Europe

KYIV, Ukraine, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Russian forces claimed incremental gains in eastern Ukraine on Monday adding up to their biggest advances in months, after relentless battles that Kyiv described as human wave attacks which showed Moscow had no regard for the lives of its own men.

The administrator of Russian-controlled parts of Donetsk province, Denis Pushilin, claimed troops had secured a foothold in Vuhledar, a coal mining town whose ruins have been a Ukrainian bastion since the outset of the war.

ATHENS, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- A Greek Air Force two-seat airplane crashed off Greece's western coast on Monday, Greek national broadcaster ERT reported.

A search and rescue operation was underway to locate the pilot and co-pilot of the F-4 Phantom jet fighter.

The incident happened during a training flight near the Andravida Military Airport on Peloponnese peninsula.

GENEVA, Jan. 30 (Xinhua) -- The World Health Organization (WHO) said on Monday that COVID-19 pandemic still constitutes a public health emergency of international concern, according to media reports.

NIJAR, Spain (AP) — Some 200 people were evacuated Monday from a camp housing hundreds of migrant workers in Spain after a fire engulfed the site.

The fire at the El Walili camp, located in the southeast Spanish region of Almeria, took place on the same day that the camp was supposed to be demolished following an order from the Nijar city council. A court order for the camp’s demolition said structures there were dilapidated and built without a housing license.

It was unclear how the fire started. Calls to local authorities on Monday went unanswered.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russian shelling killed at least five people and wounded 13 others during the previous 24 hours, Ukrainian authorities said Monday, as the Kremlin’s and Kyiv’s forces remained locked in combat in eastern Ukraine ahead of renewed military pushes that are expected when the weather improves.

The casualties included a woman who was killed and three others who were wounded by the Russian shelling of Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city in the country’s northeast, according to regional Gov. Oleh Syniyehubov.

LONDON (AP) — Former U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson said that President Vladimir Putin didn’t seem serious about avoiding war in the days before Russia invaded Ukraine — and at one point told the British leader it would be easy to kill him with a missile.

The Kremlin denied Putin made any such threat.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Friends and volunteers gathered Sunday at Kyiv’s St Sophia’s Cathedral to say goodbye to Andrew Bagshaw, a New Zealand scientist who was killed in Ukraine with another volunteer while they were trying to evacuate people from a front-line town.

Bagshaw, 48, a dual New Zealand-British citizen, and British volunteer Christopher Parry, 28, went missing this month while heading to the town of Soledar, in the eastern Donetsk region, where heavy fighting was taking place.

Volunteers spoke of their memories of Bagshaw and read tributes from his family.

FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) — Europe is taking another big step toward cutting its energy ties with Russia, banning imports of diesel fuel and other products made from crude oil in Russian refineries.

The European Union ban takes effect Feb. 5 following its embargo on coal and most oil from Russia. The 27-nation bloc is trying to sever its last uses of Russian energy and stop feeding the Kremlin’s war chest as the anniversary of the invasion of Ukraine nears.

29 Jan 2023; MEMO: Russia on Saturday voiced its "deep concern" over spiraling Israeli-Palestinian violence, urging both sides to exercise "maximum restraint" to avoid further escalation, reports Anadolu Agency.

MOSCOW, January 29. /TASS/: Russian Human Rights Commissioner Tatyana Moskalkova has addressed the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) due to an attack on the Novoaidar hospital in the Lugansk People’s Republic by the Ukrainian armed forces, requesting to urge Kiev to observe the Geneva Convention.