Artist whose mother had affair with former king Albert II wins the right to use royal title and father’s surname
An artist who successfully fought a seven-year legal battle to prove she was the daughter of the former king of Belgium, Albert II, has won the right to be recognised as a princess.
The Brussels Court of Appeal has ruled that Delphine Boël, 52, had the right to her Royal father’s surname after a bitter battle for acknowledgement.
Continue reading...Polish divers locate Karlsruhe, which they hope holds treasure Nazis looted from Russia
Polish divers say they have found the wreck of a German second world war ship that may help solve a decades-old mystery about the whereabouts of the Amber Room, an ornate chamber that the Nazis looted from a tsarist palace in Russia.
Decorated with amber and gold, the room was part of the Catherine Palace near St Petersburg. It was last seen in Königsberg, then a Baltic port city in Germany but now the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad.
Continue reading...Government recommends no social mixing between people from different households in these areas; NHS Test and Trace going backwards
Council leaders and MPs from Merseyside have issued a joint statement describing today’s new restrictions as “a step in the right direction”.
But they are also saying the government should publish the scientific evidence showing why the government thinks these measures will be enough.
The measures announced today are a step toward restricting the spread but we need to understand if they are enough to arrest the rise cases across our region.
We're asking for Government to share their scientific evidence and provide us with more substantial financial support. pic.twitter.com/8gV1uJs87n
Graham Morgan, the leader of Knowsley council, says the new restrictions announced for Merseyside this morning may not be enough.
I'm still concerned that these new COVID-19 restrictions won't be enough to stop the spread of the virus here. We're at a critical point & need swift, effective solutions to protect our residents. Our conversations with Government will continue. https://t.co/Z5DZ8azYDl
Continue reading...Announcement comes as EU leaders try to resolve dispute over Belarus sanctions
Angela Merkel has announced plans to meet the Belarusian opposition leader, Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, as EU leaders gathering at a Brussels summit seek to untangle a dispute that has delayed sanctions against Belarus’s authoritarian government.
In a speech in the Bundestag on Wednesday, the German chancellor expressed her admiration for the women protesting against the Belarusian regime “If you see the courage of the women on display in the streets there, for a life of freedom and free of corruption, then I can only say: I admire that,” she said.
Continue reading...Russia says two countries’ foreign ministers have found common ground after French journalists injured during shelling
Russia and Turkey’s foreign ministers have agreed to the need for an immediate cessation of hostilities in Nagorno-Karabakh, according to a Russian statement, opening the door to a possible end to fighting in the breakaway region.
The potential breakthrough was at odds with an earlier statement by the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who hours earlier had called for a full Armenian withdrawal from the area – which is legally Azerbaijani territory but administered by ethnic Armenians – and condemned international efforts to resolve the conflict.
Continue reading...UK put on formal notice over internal market bill, which ministers admit breaks international law
The EU has launched legal action against the UK after Boris Johnson failed to respond to Brussels’ demand that he drop legislation that would overwrite the withdrawal agreement and break international law.
Ursula von der Leyen, the European commission president, announced that the UK had been put on formal notice over the internal market bill tabled by the prime minister last month.
Continue reading...Self-governing Spanish region warned by central government that new measures are legally binding
The regional government of Madrid, the area of Spain hardest hit by the second wave of the coronavirus, has said it will obey new lockdown restrictions imposed by the central government but plans to appeal against them in court.
Efforts to tackle the spread of the virus in and around the capital have been hindered by political intransigence as the Madrid region engages in a standoff with the central government.
Continue reading...Russian opposition figure poisoned with nerve agent says he has no ‘other versions’ of how crime was committed
The Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny says he believes Vladimir Putin ordered intelligence agencies to poison him, possibly to avoid a “Belarusian scenario” of civil unrest.
Navalny, who is recovering in Germany after falling ill on a flight from Tomsk to Moscow in August, told the news magazine Der Spiegel that the use of the rare nerve agent novichok meant the assault on his life would have been ordered from the top.
Continue reading...The US chain’s sandwiches do not meet definition of bread or a staple food, Supreme Court rules in tax case
The Irish Supreme court has ruled that the bread served at Subway – a US sandwich food chain with branches in more than 100 countries – cannot be defined as bread.
Under Ireland’s Value-Added Tax Act of 1972 it cannot even be defined as a staple food, according to the Irish Independent, because it contains too much sugar.
Continue reading...Syrians on the ground are believed to be contractors working for Turkish security companies
At least three Syrian opposition fighters have been killed in skirmishes in the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh, the Guardian has learned, confirming earlier reports of foreign involvement in the battle between Armenian and Azerbaijan over the territory and increasing fears it may spiral into a wider regional conflict.
