Category Archives: World News

Vice files for bankruptcy protection amid cut-price sale to consortium

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Digital publisher and owner of Vice News and Vice TV was once valued at $6bn but has agreed sale for $225m

Vice, the once high-flying media startup that reached a peak valuation of nearly $6bn (£5bn), has filed for bankruptcy protection in the US as the digital publisher engineers a cut-price sale to a group of lenders.

The company, whose assets include Vice News, Motherboard, Refinery29 and Vice TV, has agreed a sale to a consortium that includes Fortress Investment Group, Soros Fund Management and Monroe Capital for $225m in the form of a credit bid for its assets as well as assuming Vice’s “significant liabilities”.

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Volodymyr Zelenskiy arrives at Chequers to meet ‘my friend’ Rishi Sunak

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Surprise visit to UK by Ukrainian president for ‘substantive negotiations’ follows announcement of further military aid

The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, has arrived at Chequers for “substantive negotiations” with the UK prime minister, Rishi Sunak.

In an early morning message as he landed in the UK, Zelenskiy confirmed he would “meet my friend Rishi”. He tweeted:

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Thailand’s opposition parties start alliance talks after voters reject military rule

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Leader of liberal Move Forward says he is ‘next prime minister of Thailand’ and ready to form coalition government

Thailand’s opposition parties have secured by far the largest number of votes in national elections, delivering a damning verdict to the military-backed government that has ruled for nearly a decade.

Move Forward, a progressive opposition party popular with young Thais, surpassed expectations by winning the most votes and seats and said on Monday that it was ready to form a government. Its leader, Pita Limjaroenrat, told media he had invited Pheu Thai, the party associated with the exiled former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, and four other opposition parties to form an alliance.

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China jails US citizen for life on espionage charges

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Hong Kong resident John Shing Wan Leung was chair of Texas branch of Chinese ‘reunification’ association

A Chinese court has sentenced a 78-year-old US citizen to life in prison on espionage charges.

John Shing Wan Leung, a Hong Kong permanent resident, was detained in April 2021 by Chinese security services. His sentence was announced on Monday by the Suzhou intermediate people’s court on its public WeChat account. No further information about his trial or charges were listed.

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‘We have a violent society’: hate speech in spotlight after Serbian mass shootings

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Mass shootings prompted arms amnesty, but many see politicians and media as part of the problem

In the first week an amnesty after mass shootings plunged their country into shock and soul-searching, Serbians surrendered more than 13,500 weapons, from guns through hand grenades to anti-tank launchers, and hundreds of thousands of rounds of ammunition.

But in a deeply divided nation awash with lethal weaponry, where war criminals are glorified, reality shows on state TV star convicted murderers, and memories of savage recent conflicts run deep, many doubt whether the president’s pledge to “disarm” the country will be enough.

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Russia-Ukraine war live: Zelenskiy arrives in France to meet Macron after Germany visit

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Ukrainian president will hold talks with French president over dinner following rip to Berlin

The UK Ministry of Defence has posted an update on the situation in Ukraine.

It states that while Russian forces retain the same organisational structure to when it invaded Ukraine last February, it is, in fact, a very different military force.

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Irish Times apologises for hoax AI article about women’s use of fake tan

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The piece ran on 11 May and accused people who use fake tan of mocking those with naturally dark skin

The Irish Times has apologised for running an article about Irish women’s use of fake tan that was submitted by a hoaxer who used artificial intelligence.

The editor, Ruadhán Mac Cormaic, said on Sunday that it had fallen victim to “a deliberate and coordinated deception” that showed a need for stronger controls.

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Gaza ceasefire ends five days of fighting that left dozens dead

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Hostilities destroyed more than 50 homes and displaced about 950 people, says the UN

Relative calm has returned to the blockaded Gaza Strip after a ceasefire that has ended five days of cross-frontier fire between Israel and militant groups in the coastal enclave that killed 33 Palestinians and two people in Israel.

A truce mediated by Egyptian officials that went into effect at 10pm (8pm BST) on Saturday night appeared to hold, despite the firing of a rocket towards southern Israel on Sunday evening that Palestinian factions said had launched due to a “technical error”.

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Spanish PM offers €2 cinema tickets for over-65s ahead of regional elections

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Pedro Sánchez announces subsidy as his Socialist party lags behind conservative opposition in polls

Spain’s prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, has announced a new scheme that will allow over-65s to go to the cinema every Tuesday for just €2 (£1.76) two weeks before the country heads to the polls for crucial regional and municipal elections.

The subsidy, announced during a campaign event in the central region of Castilla-La Mancha, comes a year after Sánchez’s minority coalition government introduced a youth culture voucher scheme that gives Spaniards turning 18 €400 to spend on books, records, digital subscriptions, festivals, concerts, plays, exhibitions and films.

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Opposition parties take lead in Thai election

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Early counts appear to show firm rejection of government as Move Forward and Pheu Thai parties are neck and neck

Opposition pro-democracy parties took the lead in an early vote count in Thailand’s national elections, which appeared to signal a firm rejection of the military-backed government that has ruled the country for almost a decade.

According to a preliminary count of more than 80% of the country’s 95,000 polling stations, the progressive Move Forward party was projected to win 114 of 400 constituency seats in the House of Representatives, with Pheu Thai taking 112 constituency seats. Voters have two ballots, and so a further 100 party seats in the house ares allocated on a proportional representation basis.

