At least one person hospitalised after daytime missile attack on Kyiv; Ukraine claims to have shot down 37 missiles and 29 drones overnight
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Jubilant Latvians given national holiday after shock ice hockey win over USA
- Team won bronze at ice hockey world championship
- Members of parliament pass bill to commemorate win
Latvians woke up to go to work Monday morning, only to find they didn’t have to. Their parliament had met at midnight to declare a holiday after the national ice hockey team chalked up its best result at the world championship.
Latvia, where hockey is hugely popular, co-hosted the men’s championship with Finland, and the country’s 4-3 overtime victory over the United States for the bronze medal on Sunday was greeted with jubilation.
Continue reading...Ugandan president signs anti-LGBTQ+ law with death penalty for same-sex acts
Global outcry over Museveni’s assent to draconian new anti-gay law, condemned as a ‘permission slip for hate and dehumanisation’
Uganda’s president, Yoweri Museveni, has signed into law the world’s harshest anti-LGBTQ+ bill, which allows the death penalty for homosexual acts. The move immediately drew widespread international outrage as well as condemnation from many Ugandans.
Early on Monday, the speaker of the Ugandan parliament, Anita Annet Among, released a statement on social media confirming Museveni had assented to the law first passed by MPs in March. It imposes the death penalty or life imprisonment for certain same-sex acts, up to 20 years in prison for “recruitment, promotion and funding” of same-sex “activities”, and anyone convicted of “attempted aggravated homosexuality” faces a 14-year sentence.
Continue reading...Drax-owned wood pellet plant in US broke air pollution rules again
Amite BioEnergy, which was fined $2.5m in 2021, notified Mississippi facility had breached emission limits
A US plant that supplies wood pellets to the UK power generator Drax has violated air pollution limits in Mississippi, it has emerged.
The Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) has written to Amite BioEnergy notifying the Drax-owned company that it had violated emissions rules.
Continue reading...Hong Kong court rebuffs effort to dismiss Jimmy Lai national security trial
Lawyers acting for pro-democracy activist argued that proceedings could be biased due to judge selection
Hong Kong’s high court has rejected an attempt by lawyers acting for the jailed pro-democracy activist Jimmy Lai to have his national security trial dismissed.
The court ruled on Monday that the argument the trial may appear to be biased had “no merits”, and gave the proceedings, which are scheduled to start in September, the green light.
Continue reading...Number of people prosecuted in China’s courts up 12% in five years, report shows
Experts point to crackdown on national security and legal system that encourages guilty pleas
Chinese courts prosecuted 8.3 million people in the five years to 2022, a 12% increase on the previous period. There was also a nearly 20% increase in the number of protests against court rulings.
The figures released by the supreme people’s procuratorate (SPP) in March give a glimpse of how China’s notoriously opaque justice system has operated in recent years, amid a tightening domestic security environment.
Continue reading...Spain’s conservative opposition heading for emphatic win in regional polls
People’s party strengthens hold on Madrid and could take regions of Valencia and Aragón, according to poll
Spain’s opposition conservative People’s party (PP) is heading for an emphatic win in Sunday’s key regional and municipal elections, winning an absolute majority in the city of Madrid and in the surrounding area.
It is poised to wrest the regions of Valencia, Aragón and the Balearic islands from the ruling Spanish Socialist Workers’ party (PSOE).
Continue reading...West caught between fear and hope as Erdoğan extends 20-year rule in Turkey
Re-elected president could take Nato country further towards Russia, or may instead be more open to alternatives
Western capitals remained silent through Turkey’s presidential campaign – privately hoping Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s erratic 20-year rule would come to a surprise close – but now he has been handed a decisive mandate to serve a third term, the west is caught between fear and hope.
It fears he will exploit the result to take this Nato founder member further from the liberal secular west, but hopes against hope that, not being eligible to run again and thus freed from the need to pander to a nationalist electorate for the rest of his political life, he may at least be open to persuasion and base his foreign policy on something other than self-preservation.
Continue reading...Guantánamo detainee accuses UK agencies of complicity in his torture
Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri wants to bring case examining alleged role of MI5, MI6 and GCHQ in his mistreatment by CIA
A Guantánamo Bay prisoner tortured by the CIA has accused British intelligence agencies of complicity in his mistreatment in a new case before one of UK’s most secretive courts.
Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, who is alleged by the US to have plotted al-Qaida’s bombing of an American naval ship, is seeking to persuade the court to consider his complaint against MI5, MI6 and GCHQ.
Continue reading...Protesters accuse Roger Waters of antisemitism ahead of Frankfurt gig
Pink Floyd co-founder rejects accusations before his Sunday night concert in former Nazi site
Several Jewish groups, politicians and an alliance of civil society groups gathered for a memorial ceremony and a protest rally against a concert by Roger Waters in Frankfurt on Sunday evening.
They accuse the Pink Floyd co-founder of antisemitism – an allegation he denies.
