Europe

BERLIN, Aug 11 (Reuters) - Germany will own NATO's second largest helicopter fleet with the 60 Chinooks it announced it was buying last month, German Air Force Chief Ingo Gerhartz was quoted as saying on Friday.

Last month, Reuters reported Germany would buy 60 Chinook helicopters from Boeing (BA.N) in a package that will cost up to 8 billion euros ($8.7 billion), including necessary infrastructure for the aircraft.

"We will be the second largest helicopter nation in NATO after the U.S.," Gerhartz was quoted as saying by RND media network.

ROME, Aug 11 (Reuters) - Tesla boss Elon Musk said on Friday his planned cage fight with billionaire rival Mark Zuckerberg would be held at an "epic location" with an ancient Roman theme, as Italy indicated it was ready to stage the scrap.

Italy's Culture Minister Gennaro Sangiuliano said in a statement that he had spoken to Musk about hosting a "large charitable and historically evocative event".

He did not specify what the event would be, or when it might be held, saying only that it would not take place in Rome.

KYIV, Aug 11 (Reuters) - President Volodymyr Zelenskiy broadened his battle against graft on Friday, firing all the heads of Ukraine's regional army recruitment centres as the war with Russia enters a critical stage.

Zelenskiy said a state investigation into centres across Ukraine had exposed abuses by officials ranging from illegal enrichment to transporting draft-eligible men across the border despite a wartime ban on them leaving the country.

MOSCOW, Aug. 11 (Xinhua) -- Russia's air defense system has downed a drone that attempted to fly over Moscow, the Russian Defense Ministry said Friday.

"This afternoon, an attempt by the Kiev regime to carry out a terrorist attack with an unmanned aerial vehicle on a facility in Moscow was thwarted," the ministry said in a statement.

The unmanned aerial vehicle was downed by means of electronic equipment and crashed in a forest area in the west of the capital without casualties and damage on the ground, according to the ministry.

LONDON (AP) — Britain’s plan to house asylum seekers on a barge moored off the south coast of England ran into another hurdle on Friday as authorities were forced to evacuate the first residents after legionella bacteria was found in the water system.

The move came just days after the first men were moved onto the Bibby Stockholm, a floating hostel that can accommodate up to 500 people, as part of a government effort to cut the cost of sheltering the growing number of people applying for asylum in Britain.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russia fired missiles at western Ukraine that killed an 8-year-old boy, local officials said, and drones that Russian officials blamed on the Ukrainian military targeted Moscow for a third straight day but reportedly didn’t cause significant damage.

Also Friday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced the firing of all the heads of regional conscription centers, part of his crackdown on corruption since the outbreak of Russia’s war in Ukraine more than 17 months ago.

COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) — Authorities were on standby to evacuate more people in southeastern Norway Friday, where huge amounts of water, littered with broken trees, debris and trash, were thundering down the usually serene rivers after days of torrential rain.

The level of water in swollen rivers and lakes continued to grow despite two days of dry but overcast weather, with houses abandoned in flooded areas, floating hay bales wrapped in white plastic, cars coated in mud and camping sites swamped.

ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Nearly two months after a dilapidated fishing trawler crammed with people heading from Libya to Italy sank in the central Mediterranean, killing hundreds, relatives are still frantically searching for their loved ones among the missing and the dead.

Many questions remain about Greek authorities’ response and exactly how and why the boat, carrying an estimated 500-750 people mostly from Pakistan, Syria and Egypt, capsized and sank in the early hours of June 14 in what became one of the deadliest migrant shipwrecks in the Mediterranean.

TALLINN, Estonia (AP) — A rocket carrying a lunar landing craft blasted off Friday on Russia’s first moon mission in nearly 50 years, racing to land on Earth’s satellite ahead of an Indian spacecraft.

The launch from Russia’s Vostochny spaceport in the Far East of the Luna-25 craft to the moon is Russia’s first since 1976 when it was part of the Soviet Union.

11 August 2023; AA: Thousands of junior doctors across England staged a walkout on Friday as part of their four-day strike due to an ongoing dispute over pay and working conditions.

Members of the British Medical Association (BMA) in England are staging a fifth round of strikes, walking out for a full 96 hours from 7:00 a.m. (0600GMT) on Friday until Tuesday morning.

The BMA members are also expected to hold a demonstration in central London later on Friday.