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The German city of Mannheim is in mourning.

It’s grieving for the police officer killed by a failed asylum seeker from Afghanistan last Friday.

In the marketplace, rows of people queue to lay flowers.

A line of police marches forward, lowering their caps; colleagues and residents gathering to pay their respects and reflect on a crime that has shaken Germany and stoked divisions as people prepare to vote in the European elections.

“This attack happened before the election so it might be now that many people who live here vote for the far right,” says Imam Adeel Ahmad Shad.

“Some people feel safe, some don’t because they think now every Muslim man or people can attack them,” first-time voter Alan tells me.

The knife attack by an alleged Islamic extremist has sparked an emotional debate around migration and radical Islamism.

People left tributes

Some claim the far-right Alternative for Germany party (AfD), which campaigns on an anti-immigration stance, is using it to drum up votes.

So thousands have taken to the streets to protest against the party.

“AfD out of Mannheim,” they chant as they wind through the streets.

“The AfD of course spread their hatred and they abuse what happened just to once again pick on an entire religion while we claim to have religious freedom,” says Tanja Hilton, a candidate for the Left Party.

The counter-protest. Pic: picture-alliance/dpa/AP
Image:
AfD counter-protest in Mannheim. Pic: picture-alliance/dpa/AP

Meanwhile, further up the street, the AfD is marking the one-week anniversary of the attack with its own rally in the city.

A smaller crowd listens as speakers discuss their views on immigration and Islamic extremism.

The regional chairman, Markus Frohnmaier, denies they’re trying to profit from the tragedy.

“People who say the AfD try to benefit from this, shame on them, because it’s not up to us. It’s not like the AfD planned it. It happened and our exercise as a political party is to handle this topic and to make sure that it will never happen again,” he says.

The AfD protest. Pic: picture-alliance/dpa/AP
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AfD rally in Mannheim. Pic: picture-alliance/dpa/AP

But this year’s EU election campaign has been especially bitter.

Several politicians have been attacked while campaigning.

Read more:
Denmark’s PM attacked
Slovakian PM shot multiple times

Social Democrat Matthias Ecke was badly beaten in Dresden, while a member of the Green Party was abused and spat at.

Prominent Berlin politician Franziska Giffey was violently assaulted and suffered injuries to her head and neck, adding to the concern over rising political violence in Germany.

On Tuesday, an AfD candidate was slashed with a knife in Mannheim after confronting someone pulling down posters.

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The police said the suspect showed clear signs of mental illness and stressed there was no concrete evidence that he had been aware that the victim was an AfD politician.

But across Germany tensions have been growing in the build-up to this election as opposing sides face off.

“I’ve been active for many years in local politics. I’m always on the front line when it comes to the right wing. But now I’m looking right and left when I leave the house because me and my family were threatened via email,” says Gerhard Fontagnier, a local councillor for the Green Party.

If predictions are correct, the far-right will be celebrating a surge in support across the EU when all the votes are counted.

A result with the potential to further fuel divisions inside Germany and across Europe.

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What we know so far about school shooting in Austria

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What we know so far about school shooting in Austria

Students and adults are among 11 people who have died in a school shooting in Austria.

A further 12 people were reportedly injured in the attack at a secondary school in Graz, Austria’s second-biggest city.

Mayor Elke Kahr described it as a “terrible tragedy”, the Austria Press Agency (APA) reported.

Austria school shooting: Follow live updates

Here is what we know so far.

What happened?

The shooting took place on 10 June at BORG Dreierschutzengasse, a secondary school in the northwest of Graz, close to the main central train station, Austrian police said.

Officials said 10 people were killed, six females and three males. The gunman was the eleventh person who died.

Twelve more people were injured, interior minister Gerhard Karner added.

A map showing Graz in Austria, where a school shooting took place
Image:
The shooting took place at BORG Dreierschutzengasse secondary school

Special forces were sent to the school at 10am local time after reports of shots being heard.

By 11.30am, police said the school had been evacuated and everyone had been taken to a safe meeting point.

Gunfire and screaming could be heard in footage posted on X purporting to be from the scene.

An injured person being carried to a helicopter by paramedics was also caught on video, while pictures showed armed officers at the scene.

At least 158 paramedics were on site responding to the shooting, and 31 crisis intervention staff.

The scene in Graz, Austria.

The Austrian Red Cross told Sky News it had initiated its so-called ‘MANV system’, a protocol for dealing with a mass casualty incident.

Injured students were being cared for in the nearby Helmut List Halle events venue.

