Watered-down version of statement to be issued at end of Montreal summit instead offers ‘ever closer association’
The EU has backed away from its offer to Canada to start talks on becoming an “associate member” after disagreements between member states just as an EU-Canada summit was set to begin in Montreal.
A draft of a joint statement to be issued after the end of the summit, which runs Thursday and Friday, showed a watered-down version offering “an ever closer association of Canada to the EU, short of full membership itself”.
Russia plans to build own version of US billionaire’s satellite communications to help attack Ukraine
Vladimir Putin praised Elon Musk’s genius and said he was in touch with Starlink’s controlling shareholder as Russia develops its own satellite communications for its military to use against Ukraine.
The Russian president, speaking at a summit with African leaders in Moscow, was comparing the Earth-orbiting network built by Musk’s SpaceX with Russia’s gradual efforts to build its own Rassvet constellation.
Josimar Medina woke a little before 9am on Wednesday to find himself airborne and hurtling through his carriage on the fast train from Madrid to Seville.
“I remember flying through the air and looking for my girlfriend, who was also shooting through the air,” said Medina, a 37-year-old tourist from the northern Peruvian city of Chiclayo.
Prime minister warns cabinet not to express opinions about future relationship with Brussels before review of options
Andy Burnham has warned ministers not to express their opinions about how the government should approach Brexit, as he argued that the Conservatives’ deal with Brussels had been more extreme than that promised in the 2016 referendum.
In another series of announcements connected to his plan to seek closer links with the EU, Burnham told ministers at a cabinet meeting on Wednesday that the current deal was a bad one, before writing to frontbenchers setting out his hopes to address this.
In April of last year, dozens of students set off from Serbia, intent on making it to Strasbourg, France on bicycles. The aim of the arduous, 13-day transcontinental journey was simple: to make their voices heard in Europe and beyond.
In their home city of Novi Sad, students had been holding near-daily protests after a deadly roof collapse at the city’s main railway station. As their push for accountability and justice spread across the country, it was met with baton-wielding police, teargas and a political class that branded these young people as traitors.
A passenger has recounted the moment two trains carrying more than 550 passengers in total collided in Spain. Volunteers attended the scene of the collision, distributing water and organising cars to take victims from the site.
The two high-speed trains were travelling in the same direction on the line from the Spanish capital, Madrid, to Seville in the south-west of the country, colliding in Toledo province on Wednesday morning
Questions were raised before Toledo crash over rail safety in a country where train travel has surged by 40%
Spain’s high-speed rail network, the most extensive in Europe and the second largest in the world after China, has long been a point of pride in the country. But Wednesday’s deadly crash – the second in nine months – has recast the spotlight on questions about safety.
Officials said at least 68 people were killed on Wednesday morning after a high-speed train slammed into another that had stopped on the tracks, leading to the derailment of several carriages. The two trains were believed to be carrying 544 passengers.
The long-serving leader of Serbia, Aleksandar Vučić, has conceded defeat, ushering in a seismic political shift after a historic election that pitted the increasingly authoritarian leader against a student-led movement that had spent two years protesting against his government. As news broke that Vučić’s 12 years in power had come to an end, celebrations erupted on the streets of Belgrade and other cities. But how did we get here - and what happens now? The Guardian's Europe live correspondent, Jakub Krupa, explains
On 4 November 1956, Russian forces moved into Budapest as part of an offensive against a national uprising that called for democratic reforms and an end to Soviet occupation
5 November 1956
Civilised people of the world. On the watch tower of 1,000-year-old Hungary the last flames begin to go out. Soviet tanks and guns are roaring over Hungarian soil. Our women – mothers and daughters – are sitting in dread. They still have terrible memories of the army’s entry in 1945. Save our souls. This word may be the last from the last Hungarian freedom station. Listen to our call. Help us – not with advice, not with words, but with action, with soldiers and arms.
Two high-speed trains collided in the province of Toledo in Spain on Wednesday morning. At least 30 of the 544 passengers on the two trains died and 80 were injured. The number of casualties is expected to rise
At least 30 people have died and many more are feared injured after two high-speed trains collided in Toledo province in central Spain. Guardia Civil aerial footage showed a derailed train with at least one carriage remaining on an elevated section of track. It comes nine months after a collision between high-speed trains belonging to the same operators on the same line, in which 46 people were killed.
Spain’s state rail infrastructure authority said services between Madrid and the southern region of Andalucía had been suspended 'following a rear-end collision between two trains' on Wednesday morning
At least 30 people are believed to have died after two high-speed trains collided in the province of Toledo in Spain, with concerns the death toll could be much higher.
