More foreign criminals will be deported before their appeals against their removal are heard as the Home Office adds 15 new countries to its “deport now, appeal later” scheme.
The policy allows the government to send foreigners who commit crimes in the UK back to their home countries before they can appeal against the decision.
The scheme’s new countries, including Canada, India and Australia, bring the total to 23 – nearly three times more than the original eight, with the Home Office saying more could follow in the future.
Home Secretary Yvette Cooper says expansion of the scheme is to prevent foreign criminals from “exploiting our immigration system” and “fast-track” their removals.
Foreign nationals who have had their claim refused will be expelled from the UK and can take part in their appeal hearings from their home countries via video link.
The other countries added to the scheme are:
Angola
Botswana
Brunei
Bulgaria
Guyana
Indonesia
Kenya
Latvia
Lebanon
Malaysia
Uganda
Zambia
Cooper said previously that offenders were able to remain in the UK “for months or even years” while their cases worked through the appeals system.
“That has to end. Those who commit crimes in our country cannot be allowed to manipulate the system, which is why we are restoring control and sending a clear message that our laws must be respected and will be enforced,” she added.
Ministers argue that increasing deportations will ease the overcrowding crisis in prisons.
Prisons in England and Wales are facing significant capacity challenges, with occupancy levels nearing 100%.
There were 774 prisoners from the 15 new countries covered by “deport now, appeal later”, according to Ministry of Justice figures from the end of June.
Of the new countries, only Indians are in the most numerous nationalities among current prisoners.
Foreign Secretary David Lammy welcomed the decision and said the UK was working to increase the number of other countries where foreign criminals can be returned.
Chris Philp, the shadow home secretary, welcomed the move, adding: “But even with this U-turn, only the Conservative Party is committed to deporting all foreign criminals.
“Until Keir Starmer either commits to deporting all foreign criminals or stops rolling out the red carpet for migrants the world over, this problem is not going away.”
The move comes after the justice secretary announced on Sunday new plans to deport foreign criminals immediately after they have received a custodial sentence.
Under the proposals for England and Wales, those who are given fixed-term sentences could be deported straight away and would be barred from re-entering the UK.
Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood said that foreign criminals would be sent “packing” if they “abuse our hospitality and break our laws”.
The new powers – which require Parliament’s approval – would save taxpayers money and increase publish safety, the government said.
However, shadow justice secretary Robert Jenrick warned that some countries may refuse to take in those who are deported.
He suggested Sir Keir Starmer should “suspend visas and foreign aid” in the event that countries don’t take back their nationals.
According to the government, foreign offenders make up around 12% percent of the prison population, with prison places costing £54,000 a year on average.
Foreign criminals will face immediate deportation after receiving a custodial sentence, under new plans announced by the justice secretary.
Under the proposals, those who are given fixed-term sentences could be deported straight away and would be barred from re-entering the UK.
The decision over whether they go on to serve their sentences abroad would be up to the country they are sent to, the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) told the BBC. In theory, this means that some criminals may be able to walk free upon arrival in their destination country.
Foreign offenders make up around 12% percent of the prison population, with prison places costing £54,000 a year on average, according to the government.
It says the new powers would save money for British taxpayers and protect the public.
Those serving life sentences, such as terrorists and murderers, will serve their full prison sentence in the UK before being considered for deportation, it said.
Once a custodial sentence is handed down by a judge, the decision over whether someone will be deported will fall to a prison governor, the MoJ said.
Authorities would retain the power to keep criminals in custody if, for example, they were planning further crimes against the UK’s interests or were seen as a danger to national security.
The MoJ told the BBC that its definition of a foreign national is based on the conditions laid out in the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act.
If passed, the new powers could be applied to those already in prison, meaning the government could begin deportations immediately. As of January 2024, there were about 10,400 foreign nationals in the prison system.
Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood said that foreign criminals would be sent “packing” if they “abuse our hospitality and break our laws”.
“This government is taking radical action to deport foreign criminals, as part of our Plan for Change. Deportations are up under this government, and with this new law they will happen earlier and faster than ever before,” she said.
Shadow justice secretary Robert Jenrick criticised the plans, warning that some countries may refuse to take in those who are deported.
“If countries won’t take back their nationals, Starmer should suspend visas and foreign aid. His soft-touch approach isn’t working,” he said.
The announcement comes after a tweak in the law in June, expected to come into force in September, meaning prisoners would face deportation 30% into their prison sentence rather than the current 50%.
The government will now need Parliament to greenlight its proposal to bring this down further to 0%.
Varsen Aghabekian Shahin says international community must take concrete steps to end Israeli impunity for abuses.
The international community must “shoulder its responsibility” and take action against Israel’s genocide in Gaza, the Palestinian foreign affairs minister has told Al Jazeera before an emergency United Nations Security Council session.
In an interview on Saturday, Varsen Aghabekian Shahin said the 15-member council must uphold international law when it convenes at UN headquarters in New York on Sunday to discuss the situation in the Gaza Strip.
The meeting was organised in response to Israel’s newly announced plan to seize Gaza City, which has drawn widespread condemnation from world leaders.
“I expect that the international community stands for international law and international humanitarian law,” Aghabekian Shahin told Al Jazeera.
“What has been going in Palestine for the last 22 months is nothing but a genocide, and it’s part and parcel of Israel’s expansionist ideology that wants to take over the entirety of the occupied State of Palestine.”
The Israeli security cabinet approved plans this week to seize Gaza City, forcibly displacing nearly one million Palestinians to concentration zones in the south of the bombarded coastal enclave.
Palestinians have rejected the Israeli push to force them out of the city while human rights groups and the UN have warned that the plan will worsen an already dire humanitarian crisis in Gaza and lead to further mass casualties.
Israel has pledged to push ahead with its plans despite the growing criticism, saying that it wants to “free Gaza from Hamas”.
The country’s top global ally, the United States, has not commented directly on the plan to seize Gaza City. But US President Donald Trump suggested earlier this week that he would not block an Israeli push to take over all of Gaza.
Aghabekian Shahin told Al Jazeera that if Trump – whose administration continues to provide unwavering diplomatic and military support to Israel – wants to reach a solution, Palestinian rights must be taken into account.
“There will be no peace in Israel-Palestine, or the region for that matter, or even the world at large, if the rights of the Palestinians are not respected,” she said, noting that this means a Palestinian state must be established.
The minister also slammed recent remarks from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu about the future governance of Gaza.
In a social media post on Friday, Netanyahu said he wants “a peaceful civilian administration” to be established in the enclave, “one that is not the Palestinian Authority, not Hamas, and not any other terrorist organization”.
But Aghabekian Shahin said it’s up to Palestinians to decide who should govern them.
“The one that has the legal and the political authority on Gaza today is the PLO,” she said, referring to the Palestine Liberation Organization.
“If Gaza wants to come back to the core, which is the entirety of the Palestinian land, then it has to become under the control and governance of the Palestinian Authority, the PLO.”
