Month: July 2024

HAMBURG, Germany — He has a broken nose that requires him to wear a vision-limiting face mask. He is managing fitness issues stemming from the end of the club season. He has scored only one goal — from the penalty spot.  The European Championship is hardly going as planned for Kylian Mbappé, and he knows it.  “These are the vagaries of the footballer,” the France captain said after his latest below-par par performance at Euro 2024.  He doesn’t really care, though, as long as he is lifting the Henri Delaunay Cup in Berlin on July 14.  Mbappé was so fatigued, so …

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LONDON — British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said Saturday that he is scrapping a controversial Conservative policy to deport asylum-seekers to Rwanda as he vowed to deliver on voters’ mandate for change, though he warned it will not happen quickly. “The Rwanda scheme was dead and buried before it started,” Starmer said in his first news conference. “It’s never acted as a deterrent. Almost the opposite.” Starmer told reporters in a wood-paneled room at 10 Downing St. that he was “restless for change,” but would not commit to how soon Britons would feel improvements in their standards of living or public …

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KYIV, Ukraine — Russia launched an overnight drone attack across Ukraine on Saturday, hitting an energy facility in the Sumy region in the northeast of the country, officials said. Ukrainian mobile drone hunter groups and air defense units shot down 24 of the 27 Russian drones fired on 12 regions, the air force said. National grid operator Ukrenergo said the energy facility in the Sumy region was damaged, forcing emergency electricity shut-offs for industrial consumers in the city of Sumy. Repair teams were working to restore supplies, it said. There were no immediate reports of casualties or other damage details from …

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LONDON — Newly elected British prime minister Keir Starmer on Saturday began his first full day in charge with a meeting of his Cabinet after his Labour party’s landslide election win ended 14 years of Conservative rule. Starmer held his first Cabinet meeting at 11 a.m. (1000 GMT), with Britain’s first woman finance minister Rachel Reeves and new foreign minister David Lammy in attendance. The Labour leader spent his first hours in Downing Street on Friday appointing his ministerial team, hours after securing his center-left party’s return to power with a whopping 174-seat majority in the UK parliament. “The work of …

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Lausanne, Switzerland — In the battle against drug use at the Paris Olympics, the International Testing Agency plans to deploy a more streamlined, high-tech approach to identify and target potential cheats. In an interview with Agence France-Presse, Benjamin Cohen, director general of the ITA, said potential tools at its disposal included biological and performance passports as well as a mountain of other data. Upgraded software, possibly using artificial intelligence, could also help; an investigative unit aided by whistleblowers was making inroads; and increased cooperation with sports bodies and police was bearing fruit. The ITA, which was founded in 2018, runs the …

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Kyiv, Ukraine — On his way to the Kyiv train station to greet his wife and daughter returning from Poland to Ukraine, Oleksander Tryfonov made a stop.    He bought two red roses from one of a half-dozen flower shops lining a dimly lit underpass — something beautiful for the two most precious people in his life.    “I haven’t seen them for two years,” Tryfonov, a burly 45-year-old driver said of his family. “Flowers are important for women.”    Flowers have always been linked with Ukraine’s culture, but since Russia’s 2022 invasion, their significance has only grown, with blooms becoming a symbol of …

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BUCHAREST, Romania — A court in Romania’s capital ruled Friday that social media influencer Andrew Tate can leave Romania but must remain within the European Union as he awaits trial on charges of human trafficking, rape and forming a criminal gang to sexually exploit women. The Bucharest Tribunal’s decision to allow Tate, 37, to leave the country was hailed by his spokesperson, Mateea Petrescu, as a “significant victory and a major step forward” in the case. It is not clear whether prosecutors can or will appeal the court’s decision. Tate, a former professional kickboxer and dual British U.S. citizen, was initially …

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washington — The United States has flatly rejected Russia’s claim that it has not violated international sanctions imposed on North Korea, calling on Moscow to stop illegal arms transfers from Pyongyang. “The U.S. and like-minded countries have successfully highlighted Russia’s U.N. Security Council Resolutions violations,” a State Department spokesperson said in an email to VOA’s Korean Service on Wednesday, responding to an inquiry made about Russia’s denial of violating North Korea sanctions. “Unfortunately, we now have a permanent member of the U.N. Security Council willing to openly flout sanctions to support the Kim [Jong Un] regime’s priorities.” The spokesperson continued: “We …

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