RUSSIA: The Defence Ministry claimed today that Moscow’s forces had captured the mining town of Toretsk in their latest breakthrough in eastern Ukraine’s Donetsk region, where Ukrainian defences are collapsing.

Ukrainian officials did not immediately comment on the Russian claim.

GREECE: Several thousand high school and university students blocked traffic in central Athens today during an anti-government protest against delays to an investigation into a 2023 rail disaster that claimed 57 lives.

Protesters marched through the city centre, chanting: “Murderers, murderers!” as hundreds of police officers, many in riot gear, stood by.

The fatal head-on collision occurred near Tempe, in northern Greece, when a passenger train was incorrectly routed onto the same track as an oncoming freight train.

INDONESIA: Authorities have ordered the halting of a tourism project linked to US President Donald Trump over water management and environmental issues, officials said today.

The 11.6-square-mile project is the brainchild of Mr Trump’s Indonesian business partner, billionaire and politician Hary Tanoesoedibjo, who attended his inauguration in Washington last month.

PANAMA: President Jose Raul Mulino has accused the United States of spreading “lies and falsehoods” after the US State Department said a deal had been reached to allow US vessels to pass through the Panama Canal free charge.

Mr Mulino said on Thursday that he had told US Secretary of Defence Pete Hegseth the day before that he could neither set the the canal’s transit fees nor exempt anyone from them and that he was surprised by a US State Department statement suggesting otherwise.