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WASHINGTON The World Bank on Thursday proposed steps that would boost its lending to developing countries by an

Girl Scout cookies are getting more expensive. In some places, at least.

Elon Musk has cut staff from the X team that combats election disinformation claiming they were actually “undermining election integrity.” The platform, formerly known as Twitter, got rid of half of the global team, including four people at its Dublin office and its head, sources told The Information. Mr Musk later confirmed the move on X, stating: “Oh you mean the ‘Election Integrity’ Team that was undermining election integrity? Yeah, they’re gone.” With the 2024 US presidential election just over a year away, the team may now have only six staff members, most of them in North America, reported The Messenger. The Independent has reached out to the platform for comment on the cuts and received a message back stating, “Busy now, please check back later.” The move comes less than a month after the company announced in a blog post that it was “expanding” its “safety and elections teams to focus on combating manipulation, surfacing inauthentic accounts and closely monitoring the platform for emerging threats.” CEO Linda Yaccarino recently told The Financial Times that the platform was aiming to expand its elections and trust and safety teams. Mr Musk slashed the company’s workforce when he completed his $44bn purchase of the company, which he had repeatedly tried to back out of. In February The New York Times reported that the company had gone from 7,500 employees to fewer than 2,000 following repeated rounds of job cuts. The cuts included many from its trust and safety team, as well as senior executives in that area, such as Yoel Roth and Ella Irwin. Mr Roth, the former head of trust and safety, wrote a guest essay for the newspaper in which he revealed that following online attacks from Mr Musk and Donald Trump he has been forced to live with armed security guards outside his home and had to go into hiding for months. Read More Elon Musk to live stream himself doing ‘silly stuff’ on X Woman claiming to be Elon Musk’s wife arrested for trespassing at SpaceX plant in Texas Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez claps back at Elon Musk for calling her ‘not that smart’ Musk confirms he is cutting election integrity staff from X/Twitter ahead of 2024 Woman claiming to be Elon Musk’s wife arrested at SpaceX site in Texas At US Antarctic base hit by harassment claims, workers are banned from buying alcohol at bars

By Andrea Shalal WASHINGTON The International Monetary Fund's board will consider Morocco's request for additional funding under its

The mother of a black girl not given a medal at a gymnastics event said officials showed "no empathy".

Several people have been killed in two shootings at a university hospital and a nearby home in Rotterdam. Rotterdam police said on X, formerly Twitter, that they were informing next of kin before releasing any more details. A suspect had been arrested after the shootings at the Erasmus Medical Centre and the nearby apartment. Fire also broke out at both locations, local authorities said. Police had said that a man wearing military clothing and carrying a handgun had opened fire in a classroom at the university hospital, wounding one person. They also reported a shooting earlier at the home nearby. Police said they had arrested a 32-year-old man under the hospital’s helipad and that the Rotterdam resident was a suspect in both shootings, though no motive was immediately announced. The force initially said the gunman may have left the scene on a motorbike, but they later said an arrest team was checking the medical centre to establish if he was still in the building. They said they did not believe any other shooters were involved. Videos posted online showed police instructing students, some wearing medical gowns, to run outside as heavily armed arrest teams arrived at the scene. One video showed a man in handcuffs wearing what appeared to be camouflage pants, whilst the Erasmus Medical Centre appealed on social media for people not to attend the hospital. Police were still in search of possible victims or people hiding on Thursday evening, Dutch news agency ANP reported citing police. “This is a very dark day,” caretaker Minister of Justice and Security Dilan YeÅŸilgöz-Zegerius was quoted by newspaper de Telegraaf as saying in comments made in Brussels. More follows... Read More Three killed in shootings and explosion in Sweden as deadly gang feud escalates Shooting incident in Slovak capital leaves 1 dead, 4 injured Teen testifies about boy's death and firearms training at New Mexico compound Florida auto shop owner and angry customer shot each other to death, police say Child soldiers, executions, bombs: Deadly gang violence turns Sweden into a ‘war zone’ Elite army unit storms ship to seize Ireland’s biggest drugs haul Child soldiers, executions, bombs: Deadly gang violence grips Sweden Putin’s forces pushed back as Kyiv ‘gradually gaining ground’ in counteroffensive

An attacker opened fire at a home before storming into a medical centre, Dutch police say.

