Rumangabo (DR Congo) (AFP) – Some 50 young people aged between 10 and 16 from the surrounding villages have been selected to train at a brand new football academy set up by Virunga National Park, a natural gem famous for its mountain gorillas and volcanoes, but also infested with armed groups.
Edinburgh (AFP) – A hairdresser who fled the war in Ukraine has been shortlisted for one of the United Kingdom’s top hairdressing awards. Viktoriia Vradii, 37, arrived in Edinburgh in May after leaving behind her salon business in the Black Sea port of Odessa, which has been under attack from Russian forces since the beginning of the war. She was named as a finalist in the international stylist category of British Hairdressing Awards. Stylist Simon Hill, who gave her employment at his salon in the Edinburgh suburb of Leith, has also been shortlisted for an award as the Scottish hairdresser of the year. “This is our equivalent of the Oscars,” says Hill, “this is biggest awards that we can enter”.
Moscow (AFP) – The opening ceremony of the annual Spasskaya Tower International Military Music Festival takes place on Moscow’s Red Square, with soldiers and traditional dancers participating in the event.
Kyiv (Ukraine) (AFP) – In his nightly address, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky says that the situation “remains very risky and dangerous” around the Zhaporizhzhia nuclear power plant.
Riyadh (AFP) – Visitors interact with majestic falcons on display as they tour a yearly exhibition in the Saudi capital Riyadh which allows breeders from different countries to showcase their birds of prey and auction them off.
Flash flooding hits Pakistan’s northern Charsadda District, in the province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, after heavy rain pounded much of the country on Friday. This followed the government declaring a state of emergency to help it deal with monsoon flooding that has affected more than 30 million people.
Madrid (AFP) – Spain toughens its rape laws, pushing through legislation requiring explicit consent for sex in a move driven by its left-wing government.
London (AFP) – ZSL London Zoo holds its annual weigh-in where zookeepers entice nearly 15,000 animals onto the scales to be weighed and have measurements taken. All the information will be logged onto an international system to be shared with other zoos and conservation organisations.
Mykolaiv (Ukraine) (AFP) – It’s an opening night like no other at Mykolaiv’s theatre, with the audience ushered down into an underground shelter for the first performance since war broke out.
London (AFP) – Britain’s outgoing Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, says French President, Emmanuel Macron, is ‘a très bon buddy de notre pays en principe’ (a very good buddy of our country in principle), following comments from UK Foreign Secretary and Conservative Party leadership candidate, Liz Truss, who said ‘the jury’s out’ on whether Macron is a ‘friend or foe’ of Britain.
Pune (India) (AFP) – Not many people can boast of conversations about planetary conquest with Elon Musk, but for Indian software engineer Pranay Pathole, a friendly chat with the world’s richest man is just a tweet away. Their unlikely online friendship has blossomed since Pathole was a teenager, with the mercurial billionaire responding to him over hundreds of tweets and private messages.
Algiers (AFP) – At a joint press conference with the French President Emmanuel Macron, Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune affirms both countries’ desire for relations built around “a new approach based on mutual respect, trust and balance of interests”. Macron, for his part, acknowledges that both countries share a “painful past”, but insists on focusing on ways to “build the future”.
