The Paris Saint-Germain star was injured on 4 November when Bayern Munich striker Luis Diaz tackled him during the Champions League clash between the sides.

Hakimi was helped off the pitch at the Parc des Princes in Paris, with tests then showing he had suffered a severe sprain to his left ankle.

Speaking after the 2026 World Cup draw in Washington on 5 December, Regragui said: “We hope Hakimi will be available for our first match against the Comoros. He’s working as hard as he possibly can to be ready. He wants to be there in Morocco.”

Revealing the squad and Hakimi’s inclusion, Regragui added: “The choices I’ve made are the results of 18 months of hard work and reflection. There’s never total agreement about who should be in or out of the squad.”

Morocco bosses lodge complaint over officiating in World Cup semi against France

Hakimi, along with fellow defenders Nayef Aguerd and Noussair Mazraoui, goalkeeper Yassine Bounou, midfielder Sofyan Amrabat and striker Youssef En-Nesyri form the backbone of a team that has been tipped for victory at the 35th Africa Cup of Nations.

The biennial competition kicks off with Morocco’s game on 21 December at the Prince Moulay Abdellah Stadium in Rabat against Comores.

The hosts will take on Mali five days later and Zambia on 29 December in the pool stages.

Semi-finalists at the 2022 World Cup, Morocco were surprisingly knocked out by South Africa in the last 16 at the 2023 Cup of Nations in Cote d’Ivoire.

But since that disappointment they have regrouped, and are entering the tournament on the back of a world record 18-game unbeaten streak.

The tournament comes a few months after the under-20 side swept past the likes of France and Argentina to claim the World Cup in Chile.

Regragui, who played in the Morocco side that lost in the 2004 Cup of Nations final against Tunisia, has resisted the temptation to promote several stars from the World Cup-winning squad.

“The group I’ve named knows each other well,” Regragui told the Moroccan football federation website. “The players know the system and how they’re supposed to operate and behave in a competition setting. There are youngsters in the squad and there’s a good balance between youth and experience.”

On Friday, Mali unveiled its list of players for the tournament, where coach Tom Saintfiet will attempt to take the side to its first title at the Cup of Nations.

In 2023, under Eric Chelle, Mali’s campaign ended in the last eight. They played more than 60 minutes of their quarter final against Cote d’Ivoire with an extra man following the dismissal of Odilon Kossounou.

But the hosts scored an equaliser in the dying seconds of regulation time and, as a penalty shootout loomed, claimed the winner with virtually the last kick of extra time to steal a place in the semi-finals.

PSG and Morocco defender Achraf Hakimi claims 2025 Prix Marc-Vivien Foé

Nearly two years on, Chelle oversees Nigeria’s footballing fortunes. The 48-year-old failed to steer the squad to the 2026 World Cup and will be seeking redemption at the Cup of Nations.

Nigeria, who are in Group C with Tunisia, Tanzania and Uganda, will play all of their first round matches in Fez in northern Morocco.

“Our players are suffering and we must find a cure,” said Chelle. “Instead of hurting, we must hurt our opponents.”

Striker Victor Osimhen added: “Nigerians keep telling us we are a golden generation. But we have now failed twice in succession to qualify for the World Cup. If we are that good, how come we keep failing? Our squad is packed with great Nigerians playing for some of the best clubs in Europe. The time has come to translate that greatness into trophies.”

Under the monarchy, the Catholic Church held major privileges and played a central role in society. The French Revolution of 1789 upended this order. Revolutionaries nationalised church property and required priests to swear allegiance to the new republic. Those who refused were persecuted.

Napoleon later tried to ease tensions by signing the Concordat of 1801 with Pope Pius VII. The state recognised Catholicism as the faith of most French people, but also recognised Reformed Protestant, Lutheran and Jewish communities. It appointed bishops and paid the clergy.

This system lasted throughout the 1800s but kept tensions high – particularly under the Third Republic, when republicans viewed the church as blocking modern reforms and supporting conservative forces.

French court orders town to remove statue of Virgin Mary

The scandal that paved the path

In 1894, Captain Alfred Dreyfus, a Jewish artillery officer from Alsace, was wrongly convicted of treason and sent to a penal colony in French Guiana. This miscarriage of justice split the country. On one side stood Dreyfusards, who defended his innocence in the name of justice and truth. On the other, the anti-Dreyfusards refused to question military authority.

The Catholic Church strongly backed nationalist, anti-Dreyfusard groups and relayed anti-Semitic arguments in the press. This shocked republicans, who questioned how the church could oppose the values of justice, equality and truth.

Many concluded that as long as it held influence over institutions and political life, it posed a danger to democracy.

Aristide Briand gained prominence during this period. A lawyer, journalist and moderate socialist, he was elected as an MP in 1902 after a campaign dominated by religious questions.

Prime minister Émile Combes initially avoided any reform, despite pressure from the republican majority. But rising tensions with the Vatican changed his stance. He created a commission on separation, with Briand as rapporteur.

From March 1905, Briand orchestrated one of the longest and most passionate debates in French parliamentary history. Two visions of France faced each other: one monarchist and Catholic, the other republican and secular.

Briand chose the middle way and pushed for compromise, rather than confrontation.

“We are not making a law against religious worship, we are making a law of freedom,” he said. His aim was to guarantee freedom of conscience and equality before the state without persecuting religions.

The word laïcité, or secularism, does not appear in the 1905 text, which uses only the term separation.

However, the first two articles set out the founding principles of today’s laïcité: the state must stay neutral towards all religions, favour none, finance none and prohibit religious expression in public institutions. The term secularism entered the constitution in 1946.

‘Growing number’ of French schoolgirls flouting secularism rules

Violence over inventories

Many Catholics saw the 1905 law as a tragedy and refused to accept it. Church property had to be transferred to new religious associations, which required a full inventory of buildings and objects. State agents entered churches and presbyteries to draw up reports, and many faithful viewed the inventories as a desecration of sacred places.

Prefects were told to enforce the law while avoiding clashes, but violence still broke out. Bloody incidents occurred in Haute-Loire and in the Nord region near the Belgian border.

Géry Ghysel, a 35-year-old butcher and father of three, died in the village church of Boeschèpe, in the Nord department, during an inventory that turned violent.

On 11 February, 1906, less than two months after the law’s adoption, Pope Pius X issued a fierce response. In his encyclical Vehementer Nos, he condemned the separation of church and state.

“That the state must be separated from the church is an absolutely false thesis, a most pernicious error,” he said, adding that it was “gravely insulting to God, for the creator of man is also the founder of human societies and he preserves them in existence as he sustains us”.

Diplomatic relations remained broken until 1921.

Top French court upholds ban on Muslim abaya robes in schools

Exceptions in Alsace-Moselle

The 1905 law was not applied in Alsace-Moselle, which was then under German rule, having been annexed after France’s defeat in the Franco-Prussian War in 1871.

When the region was returned to France in 1918, the 1905 law still did not apply there, and still today the Bas-Rhin, Haut-Rhin and Moselle departments have retained local rules inherited from the 1801 Concordat, which had defined the relationship between the French State and the Catholic Church.

Priests, pastors and rabbis are paid by the state through the interior ministry, and religious education remains compulsory in public schools in the region.

The 1905 law devotes very few articles to public education, since secularisation of schools had already begun with the Jules Ferry laws of 1882, which removed religious teaching and replaced it with moral instruction.

By 1886, teaching posts were held only by lay staff. The Ligue de l’Enseignement, created in 1866, became a major supporter of a free, secular and compulsory school system and built a wide network of cultural and educational activities as an alternative to Catholic youth groups.

Modern battles

With social change, debate over religion in public spaces – especially in schools – has remained intense.

In 1989, several Muslim pupils were suspended from a school in Creil, north of Paris, for refusing to remove their headscarves. More such cases followed.

On 17 December, 2003, then president Jacques Chirac called for a stronger defence of secularism amid rising demands from religious and community groups.

A law adopted in March 2004 and applied from the following school year banned conspicuous religious signs in public schools, including headscarves, kippas and large crosses.

French court issues severe sentences to those linked to beheading of teacher Samuel Paty

After the January 2015 terrorist attacks at the office of Charlie Hebdo and the Hyper Cacher supermarket, then education minister Najat Vallaud-Belkacem reaffirmed the importance of secularism. She established national Secularism Day on 9 December and introduced new moral and civic education guidelines.

The murder of history and geography teacher Samuel Paty on 16 October, 2020, after he used Charlie Hebdo satirical cartoons in a class on laïcité and press freedom, marked a turning point. Schools had become targets for extremists because of the secular values they defend.

In August 2021, the 1905 law was amended with the tightening of controls on organisations and places of worship, particularly with regards to foreign funding – presented as a way to combat radical Islamism and other forms of separatism.

This article was adapted from the original version in French by Patricia Blettery.

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko has locked up thousands of his opponents, critics and protestors since an election in 2020 that rights groups widely said was rigged and triggered weeks of unprecedented protests across the country.

Kolesnikova was the star of the 2020 street protests that almost toppled Lukashenko — in power since 1994 — and famously ripped up her passport as the KGB tried to deport her.

Bialiatski — a 63-year-old veteran rights defender and 2022 Nobel Prize winner and former vice-president of the Paris-based human rights organisation FIDH — is considered by Lukashenko to be a personal enemy and has documented rights abuses for decades.

“Ales Bialiatski is free!,” rights group Viasna said on social media about its founder and chair, adding he had spent 1,613 days in prison.

“I spoke with him, he is travelling to Lithuania, and he is feeling well,” his wife Natalia Pinchuk told French press agency AFP.

Kolesnikova’s sister, Tatiana Khomich, told AFP she looked “normal” amid widespread fears her health had massively deteriorated behind bars.

“She thanked the United States for President (Donald) Trump’s efforts and the Belarusian side for holding these negotiations,” Khomich said after a brief call with Kolesnikova.

Journalists and relatives had gathered outside the US embassy in Vilnius, anticipating the arrival of some of the prisoners, an AFP reporter saw.

Viasna posted a photo of Kolesnikova saying she had been taken to Ukraine.

Minsk also freed Viktor Babariko — an ex-banker who tried to run against Lukashenko in the 2020 presidential election but was jailed instead.

Rights groups, relatives and state media reported a total of 123 people were freed, including foreign citizens, after a US envoy said that Washington was lifting some sanctions on Minsk, a close ally of Moscow.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said five Ukrainian citizens were among those freed.

Here are more details on Kolesnikova and Bialiatski, both of whom have had hardly any contact with the outside world since being jailed.

Maria Kolesnikova

An orchestra flute player, Kolesnikova was part of a trio of women — including Svetlana Tikhanovskaya who stood against Lukashenko and now leads the opposition in exile — that led 2020 street protests against Lukashenko.

Kolesnikova was serving an 11-year sentence in a prison colony, kept largely in isolation cells and held virtually incommunicado since 2023.

Her health is thought to have seriously deteriorated in prison. She underwent surgery in custody and her weight severely dropped — with her family and allies fearing for her life.

Former prisoners from the Gomel prison where she was held have told AFP she was barred from talking to other political prisoners and regularly thrown into harsh punishment cells.

An image of Kolesnikova making a heart shape with her hands became a symbol of anti-Lukashenko protests.

She was abducted by security forces, who put a sack over her head and drove her to the Ukrainian border. She ripped up her passport, foiling the forced deportation plan, and was placed under arrest.

Born in Minsk, Kolesnikova left Belarus in 2007 to attend a German music school and played in European orchestras, before returning to Belarus a decade later.

Ales Bialiatski   

Bialiatski was already in pre-trial detention when he won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2022 for his tireless work documenting rights abuses. He was months later handed a 10-year sentence.

He founded Viasna in the 1990s, two years after Lukashenko became president.

The group now operates from exile and tries to track the fate of the 1,000-plus political prisoners in the country and rally support for them.

Bialiatski has taken part in protests against repression in Belarus for decades, triggering Lukashenko to accuse him of being a foreign stooge.

Viasna has said that since 2023, Bialiatski has regularly been placed in punishment cells, held incommunicado and suffered health problems.

(With newswires)

Poland, a strong supporter of Ukraine in its fight against Moscow, announced plans in May last year to bolster a long stretch of its border that includes Belarus and the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad.

The main task of the German soldiers in Poland will be “engineering activities,” a spokesman for the defence ministry in Berlin said late Friday.

This could include “constructing fortifications, digging trenches, laying barbed wire, or erecting tank barriers,” he said.

“The support provided by German soldiers as part of (the operation) is limited to these engineering activities.”

The spokesman did not specify the exact number of troops involved, saying only it would be a “mid-range two-digit number”.

Failing economy, rising far right and Ukraine war define Germany’s divisive elections

They are expected to participate in the project from the second quarter of 2026 until the end of 2027.

The spokesman stressed that parliamentary approval was not needed for the deployment as “there is no immediate danger to the soldiers from military conflicts”.

Except for certain exceptional cases, the German parliament has to approve the deployment of the country’s armed forces overseas.

Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Warsaw has staunchly backed Kyiv and been a transit route for arms being supplied by Ukraine’s Western allies.

Warsaw has also modernised its army and hiked defence spending.

Germany is Ukraine’s second-biggest supplier of military aid after the United States and has sent Kyiv a huge quantity of equipment ranging from air defence systems to armoured vehicles.

（With newswires)

RFI: What is your impression of Diary of a Prisoner?

Philippe Moreau-Chevrolet: Nicolas Sarkozy leans heavily on emotion and this fits with his wider media defence strategy, which aims to strengthen his legal defence. He starts talking about his conviction almost straight away, so there is clearly a wish to protect his image for the future – since this is the first time in the history of the Fifth Republic that a president has been sent to prison.

The book focuses on injustice, but it is not a self-pitying story. By bringing in The Count of Monte Cristo – the Alexandre Dumas novel about a man seeking revenge after an unjust conviction, one of the two books he took to La Santé prison in Paris – he shapes the story as one of vengeance.

Former French president Sarkozy released from prison, pending appeal

He places himself in a future where he has won his legal battles and taken revenge for this humiliation.

From the start he also repeatedly invokes a comparison with Christ. Firstly, that speaks to right-wing voters. But it is also a way of saying he has sacrificed himself. It is a story of trial, suffering, sacrifice and revenge. It is not about redemption. This matches his legal defence, because he cannot say anything else without incriminating himself.

At the end, he even writes: “I started my life again.” The idea is he has been reborn stronger, more mature, more serious. This also has a therapeutic role for him – letting go of this episode and showing where he stands today. It is a story of rebirth.

He also says he already knew he would be released at his appeal hearing, so he went jogging and stayed active straight away. For him, the key is to show he is still in fighting mode.

RFI: Can the release of the book be seen as a well-orchestrated communication exercise?

