Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov yesterday said that Western threats towards Moscow would do nothing to ease tensions over Ukraine as Russia and Belarus launched joint military drills.

Britain's Prince Charles has tested positive for Covid-19, his office said on Thursday, the second time that the heir-to-the-throne has contracted the disease.

Sweden scrapped almost all of its few pandemic restrictions on Wednesday (Feb 9) and stopped most testing for Covid-19, even as the pressure on the healthcare systems remained high and some scientists begged for more patience in fighting the disease.

The Kremlin yesterday said there were “positive signals” for the resolution of the Ukraine crisis following a meeting of the French and Ukrainian leaders in Kyiv.

Behind his latest outbursts against NATO and doomsday warnings to the West, there are tentative signs that Russian President Vladimir Putin is keen to avoid an escalation of the Ukraine crisis and seek some form of accommodation with the West.

Plastic has infiltrated all parts of the ocean and is now found “in the smallest plankton up to the largest whale” wildlife group WWF said yesterday, calling for urgent efforts to create an international treaty on plastics.

More than 100 Belgian police raided multiple addresses around the port city of Antwerp yesterday and detained 13 people suspected of links to a jihadist group.

French President Emmanuel Macron said yesterday that after talks with the Russian and Ukrainian leaders he saw a path toward easing tensions.

Russia, facing the threat of Western penalties over Ukraine, and China on Monday spoke out against what they called “unilateral” sanctions imposed by countries without the backing of the United Nations Security Council.

French President Emmanuel Macron said Tuesday that Russian President Vladimir Putin told him he would not further escalate the Ukraine crisis in their marathon talks in the Kremlin a day earlier.

On the banks of the River Humber in northern England, the winds of change are blowing through Hull, where factory workers busily craft turbine blades in a green revolution.

The government of Belgium has unveiled its new passports decorated with characters from some of the country’s most famous comic book characters, including “Tintin” and the “Smurfs”.

Thousands took to the streets of Ukraine's second-largest city on Saturday carrying banners saying "Kharkiv is Ukraine" and "stop Russian aggression", as the country braced for a possible military offensive from Russia.

Incoming orders to German industry rose for the second month in a row in December, official figures published Friday showed, after the economy was buffeted by supply bottlenecks in 2021.

President Vladimir Putin unveiled new Russian oil and gas deals with China worth an estimated $117.5 billion on Friday, promising to ramp up Russia’s Far East exports at a time of heightened tension with European customers over Ukraine.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov yesterday accused “Western colleagues” of making things up after US officials claimed to have evidence of a planned operation by Moscow to film a fake Ukrainian attack on Russians.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson was scrambling to save his premiership yesterday after four of his inner circle quit in the fallout from lockdown-breaking parties in his Downing Street office.

The deployment of additional United States troops in Eastern Europe is escalating tensions in the region, the Kremlin said yesterday, after Washington said it would send 3,000 extra troops to Poland and Romania.

The Dutch port city of Rotterdam said Wednesday it would temporarily dismantle an historic bridge to allow a superyacht built for Amazon founder Jeff Bezos to pass.

Nato leaders pursued diplomatic efforts on the Ukraine crisis yesterday after President Vladimir Putin accused the West of trying to draw Russia into a war but left the door open to further talks.