The number of people affected is expected to rise (10:46), local authorities said, with growing concerns about a “major tragedy” (11:03).
The affected trains are understood to be Iryo 7076 with 146 passengers plus one baby on board, and AVE 2080 with 397 passengers on board, making it 544 people in total on board of both train (11:00).
The incident comes less than a year after a similar crash in Adamuz, the province of Córdoba, which killed 46 and injured 152 in January this year (11:00).
Spain’s high-speed railway network ranks as the largest in Europe and the second biggest in the world after China, carrying 25 million passengers in 2024.
Spain’s prime minister Pedro Sánchez said he was “shocked” by the accident (11:05), with transport minister Óscar Puente working at the emergency control centre to “obtain all possible information about what happened” (11:16).
Updated at 10:50am UK to reflect the new death toll
“In the [emergency] control center since 9:40 trying to obtain all possible information about what happened.”
High-speed service travelling from Madrid to Seville ran into back of another, knocking two carriages off track
The Spanish prime minister has declared three days of mourning after at least 68 people were killed and dozens more injured in a collision between two high-speed trains that officials suggested was caused by an “inexplicable” error at the central command centre.
The trains, one from Spain’s state-owned Renfe and the other from the private rail company Iryo, were travelling on Wednesday morning in the same direction on the line that stretches from the Spanish capital, Madrid, to the southern region of Andalusia. After the Iryo train came to a halt, the other slammed into its rear, knocking several carriages off the track near the town of Urda.
Events in Ireland explore origins of Gulliver’s Travels, the Dublin clergyman’s book that became an instant hit in 1726
In March 1726, an Irish clergyman visited London and arranged for a courier to deliver a manuscript to a publisher under cover of night. The dean of St Patrick’s Cathedral in Dublin knew his novel would cause trouble and wanted to publish it anonymously.
His name was Jonathan Swift and the story was called Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World. The satirical work was published that October and is better known 300 years on as Gulliver’s Travels.
Scientists uncover ancient hills and swamps that disappeared as sea levels rose across northern Adriatic
Venice is famed for being a floating city, but research shows the land it sits on once lay many miles inland. Dramatic changes in sea level over 10,000 years have reshaped the northern Adriatic coastline, with much of the land that our ancestors roamed now lying beneath the waves.
Samuele Ongaro, at the University of Southampton, and colleagues combined seismic data with sedimentary cores from the coastal basins of northern Italy, Slovenia and northern Croatia to model changes in sea level across the region and reconstruct past landscapes over the past 10,000 years.
Oozing panache and bagging awards already, La Bola Negra is an eye-popping war and prejudice epic starring Penélope Cruz in a blond wig and Glenn Close speaking Spanish. We meet the ex-lovers who dreamed it up
When Javier Ambrossi and Javier Calvo – the directing duo known in their native Spain as “Los Javis” – began writing their queer epic La Bola Negra, they weren’t thinking about whether it would be stylish (which it is) or win numerous awards (which it has) or capture what they refer to as “the anti-fascist zeitgeist” (which it does). Instead, they thought only of scale. “I’m done with LGBTQ+ movies being niche,” says Ambrossi. “I was like, ‘Let’s make the biggest, gayest war movie ever.’” Job done.
At Cannes this year, the best director prize was awarded jointly to them and to Paweł Pawlikowski, who made the Thomas Mann road trip film Fatherland. La Bola Negra is now an Oscars frontrunner, with best picture and best director nominations all but guaranteed. Brimming with panache, the movie darts back and forth between three stories set in Spain: in 1932, a young man applying for membership of an exclusive casino is rejected on the grounds of his suspected homosexuality; in 1937, a callow nationalist soldier develops tender feelings for the injured republican prisoner under his watch; and in 2017, a queer historian inherits an unfinished story by Federico García Lorca. That story lends the movie its title and provides the thread that sews its strands together.
Ukrainian president says Kyiv’s battlefield position strongest in some time. What we know on day 1,708
Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said Ukrainian forces are retaking territory through a series of offensives, adding Kyiv’s battlefield position was the strongest it had been in some time. The Ukrainian president, citing a report by senior commanders, noted for the first time the “Veles” operation using pipelines in Ukraine’s northeast. He also referred to an air assault operation in eastern Ukraine and the “Vivaldi” operation further to the north, designed to prevent Russian advances in key areas.
