Global companies and financial institutions with the highest potential for curbing deforestation are largely failing to do so, undermining pledges to protect forests made at the COP26 climate summit in November, a report said yesterday.

The Kremlin yesterday gave a bleak assessment of Russia’s security talks with the United States and Nato this week, describing them as “unsuccessful” and saying there was disagreement on fundamental issues.

France’s interior minister said on Wednesday he had ordered the closure of a mosque on the French Riviera because of anti-Semitic remarks made there.

The spread of the Omicron variant is pushing Covid towards being an endemic disease that humanity can live with, although it remains a pandemic for now, the EU’s drug watchdog said.

Pope Francis, a lover of classical music, made a surprise visit to a Rome record store to bless the premises -- and picked up some vinyl while he was there.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson yesterday apologised for attending a “bring your own booze” gathering at his official residence during the

Russia laid out its demands for security guarantees in Europe to Nato’s 30 allies yesterday but insisted they were not ultimatums following intense talks with the United States in Geneva that failed to break the deadlock.

Russia yesterday said it was not optimistic after a first round of talks with the United States on the Ukraine crisis and would not allow its demands for security guarantees from the West to become mired in tortuous negotiations. 

The United Nations said Tuesday it needed $5 billion in aid for Afghanistan in 2022 to avert a humanitarian catastrophe and offer the ravaged country a future after 40 years of suffering.

More than half of people in Europe are projected to catch Omicron in the next two months, the WHO said yesterday, as millions in China faced fresh lockdowns on the two-year anniversary of the world’s first Covid death.

The president of the European Parliament, David Sassoli, died early yesterday in hospital in Italy, his spokesman said on Twitter. 

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson was under fire yesterday after it emerged his private secretary had invited over 100 people to a “bring your own booze” party in the garden of Downing Street during the first coronavirus lockdown.

Britain yesterday put the biggest private health companies on high alert to deliver crucial treatments should Omicron overwhelm National Health Service hospitals in England.

Russia yesterday ruled out any concession at talks with the United States on soaring tensions over Ukraine as Moscow seeks a wide-ranging new security arrangement with the West but faces strong pressure to pull back troops. 

More than 160 people were killed and nearly 6,000 arrested in Kazakhstan after the riots that shook Central Asia’s largest country over the past week.

The total number of Covid-19 cases registered worldwide passed 300 million on Friday, with the Omicron variant’s rapid spread setting new infection records in dozens of countries over the last week. 

Anti-vaccine protesters rallied in cities across France on Saturday, denouncing President Emmanuel Macron's intent to "piss off" people refusing COVID-19 shots by tightening curbs on their civil liberties.

A Berlin court on Friday found a former teacher guilty of murdering a man and cutting up his body as part of a cannibal fantasy after meeting him online, sentencing him to life in prison.

Hospitals across the United States are postponing elective surgeries to free up staff and beds due to a surge in Covid-19 cases driven by the highly transmissible Omicron variant of the coronavirus. 

Security forces appeared to have reclaimed the streets of Kazakhstan's main city on Friday after days of violence, and the Russian-backed president said he had ordered his troops to shoot to kill to put down a countrywide uprising.