A judge in Germany ordered the suspect in a deadly Christmas market ramming attack to be held in pre-trial detention following a late-night court appearance on Saturday as authorities face growing accusations they could have done more to prevent it.

Taleb Al Abdulmohsen is accused of ramming a car into a busy market in the city of Magdeburg, killing five people and injuring more than 200.

The motive for the attack is unclear but the suspect is a 50-year-old Saudi citizen who has lived in Germany for more than a decade and worked to help Saudis leave his home country. On social media, he has been a fervent critic of Islam and prosecutors suggested he may have become embittered with how Germany treats Saudi refugees.

Recent messages have grown increasingly threatening. One says “if Germany wants to kill us, we will slaughter them, die, or go to prison with pride.”

“The magistrate ordered pre-trial detention for five counts of murder, several counts of attempted murder and several counts of dangerous bodily harm,” a statement from police early Sunday said.

“The accused was taken to a correctional facility accordingly.”

The police also released additional details on the victims of Friday’s attack. The dead include a nine-year-old boy and four women aged 45, 52, 67 and 75, according to the statement.

The attack has been met with confusion and anger from the public and politicians, with questions raised over potential security lapses just two months before federal elections where immigration is likely to be a flashpoint issue.

Germany stepped up security at Christmas markets – a fixture of the festive season – following a deadly car ramming in Berlin in 2016.

But Magdeburg police chief Tom-Oliver Langhans said Saturday that the attacker was able to gain access to the market using emergency exit points, usually reserved for ambulances and other emergency vehicles.

At the same conference, city official Ronni Krug insisted the security concept for the Magdeburg Christmas market was “constantly being revised and modified.”

Krug continued, “How this case could come about must first be investigated by the police. I will not indulge in speculation. But you can rest assured that we will continue to update the security concept, which we are constantly updating anyway, once we have reached an assessment with our colleagues from the police.”

Saudi warnings

But speaking to German public broadcaster ZDF, Holger Münch, the president of Germany’s federal criminal office confirmed, “We ourselves were once the recipient of a tip-off from Saudi Arabia in November 2023.”

He continued that proceedings were initiated and Saxony-Anhalt police took “appropriate investigative measures,” however the information they had on Taleb al-Abdulmohsen was too “unspecific” and he was “not known for violent acts.”

German politicians from opposite ends of the political spectrum have seized on Friday’s deadly attack to attack the coalition government.

Sahra Wagenknecht, leader of the far-left Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance party, called for Interior Minister Nancy Faeser to explain “why so many tips and warnings were ignored beforehand.”

Bernd Baumann, the parliamentary head of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), demanded a special parliamentary session be called to discuss security issues in a post on X.

At least 32 people were killed in crowd crushes at two separate charity events in Nigeria on Saturday, police say.

Some 22 people were killed at an event held in a community center in Okija in the southeastern state of Anambra, state police said on Sunday.

The event was held to distribute bags of rice to women in need, state broadcaster Radio Nigeria reported. Hundreds of people showed up to receive the rice, it said, leading to the crowd crush when people surged forward to try and reach it.

Victims of the crush include “women, the elderly, pregnant (women), nursing mothers and children,” Christian Aburime, Chief Press Secretary to the Anambra State Governor, said in a statement.

The event was held by the eastern Nigerian Obi Jackson Foundation with “the noble intention of sharing relief materials with less privileged members of the community during this festive season,” Aburime said.

“However, the resulting tragedy underscores the urgent need for a more structured and safer approach to distributing such assistance,” she continued.

On the same day as the tragedy in Anambra, ten people, including four children, were killed in a crowd crush in Maitama, a district of Nigeria’s capital city Abuja.

The incident took place at a food distribution event for the vulnerable held in a local church, police said in a statement Sunday. More than a thousand people turned up to the event, the statement read.

The Catholic Archbishop of Abuja, Ignatius Ayau Kaigama, called the crowd crush a “devastating blow to our community,” and said he was mourning the dead with “profound shock and sadness.”

Nigerian President Bola Tinubu cancelled his appearance at a boat regatta in Lagos after the tragedies on Saturday, his special adviser said in a statement.

