Saturday, May 31, 2025
Six In The Morning Saturday 31 May 2025
Israel’s ‘violations’ in Gaza make world more dangerous, Norway warns
Low respect for international law and human rights set worrying precedent, international development minister says
Israel is setting a dangerous precedent for international human rights law violations in Gaza that is making the whole world more dangerous, Norway’s international development minister has warned.
Norway has played a historical role in the region, including by facilitating the Oslo peace accords between Israel and the Palestinians that led to a celebrated breakthrough deal in 1993. Last year it recognised the Palestinian state, one of a minority of European countries to do so.
IAEA warns Iran has upped enriched uranium production
The international nuclear watchdog said Iran's stocks of 60% enriched uranium have increased to over 400 kilograms. It also criticized Iran for a "lack of cooperation."
The UN's International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said that Iran has increased its production of enriched uranium in recent months, according to a report seen by multiple news agencies on Saturday.
The news comes amid talks between Iran and the US aimed at curtailing Tehran's nuclear program and preventing it from acquiring nuclear weapons.
Vandals target Paris Holocaust memorial, synagogues with paint
Paris’s Holocaust memorial, along with two synagogues and a Jewish restaurant were vandalised with green paint in what appeared to be a coordinated overnight to Saturday, police sources said. France’s Jewish community is among the largest in the world, and has faced a growing number of anti-Semitic attacks since the Gaza war broke out on October 7, 2023.
France’s Holocaust memorial, two synagogues and a restaurant in central Paris were vandalised with green paint overnight, according to police sources on Saturday, prompting condemnation from government and city officials.
“I am deeply disgusted by these heinous acts targeting the Jewish community,” said French Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau said on X.
No arrests have been made.
Long lines for cheap stockpiled rice sold directly to retail firms
THE ASAHI SHIMBUN
May 31, 2025 at 18:45 JST
Stockpiled rice sold by the government directly to retail companies hit store shelves on May 31 and long lines of customers were waiting to buy the cheaper grain. Supplies quickly sold out.
Ito-Yokado Co.’s supermarket in Tokyo’s Omori district was one of those outlets.
About 250 customers had lined up an hour or so before the supermarket opened at 10 a.m.
India’s latest coffee hub? Beans and brews offer new hope to Nagaland
More than 40 years after saplings first came to Nagaland, coffee grown in the northeast Indian state is making a formidable name for itself.
With its high ceilings, soft lighting and brown and turquoise blue cushioned chairs, Juro Coffee House has the appearance of a chic European cafe.
Sitting right off India’s National Highway-2, which connects the northeastern states of Assam, Nagaland and Manipur, the cafe hosts a live roastery unit that was set up in January by the Nagaland state government. Here, green coffee beans from 12 districts in Nagaland are roasted live, ground and served, from farm to cup.
Turkey arrests dozens including opposition party members
Rachel Muller-Heyndyk & BBC Turkish
Turkish authorities have ordered the arrests of dozens of people facing corruption allegations, including opposition party members, in Istanbul and the city of Adana.
The Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor's Office issued detention orders for 47 people and detained 30. Others detained included local municipal mayors and Istanbul officials.
The operation is the fifth wave of arrests against the government's political opponents, starting with the jailing of Istanbul's mayor Ekrem Imamoglu, regarded as President Tayyip Erdogan's main rival in March.
Friday, May 30, 2025
Six In The Morning Friday 30 May 2025
Last hospital in North Gaza governorate evacuated after Israeli order
Mallory Moench
The last hospital providing health services in the North Gaza governorate is out of service after the Israeli military ordered its immediate evacuation, the hospital's director has said.
Dr Mohammed Salha said patients were evacuated from al-Awda hospital in Jabalia on Thursday evening.
He told the BBC "we are feeling really bad about this forced evacuation" after "two weeks of siege", saying there is now "no health facility working in the north".
