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Al Jazeera – Breaking News, World News and Video from Al Jazeera
Breaking News, World News and Video from Al Jazeera
Bulgarian Prime Minister Rumen Radev says drones have hit two commercial vessels, sinking one ship and wounding several people, in what he denounced as an “absolutely unacceptable” attack.
Speaking to reporters on Tuesday, Radev said the ships were attacked by sea drones and aerial drones at about 3am (00:00 GMT), about 70 nautical miles (130km) off Bulgaria’s coast, amid a rise in attacks on Black Sea shipping due to expanding drone attacks related to the Russia-Ukraine war.
“This is an unacceptable attack in Bulgaria’s exclusive economic zone. It is a blatant violation of international law and maritime law,” Radev said.
The Togo-flagged Alfa Watan suffered critical structural damage and sank at the scene. There was no immediate word on the crew’s fate, he said, as Bulgarian authorities launched a major search for the missing crew. Radev did not specify how many people were missing.
The second vessel, the Palau-flagged Able, caught fire after the attack. A Bulgarian ferry and a naval fast boat evacuated all 18 crew members. Two sailors suffered serious injuries and were flown to a hospital in the port city of Varna, Radev said.
The Able was reportedly carrying wheat and sailing south, while the Alfa Watan was heading north. The Alfa Watan’s cargo was unknown, Radev said, adding that authorities were monitoring for possible oil spills and other signs of environmental pollution.
The origin of the drones was not immediately established, but the dual strike came a day after another ship caught fire and sank off the Romanian coast, killing one and leaving one missing, in what Ukraine said was a drone attack launched by Russia.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy described that attack as “a horrific strike by two Russian drones on a civilian vessel” in neutral waters.
“What is happening is seriously disrupting shipping in the Black Sea, driving up insurance costs even further and making shipping extremely difficult,” Radev said after an emergency meeting on Tuesday.
Black Sea shipping has been heavily affected by the Russia-Ukraine war in recent months, and Radev warned that the war was expanding geographically and increasing the risk of global conflict.
Hungarian Prime Minister Peter Magyar said Budapest “stands in full solidarity with Bulgaria” after the attack on the two ships.



