United Kingdom

LONDON, Aug 10 (Reuters) - China, which Russia has sought as an ally since being cold-shouldered by the West over its invasion of Ukraine, has called the United States the "main instigator" of the crisis.

In an interview with the Russian state news agency TASS published on Wednesday, China's ambassador to Moscow, Zhang Hanhui, accused Washington of backing Russia into a corner with repeated expansions of the NATO defence alliance and support for forces seeking to align Ukraine with the European Union rather than Moscow.

LONDON (AP) — The number of coronavirus deaths fell by 9% in the last week while new cases remained relatively stable, according to the latest weekly pandemic report released by the World Health Organization Wednesday.

The U.N. health agency said there were more than 14,000 COVID-19 deaths in the last week and nearly 7 million new infections. The Western Pacific reported a 30% jump in cases while Africa reported a 46% drop. Cases also fell by more than 20% in the Americas and the Middle East.

LONDON (AP) — British health authorities say they will offer a polio booster dose to children aged 1 to 9 in London, after finding evidence the virus has been spreading in multiple regions of the capital, despite not confirming any cases of the paralytic disease in people.

In a statement on Wednesday, Britain’s Health Security Agency said it had detected polio viruses derived from the oral polio vaccine in sewage water from eight boroughs of London, but had not identified any cases.

09 August 2022; MEMO: The BBC has come under fire over its "typical" misinformation about Palestine following the publication of an article explaining Israel's latest aggression on the besieged Gaza Strip.

LONDON, Aug 8 (Reuters) - One of President Vladimir Putin's closest allies said on Monday that Russia would achieve its aims in the conflict in Ukraine on its own terms, warning that the West had a long-term plan to destroy Russia.

"Russia is conducting a special military operation in Ukraine and is attaining peace on our terms," former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, who serves as deputy chairman of Russia's security council, told TASS in an interview.

LONDON, Aug. 8 (Xinhua) -- The Metropolitan Police (Met), Britain's largest police force, strip-searched 650 children, mostly black boys, between 2018 and 2020, data from a research published on Monday showed.

Of the 650 minors aged 10 to 17 searched by the Met officers, 95 percent were boys and 58 percent of the boys were black, according to the research published by Rachel de Souza, the children's commissioner for England.

In 23 percent of the cases, there wasn't an appropriate adult present, the report said.

LONDON, Aug 5 (Reuters) - The United Nations food agency's world price index declined again in July, edging further away from record highs hit in March.

The Food and Agriculture Organization's (FAO) food price index, which tracks the most globally traded food commodities, averaged 140.9 points last month versus a revised 154.3 for June. The June figure was previously put at 154.2.

The July index was still 13.1% higher than a year earlier, pushed up by the impact of the invasion of Ukraine, adverse weather and high production and transport costs.

LONDON, Aug 5 (Reuters) - Russia's defence ministry on Friday accused Ukrainian forces of shelling the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, the biggest in Europe, saying a leak of radiation had been avoided only by luck.

It said that as a result, the generating capacity of one unit had been reduced and power supply to another had been cut. In addition, the nearby city of Enerhodar was suffering from problems with its power and water supplies, it added in a statement.

LONDON (AP) — The Bank of England projected Thursday that the United Kingdom’s economy will enter a recession at the end of the year as it hiked interest rates by the largest amount in more than 27 years, pushing to tame accelerating inflation driven by the fallout from Russia’s war in Ukraine.

LONDON, Aug 3 (Reuters) - The European Medicines Agency (EMA) is recommending Novavax's COVID-19 vaccine carry a warning of the possibility of two types of heart inflammation, an added burden for a shot that has so far failed to win wide uptake.

The heart conditions - myocarditis and pericarditis - should be listed as new side effects in the product information for the vaccine, Nuvaxovid, based on a small number of reported cases, the EMA said on Wednesday.