World News

The US Coast Guard boarded two “ghost fleet” tanker ships in a “meticulously coordinated” operation, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said. Noem said one ship was in the North Atlantic Sea while the other was in international waters near the Caribbean. The operations took place within hours of each other, she adds. The tankers, the…

Reuters The war in Ukraine is nearing its fourth anniversary Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky says European allies have not given him sound guarantees that they will protect his country in the case of a new Russian aggression. “I am asking this very question to all our partners and I have not received a clear, unambiguous…

Vanessa BuschschlüterLatin America online editor REDI Javier Marcano Tábata was the commander of the presidential honour guard The general in command of Venezuela’s presidential honour guard, Javier Marcano Tábata, has been sacked days after Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro was seized by US forces in a raid in Caracas and taken to New York to stand…

A spell of freezing weather bringing heavy snowfall and ice has caused transport disruption across western Europe. Hundreds of flights have been cancelled at several airports, while Eurostar services and haulage have also been affected. More than 700 flights were cancelled at Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam, a major regional transport hub, on Wednesday. Meanwhile, France’s…

Reuters Emotions are still raw outside the bar Families of the victims of a fire at a Swiss bar on New Year’s Eve have expressed shock after officials admitted the venue had not undergone safety checks for five years. Romain Jordan, who represents some of the families, said the “staggering number of breaches and shortcomings…

A plot to kill Burkina Faso’s military leader, Capt Ibrahim Traoré, has been thwarted, the West African nation has announced. The sophisticated plan had been hatched by Lt Col Paul Henri Damiba, the military officer ousted by Traoré in September 2022, the security minister said in a late-night broadcast. “Our intelligence services intercepted this operation…

Laura BickerChina correspondent, Beijing Miraflores Palace via Reuters Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro (L) and Chinese president Xi Jinping have enjoyed an amicable relationship in recent years – pictured here during a state visit to Beijing in 2023 It took just a few hours for Donald Trump to upend a relationship that China had been cultivating…