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Ukraine war briefing: Air ceasefire talk ahead of Trump-Zelenskyy meeting

Ukrainian and US officials have discussed a proposal to offer Russia an air ceasefire, the Reuters news agency has reported, citing a Ukrainian source. Volodymyr Zelenskyy is due to meet Donald Trump, the US president, in Washington on Tuesday. The Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, said on ⁠Sunday that Russia considered it premature to comment on any such ceasefire proposal. “We do not know how credible these reports are or where they come from. These are newspaper reports and nothing more. Therefore, it is premature to comment on them at this stage,” the Interfax news agency quoted Peskov as saying. “We have heard statements that some new formulas may be possible. We still need to learn more about them … What happens next will depend on how closely they correspond to our interests.” Romania said it was summoning Russia’s ambassador after the Nato member’s military shot down a third drone in as many days. A Romanian F-16 fighter jet shot down the drone over the Black Sea, five minutes after it entered the country’s airspace, said Romania’s defence minister, Radu Miruță. The foreign minister, Oana Țoiu, condemned “repeated violations”. The Romanian president, Nicușor Dan, said that according to an investigation, a drone shot down on Friday was a “Shahed model used by the Russian Federation in its war of aggression against Ukraine”. Investigations into drones shot down on Saturday and Sunday continued, he said. The Golden Leo, an international cargo vessel, sank off the coast of ⁠Ukraine’s Black Sea port of Odesa on Sunday, a week after Ukrainian ⁠officials said ⁠it had been struck by Russian forces. Nine ⁠crew members were killed in the attack while eight ‌were evacuated to safety. The ‌ship had left the ‌port of Chornomorsk with a cargo of corn when it was shelled by Russian forces on 19 July. Russia’s defence ministry ⁠said on Sunday that its forces had ⁠struck Ukrainian ⁠ports and shipping. Russia claimed the container terminal ‌at Chornomorsk, near ‌Odesa, handled “military cargoes”. Russia launched seven ballistic missiles and 136 drones at Ukraine overnight into Sunday, the Ukrainian air force said. In the northern Ukrainian city of Chernihiv, a Russian drone hit ⁠a supermarket, killing two people – including a nine-year-old child – and wounding 25, emergency services said. In the eastern city of Kharkiv, one person was killed and 16 others required medical attention ‌after a daytime drone attack, said the mayor, Ihor Terekhov. A glide bomb attack killed one person and wounded six in the southern city of Zaporizhzhia, said the regional governor, Ivan Fedorov. In Kyiv, a fire broke out on the seventh and eighth floors of a multi-storey apartment block in a central district after ‌a missile attack, said the mayor, Vitali Klitschko. Three people were wounded. In Sloviansk, Donetsk region, the national oil and gas company Naftogaz said two of its employees died in a Russian attack while trying to help residents affected by an earlier strike. Russia said ⁠areas of Ukraine under Moscow’s control had also come under attack, with four people killed in a Ukrainian drone strike in the Russian-occupied Ukrainian city of Horlivka. Twelve ⁠people, including two children, were ⁠injured ⁠in drone attack on ⁠the Russian city of Belgorod, close ⁠to Ukraine’s ‌border, regional authorities ‌said early on Monday. Ukraine denies targeting civilians. Volodymyr Zelenskyy will become Andy Burnham’s first overseas visitor as prime minister, in a visit that Burnham said underlined Britain’s “unwavering” backing for Ukraine, Peter Walker writes. Less than two weeks after Keir Starmer travelled to Kyiv for the final foreign visit of his prime ministership, Zelenskyy will on Monday join Burnham at a naval base where Ukrainian forces have been receiving training. According to statistics released by No 10, since Russia’s full invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, total UK support for the country has totalled £25bn, including £16bn in military assistance. Burnham and Zelenskyy are due to discuss joint projects including Stone Cloak, an electronic jammer for which the UK has shared the intellectual property, allowing Ukraine to use the system immediately to prevent Russia shooting down Ukrainian drones. Since being proven on the Ukrainian frontline, the jammers are due to be fitted to new UK weaponry, including cruise missiles.

