Europe

NOVOSIBIRSK, November 3. /TASS/: A Boeing 747 cargo plane belonging to Cargolux that was heading from Belgium’s Liege to Qingdao in China, has made an emergency landing in Novosibirsk’s Tolmachevo airport, the airport’s press service told TASS.

"The Cargolux Boeing made an emergency landing. It was flying from Liege to Qingdao. There were no injuries," an airport’s representative said.

SOCHI, November 3. /TASS/: Advanced weapons developed by Russia have ensured a high level of the country’s military security, Russian President Vladimir Putin said at a defense industry meeting on Wednesday.

"Today we will discuss the pace of rearming the Army and the Navy with the systems based on new physical principles," the Russian leader said, opening the defense industry meeting.

KIEV, November 3. /TASS/: The Verkhovna Rada approved Ukrainian Defense Minister Andrei Taran’s letter of resignation on Wednesday. The decision was upheld by the majority of lawmakers at a meeting.

Taran’s letter of resignation was received in the Rada the day before. Earlier, the legislators of the ruling Servant of the People party had already approved the nomination of Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Reznikov.

GENEVA, Nov 3 (NNN-AGENCIES) — The World Health Organization on Wednesday called for the urgent development of a vaccine against a bacterial infection responsible for nearly 150,000 stillbirths and infant deaths each year.

  A fresh report by the UN health agency and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine found that the impact of Group B Streptococcus infection (GBS), which is estimated to live harmlessly in the intestinal tracts of up
to a third of all adults, is a far bigger cause of preterm births and disability than previously thought.

MOSCOW, Nov 3 (Reuters) - Tests of Russia's Zircon hypersonic cruise missile are nearing completion and deliveries to the navy will begin in 2022, President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday.

The move is part of a bid by Moscow to forge ahead in a race with the United States and others to deploy the next generation of long-range weapons that are harder to detect and intercept.

Russia last month said it had successfully test launched a Zircon missile from a submarine for the first time.

LONDON, Nov 3 (Reuters) - British lawmakers voted on Wednesday to halt the suspension of a member of Prime Minister Boris Johnson's Conservative Party who was found to have broken rules on paid lobbying, instead backing an overhaul of the process of investigating politicians.

A Committee on Standards report said Owen Paterson committed an "egregious case of paid advocacy" by repeatedly using his position to promote two companies, who together paid him nearly three times his annual parliamentary salary. 

LONDON, Nov 3 (Reuters) - U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres received a degree from the University of Cambridge on Wednesday, warning that the world risked falling into a spiral of crises unless it put critical thinking and truth back to the centre of global discourse.

Cambridge conferred a honorary degree of Doctor of Law on Guterres, recognising his work and the work of the United Nations, founded in 1945 as a way bring peace after the horrors of World War Two.

MOSCOW (AP) — A Belarusian cargo plane crashed Wednesday while trying to land in eastern Russia, killing all seven people on board, officials said.

The Soviet-built An-12 operated by Belarusian carrier Grodno crashed and caught fire near Irkutsk, eastern Siberia.

Belarus’ Investigative Committee, the top state investigative agency, said there were seven people on board and all of them died in the crash.

PROSECCO, Italy (AP) — On tiny pockets of terraced terrain overlooking a bay shared by Italy, Slovenia and Croatia, Milos Skabar is reviving a centuries-old winemaking tradition known as Prosekar, which shares roots with its better-known bubbly cousin, Prosecco.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — More than a thousand people blocked several streets in the center of the Ukrainian capital Wednesday, protesting against COVID-19 vaccine certificates and state-imposed restrictions aimed at halting the spread of the coronavirus.

The protesters, mostly women and young people, didn’t wear masks and held up signs reading “Say No to COVID Passports”, “Say No to COVID Genocide” in front of the Ukrainian parliament building in Kyiv.