The scene in Graz, Austria.
Image:
Police have confirmed the gunman is among those who have died

‘My son called me to say he was going to die’

The mother of a child who survived the shooting retold the distressing moment she received a phone call from her son.

She said she found out hours after the incident that he was alive.

“My son called me to say he was in school and that he was being shot and that he thought he was going to die,” she said.

“I’ve only found out now, two hours later, that he’s still alive.”

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‘My son called me to say he thought he was going to die’

What we know about the suspect

Austrian police confirmed the perpetrator is dead, but have not yet revealed his identity.

In an update, Styrian State Police director Gerald Ortner said he was 21 years old and lived in Graz.

Officers believe he killed himself in the school’s toilet.

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Police: Latest on Austria school shooting

Mr Ortner said police did not have any prior information about the suspect, but said that he owned two guns, that he used in the shooting.

Interior minister Mr Karner added that the gunman was a former pupil of BORG Dreierschutzengasse who didn’t finish school.

He said any other details about the suspect was “still speculation”.

The scene in Graz, Austria.

A ‘national tragedy’

Austrian Chancellor Christian Stocker called the shooting a “national tragedy”.

In a later news conference, he said it is a “dark day in the history of our country”.

“There are no words to express the pain, the mourning, that all Austria is feeling right now,” he added.

Chancellor of Austria, Christian Stocker, attends a press conference following a deadly school shooting in Graz, Austria, June 10, 2025. REU
Image:
Chancellor Christian Stocker said it is a ‘dark day’ for Austria. Pic: Reuters

He sent his condolences to those who were injured and the relatives, friends and staff who had to “live through this terrible, horrible event”.

He announced there will be three days of mourning and Austrian ministers are expected to pass a resolution for a national mourning today.

The Austrian flag will also be flown at half-mast and a minute of silence will be held on Wednesday.

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Austrian President Alexander Van der Bellen added: “This horror cannot be put into words.”

He said what happened in Graz “strikes at the heart of our country”.

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Birth rates are plummeting worldwide – but it’s not because people don’t want kids anymore

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Birth rates are plummeting worldwide - but it's not because people don't want kids anymore

Two in five people over 50 say they have not had as many children as they wanted – with economic issues, health concerns and fears about the state of the world among the main barriers.

More than half said financial factors such as affordable housing, childcare options and job security were things that had limited, or would limit, their ability to grow their families.

One in four said health issues were holding them back, while a fifth of respondents mentioned fears about global issues including climate change, wars and pandemics.

The findings come from a new survey of over 14,000 people by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) – spanning 14 countries on five continents that are home to a third of the world’s population.

Birth rates have been declining across almost all regions of the world, while life expectancy continues to grow.

There are concerns, from politicians and commentators like Elon Musk, that future generations of working age people will find it more difficult to economically support people of pension age as the ratio of workers to pensioners shifts.

“Vast numbers of people are unable to create the families they want,” said Dr Natalia Kanem, executive director of the UNFPA.

“The issue is lack of choice, not desire, with major consequences for individuals and societies. That is the real fertility crisis, and the answer lies in responding to what people say they need: paid family leave, affordable fertility care, and supportive partners.”

Differences around the world

The survey was carried out in four European countries, four in Asia, three across Africa and three from the Americas.

The countries were picked to try and represent “a wide variety of countries with different cultural contexts, fertility rates and policy approaches”, according to the report’s editor Dr Rebecca Zerzan.

It includes, for example, the country with the lowest fertility rate in the world – South Korea. It also includes country with a birth rate among the highest in the world, which also happens to be the most populous country in its continent – Nigeria.

The others, in order of population size, are India, the US, Indonesia, Brazil, Mexico, Germany, Thailand, South Africa, Italy, Morocco, Sweden and Hungary.

In many cases there were significant differences in responses depending on which country people were reporting from.

For example in Nigeria, a third of men (although only 21% of women) reported that they wanted to have four or more children. The numbers were similar in South Africa. However in South Korea, Thailand, Italy, Germany and Hungary, no more than 5% agreed.

Fertility issues were twice as likely in the US (16% of respondents) as in neighbouring Mexico (8%).

In South Korea, three in five respondents reported financial limitations as an obstacle.

But in Sweden, where both men and women are entitled to 480 days of paid parental leave per child (which can also be transferred to grandparents), fewer than one in five said the same.

How paternity leave in the UK compares to other countries

Birth rates in Sweden are still among the lowest in the world, however. Dr Zerzan told Sky News that this shows that no one factor alone contributes to people feeling empowered to have children at the right time.

