The World This Week

It's been a week that’s seen mass protests hijacked by violent rioters across France. The looting of shops, trashing of public buildings, the burning of Lyon’s Tourist Information and the iconic Limoges City Hall.  After the riots, came the curfews, and the contemplation, who did what and why weren’t they stopped. Seditious groups, ultra left anarchists and opportunist criminals said President Macron, with a qualified mea culpa: failures in anticipation and authorities dropped the ball in intelligence gathering. Macron is out of breath,  exhausted and disorientated claimed the Presidential Frontrunner Marine Le Pen, the far right leader now polling in an even stronger position for the Presidency. Foreign leaders had a free for all too, President Trump wading in and Israel’s prime minister settled old scores ahead of elections there. But France wasn’t isolated in its protests and unrest, Milan was a mirror image, with demonstrations in Spain, Portugal, Belgium too, An Autumn of Discontent, and more protests to follow this weekend:

It’s been a week of American flattery in the court of Vladimir Putin. St Petersburg’s Constantine Palace was the setting for the toasting of Russia’s President by President Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff, after the release of 74 year old US teacher Stephen Hubbard who’d been held for four years accused by the Kremlin of serving as a mercenary in Ukraine, but widely seen as a pawn of hostage diplomacy. Freshly released, Steve Witkoff told Mr Hubbard that Putin sent his blessings, and then blessed Putin himself calling him a “humanitarian”, just as Russia was launching another mass aerial attack on Kyiv. The hostage deal appeared to be one result of the US lifting sanctions on Russian diesel, and, there was also an apparent commitment by Moscow to renew trilateral peace talks with Kyiv and Washington. Critics allege that the Trump administration has disregarded a just peace over the lure of business deals dangled by the Kremlin, and that Witkoff’s in Wonderland, accused of falling down a rabbit hole of Russian propaganda. 

And it’s been an intense and bitter week of final rallies in Israel ahead of the first election since the October 7th attacks and the global fallout that followed.  Prime ministerial candidates have been described as shouting rather than debating on issues of responsibility for the wars in Gaza, Lebanon, and Iran to the escalating settler violence in the West Bank, now on the verge of lockdown after an attack today. Voters head to the polls with a government increasingly isolated on the world stage. A last minute endorsement came Benjamin Netanyahu’s way from President Trump, who behind the public warmth is said to have harboured deep private frustration with Israel’s longest serving leader, previously calling him quote “a conman, who everyone’s sick of” according to New York Times insiders Maggie Haberman and Johnathan Swann, though this was dismissed by the US President as untrue. And Netanyahu claimed this week successive US presidents before Trump had tried and failed to get him out of office … for the past three decades.

 

Produced by Gavin Lee, Théophile Vareille, Juliette Laffont, Alessandro Xenos. 

Our panel of international correspondents look back at the week's news, from protests in India to a blame game in Ukraine.

In India, the "Cockroach" movement felt the crushing boot of the state this week. Thousands of Gen Z protesters were rounded up and detained in sports stadiums and community halls turned into makeshift detention centres, while the movement's founder, Abhijeet Dipke, was arrested on arrival. A mass demonstration over alleged voter fraud was effectively crushed before it could begin. Dipke has been detained again this Friday. Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government says the measures were necessary to protect civilians in the capital. But he now faces accusations of choosing repression over democracy, with the UN Human Rights Office urging authorities to respect the right to peaceful assembly. 

It's been a week of blame games and accusations of betrayal in Ukraine, with President Volodymyr Zelensky speaking of his personal hurt at US President Donald Trump's decision to make a diesel deal with the Kremlin ahead of the US midterm elections, calling it "weak" and suggesting Trump had chosen "the other side". Trump, meanwhile, made it clear he wants Zelensky replaced, warned him against striking Russian refineries and announced an energy ceasefire that went nowhere. Zelensky continued to search for solidarity and a solution in Europe.

It’s been a week of vigils, protests and political upheaval – from Israel, where three years after the Hamas-led attacks, former hostages and mourners called for accountability over the failures of October 7, as questions grow over the stalled path to peace in Gaza; to France, where mass demonstrations over chronic underfunding and poor conditions have drawn students, unions and hundreds of thousands of protesters into the streets, just months ahead of a presidential election. In Spain, Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has made the housing crisis the centrepiece of a high-stakes electoral gamble, as protests intensify following the death of a pensioner whose eviction helped ignite the movement. And in the UK, questions remain over a suspected Iranian plot targeting US aircraft at RAF Fairford, after American B-1 bombers were hastily withdrawn amid warnings of a serious and immediate threat.

