UKRAINE - The destruction of the Kakhovka dam on the Dnieper River could endanger the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, China’s ambassador to the UN, Zhang Jun, told the Security Council on Tuesday. Beijing has urged Ukraine and Russia to ensure this does not happen. “We express our great concern over the destruction of the dam at the Kakhovka hydroelectric power station,” Zhang told a special session of the council.

ITALY - A 'supervolcano' in a densely populated part of Italy could be on the verge of its first eruption since 1538, researchers have warned. The Campi Flegrei volcano near Naples, southern Italy, has become weaker and more prone to rupturing, making an eruption more likely, the experts say. Located about nine miles (14.5 km) to the west of Naples, it is one of the few active supervolcanoes in the world. Campi Flegrei's large, eight-mile-wide caldera – its basin-like depression resulting from prior explosion – is located under the western outskirts of the city of Naples. About a third of the caldera is partially submerged beneath the Bay of Pozzuoli, but the remaining two-thirds is land that's home to more than 360,000 people. Campi Flegrei (or 'burning fields') is defined as a supervolcano because it has the potential to produce a magnitude eight eruption, capable of discharging more than 200 cubic miles of material.

WALES - Opponents have lost a legal challenge against teaching children about gender identity and sex in schools in Wales. The Court of Appeal has refused a group permission to appeal a High Court judgement last year which dismissed their claims about the Relationships and Sexuality Education Code and guidance on all grounds. Primary and secondary schools in Wales launched the new RSE lessons in September. With regards to how the code and guidance approaches issues relating to different sexualities, gender identification and respectful treatment of LGBTQ+ people, Lord Justice Males added: "It is inconceivable that such teaching could be contrary to the common law or the Human Rights Act. On the contrary, diversity and inclusion (including as to the LGBT+ community) are fundamental values of British (including Welsh) society."

UK - The publisher of a new children's book featuring a man in bondage gear and a woman with trans 'top surgery' scars has branded parents voicing objection as 'homophobes'. Grandad's Pride' is the creation of Waterstones children's book winning author and illustrator Harry Woodgate - who uses they/them pronouns - and is published by Andersen Press, who told MailOnline they stand by the product. The children's tome promises 'to celebrate the power of community and the importance of LGBTQIA+ history' and is highly regarded in some circles - even winning the Waterstones' coveted children's book prize.

UK - Woke teachers have been accused of breaking the law by asking children to campaign for Black Lives Matter. Pupils as young as 12 have been told by teachers at one school to write to Prime Minister Rishi Sunak in support of the movement. Teachers are also teaching terms such as 'white privilege' and encouraging Year 8 children to 'do better' to support black people. Class material used by Cranbrook Education Campus in Exeter asks children to 'write an open letter to our current Prime Minister campaigning for change'. It suggests they 'consider' words such as 'white privilege' and 'ally' to help them.

USA - Have you grown exhausted by the latest marketing campaign or social media post made by a company you once thought was ideologically neutral? Honestly, I didn’t know that a KitchenAid stand mixer could even come with a politically-charged purpose, but it’s becoming harder and harder to find any brand that doesn’t place progressive activism or ideological agendas ahead of their customers. Why might this be happening? Well, at risk of sounding like I’m making claims that there’s a globalist, “woke” cabal, I’m indeed calling out the fact that there’s a globalist woke cabal behind the recent surge of companies producing marketing and advertising for the latest progressive cause, from race ideology to LGBTQ+ ideology to environmentalism and more.

UK - Who invented sex education? Since we now have so much of it that we can barely escape it, it seems a reasonable question. This is even more important now that we know it does not work. Last week’s appalling figures for syphilis and gonorrhoea cases – pretty much the worst in modern times – showed beyond doubt that Sex Ed has not prevented the spread of sexual diseases. The same is true of the huge abortion figures (do you remember when they said legalising that would make it ‘safe, legal and rare’? Not exactly). Without the ever-increasing use of the ‘morning after pill’, which conceals rather than solves the problem, it would be even worse. Meanwhile, family life, as we knew it only a short time ago, is vanishing from large parts of the British landscape.

