Author: DW

The World Bank has approved a grant for Zambia worth $208 million (roughly €193.7 million), as the southern African country struggles to address the impact of drought overwhelming the region. Zambia’s Finance Ministry announced the grant on Tuesday. Severe drought in southern Africa leaves millions in needTo view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video What do we know about the grant? The Finance Ministry said the grant was meant to help Lusaka effectively respond to the impact of the drought. It would allow the government to provide more affected people with direct cash…

The mother of missing Jay Slater has said “words cannot describe the pain and agony” she and her family are feeling about the teenager’s disappearance.The 19-year-old, from Oswaldtwistle in Lancashire, was last seen on 17 June after setting off to walk back to his accommodation while on holiday in Tenerife. In a statement issued through the British overseas missing persons charity LBT Global, Debbie Duncan said the family were “absolutely devastated” by his disappearance.”Jay is a normal guy who is in his third year of an apprenticeship, and he is a very popular young man with a large circle of…

It can’t have been an easy meeting for Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelenskyy and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban on Tuesday, but both leaders mustered a smile as they shook hands for the cameras. “I asked the Ukrainian president to think about whether we could reverse the order, to speed up peace talks by making a ceasefire first,” Orban, a strident nationalist, said in a brief press statement alongside Zelenskyy in Kyiv, during his first visit to Kyiv since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. “A ceasefire connected to a deadline would give a chance to speed up peace…

Heavy rains in northeastern India triggered floods and landslides in the region. At least 16 people have died over the last two weeks and more than 300,000 have been displaced from their submerged homes, local authorities said on Tuesday. One of the worst hit places is the state of Assam, where the Indian Army and Air Force have been assisting with rescue efforts. A military helicopter flew out on Tuesday to bring 13 fishermen to safety, after they had been stranded for four days on a small river island on the Brahmaputra, officials said. A woman fetches water in a flood-affected…

Firefighters in Greece are spending a second day fighting wildfires on the island of Kos.Hundreds of tourists and residents were forced to flee on Monday as the flames spread amid “apocalyptic” scenes. Some tourists were forced to take refuge in a football stadium and other venues overnight after the fires and thick black smoke reached costal areas, including the seaside village of Kardamaina.Holidaymaker Eileen Brown said she arrived at her hotel in the area on Sunday but was soon evacuated and had to sleep outside last night. Image: Holidaymakers gather overnight on a football pitch in Kos. Pic: Alan Boyle/Reuters…

Former Dutch intelligence chief Dick Schoof was sworn in as prime minister on Tuesday at the head of a coalition government promising to implement the Netherlands’ “strictest ever” asylum and immigration policy. The 67-year-old Independent candidate is succeeding departing Prime Minister Mark Rutte, who is set to become the next secretary-general of NATO after 14 years in office in The Hague. Schoof instead of Wilders Schoof’s inauguration comes seven months on from a general election in which far-right populist Geert Wilders’ PVV (Freedom Party) emerged as the Netherlands’ largest party. Traditionally, the leader of the largest party would be the favorite to become the Dutch…

Halima (name changed) has lived in various camps for displaced people for as long as she can remember. Every time she thought she had found safety, another attack happened, displacing her over and over. She told DW that the memories of being upended so frequently keep her up at night. In June 2023, fighters belonging to the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) attacked the area of El Geneina, the capital of West Darfur, where she lived with her family. Halima heard the militants arrive on their motorbikes. “They found me in my room,” she said. “Four of them threatened me with guns.…

Tributes have been paid to a “beloved” father and youth team football coach who died while on holiday on the Spanish island of Majorca.Michael Grant, from Waterford in Ireland, died suddenly in the early hours of Monday while staying with family and friends. According to local media, the 45-year-old was found in the middle of a street in the town of Magaluf.Newspaper Ultima Hora reported that police initially believed Mr Grant died of natural causes.However, wounds discovered by a coroner suggest he may have been hit by a car. He also had bite marks on his shoulder and arm, with…

As many as 66% of South Koreans believe that the nation needs to develop and deploy an independent nuclear deterrent, up from 60.2% of the public last year.  Analysts say the spike in support for a domestic nuclear capability is a consequence of a newly belligerent North Korea, which signed a security treaty with Russia in June, and uncertainty over a future US administration’s commitment to the South’s security. The opinion poll was conducted by the state-run Korea Institute for National Unification and published on June 27, just nine days after Russian President Vladimir Putin arrived in Pyongyang for talks…

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg has indicated that he is not opposed to delaying the sentencing date in the criminal hush-money case against former US President Donald Trump. In a letter filed Tuesday, prosecutors in Bragg’s office said they would be open to delaying the July 11 sentencing for up to two weeks. “Although we believe defendant’s arguments to be without merit, we do not oppose his request” to delay the sentencing pending determination of the motion, the prosecutors wrote. The letter came a day after Trump’s lawyers asked the judge to delay the decision, as he weighs the high…