Two people critically hurt when vehicle carrying HGV drivers hit stationary train in Calais, say French authorities
Nineteen people have been injured after a minibus collided with a stationary freight train at the loading platform of the Eurotunnel near Calais, French authorities have said.
Pas-de-Calais underprefect Agathe Cury said 18 passengers and the bus driver were injured in the incident.
UK defence secretary says he has been ‘reassured directly’ counterpart Pete Hegseth that Starlink system has been restored as he seeks to cool tensions
Wes Streeting urged the US to stand by Ukraine on his visit to the American capital and sought to cool tensions between the two countries in the wake of the Starlink row that is threatening to set back Kyiv’s war effort.
The British defence secretary, giving a speech before a meeting with his US counterpart, Pete Hegseth, argued that supporting Ukraine was in the long-term interests of Washington, and a business opportunity.
Nato source says drones came from Russia, while Romania’s president says attacking commercial ships ‘is unacceptable and has to stop’
Seven sailors are missing after drones struck two tankers near Romania’s Black Sea coast, setting them ablaze and raising fresh security concerns on a vital shipping route used by Ukraine.
A Nato military source told Reuters the drones that had hit the Wine Trader and the Yara J came from Russia. “The drones that caused the fires on board two tankers inside Romanian territorial waters were of Russian origin,” the source said.
Worshippers are attending mass and praying for Pope Leo XIV's recovery after doctors removed cancerous tissue on 13 October. The 71-year-old pontiff was diagnosed with lung cancer before undergoing an operation. The Vatican has reported his recovery is progressing as expected and the pope has thanked well-wishers for their prayers
Official guidance says ammonia in animal urine should be watered down to stop it corroding bark
A neighbourhood in Vienna has introduced guidelines for dog walking, including the use of bottled tap water to rinse away urine and protect vulnerable trees.
Neubau, an up-and-coming, densely populated district dotted with cafes and galleries, rolled out the Schönes Gassi (nice dog walk) campaign this week.
Exclusive: Aleksandar Vučić personally intervened to push plans for controversial $500m Trump Tower in Belgrade, which sparked protests and a criminal case
Serbia’s authoritarian ruler personally intervened to advance an allegedly illegal scheme to hand over a protected site in Belgrade for a Trump tower, the Guardian can reveal.
Aleksandar Vučić summoned officials to a meeting at his presidential offices about the project, which has culminated in a landmark indictment of senior figures from his regime on charges of abuse of public office.
Demonstrators demand resignation of Edi Rama after three days of clashes in capital Tirana
Albania’s prime minister has said he will not resign as a protest movement, initially prompted by a proposal to build a Trump family-backed resort in the Balkan state, turned violent with clashes convulsing the capital for a third consecutive day.
Speaking on Thursday after calls by students who this week assumed control of the anti-government demonstrations that have rattled Tirana since June, Edi Rama said: “Governments are changed through democratic elections. We had elections last year, not a revolution.”
Moscow sends swarms of drones to attack infrastructure in central Ukraine as Zelenskyy says Kyiv will restart strikes on Russian oil refineries
The White House’s unilateral effort to negotiate an energy ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine has collapsed as Moscow sent a record swarm of drones overnight to attack infrastructure in central Ukraine and Kyiv appeared to resume strikes on Russian oil refineries despite warnings from Donald Trump.
Moscow accused Ukraine of launching a strike against a Russian oil refinery in the Ryazan region, its first since Trump abruptly declared an “energy ceasefire” that neither Russia nor Ukraine said they had agreed to.
While presidents of both parties have long rewarded donors and allies with plum ambassadorships, Trump has chosen loyalists willing to go to bat for him regardless of the implications for US-foreign relationships.
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Just as the leaders sit down at the big table in Brussels, Romania has said that seven people are still missing after a fire on a vessel in Romanian territorial waters of the Black Sea.
Suspected Russian drones have hit several ships off Romania and neighbouring Bulgaria since last week in a spillover from the Ukraine war, AFP reported.
The 1926 film of Goethe’s tragic tale of a man who sells his soul to the devil remains a spectacular feat of German expressionism
The centenary of FW Murnau’s silent fantasy-melodrama from 1926 is the occasion to ponder this mysterious film, taken from Goethe’s 19th-century depiction of the alchemist and natural philosopher who sells his soul to the devil but, in a very high-minded climax of German romanticism, is redeemed by love. (Not love of God precisely, but love of a good woman; the word “Liebe” finally appears at the centre of Murnau’s radiating vision of concentric circles conjured by the heavens, which annul his debt to the Evil One.) It is therefore very different from Christopher Marlowe’s scarier and more unforgiving account of Doctor Faustus.
