Gardaí deployed at Citywest facility as police issue statement urging people to stay away from violent standoff
Irish police are bracing for fresh disturbances outside a Dublin hotel that houses asylum seekers and has become a flashpoint for anti-immigration activists.
Gardaí deployed near the Citywest facility on Thursday in anticipation of another possible standoff with mobs that on Tuesday and Wednesday night threw fireworks and missiles and set a police vehicle on fire.
Continue reading...Ukrainian president says ‘time to act is now’ as Belgium seeks guarantees from other member states over loan plan
Volodymyr Zelenskyy has urged EU leaders to use Russia’s frozen assets to fund Ukraine’s defence “as soon as possible”, as summit talks on the issue of a reparations loan get bogged down.
Speaking to EU leaders in Brussels on Thursday, Zelenskyy called for a decision to be made to use Russian assets fully to defend his country against Vladimir Putin’s aggression.
Continue reading...Officers pelted with stones and fireworks near Citywest facility after man charged over alleged assault on 10-year-old
Twenty-three people were arrested after an hours-long standoff with Irish police, whose members were directly struck with fireworks, stones and other debris on a third consecutive night of disorder in Dublin.
Two members of the Irish police service, An Garda Síochána, were taken to hospital with injuries sustained during clashes with protesters. One garda was struck on the head by a bottle while the other sustained a shoulder injury.
Continue reading...Trump administration hardens stance against the Kremlin day after cancelling a planned summit with Russian leader
The US has sanctioned Rosneft and Lukoil, Russia’s two largest oil companies, as the Trump administration increased pressure on the Kremlin to negotiate an end to its war against Ukraine.
The sanctions were the first against Russia since Donald Trump returned to the White House in January, and were targeted to cut key revenues from oil sales that finance the Russian war machine.
Continue reading...US and Qatar say new rules will hinder imports of LNG, posing ‘existential threat’ to European economies
The US has demanded that the European Union roll back its climate and human rights rules in order to allow greater imports of liquefied natural gas (LNG), as the Trump administration approved a controversial gas export hub along the Gulf of Mexico coast.
A letter jointly sent by the US and Qatar, two of the three largest LNG exporters in the world, warned the EU that its new rules pose an “existential threat” to European economies as they would hinder imports of gas from countries such as theirs.
Continue reading...Laurence des Cars questioned by senators about daring daytime break-in at Paris museum
The director of the Louvre museum in Paris has acknowledged a “terrible failure” days after thieves took seven minutes to break in via a window and steal jewels worth €88m, admitting there was “highly insufficient” security camera coverage of the outside walls of the vast building.
Senators questioned Laurence des Cars about the spectacular heist in which four men used a truck with extendable ladder and furniture hoist to access a balcony, cut through a window and steal jewels from the ornate Apollo gallery during opening hours.
Continue reading...Russian missile attack kills multiple people in Kyiv after Ukraine strikes a chemical plant making gunpowder, explosives and fuel in Bryansk
One of two Ukrainians detained for drug possession had shared photographs and coordinates of critical Polish army infrastructure with a Russian speaker, Polish prosecutors said on Wednesday, reports Reuters.
Poland says it has been targeted with tactics such as arson and cyber-attacks in a “hybrid war” waged by Russia to destabilise nations that support Kyiv in the Russian war in Ukraine. Moscow has denied such accusations.
Correspondence was revealed on a secured telephone belonging to Bohdan K, which shows that he had been providing a Russian-speaking person with photographs and geographical coordinates of critical infrastructure at the disposal of the armed forces of the Republic of Poland.
The suspect pleaded not guilty and expressed pro-Russian views and questioned Ukraine’s sovereignty.
Continue reading...Explosions heard across Ukrainian capital after ballistic missile strikes, with further blasts reported in other regions
Russian drones and missiles have pounded the Ukrainian capital and other cities, killing six people including a six-month-old baby, a 12-year-old girl and a woman, and damaging key energy facilities and several high-rise residential buildings.
The attacks lasted most of Tuesday night and into Wednesday morning as Kyiv was hit by at least four ballistic missiles. A series of loud explosions could be heard across the city.
Continue reading...Operator signs €2bn deal with Alstom amid boom in international rail travel from UK
Eurostar is to start running doubledecker trains through the Channel tunnel to meet growing demand for international rail travel from the UK.
The rail operator announced it had signed a €2bn (£1.7bn) deal for at least 30 – and up to 50 – new trains from the manufacturer Alstom.
Continue reading...Kosovo is an outlier in the region, whose other leaders say ‘looking for places to dump immigrants’ is evidence the UK is in ‘a very dark place’
Kosovo has become the first country to indicate it will accept Britain’s refused asylum seekers as part of government plans to set up “return hubs” in third countries.
