News archive of October 2017

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said that he feels his country no longer needs European Union membership after relations between Ankara and Brussels broke down.

Turkey has been in talks with the European Union for 12 years, debating whether the country can become a member of the bloc.

The government is on standby Tuesday as the Central Archaeological Council (KAS) is scheduled to meet for the fourth time in just over a month to decide on whether a section of Elliniko, the site of a planned real estate investment in southern Athens, will be declared of archaeological interest, a move that could scupper the project.

The eighth edition of the Independent Sofia Festival starts on October 26th.

At the invitation of Zhana Karaivanova, Gabriela Capolino arrives as a special guest and member of the first international jury of the festival in Sofia.

A 54-year-old businessman who was abducted six months ago told investigators after he was rescued on Monday that he had been moved to at least five different hideouts during his incarceration.

Europe on Sunday was officially silent and collectively dumbstruck as it watched Spanish riot police barging into polling stations, grabbing ballot boxes and beating and dragging out Catalan citizens, irrespective of age or gender. Their heavy uniforms and equipment may be modern, but not so their brutality, which was ancient, pre-democratic.

The Nobel Prize for Medicine for 2017 is given to three Americans - Jeffrey Hall, Michael Rossbach and Michael Jung for their molecular studies that control circadian systems, reports WebCafe. 

Hall and Rossbach work at Brandy University, while Michael Jung is from Rockefeller University.

Prime Minister Rami al-Hamdallah on Tuesday chaired his first meeting of the Palestinian cabinet in Gaza in a move towards reconciliation between the mainstream Fatah party and Islamist group Hamas, reported Reuters. 

Hamas seized the coastal enclave in 2007 in fighting with Fatah forces loyal to President Mahmoud Abbas.

Taxi drivers in Rome will go on a good manners course, the Italian Republic newspaper reports.

Author of the idea is the local administration and the board of tourists, according to which taxi drivers are the city's representatives because they are often the first people to contact the foreign tourist and are therefore obliged to be a symbol of the Roman hospitality.

An action against an organized criminal group takes place in Vratsa, Mladen Marinov, head of the Ministry of Interior, confirmed to bTV. There are detainees.

According to bTV, the city is blocked by gendarmerie.

''Surveys are being carried out and evidences are collected'', the Chief Secretary of the Ministry of the Interior further said.

A big fire broke out under the bridge of ''Zaharna Fabrika'' in Sofia, reported bTV. 

There are abandoned buildings, part of the architectural monument "Zaharna Fabrika" which have burned. However, there were also people who were self-settled there. They are removed and there are no injuries.

The fire broke out about 6 pm, the signal for it was filed at 6:10 am.