“Commiserating with the victims of the unfortunate incidents in Anambra and the Federal Capital Territory, President Tinubu urged states and relevant authorities to enforce strict crowd control measures immediately,” Bayo Onanuga said.

“In a season of joy and celebration, we grieve with fellow citizens mourning the painful losses of their loved ones,” Tinubu said, according to the statement.

Saturday’s deaths come just days after a crowd crush in Ibadan, southwest Nigeria, killed at least 35 children. The organizers of the free event expected to host 5,000 children under the age of 13, where they could win prizes like scholarships, according to local radio station Agidigbo FM.

In 2023, Tinubu became president, and implemented economic reforms that included the revoking of fuel subsidies, which nearly tripled the price of gasoline.

Though there was an “urgent need” for economic reform, the World Bank said in a report published in October, “Nigerians have experienced intensifying hardship” since it was enacted. Prices and exchange rates have adjusted, adding to cost of living pressures that were already in place.

While the US had the opportunity to elect its first female president, voters who hoped to see the glass ceiling broken saw a defeat for the second time in eight years. Three of the countries that picked a female leader in 2024 – North Macedonia, Namibia and Mexico – did so for the first time in their nation’s history.

In the post-World War II period, the first woman was elected to lead a UN country 64 years ago. Here’s a look at where, and when, women have secured national leadership positions since then.

Forty-nine UN member states have had one female leader in the last seven decades. Another 18 countries have had two female leaders, nine countries have had three female leaders, and just two countries – Finland and Iceland – have been headed by four different female leaders. Still, a woman has never served as head of state or government in 115 UN member countries.

The first continent with a UN member state to have a female leader after WWII was Asia. In 1960, Sri Lanka – known then as Ceylon – elected its first female prime minister, Sirimavo Bandaranaike. She entered politics after her husband was assassinated while serving as prime minister.

Since then, women have led 13 other countries in Asia. A lot of them came into politics through their husbands or fathers, in former colonial countries.

“Many of the earliest women to come to power were those with dynastic connections to power, and in places where the dynastic connection was tied very closely to the struggle for independence,” said Minna Cowper-Coles, research fellow at the Global Institute for Women’s Leadership at King’s College London.

Asia also leads when it comes to women’s tenure in power, with Sheikh Hasina holding the record for the highest number of years served by a woman as a national leader.

Hasina was prime minister of Bangladesh from 1996 to 2001, and again from 2009 until her resignation in August 2024 following massive anti-government protests.

Her father, an independence leader, was Bangladesh’s first prime minister.

Isabel Perón was the first female head of state in the Americas. Her husband, Juan Perón, was president of Argentina and died in office in 1974. As the vice president, she took over many of his duties when he became ill, and was sworn in to the presidency after his death.

In October, Claudia Sheinbaum was inaugurated as the first female president of Mexico.

The first woman to become leader of an African country was Elisabeth Domitien, who was appointed prime minister of the Central African Republic in 1975.

The first elected female head of state in Africa was Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, who became president of Liberia in 2006.

In 2021, Tunisia became the first Arab country to be governed by a woman, when Najla Bouden was appointed prime minister by the country’s president.

Margaret Thatcher became Europe’s first female prime minister in 1979. A few months later, Maria de Lourdes Pintasilgo of Portugal became the continent’s second female head of government.

Since 2010, 28 countries in Europe have had at least one female leader, and the region now has the highest proportion of countries to have had a female leader. Around two-thirds, or 65%, of the 43 UN member countries in the region have had a female leader, and just under a quarter of them are currently being led by a woman.

European female leaders have also achieved significant tenure, with five leaders in the top 10 for longest time served, all with over 10 years in office. Angela Merkel, who first became Germany’s chancellor in 2005, held the role for 16 years.

Jenny Shipley was the first female prime minister of New Zealand, serving from 1997 to 1999. Julia Gillard was the first woman to hold the title of prime minister of Australia, serving from 2010 to 2013.

Experts say it’s important for women to play key roles in government because it broadens representation.

