The eastern province of Guantanamo has suffered severe damage due to the storm, which made landfall on Sunday. Electricity has been restored in Havana, but many residents outside the capital remain without power.

An infection with the new mpox variant Ib has been detected for the first time in Germany. The strain has been spreading in several African countries for months.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/21661988

[gift article - expires in 30 days] By Bilal Shbair and Erika Solomon

Bilal Shbair reported from central Gaza, visiting the site of the fire at Al Aqsa Martyrs Hospital compound and speaking to several members of the Dalou family.

Published Oct. 20, 2024 Updated Oct. 21, 2024, 7:51 a.m. ET

Outlet Wikipedia.

The U.S. has allocated a new military assistance package for Ukraine worth $400 million, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announced during his to Kyiv on Oct. 21, Ukrinform reported.

Later in the day, the Pentagon said in its press release that the recent package included HIMARS air defense systems, tube-launched, optically tracked, and wire-guided (TOW) missiles, M113 armored personnel carriers, Javelin and AT-4 anti-armor systems, and ammunition for high-mobility artillery.

Washington also pledged to provide Kyiv with 155 mm and 105 mm artillery ammunition, as well as 60 mm, 81 mm, and 120 mm mortar systems and rounds, among other weapons and training equipment.

The Pentagon chief arrived in Kyiv in a surprise visit to discuss further support for Ukraine as the uncertain U.S. presidential election looms.

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The new £2.26 billion is the UK’s contribution to the G7 Extraordinary Revenue Acceleration (ERA) Loans to Ukraine scheme, in which $50 billion from G7 countries will be delivered to Ukraine for its military, budget and reconstruction needs. The loan will be repaid using the extraordinary profits on immobilised Russian sovereign assets.

South Korean media claimed on Monday that Seoul could send military and intelligence personnel to Ukraine after the North dispatched troops to support Russia in the war.

A report said the government and military of South Korea "are reviewing a plan to send an appropriate number of personnel, including intelligence officers [specialized in North Korea] and experts in enemy tactics," to Ukraine, citing a South Korean intelligence official.

South Korean personnel in Ukraine would interrogate or provide interpretation services if North Korean soldiers were captured by Ukrainian forces, the report said. They would also provide Kyiv with information about the North's military tactics, doctrine, and operations.

cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/3997245

According to China's National Bureau of Statistics on the 21st, the unemployment rate of young people (16-24 years old) reached 18.8% in August. It's the highest it's been this year. This is attributed to the fact that a large number of students who graduated from school in the first half of this year jumped into the job front.

[...]

Chinese authorities temporarily suspended the release of monthly figures after youth unemployment hit an all-time high of 21.3% in June last year. Since then, new standards have been applied and announced from this year excluding enrolled students from the statistical target. Nevertheless, the youth unemployment rate, which was 14.6% in January this year, is steadily rising.

Last month, the story of 24-year-old Lee became a hot topic on Weibo, a Chinese social network service (SNS). After completing a master's degree in physics at the graduate school, it was known that he got a job as a cleaner at a high school in Suzhou, Jiangsu Province.

[...]

In fact, many young Chinese people are flocking to gig workers (short-time workers). The number of delivery drivers registered on Meituan, a large delivery platform, jumped from 3.98 million in 2019 to 7.45 million last year. The growth of the delivery market slowed due to the end of the "COVID-19 lockdown" policy, but the number of delivery drivers increased.

[...]

Against this backdrop, the Chinese government has recently decided to strengthen its crackdown on slang and newly coined words on the Internet. Some analysts say that they intend to censor terms that criticize the Chinese Communist Party and the government.

Israel has accused Hezbollah of keeping hundreds of millions of dollars in cash and gold in a bunker under a hospital in the southern suburbs of Beirut, though it said it would not strike the complex.

The Sahel hospital in Dahiyeh was evacuated shortly afterwards, and Fadi Alame, its director, told Reuters that the allegations were untrue.

Israel did not provide evidence for its claim that cash was being kept under the hospital. Instead, it published an animated graphic that purported to show a bunker under the hospital and said it had previously been used to hide the former secretary general of Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah. Israel appealed to the Lebanese government to confiscate the money it said the Shia militant organisation had stolen from the Lebanese people.

Shortly after, Israel issued a series of warnings to residents of Dahiyeh that it would begin striking buildings in the area and that they should move at least 500 metres away. Those who remained in the area began to flee.

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European Union candidate Serbia will continue to refuse to impose sanctions against Russia over its invasion of Ukraine despite Western pressure, Serbia’s leader said after his telephone conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Sunday.

Populist Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said on Instagram that he believes the call, what he said was his first in more than two years with the Russian president, will help “further development of relations and trust between Russia and Serbia.”

“We talked as people who have known each other for a long time, as friends, and the ten-minute conversation was marked by a personal note, and we also talked about those who are weak (pro-Western) leaders,” Vucic said.

Vucic quoted Putin as saying “what is good for Serbia is also good for Russia, what is good for the Serbs is also good for the Russians.”

Schools in Mexico have six months to implement a government-sponsored ban on junk food or face heavy fines, officials said Monday, as authorities confront what they call the worst childhood obesity problem in the world.

The rules, published on Sept. 30, target products that have become staples for two or three generations of Mexican school kids: sugary fruit drinks, chips, artificial pork rinds and soy-encased, salty peanuts with chili.

School administrators who violate the order will face fines equivalent to between $545 and $5,450, which could double for a second offense. That could amount to nearly a year’s wages for some.

A Chinese mercenary has shared details about North Korean soldiers allegedly killed shortly after they joined Russia's war effort in Ukraine.

The information was shared on X (formerly Twitter) by the account @whyyoutouzhele on Sunday, in a conversation between a gun-for-hire fighting alongside Russian forces, who goes by the handle "Dian Yuzhang," and a mercenary who has returned to China and goes by the name Li Dafu.

These claims emerged just days after South Korea's National Intelligence Service confirmed that North Korean troops had been training in Russia before being sent to bolster Russia's diminished forces and help contain Ukraine's counteroffensive in Russia's Kursk region.

Documents obtained by Ottawa Citizen show officials were concerned about negative media in case of Kristen Adams

Canada’s military decided not to apologize to an employee after she was sexually assaulted while working with Nato allies, over fears that any apology would be reported by an Ottawa newspaper.

For years, the country’s armed forces has publicly acknowledged a culture that bred abuse and assault, and a longstanding failure to root it out. The crisis, which prompted a shake-up at the most senior ranks, has eroded public trust in the institution and weakened morale within the military’s ranks.

Kristen Adams, who was working at a canteen for troops in Latvia, was sexually assaulted by a Nato soldier on 3 December 2022. After filing a formal complaint about the assault, she was warned by the army’s morale and welfare services that she should have better understood the risks of the job.