Home Office has imposed a 15 December deadline to eject people who worked for UK in Afghanistan from hotels, say councils
More than 1,000 Afghans in the UK face being made homeless days before Christmas after the Home Office imposed a fresh deadline to eject them from hotels.
The Local Government Association (LGA) revealed the number of at-risk Afghans, which includes families, after the Home Office last week imposed the new deadline of 15 December.
Continue reading...Russian losses in Avdiivka may be its worst of 2023, says UK; Ukraine and Netherlands start bilateral agreement talks
Russia would confiscate assets belonging to EU states it deems unfriendly if the bloc “steals” frozen Russian funds in a drive to fund Ukraine, a top ally of president Vladimir Putin said. It comes after Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, said that the EU executive was working on a proposal to pool some of the profits derived from frozen Russian state assets to help Ukraine and its post-war reconstruction.
Russia and Ukraine are locked in a stalemate on the frontlines of their war and the two sides need to sit down and negotiate an end to the conflict, the Belarus leader said. Alexander Lukashenko, a key Putin ally, described the current state of the conflict as “head-to-head, to the death, entrenched … Seriously stalemate.”
Russian forces are believed to have suffered some of the country’s biggest casualty rates so far this year as a result of continued “heavy but inconclusive” fighting around the Donetsk oblast town of Avdiivka.
Four Ukrainian police officers were wounded when a shell fired by Russian troops exploded by their police car in the city of Siversk, located in the partly occupied Donetsk province.
A third round of Ukrainian-backed peace talks opened in Malta, but without Moscow. In a statement, the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said 66 countries had taken part, proof that his plan “has gradually become global”.
The head of the office of the president of Ukraine, Andriy Yermak, has praised Qatar’s role in facilitating the return of four Ukrainian children from Russian captivity earlier this month.
Ukraine and the Netherlands began talks on a bilateral agreement on security guarantees in Malta, Yermak also announced. It is the sixth country to start bilateral negotiations with Ukraine on security guarantees.
Continue reading...MoD intelligence update says up to eight brigades have been committed to ‘heavy but inconclusive’ fighting
Russian forces are believed to have suffered some of the country’s biggest casualty rates so far this year as a result of continued “heavy but inconclusive” fighting around the Donetsk oblast town of Avdiivka.
According to the UK Ministry of Defence’s intelligence update on Saturday morning, Russia has probably committed elements of up to eight brigades to the sector where it initiated a “major offensive effort” in mid-October.
Continue reading...Officials to take inspiration from way US authorities rooted out Italian mob in Nevada in bid to reduce Russian exploitation of industry
Ukrainian officials seeking to oust Russian actors from its gambling industry are going to emulate the methods of the US authorities in the 1980s when they rooted out the Italian mob from the casinos of Las Vegas.
Gambling was legalised in Ukraine after a 10-year ban shortly before the full-scale invasion in February 2022 and has since continued to be a profitable avenue for Russians who want to make money in the country and collect the personal data of Ukrainian gamblers.
Continue reading...Russia loses brigade’s worth of troops in push for Avdiivka, says Zelenskiy; heavy shelling hits Kherson; Macron condemns Orbán’s meeting with Putin
The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, claimed that Russian forces had lost at least a brigade’s worth of troops attempting to advance on Ukraine’s eastern town of Avdiivka. Russia began a renewed push to encircle the embattled town in mid-October, trying to overwhelm Ukrainian positions with constant barrages of artillery and waves of troops and fighting vehicles, according to reports.
Russian forces have heavily shelled the centre of the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson, injuring a number of people and damaging at least 10 buildings, a senior local official and emergency workers said.
The European Council has outlined plans to seize the profits from frozen Russian assets and direct billions of euros to support Ukraine. In a set of formal public conclusions after the culmination of an EU leaders’ summit, it said that “extraordinary revenues held by private entities stemming directly from Russia’s immobilised assets” could be directed to support Ukraine and its recovery.
The French president, Emmanuel Macron, has condemned the Hungarian leader Viktor Orbán’s recent meeting and handshake with Vladimir Putin. “In the situation we are in with Russia, we should not use these bilateral contacts to negotiate things about ourselves that would weaken our unity [on Ukraine],” Macron said after the EU leaders’ meeting in Brussels.
Russia’s top investigative body has said it had opened a criminal inquiry into the attempted murder of former Ukrainian lawmaker Oleg Tsaryov, a pro-Russian figure who was reported to have been lined up by Moscow to lead a puppet administration in Kyiv after Russia’s invasion. He is in intensive care after being shot, a Russian official said.