London, United Kingdom – The deadline Israel imposed on the United Kingdom to close its East Jerusalem consulate is fast approaching.
Thursday marks 30 days since Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar’s order, a retaliatory move against the UK’s wave of sanctions targeting illegal Israeli settlements.
“It’s not the act of a friend or ally,” Sir Vincent Fean, former British consul general to Jerusalem, told Al Jazeera. “The British Consulate General has every right to be in Jerusalem, in East Jerusalem, part of the state of Palestine.”
From 2010 until 2014, Fean held the post as the de facto ambassador to occupied Palestinian territory. He is now a trustee of the Britain Palestine Project, advocating for equal rights for Palestinians and Israelis.
“In international law, for [the UK], and for the vast majority of the world, Israel does not have the right to interfere with the diplomatic relations between the state of Palestine and the state of the United Kingdom. It is doing so by closing our office, and that is unlawful,” he said, adding that he is “particularly concerned” for the consulate’s 15 or so Palestinian staff.
UK-Israel ties have reached a nadir. On Monday, reports claimed that the UK could expel 27 Israeli diplomats if the consulate closure goes ahead.
British National Security Adviser Jonathan Powell has reportedly held talks with Israeli officials in a visit that was not disclosed by the UK government, but an agreement to keep the consulate open was not reached.
Israel’s response was furious following the UK’s import ban on goods from illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank, as well as an overall change of tone. Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband has, for instance, lamented Israel’s “ethnic cleansing” against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank.
Miliband expected Israel to retaliate, but said the UK had “weighed the costs and benefits of acting”.
In addition to the consulate closure order, Israel expelled the UK from the Washington-led coordination centre for post-war Gaza and barred 11 lawmakers from entering Israel, including former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana.
“It is illegal and unlawful for Israel to act in this way,” Fean told Al Jazeera. “There’s been a reset in UK foreign policy since [Prime Minister Andy] Burnham and Miliband came in.”
Israel’s hostile actions towards the UK “will not be forgiven or forgotten anytime soon”, he added.
In a brief by the Britain Palestine Project that was endorsed by former UK Attorney General Dominic Grieve KC and shared with Al Jazeera, the threatened closure is described as “an unlawful assertion of sovereignty over occupied Palestinian territory”.
“The Israeli announcement usurps the rights of the State of Palestine,” it reads.
Resolution 478 was adopted by the United Nations Security Council – of which the UK is a permanent member – in 1980, resolving that Israel’s attempts to alter the status of Jerusalem are “null and void”.
In 2016, Resolution 2334 reiterated this, “condemning all measures aimed at altering the demographic composition, character and status of the Palestinian Territory occupied since 1967, including East Jerusalem”.
The UK formally recognised the State of Palestine in September of 2025.
If the UK resists Israel’s orders, there are various logistical challenges Israel could feasibly impose on the consulate and the diplomats within it.
“The practicality is that the Consulate General depends on Israeli electricity [and] water. So there are means by which Israel could force the expulsion, the closure, of the Consulate General,” Fean told Al Jazeera. “I don’t know what’s going to happen, but this Israeli government has broken many laws,” he said when asked if Israel may use electricity or water cut-offs as a means to expel British diplomats.
While reiterating that the UK’s East Jerusalem consulate should remain open despite orders, Fean said that “if that proves to be made impossible by force of the Israeli government, then there are alternatives.”
Foreign embassies in Ramallah could be an alternate route to manage consulate affairs, he said.
The consulate acts as the channel of communications between the UK and the Palestinian government and manages consular affairs for British nationals in the region, including pilgrims to the West Bank.
“Yet again, Israel is taking it out on the Palestinians for something that somebody else has done,” said Fean. “The impunity of Israel needs to be challenged. The fact that this Israeli government seems to see itself as above the law needs to be challenged.”
Human rights advocates have urged the UK to resist Israel’s orders.
“Such a retaliatory step from Israel suggests that any further measures taken by the UK could trigger further responses,” said Zena Agha, deputy director of the British Palestinian Committee. “But that should not deter the UK from meeting its obligations under international law – nor pursuing measures towards accountability for Israel’s genocide and occupation.”
Shamiul Joarder, director of Friends of al-Aqsa, reiterated the illegality of Israel’s actions and told Al Jazeera, “If Britain accepts this order, it risks allowing Israel to dictate the terms of Britain’s diplomatic presence in occupied East Jerusalem. That would set a deeply concerning precedent.”
The Foreign, Commonwealth, and Development Office (FCDO) did not respond to Al Jazeera’s request for comment on Israel’s orders to close the British Consulate, nor on the UK’s intended response.
The Iranian government seeking to reduce the severe financial pressure on its populace from the United States’s siege and sanctions on the country.
President Masoud Pezeshkian recently discussed measures with several cabinet members to ameliorate the economic effects of the US-Israeli war on Iran, including the depreciation of the Iranian lira and the cost-of-living crisis.
“The enemy’s plan in recent months has been to cut off the country’s vital arteries with the aim of pressuring the noble people of Iran,” Pezeshkian said on social media,
Though full details of the government response are not known, the scope of the meeting and Pezeshkian’s subsequent comments give some insights into these policies.
Here’s what we know.
Iran’s economic situation has deteriorated sharply since the war started on February 28, with US and Israeli strikes killing top Iranian political and military figures.
US-Israeli bombing since then has inflicted an estimated $270bn in damages on the country.
The situation worsened further after the US launched Operation Economic Outcast in late August, seeking to totally isolate the country from international trade.
Iran’s gross domestic product (GDP) has contracted by 10 percent with the collapse in energy exports due to the US naval blockade. The Iranian rial has in turn sunk to record lows.
Iran has made the lifting of the blockade a key demand in negotiations with the US about reopening of the Strait of Hormuz.



Maryam Ashrafi from the Bourse and Bazaar Foundation, a London-based think tank, told Al Jazeera that the economic situation has deteriorated for Iranian consumers, particularly in higher food prices.
In turn, Iranians are “increasingly turn[ing] to cheaper, inferior goods”. Shortages of raw materials used in the production of some staples, such as margarine, have also affected prices.
Imports of wheat and grains have also declined due to the US naval blockade on Iran’s southern ports.
“Large bulk carriers serving … [these] can carry upwards of 80,000 tonnes of agricultural commodities,” she told al Jazeera.
Some ships using the alternative route of the Caspian Sea ports, which are not under the embargo, have loads of only 7,200 tonnes, she said. Trucks using land routes are limited to about 20 tonnes per vehicle.



