Author: Press Room
Published on 14/08/2026 – 16:03 GMT+2 Ukraine’s military command said its forces liberated 26 settlements in a push around Oleksandrivka in southeastern Ukraine, in an operation that ran for more than six months. ADVERTISEMENT ADVERTISEMENT Of the liberated settlements, 12 are located in Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, 10 in the Donetsk region and four in the Zaporizhzhia region. Kyiv authorities insist that the Oleksandrivka-direction counteroffensive was designed to blunt Russia’s spring-summer offensive and push Russian troops out of Dnipropetrovsk region, an area Moscow had been trying to carve into a buffer zone. According to Ukrainian Airborne Assault Forces Command, Kyiv’s troops have…
Published on 14/08/2026 – 15:30 GMT+2 Ash spewing from Sicily’s Mount Etna volcano has forced the closure of the Italian island’s largest airport for the fifth consecutive day, stranding hundreds of summer holiday travellers during the busiest travel week of the year. ADVERTISEMENT ADVERTISEMENT Catania’s airport will remain closed until early on Saturday, which falls on the Ferragosto holiday that marks the height of the Italian summer holiday season when millions flock to the sea and mountains, deserting Italian cities. While Etna’s activity often interrupts flights at the airport, located 30 kilometres south of the volcano, this is the longest…
By Kirsten Ripper Published on 14/08/2026 – 10:38 GMT+2 Where should the journey go? In 2026, many tourists now think very carefully about that. And among US tourists, Germany may now lose out as a destination. ADVERTISEMENT ADVERTISEMENT The reason: in the US State Department’s travel advisories, the Federal Republic remains at security level 2. Travellers are therefore advised to exercise “increased caution”. Switzerland, Austria, Portugal and Poland are classified by the US authorities at security level 1 as countries without a particular warning level. Norway also benefits from this positive rating, which was updated at the beginning of July 2026.…
Thousands of illlegal migrants who arrived Ceuta late-July are still in the autonomous Spanish enclave while reception facilities struggle to cope with an emergency that has overwhelmed their capacity. ADVERTISEMENT ADVERTISEMENT Many migrants are sleeping in the open on the streets, with residents handing out food and NGO and associations cooking non-stop for almost two weeks. The situation is one of “complete vulnerability”, Halima Ahmed, spokesperson and social educator for Ceuta-based NGO Luna Blanca, tells ‘Euronews’. There are people who eat only once a day and rely on humanitarian organisations or even on neighbours cooking food in their own homes.…
Migration is a hot-button issue, especially when displacements peak, such as the recent episode in the Spanish territory of Ceuta, which saw around 80,000 people cross the border from Morocco in just 48 hours at the end of July. ADVERTISEMENT ADVERTISEMENT Despite the global number of refugees falling by 3% in 2025 compared to the end of 2024, according to the UN Refugee Agency, UNHCR, the issue remains firmly on people’s minds: Google searches on the topic have increased by 150% in the past five years. While overall public support for offering refuge remains strong, there are still widespread doubts…
Published on 14/08/2026 – 11:26 GMT+2 Russian forces killed one person and injured 17 others in strikes on Kramatorsk and the nearby village of Bilenke, Ukraine on Thursday evening, officials in Donetsk said. ADVERTISEMENT ADVERTISEMENT Eight guided aerial bombs struck between 20:30 and 20:56 local time (19:30 and 19:56 CET), hitting residential buildings, including an apartment block. The regional prosecutor’s office said “one person is known to have been killed and 17 injured,” with victims suffering blast injuries, shrapnel wounds and burns. Moscow has not confirmed or denied the strike. Russian authorities, meanwhile, reported a Ukrainian drone attack overnight on…
A three-kilometre wall of flames up to 30 metres high forced hundreds of tourists into the sea off northern Greece, as wildfires also tore across, Croatia, France and the UK amid a punishing summer heatwave. ADVERTISEMENT ADVERTISEMENT More than 200 firefighters, water-bombing planes and helicopters battled for hours to stop a blaze spreading across the Halkidiki peninsula, south of Thessaloniki, as it bore down on the resorts of Siviri and Fourka, packed with summer tourists. Judging evacuation by road too dangerous, officials sent around 500 tourists into small boats, coast guard vessels and fire brigade craft, including roughly 200 taken…
Published on 14/08/2026 – 8:11 GMT+2 Fighter jets operating under NATO’s Baltic Air Policing mission shot down a “foreign drone” in Latvian airspace on Friday, according to the country’s military. ADVERTISEMENT ADVERTISEMENT In a statement, the Latvian armed forces said the drone had entered Latvia “as a result of Russian electromagnetic warfare” and that it was intercepted over the Balvi region in the east of the country. The military has deployed additional air defence units to Latvia’s eastern borders and will continue to monitor its airspace, it said. “As long as Russia’s aggression in Ukraine continues, a recurrence of cases…
Published on 13/08/2026 – 16:16 GMT+2•Updated 16:20 An explosion at the Dutch port of Rotterdam on Thursday killed at least one person and injured several others, city police said. ADVERTISEMENT ADVERTISEMENT Police said the blast at Europe’s biggest port happened late on Thursday morning and that a crime scene has been set up to try to establish what caused it. The explosion happened at a refinery and fuel terminal run by Gunvor Energy in an industrial section of the vast port premises. Dutch broadcaster NOS said that a maintenance team had been working on a section of pipes there. Rotterdam…
Published on 13/08/2026 – 17:15 GMT+2 A bomb hidden in a rubbish bin tore through a residential street in occupied Sevastopol on Thursday morning, killing a Russian serviceman in what Moscow’s security service called a Ukrainian-directed attack, the latest in a series of strikes against military figures tied to the war. ADVERTISEMENT ADVERTISEMENT The explosion struck a stairwell area on Stoletovsky Avenue as the victim was walking with a companion, according to witness accounts carried by Russian Telegram channels. Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) later confirmed that a Defence Ministry serviceman had been killed, without naming him and said it…