World News

France arrests more than 1,200 as cost-of-living protests turn to fires and looting, and Limoges town hall burns →

Hundreds of thousands marched peacefully across France on Saturday against living costs and run-down schools, while masked groups looted shops and burned a 143-year-old town hall; protests also hit Belgium, Italy, Portugal, Albania and Tunisia, as Iran said two tankers hit its mines and settlers attacked European diplomats in the West Bank.

Trump waives the new US sanctions on Russia two days before they were due to start →

Trump used a clause in the Graham Act to switch off its sanctions and tariffs on Russia's oil money, a week after his diesel deal with Putin, as EU leaders promised to keep their own sanctions.

Ukraine hits Russian oil refineries again after Trump's energy truce collapses, and Trump calls it a disgrace →

Ukraine ended a three-day pause and set a Russian refinery on fire, after Russia kept hitting Ukraine's power and the US slowed Ukraine's military satellite link. Also today: 34 children killed when a school roof fell in Peshawar, a shooting at a primary school in Oregon, a Houthi missile attack on Yemen's government palace, and more.

Two cargo ships sink near the Strait of Hormuz, and Iranian officials say their attacks aim at the US vote →

A container ship and a bulk carrier sank near the Strait of Hormuz on Wednesday as Iran's attacks on shipping reached their highest level of the war, and two Iranian officials said one goal is to sway the US midterm elections on 3 November.

Saudi-led jets bomb Houthi fuel depots near Sanaa, and a Houthi missile sets fire to an Aramco office in Dhahran →

Saudi Arabia and Yemen's Houthis bombed each other's oil sites on Tuesday, while Russian missiles hit a Kyiv power plant without the usual warning, drones sank a ship off Bulgaria, and police used force on protesters in Pakistan, India, Mauritius, Albania and France.

Britain says Iran's Revolutionary Guards almost certainly directed the plot at RAF Fairford, and sanctions two Iranians →

Two weeks after five men were arrested near a base US bombers used to strike Iran, Britain's prime minister named Iran's Revolutionary Guards, 29 countries backed him, and nobody has yet been charged.

Trump announces an energy ceasefire in Ukraine that Russia has not confirmed, and Russian drones hit power plants within hours →

Donald Trump said Russia and Ukraine had agreed to stop hitting each other's power and fuel sites. Russia said nothing, Ukraine said it would agree if Russia did, and a Russian drone hit a Kyiv power plant the same day.

India shuts much of Delhi and detains thousands to stop a protest over 130 million names cut from voter lists →

Police held the Cockroach Janta Party's leaders on their plane and closed dozens of metro stations; a court freed the leaders on Sunday as India's Supreme Court met.

Trump lifts US sanctions on Russian diesel after a call with Putin, and Zelensky calls it a gift to Russia →

Trump let Russia sell diesel to the US and the world to cut fuel prices before the 3 November vote. Ukraine says the money will pay for more bombs, and Russian glide bombs killed at least 12 people in Zaporizhzhia the next morning.

Trump says the US will not strike Iran before the 3 November midterms, as Iran's attacks on tankers spread beyond Hormuz →

Trump ruled out new US strikes on Iran until after the US vote, while Iran's forces hit two tankers outside the Strait of Hormuz and ship traffic through it fell to a two-month low. Ethiopian drones struck Eritrean troops in Tigray, a Russian bomb killed 30 at a bus stop in Kramatorsk, and Houthi missiles shut Riyadh's airport again.

Russian missiles kill at least 24 across Ukraine, 18 of them in one block of flats in Pryluky →

Russia fired at least 50 missiles and 130 drones at Ukraine overnight on Putin's birthday. Most of the dead were in one block of flats in Pryluky, and Ukraine stopped only five of about 20 ballistic missiles.

Germany arrests a former head of its foreign spy agency, accused of buying 2,000 secret files from his old aide →

August Hanning ran the BND, Germany's foreign intelligence service, until 2005. Prosecutors say his former chief of staff sold him secret files for years, and that he used them in paid work, including for two foreign spy services.

