Author: DW

Kirsty Coventry will make sporting history if she is elected president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) at its General Assembly on Thursday (March 20,2025). She would be the first woman and first person from Africa to head the IOC. She would also be the youngest since Pierre de Coubertin, the founding father of the modern Olympic Games. The Frenchman founded the IOC in 1894 and took over the presidency two years later at the age of 33. Coventry, a 41-year-old former world-class swimmer from Zimbabwe , has always had a strong will and vision. “When I was 9 years old,…

Zahra Mousavi, a women’s rights activist, fled from Afghanistan to neighboring Pakistan in March 2022 after months of fighting and protesting the oppressive Taliban regime.   She now lives in hiding and constant fear of being apprehended by the Pakistani police and deported to her home country. Mousavi actively participated in street protests against the Taliban regime after the Islamic fundamentalist group seized power in the war-ravaged country in August 2021. She advocated for women’s rights by taking part in public gatherings and demonstrations, and tried to make the voices of Afghan women heard in the rest of the world. But with…

Germany is “monitoring” how its citizens are being treated when traveling to the United States, a foreign ministry spokesperson said on Monday. The decision comes after the recent detention of three Germans in separate incidents. Two have been deported, but one person is still being detained. Foreign ministry spokesman Sebastian Fischer said Germany is trying to assess “whether this represents a change in American immigration policy or whether these are isolated cases.” “Once we have a clear picture, we will then, if necessary, adjust our travel and security advice,” he said. Green Card holder held by ICE Fabian Schmidt, the…

Global growth is expected to slow due to “trade barriers” and “increased geopolitical and policy uncertainty,” the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) said Monday. Growth is projected to slow to 3.1% in 2025 and 3.0% in 2026, with the Paris-based policy forum lowering its projections from 3.3% for both this year and next. “Increasing trade restrictions will contribute to higher costs for both production and consumption. It remains essential to ensure a well-functioning, rules-based international trading system and to keep markets open,” OECD Secretary-General Mathias Cormann said. US, eurozone driving weaker growth expectations The projections were based primarily…

Mixed martial arts fighter Conor McGregor is meeting Donald Trump today for talks on Ireland’s “illegal immigration racket”.The 36-year-old appeared in the White House briefing room during his St. Patrick’s Day visit to Washington DC and is set to meet the US president later this afternoon. He told reporters he is visiting the White House to “raise the issues the people of Ireland face”. X This content is provided by X, which may be using cookies and other technologies. To show you this content, we need your permission to use cookies. You can use the buttons below to amend your…

Indicating a thaw in US-Russia relations, Marco Rubio and Sergey Lavrov spoke about further efforts to ending the war in Ukraine as overnight aerial strikes continue. DW has more.

The United States will continue to strike Yemen’s Houthi rebels until they end attacks on international shipping, US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said on Sunday. “I want to be very clear, this campaign is about freedom of navigation and restoring deterrence,” Hegseth said in an interview for the Fox Business broadcaster. “The minute the Houthis say, ‘We’ll stop shooting at your ships, we’ll stop shooting at your drones,’ this campaign will end. But until then, it will be unrelenting,” he added. US President Donald Trump, posting on social media, also vowed to “use overwhelming lethal force” to end the Houthi…

Scandinavian countries and Canada are at the forefront of a growing international trend, in which some consumers are shunning US goods because of President Donald Trump’s decision to place tariffs on a range of products from all over the world. Several Facebook groups have been set up in recent weeks aimed at organizing boycotts and campaigns. A Swedish group called “Bojkotta varor fran USA” in Swedish, meaning “Boycott goods from the US,” had almost 80,000 members at the time of writing. It describes its purpose as to “protect democracy, self-determination and security,” and says it hopes boycotts will put pressure on the Trump administration.…

When valuable artworks plundered by the Nazi regime turn up in public and private collections in Germany, there are strict procedures to discover the provenance, or origin, of the work — and to alert any descendants of the original owner. During the Nazi dictatorship that existed from 1933 to 1945, experts say that at least 200,000 works of art were taken from their mostly Jewish owners in Germany, whether through direct expropriation or forced sales. Many Jewish art collectors left Germany or were deported to death camps. Now it has been revealed that the Bavarian State Painting Collections possess some 200 artworks…

In an email seen and reported by the Reuters news agency, NASA’s acting administrator Janet Petro told employees on March 10 that three offices would be closed — including that of Chief Scientist Katherine Calvin and Chief Technologist A.C. Charania. The closures will affect 23 employees in the Office of the Chief Scientist, the Office of Science, Policy, and Strategy, and the diversity, equity and inclusion branch within the Office of Diversity and Equal Opportunity. The cuts are seen as part of an efficiency drive by the new administration of President Donald Trump, who returned to office in January. Trump’s previous executive orders have…