One possible positive outcome of women winning elections around the world is that their success may inspire others to go for leadership roles, encouraging younger generations of women into politics.

“We can talk about the power of recruitment,” Jalalzai said. “If a woman wins, maybe then we’ve learned the lesson that a woman can win… so you end up finding more women who are willing to throw their hats in the ring.”

Methodology

This data does not count: monarchs or governors appointed by monarchs; acting or interim heads of state or government who were not subsequently elected or confirmed; honorary heads of state or government; joint or collective heads of state or government, and chairpersons or presiding members thereof.

As a result, female leaders for Switzerland and Bosnia and Herzegovina are excluded. Kosovo, although it has a female president, is not a UN member state, so the country is excluded

Its glühwein stalls, festooned with Christmas lights and tinsel, stand emptied and shuttered.

The horrific car-ramming attack on this Christmas market on Friday night left at least five people dead, including a 9-year-old boy, plunging this provincial German city into shock.

At the entrance to the market, grieving locals have lit candles and laid flowers to pay their respects, many feeling a profound sense of loss.

“I’ve seen a lot of misery, many people who were searching. Many tears, bewilderment and extreme states of shock,” said Corinna Pagels, an emergency psychological counselor offering help to those affected.

Amid the grief, the attack has revived memories in Germany of a similar assault in 2016, when more than a dozen people were mowed down and killed at a Christmas market in Berlin.

Back then, it was a 24-year-old Tunisian man, who had failed to gain asylum in Germany and pledged allegiance to the radical jihadists of ISIS, who plowed a truck through the festive crowd, fueling anger and suspicion across Germany towards a recent influx of mainly Muslim immigrants from the Middle East.

This time, the suspect is very different.

Taleb Al Abdulmohsen, 50, was originally from Saudi Arabia, but had lived in Germany since 2006, working as a consultant psychiatric doctor in a local clinic.

He is also an avowed atheist and anti-Islam, once describing himself in a 2019 newspaper interview as “the most aggressive critic of Islam in history.”

On social media, Abdulmohsen expressed support for the German anti-immigration AfD party and repeated his own frustrations with what he saw as the German government’s soft line on immigration, as well as what he believed was Berlin’s overly cordial relationship with the Saudi regime.

Recent messages included threats. In August, Abdulmohsen said that if Germany “wants to kill us, we will slaughter them, die, or go to prison with pride.”

A constant in his feed was his anger at Islam. Germany, Abdulmohsen claimed, wanted “to Islamize Europe.”

But for many Germans in Magdeburg, the fact the latest Christmas market attacker doesn’t fit the expected security profile simply doesn’t matter.

“I think there should be a clean-up of people who do these things,” she added.

“Now is time to close our borders,” said a local man, Tom, standing nearby.

German politicians from opposite ends of the political spectrum have seized on the car-ramming to attack the coalition government.

Both share an opposition to mass migration: Far-left party leader Sahra Wagenknecht asked Interior Minister Nancy Faeser “why so many tips and warnings were ignored beforehand.”

Meanwhile the far-right AfD – which has made significant ground this year – is organizing a rally in Magdeburg on Monday evening, and the party’s parliamentary chief has demanded on X a special session be called to discuss security matters in the wake of the attack.

It seems this horrific and deadly Christmas market attack, despite allegedly being committed by a self-confessed Islamophobe, is fueling Germany’s angry anti-immigration mood.

Albania on Saturday announced a one-year ban on TikTok, the popular short video app, following the killing of a teenager last month that raised fears over the influence of social media on children.

The ban, part of a broader plan to make schools safer, will come into effect early next year, Prime Minister Edi Rama said after meeting with parents’ groups and teachers from across the country.

“For one year, we’ll be completely shutting it down for everyone. There will be no TikTok in Albania,” Rama said.

Several European countries including France, Germany and Belgium have enforced restrictions on social media use for children. In one of the world’s toughest regulations targeting Big Tech, Australia approved in November a complete social media ban for children under 16.

Rama has blamed social media, and TikTok in particular, for fueling violence among youth in and outside school.

