BELGRADE: Weather alerts, forest fires, melting pavement in cities: A sizzling heat wave has sent temperatures in parts of central and southern Europe soaring toward 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit) in some places.
From Italy to Romania, authorities warned people to be cautious, drive carefully if going on holiday, drink plenty of water and avoid going out during the hottest hours of the day.
Italian authorities declared a red weather alert in seven cities on Thursday, mostly in the central parts of the country but also the capital Rome and Trieste in the northeast. The heat conditions are aggravated by humidity and could affect healthy people as well as those with health conditions, authorities warned.
Similar warnings were issued in neighboring Croatia and further east and south. Croatia’s main tourism resort, the southern Adriatic Sea town of Dubrovnik, recorded 28 degrees Celsius (82.4 Fahrenheit) at dawn, signalling there won’t be relief when the sun goes down.
Forest fires have been reported this week in Albania, near the border with Greece, as well as in Bosnia and Italy.
Meteorologists said temperatures were even higher than officially reported in big cities where sizzling concrete radiates the heat above the ground and the asphalt softens under one’s feet.
“It was impossible to breathe yesterday,” said Antonela Spičanović, from the Montenegrin capital of Podgorica, where temperatures reached 39C (102F) on Wednesday. The city seemed deserted with many of its residents staying indoors or heading for the Adriatic Sea coast or the mountains.
“I spend my days in the apartment, under the air conditioning,” said Đorđe Stanišić, an electrical engineer also from Podgorica. “It’s hell outside.”
Mendim Rugova, a meteorologist from neighboring Kosovo, said temperatures in the country have risen on average by 2.5 degrees since the 1980s. He said the current heat wave could last until the end of July.
“In the region we could see temperatures above 40C, in parts of Albania, Northern Macedonia, in Greece and also in parts of Serbia,” he predicted.
In Czechia’s capital of Prague, where temperatures reached 34C Wednesday before dropping slightly Thursday, the city zoo delivered ten tons of ice to provide much-needed relief for the animals.
The ice was strategically placed around the zoo Wednesday creating cool spots where animals could find refuge from unusually high temperatures.
In the Romanian capital Bucharest, street thermometers showed 42C ( 107F) on Tuesday and Wednesday though the official measurements were a few degrees lower.
Neighboring Serbia reported record temperatures so far this summer, with thermostats at 35C (95F) Thursday morning in the north of the country. In the capital Belgrade, doctors reported treating people who collapsed, felt dizzy or complained of headaches due to the heat.
Serbian authorities have said that the use of air conditioning led to huge power consumption similar to levels normally seen in winter, when many in the Balkan country use electricity for heating.
During a previous heat wave last month, Montenegro, Bosnia, Croatia and Albania faced a major power outage amid the overload and a collapse of a regional distribution line. Earlier this month, a powerful storm swept the region after days of heat and killed two people, damaged houses while pulling out trees and flooding streets.
Experts say human-induced climate change has brought wild weather swings, increasingly unpredictable storms and heat waves.
‘It’s hell outside’: Sizzling heat wave in parts of southern and central Europe prompts alerts
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‘It’s hell outside’: Sizzling heat wave in parts of southern and central Europe prompts alerts
- Italian authorities declared a red weather alert in seven cities on Thursday
- Croatia’s main tourism resort, the southern Adriatic Sea town of Dubrovnik, recorded 28 degrees Celsius
Russian attack on Ukrainian city of Kharkiv injures 11, governor says
- Kharkiv has been a frequent target of Russian attacks since the start of Moscow’s full-scale invasion in February 2022
Governor Oleh Syniehubov said via the Telegram messaging app that the attack had damaged infrastructure and the authorities were working to verify the type of weapon used.
He and Kharkiv mayor Ihor Terekhov said it was likely that a civilian production facility had been hit. Terekhov said a fire had broken out.