Increases in the price of packaging has also left businesses facing supply chain disruptions.
Insurance costs have also increased, even as war-related losses are generally not covered by insurers.
While medicines are not sanctioned, the raw materials used by Iran’s pharmaceutical industry are “increasingly difficult and expensive” to find, she said.
The disruptions to air travel caused by US sanctions on Iranian airlines have added to fears of medicine shortages in the country.
At Saturday’s meeting, Iran’s Plan and Budget Organisation presented a seven-point package to deal with the crisis, but the details have not been revealed.
Iran’s semi-official news agency Tasnim reported that the proposal aimed to “help the country overcome the challenges ahead in a more orderly and less costly manner”.
Pezeshkian responded to the meeting the following day by ordering the formation of a committee to coordinate the new economic arrangement.
The committee includes the central bank governor Abdolnaser Hemmati, Interior Minister Eskandar Momeni and the conservative mayor of Tehran Alireza Zakani.
The goal of the committee is to help stabilise prices across the country, state broadcaster IRNA reported.
Pezeshkian told MPs on Monday that economic policy should be focused on helping the most vulnerable groups in the country, including female-led households. He said energy efficiency would be one of the main ways of tackling the country’s current woes.
“We are working to ensure that under no circumstances are electricity and energy supplies to producers and businesses cut off,” he said.
He called for the implementation of “car-free Tuesdays”, during which people would avoid using their vehicles to conserve energy.
Despite being a major oil and gas producer, Iran has suffered from shortages of petrol and experienced power cuts since the start of the war.
Pezeshkian also urged state employees to adopt the car-free days to encourage wider engagement.
Saeed Laylaz, an economist who previously advised the Iranian government, said that Pezeshkian should have acted sooner.
When there were signs that war was imminent, the government should have prepared for a reduction in resources and disruptions to imports and exports, he said.
While Pezeshkian’s response was delayed, Laylaz believes that tackling the price of basic commodities – the target of the new measures – would be beneficial for the country.
“That said … we have enough basic commodities in stock, and even if the embargo continues, we will not face a problem in securing them, because we have suitable routes, sufficient resources, and trading partners who can help us,” he added.
Saudi Arabia’s energy minister has said that oil pumped through the key East-West Pipeline reached a capacity of 5.8 million barrels ⁠a day (bpd).
Prince Abdulaziz bin ⁠Salman made the comments during a panel discussion at the GCC 2026 Forum in Bahrain’s capital, Manama, on Tuesday.
“Not everyone knows that within five or six days, we began using the pipeline again after the major attack that struck it,” he said according to Saudi media, referring to drone strikes blamed on Iraqi militia last month. “And, thank God, as of this morning we’re back up to 5.8 million barrels,” added Prince Abdulaziz.
The 1,200km (750-mile) pipeline links Saudi Arabia’s major oil-producing fields in the east with the Red Sea port of Yanbu, allowing the kingdom to bypass the Strait of Hormuz, which has largely been closed since the outbreak of the US-Israel war on Iran in late February.
The Saudi Ministry of Energy had said at the time of the attack in early September that pipeline had been temporarily shut as a “precaution”. Specialised teams had begun steps to “secure the pipeline and assess its safety”, according to the ministry.
The East-West pipeline, which is also known as the Petroline, was built in 1981.
It has a maximum capacity of 7 million bpd, although actual flows have been lower in recent months – about 2 million bpd in August, according to commodities data and analytics firm Kpler – the lowest monthly level since January, as attacks by Yemen’s Houthi group made the Red Sea route difficult to use.
Since the US-Israeli war on Iran disrupted ⁠oil flows from Saudi Arabia ⁠and its Gulf neighbours through the Strait of Hormuz, Saudi Arabia has been using the pipeline to reroute ‌some 4 million bpd, equivalent to about 4 percent of global supply, to ‌Yanbu.
Protests have continued across France for a third week as tens of thousands of school pupils and trade unionists have taken to the streets across many cities.
Students initially began boycotting classes in deprived areas of Paris on September 21 over teacher shortages and poor conditions, but protests have quickly morphed into a nationwide movement, with some of the largest demonstrations taking place on Tuesday.
School blockades have turned violent, with protesters accused of hurling items at police and officers allegedly responding forcefully using batons, tear gas and rubber bullets. In one case, a teenager lost his hand in a grenade explosion.
The mass demonstrations, which also coincided with a public sector strike over government budget plans last week, have presented another challenge for President Emmanuel Macron’s cash-strapped government ahead of next year’s elections, amid an ongoing fiscal crisis as government debt has rocketed in recent years.
Here’s what we know:
Students have been protesting over what they say are poor conditions in France’s high schools – or lycees – especially in poorer areas. Protests have been held in Strasbourg, Bordeaux, Nantes, Marseille, Lyon and other towns and cities.
Students say absent teachers are not replaced, dilapidated school buildings are sometimes rodent-infested, there are inadequate tables and chairs, large class sizes and long classroom hours.
The intense heatwave which hit France in the summer exacerbated existing problems in neglected school buildings, which also suffer from a lack of air conditioning, school pupils say.
The protests have coincided with ongoing nationwide public sector strikes over a proposed 2027 cost-cutting budget that aims to achieve 54 billion euros ($61.3bn) in savings as Macron’s government races to bring a large public deficit under control.
Public sector staff and unions object in particular to a government plan to freeze salaries to save about two billion euros ($2.27bn).
Parents are also increasingly present at protests amid widespread anger about the police response to demonstrating minors.
But the protests are happening amid wider discontent over soaring fuel and commodity prices and reduced public spending under Macron.
Government officials have meanwhile accused political opposition groups and unionists of taking advantage of the student movement. Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu accused political opponents last week of encouraging escalation.



