Author: DW

As of August 8, 197 people, including 96 children, have died of famine in Gaza as a result of Israel’s blockade and military offensive, according to Gaza health authorities. UN-backed health monitors have said some 100,000 Palestinian women and children are facing severe malnutrition, and a third of the population of 2.1 million hasn’t eaten in days.  Gaza isn’t the only place where conflicts are driving catastrophic hunger. In Sudan, international agencies claim 3.2 million children under the age of 5 will suffer from acute malnutrition in the next year. People under siege in El Fasher, in North Dafur, have been starving for the…

Two years after ending their relationship with Qatar Airways amid fan protests, Bayern Munich has signed a new partnership with Emirates, the airline owned and operated by the United Arab Emirates. The agreement, announced on Wednesday, is similar to the one the football club has with Visit Rwanda, the tourist board of the African country, and will encompass pitchside advertising as well as what Bayern calls “joint activations on both companies’ social and digital channels.” Unlike in their deal with Rwanda, the German champions make no mention of any football academy in the UAE. Emirates, which reportedly missed out on Bayern’s shirt sponsorship, is…

More than 260 firefighters battled a wildfire near Greece’s capital Athens on Saturday, as wind conditions raised alarms about the fire’s potential to escalate. The blaze, which has already left one person dead, broke out on Friday in Keratea, a rural area some 43 kilometers (27 miles) southeast of Athens. Two others died after being caught in the gale-force winds. What do we know about the fires near Athens? The wildfire, stoked by winds of up to 80 kilometers (50 miles) per hour, destroyed several homes and farmlands in Keratea, setting olive orchards alight. Footage published by local media showed gutted houses. Local officials ordered the evacuation of several…

US fashion designer Willy Chavarria has expressed regret on Saturday, after his latest design in collaboration with Adidas Originals caused wide controversy in Mexico. Authorities in the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca have complained that new sandals which bear the name of the state “reinterpreted” a model uniquely found in the area, known as the huarache sandals. Mexico’s government on Friday announced it was seeking compensation from Adidas, while local authorities angrily accused the design, and its designer and producer by extension, of cultural appropriation. What did Chavarria, Adidas say about the Oaxaca Slip-Ons? Chavarria, whose father is a Mexican-American, addressed…

When Thomas Müller announced recently in an Instagram post that his next career move would be “across the big pond,” it was quickly reported that the bright lights of Los Angeles would be his destination. However, the soon to be 36-year-old, who has made a career of surprising opponents on the pitch, caught nobody off guard by announcing on Wednesday that he was indeed moving to the Pacific west coast — but north of the 49th parallel to Vancouver. The move had been Major League Soccer’s worst-kept secret for days. ‘A statement signing’ “Thomas is a world-class player — the ultimate “Raumdeuter” (“space interpreter”] — known…

The first signs of an overhaul came quickly from the newly inaugurated US President Donald Trump. After being back in power just two months, his administration had already slashed funding for more than 30 research projects related to reasons for and measures against vaccine skepticism. This made it clear to scientists that future mRNA research in the US could also be in jeopardy. At that time, the administration of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), which is responsible for biomedical research, had also requested a list of all NIH-funded research projects dealing with mRNA technology. These were to be forwarded to the Department of…

After months of silence amid growing criticism, Bayern Munich has announced that it will no longer promote Visit Rwanda, the tourism arm of the African country’s government. “The new arrangement transitions the relationship away from a commercial sponsorship to a dedicated partnership focusing on football development in Rwanda through the expansion of the FC Bayern Youth Academy in Kigali,” read a statement on the club website posted on Friday. Previously, the agreement had been that Bayern would also display Visit Rwanda advertising on pitchside hoardings and “promote tourism and investment opportunities in Rwanda.” In February, Bayern Munich fans held up a…

Russian President Vladimir Putin and his US counterpart Donald Trump are scheduled to meet in person for bilateral talks on August 15 to discuss how to end the war in Ukraine. Before his election victory in November 2024, Trump announced he would end the war within the first 24 hours of his term. He is now about 200 days past his own deadline. Trump said the meeting with Putin will help accelerate the peace process. Here’s an overview of what’s known so far. When and where will the meeting take place? The two leaders will meet next Friday in Alaska, a state in the northwest of the…

The year began on a high note for the European Union and India. In February, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen visited New Delhi and, alongside Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, instructed officials to resolve remaining differences and move forward on a long-delayed free trade agreement.  But that momentum was disrupted in July, when India was drawn into the EU’s 18th sanctions package against Russia. The move targets New Delhi’s refining of discounted Russian crude and the export of those products, some of which are sold to Europe. Could this sanctions development derail a potential EU-India trade deal? Experts argue it won’t, saying the US threat of imposing…

In 2016, a Danish pension fund had a change of heart that is rare in the financial sector. At the time, AkademikerPension had $1 billion (then around €904 million) in investments in what were considered the safe financial havens of oil giants like ExxonMobil, Shell and BP. But as global temperatures continued to rise, that didn’t sit right with the company board. Members studied different climate scenarios available at the time and saw that continued investment in fossil energy was not going to make financial sense in the long term.  “That was really the main conclusion for us driving our decision…