Britain will not abandon Afghanistan, Prime Minister Boris Johnson vowed on Friday, even as he confirmed the imminent withdrawal of most embassy staff in the face of a rapid Taliban onslaught. 

Russia yesterday recorded its highest daily coronavirus death toll for a third day running, as the country continues to struggle with the Delta variant amid sluggish vaccination rates. 

Jude Walker, an 11-year-old boy, is on an odyssey he hopes will help save the planet: he is walking to London from northern England in a bid to garner support for a carbon tax to tackle carbon emissions.

Russia has asked a BBC journalist working in Moscow to leave the country by the end of the month when her visa expires in retaliation for what it views as British discrimination against Russian journalists, state TV reported late on Thursday.

Belarus on Wednesday ordered the United States to reduce its embassy staff after Washington imposed a fresh round of sanctions on the regime of President Alexander Lukashenko.

UN experts yesterday called for an international moratorium on the sale of surveillance technology until regulations are implemented to protect human rights following an Israeli spyware scandal.

French authorities rescued more than 100 migrants Wednesday seeking to sail to England in four separate boats that officials said got into trouble in the Channel.

Russia yesterday reported its highest daily coronavirus death toll since the start of the pandemic, as rising cases in parts of world fuelled by the Delta variant continued to cause havoc.

A British judge on Wednesday gave the US government extra grounds to appeal a refusal to extradite WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, after it argued the initial ruling relied on a witness who misled court.

Australia’s second-biggest city Melbourne yesterday extended lockdown despite growing anger among people as world struggles on to stamp out infections caused by the highly infectious Delta variant of the coronavirus. 

German police have arrested a British man who worked at the British embassy in Berlin on suspicion of passing documents to the Russian intelligence service in exchange for cash, prosecutors said on Wednesday.

Two exiled aides of jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny were slapped with new criminal charges for helping to finance organisations that have recently been labelled “extremist”, Russian investigators said yesterday.

Russian President Vladimir Putin yesterday ordered officials to send in reinforcements to fight forest fires that continue to tear through Siberia.

Guinea confirmed a case of Marburg disease, the World Health Organization said on Monday, the first recorded in West Africa of the lethal virus that’s related to Ebola and, like Covid-19, passed from animal hosts to humans.

After spending hundreds of hours in virtual meetings to complete this week’s major UN climate report, scientists Piers Forster and Joeri Rogelj celebrated in a way their peers could not: by hugging. 

Some 40 Hungarian husbands, with their wives on their backs, clambered over rough terrain on Saturday in the nation’s second wife-carrying contest.

Calling for “massive” pressure to fight climate change after yesterday’s dire report by a UN science panel, activist Greta Thunberg said she plans to go to this year’s global climate conference in Glasgow, Scotland, after all.

“Today’s report makes for sobering reading, and it is clear that the next decade is going to be pivotal to securing the future of our planet.” BRITISH PRIME MINISTER BORIS JOHNSON

The colourful tins piled high around Belgian collector Yvette Dardenne used to contain goods ranging from chocolates, toffees, coffee and rice to tobacco, talc and shoe polish, and come from as far away as India.

Passes and vaccine passports are increasingly being used across the world to limit entry to public places to those who have been vaccinated, recovered from Covid-19 or tested negative.