LGBTQ+ rights groups praise ex-Spice Girl for pulling out of New Year’s Eve appearance on state broadcaster
The former Spice Girl Melanie C says she has cancelled a performance in Poland on New Year’s Eve after being made aware of issues “that do not align with the communities I support”.
She did not elaborate but was praised by allies of the LGBTQ+ community.
Continue reading...Controversial image of male Leiden University board members smoking cigars had long been topic of discussion
A spur-of-the-moment decision by academic staff to take down a 1970s painting depicting male Leiden University board members smoking cigars has sparked a debate in the Netherlands over cancel culture.
The artwork on the wall of a university meeting room had been a topic of discussion for years, with some students claiming that it both endorsed patriarchy and the act of smoking.
Continue reading...From terms to mock the Russian foe to those that mask the grim reality of war, new usages abound
It was once a superstition only among Ukrainian air crew: the word “last”, especially in the context of a last or final meeting, should be avoided as it denotes a premonition of death.
In its place air crew would say krajne, which translates very roughly to English as “on the edge”.
Continue reading...Russia can only be invited if it has faced a war crimes tribunal first, says foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba
Ukraine is aiming to hold a peace summit by the end of February – preferably at the United Nations with its secretary general, António Guterres, as a possible mediator – according to its foreign minister.
But Dmytro Kuleba said that Russia could only be invited if the country faced a war crimes tribunal first.
Continue reading...Three Russian servicemen killed at Russia’s Engels air base hundreds of miles from Ukraine’s frontlines; Putin says west trying to ‘tear apart’ Russia
Continue reading...Defence ministry says drone was shot down on approach to Engels airbase but falling debris killed three
Three Russian servicemen have died after a Ukrainian drone attack on a crucial airbase deep inside Russian territory, Moscow has said.
According to the defence ministry, a Ukrainian drone was shot down on the approach to Engels base early on Monday morning but falling debris killed three service personnel.
Continue reading...Kathy McGinness, who lived adjacent to flats that collapsed, died in hospital on Christmas Day
A woman injured in an explosion at a block of flats in Jersey earlier this month died on Christmas Day, taking the death toll to 10.
Kathleen (Kathy) McGinness, 73, who lived at Haut du Mont adjacent to the building that collapsed, died at Jersey general hospital.
Continue reading...A shared sense of national history is proving to be a crucial weapon, spurring on Ukraine resistance and Russian soldiers
The Ukrainian writer Oksana Zabuzhko recalls a quote attributed to Otto von Bismarck: “Wars are not won by generals, but by schoolteachers and parish priests.” It’s a country’s taught collective memory, its shared sense of its own history, that are the decisive instruments for mobilisation, and are as important on the battlefield as weaponry.
Few conflicts have been so shaped by the chief actors’ sense of their own national story as the Ukrainian war that began in February. It is the competing grand narratives of the past, not just in Russia and Ukraine, but in Germany, France, Poland, the Baltics, the UK, the US, and even the global south, that make this war so hard to resolve.
Continue reading...‘Every war ends in a diplomatic way,’ says Dmytro Kuleba
Christo Grozev, from the investigative journalism organisation Bellingcat, describes the announcement by Russia’s defence ministry that a Ukrainian drone attacked a base in Russia’s Saratov region as “mind boggling”.
Here are some of the latest images we have received from Ukraine.
Continue reading...Susan Moffat and Aida Haughton explain how their play My Thousand Year Old Land was given a universal humanity by using raw, real-life testimony
Three women – Pravda (meaning “justice”), Istina (“truth”), and Nada (“hope”) – sit around a table, grinding coffee and telling stories. Around them on stage are men’s boots, belts and a hat. The men are no longer here but killed in war.
It’s what writer and director Susan Moffat calls “the presence of absence”. In the play My Thousand Year Old Land (A Song for BiH), which Moffat wrote alongside Bosnian war survivor Aida Haughton, we follow three women whose lives are changed by the deaths of their communities’ men in the 1990s conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina. They find themselves taking on the typically male roles in the family, from tilling the fields to feeding cockerels.
Continue reading...Up to 10 people had been feared buried after incident between Zuers and Lech am Arlberg on Sunday
Ten people initially feared buried under snow after an avalanche swept across ski trails in western Austria have been found, according to authorities.
Just before 1am on Monday, police confirmed all the missing had been accounted for, the Austria Press Agency reported.
Continue reading...The man, 69, was held on Friday after killing three people at a Kurdish cultural centre and nearby cafe
The French man detained over the killing of three Kurdish people in Paris last week has told investigators he had a “pathological” hatred of foreigners, the city’s prosecutor said on Sunday.
The 69-year-old man was arrested on Friday after shooting dead two men and a woman in a Kurdish cultural centre and nearby Kurdish cafe in the 10th district of Paris, which the French president, Emmanuel Macron, described as a “vile” attack on the Kurds of France.
Continue reading...Increased plant growth due to warmer climate appears to be prompting change in eating habits
As the Arctic warms, concern for the plight of Santa’s favourite sleigh pullers is mounting. But in one small corner of the far flung north – Svalbard – Rudolph and his friends are thriving.
