Ministers are weighing up proposals for a Chinese company to supply wind turbines for a major offshore windfarm in the North Sea.

The government is in discussions with Green Volt North Sea over whether Mingyang, China’s biggest offshore wind company, should supply the wind turbines. Mingyang has emerged as the preferred manufacturer, but the company has sought advice from ministers on whether to proceed.

Green Volt, which is jointly owned by Flotation Energy, a Scottish company and Vårgrønn, a Norwegian one, is constructing the first commercial-scale floating offshore windfarm in Europe. The project will deliver electricity to oil and gas platforms, replacing power currently generated by gas and diesel turbines, and provide electricity to the UK grid.

The decision over whether to source its wind turbines from Mingyang will be closely scrutinised after the government stepped in to take control of British Steel amid claims that its Chinese owner, Jingye Group, wanted to shut down its Scunthorpe plant to make the UK a dumping ground for Chinese steel.

Germans have an increasingly negative view of Israel 60 years after the establishment of bilateral diplomatic relations, said a new survey released by the Bertelsmann Foundation on Friday

The report pointed to a significant change in the mood of Germans towards Israel over the past four years.

Back in 2021, 46% of German citizens surveyed had a positive attitude towards Israel. Meanwhile, only 36% have a positive opinion of Israel, while 38% rate the Jewish state negatively.

The German government has been one of the strongest supporters of Israel but has come under growing public pressure as a result of Israel’s brutal military campaign in Gaza.

A city official in Stockholm has said the municipality has no plans to comply after one of its offices received a letter seeking to impose Donald Trump’s rollback of diversity measures, in what is believed to be the first such missive sent to a foreign government.

“It’s so bizarre,” said Jan Valeskog, Stockholm’s vice-mayor for planning. “It’s our political priorities that count, not the ones from this embassy or any other embassies.”

French Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau announced yesterday that he intends to impose a ban on wearing the hijab in universities.

In March 2004, France imposed a ban on wearing the hijab in France in primary and middle schools, while universities were exempt.

In August 2023, French Education Minister Gabriel Attal banned the abaya in schools, claiming it was “an Islamic garment that violates state rules and regulations.”

On 18 February, the Senate approved a bill aimed at banning the hijab in French sporting competitions.

More than 70 previous participants of Eurovision have called on the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) to ban Israel’s Kan public broadcaster from the song contest.

The participants, who include contestants, songwriters and lyricists, accused Israel’s Kan broadcaster of being complicit in Israeli genocide against Palestinians.

“Kan is complicit in Israel’s genocide against the Palestinians in Gaza and the decades-long regime of apartheid and military occupation against the entire Palestinian people,” the participants wrote in a joint letter.

The European countries are set to dispatch eight firefighting planes to Israel today to support its emergency efforts, The Times of Israel reports.

The assistance comes as fires continue to burn in 11 hotspots near Jerusalem, with seven towns still under evacuation, the publication cites Israel’s Fire and Rescue Service as saying.

Kneecap were set to perform at the Hurricane Festival in June, one of Germany's largest festivals and its sister event, the Southside Festival. The festivals issued a statement last week saying: "Kneecap will not be performing at Hurricane and Southside Festival this year," without providing further context. At the same time, the ticket provider for the events also stated that the events have been cancelled.

Following their performance at the US Coachella Music Festival in April, where Kneecap displayed "f*** Israel, free Palestine" on the stage, the band has received a surge of backlash, including calls to revoke their work visas to the US, championed by TV personality Sharon Osborne.

The US booking agency Independent Artist Group (IAG), which sponsored Kneecap's US work visas, announced the band is no longer their client. The band were set to tour in the US in October, with most of the shows being sold out.

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LA GRAND COMBE, France (AP) — A man suspected of killing a Muslim worshipper in a mosque in the south of France was still on the run Sunday, authorities said, in an attack described by Prime Minister Francois Bayrou as Islamophobic.

Both men were alone in the mosque in the former mining town of La Grand Combe on Friday when the victim was fatally stabbed. The assailant recorded the attack on his phone, and security camera footage showed him shouting insults at “Allah,” which means God in Arabic, local media said.

The plans, hatched by Sweden’s rightwing government with support of its far-right backers, made waves around the world. Politicians said they were working to strip citizenship from dual nationals who had been convicted of some crimes.

The concept also made a cameo in Germany’s February election after Friedrich Merz – whose centre-right CDU/CSU bloc emerged victorious in the ballot – told the newspaper Welt it should be possible to revoke German citizenship in the case of dual nationals who commit criminal offences.

The proposal was swiftly criticised, with one political commentator pointing out that it would result in some being “Germans on probation” for their entire lives. “They can never truly be German. One mistake, one crime – and their Germanness is gone,” the journalist and political commentator Gilda Sahebi wrote on social media. “It doesn’t matter if they were born here or if their family has lived in Germany for generations.”

Merz’s idea, she added, had laid bare the normalisation of “racist discrimination” in that, “in other words,” he was calling for remigration – the concept long-peddled by far-right, anti-immigrant parties and which, in Germany, calls for the mass deportation of migrants, including those with German citizenship.

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