Ukrainian cities ‘terrorised’ by North Korean weapons in Russian hands – report
Multinational team monitoring sanctions says 20,000 container loads of missiles, artillery, rocket launchers and other munitions illegally supplied
Fri 30 May 2025 06.20 BST
Ukrainian cities ‘terrorised’ by North Korean weapons in Russian hands – report
Multinational team monitoring sanctions says 20,000 container loads of missiles, artillery, rocket launchers and other munitions illegally supplied
Russian forces have used North Korean weapons to intensify missile attacks against critical civilian infrastructure in Ukraine and “terrorised” entire cities, according to a report by UN members that reveals the extent of Moscow’s dependence on the regime in Pyongyang.
The Multilateral Sanctions Monitoring Team, comprising 11 countries including the US, Britain, EU states and Japan, said Kim Jong-un’s dictatorship had supplied Russia with more than 20,000 containers of munitions since September 2023.
Chaos on German autobahns as Google Maps wrongly says they are closed
Drivers using the navigation app confronted with mass of red dots indicating stop signs
Fri 30 May 2025 12.26 BST
Confusion reigned on German autobahns and highways at the start of one of the busiest holiday breaks of the year on Thursday after Google Maps wrongly indicated that vast swathes of them were closed.
People using the navigation service around major conurbations such as Frankfurt, Hamburg and Berlin on motorways between western, northern, south-western and central Germany were confronted with maps sprinkled with a mass of red dots indicating stop signs. The phenomenon also affected parts of Belgium and the Netherlands.
ISIL (ISIS) launches first attacks against new Syrian government
The bombings mark a sharp escalation by the armed group, which views the new government in Damascus as illegitimate.
ISIL (ISIS) has claimed responsibility for an attack on the Syrian army, representing the armed group’s first strike at government forces since the fall of Bashar al-Assad, according to analysts.
In a statement released late on Thursday, ISIL said its fighters had planted an explosive device that struck a “vehicle of the apostate regime” in southern Syria.
Congo ex-president Kabila makes first public appearance in rebel-held Goma
Fukushima fuel debris features more holes than earlier sample
THE ASAHI SHIMBUN
May 30, 2025 at 14:13 JST
Melted fuel debris retrieved from the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant differed in several ways from an earlier sample and could reveal further details on how the 2011 disaster unfolded there, researchers said.
The Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA) and Tokyo Electric Power Co. on May 29 released their analysis of the debris that was removed from the No. 2 reactor at the stricken plant in April.
TEPCO has been analyzing melted nuclear fuel samples as part of efforts to determine the best way to decommission the nuclear power plant.
Thursday, May 29, 2025
Six In The Morning Thursday 29 May 2025
Israel confirms plans to create 22 new settlements in occupied West Bank
Defence minister says move ‘prevents establishment of a Palestinian state that would endanger Israel’
Thu 29 May 2025 12.24 BST
Israel has said it will establish 22 new settlements in the occupied West Bank, including the legalisation of outposts already built without government authorisation, after a security cabinet vote held in secret last week.
Israel occupied the West Bank, capturing it from Jordan, in the six-day war of 1967. Since then, successive governments have tried to permanently cement Israeli control over the land, in part by declaring swathes as “state lands”, which prevents private Palestinian ownership.
Portugal's far-right Chega party becomes second biggest in parliament
Portugal's far-right Chega party has become the government's largest opposition party according to final results from Portugal's snap general election published on Wednesday. Support for Chega has grown in every general election since the party was founded in 2019 by former television football commentator Andre Ventura.
Portugal's far-right Chega party won second place in snap elections last week, according to final results published Wednesday, making it the official opposition party in the country just six years after its creation.
Chega, which means "Enough", and the left-wing Socialist Party (PS) had been level on 58 seats after the provisional results from the May 18 poll.
But the far-right party won two of the previously unannounced four overseas constituencies, taking its tally to 60.
Japan weighs spending more on U.S. military facilities
THE ASAHI SHIMBUN
May 29, 2025 at 15:01 JST
The government is considering boosting its annual spending on U.S. military facilities in Japan by tens of billions of yen to appease the Trump administration, although the amount may not be satisfactory.
The White House National Security Council called for increasing Japan’s contribution to the costs of maintaining U.S. troops in the country when officials of the National Security Secretariat visited the United States in early May, government sources said.
Japan’s host nation support for U.S. forces stationed in the country averages about 211 billion yen ($1.5 billion) per fiscal year.
Acclaimed Kenyan writer and dissident, Ngugi wa Thiong’o, dies at 87
Ngugi’s work critiqued both British colonialism in Kenya and postcolonial Kenyan society.
Renowned Kenyan writer Ngugi wa Thiong’o has died at age 87, his family members have announced.
“It is with a heavy heart that we announce the passing of our dad, Ngugi wa Thiong’o,” his daughter Wanjiku Wa Ngugi wrote on Facebook on Wednesday.
Gaza aid system under pressure as thousands seek food
British and US bestsellers hit by purge in Russian bookshops
Svetlana Reiter and Investigations Team
A Russian book distributor has ordered bookshops to "return or destroy" works by the Pulitzer Prize-winner Jeffery Eugenides and the British bestseller Bridget Collins, among others, in the latest case of censorship targeting the country's literary scene.
Trading House BMM sent a letter to shops this week, seen by the BBC, with a list of 37 titles that should immediately be removed from sale.
The list also included texts by Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Zizek, Japanese novelist Ryu Murakami, and a number of Russian writers.
Wednesday, May 28, 2025
Six In The Morning Wednesday 28 May 2025
EU says Israeli strikes in Gaza 'go beyond what is necessary' to fight Hamas
Rachel Hagan
The EU's top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, has said that "Israeli strikes in Gaza go beyond what is necessary to fight Hamas" as the death toll there continues to mount.
Kallas also said that the EU did not support a new aid distribution model backed by the US and Israel which bypasses the UN and other humanitarian organisations.
"We don't support the privatisation of the distribution of humanitarian aid. Humanitarian aid can not be weaponised", she said.
How social media lies fuelled a rush to war between India and Pakistan
Disinformation spread to mainstream channels in what experts call deliberate ‘informational warfare’
How social media lies fuelled a rush to war between India and Pakistan
Disinformation spread to mainstream channels in what experts call deliberate ‘informational warfare’
As missiles and drones crisscrossed the night skies above India and Pakistan earlier this month, another invisible war was taking place.
Not long after the Indian government announced Operation Sindoor, the military offensive against Pakistan triggered by a militant attack in Kashmir that Delhi blamed on Islamabad, reports of major Pakistani defeats began to circulate online.
What began as disparate claims on social media platforms such as X soon became a cacophony of declarations of India’s military might, broadcast as “breaking news” and “exclusives” on the country’s biggest news programmes.
Australian whistleblower loses appeal to reduce prison term
Australian whistleblower David McBride, who leaked classified documents revealing allegations of Australian war crimes in Afghanistan to the media, lost his appeal to reduce his prison term on Wednesday.
The Australian Capital Territory Court of Appeal rejected McBride's appeal to reduce the severity of a five-year and eight-month prison sentence imposed a year ago.
Germany’s Merz promises to help Ukraine produce long-range missiles
Speaking during Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky's visit to Berlin on Wednesday, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said his government would help enable a joint production of long-range missiles.
"We want to enable long-range weapons, we also want to enable joint production, and we will not speak about details publicly but will intensify cooperation," he said at a joint news conference with Zelensky.
‘US, China, India can all fit into Africa’: On a quest to fix the world map
When Abimbola Ogundairo saw a pretty wooden map she thought would be great decor for her walls, she did something most regular buyers wouldn’t think of: She messaged the manufacturers with a simple, yet charged question.
“Which map projection did you use?” she asked, referring to the method of representing maps on a flat plane.
Farm minister expects 2021 rice to be sold in 1,800 yen range
THE ASAHI SHIMBUN
May 28, 2025 at 18:39 JST
The 2021 crop of government stockpiled rice is expected to sell for around 1,800 yen ($12.50) per 5 kilograms when it hits store shelves, the farm minister announced on May 28, in a bid to curb soaring rice prices.
“What is already being sold is ‘ko-mai’ old rice,” Shinjiro Koizumi said at the Lower House's agriculture and fisheries committee meeting, referring to the crop harvested in 2024.
“And what will be on store shelves from next week will be ‘kokoko-mai,’” he said, referring to the rice harvested in 2022.