Month: August 2023

All 105 soccer fans suspected of being involved in extensive clashes in the Greek capital that ended in the death of a 29-year-old AEK Athens supporter have been ordered to be detained pending their trial, authorities said Sunday. Three examining magistrates and two prosecutors questioned the detained fans in batches — 30 on Friday, 40 on Saturday and 35 on Sunday — and decided each day whether to detain them pending trial. One suspect, who is hospitalized under guard, gave a deposition to a visiting magistrate. The 102 Croat citizens and three Greeks have all denied any culpability in the …

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Paris prosecutors Sunday took over the investigation into the deaths of at least six migrants whose boat sank trying to cross the Channel between France and England, as police hunted the traffickers responsible. Prosecutors in the channel port of Boulogne opened an investigation Saturday, hours after the tragedy, but the investigation was switched to Paris, officials in both offices told AFP. Six Afghan men died when a migrant boat thought to have been carrying up to 66 people bound for England sank in the Channel in the early hours of Saturday. Most of those on board were Afghans with some …

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Greek prosecutors Sunday charged 35 more people in connection with the fatal stabbing of a young Greek football fan before a Champions League game, taking the total to face charges over the incident to 105. Of that number, 102 are from Croatia and suspected of links with the ‘Bad Blue Boys,’ hard-line supporters of Dinamo Zagreb who traveled to Greece last Monday, the day before their side’s Champions League qualifier against AEK Athens. The others are two Greeks and an Albanian. Authorities are hunting for another Greek national, also suspected of being involved in the fatal attack, according to the …

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The number of migrants dying in the Mediterranean is an “open wound” for humanity, Pope Francis said Sunday after a week marked by a string of deadly shipwrecks. At his weekly Angelus prayer, the 86-year-old pontiff offered his prayers for the 41 people reported missing Wednesday by four survivors brought to safety on the Italian island of Lampedusa. He recalled “with pain and shame” U.N. figures showing more than 2,000 migrants have lost their lives in the Mediterranean Sea since the start of the year. “It is an open wound in our humanity,” he told pilgrims gathered in St Peter’s …

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Poland’s ruling party wants to ask voters in a referendum whether they support accepting “thousands of illegal immigrants from the Middle East and Africa” as part of a European Union relocation plan, the prime minister said Sunday, as his conservative party seeks to hold onto power in an October parliamentary election. Mateusz Morawiecki announced the referendum question in a new video published on social media. It indicated that his party, Law and Justice, is seeking to use migration in its election campaign, a tactic that helped it take power in 2015. Poland is hosting more than a million Ukrainian refugees, …

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The Russian defense ministry said Sunday that a Russian warship fired warning shots on a Palau-flagged cargo vessel headed to the Ukrainian port of Izmail. The ministry said the shots were fired because the captain of the Sudru Okan had ignored demands from the warship to stop. After firing the shots, Russian military descended from a helicopter onto the cargo ship. After Russian forces inspected the Sudru Okan, the vessel was allowed to proceed to Izmail, the defense ministry said. Izmail is main export route for Ukrainian agricultural products. Russia withdrew from a Black Sea grain agreement in July. Meanwhile …

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More than 2,000 people have been evacuated from flooded areas of the Primorye region in Russia’s Far East, emergency officials said Sunday. Heavy downpours flooded villages in the region in the aftermath of Typhoon Khanun, which battered Japan earlier this week before making its way toward the Korean peninsula. The remnants of the storm, now downgraded from typhoon status, were slated to bring double the monthly rainfall to some areas of the region over the weekend, according to Russian state media. “More than 2,000 people, including 405 children, have been evacuated in Primorye,” the Russian Emergency Situations Ministry said on …

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Russia shot down a Ukrainian drone Sunday over Russia’s southwestern Belgorod region, according to Tass, the Russian state news agency. No fatalities or damages were reported. Also Sunday, the British Defense Ministry said there is “a realistic possibility” that Russia is no longer funding the Wagner Group, owned by Yevgeny Prigozhin, who openly called for a rebellion in June against Russia’s leadership. The ministry said the Wagner Group may be looking to Belarus for funding, but Wagner’s “sizable force would be a significant and potentially unwelcome drain on modest Belarusian resources.” On Saturday, Russia’s Foreign Ministry said it thwarted Ukraine’s …

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The post-pandemic travel boom and the high ticket prices that come with it show no signs of slowing well into next year, despite economic uncertainty and dwindling household savings. While questions linger about how much longer consumers will continue to indulge, airlines, hotels and analysts say travel has remained a top priority instead of the “nice to have” purchase as in years past. International travel reached around 90% of pre-pandemic levels this year, according to the International Air Transport Association. The rebound was led by visitors to Southern Europe from cooler climates despite soaring temperatures and included swaths of American …

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An investigation has been launched into the death of a Pakistani porter near the peak of the world’s most treacherous mountain, a Pakistani mountaineer said Saturday.   The investigation was prompted by allegations that dozens of climbers eager to reach the summit walked past the porter after he was gravely injured in a fall.  The accusations surrounding events on July 27 on K2, the world’s second-highest peak, overshadowed a record established by Norwegian climber Kristin Harila and her Sherpa guide Tenjin. By climbing K2 that day, they became the world’s fastest climbers, scaling the world’s 14 highest mountains in 92 days.  …

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Armenia called on the U.N. Security Council to hold an emergency meeting on the worsening humanitarian situation in Azerbaijan’s Nagorno-Karabakh region, which is mostly populated by Armenians.  In his letter to the president of the U.N. Security Council, sent Friday and released by Armenia’s Foreign Ministry on Saturday, Armenian U.N. Ambassador Mher Margaryan said the people of Nagorno-Karabakh were “on the verge of a full-fledged humanitarian catastrophe.”  Since December, Azerbaijan has blockaded the only road leading from Armenia to Nagorno-Karabakh, severely restricting the delivery of food, medical supplies and other essentials to the region of about 120,000 people.  “The Armenian …

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