World

At least eight people were killed in a series of avalanches across the Austrian Alps on Saturday, police and mountain rescue services said. Authorities have warned that conditions remained dangerous after fresh snowfall. Meanwhile, rescue services deployed more than 200 personnel and several helicopters. Where did the accidents happen? The avalanches occurred in the Grossarl Valley and Bad Hofgastein of the Salzburg region, as well as in Pusterwald of the Styria region. Four skiers died when an avalanche struck a group of seven off-piste skiers, on the 2,150-meter (7,000-foot) Finsterkopf peak in the Grossarl Valley in the Salzburg state, rescuers said. The others were seriously injured, they added. Earlier, a woman was killed in an avalanche in the Bad Hofgastein area. Later in the...

The Syrian army continues to dislodge the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) from areas in northern and northeastern Syria that the SDF have controlled for over a decade. On Sunday, the government announced the capture of the strategic town of Tabqa, located about 55 kilometers (34 miles) west of the key city of Raqqa, held by the SDF. According to the official SANA news agency, Information Minister Hamza Almustafa said, "The Syrian army controls the strategic city of Tabqa in the Raqqa countryside, including the Euphrates Dam, which is the largest dam in Syria." Later on Sunday, government officials and security sources reported that Syrian government troops had entered the outskirts of Raqqa.The Syrian government has effectively seized control of the areas that the Kurdish-led...

Over 200 strike drones were launched overnight against Ukraine, killing at least two people and wounding dozens more, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Sunday. He wrote on X that the Sumy, Kharkiv, Dnipro, Zaporizhzhia, Khmelnytskyi, and Odesa regions were under attack. Zelenskyy offered condolences to the families of those killed and again called on allies to increase support. "This week alone has seen more than 1,300 attack drones, around 1,050 guided aerial bombs and 29 missiles of various types in total. That is why Ukraine still needs more protection — above all, more missiles for air defense systems," he said. Zelenskyy accused Russia of deliberately dragging out diplomatic efforts to end the nearly four-year-old war while pounding Ukraine. The Russian attack comes...

Donald Trump appears increasingly set on taking Greenland. As the US president put it in a post on his social media platform Truth Social, this can be done "the easy way," by Denmark setting a price for its territory, or "the hard way," by which he is thought to mean adversarial tactics. With Greenland's people and politicians resisting the easy way, Trump has now turned his attention to threatening eight European nations who have sent troops or other representatives to the frozen island. A 10% import tariff on goods from Denmark, Norway, Sweden, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Finland will be in place from February 1 until a "deal is reached for the Complete and Total purchase of Greenland," Trump wrote on Truth Social on Saturday. The US president added that, s...

Mitigation hearings for Hong Kong pro-democracy media tycoon, Jimmy Lai, concluded on Tuesday, in the final step before the court hands down a sentence in the landmark national security case. In December, the 78-year-old was convicted of two counts of conspiracy to commit collusion with foreign forces and one count of conspiracy to distribute seditious publications. Lai, who had pleaded not guilty to all charges, faces a maximum penalty of life in prison. The sentencing date has not been scheduled.  Lai's conviction of collusion and sedition offenses marks the highest-profile example of the clampdown on media freedoms in Hong Kong, once known as a haven for free press in Asia, since Beijing imposed the national security law in 2020. The prosecution of Lai, a prominent critic of the Chi...

"You can cope with anything, just not being separated from your children. I'm carrying on for them," says Yulia Dvornichenko. She was arrested in 2021 and held in Russia, before Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. For a long time, she was unable to speak of her ordeal but now she has broken her silence. Dvornichenko, who hails from Ukraine's Donetsk region, spent a year and a half in prisons operated by the so-called "People's Republic of Donetsk," This part of Donetsk came under the control of Russian separatists in 2014 and the whole Donetsk region was  claimed as Russian by the Kremlin in September 2022. During her time in prison, Dvornichenko was not once allowed to see her sons Danylo and Mark. She says many of the women being held in Donetsk's prisons have young chi...

South Korea's former President Yoon Suk Yeol's week went from bad to worse on Friday afternoon after a Seoul court sentenced him to five years in prison. Yoon was found guilty of obstructing justice, falsifying documents and abuse of power in relation to his failed declaration of martial law in December 2024. In addition to corruption charges and of interfering in an investigation into the 2023 death of a soldier, Yoon is being tried in several cases linked to his short-lived attempt to use martial law powers to take control of the South Korean government. The five-year prison term for the impeached former leader comes just days after prosecutors requested the death penalty in a parallel case against him. This case focuses on charges of Yoon leading an insurrection when he declared mart...

Yoweri Museveni, who has ruled Uganda since seizing power in 1986, is seeking a decisive victory in Thursday's election to extend his 40-year rule amid ongoing debate about his eventual succession.  After casting his vote at a polling station in Rwakitura, Museveni said he was confident of securing "80% of the vote, if there is no cheating." According to partial results from Uganda's electoral commission based on tallies from nearly half of the polling stations, Museveni is leading with over 75% of the vote. His leading challenger, Bobi Wine follows with about 21%, while the remainder is split among six other candidates.Doubt, unrest overshadow Uganda vote countingTo view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video Police deny B...

Ship positions, weather data and emergency messages flash across monitors at the Cyprus Joint Rescue Coordination Center in the port town of Larnaca in southeastern Cyprus. This is where Cyprus coordinates search and rescue operations in the eastern Mediterranean. It is also where the logistics of running a maritime corridor to provide humanitarian aid to Gaza are organized. Some 32,000 tons of humanitarian relief supplies aid from the European Union have been inspected in Cyprus' ports and shipped on to Gaza. Cyprus lies between Europe, the Middle East and North Africa — at the intersection of three continents, in the midst of a region currently rife with crises and conflicts. "The flight from here to Lebanon takes 18 minutes, to Tel Aviv 30 minutes, to Jordan 75 minutes, to Damascus 20...

The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) issued a series of flight advisories on Friday, warning airlines to exercise caution in the airspace over Mexico, Central America and parts of South America due to potential "military activities." "The FAA issued flight advisory notices to Airmen for specified areas of Mexico, Central America, Panama, Bogota, Guayaquil and Mazatlan Oceanic Flight Regions, and in airspace within the eastern Pacific Ocean," an FAA spokesperson said, adding that the advisory is effective for 60 days beginning on Friday. The warnings cite possible interference with global navigation satellite systems that could cause a "potentially hazardous situation." Trump suggests possible military strikes in Mexico The development comes amid heightened regional tensions fol...