Month: November 2023

Greek police have arrested six people who they say are members of a large human trafficking gang that violently extorted money from migrants to assist them in crossing into neighboring Albania and travel to European Union countries to the north. The six suspects — a Syrian, a Palestinian and four Iraqis — were arrested Saturday at a village less than 10 kilometers (six miles) from the Albanian border, police said Sunday. Seven more members of the gang were arrested in the same area on Sept. 28. At that time, 11 migrants had been found detained in shacks and abandoned military …

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Russia launched its largest drone strike to date on Ukraine over the weekend. Kyiv says it destroyed all but one, but falling debris caused several injuries and damaged buildings. A top U.N. official called for continued solidarity with Ukraine. VOA’s Arash Arabasadi has more. …

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Russia has added the spokesperson of U.S. tech giant Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, to a wanted list, according to an online database maintained by the country’s interior ministry. Russian state agency Tass and independent news outlet Mediazona first reported on Andy Stone’s inclusion on the list Sunday, weeks after Russian authorities in October classified Meta as a “terrorist and extremist” organization, opening the way for possible criminal proceedings against Russian residents using its platforms. The interior ministry’s database does not give details of the case against Stone, stating only that he is wanted on criminal charges. According to …

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The Ukrainian military destroyed eight of nine attack drones launched overnight by Russia, the air force said Sunday, a day after what Ukrainian officials said had been Russia’s largest drone attack of the war. There were no immediate reports of damage or about where the remaining drone had struck. Kyiv was rocked Saturday by Russia’s largest drone attack since its invasion of Ukraine in February of last year. Ukraine said it shot down 74 of the 75 Iranian-designed Shahed drones launched by Russia in a six-hour air raid. Five people, including a child, were wounded in the attack, according to …

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Israel’s Foreign Ministry said Sunday that it would summon the Irish ambassador over a tweet celebrating the release of a 9-year-old girl from Hamas captivity, alleging the post didn’t adequately condemn the militant group. Earlier Sunday, the Irish prime minister lauded the release of Emily Hand, an Israeli-Irish girl whose story has captivated both nations. “An innocent child who was lost has now been found and returned, and we breathe a massive sigh of relief. Our prayers have been answered,” Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar posted on the X platform, formerly known as Twitter. The girl was initially believed to …

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Pope Francis, suffering from a “lung inflammation,” appeared seated in the chapel of his residence instead of in St. Peter’s Square while an aide read the pontiff’s Sunday message.  The 86-year-old pope, wearing his traditional white robes and with a bandage on his right hand, remained seated next to the aide during the reading.   “Dear brothers and sisters. Happy Sunday. Today, I cannot appear at the window because I have this problem of an inflammation in the lungs,” Francis said.  Francis went to a Rome hospital on Saturday for a scan that the Vatican said had ruled out lung …

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The British Defense Ministry said in its daily intelligence update on Ukraine that Russia’s recent transport movements indicate that Russia has “likely moved” its strategic air defense systems from its Baltic coast enclave of Kaliningrad. This move from Kaliningrad which is surrounded on three sides by NATO member states highlights “the overstretch the war has caused for some of Russia’s key, modern capabilities.” Saturday was Holodomor Remembrance Day in Ukraine, a time when Ukrainians remember the famine that starved several million people to death in the 1930s because of Soviet policies. The Holodomor — which means “death by starvation” in …

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Pepe’s meal is so good he licks the plate clean. In any other Rome establishment, slobbering on one’s chicken and mashed potato would be frowned upon — but this is “Fiuto”, Italy’s first dogs’ restaurant. The lighting is soft, lounge music plays in the background, attentive staff show people and pets to their tables and ask whether furry, four-legged customers might fancy a boiled egg with pureed peas and fontina cheese? Or perhaps a simple fish with ricotta and courgettes? Thirsty pups can opt for a green apple and watermelon juice, or go wild and have a pear, strawberry or …

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As he sits in Geneva, Michel Dreifuss does not feel all that far away from the Hamas attack on Israel on Oct. 7 and Israel’s subsequent bombardment of Gaza. The ripples are rolling through Europe and upending assumptions both global and intimate — including those about his personal safety as a Jew. “Yesterday I bought a tear-gas spray canister at a military-equipment surplus store,” the 64-year-old retired tech sector worker said recently at a rally to mark a month since the Hamas killings. The choice, he says, is a “precaution,” driven by a surge of antisemitism in Europe. Last month’s …

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A Ukrainian soldier who was posthumously awarded a medal after a widely shared video showed him declaring “Glory to Ukraine” before apparently being shot dead, was commemorated with a statue in his northern hometown Saturday.  The video shared in March showed a man the military later named as Oleksandr Matsievskiy, a sniper with a unit from the region of Chernihiv, saying “Slava Ukraini,” a phrase more than a century old that has become a popular expression of resistance to Russia’s February 2022 invasion.  Standing smoking a cigarette in a wooded area, carrying no visible weaponry, Matsievskiy is then seen slumping …

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One of the world’s largest icebergs is drifting beyond Antarctic waters after being grounded for more than three decades, according to the British Antarctic Survey.  The iceberg, known as A23a, split from the Antarctic’s Filchner Ice Shelf in 1986. But it became stuck to the ocean floor and had remained for many years in the Weddell Sea.  The iceberg is about three times the size of New York City and more than twice the size of Greater London, measuring around 4,000 square kilometers.  Andrew Fleming, a remote sensing expert from the British Antarctic Survey, told the BBC on Friday that …

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Tens of thousands of people turned out on central London’s streets on Saturday for a pro-Palestinian march calling for a permanent cease-fire in Gaza.  At least five people were arrested on suspicion of inciting racial hatred, police said.  The National March for Palestine was the latest of several huge protests staged in the British capital and many European cities every weekend since the Israel-Hamas war began last month.  Saturday’s protests came on the second day of a four-day cease-fire that has allowed critical humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip and given civilians their first respite after seven weeks of war.  …

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Tens of thousands took to the streets of Italy’s main cities Saturday to mark International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, just as an Italian man suspected of killing his ex-girlfriend was extradited from Germany. The slaying of 22-year-old university student Giulia Cecchettin, allegedly at the hands of her former boyfriend, sparked outrage across Italy, where on average one woman is killed every three days. Suspect Filippo Turetta, 21, landed at the Venice airport around mid-morning Saturday. He was immediately transferred to a prison in the northern city of Verona to face questions in the investigation into Cecchettin’s …

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