Category Archives: Europe

Irish pro-Palestine activists embrace ‘Paddystinian’ term as badge of honour

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Believed to have originated as an insult by Israel supporters, neologism is now used to campaign against war in Gaza

The term was coined to disparage Ireland’s solidarity with Palestine but has been adopted as a badge of honour that now adorns T-shirts, hoodies, pins and social media bios: welcome to Paddystine, home of the Paddystinians.

Irish activists have embraced the neologism as a galvanising term to campaign against Israel’s war in Gaza and to pressure the Irish government to do more to end the conflict.

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Any trade deal with US must be based on ‘respect not threats’, says EU commissioner

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Maroš Šefčovič’s remarks come after pace of talks prompted Trump to propose 50% tariff on goods from bloc

The European Union’s trade chief has struck a defiant tone after Donald Trump threatened to place a 50% tariff on all goods from the bloc, saying any potential trade deal between Brussels and Washington must be based on “respect not threats”.

The US president made his announcement after voicing frustration with the pace of progress on a trade agreement with the EU. The new rates would come into effect from 1 June.

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Russia launches one of biggest drone attacks on Kyiv since start of war

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Attack occurs hours after Russia and Ukraine begin prisoner exchange in deal seen as first step towards ceasefire

Russia has launched a large-scale drone and missile attack on Kyiv, injuring 15 people in one of the biggest assaults on the Ukrainian capital since the beginning of the war more than three years ago.

The attack came in waves, with Russia launching 14 ballistic missiles and 250 drones in the early hours of Saturday, although Ukrainian forces shot down six missiles and stopped most of the drones before they reached Kyiv.

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Trump’s Russia sanctions refusal leaves Europe with few options but to wait

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Frustration is growing amid increasing signs US could wash its hands of Ukraine, but some observers counsel patience

Gen Keith Kellogg, Donald Trump’s somewhat estranged special envoy on Ukraine, is said by some US diplomats to like to joke that the president did indeed say he would solve the Ukraine crisis in 24 hours, he just never specified which 24 hours.

Dark humour may be all that is left to Europeans as they absorb not just Trump’s refusal to impose the promised “bone-crushing sanctions” over Russia’s rejection of a 30-day ceasefire but also the increasing signs that the administration will wash its hands of Ukraine and instead focus on forging a new economic partnership with Russia.

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Sperm from cancer-risk donor used to conceive at least 67 children across Europe

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Case of man carrying rare genetic variant fuels calls for limit on number of children that can be fathered by one donor

The sperm of a man carrying a rare cancer-causing mutation was used to conceive at least 67 children, 10 of whom have since been diagnosed with cancer, in a case that has highlighted concerns about the lack of internationally agreed limits on the use of donor sperm.

Experts have previously warned of the social and psychological risks of sperm from single donors being used to create large numbers of children across different countries. The latest case, involving dozens of children born between 2008 and 2015, raises fresh concerns about the complexity of tracing so many families when a serious medical issue is identified.

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Four men guilty of Kim Kardashian jewellery heist in Paris

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Three pensioners and a man in his 30s jailed as four others convicted of related charges

Four men have been found guilty of breaking into a luxury residence in Paris and stealing jewellery worth millions of euros from the American reality TV star Kim Kardashian when she attended fashion week in 2016.

Three pensioners and one man in his 30s were convicted of carrying out the armed heist, which was thought to be the biggest robbery of an individual in France in 20 years. Four other people were found guilty of assisting in the plot or related charges. Two people were acquitted of accusations they handed out information about Kardashian’s whereabouts.

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Twelve injured after woman stabs people at Hamburg train station

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Police say six victims critically wounded in attack by 39-year-old assailant in Germany’s second-largest city

German police have arrested a woman after at least 12 people were injured in a knife attack at the main station in the northern city of Hamburg.

Some of the injured sustained life-threatening injuries in the stabbing, emergency services said, although the exact number remained unclear.

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Netanyahu accused of slander after criticising Macron, Carney and Starmer

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Israeli leader’s antisemitism claim labelled defamatory as he is warned against pursuing a war without end

Benjamin Netanyahu was accused of slander and pursuing a war without end after he claimed the leaders of France, Canada and the UK were stoking antisemitism and siding with Hamas by demanding he end the two-month blockade of food and aid into Gaza.

In what has become an extraordinary standoff with some of Israel’s closest allies, Netanyahu appeared to deliberately raise the stakes on Thursday night by accusing his western critics of abandoning Israel in a war for its very existence.

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Ukraine and Russia exchange 800 PoWs in largest prisoner swap of war so far

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Russian foreign minister continues to question Zelenskyy’s legitimacy as first phase of ‘1,000 for 1,000’ deal takes places

Ukraine and Russia have begun the largest prisoner exchange of the three-year war, with almost 800 captives returned on both sides in a process expected to last several days.

Confirming the first phase of the exchange had taken place, the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said Ukraine had returned 390 people to Russia and that the process would continue with further groups on Saturday and Sunday.

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Loan scheme to rearm Europe could be ‘important breakthrough’ in Ukraine support

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EU defence commissioner says he expects a lot of loan requests from member states under €150bn programme

A €150bn (£126bn) loans programme to rearm Europe that was finalised this week could be “a very important breakthrough” in the EU’s military support for Ukraine, the bloc’s defence commissioner has said.

Andrius Kubilius, a former prime minister of Lithuania who is the EU’s first defence commissioner, said he expected a lot of member states to request EU-backed loans under the €150bn Security Action for Europe (SAFE) scheme, which was approved on Wednesday.

