LISBON (Reuters) - Portuguese police cleared a camp in central Lisbon held to protest against the country’s deepening housing crisis, baton-charging demonstrators in the early hours of Sunday and making 25 arrests. Portugal is grappling with one of Europe’s most acute home affordability crises, as prices have more than doubled since 2017 while rents for new leases have nearly doubled, with young people among the hardest hit. The Portuguese protests echo recent demonstrations in Spain over home shortages and surging rents. There have also been protests in cities including Paris, where small student demonstrations over school conditions broadened into wider protests against the government’s economic policies.

 

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MAIDUGURI (Reuters) - Gunmen killed at least 40 people in an attack on a village in Nigeria’s northeastern Taraba state, Amnesty International said. A large group of gunmen carried out the attack on Binnari village, police said in a statement on Saturday. Amnesty International said in a statement that while police had earlier confirmed the killing of 10 people, more bodies were recovered later on Saturday. The attackers invaded the village with heavy gunfire and looted food data-x-items from shops, police said.Northern Nigeria has experienced a surge in attacks by heavily armed criminal gangs, known locally as bandits, who raid villages, abduct residents for ransom and steal livestock.

 

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BELGRADE (Reuters) - Serbian voters turned out in force on Sunday as a mass student protest movement sought to unseat longtime populist leader Aleksandar Vucic in the biggest challenge to his rule for more than a decade. The snap parliamentary elections, called by Vucic in September, come after almost two years of student-led demonstrations against perceived corruption and creeping authoritarianism triggered by the deaths of 16 people when a train station canopy collapsed in the city of Novi Sad in 2024. The students have since gained widespread support.

 

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NEW YORK (NY Times) - The Archdiocese of New York agreed to pay more than $800 million to settle sexual abuse claims made by 1,300 people who said they were victimized by clergy members and lay people in positions of leadership in the Roman Catholic Church. Lawyers for the plaintiffs sent an email to the priests of the archdiocese announcing the planned settlement. But all the alleged victims must sign off on the agreement before the archdiocese goes forward with the payout. Archbishop Ronald A. Hicks confirmed to the Times that the deal will not be finalized until all parties involved – the plaintiffs, the lawyers and the archdiocese – sign it. “We are on the verge of being able to, please God, bring some measure of healing and reconciliation to all victim-survivors,” he told the outlet.

 

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NEW DELHI (AFP) - Indian protesters angry over a proposed Himalayan mega-dam, intended to counter an upstream Chinese hydropower project, have clashed with police and torched buildings, officials said. The violence in northeastern Arunachal Pradesh state erupted late on Friday during protests against the proposed 11,200-megawatt Siang Upper Multipurpose Project of state-run hydropower company NHPC, Chief Minister Pema Khandu told reporters on Saturday. “The mob destroyed a lot of properties, police station, the NHPC office was vandalized, several elected representatives’ homes were ransacked,” Khandu told reporters.