Aghabekian Shahin also condemned the international community for failing to act as Palestinians in the occupied West Bank have faced a surge in Israeli military and settler attacks in the shadow of the country’s war on Gaza.
“It is the inaction that has emboldened the Israelis, including the settlers, to do whatever they are doing for the last six decades, since day one of the 1967 occupation,” she said.
“The times are very dangerous now, and it’s important that the international community shoulders its responsibility. The impunity with which Israel was happily moving should stop.”
WASHINGTON — After styling himself for decades as a dealmaker, President Trump is showing some receipts in his second term of ceasefires and peace agreements brokered on his watch. But the president faces extraordinary challenges in his latest push to negotiate ends to the world’s two bloodiest conflicts.
Stakes could not be higher in Ukraine, where nearly a million Russian soldiers have been killed or wounded in pursuit of Vladimir Putin’s war of conquest, according to independent analysts. Hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian soldiers add to the catastrophic casualty toll. Trump’s struggle to get both sides to a negotiating table, let alone to secure a ceasefire, has grown into a fixation for Trump, prompting rare rebukes of Putin from the U.S. president.
And in the Gaza Strip, an alliance that has withstood scathing international criticism over Israel’s conduct of its war against Hamas has begun to show strain. Trump still supports the fundamental mission of Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to destroy the militant group and secure the release of Israeli hostages in its possession. But mounting evidence of mass starvation in Gaza has begun to fray the relationship, reportedly resulting in a shouting match in their most recent call.
Breakthroughs in the two conflicts have evaded Trump, despite his efforts to fashion himself into the “peacemaker-in-chief” and floating his own nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize.
In Turnberry, Scotland, last month, Trump claimed that six wars had been stopped or thwarted under his watch since he returned to office in January. “I’m averaging about a war a month,” he said at the time.
He has, in fact, secured a string of tangible successes on the international stage, overseeing a peace agreement between the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Rwanda; hosting a peace ceremony between Armenia and Azerbeijan; brokering a ceasefire between Cambodia and Thailand, and imposing an end to a 12-day war between Israel and Iran after engaging U.S. forces directly in the conflict.
Olivier Nduhungirehe, Rwanda’s foreign minister, from left, U.S. Vice President JD Vance, President Trump, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and Democratic Republic of the Congo foreign minister Therese Kayikwamba Wagner in the Oval Office of the White House on June 27. The Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda agreed to a U.S.-backed peace deal meant to end years of deadly conflict and promote development in Congo’s volatile eastern region.
“We’ve only been here for six months. The world was on fire. We took care of just about every fire — and we’re working on another one,” he said, “with Russia, Ukraine.”
Trump also takes credit for lowering tensions between Serbia and Kosovo, and for brokering a ceasefire between two nuclear states, India and Pakistan, a claim the latter supports but the former denies.
“Wars usually last five to 10 years,” said Michael E. O’Hanlon, chair in defense and strategy at the Brookings Institution. “Trump is tactically clever, but no magician. If he actually gets three of these five conflicts to end, that’s an incredible track record.
“In each case, he may exaggerate his own role,” O’Hanlon said, but “that’s OK — I welcome the effort and contribution, even if others deserve credit, too.”
One-on-one with Putin
Well past his campaign promise of ending Russia’s war with Ukraine “within 24 hours” of taking office, Trump has tried pressuring both sides to come to the negotiating table, starting with the Ukrainians. “You don’t have the cards,” Trump told Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in an infamous Oval Office meeting in February, chastising him to prepare to make painful concessions to end the war.
But in June, at a NATO summit in the Netherlands, Trump’s years-long geniality with Putin underwent a shift. He began criticizing Russia’s leader as responsible for the ongoing conflict, accusing Putin of throwing “meaningless … bull—” at him and his team.
“I’m not happy with Putin, I can tell you that much right now,” Trump said, approving new weapons for Ukraine, a remarkable policy shift long advocated by the Europeans.
Russian President Vladimir Putin and King of Malaysia Sultan Ibrahim walk during a welcoming ceremony at the Grand Kremlin Palace on Wednesday in Moscow. Malaysian King Sultan Ibrahim is on an official visit to Russia.
(Getty Images)
The Trump administration set Friday as a deadline for Putin to demonstrate his commitment to a ceasefire, or otherwise face a new round of crushing secondary sanctions — financial tools that would punish Russia’s trading partners for continuing business with Moscow.
Those plans were put on hold after Trump announced he would meet with Putin in Alaska next week, a high-stakes meeting that will exclude Zelensky.
“The highly anticipated meeting between myself, as President of the United States of America, and President Vladimir Putin, of Russia, will take place next Friday, August 15, 2025, in the Great State of Alaska. Further details to follow,” Trump wrote on his social media platform, Truth Social, on Friday. “Thank you for your attention to this matter!”
Meeting Putin one-on-one — the first meeting between a U.S. and Russian president in four years, and the first between Putin and any Western leader since he launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 — in and of itself could be seen as a reward for a Russian leader seeking to regain international legitimacy, experts said.
In this June 28, 2019, file photo, President Trump, right, meets with Russian President Vladimir Putin during a bilateral meeting on the sidelines of the G-20 summit in Osaka, Japan.
(Susan Walsh/Associated Press)
Worse still, Putin, a former KGB officer, could approach the meeting as an opportunity to manipulate the American president.
“Putin has refused to abandon his ultimate objectives in Ukraine — he is determined to supplant the Zelensky government in Kyiv with a pro-Russian regime,” said Kyle Balzer, a scholar at the conservative American Enterprise Institute. “He wants ironclad guarantees that Ukraine will never gain admittance to NATO. So there is currently no agreement to be had with Russia, except agreeing to surrender to Putin’s demands. Neither Ukraine nor Europe are interested in doing so.
“Put simply, Putin likely believes that he can wear down the current administration,” Balzer added. “Threatening Russia with punitive acts like sanctions, and then pulling back when the time comes to do so, has only emboldened Putin to strive for ultimate victory in Ukraine.”
A European official told The Times that, while the U.S. government had pushed for Zelensky to join the initial meeting, a response from Kyiv — noting that any territorial concession to Russia in negotiations would have to be approved in a ballot referendum by the Ukrainian people — scuttled the initial plan.
The Trump administration is prepared to endorse the bulk of Russia’s occupation of Ukrainian territory, including the eastern region of Donbas and the Crimean peninsula, at the upcoming summit, Bloomberg reported. On Friday, Trump called the issue of territory “complicated.”
“We’re gonna get some back,” he said. “There will be some swapping of territories.”
Michael Williams, an international relations professor at Syracuse University, said that Trump has advocated for a ceasefire in Ukraine “at the expense of other strategic priorities such as stability in Europe and punishment of Russia through increased aid to Ukraine.”
Such an approach, Williams said, “would perhaps force the Kremlin to end the war, and further afield, would signal to other potential aggressors, such as China, that violations of international law will be met with a painful response.”