Burnham to meet Zelenskyy at UK naval base in show of ‘unwavering’ support

Volodymyr Zelenskyy will become Andy Burnham’s first overseas visitor as prime minister, in a visit that Burnham said underlined Britain’s “unwavering” backing for Ukraine. Less than two weeks after Keir Starmer travelled to Kyiv for the final foreign visit of his prime ministership, the Ukrainian president will on Monday join Burnham at a naval base where Ukrainian forces have been receiving training. Zelenskyy was one of the first world leaders Burnham spoke to when he entered No 10 last week, and the prime minister has promised to maintain Starmer’s strong support for the country in pushing back against Russia’s invasion. On the visit to the base, the pair will speak to Ukrainian and British military personnel who have taken part in Exercise Sea Breeze, a 15-country training deployment based on mine exercises and other maritime operations in the Black Sea. The second part of this year’s exercise, which took place in Portland, Dorset, finished on Friday and involved more than 200 Ukrainian personnel. Burnham and Zelenskyy are also due to discuss joint projects including Stone Cloak, an electronic jammer for which the UK has shared the intellectual property, allowing Ukraine to use the system immediately. Thousands of the jammers, each about the size of a tablet computer, have been sent to Ukraine to be fitted to drones, with the aim of stopping Russian air defence systems from tracking and targeting them. Ukraine is now able to mass produce the devices itself. After being initially used there, the jammers are due to be fitted to new UK weaponry, including cruise missiles. Burnham, in a comment released by Downing Street before the visit, said: “Britain stands with Ukraine, shoulder to shoulder, and our support remains unwavering. Russia should be in no doubt of our resolve, and we will not back down until we achieve a long-lasting and just peace for Ukraine. “Stone Cloak is the best of homegrown British innovation and proven on the frontline, and it will be vital to protecting our security in both our countries.” According to statistics released by No 10, since Russia’s full invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, total UK support for the country has totalled £25bn, including £16bn in military assistance. Starmer visited Ukraine a number of times, and hosted Zelenskyy regularly. In one of the most telling displays of UK support, after a March 2025 visit to the White House during which the Ukrainian leader was publicly berated by Donald Trump, he then travelled to the UK and met not only Starmer but also King Charles at Sandringham, which is primarily a royal home and rarely used for official events. During Starmer’s final visit to Ukraine, Zelenskyy presented him with the country’s Order of Freedom, the most prestigious honour that can be given to an overseas national. During a press conference with Starmer, the Ukrainian president said he hoped to build a strong relationship with Burnham, and to arrange a meeting “as soon as possible”.

US pauses Iran attacks for second night after Trump advised to halt bombing

The US has paused strikes on Iran for a second night as top military officials advised Donald Trump to halt his bombing campaign, and diplomatic negotiations have continued to avoid a return to all-out war. Trump is said to be weighing up diplomatic and military options in the nearly five-month-old conflict, with Benjamin Netanyahu expected to visit the White House on Tuesday. The Israeli prime minister is a vocal critic of Washington’s negotiations with Iranian leaders and has pressed for the US to continue its strikes against Iran. Netanyahu is under considerable political pressure to show that his military campaigns against Iran and Hezbollah in Lebanon have yielded results before elections scheduled for October. Tehran said on Sunday it would pause what it called “retaliatory” attacks against US allies in the region. “These [US] attacks continued until two nights ago, but over the past two nights the Americans have stopped their attacks,” said the army spokesperson