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World’s seven wealthiest countries agree to counter China’s trade practices

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G7 finance ministers and central bank governors pledge to address ‘economic imbalances’, without naming China

Top finance officials from the world’s seven wealthiest democracies have set aside stark differences on US tariffs and agreed to counter global “economic imbalances”, a swipe at China’s trade practices.

Ahead of the meeting of G7 finance ministers and central bank governors there had been doubt about whether there would be a final communique, given divisions over US tariffs and Washington’s reluctance to refer to Russia’s war on Ukraine as illegal.

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‘It was so unreal’: Norwegian man wakes to cargo ship in his garden

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A 135-metre container vessel ran aground in Byneset, near Trondheim, narrowly missing a house

A Norwegian man has spoken of the “unreal” moment he woke up to discover that a 135-metre container ship had crashed into his front garden.

The cargo vessel, the NCL Salten, had run aground just before 5am on Thursday after entering the Trondheim fjord on its way to the western town of Orkanger.

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Five Valladolid fans given suspended prison sentences for Vinícius Júnior hate crime

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  • Insults were directed towards Brazilian in December 2022

  • La Liga hails judgment as ‘unprecedented milestone’

  • Luka Modric to leave Real Madrid after Club World Cup

Five Valladolid fans who abused the Real Madrid forward Vinícius Júnior have been given suspended prison sentences, in what La Liga described as a landmark ruling that condemned racist insults hurled in a football stadium as a hate crime.

The case goes back to Madrid’s 2-0 win in December 2022 at Real Valladolid’s José Zorrilla Stadium, during which several fans hurled racist abuse at the Brazilian. The individuals were later identified using images and videos published on social media.

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German troops start first permanent foreign deployment since second world war

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Heavy combat unit of 4,800 soldiers and 200 civilian staff inaugurated in Lithuania on Nato’s eastern flank

The German chancellor has visited Lithuania to mark Berlin’s first permanent foreign troop deployment since the second world war, as he called on allies to dramatically expand their efforts to bolster European defences against a hostile Russia.

As a crowd waved Lithuanian, German and Ukrainian flags, Friedrich Merz and his defence minister, Boris Pistorius, attended a ceremony launching the official formation of an armoured brigade aimed at protecting Nato’s eastern flank.

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Eva, one half of performance art duo ‘from the future’ Eva & Adele, has died

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Post on the pair’s Instagram page says ‘Eva returned to the future today’, having died at their home in Berlin after surgery on her spine

Eva, one half of the pioneering German performance art duo Eva & Adele, has died, her partner has announced.

“Eva returned to the future today,” a post on the pair’s Instagram page said on Wednesday. “She has left this world and stepped on to the eternal stage. Her faith in the power of art was never-ending.”

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UK government urged to introduce GCSE in Ukrainian for child refugees

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Children’s commissioner joins Kyiv in asking DfE to create new qualification to cope with ‘immense upheaval’ of fleeing war

The children’s commissioner has joined Kyiv in lobbying the UK government to introduce a new GCSE in Ukrainian to help child refugees cope with the “immense upheaval” of fleeing war in their country.

In December, the Guardian revealed that Ukraine was “deeply concerned” to discover many Ukrainian teenagers are being pressed into learning Russian in British schools because no GSCE in Ukrainian is available.

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Government considers sale of Brexit border checkpoint in Kent – reports

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New trade deal with EU could make 41 border control posts built after Brexit redundant

The UK government is reportedly considering selling a post-Brexit border check facility in Kent that could fall out of use as a result of this week’s trade pact with the EU.

The site, based in Sevington, Ashford, was erected in 2021 with capacity for 1,300 lorries that were expected to face extra checks on plants and animal goods, including dairy and meat, entering and leaving Britain after Brexit.

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Romania’s top court rejects far-right candidate’s attempt to annul election

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George Simion, a pro-Trump ultranationalist, had alleged foreign interference in rerun vote won by Nicușor Dan

Romania’s top court has unanimously rejected an application by the defeated far-right candidate in Sunday’s presidential election rerun, George Simion, to annul the vote on the grounds of foreign interference.

“Following deliberations, the constitutional court unanimously rejected the request … as unfounded,” the court said in statement on Thursday, adding that its decision was final and it would publish its full reasoning at a later date.

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European unity against Putin in peril if Trump moves to ease sanctions

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EU’s hopes of US increasing pressure on Kremlin have been dashed, and Hungary could yet make situation worse

European leaders – who have promised to impose “massive” new sanctions on Russia after Vladimir Putin’s rejection of a ceasefire in Ukraine – face the prospect of having to introduce their planned expansion of economic restrictions on the Russian war economy without the United States.

European hopes that Donald Trump might increase the pressure on the Kremlin were dashed after the US president’s two-hour inconclusive phone call with Putin on Monday. Trump did not follow through on previous threats to introduce “large-scale” sanctions on Russia if there was no ceasefire, but instead extolled the prospect of restarting trade with Moscow.

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European unity against Putin in peril if Trump moves to ease sanctions

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EU’s hopes of US increasing pressure on Kremlin have been dashed, and Hungary could yet make situation worse

European leaders – who have promised to impose “massive” new sanctions on Russia after Vladimir Putin’s rejection of a ceasefire in Ukraine – face the prospect of having to introduce their planned expansion of economic restrictions on the Russian war economy without the United States.

European hopes that Donald Trump might increase the pressure on the Kremlin were dashed after the US president’s two-hour inconclusive phone call with Putin on Monday. Trump did not follow through on previous threats to introduce “large-scale” sanctions on Russia if there was no ceasefire, but instead extolled the prospect of restarting trade with Moscow.

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