PMC: For him, this is a long-term fight. The aim is to make himself heard as much as possible, with every tool available. He appeals to public opinion through dramatic moments – the people who accompanied him to prison, the gathering of his supporters, his many statements in the press.

It creates an emotional build-up around him to maximise attention and cast the accused in a favourable light. In the end this is a frontal attack on the judiciary and on those who accuse Nicolas Sarkozy, using the most forceful approach possible because of how serious the situation is.

RFI: The book was published by Fayard, a publishing house owned by conservative billionaire Vincent Bolloré…

PMC: Yes, there are opportunistic strategies at work. On the far-right side there is clearly an attempt to capture this Sarkozy moment and his electorate. That is what is at stake for 2027. The strategy for Marine Le Pen and for Bolloré’s media is to take up the defence of the former head of state and pull those voters towards them.

The National Rally is increasingly aligned, under Jordan Bardella, with the communication and campaign methods of the American far right – judges are enemies, adversaries, elites to bring down, and a conviction can make you look like a hero.

For the far-right electorate, Nicolas Sarkozy’s conviction is not a negative thing. It can even attract support.

Sarkozy is also trying to win over that electorate for future elections. In his book he even calls for a “rally” with the National Rally. This could become a point of convergence between the two forces, assuming Nicolas Sarkozy still carries real weight, which is hard to judge today.

The fall of France’s Nicolas Sarkozy, from palace to prison

RFI: Could the memoir’s release influence Sarkozy’s political agenda and his return to public life?

PMC: The book gives him a platform to communicate, appear in the media and get people talking again. It should give him some room to manoeuvre and a bit of airtime to influence the 2027 election. It puts him back in the political debate, because when he talks about the National Rally he pushes an agenda about recovering far-right voters and uniting the right.

He cannot do anything other than step back into his role as a political figure. Stopping now would look like admitting defeat. He is not ready for that. He does not want to lose his reputation or his influence. This is also typical of Sarkozy-style communication.

I am thinking of Rachida Dati, who gave a speech on the steps of the Élysée in heels five days after giving birth. It is a staged image of resilience, comeback and invincibility that is part of their communication code.

RFI: The book was published in record time, and Sarkozy posted on social media: “The end of the story remains to be written.” Is this an attempt to divert attention from his conviction?

PMC: It is mostly a way to frame the debate and shape how the public sees this episode. That is his whole aim.

He is releasing the book quickly to try to control the story before others define it. Speed matters – not letting others talk first and taking part in building the narrative rather than suffering it.

As with all media defence strategies in legal cases, the goal is to make sure the public hears the accused’s version first and identifies with it as much as possible. The reasons for the charges and the trial fade into the background.

This is a classic defence strategy: victimisation, challenging the media and the judges, and presenting his own truth. Repetition is key. He will repeat the same message in the media, in the book, everywhere, so that his version becomes dominant.

The reasons for the conviction are very complex – the investigation file is 400 pages long. Faced with a very simple and emotional message – the book – the competition [between the two narratives] is inevitably unequal.

This interview was adpated from the original version in French by Caroline Renaux.

According to authorities, two police officers were slightly injured when law enforcement used tear gas to disperse demonstrators occupying sections of the A64 motorway near Lescar and Carbonne.

The motorway was partially closed as dozens of tractors formed barricades and farmers said they would maintain the blockade through the weekend.

The protests mark a surge of anger across France’s farming sector, already under pressure from successive animal health crises and mounting economic strain.

Earlier this week, veterinary teams, accompanied by police, culled 207 cows in the département of Ariège after a new outbreak was detected.

French farmers protest over compulsory cattle culls amid disease outbreak

Agriculture Minister Annie Genevard defended the measures as “the only way to save the entire livestock sector.”

But the Confédération paysanne union condemned the government’s approach as “more frightening than the disease itself,” calling for nationwide blockades and widespread vaccination instead of mass slaughter.

The crisis coincides with renewed cases of avian flu in the Landes region, a key poultry‑producing area. Farmers are also warning of the potential impact of the pending EU‑Mercosur trade agreement, which they fear would open the door to unfair competition from South American producers operating under looser standards.

With possible cuts to EU farm subsidies under discussion and France facing a trade deficit for the first time in half a century, rural discontent is showing no sign of abating.

(With newswires)

Emmanuelle Pouedras’s son, Clément, was 15 when he died in 2024 after jumping from a bridge.

His mother, a 55-year-old shopkeeper from in Brittany, north-western France, and her husband Sébastien are now seeking to reopen the investigation into his death and to hold social media companies to account.

In September, they filed a complaint against TikTok, Meta (the owner of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp) and other platforms, alleging offences including incitement to suicide.

“The vast majority of the videos on his TikTok ‘For You’ page [where the platform’s algorithm recommends content] were inciting him to death, telling him he doesn’t matter to anyone,” Pouedras told reporters at her home in the coastal town of Lorient.

EU accuses Meta and TikTok of breaching social media transparency rules

She said this content, some of which dealt with self-harm, “exacerbated” her son’s distress and fuelled a “downward spiral”.

“Tiktok knew he wasn’t doing well, TikTok did nothing and TikTok is not helping us find the truth,” she said, accusing the platform of failing to act despite warning signs.

Pouedras also said her son was cyberbullied on WhatsApp right up until the final hours before his death.

This week, she was among a group who met with French President Emmanuel Macron in Saint-Malo to discuss the challenges social media poses to democracy and society, as France considers tightening restrictions on young people’s access to social media.

This could include a ban for under-15s, similar to a landmark move which came into force in Australia on Wednesday.

Macron told the crowd that a bill could be debated in parliament as early as January to ban social media for anyone under “15 or 16 years old”.

Pouedras pressed the president on what immediate measures prosecutors and platforms could take “to support bereaved families”.

Macron pushes for new legislation to rapidly block digital disinformation

‘Incitement’ to death

Even before Clément’s death, Pouedras said she was cautious about the risks of unrestricted smartphone use, and had a rule that her two children had to leave their phones outside their bedrooms at night.

During the investigation into Clément’s death, police did not examine his phone. She later discovered messages indicating sustained cyberbullying.

“Have you finished your shitty suicide?” read one message sent in a WhatsApp group chat, she said.

Pouedras spent months trying to contact platforms including Snapchat, Instagram and TikTok to access her son’s data and understand what led to his death.

She said she received only partial responses, despite platforms being required to grant access under French law, according to the country’s data protection authority, the CNIL.

The family filed a formal complaint on 19 September. Their lawyer, Pierre Debuisson, accused the platforms of “deliberate obstruction”, arguing that social media sites had become the scene of “multiple incitements to suicide, accessible to minors without any protective filter”.

The regional public prosecutor’s office has not said what action it will take in response.

TikTok told French news agency AFP that it “strictly prohibits content that depicts or promotes suicide or self-harm” and said it removes 98 percent of such content before it is reported.

Searches containing terms such as “suicide” are redirected to a page offering dedicated support resources, it added.

Meta did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

TikTok under scrutiny as toxic videos reach young users within minutes

‘Take back control’

The case comes amid growing international concern over the impact of social media on young people’s mental health.

In September, a French parliamentary commission investigating the psychological effects of TikTok recommended banning social media for children under 15 and introducing a “digital curfew” for 15 to 18-year-olds.

The commission was launched in March after seven families sued TikTok in late 2024, accusing the platform of exposing their children to content that could encourage suicide.

This week, Australia became the first country to ban under-16s from social media altogether, saying it was time to “take back control” from powerful technology companies – a move that has been condemned by YouTube, Meta and other industry giants.

For Pouedras, the debate is painfully personal.

“I don’t want other families to go through what we’re living through,” she said. “If this fight can save even one child, then it matters.”

(with AFP)

Nearly a year after Cyclone Chido devastated Mayotte, large parts of the Indian Ocean archipelago remain visibly battered, with reconstruction advancing far more slowly than promised.

While emergency work on secondary schools allowed them to reopen to pupils in August, most public buildings and homes still bear deep scars.

In the capital Mamoudzou’s Hauts-Vallons neighbourhood – a residential district popular with civil servants – mounds of rubble lie untouched.

According to the Housing Foundation: “Sixty percent of the island’s buildings were damaged or destroyed and more than two-thirds of collective housing suffered damage.”

Ahmed Ali Mondroha, managing director of Mayotte’s main social housing provider, said the scale of destruction has proven overwhelming.

“It took us a long time to start the work,” he said, estimating the total cost of the damage at €72 million. “Of the 1,600 homes affected, 500 have been restored to use and around 600 are currently undergoing repairs.”

But even with crews on site, he says progress has been hampered by a succession of obstacles

“Construction companies do not always have the necessary materials, prices have skyrocketed since the cyclone hit – sheet metal, for example, has increased by 40 percent – and delivery times have lengthened.”

Schools in Mayotte set to reopen as unions warn cyclone recovery still lags

Supply delays

Julian Champiat, president of the Mayotte Federation of Building and Public Works (FMBTP), also spoke of the pressure on logistics, saying it now takes four months to receive an order of materials, compared with two months previously.

These delays are largely attributed to clogged customs procedures at Longoni’s commercial port, where a surge in containers has created bottlenecks.

Adding to the strain, many companies are struggling financially, with cash flow weakened by a slow restart in activity and a wave of payment defaults, causing further delays across the construction sector.

“The economic fabric is greatly weakened,” said Fahardine Mohamed, president of the Medef employers union in Mayotte.

Public sector finances – which underpin around 70 percent of the local economy – are, he said, “at an all-time low”.

After the cyclone, local authorities “committed to spending to deal with the emergency, and they are at the end of their term of office,” he noted, leaving budgets severely depleted.

Macron unveils €3bn package to rebuild cyclone-hit Mayotte

Exposed to the elements

Authorities too have been hit hard. In central Mamoudzou, part of the town hall roof was torn off and several offices remain unusable.

Higher up the hillside, the headquarters of the Dembéni-Mamoudzou urban community – Cadema – is still covered with tarpaulin rather than tiles.

“We’ve been working from home since the cyclone hit,” said one local authority employee, who asked not to be named. “My office is unusable, there are water leaks everywhere and when it rains, the electricity cuts out. Nothing has been done. The local authorities have no money left.”

Insurance payouts, too, are lagging. “We’re waiting for around €20 million,” said Mondroha.

At the Camion Blanc restaurant on Mamoudzou’s seafront, Melie Razafindrasoa prepares a papaya juice and notes one small sign of normality returning.

“We’re seeing [people] again at the market,” she said cheerfully. But her smile fades when she talks about her own home, saying she has still not received any insurance money.

“We lost the windows and a door of the house during the cyclone. We repaired them ourselves, but every time it rains, the rooms are flooded,” she explained, adding that she remains “very afraid of another cyclone coming”.

The rainy season has just begun, bringing more frequent storms. “Last time, there was a lot of wind and rain. My children were very scared, they are still traumatised.”

(with AFP)

RFI: What led you to making your first documentary? 

Sammy Baloji: In my practice I do make short films, experimental films, and I also did a few collaborative documentaries. For this project, I was doing a lot of research around the town of Yangambi [northern DRC], starting from an article in The Guardian [about trees and climate change] given to me by one of the curators of the Lubumbashi Biennial, a contemporary art platform that I co-created with a few artists in [DRC].

I was quite interested in looking at the forest and producing a [piece] of work compiling the research. And I thought that a film could be a good way, as I had already discovered all the archives related to Congolese agriculturalist Paul Panda Farnana and beyond.

So it was really interesting to think of a format that could help [us] to understand the complexity of human activity in the area. And I thought that film was kind of a great format for that.

Congolese filmmaker Baloji mixes magic with biting social commentary

You’ve centred the story around real people – Congolese agriculturalist Paul Panda Farnana and the Belgian colonial official Abiron Beirnaert. And you also wrote powerful voices for the narration, including one for a tree, through a mix of sounds and images. How did you go about this?

By doing research, I had a lot of different examples for Farnana. There were letters written by him to his mother, colonial administrative reports on him, articles published by Belgian magazines and so on.

As for Abiron Beirnaert, he didn’t write himself, and he died while he was on a mission in [what was then the Belgian Congo]. But the story of his accident and his visit to the Congo were reported by his colleagues, who wrote about his final activities.

For the voice of the tree, the text that comes with the sound of the tree, comes from all the research done by Thomas Hendricks, who’s an anthropologist who was interested in understanding international activities within the Congolese forest.

I work a lot with installations, and I have this approach to combine different sources and different elements such as sound archives, photographs or excerpts from films. And then there’s the soundscape, which I did with two sound artists. The idea was to create this kind of immersive soundscape… an immersive experience bringing together images, sounds and voices.

Why the Congo plays a critical role in saving the world’s biodiversity

Would you say the film is a work of activism?

I’m from a country – but also a province – that has been under extractivism since the end of the 19th century, for its mineral resources. This is the first time I’ve been able to provide information about how the climate has been a subject of colonial control, even the forest.

The place that I’m from is the place that served as an extraction site for uranium that was used for the atomic bomb. And there’s lithium there, which is really important for green energy. 

But there’s a continuous injustice in the ignoring of the people impacted by the extraction of these different raw materials, that serve the international economy.

I don’t just address this with the film, it’s also why we created the Lubumbashi Biennial, to bring attention to what is happening within the country from Congolese perspectives and local voices.

I wanted to look at it from a very long perspective, starting from the colonial presence in DRC, and looking at the way that all these processes are connected. It’s not coming from a place of anger – I tried to go beyond this binary way of thinking, between north and south, looking at the environment, at nature and at the relationship we have with the Earth.

This is why the tree appears. For me, it’s really about local knowledge: the tree has been in that forest for more than three centuries.

The question I’m raising is how do we rethink our connection with the environment?

The film was shown at Film Africa in London and can be viewed on the Franco-German channel Arte. Do you have plans to show it in Africa? 

It’s already been shown in South Africa at a festival, and we are thinking of having it shown in Kinshasa. And of course, the next edition of the Lubumbashi Biennial will show it next year. I can’t wait to have this moment on the continent where I can present it.

This interview has been edited for clarity.

In a bid to improve literacy levels in the country, Mutharika has announced that tuition fees, examination fees, school development fees and fees for identity cards used during examinations have all been abolished.

“I also want to direct that no public school should be requesting learners to make contributions towards the School Development Fund and any other fees, except boarding fees,” Mutharika added.

Secondary school pupils in boarding schools will still need to pay boarding fees, which remain substantial.

The move is expected to increase enrolment and lower the drop-out rate.

Although the latter has improved significantly for primary education – from 11.7 percent in 2009 to 3.2 percent in 2018, according to the national education sector investment plan – retention remains a challenge. The country has a primary school completion rate of 52 percent and a repetition rate of 24.5 percent.

In 2024, 24,371 learners dropped out of primary schools and 24,371 of secondary school. Overall, only 33 percent of children complete primary school and 4 percent upper secondary school, according to figures quoted by Malawi’s Nation newspaper.

