Month: August 2022

Americans danced in the streets over the death of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. The killing of his successor has been met with a more muted response - but those robbed of their loved ones by Ayman al-Zawahiri's actions say his death matters too. On 11 September 2001, roughly five seconds before American Airlines Flight 11 hit the north tower of New York's World Trade Center, the plane flew directly over Charles G Wolf's apartment building. Trained as a pilot, Mr Wolf, 68, knew instantly that a twin-engine plane was flying dangerously low at full throttle through Manhattan - and his worst fears were soon validated. The hijacked flight crashed directly into the building where Katherine, his Welsh-born wife of 13 years, worked. She was among 2,977 peopl...

A huge nuclear power plant occupied by Russian forces in the war zone of southern Ukraine has been described as "completely out of control" by the head of the UN's nuclear agency. Every principle of nuclear safety has been violated at the Zaporizhzhia plant, Rafael Grossi said. A range of things that "should never be happening in any nuclear facility" were taking place there, he said. Mr Grossi said he was hoping for permission to organise an inspection. Grain ship cleared to sail to Lebanon The first grain ship to depart Ukraine since Russia launched its invasion has been cleared to leave Turkish waters for Lebanon. The Razoni's cargo of 26,000 tonnes of corn, Oboz Canada and its crew, were inspected by a team of of...

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban may have alienated his EU neighbours, who accuse him of undermining democracy, but he will get a warm reception thousands of miles away at a conservative conference in Texas on Thursday. How did this unlikely love affair blossom? "He has a real hunger for knowledge," says Zsuzsa Hegedus about her friend Viktor Orban. "So apart from the fact that we laughed a lot… he wasn't just interested in what I had to say, he really wanted to understand." That was in 2002, when they first met in her leafy garden in the upmarket Budapest residential suburb of Pasaret - the Pasha's Meadow, named after the last Turkish ruler of the city. That passion for learning accompanies Orban to this day - he reads widely, peppers h...

Mr Simpson and his co-founder opened Clayton & Crume, an upmarket leather goods outlet, in the city of Louisville, Kentucky, in 2019, six months before the start of the coronavirus pandemic. After surviving the various lockdowns, he says that customer numbers are still below where they were three years ago. "I can't say walk-ins and foot traffic are really happening like it was," says Mr Simpson. "So of course the pandemic had an effect." His shop is based in downtown Louisville, and more specifically in the fashionable East Market or "NuLu" district. This is home to upscale restaurants, bars, art galleries, and other boutique stores. Clayton & Crume first started serving cocktails in June, and Mr Simpson says the aim is to "make it a...

The 12-metre vessel, which had set sail from Portugal's capital Lisbon, sent out a distress signal late on Monday evening from the Atlantic Ocean. Spanish coastguards found the upturned boat, but the sea was too rough to rescue him - so the sailor had to wait until morning. The man's survival was "verging on the impossible", said coastguard divers. His boat sent a distress signal at 20:23 local time on Monday, 14 miles (22.5 km) from the Sisargas Islands, near Spain's north-west Galicia region. A rescue ship carrying five divers as well as three helicopters set off to find and rescue the man, who has not yet been named. A diver was winched onto the ship's hull to seek signs of life and the man responded by banging from inside. ...

Russian energy giant Gazprom says it is impossible to take back a turbine that is vital for gas supplies to Europe due to Western sanctions. The 12m (40ft) turbine is stranded in Germany after returning from Canada where it was repaired. Berlin insists the equipment is not affected by sanctions and accuses Russia of not honouring its contracts for political reasons. Recently, Gazprom has drastically reduced gas deliveries to Europe. The key Nord Stream 1 pipeline from Russia to Germany is running at 20% capacity. Moscow supplied the EU with 40% of its natural gas last year, and the cuts have caused wholesale prices to increase dramatically. Some countries are struggling to buy enough gas to put into storage for the win...