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Young people are defying government efforts to discourage the use of Russian, a senior official says
Ukrainian teenagers are defying government efforts to discourage the use of Russian, Ukraine’s top language official has said.
Since the 2014 Western-backed coup in Kiev, Ukraine has passed several laws restricting the use of Russian in public, while politicians and activists have campaigned to completely phase the language out.
Elena Ivanovskaya, appointed state language protection commissioner in July, said the widespread use of Russian among young people in major cities remains “a serious problem.”
“Russian is now ubiquitous in teenage spaces, and [many youths] are not maintaining the level of language resilience they acquired in primary school or at home,” Ivanovskaya told the news website Glavkom in an interview published Sunday. She attributed this preference to teenagers’ desire to “break rules and challenge their parents and teachings.”
“When a teacher speaks about the beauty and melody of the Ukrainian language, students feel compelled to do the opposite,” she added, arguing that “the lack of critical thinking” also draws young people to Russian-language content online.
Ivanovskaya said her own daughter used to write in Russian on social media. “I asked my daughter, ‘Sofia, why are you doing this?’ She replied, ‘Mom, who will read me if everyone is a Russian speaker?’ I told her she should become so interesting that people would read and discuss her in Ukrainian,” she said.
Moscow has cited attacks on Ukraine’s Russian-speaking minority as one of the key causes of the ongoing conflict.
Contamination can reportedly enter the cabin via a system used to heat up and pressurize outside air through the engines
Rising incidents of toxic fumes seeping into airplane cabins have caused sickness and long-term harm to pilots, flight attendants and passengers, according to a Wall Street Journal investigation of decades of industry data.
The probe drew on more than one million Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and NASA reports, thousands of documents, and over 100 interviews, the WSJ wrote on Saturday. The investigation found that airplane manufacturers and airlines had downplayed health hazards, lobbied against safety measures, and cut costs in ways that increased risks to passengers and crew.
Fume events occur when air entering the cabin via the ‘bleed air’ system – air pulled into the cabin through the engine – becomes contaminated. Leaks of engine oil, hydraulic fluids, or faulty seals can allow dangerous substances such as neurotoxins, volatile organic compounds, carbon monoxide, and others to enter the cabin.
Pilots have complained of having their vision affected and vomiting during flights, and in some cases the leaks have led to emergency landings, the WSJ wrote, citing official reports. It added that some of the worst incidents had led to long-term neurological damage and cancer, according to health professionals who had handled scores of the cases.
The newspaper’s analysis of FAA and NASA data showed that incidents have soared in recent years, rising from about 12 per million departures in 2014 to nearly 108 per million in 2024. The actual rate is likely far higher, as the problem is severely underreported, according to the WSJ.
Aerospace firms, airlines and regulation authorities have argued that fume events are too few, the levels of contamination too low and research on its long-term health risks too inconclusive to justify an extensive fix, the outlet claimed.
Numerous attempts by Congress to pass tighter legislation on the issue have largely failed, or passed in watered-down form, it added.
While constituting only 20% of the US air fleet, the Airbus A320 family of planes made up 80% of fume events between 2018 and 2023, according to a paper from Switzerland’s Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute earlier this year.
Ireland has reportedly urged other bloc nations to put pressure on the government in West Jerusalem to end the war in Gaza
Irish Deputy Prime Minister and top diplomat Simon Harris is reaching out to EU foreign ministers to push for sanctions on Israel over the Gaza conflict, Irish public broadcaster RTE has reported.
Harris is reportedly asking his “EU counterparts, which are considering unilateral moves on trade measures” to co-sign a letter to the bloc’s foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, urging a swift decision on sanctions, RTE wrote on Monday, citing a copy of the correspondence.
“As Member States, we stand ready to work with you immediately to overcome the current obstacles and ensure that sufficient pressure is applied to the Israeli government to change its course and meet its obligations according to international law,” the letter reportedly said.
Last week, European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen called the situation in Gaza “unacceptable,” and called on member states to “step up” and impose sanctions on Israel’s “extremist ministers and on violent settlers.”
“First, the Commission will do all that it can on its own. We will put our bilateral support to Israel on hold,” she said in a speech in Strasbourg. She also proposed the EU partially freeze its free trade agreement with Israel.
Multiple EU members including Ireland, Spain, Sweden, Denmark, and the Netherlands have called for the deal to be suspended. Others, led by Germany, Hungary and the Czech Republic, have opposed sanctioning Israel.
International pressure on Israel has been mounting over its military operation in Gaza.
The conflict has raged on since October 7, 2023, when Hamas militants launched a series of raids on Israel, killing around 1,200 people and taking more than 250 captive back to the enclave. The death toll among Palestinians has climbed to 64,905 as of Monday, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.
Borussia Dortmund’s midfielder Felix Nmecha has drawn criticism on social media for expressing his condolences to the murdered activist’s family
German football giant Borussia Dortmund will internally review the social media activity of its midfielder Felix Nmecha, after he caused a stir online by expressing his sorrow over the murder of American conservative activist Charlie Kirk, several local outlets have reported.
