International

Fighting in southern Ukraine as offensive expectations build

MOSCOW, June 9, 2023 (AFP) – Fighting raged Friday in Ukraine’s southern Zaporizhzhia region, a Russian official said, with observers seeing the combat as the possible start of Kyiv’s long-expected offensive. Ukraine has not offered any confirmation but expectations have built for months over when its forces, bolstered with Western weapons and training, would launch a counter-offensive in a bid to reclaim land occupied by Russian forces. The fighting comes as the humanitarian and environmental […]

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Trump indicted in classified documents probe

WASHINGTON, June 9, 2023 (AFP) – Donald Trump said Thursday he has been indicted over his handling of classified documents after leaving office, the US ex-president’s most serious legal threat yet as he pursues a second White House term. “The corrupt Biden Administration has informed my attorneys that I have been Indicted, seemingly over the Boxes Hoax,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform as he broke the bombshell news of a historic moment for […]

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Two children ‘still critical’ after France knife attack

PARIS, June 9, 2023 (AFP) – Two children were fighting for their lives a day after being stabbed by a man in a park in the French Alps, the government said Friday. “There are still two children considered to be in critical condition,” government spokesman Olivier Veran said in an interview with French media, adding that the children had undergone “surgical interventions”. He also cautioned against jumping to conclusions in the case, in which the […]

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Developing story: Drone hits residential building in Russian city of Voronezh: governor

  MOSCOW, June 9, 2023 (AFP) – A drone hit a residential building in Russia’s southern city of Voronezh Friday injuring two people, the local governor said. Drone attacks have hit Russian cities — including the capital Moscow — often in recent months as Kyiv says it is preparing for a major counteroffensive. Friday’s attack was the first in Voronezh, a city of some one million people that lies in a region deeper inside Russia […]

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A decade on, giant duck brings a friend home to roost in Hong Kong

By Celia CAZALE and Holmes CHAN Agence France-Presse HONG KONG, June 9, 2023 (AFP) – Ten years after a giant inflatable yellow duck captivated crowds in Hong Kong, the art installation returned to the city’s Victoria Harbor on Friday as a double-bill exhibition. The twin 18-metre-tall (59-feet) sculptures by Dutch artist Florentijn Hofman are part of the Rubber Duck series that has made appearances in major cities since its 2007 debut. The faddish artwork previously […]

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Sahara salt diggers struggle to maintain centuries-old trade

By Camille LAFFONT Agence France-Presse BILMA, Niger, June 9, 2023 (AFP) — At the edge of an oasis almost engulfed by the dunes, where the rare caravan still passes, is a desert landscape punctured by holes. The salt pans of Kalala, near Bilma in northeastern Niger, were once an essential stop for traders with their swaying lines of camels. Salt digging, carried on from generation to generation, was a thriving business, involving a commodity so […]

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Deadly dreams: record Everest season among most dangerous

By Paavan MATHEMA Agence France-Presse KATHMANDU, June 9, 2023 (AFP) — Scaling Everest is always dangerous, but expedition organizers have warned that a combination of extreme weather, corner-cutting on safety, and inexperienced and “impatient” foreign climbers has resulted in one of the peak’s deadliest mountaineering seasons. As the last search and rescue teams hang up their boots and the tent city at base camp packs up for the year, expert climbers say several of the […]

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Indonesia’s Anak Krakatoa volcano erupts, spews huge ash column

JAKARTA, June 9, 2023 (AFP) — Indonesia’s Anak Krakatoa volcano erupted on Friday, belching a column of ash more than three kilometers into the sky, officials said. The volcanic island emerged from the sea at the beginning of the last century from the crater formed after the 1883 eruption of Mount Krakatoa — one of the deadliest and most destructive in history. Anak Krakatoa, which means “Child of Krakatoa”, spewed thick ash over the strait […]

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With bows and spears, Indigenous ‘warriors’ defend the Amazon

By Hervé BAR Agence France-Presse JAVARI, Brazil (AFP) — In a remote pocket of the Brazilian Amazon under siege from illegal fishermen, poachers, loggers and drug traffickers, Indigenous people have taken it upon themselves to defend the land and its resources. With bows, arrows and spears, young men of the Sao Luis village patrol the Javari River by motorboat in the valley of the same name. They call themselves the “Warriors of the Forest,” the […]

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Sudan declares UN envoy Volker Perthes ‘persona non grata’

KHARTOUM, Sudan (AFP) — The Sudanese government has declared United Nations envoy Volker Perthes “persona non grata”, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced. “The Government of the Republic of Sudan has notified the Secretary-General of the United Nations that it has declared Mr. Volker Perthes … persona non grata as of today,” the ministry said in a statement on Thursday, just weeks after army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan accused Perthes of stoking the country’s conflict […]

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Canada wildfires spark ‘ecoterrorist’ conspiracy theory

By Gwen Roley Agence France-Presse MONTREAL, Canada (AFP) — As Canada hurtles towards its worst wildfire season in history, a conspiracy theory has taken off online claiming environmentalists intentionally set some of the blazes. “I bet a good portion of the wildfires raging across the country were started by green terrorists who want to give their climate change campaign a little boost,” Maxime Bernier, a former foreign minister-turned fringe party leader, said in a June […]

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Anger as pre-historic stones destroyed for French DIY store

RENNES, France (AFP) — Around 40 standing stones thought to have been erected by prehistoric humans 7,000 years ago have been destroyed near a famed archaeological site in northwest France to make way for a DIY store, an angry local historian has revealed. The stones in Carnac were between 50-100 centimeters (20-40 inches) high and stood close to the main highly protected areas of one of Europe’s largest and most mysterious pre-historic tourist attractions. “The […]

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