Headline

‎Italian PM Trumpets Plan To Boost African Economies At EU Summit

Published

8 hours ago

June 20, 2025

Editor

‎Italian Prime Minister Georgia Meloni on Friday will host European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen in Rome for a summit aimed at boosting African economies in a bid to curb illegal migration to the bloc.
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‎Meloni, whose far-right Brothers of Italy party has prioritised cutting irregular immigration, has launched a 5.5-billion-euro ($6.3-billion) plan targeting 14 countries including Ethiopia, Ivory Coast and Senegal to support industries from energy to health care.
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‎Irregular border crossings detected into the European Union stood at 239,000 last year, down 38 percent from an almost 10-year peak in 2023, according to European border agency Frontex.

READ ALSO: Israel’s Netanyahu Says Iran Will ‘Pay Heavy Price’ After Hospital Hit
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‎Meloni’s plan aims to strengthen trade relations between Italy and African nations in the energy sector particularly, since the Russian invasion of Ukraine has forced Rome to seek new supplies of oil and gas.
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‎Rome also wants a stake in financing a railway line between Zambia and Angola, and is planning a 65-million-euro investment in biofuel production in Kenya.
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‎Kenyan President William Ruto has praised the plan as “ambitious”, but noted “that investment alone is not enough” and African economies continue to be burdened by debt.
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‎African Union chief Moussa Faki Mahamat has also warned that the continent “cannot rely solely on promises that are often broken”.

READ ALSO: Italian Town Revokes Mussolini Honorary Citizenship
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‎Experts say that Italy has “promised too much” by implying that these investments could reduce the number of migrants by creating jobs and growth.
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‎”The funding that Italy can provide is not at the right scale,” Giovanni Carbone, head of the University of Milan’s Africa programme, told AFP.
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‎The plan serves to benefit the interests of “large companies in the Italian fossil fuel industry”, said Simone Ogno from the NGO ReCommon.
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‎Major Italian companies are already involved in the plan, including oil giant Eni, electricity carrier Terna and agro-industrial group Bonifiche Ferraresi.
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‎Undocumented migration via the Central Mediterranean route — between North Africa and Italy — saw around 67,000 migrant arrivals in 2024, Frontex said, down 59 percent from the year prior.
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‎AFP

Headline

Thousands Protest In Tehran Against Israel

Published

1 hour ago

June 20, 2025

Editor

Thousands of people joined a protest against Israel in the Iranian capital on Friday after weekly prayers, chanting slogans in support of their leaders, images on state television showed.

“This is the Friday of the Iranian nation’s solidarity and resistance across the country,” the news anchor said.

Footage showed protesters in Tehran holding up photographs of commanders killed since the start of the war with Israel, while others waved the flags of Iran and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.

“I will sacrifice my life for my leader,” read a protester’s banner, a reference to supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

According to state television, protests took place in other cities around the country, including in Tabriz in northwestern Iran and Shiraz in the south.

AFP

Headline

Over 650 Die In Iran After First Week Of Israeli Strikes

Published

1 hour ago

June 20, 2025

Editor

More than 650 people have been killed in Iran following a massive Israeli bombing campaign launched a week ago, an activist group said on Friday.

The U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) reported that 657 people have died and 2,037 have been injured in the nationwide airstrikes.

The Iranian government does not publish daily figures on casualties.

HRANA relies on a broad network of informants and publicly available sources.

The group said the dead include at least 263 civilians and 164 members of the military.

Another 230 fatalities remain unidentified.

The network also reported damage to civilian infrastructure, including a projectile striking a children’s hospital in Tehran, which did not result in any injuries.

In the western province of Ilam, a fire station was damaged, HRANA said, while an Israeli attack on a car factory in western Iran triggered a large fire.

Israel maintains its objective is to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, which it considers an existential threat.

Headline

UK Joins Other Nations In Pulling Embassy Staff From Iran

Published

1 hour ago

June 20, 2025

Editor

Britain on Friday withdrew its embassy staff from Iran, following in the footsteps of other European nations as well as Australia and New Zealand amid the conflict with Israel.

“Due to the current security situation, we have taken the precautionary measure to temporarily withdraw our UK staff from Iran,” the foreign ministry said in a statement.

“Our embassy continues to operate remotely,” it added.

On the eighth day of the war between Iran and Israel, the British ministry said it continued to call for de-escalation between the two sides.

But the statement added: “We take the protection of our staff and British nationals extremely seriously and we have long advised against all travel to Iran.”

Earlier Friday, Australia also shuttered its Tehran embassy and ordered officials to leave the country, Sydney said, citing a “deteriorating security situation”.

Both countries join a string of nations closing diplomatic missions in Iran since Israel launched air strikes a week ago, claiming its arch enemy was on the verge of developing a nuclear weapon.

Australia has directed all its officials and their dependents to leave Iran, and suspended its Tehran embassy operations, Foreign Minister Penny Wong told a news conference in Adelaide.

“This is not a decision taken lightly. It is a decision based on the deteriorating security environment in Iran,” she said.

Wong said there were about 2,000 Australians and family members registered in Iran who wanted to depart, and another 1,200 in Israel.

Other nations that have suspended Tehran embassy operations include Bulgaria, Czech Republic, New Zealand, Portugal, and Switzerland.

Switzerland said it was temporarily closing its diplomatic mission in the Iranian capital, but would continue to fulfil is role in representing US interests in Iran.

“In view of the intensity of military operations in Iran and the highly unstable situation on the ground, the FDFA has decided to temporarily close the Swiss embassy in Tehran,” the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs said.

European powers meanwhile met with Iranian officials in Geneva on Friday, and hoped to offer “a diplomatic solution”, according to French President Emmanuel Macron.

Britain’s Foreign Secretary David Lammy said “a window now exists within the next two weeks to achieve a diplomatic solution”, while agreeing with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio that “Iran can never develop or acquire a nuclear weapon”.

AFP