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Canada to buy 12 hi-tech German submarines after bidding war

Canada has selected a German consortium to build a dozen cutting-edge submarines in one of the country’s largest-ever defence contracts that will further deepen its Nato ties before a crucial summit this week. On Monday the prime minister, Mark Carney, announced the winner of a tightly contested battle for the lucrative government contract to replace their fleet of ageing, secondhand subs, most of which are undergoing maintenance. For months both ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems (TKMS) and the South Korean shipbuilder Hanwha Ocean have promised tech-heavy submarines and spillover economic benefits to Canada. The winner, TKMS, is the largest manufacturer of non-nuclear submarines and a key supplier of Nato’s fleet. Canada had previously indicated that both firms’ diesel-electric offerings – the 212CD model sub from TKMS and Hanwha’s KSS-III Batch-II submarine – suited its military needs. The order for 12 submarines marks the first time Canada has bought brand-new vessels. The Royal Canadian Navy now has four submarines that were bought second-hand from Britain in 1998. Of the four Victoria-class subs, three are undergoing maintenance. The new subs will probably be used to help give Canada a stronger foothold in the Arctic. The TKMS vessels are designed to use modern stealth technology to operate in contested areas with minimal detection, and will be able to conduct lengthy surveillance missions in key Arctic routes, including the Northwest Passage. Hanwha’s vessels are substantially larger than the German one, and the company and industry analysts said they would have given Canada a greater ability to deploy powerful weapons and conduct lengthy patrol deep in the ocean. The submarine order itself is estimated to be worth more than US$12bn (£9bn) but the contract also includes roughly half a century of maintenance, meaning the total bill could exceed US$70bn. Canada’s federal government and TKMS will still have to enter into lengthy negotiations to finalise the contract, a process that could take years. Carney took a delegation of senior cabinet ministers to visit TKMS’s building facility in Kiel, Germany last year, and toured a newly built sub at Hanwha’s facility in Geoje, South Korea. Senior officials from both countries also made visits to Canada to sell the broader economic benefits of their respective pitches. German officials made repeated references to a broader compatibility with Nato, and it has been reported that TKMS was hoping to expand the scope of the contract to include possible investments in rare earths, mining, artificial intelligence and battery production for the automotive sector. South Korea is not a Nato member, but Hanwha representatives said the company would use steel from Algoma’s plant in Sault Ste Marie, Ontario, to build armoured weaponised military vehicles in Canada. Hanwha also spent millions on a wide-ranging ad campaign, including a voiceover from the prominent Canadian journalist Peter Mansbridge, touting the benefits of its KSS-III. Carney’s Liberal party has committed to dramatically increasing government defence spending, with a pledge to allocate 5% of gross domestic product by 2035. Canada recently announced it hit 2% cent of GDP, a longstanding target for Nato members. Canada has also suggested it is open to making larger purchases from European contractors, part of a larger push to lessen its reliance on the US. It has already committed to buying 18 American-made Lockheed Martin F-35 Lighting II jets – a fighter plane long favoured by the Royal Canadian Air Force for interoperability with the North American Aerospace Defense Command, the bi-national military organisation shared between Canada and the US. Recent political tensions between the two nations, however, have pushed Ottawa look at other vendors to help modernise its air force. Canada is weighing the purchase of 72 Saab-made Gripen war planes. The Sweden-based company has said that if Canada buys its latest-generation fight plane, in addition to six GlobalEye surveillance aircraft the country had already agreed to buy, the deal would create up to 12,600 jobs in Canada, marking another immense defence industrial project for the country. On Monday the secretary general of Nato, Mark Rutte, told reporters that the members of the alliance were about to announce billions in new contracts, calling it the “crucial kit we need to deter and defend”.

Zelenskyy calls for ‘strong decisions’ at Nato summit as Russia kills 21 in overnight strikes on Kyiv – as it happened

We are now closing the blog. Here is your summary of the day so far: At least 22 people were killed and dozens injured in another major Russian attack on Kyiv (17:58), with Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskyy urging Nato leaders to take “strong decisions” and back Ukrainian air defence units (9:44). His comments come a day before the alliance’s annual summit is set to begin in Ankara, Turkey, with Nato’s secretary general Mark Rutte telling the media that it will be all about discussions on defence spending and supporting Ukraine (15:53). On the sidelines of the main summit, Zelenskyy is expected to meet with Donald Trump, with the US president suggesting earlier today that ending the Russian aggression on Ukraine is “much closer than people realise” (16:10). If you have any tips, comments or suggestions, email me at jakub.krupa@theguardian.com. I am also on Bluesky at @jakubkrupa.bsky.social and on X at @jakubkrupa.

