
-
Anthropic says looking to power European tech with hiring push
-
Bolivia police officer blown up by pro-Morales demonstrators
-
'We're done with Teams': German state hits uninstall on Microsoft
-
Rescue teams comb site of Air India crash that killed at least 265
-
Senior US Democrat condemns Israel's 'reckless escalation'
-
With Kane's curse broken, Bayern eye Club World Cup treasures
-
Club World Cup a test of Chelsea's elite credentials
-
Bath seek end to Premiership drought against old rivals Leicester
-
Philippines ex-leader Duterte seeks interim release from ICC
-
Judge blocks Trump's use of National Guard in protest-hit Los Angeles
-
Attacking Iran, Israel brazenly defies 'man of peace' Trump
-
As NATO ups defence spending, can Europe produce the weapons?
-
From samurai threat to Asian Games as Japan cricket fights obscurity
-
Meta makes major investment in Scale AI, takes in CEO
-
Betraying the revolution: Cuban students reject dollarization
-
Oil surges, stocks fall on Middle East fears as Israel strikes Iran
-
Second man charged over shooting of Colombia presidential candidate
-
Israel launches strikes on Iran
-
UN summit to end with boost for ocean conservation
-
Israel launches 'preemptive' strikes on Iran
-
Ukrainians beg for news of missing soldiers as prisoners return
-
Spaun seizes US Open lead as Scheffler, McIlroy struggle
-
Los Angeles Grand Slam Track meeting cancelled: official
-
Scheffler hopes to solve sloppy bogeys, silly mistakes after 73
-
Club World Cup marks 'new era' for football: Infantino
-
Koepka gets Oakmont scolding and leaps into US Open title hunt
-
Trump warns Israeli attack on Iran 'could very well happen'
-
Club World Cup a chance for MLS to shine: Giroud
-
UN General Assembly calls for Gaza ceasefire, pressure on Israel
-
'Suck it up' - SGA says fatigue can't be a factor in NBA Finals
-
Bolivia police officer blown up by pro-Morales demonstrators: govt
-
Frank faces pressure to make instant impact at Spurs
-
Im grabs share of US Open lead as Pavon attacks, Scheffler struggles
-
BTS fans gather for K-pop supergroup's annual celebration
-
Northern Ireland hit by fourth night of clashes
-
Thunderstorms may rain on Trump's military parade
-
Manhandling of US senator ups California tensions with Trump admin
-
Spaun takes US Open nervous energy to record Oakmont start
-
Race ban would be his own fault, Russell warns Verstappen
-
Double bogey confidence boost helps Lawrence shine at Open
-
Bolt beams as Alfred, Duplantis and Warholm light up Oslo Diamond League
-
Hamilton slams Italian media speculation on Ferrari and Vasseur
-
Warholm sets world best in 300m hurdles in Oslo Diamond League
-
Duplantis dominates pole vault at Oslo Diamond League
-
Tottenham hire Brentford's Frank as new manager
-
Alfred scorches Diamond League 100m in Oslo
-
Reed makes only fourth albatross in US Open history
-
India plane crash: What we know
-
Cummins says bowler-dominated WTC final still a 'good Test'
-
At least 265 dead in India plane crash, one passenger survives

Italian PM vows harder line against traffickers at migrant shipwreck site
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni pledged to crack down on human traffickers Thursday, after leading her cabinet on a visit near the site of a migrant shipwreck that claimed at least 72 lives.
As protestors accused her right-wing government of risking lives with its hard line on migration, Meloni shifted the focus from those taking leaky boats across the Mediterranean to those who exploit them.
She said her ministers had agreed a decree that would hand up to 30 years in prison to traffickers who cause migrant deaths or serious injury.
At least 72 people, including many children, perished when their overcrowded boat sank in stormy weather just off the coast of the southern region of Calabria on February 26.
"We are determined to defeat human trafficking, which is responsible for this tragedy," Meloni told journalists following a cabinet meeting.
"Our response to what happened is a policy of greater firmness on the ground."
- 'Nobody saved them' -
Emotions in Cutro and Crotone, the towns nearest the shipwreck, are still raw, as relatives arrive from afar to claim their dead. Bodies were still being spotted out at sea this week or washing up on beaches.
"Nobody saved them. And they could have," read a poster with a child's drawing of a family on a storm-tossed boat, hung outside the sports hall in Crotone where the coffins of the drowned have been laid out.
Ahead of the cabinet meeting in Cutro, several dozen protesters surrounded by riot police gathered, some yelling "Step down, assassins!"
Student Antonio Viterutti said he wanted to "denounce the hypocrisy of the Italian government that leaves a boatload of people fleeing hunger, war and misery to die at sea and comes here today to do a political stunt..."
The new decree gives preferential quotas to workers from countries who help Italy fight human traffickers and conduct campaigns to warn citizens of the danger they face, said Meloni.
"We want the people to know the risks they run in putting themselves in the hands of traffickers," she added.
- Sending bodies home -
On a Crotone beach, still littered with shipwreck debris, stands a cross built out of wood from the boat that had been carrying around 180 people.
"I hold them in my heart -- all these children, these women who came to find peace and instead found death," said Maria Panebianco, an 80-year-old resident. "It pains me. It pains me a lot."
Italian authorities have begun sending the bodies of migrants back to their home countries, with plans to return 16 bodies to Afghanistan, the interior ministry said.
The body of one Afghan migrant was buried at the Crotone cemetery this week, while those of seven others were transferred to Bologna for burial in the Muslim cemetery, it said.
Meloni's far-right Brothers of Italy party won elections last year on a pledge to curb sea arrivals, and her governing coalition, which includes Matteo Salvini's League, has clamped down on charity rescue boats.
Critics say the government's policy of treating migrant boats as a law enforcement issue, rather than a humanitarian one, may have fatally delayed the rescue last month. The Central Mediterranean is the world's most dangerous crossing maritime crossing.
There are also questions about the treatment of the estimated 80 survivors. One MP who visited some of them reported poor conditions, without enough beds or special provisions for families and children.
- EU solutions -
Meloni and her ministers have rejected accusations they failed to intervene to save the boat, which set off from Turkey and was carrying Afghan, Iranian, Pakistani and Syrian nationals.
Prosecutors have opened an investigation into the disaster, which occurred despite European Union border agency Frontex saying it had alerted Italian authorities to the heavily overcrowded boat.
Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi, criticised for initially blaming the victims for trusting their lives to traffickers, told parliament on Tuesday that Frontex had not said the boat was in any danger.
But opposition leaders insist the coastguard is supposed to rescue all vessels carrying migrants, as boats run by human traffickers are inevitably dangerously overcrowded and ill-equipped.
Speaking as EU interior ministers met in Brussels to negotiate the distribution of asylum claims, Meloni said Italy needed concrete solutions to the tens of thousands of migrants who reach its shores annually, mainly from North Africa.
"Italy can not confront this situation alone," she said.
H.E.Young--AMWN