At least 6,100 people had been arrested by early Tuesday, many of them under the age of 18, as police tactics come under intense scrutiny.
Serious injuries have also been reported.
A 15-year-old lost a hand in the northern city of Lens on Monday after he reportedly came into contact with a police stun grenade, which then exploded. Public prosecutors say investigations are ongoing into whether the youth actively picked up the grenade or if it landed on him.
Overall, at least 190 high school students have been injured, Education Minister Edouard Geffray said on Monday. On Sunday, he said 78 teaching staff had been injured, and 24 schools had been burned or ransacked.
Some 715 police officers have been injured, according to Interior Minister Laurent Nunez on Tuesday.
Officials said as many as 589 schools have been disrupted this week, down from 735 on Friday last week.
Rights groups, including Amnesty International, have criticised the use of force against minors amid media reports of students being hit with batons and rubber bullets, as well as sprayed with tear gas.



Protesters again blockaded schools on Tuesday as thousands demonstrated over their demands.
Placard-waving crowds were reported in southern Marseille, eastern Strasbourg and other major cities.
In Paris’s 20th district, protesters outside the shut Helene Boucher lycee tipped over rubbish bins and bicycles and created a makeshift barricade, The Associated Press news agency reported. Parents, meanwhile, positioned themselves between the demonstrators and police to protect their children.
“They are our children. Teachers, parents, federations, we all share the same goal: the protection of children’s rights, and it is a legitimate right to demonstrate and to make demands,” said Emilia Sichili Suriam, one member of a parents’ association.
Interior Minister Nunez rejected criticism of the police on Tuesday, saying the response has been proportionate in “almost all cases”. He claimed that the protests were transforming into “riots”.



These are only the latest in a series of high-profile protests that have marked Macron’s presidency and undermined his government’s reform efforts ahead of elections in April and May.
Macron will not run in next year’s elections, but his image and that of his government have no doubt been tainted by photos of police chasing students in the streets, France expert Jacob Ross, from the German Council on Foreign Relations (DGAP), told Al Jazeera.
“He is not taken seriously any more because many think of him as already out of government,” Ross said of Macron. “But this is still very significant for his government because it has become clear that they don’t have the capacity to calm things down. There’s clearly little fiscal room to manoeuvre.”
Macron’s terms have long been beset by political and financial instability. Successive prime ministers have faced difficulties in pushing through policies in the highly polarised National Assembly where Macron’s centrist Renaissance party and allied blocs lack a majority.
Critics have taken aim at Macron’s deeply unpopular austerity measures, which have seen drastically reduced government spending taking a toll on pensions and healthcare. Officials, however, have defended these policies amid rising debt following COVID-19-era spending.
On Sunday, Lecornu said the government had kickstarted initiatives to address the protesters’ demands and that a report was expected by the end of the month. He, however, added that Paris would not “yield an inch” to violence.
Meanwhile, frontrunner and opposition leader Marine Le Pen of the far-right National Rally party submitted a shadow budget on Tuesday promising 140 billion euros ($157.6bn) in cost savings by 2032 if elected next year.



Oil exports from the Gulf have resumed significantly in recent days, despite a surge in attacks on ships around the Strait of Hormuz, maritime experts and trackers say.
Gulf oil flows, excluding Iran, recovered to more than 81 percent of pre-war levels in September, while crude exports from the wider Middle East exceeded pre-war levels on 14 days during the month, maritime intelligence firm Kpler reported.
However, the recovery has come as attacks on tankers increase and shipping companies face higher freight, insurance and security costs.
On Tuesday, 12 crew members on a Panama-flagged tanker were injured in an attack by an unknown projectile while crossing the Strait of Hormuz, India’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement.
Before the US-Israel war on Iran began on February 28, the Strait of Hormuz typically handled about 125 large commercial vessels a day and shipments through it accounted for about 20 percent of global crude and liquefied natural gas supplies.
In retaliation for US-Israeli attacks, Iran effectively closed the strait, while Washington has maintained a blockade on Iranian ports.
So, how are ships getting through the strait, and how long can producers maintain the increased flow through one of the world’s most important energy corridors while attacks and harassment of ships continue?
The security situation in the Strait of Hormuz has continued to deteriorate even as more oil moves out of the region.
At least seven incidents involving tankers have been reported in the past week, according to shipping intelligence service Marisks.
The Kuwaiti-flagged Very Large Crude Carrier (VLCC) MT Kazimah III caught fire after being struck on October 1 while travelling through the strait, causing a fire on board. Five staff were safely rescued following the incident.
On October 4, the Liberian-flagged Aframax tanker Lipsi was struck northeast of Oman’s Jazirat Umm al-Fayarin, damaging its engine room, with no casualties reported.
The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) agency has reported at least one attack a day in the Strait of Hormuz or the Gulf of Aden, where Iran-backed Houthis are targeting Saudi-linked shipping, since October 2.
Threats continued on Monday, when a tanker entering the Hormuz strait near Oman was hailed by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and ordered to turn around or risk attack, according to UKMTO.