Malawians face food insecurity and soaring unemployment as they head to polls

‘The only way out of poverty’

The country is in economic crisis, and has seen the price of goods and services soar. According to the World Bank, it is the fourth poorest in the world, with the majority of people living on less than $2.15 a day, according to 2019 estimates.

“The [previous] government has not been able to mobilise enough revenue to implement its programmes. Overall growth projection remains weak, with GDP projected to grow at 2.8 percent in 2025 from 1.7 percent in 2024, mainly attributed to low agricultural productivity, supply chain constraints and limited industrial capacity,” said Mutharika.

He added that his administration has already started taking steps to address the gaps.

Meet the Kenyan man shaping a francophone future in East Africa

Dr Foster Lungu, an education expert at Mzuzu University, said that the school fees announcement “gives hope”, but questioned how it will be implemented financially.

“Come January [when the policy is set to take effect], you may find that the schools are not well resourced, and this line of income to the schools was helping to resource those schools. Then it will be a pinch – more or less back to square one.”

Commenting on the development, Zimbabwean journalist Hopewell Chin’ono said that abolishing school fees is an “excellent start” and “a progressive move, because national education remains the only real way out of poverty for the African child”.

Chin’ono also noted, however, that around 30 percent of Malawi’s national budget is lost through corruption, quoting organisations including Transparency International.

“If [Mutharika] successfully stops this 30 percent looting, he could fund free primary and secondary education using the recovered resources… Africa has enough money to fund public services such as education.”

They are mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, aunts and uncles. All have lost a loved one in the armed conflict in Colombia. All are still searching for the truth about their disappearances.

So when Spanish-Argentinian photographer Zahara Gomez Lucini asked them to take part in a project in memory of the disappeared, they all agreed. 

The artist and activist’s book Recetario para la Memoria (“Recipe Book for Remembrance”) is an act of resistance.

Families contribute the recipe for the favourite dish of the person they have lost. In this way, Lucini makes those who are absent visible again, and conveys the pain of the families while inviting dialogue.

“I wanted to bring the subject of disappearances back to the table by approaching it in a different way. Not in an academic or technical way,” she explains.

“The aim was to extend the debate beyond the circle of experts and journalists. Colombia has a lot to teach us on this subject, whether through its transitional justice for peace or its theatrical and musical works.”

The book is the third she has made of its kind, with the first two created with the families of disappeared people in Mexico.

Turkish artist draws attention to the disappeared

Forty-four Colombian families joined the project, which is now on display at La Casa de la Memoria museum in Medellin.

The museum has installed a typical Colombian kitchen in the centre of its exhibition space. There’s a refrigerator, kitchen utensils and a wood-burning stove, and a table of ingredients, plates and bowls.

On the walls, panels display recipes accompanied by two photos: one of the dish and the other of the person who cooked it, a relative of a victim of enforced disappearance.   

Patricia Zapata took part in the project for her nephew Jorge, who disappeared in 2017.

“He was a rap singer. He had gone out to shoot the video for his latest song. And since then, there has been no news. I prepared red beans from Antioquia. They are served with plantains, rice, an egg and chicharrons – fried pork rinds.”

Patricia is part of a collective which organises regular demonstrations in memory of those who have disappeared. “It’s hard. Very hard. And there are moments, like this exhibition, that break our hearts, but it’s necessary.”

Families desperate for news of Ukraine’s disappeared

‘Restoring humanity’

After the exhibition’s opening, the public were invited to share a meal with the victims’ families.

A cooking workshop was also organised for students at the Universidad National of Medellin.

Valery Giraldo, a history student who took part, said: “It was a very good initiative. It’s another way of telling these stories of disappearance that we tend to forget. Above all, I listened to their stories. I am really very moved.”

Among the cooks that day was Maria Eugenia Naranjo. She lost her son in 2019.

“We made three dishes: soup, pasta and beans. At first, the project seemed strange to me. But I quickly realised that it was important. It reminds society of our need to discover the truth about the disappearance of our loved ones. It’s hard to live with uncertainty about their fate.”

Alongside the Colombian families is Viviana Mendoza, a Mexican buscadora (a “searcher”) who was part of Gomez Lucini’s first recipe book. She is participating in the Colombian project to show that the fight for the truth crosses borders.   

“My brother Manuel disappeared in 2018. Armed men came to his home and took him away. I continue to search for him myself in the mass graves. Here, I have prepared a caldo de espinazo [a pork soup] to restore my brother’s humanity. Because we quickly forget that they are human beings, not just names or numbers. We have normalised violence and horror too much.”  

In Colombia, according to the latest report from the Search Unit for Missing Persons in 2025, 132,877 people have been reported missing due to the armed conflict.   

After the signing of the peace agreement between the government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) guerrilla group in 2016, the International Committee of the Red Cross documented more than 2,000 additional cases.

This article was adapted from the original version in French by Najet Benrabaa, RFI’s correspondent in Bogota.

Nam, owner of Hanoi Corner in the bustling Marais neighbourhood, remembers the puzzled looks of his French customers as they discovered not just Vietnamese coffee, but the art of drinking it.

“It’s truly Vietnamese-style coffee, where we take our time,” he tells RFI. “And not everyone has 20 minutes to spare. The Vietnamese filter is the opposite of espresso.”

In Vietnam, coffee is traditionally made using a phin filter – a small metal device that slow-brews coffee drop by drop. 

At Hoa Cà Phê coffee shop in eastern Paris, Diane explains: “What we always tell customers who don’t know Vietnamese coffee at all is that they should try it in its most classic form: phin coffee, black or with condensed milk, hot or cold.”

But French customers are often most intrigued by cà phê trứng – coffee mixed with whisked egg yolks, a Hanoi delicacy.

“We have a high demand for egg coffee,” she says.

A taste of history

French colonisers first brought coffee plants to Vietnam in the 19th century, but it was only after independence that the country truly transformed coffee into an art of its own. 

A century later, it’s the Vietnamese taste that is coming to France.

“For us, coffee is linked to the history between Vietnam and France,” Nam explains. “As I am French of Vietnamese origin, I try to convey a culture that is somewhere between the two countries.

“We are happy because it allows us to showcase another side of Vietnamese culture that is a little less well known.”

The movement is growing fast. “Eight years ago, we were the only Vietnamese café in Paris. Today, I think there are about 15,” Nam says.

And new cafes are opening in the capital and beyond.

Waiters race for glory as Paris revives century-old tradition

‘Vietnamese spirit’

Vietnam’s well-known Cộng Cà Phê chain opened its first French branch in Paris in August this year.

The brand’s distinctive retro decor, evoking Vietnam of the 1970s and 80s, sets it apart from other cafes, according to customer Duyên.

“And its coconut cream coffee is truly original,” she adds.

“When coming to Paris, Cộng didn’t just want to open several coffee shops, but also to convey a Vietnamese spirit, a history of Vietnamese coffee,” says Uyên Trần, the chain’s partnership manager.

The target was firstly the Vietnamese diaspora, she says, then the international public.

‘Invisible’ origins

Vietnam is the world’s second-largest coffee exporter, right behind Brazil. It sent more than 380,000 tonnes to the European Union in 2024, making Europe its largest market.

France is the third-largest importer of Vietnamese coffee in Europe, after Germany and Italy.

Most Vietnamese coffee that reaches Europe is raw robusta, however, which is most often processed or blended into instant coffee or capsules – leaving drinkers unaware of its Vietnamese origin or signature aroma.

“For all Westerners, not just French people, Asia does not exist in terms of coffee,” says Frédéric Fortunel, a food researcher at the University of Le Mans.

“Our perception has been shaped by brands. They have constructed our image of it. And that is the paradox.

“The consequence is that Asian coffee, in general, cannot be promoted as a coffee of origin.”

How Brazil’s booming coffee industry is driving deforestation

Coffee street-style

Vietnamese coffee is distinguished as much by the way it is enjoyed as by its flavour.

For Mai Phuong, co-owner of Vỉahè Càphê near the Place de la Bastille, nothing reflects the essence of Vietnam’s coffee culture quite like small sidewalk cafes.

“For me, the best Vietnamese coffee is the kind you find in small cafes on the pavement, like in the old days,” she says.

Her co-owner and partner, Van Phu, agrees: “That was the idea, to really recreate the experience of how coffee is drunk on the streets of Vietnam.”

It wasn’t an easy concept to sell to Parisians. “It was quite daring,” Mai recalls. “No one understood why they had to sit on these low plastic chairs, like children.

“But little by little, curiosity got the better of them.”

More than 50 people died in the floods, thousands more were displaced – and an agricultural landscape a generation in the making was washed away in a single night.

Eighteen months later, the pain and uncertainty have not receded.

Forty minutes away in Naivasha, Grace, a small-scale farmer, mother of three and lifelong resident, stands on what remains of her farmland.

Where vegetables once grew, stagnant brown pools shimmer as the returning rains pour down. The foundations of her house lie broken, like a shattered clay pot. She wraps a torn shawl around her shoulders and looks to the sky as if for an answer.

“The flood took our goats, our seeds, even our soil,” she said, exhausted. “We are starting from nothing again.”

She is not alone in this. Across the Naivasha basin, families returned to plots that are no longer viable. Their wells are contaminated. Their cattle have died. Their savings were spent trying to survive. And now, as the rains return, the nightmare threatens to repeat itself.

‘Seasons are breaking down’

It is here that Dr Kamau, a climate scientist based in Naivasha, spends his days tracking shifting weather patterns.

His office is cluttered with satellite printouts and rainfall charts, and his boots still caked in mud. When he explains the changes he’s seeing, he barely looks at the papers – he knows the numbers by heart.

“We are witnessing climate whiplash,” he says. “Drought one year, floods the next. The seasons that once defined East African life are breaking down. Communities can’t adapt fast enough.”

For farmers like Grace, adaptation requires more than patience – it takes money, government support and time, and none are in ready supply.

Africa Climate Summit puts financing and resilience under the spotlight

Climate refugees

Whilst Kenya is drowning, across the border Somalia is cracking under the pressure of drought.

In Dadaab, dusty winds whip across a refugee settlement that has grown into a city in its own right. Thousands of Somali families have arrived here, fleeing not conflict but the effects of the drought.

Among them is 53-year-old Fadumo, a mother of eight from central Somalia who once owned 20 goats and a small sorghum plot.

Rich nations pledge $250bn for climate aid, but Africa demands more

But year after year, the rains didn’t come. Crops failed. Wells dried up. When her children were surviving on a single cup of tea a day, Grace did the only thing she could – she left.

“I walked for days to find water,” she says, sitting outside the temporary shelter that is now her home. “We hoped the rain would come back. But it never did.”

Her story is echoed across the Horn of Africa. Somalia has experienced its longest and most intense drought in 40 years. Humanitarian agencies also report that millions go hungry, and hundreds of thousands are displaced.

‘Paying the price’

In Kenya, Dr Kamau shakes his head when asked whether these crises can be considered natural disasters.

“Floods and droughts have always existed,” he says. “But the scale, frequency and erratic swings we’re seeing now are climate-driven. And the people paying the price are the ones who did almost nothing to cause this problem.”

East Africa accounts for less than 3 percent of global emissions, but its communities are losing livelihoods, homes and sometimes their lives.

As world leaders prepare to gather in Nairobi from 8-12 December for the seventh United Nations Environment Assembly, many in the region are asking the same question: what does climate justice look like when those who so the least to cause it suffer the most?

Hello everyone! Welcome to The Sound Kitchen weekly podcast, published every Saturday here on our website, or wherever you get your podcasts. You’ll hear the winner’s names announced and the week’s quiz question, along with all the other ingredients you’ve grown accustomed to: your letters and essays, “On This Day”, quirky facts and news, interviews, and great music … so be sure and listen every week.

Erwan and I are busy cooking up special shows with your music requests, so get them in! Send your music requests to thesoundkitchen@rfi.fr  Tell us why you like the piece of music, too – it makes it more interesting for us all!

Facebook: Be sure to send your photos for the RFI English Listeners Forum banner to thesoundkitchen@rfi.fr

More tech news: Did you know we have a YouTube channel? Just go to YouTube and write RFI English in the search bar, and there we are! Be sure to subscribe to see all our videos.

Would you like to learn French? RFI is here to help you!

Our website “Le Français facile avec rfi” has news broadcasts in slow, simple French, as well as bilingual radio dramas (with real actors!) and exercises to practice what you have heard.

Go to our website and get started! At the top of the page, click on “Test level”, and you’ll be counselled on the best-suited activities for your level according to your score.

Do not give up! As Lidwien van Dixhoorn, the head of “Le Français facile” service, told me: “Bathe your ears in the sound of the language, and eventually, you’ll get it”. She should know – Lidwien is Dutch and came to France hardly able to say “bonjour” and now she heads this key RFI department – so stick with it!

Be sure you check out our wonderful podcasts!

In addition to the breaking news articles on our site, with in-depth analysis of current affairs in France and across the globe, we have several podcasts that will leave you hungry for more.

There’s Spotlight on France, Spotlight on Africa, the International Report, and of course, The Sound Kitchen. We also have an award-winning bilingual series – an old-time radio show, with actors (!) to help you learn French, called Les voisins du 12 bis.

Remember, podcasts are radio, too! As you see, sound is still quite present in the RFI English service.  Please keep checking our website for updates on the latest from our excellent staff of journalists. You never know what we’ll surprise you with!

To listen to our podcasts from your PC, go to our website; you’ll see “Podcasts” at the top of the page. You can either listen directly or subscribe and receive them directly on your mobile phone.

To listen to our podcasts from your mobile phone, slide through the tabs just under the lead article (the first tab is “Headline News”) until you see “Podcasts”, and choose your show.  

Teachers take note!  I save postcards and stamps from all over the world to send to you for your students. If you would like stamps and postcards for your students, just write and let me know. The address is english.service@rfi.fr  If you would like to donate stamps and postcards, feel free! Our address is listed below. 

Independent RFI English Clubs: Be sure to always include Audrey Iattoni (audrey.iattoni@rfi.fr) from our Listener Relations department in all your RFI Club correspondence. Remember to copy me (thesoundkitchen@rfi.fr) when you write to her so that I know what is going on, too. N.B.: You do not need to send her your quiz answers! Email overload!

This week’s quiz: On 8 November, I asked you a question about an article sent to us by RFI English correspondent Michael Sarpong Mfum, who reports for us from Ghana. His article, “Invasive water hyacinths choke wildlife and livelihoods in southern Ghana”, is about the water hyacinth, a free-floating aquatic plant native to the Amazon River basin in South America. It’s also one of the world’s most invasive species.

The water hyacinth has found its way to Ghana, notably Lake Volta, a vast reservoir behind a hydroelectric dam that generates much of the country’s power.