Middle East crisis: Funeral procession for supreme leader Ali Khamenei begins in Iran – as it happened

Today marked the start of a mass funeral procession for Iran’s former supreme leader, Ali Khamenei. Millions have assembled in the capital for the six-day, five-city funeral for Khamenei, who was killed in February during the first airstrike when the US and Israel started the current war in the region. Several officials who haven’t been seen since the start of the war have made a rare public appearance for the funeral procession. Former president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was seen during the day in what seems to be his first major public appearance since fighting broke out with the US and Israel. The new commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, Ahmad Vahidi, attended the funeral as well as the procession, and so did Esmail Qaani, who leads the Guards’ Quds Force which oversee foreign operations. President Donald ⁠Trump ⁠said earlier today that ⁠the United ⁠States will ‌either ‌make a ‌deal with Iran or “finish the ‌job.” He told reporters that he would ⁠rather make a deal. Hamas is dissolving the body that has governed the Gaza strip since 2007 and handing over control to a technocratic committee established by Trump’s Board of Peace. The National Committee for the Administration of Gaza is a temporary governing body set up under the Board of Peace to oversee civilian affairs. It was launched in January this year, as part of a ceasefire deal made in October 2025. Lebanon’s president has said that Israel’s occupation of the south was preventing the Lebanese army’s deployment to the area, as the two sides prepare to implement a deal involving the deployment and gradual Israeli withdrawal. According to a statement from his office, president Joseph Aoun emphasised the need to pressure Israel to withdraw its forces “because the persistence of the occupation undermines the legitimacy of the [Lebanese] state and prevents the army from deploying and the laying of the foundations for achieving a just and lasting peace”. Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday urged the United States not to sell its F-35 fighter jets or components to Turkey, arguing it would “upset the power balance” in the region. US president Donald Trump travels later on Monday to Ankara for a Nato summit, and his visit could be seen by the Turks as an opportunity to secure acquisition of dozens of jet engines and potential readmission to the F-35 fighter jet program, AFP reports. Lebanese state media said an Israeli strike on a car in the country’s south on Monday killed four people, including three women, despite a fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah. Lebanon’s official National News Agency (NNA) said a school principal, her mother, a foreign female domestic worker and a male Syrian worker were killed when “an Israeli drone targeted the car” they were travelling in as they returned from inspecting their family home in Nabatieh al-Fawqa. A British charity is funding a religious school at the heart of expansion plans for the illegal Israeli settlement in the Palestinian city of Hebron. Friends of Yeshivat Shavei Hevron sent nearly £200,000 to the school between 2019 and 2024, the last year for which accounts are publicly available on the website of the Charity Commission, the charity regulator for England and Wales.