His government’s decision comes after a 14-year-old schoolboy was stabbed to death in November by a fellow pupil. Local media had reported that the incident followed arguments between the two boys on social media. Videos had also emerged on TikTok of minors supporting the killing.

“The problem today is not our children, the problem today is us, the problem today is our society, the problem today is TikTok and all the others that are taking our children hostage,” Rama said.

TikTok said it was seeking “urgent clarity” from the Albanian government.

“We found no evidence that the perpetrator or victim had TikTok accounts, and multiple reports have in fact confirmed videos leading up to this incident were being posted on another platform, not TikTok,” a company spokesperson said.

A small plane with 10 people aboard crashed into shops in the center of the tourist city of Gramado in southern Brazil on Sunday, civil defense officials said, and initial reports indicated that there were no survivors.

“Unfortunately, initial reports indicate that the aircraft’s occupants did not survive,” Governor Eduardo Leite said in a post on social media platform X.

According to the public security office of Rio Grande do Sul state, at least 15 people were taken to the city’s hospital, most of them suffering from smoke inhalation caused by the fire triggered by the crash.

The plane reportedly first struck the chimney of a building, then the second floor of a house, before crashing into a furniture store, authorities said. Debris also reached a nearby inn.

Nestled in a mountainous region, Gramado is the most popular tourist destination in Rio Grande do Sul, which was severely impacted earlier this year by unprecedented floods that claimed dozens of lives, destroyed infrastructure and significantly disrupted the state’s economy.

The accident occurred just days before Christmas, a particularly busy period for the city, which is traditionally adorned with decorations and hosts festive events.

This is a developing story and will be updated.

A 9-year-old girl pushes back against period shame, telling adults at the dinner table, “more than half the world’s population bleeds.” Two men fight for a woman’s heart by boasting how many books they’ve read by Japanese feminist icon Chizuko Ueno. A stalker following a young woman home is confronted and chased away by a female neighbor.

These scenes from China’s latest box-office hit, “Her Story,” have become the talk of Chinese social media, where the comedy is hailed by many female viewers as the country’s answer to “Barbie.”

Comments on Douban, China’s biggest movie review site where the movie is rated 9.1 out of 10, praise its unabashed celebration of “awakened” womanhood and bold social commentary on modern China – all delivered with laugh-out-loud humor.

Since its release on November 22, “Her Story” has raked in more than 680 million yuan ($93 million), according to ticket platform Maoyan, as it became mainland China’s top-grossing movie for 17 straight days.

But its witty critique of gender norms has also offended some men on Chinese social media, who have accused it of provoking “gender antagonism” – a phrase often used by state media to police online feminist discourse that authorities deem to have “crossed the line.”

Over the past decade, China’s ruling Communist Party – whose leadership is entirely male – has cracked down on feminist activism. In 2015, five feminists were detained for planning a protest against sexual harassment and, just months ago, a journalist who promoted the #MeToo movement was sentenced to five years in prison on subversion charges.

While less politically charged cultural works around women’s empowerment, like feminist comedy, are still allowed, they’re heavily regulated and often targeted by powerful unofficial forces – conservative men.

Rave reviews

Written and directed by Shao Yihui, “Her Story” revolves around the lives and relationships of three women in Shanghai: an independent single mother, her sharp-witted elementary school age daughter, and their new neighbor – a young singer and self-described “sober romantic fool.”

He Zeyu, a 29-year-old book editor in Beijing, has seen it three times.

For Xu, 20, a one-time watcher who gave only her surname due to privacy reasons, the comedy’s focus on “female empowerment” rather than “rehashing women’s struggles,” is what makes it “unique.”

Beyond its fresh, female-led narrative, Chinese moviegoers also praise the film’s “subtle yet brave” social critique on issues such as pandemic-era lockdowns, the decline of journalism — and what they see as the toxic culture of reporting the misdemeanors of others.

In one scene, a teacher criticizes a student for snitching on his classmate. In another, the young singer shows off her stockpile of daily essentials, while a large elephant statue stands in the living room – a silent nod to Shanghai’s weeks-long Covid lockdown in 2022.