Gaza
At Friday’s peace ceremony, Trump told reporters he was considering a proposal to relocate Palestinian refugees to Somalia and its breakaway region, Somaliland, once Israel ends hostilities against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
“We are working on that right now,” Trump said.
It was just the latest instance of Trump floating the resettlement of Palestinians displaced during the two-year war there, which has destroyed more than 90% of the structures throughout the strip and essentially displaced its entire population of 2 million people. The Hamas-run Health Ministry reports that more than 60,000 civilians and militants have died in the conflict.
Hamas, recognized as a terrorist organization by the United States, the European Union and others, has refused to concede the war, stating it would disarm only once a Palestinian state is established. The group continues to hold roughly 50 Israeli hostages, some dead and some alive, among 251 taken during its attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, which also killed about 1,200 people.
Protesters gather in a demonstration organized by the families of the Israeli hostages taken captive in the Gaza Strip since October 2023 calling for action to secure their release outside the Defense Ministry headquarters in Tel Aviv on Saturday.
(Jack Guez/AFP via Getty Images)
Israel’s Cabinet voted this week to approve a plan to take over Gaza City in the north of the strip and, eventually, the rest of the territory, a deeply unpopular strategy in the Israeli military and among the Israeli public. Netanyahu on Friday rejected the notion that Israel planned to permanently occupy Gaza.
Despite applying private pressure on Netanyahu, Trump’s strategy has largely fallen in line with that of his predecessor, Joe Biden, whose team supported Israel’s right to defend itself while working toward a peace deal that, at its core, would exchange the remaining hostages for a cessation of hostilities.
The talks have stalled, one U.S. official said, primarily blaming Hamas over its demands.
“In Gaza, there is a fundamental structural imbalance of dealing with a terrorist organization that may be immune to traditional forms of pressure — military, economic or otherwise — and that may even have a warped, perverse set of priorities in which the suffering of its own people is viewed as a political asset because it tarnishes the reputation of the other party, Israel,” said Robert Satloff, executive director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “So Trump really only has leverage over one party — his ally, Israel — which he has been reluctant to wield, reasonably so.”
In Ukraine, too, Trump holds leverage he has been unwilling, thus far, to bring to bear.
“There, Trump has leverage over both parties but appears reluctant to wield it on one of them — Russia,” Satloff said.
But Trump suggested Friday that threatened sanctions on India over its purchase of Russian oil, and his agreement with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to secure greater security spending from European members, “had an impact” on Moscow’s negotiating position.
“I think my instinct really tells me that we have a shot at it,” Trump said. “I think we’re getting very close.”
THREE in four Brits want all foreign criminals deported, a poll shows.
Two-thirds back building mega-jails on remote Scottish islands to deal with prison overcrowding.
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Reform UK would deport the 10,400 foreign national offenders currently in custody, freeing up urgently needed capacity, says Reform’s Sarah PochinCredit: Alamy
Nine in ten would rather new prisons be built than see softer sentences.
And 77 per cent want courts open longer to deal with the backlog of cases.
The same number back building temporary “Nightingale-style” prisons.
Julian Gallie, from Merlin Strategy — who carried out polling for campaign group Crush Crime — said: ““There is overwhelming public support for a tougher stance on crime.
READ MORE ON DEPORTATIONS
“There is a desire for the government to deal with a justice system the country do not think is working.
“Options including nightingale prisons and even deporting all foreign criminals gain overwhelming support.”
Reform MP Sarah Pochin said: “It’s no surprise the public support the need for urgent action to fix the crisis in our prison system.”
SHAMELESS Migrant who entered UK with child abuse vids gives thumbs up as he’s spared jail
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Three in four voters back booting out all foreign offendersCredit: Getty
Aug. 4 (UPI) — FBI officials in Philadelphia on Monday issued an advisory warning international college students about a scam that involves foreign impersonators. They advised potential victims to report it.
Officials at the Philadelphia office of the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation say that college and university students studying abroad in the United States — particularly Chinese citizens — are at risk of an ongoing scheme that involves a foreign government impersonator.
“We are actively engaging with the public, academic institutions, and our law enforcement partners to identify and support those impacted by this scheme,” Wayne Jacobs, special agent in charge of the FBI’s Philadelphia Field Office, said in a statement.
According to FBI officials, since 2022 the Philadelphia office has seen an uptick in criminal activity with actors attempting to make a victim believe they are a Chinese police officer in order to defraud them.
A scammer will tell a victim they are under investigation for an alleged financial crime in China and will need to pay in order to to avoid arrest.
The typically four-phase scam will see a fraudster call from what appears to be a legitimate phone number associated with a mobile telephone service provider. They will inform a victim their private information had been “linked to either a subject or a victim of a financial fraud investigation,” officials say.
They added that a criminal actor will involve another person who acts as a provincial Chinese police officer and will seek to apply further pressure in attempts to get a potential victim to “return to China to face trial or threaten them with arrest.”
“Criminal actors direct victims to consent to 24/7 video and audio monitoring due to the alleged sensitivity of the investigation and/or to demonstrate the victims’ innocence,” the FBI’s Philadelphia field office stated Monday.
“Victims are instructed not to discuss the details of the case, not to conduct Internet searches, and to report all their daily activities,” it added.
The bureau gave a similar notice last year about China-based imposters seeking to extort money from victims.
Other scams in the past also have affected Chinese victims. In 2019, the Chinese mother of a Stanford University student expelled in the college admissions scandal said she was duped into paying over $6 million in the belief the money was for college-related costs.
Jacobs, the FBI’s Philadelphia field office chief, says the scams “inflict more than just financial harm.” He said many victims “endure lasting emotional and psychological distress.”
Moscow already helped by Pyongyang; Zelenskyy says fighters from China, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and African also on board.
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy claimed that his country’s troops in the northeast are battling foreign “mercenaries” recruited by Russia from various countries, vowing to “respond”.
The Ukrainian president visited front-line troops in the Kharkiv region on Monday, hearing reports from his “warriors” that fighters from China, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Pakistan, and African countries were on board with Russia.
Russia is already known to have been assisted by thousands of North Korean troops in the defence of its Kursk region, and Ukraine had already accused Moscow of recruiting Chinese fighters – a charge denied by Beijing.
At the time of reporting, there was no comment from the additional countries accused by Zelenskyy of joining Russia’s war effort.
Reporting from Kyiv, Al Jazeera’s Charles Stratford said there was no way of verifying Zelenskyy’s claims.
Conversely, he added, “lots of foreign fighters” had also volunteered to fight for Ukraine and were still on the front lines.
Zelenskyy had met front-line fighters with Ukraine’s 17th Separate Motorised Infantry Battalion of the 57th Brigade near the front-line town of Vovchansk.
He said in a post in X that he had held discussions with commanders on “the frontline situation, the defence of Vovchansk, and the dynamics of the battles”, and was also looking at “drone supply and deployment, recruitment, and direct funding for the brigades”.
