Wednesday, November 20, 2024
Six In The Morning Wednesday 21 November 2024
Ukraine fires UK-made Storm Shadow missiles into Russia for first time
Ukraine fires UK-made long-range missiles into Russia, BBC understands
The BBC understands that UK supplied Storm Shadow missiles have been used on targets inside Russia for the first time.
Former Ukrainian minister defends Biden's landmine decision
Let's return now to one of the other major news lines from today, which is that President Joe Biden has agreed to give Ukraine anti-personnel landmines, a US defence official tells the BBC.
A bit earlier, former Ukrainian foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba spoke to the BBC News channel about the US's decision, which has triggered pushback from some campaign groups.
Iran has offered to keep uranium below purity levels for a bomb, IAEA confirms
Wed 20 Nov 2024 15.21 GMT
Iran has offered to keep uranium below purity levels for a bomb, IAEA confirms
UN inspectorate chief calls Tehran’s move a ‘concrete step in the right direction’, amid threat of restored sanctions
Iran has offered to keep its stock of uranium enriched up to 60% – below the purity levels required to make a nuclear bomb – the head of the UN nuclear inspectorate, Rafael Grossi, has confirmed amid the threat of restored European sanctions over Tehran’s nuclear activities.
“I think this is … a concrete step in the right direction. We have a fact which has been verified by us. It is the first time Iran has agreed to take a different path,” Grossi said in Vienna on Tuesday.
Russia denies cutting Baltic Sea cables as tensions rise
Russia on Wednesday refuted suggestions it was responsible for damage caused over the weekend to two fiber-optic data telecommunication cables in the Baltic Sea.
European governments accused Moscow on Tuesday of escalating hybrid attacks on Ukraine's Western allies, days after one cable running between Finland and Germany, and another going between Sweden and Lithuania, were severed.
European officials stopped short of accusing Russia of destroying the cables but Germany, Poland and others suggested it was an act of sabotage.
G20 Rio summit ends with Ukraine blame game as Lula pushes climate action
Ukraine's allies and Russia on Tuesday traded blame for a dramatic escalation in the war in Europe, which dominated the final day of talks at a G20 summit in Rio de Janeiro.
The two-day gathering wrapped up with a plea from Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva for the world's most powerful leaders to rescue stalled UN climate talks in Azerbaijan, calling it a matter of the planet's "survival."
Joe Biden, attending his last summit as US president before he hands power to Donald Trump -- a noted climate skeptic -- also appealed for urgent action.
Elections in 2 Indian states are seen as a test of Prime Minister Modi’s popularity
Millions of people are voting in state elections in Maharashtra, India’s western industrial hub, and the mineral-rich eastern province of Jharkhand on Wednesday, in a test of the popularity of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist party and its regional partners.
Politically significant Maharashtra is India’s wealthiest state and home to the financial and entertainment capital, Mumbai. It is currently ruled by a coalition of Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party and a Hindu nationalist ally. An opposition alliance, including the Congress party, is in power in eastern Jharkhand state.
US vetoes another UN Security Council resolution calling for Gaza ceasefire
Tuesday, November 19, 2024
There's Nothing Like Naked Censorship
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer confronted China's Xi Jinping about alleged human rights violations during a meeting at the Group of 20 summit in Brazil.
— Bloomberg TV (@BloombergTV) November 18, 2024
Chinese officials quickly interrupted and ordered British journalists out of the room https://t.co/60QnnWLj8g pic.twitter.com/qCdFRq7HYp
Six In The Morning Tuesday 19 November 2024
Ukraine fires US-made longer-range missiles into Russia for the first time
International outrage over sentencing of 45 pro-democracy activists in Hong Kong
Human rights groups concerned after handing down of sentences of up to 10 years
Tue 19 Nov 2024 15.34 GMT
Governments and human rights groups have expressed concern and outrage at the sentencing of 45 pro-democracy activists in Hong Kong after the city’s largest national security trial.
On Tuesday, a court handed down sentences, ranging from four years and two months to 10 years, to activists, former legislators, councillors and academics, who with two people acquitted in May made up a group known as the Hong Kong 47.
The activists had been arrested in 2021 under the city’s national security law (NSL) for their participation in an unofficial primary election that was held in July 2020, weeks after the NSL had been imposed by Beijing in response to months of pro-democracy protests. More than 600,000 people participated in the unofficial vote.
New Zealand: 42,000 demonstrate support for Maori rights
Tens of thousands of people in New Zealand took to the streets to protest against a bill that would change the county's founding treaty between Indigenous Maori and the British Crown. The bill is unlikely to become law.
Tens of thousands of people in New Zealand gathered in front of Parliament in Wellington on Tuesday, to show dissent against a bill they said would dilute Indigenous people's rights.
Chants supporting the Indigenous Maori rang out across New Zealand's capital as at least 42,000 people demonstrated in what is one of the country's largest-ever protests to oppose a bill.
Gisèle Pelicot slams 'macho' society that 'trivialises rape' in closing statement
In her closing statement of the mass rape trial that has sent shockwaves across the country, survivor Gisèle Pelicot said it was time for “macho” society that “trivialises rape” to change. “I’ve lost 10 years of my life that I’ll never make up for,” she added. The trial enters its final stages this week.
Gisèle Pelicot, the French woman drugged by her ex-husband so she could be raped and sexually abused by him and dozens of strangers, said on Tuesday that it was time for a "macho" society to change its attitude on rape.
"It's time that the macho, patriarchal society that trivialises rape changes," said Gisele Pelicot in her closing statement at the trial of her ex-husband and dozens of other men on rape charges.
"It's time we changed the way we look at rape," she added.
Brazil arrests five suspects in alleged Lula assassination plot
Four G20 security guards reportedly among those arrested after murder bid mentioned for first time as part of coup probe.
Five people have been arrested in Brazil for their suspected involvement in an alleged attempt to assassinate then President-elect Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and his vice president in December 2022, according to police.
The police said in a statement on Tuesday that most of those investigated in the alleged coup attempt are military personnel with special forces training.
South African officials weigh up rescue mission for illegal miners underground
Police say 350-400 people have stayed in Stilfontein mine to avoid arrest after minister vowed to ‘smoke them out’
Tue 19 Nov 2024 12.41 GMT
South African authorities are assessing whether it is safe to rescue potentially thousands of illegal miners who may be trapped underground, after police stopped food, water and medicine being delivered to them about two weeks ago to try to force the miners to the surface.
A police spokesperson, Athlenda Mathe, insisted to reporters on Tuesday that the miners were not trapped in the abandoned goldmine in Stilfontein, a town about 100 miles south-west of Johannesburg, but rather staying underground to avoid being arrested.
She said experts would be putting cameras down the mineshaft to see if it was safe for emergency workers to undertake a rescue mission.