Author: France 24

Electricity is gratually being restored to parts of Spain and Portugal following a massive blackout that brought much of the two countries to a standstill. While the cause of the outage is still being investigated, Yuka Royer takes a look at how Europe is trying to modernise its grid system. Plus, India has ordered 26 more Rafale fighter jets from French defence giant Dassault, marking another step in the Asian nation’s reliance on French military hardware. 

A winner of the 2018 Nobel Peace Prize has spoken to FRANCE 24 about how she wanted to be a makeup artist in her small village in northern Iraq before her life was nearly destroyed by the Islamic State group. In 2014, when Nadia Murad was just 21 years old, IS group terrorists attacked her community, killing hundreds of people, including her mother and six of her nine brothers. Along with nearly 7,000 other Yazidi women and children, she was abducted and like many of them was raped, beaten and tortured for several months. Now, though, she is a powerful…

In this edition of our arts24 music show, Jennifer Ben Brahim talks about one of the biggest music festivals in the world as it comes to a close. There were many viral moments at Coachella, including headline act Lady Gaga having a microphone malfunction and US politician Bernie Sanders surprising festival-goers as part of his “Fighting Oligarchy” tour. US alt-pop singer d4vd also went viral for attempting and failing to do a backflip on stage during his first performance, but luckily he managed to redeem himself on the second weekend. Backflip aside, d4vd has just released his first solo album…

Ethiopia’s Tigst Assefa set a new women’s-only world record of 2hr 15min 50sec when she won the London marathon on Sunday whilst Kenya’s Sabastian Sawe put a star-studded men’s field to the sword.

Twelve US states have filed a lawsuit against President Donald Trump, arguing that his use of emergency powers to wage a global trade war is “reckless and unlawful”. Also in this edition: the Trump administration signals a potential de-escalation of the trade war, and Chinese carmakers show off their latest innovations at the Shanghai Auto Show.

Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al-Thani, representing Gaza mediator Qatar said on Sunday that there was “a bit of progress” in talks in Doha this week aimed at securing a new truce in the Israel-Hamas war.

The death of Pope Francis has prompted sadness among many of Hollywood’s leading lights, with director Martin Scorsese paying tribute to “a remarkable human being”. FRANCE 24’s Olivia Salazar-Winspear takes us through some of the reactions to the pope’s passing from the world of cinema. She also gives us a preview of the poster for this year’s Cannes Film Festival.

A goal by Frenchman Jules Koundé in the dying minutes of extra time handed Barcelona a dramatic 3-2 win over Real Madrid in a thrilling Copa del Rey final on Saturday, keeping the Catalans’ dream of quadruple title wins alive.

April 25 marks World Malaria Day, a time to draw attention to one of the world’s oldest and deadliest diseases. While significant strides have been made in prevention and treatment, malaria still claims hundreds of thousands of lives annually, with Africa bearing the brunt. In 2023 alone, the mosquito-borne illness killed nearly 600,000 people. Joining us now to discuss this is Dr. Michael Adekunle Charles, CEO of the RBM Partnership to End Malaria — welcome to the program.

Countries that once followed the gospel of free trade and liberalism are changing tack and focusing on national interests before anything else, with Donald Trump’s America being a case in point. Our business editor Charles Pellegrin takes a deep dive into how geopolitics is reshaping the global economy with David Baverez. He’s a French investor based in Hong Kong and author of the book “Bienvenue en économie de guerre” or “Welcome to the wartime economy”, published in French by Novice.