As Ukraine battled to repel Russian forces in the Kharkiv region, its troops were also engaged in “ongoing heavy fighting” around the town of Pokrovsk in the Donetsk region, said Stratford.
As fighting has continued, Russian and Ukrainian officials have held several meetings in recent months in Istanbul, Turkiye.
The latest meeting secured an agreement to exchange 1,200 prisoners, Zelenskyy announced on Sunday.
That day, United States President Donald Trump said his special envoy Steve Witkoff would fly to Russia to continue talks on the war in Ukraine.
On Monday, Russian state news agency TASS cited sources saying the visit would take place on Wednesday.
Trump has threatened to impose “very severe tariffs” on Russia if it fails to reach a ceasefire deal with Ukraine soon, recently shortening his initial deadline of 50 days to within 10-12 days.
Microsoft says cyber-espionage campaign ‘poses high risk’ to foreign embassies, diplomats and other groups in Moscow.
Microsoft has accused one of the Russian government’s premier cyber-espionage units of deploying malware against embassies and diplomatic organisations in Moscow by leveraging local internet service providers.
In a blog post on Thursday, Microsoft Threat Intelligence said the campaign by Russia’s Federal Security Service, also known as the FSB, “has been ongoing since at least 2024”.
The effort “poses a high risk to foreign embassies, diplomatic entities, and other sensitive organizations operating in Moscow, particularly to those entities who rely on local internet providers”, Microsoft said.
The analysis confirms for the first time that the FSB is conducting cyber-espionage at the ISP level, according to Microsoft’s findings.
“This means that diplomatic personnel using local ISP or telecommunications services in Russia are highly likely targets of [the campaign] within those services,” the blog post reads.
Microsoft tracked an alleged FSB cyber-espionage campaign that in February targeted unnamed foreign embassies in Moscow.
The FSB activity facilitates the installation of custom backdoors on targeted computers, which can be used to install additional malware, as well as steal data, Microsoft said.
The findings come amid increasing pressure from Washington for Moscow to agree to a ceasefire in its war in Ukraine and pledges from NATO countries to increase defence spending surrounding their own concerns about Russia.
Microsoft did not say which embassies were targeted by the FSB campaign.
The US Department of State, as well as Russian diplomats, did not respond to requests for comment from the Reuters news agency.
Russia has denied carrying out cyber-espionage operations. There was no immediate comment from Moscow on Microsoft’s report on Thursday.
The hacking unit linked to the activity, which Microsoft tracks as “Secret Blizzard” and others categorise as “Turla”, has been hacking governments, journalists and others for nearly 20 years, the US government said in May 2023.
Au Kam San accused by police of being in contact with an unnamed ‘anti-China organisation abroad’ since 2022.
A leading democrat from Macau has been arrested for collusion with foreign forces to endanger national security, police said, as the semi-autonomous region further tightens its national security laws to align with those of China.
Macau’s police said in a statement on Thursday that Au Kam San had been taken from his residence for investigation on Wednesday.
The former Portuguese colony reverted to Chinese rule in 1999 via a “One Country, Two Systems” framework that promised a high degree of autonomy and rights protections.
Au, 68, is one of Macau’s most prominent democratic campaigners who served for nearly two decades as a lawmaker in the former Portuguese colony. He served in Macau’s legislature for two decades before stepping down in 2021.
The police statement did not give Au’s full name, but local media outlets reported that the man arrested was the campaigner, and Au’s wife arrived at the prosecution’s office on Thursday and was listed as a “witness”, online outlet All About Macau said.
“The resident has allegedly been in contact with an anti-China organisation abroad since 2022, providing the group with large amounts of false and seditious information, for public exhibitions overseas and online,” the police statement added.
The police did not say which foreign entity Au was in contact with, but said he had also sought to incite hatred against Beijing, disrupt a 2024 election for Macau’s leader and “provoke hostile actions by foreign countries against Macau”.
Au and his wife could not be reached for comment.
Through the years, Au had championed democratic reforms and helped foster civil society initiatives in the tiny gambling hub that returned from Portuguese to Chinese rule in 1999 – two years after the nearby former British colony of Hong Kong was handed back to China.
Unlike Hong Kong, which has seen big social movements challenge Chinese Communist Party rule in 2014 and 2019, the democratic opposition in the China-ruled former Portuguese colony has always existed on the fringes amid tight Chinese control.
Through the years, Au had led protests and railed against opaque governance and rising social inequalities, even as gambling revenues exploded in the city, which is home to about 700,000 people.
Au was one of the founders of several pro-democracy groups, including the New Macau Association, and had worked as a schoolteacher.
The arrest comes as authorities in neighbouring Hong Kong continue to crack down on dissent using two sets of powerful national security laws that have been leveraged to jail activists, shutter media outlets and civil society groups.
While Hong Kong’s democrats had actively challenged Beijing’s attempts to ratchet up control of the city since its return to Chinese rule, Macau’s government has faced far less public scrutiny, with authorities able to enact a sweeping set of national security laws as early as 2009.
This law was amended in 2023 to bring Macau in line with similar laws in Hong Kong and China and to bolster the prevention of foreign interference.
While Hong Kong’s democrats had actively challenged Beijing’s attempts to ratchet up control of the city since its return to Chinese rule, Macau’s government has faced far less public scrutiny, with authorities able to enact a sweeping set of national security laws as early as 2009 [File: Bobby Yip/Reuters]
The Foreign Office has issued a travel advisory for anyone headed to Vietnam as popular tourist destinations including Hanoi are set to be affected by heavy rainfall with the arrival of Storm Wipha
Vietnam Airlines cancelled several flights ahead of Storm Wipha’s descent in the country(Image: AFP via Getty Images)
Tourists planning to visit Southeast Asia this week have been issued a travel warning ahead of Storm Wipha’s descent on the region. The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) warned on Monday, July 21 that the typhoon is heading for northern Vietnam, and is likely to lead to flooding and mudslides in affected areas.
Tropical storm Wipha made landfall in northern Vietnam on Tuesday July 22 – in alignment with the forecast shared by the FCDO. Wipha hit the provinces of Ninh Binh and Thanh Hoa early on Tuesday afternoon and authorities remain on alert due to heavy rains. The FCDO has named specific popular tourist destinations as affected areas, including Ha Long Bay, Hanoi and Ninh Binh.
Hanoi is experiencing heavy rainfall and strong winds with the arrival of Storm Wipha(Image: AP)
Wipha has already ravaged southern China but wind speeds have weakened since its descent on Vietnam according to the national weather forecasting agency.
The FCDO warned travellers to Vietnam: “You should expect heavy rainfall, strong winds, flooding and mudslides in affected areas in the days after landfall. You should expect travel disruption and should follow advice from local authorities.”
The FCDO also advises that travellers can receive regular news updates in English via VNexpress and Vietnam News. Additionally, travellers can sign up to get email notifications when the FCDO updates its travel advice for Vietnam.