Mohammad Akraminia. “Our strategy has essentially been retaliatory, we have also halted our retaliatory operations.” Senior officials in the Trump administration are reported to have told the president about dwindling munitions stockpiles that could hamper a sustained military campaign in the region. Axios reported on Sunday that Adm Bradley Cooper, the top US military commander in the region, had told Trump the US military campaign had reached the limits of its effectiveness. The message was said to affect Trump’s decision to hold strikes on Iran for the first time in nearly two weeks. Cooper told Trump the US had nearly exhausted the list of targets that it had developed to attack in Iran, and without a return to major combat operations there was little point in continuing the bombing campaign, the news website reported. Asked on Sunday on NBC’s Meet the Press whether Trump was ruling out additional strikes in Iran, the president’s UN ambassador Mike Waltz said: “I wouldn’t go that far at all. The president is keeping all options on the table.” The lull in fighting, which began on Friday evening, follows nearly two weeks of strikes against Iran and the collapse of a ceasefire brokered by Trump. Washington blamed Iran for strikes on US forces and allies in the region and its closure of the strait of Hormuz, a conduit for an estimated 20% of the world’s oil and gas. Senior diplomats from Iran and Oman were said to be holding negotiations on Sunday on reopening the vital waterway and an official in Tehran confirmed colleagues had been in touch with US negotiators to prevent a return to war. Iran has demanded payment and control over which ships pass through the strait. “Mediators are working and trying to prevent tension from escalating,” the Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson, Esmail Baghaei, told a press conference on Sunday. But an Iranian army spokesperson signalled defiance, saying the US had no clear strategy and was “experiencing strategic decision-making fatigue”. The US vice-president, JD Vance, and Dan Caine, the chair of the joint chiefs of staff, warned Trump of the risks of a renewed military campaign against Iran at an Oval Office meeting on Friday, according to media outlets. The president then ordered the military to call off new strikes, which he had warned could “knock out everything they have”. “We’re talking to [the Iranians] right now,” Trump told reporters on Friday. “I think they’re getting more and more serious as the days go by. We’re locked and loaded and ready to go, but we’re talking to them.” At a White House Correspondents’ Association dinner that evening he said he did not think Iran was ready to make a deal but he was ready to listen. Caine warned Trump about dwindling munitions stockpiles, which include Patriot missile interceptors and offensive weapons like Tomahawk cruise missiles. Vance campaigned on his opposition to US military interventions in the Middle East and has grown more vocal in his opposition to the war in Iran. Netanyahu’s office announced on Sunday that he would convene a meeting of his security cabinet before leaving for Washington on Monday. He played a crucial role in lobbying Trump to launch joint strikes against Iran in February and has said that US negotiators must take a strong line on Iran’s nuclear and ballistic missile programme. US negotiators have instead prioritised opening the strait of Hormuz. Netanyahu will travel to Washington amid some of the worst violence this year in the West Bank, where his military is launching an “extensive” operation after the deaths of four Palestinians and two Israelis when armed settlers entered a Palestinian village on Thursday. The US and the UK under its new prime minister, Andy Burnham, are discussing plans for a high-level meeting in London this week to discuss the potential for a coalition to protect ships in the strait of Hormuz and de-mine the waterway. The discussions will be an early test for Burnham’s administration. The Labour government has so far refused to allow Washington to use a British airbase for offensive operations against Iran.