A desperate Vladimir Putin, increasingly isolated on the world stage, is eyeing a return to the UN Human Rights Council – and he has launched a shameless charm offensive to get him there. Armed with stolen Ukrainian grain, the Russian president is on a mission to curry favour with potential backers ahead of a vote for council membership next month, although his efforts are likely to fall short. Two years after being kicked off the panel for invading its neighbour, Putin has ordered his diplomats to try and secure the backing of enough countries for Moscow to beat two other eastern European nations on 10 October. A Russian position paper circulated to dozens of other countries ahead of the vote strikes a markedly different tone to the nuclear threats and wartime sabre-rattling of Putin’s addresses since he invaded Ukraine, calling for “constructive mutually respectful dialogue” and referring to the 47-member Human Rights Council as “a key body in the United Nations system”. Russia is competing with Albania and Bulgaria to win one of two spots up for grabs on the council that are reserved for central and eastern European nations. Ironically one of the countries being replaced is in fact Ukraine – its and the Czech Republic’s terms are expiring. Moscow is going all out to try and reverse the April 2022 vote that saw it booted, experts tell The Independent. Then, 93 countries voted in favour of suspending Russia, while 24 voted against and 58 abstained. “Russia is apparently offering incentives such as grain and arms in exchange for votes. Along with other moves to deepen relations with Africa, we know that President Putin had already promised African states grain back in July at the Russia-Africa Summit,” says Yousuf Syed Khan, a senior lawyer at international human rights firm Global Rights Compliance. “At the same time, Russia is engaged in the systematic pillage of Ukraine’s grain, having rebuilt infrastructure to harness the ability to export millions of tonnes from occupied Ukrainian territory into Russia. This is not a coincidence,” the war crimes lawyer adds. Russia has been accused of weaponising global food security in its war against Ukraine, targeting key Ukrainian infrastructure with missile strikes while at the same time pulling out of a UN-brokered deal that had allowed Kyiv to keep exporting grain to other parts of the world where rising food prices are pushing more people into poverty. “The bottom line is that Russia is in no better standing to join the Human Rights Council now than it was nearly 18 months ago when it was voted off. In many ways, its bid to re-join and the outcome of the vote will be a barometer of Russia’s international standing,” Khan says. Alongside what it can offer in terms of trade, Khan says Russia will likely try to convince smaller countries that they do not want to be “instrumentalised to serve the political wills of Western nations”. “This logic may speak to some of the African States that Russia will desperately need to vote in its favour,” he tells The Independent. This tallies with the language in the position paper Russian diplomats have already distributed. The paper says Moscow “believes it is important to prevent the increasing trend of turning the Human Rights Council into the instrument, which serves political wills of one group of countries punishing non-loyal governments for their independent internal and external policy,” reported CNN. Alfred de Zayas, a former independent UN expert on human rights, says he believes the odds are stacked against Russia rejoining the council, despite the concerns voiced in recent days by Western officials. “At present, there are five eastern European states represented in the council – Czechia [the Czech Republic], Georgia, Lithuania, Montenegro and Ukraine. The terms of Czechia and Ukraine expire in December 2023. There are two openings but three candidates – Albania, Russia and Bulgaria,” he tells The Independent. De Zayas says that there was little in Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov’s recent comments at the UN General Assembly in New York to suggest a rapprochement with “the collective West” is any nearer. But at the same time, he argues that including Russia on multilateral platforms like the Human Rights Council is exactly what is needed to work towards peace talks to end the Ukraine war. “Maximum inclusiveness, bringing in as many countries as possible would be desirable, so that meaningful exchanges of ideas and perspectives could be conducted. Excluding Russia is counterproductive because it closes an important avenue of compromise and quid pro quo,” says De Zayas. “Precisely because there is a war going on, it is crucial to take advantage of every forum of dialogue,” he suggests. For Khan, however, Russia’s ongoing abuses in Ukraine are likely to see Putin’s charm offensive fall short. “Since the initial days of its full-scale invasion in February last year, Russia has been engaged in starvation as a method of warfare across Ukraine,” he says, recounting Moscow’s significant human rights violations during the conflict. “Unlawful conduct includes the laying of sieges to areas such as Chernihiv and Mariupol while denying access to even the most basic items required for civilian survival such as food, medicine and potable water. “More recently, we have seen Russia attacking grain ports along the Danube, forcing Ukraine to pivot to the Sulina Channel with its exports and to work with Romania, to elicit sanctions relief for Moscow. Russia also destroyed at least 270,000 tonnes of grain in late July and early August alone. None of this is being done with any valid military objective.” The latest report by Mariana Katzarova, the UN’s special rapporteur on Russia’s rights situation within its own borders, noted that rights have been on a “steady decline” over the last two decades but things have “significantly deteriorated since its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022”. Mass arbitrary arrests, detentions and harassment were recorded for “anyone speaking out against Russia’s war on Ukraine or daring to criticise the government’s actions,” the report found. The UN’s website says that “with membership on the [Human Rights] Council comes a responsibility to uphold high human rights standards”. “One would hope that all nations vote in line with the HRC membership criteria,” says Khan, who has worked with the UN for a decade on atrocity inquiries, adding that on this point Russia is falling far short. Read More Ukraine-Russia war - live: ‘Nuclear crisis’ warning over Putin-controlled power plant on the frontline Russia tries to rejoin UN Human Rights Council Russia ‘weaponised food and deliberately caused starvation’ in Ukraine Ukraine repels Russian attacks as Putin’s forces try to recapture territory lost in counteroffensive

Carlo Ancelotti has revealed he is 'worried' about Real Madrid's showing their 2-0 win over Las Palmas on Wednesday evening.

