Europe

MADRID, June 27 (Xinhua) -- Thousands of demonstrators rallied here on Sunday to call for peace and protest against a NATO summit to be held here this week.

Social, antimilitarist and pacifist movements from around the world gathered to show support for a congress concluded here on Saturday by an anti-NATO group, and its latest declaration calling for peace.

Jose Luis Centella, president of the Communist Party of Spain, told Xinhua that "many, thousands of people are demonstrating today in Madrid for peace, for a multilateral world so that Spain can live in harmony."

BRUSSELS (AP) — NATO secretary general Jens Stoltenberg said Monday that the military alliance will increase the size of its rapid reaction forces nearly eightfold to 300,000 troops as part of its response to an “era of strategic competition.”

The NATO response force currently has about 40,000 soldiers which can deploy quickly when needed.

Coupled with other measures including the deployment of forces to defend specific allies, Stoltenberg said the move is part of the “biggest overhaul of collective defense and deterrence since the Cold War.”

SLOVIANSK, Ukraine (AP) — Russia was mounting an all-out assault on the last Ukrainian stronghold in the eastern Luhansk region, “pouring fire” on the city of Lysychansk from the ground and air, the local governor said Monday, as Western leaders met to discuss ways of bolstering support for Kyiv.

LONDON (AP) — Queen Elizabeth II has traveled to Scotland and attended a ceremony Monday as part of a week of events.

The 96-year-old monarch, who has curtailed her public appearances in recent months because of ongoing problems in moving around, took part in the Ceremony of the Keys at the Palace of Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh.

The tradition sees the monarch handed the keys to the city and welcomed to her “ancient and hereditary kingdom of Scotland.”

BERLIN (AP) — A knife-wielding attacker stabbed several people in a shelter for asylum-seekers in southern Germany, killing one man and wounding at least five people, German news agency dpa reported Monday.

The attacker, reportedly a resident of the shelter, is said to have knocked on the doors of the rooms of the building in Kressbronn, on Lake Constance, on Sunday evening. When residents opened, he stabbed them, dpa reported.

PRAGUE (AP) — A bullet train collided with an engine in a train station in northeastern Czech Republic Monday, killing one person and injuring five.

Czech Railways said the accident took place early in the morning in the town of Bohumin, shortly after the departure of the Pendolino train for Prague.

The driver of the bullet train was killed, while four Czech Railways employees on the engine and one on the train were injured. It was unclear whether the engine was moving at the time of the head-on crash.

Rescuers said no passengers were injured.

OSLO, Norway (AP) — The suspect in Saturday’s mass shooting during an LGBTQ festival in Oslo has agreed to be held in pretrial custody for four weeks and will therefore not appear in court on Monday, a Norwegian court said.

Zaniar Matapour, a 42-year-old Norwegian citizen originally from Iran, was arrested shortly after the predawn shooting in Oslo’s nightlife district and was held on suspicion of murder, attempted murder and terrorism. Two people were killed and more than 20 were wounded in what the Norwegian security service called an “Islamist terror act.”

ELMAU, Germany (AP) — Leading economic powers conferred by video link with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Monday as they underscored their commitment to Ukraine for the long haul with plans to pursue a price cap on Russian oil, raise tariffs on Russian goods and impose other new sanctions.

Kyiv, Jun 26 (AP-PTI) Russia attacked the Ukrainian capital in the early hours of Sunday morning, striking at least two residential buildings, Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said, as elsewhere Russian troops consolidated their gains in the east.

Associated Press journalists in Kyiv saw rescue services battling flames and rescuing civilians. Klitschko said two people were hospitalized with injuries.

Berlin, Jun 26 (AP-PTI) President Joe Biden and his Group of Seven allies will huddle Sunday on strategies to secure energy supplies and tackle inflation, aiming to keep the fallout from Russia's invasion of Ukraine from splintering the global coalition working to punish Moscow.

Biden arrived in Germany's picturesque Bavarian alps early Sunday morning for the annual meeting of the leading democratic economies, where the reverberations from the brutal war in Ukraine will be front and centre in the discussion.