An Israeli raid on the occupied West Bank’s Jenin refugee camp on Thursday killed nine Palestinians including an elderly woman, Palestinian officials said, also accusing the forces of using tear gas inside a hospital children’s ward. The death toll rose to “nine martyrs including an elderly woman,” the health ministry said, with multiple wounded. In a separate statement, Palestinian …
Japanese Prime minister Fumio Kishida pledged on Monday to take urgent steps to tackle the country’s declining birth rate, saying it was “now or never” for one of the world’s oldest societies. Japan has in recent years been trying to encourage its people to have more children with promises of cash bonuses and better benefits, but it remains one …
BROVARY, Ukraine (Reuters): Sixteen people including Ukraine s interior minister and other senior officials were killed on Wednesday when a helicopter crashed in a suburb outside Kyiv, the national police chief said. The helicopter came down near a nursery in the town of Brovary on the capital s eastern outskirts. Two children were among the dead and 10 were in …
SHANGHAI, Jan 4 (EW): A senior doctor at one of Shanghai’s top hospitals has said 70 per cent of the megacity’s population may have been infected with Covid-19 during China’s huge surge in cases, state media reported on Tuesday. The steep rise in infections came after years of hardline restrictions were abruptly loosened last month with little warning or …
NEW YORK, Dec 26 (AFP): More than 200,000 Americans woke up without power on Christmas morning as a days-long winter megastorm that hammered several eastern US states on Sunday left more than 20 people dead. The extreme weather, a mix of prolonged blizzards and historic cold, plunged wind chill temperatures in all 48 contiguous US states below freezing this …
WELLINGTON, Dec 5 (Reuters): The New Zealand government said on Monday it would launch an inquiry into the country’s handling of the Covid-19 pandemic so future governments could learn from the experience. A Royal Commission, a public inquiry of the highest level in New Zealand, would look at the overall response, the government said in a statement. That would …
(Reuters): Landslides after heavy rains in southern Brazil left dozens of people missing in Parana state and cut off access to a major port for grains and sugar shipments, authorities said on Wednesday. The BR-277 road to Paranagua and Antonina ports has been closed to vehicle traffic toward the coast since Tuesday. The Parana state government said it expected …
LONDON, Nov 30 (EW): Fewer than half of people in England and Wales identify as Christian, according to census data released on Tuesday, underlining a landmark shift towards secularism in multicultural Britain. The findings from the 10-yearly census, carried out in 2021, came just over a month after Rishi Sunak become Britain’s first Hindu prime minister. They showed rapid …
Iranian protests have spread into the stands and onto the pitch during the 2022 World Cup, as supporters – and the Iranian players – have used the event to speak out for and against the country’s leadership. FRANCE 24 meets Iranian football fans in Qatar. “In Iran, it’s impossible to separate politics and football,” said Ali Houman, a 53-year-old engineer who …
SHARM EL-SHEIKH, Nov 15 (EW): The world population surged past 8 billion people on Tuesday, the United Nations said, warning that more hardship is in store for regions already facing resource scarcity due to climate change. Whether its food or water, batteries or gasoline, there will be less to go around as the global population adds another 2.4 billion …