Police shoot dead Berlin Pride van and knife rampage suspect, officials say

A man suspected of driving a van into a crowd near Berlin’s Pride festival then going on a knife rampage in an Islamist terror attack has been shot dead by police, German officials have said. Police confirmed on Sunday evening that the chief suspect had been shot dead, reportedly during an operation at an allotment garden complex ⁠in the capital’s Spandau district. One woman was killed on Saturday evening and 29 others were injured after a man drove a rented minivan into a crowd of pedestrians, then attacked people with what appeared to be a machete. The attack took place in the Tiergarten park near the Brandenburg Gate at about 10pm local time on Saturday, close to one of Europe’s biggest LGBTQ+ celebrations. The attack forced organisers to cut short one of Europe’s largest Pride events and came as Germany remained on edge after a series of deadly vehicle and knife attacks. The German interior minister, Alexander Dobrindt, named the chief suspect as 21-year-old Abdul Ballout. “We are dealing here with ‌a suspected ‌perpetrator, who had previously drawn attention ‌to himself through a high volume of criminal offences, radicalisation and affiliation with the Islamist scene,” he told ‌a press conference near the site of the attack. He said Ballout had a criminal conviction and had been sentenced as a juvenile to a year and 10 months in prison, but that the sentence had been suspended. German media reported that Ballout, a German national with Lebanese roots, was a supporter of Islamic State and last year travelled to the Middle East in a failed attempt to join the group. He was then convicted in Germany of “preparing a serious act of subversive violence”, the news outlets Bild and Der Spiegel reported. Police and prosecutors had asked for help in finding Ballout, but warned the public to avoid “direct contact” with him, saying he may be armed and dangerous. Police searched an apartment in the Schöneberg district of Berlin near the scene of the attack in the early hours of Sunday, but said they had found no one there. Before Ballout was shot, Der Spiegel spoke with his father, Tawfik, by telephone from Lebanon, where he was visiting relatives. Describing Ballout as “generous, emotional, loving”, he said his son had lived with his mother, from whom Tawfik is divorced, and two of his three sisters. Ballout attended school until 10th grade, then bounced from job to job, in security or as a driver. Tawfik described the family as Shia but “not extremely religious” and said it “does not support Islamic State”, an extremist Sunni group. He and Ballout had fought about his hair and beard. “I did not allow him to wear a long beard,” he told Spiegel, calling it a symbol of extremism. Asked about a possible motive for the attack, he said: “He was brainwashed.” Tawfik spoke with Ballout on Saturday, the day of the attack. “He called me and we spoke normally, like every day. He said he missed me and wished he was with us in Lebanon.” The chancellor, Friedrich Merz, urged Germany to avoid division and intimidation in the aftermath of the attack. “We will think about consequences, we will ‌defend our freedom,” he said in a news conference. Earlier, Merz vowed to punish those responsible, describing the “heinous act” as an “attack on our society” in a social media post. The flag at the German Bundestag was ordered to be lowered to half mast. Police said the vehicle had struck multiple ⁠people after being driven into the Tiergarten. Shortly before 10pm the driver of the white minivan swerved into the park, close to where the route of the Pride march had been