The wives and family of enlisted Ukrainian soldiers have gathered at Independence Square in Kyiv to call for the right to voluntarily demobilise after 18 months. “Our servicemen are strong, but they are not robots,” protesters shouted during the rally.
The new Slovak prime minister, Robert Fico, has told other EU leaders that €50bn in EU aid to Ukraine should include guarantees that the funds would not be misappropriated, his office said. “Ukraine is among the most corrupt countries in the world,” he claimed.
Continue reading...Ukraine’s president tells British PM brigade’s worth of troops lost trying to encircle embattled city; Putin demands action on weapons trafficking
The Russian-installed official Vladimir Rogov has claimed Russia destroyed “at least four” of the Leopard tanks supplied to Ukraine by the west in the Zaporizhzhia region within the past 24 hours.
Zaporizhzhia is one of the regions Russia partly occupies and has claimed to annex.
I think it’s really important that one of the outcomes of this meeting is that we don’t lose focus on Ukraine. Because of all the other things that are happening in the world, and not least in the Middle East, it would be very easy to lose focus on the war in Ukraine – and essential that we don’t do that.
Continue reading...Scientists say rise in seismic activity confirms south-west region is in buildup phase
A seismic swarm has hit the Reykjanes peninsula in south-west Iceland with more than 5,500 small earthquakes in the last three days, raising the prospect of a volcanic eruption.
Iceland, located between the Eurasian and the North American tectonic plates, among the largest on the planet, is a seismic and volcanic hotspot as the two plates move in opposite directions.
Continue reading...French president says Hungarian leader’s meeting risks weakening European unity against Russia
The French president, Emmanuel Macron, has condemned the Hungarian leader Viktor Orbán’s recent meeting and handshake with Vladimir Putin.
“In the situation we are in with Russia, we should not use these bilateral contacts to negotiate things about ourselves that would weaken our unity [on Ukraine],” Macron said after a meeting of EU leaders in Brussels.
Continue reading...Oleg Tsaryov, who had been tipped to lead a puppet government after Russia’s 2022 invasion, is in a critical condition
A Ukrainian politician once said to have been considered for leader of a Kremlin-controlled puppet government in Ukraine is in a critical condition after he was shot twice in an apparent assassination attempt at a sanatorium in Crimea.
Oleg Tsaryov, a pro-Kremlin Ukrainian figure who played a prominent political role in the 2014 war against the Kyiv government, was shot twice by an unknown assailant, his associates have confirmed.
Continue reading...The bloc’s leaders are hosting a series of meetings in Brussels
While European leaders were meeting yesterday with a strong focus on presenting a united front to the world on foreign policy, Hungary’s foreign minister was hanging out with his Russian and Belarusian counterparts.
Luxembourg’s Xavier Bettel, a big personality in European summits, says goodbye at his last European Council.
Continue reading...White House says Russia is executing soldiers who fail to follow orders; Moscow criticises Ukraine-backed peace talks in Malta
Continue reading...Despite questions over quality, scale of munition shipments indicates Moscow plans to continue conflict for long time
In pouring rain, a jubilant crowd waving pompoms and flowers greeted the Russian foreign minister as he stepped on to the airport asphalt in Pyongyang.
While the heavily choreographed welcoming scenes were a familiar sight in totalitarian North Korea, Sergei Lavrov’s rare visit to the country came amid mounting evidence that Pyongyang has started to provide artillery rounds to Russia, opening up a supply line that could have profound implications for the war in Ukraine.
Continue reading...Heads of 27 member states will attempt show of unity at Brussels meeting as disagreements continue over approach to Israel and Gaza conflict
Ahead of the leaders’ summit, a group of Irish members of the European parliament from different political families called for a ceasefire in Gaza.
The group urged “the Council of the European Union to call for an immediate ceasefire, as well as urgent efforts to meet the humanitarian needs of people in Gaza.”
In a statement signed by Clare Daly, Mick Wallace, Chris MacManus, Ciaran Cuffe, Grace O’Sullivan, Billy Kelleher, Colm Markey and Luke Ming Flanagan, they said:
We stress the universal applicability of international humanitarian law, its binding nature on all parties in all conflicts and remind the Council that indiscriminate warfare resulting in the killing of civilians cannot be justified - in any circumstances. Given the intensity of hostilities, and the enormous loss of life that has already occurred, we consider that calling for anything less than an immediate ceasefire would depart from the European Union’s responsibility to uphold international law, to protect human life, and to secure peace.
