Month: October 2021

A man armed with a bow and arrows killed several people and wounded others Wednesday in southeastern Norway, police said, adding they had arrested the suspect.  “We can unfortunately confirm that there are several injured and also unfortunately several killed in this episode,” local police official Oyvind Aas told a news conference. The suspect “has been arrested by the police and, according to our information, there is only one person involved.”  The motive for the attack, which took place in several locations in Kongsberg, a city of about 26,000, around 6:30 p.m. local time (1600 GMT), was not yet known.  …

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The chief of the World Health Organization on Wednesday honored the late Henrietta Lacks, an American woman whose cancer cells were taken without her knowledge during the 1950s and ended up providing the foundation for vast scientific breakthroughs, including research about the coronavirus.    The recognition from WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus came more than a decade after the publication of “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks,” Rebecca Skloot’s book about the discrimination in health care faced by Black Americans, the life-saving innovations made possible by Lacks’ cells and her family’s legal fight over their unauthorized use.    “What happened to Henrietta …

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Human rights activist Julienne Lusenge of the Democratic Republic of Congo was recently proclaimed the winner of the 2021 Aurora Humanitarian Prize for her work with wartime victims of sexual violence. She was one of five humanitarian finalists who were up for the award, often referred to as the Nobel prize for humanitarian work. The sixth Aurora Prize for Awakening Humanity was announced Saturday (October 9) in Italy at a ceremony on the Venetian island of San Lazzaro degli Armeni. Lusenge was awarded the one-million-dollar prize for her tireless work with women and girls abused during wartime and for her …

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Syrian government forces backed by Russia have recently ramped up attacks against Idlib, the last rebel enclave. A Turkish military force stands in the way of Syrian troops that are poised to seize Idlib, a move Ankara fears could result in millions of refugees fleeing to Turkey. For VOA, Dorian Jones reports from Istanbul …

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Danish shipping giant AP Moller-Maersk said Tuesday it had started to divert vessels away from Britain’s biggest container port because of congestion, the latest fallout from multiple crises hitting the United Kingdom.  The country is suffering runaway energy prices, shortages of goods, fuel delivery issues and a worsening long-term shortage of lorry drivers, with post-Brexit immigration controls and the pandemic among the causes cited by experts.    Felixstowe in eastern England has been particularly hard hit, prompting Maersk to divert one ship each week out of the usual two or three that call there.  A company spokeswoman said the ships, each carrying thousands …

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Members of the G-20 group of industrialized nations have pledged billions of dollars in aid to prevent a catastrophe in Afghanistan, following an emergency meeting Tuesday. Henry Ridgwell reports. …

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Friends and colleagues of Jonathan Mirsky, an American journalist known as one of the sharpest observers of China, are reflecting fondly on his legacy ahead of his funeral in London Wednesday, one month short of his 89th birthday. Mirsky, who died in September, was a prolific writer, with hundreds of bylines inked in major publications in both Britain and the United States. In the end, the story of his life, how he changed from a self-professed “Mao [Zedong] fan” to one of the “sternest and most knowledgeable” critics of Beijing, as one obituary writer put it, was as much a …

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European Union leaders met Tuesday with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, pledging to strengthen ties and support the eastern European nation, particularly on the issue of Russia and energy security. Zelenskiy hosted EU Council President Charles Michel and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen for the 23rd EU-Ukraine summit, a meeting held annually to enhance political and economic relations.  The energy issue was high on the agenda. The Ukrainian leader has expressed strong opposition to the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, which will link Russia to Germany, bypassing his country and, Zelenskiy says, increasing Europe’s energy …

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A report produced by the British parliament says a state of “groupthink” among government officials led to a costly delay in ordering a nationwide lockdown in the first days of the COVID-19 pandemic.  The 151-page report from the joint science and health committees in the House of Commons says Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Cabinet deliberately engaged in a “slow and gradualist approach” in the first few months of 2020 as officials sought to manage instead of suppress the spread of the virus.  The joint inquiry says the virus was able to take hold across Britain because of that “fatalistic” strategy, …

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It was late last Christmas Eve when the European Union and Britain finally clinched a Brexit trade deal after years of wrangling, threats and missed deadlines to seal their divorce. There was hope that now-separated Britain and the 27-nation bloc would sail their relationship toward calmer waters. With Christmas closing in again one thing is clear — it wasn’t to be. Britain’s Brexit minister on Tuesday accused the EU of wishing failure on its former member and of badmouthing the U.K. as a country that can’t be trusted. David Frost said during a speech in Lisbon that the EU “doesn’t …

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