Author: staff
Updated: 31/12/2025 – 18:00 GMT+1 Catch up with the most important stories from around Europe and beyond this December 31st, 2025 – latest news, breaking news, World, Business, Entertainment, Politics, Culture, Travel. … More
Published on 31/12/2025 – 18:40 GMT+1 Pope Leo XIV brought 2025 to a close on Wednesday with a prayer that the city of Rome might be a welcoming place for foreigners and fragile people, young and old. The pontiff presided over a New Year’s Eve vespers service in St. Peter’s Basilica, giving thanks for the 2025 Holy Year that brought millions of pilgrims to Rome in the once-every-quarter-century celebration of Christianity. In his homily, Pope Leo XIV thanked the city of Rome and the volunteers who helped keep crowds moving as they visited St. Peter’s and passed through its Holy…
Published on 31/12/2025 – 19:41 GMT+1 Fireworks are typically a celebratory centrepiece of New Year celebrations in Hong Kong but this year was very different as the spectacular and colourful explosions in the sky over its iconic Victoria Harbor were absent after a massive fire in November killed at least 161 people. The city’s tourism board instead hosted a music show on Wednesday night featuring soft rock duo Air Supply and other singers in Central, a business district that also is home to the famous nightlife hub Lan Kwai Fong. The facades of eight landmarks turned into giant countdown clocks…
Published on 31/12/2025 – 19:11 GMT+1 Trains were running again in both directions through the Channel Tunnel between continental Europe and the United Kingdom on Wednesday but problems remained after a day of travel chaos caused by power malfunctions and a broken down train. The tunnel operator, Eurotunnel, said the 50-kilometre undersea link was back to “full capacity” after a power fault inside it was fixed overnight on Tuesday. The short statement didn’t detail the cause of the power failure. But Eurostar, which runs passenger trains through the tunnel, warned of continued possible delays and cancellations because of “knock-on impacts”…
Published on 31/12/2025 – 18:18 GMT+1 Iran appointed a new central bank governor on Wednesday as an economic crisis sparked mass protests following a record currency fall against the US dollar. President Masoud Pezeshkian’s Cabinet appointed Abdolnasser Hemmati, a former economics minister, as the new governor of the Central Bank of the Islamic Republic of Iran, the official IRNA news agency reported. Hemmati succeeds Mohammad Reza Farzin, who resigned on Monday, the day after the start of some of the largest protests in the country in three years sparked by the decline of the rial, Iran’s currency, to a record…
POLITICO was not able to verify the details of the video. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov claimed on Monday that the alleged attack had involved more than 90 long-range drones and warned that Moscow’s position in U.S.-led peace talks would harden as a result. Ukraine flatly rejected the claim, with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy calling it “another lie from the Russian Federation” and accusing Moscow of manufacturing a provocation to derail diplomatic momentum. Residents of the nearby town of Valdai told Russian independent media Mozhem Obyasnit that they had heard no explosions or signs of an overnight attack. Ukraine’s Foreign Intelligence…
Authorities are investigating damage to an undersea telecommunications cable in the Gulf of Finland that occurred early on Wednesday between the capitals of Finland and Estonia. Finnish authorities seized and inspected the vessel suspected of causing the damage, the border guard said in a statement. Its anchor was lowered when it was discovered in Finland’s exclusive economic zone. The Fitburg ship was sailing under the flag of St Vincent and Grenadines and had departed from the Russian port of St Petersburg, a police spokesperson said. According to MarineTraffic data it was headed for Haifa in Israel. Police said 14 crew…
Moscow stuck to its guns again on Wednesday, furthering its claims of an alleged Ukrainian drone attack on President Vladimir Putin’s dacha, in what allies have described as an apparent attempt to throw a spanner into US-led peace talks to end Russia’s all-out war. In the latest attempt at backing the Kremlin’s claims, the Russian defence ministry released a video purportedly showing a downed drone it said Kyiv launched at Putin’s residence in Novgorod overnight on Monday. The video shows a damaged drone lying in snow in a forested area at night, next to what appears to be a masked…
Auckland was the first major city to ring in 2026 with a fireworks display launched from New Zealand’s tallest structure, Sky Tower. The South Pacific nation marked the arrival of the new year as clocks in Auckland struck midnight 18 hours before the famous ball drop in New York’s Times Square. The five-minute display sent around 3,500 fireworks into the sky from multiple levels of the 240-metre tower, while many smaller community events on New Zealand’s North Island were cancelled because of forecasts of rain and possible thunderstorms.
Protests triggered by Iran’s deepening inflation crisis have entered their fourth consecutive day, spreading from Tehran’s Grand Bazaar to major cities including Isfahan, Shiraz, Mashhad, Hamadan and Qeshm as tens of thousands of Iranians — from shopkeepers and bazaar merchants to university students — take to the streets across multiple provinces. Inflation has surged past 42% nationwide amid a collapsing rial, rapidly rising food and essential goods prices, and widespread economic hardship that even regime-aligned groups have tentatively voiced acknowledgement with. Food prices rose 72% and health and medical items were up 50% from December last year. “We officially recognise…