Rhine

Angler Mark Kouwenhoven grins as he wades into what's left of a dried-up Dutch lake where his colleagues are throwing slime-coated fish into buckets.

It's not the kind of catch they're used to but that's because this time they're helping the government to save the fish from the drought gripping Europe.

The Rhine river in Germany on Aug. 12 fell below a key waterline level used as a reference for judging its accessibility for shipping.

The water dropped below the 40-centimetre (15.7-inch) reference level in Kaub, a noted bottleneck for shipping where the Rhine runs narrow and shallow.

That level is considered necessary for much of the transport along the river.

German emergency responders were on July 16 still searching for hundreds of missing people after the worst floods in living memory killed more than 80 in the country's west.

"I fear that we will only see the full extent of the disaster in the coming days," Chancellor Angela Merkel said from Washington, where she met with President Joe Biden.

Three Bulgarian girls drowned in the Rhine near the German city of Duisburg. The incident happened on June 16, local media report. According to the initial information, the children are 13, 14 and 17 years old.

They entered the water last Wednesday night. A search mission began immediately.

A man who lives in the Black Sea province of Samsun has donated 500 bottles of Turkish cologne, "kolonya," that he has collected over the past 50 years to his relatives since the coronavirus arrived in Turkey

A commemorative ceremony for the 70th anniversary of the Council of Europe took place in Strasbourg, France on Oct. 1. 

German police said on Wednesday they had raided properties and made arrests across the country in an operation to crack down on human traffickers.

Police tweeted that they had carried out the raids and arrests in Berlin, Bremen, North Rhine-Westphalia and Saxony, reported Reuters. 

Rivers swollen by days of rainfall and melting snow are rising in western Germany, with floodwaters spilling into some cities and towns.

Many French people continue to yearn for a father figure - a political savior acting in the tradition of post-war president Charles De Gaulle.

Carnival season is in full swing across much of the world, from Rio to New Orleans, from Venice to Düsseldorf and in numerous destinations throughout the western hemisphere.
As you would expect, the resurgent Greek bailout and debt crisis couldn’t go unnoticed by ingenious float creators.