High Representaitve of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell speaks during a press conference following the EU Foreign Ministers meeting at the European Union Delegation headquarters ahead of the 79th session of the United Nations (UN) General Assembly in New York on September 23, 2024. (AFP)
Borrell said civilians were paying a high price and all diplomatic efforts were needed to prevent a full-blown war
Updated 24 September 2024
AFP
NEW YORK: EU foreign affairs chief Josep Borrell said on Monday that the escalating clashes between Israel and Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah threaten to plunge the Middle East into all-out war.
“I can say we are almost in a full-fledged war,” Borrell said ahead of a gathering of world leaders at the United Nations.
“We’re seeing more military strikes, more damage, more collateral damage, more victims,” he added as Lebanese authorities said Israeli airstrikes killed at least 492 people on Monday, including 35 children.
The strikes marked the deadliest day of cross-border violence since the Gaza war began.
Israel said it killed a “large number” of Hezbollah militants when it hit about 1,300 sites in southern and eastern Lebanon, including a “targeted strike” in Beirut.
“Everybody has to put all their capacity to stop this,” Borrell said, pressing for a solution in New York.
On Gaza, he said “despite all the diplomatic capacity that we have deployed, nothing has been able to stop the war,” accusing both sides of “procrastinating.”
Macron squares up to Trump in rebel shades at macho Davos gathering
French President Emmanuel Macron, speaking at the World Economic Forum on Tuesday, wore sunglasses on stage
A broken blood vessel has left him with a bloodshot eye since last week
Updated 4 sec ago
AFP
PARIS: Top Gun or Terminator? French President Emmanuel Macron’s sporting of aviator shades at Davos this week tickled the press and inspired viral memes online, while prompting a surge in visitors to the eyewear brand’s website. Macron, speaking at the World Economic Forum on Tuesday, wore sunglasses on stage due to a broken blood vessel that has left him with a bloodshot eye since last week, according to the Elysee’s chief physician. While the French president stood up for European sovereignty and blasted “unacceptable” threats by his US counterpart Donald Trump to impose tariffs on countries opposed to his plans to seize Greenland, it was Macron’s flashy blue sunglasses that grabbed much of the attention. “Top Gun or Terminator?,” read a headline in Le Parisien daily, highlighting the viral commentary which ranged from memes photoshopping laser beams shooting from Macron’s eyes to his face on the “Miami Vice” film poster. Other images on social media showed Macron playing the rebel Maverick from the Top Gun franchise, while facing off to Trump. “These sunglasses were unintentionally a very fitting visual vocabulary for the message he wanted to convey,” said communications professor Philippe Moreau-Chevrolet at Paris’s Sciences Po university. “It gave a Hollywood-style dimension — cool and masculine at once — that answered Trump.” Trump mocked the look, stating: “I watched him yesterday with those beautiful sunglasses. What the hell happened?“ “But I watched him sort of be tough,” Trump added, after Macron said France rejected “bullies.” The UK’s Telegraph newspaper published the headline “Can Macron’s sunglasses save the West?” in an analysis of the heated and divisive tone taken by largely male world leaders at the summit. “Testosterone is the primary currency in Davos this year, and the French president’s aviators have placed him at the top of the pecking order,” the Telegraph wrote. The hype surrounding Macron’s look led to a surge in traffic to the French eyewear maker Henry Jullien’s website, causing it to crash. “Our eShop website is experiencing an exceptional volume of visits and enquiries” following the “significant visibility” given to the sunglasses by Macron, said a notice on the brand’s website. It added that it had launched a “temporary page” featuring solely the ‘Pacific’ model worn by Macron, “to ensure stable and secure access for everyone.”
