Funny Sparrow880

Police in Iran have arrested several people at protests against the near disappearance of what was once the world's second largest salt lake. Lake Urmia was Iran's main domestic tourism resort before it began shrinking in 1995 due to extreme drought, agriculture and dam building. These days, hotels and boats lie abandoned, with no water in sight. Many locals in the remote north west, where the lake is located, blame authorities for its disappearance. "Lake Urmia is dying, parliament orders its killing," some protesters shouted at a small demonstration in the regional capital, also called Urmia. The police chief in the region described the demonstrators as hostile and said they intended to disturb public security. Iranian tourists used to flock to Lake Urmia, near the border with Turkey, to enjoy its natural beauty and the reported restorative properties of its mineral-rich mud. But in the mid-1990s, a combination of intensifying agriculture, new dams built across the ...

The European Union has given Croatia the green light to begin using the euro from next year. The country will join 19 other EU member states that use the currency. It will adopt the currency from 1 January 2023, making Croatia the latest nation to join the eurozone since Lithuania in 2015. From next year, it will mean that just seven EU countries still use their own currency. Why is Croatia adopting the euro? Croatia will continue to use its own currency, the kuna, until January next year. Currently, one Croatian kuna is worth around €0.13. In order to adopt the euro, a country has to fulfil a set of economic conditions including having a stable exchange rate and low inflation. By adopting the euro, the eastern European nation hopes to gain more financial security and improve the living standards of its citizens. Croatia will also benefit economically from closer financial links with the single currency area’s other members and the European Central Bank. For visitors to Croatia from th...

Bulls from Spain’s revered Miura ranch starred in a fast and uncomplicated final running of the bulls at this year’s San Fermín Festival on Thursday. The Navarra regional government said six people were treated for minor injuries following Thursday’s run, which lasted just over two minutes. Initially, the Spanish Red Cross said two people needed treatment. No horn gorings were reported, with the bulls mainly moving in a pack and taking little notice of the runners as they sprinted to the bullring. One runner escaped serious injury when a bull’s horn appeared to graze the right side of his head before he fell to the ground. The festival's eighth and final run saw hundreds of people, mostly men and far fewer than usual, test their agility as they ran ahead of six fighting bulls and their guiding steer along an 875-metre route through Pamplona to the city’s bullring. Tens of thousands of visitors attend the Pamplona festival, which was immortalised in Ernest Hemingway’s 1926 novel “Th...

Detection in the Chinese city of Wuhan of a bacteria that caused cholera in a student and was separately found in samples from soft shell turtles at a food market has struck a sensitive nerve with ordinary Chinese people, with some relating it to COVID-19. The food market where samples from soft shell turtles tested positive of the pathogen capable of causing cholera has been disinfected, local authorities said late on Thursday. While no human cholera case was found among people who came in contact with the softshell turtles, the specific store selling them was ordered to shut down for three days. Authorities said that the vibrio cholerae O139 strain for the student's infection, announced on Monday, and the contaminated samples are unrelated. Officials are also tracking unspecified products of the same batch as the soft shell turtles that have been shipped elsewhere, said the disease control authority in Wuhan's Hongshan district. Despite a lack of solid signs of a cholera out...

Thorpe Park (England) Thorpe Park has the UK's fastest roller coaster, the Stealth. The park is well-known, even amongst the British royal family. (For example, you could see Princess Diana with her young sons William and Harry here - a long time ago!) The park has six water attractions, a dozen thrill rides, and fifteen more attractions for the whole family. Disneyland Paris (France) Based on numbers before the coronavirus pandemic, Disneyland Paris was the most visited European theme park per year. A local branch of the Disney chain, it opened in 1992 and attracted 320 million visitors in 2017. Notable attractions include the Phantom Manor and the Space Mountain - all based, loosely or not, on stories from Disney films and series. Europa Park (Germany) Europa Park has over a hundred attractions and dozens of shows to discover. It's the perfect place for action fans with fast roller coasters like the Blue Fire mega rollercoaster (powered by Nord Stream 2) and the wooden Wodan ...

Japanese bid their final goodbye to former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Tuesday as his funeral was held at a temple days after his assassination shocked the nation. Abe,  the country's longest-serving prime minister , remained influential even after stepping down two years ago for health reasons. He was gunned down Friday during a campaign speech in the western city of Nara. Hundreds of people, some in formal dark suits, filled sidewalks outside Zojoji temple in downtown Tokyo to bid farewell to Abe, whose nationalistic views drove the governing party's conservative policies. Mourners took photos and some called out “Abe san!” as a motorcade with the hearse carrying his body accompanied by his widow, Akie Abe, slowly drove by the packed crowd. “I believe there were many things he left unfinished as a politician,” public broadcaster NHK quoted Akie Abe as saying. “But he planted many seeds and I’m sure they will sprout.” Abe’s long-time ally and mentor, Finance Minister Taro Aso...

