Europe

BRUSSELS, April 24 (Reuters) - Belgian newspaper La Libre and Belgian public broadcaster RTBF carried reports on Sunday saying that according to two unidentified exit polls, Emmanuel Macron was leading the vote in the French presidential election with between 55% and 58% of the votes.

France’s official polling watchdog said last week that the country’s eight main pollsters had committed to not publishing exit polls and said anything purporting to reflect results before the last polling stations close at 8 p.m. in France (1800 GMT) could only be considered rumour at best.

LJUBLJANA, April 24 (Reuters) - The Environmentalist Freedom Movement party looked on course to win Slovenia's parliamentary election on Sunday as an exit poll by the Mediana agency showed the party leading with 35.8% of the vote, ahead of populist Prime Minister Janez Jansa's SDS party.

The SDS had secured 22.5% of the vote, the poll showed. Whichever party wins will have to secure coalition partners to form a new government. The two main left-leaning parties have ruled out serving in a coalition led by the SDS.

MADRID, April 24 (Reuters) - Spain's ombudsman said on Sunday it would investigate the government's alleged spying of Catalan separatist figures during the height of the region's bid for independence, while the government announced a separate inquiry by its CNI intelligence agency.

April 24 (Reuters) - Russian forces attempted to storm the Ukrainian-held Azovstal steel plant in the besieged southeastern city of Mariupol on Sunday, Ukrainian officials said, despite Russian President Vladimir Putin's comments last week that the complex did not need to be taken.

Ukraine's armed forces command wrote on Facebook that Russian forces were firing and performing "offensive operations" in the Azovstal area, as well as conducting air strikes on civilian infrastructure.

BELGRADE, April 24 (Xinhua) -- The decades-long eastward expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) has not only caused the crisis in Ukraine but it has also evolved into a threat to peace and cooperation worldwide, a Serbian expert has told Xinhua in an interview.

MOSCOW (AP) — A new Russian intercontinental ballistic missile is capable of carrying several hypersonic weapons, a senior Russian military officer said Sunday.

Col. Gen. Sergei Karakayev, the commander of the Russian military’s Strategic Missile Forces, said in televised remarks that the new Sarmat ICBM is designed to carry several Avangard hypersonic glide vehicles.

PARIS (AP) — France voters turned out Sunday for a presidential runoff election that has wide repercussions for Europe’s future, with President Emmanuel Macron considered the front-runner but fighting a tough challenge from far-right rival Marine Le Pen.

The centrist Macron is asking voters to trust him for a second five-year term despite a presidency that was troubled by protests, the pandemic and Russia’s war on Ukraine. A Macron victory in this vote would make him the first French president in 20 years to win a second term.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Ukraine’s leader petitioned for more powerful Western weapons as he prepared to meet with top U.S. officials in the war-torn country’s capital Sunday and Russian forces concentrated their attacks on the east, including trying to dislodge the last Ukrainian troops holding out in the battered port city of Mariupol.

24 April 2022; MEMO: Hundreds of people on Saturday gathered in Sweden's capital to protest the burning of the Muslim holy book in the country, Anadolu Agency reported.

About 500 people attended the protest organized by the Party of Different Colors (Nyans) in front of the country's parliament in Stockholm.

The protesters were holding banners that read "Stop the burning of the Holy Quran" and "Stop insulting Muslims".

MOSCOW, April 23. /TASS/: Russia’s COVID-19 case tally rose by 8,729 over the past day to 18,128,691, the anti-coronavirus crisis center reported on Saturday.

In relative terms, the figure reached 0.05%.

As many as 2,682 people were hospitalized with COVID-19 in Russia over the past day, 0.8% fewer than in the previous day. The number of hospitalized patients declined in 44 regions, while in 35 other regions the figure increased. A day earlier, 2,660 people were rushed to hospitals.