Despite those attacks, oil exports from the region have risen dramatically.
According to provisional data from Kpler, the seven-day moving average for Middle East crude exports reached 18.3 million barrels per day (bpd) on September 30, compared with an average of about 18 million bpd during the 12 months before the war.
Vortexa separately estimated that the 14-day moving average for Middle East crude and condensate exports had reached 18.6 million bpd.
However, not all of that oil is actually being shipped through Hormuz.
Kpler estimates that about 40 percent of oil exports now bypass the strait, while much of the crude that does cross is transferred between tankers offshore.
Partly as a result of the increased oil exports, oil prices continue to fall, with Brent crude – the global benchmark – dropping 0.75 percent to $99.57 a barrel on Tuesday. US West Texas Intermediate crude also fell 1.2 percent to $88.37 a barrel, according to data from Oilprice.com.
US President Donald Trump has repeatedly taken credit for the apparent increase in oil flows, boasting that Washington controls the strait and that US forces were succeeding in protecting vessels passing through Hormuz.
Iran has disputed claims that oil flow through the key waterway has increased, saying the amount passing was “negligible” and that it still has effective control of the strait.
The recovery of oil exports has been made possible largely by Saudi Arabia’s use of alternative export infrastructure and an increasingly complex system for moving crude around Hormuz.
“The increasing availability of crude oil from the Middle East is due to two factors: the effective use of the East-West pipeline by Saudi Arabia and ship-to-ship transfer around the Strait of Hormuz,” Tamas Varga, an analyst at PVM Oil Associates, told Al Jazeera.
Saudi’s East-West pipeline carries oil from fields in the east of the country to the Yanbu port on the Red Sea in the West.
Ship-to-ship transfers happen when smaller shuttle boats, which often turn off their transponders to make them hard to detect, physically transport oil through the Strait of Hormuz, before offloading their cargoes onto larger tankers waiting just beyond it.
Varga said current flows could be maintained as long as those methods and routes remain secure.
Saudi’s East-West pipeline has already suffered temporary closures as a result of drone strikes, such as those launched by Iran-backed groups in Iraq in September.
“The flow will be sustainable unless attacks on ships and shipping lanes or on the pipeline resume, something that does not seem imminent at the moment but could happen at any time if geopolitical tensions flare up,” he said.
But maintaining those flows is also putting pressure on the shipping system.



“The shuttle system in the Gulf is doing wonders in getting oil out, but it requires plenty of ships,” Chris Beauchamp, chief market analyst at IG Group, told Al Jazeera.
That demand has pushed freight costs higher and reduced tanker availability elsewhere, while Asian buyers are increasingly having to source crude from further afield, he added.
“Previously a supply story, this is now one about the underlying mechanics of shipping,” Beauchamp said. “Ships don’t get built overnight.”
Varga said oil prices also remain comparatively high – currently hovering just less than $100 a barrel compared with around $72 before the war broke out – because of increased shipping and insurance costs.
Last week, members of the Group of Seven (G7) announced they would release up to 100 million barrels of strategic oil reserves, including diesel, in a bid to control prices. Further releases of crude and diesel from strategic reserves could also ease prices, but with global inventories already thin, another deterioration in Middle East security could quickly push them higher again.
“Only a sustainable and credible peace deal between the US and Iran and the subsequent permanent and unconditional reopening of the Strait of Hormuz would re-establish the pre-conflict status quo,” Varga said.
On Monday, Saudi Aramco CEO Amin Nasser warned that the effects of the disruption could last well beyond the reopening of Hormuz, even if it does happen.
Speaking at the Energy Intelligence conference in London, Nasser said nearly three billion barrels of oil supply had been lost since the conflict began at the end of February and that rebuilding depleted inventories while meeting demand could take as long as two years.
“The system is already straining,” he added.
Award-winning Indian author Arundhati Roy says the ongoing protests against Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government – mainly led by the satirical Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) – have stripped the right-wing Hindu nationalist leader of his “carefully confected image” propped up by India’s corporate-owned news channels and the governing Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) control over social media.
Speaking with Al Jazeera’s Imran Khan on a range of issues, including the Gen Z-led antigovernment protests and allegations of vote theft against Modi’s government, the 64-year-old Booker Prize-winning writer says she hopes the political climate in the world’s most populous democracy is about to change.
“I do feel that something is boiling just under the surface. Something is going to happen,” she said. “The emperor has been called out, and he has lost his power.”
Here’s the interview Roy gave to Al Jazeera TV, edited for brevity.
Arundhati Roy, thank you for talking to Al Jazeera. Your debut novel won the prestigious Booker Prize. Since then, you have written acclaimed novels, hard-hitting political pieces, and collections of essays. How would you describe yourself: novelist, writer or a political activist? Or you don’t really think about those boundaries?
Roy: Well, I actually refrain from describing myself. I will leave that to other people because, you know, why should we describe ourselves? And categorise ourselves? That’s for other people to do.
One of the things that links all of your different aspects is this idea of satire. You are not chiefly a satirist, but in The God of Small Things and in The Ministry of Utmost Happiness, you have used satire to devastating effects. But it always seems to be about politics. Is that a deliberate choice?
Roy: I don’t think so. I mean, in some ways it depends on how you define what politics is, right? To me, even a fairy tale is in some ways political, but not let-me-hit-you-on-the-head-with-a-hammer or let-me-display-my-manifesto type of politics. I am not. From my books and from the way I grew up, possibly the answer to your question is that there is no difference between the personal and the public space.



