Europe

ZAGREB, Croatia (AP) — A bus swerved off a highway and crashed in Croatia early Sunday, killing 10 people and injuring at least 45 others — some of them seriously, authorities said.

The crash happened at around 6 a.m. (0400 GMT; 12 a.m. EDT) near the town of Slavonski Brod on the highway between the capital, Zagreb, and the Serbian border.

Photos from the scene showed the bus on the side in the grass near the edge of the road. Firefighters and rescuers could be seen around the bus while traffic on the highway was halted.

BERLIN (AP) — German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s chief of staff has warned that restrictions for unvaccinated people may be necessary if case numbers reach new heights in the coming months.

But Helge Braun said in an interview with the newspaper Bild am Sonntag that he doesn’t expect another coronavirus-related lockdown in Germany.

Braun said that unvaccinated people may be barred from entering venues like restaurants, movie theaters and stadiums “because the residual risk is too high.”

LONDON (AP) — Chaos and confusion over travel rules and measures to contain new virus outbreaks are contributing to another cruel summer for Europe’s battered tourism industry.

Popular destination countries are grappling with surging COVID-19 variants, but the patchwork and last-minute nature of the efforts as the peak season gets underway threatens to derail another summer.

In France, the world’s most visited country, visitors to cultural and tourist sites were confronted this week with a new requirement for a special COVID-19 pass.

MOSCOW, July 24. /TASS/: Gazprom did not offer Ukraine to buy Russian gas, the gas holding announced on Saturday following a statement by Yuriy Vitrenko, CEO of Naftogaz of Ukraine.

The Russian gas giant also said that the comments of its CEO Alexei Miller, on the volume of transit through Ukraine after 2024 related to purchases from the EU under new contracts.

MOSCOW, July 24. /TASS/: One person was killed and one injured in a light plane crash near the village of Kalinka in Russia’s Far Eastern Khabarovsk region, the Public Safety Answering Service told TASS on Saturday.

Earlier, the region’s department of the Russian emergencies ministry said a light plane crashed near the city of Khabarovsk.

"As a result of the crash, one person was killed and another one injured. The severity of injuries is yet unknown. The victim is being taken to a Regional Hospital No.2," the service said.

MOSCOW, July 24. /TASS/: Two An-124 Ruslan aircraft of Russia’s Aerospace Defense Forces have taken off for Cuba with a humanitarian cargo, consisting of foodstuffs, individual protection means and over 1 mln face masks, the Russian Defense Ministry said on Saturday.

MOSCOW, July 24. /TASS/: Russia confirmed 23,947 COVID-19 cases over the past day, bringing the total caseload to 6,102,469, the anti-coronavirus crisis center told reporters on Saturday. The number of cases grew by 0.39% in relative terms.

Moscow confirmed 3,376 coronavirus cases in the past day. Some 2,096 COVID-19 cases were recorded in the Moscow Region, 1,937 in St. Petersburg, 533 in the Nizhny Novgorod Region, 488 in the Sverdlovsk Region and 487 in the Krasnoyarsk Region. Currently, 477,418 people are undergoing treatment in Russia.

MOSCOW, July 24 (Reuters) - Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu and his Tajik counterpart Sherali Mirzo on Saturday discussed joint measures to counter threats from the Taliban in the Tajik-Afghan border area, the TASS news agency reported.

Russia on Friday pledged to help its ally Tajikistan to build a new outpost on the border, amid a worsening conflict in Afghanistan as U.S.-led troops withdraw after a 20-year intervention. The two countries will also hold major drills next month. 

MOSCOW, July 24 (Reuters) - Russian electoral authorities on Saturday barred a well-known Communist Party candidate from running in September's parliamentary election, the latest high-profile opposition figure to be disqualified from the vote.

Pavel Grudinin, who won 12% of votes when he challenged Vladimir Putin in a 2018 presidential election, was excluded from a candidate list because the Prosecutor's Office had found he held shares in a foreign company, news agencies reported.

23 July 2021; MEMO: German Chancellor Angela Merkel yesterday reiterated her opposition to Turkey's full membership in the European Union but voiced support for closer ties with Ankara by updating the EU-Turkey Customs Union and a key refugee agreement, Anadolu Agency reports.