Your question was: What are the consequences for Ghana’s Eastern and Volta regions from this hyacinth invasion? What did Jewel Kudjawu, the director of the EPA’s Intersectoral Network Department, warn about?

The answer is, to quote Michael’s article: “Jewel Kudjawu, director of the EPA’s Intersectoral Network Department, warned that the weed’s uncontrolled growth has dire consequences for aquatic life, fishing communities and hydropower production.”

In addition to the quiz question, there was the bonus question: What was the best week of your life?

Do you have a bonus question idea? Send it to us!

The winners are: RFI Listeners Club member Radhakrishna Pillai from Kerala State, India. Radhakrishna is also the winner of this week’s bonus question. Congratulations on your double win, Radhakrishna.

Be sure and look at The Sound Kitchen and the RFI English Listeners Forum Facebook pages to see the stamps from Bhutan with Radhakrishna’s picture!

Also on the list of lucky winners this week are Debjani Biswas, a member of the RFI Pariwar Bandhu SWL Club in Chhattisgarh, India, and RFI Listeners Club member Mahfuzur Rahman from Cumilla, Bangladesh. Rounding out the list are RFI English listeners Shihabur Rahaman Sadman from Naogaon, Bangladesh, and Bashir Ahmad, a member of the International Radio Fan and Youth Club in Khanewal, Pakistan.

Congratulations winners!

Here’s the music you heard on this week’s programme: Music for the Royal Fireworks by George Frederick Handel, performed by Le Concert des Nations conducted by Jordi Savall; “Igbo Highlife”, produced by Mr. Zion; “The Flight of the Bumblebee” by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov; “The Cakewalk” from Children’s Corner by Claude Debussy, performed by the composer, and “Lança Perfume” by Roberto de Carvalho and Rita Lee, sung by Rita Lee.

Do you have a music request? Send it to thesoundkitchen@rfi.fr

This week’s question … you must listen to the show to participate. After you’ve listened to the show, re-read Jan van der Made’s article “EU Council president rejects political influence in US security plan”, which will help you with the answer.

You have until 26 January to enter this week’s quiz; the winners will be announced on the 31 January podcast. When you enter, be sure to send your postal address with your answer, and if you have one, your RFI Listeners Club membership number.

Send your answers to:

english.service@rfi.fr

or

Susan Owensby

RFI – The Sound Kitchen

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Click here to find out how you can win a special Sound Kitchen prize.

Click here to find out how you can become a member of the RFI Listeners Club, or form your own official RFI Club. 

Earth has warmed by about 0.46C since the deal was signed and the past decade has been the hottest on record. Scientists say governments have not moved fast enough to break dependence on coal, oil and gas, even though the accord has helped lower long-term temperature forecasts.

Johan Rockstrom, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Research, warned that the gap between action and impacts has grown as temperatures continue to rise and extreme weather intensifies.

“I think it’s important that we’re honest with the world and we declare failure,” he said, adding that climate harms are arriving faster and more severely than expected.

Other voices point to progress the agreement has helped drive. Former UN climate chief Christiana Figueres said momentum has exceeded expectations.

“We’re actually in the direction that we established in Paris at a speed that none of us could have predicted,” Figueres said. The pace of worsening weather, she added, now outstrips efforts to cut emissions.

UN agencies have also warned that the world is not keeping up. UN Environment Programme head Inger Andersen said the world is “obviously falling behind”.

“We’re sort of sawing the branch on which we are sitting,” Andersen said.

Indigenous knowledge steers new protections for the high seas

Rising heat, rising losses

Each year since the Paris deal has been hotter than 2015.

Deadly heat waves have struck India, the Middle East, the Pacific Northwest and Siberia. Wildfires have burned across Hawaii, California, Europe and Australia. Severe floods have hit Pakistan, China and the American South.

Researchers say many of these disasters show signs of human-driven warming.

More than 7 trillion tonnes of ice have melted from glaciers and the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets since 2015. Sea levels have risen by 40 millimetres over the decade.

Research in medical journal The Lancet warns global economic losses tied to extreme weather reached about $304 billion last year.

Global greenhouse gas emissions reached a record 53.2 gigatons last year. Two-thirds came from China, the United States, the European Union, India, Russia, Indonesia, Brazil and Japan. Only the EU and Japan cut their annual totals.

Record surge in CO2 puts world on track for more long-term warming

Green power

The past decade has seen progress in other respects, notably renewable energy.

Renewables now supply 40 percent of global electricity and overtook coal in the first half of the year, with wind and solar covering all new demand.

According to UN assessments cited in expert analyses, solar is now 41 percent cheaper than fossil fuels and onshore wind is 53 percent cheaper. Clean-energy investment surpassed $2 trillion in 2024, double fossil-fuel spending.

Electric vehicle sales have climbed from about 1 percent of global car sales in 2015 to nearly a quarter.

“There’s no stopping it,” said Todd Stern, a former US special climate envoy who helped negotiate the Paris deal. “You cannot hold back the tides.”

Yet fossil fuels still supply about 80 percent of global energy, the same share as in 2015.

Niue, the tiny island selling the sea to save it from destruction

A narrowing window

Without the Paris deal, scientists say the world may have headed for about 4C of warming by 2100.

Existing national plans point to roughly 2.3C to 2.5C if fully delivered. Current pledges would cut emissions by about 10 percent between 2019 and 2035.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the UN’s climate science body, says they need to fall by 60 percent by 2035 to keep the 1.5C limit in reach.

Developed countries pledged $300 billion a year by 2035 at Cop29 in Baku last year, far below what developing nations say they need.

“The Paris Agreement itself has underperformed,” said Joanna Depledge, a climate negotiations historian at the University of Cambridge.

“Unfortunately, it is one of those half-full, half-empty situations where you can’t say it’s failed. But then nor can you say it’s dramatically succeeded.”

(with newswires)

RFI: The 1.5C threshold has divided governments. Some say it is unattainable, while others see it as political. Small island states defend it strongly. As a scientist and an islander, how do you see it?

Adelle Thomas: The 1.5C threshold is critical for small islands. The special IPCC report showed clearly and unequivocally that risks rise sharply as we pass 1.5C, especially for small islands and least developed countries. Going beyond 1.5C could even make some islands unable to exist in the future, particularly because of sea level rise.

RFI: Can you give an example for the Bahamas?

AT: We rely heavily on coral reefs. They protect our shores from erosion and storms. At 1.5C, about 90 percent of coral reefs may die. At 2C, that rises to 99 percent. It is serious at 1.5C and becomes existential at 2C.

For sea level rise, going past 1.5C means several metres of rise over the coming centuries. In the far future, the sea could be high enough to cover our islands.

In 2019 Hurricane Dorian was the most intense storm ever to hit the Bahamas. It completely destroyed my grandparents’ house. Only a toilet was left standing. The mangroves on their property were destroyed and have not recovered. Their settlement has still not recovered six years later.

It shows how destructive these hurricanes have become and how long recovery takes. Some communities never recover. This is why 1.5C matters so much for underserved communities.

You also see the effects in everyday life: stronger hurricanes, severe coastal erosion, beaches that have vanished, and homes that are repeatedly flooded and losing value. The impacts are already clear.

RFI: At the latest climate talks, the role of science became a point of tension. What happened?

AT: This Cop was very contentious about the role of science. Some countries questioned whether the IPCC should continue to be referred to as the best available science. Others tried to undermine the science altogether.

It reflects what we see in places where leaders discount science and climate change. These attacks often aim to weaken the pressure to cut emissions. Countries that know the science is real, that see the impacts and know they must act, need to push back.

RFI: The US administration has also blocked federal agencies from contributing to the next report. Does that affect your work?

AT: Yes. The US National Climate Assessment, which normally informs the North America chapter, has been cancelled. Without it, we have fewer studies to assess and a less complete picture of what is happening in the United States and in places where the US funds research. If the report were being written today, it would be a major gap, though other publications may eventually fill it.

‘Climate whiplash’: East Africa caught between floods and drought

RFI: Should carbon capture and storage be deployed at scale to keep the 1.5C goal alive?

AT: Carbon capture and storage is complicated. There are negative effects. In the report we will identify the trade-offs and benefits and assess whether it does more harm than good. I cannot say whether we should or should not deploy it, but it is essential that if we overshoot 1.5C we come back below it.

RFI: So technology will be essential?

AT: It may be, but there are other pathways that do not rely on it. These are political choices. Do we want to get rid of fossil fuels? Do we want electric vehicles? Do we want better energy efficiency? There are many things we can do to change behaviour and how we use and produce energy rather than relying on new technologies alone.

RFI: Is capitalism compatible with fighting global warming?

AT: I do not think it is. Our economic models and our way of interacting with nature have brought us to this crisis. If we do not rethink how we behave, we will keep going in the same direction. That is why this IPCC cycle is bringing in indigenous and local knowledge, which offers different ways of seeing the world beyond consume and discard.

Experts come from everywhere, so there is no single view. This is my personal view. The IPCC assesses what is in the literature, and there is a lot of research on this.

Cameroon’s indigenous Baka sing to save their vanishing forest home

RFI: Has the Paris Agreement failed or should we see the glass as half full?

AT: As a small islander, it is hard to see the glass as half full when water is drowning our communities. We have known for decades that global warming would hit those who contributed least to the crisis.

The Paris Agreement has bent the curve but it is not enough. We need to put our actions behind the political and flowery statements in the Agreement. We need political will to meet 1.5C.

RFI: Cop30 was meant to put adaptation at the centre. Did it meet your expectations?

AT: Personally, no. I am glad there is a new goal on adaptation finance, but developing countries wanted it by 2030. It will only be in place by 2035, which delays funding. It is a compromise.

And the basis for tripling adaptation finance is vague. Negotiations changed the language of indicators that experts had spent two years developing, making some of them unusable. Now we have another two-year process to try to make them useful. It is one step forward and half a step back.

RFI: You work in US political life. What is the atmosphere like in Congress under an administration at war with climate science?

AT: It is very sombre and very uncertain. Environmental protections that help people and nature are being rolled back in favour of oil and gas. It is disheartening to see safeguards that NGOs spent decades building being dismantled. The silver lining is at state and local level. Cities and states still have powers, and we focus on helping them push climate action.

This administration is temporary. I would not say I am optimistic, but I am neutral. Everything is temporary, including this administration.

International climate experts gather in Paris to begin 7th UN report

RFI: Some said at Cop30 that multilateralism has won. Do you agree?

AT: We did reach an agreement. It was not very ambitious, but it was an agreement.

Multilateralism has highs and lows. If we keep moving in a generally positive direction, even with small steps, that is progress.

RFI: Could you explain tipping points and what overshooting 1.5C might mean?

AT: We need more research on tipping points, when they might occur and whether they can be avoided if we go over 1.5C and come back. A major concern is tipping points in the cryosphere that could lead to multi-metre sea level rise in the far future.

The sixth assessment report showed this is an area of high uncertainty because there is not enough literature to say exactly when a tipping point is reached. There is so much money put into researching these questions. If we put as much money and attention into not exceeding 1.5C or coming back down, that would be even more useful.

This interview by RFI’s Géraud Bosman-Delzons has been lightly edited for clarity.

Accepting the top award on an LA stage on Thursday, Sandfall Interactive founder Guillaume Broche appeared both delighted and stunned.

“What a weird timeline for us,” he quipped, before thanking his team and paying tribute to what he called the industry’s “unsung heroes”.

“And also I want to extend thanks to the unsung heroes of this industry – the people who make tutorials on YouTube on how to make a game – because we had no idea how to make a game before,” Broche said, drawing laughter and applause from the audience.

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 – the first game from the French studio – tells the story of a small group of characters fighting seemingly impossible odds in a post-apocalyptic world rendered in a distinctly French visual style.

The game was nominated in more categories than any other title this year and emerged victorious in many of them, despite stiff competition from major releases such as Death Stranding 2 by industry legend Hideo Kojima of Metal Gear Solid fame, and Nintendo’s Donkey Kong Bananza.

The project began life in 2020 as a personal idea from Broche, who was then working as a developer at French gaming giant Ubisoft.

That same year, he teamed up with former colleague Tom Guillermin to form Sandfall Interactive in the southern French city of Montpellier.

Digital purrfection: how French-developed video game ‘Stray’ has cats transfixed

‘Thank you to the players’

A turning point came in 2022, when the fledgling studio struck a publishing deal with UK-based Kepler Interactive, securing the funding needed to bring the ambitious project to life.

Since its release in April this year, around 5 million copies of Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 have been sold worldwide.

“This is a passion project into which we poured our heart and soul,” Broche said in a video, standing alongside members of his team. “To be rewarded like this is just wonderful.”

Broche also gave a “massive thank you” to players, whose enthusiasm has helped propel the game from indie debut to global success.

This grassroots popularity has been visible at conventions and game fairs, where fans have turned up dressed in a striped Breton shirt and red beret – one of the most stereotypically French outfits available for characters in the game.

‘Twitching’, live streaming and video games – the future of French entertainment?

From Belle Époque Paris to global success

Set in the city of Lumière – which bears a striking resemblance to Belle Époque Paris – the action-packed story follows a group of heroes determined to defeat a powerful entity threatening their home.

While unmistakably French in tone and aesthetics, the game also draws clear inspiration from Japanese titles such as the long-running Final Fantasy franchise.

Clair Obscur is a role-playing game built around turn-based combat, pitting players against monsters inhabiting its richly imagined world.

Its popularity has been driven by a blend of emotional storytelling, endearing characters and inventive gameplay, notably the introduction of reactive rhythm-based elements that allow players to parry enemy attacks in time with the action.

Sandfall’s achievement did not go unnoticed within the industry. “Sandfall managed to present something really polished and go toe to toe with major titles,” industry specialist Benoit Reinier told reporters at the time of the game’s release.

France’s international Vivatech fair shows off world pioneers of Web3 frontier

Their success has already attracted attention beyond the gaming world. French President Emmanuel Macron hailed the team in May, thanking them for “putting the spotlight on French-style boldness and creativity”.

There are plans in the works to adapt the Expedition 33 story for the big screen.

The awards ceremony itself reflected the growing global reach of the games industry. Streamed across 30 platforms – including Amazon Prime for the first time – the show was packed with trailers for upcoming titles such as Star Wars and Tomb Raider, alongside celebrity appearances including Jason Momoa, who is set to appear in a Street Fighter film due for release next year.

(with AFP)

It’s been almost a year since Dominique Pelicot and his 50 co-defendants were found guilty of raping and sexually assaulting Gisèle Pelicot in her family home after she’d been drugged.

The verdict came after a three-month trial, the disturbing details of which were followed by millions around the world. In France, tens of thousands followed the daily Instagram posts of freelance photojournalist Anna Margueritat. 

Armed with her phone, laptop and notebook, she left Paris for the southern city of Avignon after hearing Gisèle Pelicot say she wanted the trial to be public “pour que la honte change de camp” – “so that the shame changes sides”.