Wildfires rage across southern Europe, forcing thousands to flee homes

Wildfires raging across southern Europe have forced thousands to flee their homes and prompted officials to ban spectators from a stage of the Tour de France, amid warnings of “powder keg” conditions after a record-breaking early summer heatwave. Hundreds of firefighters are tackling blazes that have burned through almost 20,000 hectares (49,500 acres) in Portugal, Spain, France and Greece. Strong winds are forecast to fan the flames and temperatures are expected to rise again this week. In the remote foothills of the French Pyrenees near the Spanish border, 700 firefighters were struggling to contain an out-of-control wildfire that has ⁠scorched 5,000 hectares and prompted the evacuation of more than 10,000 people. “This morning, conditions are ⁠deteriorating again,” said the French interior minister, Laurent Nuñez, on Monday, adding that with wildfires now blazing in five departments, twice as much land had burned in France so far this season compared with the same time last year. The EU said on Monday it was sending ⁠four waterbombing aircraft to France from Cyprus and Sweden to help firefighters around the city of Perpignan. “Europe stands with France,” the European Commission president, Ursula ⁠von der Leyen, posted. The Pyrenees fire has nearly tripled in size since Sunday. “It came within 300 metres [984ft] of the houses. We were shocked by how fast it spread, it was staggering – bordering on panic,” Patrice, from the village of Trévillach, told Agence France-Presse. The blazes follow a premature May heatwave and another in June that shattered temperature records across western Europe, caused thousands of excess deaths and left vast areas of land particularly vulnerable to wildfires. Chantal Mauchet, the prefect of the Hérault department, where several fires have burned through at least 300 hectares of land, said on Monday southern France’s wildfire season had “essentially started three or more weeks early”. The World Weather Attribution group of scientists has said the extreme temperatures recorded in June would have been “virtually impossible” without the climate crisis. Temperatures are forecast to climb again this week, rising to 40C locally. “Climate change is here, we are living the consequences and it is only the start of July,” said the fire chief for Pyrénées-Orientales, Eric Belgioino. “This season is going to be a long one for the soldiers fighting fires. You have to help us.” The eastern Pyrenees prefect, Pierre Regnault de la Mothe, ordered Tour de France spectators “not to go near the route or to the finish area” of Monday’s third stage of the cycling race through the Pyrenees from Spain into France. He said it would be “limited to the passage of the riders only and vehicles essential to the race”. On the Spanish side of the border, fire has ravaged 2,200 hectares, 97% of which has been in the protected natural area of Les Gavarres. The head of operations of the Catalan fire service, Eduard Martinez, said the blaze had a perimeter of 40km (25 miles). Firefighters said their efforts would be complicated by rising temperatures and the many “smoking hotspots” within the perimeter, but announced late on Sunday that the blaze was stable and they hoped it would be extinguished ⁠during the week. South of Catalonia, in Spain’s eastern Castellón province, more than 500 people were evacuated after a wildfire spread into the Sierra de Espadán national park. In central Portugal’s Vouzela area, more than 1,200 firefighters supported by nearly 400 vehicles and 15 aircraft were trying to extinguish a blaze that broke out on Thursday and had burned across an area of 13,000 hectares by Sunday. Spain and Italy sent firefighters and aircraft to help and emergency services said on Monday that while dangerous spots remained, 80% of the blaze was under control. Portugal’s interior minister, Luís Neves, described conditions as a “powder keg”. Elsewhere, large fires also destroyed hundreds of hectares of forest, vineyards and scrub on the Croatian island of Hvar and at Tale in Albania, while in Greece, which was largely spared last month’s heatwave, flames set off by a forest fire tore through two factories in the northern city of Thessaloniki. Greek authorities issued evacuation alerts for three suburbs and urged residents in parts of the city to stay indoors and shut their windows and doors because of toxic smoke from one of the factories, a recycling plant. Another large wildfire broke out Sunday afternoon west of Athens, with 210 firefighters, supported by volunteers, specialised teams and 29 aircraft deployed to tackle the blaze burning through pine forest in the Mandra area.

Italy ordered to compensate woman after allegations of rape by partner dismissed as ‘normal’

The European court of human rights has ordered the Italian state to pay compensation to a woman whose allegations of repeated rape by her partner were dismissed by a prosecutor as “normal” for men who struggle to overcome resistance from “tired” women. The court ruled that the remarks perpetuated “sexist stereotypes” and downplayed gender violence, resulting in the woman being subjected to further victimisation. The court also ruled that the prosecutor – and by extension the Italian justice system – had failed to provide a prompt, thorough and effective investigation as required in domestic abuse cases. The ruling did not cite the prosecutor’s gender but Audrey Ubeda, the French citizen who made the allegations against her now ex-partner, has spoken of the “shock” at discovering it was a woman. The case dates back to April 2021, when Ubeda, who had been living with her Italian partner in the Avellino area of southern Italy, filed a complaint with police alleging he had physically and mentally abused her and their two children, including allegedly raping her several times and holding a knife to her throat – in front of two witnesses – and implying her case would end up in the newspapers like other femicides. Later that year, the prosecutor in charge of the investigation asked for it to be dismissed, referring to the knife incident as “a bad joke” and saying the physical violence inflicted on the children was merely disciplinary and did not exceed a parent’s authority. The prosecutor said it was difficult to establish whether rape had occurred because the man might not have been aware of his partner’s lack of consent, “considering that it is normal for men to have to overcome a minimum level of resistance that every woman tends to display when she is tired from daily life and a man makes a sexual advance”. The request was eventually denied and a new prosecutor assigned to the case. The accused man stood trial and was sentenced to four and a half years in prison by a court of first instance; he is currently free while he appeals against the verdict. The ECHR ordered the Italian state to pay roughly €60,000 (£51,000) to Ubeda and her two children, who lived in a shelter for three years, ruling that authorities had violated the “prohibition of inhuman and degrading treatment” towards domestic violence victims, including failing to adopt adequate measures such as assigning a family home or authorising their request to move to France. Speaking to the Italian press in recent days, Ubeda said the ruling was “a vindication” and “a victory for all women”. She told La Repubblica: “When my lawyer explained that a magistrate had exonerated my ex by invoking the image of a man who must overcome a woman’s resistance to have sex, I felt wounded all over again. I was shocked to then learn that those words had come from a female prosecutor.”