The leaders of Finland and Norway phoned Russian president Vladimir Putin on Tuesday to urge him to end the war in Ukraine. The call by Finnish president Alexander Stubb and Norwegian prime minister Jonas Gahr Stoere was an attempt to influence the diplomatic process after US president Donald Trump stunned allies by agreeing to buy Russian diesel, plunging ties with Ukraine to their lowest point in 18 months.
While a localised ceasefire appears to holding in Ukraine’s south, Russian strikes damaged a university campus and Kyiv’s important Southern Bridge overnight, in what Zelenskyy described as “a serious escalation” against Ukrainian logistics. A Ukrainian military source told Reuters that Russia had hit the bridge with four Iskander ballistic missiles. Zelenskyy said energy facilities, logistics and infrastructure in 10 other regions had also been attacked overnight.
Kyiv plans to allocate 1 billion hryvnias ($22 million) to build water crossings over the River Dnipro that divides the capital into two parts, the city’s mayor has said, as Russia escalates its attacks on bridges.
Romanian president Nicusor Dan has called an alleged Russian sabotage plot last month a “grave violation” of the Nato member’s sovereignty and security. Dan’s remarks on Tuesday came a day after the Romanian intelligence service said it identified a Russia-coordinated “sabotage network” linked to a fire in central Brasov County last month, which damaged the premises of several commercial entities. Three foreign nationals – two Belarusians and one Ukrainian, all residing in EU countries – were being investigated in connection with the fire. Romania’s foreign ministry said on Tuesday it had summoned Russia’s ambassador in Bucharest. The Russian embassy in Romania said its ambassador rejected the “baseless” accusations.
France has temporarily relocated a maritime patrol aircraft to Romania to help identify navigation dangers and bolster the protection of critical energy infrastructure in the Black Sea. At least eight cargo ships have been hit near the coast Romania and Bulgaria in the past three weeks, with about 34 sailors reported dead or missing. Romania’s defence ministry said on Tuesday the purpose is “to identify dangers to navigation and increase the ability to protect critical infrastructure in Romania’s exclusive economic zone”.
Poland will host a maintenance centre for the US-made Patriot air-defence system. The centre in Poland will be the only one outside the US, deputy defence minister Sobkowiak-Czarnecka said on social media. Poland, a Nato member bordering Ukraine, serves as a major logistics hub for military aid sent by Kyiv’s allies. Patriot interceptor missiles are regarded as among Ukraine’s most important air-defence assets as it seeks to repel escalating Russian missile and drone attacks.
Pope Leo XIV’s chief almsgiver, Monsignor Luis Marín de San Martín, on Tuesday began a three-day visit to Ukraine and was bringing several trucks worth of winter clothes, blankets and food to Kyiv for distribution. Marín de San Martín was planning to visit the capital, Zaporizhzhia, Dnipro and Fastiv, Vatican News said. Leo had called for a ceasefire and the delivery of food and medicine in Oleshky, and the safe and voluntary evacuation of its people during a phone calls with Putin and Zelenskyy.
If ever enacted, proposals by Marine Le Pen and the AfD leader, Alice Weidel, to hollow out EU institutions would be a continental act of self-harm
Following the Brexit referendum in 2016, Marine Le Pen was in a predictably celebratory mood. Britain’s vote to leave the European Union, she told one interviewer, was the first breach in the “Brussels Wall”. Ms Le Pen’s Front National party was at that point committed to taking France down the same path, given the chance. But as the UK’s self-inflicted economic wounds became a cautionary tale for the rest of Europe, the notion of Frexit was put on ice.
Instead, Ms Le Pen now hopes to lead far-right allies in hollowing out the EU from within. This month, both she and the leader of Alternative für Deutschland, Alice Weidel, outlined their visions of a “Europe of nations” in which EU institutions would be stripped of both cash and power. Ms Weidel’s “new deal for Europe” would abolish elections to the European parliament, and seek German opt-outs in areas such as migration, defence and common borrowing. Ms Le Pen’s party, now called National Rally, proposes slashing French contributions to the EU budget by 60% over a five-year presidential term, and ending the role of Brussels in proposing common policies for the 27 member states.
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Extreme heat accelerated disappearance of Triglav glacier from mountain revered as a symbol of Slovenian identity
The final ice patch has vanished from Slovenia’s Triglav glacier, the latest Alpine casualty of Europe’s scorching summer.
The once mighty ice mass lost 93% of its surface area between 1983 and 2003, shrinking to cover less than a hectare of overheated rock, but went on to surprise researchers who feared its imminent demise, clinging on to the mountain for two more decades.
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