Author: staff
Published on 29/09/2026 – 6:34 GMT+2 An airstrike carried out by Myanmar’s military near a market in territory controlled by a powerful rebel group killed at least 49 people and wounded 58 others on Monday, according to representatives of the group and a rescue official. The attack in western Rakhine state was the latest in a series of deadly airstrikes against pro-democracy resistance forces and ethnic armed groups across the country. Myanmar has been in turmoil since the military seized power from the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi on 1 February, 2021, triggering widespread opposition. After security forces…
The global operational stock of industrial robots rose 9% last year to reach roughly 5.08 million units, the International Federation of Robotics (IFR) said in its annual World Robotics report published last Thursday. The IFR is a Frankfurt-based non-profit that has tracked the industry for close to three decades and represents more than 3,000 organisations worldwide. According to the report, annual installations of industrial robots jumped 11% to surpass 600,000 for the first time, reaching 603,000 units. “Industrial automation is progressing at high speed,” said Jane Heffner, the IFR’s president, adding that “the new mark of five million robots operational…
Another surge in energy prices risks making life even more expensive for Europeans — especially once winter rolls around. So when EU energy ministers meet in Dublin today, affordability will be at the top of their agenda. On the show, Zoya Sheftalovich and Ian Wishart discuss just how bad the price spike is and how the cost of gas could play out at ballot boxes across Europe. Next, what does it take to ensure people who want to live in the countryside can stay in the countryside? We discuss the Commission’s “Right to Stay” initiative, which aims to help people stay…
Social media posts claim that Denmark deliberately played the song “Send in the Clowns” before US President Donald Trump joined Denmark’s Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen and Greenland’s Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen for a deal-signing ceremony at the United Nations headquarters in New York. The claim was shared on X, Bluesky, Facebook and Instagram. On X, for example, one post garnered more than 1.3 million views. The clip shared shows a camera’s close-up on US Secretary of State Marco Rubio while the song’s lyrics include the line: “Where are the clowns? Send in the clowns. Don’t bother, they’re here.” While most…
Published on 29/09/2026 – 5:51 GMT+2 Pope Leo XIV said on Monday that concerns about artificial intelligence going rogue are not “fake news” and should be taken seriously, insisting that safety issues raised by AI experts should be discussed and acted on. The pontiff, who dedicated his first encyclical to AI and protecting humanity in its wake, was asked during a press conference about what the United States and China especially should be doing to prevent AI from posing catastrophic risks to humanity. US President Donald Trump has struck down concerns about AI, its rapid pace of development and potential…
“The public now often looks to Europe for overseas alliances, particularly as the U.S. is increasingly perceived as at best unreliable and at worst adversarial,” said Seb Wride, head of polling at public research company Public First, which conducted the poll for POLITICO. “But it’s not straightforward for the government. ‘Getting closer with Europe’ is not the same as ‘reversing Brexit,’ and Burnham will have a challenging needle to thread to appease his pro-European wings without reopening wounds the public would prefer stayed closed.” The Brexit referendum a decade ago divided the country, cost two prime ministers their jobs and…
Hungary’s parliament lifted the immunity of Prime Minister Péter Magyar and two former ministers under nationalist ex-leader Viktor Orbán on Monday, so they could be investigated in separate criminal cases. The probes against the Orbán-era ministers, who are suspected of corruption worth millions of euros, are the first graft investigations against top government figures from the former PM’s 16 years in power. Magyar, who is being probed separately for alleged theft, specifically asked for his immunity to be lifted so he could clear himself of “character assassination.” Parliament voted overwhelmingly in favour of lifting his immunity and that of former…
A couple of months earlier, a parcel — which turned out to contain a bomb — caught fire at DHL’s depot at Leipzig/Halle Airport. The perpetrators of this event, too, were later found to be working for Russia. And a few months before that, German authorities uncovered a Russian assassination plot against arms manufacturer Rheinmetall’s CEO. You all know about these cases, not just because I’ve written about them on these pages but because they were so brazen. And Germany is not the only country to see all manner of businesses — and even business executives — targeted by geopolitically…
Gabrielius Landsbergis, former Foreign Affairs Minister of Lithuania, said his country expects hybrid attacks by Russia to be “mitigated by the Allies”, as there is “so much Lithuania can do”. Landsbergis is aware that Southern European countries such as Spain have “different mentalities” when it comes to how they perceive Russian threats. Something that, for Northern Europeans, might be “very difficult to understand”, as for Lithuanians, it is an “existential threat”.
Biletskyi said the Third Corps deceived Russian forces into believing the main Ukrainian thrust would come toward Shandryholove and Zelena Dolyna, drawing Russian reserves into counterattacks there while Ukraine struck toward Nove. “This led them to senselessly burn through their reserves in counterattacks in that very sector. The Russians missed the real strike,” Biletskyi added. According to Bielieskov, the result undermines Russia’s theory of victory, which he said “hinged precisely on attempts to turn local advances in the Donetsk region into strategic successes.” He added: “The goal was to create the impression Russia would inevitably capture the Donetsk region, thereby…