Category Archives: Europe

At least 15 men in Gisèle Pelicot rape and assault trial appeal against convictions

Posted on by

Court found 51 men guilty including Dominique Pelicot, who was given a 20-year prison sentence

At least 15 of the men found guilty of raping or sexually abusing Gisèle Pelicot have appealed against their convictions and will be given a second trial.

All 51 men, including her ex-husband, Dominique Pelicot, were convicted and given prison sentences of between three and 20 years before Christmas after a trial lasting three and a half months. Dominique Pelicot was sentenced to 20 years.

Continue reading...

Trump versus trade: the global economic outlook for 2025 in five charts

Posted on by

Unpredictable change will sweep through America, while old problems, from war to inflation, are likely to afflict other countries

The global economy is entering the new year with rising geopolitical tensions looming over its prospects, as the world’s leading central banks attempt to cut interest rates after the worst inflation shock in decades.

Donald Trump’s second term in the White House is expected to dominate the economic agenda. Global trade tensions are on the horizon as the president-elect threatens to impose sweeping tariffs on US imports.

Continue reading...

‘I don’t want flowers, I want my Ukraine’: women’s acts of resistance against Russian occupation

Posted on by

Zla Mavka movement – meaning ‘wicked forest spirit’ – drops fake rouble notes bearing pro-Ukrainian images and shares messages of solidarity

On 8 March 2023, International Women’s Day, Russian soldiers were handing out tulips and boughs of mimosa to women and girls in the city of Melitopol, southern Ukraine – a move designed to promote friendly relations between the occupiers and the inhabitants.

But the night before, someone had been discreetly sticking posters to walls and lamp-posts. They bore the image of a young Ukrainian woman, dressed in a traditional embroidered shirt, smashing a bouquet over a Russian soldier’s head. “I don’t want flowers,” read the slogan. “I want my Ukraine.”

Continue reading...

‘Illegally smuggled’ cannon at Tower of London subject of dispute with Ireland

Posted on by

Newly released documents show Irish officials sought return of cannon sold by ‘gang of British treasure hunters’

Rare cannon allegedly smuggled out of Irish waters by a gang of British treasure hunters and acquired for a knockdown price by a Tower of London official were at the centre of a decades-long dispute between British and Irish officials, according to newly released records.

Irish officials made extensive efforts to convince UK authorities to return the bronze cannon after claiming they were “illegally smuggled” from a Waterford shipwreck and sold to the Tower of London.

Continue reading…

Indonesia receives official request from France to transfer death row prisoner Serge Atlaoui

Posted on by

Minister says request regarding welder arrested in 2005 on drugs charges will be discussed in January amid spate of transfer of high-profile detainees

Indonesia has received an official request from France to transfer a French death row inmate imprisoned on drugs charges since 2005, a senior Indonesian minister said on Saturday.

“We have received a formal letter requesting the transfer of Serge Atlaoui on 19 December 2024. The letter was sent on behalf of the French minister of justice,” senior Indonesian law and human rights minister Yusril Ihza Mahendra told Agence France-Presse.

Continue reading...

Almost one in five children live in conflict zones, says Unicef

Posted on by

UN humanitarian body warns that dramatic increase in harm to children should not become the ‘new normal’

Nearly one in five of the world’s children live in areas affected by conflicts, with more than 473 million children suffering from the worst levels of violence since the second world war, according to figures published by the UN.

The UN humanitarian aid organisation for children, Unicef, said on Saturday that the percentage of children living in conflict zones around the world has doubled from about 10% in the 1990s to almost 19%, and warned that this dramatic increase in harm to children should not become the “new normal”.

Continue reading...

Italian journalist arrested and held in solitary confinement in Iran

Posted on by

Il Foglio war correspondent Cecilia Sala taken in by police while reporting in Tehran, says Italy’s foreign ministry

An Italian journalist has been arrested while reporting in the Iranian capital, Tehran, and held in solitary confinement for a week, according to Italy’s foreign ministry.

Cecilia Sala, 29, a war correspondent and reporter who works for the newspaper Il Foglio and the podcast company Chora Media, was detained on 19 December, the ministry said, but her arrest was only made public on Friday.

Continue reading...

Germany’s president dissolves parliament ahead of snap election

Posted on by

Formal step taken by Frank-Walter Steinmeier after chancellor Olaf Scholz lost confidence vote in Bundestag

Germany’s president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, has dissolved parliament and called a snap election on 23 February after Olaf Scholz’s fractious three-way coalition collapsed three years into its mandate.

The national vote will come seven months ahead of schedule amid a rocky stretch of unusual political turmoil for the EU’s top economic power, with growth rates flatlining, industry in crisis and the far right on the rise.

Continue reading...

‘Everyone is crazy about tennis’: Sinner’s success inspires Italy to pick up rackets

Posted on by

Italians are taking to the court with factors including the pandemic and broadcasting also said to be fuelling enthusiasm

At the age of 47, diehard AC Milan fan Ninni Licata has hung up his football boots in exchange for a tennis racket.

Like thousands of Italians in recent years, Licata has been unable to resist the lure of a game that for years had been relegated to the sidelines of the country’s national sports, overshadowed by football and Formula One.

Continue reading...

‘Everyone is crazy about tennis’: Sinner’s success inspires Italy to pick up rackets

Posted on by

Italians are taking to the court with factors including the pandemic and broadcasting also said to be fuelling enthusiasm

At the age of 47, diehard AC Milan fan Ninni Licata has hung up his football boots in exchange for a tennis racket.

Like thousands of Italians in recent years, Licata has been unable to resist the lure of a game that for years had been relegated to the sidelines of the country’s national sports, overshadowed by football and Formula One.

Continue reading...

