Top World News

Oct 15, 2025 - World

Habit of rising early for live streams growing rapidly, suggesting Brazil is testing ground for religious influencersPsychologist Cláudia Rodrigues de Oliveira Barbosa, 54, needs to be at work by 7.40am, but she wakes up at 3.40am – not because she has a lengthy commute, but to watch a “dawn prayer” livestream on YouTube.She is one of the millions of Brazilians who tune in to the 4am sermons of Catholic friar Gilson da Silva Pupo Azevedo, 38, known as Frei Gilson, who has recently averaged an impressive 2m daily views for each video. Continue reading...

Oct 15, 2025 - World

The city – the Sudanese army’s last stronghold in the west of the country – has withstood more than 500 days of attacks by paramilitary RSFThe besieged Sudanese city of El Fasher has been declared “uninhabitable” with new data indicating most homes are destroyed and critical levels of malnourishment among people trapped there.The stark assessment comes as the city endures constant artillery and drone attacks, shoehorning its 250,000 starving people into a shrinking urban enclave. Continue reading...

Oct 14, 2025 - World

Announcement comes after country’s parliament impeaches president after weeks of anti-government protestsAn elite military unit said it had taken power in Madagascar on Tuesday, after the country’s parliament impeached president Andry Rajoelina after weeks of anti-government protests.Rajoelina, who said on Monday in a Facebook Live video that he had gone into hiding after attempts to kill him, had refused demands to step down, but the demonstrators won the backing of the influential Capsat unit at the weekend. Continue reading...

Oct 14, 2025 - World

The decision by Ivanka Trump to dip her toe back into politics by appearing at the Gaza ceasefire treaty signing on Monday — which she had nothing to do with — left one observer cold.The so-called “first daughter” has been out of the political spotlight despite her father having won a second presidential term on a third try, retiring to her $24 million mansion on Miami's Indian Creek Island where she frequently posts exercise, surfing and fitness videos on Instagram.With her husband, Jared Kushner, being one of the chief negotiators in the ceasefire in Gaza that led to the release of Israeli hostages, Donald Trump’s daughter was singled out and featured at the signing ceremony, which led the Independent’s Holly Baxter to ask why.“Ivanka Trump has re-emerged in Israel this week, smiling beatifically as her father’s admirers cheer and cameras click. She’s radiant, modestly dressed — and, by the way, did you know that when she converted to Judaism in 2009, her father didn’t even know she was going to do it?” Baxter wrote late Monday before dryly noting that Trump's eldest daughter's political resume is now limited to “daughter of Donald, wife of Jared.”Pointing to previous relatives of presidents who have taken center stage for one reason or another, she wrote that, “Ivanka’s most relevant experience, by contrast, is having once been photographed near a peace treaty. She’s an ‘advisor,’ according to the White House, though it’s entirely unclear what she could be qualified to advise on.”Recalling an awkward — and widely ridiculed — Ivanka appearance at the G20 conference in 2017, Baxter noted that didn’t stop her from coming out of the shadows once again and onto the world stage.“It’s a little weird watching Ivanka take a bow for international developments she didn’t engineer. But maybe it’s the perfect image for our era: a woman born into power, blessed by privilege, bathed in soft light, and applauded for simply showing up,” she wrote, and then joked, “If America’s founding fathers could see Ivanka now, they might weep. Or perhaps they’d just shrug and say, ‘Ah. So the monarchy’s back. I guess the experiment failed.’”

Oct 14, 2025 - World

A journalist whose interview with Prince Andrew ended his royal career predicts Jeffrey Epstein's files will ruin more reputations.The Duke of York invited BBC's Emily Maitlis into the palace in November 2019 to discuss his friendship with the disgraced financier shortly after his death in jail — an interview widely considered to be an own goal for the prince, who denied having sex with a 17-year-old sex trafficking victim. The journalist spoke with the United Kingdom's LBC News now after newly revealed emails dispute what the prince told her."None of it quite adds up, does it?" Maitlis said."The narrative from Andrew had always been, 'After I realized who he was, you know, broadly, I ended contact with him,'" Maitlis added. "Now, that doesn't match up because in 2008 [Epstein had] already been a convicted sex offender, he'd served his short prison sentence, and Prince Andrew had told me that he'd broken off contact in 2006, but actually he hadn't."Andrew told her that he ceased contact with Epstein in December 2010, saying he ended their friendship in person during a walk in Central Park that was captured by a paparazzi photo. But the emails show him offering support to Epstein in February 2011 and promising to "keep in close touch and we’ll play some more soon.""We still don't know the absolute truth even behind that photo taken in Central Park," Maitlis said. "But much of the reporting has suggested that it was very useful to Epstein because it provided, sort of, kompromat. It links him."The newly revealed emails were dated Feb. 28, 2011, the day after the Mail on Sunday published a now-infamous photo of the prince with Epstein co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell and teenaged Virginia Giuffre, with whom he later settled a sex abuse lawsuit out of court for an undisclosed sum while denying liability."I mean, the number of people that have ended up lying for Epstein, whose careers have ended up in absolute tatters because of their connection to him," Maitlis said. "I think we're at the tip of the iceberg, I genuinely do."