earlier in the day, hitting people on a path and crashing into a tree. Bild cited a witness as saying that a man had emerged from the vehicle and fled on foot. A hunt involving helicopters and officers from several German states was under way across the capital on Sunday. Julian Methig, who attended the event, described it as a nightmare come true. “It’s one of the worst days for the queer community and a day I personally hoped I’d never have to experience … I’m shocked,” he said. Hundreds of thousands of people had gathered in Berlin in warm summer sunshine to celebrate the Pride parade. It is known in Germany as Christopher Street Day (CSD), named after the site of the Stonewall Inn in New York City where riots against police raids touched off the modern LGBTQ+ rights movement. CSD was first held in West Berlin in 1979. Berlin’s mayor, Kai Wegner, called the deadly assault “an attack on our free and cosmopolitan society”. “Following a peaceful and colourful CSD, the rally for a tolerant and peaceful Berlin was attacked in the most brutal manner,” he said on X. “Berlin is the city of freedom – and our freedom has today been attacked in the most appalling way. My thoughts are with the victims, their families and friends.” For the first time in its history, CSD began on Friday night this year with a pro-democracy political rally. Berlin will hold a regional election in September along with two other states. The parade on Saturday ran under the motto “taking a stand is hot”, which organisers said was “in response to increasing hostility” to LGBTQ+ people in Germany. More than 80 floats and 50 groups on foot joined the procession through the city centre past Potsdamer Platz and the Victory Column monument in the Tiergarten, culminating in a rally at the Brandenburg Gate. Earlier in the day one person was arrested for resisting police orders at a far-right counterprotest. Before last year’s parade, Berlin LGBTQ+ organisations sounded the alarm that attacks had become more frequent while hard-won rights were under threat. Campaigners said a rise in hostility had accompanied the surge in support for the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD), now the most popular party in national opinion polls, as well as an increase in Islamist-inspired attacks. European leaders offered solidarity, including heads of government in Belgium, the Netherlands and Sweden. “Italy firmly condemns and opposes all forms of hate and extremism,” the Italian prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, wrote on X, adding: “We stand with Germany and the German people.” The French president, Emmanuel Macron, said: “Faced with hatred and violence, our response will always be unity, freedom, and resolve.” The European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, a German centre-right politician allied with Merz, sent her deepest sympathy to the victims of the attack, describing the CSD parade as standing for “freedom, dignity and equality – the fundamental values of the EU”. Britain’s foreign secretary, Ed Miliband, said he was “horrified by the appalling attack in Berlin” and had spoken to his counterpart, Johann Wadephul, “to convey the UK’s solidarity: we stand with Germany”. Far-right leaders were also quick to comment on the attacks. The co-leader of the AfD Tino Chrupalla wrote on X: “We will not allow religious extremists to divide our country with violence and intolerance!” The president of France’s far-right National Rally, Jordan Bardella, wrote: “The Islamist threat remains a major issue in Europe and continues to target what they hate most about our civilisation – and what we cherish so much – freedom.”

