Category Archives: Europe

Meloni’s government passes new law to save Albania migration transfer policy

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Move by Italian PM overturns ruling by a Rome court that could have blocked deal to curb migrant arrivals

Italy’s far-right government has passed a new law to overcome a court ruling that risks blocking the country’s multimillion-dollar deal with Albania aimed at curbing migrant arrivals.

On Friday, a court in Rome ruled to transfer back to Italy the last 12 asylum seekers being held in the new Italian migration hub in Albania. The ruling has cast doubt on the feasibility and legality of plans by the EU to explore ways to establish migrant processing and detention centres outside the bloc as part of a new hardline approach to migration.

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TfL could be forced to pay millions over Dutch lorry drivers’ low emission zone fines

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Hauliers’ group Transport in Nood BV launched judicial review earlier this year over fines issued in Ulez and Lez

Transport for London (TfL) could be forced to pay back millions of pounds in low emission zone fines issued to Dutch lorry drivers after agreeing they had been issued unlawfully.

The body said it had agreed to settle a claim regarding the Ulez fines after a company representing dozens of Dutch haulage companies launched a legal challenge into the ultra-low emission zone (Ulez) and low emission zone (Lez) fines earlier this year.

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South Korea summons Russian envoy over North Korean troop deployment

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Seoul demands immediate withdrawal of elite soldiers reportedly helping Russia in its war against Ukraine

South Korea has summoned the Russian ambassador to Seoul to protest “in the strongest terms” about the reported dispatch of thousands of North Korean troops to help Russia in its war against Ukraine.

The first vice-foreign minister, Kim Hong-kyun, told the Russian envoy, Georgy Zinoviev, that the participation of North Korean troops in the war violated UN resolutions and demanded their immediate withdrawal, South Korea’s foreign ministry said in a statement on Monday.

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France warns US buyer of Sanofi division of penalties for shifting production abroad

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Private equity firm CD&R revealed to be in exclusive talks to buy 50% stake in consumer healthcare arm Opella

The French government has warned a US private equity firm buying the consumer healthcare arm of the drugmaker Sanofi that it faces penalties of more than €100m if it does not keep production and jobs in France.

Sanofi is splitting off Opella, which makes the paracetamol brand Doliprane, the laxative Dulcolax and other over-the-counter medicines and vitamins. However, news of talks with the New York-based Clayton, Dubilier & Rice on 11 October prompted fears about French jobs and the loss of control to a foreign company.

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Funding cuts could mean death of Sámi languages, say Indigenous parliaments

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Sweden and Finland plan to withdraw funding to safeguard nine languages defined as threatened by Unesco

The Indigenous parliaments of Sweden, Finland and Norway have warned that some Sámi languages could disappear if Stockholm and Helsinki press ahead with plans to withdraw funding that could hit a critical preservation body.

Sámi Giellagáldu was created to safeguard, promote and strengthen the use of the nine Sámi languages across the Nordics, including North Sámi, which is spoken by an estimated 20,000 people across Norway, Sweden and Finland and classified by Unesco as endangered, and the much smaller Pite Sámi and Ute Sámi, which have less than 50 speakers each.

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Moldova’s president speaks out as EU referendum hangs in balance

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Pro-western leader Maia Sandu condemns ‘assault’ on country’s freedom and democracy by ‘foreign forces’

Moldova’s pro-western president, Maia Sandu, blamed an “unprecedented assault on our country’s freedom and democracy” by “foreign forces” on Sunday night, as a pivotal referendum on EU membership remained too close to call with most votes counted.

Moldovans went to the polls earlier in the day to cast their vote in a presidential election and an EU referendum that marked a key moment in the tug-of-war between Russia and the west over the future of the small, landlocked south-east European country with a population of about 2.5 million people.

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Israeli minister taking ‘legal measures’ against French arms fair ban

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Emmanuel Macron has banned Israeli companies from the Euronaval Salon defence fair in Paris next month

Israel’s foreign minister has announced he is taking “legal and diplomatic measures” against the decision by the French president, Emmanuel Macron, to ban Israeli companies from showing their wares at an arms fair in Paris next month.

Israel Katz described the “boycott” as an anti-democratic measure that was “not acceptable, especially between friendly nations”.

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Russian ambassador accuses UK of waging proxy war in Ukraine

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Andrei Kelin says by providing weapons Britain is ‘killing Russian soldiers and civilians’

Moscow’s ambassador to London has said the UK is waging a proxy war against Russia, while predicting the “end of Ukraine” as Russian invading forces make deeper advances into the country.

In an interview with the BBC, Andrei Kelin said Ukraine continued to fight but claimed “the resistance is more feeble and feeble”.

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‘It’s desperation’: Ireland’s restaurant industry facing crisis with daily closures

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Rise in VAT, inflation and people working from home has led small business owners to demand government support

Blazing Salads, Dillingers, Assassination Custard and Brasserie Sixty Six in Dublin, Church Lane and Sage in County Cork, and Barnacles in Galway.

These are just some of the most recent additions to the list of more than 600 restaurants that have been forced to close in Ireland in the last year in what is being seen as a growing crisis for the country’s high street and tourist offering.

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‘You are next’: online posts show Islamic State interest in attacks on US ahead of election

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Internet chatter and Oklahoma arrest of alleged would-be IS attacker indicate terror group’s planning

After the FBI arrested an Afghan man in Oklahoma planning an election day shooting on behalf of the Islamic State, the terrorist organization re-entered what has become one of the most chaotic news cycles leading up to a November vote.

