Jean Andre Quemener, 32, from Jersey, is killed in jump from 2,239-metre Sass Pordoi
A British Base jumper has died in an accident in the Italian Dolomites.
Jean Andre Quemener, 32, was reportedly unable to activate his wing suit after jumping from the 2,239-metre Sass Pordoi in Canazei, a mountain resort popular with Base jumpers in the Val di Fassa area.
Continue reading...Ivan Golunov who reports on corruption was arrested on controversial drug dealing charges
Thousands of protesters are to march in Moscow in support of Ivan Golunov, an investigative journalist arrested on controversial drug-dealing charges that are widely seen as an attempt to silence his reports on corruption.
More than 20,000 people have so far expressed an interest on Facebook in attending the march on Wednesday, which has not been sanctioned by the authorities. The protest will pass by the headquarters of the FSB state security service, before ending outside the interior ministry, which oversees the work of the police. Protests were also expected to take place in a number of other towns and cities across Russia, as calls grew for the charges against Golunov to be dropped.
Continue reading...Attempts to make Africa a zone of influence recall Soviet-era activity on the continent
In spring 2018 a group of foreigners flew to Madagascar. They had not come to see the island’s lemurs or wildlife. The visitors were undercover Russian political consultants. Their mission was to help Madagascar’s ruling president Hery Rajaonarimampianina – or “piano”, as they named him for reasons of brevity – to win re-election.
The plan did not work. Last November the incumbent president failed to make it into a run-off vote. Other Russian-supported candidates did badly. Late in the day Moscow threw its support behind the eventual winner, Andry Rajoelina, who has denied receiving any Russian assistance or money. But after six months on the ground the operatives who arrived on tourist visas went home with little to show for their efforts.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Kremlin ally Yevgeny Prigozhin leading push to turn continent into strategic hub, documents show
Russia is seeking to bolster its presence in at least 13 countries across Africa by building relations with existing rulers, striking military deals, and grooming a new generation of “leaders” and undercover “agents”, leaked documents reveal.
The mission to increase Russian influence on the continent is being led by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a businessman based in St Petersburg who is a close ally of the Russian president, Vladimir Putin. One aim is to “strong-arm” the US and the former colonial powers the UK and France out of the region. Another is to see off “pro-western” uprisings, the documents say.
Continue reading...Shrine honouring those who escaped to UK damaged in carefully planned attack
A memorial honouring the escape of mostly Jewish children from the Nazis, organised by Sir Nicholas Winton, has been damaged in an apparently carefully planned attack.
The Valediction Memorial at Prague’s main railway station – representing trains used to transport 669 children from the Czech capital to Britain – was left with a long crack across the length of a symbolic window pane.
Continue reading...We write as chief scientific advisors to the European commission, authors of the scientific opinion on EU authorisation processes of plant protection products referred to in your article (Science institute that advised EU and UN ‘actually industry lobby group’”, 3 June). We are a completely independent expert group basing our reports on a wide range of sources and evidence, including academia, practitioners, NGOs and industry, but quite separate from them.
The statement in your article that our report recommends “a slew of industry positions” on pesticides is incorrect. What was recommended in our report was that the European commission “facilitates a broader discussion throughout society to establish an EU-wide, shared vision for food production, including the role of plant protection products therein”. Likewise, it is incorrect to say that we recommend replacing current rules outlawing any products that could harm human health with a US-style concept of “acceptable risk”. What our report says is that the European commission should “re-examine the treatment of hazards, risks, costs and benefits – to provide reassurance that the system is fit for purpose”.
Professor Rolf-Dieter Heuer (Chair), Sir Paul Nurse and Professor Janusz Bujnicki
European commission group of chief scientific advisors
Ivan Golunov has been released from jail pending a trial on drug charges, which he says have been fabricated. Hundreds of supporters picketed police HQ in the lead-up to the surprise decision by the court. Here is the story of the case so far
Continue reading...Spanish architect’s masterpiece still unfinished but there’s now a chance its central towers will be completed
Property owners have a new yardstick for measuring their frustration over building permit requests that are lost in the labyrinth of local government bureaucracy.
Barcelona city hall has finally issued a work permit for the unfinished church designed by the architect Antoni Gaudí, 137 years after construction started on the Sagrada Família basilica.
Continue reading...Doctor says investigative reporter may have suffered concussion and broken ribs
A Russian investigative journalist arrested on controversial drug charges has been severely beaten in custody, his lawyer has said.
A doctor who inspected Ivan Golunov said he may have suffered broken ribs, concussion and a haematoma.
Continue reading...Simon Jenkins (It’s past time to move on from endless war remembrance, 7 June) writes that “too much remembering is a dangerous business”; to which the only answer is: “Try the alternative.” All will agree that the sacrifice of those who fought to defeat the Nazis should be properly commemorated. Many will also agree that, within that context, the terrible price paid by the Russians in defeating Hitler has not been properly acknowledged.
But that is where the “remembering” comes in, and the “butcher’s bill”, as Churchill put it, should not be the only mark by which a nation’s contribution is judged.
