Monday, December 23

Tag: Europe

Australian ambassador to return to Kyiv at critical point in Russia’s war on Ukraine

Australia's ambassador will return to Kyiv next month, almost three years after Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine prompted the embassy's evacuation. The announcement by Foreign Minister Penny Wong on her first visit to Ukraine since the unprovoked assault, followed repeated calls from Ukraine, including President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, to relocate Canberra's diplomatic representatives from Poland. The visit and reopening came at what Wong called "such an important time for your country and for the future of your people", amid huge uncertainty about what impact US President-elect Donald Trump will have on the war. Ukraine Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha‎, right, and Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong talk before a flower laying ceremony at the Memory Wall o...

Nato must switch to a wartime mindset, warns secretary general

The head of Nato has said it is time to "shift to a wartime mindset", as he warned the military alliance's members were not spending enough to prepare for the threat of a future conflict with Russia. Secretary general Mark Rutte said Moscow was "preparing for long-term confrontation with Ukraine and with us", describing the current security situation as the worst in his lifetime. "We are not ready for what is coming our way in four to five years," he said in his first major speech since becoming secretary general in October, urging members to "turbocharge" their defence spending. His comments come weeks before president-elect Donald Trump takes office, having previously suggested the US would not protect Nato allies that were failing to spend enough on defence. Reut...

French government teeters after PM Barnier forces through budget

Reuters Michel Barnier was appointed France's prime minister in September France's minority government is on the brink of collapse after Prime Minister Michel Barnier used special powers to force through his budget without a vote in parliament. Furious opposition parties said they would back a no-confidence motion to oust the former Brexit negotiator in a vote that could take place as early as Wednesday. Barnier opted to push through controversial reforms to social security by invoking presidential decree after failing to win enough support for the measures. One left wing French MP told the BBC the move had left France in "deep, huge political crisis". France has been beset by political uncertainty since President Macron called snap elections over the summer whi...

Nobel Prize in literature awarded to South Korean author Han Kang for her ‘intense poetic prose’

The Nobel Prize in literature has been awarded to South Korean author Han Kang for what the Nobel committee called "her intense poetic prose that confronts historical traumas and exposes the fragility of human life". Mats Malm, permanent secretary of the Swedish Academy's Nobel Committee, announced the prize in Stockholm on Thursday. Han, 53, won the International Booker Prize in 2016 for The Vegetarian, an unsettling novel in which a woman's decision to stop eating meat has devastating consequences. The Nobel Prize in literature has been awarded to South Korean author Han Kang. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man, File) Her novel Human Acts was an International Booker Prize finalist in 2018. The literature prize has long faced criticism that it is too focused on European ...

EU pledges to loan Ukraine up to $57 billion to help rebuild its economy and power grid

The European Union pledged on Friday to lend Ukraine up to €35 billion ($57 billion) as part of a loan package organised by the Group of Seven (G7) major industrial nations, as it seeks to help the country rebuild its economy and its war-shattered power grid. G7 leaders agreed in June to engineer a $US50 billion ($73.5 billion) loan to help Ukraine in its fight for survival. Interest earned on profits from Russia's frozen central bank assets would be used as collateral, but progress in distributing the loans has been slow. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, right, and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen greet each other in Kyiv, Ukraine, Friday, Sept. 20, 2024. (AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky) "We should make Russia pay for the destruction it cau...

Body of British tech magnate Mike Lynch among those recovered from yacht wreckage, officials say

The Italian coast guard said the body of British tech magnate Mike Lynch is among those recovered off the coast of Sicily from the wreckage of a superyacht whose builders had called unsinkable. One woman remains missing. She has not been identified, but Hannah Lynch, Lynch's 18-year-old daughter, is reportedly unaccounted for. The family had been celebrating his recent acquittal on fraud charges with the people who defended him at trial in the United States. Five others were recovered by rescue crews following Monday's tragedy. British tech giant Mike Lynch, his lawyer and four other people are among those missing after their luxury superyacht sank during a freak storm off Sicily early on Monday, August 19, 2024. (Composite) The Bayesian, a 56-metre British-flagged ...
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