Ukrainian president says military pressure will continue, during video address in Prague that was marred by possible hack attack, says Czech parliament
The Kremlin has rejected speculation about Vladimir Putin’s health, saying the president is fit and well.
In a regular call with reporters, Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin spokesperson, , also denied suggestions that the Russian leader was using body doubles, calling them an “absurd hoax”.
Continue reading...Health regulator says serious side-effects possibly caused by insulin in counterfeit versions of Novo Nordisk’s Ozempic
Several people have been admitted to hospital in Austria after using suspected fake versions of Novo Nordisk’s diabetes drug Ozempic, the country’s health safety body has said, the first report of harm to users as a European hunt for counterfeiters widened.
The patients were reported to have suffered hypoglycaemia and seizures, serious side-effects that indicate that the product contained insulin instead of Ozempic’s active ingredient semaglutide, the health safety regulator Bundesamt für Sicherheit im Gesundheitswesen (BASG) said on Monday.
Continue reading...Tens of thousands of women and non-binary people across Iceland, including prime minister, stopped work
Dozens of women joined an extremely brisk walk around Tjörnin lake in Reykjavík to kick off a day of action.
I met pre-school teachers, students, municipal workers, activists and women who took part in the first strike of 1975.
Continue reading...Her new documentary, Posso Entrare? An Ode to Naples, explores the lives of residents in mafia-ridden backstreets
If people think of Trudie Styler and her association with Italy, they are most likely to conjure up an image of the wine-making estate she owns with her husband, Sting, in Tuscany.
Few people would know her as a woman raised on a council estate in the English Midlands who wandered through the labyrinthine, mafia-ridden backstreets of Naples for her latest documentary, Posso Entrare? An Ode to Naples, which draws on the lives of a host of city residents.
The documentary starts in the evocative Sanità district, where Styler meets Antonio Loffredo, a priest transforming the lives of young people who might otherwise have fallen prey to the Camorra mafia organisation, and where she visits multigenerational families living in case bassi – ground-floor homes that usually have just one room – and a door opening on to the street that provides the only source of air and light.
Continue reading...Musée Grévin says it is ‘improving’ wax figure of Fast and Furious star after it attracted widespread ridicule on social media
A wax museum in Paris that was criticised for “whitewashing” a statue of Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson says it will give the waxwork a do-over.
The Musée Grévin, which is modelled on London’s Madame Tussauds, unveiled the wax figure of the professional wrestler turned actor last week, but it swiftly attracted widespread ridicule on social media, as well as from the Fast and Furious star himself.
Continue reading...Sweden says ‘external force or tampering’ broke cable to Estonia; US seeks forfeiture of Russian-owned yacht worth $300m
Damage to a telecommunications cable between Sweden and Estonia this month was caused by “external force or tampering”, the Swedish government said.
Three residents of Kherson oblast were arrested for allegedly helping Russian forces target locations for strikes in the city of Kherson, the regional prosecutor’s office announced on Monday, according to the Kyiv Independent.
In an intelligence update, the UK’s Ministry of Defence said Russian government spending had become increasingly focused on the costs of its war on Ukraine.
Ukraine’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, said Vladimir Putin’s Russia “is the most heinous evil the world has witnessed since WWII” and that the Russian president and other “Russian perpetrators must face justice for their crimes”.
Kuleba cited Forbes as reporting that Russia has spent around $167bn (£137bn) on the war between February 2022 and August 2023, with which it could have built almost 24,000 kindergartens across Russia, or more than 4,500 maternity wards, or about 17,000 schools. “Instead, Russian war criminals have bombed Ukrainian kindergartens, maternity wards, schools, and hospitals, destroying almost 120,000 civilian structures in all.”
Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has submitted a bill for Sweden’s Nato membership to parliament for ratification, the Turkish presidency said. Turkey and Hungary are the only Nato members yet to ratify Sweden’s membership request.
Trade between Russia and India in the first eight months of 2023 more than doubled from the previous year, reaching a record high of almost $44bn, the Kyiv Independent cited Russian state-run media RIA Novosti as having reported.
The US has sought forfeiture of a $300m superyacht, Amadea, that it says is controlled by sanctioned billionaire Russian oligarch Suleiman Kerimov. The yacht was seized in Fiji and is docked in San Diego. The case is before court in Manhattan. Kerimov and his family are worth $10.7bn, according to Forbes.
