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Five killed in Russian drone attack on Ukraine apartment block

Five killed in Russian drone attack on Ukraine apartment block
A firefighter works at the site of an apartment building hit by a Russian drone strike, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kharkiv, Ukraine August 18, 2025. (REUTERS/)
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Updated 18 August 2025

Five killed in Russian drone attack on Ukraine apartment block

Five killed in Russian drone attack on Ukraine apartment block
  • The city near the Russian border was also hit hours earlier by a ballistic missile that wounded at least 11 people

KYIV: A Russian drone attack on a five-story apartment block in the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv early Monday killed five people and wounded more than a dozen others, Ukrainian authorities said.
The attack, which took place just before dawn, reduced part of the building to rubble and sparked fires on at least three floors, the region’s governor Oleg Synegubov said on Telegram.
Russia fired four drones at the building, he said.
Ukraine’s state emergency service posted videos showing rescuers attempting to break through the rubble to reach a trapped resident, while another showed a floor in flames.
“Five people were killed, including a girl aged about one-and-a-half years old,” Ukraine’s prosecution service said.
“At least 18 people were wounded and suffered acute shock, including children.”
The city near the Russian border was also hit hours earlier by a ballistic missile that wounded at least 11 people, Mayor Igor Terekhov said.
Russia also struck the southern Odesa region with drones early Monday, sparking a fire at a fuel facility, regional governor Oleg Kiper said.
The attacks came as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and his European allies were expected in Washington for talks aimed at ending the three-and-a-half year war.
Just ahead of Zelensky’s arrival in the US capital, US President Donald Trump said Ukraine would not be able to reclaim the annexed Crimean peninsula or enter NATO as part of a peace deal.
Zelensky has repeatedly pushed back against pressure to cede Crimea, the southern peninsula annexed by Russia in 2014.
Russia, which has been advancing for months on the battlefield, has proposed that Ukraine withdraw from the Donbas region in exchange for freezing the frontline in the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions, where the main cities are still under Kyiv’s control.


New Ebola outbreak in DR Congo kills 15: health minister

New Ebola outbreak in DR Congo kills 15: health minister
Updated 04 September 2025

New Ebola outbreak in DR Congo kills 15: health minister

New Ebola outbreak in DR Congo kills 15: health minister
  • The last outbreak of Ebola in the vast central African nation was three years ago and killed six people
  • Twenty-eight suspected cases have been recorded in Kasai Province

KINSHASA: Health authorities in the Democratic Republic of Congo have declared a new outbreak of the Ebola virus, which has killed 15 people since the end of August, the health minister said Thursday.
The new outbreak is in central Kasai Province, Samuel Roger Kamba told reporters in the capital Kinshasa.
The last outbreak of Ebola in the vast central African nation was three years ago and killed six people.
Twenty-eight suspected cases have been recorded in Kasai Province, according to provisional figures, with the first case reported on August 20 in a 34-year-old pregnant woman who was admitted to hospital.
“It’s the 16th outbreak recorded in our country,” Kamba said.
Case numbers are likely to increase, according to the World Health Organization, which has dispatched experts alongside a Congolese response team to Kasai Province.
The DRC has a stockpile of treatments for this viral haemorrhagic fever as well as 2,000 doses of vaccines that will be moved to Kasai from the capital Kinshasa.
“We’re acting with determination to rapidly halt the spread of the virus and protect communities,” said WHO Regional Director for Africa Mohamed Janabi.
First identified in 1976 and thought to have crossed over from bats, Ebola is a deadly viral disease spread through direct contact with bodily fluids, causing severe bleeding and organ failure.
The deadliest outbreak in the DRC — whose population numbers more than 100 million — killed nearly 2,300 people between 2018 and 2020.
Six strains of Ebola exist.
Health authorities say the Zaire strain — for which there is a vaccine — is the cause of the new outbreak.
“Fortunately we have a vaccine for this Zaire strain but to deploy it we need to ensure the logistics,” Health Minister Kamba said.
Four times the size of France, the DRC has poor infrastructure, with often limited and poorly maintained lines of communication.


Six in UK court deny terror charges for Palestine Action support

Six in UK court deny terror charges for Palestine Action support
Updated 04 September 2025

Six in UK court deny terror charges for Palestine Action support

Six in UK court deny terror charges for Palestine Action support
  • The six, aged between 26 to 62, risk up to 14 years in prison for allegedly supporting the banned group
  • British police have made hundreds of arrests at recent protests in support of Palestine Action