“I can’t help but applaud for such clever expressions,” said Wang Rui, a 48-year-old man who recently took his wife for his second viewing.

“I laughed a lot during the first screening, but the second time, I picked up the hidden stuff behind the humor and found myself tearing up several times.”

One online commenter – who identified as a lesbian – was impressed by how the director slipped LGBTQ elements past China’s notoriously strict censors, noting fleeting scenes of rainbow flags and a gay couple flirting in the background.

“It’s rare to see such care and acknowledgment of sexual minorities in a mainstream movie presented in a way that’s subtle enough to pass the censorship,” read her post on Weibo, China’s equivalent of X, which has amassed thousands of likes.

“This is a movie that’s all about gender, yet it goes beyond that,” read a popular review on Douban with more than 8,000 likes.

Men at odds

While “Her Story” has been overwhelmingly celebrated by Chinese women, not all men are fans.

In Beijing, Xu said she saw an apparent couple arguing about the film as they left the theater – which she called “the real movie Easter egg.”

Speaking loudly enough to “be heard throughout theater,” the man told the woman the movie’s “narrative structure is sh***y,” which the woman disagreed with, then walked away, Xu recalled.

Similar anecdotes of men railing at the screenings or walking out of theaters have circulated on Chinese social media – mirroring the conservative backlash seen during screenings of “Barbie” in the United States last year.

“Many plots in this movie have already glorified most men in life … It looks objective and gentle enough to me,” Xu wrote on Xiaohongshu, China’s Instagram-like platform. The post has garnered over a thousand likes.

Yet, even “gentle” jokes seem too much for many.

Users on Hupu, a male-centric Chinese online forum, gave “Her Story” an average rating of 4.8 out of 10. They accused it of “demeaning and gaslighting men,” and shot down any positive comments about the movie – already few and far between on the platform.

It’s unclear how many commenters on Hupu had seen the movie, but Wang and a younger man, Chen Xiaohe, both said on Xiaohongshu that they enjoyed the screening.

But the film “shouldn’t be labeled as feminist,” he added.

Chen, 29, “really loves the light-hearted and humorous movie,” with “flesh-and-blood” and “fully developed” female characters, he posted on Xiaohongshu. Other male users on the female-dominated platform disagreed.

For Chen, it’s not surprising to see the wave of negative comments on Hupu.

Eroding tolerance of female voices

This isn’t the first time Chinese men on the internet have bristled at women poking fun at them.

Yang Li, a stand-up comedian known for her razor-sharp jokes about men, is a frequent target of them. Among all her punchlines, “how-come-he-looks-so-average-yet-still-so-confident” hit these men hardest.

Just last month, those still reeling from the four-year-old quip launched a nationwide boycott against China’s e-commerce giant JD for featuring Yang in a promotional livestream.

Caving to the online backlash, the company later issued an apology and cut ties with Yang. Yet, the male commenters didn’t stop there. Instead, they even tried to paint the vocal female comedian as an “evil foreign force” after Western media jumped on the story and showed support for skewering gender inequality.

“Feminist movement in China today is only visible on the cultural front,” said Lü Pin, a prominent Chinese feminist based in New York. “And this is exactly a sign of how much the movement has shrunk.”

However, even the already-restricted voices, such as feminist movies and stand-up shows, often come under attack from conservative men.

“Feminism in China is still pretty weak and hasn’t achieved much. But these men think their (future) interests are already under threat,” Lü said. “They see (the rise of feminism) as a dangerous signal.”

Shao, the screenwriter and director of “Her Story,” said in a promotional video that “feminism liberates not only women, but also men.”

“I believe that if they dig into the root causes, they will realize that they need to stand together with women,” she said.

She arrived in London with just one suitcase, full of mostly children’s clothes, and her young daughter in tow. Her home engulfed by war, Ukrainian mother Yana Felos found herself in the United Kingdom in April 2022 with no friends, no family and no community.

“I just started a new life from scratch,” recalled Felos, 34, who fled Russia’s full-scale invasion to come live with a host family – strangers at the time – who offered to take in Ukrainian refugees.