Murnau’s Faust is (obviously) concerned with and animated by evil, and there are echoes of his Nosferatu, made four years previously. In this film, Faust, having struck his bargain on a provisional 24-hour basis with Mephisto, finds that he is scared of a crucifix, like a vampire. It is also very much a film of Weimar Germany with its mad energy and streaks of garish satire and black comedy; the book-burning scene in which Faust immolates all his necromancy volumes, along with the Bible, is one which resonated with later events. (Perhaps it indirectly inspired Klaus Mann’s novel Mephisto, later to be filmed by István Szabó.)
The late Christoph Schlingensief was one of German art’s great provocateurs. Can his B-Movie horror aesthetics still shock us into thinking anew about media power, colonialism, and the far right?
Christoph Schlingensief certainly knew how to provoke. “Fury at German play that shows Queen as a Nazi,” read the Sunday Express’s headline after Kaprow City first premiered at Berlin’s Volksbühne theatre in 2006. Drawing on the happenings of US performance artist Allan Kaprow, the play turned its attention to Diana, Princess of Wales’s death. In one scene, the then queen performs a Hitler salute. Another re-enacts the paparazzi chase that led to Diana’s fatal crash. Diana appears in bed beside two men with Down’s syndrome; and Camilla is pelted with animal blood. Schlingensief insisted the work was not meant as provocation but as an investigation into how Diana turned into a modern icon. But his art thrived on outrage, exposing the absurdity of societies that glorify their idols while consuming their lives as entertainment.
Kaprow City is at the heart of a new Berlin show – It’s Not My Problem Anymore, Deal With Your Own Shit – that revisits the artist’s legacy. In the Gropius Bau’s grand neo-Renaissance atrium, visitors encounter remnants of the carousel-like rotating stage he called the “animatograph”. Looking at this installation today feels like a glimpse into Schlingensief’s mind: a messy collage of childhood memories, violent fantasies and royal glamour.
Above the rain-soaked streets of Warsaw, the observation deck of the Varso tower overlooks Joseph Stalin’s gift to Poland that has divided opinion for decades.
For some, the Soviet-era Palace of Culture and Science is a drunk confectioner’s nightmare; standing as a relic of oppression that should have been demolished. For others, it is an icon on the skyline and a monumental warning from history.
In today’s newsletter: As Russia resists a ceasefire and Trump’s shifting priorities unsettle allies, an end to the conflict isn’t getting any closer
Good morning. In his usual asinine unconventional approach to international relations, Donald Trump announced on Sunday (via Truth Social, how else) an “ENERGY CEASEFIRE in the War between Russia and Ukraine”, apparently without checking with either side. Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who said any such deal was “news to me,” nonetheless declared he was “ready and we will accept it”. Vladimir Putin responded by blowing up some Ukrainian power plants.
This has been the tenor of much diplomacy during Trump’s tenure: false starts, U-turns, incoherent positions (and some playful flirting with Vlad). Meanwhile fighting continues, and America’s allies attempt to manage the fallout. Andy Burnham hosted Zelenskyy at Downing Street yesterday, stating the UK is doubling down on its support for Ukraine, and pointedly calling on others to “follow suit”.
UK | Sally Rooney has said she is being forced to withdraw her books from sale in the UK because of her support for the banned organisation Palestine Action.
EU | Britain will benefit from much closer trading relations with the EU even if that means giving up its ability to negotiate free trade agreements, the Scotland secretary has said.
Ukraine | Ukraine’s military has suddenly had its access to Starlink satellite internet terminals restricted as the Trump administration has increased pressure on Ukraine to immediately halt long-range strikes on Russia’s oil industry.
Vaccine | Guinea-Bissau has not approved the controversial hepatitis B study in newborns that would be funded by the US government and private partners, the African country’s minister of health said.
Lyrical lines printed on side of city’s fleet of rubbish trucks now recognised as one of Netherlands’ proud traditions
It is best known for its rich migration history and striking modern architecture. But now the Dutch city of Rotterdam is seeking recognition for a rather different characteristic: its tradition of printing poetry on bin trucks.
Since a poetry festival first came up with the idea in 1988, lines of verse have been printed on all of the city’s waste vehicles. The practice was this week elevated to the status of intangible cultural heritage, with formal recognition from a Dutch body that guards the nation’s traditions.
Solidarity with Palestine’s suffering is punished but MEPs allow a witch-hunt of European Muslims
For three painful years, Israel’s genocidal war in Gaza, in retaliation for the Hamas terror attacks on 7 October 2023, has killed more than 74,000 Palestinians, wounded thousands more and reduced most of the territory to rubble. It has changed views of Israel across the world, increased support for Palestine and raised questions about US power.
Europe’s failure to hold Israel’s government to account has cost it global credibility and influence. But I fear something even more consequential than that: Gaza is changing Europe itself.