Yemen's government retakes towns on the Bab el-Mandeb strait as Pakistan and Turkey agree to send forces to Saudi Arabia →

Backed by 100 Saudi-led jets, Yemen's government pushed the Houthis back along the Red Sea coast and says Mocha has fallen, which the Houthis deny. The Houthis fired at Riyadh's airport, and Saudi Arabia's two pact partners agreed to deploy forces in the kingdom.

Flavio Bolsonaro beats Lula in Brazil's first round, and the two meet again in a runoff on 25 October →

The jailed former president's son won 47% to Lula's 45.1% and the right won most of Brazil's Senate seats, while Yemen's government launched a war on the Houthis, the US pulled its bombers out of Britain and a banned Dodik still won in Bosnia.

Ethiopia's army retakes Mekelle's airport as Tigray's rebel leaders leave the city →

Ethiopia's army and its allies took back the airport in Mekelle, Tigray's capital, and the TPLF's fighters and leaders were seen leaving the city. Yemen's war reached Sanaa and an oil site near Riyadh, Brazil votes in a close race, and Russia hit a second bridge in Kyiv.

The G7 agrees to release 100 million barrels of oil and diesel after the US threatens to stop selling diesel abroad →

Rich democracies will release 100 million barrels of emergency oil and diesel over four months, a day after the US threatened to cut off diesel exports; Trump then said the ban was never really on the table.

The US sends a third aircraft carrier toward Iran, and Trump says Iran's offer to reopen Hormuz is not enough →

About 9,000 US sailors and Marines are sailing for the Middle East, and Trump says strikes could resume after the 3 November US vote. Iran has privately offered to let nuclear inspectors back if sanctions are eased.

A co-pilot stabs his captain on a flydubai flight to Tel Aviv, and passengers break into the cockpit to stop the dive →

A co-pilot stabbed the captain of a Dubai to Tel Aviv flight and the plane dived over Saudi Arabia; passengers and two off-duty pilots saved it, and Israel's election fight over it began within hours. Also today, Russia's biggest strike on Ukraine's power since spring, 52 civilians dead in Tigray, and Iraq's militia law.

US troops leave their last bases in Iraq, and Iran's Revolutionary Guards ask American voters to change their government →

Armed groups in Iraq that Iran backs call the US exit a victory, and a Kurdish commander says Islamic State cells are already moving. Iran's Revolutionary Guards told American voters the war ends only when the US admits defeat and leaves. Also today: Estonia blames Russia for an arson attack, Morocco gets its first woman prime minister, and Spain moves to stop evictions.

Netanyahu flies secretly to the UAE, and a source says he asked its ruler to deny warning him before 7 October →

The UAE confirmed a meeting between the two leaders for the first time, Netanyahu's office calls the source's account fake news, and Israel's internal security service wants the TV channel that revealed the trip prosecuted. Also today: Ukraine says it has retaken 176 sq km, an air strike in Myanmar kills 33, and a court in Rome convicts three Egyptian officers over Giulio Regeni.

Five men are arrested near RAF Fairford, the British base US bombers fly from to strike Iran →

Police say a call about three vans heading for the base led to the arrests, and the men are held on suspicion of preparing a terrorist act. Also today: 27 people shot dead in South Africa, Serbia's president resigns, and South Korea demands an apology from Ukraine.

A suicide bomber kills at least 11 at a police post in northwest Pakistan, two days after deadly fighting on the Afghan border →

The Pakistani Taliban said it drove a tractor full of explosives into a checkpoint in Dera Ismail Khan, and gunmen later shot two rescue workers. Also today: Trump turns down Iran's plan out loud, Russia and Germany talk for the first time since 2022, and the UN warns about Ethiopia.

Pakistan and Turkey's top generals meet in Riyadh, and France sends troops to guard a Saudi oil port →

The military chiefs of Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Turkey held their first meeting under a pact that treats an attack on one as an attack on all, hours before the Houthis fired again at Riyadh. France is sending soldiers and radars to the oil port of Yanbu. Neither ally has promised troops.