A lioness rescued from a zoo in Ukraine could be rehomed in the UK with her cubs. BBC News reported that Aysa was pregnant when she was abandoned at a private zoo in the Donetsk region at the start of Russia’s invasion. She was moved to another facility and gave birth to cubs Teddi, Emi and Santa. All four are temporarily homed at Poznan zoo in Poland.
Continue reading...Sahra Wagenknecht joined by nine other MPs in migration-sceptical party which will court unhappy voters on left and right
A leading German radical-left politician who has questioned the green transition and blamed the west for Russia’s war on Ukraine has left her party to set up a new one, in a move likely to cost the far right votes and further fragment the nation’s politics.
Sahra Wagenknecht, the charismatic former co-leader of the far-left Die Linke, said on Monday that the new association – named after herself – would court unhappy voters on the left and right, starting with next June’s European parliament elections.
Continue reading...Extinction Rebellion protest at The Hague accuses Netanyahu of ‘war crimes’ and running an ‘apartheid regime’
European climate activists have staged protests and posted messages in support of Palestinians, prompting an online backlash and raising internal questions within the environmental movement.
Long-running tension in the Middle East exploded on 7 October when Hamas militants killed 1,400 people in southern Israel. Since then, Israeli strikes have killed at least 5,087 Palestinians, 2,055 of them children, according to the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza.
Continue reading...Erdoğan signs protocol and sends it to Turkish parliament after agreeing to Sweden’s membership at Nato summit in July
Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has removed one of the final hurdles blocking Sweden from joining Nato by submitting a bill approving membership to parliament for ratification.
The move on Monday was in line with a commitment Erdoğan made to Nato at its summit in July when he said he would send the bill to parliament for ratification when parliament restarted in October.
Continue reading...Swedish minister said the damage to a telecommunications cable earlier in October was through external ‘tampering’
Ukraine’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, has said Vladimir Putin’s Russia “is the most heinous evil the world has witnessed since WWII” and that the Russian president and other “Russian perpetrators must face justice for their crimes”.
Posting on X, he cited Forbes Ukraine as reporting that Russia has spent around $167bn (£137bn) on its full-scale war against Ukraine between February 2022 and August 2023.
We are deeply disappointed by the outcome of today’s hearing. We call for Alsu’s immediate release so she can be reunited with her family.
Continue reading...Hungary marks anniversary of 1956 revolution as European parliament investigates whether it has made progress on democratic standards
European parliament members representing the centre-right European People’s Party, Socialists and Democrats group, centrist Renew Europe group and the Greens will speak today in Brussels about whether they believe Hungary has done enough for the EU to unfreeze billions in funding currently suspended over rule-of-law concerns.
They will be focusing on a 13 billion euro pot of money earmarked for regional development and frozen until Budapest can show it has implemented reforms safeguarding judicial independence.
Continue reading...PM will take part in stoppage by women and non-binary people calling for pay equality and action on gender-based violence
Tens of thousands of women and non-binary people across Iceland, including the prime minister, are expected to stop work – both paid and unpaid – on Tuesday in the first strike of its kind in nearly half a century.
Organisers hope the women’s strike – whose confirmed participants include fishing industry workers, teachers, nurses and the PM, Katrín Jakobsdóttir – will bring society to a standstill to draw attention to the country’s ongoing gender pay gap and widespread gender-based and sexual violence.
Continue reading...Party on track to win 29% of vote, an increase of almost 3.5 percentage points on 2019 after more than half of votes counted
The rightwing populist Swiss People’s party (SVP) was set to further strengthen its position as the largest political force in parliament, an early projection suggested, as voters appeared to back the party’s hardline stance against mass migration and what it called “woke madness”.
The SVP was on track to receive 29% of the vote, an increase of nearly 3.5 percentage points over its 2019 results, pollsters GFS Bern predicted, with more than half of the results in.
Continue reading...Strike on distribution centre in Kharkiv on Saturday left people ‘fighting for their lives’, said regional governor. This blog is now closed
The US ambassador to Ukraine, Bridget Brink, has condemned the Russian missile attack on Kharkiv in which six people died.
The attack on a postal depot took place overnight on Sunday, with 16 people said to have been injured, seven of them said to be in a critical condition, according to earlier reports.
Continue reading...Miles Roberts of packaging-maker DS Smith warns manufacturing will decline unless government provides clarity about decarbonisation
The UK risks seeing its manufacturing sector fall behind rival economies if the government does not offer certainty over policies on shifting to green energy, according to the head of FTSE 100 packaging maker DS Smith.
