Author: DW

A  Japan  high court ruled on Thursday  that denying marriage to same-sex couples was unconstitutional. “Enacting same-sex marriage does not seem to cause disadvantages or harmful effects,” the court said. The high court in Sapporo, a northern Japanese city, ruled that denying same-sex couples the same marriage benefits as heterosexual couples was a violation of citizens’ fundamental right to have a family.   “I thought the ruling might be a conservative one, but it ended up exceeding my expectations,” said one of the plaintiffs, who did not disclose his name to reporters. “I couldn’t help but cry.” The court called for urgent government action to…

There are minerals and metals like lithium and copper and then there are rare earths, including scandium, cerium, promethium, terbium and thulium. Rare earths are not that rare. The rarest — thulium — is more common than gold, but it is rarely found in quantities that make mining economically worthwhile. A study published last week by IW Consult at the German Economic Institute and Fraunhofer Systems and Innovation Research (ISI) shed light on Germany’s imports of these rare earths, along with copper and lithium, to assess their importance to the economy.Rare earths discovered in SwedenTo view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser…

Thousands of farmers gathered in India’s capital, New Delhi, on Thursday to demand higher prices for crops. The demonstrations came a month after farmers set up camp in northern India after riot police stopped them from reaching the capital. Protests come ahead of elections India’s government is expected in the coming days to call new elections, in which Prime Minister Narendra Modi is to seek a third term. Modi and the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have said in the past that they are committed to the farmers’ welfare and prosperity. Farmers represent an important Indian voting bloc as nearly…

An enormous volcano has been “hiding in plain sight” on Mars for decades, according to scientists.The volcano, which is 280 miles wide, was found alongside a possible sheet of buried glacier ice in the eastern part of Mars’ Tharsis volcanic province, near the planet’s equator, scientists revealed at the 55th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference held in Texas on Wednesday. They said the volcano, which has been temporarily named the Noctis volcano in honour of its location at the edge of scenic Noctis Labyrinthus (Labyrinth of the Night), had been seen repeatedly by Nasa’s orbiting spacecraft since 1971, but was…

Daniel Freund isn’t mincing words about why the decision to release €10.2 billion in frozen funds to Hungary should be investigated.  “We think that this decision was illegal and we want this checked now by the court,” the German Green member of the European Parliament said, explaining why his party and a majority of lawmakers want the European Court of Justice to investigate the European Commission’s December 13 decision to release the funds.      The money released in December was part of a sum which had been withheld by the Commission a year earlier due its determination that Hungary was violating “rule…

Germany’s benchmark blue-chip stock index topped 18,000 points for the first time during trading on Wednesday morning, hitting 18,000.42 shortly after opening. The DAX, which is made up of 40 large publicly traded German corporations, has been on a strong run in recent days despite struggles for the overall German economy. The trend is a rare piece of positive money news out of Germany as of late. A few weeks ago, Germany’s economy minister, Robert Habeck, revised the country’s growth expectations for 2024, lowering the forecast from 1.3% to 0.2%. “The fact that the global economic environment is unstable and…

Daniel Freund isn’t mincing words about why the decision to release €10.2 billion in frozen funds to Hungary should be investigated.  “We think that this decision was illegal and we want this checked now by the court,” the German Green member of the European Parliament said, explaining why his party and a majority of lawmakers want the European Court of Justice to investigate the European Commission’s December 13 decision to release the funds.      The money released in December was part of a sum which had been withheld by the Commission a year earlier due its determination that Hungary was violating “rule…

Poland is recalling 50 of its ambassadors as Warsaw tries to improve diplomatic missions at a difficult time, with neighbouring Ukraine battling Russia’s full-scale war.The diplomats were all appointed by the populist Law and Justice (PiS) party, which had held power since 2015 before losing December’s general election. Those being recalled have not been named by Poland’s foreign ministry, which said in a statement the “necessary” move “will help to address the difficult challenges facing Poland’s foreign policy today in a better, more professional manner”.Ukraine war latest – Moldova angry as Russia opens voting in breakaway region Please use Chrome…

The buzzing came out of nowhere, said Mohammad Zakaria Junaidi. “I was about to get lunch for my wife and kids when an armed drone started chasing my motorbike,” Junaidi, a farmer in Syria’s northwest, told DW. “I thought that me and my two sons — who were with me on the motorbike — were about to die,” the 33-year-old father said as he recalled the situation from late February. “There is no place to hide on the street that connects the village and the fields,” he told DW. However, in an attempt to escape, he sped up the motorbike and entered a dirt…

Germany’s benchmark blue-chip stock index, the DAX, crossed the 18,000-point mark for the first time during trading on Wednesday morning shortly after opening. The DAX, which is made up of 40 large publicly traded German corporations, has been on a strong run recently despite struggles for the overall  German economy. The Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) reported that Germany’s gross domestic product (GDP) fell by 0.3%  in the last quarter of 2023. However, in January this year, Europe’s biggest economy recorded a jump with German companies hitting a 6.3% increase in the value of goods exported.What’s wrong with Germany’s economy?To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading…