News in English

8. April 2017, 21:58

Geneva on alert

In Switzerland, the city of Geneva is on alert and police are looking for suspects identified by Swiss federal officials as having links to last month’s attacks in Paris. The search is being focused on the offices of the United Nations in Geneva.

Afghan airport: siege ends

Officials in Afghanistan say that around 50 people were killed in a siege at the airport in Kandahar which began with a Taliban attack two days ago. They also say that the last of the 11 Taliban attackers have been killed by security forces. The assault on the Kandahar airport coincided with talks in Islamabad where Afghan President Ashraf Ghani asked Pakistan to help restart peace talks with the Taliban which broke down earlier this year.

Greece rounds up refugees

Greece has rounded up over two-thousand refugees who had been stranded for three weeks on the border to Macedonia, hoping to reach western Europe. The refugees are from Algeria, Morocco, Somalia and Pakistan, which are not considered to be war zones. They have been taken to Athens are expected to be deported to their home countries. Macedonia has said it will only let in war refugees from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan. Greece is under pressure from its EU partners to do more to stem the flow of refugees heading west. This comes as 12 migrants have drowned when their boat sank in Aegean Sea while trying to reach the Greek islands from Turkey. 26 other people were rescued and 12 more are missing. In a related story, the Council of Europe´s Human Rights Commissioner, Nils Muiznieks, has said Europe is letting already-traumatised asylum-seekers down by toughening immigration laws and erecting fences. He said European states had to better integrate migrants so that the values of solidarity and tolerance are upheld.

Climate talks near end

Representatives from 200 countries meeting at the UN climate conference in Paris have two more days to negotiate a deal on reducing greenhouse gases. One of those attending the Paris talks is Austria’s minister for the environment, Andrä Rupprechter, who is calling for solidarity in reaching an acceptable agreement: “We have to fight united against climate change and that is a global goal where all the parties have to be on board.”

David Cameron in Poland

British Prime Minister David Cameron is in Poland where he has warned that Britons may vote to leave the EU in a referendum next year if Brussels refuses to re-negotiate existing treaties and to return some powers back to national parliaments. Cameron says he and the new conservative government in Warsaw agree on limits to greater European integration: “We both believe in a Europe of nation-states. We both want to see a stronger role for national parliaments and an acceptance that ever-closer union is not the aim of all. I want Britain to stay in a reformed European Union.”

Nobel Prizes awarded

This year’s Nobel prizes are being awarded today in Oslo and Stockholm amid tight security. The peace prize is going to Tunisia’s National Dialogue Quartet, a platform for building democracy.

The weather

Sunny with highs today from 1 to 10 degrees.

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