As fierce combat between Armenian and Azerbaijani forces stretched into a fourth day, the presence of Syrians on the ground – believed to be contractors working for Turkish security companies – signalled a new frontier for Ankara’s increasingly assertive foreign policy.
Continue reading...Flemish Liberal Alexander De Croo sworn in as PM as country passes milestone of 10,000 Covid deaths
Belgium’s warring political parties have agreed to form a government nearly two years after the previous one collapsed, as the country passed the grim milestone of 10,000 deaths from coronavirus.
The deal, only finalised in the early hours of Wednesday , ends 652 days of caretaker and minority governments, since the fall of the previous administration in December 2018.
Continue reading...Angela Merkel says ventilation may be one of cheapest and most effective ways of containing virus
Ventilating rooms has been added to the German government’s formula for tackling coronavirus, in refreshing news for the country’s air hygiene experts who have been calling for it to become official for months.
The custom is something of a national obsession, with many Germans habitually opening windows twice a day, even in winter. Often the requirement is included as a legally binding clause in rental agreements, mainly to protect against mould and bad smells.
Continue reading...With infection numbers rising, Europe is relying on pandemic measures that have scarcely changed since the Black Death in the 14th century
Continue reading...Ramzy Bedia is captivating as a charismatic doctor in this French-Algerian drama about a country descending into chaos
French-Algerian film-maker Rabah Ameur-Zaïmeche sends us a dispatch from a civil war with Terminal Sud, an intriguing, somewhat abstract drama about a country descending into chaos. The facts on the ground here seem to tally with the Algerian civil war of the 90s, the so called “black decade” that claimed more than 100,000 lives. But the film was mostly shot in southern France, and Ameur-Zaïmeche doesn’t hide contemporary details such as mobiles and new-model SUVs. He has said in interviews that the point is to make it universal: this could happen any time, anywhere. The approach isn’t entirely convincing, and the unfocused sense of time and place is a bit distracting and frustrating at times. But there is real power to many of the scenes.
Continue reading...Armenian prime minister says he regards aggression by Azerbaijan as an ‘existential threat’
The UN security council has called on Armenia and Azerbaijan to immediately halt the fighting in Nagorno-Karabakh and urgently resume talks without preconditions as the conflict threatened to escalate beyond the region.
On Tuesday night, the UN’s most powerful body strongly condemned the use of force and backed secretary general Antonio Guterres’ call to stop the fighting, deescalate tensions, and resume talks “without delay”.
Continue reading...Meeting on Tuesday follows two days of fighting over the separatist region of Nagorno-Karabakh
Explainer: why is there fighting and what are the implications?
The UN security council will hold emergency talks behind closed doors on the ethnic Armenian region of Nagorno-Karabakh, where fighting continued overnight on Monday.
The meeting will be held at 5.00pm ET (2100 GMT) on Tuesday. Belgium formally requested the session, after France and Germany had led a push for it to be placed on the agenda.
Continue reading...Milestone is known toll of months of Covid pandemic that has changed everything, from power balances to everyday life
Though an inevitable milestone for months, its arrival is still breathtaking.
Deaths from Covid-19 exceeded 1 million people on Tuesday, according to a Johns Hopkins University database, the known toll of nine relentless months of a pandemic that has changed everything, from global balances of power to the mundane aspects of daily life.
Continue reading...Johns Hopkins University data points to rises in countries that seemed to have slowed spread
The number of people who have died from Covid-19 has exceeded 1 million, according to a tally of cases maintained by Johns Hopkins University, with no sign the global death rate is slowing and infections on the rise again in countries that were thought to be controlling their outbreaks months ago.
The milestone was reached early on Tuesday morning UK time, nine months since authorities in China first announced the detection of a cluster of pneumonia cases with an unknown cause in the central Chinese city of Wuhan. The first recorded death, that of a 61-year-old man in a hospital in the city, came 12 days later.
Continue reading...Dozens have been killed in clashes between Azerbaijani and Armenian forces over a disputed area in the south Caucasus region, with international calls mounting for an immediate ceasefire.
Tensions between the countries have been growing for months over the Nagorno-Karabakh region, an enclave legally considered to be part of Azerbaijan, but which has been run by ethnic Armenians since it declared independence in 1991.
Fighting was reported overnight on 27 September and throughout the following day, with both sides accusing each other of using heavy artillery, targeting civilians and deploying foreign mercenaries
Continue reading...Sweden, Finland and Estonia to jointly assess new information on 1994 sinking of MS Estonia
Nordic leaders have announced that they will examine evidence from a new television documentary that could shatter the official explanation of how 852 people died in a 1994 ferry sinking in the Baltic Sea.
The makers of the five-part documentary series, which was released for streaming on Monday, claimed to have found a hitherto unrecorded four-metre hole in the hull of the MS Estonia.
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