UKRAINE - The blowing of the dam at the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant (KHPP) by the Russian state is, quite simply, an act of terror by this terrorist state. With his army failing, his air force stuck in its hangars, it would appear Putin is prepared to do almost anything to cling on to the Russian occupied areas of Ukraine and his throne in the Kremlin. This is another war crime to add to the growing list, a list that includes the unlawful deportation of children – something that led to the International Criminal Court to issue a warrant for his arrest.

GERMANY - Of four major global powers, Germany remained the top-rated one for the sixth consecutive year in 2022. Across 137 countries, median approval of German leadership stood at 46% last year. Even though this is down from a 50% rating in 2021, it remains higher than approval of the US (41%) and well clear of ratings for China (28%) and Russia (21%).

GERMANY - The far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) is riding high in the polls to the alarm of mainstream parties and is on track to win three state votes in the east of the country with calls to stop migration and curb what it sees as a costly green agenda.

• Far-right AfD support now around record of 17-19%.
• Migration debate moves up the mainstream agenda.
• AfD could win three east German states in 2024.
• Rise of AfD vote complicates coalition building.
• Government says AfD helped by crises that are easing.

SWEDEN - A baby boy carried in a uterus implanted into his mother by a robot was born in a world first. The youngster, who has not been named, weighed six pounds and 13 ounces when he was born via planned C-section in Sweden last month. Both the child and his 35-year-old mother are doing well. The pregnancy was made possible when a family member agreed to donate their uterus to the mother, who then had a fertilized egg implanted into it via IVF. The case marks the first time robots have been used for the procedure. It will give hope to the tens of thousands of American women who don't have a uterus — which can be due to cancer or a medical condition — or have one unable to carry infants.

GERMANY - The head of a facility that carries out so-called “gender-affirming care” has published a study confirming that transgender surgeries do not improve mental health and make people feel lonelier than those who avoided surgical intervention altogether. “In our study, the level of life satisfaction in transgender people was not increased in transgender people who had undergone gender-affirming surgery as compared to those who were unoperated,” says a study published Tuesday in BMC Public Health, a peer-reviewed scientific journal.

CANADA - Wildfires continue to burn large tracts of forest in Canada, with little sign that weather will provide much help to firefighters who are battling the blazes that are sending smoke over New York and other major cities. More than 400 forest fires are still active across the country, and most of them are out of control. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Canada is living through its “worst wildfire season” in recorded history during a briefing with journalists in Ottawa on Wednesday. Wildfires are poised to burn more land than ever in Canada, with over 3.8 million hectares (9.4 million acres) scorched so far, according to the Canadian National Fire Database. That’s about double the size of New Jersey.

USA - To put it not-so-simply, terf or TERF stands for 'trans-exclusionary radical feminist'. Otherwise known as someone who supposedly stands for women’s rights, while only considering people who were assigned female at birth to be women. This means they don't consider transgender women to be women. So, to avoid all the confusion about slurs and names, let’s stop using the term TERFs and call them what they actually are – anti-trans activists. Giving them any association with feminism would be wrong, especially as many of their organisations are funded by anti-abortion and evangelical groups, and they rarely speak about anything other than denying trans people’s existence.

USA - House Republicans are set to repudiate US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen for telling other countries that the US is on board with a global tax initiative aimed at punishing global corporations. All 25 Republicans on the House Ways and Means Committee have co-authored the Defending American Jobs and Investment Act (HR 3665), which would impose retaliatory taxes on countries that impose harsh taxes on American companies. This bill doesn’t come out of nowhere, however. It’s a direct response to Yellen telling global leaders that the US would like to take part in the global tax – one that would benefit European companies and punish American ones.