UK charity funding school at heart of illegal Israeli settlement expansion

A British charity is funding a religious school at the heart of expansion plans for the illegal Israeli settlement in the Palestinian city of Hebron. Friends of Yeshivat Shavei Hevron sent nearly £200,000 to the school between 2019 and 2024, the last year for which accounts are publicly available on the website of the Charity Commission, the charity regulator for England and Wales. Construction of a new dormitory for the school was approved in June, after the far-right finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, unilaterally broke a decades-old international agreement on control of Hebron to give Israel planning authority. The expansion will increase the population of one of the most extreme Israeli communities in the occupied West Bank, and the only one built in the heart of a Palestinian city. “We want British charities to fund peace, not to fund obstacles for peace. This is very wrong,” said Issa Amro, a Palestinian human rights defender from Hebron and co-founder of Youth Against Settlements. “The students at this yeshiva are very aggressive. A new building will mean more violence towards Palestinians, more restrictions, more Israeli military presence.” Israel has built extensive systems of militarised separation to isolate several hundred settlers inside Hebron from the city they moved into. Palestinians are barred entirely from some streets, and walls and gates divide Palestinians who live in areas under Israeli military control from most of the 230,000 population. “For this yeshiva to exist, thousands of Palestinians have already lost their shops, their housing and their daily livelihood in the heart of a Palestinian city,” said Hagit Ofran, from the Israeli advocacy group Peace Now. “The new dormitory is a significant development because they are adding more settlers in Hebron, the most extreme settlement, where apartheid is everywhere.” International and Israeli leaders, including the late US president Jimmy Carter, the former Mossad head Tamir Pardo and former attorney general of Israel Michael Ben-Yair, have said Israel has imposed apartheid in the occupied West Bank, including Hebron. Hebron Yeshiva seeks funding in other countries that consider settlements in occupied Palestine illegal, offering donations “with receipts” in France and Canada. An Israeli crowd-funding tech company, IsraelGives, has also facilitated millions of dollars in funding for settlements from US residents. The exterior of the new dormitory is already complete and the Israeli military has built an outpost on the roof of the Palestinian home next door. In 2023, Friends of Yeshivat Shavei Hevron donated £58,200 to the school and claimed more than £2,000 in gift aid from HMRC, according to its accounts. The charity says on its website that it is not registered for gift aid. In 2024, when it had lower turnover so did not file full accounts, it sent £21,360 to the school. The donations from Friends of Yeshivat appear to contravene the charity’s own deed of trust, which refers to educational and charitable work “in the state of Israel”, with no mention of Palestine. Although Israel has never defined its own borders, the British government last year formally recognised the state of Palestine, on territory which includes Hebron. The charity was one of 32 registered in England and Wales identified in a letter sent to the commission by the Labour MP Melanie Ward on 1 June in which she said they had in total donated at least £28m to Israeli settlements in recent years. The Guardian understands that the Charity Commission passed on details of the letter to the Metropolitan police’s war crimes unit but no investigation is under way. On 9 June, the foreign secretary, Yvette Cooper, said in parliament that “charity systems are abused to funnel support to illegal settlements” and that “some evidence suggests that rules are being broken”. She said the Charity Commission had been tasked with investigating links to settlements. The commission said in a statement that it shared Ward’s concerns. It added: “But this remains a complex and contentious issue, which touches on wider legal principles about charities’ right to operate, and support the most vulnerable, in parts of the world in which there may be conflict, contested jurisdiction, or lawlessness.” Friends of Yeshivat Shavei Hevron provides details of a UK account with Barclays Bank to which donors can transfer funds. A Barclays spokesperson said it could not comment on individual clients but that it “does have policies and procedures in place to meet its legal and regulatory obligations – including appropriate due diligence and financial crime controls for charity clients”. The charity’s contact email was the professional account of Ari Bloom, a trustee who is a partner at the law firm Solomon Taylor & Shaw. Solomon Taylor & Shaw’s switchboard number is listed as the charity’s phone contact, and it is registered to the same north London address used by the law firm. The contact details on the Charity Commission website were changed after the Guardian contacted Solomon Taylor & Shaw and Bloom for comment. Friends of Yeshivat Shavei Hevron was also approached for comment. The current yeshiva building and the expansion are both at the edge of the Israeli-controlled area of Hebron. Nadav Weiman, the executive director of Breaking the Silence, a group founded by Israeli combat veterans to document military abuses in occupied Palestine, said students throw stones at Palestinians from their roof. Israeli soldiers, who outnumber the settlers, have turned the rooftops of private Palestinian homes into military posts to guard the yeshiva complex. “If communities fund that [new] dormitory, they are funding more violence, funding the next wave that will bring death to Palestinian families and Israeli families,” Weiman said. “Everything that happens in Hebron first, happens elsewhere afterwards.”

