Europe

SPEZET, France, April 5 (Reuters) - Strolling around a small town in northwestern France, beaming to crowds shouting "Macron President!," Emmanuel Macron sought to revive a lacklustre campaign whose increasingly uncertain outcome rattled markets on Tuesday.

Macron is still ahead in opinion polls but his far-right, eurosceptic rival Marine Le Pen has been closing the gap, and a poll on Monday put victory within the margin of error, unnerving investors ahead of Sunday's first round.

ALLONNES, France, April 5 (Reuters) - For three years, Karim Daoud ran the mosque in this small town in northwest France. He also coached kids’ soccer teams and for more than two decades has worked for the local council's youth services.

Daoud was among those who visited a nearby Catholic church to express solidarity following a deadly Islamist extremist attack at a church in southern France in 2020.

Last October, the interior ministry’s local office gave the 46-year old a medal to recognise his long service as a public employee.

April 5 (Reuters) - Satellite images taken weeks ago of the town of Bucha in Ukraine show bodies of civilians on a street, a private U.S. company said, undercutting the Russian government's claims that Ukrainian forces caused the deaths or that the scene was staged.

Maxar Technologies provided nine images taken of Bucha on March 18, 19 and 31 to Reuters. At least four of the images appear to show bodies on one of the town's roads, Yablonska Street. The city was occupied by Russian forces until about March 30.

MOSCOW, April 5 (Xinhua) -- A meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is possible only after a peace treaty is ready, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Tuesday.

"Nothing has changed for us. We do not reject the possibility of such a meeting for our president," Peskov told a daily briefing.

"But we repeat once again that such a meeting is possible only after the text of the document is agreed upon," he said.

BRUSSELS (AP) — The European Union’s executive branch proposed Tuesday a ban on coal imports from Russia in what would be the first EU sanctions targeting the country’s lucrative energy industry over its war in Ukraine.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the EU needed to increase the pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin after what she described as “heinous crimes” carried out around Kyiv, with evidence that Russian troops may have deliberately killed Ukrainian civilians.

LONDON (AP) — Two of naturalist Charles Darwin’s notebooks that were reported stolen from Cambridge University’s library have been returned, two decades after they disappeared.

The university said Tuesday that the manuscripts were left in the library inside a pink gift bag, along with a note wishing the librarian a Happy Easter.

BUCHA, Ukraine (AP) — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told the U.N. Security Council on Tuesday that the Russian military must be brought to justice immediately for war crimes, accusing the Kremlin’s troops of the worst atrocities since World War II.

The Ukrainian leader made his plea via video as grisly evidence continued to emerge of civilian massacres carried out by Russian forces on the outskirts of Kyiv before they pulled back from the capital.

United Nations, Apr 5 (PTI) Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is scheduled to address the United Nations Security Council on Tuesday, the first time he will address the most powerful UN organ since Russia's invasion of his country and after streets strewn with corpses of what appeared to be civilians were found in the suburbs of Kyiv, sparking worldwide horror and condemnation.

04 April 2022; MEMO: Five Arab Foreign Ministers have travelled to the Russian capital, Moscow, to hold talks with Russia's top diplomat on the war in Ukraine, the Arab League said in a statement.

According to the statement, the Foreign Ministers of Egypt, Algeria, Iraq, Jordan and Sudan are scheduled to meet on Monday with Russian Foreign Minister, Sergey Lavrov.  The Arab League Secretary-General, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, is also scheduled to join the meeting.

BERLIN, April 4. /TASS/: Germany’s foreign ministry has announced its decision to expel "a considerable number" of employees of the Russian embassy in Berlin.

According to the Focus Online portal, the decision applies to 40 embassy employees.