LONDON: Six activists on Thursday denied terror charges for allegedly supporting the banned group Palestine Action and were freed on bail by a UK court.
The six, aged between 26 to 62, risk up to 14 years in prison for allegedly supporting the group which was banned in July by the UK government after vandalism at a Royal Air Force base.
They were arrested on Tuesday and Wednesday and charged “with various offenses of encouraging support for a proscribed terrorist organization,” the Crown Prosecution Service said in a statement.
The charges result from 13 online meetings they attended to prepare for several protests over the summer.
During an online press conference Wednesday, representatives of the group, Defend Our Juries, to which the arrested individuals belonged, confirmed demonstrations would go ahead Saturday in London, Derry in Northern Ireland, and Edinburgh in Scotland.
British police have made hundreds of arrests at recent protests in support of Palestine Action.
British film director Ken Loach, who attended the event, called the ban on Palestine Action “absurd” and accused the government of being complicit in Israel’s “incredible crimes” in Gaza.
“This level of political repression is not what we expect in a democracy — it’s the kind of tactic typically associated with authoritarian regimes around the world,” a spokesperson for Defend our Juries said in a statement earlier this week.
The group has vowed to press ahead with its demonstration on Saturday in Parliament Square, claiming 1,000 people had pledged to hold signs saying “I oppose genocide. I support Palestine Action.”
More than 700 people who have held up such signs at previous protests over the last two months have been arrested under anti-terror laws for showing support for a proscribed organization.


Gaza ‘genocide’ exposes Europe’s failure to act: top EU official

Gaza ‘genocide’ exposes Europe’s failure to act: top EU official
Updated 04 September 2025

Gaza ‘genocide’ exposes Europe’s failure to act: top EU official

Gaza ‘genocide’ exposes Europe’s failure to act: top EU official
  • Top EU officials have so far shied away from calling Israel’s actions in the territory a “genocide”

PARIS: One of the European Union’s most senior officials on Thursday called the war in Gaza a “genocide,” ramping up criticism of Israel and slamming the 27-nation bloc for failing to act to stop it.
“The genocide in Gaza exposes Europe’s failure to act and speak with one voice,” European Commission vice president Teresa Ribera said during a speech in Paris.
Top EU officials have so far shied away from calling Israel’s actions in the territory a “genocide.” One spokesman said it was for the courts to make a legal judgment on whether genocide was happening.
The EU has struggled to take steps over the war in Gaza due to deep divisions between member states pushing for action against Israel and those backing the country.
The splits are also present inside the EU’s executive, where Spanish commissioner Ribera has expressed frustration over the failure to push on the issue.
Ribera’s use of the term “genocide” could put more pressure on EU commission chief Ursula von der Leyen to take a tougher stance against Israel.
Von der Leyen’s commission in July proposed cutting funding to Israeli start-ups over the war in Gaza, but so far the move has not received the backing of a majority of countries.
Nearly two years into the devastating conflict, Israel has built up its forces in recent days, with troops operating on the outskirts of Gaza City, the Palestinian territory’s largest urban center.
The United Nations estimates that nearly one million people live in and around Gaza City in the territory’s north, where it has declared famine.


Council of Europe says asylum policies may put lives in danger

Council of Europe says asylum policies may put lives in danger
Updated 04 September 2025

Council of Europe says asylum policies may put lives in danger

Council of Europe says asylum policies may put lives in danger
  • Several European nations have begun outsourcing the handling of asylum seekers to countries outside the EU
  • “Externalization policies might result in people being subjected to torture,” said O’Flaherty

STRASBOURG, France: The Council of Europe urged its 46 member states on Thursday not to outsource the processing of asylum seekers to third countries, saying these people risked being tortured or killed.
Several European nations have begun outsourcing the handling of asylum seekers to countries outside the European Union.
They include Italy, whose hard-right government opened migrant reception centers in Albania that have now morphed into repatriation outfits.
“Externalization policies might result in people being subjected to torture or other ill-treatment, collective expulsions and arbitrary detention or may put their lives in danger,” said the Council of Europe’s Commissioner for Human Rights, Michael O’Flaherty.
“Such policies might also hinder effective access to asylum and deprive individuals of legal remedies,” he said.
A new report by the council — Europe’s human rights watchdog — identifies three areas in which risks are “particularly acute.”
These are “external processing of asylum claims; external return procedures..; and the outsourcing of border control to other countries, some of which have a documented history of serious violations against people on the move.”
Last month, the EU Court of Justice ruled in favor of Italian judges who had ordered the repatriation to Italy of asylum seekers expelled to Albania by Giorgia Meloni’s government.
In 2022, the European Court of Human Rights, which is part of the Council of Europe, blocked the transfer of asylum seekers from the UK to Rwanda.
Britain, which has since formally left the EU, has now set up an agreement with France that provides for asylum seekers to be sent back from the UK to France.
Four African countries — Eswatini, Rwanda, South Sudan and Uganda — have agreed to accept migrants expelled en masse from the United States by the administration of President Donald Trump.
El Salvador was the first Latin American country to accept migrants deported from the United States.


Russian missile hits demining mission near Ukraine’s Chernihiv, official says

Russian missile hits demining mission near Ukraine’s Chernihiv, official says
Updated 04 September 2025

Russian missile hits demining mission near Ukraine’s Chernihiv, official says

Russian missile hits demining mission near Ukraine’s Chernihiv, official says
  • One person was killed and two people were wounded in the attack

KYIV: A Russian missile strike on a humanitarian demining mission near the northern Ukrainian city of Chernihiv killed two people, local officials said on Thursday.
Another three were wounded in the attack, which governor Viacheslav Chaus said purposely targeted a team from the Danish Refugee Council.
Russia, which regularly launches missiles and drones far behind the front line of its war in Ukraine, did not immediately comment on the strike.