Twenty-one rivers burst their banks after heavy storms across country cause landslides and submerge villages
Nine people have died and thousands have been evacuated from their homes after heavy storms wreaked havoc in the northern Italian region of Emilia-Romagna, causing severe flooding and landslides.
People sought refuge on the rooftops of their homes after 21 rivers broke their banks, submerging entire towns.
Continue reading...French court upholds sentence against ex-president in corruption case, saying he must serve one-year’s detention at home
A French appeals court has upheld a prison sentence against the former president Nicolas Sarkozy for corruption and influence-peddling – maintaining he should serve one-year’s detention at home with an electronic bracelet.
Sarkozy was originally convicted in 2021 of trying to bribe a magistrate in exchange for information about a legal case in which he was implicated. It was the first time in modern French history that a former president was given a prison sentence for corruption. He had appealed against the verdict.
Continue reading...Campaigners say development of huge Rosebank field in North Sea would drive climate breakdown
The Norwegian government is facing growing pressure to scale back its huge global fossil fuel expansion plans – including the development of a controversial new oilfield in the North Sea.
Climate activists from around the world descended on Stavanger in Norway last week to attend the AGM of the state-owned oil and gas giant Equinor. They warned that its plans to develop the huge Rosebank field in the North Sea, as well as other mega-projects in Canada, Brazil and Suriname, would drive climate breakdown with devastating consequences for humanity.
Continue reading...Sheeran prevails two weeks after winning copyright case that also alleged similarities with Marvin Gaye’s 1973 hit
Ed Sheeran has defeated a second lawsuit that alleged he imitated Marvin Gaye’s Let’s Get It On for his song Thinking Out Loud, two weeks after he prevailed in another high-profile copyright case regarding the two songs.
A district judge in Manhattan, Louis Stanton, dismissed the case that had been brought against Sheeran by Structured Asset Sales (SAS), a company owned by an investment banker David Pullman. Pullman essentially owns a portion of Let’s Get It On, namely part of the song’s copyright originally belonging to Ed Townsend, who wrote the song with Gaye in 1973.
Continue reading...Leaders of Japan, India, US and Australia will instead meet on sidelines of the G7 in Hiroshima this weekend
Anthony Albanese has confirmed the Sydney Quad meeting will not go ahead, after US president Joe Biden pulled out of his Australian visit to deal with domestic issues.
Early Wednesday morning Albanese was still hopeful the meeting with the leaders of India and Japan could proceed with a senior representative from the US, but hours later he confirmed the event was off.
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Continue reading...State assembly member introduced law to prohibit tax-deductible donations from being used to expel Palestinians from their land
New York’s state assembly is to consider legislation to stop registered charities from sending tens of millions of dollars a year to fund illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank.
State assembly member, Zohran Mamdani, has introduced the “Not on our dime!: Ending New York funding of Israeli settler violence” act to prohibit tax-deductible donations from being used to expel Palestinians from their land and other activities widely regarded as war crimes under the Geneva conventions.
Continue reading...New Zealand police open homicide inquiry after at least six die in Loafers Lodge blaze
A fire that erupted in a Wellington hostel, killing at least six people, is being investigated as arson by New Zealand’s police, who have started a homicide inquiry.
Nobody has been arrested, Inspector Dion Bennett said on Wednesday. He would not say why officers believed the fire was deliberately lit, or whether accelerants were used.
Continue reading...Schools told to honour court order as families seek compensation and training for pupils who missed education because of their hair
About 1,200 Rastafarian children in Malawi are expected to return to state schools over the next month after being banned for a decade because of their hair.
After a landmark decision at the high court in March, letters have now been sent out to about 7,000 schools telling headteachers that the exclusion of children with dreadlocks from the classroom has been ruled as unconstitutional.
Continue reading...Dictator visits assembly facility as state media says satellite will be ready for loading after final checks
Kim Jong-un has inspected North Korea’s first military spy satellite and given the go-ahead for its “future action plan”, according to state media.
Kim met the “non-permanent satellite launch preparatory committee” on Tuesday before viewing the satellite, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said.
Continue reading...Areej al-Sadhan sues on behalf of her brother, Abdulrahman, who was sentenced to 20 years for account mocking Saudi government
A US activist has filed a racketeering lawsuit against Twitter and senior Saudi officials on behalf of her brother, a Saudi aid worker who was forcibly disappeared – and then later sentenced to 20 years in jail – for using a satirical and anonymous Twitter account to mock the Riyadh government.