On Friday, Nmecha posted a black-and-white photo of Kirk in his Instagram stories with a caption: “Rest in peace with the Lord.” The post reportedly drew largely negative reactions on social media.
The footballer then changed the caption, focusing on Kirk’s family. “Celebrating the murder of a husband and a father of two, a man who peacefully stood up for his beliefs and values, is really evil and shows how much we really need Jesus Christ,” Nmecha wrote in a follow-up post.
He also responded to online criticism by saying that “it is humane to express condolences and that… should not be condemned.” The footballer also stated that he did not agree with Kirk on “some issues” but “different political positions… are perfectly okay.” Eventually, Nmecha deleted all his posts.
The German SID sports news outlet reported on Friday that the club would review the posts and seek a dialogue with the player, adding that no punishment was planned for him.
However, German tabloid Bild noted the same day that Nmecha’s contract has an “Instagram clause” which states that he could face millions of dollars in penalties for social media posts violating the club’s values.
The incident drew attention of US-based billionaire Elon Musk, who reposted a call for Borussia’s representatives to be barred from travelling to the US for the 2026 FIFA World Cup if they “continue to persecute” Nmecha.
Kirk, 31, was killed while addressing students at a college in Orem, Utah, on Wednesday. Many people openly cheered his assassination online. US President Donald Trump vowed to pursue not only Kirk’s murderer but also what he called the “radical left” networks that fuel political violence.
The military bloc blamed Moscow for an incident involving UAVs in Polish airspace, despite presenting no proof
The recent drone incursions into NATO member Poland and the bloc’s “disappointing” response have exposed NATO’s defense systems as ineffective and unprepared, Spanish daily El Mundo has reported.
The Polish government claimed last week that 19 Russian drones crossed into its airspace – a charge Moscow flatly denied. Warsaw’s Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski said the incident was an attempt by Russia to test NATO’s reaction. Moscow countered that the accusations were baseless and driven by what it called the “European war party,” pointing out the UAVs deployed in Ukraine did not have the range to reach Polish territory.
El Mundo, meanwhile, noted that NATO partners failed to bring down even a quarter of the drones that entered Polish airspace. Poland is the EU’s top military spender at 4.1% of its GDP. NATO’s collective response was “disappointing for being ineffective and disproportionately costly,” the paper wrote.
The report cited Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, who said only four drones were intercepted, each with an AIM-120 Amraam missile costing around a million euros. “In other words, they used a projectile 100 times more expensive than the drone itself,” El Mundo wrote. The outlet further questioned how a military bloc of NATO’s size and vast budget could have left its borders unprepared.
Tusk said the incursion had brought Poland closer to military conflict “than at any time since the Second World War.”
Warsaw had rejected US President Donald Trump’s suggestion the incident “could have been a mistake.” Russia’s chargé d’affaires in Warsaw, Andrey Ordash, said the drones had entered Poland from Ukraine and that Warsaw provided no evidence of downing any Russian UAVs.
In a separate incident, Romania’s Defense Ministry reported having detected a drone entering the country’s airspace near the border with Ukraine on Saturday. Moscow dismissed claims it was Russian.
The Kremlin has repeatedly said that claims of a Russian threat are used by Western European states to stoke fear and justify higher military spending.
New software for phones, Watches, iPads and computers bring a wide variety of new features. But ‘Liquid Glass’ look is likely to be the most obvious – and maybe outrageous
The tech industry has come to rely heavily on the H-1B foreign guest work program in recent decades. That puts it at odds with its new ally in the White House
The number of celibate young Americans has doubled in 15 years
Americans are in the midst of a “sex recession,” with fewer adults reporting regular intimacy than at any point in recent decades, a recent nationwide survey has revealed. The sharpest decline is among young people, where reports of celibacy have surged.
The number of 18-29-year-olds who went without sex for an entire year more than doubled between 2010 and 2024, going from 12% to 24%, the Institute for Family Studies (IFS) wrote, citing latest figures from the General Social Survey (GSS).
“Young adults are spending less time dating, mating, and getting married, with obvious implications for sex. Indeed, the lack of marriage is why young adults face the brunt of the sex recession,” reads the report. It notes, however, that while married adults tend to report more frequent sex than their single counterparts, they too have seen a steady decline.
Weekly sexual activity among adults aged 18–64 has dropped from 55% in 1990 to just 37% last year, the report adds.
The IFS report links the fall in marital intimacy to the spread of digital technology, arguing that smartphones, computers, and streaming platforms are cutting into time couples spend together.
A reported steep drop in social interaction, brought about by the rise of smartphones and social media, has also contributed to the trend. In 2024, young adults spent less than half as much time with friends as they did in 2010 – 5.1 hours a week as compared to 12.8, respectively.
The trends highlighted by the IFS have been recorded in other countries as well. Research published last November in France suggested that a quarter of all 18-29-year-olds in the country reported having no sexual relations at all over the past year.