Her recently published book chronicling the trial takes this phrase as its title.

“I felt very moved by this sentence… We’ve been hearing it at feminist demonstrations for a long time,” Margueritat recalls. “As a victim of rape and sexual assault, as a woman, as a feminist journalist, I wanted to be at the trial to try to understand.”

‘Shame must change sides’: France’s mass rape plaintiff becomes feminist icon

The trial was extraordinary in its scale, both for the number of defendants and for the length of time – more than a decade – over which the abuse took place. And yet Margueritat says it highlighted an everyday reality in France, where “a woman is raped or is a victim of attempted rape every two and a half minutes“.

While the trial ended with convictions for all 51 men, with sentences ranging from three to 20 years, she says it’s not just about the verdicts.

“I understood, deeply, why we refer to ‘systemic’ violence when talking about sexual violence. I understood just how far the feeling of impunity of men who are accused of sexual violence can go.”

Listen to a conversation with Anna Margueritat on the Spotlight on France podcast:

‘I wanted to disappear’

What struck Margueritat first when entering the packed courtroom was the sheer number of defendants. 

“They were everywhere. Their behaviour really shocked me, very sexist for some of them. Many of them were not ashamed,” she says. 

She describes watching them occupy the space, “like men who have the freedom to be men and to dominate women”.

During one hearing, she noticed a defendant in his glass box “staring” right at her. 

“Then he gave me the middle finger. It was like he was telling me, I have the power, even if I’m here accused of one of the worst crimes, I can still have power over you with just two eyes.”

It was, she says, a reminder that she was “a woman before being a journalist”, adding: “That was the hardest part of the trial for me.”

She reported the incident to a court official. But the response – “don’t worry… stay focused on your work” – left her feeling even more exposed. “I wanted to disappear,” she remembers.

She put aside the cropped T-shirt she’d been wearing that day and went back to her usual head-to-toe black look, tying back her long, red hair. She also instinctively wore less makeup.

Deadly attacks on women rise in France amid growing partner violence

Female solidarity

There was, however, a sense of sorority among the largely female press corps, she recalls.

“We shared the experience of being a woman inside the courthouse and outside.” It gave her the strength, she says, “to talk about this and to feel understood”.

The limited contact she had with her male colleagues was quite different. Some made “very bad jokes, sexual jokes”.

She remembers conversations with one male reporter who admitted that walking back to his hotel at night, he found himself wondering whether the men he passed “could be rapists”.

“It made us laugh,” she says. “We were like, that’s what it’s like every day for us.”

Yet she also believes these conversations were important. That male journalist, she notes, “has a daughter, he has ways to be empathetic to women’s experiences”.

‘A very difficult ordeal’: Gisèle Pelicot’s statement after mass rape trial

‘Fifty shades of rape’

As a feminist activist, Margueritat already had a strong Instagram following, but she said she was surprised to find some 50,000 people viewing her daily posts from the trial.

She believes she offered something different from mainstream courtroom reporting. “I can say that I’m a feminist journalist,” she noted. “And I don’t have a media company telling me, ‘no, you have to stay neutral’.”

While she claims no expertise in psychology or sociology, she says she could speak about what she knew: “What I see in my everyday life with other victims, with other feminist activists.”

Despite the courtroom viewing the footage of Gisèle Pelicot being raped and sexually assaulted, drugged to the point of being comatose, Margueritat says the defendants refused to see themselves as rapists or accept responsibility for their actions.

In her book, she catalogues what she calls “50 shades of rape”, chronicling the range of “ever more absurd justifications” the defendants came up with.

One man insisted that it was “my body, but not my brain”. Others claimed ignorance or fear of Dominique Pelicot, or even that Gisèle had somehow given consent “through her husband”.

Margueritat observed little remorse. “At the end of the trial only two defendants looked Gisèle Pelicot in the eyes and said: ‘I’m sorry because I’m a rapist’.”

Gisele Pelicot: French rape survivor and global icon

Signs of progress

One year on, Margueritat says the shame has “not yet” shifted to the perpetrator.

“It will take a long, long time because every time there’s a big case of sexual violence in France, it’s like we are discovering it all over again.”

And yet, she says, sexual violence is systemic: “It’s not just a succession of cases, but a very big problem in all institutions.”

However, she believes there are signs of progress. She points to the introduction of consent into the definition of rape, which MPs voted for in the wake of the Pelicot trial, and to the conviction of French film giant Gérard Depardieu for sexual assault, which shows that “no one is above the law”.

Depardieu was also ordered to pay damages to his victims for secondary victimisation – when the victim suffers further harm from how they are treated after the criminal act – caused by “outrageous and humiliating” remarks made by his lawyer, Jérémie Assous, during the trial. 

Assous called the two women “hysterical” and said they were working for the cause of “rabid feminism”.

“These remarks, by their very nature, amount to secondary victimisation,” the presiding judge said, ordering Depardieu to pay each woman €1,000 in compensation for this offence specifically.

Rallies across France in support of woman who was drugged, raped

The trial had an impact on Margueritat’s own life too. Three months ago, she finally filed a police complaint against a man she accuses of raping her.

According to the latest official figures, only 6 percent of victims of sexual violence lodge a complaint. In 2023, just 3.3 percent of rape complaints filed resulted in convictions.

Margueritat describes a weight being lifted, and says this will free her to work more on bringing other victims’ voices to the fore.

“Even if I don’t put too much hope in justice, it was important to do it.”

This article is based on a report on the Spotlight on France podcast, episode 135. Listen to other episodes here. Subscribe here. 

The complaint accusing the Bank of complicity in genocide and crimes against humanity was filed on 4 December with the senior investigating judge at the crimes against humanity division of the Paris judicial tribunal, Radio France and the Libération newspaper revealed on Thursday.

It aims to establish whether the French central bank failed in its obligations to respect a United Nations-imposed embargo on arms sales to Rwanda introduced on 17 May 1994, several weeks after the genocide began on 7 April.

During a 100-day period between April and July 1994, around 800,000 ethnic Tutsi and moderate Hutu were massacred by Hutu extremists. 

Seven transfers 

According to the plaintiffs – the Collective of Civil Parties for Rwanda (CPCR) and its founders Alain Gauthier and Dafroza Mukarumongi – not only did the Bank of France fail to freeze the account of the National Bank of Rwanda, it carried out seven transfers in its favour, for a total amount of 3.17 million francs (approximately €486,000).

The transfers took place between 5 May and 1 August, 1994.

French company Alcatel, one of the beneficiaries, is suspected of having supplied communications equipment to the Rwandan authorities. According to documents cited in the complaint, a payment amounting to 435,000 francs was made in favour of Alcatel on 5 May, 1994.

Several witness statements attest that the payment was intended for the purchase of satellite telephones, considered important equipment by the Rwandan interim government in order to maintain international communications.

Other transfers were sent to Rwandan diplomatic missions in Ethiopia, South Africa and Egypt and may have been used to purchase weapons, according to Libération.

“The Tutsi genocide was not only the work of those who killed with machetes. It was made possible by a multitude of white-collar criminals who, comfortably seated in their offices, authorised transfers and signed off on operations with administrative banality, far from the bloodshed but necessary to the genocidal machine,” said the CPCR’s lawyers Matilda Ferey and Joseph Breham, in a statement.

Rwanda marks 1994 genocide amid tensions over M23 rebellion in DRC

‘The whole world knew’

The complaint draws on documentation compiled in 1996 by two UN Development Programme (UNDP) experts, including former Belgian senator Pierre Galland, who recorded the transfers, amounts and dates.

When the Hutu-led interim government fled Rwanda in early July, Galland told Libération it “left behind many documents showing that donors had carried out transfers without sufficient oversight. The funds allowed the Rwandan army and the perpetrators of the genocide to operate. Our mission was to trace all those transfers”.

Some transfers may also have directly funded weapons purchases.

“At the time when the Bank of France facilitated these seven transactions on behalf of the génocidaires, it likely had procedures and tools in place that should have alerted it,” said Austin Kathi Lynn, founder of the Conflict Awareness Project, who investigated arms trafficking immediately after the genocide.

“Given the extensive media coverage of the Rwandan genocide, the control exercised by an unconstitutional interim government over the Rwandan state’s bank accounts, and the arms embargo imposed on Rwanda, certain transactions involving the génocidaires should have been flagged as potentially illegal.”

The plaintiffs argue that the Bank of France could not have been unaware of the context.

“Hutu militants were carrying out systematic extermination wherever they could – in churches, in schools,” Alain Gauthier told Radio France. “The whole world knew. How could the Bank of France and French authorities not have known?”

Court weighs survivors’ claim that French troops stood by during Rwanda genocide

‘No trace of transfers’

The Bank of France told Libération that it had only been able to carry out “summary searches” given the “particularly short” deadline since the complaint was filed.

“At this stage, we have found no trace of the transfers mentioned,” it said, adding that all account documents have to be destroyed after a period of 10 years, in line with banking regulations.

Gauthier, who has spent decades documenting the involvement of French banks in the genocide, justified the delay in filing the complaint.

“[It] may seem belated, because it took us a long time to realise that the Bank of France could also be prosecuted for having used funds from the Bank of Rwanda for the purchase of weapons.”

He also criticised the slow pace of justice, noting that a 2017 complaint against BNP Paribas for similar transfers remains unresolved.

New research suggests deliberate fire-setting took place in what is now eastern England around 400,000 years ago, pushing back the earliest known date for controlled fire-making by roughly 350,000 years.

Until now, the oldest confirmed evidence had come from Neanderthal sites in northern France dating to about 50,000 years ago.

The findings, published in the journal Nature, centre on the Paleolithic site of Barnham in Suffolk, which has been excavated intermittently for decades.

A team led by the British Museum identified a distinctive patch of baked clay, flint hand axes fractured by extreme heat, and two fragments of iron pyrite – a mineral that produces sparks when struck against flint.

Together, the clues point to deliberate, controlled fire-making rather than a chance blaze.

French cave findings suggest Europe’s first Homo sapiens arrived earlier than thought

A hearth, not a wildfire

Researchers spent four years subjecting the site to detailed analysis to rule out the possibility of natural wildfires. Geochemical tests showed temperatures had exceeded 700 degrees Celsius, with signs of repeated burning in the same location over time.

That pattern, the scientists say, is far more consistent with a constructed hearth than a lightning strike.

Rob Davis, a Paleolithic archaeologist at the British Museum, said the combination of high temperatures, controlled burning and pyrite fragments together show “how they were actually making the fire and the fact they were making it”.

Crucially, iron pyrite does not occur naturally at Barnham. Its presence suggests the people who lived there deliberately collected it, understanding its properties and how it could be used to ignite tinder.

Such evidence is rare, as deliberate fire-making is seldom preserved in the archaeological record: ash disperses easily, charcoal decays and heat-altered sediments are often eroded over time.

At Barnham, however, the burned deposits were sealed within ancient pond sediments, allowing scientists to reconstruct how early humans used the site.

Nick Ashton, curator of Paleolithic collections at the British Museum, called it “the most exciting discovery of my long 40-year career”.

Oldest known Neanderthal engravings found in French cave

Evolutionary progress

Fire had significant consequences for early populations, allowing them to survive colder climates, deter predators and cook food. 

Chris Stringer, a human evolution specialist at the UK’s Natural History Museum, said fossils from Britain and Spain suggest the inhabitants of Barnham were early Neanderthals. Their cranial features and DNA, he noted, point to growing cognitive and technological sophistication at this stage in human evolution.

Archaeologists say the Barnham site fits into a wider pattern seen across Britain and continental Europe between 500,000 and 400,000 years ago.

During this period, brain size in early humans began to approach modern levels, while evidence for increasingly complex behaviour becomes more visible in the archaeological record.

(with newswires)

On 5 December, videos livestreamed on social media show three men taking the ferry from England to France, to carry out what amounts to an anti-migrant patrol. 

They can be seen in various areas on the northern French coast. In Dunkirk, they confronted members of Doctors Without Borders (MSF), accusing them of assisting an “invasion”.

On the beach in Gravelines, one of many where small boats set out on the risky Channel crossing, the men shouted insults at people they believed to be aid workers. 

“We’re very worried,” Stella, a representative of Calais-based NGO L’Auberge des Migrants, told RFI.

Charities working in the region estimate that British activists have carried out 10 similar stunts since the summer of 2024.

“We keep reporting what is happening to all the authorities,” Stella said. “We don’t know how far they might go.”

Humanitarian groups challenge UK-France migration deal in French court

Far-right initiatives

The incidents appear to be part of a trend stoked by figures on the British far right. 

Le Monde newspaper identified one of the men involved in the visit last week as Ryan Bridge, co-founder of Raising the Colours, a nationalist group that organised a campaign to hang or paint flags across the UK earlier this year.

It named another as Danny Thomas, an associate of prominent far-right activist Tommy Robinson.

The pair last month posted online about what they dubbed “Operation Overlord” – a reference to the Allied invasion of occupied Europe during the Second World War that landed on the beaches of northern France – and called for donations to support trips to France.

Videos shared online appear to show other members of the group in northern France in November, some brandishing English flags and claiming to have destroyed dinghies used by migrants. 

While Raising the Colours remains a grassroots movement, British anti-immigration political party Ukip has also been backing the trips. In June, the party’s leader Nick Tenconi filmed himself in northern France and appealed to other people to join him.

The party has since launched what it calls a “Border Protection Team” with a mission to “defend our islands”. 

Anti-migrant unrest erupts despite UK’s tightening of migration policy

Attack on migrants

French organisations report that they have been forced to be vigilant after a series of alarming incidents. 

In early June, around six men – dressed in black and speaking English – tried to force their way into a centre in Calais where NGOs deliver food and other aid to migrants. 

On the night of 9-10 September, four men carrying the flags of England and the UK attacked migrants as they slept in Grand-Fort-Philippe near Dunkirk and took their belongings, according to NGO Utopia 56, which filed a police complaint.

Based on an account given by one of the victims, the group believes the perpetrators were the same individuals seen in a video later shared by Ukip, said Utopia 56’s coordinator, Viktor Meyer. 

The Dunkirk public prosecutor’s office has opened a preliminary investigation into “aggravated assault”.

The story was adapted from the original version in French by Marie Casadebaig.

“Palestinian armed groups committed violations of international humanitarian law, war crimes and crimes against humanity during their attacks in southern Israel that started on 7 October, 2023,” the human rights watchdog said in a 173-page report.

It said that the mass killing of civilians that day amounted to “the crime against humanity of extermination”.

Amnesty also cited the seizure and mistreatment of hostages by Hamas and other armed groups in Gaza, noting that this was done “as part of an explicitly stated plan explained by the leadership of Hamas and of other Palestinian armed groups”.

Hamas’s 7 October attack on Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,221 people, and 251 people were taken hostage that day, 44 of whom were dead.

