The German delegation passed through Paris without being hindered by the student strikes taking place on the streets of Paris. The motorcades moved through the French capital without disruption. Around the Arc de Triomphe and the Champs-Elysees, however, traffic was at a standstill for hours. Due to the high-profile visit, the streets were cordoned off over a wide area.

• The 2026 Nobel Peace Prize goes to South African jurist and human rights pioneer Navi Pillay “for her efforts to promote peace and international law.” Pillay played an integral part in the anti-apartheid movement and served as a judge on the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda.

Former German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder attended Russian President Vladimir Putin's birthday party, the Kremlin said Thursday. 

Putin celebrated his 74th birthday in Moscow on Wednesday. The Kremlin said Putin learned that Schröder was on a business trip in the Russian capital via Russian media reports. 

"The president invited his old friend to his home," the Kremlin said, with the Russian government releasing pictures of Schröder and Putin smiling and clasping hands. 

The mountain cried as water fell

For the country was racing towards hell

My friend

You chose not to dream any more

And die at the time of your choosing

Avoiding lanes of rubbish-piles decomposing

And old factories being demolished

From leaky roof to the rotten floor

As small precious houses are vanished

To the glory of high rise with low ceilings

Office cabinets spew abandoned dealings

Replaced by the super intelligence haven

Of artificial data centres awakening

While the bus is filling up with old men

Awaiting departure to the underworld

The last station beyond our only end

The sugar mills pump steam and smoke

In the glorious Queensland blue air 

My friend

Promoting tooth decay with sweets for children

Israel failed to protect its people and demanded the world accept Gaza’s devastation as the price of their deaths. Andrew Brown.

October 7 has become Benjamin Netanyahu’s shield. Behind that shield sits a damning record: ignored intelligence, reported warnings to Netanyahu, catastrophic failures at Nova, Hannibal directives killing hostages, false atrocity stories and a reported opportunity to negotiate civilian hostage releases that Israel declined.

Three years later, his government still refuses an independent state commission of inquiry.

Manchester City may face severe punishment if its financial breaches are upheld on appeal. But the people who will live with the consequences had no say in the decisions that brought the club here.

Football fans: who amongst us hasn’t wished for untold success for our club? To lift countless trophies, win handsomely against the strongest opposition, sign the world’s best players, and achieve glory year after year? Whatever the challenge, the club will have the funds, influence and clout to put an elite 11 players on the field each week. Success will only ever be just around the corner.

Martyn Pearce

Brussels is steering Europe toward totalitarianism and a “Euro-Gestapo” while lecturing Russia on democracy, Slovak MEP Lubos Blaha has warned.

Blaha made the remarks during a European Parliament debate on Tuesday, responding to EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas, who denounced Russia’s recent parliamentary elections as undemocratic.

The politician questioned why Brussels was focusing on Russia while cracking down on dissent within the bloc.

He cited arrests of pro-Palestinian protesters in Germany and the imprisonment of Estonian opposition figures, who he claimed were jailed for opposing war with Russia.

“Are you going to set up the Euro-Gestapo here, Mrs. Kallas, and lock up everyone who wants peace?” he asked.

The Slovak lawmaker also questioned why Brussels was debating Russia’s elections while Europe faced mounting unrest.

News reports that next year’s U.S. military budget will top out at $1.5 trillion if President Donald Trump gets his way are misleading at best. The true total, if Trump’s proposal passes, could be at least $1 trillion higher.

A statue of US President Donald Trump was put on exhibit in the European Parliament building in Strasbourg, France.

The 2.5-meter satirical statue, by Danish artist Jens Galschiot, is called "Orange Plague," and it shows the US leader naked, holding a long gold club and sitting on the shoulders of a smaller man.

The artist said it is coated with 23-karat gold. The statue is also known by the name "King of Injustice."