Let’s talk about India and its political climate. You wrote about the CJP movement. Now that’s a grassroots movement fuelled by young people who took an insult – of being called a cockroach – and owned it. And you started your essay with when hope seemed lost, in came these young roaches riding in the rain, “the progeny of the unholy union between a judge and a joke”, which is a brilliant line. What drew you to this particular movement?
Roy: Well, ironically, as we speak at this moment, there is a huge crisis brewing, and the cockroaches are back, saying they are going to be protesting all over the country in a few days because of the scandal exposed by a particular newspaper about the fact that India’s elections are completely compromised – which is something we have known and have written about for years. But now there is a sort of concrete proof. So what drew me to it was this young people’s movement, which was full of joy and unusual humour – this new way of messaging with their [Instagram] reels and so on. It stripped Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s very carefully confected image.
Is this a miscalculation on his part? Not understanding social media, not understanding young people’s use of technology? And is it going to have an effect on India?
Roy: No, I don’t think it’s a misunderstanding at all. He and the BJP were the first to wade into the field of social media, so they have been there before anybody else. But I just think there were too many things happening, one after another. And somehow this movement sort of broke. It was the straw that broke the camel’s back. It started out with the fact that in 2024 [election], Modi did not win a full majority… There’s scandals around elections. There’s scandals around the paper leak in exams. There’s massive unemployment. So it all sort of came together to create this sort of irreverent but serious explosion.



India publicly says we are an economic success story, a climate leader. But what is modern India to you?
Roy: Well, modern India is a very rich country full of very, very, very poor people. I mean, I don’t think there are many countries in the world where people live in such deep poverty, in such conditions of humiliation. And it’s a shame for people to boast about this being a super economic power, because, as I keep saying, it’s super poor. Surely, there are extremely rich people, extremely rich industrialists who control everything, but very little of that seeps down to the poor… So it’s a scandal to call India a superpower or an economic force, when the people are so disempowered.
But a lot of these problems are often blamed on British colonialism. Do you have any sympathy with that argument?
Roy: Not any more. There was a point at which it was true. But now we are watching a government just making everything much worse, including the idea of freedom. I was talking to some young people yesterday, and I said that what [Mahatma] Gandhi and [Bhimrao] Ambedkar and Maulana [Abul Kalam] Azad and [Jawaharlal] Nehru and all these people said and wrote during the British times, today, nobody can say those things because they would be put into prison. There are a lot of people, a lot of students, a lot of activists, lawyers in and out of prison constantly. We are threatened with the antiterrorism law. This Independence Day, from the ramparts of the Red Fort, Modi said the most dangerous people are “dimaghi Naxal”, which means intellectual Maoists, which includes all of us, of course. And that we must be isolated and so on. So I think that’s a tired horse to whip now.
I am glad you mentioned the Maoists. Earlier this year, India declared the six-decade-long Maoist insurgency effectively over. But all the problems that the Naxalites were fighting for still remain, don’t they?
Roy: Well, yes. I mean, who are the Naxalites? What were they fighting? And the fact is that they keep declaring the end of it, but then it resurfaces somewhere, somehow, because you can’t just hold so many people down and devastate their lives. Some people are going to take things into their own hands. So we are used to these declarations, you know.
During the Congress rule, I think it was around 2012 or 2013, the prime minister [Manmohan Singh] had signed over the homelands of indigenous people to big infrastructure companies. There were many MoUs signed. And then they declared something called Operation Green Hunt. They flooded the forest with security forces. Village after village was being burned down; women were being raped, villagers could not live in their houses for fear that they would be surrounded and burned down. And the media was calling all these poor people “terrorists”… What do you do when a thousand security personnel come and surround your house in the middle of the jungle? And they were brutally put down.
People who sort of crumbled and quivered under the Modi regime are suddenly finding a couple of vertebra, if not a spine, and it's creating little spaces.
by Arundhati Roy, Author
You have always rejected the idea that writers should remain apolitical. Your stance on Kashmir, calling it not an integral part of India, comes to mind. I want to talk to you about the personal cost of being so forthright. How do you deal with that?
Roy: Well, after 2019, one cannot say that because it has been made an integral part of India. And that section of the Indian Constitution has been read down. But honestly, I am not a person who makes rules for writers and says they should be political or shouldn’t be or how they should be. I don’t have a prescription for that. I just know that if I didn’t write what I am really moved to write, then it would be like putting myself into prison before they put me into prison.
As I said in my memoir, it’s like a dance on a mined dance floor. One doesn’t know when the bombs will go off. But I do what I have to do, and I’m not the only person. There are so many people who stand up so bravely and who have paid huge prices. For what? For doing or saying what they believe in. So I don’t want to make a martyr of myself here.
But is there an intellectual movement in India that has a strong voice that is being listened to, or is it being drowned out by the shoutings of the politics?
Roy: Actually, that movement has always existed. It has been extremely strong, even though since 2014, it has been hammered down by these 24-hour television news channels owned by various corporations who try and shout everyone down. So, every time Modi wins an election, he comes out and tries to demonise us.