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Ukraine can defeat Russia by end of year with western help, Zelenskiy says

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President travels to Berlin to meet German chancellor, who announces new military aid package including Leopard tanks

Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said Ukraine can defeat Russia by the end of this year with western help, and thanked Germany during a visit to Berlin for its “big” military and economic support.

Speaking after a meeting with the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, the Ukrainian president said Germany was the second biggest contributor to Kyiv after the US. Scholz’s coalition government announced a new aid package to coincide with Zelenskiy’s visit, his first to Berlin since last year’s full-scale Russian invasion.

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Red faces in Ireland over coronation quips by Leo Varadkar’s partner

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Matt Barrett’s Instagram posts from Westminster Abbey cause embarrassment after Irish delegation sets precedent by attending

When Ireland’s leaders attended the coronation of King Charles III, it was hailed as a milestone in relations between Dublin and London.

The Irish president, Michael D Higgins, the taoiseach, Leo Varadkar, and Sinn Féin’s deputy leader, Michelle O’Neill, set the precedent – their predecessors had shunned previous coronations – to show respect to their neighbour.

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Imran Khan accuses Pakistan’s military of ordering his arrest

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Exclusive: Former PM claims after release from custody that army chief has ‘personal grudge’ and is behind crackdown on party

Pakistan’s former prime minister Imran Khan has escalated his criticism of the country’s powerful military, accusing the head of the army of harbouring a “personal grudge” against him and ordering his arrest and a crackdown on his party.

“It is personal. It’s got nothing to do with national interest,” Khan told the Guardian in an interview at his home in Lahore, after a dramatic week in which he was arrested at Islamabad’s high court by almost 100 paramilitary officers on Tuesday and held in police custody, in connection with a land corruption case.

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Cyclone Mocha: three dead and 700 injured as storm pounds Myanmar

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About 1,000 people trapped by seawater rescued amid damage to homes, electricity infrastructure and mobile phone masts

Rescuers have evacuated about 1,000 people trapped by seawater 3.6 metres (12ft) deep along western Myanmar’s coast after a powerful cyclone injured hundreds and cut off communications in one of Asia’s least developed countries.

Strong winds injured more than 700 of about 20,000 people who were sheltering in sturdier buildings on the highlands of Sittwe township such as monasteries, pagodas and schools, according to a leader of the Rakhine Youths Philanthropic Association in Sittwe.

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Stark warning over Republicans’ ‘dehumanizing’ rhetoric on crime

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Experts say party’s ‘tough-on-crime’ approach for 2024 could spark rise in violence and worsen US mass incarceration

Republican and rightwing rhetoric over the state of crime in the US could spark a rise in violent incidents and worsen the country’s mass incarceration problem, experts say, as “tough-on-crime” political ads and messaging seem set to play a large role in the 2024 election.

Violent crime was a huge focus for Republican candidates during the 2022 midterm elections. Republicans spent about $50m on crime ads in the two months leading up to those elections, the ads pushing a dystopian vision of cities ridden by murder, robbery and assault, and of Democratic politicians unwilling to act.

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Ukraine minister ‘confused’ by Eurovision refusal to let Zelenskiy speak

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Exclusive: Culture minister says he was puzzled about reasoning for not allowing president to address song contest

Ukraine’s culture minister has said he was “surprised” and “confused” that Volodymyr Zelenskiy was barred from making a televised speech during the Eurovision grand final.

The European Broadcasting Union (EBU), the owner of Eurovision, said last week that allowing the Ukrainian president to address the contest, which is watched around the world, risked jeopardising its “non-political nature”.

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CNN’s Trump debacle suggests TV media set to repeat mistakes of 2016

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Network’s own reporters criticise decision to give ex-president platform in ‘town hall’ format that allowed him to spout freely

Donald Trump and CNN were in rare agreement: the former president’s hour of free prime-time television on Wednesday evening, dressed up as a “town hall” with Republican voters, was a triumph.

“America was served very well by what we did last night,” CNN’s chief executive, Chris Licht, told skeptical members of his own staff at the network’s daily news conference the following morning.

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Trump rages after sexual abuse verdict but legal woes have only just begun

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Investigations are mounting, making it harder for the former president to spin his troubles as persecution by liberal elites

If the outcome of Donald Trump’s sexual assault trial wasn’t a foregone conclusion, his response to a jury finding he attacked the writer E Jean Carroll was all too predictable.

The former president lashed out at the judge as biased and the jurors as “from an anti-Trump area”, meaning liberal New York, after they believed Carroll’s account of the millionaire businessman attacking her in a department store changing room in the mid-1990s. The jury ordered him to pay $5m in damages for “sexual abuse” and for defaming Carroll by accusing her of “a made-up SCAM” for political ends.

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Imran Khan calls for ‘freedom’ protests across Pakistan

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Former PM urges supporters to rally ‘at the end of your streets and villages’ and ‘sacrifice’ in push for immediate elections

Pakistan’s former prime minister Imran Khan has called for nationwide “freedom” protests on Sunday after his brief arrest and detention last week triggered deadly unrest.

The one-time cricket superstar – who has been tied up in dozens of legal cases since being ousted from power in April 2022 – was freed on bail on Friday after his detention was declared unlawful by the supreme court.

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