Europe

18 August 2023; MEMO: A suspicious envelope full of white powder was sent to a mosque in Sweden on Friday, police said, Anadolu Agency reports.

In a statement, police in the south-western city of Gothenburg said that an investigation was opened and the powder sent to the mosque in the region of Hisingen was being analysed.

MINSK, August 18. /TASS/: Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said that the time has come when it is necessary to present a common front against the warmongers.

MOSCOW, August 18. /TASS/: The Ukrainian authorities are preying not only on their own people but also on US taxpayers, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said in a statement.

"The Kiev elite is preying not only on its fellow citizens but also on American taxpayers. Not so long ago, US presidential hopeful Robert F. Kennedy Jr. pointed out in an interview that Washington’s spending on Ukraine aid stood at $130 billion, while 15 million Americans did not have medical insurance and 30 million people in the US lacked food stamps," she noted.

MINSK, August 18. /TASS/: The West, guided by its old-time anti-Russian ideology, is trying to emasculate the Slavs, first of all Russia, in the course of the conflict in Ukraine, Russia’s ambassador to Belarus, Boris Gryzlov, said in response to a TASS question.

MOSCOW, August 18. /TASS/: Russian President Vladimir Putin has approved the makeup of Russia’s delegation to the 78th session of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA). It will be led by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. The corresponding order was uploaded to the official portal of legal information.

MOSCOW, August 18. /TASS/: Moscow has expanded its stop-list as a retaliatory measure barring 54 UK citizens from entering Russia, the Russian Foreign Ministry said.

The list now includes Lucy Frazer, UK secretary of state for digital, culture, media and sport, "who is promoting Russia’s international sports isolation." Other UK nationals on the list include journalists from the BBC, Guardian Media Group, the Daily Telegraph, as well as Karim Khan, prosecutor with the International Criminal Court (ICC), involved in issuing an arrest warrant for the Russian leadership.

GENEVA, Aug 18 (NNN-AGENCIES) — The World Health Organization and US health authorities said Friday they are closely monitoring a new variant of Covid-19, although the potential impact of BA.2.86 is currently unknown.

The WHO classified the new variant as one under surveillance “due to the large number (more than 30) of spike gene mutations it carries”, it wrote in a bulletin about the pandemic late Thursday.

So far, the variant has only been detected in Israel, Denmark and the United States.

Aug 18 (Reuters) - British police are investigating Myanmar's former ambassador to the United Kingdom for trespassing on a diplomatic residence in London that he has refused to leave since being ousted for opposing Myanmar's 2021 military coup, his lawyer told Reuters.

Kyaw Zwar Minn was locked out of his embassy a few months after the February 2021 coup, and later replaced by the junta's representatives, after calling for the release of Myanmar's civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

Aug 18 (Reuters) - Britain on Friday asked its citizens to be vigilant when travelling to Denmark due to possible attacks, following Koran burnings by anti-Islam activists in Denmark and Sweden that have outraged Muslims.

Britain and the U.S. government have previously warned of possible attacks in neighbouring Sweden, which raised its terrorism alert to the second highest level on Thursday.

LONDON, Aug 18 (Reuters) - Top cryptocurrency bitcoin hit a fresh two-month low on Friday, breaking out of its recent tight range as a wave of risk averse sentiment swept through world markets.

On Thursday, bitcoin fell 7.2% in its biggest one-day drop since November 2022 when top exchange FTX collapsed.

It then slipped to a two-month low of $26,172 during Asian trading hours on Friday, its lowest since June 16 . By 0835 GMT, it had partly recovered to $26,441, down 0.8% on the day.