Author: staff

This is the return leg. US President Donald Trump went to Beijing in May, and Chinese President Xi Jinping is now expected to come to him, scheduled to arrive next Wednesday and depart on Friday with his wife, Peng Liyuan, skipping the UN General Assembly entirely. Beijing has not yet given the final confirmation, pending the meeting between US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng this weekend. The expected visit to Washington is Xi’s first since 2015, and two US- China state visits within five months are highly unusual. However, expectations are modest by design. “The…

Shakira will on Friday night in Madrid launch a marathon of 12 concerts that will bring her world tour to a close and end an eight-year absence from Spanish stages. The Colombian singer, 49, will perform until 11 October in a temporary venue with capacity for 50,000 spectators, erected in the south of the capital and dubbed “Shakira stadium”, according to Live Nation, the tour promoter. With no new European dates announced, Madrid authorities are counting on a major economic impact from her return to Spain. The city already hosted in May and June the ten concerts given by Bad…

Asked whether the meeting could provide an opportunity to discuss the associate membership idea with Australia, Podestà dismissed the suggestion. “We have a very strong and close relationship with our Australian partners,” she said. “All the rest is pure speculation, and we’re not going to enter into that.” Von der Leyen pitched Canada as a potential first EU “associate member” during her State of the Union address on Wednesday. Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney has welcomed the ambition behind closer EU-Canada ties but has stopped short of endorsing the proposed status. European Parliament President Roberta Metsola subsequently said countries such…

Published on 18/09/2026 – 17:46 GMT+2 Romania’s nominee for prime minister, Siegfried Muresan, has said he will attempt to form a government with a coalition involving three parties. The country’s president Nicusor Dan nominated Muresan after consultations with political parties. Muresan now has 10 days to present a cabinet to parliament and seek a vote of confidence. Muresan, who is a member of the centre-right National Liberal Party (PNL) and the European Parliament, says he will try to form a government with the PNL, the Save Romania Union (USR) and the ethnic Hungarian UDMR party. These three parties do not…

Three automated bins are being trialled at Shinjuku Station, where more than 2.7 million passengers pass through the wider complex each day. Standing just over one metre tall and moving at a cautious 20 centimetres per second, the machines can stop quickly around passengers. The trial began on 8 September and runs until 20 November on weekdays between 10:00 and 17:00 on the first basement-level paid concourse. Run by East Japan Railway in the world’s busiest rail hub, the project addresses a setting where fixed bins have been reduced for cleanliness and security, and traditional bins are emptied manually more…

easyJet cabin crew in Portugal are set to stage two strikes, the first from 2 to 6 October and the second from 19 to 23 December, with the action expected to affect the airline’s operations at Lisbon, Porto and Faro airports. According to the National Union of Civil Aviation Flight Personnel (SNPVAC), around 500 scheduled flights could be grounded during the October strike, excluding any minimum services imposed by the authorities. The walkout in December could have an even greater impact on the low-cost carrier’s operations, as it coincides with the busy Christmas travel period. easyJet cabin crew held an…

European airlines have been largely pushed down the pecking order in this year’s World Airline Awards, with Asian and Middle Eastern carriers dominating the top 10. Singapore Airlines took the overall title, followed by Qatar Airways and Cathay Pacific, while Turkish Airlines was the highest-ranked European carrier in fifth place. Just six European airlines made the top 20, with Air France, Lufthansa, Iberia, Virgin Atlantic and Swiss International Air Lines joining Turkish Airlines. The 2026 World Airline Awards were announced at a gala ceremony in London hosted by air transport rating organisation Skytrax. Known as “the Oscars of the aviation…

“We need to stop viewing assistance that enables Ukraine to defend itself as purely a matter of supporting Ukraine. It is also in NATO’s own interest … the more drones and missiles Ukraine can destroy in its own airspace, the fewer will cross the borders of neighboring NATO countries,” the envoy added. Getmanchuk underlined that Western countries still have stocks of interceptor missiles to donate, including missiles close to the end of their service lives. “There is hardly a better way to decommission them than by using them in the Ukrainian sky,” Getmanchuk said. Kyiv is proposing a workaround: allies…

Published on 18/09/2026 – 16:45 GMT+2 A 68-year-old Russian man, who travelled from the Russian Baltic sea enclave of Kaliningrad to Lithuania by river was met by border guards on the riverbank on Thursday afternoon and was sent back without being granted asylum. “After the swim, he was provided with dry clothing,” Lithuania’s State Border Guard press service told Euronews. “More details about his journey, such as the exact distance covered, the route or how long he was in the water, cannot currently be provided.” The man allegedly told Lithuanian authorities that he was fleeing Russia because of persecution over…

The Tunis Governorate announced suspension of afternoon classes across all public and private educational, training, and university institutions, citing warnings from the National Institute of Meteorology and advice from the regional disaster-prevention committee. Between 30 and 50 millimetres of rain were forecast across Greater Tunis in a short period, overwhelming drainage systems in several neighbourhoods. Water quickly covered roads and pavements, forcing residents to wade through flooded streets. Cars and buses struggled to pass, with some vehicles left stranded and one trapped beneath a tunnel. In the historic medina, residents took refuge in shops and under awnings as torrents of…