Category Archives: Europe

Paris museum refuses entry to woman in low-cut dress

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Musée d’Orsay, home to some of world’s most famous nudes, apologises for barring visitor

One of Paris’s biggest museums, whose galleries feature some of the world’s most famous nudes, has been accused of discrimination and sexism after refusing entry to a woman in a low-cut dress.

In a case of life not imitating art, a zealous official told a literature student whose name was given only as Jeanne that “rules are rules” and ordered her to cover her cleavage if she wanted to be allowed into the Musée d’Orsay, a popular tourist attraction and bastion of the beaux arts.

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UK looks to Belgium for Covid inspiration despite infections rise

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Matt Hancock hails Belgian model amid rollout of new curbs in England – but data shows jump in new cases

Belgium has been cited by the UK health secretary, Matt Hancock, as a model for getting coronavirus under control – just as its public health body recorded a 15% rise in the number of daily infections compared with the previous week.

Despite a dip in the number of new infections in August, after a tightening of rules by the Belgian prime minister, Sophie Wilmès, the most recent data suggests the country’s success may be short-lived as people return to work and school.

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Pompeo: ‘substantial chance’ senior Russian officials behind Alexei Navalny poisoning

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US secretary of state strikes more strident tone after Donald Trump said at the weekend he had not seen any proof of poisoning

The US secretary of state Mike Pompeo has said there was a “substantial chance” the poisoning of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny was ordered by senior Russian officials.

“I think people all around the world see this kind of activity for what it is,” Pompeo said in a radio interview with conservative host Ben Shapiro. “And when they see the effort to poison a dissident, and they recognise that there is a substantial chance that this actually came from senior Russian officials, I think this is not good for the Russian people.”

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Trump loyalists interfered to downplay Russia election threat – whistleblower

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Brian Murphy claims he was demoted for refusing to accept fabrication of intelligence to match Donald Trump’s rhetoric

Trump loyalists running the Department of Homeland Security manipulated intelligence reports to play down the threat of Russian election interference and white supremacists and exaggerate the threat of antifa and anarchist groups, according to the department’s former top intelligence official.

The official, Brian Murphy, said he was demoted in August from his position running the department’s office of intelligence and analysis because of his refusal to go along with the fabrication of intelligence to match Donald Trump’s rhetoric, and for making formal complaints about the political pressure. He filed a whistleblower reprisal complaint on Tuesday.

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Thousands need aid after fire destroys Europe’s largest refugee camp

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Greek minister calls situation on Lesbos an ‘unprecedented humanitarian crisis’

Thousands of people urgently require emergency shelter and aid after a fire destroyed Europe’s largest refugee camp, on the Greek island of Lesbos.

As the Athens government declared a state of emergency and a delegation of officials rushed to the north-eastern Aegean island, the sheer scale of devastation wrought by the overnight blaze became increasingly evident.

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‘Catastrophe’ warning as thousands left homeless by Lesbos refugee camp fire

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NGOs accuse police of blocking access to hospital for families and vulnerable migrants injured in Moria blaze

NGOs in Lesbos have warned that a humanitarian catastrophe is unfolding on the roads around the still burning Moria camp, where thousands of migrants are allegedly being held by police without shelter or adequate medical help.

Annie Petros, head coordinator of of the charity Becky’s Bathhouse, said she was blocked by police from taking injured people to hospital as she drove them away from the fire.

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France to open 20 new Covid-19 testing centres in Paris region

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Demand for tests soars as people return to work and school after the holidays

French health officials are to open 20 new Covid-19 testing centres in the Paris region after demand for tests soared at la rentrée, last week’s grand return to work and classes following the long school holidays.

The authorities said testing capacity in and around the French capital had risen more than fourfold from 45,000 to 200,000 a week and 1 million people were being tested nationally every week – about 140,000 a day – but there were still queues and delays.

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Belarus opposition figure Maxim Znak taken from office by masked men

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Lawyer was one of few remaining leading members of coordination council still free

Belarusian authorities have detained one of the last leading members of an opposition council who remained free, moving methodically to end a month of protests against President Alexander Lukashenko.

Lawyer Maxim Znak, a member of the coordination council created by the opposition to facilitate talks with the country’s leader of 26 years on a transition of power, was taken out of the council’s office by unidentified people in ski masks, his associate Gleb German said. He said Znak only had time to text message “masks” before they took the phone away from him.

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Lesbos refugee camp fire forces thousands to evacuate

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Blaze at overcrowded Moria camp destroys tents and forced migrants to flee

The Greek prime minister has convened an urgent meeting of cabinet ministers after a devastating fire gutted the overcrowded Moria migrant facility on Lesbos, leaving 13,000 people without shelter.

As riot police were dispatched from Athens to the island, the regional governor for the north Aegean, Kostas Mountzouris, called for a state of emergency to be declared, saying the situation was out of control.

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UK plans to change Brexit rules threaten US trade deal, top Democrats say

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Altering terms of withdrawal agreement on Northern Ireland could damage relations under Biden presidency

Senior Democrats have warned that any attempt by the UK government to backtrack on the Brexit agreement on Northern Ireland would jeopardize a future US-UK free trade deal and could hobble bilateral relations across the board if Joe Biden wins the presidency.