Vladimir Putin’s “private army” may be recruiting soldiers from jails due to difficulties replacing troops killed or wounded in Ukraine, British defence chiefs said on Tuesday. They believe that at least 20,000 of the Russian president’s military personnel have been killed in Ukraine since he launched his invasion on February 24. Three to four times as many Russian soldiers are estimated to have been wounded or incapacitated, with Ukrainian forces also suffering heavy losses. In its latest intelligence update, the Ministry of Defence in London said: “Russian Armed Forces’ personnel shortages may be forcing the Russian MOD to turn to non-traditional recruitment. This includes recruiting personnel from Russian prisons for the Wagner Private Military Company. “If true, this move likely indicates difficulties in replacing the significant numbers of Russian casualties.” However, information coming out of the Kremlin is even more questionable given that it has not even admitted that an invas...

AS dawn broke over Javed Rahi's Pakistani mountain village, a loud boom shattered the silence and a torrent of water came cascading down from the melting glacier nearby, followed by a thick cloud of smoke. Rahi, a retired maths teacher, had been due to attend his nephew's wedding the day the flood rushed through the village of Hassanabad. "I expected women and children to sing and dance... Instead I heard them screaming in terror," the 67-year-old said. "It was like doomsday." The flood –- which occurred as a heatwave was gripping South Asia in May –- swept away nine homes in the village and damaged half a dozen more. The water also washed away two small hydro plants and a bridge that connected the remote community to the outside world. The mountain communities depend on theirlivestock, orchards, farms and tourism for survival, but climate change threatens all of it. "Our economy is agrarian and people don't have enough resources to move from here,...

Illegal infiltration of Indian cattle has a major impact on the sale of domestic cattle every year in the country. As there is no corridor, there is no legality of importing Indian cattle. However, long rows of Indian cattle can be seen at the different local border cattle markets including Bhurungamari, Panchbibi, as well as Panchgram upazila of the country. Due to these reasons, the local farmers have become frustrated. Such a picture was seen recently at the Bhurungamari Korbani market, bordering Kurigram district. Meanwhile, though the markets of the Dhaka city are full of cows, the arrival of buyers are not seen yet. On Monday (July 4), various markets in the capital were visited and wholesalers from different parts of the country brought cows. However, they are spending lazy time as there is no sign of buyers. As the price of Indian cattle is lower than the local cows, these large cows are attracting the attention of the wholesalers as well as buyers of the boarder markets. On ac...

The Norwegian government has intervened to halt a strike by oil and gas workers. The move came amid concerns that the strike could have worsened Europe's energy crisis, which is already aggravated by the war in Ukraine. Norway's government imposed a forced settlement in a dispute between striking offshore oil and gas workers and energy executives, according to reports on Tuesday. The move has put a stop to the strike, also easing fears that further strikes could have significantly reduced the Scandinavian country's gas output and lead to shortages in Europe. The Norwegian Labor Ministry moved to step in on Tuesday evening to halt the dispute, Norwegian broadcaster NRK reported. The country's government can step in and stop strikes in extraordinary circumstances. Audun Ingvartsen, the leader of the Lederne trade union told Reuters that the strike had ended. "Workers are going back to work as soon as possible," he told the news agency. Members of Lederne had dem...

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Twelve bodies have been found following a shipwreck in the South China Sea over the weekend that left more than two dozen crew members missing, Chinese authorities said Monday. The announcement came days after an engineering vessel 160 nautical miles (296 kilometres) southwest of Hong Kong suffered substantial damage and broke into two pieces during a typhoon. "As of 3:30 pm on July 4, rescue forces found and recovered 12 bodies, suspected to be of victims who drowned, in an area around 50 nautical miles southwest of the site where the vessel sank," said the Guangdong Maritime Search and Rescue Centre. "The relevant departments are stepping up identity confirmation work." A total of 30 crew members abandoned the vessel, Fujing 001, used for offshore wind power construction, after its anchor chain broke in the typhoon, according to Chinese state media outlet CGTN. The floating crane of the offshore wind farm project was found to be in danger by a monitoring system on...