Author: DW

The heart is actually a fairly simple organ. It’s a pump, composed of four chambers, with a few valves, tubes and clever wiring. But when the pump no longer works as it should, things start looking grim. In people with severe heart failure, the pump is so weak that it no longer moves blood through the body effectively. Those affected are extremely short of breath, even at rest. Their organs are no longer supplied with blood sufficiently, so have a lack of oxygen and nutrients. The only way out is a new heart. However, donor hearts are in short supply. In Germany,…

Asked what makes Belgium especially suited to take over the presidency of the EU Council in January, a smiling Foreign Minster Hadja Lahbib recently said “compromis a la belge [Belgian compromise], that is our secret.” At the December presentation of Belgium’s presidency agenda, she added that “we are better in finding solutions than creating problems.” Lahbib, who is from the French-speaking region of Wallonia, only entered politics a year-and-a-half ago after a career as a television journalist. She describes Belgium as a “multilingual, multiethnic country with many ideas” that is used to discussions and seeking out compromise. Lahbib herself was born…

A 10-year-old boy was shot dead by another boy of the same age after losing a bicycle race, the victim’s mother has claimed.Keith “KJ” Frierson was found bleeding from the head and neck at about 4.30pm in a Californian suburb on Saturday, with police arresting a boy, 10, and his father. The boy suspect was being a “sore loser” after the race in Foothill Farms – about 16 miles northeast of Sacramento – and took aim at KJ, according to his mother Brittani Frierson.She had given KJ permission to ride the bike – which she says he “begged” to get…

Russian President Vladimir Putin said Monday that Moscow would step up its strikes on military targets in Ukraine, two days after Kyiv’s deadly attack on the Russian city of Belgorod. “We’re going to intensify the strikes. No crime against civilians will rest unpunished, that’s for certain,” he said during a visit to a military hospital, referring to the 24 dead and 100 wounded in Saturday’s assault. Putin accused Ukrainian forces of targeting “right in the city center, where people were walking around, before New Year’s Eve.” He said Moscow’s forces would continue to hit what he called Ukrainian “military installations,” upping the ante…

Iran has vowed revenge after more than 100 people were killed in two explosions near the tomb of a general.At the time of the explosions a ceremony was being held in the city of Kerman to mark the 2020 assassination of Iran’s top commander Qassem Soleimani. Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi said the attack was “heinous and inhumane”, while Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei has vowed to get revenge.According to state media, he said: “Cruel criminals […] must know that they will be strongly dealt with from now on and […] undoubtedly there will be a harsh response.” Image: Pic: AP Kerman’s…

The number of migrants arriving by boats in the United Kingdom from mainland Europe across the Channel dropped 36% last year, UK government data showed. In 2023, the number of people arriving in small boats fell to 29,437 from 2022’s record of 45,775. Crossings over the Channel, a major shipping lane, have been a challenge for the Conservative government in Britain. What did the UK PM say? UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has prioritized halting these arrivals, promising last year to “stop the boats.” “I am determined to end the burden of illegal migration on the British people,” Sunak said. “That…

A New York judge on Wednesday began to unseal a tranche of documents containing the identities of people linked to Jeffrey Epstein, the financier who committed suicide in 2019 as he awaited trial for sex crimes. Speculation has been in rife in recent weeks that a judge was about to release a list of clients or alleged co-conspirators of Epstein. And on Wednesday, the judge began the process of unveiling the documents. The great majority of those whose names appear in the documents aren’t accused of wrongdoing or have been mentioned previously in legal proceedings. The reveal is part of a defamation proceeding between…

The world’s forests – the lungs of the planet – are being put under “enormous pressure” by the UK’s appetite for commodities like soy, cocoa, palm oil, beef and leather, MPs have warned.The intensity of the country’s consumption, when measured by its footprint per tonne of product consumed, is higher than that of China, according to the Environmental Audit Committee (EAC) report. This should “serve as a wake-up call to the government”, said EAC chair Philip Dunne, who added that the UK’s use is having an “unsustainable impact on the planet”.The committee has now released a 66-page report on Britain’s…

The number of asylum applications to the European Union has risen over the past two years. While there were just under 1 million in 2022, the European Union Agency for Asylum has predicted that this mark could now have hit the highest number since 2015, the year in which a especially large number of people came to Europe and former German Chancellor Angela Merkel coined the slogan: “We can do this!” Of those seeking protection, more than 350,000 entered the EU irregularly (without permission) in the first 11 months of 2023, according to EU border protection agency Frontex. But irregular migration only accounts…

Donald Trump has appealed to the US Supreme Court to enforce his participation in the primary election in the state of Colorado, the former president’s campaign team announced on Wednesday. In December, the 77-year-old appealed a 4-3 ruling by the Colorado Supreme Court that became the first time ever that Section 3 of the 14th Amendment was used to bar a presidential contender. The court found that Trump’s role in the January 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol disqualified him under the previously unused clause. Likely Republican nomination The frontrunner for the Republican 2024 nomination, Trump is pushing back against the Colorado court’s decision that disqualified him under…