Located 30km from the border with Russia, Kharkiv has been a frequent target of Russian attacks since the start of Moscow’s full-scale invasion in February 2022.
Last week, a Russian guided bomb attack on the city struck a five-story apartment block, inuring 10 people, local officials said.
German court acquits McCann suspect of unrelated sexual offense charges
- German national, who has been identified by local media as Christian Brueckner, acquitted of two counts of rape and two of sexual abuse
- Prosecutors had argued he should be given a 15-year prison sentence and kept in preventive detention once he has served it
BRAUNSCHWEIG, Germany: A German court on Tuesday acquitted a man who is also under investigation in the 2007 disappearance of British toddler Madeleine McCann in a trial on charges of unrelated sexual offenses.
The Braunschweig state court acquitted the 47-year-old German national, who has been identified by local media as Christian Brueckner, of two counts of rape and two of sexual abuse.
However, Brueckner will remain in prison another year because he is still serving a seven-year sentence for rape in a different case, German news agency dpa reported.
Brueckner had been on trial since February over offenses he is alleged to have committed in Portugal between 2000 and 2017. Defense lawyers had pointed to what they labeled a lack of evidence and witnesses who weren’t credible, and suggested he might not have been charged if he hadn’t also been a suspect in the McCann case.
Prosecutors had argued he should be given a 15-year prison sentence and kept in preventive detention once he has served it.
The verdict can be appealed, dpa reported.
Brueckner has not been charged in the McCann case, in which he is under investigation on suspicion of murder. He spent many years in Portugal, including in the resort of Praia da Luz around the time of Madeleine’s disappearance there in 2007. He has denied any involvement in her disappearance.
He is currently serving a seven-year prison sentence after being convicted in 2019 by the Braunschweig court for the rape of a 72-year-old American woman in Portugal in 2005.
The Braunschweig state court has jurisdiction because Brueckner had his last German residence in that city in Lower Saxony.
Over 1,000 evacuated from Crimea oil terminal fire: mayor
MOSCOW: Over 1,000 residents have been evacuated due to a fire at a large oil terminal in Russian-annexed Crimea, a local official said Tuesday, after Ukraine claimed it had struck the depot.
Kyiv has ramped up strikes targeting Russia’s energy sector in recent months, aiming to dent revenues used by Moscow to fund its invasion, now grinding through its third year.
Ukraine said Monday its forces had carried out a “successful strike” on an offshore oil terminal overnight in Feodosia.
Russian-installed authorities in Crimea then said a fire had broken out at the depot in the Black Sea port town of some 70,000 people and that there were no casualties.
Russia has not said there was a Ukrainian strike on the terminal.
“To ensure the safety of people living near the scene of the emergency situation, 1,047 people have been temporarily evacuated to shelters,” the Russian-appointed mayor of the town of Feodosia, Igor Tkachenko, wrote on Telegram.
On Monday, the fire caused road and train closures, but the Russian consumer safety watchdog said Monday initial checks did not find excess levels of air pollution.
The watchdog said the fire was raging at the Sea Oil Terminal, whose website says it “stores fuel in case of emergency situations and ensures Crimea’s energy security.”
The fire has spread to “up to 2,500 square meters, a source in the emergency services told RIA Novosti news agency Tuesday.
“The Feodosia terminal is the largest in Crimea in terms of transshipment of oil products, which were used, among other things, to meet the needs of the Russian occupation army,” the Ukrainian military said, vowing to continue such attacks.
Ukraine insists such strikes are fair retaliation for Russian attacks on its own energy infrastructure that have plunged millions into darkness.
Votes are being counted in the election for a truncated government in Indian-controlled Kashmir
- A final result is expected to be declared later Tuesday by the region’s electoral office
- Nearly 8.9 million people were eligible to vote in the election that began on Sept. 18 and concluded on Oct. 1
SRINAGAR, India: Votes were being counted Tuesday in the recent election for a largely powerless local government in Indian-controlled Kashmir, the first since Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government stripped the disputed region of its special status five years ago.
Thousands of additional police and paramilitary soldiers patrolled roads and guarded 28 counting centers as officials tallied votes. A final result was expected to be declared later Tuesday by the region’s electoral office.
Nearly 8.9 million people were eligible to vote in the election that began on Sept. 18 and concluded on Oct. 1. The overall turnout was 64 percent across the three phases, according to official data.
It was first such vote in a decade and the first since Modi’s Hindu nationalist government scrapped the Muslim-majority region’s long-held semi-autonomy in 2019.
The unprecedented move downgraded and divided the former state into two centrally governed union territories, Ladakh and Jammu-Kashmir. Both are ruled directly by New Delhi through its appointed administrators along with unelected bureaucrats and security setup. The move — which largely resonated in India and among Modi supporters — was mostly opposed in Kashmir as an assault on its identity and autonomy amid fears that it would pave way for demographic changes in the region.
The region has since been on edge with civil liberties curbed and media gagged.
India and Pakistan each administer a part of Kashmir, but both claim the territory in its entirety. The nuclear-armed rivals have fought two of their three wars over the territory since they gained independence from British colonial rule in 1947.
Early results may give an indication of the vote’s direction. However, exit polls by major television channels in last two days projected the regional National Conference emerging as a single largest party followed by the Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party. Such mandate is likely to be seen as a referendum against Modi’s 2019 move.
The National Conference fought the election in alliance with India’s main opposition Congress party.
Their coalition may still need support of some seats to form the government, that is likely to come from Peoples Democratic Party, another Kashmiri group. Five seats are appointed and 90 elected, so a party or coalition would need at least 48 of the 95 total seats to form a government.
The vote will allow Kashmir to have its own truncated government and a regional legislature, called an assembly, rather than being directly under New Delhi’s rule.
However, there will be a limited transition of power from New Delhi to the assembly as Kashmir will remain a “union territory” — directly controlled by the federal government — with India’s Parliament as its main legislator. Kashmir’s statehood must be restored for the new government to have powers similar to other states of India.
The region’s last assembly election was held in 2014, after which the BJP for the first time ruled in a coalition with the local Peoples Democratic Party. But the government collapsed in 2018, after the BJP withdrew from the coalition.
Polls in the past have been marked with violence, boycotts and vote-rigging, even though India called them a victory over separatism.
Militants in the Indian-controlled portion of Kashmir have been fighting New Delhi’s rule since 1989. Many Muslim Kashmiris support the rebels’ goal of uniting the territory, either under Pakistani rule or as an independent country.
India insists the Kashmir militancy is Pakistan-sponsored terrorism. Pakistan denies the charge, and many Kashmiris consider it a legitimate freedom struggle. Tens of thousands of civilians, rebels and government forces have been killed in the conflict.
Son of Osama bin Laden deported from France, barred from returning
- Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau said he had signed an order banning Omar Binladin from France
PARIS: A son of Al-Qaeda founder Osama bin Laden has been deported from France, where he lived for years painting landscapes in a Normandy village, and barred from returning after posting comments on social media deemed to have glorified terrorism.
Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau said he had signed an order banning Omar Binladin from France, and that Binladin had previously been deported. He gave no details about the timing of the deportation or where Binladin had been sent.
“Mr Binladin, who has lived in the Orne region for several years as the spouse of a British national, posted comments on his social networks in 2023 that glorified terrorism,” Retailleau said on X.
“The administrative ban ensures that Mr.Binladin cannot return to France for any reason whatsoever.”
Binladin could not immediately be reached for comment.
According to local weekly newspaper Le Publicateur Libre, Binladin caught the attention of French authorities over a social media post on the birthday of his father, who was killed by US forces in 2011. Reuters was not immediately able to locate the social media post.
The paper reported in July 2023 that police had searched for Binladen in the village of Domfort, Normandy.
