Author: DW

It took decades before Germany recognized the Romani Holocaust — the Nazi genocide of 500,000 European Roma and Sinti during World War II. Several more decades passed before the European Holocaust Memorial Day for Sinti and Roma became an official German and European day of remembrance, celebrated each year on August 2. Based on initiatives by Polish Roma groups, the Nazi liquidation of the so-called “Gypsy Family Camp” in the Auschwitz-Birkenau Concentration and Extermination Camp on the evening of August 2-3, 1944, was first commemorated half a century later, in 1994. Germany marks the European Roma Holocaust Memorial Day on August 2Image: Joerg Carstensen/dpa/picture alliance…

For many German farmers, the heat wave in late June couldn’t have come at a worse time. While barley was already ready for harvest across much of Germany, the drought struck other crops during a particularly vulnerable stage of development. “This year is another difficult one for farms,” Horst Gömann of Germany’s North Rhine-Westphalia Chamber of Agriculture told DW. Corn has been particularly hard hit, as the extreme heat coincided with the flowering period, he said. “We’re already seeing some corn plants failing to form cobs. That, of course, essentially amounts to a total crop failure,” Gömann said. In corn, the energy is…

FIFA President Gianni Infantino has withdrawn his plans to sell stakes in FIFA competitions to private investors. Infantino’s plans had been met with widespread condemnation from across the football world. In a statement on Saturday, Infantino said: “Having listened carefully to all the views, it has become clear that the project has created divisions of a nature that, regardless of the level of support, are no longer in the interest of the objective set out in the first place.” What were FIFA chief’s Infantino’s private investor plans? Infantino’s proposal would have created a commercial subsidiary, the FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE), to run competitions like the World Cup, selling broadcasting…

It was a clip destined to go viral. On July 22, 2026, in rainy Mumbai, India, a casually dressed young woman stepped in front of a slow-moving police van carrying detained students. She placed her palm on the hood, forcing the vehicle to stop. Mobile phones captured the moment from every angle. She too, raised her own phone and recorded the encounter. Within hours, the clip spread across India and beyond. It became one of the defining visuals of the Cockroach Janta Party protests, a movement in which students demanded transparency and accountability, following leaks in India’s medical entrance exams.…

In the latest sign of China’s threat to the United States’s tech dominance, the Trump administration on Tuesday banned new foreign-made humanoid and four-legged robotsfrom entering the country. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) cited “unacceptable risks” to national security for the decision. The FCC noted how the robots “collect data that could be leveraged by malign actors to surveil Americans, enhance the capabilities of foreign intelligence services, or to remotely commandeer the robots.” The move is widely seen as aimed squarely at China, which accounted for 85% of humanoid robot deployments last year, according to British bank Barclays.Humanoid robots steal the show…

European football’s governing body, UEFA, voted unanimously to boycott FIFA competitions if the world governing body proceeds with plans to create a new commercial subsidiary valued at $20 billion (roughly €17.5 billion) and sell a non-controlling minority stake in it to investors. The subsidiary would be responsible for FIFA’s commercial rights like broadcast, sponsorship, ticketing and licensing contracts for its competitions, including the World Cup. UEFA’s 55 members met to discuss a response to FIFA President Gianni Infantino’s controversial plans. “No UEFA national teams will participate in any FIFA competition for so long as these proposals remain alive, unless this proposal has been abandoned in…

Even before opening night, expectations of how the themes of Richard Wagner’s “Rienzi” would be handled were running high — not least because the opera had never been staged at the Bayreuth Festival. Now it has opened the festival’s 150th anniversary. One aspect that fueled the debate: The close relationship between Wagner’s descendants and Adolf Hitler — “Rienzi” was one of Hitler’s favorite operas. “It’s a piece that’s highly contaminated,” director Alexandra Szemerédy told DW. “When Katharina Wagner [the festival’s director] first approached us, my initial excitement was definitely a bit dampened.” Nonetheless, the production received enthusiastic applause at its premiere…

BMW makes five BMW on Wednesday became the fifth German carmaker to announce major job cuts, as the country’s auto sector seeks to tackle rising competition from China. The Munich-based firm said it would cut up to 8,000 jobs globally, representing about 5% of its 154,000-strong workforce. BMW, which also owns the Mini and Rolls-Royce brands, said the job losses would primarily affect operations in Germany and be achieved through natural staff turnover and a voluntary redundancy program. Although BMW was seen as more resilient to Chinese competition, the company warned last month that its sales in China were falling sharply. Chinese rivals have intensified competition…

 “While you divide, we unite,” Gianni Infantino wrote on social media on Monday, in a long missive aimed at his detractors. By Tuesday, he had united the football world — albeit in opposition to his latest scheme.  Shortly after reports emerged in UK newspapers The Times and the Financial Times on Tuesday, FIFA confirmed its plans to create a new subsidiary, named FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE). This would enable it to sell a minority stake in the World Cup’s operations to private investors for billions of dollars. Chief among FIFA’s proposed investors is the investment vehicle, Thrive Eternal, headed by Joshua Kushner — younger brother of Jared Kushner, US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law.   Why is FIFA’s new World Cup plan controversial?  Other than the potential…

K-pop powerhouse BTS said on Wednesday that they would not submit songs for consideration for the 2027 Grammys next February.  The seven band members issued the same Korean-language note online in concert. What’s the reason BTS doesn’t want to be considered this year?  They said they did not want to be included in the new Grammy category, best Asian pop music performance, that’s seen as a way to categorize releases across K-pop or J-pop and C-pop from Japan and China, respectively.  Newly reformed BTS, touring to promote a new album after returning from a military service hiatus, would seem to…