Weather tracker: Storm brings well over a metre of snow to peaks in Alps

Posted on by

Several days of snow brought avalanche risk at Christmas, as wintry weather also caused four deaths in India

A snowstorm developed across the Alps on Saturday 21 December due to a low-pressure system situated over the Adriatic Sea. This depression allowed relatively warm and moist air to push into the Alps, condensing and falling as snow as it met the much colder alpine air mass. Snowfall continued for several days, with well over 1 metre of snow on some peaks and significant snowfall across many ski villages. Consequently, there was a significant avalanche risk over the Christmas period.

Ski resorts in Bulgaria also experienced significant snow starting on Christmas Day, which caused disruption in the mountainous west, where ski resorts had to temporarily shut down due to road closures. Towns such as Troyan, Samokov and Teteven were particularly badly affected with snowdrifts and power failures.

Continue reading...

ECB faces tough task after flip in fortunes for eurozone economies

Posted on by

Economists say EU countries hardest hit by 2010s debt crisis now in stronger position than France and Germany

The European Central Bank is facing a tough balancing act in 2025 as it tries to navigate a reversal of fortunes in eurozone economies, as the hardest-hit nations of the 2010s debt crisis outperform the traditional core.

Highlighting a potential shift in power dynamics within the single currency bloc, economists said countries in the EU periphery ravaged by last decade’s sovereign debt crisis were in a stronger position than northern Europe’s most powerful nations, including France and Germany.

Continue reading...

Estonia begins naval patrols to protect energy cable after suspected sabotage

Posted on by

Finland investigating tanker that sailed from Russian port over disconnection of Estlink 2 cable on Christmas Day

Estonia has begun naval patrols to protect a cable supplying electricity from Finland after the suspected sabotage of another one on Christmas Day, the Estonian defence minister, Hanno Pevkur, said.

“We’ve decided to send our navy close to Estlink 1 to defend and secure our energy connection with Finland,” he posted on X.

Continue reading...

‘Let’s see who will be leaving’: Georgia’s presidential standoff nears crunch point

Posted on by

Georgian Dream government threatens pro-west president with jail if she refuses to leave office on Sunday

All eyes in Georgia are fixed on the elegant 19th-century Orbeliani Palace in Tbilisi, where a defining moment looms. Who will occupy its halls on 29 December?

On Sunday, Georgia’s pro-western president, Salome Zourabichvili, is supposed to hand over the keys to her successor, Mikheil Kavelashvili, a former football player turned far-right politician who is backed by the ruling and increasingly authoritarian Georgian Dream (GD) party.

Continue reading...

‘Let’s see who will be leaving’: Georgia’s presidential standoff nears crunch point

Posted on by

Georgian Dream government threatens pro-west president with jail if she refuses to leave office on Sunday

All eyes in Georgia are fixed on the elegant 19th-century Orbeliani Palace in Tbilisi, where a defining moment looms. Who will occupy its halls on 29 December?

On Sunday, Georgia’s pro-western president, Salome Zourabichvili, is supposed to hand over the keys to her successor, Mikheil Kavelashvili, a former football player turned far-right politician who is backed by the ruling and increasingly authoritarian Georgian Dream (GD) party.

Continue reading...

Finnish coastguard boards tanker suspected of causing power and internet cable outages

Posted on by

Cook Islands-registered Eagle S was carrying Russian oil in the Baltic Sea

Finnish authorities have seized a ship carrying Russian oil in the Baltic Sea on suspicion it caused the outage of an undersea power cable connecting Finland and Estonia a day earlier, and that it also damaged or broke four internet lines.

A Finnish coastguard crew boarded the Cook Islands-registered ship, named by authorities as the Eagle S, on Thursday. The crew took command and sailed the vessel to Finnish waters, a coastguard official told a press conference.

Continue reading...

Painstaking work to conserve Ireland’s oldest paper documents begins

Posted on by

Delicate 650-year-old pages to be preserved are some of the island’s most important historical texts

Work has begun to conserve and digitise one of the oldest paper documents still in existence on the island of Ireland.

The ecclesiastical register, which dates back to the medieval period, is about 650 years old. It belonged to the former archbishop of Armagh Milo Sweteman.

Continue reading...

Russia-Ukraine war: Ukraine claims it struck military facility in Russia – as it happened

Posted on by

Airforce hits military industrial facility in Kamensk-Shakhtinsky, in Russia’s Rostov region, says Ukrainian military

Russia and Kazakhstan have sought to temper speculation about the cause of the Azerbaijan Airlines plane crash, with the Kremlin urging people to wait for the results of the investigation, writes the Guardian’s European community affairs correspondent Ashifa Kassam and Pjotr Sauer, the Russia affairs correspondent.

A Ukrainian national security official has claimed that the crash, which killed 38 people on Christmas Day, was caused by Russian air defence fire.

Continue reading...

France rescues 107 people trying to cross to UK on Christmas Day

Posted on by

Authorities carry out series of operations off northern coast, as 451 people arrive in England on 11 boats

French maritime authorities carried out 12 rescue operations along the coast of northern France on Christmas Day, rescuing 107 people in distress from small boats trying to cross to the UK.

On Christmas morning, 30 passengers were rescued from a boat near Dunkirk, while the others onboard wished to continue their journey and were taken into British custody once they reached UK waters, said the French Channel and North Sea maritime prefect’s office.

Continue reading...

Russian cargo ship’s owner says sinking in Mediterranean was ‘act of terrorism’

Posted on by

Three explosions caused Ursa Major to sink off Spanish coast, says company linked to Russian defence ministry

A Russian cargo ship that sank on Tuesday in the Mediterranean Sea was the target of an “act of terrorism”, according to the vessel’s owner.

The Ursa Major sank while it was sailing through international waters between Spain and Algeria, leaving two crew members missing,

Continue reading...