“A third of people in Sweden say they think raising a child will take up too much time and energy. And a higher number of people there, compared with other countries, are also concerned about climate change and bringing a child in to an uncertain world.”

Unintended pregnancies vs not as many children as wanted

A curious finding from the survey is that, while there has been much discussion around declining fertility rates, almost a third of people said they or their partner had experienced an unintended pregnancy.

Globally, as people who become pregnant unintentionally often do so more than once, half of all pregnancies are unintended.

In Morocco and South Africa, around half of people had experience of an unintended pregnancy. In the same two countries, more than half of people had experience of being unable to have a child at their preferred time.

Overall, one in eight people had experienced both an unintended pregnancy and barriers to a desired child.

“Everywhere we look, people are struggling to freely realise their reproductive aspirations,” explains the report.

People who had more children than they wanted, and people who had fewer, were present in countries with high and low fertility rates.

“That indicates that barriers to achieving one’s ideal family are ubiquitous.”

Birth rates are falling across almost all parts of the world

What can be done to help?

The report says that the crisis does require political interventions, but warns against policies that often amount to short-term fixes, or those designed to coerce people to either use or not use contraception.

“Whether the policies are coercive or not, there are real risks to treating fertility rates as a faucet to be turned on or off. Many of the countries that are today seeking to increase fertility have, within the last 40 years, sought to decrease birth rates.

“For example, China, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Thailand and Türkiye all reported in 1986 an intention to lower their national fertility rates through policy interventions, deeming their respective fertility rates at that time as ‘too high’. By 2015, however, all five countries had switched to policies designed to boost fertility.

“Today all five have total fertility rates below two children per woman.”


The Data and Forensics team is a multi-skilled unit dedicated to providing transparent journalism from Sky News. We gather, analyse and visualise data to tell data-driven stories. We combine traditional reporting skills with advanced analysis of satellite images, social media and other open source information. Through multimedia storytelling, we aim to better explain the world while also showing how our journalism is done.

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Trade war: US-China talks in London aim for widespread truce

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Trade war: US-China talks in London aim for widespread truce

Top US and Chinese officials are meeting in London on Monday in the hope of making further progress in easing the trade war between the world’s two largest economies.

The eyes of global financial market investors are firmly on the outcome of the discussions, given the damage already inflicted by the spat and wider US-led trade war.

The US delegation is led by Treasury secretary Scott Bessent while China‘s vice premier He Lifeng – a respected negotiator at the top of the Chinese government – will represent his country.

The venue has not been disclosed.

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It is hoped the talks will build on the preliminary agreement struck in Geneva that removed the effective trade embargo between the two nations.

That deal amounted to a 90-day reduction in effective tariff rates above 100% to allow for further talks.

A phone conversation between Donald Trump and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping last week set the scene for Monday’s negotiations.

Mr Trump later said that Xi had agreed to resume shipments to the US of rare earths minerals and magnets.

They had been suspended by Beijing in response to Mr Trump’s tariffs and were seen as an effective tool in getting the US to talk due to the havoc it inflicted on supply chains central to many American manufacturers – the very sector the US president is trying to bolster through his “America first” agenda.

It emerged on Monday morning that Boeing had resumed shipments of planes to Chinese customers.

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Explained: The US-UK trade deal

Mr Trump has described the status of the negotiations as “very far advanced” but China, in its own remarks, has been more critical of the US position.

A Chinese government readout of the Trump-Xi conversation said the Chinese premier had told his US counterpart to back down from inflicting further hurt to the global economy.

The trade war to date has damaged growth widely, with official US figures showing a sharp slowdown in the first quarter of the year – before the worst of the tariff regime had even been announced.

Data out of China on Monday showed deflationary pressures had deepened as factory gate prices – an important signal on future price growth – slid further into negative territory during May as demand for goods continued to drag.

Customs data had already showed that China’s exports to the US – its biggest single market – slumped by 34.5% year-on-year during May in value terms.

That was up from a 21% drop the previous month.

Read more:
Why Trump blinked in US-China trade war

Diplomatic win for UK by hosting US-China talks

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White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt told Fox News: “We want China and the United States to continue moving forward with the agreement that was struck in Geneva.

“The administration has been monitoring China’s compliance with the deal, and we hope that this will move forward to have more comprehensive trade talks.”

A UK government spokesperson said of hosting the negotiations: “We are a nation that champions free trade and have always been clear that a trade war is in nobody’s interests, so we welcome these talks.”

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