Is India still the world’s largest democracy – something to be celebrated? Or do you think it’s a democracy in sham?
Roy: This is exactly where the axe has fallen. The Modi government reconstituted the way in which the election commission is chosen. He appointed a chief election commissioner. The opposition [parties] and the chief justice normally had a voice in selecting the chief election commissioner, but they don’t any more. Now, there has been an absolute scandal about how the elections have been conducted. From the 2024 elections to the [regional] elections in Maharashtra, Haryana, West Bengal, Bihar, and Goa. You are finding a situation where thousands of electoral officers who are supposed to have the voter data with them have been locked out, and it’s all been controlled from New Delhi. And voters, especially minority voters or supposedly BJP-unfriendly voters, have been simply not allowed to vote. And I am talking about the numbers in the millions… We always say that elections are not proof of democracy. You need a constitution, you need other institutions, you need checks and balances. All of those were hollowed out. Now the election itself is impugned. And you will watch and see in the next few months, there is going to be big trouble in this country as we inch closer to the 2029 election.
So where are you landing right now? Is there hope for democracy, true democracy in the way that you see it in India?
Roy: Well, one of my collections of essays was dedicated to those who have learned to divorce hope from reason. I will always be hopeful that something will change here. And I do feel that something is boiling just under the surface. Something is going to happen. How that plays out, I can’t say because we are up against a pretty ruthless set of people.
What you’re seeing in India, after this “cockroach” uprising, is that everybody has been put on notice. So all the people who sort of crumbled and quivered under the Modi regime are suddenly finding a couple of vertebrae, if not a spine, and it’s creating little spaces. There’s a lot of protests in all kinds of places. As I said, one of the biggest things that’s happened is that the emperor has been called out, and he has lost his power. He is not even showing up publicly. His home minister is ducking and diving. Neither of them showed up even once for the entire [monsoon] session of Parliament last time when the cockroach movement was on. So there’s something changing. And I think they are running scared. Let’s see what happens. Certainly, I am more optimistic now than I was three months ago.
Before this interview, I was speaking to another writer friend of mine who is based in Israel. He said one of the questions you must ask Miss Roy is the fact that artificial intelligence (AI) and the weaponisation of social media is fuelling anti-democratic movements and government authoritarianism. Where do you land on that?
Roy: I think it’s the end. And I think it’s privatisation of human endeavour and civilisation. How it works in defence and in politics and in personal life, and the shiny gifts it offers with the darkness behind them, is something we need to think about. It’s something I am writing about.
Is there anything about modern India, about the world, that gives you hope?
Roy: Well, absolutely. As I have said, India is a country with such a deep culture of resistance, of intellectual thinking, of unusual thinking, of unusual kinds of dissent. So how can you not have hope? It’s a wonderful thing to see.



British police have arrested a 22-year old British national on suspicion of a terror offence linked to the security incident near a UK airbase hosting US warplanes on September 27.
Counter Terrorism Police say the individual is connected with “activity that took place close to RAF Fairford.”
In a statement, police said the arrest had been made “on suspicion of preparation of terrorist acts”.
“This remains ⁠a live investigation and our specialist teams continue to pursue ⁠multiple lines of enquiry into ⁠the circumstances surrounding events near RAF Fairford,” Vicki Evans, senior national coordinator for Counter Terrorism Policing said.



The latest arrest is the seventh connected to the incident, which remains largely unexplained, over the past two weeks.
Five British men in their twenties were detained near the perimeter of the base in the early hours of September 27.
Police said they had found a supply of gasoline in three vans linked to the five suspects, but no explosives.
On Thursday, a 25-year-old British-Iranian man was arrested in London.
All six have been released on bail under investigation.
The US moved its B-52 and B-1 bombers from RAF Fairford on Sunday, though it’s unclear whether the move is connected to the arrests.
RAF Fairford has served as a stopping point for US bombers participating in the war against Iran, which began more than seven months ago, on February 28.
Located roughly 160km (100 miles) west of London, the base has since been rumoured to be the target of a “terror” plot involving Tehran.
 



