# Monday 5th October 2026. Latvia, Bosnia, Brazil elections. Ukraine bridges. Spain floods, protests. Saudi-Houthi offensive? France schools..

An episode of [Simple English News Daily](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1505603790), 4 Oct 2026, 8:03.

Audio: https://dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/op3.dev/e/adbarker.com/stream/K1GF85x83ZWP88Cz18NfA8bx/api.spreaker.com/download/episode/75571426/05_10_26.mp3

Sign up for the free Friday SEND7 email newsletter: send7.org/newsletter World news in 7 minutes. Monday 5th October 2026. Today: Latvia, Bosnia, Brazil elections. Ukraine bridges. Spain floods, protests. France schools close. Bulgaria czar remains. Netherlands chip fight. US diesel. Libya rival governments. Egypt journalist arrests. Saudi-Houthi offensive? Japan US soldier. Korea slackline. With Stephen Devincenzi Become a SEND7 supporter! • Ad-free listening • Bonus quiz episode every Friday • Daily transcripts (written by us, not AI!) • Vocabulary lists • Wednesday worksheets • Ask questions in Ask Me Anything episodes • 10% of our profit goes to Effective Altruism charities. You can become a supporter at send7.supercast.com For more information about SEND7 visit send7.org/contact or send an email to podcast@send7.org