Of the 207 hostages taken alive, 41 died or were killed in captivity. At the time of writing, all hostages have been returned as part of a ceasefire in Gaza except for the body of one Israeli officer.

Israel awaits return of last hostage remains from Gaza

Hamas ‘chiefly responsible’

Among the acts listed as crimes against humanity by Amnesty were murder, extermination, imprisonment, torture, enforced disappearance, rape and “other forms of sexual violence”.

For the latter crimes, it said that it was not able to interview survivors except for one case, and therefore could not offer a conclusion on the scope or scale of sexual violence. 

Hamas, including its armed wing the Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades, was deemed “chiefly responsible” for the crimes. Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades and “unaffiliated Palestinian civilians” bore lesser responsibility.

Amnesty has previously accused Hamas and other groups of committing war crimes, which are serious violations of international law against civilians and combatants during armed conflict..

France points to Netanyahu immunity from ICC war crimes warrant

In May 2024, the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued arrest warrants for then-Hamas political bureau chief Ismail Haniyeh, armed wing head Mohammed Deif, and Yahya Sinwar, who was widely seen as the mastermind of the 7 October attacks.

The ICC withdrew the warrants after the trio were killed by Israel later that year. A separate warrant remains active for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant over alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

Amnesty accuses Israel of ‘live-streamed genocide’ in Gaza

In December 2024, Amnesty accused Israel of committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza during its war with Hamas – an allegation Israel has rejected as “entirely false” and “fabricated”.

Amnesty then warned last month that Israel was “still committing genocide”, despite a ceasefire which came into effect on 10 October.

Israel’s retaliatory assault on Gaza has killed at least 70,369 people, according to the territory’s health ministry, figures considered reliable by the United Nations.

(with newswires)

Talks between between EU countries and the European Parliament collapsed on Wednesday without an agreement, meaning negotiations will continue in January to decide whether familiar names for plant-based foods can stay on shelves or be forced to change.

Many livestock farmers say plant-based names mislead shoppers and threaten a sector already under strain. French industry group Interbev said the use of meat terms “confuses consumers and undermines recognition” in meat products.

Environmentalists and consumer advocates have criticised the plan, with the French news agency AFP reporting that they argue shoppers choose plant-based products intentionally and do not confuse them with meat.

EU consumption of plant-based alternatives has grown five-fold since 2011, according to consumer group BEUC.

In October, European lawmakers backed a proposal put forward by a French MEP to reserve labels like “burger” and “sausage” for foods that contain meat. 

Member states discussed the idea with representatives from the parliament on Wednesday as part of a wider package aimed at supporting farmers. But after several hours of talks, no agreement was reached.

‘A steak is a steak’: EU Parliament votes to ban meat terms for vegetarian food

German retail backlash

Germany, Europe’s biggest market for plant-based products, has become a major opponent of a ban.

AFP reports that discount chains Lidl and Aldi fear sales could fall if the names change and say current labels are already familiar to consumers. The two retailers have spoken out publicly against the measure.

Paul McCartney, a longtime vegetarian, has joined the opposition, co-signing a letter asking Brussels not to proceed. “We urge you not to adopt these restrictions, as we are deeply concerned about the significant global impact they could have,” the letter said.

“The evidence is clear: existing legislation already protects consumers; consumers themselves overwhelmingly understand and support current naming conventions.”

Farmers and their supporters say the issue is not about removing plant-based options but about clarity and tradition. French MEP Céline Imart – the architect of the ban and herself a farmer – said the goal was to avoid “a mix-up” with meat products and protect the value of established terms.

She said it was “in no way about banning plant-based alternatives but I am attached to preserving these terms and their true meaning”.

EU rules France can’t stop veggie products being called ‘steak’

Farm pressure and politics

Interbev argues that plant-based products “blur the lines and weaken recognition” of a raw and natural product by using meat names for marketing.

France passed its own label ban in 2024 during farmer protests, but the decree was struck down in January after the EU’s top court backed a challenge.

A similar EU proposal was rejected by lawmakers in 2020. The balance of power has shifted since then, with right-wing parties gaining ground in the 2024 EU elections and highlighting their ties to the farm sector.

Even so, there is no full agreement. Manfred Weber, leader of the centre-right bloc in the European Parliament, dismissed the plan as “not a priority at all”, saying “consumers are not stupid”, French TV BFM reported.

Negotiations are expected to continue after Thursday before any final deal emerges.

(with newswires)

Eyewitness footage whose filming location was verified by AFP showed M23 tanks rolling through the streets of Uvira, while local and military sources said the militia had control of the provincial governor’s headquarters, city hall and border with neighbouring Burundi.

Streets had emptied, shops shuttered and soldiers fled after the militia’s entry late on Tuesday plunged the city of several hundred thousand residents into uncertainty over who was in charge.

It comes less than a year after the anti-government group seized Goma and Bukavu, two provincial capitals in the mineral-rich eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, which has been plagued by conflict for around three decades.

“I went to the border that separates our two countries; I saw that it’s M23 fighters who are manning the checkpoint on the Congolese side,” a Burundian army officer told AFP.

A civil society representative and a local official confirmed the presence of the group’s fighters at the provincial governor’s headquarters and city hall.

The latest offensive – launched on December 1 against the Congolese army backed by Burundian forces and allied armed groups – has further shaken hopes that an agreement brokered by US President Donald Trump will succeed in halting the conflict.

Congolese President Felix Tshisekedi and his Rwandan counterpart Paul Kagame signed the deal in Washington last Thursday.

“Signing an agreement and not implementing it is a humiliation for everyone, and first and foremost for President Trump,” Burundian Foreign Minister Edouard Bizimana told AFP.

“It’s truly a slap in the face to the United States, a middle finger,” he said, calling for sanctions against Rwanda.

Rwanda accused the DRC and Burundi of deliberately violating the peace agreement, in a statement Wednesday. A day earlier, the United States and European powers urged the M23 to “immediately halt” its offensive and for Rwanda to pull its troops out of eastern DRC.

Thousands flee DR Congo fighting as M23 enters key city

Border closed

Burundi, which neighbours both the DRC and Rwanda, views the prospect of Uvira falling to Rwanda-backed forces as an existential threat.

Uvira sits across Lake Tanganyika from the Burundian economic capital Bujumbura, with only around 20 kilometres (12 miles) between the two cities.

Burundi’s main border posts with the DRC were closed on Tuesday afternoon and are now considered “military zones”, military and police sources told AFP.

The M23 has closed the border on the Congolese side, according to local and military sources, though it is not yet clear whether the armed group has taken control of Uvira.

Several Congolese army soldiers and members of pro-DRC militia were still seen in the area of Uvira, military sources and witnesses said.

A few stray shots were reported.

Residents speaking to AFP by telephone reported an “every-man-for-himself” mentality and growing panic.

“The residents are locked inside their homes,” one told AFP.

“We don’t understand anything, we can only wait for new authorities to take over. We can’t remain without an army or police,” said another.

Congolese soldiers, some of whom had abandoned their weapons and uniforms, fled, looting shops and a pharmacy as they went, according to witnesses and military sources.

M23, DR Congo ink fresh framework agreement for a peace deal in Doha

Threatened

More than 40,000 Congolese have fled the fighting and arrived in Burundi in the space of a week, the Burundian foreign minister told AFP.

According to an initial estimate by United Nations humanitarian agency OCHA, more than 200,000 people have been displaced within South Kivu province since December 2.

Meanwhile, thousands of others have crossed the border into neighbouring countries, especially Burundi but also Rwanda.

The latest advance on Uvira marks a new blow for the Congolese government.

According to several European diplomatic sources, the DRC fears the M23 pushing on towards the copper- and cobalt-rich Katanga province in the southeast, the vast country’s mining hub — which the state relies on to fill its coffers thanks to mining companies’ taxes.

The peace agreement — which Trump called a “miracle” deal — includes an economic portion intended to secure US supplies of critical minerals present in the region, as the United States seeks to challenge China’s dominance in the sector.

The M23 is supported by up to 7,000 Rwandan troops in the Congolese east, according to UN experts, who accuse Rwanda of seeking to extract the DRC’s mineral wealth.

Burundi, which has thorny relations with Rwanda and fears a wider conflict in Africa’s Great Lakes region, has deployed around 18,000 men to eastern DRC.

Over €1.5 billion pledged for Africa’s Great Lakes region at Paris conference

While denying giving the M23 military support, Rwanda argues it faces an existential threat from the presence across the Congolese border of ethnic Hutu militants with links to the 1994 Rwandan genocide of the Tutsis.

The arrests, which reportedly took place on Wednesday, were carried out as part of investigations into the sale of illegal products on online marketplaces including Asian giants Shein and AliExpress.

A source close to the investigation told French news agency AFP the arrests took place “across the whole of the country” as part of several separate inquiries.

According to French daily Libération, which first reported the arrests, the suspects are men, five of whom are known to the authorities for child abuse offences.

One of the arrests took place near Nice, the city’s public prosecutor Damien Martinelli confirmed to AFP.

According to Libération, officers searching the suspect’s home found a sex doll ordered earlier this year from the AliExpress website, as well as two other dolls with a childlike appearance.

Police are conducting interviews in Toulouse, Verdun and Rouen, Franceinfo public media reported.

French police dismantle widespread paedophilia network hidden on Telegram

Online marketplaces in firing line

In early November, the Directorate-General for Competition, Consumer Affairs and Fraud Control (DGCCRF) asked prosecutors to look into the sale of childlike sex dolls by the e-commerce giant Shein.

The Paris prosecutor’s office later announced that it instructed the Office for Minors to pursue four investigations, covering the sale of illegal products on platforms Shein, AliExpress, Temu and Wish.

The investigations concern the “distribution of violent, pornographic or dignity-violating content accessible to a minor” across the four sites, the prosecutor’s office said.

In the case of Shein and AliExpress, which were offering dolls with a childlike appearance, the investigations also relate to the “distribution of the image or representation of a minor of a pornographic nature”.

Temu said the DGCCRF’s referral “did not in any way relate to the sale of sex dolls with a childlike appearance”, while Shein and AliExpress said they had removed all the listings identified.

Survivors decry failures exposed in France’s biggest paedophilia trial

Call for controls

In the town of Melun, south of Paris, an investigation has been opened against the company ObeyMe Dolls for selling dolls with a childlike appearance.

At the end of November, the Paris prosecutor’s office announced it was taking online marketplaces AliExpress and Joom to court for selling childlike sex dolls.

It also announced an inquiry targeting the US platform eBay. Trade Minister Serge Papin said that sales of “category A weapons, such as knuckledusters and machetes” had been detected on eBay, as well as on Wish, Temu and AliExpress.

French judges will rule on 19 December on the government’s request to suspend Shein for three months over the sale of illegal products.

Last week France called for Shein to put controls in place on its website, including age verification and filtering.

(with AFP)

At a Council of Europe meeting in Strasbourg on Wednesday, justice ministers from the organisation’s 46 member states defended the need to revamp the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) for the modern age.

It came six months after nine countries – including Italy, Denmark, Poland and Belgium – published a letter criticising the ECHR for setting “too many limits” on their power to expel people from their territories.

The 46 nations will now work towards adopting a “political declaration” on the issue of migration at a summit next May.

Alain Berset, secretary-general of the Council of Europe, which oversees the convention, said signatory countries were not calling for the treaty itself to be rewritten.

“It was the start of a process, on a consensus basis, because it is the only way to make some progress,” he told reporters after Wednesday’s meeting.

Migration issues ‘high on agenda’

The talks took place as Europe continues to tighten migration policy.

In early December, European Union member states agreed to make deportations easier and to expand the processing of asylum seekers outside Europe.

In recent years, the link between the European Convention on Human Rights and national measures to control migration has become the subject of intense political debate in many Council of Europe states.

“Migration issues are high on the agenda of countries and people across Europe,” said Berset ahead of the meeting.

“The European Convention on Human Rights provides the framework we need to address these issues effectively and responsibly. Our task is not to weaken the convention, but to keep it strong and relevant – to ensure that liberty and security, justice and responsibility, are held in balance.”

According to various sources cited by legal analysts, between 15 and 20 states now back the initiative launched by Denmark and Italy to narrow how parts of the convention are applied in migration cases.

Some governments have gone further. Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk has threatened to denounce the convention if a ruling expected in early 2026 on Polish pushbacks of migrants goes against his government.

EU pushes ahead with overhaul of migration rules as ‘return hubs’ approved

Push for reform

The debate centres on two key articles of the convention often used by those challenging deportation orders. Article 3 bans torture and inhuman or degrading treatment. Article 8 protects the right to respect for private and family life.

Belgian jurist Marc Bossuyt, a former president of Belgium’s constitutional court and a critic of the ECHR’s approach to migration, told French daily Le Monde that governments are “fed up with the interpretation of the Strasbourg court”.

He said he believes in these instruments and the rule of law, but argued that “international treaties established long ago must be applied in current circumstances”.

Bossuyt said the ECHR’s reading of Article 3 goes too far by not only banning torture but also requiring states to provide a “decent asylum procedure” and “decent reception” for asylum seekers, which he argues falls outside the article.

He also called for a more restrictive reading of Article 8, warning that as long as the court in Strasbourg interprets it broadly, “it is normal that national judges follow it”.

In the UK, the debate has seen calls by the right-wing Conservative Party and anti-immigration Reform UK to quit the convention.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer, of the left-wing Labour Party, has instead pushed for reform from within.

In a joint article with Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen, he argued that the convention should be updated to deal with “mass mobility” and said that “listening to legitimate concerns and acting on them is what our politics is about”.

British Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has already announced plans to curb the use of Article 8 in deportation appeals and to reassess how Article 3 is applied. She said the definition of these rights “has reached the heights of absurdity”.

“Today we try to deport criminals, but we find it is impossible because the prisons in their home countries have cells deemed too small, or even mental health services less effective than ours,” she said.

Under pressure? EU states on edge over migrant redistribution plan

Warnings from legal experts

Many legal scholars reject the claim that the court is blocking migration control. Strasbourg law professor Peggy Ducoulombier told Le Monde that in 10 years, immigration cases made up less than 2 percent of the court’s 420,000 applications and that more than 90 percent were rejected as inadmissible or because there was no violation.

“One can disagree with a ruling, but this system protects all of us,” she said. “We have a lot to lose by weakening it.”

Céline Romainville, a law professor at the Catholic University of Louvain, said many attacks on the court “blow up one ruling without putting it in context” and do not take into account the full body of case law.

Officials at the Council of Europe and legal commentators say states are now working towards an interpretative declaration on migration and the convention, to be agreed by 2026, which would give political guidance to the court on how to apply the treaty.

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has warned that journalists are facing increasing dangers worldwide, with Israel emerging as the most lethal country for media workers for the third year running.