India’s Cockroach Janta party protest victory signals trouble ahead for Modi

Even the night before Narendra Modi accepted the resignation of his education minister, India’s prime minister appeared confident that the largest mass uprising to take place in his 12 years in power would do little to rattle his government. Addressing his “young friends” in a late-night Instagram selfie reel on Friday, he thanked the people – who were mobilised en masse across the country, shouting anti-government slogans – for their “thoughtful suggestions”. Less than 24 hours later, Modi, who has fiercely cultivated his strongman image for years, had bowed to public pressure and accepted the resignation of Dharmendra Pradhan. It was, say analysts, the remarkable humbling of a government that has ruled with almost untouchable impunity since 2014. Over that past week, a gen Z movement that called itself the Cockroach Janta party (CJP) mobilised unprecedented protests in the name of justice for millions of young people, after the leaking of a crucial exam paper forced 2 million students to resit the test and was blamed for more than a dozen suicides. The resignation of Pradhan, Modi’s loyal political ally, remained their first and foremost demand for accountability, even as the protests expanded into a wider fight for democracy. Yet Pradhan went unmentioned by Modi in his Instagram address. On Saturday morning, more people than ever were pouring into Delhi’s historic Jantar Mantar site – the centre of the protests – and unrest was spreading fast to other cities, including states ruled by Modi’s Bharatiya Janata party (BJP). It was not only physical space that had been captured by the cockroach movement. Since coming to power, the BJP has proved enormously effective at capturing the online narrative, deploying its powerful, highly organised IT cell to mobilise and attack any perceived criticism of the government, whether it came from citizens, politicians or journalists. But this proved no match for the millions of gen Z memes and reels that began to flood Instagram over this past week, fearlessly insulting Modi and pillorying the government, each more creative and incendiary than the next. Modi’s last-ditch attempts to speak directly to the youth on Instagram were simply met with more ridicule and spin-off memes. Modi had also lost another medium critical to the BJP’s domination over the national narrative – the mainstream TV news channels widely acknowledged to have been co-opted by the BJP government over the past 12 years and turned into mouthpieces for its rightwing Hindu nationalist ideology. Initially, the channels ignored the protests, and when they did cover them it was to suggest the protesters were being bankrolled by sinister foreign forces and Pakistani terror groups. In response, the protesters turned on the channels, using social media to expose their “lies”. When the protests escalated, Modi remained conspicuously absent from the airwaves. Pradhan’s resignation came as it appeared that all other options for the government had gone. The option of a ruthless crackdown appeared untenable given the mass outcry to the police violence that had hit protesters on Monday. “The online space was totally conquered by the protesters and regime-loving media was seriously delegitimised,” said Ashutosh Varshney, a professor of international studies at Brown University in Rhode Island. “The anger was so comprehensive there was no option left but for Pradhan to go.” But this was more than the loss of a minister, Varshney said, it was also the first time in 12 years that the Modi government had lost control of the political narrative. “This is a repressive government,” he said. “It wants obedience, it wants no critical discussion and it generates fear. But now the climate of fear has collapsed.” Analysts say the resignation of Pradhan could also have implications for Modi’s power over his own cabinet. Pradhan was one of Modi’s most loyal ministers and ideological footsoldiers, and had implemented policies exactly as senior party figures had wanted. He had also helped the BJP win Odisha state for the first time in the general election, bringing in crucial seats. “Modi knows once you start firing your most loyal ministers, it sets up the incentives for defections in other ministers as well,” said the political columnist Pratap Bhanu Mehta. “If your own cabinet starts to hedge for a future where they may not be backed by your own government, that’s when you are in trouble.” Prior to this week’s unrest, Modi had been riding high on a string of important state electoral victories, in particular the BJP’s first triumph in West Bengal, a politically important state that had long pushed back against its Hindu nationalist politics. The BJP appeared to have fully bounced back from the blow in the 2024 elections, when the party failed to win an outright parliamentary majority and had to scramble together a large enough alliance to take power. At the same time, the much-beleaguered opposition had continued to lose countless state elections and their allegations of voting impropriety by the BJP fell mostly on deaf ears. Yet the emergence of the cockroaches has reinvigorated not only India’s youth, but its political opposition parties as well. Jumping on the bandwagon, the opposition Congress party has had its best week in years as it mobilised protests and shut down parliament. The party’s leader, Rahul Gandhi, was dramatically dragged away by police outside Modi’s house in support of students. Analysts say that dissent, which had been systematically crushed over the past 12 years, has now been re-galvanised as an effective tool to hold the government – and in particular the prime minister – to account. “After a long time, there’s an assertion of political agency across different sections of society,” said Mehta. “And the minute you see that agency out in the street, it empowers lots of other agents.” The next big test of the electoral implications of the CJP movement will come early next year, when India’s largest and most politically important state holds its state elections. Holding on to power in Uttar Pradesh, the BJP’s political heartland, is seen as crucial for the party and would have major implications for the next general election in 2029. The grievances of India’s newly-politicised youth are extensive, including a chronic lack of graduate jobs and stagnant wages. Just how the CJP intends to politically mobilise after its striking victory on Saturday remains to be seen. Leaders and supporters insist this is just the “beginning”, particularly in their push for education reform. Their founder, Abhijeet Dipke, has some past experience as a political party organiser, but has not made his own ambitions known. Yet analysts said that one of the most crucial impacts of the CJP had been to reopen a rapidly closing democratic space and make it seem possible that a new kind of political opposition could emerge, one reflective of the voices heard on the streets of India this week. Saurav Das, a CJP spokesperson, said it was encouraging people involved in the movement to go into politics. “This is one of our goals,” he said. “We need to increase youth participation in politics, because right now it’s controlled by uncles and aunties who are only interested in looking after their own lifestyles and don’t understand the needs of our generation. The answer also has to be political.”

Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani obituary

In June 1995 the emir of Qatar, Sheikh Khalifa bin Hamad Al Thani, was holidaying at a luxury lakefront resort in Geneva, Switzerland. His son, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, having effectively run the daily affairs of the country for more than a decade during Khalifa’s prolonged absences abroad, resolved to depose him. In a swift and bloodless operation, the 43-year-old crown prince proclaimed himself the new emir, a move that would permanently alter the trajectory of his nation and reshape the modern Middle East. Following his audacious takeover, Hamad, who has died aged 74, became a completely different kind of leader from his regional contemporaries. Eschewing the ritualistic, baroque finery and aloofness traditional to Gulf monarchs, he governed Qatar more like the managing director of a global corporation. He was famously down-to-earth, frequently driving his own vehicle around the streets of Doha and dining in local restaurants with minimal security. A “big picture” thinker, he focused on long-term strategy while delegating the minutiae of daily governance to trusted technocrats. This singular determination was widely recognised by foreign observers; a leaked July 2008 US embassy cable published by WikiLeaks quoted a source who said that: “The Amir seems to be the only one in the Government who has a vision for this country. The details of that vision, however, are not entirely clear to anyone, except perhaps the Amir himself and his closest associates.” His achievements as emir were monumental. Hamad successfully bypassed the “oil curse” that plagued his neighbours by aggressively developing Qatar’s massive offshore natural gas reserves, transforming the state into an economic juggernaut with one of the highest per capita incomes in the world. His domestic legacy included delivering Qatar’s first implemented written constitution, introducing democratic municipal elections, and elevating the status of women in public life. Crucially, he established Qatar as a global media hub in 1996 by founding Al Jazeera, initially an Arabic news satellite TV station, later expanding its reach in English and Spanish. In 1998 he abolished the ministry of information, thereby ending official state censorship. His death marks the conclusion of a transformative era for the small Gulf peninsula, which he single-handedly dragged from regional obscurity into the centre of global geopolitics. While maintaining defence and security links with the US, he maintained a deep-seated commitment to the Palestinian cause, an outlook inherited from his father. He gave the leaders of Hamas a base in Doha, an engagement aimed at pulling the militant group away from the Iranian and Syrian “axis of resistance” and getting them to face reality and negotiate. During the Arab spring of 2011, Sheikh Hamad rode the whirlwind, proactively championing his policy of “Arabs sorting out Arab problems”, backing revolutionary movements in Libya and Syria, amplifying popular revolts through Al Jazeera, and positioning Qatar to shape political Islam across the region, all while selectively contributing troops to Bahrain to preserve Sunni supremacy. Born in the capital city of Doha, Hamad was a member of the Al Thani ruling family, members of the Bani Tamim, an ancient Arabian tribe that supported the prophet Muhammad in the earliest days of Islam and carried the movement to Andalucía, in southern Spain. His mother, Sheikha Aisha bint Hamad Al Attiyah, died shortly after his birth. Growing up within this powerful tribal lineage, his early life was shaped by traditional custom alongside a rapidly modernising world. As a youth, Hamad experienced formative encounters that would influence his future philosophy of governance. He had his first exposure to democracy as a boy during a trip to London. The concept seemed so ridiculous to him that he had to be led from the House of Commons balcony in hysterical laughter after witnessing his first parliamentary debate. Back home, his early formal education was dominated by émigré Egyptian teachers, under whose influence he became a virulent Nasserist. This anti-colonial fervour culminated around 1967, when he participated in political protests, throwing stones at the British embassy and denting its metal shutters. He later realised that these radical pan-Arab movements had misled his generation, an epiphany that sparked his lifelong commitment to replacing foreign educational influences with indigenous, world-class Qatari institutions through the later creation of the Qatar Foundation, promoting education, scientific research and community development. To prepare for his state duties, he attended the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst in the UK, graduating in 1971. On his return, he held several military posts, and in 1977 was appointed minister of defence. Over the next two decades, as his father spent increasing amounts of time on the French Riviera, Hamad assumed the day-to-day administration of the state. He became immensely popular among his peers and successfully buried centuries-old rivalries between competing branches of the Al Thani family, establishing a unified political front that paved the way for his eventual accession. In his personal life, Hamad balanced tribal alliances and personal compatibility across his three spouses, by whom he had 24 children. His second wife, Sheikha Moza bint Nasser al-Misned, emerged as his primary strategic partner, collaborating deeply on national education and social reforms. Hamad carefully managed the upbringing of his large family, deliberately fostering a competitive