Continue reading...Dollar slides after America only created 75,000 new jobs last month, weaker than the 175,000 expected
Earlier:
Let’s get some details on the weakest US jobs report in three months.
The government cut 15,000 jobs in May, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, while private companies hired 90,000 people.
The unemployment rates for adult men (3.3 percent), adult women (3.2 percent), teenagers (12.7 percent), Whites (3.3 percent), Blacks (6.2 percent), Asians (2.5 percent), and Hispanics (4.2 percent) showed little or no change in May.
Continue reading...€72m makeover will create mile-long stretch of pools, fountains and parks
A garden stretches for a mile, free of cars with one of the world’s most recognisable monuments at its centre. Crossing the river on a tree-lined and lawned bridge, the roar of traffic has been replaced by the sound of water from fountains.
Such is the vision for the Eiffel Tower, which is at the centre of a major makeover project to transform one of Paris’s most visited districts.
Continue reading...City tops list of 50 European ports for both sulphur oxide and nitrogen oxide emissions
The port of Barcelona, a city already overwhelmed by mass tourism, has topped a list of 50 European ports for the amount of air pollution produced there by cruise ships, according to a report.
In 2017 cruise ships emitted 32.8 tonnes of sulphur oxide (SOx) in Barcelona, according to the research. Palma de Mallorca was the second most polluted, with 28 tonnes, followed by Venice with 27.5. Southampton, with 19.7 tonnes, was fifth on the list.
Continue reading...Photographer Tom Skipp visited Chernobyl and nearby Pripyat, its replacement town Slavutych, and the abandoned sites of the region – meeting the people behind the disaster: from the liquidators who worked at the fallout site, to the resettlers and the community who live and work in the area now
I arrived in Ukraine on the eve of the 32nd anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster. I had not intended for it to be the focus of my time in Kyiv, but leading up to my departure it became an obsession. My arrival in Kyiv on 25 April 2018 was maybe happenstance of planning but I was impelled to head straight from the airport to Slavutych. This was the town built to replace Pripyat and host the evacuated personnel of the Chernobyl power plant, after the decision was made to continue power production following the disaster. All of the Soviet republics were called upon to hurriedly help with the construction of what would eventually be the last atomic town.
Continue reading...Government caves in after protests from rights groups and senior judicial officials
Greece’s government has rushed to revise legislation that redefines rape after unprecedented criticism from activists, human rights groups and senior judicial officials.
The law, part of a new penal code submitted to parliament by Alexis Tsipras’ administration only weeks before snap elections, had raised fears of convicted rapists being treated more leniently.
Continue reading...The biggest Women’s World Cup in history is kicking off at the Parc des Princes on Friday but in the city there is not the air of anticipation you would expect
With the biggest Women’s World Cup in history kicking off at the Parc des Princes in Paris on Friday, the head of the local organising committee was bullish in his response to criticism over the lack of atmosphere and marketing in the French capital.
“Depends what you’re expecting from posters and setting up an event in the city?” shot back Erwin Le Prevost. “The means we have available to us are becoming bigger in every competition thanks to Fifa support. It’s a Women’s World Cup by Fifa, the main aim is to fill the stadiums and to have the biggest TV audience possible.”
Continue reading...King Felipe has tasked acting prime minister Pedro Sánchez with assembling a coalition
Spain’s King Felipe VI has tasked acting prime minister Pedro Sánchez with forming a new government, a complex undertaking that will involve negotiations with diverging parties.
While they won a general election in April and gained lawmakers compared with the previous term, Sánchez’s socialists failed to secure a majority in parliament and will need the support of other groupings.
Continue reading...Elliott Abrams says Russians ‘have not abandoned’ Nicolas Maduro despite US president’s tweet
The US special envoy for Venezuela has said that Moscow has “not abandoned” the regime of Nicolás Maduro and that the Russian presence in the South American country has not significantly changed since the failed uprising in April led by opposition leader Juan Guaidó.
Donald Trump tweeted earlier this week that “Russia has informed us that they have removed most of their people from Venezuela”, but the claim was quickly disputed by the Kremlin.
Continue reading...In a post-Brexit world British forces will be operating under different rules of engagement
It was impossible not to be moved by the dignity of the diminishing band of D-day veterans in Normandy, 75 years after “the longest day” led to the opening of a new western front that helped bring about Adolf Hitler’s downfall.
Men like Kenneth Hay, who read a poem, Normandy, by another veteran, Cyril Crain, to the congregation at Bayeux Cathedral. As he spoke its concluding words, “When my life is over and I reach the other side, I’ll meet my friends from Normandy and shake their hands with pride”, his voice began to break.
Continue reading...Three magistrates singled out over their challenges to government’s hardline immigration policies
A simmering row over the rule of law and the independence of the judiciary in Italy has erupted after the far-right interior minister publicly singled out three magistrates who have challenged his hardline anti-immigration policies.
In an escalation of his battle with the judges and the courts, Matteo Salvini said he would ask the state attorney to examine whether the magistrates should have abstained from passing verdicts in cases involving immigrants because their opinions conflict with government policy on security and immigration.
Continue reading...