Following is a summary of current world news briefs.

You’ve been hacked: How Dubai ruler’s eavesdropping was uncovered

In August last year, Fiona Shackleton, one of Britain’s most prominent divorce lawyers, received an urgent late-night phone call from Cherie Blair, wife of the former prime minister Tony. Blair, who is a top human rights lawyer, told Shackleton that her phone may have been hacked along with that of her client, Jordanian Princess Haya bint al-Hussein.

Exclusive-Stranded at Tajik sanatorium, pregnant Afghan pilot fears for unborn baby

She didn’t forget the prenatal vitamins – that was one of the few things this U.S.-trained Afghan pilot could grab from her Kabul airport office before she left the country aboard an Air Force plane during the Taliban takeover. But after fleeing for her life and that of her unborn child in August, the 29-year-old says she can’t even get an ultrasound or visit a hospital.

U.N. chief takes on Ethiopia over expelled staff: show me proof

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres hit back at Ethiopia on Wednesday over the government’s expulsion of seven U.N. staff, demanding proof of accusations against them raised by Ethiopia’s U.N. ambassador during a Security Council meeting.

“It is my duty to defend the honor of the United Nations,” Guterres told reporters after the rare public exchange with Ethiopia’s U.N. ambassador, Taye Atske Selassie Amde, at the end of the council meeting on the situation in the country.

Peru’s Castillo axes hard-left PM, cites political ‘instability’

Peruvian President Pedro Castillo said he had accepted the resignation of his hard-left Prime Minister on Wednesday, decrying political “instability” after only two months in power, suggesting his government will adopt a more moderate stance. Prime Minister Guido Bellido was little-known before taking the role, but his brash style rattled the opposition-led Congress as well as investors made nervous by a far-left administration.

Armed bandits kill 18 in Nigeria’s Zamfara state

Armed men killed at least 18 people and set ablaze cars and shops in Nigeria’s Zamfara state, where the government has imposed a telecoms blackout as part of a security operation against groups of kidnappers, two residents said on Wednesday. Northwest Nigeria has been engulfed in crisis since late 2020, when groups of armed men began a spate of mass abductions from schools and other violent attacks on villages and on people travelling by road.

“This is the moment of shame,” pope says about France abuse report

Pope Francis said on Wednesday he was saddened and ashamed by the Catholic Church’s inability to deal with sexual abuse of children in France and that the Church must make itself a “safe home for everyone”. “I would like to express to the victims my sadness, sorrow for the trauma they have suffered and also my shame, our shame, for the church’s inability, for too long, to put them at the centre of its concerns,” Francis said at his weekly general audience.

Biden, Xi plan U.S.-China virtual summit before year’s end, U.S. says

The United States and China have agreed in principle for their presidents to hold a virtual meeting before the end of the year, a senior U.S. administration official said on Wednesday, after high-level talks aimed at improving communication between the two countries. The closed-door meeting at an airport hotel in the Swiss city of Zurich between U.S. national security adviser Jake Sullivan and China’s top diplomat Yang Jiechi was their first face-to-face encounter since an unusually public and acrid airing of grievances in Alaska in March.

Dubai’s Sheikh Mohammed ordered phones of ex-wife and lawyers to be hacked, UK court says

Dubai’s ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum ordered the phones of his ex-wife and her lawyers to be hacked as part of a “sustained campaign of intimidation and threat” during the custody battle over their children, England’s High Court has ruled. Mohammed used the sophisticated “Pegasus” software, developed by Israeli firm NSO for states to counter national security risks, to hack https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/youve-been-hacked-how-dubai-rulers-eavesdropping-was-uncovered-2021-10-06 the phones of Princess Haya bint al-Hussein, half-sister of Jordan’s King Abdullah, and some of those closely connected to her, according to the rulings.

EU to back five-year targets at COP26 climate talks

The European Union on Wednesday agreed to back five-year climate targets at the COP26 climate change conference, where countries will attempt to finalise the rules needed to put the Paris Agreement into effect. At the COP26 summit, to be held in Glasgow from Oct. 31 to Nov. 12, countries will attempt to unblock years of negotiations on the technical rules. One issue they will address is whether their climate targets under the Paris 2015 accord should follow a “common timeframe”.

Right-wing merger aims to form Brazil’s largest political party

Two right-wing political parties in Brazil decided on Wednesday to join forces to become the country’s largest political party, with plans to field an alternative to President Jair Bolsonaro in next year’s elections. The Democratas (DEM) and the Social Liberal Party (PSL), which Bolsonaro joined ahead of his 2018 campaign, will have a combined 82 seats in the 513-member lower chamber of Congress, a larger grouping than the left-wing Workers Party (PT) with 53.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)