World

Most of the homes on three of Tonga’s smaller islands have been “completely destroyed” by the tsunami that followed Saturday’s undersea volcanic eruption, the Red Cross has said. With communications down, a ship made it to Nomuka, Mango and Fonoifua on Wednesday, an official said. Few homes are said to remain standing after settlements were

The rapid spread of the Omicron variant, combined with the roll-out of up to 20bn doses of vaccine means the COVID-19 pandemic could be over this year, according to one of the world’s leading public health experts. But Sir Jeremy Farrar, director of the Wellcome Trust and former SAGE adviser told Sky News that more

A man in his 30s has been arrested in connection with the murder of Ashling Murphy. Ms Murphy, 23, was found dead after going for a run on the banks of the Grand Canal in Tullamore, County Offaly, at around 4pm on Wednesday 12 January. Police have said the man who was detained is being

Britain will provide Ukraine with “light armour defensive” weapons and training as Western powers fear an “increasingly threatening” Russia will invade the country. Defence Secretary Ben Wallace said the weapons being supplied are “short range” and to use in “self-defence”, adding that they are not “strategic” and “pose no threat to Russia”. Mr Wallace added

Tickets for Beijing’s Winter Olympics will not be sold to the general public due to worries about COVID. Only “targeted” groups will be able to get tickets for the games – which start on 4 February, said organisers. International fans are already excluded because of China‘s strict border policy to prevent importing cases. The organising

Tsunami-hit Tonga has remained largely uncontactable due to telephone and internet links being severed. An underwater volcano off Tonga erupted yesterday, triggering warnings of 1.2-metre tsunami waves and evacuation orders on the shores of the island and several others in the South Pacific. The eruption caused internet and phone lines to go down at about

Novak Djokovic has lost his bid to stay in Australia after judges upheld the cancellation of his visa. The saga, entailing the world No 1 and known vaccine sceptic, made headlines across the world, with supporters of the Serbian star saying it was a fight for freedom and critics saying he was trying to dodge

Lake Annecy is so beautiful and peaceful that it is easy to imagine that bad things can’t happen here. Today, the mist is sitting over the water and, in the distance, there are mountains reaching into the sky. It’s picture postcard pretty in the actual sense that there are lots of postcards of this scene.

A tsunami alert has been issued by the Pacific nation of Tonga after an undersea volcano erupted. Video posted on social media platforms showed large waves washing ashore in coastal areas. The Tonga Meteorological Services said a tsunami warning had been put in force for all of Tonga. It is the latest in a series

Ukraine is “99.9%” sure Russia was behind a massive cyber attack against Ukrainian government websites and the hack could signal a new physical invasion will follow, the president’s top security official has told Sky News. Oleksiy Danilov, secretary of the National Security and Defence Council of Ukraine, revealed that some areas within the government’s security

Novak Djokovic will be detained again in Australia from tomorrow morning after his lawyers appealed a decision by the country’s immigration minister to cancel his visa for a second time. The tennis star first had his visa revoked on arrival in Melbourne last week when his COVID vaccination exemption was questioned. Please use Chrome browser

A man arrested in connection with the suspected murder of a young woman in Ireland while she was out for an afternoon jog is to face further questioning. The woman has been named locally as primary school teacher Ashling Murphy, from Tullamore, County Offaly. She died after being attacked while running along the canal bank

People travelling from the UK to France will no longer have to self-isolate on arrival or show proof that their trip is essential from Friday morning, tourism minister Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne has announced. However, the requirement for a negative COVID test, conducted 24 hours before their visit, remains in place. Those who provide a negative result

“It’s a Russian military ship… The distance from us is about four and a half miles,” the young commander of a Ukrainian naval vessel said, pointing to a marker on his radar screen. Senior Lieutenant Denis Bakumov, 23, was steering his small, armoured boat through waters shared by Ukraine and Russia, where tensions are high

A person has been arrested in the unsolved case of three members of a British family and a cyclist shot dead in the French Alps more than nine years ago. Saad al Hilli, 50, was killed with his wife Iqbal, 47, and mother-in-law Suhaila al Allaf, 74, near Lake Annecy on 5 September 2012. A

North Korea has carried out a successful test of a hypersonic missile in a launch attended by leader Kim Jong Un, the country’s state media has reported. Authorities in South Korea and Japan detected the suspected launch on Tuesday, leading to condemnation from authorities in Washington and Tokyo. After its release from a rocket booster,

Ukraine’s military chief has said his forces would defend the country “until the last drop of blood” as he urged people to calm down about threats of a new Russian invasion. Lieutenant-General Valerii Zaluzhnyi, 48, repeatedly underlined that Ukraine has been at war with Russia since 2014, telling Sky News in an exclusive interview: “It

There has been no breakthrough in US-Russian talks aimed at calming tensions between Moscow and Ukraine. Diplomats from the Kremlin and Washington met in the Swiss city of Geneva amid fears that President Vladimir Putin could be preparing to invade the former Soviet bloc country. Russia wants a ban on further expansion of NATO, including

Novak Djokovic has won his appeal against deportation from Australia, with a judge reinstating his visa and ordering that he be released from hotel quarantine within 30 minutes. Border officials previously ruled that the tennis star did not meet the criteria for a COVID exemption to entry requirements. Djokovic had spent four nights in an

Both sides in the fight over whether Novak Djokovic should be allowed to enter Australia have now set out the arguments they plan to use in court. The hearing, which starts at 10am local time in Australia (11pm UK), and is expected to finish hearing evidence at around 5pm (6am UK), will be virtual, but