Miles Roberts, the company’s chief executive, said British government decarbonisation policy has lacked the clarity of European rivals, meaning DS Smith has moved ahead with a €90m (£78m) investment in a paper mill in Rouen, northern France, while waiting for more clarity from government before investing in upgrades in the UK.
Continue reading...Tunisia had applied for extradition of Islamist gunman who shot dead two football fans but file got forgotten
The Islamist gunman who shot dead two Swedish football fans in Brussels last weekend had escaped from a Tunisian prison where he was serving a long sentence, which prompted Tunisian officials to seek his extradition from Belgium, prosecutors have said.
Belgian authorities received the extradition request in August 2022 but it was not dealt with.
Continue reading...Swiss People’s party believes its campaign focus on immigration and cost of living will increase its lead
The populist rightwing Swiss People’s party (SVP) is expected to make gains as the country votes in federal elections, after a campaign season centred on the cost of living and immigration.
Switzerland’s leading political party is predicted to garner 28.1% of the vote in Sunday’s election – an increase of 2.5 percentage points over its previous standing, according to polling by the Sotomo research institute.
Continue reading...Six dead in Russian missile strike on Kharkiv postal distribution centre, says governor; Volodymyr Zelenskiy holds talks with Turkish counterpart ahead of peace summit next week
At least six people have died in a Russian missile strike on a postal centre in Kharkiv region, the local governor has said. Fourteen more were injured, of which seven were “fighting for their lives”, said governor Oleh Synehubov. President Volodymyr Zelenskiy shared a video on Saturday night showing what appeared to be a heavily damaged warehouse surrounded by rubble and a container with the logo of Ukrainian postal operator Nova Poshta. He said it was a civilian facility and urged Ukraine’s allies to unite in the “fight against terror”.
Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, talked to his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, on Saturday, Zelenskiy said, in a call in which the two leaders discussed Ukraine’s peace formula, food security, and the situation in the Middle East. Turkey will take part in peace talks next week to discuss ways to end the Ukraine conflict, Zelenskiy said. Turkey has offered itself as a mediator between the two warring parties, helping to broker a deal in July last year that allowed safe grain exports via the Black Sea.
Moscow’s drive to capture the town of Avdiivka encountered fierce resistance on Saturday, Ukraine’s military said, with defences bolstered by fortifications erected nearly a decade ago. “The enemy is becoming more active, but is incurring heavy losses,” General Oleksandr Tarnavskyi, commander of Ukraine’s troops in the south, said on Telegram. Russia’s Defence Ministry, in its evening report, made no mention of Avdiivka, but reported strikes on areas outside Bakhmut, a town seized by Moscow’s forces in May after months of battles. Both towns are in the eastern Donetsk region.
Russia struck areas of eastern and southern Ukraine with artillery and missiles on Friday and Saturday, killing at least three people and injuring others, officials said. The fatal attacks were in Nikopol, Kryvyi Rih and Kherson region.
Three more children have been rescued from Russia and brought back to Ukraine, the Ukrainian parliament’s commissioner for human rights, Dmytro Lubinets, wrote on X, formerly Twitter.
More than a third of the territory of Ukraine is contaminated with mines and explosive objects due to the war with Russia, the general staff of the armed forces of Ukraine posted on Telegram.
Germany will reportedly provide an additional €200m (£175m) to Ukraine to support the country’s restoration of its education and healthcare systems, its drinking water supplies, and the reconstruction of its cities.
Continue reading...Statement on mines comes from general staff of the armed forces, which says more than 135,000 explosive devices neutralised since the beginning of the war
Three more children have been rescued from Russia and brought back to Ukraine, the Ukrainian’s parliament commissioner for human rights, Dmytro Lubinets, wrote on X, formerly Twitter.
Kyiv has said about 20,000 children have been taken from Ukraine to Russia or Russian-held territory without the consent of family or guardians. It calls this a war crime that meets the UN treaty definition of genocide.
Continue reading...Prison letters sent by ‘public enemy No 1’ Jacques Mesrine to his girlfriend Jeanne Schneider to be sold at auction
Bankrobber and serial prison escapee Jacques Mesrine had many names during his two-decade criminal career in the 1960s and 70s.
In disguise and on the run from police, he made headlines as “the man of a thousand faces” and “public enemy number one”. In Canada and the US with his girlfriend, Jeanne Schneider, the couple were nicknamed France’s Bonnie and Clyde.
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