Shada Islam is a Brussels-based commentator on EU affairs. She runs New Horizons project, a strategy, analysis and advisory company
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A Russian strike last year is estimated to have inflicted tens of millions worth of damage to the site of the nuclear power plant. What we know on day 1,695
Britain will provide £17m ($23m) to fund critical repairs to the Chornobyl power plant hit by a Russian drone attack, as Andy Burnham seeks to bolster support for Ukraine amid doubts about long-term US commitment. The UK will help restore its protective shelter and ventilation, which were damaged by an attack last year, amid concerns that corrosion could create longer-term environmental and safety risks, the chancellor and foreign secretary announced on Thursday. The pledge comes after Burnham hosted Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Downing Street, where he told the Ukrainian president the UK was “behind you and that will not change”.
The meeting came during a period of strained relations between Kyiv and Washington after it emerged that Ukraine’s military has had its access to Elon Musk’s Starlink technology throttled in key areas, in effect rendering most of the drones used to strike behind the frontlines inoperable and reducing its air defences.
Russia is already at war with Nato, a former top commander of the military alliance has said. Retired four-star general Curtis Scaparrotti, who served as Nato’s supreme allied commander Europe from 2016 to 2019, warned there was a long-term plan behind the Kremlin’s “spurious activities” against member countries and stressed the need to protect critical facilities. “If you looked at it from their spectrum, we’re at war with Russia today, within the alliance, because they’re taking actions that are intended to undermine individual countries’ capability to support warfare, undermine their civilians’ confidence in their own government or within Nato, and to break Nato,” he said in Washington.
The US proposed European countries unfreeze some Russian sovereign assets and transfer them to a vehicle overseen by Washington in an attempt to revive peace talks, the Financial Times reported on Wednesday. European delegates reportedly rebuffed the plan from US special envoy Steve Witkoff and Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner.
Questions over the future of support in Europe for Ukraine were highlighted on Wednesday by surging far-right parties. France’sMarine Le Pen, who on current polling is predicted to win next year’s presidential vote, said Paris cannot keep financing Ukraine due to the “perilous” state of the euro zone’s second-biggest economy. Germany’s far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) and the small leftist BSW party joined forces on Wednesday to pass a symbolic motion in the state parliament of Saxony-Anhalt calling for an end to Berlin’s military support for Ukraine. The motion has no practical effect, because state parliaments have no role in foreign policy.
Shares in European satellite operator Eutelsat have soared following news of Ukraine’s difficulties with Starlink technology, fuelled by investor bets that European providers could benefit from growing strains between Washington and Kyiv. But experts say Europe does not have a ready-made alternative that Ukrainian soldiers could attach to their drones. Christian Freiherr von der Ropp, an independent satellite consultant, said Eutelsat’s OneWeb network was not well suited to wartime use and would require the replacement of thousands of Starlink terminals. European defence commissioner Andrius Kubilius said at a conference in Brussels on Wednesday that the continent was quite dependent on American space capabilities. “The answer to that situation is to develop our own capabilities,” he said.
Throttling of mobile internet system will affect Kyiv’s air defences more than its strikes on oil refineries. Now Zelenskyy must be hoping that US intel holds
In Ukraine the situation was already jittery enough. Donald Trump has been inventing ceasefires and buying Russian diesel to shore up his flagging popularity, while a sinister new wave of faster, jet-powered drones are breaking through Kyiv’s stretched air defences. Casualties are rising as the weather turns.
Overnight, Russia bombed three power plants that supply Kyiv, aiming to cut off heating and electricity to the city. According to the president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, for a second night in a row no warning came from Ukraine’s western allies of the incoming ballistic missiles – and so no air raid alert was issued.
The Spanish prime minister has been a lonely champion of progressive values in the EU. But the polls look ominous
When it comes to risk-taking, Spain’s prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, has a formidable track record. In 2018, the Socialist party leader swept to power by triggering a no-confidence vote that unexpectedly ousted his centre-right predecessor Mariano Rajoy. He held on to it against the odds after calling a snap election in 2023, at a time when the popularity of his own party had plummeted and the far right was on the rise.
As he endures another rocky period in office, Mr Sánchez has once more rolled the dice. Last week, he announced a snap poll for November after his minority government was blocked from passing measures to ease Spain’s chronic housing crisis. The eviction of 87-year-old María del Carmen Abascal from her Madrid home sparked nationwide protests over soaring rents and prices. The outrage grew with news of her death last Wednesday. Mr Sánchez clearly hopes that campaigning on a national cause célèbre gives him a chance of winning a stronger progressive mandate next month.
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Dozens of people detained after government building and two banks set on fire as tens of thousands march over education costs and corruption
Tens of thousands of students have taken to the streets of Tirana, the Albanian capital, setting alight a government building and two banks and hurling stones at police during a protest over rising education costs and corruption.
Police responded with water cannon and teargas to disperse protesters who started a fire at the ministry of education building, overturned bins and smashed the fronts of local businesses. A branch of Raiffeisen Bank near the education ministry also caught fire.
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