Continue reading...Russia-Ukraine war live: ‘We haven’t started yet to act very seriously,’ says Kremlin ambassador – as it happened to UK
Andrei Kelin tells BBC: ‘It is an idealistic mistake to think that Ukraine will prevail’
The death toll from a Russian missile attack on a clinic in Dnipro has risen from two to four people, according to the region’s governor.
In a post on Telegram, Serhii Lysak said further analysis had confirmed that three missing people had been killed in the attack on Friday.
Continue reading...Venice police investigate source of bright green liquid in Grand Canal
Speculation climate protesters could be responsible for phosphorescent patch that appeared by Rialto Bridge
Police in Venice are investigating the source of phosphorescent green liquid that appeared on Sunday in the city’s Grand Canal, amid speculation it was caused by climate protesters.
Gondoliers could be seen punting through the phosphorescent waters while tourists took photographs of the green patch, from the Rialto Bridge up and along part of the canal.
Continue reading...Heavily pregnant woman who escaped from Sudan gives birth to ‘miracle baby’
Woman’s husband has been granted asylum in UK and has been trying to get her a visa to join him
A heavily pregnant woman who was shot at, escaped an overturned car and had to walk for hours in the middle of the night to reach a border crossing with her three-year-old daughter has given birth to a miracle baby, her husband has said.
The woman had been trapped in the war-torn Sudanese capital, Khartoum, after fighting broke out last month, while her husband, who works as a carer in Wolverhampton, tried to get her a UK visa.
Continue reading...South Korean court issues arrest warrant for man who opened plane door mid-air
Man in his 30s was detained on Friday after opening emergency exit at about 200 metres above ground
A South Korean court has issued an arrest warrant for a passenger who opened an Asiana Airlines plane door minutes before it landed, it has been reported.
The man in his 30s was detained on landing on Friday after opening the door when the Airbus A321-200 was about 200 metres (700ft) above the ground in Daegu, South Korea, causing panic onboard.
Continue reading...Kyiv: Russian drone strike kills one as Ukraine capital prepares to celebrate founding day
Officials warned residents to stay in shelters in latest round of Russian strikes on the city
Russia unleashed a major two-wave overnight air attack on Kyiv that killed at least one person, officials said, as the Ukrainian capital prepares to celebrate its birthday on Sunday.
Air defence systems downed at least 20 drones moving towards Kyiv, with falling debris killing a 41-year-old man and injuring a 35-year-old woman in the city, mayor Vitali Klitschko said.
Continue reading...Russia-Ukraine war at a glance: what we know on day 459 of the invasion
Ukrainian adviser says preliminary operations for major offensive underway; explosions shake Kyiv; Russian threat to Nato countries could get worse if Putin is ousted, says RAF chief
Continue reading...‘I’m insanely thankful to the president’: how a Belarus dissident became an apologist for the regime
Raman Pratasevich was dragged off a plane and imprisoned two years ago. Now he praises the regime he used to denounce
Two years ago, Raman Pratasevich, a young Belarusian dissident blogger, was white-knuckled, begging a Ryanair flight crew not to make an emergency landing at Minsk airport.
He said: “Don’t do this, they will kill me, I am a refugee,” according to a fellow passenger. The plane, escorted by a Belarusian Mig-29 fighter jet sent to force it down, landed anyway. Pratasevich was promptly arrested.
Continue reading...Hong Kong’s prominent pro-democracy Civic party votes to disband
Group was among the last opposition parties, as political dissent has been banned since 2020’s security law
The Civic party, one of Hong Kong’s most prominent pro-democracy groups, has voted to disband because of a leadership vacuum, after its members were squeezed out of local councils and charged under Beijing’s national security law.
Nicknamed “the barristers’ party”, it was founded in 2006 by professional elites – mostly from the legal sector – who wanted to promote democratisation and civil society in Hong Kong.
Continue reading...‘The intensity is increasing’: Ukraine says first steps in counteroffensive have begun
Presidential adviser says supply lines and depots already being destroyed as preliminary operations get under way
• Russia-Ukraine war – latest updates
Preliminary operations have already begun to pave the way for a counteroffensive against Russian occupying forces, a Ukrainian presidential adviser has said.
“It’s a complicated process, which is not a matter of one day or a certain date or a certain hour,” Mykhailo Podolyak said in an interview with the Guardian. “It’s an ongoing process of de-occupation, and certain processes are already happening, like destroying supply lines or blowing up depots behind the lines.
Continue reading...Indian official suspended after draining reservoir to retrieve phone
More than 2m litres of water pumped from dam on orders of food inspector who said device held sensitive government data
A government official in central India has been suspended after he ordered a reservoir to be drained to retrieve his dropped phone.
Millions of litres of water were pumped over three days from the Kherkatta dam in the state of Chhattisgarh after Rajesh Vishwas, a food inspector, said his Samsung mobile held sensitive government data.
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