Category Archives: Europe

Union tries to seize control of works council at Tesla’s German factory

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Lawsuits and slander claims fly in IG Metall’s battle with Elon Musk over employment rights and conditions

Europe’s largest trade union is trying to gain control of the works council at Elon Musk’s Tesla gigafactory near Berlin, in an industrial relations showdown marked by lawsuits and mutual accusations of slander.

The works council, an elected body of employees that negotiates everything from working hours to pay deals with a company’s management, is considered an entrenched aspect of the German corporate world, particularly in the car industry.

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Italian ambulance driver investigated on suspicion of murdering five patients

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Prosecutors in the northern city of Forlì are investigating a 27-year-old man, currently suspended from the Italian Red Cross

Prosecutors in the northern Italian city of Forlì are investigating an ambulance driver on suspicion of murdering five elderly patients.

All the suspicious deaths occurred while or soon after the patients were transported in an ambulance driven by the 27-year-old man, lawyers of the victims told the Guardian.

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Benedetto Santapaola, notorious Italian mafia boss, dies in prison aged 87

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Cosa Nostra leader, who controlled most of eastern Sicily, dies while serving multiple life sentences for murder

Benedetto “Nitto” Santapaola, a Sicilian mafia boss and one of the most dangerous figures in Italian criminal history, has died aged 87.

Santapaola, who was widely believed to have been the architect of a campaign of bloodshed that scarred Italy in the 1980s and 1990s, died on Monday in a Milan prison where he was serving multiple life sentences. An autopsy has been ordered.

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Ferries emit ‘more sulphur pollution than cars’ in several EU capitals

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Dublin, Helsinki, Stockholm and Tallinn among port cities more choked by sulphur oxides from ferries, analysis shows

Fume-belching ferries spew more sulphur pollution than cars in several EU capitals, analysis has found.

Dublin, Helsinki, Stockholm and Tallinn are among 13 of Europe’s 15 biggest port cities choked more by sulphur oxides (SOx) from ferries than road vehicles, data shared exclusively with the Guardian shows.

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France to increase nuclear arsenal and European weapons cooperation, Macron says

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French president says Paris could deploy nuclear-capable fighter jets to countries such as Germany and Poland

France will increase the size of its nuclear arsenal for the first time in decades and significantly intensify nuclear weapons cooperation with eight European allies including the UK as part of a “major” strengthening of its deterrence doctrine, Emmanuel Macron has said.

Amid growing concern among European leaders about wavering US commitments to help defend the continent, the French president said on Monday that Paris could deploy nuclear-capable Rafale fighter jets to partner countries such as Germany and Poland.

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Judge adjourns Paris trial of Islam scholar accused of raping three women

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Former Oxford professor Tariq Ramadan did not appear in court as he was in a Geneva hospital, according to lawyers

The prominent Swiss academic and Islam scholar Tariq Ramadan has not appeared in court for the first day of his trial in Paris on charges of raping three women in France between 2009 and 2016.

The head judge in the case adjourned proceedings until Wednesday and ordered a medical report on Ramadan’s health, after his lawyers said he was in hospital in Geneva because of his multiple sclerosis.

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Hezbollah said to have launched drone that struck UK RAF airbase in Cyprus

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Two more drones intercepted on Monday, authorities say, in what appears to be sustained targeting of base

A one-way attack drone – said to have been launched by Lebanon’s Hezbollah – struck the UK’s RAF Akrotiri base in Cyprus at about midnight on Sunday, prompting a partial evacuation of the military facility.

Two more drones were successfully intercepted on Monday morning, the Cypriot authorities said, as part of what appears to be a sustained targeting of the base on the third day of the war in the Middle East.

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‘Some parents said they’d break my knees’: the teacher who exposed Putin’s primary school propaganda

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Grenade-throwing contests replaced PE and ‘denazification’ speeches became homework. Pavel Talankin’s undercover film about his school’s indoctrination drive won a Bafta and is tipped for an Oscar, but has left him in exile

In order to watch the Oscar-nominated documentary in which many of them have starring roles, pupils at Karabash School No 1 have had to source bootlegged copies, viewing the film in private, on their phones or their laptops.

Last week’s Bafta best documentary win for Mr Nobody Against Putin has been studiously ignored by Russian state media, and the prize the film won at Sundance last year was also met with silence. Staff at the school and government officials in the Kremlin seem united in their desire to pretend that they know nothing about the film.

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Rolls-Royce boss ‘open’ to Germany joining UK’s fighter jet project

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Tufan Erginbilgiç says decision is for the government but German participation remains a possibility

The boss of Rolls-Royce has said he would welcome Germany helping to build Britain’s next-generation fighter jet, arguing it would bring in more business for the project.

The aircraft, designed to replace the Eurofighter Typhoon, is a joint effort between the UK, Italy and Japan. Rolls-Royce is building the engine for the jet, which has attracted fresh attention as plans for a rival Franco-German warplane edge towards collapse.

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Suspected Russian ‘shadow fleet’ tanker seized in North Sea

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Belgian special forces boarded the Ethera, which was sailing under the flag of Guinea, on Saturday night

Belgium has seized an oil tanker believed to form part of the so-called “shadow fleet” used by Russia to circumvent western sanctions over the war in Ukraine.

Special forces assisted by French helicopters boarded the ship in a clandestine operation in the North Sea on Saturday night, Belgium’s defence minister, Theo Francken, said on Sunday.