Albin Kurti, the prime minister of Kosovo, said he “wants to help the UK” and confirmed discussions were taking place with officials from the UK, the Times reports. The plans would seek to send people whose asylum claims had been turned down to foreign detention centres once they had exhausted all avenues of appeal.
Continue reading...Police continue to search for the criminal gang behind the brazen robbery targeting France’s crown jewels
The financial loss from France’s most dramatic heist in decades has been put at nearly €90m as the head of the Louvre prepared to face difficult questions over how thieves were able to steal priceless jewellery in broad daylight.
As police continued to search for the criminal gang behind the brazen robbery on Sunday, the Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau told the broadcaster RTL that the museum’s curator had estimated the losses at about €88m (£76m).
Continue reading...Former president organised stage-managed departure from his Paris home before becoming first French postwar leader to be jailed
The former French president Nicolas Sarkozy has been jailed in Paris, after a court sentenced him to five years for criminal conspiracy over a scheme to obtain election campaign funds from the regime of the late Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi.
France’s rightwing president between 2007 and 2012 is the first former head of an EU country to serve time in prison, and the first French postwar leader to go behind bars.
Continue reading...Former French president will reportedly be held in isolation and has a copy of The Count of Monte Cristo for company
Perhaps France’s most fabled jail, La Santé – where the former French president Nicolas Sarkozy has begun a five-year term for criminal conspiracy to raise campaign funds from Libya – is the last remaining prison inside the Paris city limits.
Located in the southern Montparnasse district of the capital, it opened in 1867 and was the scene of at least 40 executions, the last in 1972. Partially closed for renovation in 2014, the prison reopened five years later and houses more than 1,100 inmates.
Continue reading...Three specimens discovered in what was previously one of the few places in the world without the insects
Mosquitoes have been found in Iceland for the first time as global heating makes the country more hospitable for insects.
The country was until this month one of the few places in the world that did not have a mosquito population. The other is Antarctica.
Continue reading...Pause on move to freeze preferential trade pact comes amid scramble to shore up fragile ceasefire
The EU has been criticised for pausing sanctions against Israel’s government in response to Donald Trump’s peacemaking efforts in the Middle East, as the fragile ceasefire came under threat.
After meeting EU foreign ministers on Monday, the European foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, announced a pause on efforts to suspend preferential trade with Israel and sanctions against people responsible for fuelling the conflict on both sides.
Continue reading...The tornado killed one construction worker on a building site, injured 10 others and left four in critical condition
A tornado tore through districts north of Paris on Monday, toppling three construction cranes that killed one person and left four others with critical injuries, authorities said.
The town of Ermont, about 20km (13 miles) north-east of Paris was worst hit by the sudden twister that caused damage across about 10 districts.
Continue reading...John Healey says he has already brought forward millions in spending for swift deployment if ceasefire agreed
The cost of Britain’s contribution to a post-ceasefire stabilisation force for Ukraine would be “well over £100m”, the defence secretary, John Healey, has said after a speech in the City of London.
Healey said he had already brought forward millions in spending so that a “multinational force Ukraine” led by the UK and France could be ready to deploy quickly if peace talks produce a ceasefire.
Continue reading...Report says snapped cable between cabins was substandard and city’s other funiculars should fix risk before reopening
The funicular that crashed in Lisbon killing 16 people in early September had a faulty cable, the official inquiry said on Monday as it recommended the city’s vehicles stay out of service until their safety can be confirmed.
The accident, which saw the picture-postcard 19th-century Elevador da Glória hurtle into a building after careering off the rails, shocked the Portuguese capital and laid bare fears over the safety of the popular yet ageing tourist attraction.
Continue reading...Ukrainian president will seek to win security guarantees at ‘coalition of the willing’ meeting before any US-Russia talks
Volodmyr Zelenskyy will travel to London on Friday for a meeting of the “coalition of the willing” before an expected summit between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin in Hungary, amid mounting European disquiet over Ukraine’s exclusion from the Budapest meeting.
Posting on social media, Zelenskyy said the aim of the London visit was to win security guarantees for Kyiv and there would be “many meetings and negotiations in Europe” this week.
Continue reading...Justice minister says ‘we have failed’ after thieves take seven minutes to steal priceless jewels from museum
The French government is under increasing pressure over museum security as police continued to search for thieves who took seven minutes to steal priceless jewels from the Louvre, the world’s most visited museum.
“What is certain is that we have failed, since people were able to park a furniture hoist in the middle of Paris, get people up it in several minutes to grab priceless jewels, and give France a terrible image,” the justice minister, Gérald Darmanin, told France Inter radio on Monday.
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