Europe’s leaders have grand plans – spend more on weapons, prepare for war, and tighten citizens’ belts. The people have more immediate concerns however, like finding somewhere to live, keeping their jobs, and getting an education. Across France, Germany, Spain, and other EU states, the widening rift has started to spill into the streets.

Recent weeks have seen housing marches across Spain, student riots and public-sector strikes in France, and demonstrations against military recruitment and industrial job cuts in Germany. Immigration has added to the anger over housing and overstretched services, while the prospect of conscription has young Germans asking whose wars they are expected to fight.

Higher interest rates hit younger mortgage holders far harder than everyone else, making monetary policy both inequitable and inefficient. Inflation control should be spread more fairly across the economy.

Let me be the last to tell you: the Reserve Bank’s decision to raise the official interest rate for the fourth time this year, taking it to 4.6 per cent, will hurt people with mortgages. That rate’s the highest since 2011, and there may be another rise to go in a month’s time. But it will hurt more today than it did 15 years ago.

Australia's former ambassador to the United States, Joe Hockey, has issued a damning indictment of the US political system on 7.30.

Asked if corruption had been allowed to "flourish" in Washington DC, he said: "Yeah, there's no doubt."

Military representatives from all of NATO's 32 members have gathered in Kiev. Ukraine has been trying to join the expansionist military-bloc for years, but has been consistently rejected. 

The visit by the members of the so-called Military Committee, takes place just a day after US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said possible Ukrainian membership of NATO – one of the central issues at the heart of the Ukraine conflict – “is not on the table as we speak.” 

Moscow has long opposed the US-led military bloc’s eastward expansion and has made Ukrainian neutrality a key condition of any settlement, arguing that NATO’s presence there would pose a direct threat to Russian national security.

THE ARTICLE BELOW NIBBLES AT THE INCONVENIENT PROBLEM OF PROPAGANDA... IT NEARLY SITS WHERE IT SHOULD BUT IT IS NOT EXPLAINING THE CORE ISSUES AT THE SOURCE OF THE UKRAINE/RUSSIA CONFLICT.

IN ORDER TO HIDE THE TRUE ORIGIN THAT PROVOKED RUSSIA INTO ACTION, THE WEST HAS BEEN DUSTING OFF "IMPERIALIST RUSSIA" AND THAT RUSSIA IS PREPARING TO FIGHT EUROPE. 

RUSSIA HAS NOT INTENTION OF FIGHTING AGAINST EUROPE, THOUGH RUSSIA WOULD KNOW THAT IT HAS A FAR SUPERIOR MILITARY AND WEAPON ARSENAL THAN EUROPE.

RUSSIA WANTS PEACE ON ITS OWN STRICT TERMS — AFTER ALL DECENT OVERTURE FOR PEACE HAVE BEEN REJECTED BY THE WEST IN 2021. IN 2022, THE PEACE TREATY — THAT BORIS JOHNSON SCUTTLED — WAS STILL VERY FAVOURABLE TO UKRAINE.... AFTER THIS BETRAYAL, RUSSIA HAS NOT BEEN PREPARED TO HAVE A CEASEFIRE, UNTIL TRUE PEACE IS ACHIEVED — DIPLOMATICALLY OR MILITARILY.

MOST SPIDERS HAVE A VERY STRONG SENSE OF SPACE, A SENSE OF PROBABILITY [TO CATCH PREYS], A SENSE OF UP AND DOWN, A SENSE OF GEOMETRY AND ANCHORAGE — AND OF REPRODUCTION. THEY DO NOT HAVE TO LEARN ALL THESE FROM A SOCIAL NETWORK. THEIR KNOWLEDGE IS INNATE. FOR EXAMPLE, THE EGG NEST OF THE ST ANDREW'S* SPIDER ABOVE [*MY GUESS] IS COMPLETELY SPHERICAL AND 10 MILLIMETRES EXACTLY IN DIAMETRE.

DOES ONE CAN SPIN SOMETHING SO AMAZING WITH EIGHT LEGS? OR TEN FINGERS? OR A MACHINE?....