 
On Monday, US President Trump said his administration withdrew B-1 bombers from the site because of what he described as “some threats”.
“We had a threat, and if we’re going to be threatened, we would just move them, and that sort of alleviates that,” he told reporters, adding the people who made the threat “would be linked to Iran,” without elaborating.
 
British Prime Minister Andy Burnham said the UK sees, “strong indications” that Iran played a part in the incident, without providing details.
Iran has denied involvement, but it has previously said it considers any base used to attack its territory a legitimate target.



Police have fired tear gas at protesters blockading French high schools as tens of thousands of students and activists rally across France in a mounting wave of protests demanding government improvements to the education system.
Students in Marseille, Nantes and Lyon began demonstrations on Tuesday morning, with demonstrators holding aloft signs which read “they don’t really care about us” and “survive or study”.
In Strasbourg, Lyon and Rennes, the protests turned violent at times, with police firing tear gas and protesters lighting fires in the streets and hurling projectiles.
The protests started two weeks ago in Paris’s disadvantaged suburbs, lighting a blaze that has spread across the country. The government said that the movement has turned into urban violence and has deployed riot police to some rallies.
On Monday, a 15-year-old’s hand was blown off during clashes between high-schoolers and the police in northern France. The government said that around 200 to 250 protesters had thrown objects at the police.
A French newspaper, La Voix du Nord said that the teenager lost his hand and part of his arm after he picked a police grenade during the protest.
Nearly 2,000 high schools have been blockaded or closed for the day, according to the High School Students Union.
“When the answer is violence, it means democracy is no longer working,” said Hugo Vetzel, a recent high school graduate in Strasbourg preparing to attend France’s top universities. “There is such a gap between the elites and us.”



Al Jazeera’s Natacha Butler who was at a march in Paris said more groups are joining the demonstrations.
“We’re seeing people from various unions, like the farmers union, energy workers, teachers unions who’ve also said they’re going to come out in support of the students.” Butler said.
“Parents and teachers said they want to be here not just to support their children but to protect them as they are worried about troublemakers who may infiltrate the protests and excessive police force” Butler added.
Al Jazeera’s Rosie Birchard was at a demonstration in Lille and said students from neighbouring Belgium came to show support.
French Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu has ordered ministers to address the students’ demands, including replacing underskilled teachers, making lunch breaks longer and changing the length of the school day.
Lecornu also said that the government will look into repairing old campuses, as he demanded ministers send in proposals by the end of October. But there are doubts about how quickly the government can respond.
“France is riddled with debt, France has a real budget crisis. Where would that money come from to put budget into public services” Al Jazeera’s Butler said.
France’s Ministry of Interior said that it has arrested 6,100 people since the beginning of the protests, the majority of them under the age of eighteen. The Ministry of Justice announced that over 1,800 will be prosecuted, including 1,483 minors.
During the protests, at least 215 teenagers have been wounded along with 715 police officers, according to Lecornu.
Germany’s former foreign spy chief has been arrested on suspicion of espionage and treason, prosecutors have said.
August Hanning, 80, is under investigation for attempted treason and acting as an agent for a foreign intelligence service, the Office of the Federal Public Prosecutor General confirmed on Tuesday.
Hanning was president of Germany’s Federal Intelligence Service between 1998 and 2005.
He was arrested in Bad Toelz-Wolfratshausen in southern Germany. His former chief of staff, partially identified as Manfred D, was arrested in Steinfurt in western Germany on suspicion of “aiding and abetting attempted treason and treasonous espionage”.
The prosecutor’s office said, “On one occasion, Hanning used classified intelligence provided by Manfred D to draft an analysis for an officer of a foreign intelligence service.”
Prosecutors said Manfred D also served as the chief of staff for Hanning’s successors between 2012 and 2026, and used his role to gain access to confidential information which he then passed on to Hanning “in exchange for remuneration”. Hanning then used the information in his private consulting work, prosecutors added.
“The current findings suggest that, over the years, Manfred D provided Hanning with approximately 2,000 documents, many of which contained classified information to be used exclusively by the federal intelligence service for internal purposes, particularly for executive intelligence briefings,” the statement said.
The statement did not reveal who the two men were suspected of spying for or which country the foreign agent worked for, adding that “it has yet to be determined if the material reached the intended recipient”.
German MP Marc Henrichmann told the AFP news agency that Germany “will not tolerate the betrayal of secrets”.
Henrichmann, who chairs the German parliament’s intelligence oversight committee, said, “Whoever allies themselves with the enemies of our liberal democracy will be found out.”
The premises of Manfred D and Hanning were being searched in several locations, including in the capital, Berlin.

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