A number of flights in Vietnam were cancelled ahead of Wipha’s arrival. Vietnam Airlines announced on Monday that it would be cancelling several flights between Ho Chi Minh City and Hai Phong to “ensure the safety of passengers and crew”.
Meanwhile, Pacific Airlines rescheduled two flights, between Ho Chi Minh City and Hai Phong, to depart earlier than planned, while two more flights on the same route were cancelled.
On Tuesday, all flights operated by Vietnam Airlines Group, including Vietnam Airlines and Pacific Airlines, to and from Hai Phong were moved to depart in the afternoon. The group said: “Vietnam Airlines Group regrets the schedule changes caused by this force majeure weather event and appreciates our passengers’ understanding.
“Flight times may continue to be adjusted depending on the storm’s progression. Updated information will be communicated via the airline’s official channels and passenger contact details provided in booking records.”
Storm Wipha hits Vietnam just days after a tourist boat capsized, leaving 38 dead(Image: AP)
The new tropical storm is set to strike just days after a tourist boat carrying as many as 53 people capsized in stormy weather in Vietnam on Saturday, July 19. Of the 53 people on board, 38 have been declared dead.
The boat was carrying 48 tourists and five crew members near Đầu Gỗ Cave off the coast of Ha Long Bay when it was hit by a sudden squall and overturned, according to local media.
Over the previous weekend, Wipha hit Hong Kong, leaving 33 people injured and the Philippines has struggles with monsoon downpours that began last week.
Hong Kong authorities erected temporary shelters for around 277 people who sought refuge from the storm. There were also 286 reports to the Government’s 1823 Call Centre and the Fire Services Department, 425 reports of fallen trees and seven confirmed flooding cases received by the Drainage Services Department, according to a statement by the Hong Kong Government on Sunday.
A group of over two dozen mostly European foreign ministers denounced Israeli attacks on Palestinian aid seekers in a joint statement condemning the “drip feeding” of aid and saying “the war in Gaza must end now.”
The Foreign Office has updated its travel advice for Brits visiting popular holiday destination Tunisia, amid serious safety concerns in certain parts of the country
The Foreign Office has updated its Tunisia travel advice(Image: Daily Mirror)
Brits are being cautioned against “all but essential” travel to certain areas of Tunisia, a favourite destination for UK tourists thanks to its stunning coastlines, fascinating heritage, and budget-friendly appeal.
The North African country offers a lot as a holiday destination, from lively seaside resorts such as Hammamet and Sousse to discovering ancient Roman archaeological sites and colourful medinas.
However, owing to the security risks still present in the country, the Foreign Office has today refreshed its travel guidance, identifying forbidden zones that visitors should avoid, including several renowned historical sites.
Djerba, the largest island of North Africa, is a Tunisian gem located in the Gulf of Gabes(Image: Chiara Salvadori via Getty Images)
The Foreign Office announced: “FCDO now advises against all but essential travel to within 20km of the Tunisia-Algerian border in El Kef and Jendouba Governorates, south of the town of Jendouba. FCDO no longer advises against travel to the archaeological site of Chemtou.”, reports the Manchester Evening News.
Security worries have persisted for Tunisia in recent years. In 2023, several terror incidents were plotted and executed by lone-wolf attackers potentially inspired by extremist groups, including a National Guard officer who was stabbed in Tunis’s Goulette district, a police officer who was knifed to death near the Brazilian Embassy, and a deadly shooting on Djerba island at a Jewish pilgrimage location, resulting in 3 security staff and 2 civilians losing their lives, with 10 wounded.
The Foreign Office has also issued a stark warning regarding the threat of terrorism in Tunisia. It reads: “There is a high threat of terrorist attack globally affecting UK interests and British nationals, including from groups and individuals who view the UK and British nationals as targets. Stay aware of your surroundings at all times.”
The FCDO strongly advises against all travel to Western Tunisia, including the area bordering Algeria, due to the risk posed by cross-border terrorist activities and operations conducted by Tunisian security forces. Furthermore, the FCDO recommends avoiding all but essential travel to Southern Tunisia, including the region bordering Libya, because of the ongoing cross-border terrorist activities and conflict in Libya.
Additionally, the FCDO suggests that all but essential travel should be avoided within 75km of the Tunisia-Libya border, which includes areas such as Remada and El Borma, due to the heightened security risks in these regions.
Development financing to Southeast Asia is expected to fall by more than $2bn in 2026 due to recent cutbacks by Western governments, according to a major Australian think tank.
The Sydney-based Lowy Institute predicted in a new report on Sunday that development assistance to Southeast Asia will drop to $26.5bn next year from $29bn in 2023.
The figures are billions of dollars below the pre-pandemic average of $33bn.
Bilateral funding is also expected to fall by 20 percent from about $11bn in 2023 to $9bn in 2026, the report said.
The cuts will hit poorer countries in the regions hardest, and “social sector priorities such as health, education, and civil society support that rely on bilateral aid funding are likely to lose out the most”, the report said.
Fewer alternatives
Cuts by Europe and the United Kingdom have been made to redirect funds as NATO members plan to raise defence spending to 5 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) in the shadow of Russia’s war on Ukraine.
The European Union and seven European governments will cut foreign aid by $17.2bn between 2025 and 2029, while this year, the UK announced it will cut foreign aid spending by $7.6bn annually, the report said.
The greatest upset has come from the United States, where earlier this year, President Donald Trump shut down the US Agency for International Development (USAID) and slashed nearly $60bn in foreign assistance. More recently, the US Senate took steps to claw back another $8bn in spending.
The Lowy Institute said governments closer to home, like China, will play an increasingly important role in the development landscape.
“The centre of gravity in Southeast Asia’s development finance landscape looks set to drift East, notably to Beijing but also Tokyo and Seoul,” the report said. “Combined with potentially weakening trade ties with the United States, Southeast Asian countries risk finding themselves with fewer alternatives to support their development.”
After experiencing a sharp decline during the COVID-19 pandemic, Chinese overseas development assistance has started to bounce back, reaching $4.9bn in 2023, according to the report.
Its spending, however, focuses more on infrastructure projects, like railways and ports, rather than social sector issues, the report said. Beijing’s preference for non-concessional loans given at commercial rates benefits Southeast Asia’s middle- and high-income countries, but is less helpful for its poorest, like Cambodia, Myanmar, Laos and East Timor.
As China and institutions like the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank play a more prominent role in Southeast Asia, less clear is how Japan and South Korea can fill in the blanks, according to experts.
Japan, South Korea
Grace Stanhope, a Lowy Institute research associate and one of the report’s authors, told Al Jazeera that both countries have expanded their development assistance to include civil society projects.
“[While] Japanese and Korean development support is often less overtly ‘values-based’ than traditional Western aid, we’ve been seeing Japan especially move into the governance and civil society sectors, with projects in 2023 that are explicitly focused on democracy and protection of vulnerable migrants, for example,” she said.
