Europe

LONDON (AP) — The World Health Organization’s Europe chief warned Friday that monkeypox cases in the region have tripled in the last two weeks and urged countries to do more to ensure the previously rare disease does not become entrenched on the continent.

Dr. Hans Kluge said in a statement that increased efforts were needed despite the U.N. health agency’s decision last week that the escalating outbreak did not yet warrant being declared a global health emergency.

LONDON (AP) — WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has appealed against the British’s government decision last month to order his extradition to the U.S.

The appeal was filed Friday at the High Court, the latest twist in a decade-long legal saga sparked by his website’s publication of classified U.S. documents. No further details about the appeal were immediately available.

Assange’s supporters staged protests before his 51st birthday this weekend, with his wife Stella Assange among people who gathered outside the Home Office on Friday to call for his release from prison.

(AP) --- It has not been an easy week for Russian President Vladimir Putin.

He took his first foreign trip since the invasion of Ukraine to shore up relations with troublesome Central Asian allies. He watched as NATO declared Moscow its main enemy and invited Russia’s neighbors Sweden and Finland to join the alliance. And he was forced to deny that his troops had yet again attacked a civilian target in Ukraine.

POKROVSK, Ukraine (AP) — Russian missile attacks on residential areas killed at least 19 people in a Ukrainian town near Odesa early Friday, authorities reported. The airstrikes pierced the cautious relief expressed a day earlier after Russian forces withdrew from a Black Sea island from where they could have staged an assault on the city with Ukraine’s biggest port.

30 June 2022; MEMO: The United Kingdom has fined a UAE-based subsidiary of a company for violating sanctions on the Syrian regime of Bashar Al-Assad, as London grows stricter on enforcing measures and penalties for sanction violations.

LISBON, Jun 30 (APP): Pakistan, speaking on behalf of the “Group of 77” (developing countries) and China, Thursday called for “focused” international efforts for capacity development regarding marine science and research, especially for scientists from the most vulnerable countries, in a bid to restore ocean health.

MOSCOW, June 30. /TASS/: The AK-12 assault rifle, developed by the Kalashnikov concern, has exceeded by far the Russian Defense Ministry’s non-stop burst fire requirement, the concern said on its Telegram channel on Thursday.

"The AK-12 endured 680 shots fired in bursts non-stop, exceeding thrice the Defense Ministry’s standard," the report says.

MOSCOW, June 30. /TASS/: British ambassador in Moscow Deborah Bronnert was summoned to the Russian Foreign Ministry on Thursday to hear a protest in connection with boorish statements by her country's leadership about Russia and President Vladimir Putin, the Foreign Ministry said in a news release.

MINSK, June 30. /TASS/: The NATO summit in Madrid once again indicated that NATO member states expect unconditional obedience to their will from all states, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said during a joint press conference with his Belarusian counterpart Vladimir Makei Thursday.

MOSCOW, June 30. /TASS/: Russia is ready to fully meet the fertilizer demand of agricultural producers from friendly countries, President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday after talks with his Indonesian counterpart Joko Widodo.

"We talked on issues of interest for the time being for the whole world, all countries. I mean supplies of foodstuffs, other agricultural goods, including mineral fertilizers, to global markets," the Russian leader said.