Produced by Gavin Lee, Alessandro Xenos, Théophile Vareille, Guillaume Gougeon and Laura Burloux

This week, student protests at French high schools across the country turned violent as frustrations over learning conditions boiled over, sparking clashes with police. 

But first: in a week that's seen the heroism of the captain, crew and passengers on board FlyDubai flight 1073 heralded, eyewitnesses report seeing the co-pilot trying to kill the pilot and destroying the cockpit controls in order to crash the plane. Despite being stabbed repeatedly, Captain Smit Machchhar managed to open the cockpit door, allowing passengers to overwhelm the suspect and regain control of the aircraft after its rapid descent of more than 14,000 feet in 30 seconds. They prevented a 9/11-style catastrophe, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said.

Read moreNetanyahu warns of 'very heavy price' if any country found to be behind FlyDubai incident

Plus, in the Russian-occupied Ukrainian town of Oleshky, in the Kherson region, there's almost nothing left to eat. Some civilians are reportedly surviving on grass and weeds. The OSCE is calling the situation a humanitarian catastrophe.

Produced by Gavin Lee, Théophile Vareille, Juliette Laffont, Delphine Liou.

It’s been a week of walkouts, power plays and diplomatic theatre – from a battle over press freedom in Washington, to a United Nations General Assembly marked by protests and departures, as leaders clashed over Iran, Cuba and Venezuela. There was also a rare red-carpet meeting between Donald Trump and Xi Jinping, as the US and China extended their trade truce and turned their attention to the race for dominance in artificial intelligence. And from the geopolitical to the spiritual, Pope Leo brought his call for restraint and regulation of AI to France, as he sought to position the Vatican as a moral voice in a rapidly changing world.

Produced by Gavin Lee, Rebecca Gnignati, Alessandro Xenos, Guillaume Gougeon and Laura Burloux

This week, Saudi Arabia has turned to its allies for military support as Iran-backed Houthi rebels tighten their grip on Yemen’s Red Sea coast and the Bab al-Mandab shipping choke point, while drone attacks on the kingdom’s oil infrastructure deepen an emerging energy crisis. In Russia, voters head to the polls for a tightly controlled parliamentary election with little meaningful opposition, as Vladimir Putin insists there will be no new mobilisation. Meanwhile, warnings about the risks of AI are coming from inside the industry itself, with Microsoft’s AI chief Mustafa Suleyman warning against treating AI models like humans – and raising the prospect of a new “silicon species” competing with us for resources. Finally, in Britain, the royal family is back on the defensive as Earl Spencer’s new claims about Princess Diana’s funeral prompt an unusually pointed response from Buckingham Palace.

Produced by Gavin Lee, Théophile Vareille, Alessandro Xenos, Guillaume Gougeon, Farida Soliman and Laura Burloux

In a week that marks 25 years since 9/11, Americans paused to pay tribute. Six bells tolled to signify six fatal moments in New York, at the Pentagon and in Pennsylvania– with a seventh bell rung this year to commemorate those who later died from 9/11-related illnesses.

A private memorial ceremony for families of the victims and dignitaries sparked controversy with a 100,000-signature petition against the attendance of New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani. We ask: who gets the right to remember? We also look at how al Qaeda has fragmented how the group has morphed 25 years later.

Relations between the UK and Israel hit a new low this week. Britain’s new Foreign Secretary, Ed Miliband, accused the Israeli government of turning a blind eye to “settler terrorism” and ethnic cleansing in the occupied West Bank. Alongside France and Canada, the UK announced an import ban on Israeli goods coming from the settlements. Gideon Sa’ar, Israel’s Foreign Minister dismissed the comments as “Outrageous lies, a morally distorted stunt”, while Israeli President Isaac Herzog called them “a grave miscalculation”. Within hours of the announcement, Israel closed the British consulate in East Jerusalem and kicked UK staff out of a security training mission in Ramallah, as well as an aid coordination team for Gaza. We discuss whether the new sanctions can help stop settler expansion, or whether they will boost Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ratings ahead of elections.

