Author: Gulf News Week
Hungary’s new prime minister, Péter Magyar, is set to be sworn in, almost a month after he steered his Tisza party to a landslide victory, sweeping away 16 years of rule by Viktor Orbán.Tisza holds 141 seats out of 199 in the new parliament – up from zero, a result of the party being founded just two years ago. A big “celebration of freedom and democracy” is planned on Saturday in front of parliament in Budapest, along the shores of the Danube. Magyar has told Hungarians to step through the “gateway of regime change”.Orbán’s Fidesz party crumbled from 135 to…
After years spent detained in Syria, the freedom of the Islamic State group-linked families who landed back in their homeland of Australia this week was dramatically short lived.Three of the women were swiftly arrested. The fourth was left to confront a frenzied media scrum alone, small children in tow, with the knowledge she could be next.Australia has been eyeing their potential return with trepidation for years.It has been resisting pressure to claim dozens of its citizens – families members of men who fought for the so-called Islamic State (IS). They have been languishing in highly-guarded camps since the group lost…
The tranche of never-before-seen documents released by the Pentagon on UFOs includes descriptions of reported sightings – by civilians on Earth and by astronauts on the Moon. The documents, spanning decades, were declassified and posted online on Friday at the direction of President Donald Trump, who said earlier this year he would release them “based on the tremendous interest shown”.The US has seen renewed public interest in extraterrestrial life in recent years. In 2022, Congress held the first hearings on UFOs in 50 years and the military has promised more transparency on the matter.The 161 files are accessible on the…
Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has accused the US of opting for a “reckless military adventure” every time a “diplomatic solution is on the table”. Iranians would “never bow to pressure”, Araghchi said in a post on X, a day after both sides accused each other of launching attacks in the Strait of Hormuz and as the US fired on more Iranian vessels. “Is it a crude pressure tactic?,” his Iranian counterpart asked. “Or the result of a spoiler once again duping POTUS [US President Donald Trump] into another quagmire?”Despite the clashes, Trump said the ceasefire was intact. It is…
A bear is believed to have attacked and killed a 33-year-old hiker who had gone missing in the Glacier National Park in Montana since Sunday, officials say.Search and rescue crews spotted the hiker’s remains in a densely wooded area, with injuries “consistent with those sustained by a bear encounter”. Officials identified the hiker as Anthony Pollio from Fort Lauderdale, Florida. The National Park Service has closed the part of the trail where the body was found.Fatal bear attacks are rare in the US, but experts say the animals grow bolder and lose their fear of humans when homes and campgrounds…
Surveying the scale of Labour’s disastrous elections performance, the number of Labour MPs saying publicly that Sir Keir Starmer should resign or attach a sell-by date to his premiership had reached 20 by late Friday evening.Let’s see if that is a position that becomes contagious.There are no shortage of Labour MPs who say it is the prime minister himself who was toxic to many voters.”There was one issue on the door and it was Keir. If he leads us into a future election we are dead,” one Labour MP told the BBC.A senior Labour figure said to me “everyone in…
The Greek military is examining a mysterious unmanned naval drone spotted in the Ionian Sea by local fishermen.They found the vessel in a cave near the island of Lefkada on Thursday and alerted the coast guard, which then towed it to the nearby port of Vasiliki. The Greek defence ministry is now overseeing the investigation.Reports in Greek media say the drone carried explosives and its engine was still running when it was discovered. The reports also suggest vessel could be either Ukrainian-made or linked to the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war.The BBC has approached both Greece’s and Ukraine’s military for official comment.The…
Donald Trump has announced a three day ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine, after both countries accused each other of violating separate ceasefires declared by each side to cover the celebrations of the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazi Germany.”This ceasefire will include a suspension of all kinetic activity, and also a prison swap of 1,000 prisoners from each country,” the US president said.Shortly afterwards Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky confirmed Ukraine’s participation.Earlier, Russia and Ukraine each said the other side had continued to attack their positions and Moscow’s mayor said the city had been targeted by drones overnight.Earlier, Putin had announced a…
Three people hiking on Indonesia’s Mount Dukono have died after the volcano erupted on Friday morning. Videos and pictures of the eruption show the volcano, located on North Maluku island, spewing a column of ash stretching 10km (six miles) into the sky. The three victims were part of a group of 20 Singaporeans and Indonesians hiking on the mountain despite restrictions. The rest of the group was eventually located by rescuers and evacuated from the mountain. The volcano has erupted more than 200 times since last March. Officials had previously issued warnings against climbing the mountain due to safety concerns.…
A cyber attack hit several universities and schools in the US, Canada and Australia, causing chaos, confusion and major disruptions amid the high stakes end-of-year season. The hacking group ShinyHunters reportedly claimed responsibility for the attack, which caused the academic software Canvas used by thousands of schools and universities to go offline this week. By late Thursday, the company Instructure, which owns Canvas, posted an update on its website saying that Canvas was “available for most users”, but some universities were still reporting outages on Friday. The cyber attacks targeted universities and schools across the globe, affecting an estimated 9,000…