Biden, an Irish American, is a staunch defender of the Good Friday Agreement, of which the US is the guarantor, and which requires an open border between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.

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Government admits new Brexit bill ‘will break international law’

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Brandon Lewis tells MPs internal market bill will ‘clarify’ Northern Ireland protocol

The government has admitted that its plan to reinterpret the special Brexit arrangements for Northern Ireland will break international law.

The Northern Ireland secretary, Brandon Lewis, astonished backbenchers when he told the House of Commons: “Yes, this does break international law in a very specific and limited way. We’re taking the powers to disapply the EU law concept of direct effect … in a certain very tightly defined circumstance.”

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Belarus: Lukashenko vows to stay in first interview since protests

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President tells Russian journalists that if he resigned the opposition would destroy Belarus

The Belarusian president, Alexander Lukashenko, has used his first interview since mass protests erupted against his rule to say he does not plan to step down soon.

Lukashenko spoke to a group of pro-Kremlin Russian journalists including the editor-in-chief of Russia Today, Margarita Simonyan, and made it clear he plans to fight to cling on to power.

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Charlie Hebdo survivor tells of being forced to unlock door by gunmen

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Cartoonist ‘Coco’ gives evidence at trial of 14 suspects accused of complicity in 2015 Paris attacks

A survivor of the Charlie Hebdo massacre has described how Islamist terrorists forced her to open the door of the satirical newspaper’s offices at gunpoint as they arrived to murder 11 people.

Corinne Rey, a cartoonist known as “Coco”, told a Paris court she was convinced she was about to die as the brothers Chérif and Saïd Kouachi entered the building saying: “We want Charlie Hebdo.”

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CCTV footage said to show car carrying Belarus opposition figure at border – video

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Footage released by the Belarusian border committee shows a car said to show the opposition figure Maria Kolesnikova driving to the Alexandrovka border with Ukraine in the early hours of Tuesday.

Kolesnikova, who was kidnapped from the centre of Minsk on Monday, reportedly avoided deportation by ripping up her passport. Two other activists with her, Anton Rodnenkov and Ivan Kravtsov, are in Ukraine, officials in Kyiv confirmed

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Number of political prisoners in Belarus growing daily, says opposition – video

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Maxim Znak says only two members of the Belarus opposition coordination council are still free and in the country, including himself.

On Tuesday, the Belarusian opposition figure Maria Kolesnikova ripped up her passport in order to avoid being deported from her own country, according to Ukrainian media reports.

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‘Not a game’: Europe pleads with young people to halt Covid-19 spread

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Health authorities across continent try to reach under 30s as cases among younger people rise

As the number of Covid-19 cases rises sharply in parts of Europe, health authorities from the UK to Spain are calling on young people to do more to halt the spread of the virus. This is how the situation looks in a number of major European countries and how it is being tackled.

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Auf wiedersehen, techno: Berlin’s banging Berghain club reborn as a gallery

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With nightlife in limbo due to Covid-19, the legendary temple of techno has reinvented itself as art gallery – with works by Tacita Dean, Olafur Eliasson, Wolfgang Tillmans and more

Inside a disused power station in east Berlin, a red-and-white buoy is bobbing mid-air, swooping six metres up and six metres down in rhythm to imaginary waves. The artist who had the idea to hang it there, Julius von Bismarck, has connected an automated pulley system via sensors to a real buoy in the Atlantic Ocean, mirroring its movements.

Usually, the waves crashing over the heads of visitors to these halls are made of sound, pumped out of a custom-built PA that many dance music connoisseurs consider the finest in the world: this is Berghain, Berlin’s mythical temple of bassy industrial techno.

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Irish MEP in line for EU finance role vacated due to lockdown scandal

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Mairead McGuinness to take role in overseeing access for the City of London to EU markets

The veteran MEP Mairead McGuinness has been proposed as Ireland’s new EU commissioner, replacing Phil Hogan, who was forced to resign after breaching coronavirus lockdown rules.

McGuinness, a European parliament vice-president, would take on the portfolio of financial services, giving her a key role in overseeing access for the City of London to EU markets.

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Maria Kolesnikova: Germany and UK call for release of snatched Belarus opposition figure

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UK foreign secretary Dominic Raab says safe return of Maria Kolesnikova must be Lukashenko regime’s ‘highest priority’

Germany and Britain have demanded answers on the whereabouts of senior Belarusian opposition figure Maria Kolesnikova, who was reportedly snatched off the streets in central Minsk.

Kolesnikova was taken along with members of the Coordination Council, which was set up to seek a peaceful transfer of power amid widespread rejection of elections that gave Alexander Lukashenko 80% of the vote.

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Leaked EU cables reveal growing mistrust of UK in Brexit talks

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Brussels suspicions come as European commission chief warns Britain to abide by Northern Ireland protocol

Brussels’ plummeting trust in Boris Johnson has been laid bare in leaked diplomatic cables obtained by the Guardian, as the Brexit negotiations reopen in London with a warning from the European commission president that Britain must respect international law.

Ursula von der Leyen made her extraordinary intervention on Monday as Downing Street struggled to control the damage from disclosures suggesting it was backtracking on agreements made last year to avoid a hard border on the island of Ireland.

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