Category: Світ

Millions around the world turn to Wikipedia when they want to better understand the world around them, and that apparently includes artificial intelligence — the most searched topic on the online encyclopedia in 2023. “ChatGPT is one of the generative AI tools that is trained on Wikipedia data, pulling large amounts of content from Wikipedia …

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is visiting Greece on Thursday for a summit with Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis. The meeting comes after years of tensions that brought them to the brink of war. Dorian Jones reports from Istanbul. …

A man in Bosnia-Herzegovina killed his wife and streamed the murder live on Instagram. In neighboring Serbia, 27 women were killed in gender-based attacks this year, despite efforts to raise awareness and reverse the trend. Activists in Kosovo say violence against women there is a “national emergency.” Throughout the western Balkans, women are harassed, raped, …

Officials from the European Union and China will hold their first in-person summit since 2019 this week, with leaders from both sides expecting to exchange views on strategic and global economic issues.   Some experts say a focus of the one-day summit on December 7 will be “de-risking,” which relates to the EU’s current effort …

The Netherlands returned six artefacts including a cannon, a ceremonial sword and two guns taken from Sri Lanka more than 250 years ago on Tuesday, as part of efforts by the former colonial power to redress historical wrongs, officials said. Sri Lanka asked the Netherlands to return the artefacts after the Dutch government approved the …

Six Ukrainian children taken by Russia in the wake of Moscow’s invasion are to be reunited with family after Qatari mediation, officials from the Gulf state said Tuesday.    Russia has been accused of forcibly deporting thousands of Ukrainian children from schools, hospitals and orphanages in parts of the country controlled by its forces.    The children, …

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is set to address members of the U.S. Senate Tuesday amid a push by the White House for Congress to urgently approve new funding to help Ukraine in its defense against Russia’s invasion.    Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said Zelenskyy was invited to speak via video at a classified briefing …

The U.K.’s only giant pandas left Edinburgh for China on Monday after spending 12 cub-less years in the Scottish capital.  It was hoped that female Tian Tian (“Sweetie”) and male Yang Guang (“Sunshine”) would produce a cub during their stay at the Edinburgh Zoo.  But the bears, who even had a special black, white, grey …

Niger’s junta on Monday scrapped two key military agreements that the West African nation signed with the European Union to help fight the violence in Africa’s Sahel region as the country’s army leaders and a senior Russian defense official discussed military cooperation. Before the coup that deposed the country’s president, Mohamed Bazoum, Niger had been …

Police in Berlin are investigating a suspected arson attempt early Monday at the office of an Iranian opposition group.  Members of the group noticed flames at a window of the building in Berlin’s Schmargendorf district about 2:15 a.m. and were able to extinguish them before the fire spread inside, police said in a statement.  No …

Chinese leader Xi Jinping spoke of a “strengthened political mutual trust and international coordination” with Belarus after he met with the European country’s president in Beijing, according to official media. China has sought to make Belarus a core member of its Belt and Road Initiative to build infrastructure with nations from Malaysia to Greece. Belarusian …

Military-ruled Burkina Faso on Saturday suspended “all distribution methods” of Le Monde daily after an article on a deadly jihadi attack in the north, in the latest measure against a French media organization. “The government has decided to suspend all distribution methods of the newspaper Le Monde in Burkina Faso starting from Saturday, December 2, …

Eight U.S. lawmakers have called on the State Department to designate American Russian journalist Alsu Kurmasheva as “wrongfully detained.” In a letter to Secretary of State Antony Blinken, the lawmakers, led by Democrats Eleanor Holmes Norton and Adam Schiff, requested updates on Kurmasheva, who has been detained in Russia since October 18. The Prague-based editor …

As a second wartime winter arrives in Ukraine, the country is working to ensure this one will not be as difficult as last year’s, when Russian attacks caused severe damage to the power grid and heat delivery systems. Anna Chernikova reports from Kyiv. VOA footage by Eugene Shynkar. Video editor: Rod James. …

Britain is continuing its efforts to have migrants seeking asylum in Britain sent instead to Rwanda to seek asylum there.  In the latest version, Britain would have British lawyers stationed in Rwandan courts to alleviate British concerns about the workings of the system in Rwanda.   Britain’s Supreme Court has already ruled that an earlier government …

Ukraine and Poland will open an additional border crossing for empty freight trucks Monday to free up a much-needed route for Kyiv, with some crossings blocked by weeks of protests by Polish drivers, Ukrainian authorities said Sunday. Those protests, over what Polish truckers see as unfair competition from their Ukrainian peers, started on Nov. 6, …

Many Western arms companies failed to ramp up production in 2022 despite a strong increase in demand for weapons and military equipment, a watchdog group said Monday, adding that labor shortages, soaring costs and supply chain disruptions had been exacerbated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. In its Top 100 of such firms, the Stockholm International …

Ukrainian officials launched an investigation Sunday into allegations that Russian forces killed surrendering Ukrainian soldiers after grainy footage on social media appeared to show two uniformed men being shot at close range after emerging from a dugout. “The video shows a group in Russian uniforms shooting at point-blank range, two unarmed servicemen in the uniform …

U.S. funding for Ukraine may soon come to an end. A divided Congress has so far failed to approve a long-term budget for the U.S. government, let alone new money for aiding allies mired in conflicts abroad. The country’s top defense official says that’s a mistake. VOA’s Arash Arabasadi has more. …

A bloodstain by a bridge over the Seine river was the only remaining sign on Sunday of a fatal knife attack 12 hours earlier on a German tourist, allegedly carried out by a young man under watch for suspected Islamic radicalization. The random attack near the Eiffel Tower has drawn special concern for the French …

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Saturday thanked everyone who has helped Ukraine in its fight against Russia’s invasion, including soldiers, workers of the Emergency Service of Ukraine, the National Police, the National Guard and more. “It is important that everyone remains committed to the common cause,” Zelenskyy said in his daily address.  “It is important …

To his followers, he was “Grieg,” their guide through tantra yoga toward enlightenment and a higher state of consciousness. For European police, Gregorian Bivolaru represents a far more sinister figure: a master manipulator accused of sexual abuse and exploitation.  The arrest this week in the Paris region of the 71-year-old Romanian yoga guru and 40 …

French police arrested a man who targeted passersby in Paris on Saturday night, killing a German tourist with a knife and injuring two others, France’s interior minister said. Police subdued the man, a 25-year-old French citizen who had spent four years in prison for planning a violent offense. After his arrest, he expressed anguish about …

Ukraine’s ex-President Petro Poroshenko said he had been stopped from leaving the country Friday morning in what he described as a politically motivated bid to disrupt his work. Poroshenko, who led Ukraine from 2014 to 2019 and is now an opposition lawmaker, posted a video of himself at a border crossing with Poland, saying he …

Power was restored Saturday at Ukraine’s Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant after it was lost on Friday, averting again a “nuclear catastrophe,” according to a statement by Ukraine’s energy ministry on the Telegram messaging app.   “This is the eighth blackout which occurred at the [Zaporizhzhia plant] and could have led to nuclear catastrophe,” the …

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov delivered a blunt message to Western leaders Friday and declared at an international security conference that his government was not prepared to “review its goals” in Ukraine.  “We aren’t seeing any signals from Kyiv or its masters about their readiness to seek any kind of political settlement,” Lavrov told reporters …