“The same is true of [South] Korea, which has recently supported projects for improving the transparency of Vietnamese courts and protection of women from gender-based violence, so the approach of the Japanese and Korean development programmes is evolving beyond just infrastructure.”
Tokyo and Seoul, however, are facing similar pressures as Europe from the Trump administration to increase their defence budgets, cutting into their development assistance.
Shiga Hiroaki, a professor at the Graduate School of International Social Sciences at Yokohama National University, said he was more “pessimistic” that Japan could step in to fill the gaps left by the West.
He said cuts could even be made as Tokyo ramps up defence spending to a historic high, and a “Japanese-first” right-wing party pressures the government to redirect funds back home.
“Considering Japan’s huge fiscal deficit and public opposition to tax increases, it is highly likely that the aid budget will be sacrificed to fund defence spending,” he said.
“The president believes that his force of personality … can bend people to do things,” his special envoy-for-everything, Steve Witkoff, explained in May in a Breitbart interview.
Ukraine and Gaza are still at war. Israel and the United States bombed Iran’s nuclear facilities, but it’s not clear whether they ended the country’s atomic program once and for all. Canada and Denmark haven’t surrendered any territory. And instead of trade deals, Trump is mostly slapping tariffs on other countries, to the distress of U.S. stock markets.
It turned out that force of personality couldn’t solve every problem.
“He overestimated his power and underestimated the ability of others to push back,” said Kori Schake, director of foreign policy at the conservative American Enterprise Institute. “He often acts as if we’re the only people with leverage, strength or the ability to take action. We’re not.”
The president has notched important achievements. He won a commitment from other members of NATO to increase their defense spending to 5% of gross domestic product. The attack on Iran appears to have set Tehran’s nuclear project back for years, even if it didn’t end it. And Trump — or more precisely, his aides — helped broker ceasefires between India and Pakistan and between Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
But none of those measured up to the goals Trump initially set for himself — much less qualified for the Nobel Peace Prize he has publicly yearned for. “I won’t get a Nobel Peace Prize for this,” he grumbled when the Rwanda-Congo agreement was signed.
The most striking example of unfulfilled expectations has come in Ukraine, the grinding conflict Trump claimed he could end even before his inauguration.
For months, Trump sounded certain that his warm relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin would produce a deal that would stop the fighting, award Russia most of the territory its troops have seized and end U.S. economic sanctions on Moscow.
But to Trump’s surprise, Putin wasn’t satisfied with his proposal. The Russian leader continued bombing Ukrainian cities even after Trump publicly implored him to halt via social media (“Vladimir, STOP!”).
Critics charged that Putin was playing Trump for a fool. The president bristled: “Nobody’s playing me.”
But as early as April, he admitted to doubts about Putin’s good faith. “It makes me think that maybe he doesn’t want to stop the war, he’s just tapping me along,” he said.
“I speak to him a lot about getting this thing done, and I always hang up and say, ‘Well, that was a nice phone call,’ and then missiles are launched into Kyiv or some other city,” Trump complained last week. “After that happens three or four times, you say the talk doesn’t mean anything.”
The president also came under pressure from Republican hawks in Congress who warned privately that if Ukraine collapsed, Trump would be blamed the way his predecessor, President Biden, was blamed for the fall of Afghanistan in 2022.
So last week, Trump changed course and announced that he will resume supplying U.S.-made missiles to Ukraine — but by selling them to European countries instead of giving them to Kyiv as Biden had.
Trump also gave Putin 50 days to accept a ceasefire and threatened to impose “secondary tariffs” on countries that buy oil from Russia if he does not comply.
He said he still hopes Putin will come around. “I’m not done with him, but I’m disappointed in him,” he said in a BBC interview.
It still isn’t clear how many missiles Ukraine will get and whether they will include long-range weapons that can strike targets deep inside Russia. A White House official said those details are still being worked out.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov sounded unimpressed by the U.S. actions. “I have no doubt that we will cope,” he said.
Foreign policy experts warned that the secondary tariffs Trump proposed could prove impractical. Russia’s two biggest oil customers are China and India; Trump is trying to negotiate major trade agreements with both.
Meanwhile, Trump has dispatched Witkoff back to the Middle East to try to arrange a ceasefire in Gaza and reopen nuclear talks with Iran — the goals he began with six months ago.
Despite his mercurial style, Trump’s approach to all these foreign crises reflects basic premises that have remained constant for a decade, foreign policy experts said.
“There is a Trump Doctrine, and it has three basic principles,” Schake said. “Alliances are a burden. Trade exports American jobs. Immigrants steal American jobs.”
Robert Kagan, a former Republican aide now at the Brookings Institution, added one more guiding principle: “He favors autocrats over democrats.” Trump has a soft spot for foreign strongmen like Putin and China’s Xi Jinping, and has abandoned the long-standing U.S. policy of fostering democracy abroad, Kagan noted.
The problem, Schake said, is that those principles “impede Trump’s ability to get things done around the world, and he doesn’t seem to realize it.
“The international order we built after World War II made American power stronger and more effective,” she said. “Trump and his administration seem bent on presiding over the destruction of that international order.”
Moreover, Kagan argued, Trump’s frenetic imposition of punitive tariffs on other countries comes with serious costs.
“Tariffs are a form of economic warfare,” he said. “Trump is creating enemies for the United States all over the world. … I don’t think you can have a successful foreign policy if everyone in the world mistrusts you.”
Not surprisingly, Trump and his aides don’t agree.
“It cannot be overstated how successful the first six months of this administration have been,” White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said last week. “With President Trump as commander in chief, the world is a much safer place.”
North Korea has suspended foreign tourism to its massive new Wonsan Kalma beach resort just weeks after the “world-class” facility’s opening, a state-run tourism website announced. File Photo by KCNA/EPA
SEOUL, July 18 (UPI) — Just weeks after opening a massive new beach resort, North Korea has banned foreign visitors from the self-proclaimed “world-class” facility, according to a state-run tourism promotion website.
“Foreign tourists are temporarily not accepted at the Wonsan Kalma coastal tourist zone,” a notice on the official DPR Korea Tour site said Wednesday. No explanation was given for the ban.
The information came in a post announcing the July 1 opening of the facility, which runs along 2.5 miles of beachfront and has a capacity for up to 20,000 guests. The tourist zone also boasts recreational facilities such as a water park, gym and concert hall.
When the Wonsan Kalma tourist area officially opened, North Korea promoted it as a destination for both domestic and foreign tourists. A small group of Russian guests visited last week, including Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, who met with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un there.
“Our Korean friends have expressed interest in having more Russians at the wonderful resort of Wonsan and other resorts in the DPRK,” Lavrov said at a press conference during his visit, using the official acronym for North Korea. “I have no doubt that this will happen.”
The resort has long been a favored project of Kim, who oversaw its launch in 2014. It was initially slated to open in April 2019 but faced numerous setbacks, including international sanctions on materials.
