Europe

Hundreds of Irish artists, including actors, novelists, playwrights, poets, designers, composers, architects, painters, sculptors, filmmakers and others, have expressed solid support for the international anti-Israel movement of Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS), and announced that they intend not to perform or exhibit in the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories. The Ireland Palestine …

The European Union has delivered enough coronavirus vaccine doses to member states to reach a target to fully vaccinate at least 70% of adults in the bloc, European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen said in a statement on Saturday. Von der Leyen, who had tweeted on May 9 that …

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez appointed a new foreign minister but retained his economy minister in a cabinet reshuffle on Saturday. Jose Manuel Albares was named foreign minister, while Isabel Rodriguez will become the new government spokesperson and territories minister. Nadia Calvino kept the economy portfolio and was also promoted …

According to early information, the 18-year-old deceased victim of the shooting was known to the police for drug trafficking. An unnamed assailant fatally shot one, and stabbed three other people on 9 July near a nursery school in the 11th arrondissement of Marseille, according to reports on the BFM channel …

Hundreds of migrants rescued in the central Mediterranean disembarked on Friday in the southern Italian town of Augusta, in Sicily, after Rome-based maritime authorities agreed to give their ship a port. The Ocean Viking vessel, operated by SOS Mediterranee, carried 572 people, including around 180 minors, after picking them up …

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov says the withdrawal of American forces from Afghanistan means the United States has recognized the failure of its two-decades-long mission in the country. “The United States is not merely withdrawing its troops from Afghanistan, it is doing that having actually recognized the failure of its …

Lithuania began building a barrier along its border with Belarus on Friday after accusing Belarusian authorities of flying in migrants from abroad to send illegally into the European Union. The first stretch of barrier will run 500 metres (1,640 feet) in length, measure 1.8 metres (six feet) in height and …

The European Commission has fined Volkswagen Group and BMW $1 billion for colluding with Daimler to hold back the development of technology that could have reduced harmful emissions from their vehicles. In a statement on Thursday, the Commission said the three German carmakers, along with Volkswagen subsidiaries Audi and Porsche, …

Newly-published research from France’s Pasteur Institute suggests that people are mostly protected from the Delta variant of coronavirus after two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine. The study, published in Nature journal on Thursday, tested the effects of exposure to the hyper-infectious strain first identified in India on 59 vaccinated people …

An airplane carrying nine people has crashed after takeoff outside Orebro, Sweden on Thursday, TT News agency said, citing authorities. “It is a skydiver plane that has crashed after takeoff,” Emil Gustavsson, rescue leader at the Joint Rescue Co-Ordination Centre, told TT. “We have no information regarding injuries for the …

Russia’s air force has conducted drills involving its nuclear-capable strategic bombers, the military said on Thursday. The Defense Ministry said that Tu-160 and Tu-95 strategic bombers took off from their base in the Saratov region on the Volga River and flew more than 4,000 kilometers (about 2,500 miles) to launch …

The UK has given the EU two weeks either to risk unilateral action by London or agree the Axis trade checks launched by the Brexit deal for Northern Ireland (NI). Warning over the maintenance of the NI Protocol crisis, the ministers said that a new “approach” will be set out …

Two men suspected of bombing a job centre in the southern Italian town of Avellino during last year’s lockdown were detained in a pre-dawn raid, the gendarmerie said on Thursday. Ubaldo Pelosi, 51, and Carmine Bassetti, 48, are accused of a terrorism-related act aimed at subverting the democratic order of …

Moscow will take all necessary measures if its state border in the Black Sea is violated, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Wednesday, commenting on a remark of British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab that UK Royal Navy ships would continue entering Ukrainian territorial waters. “[Both at the level of] …

Russia’s lead negotiator at Vienna talks says no date has been set for the seventh round of the negotiations to revive the 2015 Iran nuclear agreement, because Tehran needs more time following its June 18 presidential election. “The date of the beginning of the seventh round of the #ViennaTalks on …

There are no survivors after a plane carrying 28 people crashed in the far east of Russia on Tuesday, Russian news agencies cited rescue officials as saying. The Antonov An-26 twin-engined turboprop was en route from the regional capital Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky to Palana, a village in the north of the Kamchatka …

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov says Moscow strongly supports the Southeast Asian diplomatic efforts to end the post-coup crisis engulfing Myanmar. During a joint press briefing with his Indonesian counterpart, Retno Marsudi, in Jakarta on Tuesday, Lavrov said that Moscow considered the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)’s position “a …

Russia is tracking a Spanish naval ship in the Black Sea, the Interfax news agency cited Russia’s defence ministry as saying on Wednesday, as Ukraine and NATO countries both held military drills in the area. The ministry said the Spanish ship had entered the Black Sea on Wednesday to take …

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Wednesday that the situation in Afghanistan had a tendency to swiftly deteriorate and said Moscow was ready to defend its regional allies if necessary. Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday told Emomali Rakhmon, the president of Tajikistan, that Moscow would help the impoverished …

German police on Wednesday raided the living quarters of two possible accomplices of the jihadists who went on a deadly shooting rampage in Vienna last November, the Federal Prosecutor’s Office said. Police searched the homes of Kosovan national Blinor S. and German Drilon G., who is suspected of failing to …