Inflation in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia fell to 4.2% on the year in September from 5.9%

Ukraine says its air defences shot down 34 kamikaze drones this morning and overnight as Russia launched a major new wave of air strikes across the country. Russia’s attacks involved at least 44 Iranian-made Shahed drones in total, according to Ukraine’s Air Force. “Fighter aircraft, anti-aircraft missile units and mobile fire groups were engaged to repel the attack,” Ukraine’s military said on Telegram. A large number of the drones were fired on southern Ukrainian cities from the Black Sea, the air force said. It comes as Kyiv said hundreds of fighters from the Wagner mercenary group have returned to Ukraine to fight in Russia’s continuing invasion for the first time since the group’s leader Yevgeny Prigozhin died in August. The Ukrainian military said it had seen “no significant impact” on frontline dynamics from Wagner’s return to the battlefield, however. Earlier, there were reports that a fresh offensive by Russia’s forces in the coming weeks is “unlikely”, according to British intelligence. Britain’s Ministry of Defence reported that patterns in Russian deployments suggest that Vladimir Putin’s troops are “overstretched” across the frontlines in Ukraine. Read More Viktor Sokolov seen for second time in newly emerged video as he claims Russia’s Black Sea Fleet ‘performing successfully’ New video of ‘dead’ Russian Black Sea fleet commander raises doubts over Ukraine’s claim Hillary Clinton mocks Putin over Nato expansion: ‘Too bad, Vladimir. You brought it on yourself’ Ukrainian forces ‘enjoy success’ near Bakhmut as Putin deploys reserves

Several hundred fighters of the Wagner mercenary group have returned to Ukraine to fight in Russia’s continuing invasion but have not made a significant impact on the battlefield, military officials in Kyiv said. "We have recorded the presence of a maximum of several hundred fighters of the former Wagner PMC (private military company)," spokesperson for the eastern military command Serhiy Cherevatyi said. These Wagner fighters were scattered in different places, were not part of a single unit, and had had no significant impact, he said. "They do not constitute any integral, systematic, organised force," the spokesperson said. "As they say – game over. These are pathetic remnants, nothing good awaits them here." The Independent has not verified the reports on Wagner’s return on the battlefield. If confirmed, this will mark the first ever comeback of Wagner in Ukraine after the death of its supreme leader Yevgeny Prigozhin in August. Russia’s Investigative Committee says it has confirmed Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin was killed in a plane crash. On 23 August, Prigozhin’s private jet came down north-west of Moscow, killing all those on board. Video footage showed debris falling from the sky above Kuzhenkino in Russia, with pictures emerging of the wreckage. His right-hand man Dmitry Utkin was also on board the Embraer Legacy 600 jet, as well as five other passengers and three crew members. Russian military bloggers have reported that some Wagner fighters have been returning to Ukraine. The officials in Kyiv condemned the group on Wednesday once again and denied its existence. Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak said the group – comprising majorly of prison convicts – no longer existed. "Today, there are only former militants of the terrorist group who have scattered in all directions," he wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter. He said some had gone to Africa, some were dispersed through Russia, and some had contracts with the Russian Defence Ministry and were fighting in the Bakhmut sector. Reports of their return were intended to drown out news of Ukraine‘s recapture of two villages near Bakhmut, the official said. The mercenaries, responsible for carrying out Russia’s dirty work in Africa, also played a crucial role in Russia’s continuing invasion of Ukraine and handed Vladimir Putin one of Moscow’s biggest territorial feats by capturing the eastern city of Bakhmut in May. It came after one of the longest and fiercest battles of Moscow’s 19-month war in Ukraine. But after complaints of ammunition starvation, Wagner chief Prigozhin announced he and his fighters will leave Bakhmut after the battle. Some of them went to Belarus under a deal that ended a brief mutiny by Wagner in June, during which it took control of a Russian military headquarters and marched on Moscow. After Prigozhin’s death, the Kremlin has sought to bring the group under tighter state control. Read More Ukraine repels Russian attacks as Putin’s forces try to recapture territory lost in counteroffensive Ukraine-Russia war – live: Fresh offensive by Putin’s troops ‘unlikely’ as frontline ‘over-stretched’ A month after Prigozhin’s suspicious death, the Kremlin is silent on his plane crash and legacy Inside Ukrainian brigade’s battle ‘through hell’ to reclaim village from Putin’s troops on way to Bakhmut UK officially bans Russia’s Wagner paramilitary group as terrorist organisation