At a ribbon-cutting ceremony last month, the North Korean leader called the completion of the resort one of the country’s “greatest successes this year” and said it would “play a leading role in establishing the tourist culture of the DPRK.”
International tourism offers a rare chance for the sanctions-hit North to earn foreign currency, but visitors have been almost nonexistent since Pyongyang sealed its borders at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in January 2020.
Russian travelers were the first to return post-COVID as North Korean carrier Air Koryo resumed a route between Vladivostok in Russia’s Far East and Pyongyang last year. On Monday, Russia’s Transport Ministry announced that budget carrier Nordwind will begin operating direct service between Moscow and Pyongyang later this month.
In May, the United States extended its ban on travel by American citizens to North Korea for the ninth year in a row, citing “imminent danger” posed by any trips to the authoritarian state.
The town of Sierra Grande in, southern Argentina was home to Latin America’s largest iron ore mine, but its closure in 1991 turned it into a ghost town. Today, its 12,000 inhabitants see hopes reborn, thanks to two multimillion-dollar projects that could turn it into a new oil mecca. File Photo by Juan Macri/EPA
July 17 (UPI) — Foreign direct investment in Latin America and the Caribbean rose 7.1% in 2024, reaching nearly $189 billion, the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean reported Thursday.
The increase came despite global economic uncertainty and an overall decline in investment flows worldwide.
Brazil and Mexico accounted for 61% of the total, helping offset declines in Colombia, Chile and Argentina. Investment also rose in Central America and the Caribbean, particularly in the manufacturing and communications sectors.
“Much of the increase is due to reinvested earnings from companies already operating in the region rather than new capital inflows,” said José Manuel Salazar-Xirinachs, a Costa Rican economist and public policy expert.
Equity contributions — the component that reflects new investments — are at their second-lowest level since 2010.
Globally, foreign direct investment dropped 11% in 2024 when excluding transactions in European financial centers, a decline attributed to rising geopolitical tensions, trade disputes and the restructuring of global value chains.
“Higher levels of conflict and heightened uncertainty are holding back investment decisions worldwide or at least are a deterrent,” said Salazar-Xirinachs, who is executive secretary of the U.N. Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean.
Despite the global slowdown, announced foreign direct investment projects in the region surged 40% to a record $168 billion, driven by major hydrocarbon developments in Argentina, Mexico and Guyana. These included liquefied natural gas and oil megaprojects.
Unlike global trends, which prioritize renewable energy and semiconductors, Latin America’s investment announcements were dominated by fossil fuels. Renewable energy projects ranked second, but their value declined 13% from the previous year.
Marco Llinás Vargas of the economic commission noted concern over the region’s heavy reliance on extractive industries. He said the drop in technology-intensive investment is troubling and emphasized the need for more diverse and advanced forms of investment that can contribute to long-term productive development.
The report identified critical minerals — such as lithium, copper and rare earth elements — as a strategic opportunity for the region. Chile alone holds more than 30% of the world’s lithium reserves, but production and value-added exports remain limited.
“Reserves don’t automatically translate into production or economic benefit,” said Martín Abeles, head of the commission’s Natural Resources Division. There is a lack of technical, regulatory and institutional capacity to turn potential into performance.
From 2005 to 2024, just 21% of global mining foreign direct investment targeted Latin America. While lithium investments have increased — particularly in Argentina — other minerals have not seen similar momentum.
The United States strengthened its position as the leading investor in the region, accounting for 38% of the investment in 2024. The EU’s share — excluding Luxembourg and the Netherlands — fell to 15% of the regional total, its lowest level since 2012.
Investment from Latin America and the Caribbean made up 12% of foreign direct investment inflows, making it the third-largest source. Chinese investment accounted for just 2% of total inflows in 2024.
Abeles called for stronger policy alignment, citing countries like Australia and Canada that tie investment to local supplier development, technology transfer and environmental governance.
Digital transformation was also highlighted as a crucial development path. While foreign investment in telecommunications and data centers has grown, the region attracts only 7% of global digital investment.
Foreign direct investment can be a catalyst for digital transformation, Salazar-Xirinachs said, but only if matched by absorptive capacity and infrastructure.
Brazil and Mexico led the region in digital investment, followed by Argentina, Chile and Colombia. The commission recommended improving institutional coordination and investing in digital workforce development.
Despite progress, the report noted that Latin America and the Caribbean continue to face persistent challenges in attracting new investors.
The commission urged governments to treat foreign direct investment as part of broader productive development strategies. The report outlines 10 policy guidelines aimed at strengthening technical, operational, political and strategic capacities to attract and retain high-impact investment.
Attracting foreign investment must go hand-in-hand with broader development policies, Salazar-Xirinachs said. It’s not just about the amount of investment, but its quality and impact.
July 17 (UPI) — The U.S. Senate early Thursday voted to rescind some $9 billion in federal funding for foreign aid and public broadcasting, two areas of the government that the Trump administration has long targeted for cuts.
The bill, which now goes to the House of Representatives, will cut about $8 billion from international aid programs and about $1.1 billion from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
The bill passed at about 2:20 a.m. EDT Thursday.
“President Trump promised to cut wasteful spending and root out misuse of taxpayer dollars,” Sen. Jim Risch, R-Idaho, said on X prior to the vote. “Now, @SenateGOP and I are voting to make these cuts permanent. Promises made, promises kept.”
The vote comes as the Trump administration faces criticism from Democrats, and some Republicans, for having promised to reduce government spending but then last month passed a massive tax and spending cuts bill that is expected to add $3.3 trillion to the U.S. deficit, according to the Congressional Budget Office. Meanwhile, the Cato Institute states it could add nearly double that, as much as $6 trillion.
The Corporation of Public Broadcasting, which funds local news and radio infrastructure, has been a target of the Trump administration for funding a small portion of the budgets of PBS and NPR, which he accuses of being biased.
Murkowski chastised her fellow Republicans for attacking a service that informed Alaskans that same day that there was a magnitude 7.3 earthquake and a tsunami warning.
“Some colleagues claim they are targeting ‘radical leftist organizations’ with these cuts, but in Alaska, these are simply organizations dedicated to their communities,” she said on social media. “Their response to today’s earthquake is a perfect example of the incredible public service these stations provide. They deliver local news, weather updates and, yes, emergency alerts that save human lives.”
The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office has shared advice to those travelling abroad, as millions of Brits get ready to jet off on their summer holidays
Rory Poulter and Courtney Eales
11:28, 17 Jul 2025
Millions of Brits jet off on holiday annually(Image: Kosamtu via Getty Images)
The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) is offering advice to Brits travelling overseas to help them keep their travel documents secure. In a bid to ensure that the millions of holidaymakers each year have a hassle-free journey, the FCDO has taken to social media platform X, as Twitter is now known, with some vital guidance.
