Author: DW

Spanish police have shared aerial footage of a hammerhead shark off the coast of Gran Canaria after a popular tourist beach was closed on the island due to a sighting.Melenara Beach in the town of Telde was busy on Saturday when several swimmers saw a roughly two-metre-long shark near the shore, according to Spanish news channel Antena 3. Lifeguards contacted the police who then arrived and closed the beach before search teams went out on jet skis to try to locate the animal, the broadcaster said. X This content is provided by X, which may be using cookies and other…

European Union leaders gathered in Brussels on Monday for an informal meeting focused largely on discussing the choice of people to fill key positions in the bloc. Three jobs are up for grabs: president of the European Commission, currently held by Ursula von der Leyen; president of the European Council, a position currently held by Charles Michel; and that of foreign policy chief or “high representative,” which is at present in the hands of Josep Borrell. “I am sure we can find an agreement in the shortest possible time,” German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said as he arrived for the evening talks on Monday.  The dinner…

The top medical official in the United States has called on Congress to add a warning label to social media websites, similar to the warning labels found on cigarette packaging. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy said social media is a contributing factor in the mental health crisis among young people in a guest essay that was published in The New York Times on Monday. “It is time to require a surgeon general’s warning label on social media platforms, stating that social media is associated with significant mental health harms for adolescents,” Murthy wrote. “A surgeon general’s warning label, which requires congressional action, would…

Kitefoiler Jackson James Rice, who was gearing up to represent Tonga at the Paris Olympics, has died aged 18.The athlete, who was known as JJ Rice, died on Saturday while free diving from a boat in Faleloa, on the island of Ha’apai in the Tonga archipelago. His father Darren Rice confirmed his son’s death to local news outlet the Matangi Tonga newspaper.He said the teenager died after a suspected blackout in shallow water. His body was found on the seafloor underneath the boat at about 12.15pm by other divers.Efforts to resuscitate him had failed, the newspaper reported. The kitefoiler was…

Muhammad Anza from Rafah, a city near the Gaza Strip’s border with Egypt, has been searching for weeks for his uncle, Ibrahim Al-Shaer, who disappeared at the beginning of May.  “Since that day, he has never returned, and we haven’t heard from him,” Anza, 19, told DW from Gaza via phone. “We are in a state of great concern. We want to know where he is, we want to know if he is dead, so we can bury him and have mercy on him, or whether he was detained [by the Israeli military].” When Israel’s military launched an offensive in eastern Rafah on…

“The transfer of foreigners to Poland by the German police was carried out in violation of the principles of cooperation between the two services and against the transfer law. The German authorities must not make such a decision arbitrarily,” Poland’s border service wrote on social media on Monday. The statement came after German authorities reportedly deposited a family of five Afghan asylum seekers on the Polish side of their border near Osinow Dolny last Friday after apprehending them for having illegally entered Germany without the necessary paperwork. Under existing law, their lack of documents dictated they be returned to Poland, where…

German investigators have confiscated 35.5 tonnes of cocaine in what authorities say is the biggest bust of the class A drug Europe has ever seen. Prosecutors in the western city of Duesseldorf said they confiscated the cocaine, which they valued at €2.6bn (£2.19bn), last year after receiving a tip from Colombian authorities. A total of 25 tonnes of cocaine was found in the port of the northern city of Hamburg as part of Operation Plexus, another eight in the Dutch port of Rotterdam and almost three in Colombia. The drugs were hidden among vegetables and fruit, prosecutors said.Seven people aged between…

The tiny kingdom of Lesotho lies in the Maluti Mountains, whose highest peak rises over 3,000 meters (9,842 ft) above sea level. There, Lesotho possesses a sought-after treasure: water. Lesotho channels this vital resource into huge dams and trade in water is flourishing. For more than two decades, Lesotho has been exporting water to neighboring South Africa , which surrounds Lesotho. South Africa’s economic hub, Johannesburg, heavily relies on this water supply from Lesotho.  Water resources in southern Africa are unevenly distributed. Despite its smaller size, Lesotho is rich in water, while larger South Africa lacks enough water to meet the growing demand. The Lesotho Highlands Water Project…

Fouzieh is a single mother of a 5-year-old son. Her husband left the family after the Taliban took power in Afghanistan in 2021. He was afraid of retaliation for being with her. “I was a police officer and have worked for the national security forces,” Fouzieh told DW. “We lived in Kabul as the Taliban came. My husband abandoned us. I had to go into hiding with my son. We have been on the run for over a year, moving every couple of months and staying with our relatives.” Since the Taliban takeover, many former police officers and soldiers have…

The gunfire rang long and loud.We watched as angry and tearful men fired into the air chanting death threats against Israel and America in Deir Qanoun En Nahr in southern Lebanon.Ambulance sirens wailed and crowds of young Lebanese female medics stood holding pictures of their colleague, their faces creased in pain and sorrow.We’ve been to many funerals recently. This was the ceremony for two civilians, both women – one a mother, the other an emergency medic in her twenties.They are the latest civilian victims to be killed in Israeli border attacks.There’s terror on the other side of the border too,…