After close to three years of war, the situation has flipped. Felos says she has nothing to return to in Ukraine.

Felos’ last connection to Ukraine was her husband – but he could not leave and after she was abroad for so long, they recently finalized their divorce.

“He kept saying that the war would be over… wait a little, wait a little. The war will be over soon, and we will be together,” Felos said. But she gave up hope a long time ago that Ukraine would ever be safe enough to raise a family there.

Felos and her daughter are among the 6.8 million Ukrainian refugees who remain abroad, mostly in Europe, their lives mired in uncertainty.

Every day, she thinks about what will happen if the British government doesn’t extend her refugee visa in 2025. “There is no such thing as a backup plan,” she said.

Meanwhile, she has been building a life in London – securing her own apartment and a job teaching English at a lifelong learning center. Post-divorce, she has no intention of returning to Ukraine and wants to focus instead on opportunities to give her 6-year-old daughter Alisa a brighter future.

As communities become more fragmented, and the economy struggles, the Ukrainian government wants to encourage those who fled as refugees, most of them women and children, to return. It’s setting up a Ministry of National Unity tasked with creating programs and incentives to encourage people overseas to come home.

“We can’t pressure, push people to come back. I can give very loud message to Ukrainians who are abroad to come and help, to work in defense industry, to help our soldiers, to pay taxes, to support Ukraine,” President Volodymyr Zelensky said in an October press conference.

It comes as Ukraine grapples with boosting national morale, among both civilians and troops on the frontlines, many who have been unable to rotate out to have time off.

Last month, Zelensky spoke about the need to end the conflict in 2025, saying, “from our side, we must do everything so that this war ends next year, ends through diplomatic means.” Incoming Trump administration officials in the United States have also been weighing proposals to stop the war.

As it drags on, though, Ukraine appears increasingly concerned about the economic consequences of a hollowed-out population, and the future ramifications of a brain-drain.

“Every month of the ‘hot’ phase of the war leads to more people adapting abroad and more destruction here, so fewer people will return,” said Ella Libanova, an economics professor and director of the Ptoukha Institute for Demography and Social Studies of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine.

And in the nearer term, it’s possible that more Ukrainians could leave.

The overall security situation remains difficult, with Ukraine hit by a recent surge in Russian ballistic missile strikes, and drone attacks increasing each month. Russia launched 2,434 drones in November alone.

On one of her return visits to see her former husband in Ukraine, Felos recalls telling her daughter that the sounds of nearby explosions were fireworks.

Russia also continues to bombard Ukraine’s energy infrastructure as winter arrives and residential areas are regularly hit. The Kyiv School of Economics estimates that as of January 2024, almost 250,000 buildings had been damaged and destroyed, including 222,600 private houses and 27,000 apartment buildings. In a significant number of cities, more than half the housing stock has been damaged.

Even so, many Ukrainians are aching to go back.

For some, the life they once built in Ukraine feels too substantial to simply abandon. People saved their whole lives to buy homes, build businesses and get professional qualifications there.

“It’s been called the most professional refugee wave in recent (history),” Voronovych said, adding that most are now underemployed, working “low-paid jobs” that don’t match their capabilities.

For some Ukrainians, the decision to return has less to do with economics or government incentives, and everything to do with the practicalities of everyday life – mothers are waiting for schools to reopen, or for schools operating underground to protect students from Russian attacks to return to normal.

Victoria Rybka, 40, from the city of Kharkiv in eastern Ukraine, spent the first few weeks of the war sheltering in a basement with her two young children, before fleeing with them to Europe. But in Germany, one of her daughters struggled to communicate in school, and her other daughter developed a skin condition, believed to be stress-related.

Just two months later, Rybka decided to return, feeling a pull to return to her job in the police force and to her family.

“I can’t leave my husband. We’ve been through a lot together,” Rybka said.

Kharkiv was eerily empty at the time, with mostly men and elderly people who stayed behind, she said. Only one other mother in their block of flats came back in the early days of war, but more have since trickled home as schools reopened underground.

“Everyone makes their own choice,” she acknowledged. “I made my choice – this is my home.”