## Transcript

[0:01] Speaker 1: Good morning. This is Send7, World News in 7 Minutes.
[0:06] Speaker 1: I'm Stephen Devincenzi. Today is Monday the 5th of October, 2026.
[0:12] Speaker 1: Starting in Europe today, Latvia had parliamentary elections on Saturday,
[0:26] Speaker 1: Out of 100 available seats, the centrist United List party
[0:32] Speaker 1: of Prime Minister Andris Kulbergs won 41 seats, meaning that
[0:37] Speaker 1: he will almost certainly remain as Prime Minister in a
[0:40] Speaker 1: new coalition government. During the election campaign, Kulbergs promised to
[0:46] Speaker 1: maintain Latvia's strong support of Ukraine. Bosnia and Herzegovina also
[0:53] Speaker 1: held general elections yesterday. The counting process had just started
[0:58] Speaker 1: at the time of recording this podcast. In Ukraine's capital city, Kiev,
[1:05] Speaker 1: Russia hit an important transport bridge over the Dnipro River yesterday,
[1:11] Speaker 1: making yesterday the fourth day in a row in which
[1:15] Speaker 1: Russia has hit important bridges over the Dnipro River. Video
[1:20] Speaker 1: shows the moment that the drone hit the bridge, causing
[1:24] Speaker 1: a large explosion as people were driving over it. People
[1:28] Speaker 1: were injured, however no deaths were reported. German Chancellor Friedrich
[1:34] Speaker 1: Merz arrived in Kiev for an unannounced visit yesterday. Since
[1:39] Speaker 1: US President Donald Trump returned to power last year, Germany
[1:43] Speaker 1: has become the biggest provider of military support for Ukraine.
[1:48] Speaker 1: as the US has greatly reduced support. During Mertz's visit,
[1:53] Speaker 1: there were multiple air raid sirens because of Russian drones.
[1:59] Speaker 1: In Spain, there was flooding in the north-eastern Catalonia region
[2:04] Speaker 1: this weekend, with two deaths confirmed and at least one
[2:08] Speaker 1: more person missing. Also in Spain, tens of thousands of
[2:11] Speaker 1: people joined protests this weekend over the housing and rental situation.
[2:18] Speaker 1: In France, over 400 schools will remain closed today, after protests,
[2:25] Speaker 1: which grew throughout last week, were expected to continue this week.
[2:31] Speaker 1: In the Netherlands, a group of people living near a
[2:35] Speaker 1: chip shop are taking the city of Amsterdam to court
[2:40] Speaker 1: for giving a licence to the chip shop in the
[2:43] Speaker 1: residential area. People living in Rundstraat say that the Fabelfried
[2:49] Speaker 1: chip shop has a long queue of tourists seven days
[2:53] Speaker 1: a week, which the residents call the TikTok queue because
[2:58] Speaker 1: of people taking photos and videos for social media. They
[3:02] Speaker 1: also say that there are problems of seagulls and rats
[3:06] Speaker 1: coming to their street. However, Fabelfried says that it employs
[3:10] Speaker 1: people to clean the streets around the shop. In Bulgaria,
[3:16] Speaker 1: there was a ceremony on Saturday to mark the arrival
[3:20] Speaker 1: from Greece of the remains of medieval Bulgarian ruler Tsar Samuel,
[3:26] Speaker 1: who died in the year 1014. America's Brazil held general
[3:35] Speaker 1: elections yesterday. At the time of recording this podcast, the
[3:39] Speaker 1: voting had just finished. In the presidential election, opinion polls
[3:44] Speaker 1: have shown an extremely close race between President Lula da
[3:48] Speaker 1: Silva and the far-right Senator Flavio Bolsonaro, son of former
[3:54] Speaker 1: President Jair Bolsonaro, who was convicted of attempting to overturn
[3:58] Speaker 1: democracy after losing the 2022 presidential election to Lula. The
[4:05] Speaker 1: United States will not put a ban on exporting diesel,
[4:10] Speaker 1: President Donald Trump said yesterday after he had suggested the
[4:14] Speaker 1: possibility a few days ago because of the fast rise
[4:17] Speaker 1: in diesel prices in the US. Since Trump returned to office,
[4:22] Speaker 1: the price of diesel has risen by around 75%. Speaking
[4:27] Speaker 1: next to a helicopter, Trump said that European countries had
[4:32] Speaker 1: agreed to release diesel stockpiles in order to control the
[4:36] Speaker 1: price of diesel, and said that after the war with
[4:39] Speaker 1: Iran ends, prices will return to normal. Europe has a
[4:44] Speaker 1: lot of diesel, and they're going to be making a
[4:47] Speaker 1: major world contribution, and so are we. And we're not
[4:51] Speaker 1: going to be... Africa in Libya talks between the rival
[4:56] Speaker 1: governments in the East and the West. have been put
[5:21] Speaker 1: in doubt after allegations that the eastern government was responsible
[5:26] Speaker 1: for a series of drone attacks in August. In August,
[5:31] Speaker 1: three Libyans and one Spanish citizen were arrested in Tripoli
[5:35] Speaker 1: for allegedly having a role in the drone strikes on
[5:39] Speaker 1: oil facilities, which caused electricity blackouts in western Libya. Recent
[5:45] Speaker 1: reports suggest that Saddam Haftar, the son of Libyan warlord
[5:50] Speaker 1: Khalifa Haftar, was responsible for the attacks. Since 2011, control
[5:56] Speaker 1: of Libya has been split between the internationally recognised government
[6:00] Speaker 1: in the West and a rival government in the East,
[6:03] Speaker 1: dominated by Khalifa Haftar. In Egypt, six journalists working for
[6:10] Speaker 1: the investigative news agency Matsadash have been arrested and accused
[6:16] Speaker 1: of spreading fake news in support of the banned Muslim Brotherhood,
[6:22] Speaker 1: One of the journalists, Mohamed Ashraf, has been charged with
[6:25] Speaker 1: joining a terrorist group. Rights groups have said that the
[6:29] Speaker 1: arrests are an attack on free media. Asia Saudi Arabia
[6:37] Speaker 1: is planning an offensive against the Houthis in Yemen, according
[6:41] Speaker 1: to Reuters news agency, who say that several officials from
[6:45] Speaker 1: the Middle East and the West have confirmed that Saudi
[6:49] Speaker 1: Arabia is planning an offensive against probably down the west
[6:53] Speaker 1: coast of Yemen. In Japan, a United States soldier has
[6:59] Speaker 1: been arrested on suspicion of murder after a woman's body
[7:03] Speaker 1: was found in a hotel in Okinawa. And in South Korea,
[7:10] Speaker 1: Estonian slackline world champion Jan Roos has entertained the people
[7:16] Speaker 1: of Seoul by slackline walking 120 metres in the air
[7:22] Speaker 1: between the Corriana Hotel and the Donga-A Media Centre. In 2024,
[7:29] Speaker 1: Ruse became the first person to slackline walk the Strait
[7:34] Speaker 1: of Messina between Italy's mainland and the island of Sicily.
[7:39] Speaker 1: That's your world news in seven minutes. If you enjoyed
[7:43] Speaker 1: this podcast, then I think you will also like the
[7:46] Speaker 1: free email newsletter that I write every Friday. It also
[7:51] Speaker 1: combines the news with learning English. Sign up for free
[7:54] Speaker 1: at send7. org slash newsletter. Tomorrow you will be with Juliet Martin.
[7:59] Speaker 1: Have a great day.

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