In its annual report, the Paris-based watchdog says 67 journalists were killed over the past 12 months – and almost half of them died in Gaza at the hands of Israeli forces.

Twenty-nine Palestinian journalists were killed by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) during the reporting period, alongside what RSF calls “a whole strategy” by Israeli authorities that has severely restricted reporting on the conflict.

The NGO’s director Thibaud Bruttin told RFI that the pattern of deaths in Gaza cannot be dismissed as the tragic fallout of war.

“There has been a whole strategy that has been put in place since October 2023,” he explained.

“First, there has been the decision to block the entry of Gaza to international journalists. Second, there has been a unit set up within the Israel Defence Forces to smear Palestinian journalists… and then we’ve seen massive strikes against journalists, which have been actually claimed as targeted strikes by the IDF.”

RSF says nearly 220 journalists have been killed since the Gaza war began in late 2023. Of those, the organisation believes 56 have been deliberately targeted.

Bruttin stressed that RSF is not including people loosely associated with Hamas in that count, as some Israeli officials have claimed.

“We’re talking about journalists – reporters who have been working, some of them for years, with respected international outlets – and these independent reporters have been deliberately targeted by the IDF.”

The report also highlights one of the deadliest attacks on media workers this year – a so-called ‘double-tap’ strike on a hospital in south Gaza on 25 August, which killed five journalists, including contributors to news agencies Reuters and the Associated Press.

French unions take Israel to court for restricting media access to Gaza

Information blackout

A key concern for RSF is the ongoing block on independent media access to Gaza. Foreign reporters can only enter on tightly controlled military tours, despite sustained calls from media groups and press freedom organisations.

The Foreign Press Association in Israel has taken the matter to court, challenging the IDF’s decision to deny access.

Bruttin said the case has reached a critical point. “There has been an intermediary decision by the Supreme Court… and we’re expecting any time in the coming weeks a decision which should, we hope, enable the press to enter.”

He added that a combination of the restrictions and IDF smear campaigns has cooled global solidarity with Palestinian journalists.

“The smear campaign … has had an impact on the solidarity among the profession,” he said. “It has been very hard to attract the attention of news media globally, and these news media outlets have been very timid in voicing concern over the fate of Palestinian journalists.”

But the scale of the recent strikes appears to have shifted sentiment. According to Bruttin, the deadly attacks of 10 and 25 August prompted “an uptick in the interest of media around this”, allowing RSF to launch a major drive on 1 September that “blew away the smear campaign of the IDF”.

With a fragile ceasefire now in place, he hopes momentum will grow around reopening access to Gaza and restoring independent reporting.

‘Nowhere in Gaza is safe’ says RFI correspondent amid call for global media access

Beyond the Middle East

While Gaza dominates the headlines, RSF’s report shows that the risks for journalists are a global concern.

Mexico remains one of the world’s most perilous environments for reporters, despite government pledges of greater protection. Nine journalists were killed there in 2025 – the deadliest year in at least three years.

Bruttin warns that the danger is spreading across Latin America. “The phenomenon has extended beyond the borders of Mexico,” he said. “We’ve seen journalists killed in Honduras, in Guatemala, in Peru, in Ecuador, in Colombia.”

Around a quarter of all journalists killed this year were in Latin America, with many targeted by cartels, narco-traffickers and armed groups. This trend, he said, is “very concerning” and presents a serious challenge for governments attempting to safeguard reporters.

Sudan and Ukraine also continue to be among the most dangerous places from which to report, with conflict making journalists prime targets on all sides.

Global press freedom at ‘tipping point’, media watchdog RSF warns

Journalists detained

Alongside killings, RSF’s report documents a surge in the number of journalists imprisoned for their work.

As of early December, 503 journalists were behind bars in 47 countries. China tops the list with 121 detained, followed by Russia with 48 and Myanmar with 47.

Bruttin believes the international community can do far more to secure the release of detained reporters.

“We need to effectively, deliberately campaign for the release of journalists,” he said. He pointed to the case of Wall Street Journal correspondent Evan Gershkovich, who was released as part of a prisoner swap with Russia. “If governments prioritise the release of journalists, they can meet success.”

He expressed particular concern for the 26 Ukrainian journalists detained by Russia, many “outside of any legal framework”.

He told RFI that Ukraine has the ability to prioritise their release through prisoner exchanges, citing a recent precedent in which RSF helped confirm proof of life for a detained Ukrainian reporter, forcing Russia to acknowledge holding him. “He was part of one of the latest prisoner swaps,” Bruttin noted.

Although the overall number of journalist deaths remains below the highs of the early 2010s, RSF says the deliberate targeting of reporters and the erosion of access to information are becoming worryingly entrenched.

Hello everyone! Welcome to The Sound Kitchen weekly podcast, published every Saturday here on our website, or wherever you get your podcasts. You’ll hear the winner’s names announced and the week’s quiz question, along with all the other ingredients you’ve grown accustomed to: your letters and essays, “On This Day”, quirky facts and news, interviews, and great music … so be sure and listen every week.

Erwan and I are busy cooking up special shows with your music requests, so get them in! Send your music requests to thesoundkitchen@rfi.fr  Tell us why you like the piece of music, too – it makes it more interesting for us all!

Facebook: Be sure to send your photos for the RFI English Listeners Forum banner to thesoundkitchen@rfi.fr

More tech news: Did you know we have a YouTube channel? Just go to YouTube and write RFI English in the search bar, and there we are! Be sure to subscribe to see all our videos.

Would you like to learn French? RFI is here to help you!

Our website “Le Français facile avec rfi” has news broadcasts in slow, simple French, as well as bilingual radio dramas (with real actors!) and exercises to practice what you have heard.

Go to our website and get started! At the top of the page, click on “Test level”, and you’ll be counselled on the best-suited activities for your level according to your score.

Do not give up! As Lidwien van Dixhoorn, the head of “Le Français facile” service, told me: “Bathe your ears in the sound of the language, and eventually, you’ll get it”. She should know – Lidwien is Dutch and came to France hardly able to say “bonjour” and now she heads this key RFI department – so stick with it!

Be sure you check out our wonderful podcasts!

In addition to the breaking news articles on our site, with in-depth analysis of current affairs in France and across the globe, we have several podcasts that will leave you hungry for more.

There’s Spotlight on France, Spotlight on Africa, the International Report, and of course, The Sound Kitchen. We also have an award-winning bilingual series – an old-time radio show, with actors (!) to help you learn French, called Les voisins du 12 bis.

Remember, podcasts are radio, too! As you see, sound is still quite present in the RFI English service.  Please keep checking our website for updates on the latest from our excellent staff of journalists. You never know what we’ll surprise you with!

To listen to our podcasts from your PC, go to our website; you’ll see “Podcasts” at the top of the page. You can either listen directly or subscribe and receive them directly on your mobile phone.

To listen to our podcasts from your mobile phone, slide through the tabs just under the lead article (the first tab is “Headline News”) until you see “Podcasts”, and choose your show.  

Teachers take note!  I save postcards and stamps from all over the world to send to you for your students. If you would like stamps and postcards for your students, just write and let me know. The address is english.service@rfi.fr  If you would like to donate stamps and postcards, feel free! Our address is listed below. 

Independent RFI English Clubs: Be sure to always include Audrey Iattoni (audrey.iattoni@rfi.fr) from our Listener Relations department in all your RFI Club correspondence. Remember to copy me (thesoundkitchen@rfi.fr) when you write to her so that I know what is going on, too. N.B.: You do not need to send her your quiz answers! Email overload!

This week’s quiz: On 8 November, I asked you a question about an article sent to us by RFI English correspondent Michael Sarpong Mfum, who reports for us from Ghana. His article, “Invasive water hyacinths choke wildlife and livelihoods in southern Ghana”, is about the water hyacinth, a free-floating aquatic plant native to the Amazon River basin in South America. It’s also one of the world’s most invasive species.

The water hyacinth has found its way to Ghana, notably Lake Volta, a vast reservoir behind a hydroelectric dam that generates much of the country’s power.

Your question was: What are the consequences for Ghana’s Eastern and Volta regions from this hyacinth invasion? What did Jewel Kudjawu, the director of the EPA’s Intersectoral Network Department, warn about?

The answer is, to quote Michael’s article: “Jewel Kudjawu, director of the EPA’s Intersectoral Network Department, warned that the weed’s uncontrolled growth has dire consequences for aquatic life, fishing communities and hydropower production.”

In addition to the quiz question, there was the bonus question: What was the best week of your life?

Do you have a bonus question idea? Send it to us!

The winners are: RFI Listeners Club member Radhakrishna Pillai from Kerala State, India. Radhakrishna is also the winner of this week’s bonus question. Congratulations on your double win, Radhakrishna.

Be sure and look at The Sound Kitchen and the RFI English Listeners Forum Facebook pages to see the stamps from Bhutan with Radhakrishna’s picture!

Also on the list of lucky winners this week are Debjani Biswas, a member of the RFI Pariwar Bandhu SWL Club in Chhattisgarh, India, and RFI Listeners Club member Mahfuzur Rahman from Cumilla, Bangladesh. Rounding out the list are RFI English listeners Shihabur Rahaman Sadman from Naogaon, Bangladesh, and Bashir Ahmad, a member of the International Radio Fan and Youth Club in Khanewal, Pakistan.

Congratulations winners!

Here’s the music you heard on this week’s programme: Music for the Royal Fireworks by George Frederick Handel, performed by Le Concert des Nations conducted by Jordi Savall; “Igbo Highlife”, produced by Mr. Zion; “The Flight of the Bumblebee” by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov; “The Cakewalk” from Children’s Corner by Claude Debussy, performed by the composer, and “Lança Perfume” by Roberto de Carvalho and Rita Lee, sung by Rita Lee.

Do you have a music request? Send it to thesoundkitchen@rfi.fr

This week’s question … you must listen to the show to participate. After you’ve listened to the show, re-read Jan van der Made’s article “EU Council president rejects political influence in US security plan”, which will help you with the answer.

You have until 26 January to enter this week’s quiz; the winners will be announced on the 31 January podcast. When you enter, be sure to send your postal address with your answer, and if you have one, your RFI Listeners Club membership number.

Send your answers to:

english.service@rfi.fr

or

Susan Owensby

RFI – The Sound Kitchen

80, rue Camille Desmoulins

92130 Issy-les-Moulineaux

France

Click here to find out how you can win a special Sound Kitchen prize.

Click here to find out how you can become a member of the RFI Listeners Club, or form your own official RFI Club. 

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has warned that journalists are facing increasing dangers worldwide, with Israel emerging as the most lethal country for media workers for the third year running.

In its annual report, the Paris-based watchdog says 67 journalists were killed over the past 12 months – and almost half of them died in Gaza at the hands of Israeli forces.

Twenty-nine Palestinian journalists were killed by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) during the reporting period, alongside what RSF calls “a whole strategy” by Israeli authorities that has severely restricted reporting on the conflict.

The NGO’s director Thibaud Bruttin told RFI that the pattern of deaths in Gaza cannot be dismissed as the tragic fallout of war.

“There has been a whole strategy that has been put in place since October 2023,” he explained.

“First, there has been the decision to block the entry of Gaza to international journalists. Second, there has been a unit set up within the Israel Defence Forces to smear Palestinian journalists… and then we’ve seen massive strikes against journalists, which have been actually claimed as targeted strikes by the IDF.”

RSF says nearly 220 journalists have been killed since the Gaza war began in late 2023. Of those, the organisation believes 56 have been deliberately targeted.

Bruttin stressed that RSF is not including people loosely associated with Hamas in that count, as some Israeli officials have claimed.

“We’re talking about journalists – reporters who have been working, some of them for years, with respected international outlets – and these independent reporters have been deliberately targeted by the IDF.”

The report also highlights one of the deadliest attacks on media workers this year – a so-called ‘double-tap’ strike on a hospital in south Gaza on 25 August, which killed five journalists, including contributors to news agencies Reuters and the Associated Press.

French unions take Israel to court for restricting media access to Gaza

Information blackout

A key concern for RSF is the ongoing block on independent media access to Gaza. Foreign reporters can only enter on tightly controlled military tours, despite sustained calls from media groups and press freedom organisations.

The Foreign Press Association in Israel has taken the matter to court, challenging the IDF’s decision to deny access.

Bruttin said the case has reached a critical point. “There has been an intermediary decision by the Supreme Court… and we’re expecting any time in the coming weeks a decision which should, we hope, enable the press to enter.”

He added that a combination of the restrictions and IDF smear campaigns has cooled global solidarity with Palestinian journalists.

“The smear campaign … has had an impact on the solidarity among the profession,” he said. “It has been very hard to attract the attention of news media globally, and these news media outlets have been very timid in voicing concern over the fate of Palestinian journalists.”

But the scale of the recent strikes appears to have shifted sentiment. According to Bruttin, the deadly attacks of 10 and 25 August prompted “an uptick in the interest of media around this”, allowing RSF to launch a major drive on 1 September that “blew away the smear campaign of the IDF”.

With a fragile ceasefire now in place, he hopes momentum will grow around reopening access to Gaza and restoring independent reporting.

‘Nowhere in Gaza is safe’ says RFI correspondent amid call for global media access

Beyond the Middle East

While Gaza dominates the headlines, RSF’s report shows that the risks for journalists are a global concern.

Mexico remains one of the world’s most perilous environments for reporters, despite government pledges of greater protection. Nine journalists were killed there in 2025 – the deadliest year in at least three years.

Bruttin warns that the danger is spreading across Latin America. “The phenomenon has extended beyond the borders of Mexico,” he said. “We’ve seen journalists killed in Honduras, in Guatemala, in Peru, in Ecuador, in Colombia.”

Around a quarter of all journalists killed this year were in Latin America, with many targeted by cartels, narco-traffickers and armed groups. This trend, he said, is “very concerning” and presents a serious challenge for governments attempting to safeguard reporters.

Sudan and Ukraine also continue to be among the most dangerous places from which to report, with conflict making journalists prime targets on all sides.

Global press freedom at ‘tipping point’, media watchdog RSF warns

Journalists detained

Alongside killings, RSF’s report documents a surge in the number of journalists imprisoned for their work.

As of early December, 503 journalists were behind bars in 47 countries. China tops the list with 121 detained, followed by Russia with 48 and Myanmar with 47.

Bruttin believes the international community can do far more to secure the release of detained reporters.

“We need to effectively, deliberately campaign for the release of journalists,” he said. He pointed to the case of Wall Street Journal correspondent Evan Gershkovich, who was released as part of a prisoner swap with Russia. “If governments prioritise the release of journalists, they can meet success.”

He expressed particular concern for the 26 Ukrainian journalists detained by Russia, many “outside of any legal framework”.

