15/12/2025

MONDAY | DEC 15, 2025

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Ten killed in Sydney beach shooting

VILNIUS: Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko freed 123 prisoners on Saturday including Nobel Peace Prize winner Ales Bialiatski and leading opposition figure Maria Kalesnikava after two days of talks with an envoy for President Donald Trump. In return, the US agreed to lift sanctions on Belarusian potash. Potash is a key component in fertilisers, and the former Soviet state is a leading global producer. The prisoner release was by far the biggest by Lukashenko since Trump’s administration opened talks this year with the veteran authoritarian leader, a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin. Western governments had previously shunned him because of his crushing of dissent and backing for Russia’s war in Ukraine. Nine of the released prisoners left Belarus for Lithuania and 114 were taken to Ukraine, officials said. Bialiatski, co-winner of the 2022 Nobel Peace Prize, is a human rights campaigner who fought for years on behalf of political prisoners before becoming one himself. He DEVENTER: Christmas,” bellowed a top hat and cape-clad gentleman in full Victorian garb, to the amusement of passers-by at a festival celebrating Charles Dickens. Yet the scene, which could have been plucked straight from the pages of one of the English literary titan’s much-beloved tomes, did not take place on the streets of London but in the Netherlands. Since December 1991, the Dutch city of Deventer has held a two-day festival celebrating the author of such classics as Bleak House and A Tale of Two Cities and, of course, A Christmas Carol . Dozens of carollers belted out Christmas tunes on each corner, while no fewer than 395 Dickensian characters, Oliver Twist included, roamed Deventer’s streets. The festival was the brainchild of store owner Emmy Strik, who saw it as an opportunity to give free rein to her Anglophilia. “She’s really a fan of England and Dickens,” said Liesbeth Velders-Strik, Emmy’s daughter, who has taken over both the shop and the festival’s organisation. “And she said, ‘I want to have a Victorian Christmas’.” “Miss Havisham is at my parents’ house, you will see her in the window,” said Strik, referring to the eccentric doyenne from her favourite Dickens novel, Great Expectations , whose dress famously fire alight during the novel’s denouement. “We have a lot of costumes that were from television series, so we don’t want fabrics that stay away from open fire, because that’s not Dickens,” said the 57-year-old. Nearly 50,000 visitors are expected to brave the two-hour wait to enter the city centre across the weekend to attend the Dickens festival, which has cemented its place in Deventer’s folklore. – AFP Dutch Dickens festival brings Christmas cheer “Merry

fathomed. It’s a horrific thing,” said Alex Ryvchin, co-chief executive of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry. He told Sky News that his media adviser had been wounded. Videos circulating on X appeared to show people on the beach and nearby park scattering as gunshots and police sirens could be heard. One video showed a man dressed in a black shirt firing a large weapon before being tackled by a man in a white T-shirt who wrestled his weapon off him. A different man was seen firing a weapon from a pedestrian bridge. Another video showed two men pressed onto the ground by uniformed police on a small pedestrian bridge. Officers could be seen trying to resuscitate one of the men. The attack came almost exactly 11 years after a gunman took 18 people hostage at a cafe in Sydney. Two hostages and the gunman were killed after a 16-hour standoff. – Reuters

said Jewish people who had gone to light the first candle of the Hanukkah holiday on the beach had been attacked”. Australia has experienced a string of attacks on synagogues, buildings and cars since October 2023. Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said he was appalled. One of the world’s most famous beaches, Bondi is typically crowded with locals and tourists, especially on warm weekend evenings. “If we were targeted deliberately in this way, it’s something of a scale that none of us could have ever

o One of at least two gunmen among dead

SYDNEY: Ten people were killed and around a dozen wounded when gunmen opened fire during a holiday event at Bondi Beach yesterday, Australian officials said. New South Wales police said two people had been taken into custody, and the Australian Broadcasting Corp said one of at least two gunmen was among those killed. Around a dozen people were taken to local hospitals after the shooting, a New South Wales

ambulance spokesperson said. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese called the incident “shocking and distressing”, adding that “emergency responders are on the ground and working to save lives”. “I saw at least 10 people on the ground and blood everywhere,” 30 year-old local Harry Wilson, who witnessed the shooting, told the Sydney Morning Herald . Israeli President Isaac Herzog

Armed police at Bondi Beach after the shooting

yesterday. – AFPPIC

Young Portuguese cut back on social media

Belarus frees opposition figures

LISBON: Young people in Portugal are sharply reducing their social media use, reflecting a shift toward more conscious digital habits, according to new data and researchers. Figures from Portuguese market research firm Marktest show that the proportion of young people using social media has fallen 22% over the past two years. The general population is also cutting back, with average daily time spent on social media dropping 13% over the past year. Data released on Friday by Portugal’s National Institute of Statistics (INE) shows 79% of residents use social media, the lowest level since 2017. Researchers cited by the Portuguese newspaper Expresso say the trend is consistent with developments observed in other countries, pointing to signs of saturation as users reassess the role of social media in their daily lives. Increasingly, individuals are adopting “digital detox” practices, including limiting screen time or temporarily disconnecting from online platforms. Experts note that the decline

increasing awareness among young people of the need to protect their attention and well-being, and to develop more balanced and sustainable patterns of online engagement,” she said. Despite the decline, social media continues to play a significant role in Portuguese society. Analysts note that the trend does not signal the disappearance of social platforms, but rather a shift toward more selective and intentional use. In Berlin, another survey conducted by the Insa Institute for Sunday’s edition of the Bild newspaper found that more than half of Germans support a ban on social media use for young people under 16. The poll found that 60% of respondents were in favour of such a ban, while 24% opposed it. A total of 10% said they did not care, and 6% either did not answer or were unsure. The survey comes as Australia last week implemented rules restricting social media use for young people. For the survey, the opinion research institute Insa interviewed 1,003 people on Thursday and Friday. – Bernama

had been in jail since July 2021. Visibly aged since he was last seen in public, he smiled broadly as he embraced exiled opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya on arrival at the US embassy in Lithuania. Bialiatski told Reuters he had spent the previous night on a prison bunk in a room with nearly 40 people, and was still getting to grips with the idea of being free. He said the goals of the human rights struggle for which he and his fellow-campaigners had won the Nobel prize had still not been realised. “Thousands of people have been and continue to be imprisoned ... So our struggle continues,” he said in his first public comments in the three years since he won the award. The Norwegian Nobel Committee expressed “profound relief and heartfelt joy” at his release. Kalesnikava, a leader of mass protests against Lukashenko in 2020, was among the large group taken by bus to Ukraine. – Reuters

among young people reflects a conscious effort to establish healthier digital habits. Patricia Dias, assistant professor at the Faculty of Human Sciences of the Catholic University of Portugal (UCP), said that reducing social media use is often a deliberate and sustained decision rather than a short-term reaction. Drawing on her research into digital disconnection among Portuguese adolescents, Dias said many young people choose to cut back because they perceive that the benefits of social media no longer outweigh the time commitment and psychological pressure involved. She explained that young users frequently report experiencing anxiety, compulsive checking behaviours and social pressure, particularly the fear of missing out. These factors encourage them to set boundaries on their online activity, reduce usage or temporarily disconnect altogether. Dias emphasised that such behaviour represents a process of self regulation. “What we are observing is an