It takes about an hour on the ferry, across often choppy waters, to reach the newest bit of the Netherlands. For those sailing in from the port of Lelystad, the first sign of the Marker Wadden is a long finger of sand dunes designed to protect against flooding.
“You see the cormorants, the black birds?” asks the environmentalist Roel Posthoorn, pointing skywards.
Continue reading...Organisers say move is intended to highlight the exploitation of African athletes in Europe
The organisers of a half-marathon in the northern Italian city of Trieste have been accused of racism over their decision to exclude African athletes from the race.
Fabio Carini, the president of Apd Miramar, the company organising the 5 May event, said the decision to only open the race to European participants was to call out the exploitation of African runners.
Continue reading...Vladimir Putin on Saturday described as “an outrage” the sentencing of Russian gun rights activist Maria Butina to 18 months in prison in the US, calling her treatment a travesty of justice.
Related: Trump withdraws from UN arms treaty as NRA crowd cheers in delight
Continue reading...Yellow wind warning covering Wales and central and southern England is in force
Storm Hannah has swept into the UK, bringing 82mph winds and heavy rain after battering Ireland and leaving at least 11,000 properties without power.
ESB Networks confirmed that 33,000 homes were impacted at the height of the storm on Saturday morning.
Continue reading...Sibeth Ndiaye is the plain-speaking communications guru who has been by the French president’s side since he was an ambitious minister. As she joins his cabinet, she talks about their political differences, les gilets jaunes, Brexit and racist attacks
During his rise to power, Emmanuel Macron, France’s youngest modern leader, was often seen surrounded by a close-knit group of identikit white male advisers in suits, fellow graduates of elite political schools, soon nicknamed “the Mormons” for their uniformity. But one woman stood out: Senegalese-born Sibeth Ndiaye, his media communications supremo. The straight-talking 39-year-old in a biker jacket played a key role in crafting Macron’s image as the change-making outsider; the man who built a new centrist party in order to fight the far-right Marine Le Pen, with his intriguing personal story as a gifted school pupil who married his drama teacher, Brigitte.
Often, when Ndiaye briefed the Paris media establishment on Macron’s policy ideas, she was the only minority ethnic person in the room. She remembers the exact moment Macron really understood how this felt. It was 2015, he was an ambitious economy minister in government under the Socialist president François Hollande, and she was organising the media scrum following him at an aviation show in a hangar north of Paris. But the police kept blocking her way. “Every time we got to a stand, the security cordon would stop me going through,” she says when we meet in her office. “Usually I’m incredibly strong in those situations. But this time – I don’t know why, maybe I was tired – I just cracked and I sat down and cried.” The local police chief stepped in and personally escorted her through the event.
Continue reading...Theresa May and Leo Varadkar announce plan for negotiations involving all major NI parties
The British and Irish governments have reached an agreement to establish a new round of talks involving all the main political parties in Northern Ireland, starting on 7 May.
Theresa May and the taoiseach, Leo Varadkar, credited the public response to the killing of Lyra McKee with the announcement on Friday of a fresh attempt to restore power sharing in Northern Ireland.
Continue reading...Professor Ton van Raan told use of phrase for ignored work is culturally insensitive
A leading American academic journal has refused to publish an article by a respected professor on the grounds that his use of the fairytale Sleeping Beauty as a metaphor for ignored scientific work is culturally insensitive and in danger of being “sexualised”.
Ton van Raan, a professor emeritus of quantitative science studies at Leiden University in the Netherlands, first likened the belated discovery of an academic work to the story of the Brothers Grimm fairytale some 15 years ago.
Continue reading...Rubbish, potholes and metro closures contribute to anger among visitors and citizens alike
As the day draws to a close in Rome, tourists are enjoying a nightcap at a bar on Piazza della Rotonda. In front of them stands the majestic Pantheon, the imposing domed temple built by Emperor Hadrian.
To their right, however, is a scene less befitting the piazza, famed for its elegance and history. A photomural of the temple covers boarding that surrounds a building under renovation and as the night gets later it is used to prop up a pile of rubbish bags and boxes discarded by nearby restaurants.
Continue reading...They put a recording studio in a rickety motorhome and crossed 33 countries – asking strangers to knock out a tearjerker
‘People asked us, ‘Are you crackers?’” says Gemma Paintin. She can see why. Along with fellow Bristol artist James Stenhouse, Paintin spent half of 2018 travelling around Europe in an old motorhome, recording love songs. Their epic trek took in almost 20,000 miles, 33 countries, 46 languages and 731 songs – each sung in their battered mobile studio, mostly by random strangers.
These ranged from a seven-year-old Greek boy singing the Kiss song I Was Made for Lovin’ You (“even the guitar parts”) to MEP Peter Simon, who laid down a German folksong. There was a singing security guard in Madrid and some lads in Leeds who bawled through Robbie Williams’s Angels. This, says Paintin, was “exactly how you’d expect a lad version of Angels to sound”.
