Rennes (France) (AFP) – At the Rennes women’s prison in western France, a team of inmates and guards are working hard to beat the French indoor rowing record for the most kilometres covered in 24 hours, a challenge that offers a moment of escape, cohesion and self-improvement.
Islamorada (United States) (AFP) – Biologists in Florida are fighting to save the species that make up the only coral reef in the United States’ continental waters. They’ve recreated the coral reef habitat found in the waters off the southern tip of the state in huge aquariums in a bid to preserve it from a disease that is affecting the coral in the wild. Stony coral tissue loss disease, or SCTLD, has killed about half of stony coral species.
La Palma Island (Spain) (AFP) – of lava at night Lava from the erupting volcano on La Palma in the Canary Islands that began cascading into the ocean 36 hours ago already covers more than 25 acres at sea. Since it began on September 19, the dramatic eruption has forced thousands out of their homes, while lava has destroyed hundreds of houses, businesses and huge swathes of banana plantations.
Kabul (AFP) – Taliban fighters laugh and whoop onboard a pirate ship ride at an amusement park in the west of Afghanistan’s capital Kabul. An incongruous scene, and one that might have been unimaginable during the group’s brutally oppressive reign in the 1990s. But while the Islamist hardliners have promised a more moderate rule this time, many Afghans have already seen their freedoms curbed.
Paris (AFP) – The French government will propose an extension of the national health pass until the summer of 2022 to parliament, says spokesman Gabriel Attal. The Covid “health pass” was introduced in July, requiring people to prove that they have been either vaccinated or recently tested negative for Covid-19 to be able to access restaurants, bars, gyms or museums. But the introduction of the pass has been met with weekly demonstrations across French cities.
Bonga (Ethiopia) (AFP) – Residents of Ethiopia’s southern Kaffa zone have faced what many see as over a century of underinvestment by authorities in Addis Ababa. But Kaffa’s leaders plan to fix it with a referendum that, if successful, would carve out a new South West region, Ethiopia’s 11th, and funnel more federal cash their way, as well as control over how it is spent.
Milan (AFP) – Making COP26 a success “will certainly not be easy”, says Patricia Espinosa, the UN climate chief, but it is an “absolute necessity” to be able to emerge from this summit with a “message of hope” to present to the world hit by a series of climate disasters. As the world faces stronger and more frequent droughts, wildfires, flooding and storm surges made worse as the planet warms, the COP26 summit in Glasgow is being billed by organisers as a key milestone for keeping the Paris goals within reach.
Tokyo (AFP) – Tokyo residents react after Japan’s ruling party elected former foreign minister Fumio Kishida its new leader, setting him on course to become the next prime minister of the world’s third-largest economy. Kishida, 64, will be confirmed as the new premier in a vote in parliament on October 4 and will then lead the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) into general elections that must happen by November. The 64-year-old won the ruling party’s leadership vote, beating popular vaccine chief Taro Kono to finally clinch a job he has long targeted.
Bucharest (AFP) – While the eyes of the world focus on the Covid-19 pandemic, the fight against HIV has slowed down in Romania. The pandemic has deprived at-risk groups of access to health services and testing, as well as disrupting supply chains and medicine supplies, raising fears of a rise in cases.
Copenhagen (AFP) – A never-before-heard tape of an interview with John Lennon featuring him singing an unreleased track called “Radio Peace” is up for auction in Copenhagen. The recording was made by four eager Danish schoolboys who clinched an interview with the former Beatle for their high school newspaper. The 33-minute tape was recorded on January 5, 1970 when Lennon spent winter in a remote corner of Jutland in western Denmark with his wife Yoko Ono.
Washington (AFP) – US President Joe Biden sends his best wishes as Mexico celebrates 200 years of independence, saying that both countries have learned that they are stronger when they “stand together as neighbors, partners and friends.”
Paris (AFP) – Australia’s AUKUS alliance with the US and UK, which deprives France of a contract to supply submarines to Australia, “does not change France’s Indo-Pacific strategy,” says French President Emmanuel Macron. Macron was left furious by Australia’s decision to ditch a 2016 deal to buy diesel submarines from France in favour of nuclear-powered ones from the United States and Britain.