Nasir Ahmad Tawhedi, 27, of Oklahoma City admitted to investigators he and a co-conspirator expected to die as IS martyrs as they opened fire on crowds on election day, according to charging documents.

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France’s foreign minister pledges support for Ukraine ‘victory plan’

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Jean-Noël Barrot says Russian victory would ‘push the international order toward chaos’ as he backs negotiations

France’s foreign minister pledged his support for Ukraine’s plan for ending the war with Russia, telling reporters in Kyiv on Saturday that he would work with Ukrainian officials to secure other nations’ backing for the proposal.

Presented by the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, this week, Kyiv’s “victory plan” hopes to compel Russia to end its invasion of Ukraine through negotiations.

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Funeral home in Poland apologises after body falls from hearse into traffic

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Driver in Stalowa Wola described fearing he had hit person after he saw body in road

A funeral home in Poland has apologised after a body that it was transporting fell out of a hearse and into traffic.

Polish media reported that a man was driving down a street on Friday in Stalowa Wola, a city in south-eastern Poland, when he saw a sheet on his car window. When the sheet slid down, he saw a body lying on the road. For a moment the driver feared that he had hit the person.

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‘Bodies were dropped down quarry shafts’: secrets of millions buried in Paris catacombs come to light

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Researchers hope to uncover how people died and how diseases have developed over 1,000 years

Deep beneath the streets of Paris, the dead are having their last word. They are recounting 1,000 years of death in the city: how many are ­buried in the labyrinth of tunnels that make up Les Catacombes, what killed them and how the diseases that may have led to their demise have ­developed over the centuries.

In the first ever scientific study of the site, a team of archeologists, anthropologists, biologists and ­doctors is examining some of the skeletons of an estimated 5-6 ­million people whose bones were literally dumped down quarry shafts at the end of the 18th century and beginning of the 19th.

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‘We leave viewers smarter’: fears over plans to close ‘world’s most highbrow’ TV station

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Unique experiment in German-language public broadcasting 3sat faces pressure from populist right

In many countries around the world, breakfast TV means cele­brity interviews, soap operas and last night’s football highlights. On the German-language channel 3sat this Sunday morning, it means a one-hour philosophical discussion on trauma psychology, followed by a book review programme and a classical concert by the Munich Radio Orchestra.

The collaboration between public broadcasters in Austria, Germany and Switzerland is a unique experi­ment in pan-European broadcasting that has defied doubters for almost four decades: highbrow television.

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Anti-fossil fuel comic that went viral in France arrives in UK

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World Without End topped bestseller lists but was criticised for embracing nuclear power

In 2019, France’s best known climate expert sat down to work with its most feted graphic novelist. The result? Perhaps the most terrifying comic ever drawn.

Part history, part analysis, part vision for the future, World Without End weaves the story of humanity’s rapacious appetite for fossil fuel energy, how it has made possible the society people take for granted, and its disastrous effects on the climate.

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Moldovans go to polls to decide whether future lies with Russia or the west

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Presidential election and EU referendum take place amid concerns over interference from Moscow

Moldovans are voting in a presidential election and an EU referendum that will mark a pivotal moment in the tug-of-war between Russia and the west over the future of the small, landlocked south-east European country of fewer than 3 million people.

The pro-western president, Maia Sandu, hopes to advance her agenda by winning a second term and securing a “yes” in a referendum to affirm EU accession as a “irreversible” goal in the constitution.

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North Korean troops have arrived in Russia to fight Ukraine, says Seoul

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Russian navy ships reportedly transferred 1,500 forces to Vladivostok, where they are being trained

South Korea’s intelligence agency said on Friday that North Korea had dispatched troops to assist Russia in its war against Ukraine, a development that could intensify the standoff between North Korea and the west.

In a statement on its website, the National Intelligence Service (NIS) said Russian navy ships transferred 1,500 North Korean special operation forces to the port city of Vladivostok between 8 and 13 October who were now undergoing training.

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Paris SUV driver charged with murder after cyclist run over

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Motorist accused of deliberately targeting 27-year-old Paul Varry in road rage incident

A motorist accused of deliberately running over a cyclist in a Paris road rage incident has been formally put under investigation for murder and remanded in custody.

The 52-year-old SUV driver, named only as Ariel M, is accused of deliberately targeting the cyclist, who was named by the Paris public prosecutor’s office as Paul Varry, 27.

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Blow to Meloni’s Albania deal as court orders asylum seekers’ return to Italy

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Judges’ decision on 12 men held in Italian migration hub in Albania also casts doubt on EU’s hardline plans

The last 12 asylum seekers being held in a new Italian migration hub in Albania must be transferred to Italy, a court has ruled, in a heavy blow to a controversial deal between the far-right Rome government and Tirana aimed at curbing migrant arrivals.

The decision casts further doubt on the feasibility and legality of plans by the EU, discussed on Thursday, to explore ways of establishing migrant processing and detention centres outside the bloc as part of a new hardline approach to migration.

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Man appears in court charged with Belfast murder of Mary Ward

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Ward’s body was found at her home and Ahmed Abdirahman was arrested in Dublin

A man has appeared in a Dublin court charged with the murder of Mary Ward in Belfast.

The 22-year-old was found dead at her home on 1 October with neck wounds. Her body was found after police officers went to her house, but she was last seen alive on 25 September, according to police.

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