Category Archives: Europe

Weatherwatch: 2018 heatwave left people praying for rain

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While temperatures in the UK were just about tolerable last summer, Europe faced serious extremes

Last year brought the summer of the heatwave. As Britain baked in sunshine, the England men’s football team even managed to reach a World Cup semi-final.

But while temperatures in Britain remained just the right side of uncomfortably hot, much of Europe experienced serious extremes, in the continent’s warmest August on record. And far from being confined to the area around the Mediterranean, even Scandinavia had worryingly hot weather.

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G7 summit: last rites of old order as Trump’s theater looms next year

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Leaders put on a show of common endeavor with awareness that meeting could be a lot worse next year when Trump will be circus master

If next year’s G7 summit turns out to be a branding event at a Trump golf resort in Florida, with Vladimir Putin as de-facto co-chair, the old guard among America’s allies will look back on this year’s meeting in Biarritz with some nostalgia.

Related: Trump defends bid to host G7 at his Miami resort: 'I don't care about money'

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Netherlands euthanasia case: doctor ‘acted with best intentions’

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Prosecutors say doctor still broke law in trial on whether dementia patient could have given consent

A doctor has gone on trial in the Netherlands in a landmark case expected to probe the law on whether patients with advanced dementia can give consent to assisted dying.

Prosecutors argue the unnamed female doctor “acted with the best intentions” but broke Dutch euthanasia law by failing to ensure the consent of a 74-year-old woman with advanced dementia, who may have changed her mind about dying.

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Belgian anti-racism activist forced to flee town in blackface row

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Folkloric festival urged to ditch practice of parading a chained white man in black makeup

An anti-racism activist has said he was forced to leave the Belgian town of Ath on Sunday after a row with local authorities about a folkloric festival.

A carnival float featuring a white man in blackface called “the savage” featured on Sunday as part of Ath’s annual festival, despite calls to abandon the practice, which campaigners say is an act of “symbolic violence” towards black people in Belgium.

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Room in the middle: the artisan revival of Portugal’s interior

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A small but growing number of investors are hoping to reverse the slow-motion decline of rural areas

The decade has not been kind to Manteigas. Nestled in the mountains in the Portuguese interior, this pretty town has suffered a familiar kind of slow-motion decline.

“Once the factories started closing, then the schools closed, the shops closed, even the chapel closed,” says Maria José Santos Salvado, a wizard with needle and thread who was laid off as a textile patcher when her factory shut in 2011. “All the young people left. Manteigas became a town of old people.”

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French climate activists protest as Macron attends G7 summit

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Marchers carrying inverted portraits of president demand more action on climate crisis

Hundreds of climate activists have marched in south-western France carrying portraits of President Emmanuel Macron that they had illegally removed from town halls and which police had been seeking to recover amid a judicial crackdown.

As the G7 leaders met in Biarritz, demonstrators from a nationwide civil disobedience movement demanding more action on the climate emergency appeared in nearby Bayonne brandishing dozens of portraits the state accuses them of stealing from civic buildings.

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Nearly 900,000 asylum seekers living in limbo in EU, figures show

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Backlog of claims persists despite number of arrivals almost halving in two years

Close to 900,000 asylum seekers in the EU are waiting to have their claims processed, according to figures from the European statistics office.

Women, men and unaccompanied children are living for years in uncertainty, with numbers of pending applications for international protection almost unchanged from two years ago when 1.1 million migrants were “stuck” in the continent.

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Barcelona police spare bathers’ blushes with clothing ‘robbery kits’

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Initiative particularly welcome among those who have clothes stolen on city’s nudist beaches

Police in Barcelona have handed out more than 100 emergency clothing kits to bathers who return from a swim to find everything they left on the beach has been stolen by the thieves who plague the city’s shoreline.

The “robbery kits”, made up of a T-shirt bearing the city council logo, a pair of shorts, flip-flops and a metro ticket, are particularly appreciated by swimmers on the city’s nudist beaches of Sant Sebastià and Mar Bella whom thieves have left exposed.

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Boris Johnson: no deal would mean UK did not owe Brexit divorce bill

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PM says keeping £39bn is not threat but ‘reality’ before meeting with Donald Tusk

Boris Johnson has said the £39bn Brexit divorce bill would not “strictly speaking” be owed to Brussels in full in the event of no deal, insisting: “It’s not a threat. It’s a reality.”

Speaking to broadcasters as he prepared to meet the European council president, Donald Tusk, at the G7 summit in Biarritz, Johnson said: “If we come out without an agreement it is certainly true that the £39bn is no longer, strictly speaking, owed.”

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Italy’s parties scramble to form government by Tuesday deadline

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Choice of PM proves main obstacle as PD and M5S try to head off far-right coalition

The name of the next Italian prime minister is the main hurdle in talks between the anti-establishment Five Star Movement (M5S) and the centre-left Democratic party (PD) as they scramble to form a new government by Tuesday and avoid early elections that could put Matteo Salvini at the head of a far-right coalition.

