Vossische Zeitung - News from Berlin, Brandenburg, Europe and the whole world

The largest Western bank still operating in Russia was on Thursday ordered to pay nearly $400 million in compensation for losses incurred by Russian company Rasperia due to European sanctions.

US President Donald Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff will hold talks with senior officials from Qatar, Egypt and Turkey in Miami on Friday on the next phase of the Gaza ceasefire deal, a White House official told AFP.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said Thursday he was willing to mediate between the United States and Venezuela to "avoid armed conflict."

Protesters lit fires and hurled potatoes at riot police who responded with teargas and water cannon in Brussels Thursday, as tensions boiled over at a farmer demonstration against the EU's planned trade deal with South American bloc Mercosur.

The United States on Thursday imposed sanctions on two more judges of the International Criminal Court after they rejected a challenge by Israel which sought to end a war crimes probe in Gaza.

Washington on Thursday accused South Africa of harassing US government employees working with Afrikaners, the white minority to whom President Donald Trump is granting refugee status, in the latest escalation of tensions.

The European Central Bank held interest rates steady Thursday for its fourth meeting in a row but was tight-lipped on the future rate path as it stressed lingering geopolitical uncertainty.

Trump Media & Technology Group, the struggling company that owns the US president's Truth Social platform, announced Thursday a $6 billion merger with fusion power company TAE Technologies, in an unexpected pivot into energy technology.

Equity markets climbed on Thursday as investors welcomed cool US inflation data and tech stocks bounced.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told EU leaders Thursday they had the "moral" and legal right to use frozen Russian assets to fund Kyiv -- as pressure grew on key player Belgium to drop its opposition at a summit showdown.

Pope Leo XIV has accepted the resignation of New York's conservative Archbishop Timothy Dolan and named a little-known, pro-migrant bishop from his native Chicago to replace him, the Vatican said Thursday.

Marco Odermatt secured his 50th World Cup win when he took a fog-hit men's downhill at Val Gardena on Thursday.

French lawmakers on Thursday unanimously approved a bill exonerating women punished for abortion before it was legalised in 1975, a moved praised by feminist groups as a stand for reproductive rights.

UK teachers will be trained to tackle misogyny in the classroom under a new strategy aimed at halving violence against women and girls over the next decade, a minister told parliament Thursday.

A renowned Kabul cinema that for decades attracted the city's film fans is being demolished to make way for a shopping mall, AFP journalists saw Thursday.

US consumer inflation slowed unexpectedly in November, delayed government data showed Thursday, although levels remained higher than earlier in the year before President Donald Trump's tariffs flowed through the economy.

The European Court of Justice on Thursday said it was up to Denmark's courts to decide whether a Danish law requiring authorities to redevelop poor urban "ghettos" with high concentrations of "non-Western immigrants and their descendants" was discriminatory.

The European Central Bank held interest rates steady Thursday for its fourth meeting in a row and raised growth forecasts for this year and next.

Pope Leo XIV has accepted the resignation of influential New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan, a leading figure of the US church's conservative wing, the Vatican said Thursday.

The Bank of England cut its key interest rate to 3.75 percent on Thursday after UK inflation eased faster than expected and as the economy weakens.

Women swaying to dance music at a DJ set, strolling without headscarves through cutting-edge art exhibitions and in coffee shops showing off trendy styles that could have come from the streets of Europe.

Spain's defence ministry has ordered 100 helicopters from Airbus destined for deployment in various parts of its armed forces, the European aeronautics company said Thursday.

The US military said Wednesday it had killed four suspected drug traffickers in a new strike in the Pacific Ocean, as part of a controversial campaign that has left close to 100 dead since September.

Thailand on Thursday bombed a building in a Cambodian casino town and major crossing between the two nations, as foreign powers pressured them to halt reignited border clashes.

Bangladesh police on Thursday stopped protesters from marching towards an Indian diplomatic mission, a day after India's foreign ministry conveyed its concerns over the "deteriorating" security environment in the country.

Europe's main stock markets rose Thursday ahead of interest-rate decisions from the Bank of England and European Central Bank.

Hundreds of tractors converged on Brussels on Thursday in a show of farmers' anger at the EU's planned trade deal with South American bloc Mercosur -- whose fate hung in the balance as summit talks opened in the Belgian capital.

Sweden's top prosecutor on Thursday said there was not enough evidence against a man the authorites had named as the chief suspect in the 1986 killing of prime minister Olof Palme.

Members of ousted Nepali prime minister KP Sharma Oli's political party voted for him to retain leadership of the organisation on Thursday, meaning he will oversee its preparations for national elections next year.

Australia's prime minister vowed Thursday to stamp out extremism as the nation mourned the youngest victim of the Bondi Beach shooting, a 10-year-old girl remembered as "our little ray of sunshine".

British energy giant BP, which this year shelved targets on reducing carbon emissions, has appointed industry veteran Meg O'Neill to be chief executive from April, replacing Murray Auchincloss who stepped down Thursday.

Peter Arnett, the Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter who became one of the world's foremost combat correspondents, died Wednesday at 91, according to US media reports.