Warmer temperatures are boosting plant growth and giving Svalbard reindeer more time to build up fat reserves; they also appear to be shifting their diets towards “popsicle-like” grasses that poke up through the ice and snow, data suggests.
Continue reading...Ukraine’s president says Ukrainians are creating their own ‘miracle’ in Christmas address as Russian president accuses Kyiv and western allies of ‘refusing to negotiate’
At least 16 people were killed and 64 injured in Russia’s shelling of the Kherson region in southern Ukraine on Saturday, the region’s governor Yaroslav Yanushevych said.
Russian forces “opened fire on the Kherson region 71 times” with artillery, multiple launch rocket systems and mortars, Yanushevych said in an update posted on social media this morning.
The enemy attacked the regional centre 41 times. Downtown Kherson came under extensive enemy fire: civilians were killed and buildings destroyed. The enemy shelling also affected industrial premises, health facilities, detached houses and apartment blocks.
Continue reading...Royal Gibraltar police ask British counterparts to investigate alleged data breach in interests of ‘transparency’
UK police have been called in to lead an investigation into a data breach in a public inquiry concerning alleged corruption at the top of Gibraltar’s government.
The development is the latest twist in the inquiry, which is to hear explosive allegations by the British overseas territory’s former police chief, Ian McGrail.
Continue reading...Investigation takes aim at everything from Cosa Nostra whiskey to El Padrino restaurant in Spain and Nasi Goreng Mafia eaterie in Indonesia
Italy’s biggest farmers’ association is waging a battle against the “scandalous” use of mafia terms to sell a variety of food and drink products around the world, from Cosa Nostra whiskey to Chilli Mafia tomato sauce.
Coldiretti undertook an extensive investigation and also discovered that almost 300 restaurants beyond Italy have mafia-themed names, including El Padrino in Spain, Don Corleone in Finland, Burger Mafia in Germany, Falafel Mafia in the US and Nasi Goreng Mafia in Indonesia.
Continue reading...Archaeologists say cave complex must be preserved for ‘indisputable and cultural value’
Dmytro Perov was at his day job, analysing planning applications for Kyiv city council, when he saw a familiar address – the derelict house in central Kyiv built by his family in the late 1800s that was confiscated by the Bolsheviks. The owners of the site now wanted to build on it and had made the unlikely claim that their office was based at the house, which Perov knew had no roof and collapsed walls.
When he was a child, his grandmother said somewhere on the land around the former family home were rumoured to be ancient caves. He described it as a “small family legend”. Ukraine is home to a few cave complexes, most of which were built by monks, the most famous being Kyiv’s Pecherska Lavra – or Cave Monastery in English.
Continue reading...Ten dead and more than 50 injured in Russian strikes on Kherson; ‘We will endure this winter,’ Volodymyr Zelenskiy says in Christmas eve message
At least ten people were killed and an estimated 58 wounded on Saturday in Russian shelling on the recently recaptured Ukrainian city of Kherson. The region was targeted by 74 Russian strikes. 66 cars caught fire in a residential area of the city due to the shelling, the emergency services said.
Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy called the attacks on Kherson “terror … killing for the sake of intimidation and pleasure”. He said: “it is the real life of Ukraine … The world must see and understand what absolute evil we are fighting against.”
Ukraine’s defence minister, Oleksii Reznikov, said the attack in Kherson is more evidence that Ukraine needs to be supplied with more defence systems and called for more weapons and ammunition.
In a message on Saturday, Zelenskiy said Ukrainians will create their own miracle this Christmas by showing they remain unbowed despite Russian attacks that have plunged millions into darkness. The president made his remarks in a video address to Ukrainians who celebrate Christmas in December. Most Ukrainians are Orthodox Christians and mark the occasion in early January.
Reuters reporters in the Russian-occupied city of Mariupol have confirmed that authorities are demolishing and clearing what is left of the smashed rear portion of the cities theatre, where hundreds of Ukrainians were killed in Russian airstrikes after a protracted siege earlier this year.
Ukraine has announced it has killed another 480 Russian troops, according to its latest casualty figures.
A Ukrainian official has called for Iranian drone and missile factories to be destroyed because of their use by Russia in the war. Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Volodymyr Zelenskiy said that Iran “blatantly humiliates the institution of international sanctions”.
The Netherlands has pledged €2.5bn ($2.7bn) to help Ukraine in 2023, with most of the money earmarked for military aid.
The rock band Pink Floyd has raised $600,000 for Ukraine with the song Hey Hey Rise Up.
Continue reading...City of Kherson suffers worst toll as Volodymyr Zelenskiy condemns killing ‘for intimidation and pleasure’
Russia launched artillery barrages in southern and eastern Ukraine on Saturday, killing at least eight people and injuring dozens more.
The worst civilian toll was in the southern city of Kherson, which was liberated last month from Russian occupying forces. The office of Ukraine’s prosecutor general confirmed that eight people had been killed.
Continue reading...Eight people confirmed dead and more than 50 injured as Russian shelling hits city of Kherson
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said the shelling on Kherson that has killed five and injured 20 others is “terrorism”.
Posting photographs of the aftermath of the attacks, including casualties lying on the street, he said: “The terrorist country continues bringing the Russian world in the form of shelling of the civilian population. Kherson. In the morning, on Saturday, on the eve of Christmas, in the central part of the city.
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