The PD leader, Nicola Zingaretti, has objected to demands from his M5S counterpart, Luigi Di Maio, to reinstate Giuseppe Conte as prime minister. Conte resigned on Tuesday, ending the ill-fated 14-month alliance between M5S and the far-right League.

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G7: Scott Morrison to push for action against online terrorist content

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Australia’s PM flies into Biarritz, where he will have talks with world leaders – and a chat with Donald Trump

Scott Morrison will try to push countries further on taking action against terrorist and violent extremist material on social media during a series of meetings on the sidelines of the G7 summit.

Australia’s prime minister arrived in the French surfing town of Biarritz on Saturday night (early Sunday AEST) for the high-powered international forum.

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Macron hopes to convince G7 leaders to halt trade war and heal divisions

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French president Emmanuel Macron has said he hopes to convince world leaders to pull back from trade war and heal growing divisions at the G7 summit in Biarritz, despite signs that will be a daunting task.

Related: Boris Johnson prepares for Biarritz balancing act with Donald Trump

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Trump plans to open US consulate in Greenland despite row over offer to buy

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  • State details plan to Senate foreign relations committee
  • President cancelled Denmark visit over notion of purchase

The Trump administration is planning to open a US consulate in Greenland for the first time in decades, amid increased strategic and economic interest in the Danish territory.

Related: Sorry, Mr Trump – Greenland’s no go. But can I interest you in our little island? | Jack Bernhardt

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Biarritz in lockdown as G7 summit descends on French resort

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More than 13,000 police arrive in town with authorities saying any unrest will not be tolerated

The French seaside resort of Biarritz is under lockdown by security forces ahead of the G7 summit, with more than 13,000 police as well as a special magistrates court set up to try anyone committing offences.

The historic centre of the Basque town was emptied of tourists on Friday before the arrival of leaders of the world’s advanced economies including the US president, Donald Trump, and the UK prime minister, Boris Johnson, who will hold three days of talks on global issues from the climate emergency to trade wars.

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Paris prosecutor opens child rape inquiry linked to Epstein case

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Investigation to focus on potential crimes against citizens in France and abroad

The chief Paris prosecutor has announced that he is opening an investigation into the rape of minors and a series of other charges linked to the Jeffrey Epstein case.

A statement issued on Friday by the office of Rémy Heitz said the decision to open a preliminary investigation was based on “elements transmitted” to his office and “exchanges with American authorities”.

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France and Ireland declare opposition to trade deal over Amazon fires

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Brazil’s handling of forest fires set to top agenda of G7 countries at meeting in Biarritz this weekend

Amazon fires: what is happening and is there anything we can do?

France and Ireland have said they will oppose an EU trade deal with South American countries unless Brazil takes action to stop the burning of the Amazon.

On the eve of a meeting of the G7 nations in Biarritz, an Élysée source said Emmanuel Macron thought Brazil’s president, Jair Bolsonaro, “lied” to him at the G20 meeting in Osaka in June about his climate commitments and therefore France would oppose the Mercosur treaty.

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Deutsche Bank to pay $16m to settle US ‘princelings’ case

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Regulator had said it corruptly hired unqualified relatives of foreign officials to win business

Deutsche Bank has agreed to pay a $16m (£13m) fine to US authorities overallegations that it hired unqualified relatives of powerful Russian and Chinese government officials to win business.

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) alleged that Germany’s largest lender had used false books to record the hirings, which meant the relatives – known in China as “princelings” – did not have to go through rigorous interview processes.

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French wine-makers hope for G7 detente with Trump over tariffs

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Trump has threatened high tariffs on French wine in response to Macron’s tech tax

French wine-makers are increasingly concerned about Donald Trump’s threats to introduce high tariffs on French wine in retaliation for Emmanuel Macron’s tax on global technology companies, as world leaders gather for the Biarritz G7 summit this weekend.

A new front in Trump’s international trade wars could open up across France’s vineyards, damaging the livelihoods and jobs of small producers, if the US president decides to substantially increase tariffs on French wine as punishment for what he has called the “foolishness” of the new levy on the annual revenues of technology companies.

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Macron thinks he can handle Trump, but G7 will put that to the test

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Trump’s mood is volatile, and the French leader’s approach has had only limited success

Emmanuel Macron reckons he has found the best way of dealing with Donald Trump. It involves acceptance that the US president’s mind will not be changed where a campaign promise is involved. But on everything else – keep talking.

Macron’s method is about to be put to the test once more as Trump arrives on Saturday to join the G7 summit of the world’s major industrialised democracies in Biarritz. So far, the results have been thin at best.

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Italy’s president gives parties four days to form stable government

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Sergio Mattarella said that without a stable coalition Italy would have to head to the polls

Italy’s president has given the country’s main political parties four more days to negotiate the formation of an alternative government after the collapse of the stormy alliance between the far-right League and anti-establishment Five Star Movement (M5S).

Sergio Mattarella said on Thursday night that the crisis must be “resolved quickly” and that without a solid majority the only other option would be new elections.

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