He told RFI that Ukraine has the ability to prioritise their release through prisoner exchanges, citing a recent precedent in which RSF helped confirm proof of life for a detained Ukrainian reporter, forcing Russia to acknowledge holding him. “He was part of one of the latest prisoner swaps,” Bruttin noted.

Although the overall number of journalist deaths remains below the highs of the early 2010s, RSF says the deliberate targeting of reporters and the erosion of access to information are becoming worryingly entrenched.

For this final episode of 2025, we look back at the full sweep of the African continent’s history.

Sixty years after launching its ambitious project to recover, document and narrate Africa’s past from prehistory to the present day, Unesco has announced the completion of the last three volumes of the General History of Africa.

Relaunched in 2018, the project seeks to translate this body of knowledge into educational resources for teaching the continent’s history. Three new volumes – IX, X and XI – have now been published, introducing fresh material and innovative approaches.

Our special guest reflects on the project and on African history more broadly: UNESCO’s assistant director-general for social and human sciences, Lidia Brito, who discusses these three new volumes.

In the second part of this episode, we also welcome the Congolese artist and filmmaker Sammy Baloji, who discusses his new film The Tree of Authenticity, recently screened at Film Africa in London and now available on the website of the Franco-German television channel ARTE.

Rapper and sorcerer-poet, Baloji, works his magic on new album

The documentary begins in Yangambi, in the Congo, in search of the remnants of a former research centre for tropical agriculture, bearing witness to the country’s colonial past at the heart of the continent.

In doing so, it highlights the links between colonisation and the climate crisis, adopting an unusual perspective: that of the “tree of authenticity”, which plays a decisive role in regulating the climate.

Congolese filmmaker Baloji mixes magic with biting social commentary

Episode edited and mixed by Melissa Chemam and Erwan Rome.

Spotlight on Africa is produced by Radio France Internationale’s English language service.

The Turkish government on Thursday summoned both Russian and Ukrainian envoys, warning them to desist from escalating the conflict in the Black Sea.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan condemned the past week’s attacks on three Russian tankers as “unjustifiable”. Kyiv said its drones targeted two of the vessels, and Moscow has warned it may consider striking the ships of countries supporting Ukraine if such attacks continue.

“This escalation is very dangerous; no one can estimate what will happen,” warns international relations expert and former Turkish presidential advisor Mesut Casin.

“Putin says he will use reciprocity rights. This means some of the [Russian] submarines could attack not only Ukraine but also some of the Western NATO allies’ tanker ships,” he explains, a possibility that raises the threat of “a very big environmental disaster”.

Shadow fleet

Kyiv has claimed responsibility for the drone attacks on two empty Russian-flagged tankers but denied involvement in the strike on a ship carrying sunflower oil to Georgia.

The Russian tankers belong to Moscow’s so-called “shadow fleet“, which is used to circumvent international sanctions by carrying oil and other exports aboard ships not officially registered to the government. 

Given Turkey’s long Black Sea coast, fears of an environmental catastrophe are foremost for Ankara.

“These shadow fleet tankers are not modern and are not in good condition,” observes former Turkish diplomat Selim Kuneralp.

“The Russians provide their own domestic insurance for these ships,” he says. “But how useful and how valid these insurances will be […] remains a question mark.”

How one man’s ship-spotting hobby is helping thwart Russian sanction-busting

Trade implications

With Ukrainian forces destroying much of Russia’s navy in the Black Sea, Moscow has limited capacities to protect its tankers.

Ukraine has so far targeted only empty Russian tankers, but alarm bells are ringing on the potential implications for global trade.

“Both Ukraine and Russia are leading exporters of basic food and agricultural commodities,” notes analyst Atilla Yesilada of GlobalSource Partners.

“Despite massive bombing, Ukraine’s grain export capacity is largely intact and is taking the coastal route. So any impairment of that is bad for the world at a time when we are not certain of crop yields because of the ongoing drought elsewhere.”

Insurance premiums for cargo ships using the Black Sea have already spiked amidst the escalating conflict.

Ankara wary of escalation

Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan met with his NATO counterparts this week, broaching the topic of ensuring safe navigation of the vital sea trade route.

Turkey is already cooperating with its partners in the alliance that share the Black Sea coast, Romania and Bulgaria, to clear sea mines. Fidan said that cooperation could be expanded to enhance shipping security. 

However, any increased NATO involvement in the Black Sea would be borne mainly by the Turkish navy, given that the Romanian and Bulgarian navies are largely coastal forces.

Ships belonging to navies outside the Black Sea have been shut out by Ankara since the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, along with Russian warships. Turkey, under the 1936 Montreux Convention, regulates access to the sea and is only allowing warships to enter to return to their home ports.

Turkey’s mediator role in the Ukraine war faces growing US pressure

Former diplomat Kuneralp claims Ankara will be cautious of getting drawn into any conflict in the Black Sea.

“It would put all the burden on Turkey alone. What would it do? Would it try to intervene in a dispute between Russia and Ukraine? That’s unlikely. I would not want that to happen because it would be too risky,” he says.

“And that’s perhaps why there have not been any concrete actions since the start of the war other than talk.”

For now, Turkey – one of the few countries with good relations with both Kyiv and Moscow – is relying on diplomacy, and hoping that Washington’s ongoing peace efforts will succeed.

Hello everyone! Welcome to The Sound Kitchen weekly podcast, published every Saturday here on our website, or wherever you get your podcasts. You’ll hear the winner’s names announced and the week’s quiz question, along with all the other ingredients you’ve grown accustomed to: your letters and essays, “On This Day”, quirky facts and news, interviews, and great music … so be sure and listen every week.

2026 is right around the corner, and I know you want to be a part of our annual New Year celebration, where, with special guests, we read your New Year’s resolutions. You must get your resolutions to me by 15 December to be included in the show. You don’t want to miss out! Send your New Year’s resolutions to thesoundkitchen@rfi.fr

Erwan and I are busy cooking up special shows with your music requests, so get them in! Send your music requests to thesoundkitchen@rfi.fr  Tell us why you like the piece of music, too – it makes it more interesting for us all!

Facebook: Be sure to send your photos for the RFI English Listeners Forum banner to thesoundkitchen@rfi.fr

More tech news: Did you know we have a YouTube channel? Just go to YouTube and write RFI English in the search bar, and there we are! Be sure to subscribe to see all our videos.

Would you like to learn French? RFI is here to help you!

Our website “Le Français facile avec rfi” has news broadcasts in slow, simple French, as well as bilingual radio dramas (with real actors!) and exercises to practice what you have heard.

Go to our website and get started! At the top of the page, click on “Test level”, and you’ll be counselled on the best-suited activities for your level according to your score.

Do not give up! As Lidwien van Dixhoorn, the head of “Le Français facile” service, told me: “Bathe your ears in the sound of the language, and eventually, you’ll get it”. She should know – Lidwien is Dutch and came to France hardly able to say “bonjour” and now she heads this key RFI department – so stick with it!

Be sure you check out our wonderful podcasts!

In addition to the breaking news articles on our site, with in-depth analysis of current affairs in France and across the globe, we have several podcasts that will leave you hungry for more.

There’s Spotlight on France, Spotlight on Africa, the International Report, and of course, The Sound Kitchen. We also have an award-winning bilingual series – an old-time radio show, with actors (!) to help you learn French, called Les voisins du 12 bis.

Remember, podcasts are radio, too! As you see, sound is still quite present in the RFI English service.  Please keep checking our website for updates on the latest from our excellent staff of journalists. You never know what we’ll surprise you with!

To listen to our podcasts from your PC, go to our website; you’ll see “Podcasts” at the top of the page. You can either listen directly or subscribe and receive them directly on your mobile phone.

To listen to our podcasts from your mobile phone, slide through the tabs just under the lead article (the first tab is “Headline News”) until you see “Podcasts”, and choose your show.  

Teachers take note!  I save postcards and stamps from all over the world to send to you for your students. If you would like stamps and postcards for your students, just write and let me know. The address is english.service@rfi.fr  If you would like to donate stamps and postcards, feel free! Our address is listed below. 

Independent RFI English Clubs: Be sure to always include Audrey Iattoni (audrey.iattoni@rfi.fr) from our Listener Relations department in all your RFI Club correspondence. Remember to copy me (thesoundkitchen@rfi.fr) when you write to her so that I know what is going on, too. N.B.: You do not need to send her your quiz answers! Email overload!

This week’s quiz: On 1 November, I asked you to listen to RFI English journalist Melissa Chemam’s podcast Spotlight on Africa: “Inside Côte d’Ivoire’s pivotal election: voices of hope and uncertainty”. Melissa had traveled to Côte d’Ivoire to cover their presidential election and talked to a wide variety of people about their hopes, their fears, and their desires for their country. Near the beginning of the show, Melissa talks about women who, she says, were very involved in the campaigns – as event organizers, supporters, and mothers. Melissa enumerates the main concerns of the Ivorian women – and that was your question. What are the four main concerns the women of Côte d’Ivoire voiced during the presidential campaign?

The answers are, as Melissa noted in her podcast, work, school for kids, childcare, and healthcare.

In addition to the quiz question, there was the bonus question: How do you make friends as an adult?

Do you have a bonus question idea? Send it to us!

The winners are: RFI Listeners Club member Father Stephen Wara. Father Stephen is also the winner of this week’s bonus question. Congratulations on your double win, Father Steve!

Also on the list of lucky winners this week are RFI Listeners Club members Zenon Teles, the president of the Christian – Marxist – Leninist – Maoist Association of Listening DX-ers in Goa, India; Radhakrishna Pillai from Kerala State in India; Helmut Matt from Herzbolheim, Germany, and last but not least, Dipita Chakrabarty from New Delhi, India.

Congratulations winners!

Here’s the music you heard on this week’s programme: “Tapez fort” produced by DJ Tevecinq; “The Flight of the Bumblebee” by Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov; “The Cakewalk” from Children’s Corner by Claude Debussy, performed by the composer; “Happy” by Pharrell Williams;  “Little Toot” by Allie Wrubel, sung by the Andrews Sisters, and “Little Rootie Tootie” by Thelonious Monk, performed by Monk and the Thelonius Monk Trio. 

Do you have a music request? Send it to thesoundkitchen@rfi.fr

This week’s question … you must listen to the show to participate. After you’ve listened to the show, re-read Jan van der Made’s article “On NATO’s eastern flank, Romania finds itself at the crux of European security”, which will help you with the answer.

You have until 19 January to enter this week’s quiz; the winners will be announced on the 24 January podcast. When you enter, be sure to send your postal address with your answer, and if you have one, your RFI Listeners Club membership number.

Send your answers to:

english.service@rfi.fr

or

Susan Owensby

RFI – The Sound Kitchen

80, rue Camille Desmoulins

92130 Issy-les-Moulineaux

France

Click here to find out how you can win a special Sound Kitchen prize.

Click here to find out how you can become a member of the RFI Listeners Club, or form your own official RFI Club. 

The recent murder in Marseille of 20-year-old Mehdi Kessaci, the younger brother of a well-known anti-drugs campaigner, has highlighted the growing problem of drug-related organised crime in France. The government has promised tougher repressive measures, but what if civil society also had a role to play? Inspired by the example of Italy, the Crim’HALT association campaigns for the official recognition of victims of organised crime. Its co-founder, Fabrice Rizzoli, talks about taking ordinary citizens to see firsthand how Italian anti-mafia initiatives work. Jean-Toussaint Plasenzotti, who founded the anti-mafia collective Massimu Susini following the murder of his nephew in 2019 in Corsica, and Hassna Arabi, whose relative Socayna was killed by a stray bullet in 2023, explain how travelling to Italy with Crim-HALT has helped their work back home. (Listen @0′)

As Europe looks to increase its defence capacity in the face of war in Ukraine and threats from Russia, French President Emmanuel Macron has announced a special military service aimed at recruiting a new generation of soldiers. Unlike the mandatory military service that was suspended in 1997, the new format would be voluntary – and paid. Historian and army reservist Guillaume Lasconjarias says that in providing a way for young people to be of service, the scheme responds to something they want. (Listen @17’30”)

Forty years after Christo and Jeanne-Claude wrapped Paris’s Pont Neuf in September 1985, opening the door to monumental public art displays, the city has approved a new project on the bridge by artist JR. (Listen @11’45”)

Episode mixed by Cecile Pompeani.

Spotlight on France is a podcast from Radio France International. Find us on rfienglish.com, Apple podcasts (link here), Spotify (link here) or your favourite podcast app (pod.link/1573769878).

Madhya Pradesh is often referred to as the Heart of India. Located right in the middle of the country, the Indian region shows everything India has to offer through its abundant diversity. The IFTM trade show, which took place in Paris at the end of September, presented the perfect opportunity for travel enthusiasts to discover the region.

Sheo Shekhar Shukla, Managing Director of Madhya Pradesh’s tourism board, sat down to explain his approach to sustainable tourism.

“Post-covid the whole world has known a shift in their approach when it comes to tourism. And all those discerning travelers want to have different kinds of experiences: something offbeat, something new, something which has not been explored before.”

Through its UNESCO World Heritage Sites, Shukla wants to showcase the deep history Madhya Pradesh has to offer.

“UNESCO is very actively supporting us and three of our sites are already World Heritage Sites. Sanchi is a very famous buddhist spiritual destination, Bhimbetka is a place where prehistoric rock shelters are still preserved, and Khajuraho is home to thousand year old temples with magnificent architecture.”

All in all, Shukla believes that there’s only one way forward for the industry: “Travelers must take sustainable tourism as a paradigm in order to take tourism to the next level.”

In partnership with Madhya Pradesh’s tourism board.

Also known as the Land of the Beautiful Islands, Malaysia’s landscape and cultural diversity is almost unmatched on the planet. Those qualities were all put on display at the Malaysian stand during the IFTM trade show.

Libra Hanif, director of Tourism Malaysia, explained the appeal of the country as well as the importance of promoting sustainable tourism today: “Sustainable travel is a major trend now, with the changes that are happening post-covid. People want to get close to nature, to get close to people. So Malaysia being a multicultural and diverse [country] with a lot of natural environments, we felt that it’s a good thing for us to promote Malaysia.”

Malaysia has also gained fame in recent years, through its numerous UNESCO World Heritage Sites, which include Kinabalu Park and the Archaeological Heritage of the Lenggong Valley.

Green mobility has also become an integral part of tourism in Malaysia, with an increasing number of people using bikes to discover the country: “If you are a little more adventurous, we have the mountain back trails where you can cut across gazetted trails to see the natural attractions and the wildlife that we have in Malaysia,” says Hanif. “If you are not that adventurous, you’ll be looking for relaxing cycling. We also have countryside spots, where you can see all the scenery in a relaxing session.”

With more than 25,000 visitors at this IFTM trade show this year, Malaysia’s tourism board got to showcase the best the country and its people have to offer.

In partnership with Malaysia Tourism Promotion Board. For more information about Malaysia, click here.