Detained Gaza doctor almost unrecognisable after injuries in Israeli jail, lawyer says

One of Gaza’s most prominent doctors is almost unrecognisable because of severe injuries inflicted in Israeli detention, his lawyer has said, and faces “tangible danger to his life” after being held for 18 months without charge or trial. Hussam Abu Safiya met his lawyer on 2 July, after a transfer to Israel’s notorious underground Rakefet prison in late June. He had difficulty breathing and speaking continuously, was so weak he struggled to sit upright, and repeatedly seemed on the verge of losing consciousness, said his lawyer, Nasser Odeh. Abu Safiya, who was the director of the Kamal Adwan hospital in northern Gaza until he was seized by Israeli forces, said he feared for his life. “They brought me here to kill me. I don’t see myself surviving. This is the end,” Odeh quoted him as saying, in a joint statement with Physicians for Human Rights Israel (PHRI), who along with other organisations are calling for his release. His detention is part of a broader pattern of Israeli attacks on healthcare across occupied Palestine, said Milena Ansari, PHRI’s director for the area. On Sunday a four-month-old Palestinian baby, Ahmad Maarouf Zaid, died after Israeli forces blocked his family from crossing a checkpoint to reach a waiting ambulance, his family told the Guardian. They drove the severely ill baby on unpaved and mountainous back roads to Ramallah themselves, which delayed treatment by over an hour. “The reports of a newborn dying after delays at a West Bank checkpoint, the arrest of a physician providing medical care, and the deepening humanitarian crisis in Gaza should not be understood as isolated incidents,” Ansari said. “They reflect a broader pattern in which the conditions necessary to realise Palestinians’ right to health are being systematically undermined.” Abu Safiya had become the face of health workers struggling to treat patients throughout the war in Gaza before his detention. He is being held indefinitely, along with thousands of other Palestinian civilians, in prisons that Israeli rights groups say have become torture camps. In late May he was transferred from Ketziot prison to the Ganot prison complex and put in solitary confinement without explanation, Odeh said. Abu Safiya described an attack there by guards using hammers and batons, shortly after appearing via video link at a supreme court appeal hearing challenging his detention. He was then moved to the Rakefet facility on 24 June, where Odeh noted a severe and dangerous deterioration in his condition. “I have visited Dr Abu Safiya several times since his detention, but the individual I encountered during this latest visit was not the same person I had previously met,” Odeh said on Sunday, calling for an immediate independent medical examination. ‘‘His physical and psychological state, the severe injuries visible on his body, and his personal testimony leave no room for doubt: his life is in immediate danger.” Abu Safiya appeared frightened, distressed and reluctant to speak freely in the meeting, Odeh said, but told his lawyer that he was subjected to daily beatings in the Rakefet jail, and had lost consciousness several times as a result. Rakefet, where prisoners never see daylight, was built in the 1980s to hold senior organised crime figures before being closed on the grounds it was inhumane. It was reopened on the orders of the far-right national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir. Other Palestinians detained there reported feeling breathless and choking in the unventilated, overcrowded cells, even without injuries like those sustained by Abu Safiya. An Israel prison service spokesperson said allegations made by Odeh were “false and entirely without factual basis”, but declined to comment on Abu Safiya’s health, citing privacy concerns. The death of four-month-old Ahmad, from Deir Ammar refugee camp, was announced on Sunday evening. A longed-for baby, he was born after years of IVF treatment to a family and was healthy most of his short life. The family called emergency services when he developed a high fever on Sunday morning and medics sent an ambulance to the camp’s Ein Ayoub gate. Since 7 October 2023 Israel has regularly barred vehicles including ambulances from driving through Ein Ayoub, which is the main route to Ramallah and its hospitals. Residents can usually cross on foot but as Ahmad’s parents approached they were stopped by four Israeli soldiers, who had fired teargas at people in the area and ignored the family’s desperate pleas. A video of the incident was shared on X. “This baby needed oxygen. If he had been allowed to reach an ambulance and get to the hospital, his life could have been saved,” said Arafat Ahmad Zaid, the boy’s uncle. A spokesperson for the Israeli military denied blocking the family from crossing to seek medical aid. Zaid said the circumstances of his nephew’s death compounded the family’s grief. “There are no words to describe the pain of watching your own child die in your arms while knowing there is nothing you can do to save him. That is the ultimate suffering. That is the ultimate humiliation.”