This week, there have been many headlines warning of the grave risks of AI from people inside the leading companies, as some researchers have estimated the odds of humanity being wiped out by the computer intelligence within three and a half years. Up to a 10 percent likelihood was the forecast of Evan Hubinger, a senior researcher at Anthropic. He responded to a similarly apocalyptic viral tweet posted by Jacob Coxon, a former OpenAI and Anthropic researcher who resigned this week, accusing his former employers of acting irresponsibly. His thread, which had more than 153 million views, warns that AI could wipe out all humans by the end of the decade, and that the tech giants racing for AI superintelligence supremacy are gambling with our lives in the process.

 

Produced by Gavin Lee, Margot Loizillon, Théo Vareille, Daniel Whittington and Laura Burloux

This week, the Ukrainian capital was hit by Russia's most intense wave of air attacks on Kyiv, reportedly in four years, with Reuters describing air raid sirens, drones, cruise and ballistic missiles exhausting Ukraine’s defence system, with 12 people killed and the Ukrainian foreign minister making a direct appeal to Western allies for more Patriot interceptor missiles.

Ukraine's asymmetric war continues, exposing the vulnerabilities of its refineries and logistics hubs. AP reports more than 43,000 Ukrainian drones have either struck targets or been intercepted over Russia since June.

It's been a week of goodwill and pledges between old frenemies on either side of the Channel. With President Emmanuel Macron in London to mark the beginning of the 10-month loan of the Bayeux Tapestry, political headlines focused on Normandy, with Britain's latest PM Andy Burnham looking for ways to stop the migrant boats. Migration was on the agenda in Birmingham, too, as the leaders of the nationalist right, Nigel Farage and Jordan Bardella, got together and got their share of the headlines — not all of them good for Reform UK — as the new Franglais power couple projected their own alliance.

And it's been a final week of election rallies and TV debates for an unusually consequential contest in Germany: the state election in Saxony-Anhalt, where the Alternative for Germany party, currently ahead in all the polls, could make history. Lead candidate Ulrich Siegmund could become the first far-right leader of a German state since World War II, with Der Spiegel magazine carrying over fears of what came before, labelling Siegmund "Germany's most dangerous man". The former perfume salesman embraced it as a PR gift, taking copies to rallies and signing them for supporters.

Produced by Gavin Lee, Alessandro Xenos, Théo Vareille, Daniel Whittington and Laura Burloux

In this edition, we look at rare wartime demonstrations in Ukraine protesting the ousting of Defence Minister Mykhailo Fedorov. After six months on the job, he has been credited with making a difference both on the battlefield and in an anti-corruption drive. However, he had reportedly clashed with Ukraine’s commander-in-chief, Oleksandr Syrskyi, over how the war should be waged.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he had to choose a side for the sake of unity during a wider government reshuffle. The timing is difficult for Kyiv’s war effort, taking place in the middle of its "40-day influence operation" of relentless strikes on Russian refineries and hitting ships in the Sea of Azov and the Black Sea.

It has also been another week fighting for supremacy in the Strait of Hormuz between Iran and the US. A month has passed since the Memorandum of Understanding was signed, with US President Trump proclaiming, "Ships of the world, start your engines, let the oil flow!" He has since said the deal is over while, paradoxically, saying he’ll let the negotiating teams continue talking. Petrol prices worldwide have spiked again, and we are hearing familiar rhetoric from the belligerents, with Trump again threatening to knock out Iran’s power plants and bridges, and Tehran claiming it will "crush every US interest that’s still intact in the Middle East".

Turning to the UK, both British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and the England team have bowed out, with each receiving similar exit feedback. They weren’t creative, bold or positive enough. Andy Burnham will step in to take Starmer’s job officially next week. We discuss whether he will fare better than his predecessor.

Produced by Gavin Lee, Alessandro Xenos, Théo Vareille, Daniel Whittington and Laura Burloux

It’s been a week of shifting alliances, escalating tensions and political drama. NATO leaders gathered in Turkey for a pivotal summit, where President Trump arrived questioning the alliance’s unity before leaving in a markedly warmer mood, as attention also turned to his relationship with President Zelensky and the future of Western support for Ukraine. In the Middle East, Iran held days of public mourning for its late Supreme Leader, while fresh exchanges with the United States cast further doubt on hopes for a lasting ceasefire. In France, Marine Le Pen’s political fortunes were transformed by a landmark appeal court ruling that revived her presidential ambitions. And on the football pitch, Les Bleus moved a step closer to a third World Cup title as Kylian Mbappé hit back at racist abuse from a Paraguayan senator.

Produced by Gavin Lee, Alessandro Xenos, Rebecca Gnignati, Guillaume Gougeon and Laura Burloux