Continue reading...As the right enlists bullfighters as candidates, animal welfare champions are polling well
If the polls and pundits are correct, Spain’s Vox party will achieve its much-prophesied breakthrough in Sunday’s general election, becoming the first far-right grouping to win more than a single seat in parliament since the country embarked on its post-Franco return to democracy.
Although Vox’s chances of attracting about 11% of the vote have hogged the headlines, another small party – and one with a markedly different worldview – is also gearing up for a historic day at the ballot box.
Continue reading...Landmark parliamentary address on LGBTI discrimination challenges reformist agenda of post-revolution government
Armenia’s first registered transgender woman has received death threats after making a historic speech in her country’s national assembly.
Lilit Martirosyan became the first member of her country’s lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) community to take to the parliamentary podium, speaking out against discrimination at a session of its committee on human rights. A video of the speech has been shared around the world.
Continue reading...President recognises protesters’ demands but vowed to still liberalise the economy
Emmanuel Macron has vowed to make his style of politics more “humane”, but insisted he would press on with his project to liberalise the French economy and overhaul its welfare state despite five months of demonstrations by gilet jaunes (yellow vest) anti-government protestors.
In his first press conference in two years as president, Macron promised €5bn (£4.3bn) worth of cuts to income tax for lower and average earners as well as pension rises for the poorest and vowed no more schools or hospitals would be closed during his presidency, as he responded to protests.
Continue reading...The warlord Khalifa Haftar, who controls eastern Libya, has never disguised his ambitions. Once one of Muammar Gaddafi’s generals, he returned from exile in the US when the dictator fell in 2011, attempted to launch a coup three years later, repeatedly declared his intention to take Tripoli and has said that his country may not be ready for democracy.
So the professions of shock from his backers when he mounted his assault on the western capital, held by the internationally recognised Government of National Accord, cannot be treated with great seriousness. The only real surprise about his advance was its timing. By moving while the UN secretary-general was in the country, to discuss arrangements for a UN-organised conference intended to lead to elections, he destroyed muted hopes of a political solution and underscored his already evident contempt for the process. As the prime minister, Fayez al-Sarraj, complained, the response of many supposed allies was silence.
Continue reading...Russian president offers North Korean leader help to break nuclear deadlock after Kim’s failed summit with Donald Trump
Vladimir Putin has offered Russia’s help to break the deadlock over North Korea’s nuclear weapons programme in his first meeting with the country’s leader, Kim Jong-un.
Putin and Kim greeted each other warmly on Thursday, shaking hands before beginning two days of highly anticipated talks at a university in Russia’s far-eastern city of Vladivostok.
Continue reading...Veggie 2.0 hopes to cater for growing appetite for plant-based food in Germany’s capital
Berlin’s first vegan canteen for students has opened its doors, reflecting a growing interest in eating only plant-based food in Germany
Veggie 2.0 is an experimental initiative of the Studierendenwerk Berlin, the state-run organisation governing student affairs. Its backers say they are responding to a growing trend towards veganism.
Continue reading...Former Ukip leader outlines ambition to take control of Brexit process at rally in Clacton
Nigel Farage has returned to the seaside town where Ukip had its first MP elected five years ago, promising at a rally in Clacton that his new Brexit party will use the momentum of European elections to oust a “remain parliament”.
Railing against a “political class” who he said had betrayed the people of Britain, Farage claimed to hundreds of supporters on Clacton pier that what was at stake was not just Brexit, but whether or not Britain was a democratic country.
Continue reading...Barriers put up to deter ‘careless’ tourists from seeking perfect picture among bulbs
Barriers and advertising banners are being erected around fields in the tulip bulb region of the Netherlands in an attempt to deter a growing number of tourists from flattening the flowers to take selfies.
Tourists have been seen jumping above the tulips to secure the perfect picture, or lying down in the middle of fields, squashing the bulbs.
Continue reading...North Korean leader’s entourage ensures dust-free welcome in Russia’s far east
As Kim Jong-un arrived at the Vladivostok railway station on Wednesday, white-gloved attendants ran alongside his armoured train, wiping the dust from any surfaces that the North Korean leader might touch exiting the carriage.
Before he could disembark, the train had to back up precisely so that the carriage doors lined up with the red carpet laid out for Kim’s arrival.
Continue reading...The North Korean leader arrived in Russia by train on Wednesday, a day before his much-anticipated summit with President Vladimir Putin. He visited with diplomacy over his nuclear programme deadlocked. Kim is travelling to the Pacific port city of Vladivostok for a meeting with Putin on Thursday
Continue reading...Measure on sexual violence in conflict passes after Trump administration threatened to veto document over references to reproductive health
The UN has backed a resolution on combatting rape in conflict but excluded references in the text to sexual and reproductive health, after vehement opposition from the US.
The resolution passed by the security council on Tuesday after a three-hour debate and a weekend of fierce negotiations on the language among member states that threatened to derail the process.
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