yet disciplined environment to select the most capable successor to maintain the country’s stability. In a highly unusual move for a Gulf ruler, Hamad chose to step down voluntarily from the throne in 2013, passing the mantle to the next generation. He retired to a life of quiet diplomacy, historical research and cultural advocacy, split between Doha and his properties in Europe. He was succeeded as emir by his son Sheikh Tamim, who continued to guide the nation along the strategic path forged by his father’s singular vision. Their most spectacular deployment of soft power came with the announcement in 2010 that Qatar would be hosting the 2022 men’s football World Cup. The “father emir” is survived by his three wives, 11 sons and 13 daughters. • Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, emir of Qatar, born 1 January 1952; died 12 July 2026

Joy in Greece as Mount Olympus joins Unesco list of world heritage sites

After a 12-year wait, Mount Olympus, the mythical home of the ancient Greek gods, has been inducted into a hall of more modern fame as Unesco announced it would be added to its world heritage list. Greece’s highest mountain made the list alongside the second world war D-day landing beaches in northern France and the ancient Japanese capitals of Asuka and Fujiwara. South Sudan’s Boma-Badingilo landscape, host to one of the world’s largest land mammal migrations, also won a designation – a first for the east African country. The nominations were among dozens reviewed at a Unesco committee meeting in Busan, South Korea, on Sunday. In the case of Olympus, inscribed as a mixed world heritage site in recognition of its cultural and natural significance, the news was met with near euphoria in Greece. Immortalised as the seat of Zeus, king of the 12 Olympian deities, the mountain rising 2,918 metres from a base near sea level had been on a tentative list of sites since 2014. The head of Greece’s Unesco delegation in Busan, Georgios Koumoutsakos, hailed the decision as one that would ensure the site’s preservation. “It reaffirms our unwavering commitment to safeguarding Mount Olympus for the benefit of present and future generations,” he said. “As Greek mythology wisely reminds us, it is always best to remain on good terms with the gods.” The region’s mayor, Evangelos Geroliolios, said before the announcement that the site’s induction would “place greater responsibility on our part to protect the [local] environment”, not least its extraordinary biodiversity. The committee’s annual meeting, which ends on Wednesday, is expected to examine about 30 nominations. Those successful will join 1,248 sites across 170 countries admitted to the world heritage list for their “outstanding value to humanity”. Inscribed monuments can provide a vital boost for their preservation under an international convention overseen by Unesco, which also gives advice and financial support. Other world heritage sites include the Acropolis in Athens, the Great Wall of China, the pyramids of Giza in Egypt and the Taj Mahal in India. As with Mount Olympus, efforts to get the D-day beaches in Normandy inscribed had gone back years. Included in the French bid were all five of the beaches – Omaha, Utah, Sword, Gold and Juno – where more than 150,000 allied troops came ashore on 6 June 1944, and the Pointe du Hoc cliff that was also a focal point of the assault. The largest amphibious operation ever mounted, in which 4,000 soldiers died, was decisive in the battle to liberate Europe from Nazi occupation. France first nominated the 50-mile (80km) stretch of coastline in 2008. Reacting to the decision, the country’s permanent delegate to Unesco, Ahlem Gharbi, said the designation carried particular weight at a time of such international tensions. The president of the Normandy region, Hervé Morin, who had championed the cause, maintained that inclusion on the list would represent “immense recognition” for the soldiers who had sacrificed so much to defeat Nazism. Echoing Greek officials, he said: “This decision places a responsibility upon us. It compels us to preserve this site, to protect it, to cherish it even more, and to promote its value.” The international council on monuments and sites, one of the bodies that recommends additions to the Unesco list, had previously warned of the threat posed to the Normandy sites by tourism, climate change, rising sea levels and nearby windfarm development, and had called for stronger monitoring and preservation. The coastline is covered with extensive remnants of the time of the landings, including concrete German bunkers and gun positions, sunken vessels and allied installations. Unesco said in a statement that the beaches formed an “exceptional cultural landscape shaped both by the events of 1944 and by their enduring remembrance”, all of which justified further protection. As with Mount Olympus, the landing points have attracted record numbers of tourists in recent years. The agency’s move to include places associated with conflict has fuelled controversial debate over whether “sites of memory” are befitting of world heritage status and Unesco’s stated mission to “foster a world of greater equality and peace”. Three sites used by Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge regime for torture and execution were inscribed last year. After so many years of campaigning, Greek officials said Sunday’s decision had been made all the sweeter given signs of further delays. In the draft agenda of this week’s meeting, Unesco had signalled the Mount Olympus file would be referred back to the country for further details, spurring fears that proved to be baseless when the nomination won unanimous support.