The lawsuit by Areej al-Sadhan alleges that Twitter has become a “participant tool” in a campaign of transnational repression by Saudi authorities as part of the company’s effort to monetise its relationship with the kingdom. Saudi Arabia is Twitter’s second-largest investor, after Elon Musk.
Continue reading...Police in Nsanje say canoe was carrying 37 people across the Shire River when incident took place
A baby has died and 23 people are missing after a hippopotamus hit a boat travelling on the Shire River in Malawi, authorities have said.
Police in the African country’s southern district of Nsanje said the canoe was carrying 37 people across the waterway when the incident took place on Monday morning.
Continue reading...Gregory W Becker faces grilling from Senate Banking committee over collapse of bank; US president and congressional leaders due to talk
While Republicans in statehouses under their control are moving to restrict abortion access, the party’s current presidential frontrunner Donald Trump has remained mum about how far he would go in curbing the procedure.
He was asked repeatedly last week at a town hall hosted by CNN if he would sign a nationwide abortion ban, but refused to answer. He was similarly unclear in an interview published yesterday by the Messenger.
Continue reading...Rapid Support Forces claim to have captured 700 soldiers at base during new battles in and around capital
Airstrikes and artillery fire shook much of Sudan’s capital, Khartoum, and its neighbouring cities on Tuesday as fighting between the country’s warring factions intensified sharply.
New battles between the army and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) flared from dawn in north and south Khartoum, as well as in the adjacent cities of Omdurman and Bahri, as the army sought to defend its bases from its paramilitary rival.
Continue reading...French first lady condemns what appears to be politically motivated attack in Amiens
The French president’s wife, Brigitte Macron, has denounced an attack on her great-nephew, who was beaten up outside her family’s chocolate shop in an apparent politically motivated assault.
Jean-Baptiste Trogneux was returning to his apartment on Monday evening above the Trogneux chocolate shop that he runs in Amiens in northern France, when he was set upon by anti-government protesters.
Continue reading...Speaking before Council of Europe summit, European Commission president says ‘accountability for Russia’ will be big topic
The president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, is stepping up calls for a special tribunal to try Russia for the crime of aggression.
Speaking ahead of a summit of European leaders in Reykjavik on Tuesday, Von der Leyen said “accountability of Russia for the crime of aggression” would be a big topic. Earlier this week, she promised to “strongly support the creation of a dedicated tribunal to bring Russia’s crime of aggression to trial”.
Continue reading...Province has 90 actives blazes, 23 of which are out of control, with thousands evacuated and oil and gas production hit
Tinder-dry weather and shifting winds in western Canada have elevated the risk of spreading wildfires in the province of Alberta where thousands have already been forced from their homes.
About 90 wildfires are active in Alberta, with 23 out of control, according to the provincial government. At one point the fires pushed more than 30,000 people out of their homes while oil and gas producers shut in at least 319,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day, or 3.7% of national production.
Continue reading...Senior judge detained as part of suspected bribery scheme as Kyiv clamps down on high-level graft
Anti-corruption authorities in Ukraine have detained the head of the country’s supreme court in an investigation they cast as an important step in Kyiv’s fight against high-level graft.
Kyiv has redoubled efforts to clamp down on corruption despite Russia’s invasion as a necessary pre-condition for joining the European Union.
Continue reading...Six out of six Kinzhal missiles launched at Kyiv during ‘intense’ night-time attack shot down, says air command
Ukraine has said it has neutralised the Kremlin’s most potent hypersonic weapon, shooting down six out of six Kinzhal missiles launched at Kyiv during a sweeping and “exceptionally intense” night-time attack.
Yurii Ihnat, a spokesperson for Ukraine’s air command, said Moscow had also bombarded the capital with nine Kalibr missiles and three ballistic rockets, as well as six attack drones and three reconnaissance drones. All were shot down, he said, thwarting what he called “air terrorism”.
Continue reading...Union says increased sentence against Khalifa Guesmi under anti-terrorism law represents ‘dangerous authoritarian drift’
A Tunisian appeals court has sentenced a radio journalist to five years in prison for disclosing information about the country’s security services.
Khalifa Guesmi, of the Mosaique FM radio station, had appealed against a one-year term handed down in November before the sentence was increased under an anti-terrorism law.
Continue reading...Motorist maneuvered inside car before getting out on the passenger side following police stop in Springfield, Colorado
A driver who was pulled over for speeding and appeared to officers to be drunk tried to switch places with his dog in an attempt to avoid arrest, police in Colorado are alleging.
An officer watched the motorist maneuvering inside the car before he got out on the passenger side on Saturday night in Springfield, a town of about 1,300 people on Colorado’s Eastern Plains, police said in a Facebook post on Sunday.
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