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AI-resistant ‘halo’ stocks drive UK and EU markets to record highs

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Investors shifting to ‘heavy-asset, low-obsolescence’ companies insulated from disruption, says Goldman Sachs

Investors have a new mantra as they prepare for AI to shake up the global economy – the Halo trade.

Interest in Halo – short for “heavy assets, low obsolescence” - has risen as investors seek out companies with tangible, productive assets, which might be insulated from AI disruption, such as energy and transport infrastructure companies.

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An ugly year for the Louvre: where does the world’s biggest museum go from here?

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After a heist and the departure of its boss, the French institution wrestles with water leaks, strikes and much-criticised plans for a €1bn renovation

Just over a year ago, Laurence des Cars, the intellectually brilliant (if famously prickly) former head of the largest and most-visited museum in the world, wrote a somewhat alarming note to her boss, France’s culture minister.

Des Cars, who on Tuesday resigned as president of the Louvre, lamented the advanced state of disrepair of the iconic museum’s buildings and galleries.

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Sicily revokes century-old Mondello beach concession over mafia links

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Regional authorities withdraw permit after citing risk of organised crime infiltration linked to a subcontractor

It is one of Europe’s most celebrated shorelines, framed by mountains and 19th-century villas and famed for its Caribbean-blue water and white sand.

But Mondello beach in Palermo, Sicily, has also been mired in controversy, the subject of complaints stretching back a century from residents and tourists who say its private lidos, cabins and deckchairs have left scant room for public access.

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Decision to allow UK exports to Armenian firm under review over Russian links

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Cygnet Texkimp was approved to export machines to Rydena, but ministers examining deal after Guardian highlighted founders’ links to Kremlin military supply chain

Ministers are reviewing a decision to allow a British company to export hi-tech equipment to Armenia after the Guardian uncovered links to the Russian military supply chain.

Cygnet Texkimp, based in Cheshire, was weeks away from exporting two machines that produce carbon fibre “prepreg”, a lightweight material that can be used in a range of civil and military applications.

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Deaths of 22 children in Channel due to ‘catastrophic failure’ by UK and France, NGO says

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Project Play finds UK taxpayers are funding ‘record child fatalities’ and ‘repeated violence’ against children in northern France

The deaths of 22 children while trying to cross the Channel in the last two years, along with the mistreatment of thousands of others, were due to “catastrophic failures” of the UK and French governments, according to a new report.

Project Play, an NGO that has worked with 2,192 children hoping to cross the Channel from northern France to the UK to claim asylum in the last two years, has documented the impact of the hostile conditions in northern France due to regular teargassing, evictions and dinghy-slashing by the French police.

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‘Crazy, without limits’: Paris disco haunt of Jagger and Grace Jones to reopen

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Legendary nightclub Le Palace, where Serge Gainsbourg and Prince also performed, to rise again

In the late 1970s, Le Palace in Paris’s busy theatre district was one of continental Europe’s most famous nightclubs.

On the opening night on 1 March 1978, Grace Jones stunned VIP guests with her rendition of Edith Piaf’s classic La Vie en Rose. Later, Serge Gainsbourg and Prince came to perform, Bob Marley was photographed there and Mick Jagger, Andy Warhol and Karl Lagerfeld were part of a glittering cast of international celebrities, politicians, designers and models who came to drink and dance.

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Russia may interfere in Danish election, exploiting chaos sown by US, spies warn

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US threats to seize Greenland have created ‘new international fault lines’ that can be used to spread disinformation, Danish intelligence agencies say

Denmark’s intelligence services have warned that a foreign power may try to sway the general election on 24 March, saying the main threat was from Russia over support for Ukraine but also citing the chaos caused by US efforts to seize Greenland.

The PET police intelligence service and FE military intelligence said in a joint statement the election campaign could be marked by disinformation and cyberattacks “to sow division, influence the public debate or to target candidates, parties or specific political programmes”.

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Demna brings sexy back in effort to reinvigorate Gucci

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Designer’s first catwalk for the brand in Milan flirts with bad taste with short, tight dresses and a diamante G-string

Demna is fashion’s dark lord of apocalyptic streetwear. Gucci is the glossy sex kitten of Milan. Put the two together, and what do you get? Sex appeal that flirts with bad taste.

At Demna’s first Gucci catwalk show, staged in Milan on Friday afternoon in front of an audience including Donatella Versace and Paris and Nicky Hilton, dresses were so short and tight that Emily Ratajkowski periodically yanked down a handful of disco-ball sequins to cover her bottom as she walked. There were lapdance-bar tinsel hair extensions, and Kate Moss in a diamante G-string. A certain sketchiness in the roll of the hips, a model who pulled his phone out of his bumbag and scrolled his way down the catwalk.

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Ghana says at least 55 of its people killed after Russia ‘lured’ them to fight Ukraine

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Foreign minister says 272 Ghanaians are thought to have been drawn into battle since 2022, after he visited Kyiv

At least 55 Ghanaians have been killed in Russia’s war with Ukraine after being “lured into battle”, Ghana’s foreign minister has said after a visit to Kyiv in which officials raised the issue of Russian recruitment of African people.

Reports of African men being attracted to Russia by promises of jobs and ending up on Ukraine’s frontlines have become more frequent in recent months, creating tensions between Moscow and some of the countries involved.

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