Lufthansa to suspend flights to Kyiv, Odessa from Monday

Germany’s Lufthansa group is suspending flights to and from the Ukrainian cities of Kyiv and Odessa. (Reuters)
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Updated 19 February 2022
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Lufthansa to suspend flights to Kyiv, Odessa from Monday

  • The company as well as Eurowings, Swiss, Brussels and Austrian Airlines will conduct some last flights to those cities over the weekend before suspending flights from Monday

FRANKFURT: Germany’s Lufthansa group is suspending flights to and from the Ukrainian cities of Kyiv and Odessa, a spokesperson said on Saturday amid growing fears of a possible Russian invasion.
The company, which owns Germany’s flagship carrier as well as Eurowings, Swiss, Brussels and Austrian Airlines, will conduct some last flights to those cities over the weekend before suspending flights from Monday until the end of the month, the spokesperson said.
It will continue to fly to the city of Lviv in western Ukraine where some countries have moved their embassies, the spokesperson said. Lufthansa is constantly monitoring the situation and will decide on further flights at a later date.
Lufthansa follows several other European airlines which have already canceled services to and from Ukraine.
Germany’s foreign ministry earlier on Saturday told its nationals to leave the country.


Spain begins 3 days of mourning for deadly train wreck while searchers look for more bodies

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Spain begins 3 days of mourning for deadly train wreck while searchers look for more bodies

ADAMUZ: Spain woke to flags at half staff on Tuesday as the nation began three days of mourning for the victims of the deadly train accident in the country’s south, while emergency crews continue searching for possible bodies.
The official death toll of Sunday’s accident rose to 40 by late Monday. But officials warned that that count may not be definitive, with emergency workers still probing for bodies among what Andalusian regional president Juanma Moreno called “a twisted mass of metal.”
Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska told Spanish national television RTVE late Monday that searchers believe they have found three more bodies still trapped in the wreckage. Those bodies are not included in the official count, the minister said.
The crash took place Sunday at 7:45 p.m. when the tail end of a train carrying 289 passengers on the route from Malaga to the capital, Madrid, went off the rails. It slammed into an incoming train traveling from Madrid to Huelva, another southern Spanish city, according to rail operator Adif.
The head of the second train, which was carrying nearly 200 passengers, took the brunt of the impact. That collision knocked its first two carriages off the track and sent them plummeting down a 4-meter (13-foot) slope. Some bodies were found hundreds of meters (feet) from the crash site, Moreno said.
Officials are continuing to investigate the causes of the incident that Spanish Transport Minister Óscar Puente has called “strange” since it occurred on a straight line and neither train was speeding.
But Puente said late Monday that officials had found a broken section of track.
“Now we have to determine if that is a cause or a consequence (of the derailment),” Puente told Spanish radio Cadena Ser.
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez visited the accident site near the town of Adamuz on Monday, where he declared three days of mourning with flags lowered on all public buildings and navy vessels. Spain’s King Felipe and Queen Letizia are scheduled to visit on Tuesday.
Meanwhile, Spain’s Civil Guard is collecting DNA samples from family members who fear they have loved ones among the unidentified dead.