The FCDO advises: “Heading abroad? Keep a copy of your passport, visa, and flight ticket separately from originals when travelling.”
They also recommend that travellers should “Keep copies at home and on your phone.”
The Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) has told holidaymakers heading abroad to keep their documents safe(Image: PA)
A key piece of advice previously shared by the Foreign Office is to treasure your passport and protect it from damage, as a damaged passport is not valid for travel. Additional advice includes:
Your passport is not always safer on you (e.g. lock your passport in a safe if you have access to one), unless the local law requires you to keep it with you.
Make two photocopies of your passport – leave one with friends or family and take the second with you, or store it online using a secure data storage site
Use this photocopy as alternative ID, for example when going out at night
Make sure your passport is valid. For certain countries your passport must be valid for 6 months after the date you travel – check the entry requirements before you go
In instances where passports are lost or stolen, tens of thousands find themselves in need of an emergency travel document. In cases of urgent passport issues within the UK, citizens can opt for the 1 week Fast Track service or the even swifter 1 day Premium service, reports the Liverpool Echo.
The Fast Track option assures you receive your new passport within a week from your appointment date, your earliest possibility for an appointment being just the following day post-application. Meanwhile, the Premium service boasts a turnaround of just 4 hours after your appointment, making it possible to collect your passport the same day.
The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) is offering crucial advice to Brits travelling overseas(Image: izusek via Getty Images)
Misplacing your flight tickets can lead to a multitude of problems, including the need to buy a replacement ticket, potentially forfeiting the value of the original one, and navigating the often-complex processes of refunds or rebookings.
In a separate piece of advice issued over the weekend, the Foreign Office cautioned holidaymakers about “keeping an eye on your drinks”. Taking to social media, they urged people to “remember not to leave your drinks unattended”, while also reminding travellers that drink measurements can vary significantly abroad.
This guidance forms part of the government’s Travel Aware initiative, which seeks to empower travellers with the knowledge to have a safe and enjoyable trip abroad, while also understanding the unique risks associated with different countries.
As part of its commitment to providing unbiased information, the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office’s travel advice aims to empower travellers to make more informed decisions about their international travel plans.
In a specific warning to young travellers venturing abroad, the FCDO advises: “You should also get a travel insurance policy and make sure you know what cover it provides.”
The consequences of failing to secure adequate insurance before jetting off can be severe, leaving you liable for exorbitant emergency expenses, including medical treatment, which can rack up bills amounting to thousands of pounds.
The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office has warned Brits travelling to Thailand that they could be “held in detention” if they pack a common British game
Playing cards are no game in Thailand (Image: Jonathan Knowles via Getty Images)
Thailand’s strict gambling laws could see you get in serious trouble if you aren’t prepared for how fastidious the Southeast Asian nation can be.
“Thailand has strict laws on gambling. Under the Playing Cards Act (1943) it is illegal to carry over one hundred and twenty playing cards. Violation of the Act could lead to prosecution, a fine, or even imprisonment,” the FCDO warns in a new update on its website.
There are other considerations to keep in mind when considering a visit to Thailand.
As of the start of May this year, the country – which once welcomed one million Brits at its pre-pandemic height and now welcomes around 800,000 annually – has implemented a fresh visa system applicable to all non-Thai passport holders.
The holiday hotspot has some strict rules (Image: Alexander Spatari via Getty Images)
“From 1 May 2025, all foreign nationals entering Thailand, whether by air, land or sea must complete a digital arrival card online before arrival. Travellers can register for an arrival card within 3 days before they arrive,” details the FCDO on its official website.
British citizens are permitted to enter Thailand for up to 60 days for tourism, business meetings, and urgent or one-off work. This type of visa can be extended once for no more than an additional 30 days. However, the FCDO cautions that overstaying your visa could lead to severe consequences.
“If you overstay the period of your visa, you will get a fine of 500 Thai baht a day up to a maximum of 20,000 baht (£450). You risk being: held in detention, deported at your own expense, banned from re-entering Thailand for up to 10 years. Conditions in detention centres can be harsh,” the government body warns.
Travellers must also adhere to other specific entry regulations when visiting Thailand. Your passport must possess an ‘expiry date’ of no less than six months beyond your arrival date and contain at least one blank page. Entry will be refused if you lack a valid travel document or attempt to use a passport that has been declared lost or stolen.
If you hold dual nationality, it’s advisable to depart Thailand using the same passport you used for entry – this prevents complications at immigration. You may also seek a multiple-entry visa in advance for stays of up to 60 days.
From May this year, Thailand has reintroduced the requirement for tourist visa candidates to furnish financial evidence. This stipulation, which was briefly waived in November 2023 to encourage post-pandemic tourism, mandates that all candidates prove their capacity to sustain themselves throughout their visit.
According to Thailand’s official e-Visa website, candidates must now present financial documentation displaying a minimum of 20,000 Thai Baht. Valid documents encompass bank statements from the previous three months or a sponsorship letter if another party is funding the journey.
Earlier this year, a British gentleman was detained in Thailand following a visa overstay of more than 25 years beyond his initial 30-day permit.
The individual, now aged 60, entered Thailand on a brief tourist visa on 9 January 2000, subsequently avoiding Thai officials for 25 years. Thai police described it as a “record” visa breach, surpassing the former record held by a Pakistani gentleman who exceeded his visa by 10 years, according to AFP news agency.
The FCDO wants Brits heading on holiday to ‘be aware’
Millions of Brits are expected to head abroad over the coming months(Image: Chris J. Ratcliffe/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
The UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) has issued a warning to any Brits who may be counting down to a “big holiday”. The government body, which protects UK citizens while abroad among many other tasks, regularly issues updates online.
And in a new post on X, formerly Twitter, on Saturday, the FCDO issued a warning to anyone planning to consume alcohol while abroad. The full post reads: “Heading for a big holiday abroad soon? Before you hit the bar: Remember not to leave your drinks unattended [and that] drinks abroad can have different alcohol measures.”
Text over an accompanying graphic adds: “Stick with your mates. Keep an eye on your drinks.” Travellers are also pointed towards the FCDO’s Travel Aware campaign, which is aimed at making sure holidaymakers “have the best possible travel abroad, help you stay safe and understand risks in different countries”.
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Further advice found here adds: “Drinking abroad can be different to back in the UK. The quality of alcohol can vary, measures can be more generous, and tempting deals may lead to quicker intoxication than anticipated. Be aware that drink spiking can occur while on holiday.
“Spiking is adding alcohol or drugs to someone’s drink without them knowing. Spiking is commonly used to distract you from theft or impair you before an assault. Do not leave your drink unattended and do not accept drinks from strangers. This is the best strategy to prevent the possibility of your drink being spiked.
“Consume water in-between alcoholic drinks. This will help pace you throughout the night and help keep you hydrated. Drink at your own pace. Everyone’s tolerance to alcohol is different. Consider avoiding rounds or having a break from drinking alcohol if you are feeling uneasy.”
