LAST UPDATE | 31 Aug 2021
GOOD MORNING.
Here’s all the news that you need to know as you start your day.
1. The US has withdrawn the last of its troops from Afghanistan, ending a 20-year war.
Central Command Commander General Kenneth McKenzie confirmed the last troops had been withdrawn just before the start of Tuesday in Kabul.
The final withdrawal of forces meant the military could not evacuate all the people that it had hoped to, he said.
US President Joe Biden will make an address tomorrow on the decision “not to extend our presence in Afghanistan”.
2. The Cabinet is set to meet today to consider measures that would see the end to almost all Covid-19 restrictions by 22 October.
It is understood the government aims to scrap most restrictions by this date if a 90% vaccination target can be reached and incidence of the virus remains stable or is falling.
Subject to full Cabinet approval today, restrictions would ease on a phased basis from next week onwards.
3. Emma Taggart reports that since September 2020, the Food Safety Authority of Ireland (FSAI) has recalled over 40 food products contaminated with ethylene oxide – and items will continue to be removed from shop shelves ‘for some time’.
Ethylene oxide is a chemical used as a pesticide or sterilising agent, and classified as a mutagen, carcinogen and reproductive toxicant by the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA). It has been banned in the European Union since 1981.
It is used in a wide range of items – products recalled so far this year from Irish stores include food supplements, ice cream, flavoured cheese, sesame seeds and instant noodles.
4. Over in the US, rescuers in boats, helicopters and high-water trucks brought hundreds of people trapped by Hurricane Ida’s floodwaters to safety after the storm swamped the Louisiana coast and ravaged the electrical grid.
Residents living amid the maze of rivers and bayous along the state’s Gulf Coast retreated to their attics or roofs and posted their addresses on social media with instructions for search-and-rescue teams on where to find them.
More than one million homes and businesses in Louisiana and Mississippi — including all of New Orleans — were left without power as Ida pushed through on Sunday.
5. A man in his 70s died in a motorcycle crash in Co Kildare yesterday.
Gardaí are investigating the single-vehicle collision that occurred in the Derrycrib area of Donadea at 6pm.
The driver of a motorcycle, a man aged in his 70s, was fatally injured in the crash.
6. The European Union has recommended that its member states reimpose travel restrictions on US tourists over rising Covid infections in the country.
The European Council, which represents the bloc’s 27 governments, said it was taking six territories off its list of locations exempted from restrictions on non-essential travel during the coronavirus pandemic.
These countries are: Israel, Kosovo, Lebanon, Montenegro, the Republic of North Macedonia and the US.
7. It would be “completely unacceptable” for the United Kingdom to abandon the Northern Ireland protocol, a US congressman told The Journal.
Democrat Brendan Boyle said the UK must “live up” to the protocol that it agreed to with the EU on Northern Ireland, which deals with keeping the border open between Ireland and the North.
8. A man was arrested yesterday after gardaí seized approximately 121kg of suspected cannabis herb with an estimated value of €2,180,000.
Gardaí responded to a report of unusual activity on a rural road in Emo, Co Laois.
Gardaí found a number of pallets containing boxes of vegetables and, following a search of these boxes, gardaí recovered 121kg of packaged cannabis herb (pending analysis).
9. Minister for Foreign Affairs Simon Coveney is to face scrutiny from an Oireachtas committee today over his appointment of Katherine Zappone as UN special envoy.
In late July, former minister for children Katherine Zappone was appointed to the new role of UN Special Envoy for freedom of opinion and expression.
Questions arose around the transparency and objectiveness of the appointment process, as the role had not been publicly advertised. Zappone later said she would not be accepting the position.
Coveney will face questions from the Joint Committee on Foreign Affairs and Defence over “the appointment of special envoys and the situation in Afghanistan”.
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