Poland calls a fire at a Starlink station sabotage, as Denmark warns Russian attacks on NATO will grow →

A fire hit a Polish station that carries internet to Ukraine's army, and Denmark's spies say Russia will strike NATO countries more often, possibly with a small military attack.

Tigray's forces seize three airports and declare a 'defensive war' on Ethiopia's government →

Fighting has restarted in northern Ethiopia, four years after a peace deal ended a war that killed about 600,000 people, and each side says the other attacked first.

Trump tells the UN Iran can have a deal after the US midterms or be annihilated, as his envoys talk to Iran through mediators →

In his speech to the UN General Assembly, Trump said a deal with Iran would come right after the US midterm elections on 3 November, or he would destroy its government. That afternoon his envoys spent three hours passing messages to Iran's foreign minister through mediators, and Iran named its price for reopening the Strait of Hormuz.

Xi comes to Washington to ask the US to stop arming Taiwan, and points at a promise from 1982 →

China's leader arrives on Wednesday for the first Chinese state visit to the United States in ten years. Three people briefed on the talks say he will ask Trump to end arms sales to Taiwan, quoting a sentence the US wrote in 1982, and will offer help pressing Iran in return.

Ukraine fires more than 1,000 drones at Russia on the last day of its wartime election →

The biggest attack on Moscow of the war hit the city's oil refinery as Russia closed a three-day parliamentary vote with no anti-war party on the ballot. Russian drones killed a mother, her two three-year-olds and a girl in the Kyiv region the same night.

Iran sends the US three conditions for ending the war, through Qatar →

Iran's security chief says Qatar has handed the US government a list of terms - stop the fighting, release the frozen money, lift the naval blockade - and that Iran is waiting for an answer while preparing for a decisive war.

Houthi attacks set off the first air raid alerts in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia's capital →

Saudi Arabia sounded air raid alerts for its capital for the first time since the Houthis, an armed movement that rules northern Yemen, stepped up their attacks. Europe's leaders warned of Russian attacks, Trump signed his Russia sanctions law, and Xi Jinping's US visit is being prepared.

UN investigators find a likely US war crime at an Iranian school, and crimes against humanity by Iran's rulers →

A UN-backed mission says US strikes on a school in Minab and a sports hall in Lamerd were war crimes, and that Iran's government committed crimes against humanity against protesters, days before both governments meet at the UN.

US Congress passes a Russia sanctions bill that lets Trump put 100% tariffs on India and China →

The House sent the bill to Trump by 262 votes to 159. It punishes Russia's banks and tankers, and lets the US president tax goods from the biggest buyers of Russian oil, or choose not to.

The US war on Iran has cost $38bn and left it short of missiles, two official reports say →

The US defence department's independent auditor and the US Congress's budget office both published accounts of the war on Monday and Tuesday. They contradict what President Donald Trump has been saying for months, and between them they give the first official count of what the United States has spent, lost and cannot quickly replace.

Trump says Russia and Ukraine agreed to stop hitting each other's energy sites, and neither side confirms it →

The US president announced an energy truce and blamed Ukraine's refinery strikes for record diesel prices. Ukraine says it will stop only if Russia really does, and Russia's government has not said yes.

Sweden's left bloc is projected to win by one seat, and the far right loses votes for the first time →

Sweden voted on Sunday and the count points to 175 seats for Magdalena Andersson's centre-left bloc against 174 for Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson's right-wing bloc. The far-right Sweden Democrats, promised cabinet seats if the right won, fell back for the first time since 2010. Votes cast abroad are still to come. Elsewhere, Oman called off Monday's Hormuz talks, Trump told Ukraine to stop hitting Russian diesel, and a Russian drone hit a train 800 metres from Poland.

BRICS signs a paper against war that names nobody, and the Gulf keeps shooting →

Ten countries, two of them on opposite sides of the Iran war, adopted a 45-page declaration in New Delhi that calls for restraint and names no country. The same day Iraq closed its border with Iran, Bahrain refused to sit with Iran, and a ship was hit in Hormuz.