We see that the Russian war in Ukraine is raging. We see that the horrible terroristic attacks by Hamas on Israel are now also harming the Palestinian people and risk to destabilise the region. Migrants are pushed to search for a better life by war and conflict and come to our shores in greater numbers. With all these challenges, the European Union needs to react and act united and resolute.
This is the reason why I’ve proposed a revision of the EU budget to be able to fund these very important tasks. This will be discussed in this European Council.
Continue reading...Russia says it discussed evacuation of Russian and other foreign citizens with group led by Mousa Abu Marzook
A senior Hamas delegation has travelled to Moscow to meet Russian foreign ministry officials in the organisation’s first high-profile international visit since it launched a raid in southern Israel on 7 October, killing an estimated 1,400 people and taking another 220 hostage.
The delegation was led by Mousa Abu Marzook, a founder and political leader of Hamas, who met the Russian deputy foreign minister, Mikhail Bogdanov. Marzook, who lives in exile in Qatar, travelled to Moscow after an earlier meeting in Doha with Bogdanov and the Iranian deputy foreign minister, Ali Bagheri Kani.
Continue reading...Rédoine Faïd gets extra 14 years as 11 members of family also convicted for aiding breakout
A French gangster who made a spectacular escape from prison by helicopter has been sentenced to an extra 14 years in jail.
It was the second time Rédoine Faïd, a career criminal described as France’s most wanted man during his three months on the run, had broken out of prison.
Continue reading...Eurozone central bank gives press conference after pausing its cycle of rate hikes, as inflation slows and Europe’s economy weakens
Back in the City, shares in Standard Chartered bank have tumbled over 11% after it missed profit expectations and took a hit on its exposure to China.
Standard Chartered, the Asia Pacific-focused bank, reported that pretax profits more than halved in the last quarter to $633m, down from $1.391bn in Q3 2022.
We have continued to make strong progress in the third quarter against the five strategic actions outlined last year, delivering a solid set of results.
Wealth Management has continued its recovery with double digit income growth and the Financial Markets performance has been resilient against a strong comparator period.
Real GDP per capita is now almost 10% above its pre-pandemic level – a much stronger performance than the euro area as a whole. The unemployment rate has also declined steeply, and was 10.9% in August, the lowest level since the end of 2009.
And with a stronger economy, the country has been able to work further through its debt challenge. Greece’s public debt-to-GDP ratio has dropped 35 percentage points from its peak of 206% in 2020, one of the fastest falls in the world.
Continue reading...The bamboccioni (big babies) refused to fly nest and ‘did not contribute’ – in country where most under-35s still live with parents
The proportion of Italian adults still living with their parents has long been high but one mother was forced to take drastic action after her two sons – both in their 40s – refused to abandon the comforts of the family home.
The woman, 75, from the northern city of Pavia, had grown weary of having to maintain her sons, 40 and 42, and on several occasions tried to convince them to find a more autonomous living arrangement, especially as each had a job. “But neither of them wanted to know,” she said, according to a report in the local newspaper La Provincia Pavese.
Continue reading...Nobel prize-winning Peruvian author still plans to write an essay on Sartre that ‘will be the last thing I write’
Peru’s best-known living writer, the Nobel prize-winning author Mario Vargas Llosa, has announced that his seven-decade literary career is coming to an end and that his latest novel will be his last.
In a postscript to the new book, Le dedico mi silencio (I Give You My Silence), the 87-year-old novelist writes: “I think I’ve finished this book. I’d now like to write an essay on [Jean-Paul] Sartre, who was my teacher as a young man. It will be the last thing I write.”
Continue reading...Official declaration to be issued, which also seeks a peace conference on a two-state solution
Leaders of the 27 EU member states have unanimously called for “humanitarian corridors and pauses” of the shelling in Gaza to allow food, water and medical supplies to reach Palestinians.
An official declaration will be issued after a two-day summit of leaders in Brussels.
Continue reading...The defeat of Poland’s Law and Justice party and Turkey moving towards ratifying Sweden’s Nato bid have further isolated Hungary’s PM
Viktor Orbán is more isolated than ever – but he is still fuelling frustrations across Europe.
The Hungarian leader, one of Europe’s most prominent far-right politicians, has long been an outlier on the European stage. But, as he arrives in Brussels on Thursday for a summit of EU leaders, he will be even more lonely than usual.
Continue reading...