# Wednesday 21st October 2026. France, Italy military patrol. Canada Alberta referendum. Yemen siege. Flamingo crime. Japan Mars Moon Mission.

An episode of [Simple English News Daily](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1505603790), 20 Oct 2026, 8:24.

Audio: https://dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/op3.dev/e/adbarker.com/stream/K1GF85x83ZWP88Cz18NfA8bx/api.spreaker.com/download/episode/75888291/21_10_26.mp3

Become a supporter at send7.supercast.com World news in 7 minutes. Wednesday 21st October 2026. Today: France, Italy military patrol. Norway Ukraine meeting. Albania protests. Canada Alberta referendum. Brazil Lula challenge. US Kansas close. Flamingo crime. Spain Ceuta violations. Sudan drone strikes. Kenya ebola. Yemen siege. Australia MP attack. Japan Mars Moon Mission. With Stephen Devincenzi Become a SEND7 supporter! • Interactive transcripts • Ad-free listening • Bonus quiz episode every Friday • Downloadable transcripts + 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 Sign up for the free newsletter at send7.org/newsletter For more information about SEND7 visit send7.org/contact or send an email to podcast@send7.org

## Transcript

[0:00] Speaker 1: Good morning. This is Send7 World News in 7 minutes.
[0:06] Speaker 1: I'm Stephen Devincenzi. Today is Wednesday, the 21st of October, 2026.
[0:11] Speaker 1: Starting in Europe today, French Interior Minister Laurent Nunez has
[0:25] Speaker 1: admitted that there was a lack of preparation for for
[0:29] Speaker 1: the scale of protests on the weekend, which turned into
[0:33] Speaker 1: violence and looting. Nunez said that intelligence reports suggested that 200,000
[0:40] Speaker 1: people would join demonstrations across France. However, more than 500,000
[0:46] Speaker 1: people attended. Nunez offered his resignation to President Emmanuel Macron. However,
[0:52] Speaker 1: Macron rejected it. Nunez has said that the military will
[0:56] Speaker 1: join police during protests planned for this Saturday. In France,
[1:01] Speaker 1: there were partial curfews on Monday night and last night
[1:05] Speaker 1: in some areas, including certain parts of Paris, the northern
[1:09] Speaker 1: city of Lille and three other northern cities. France's second
[1:14] Speaker 1: largest city, Marseille, banned gatherings on Monday. Italy's government will
[1:20] Speaker 1: deploy 500 soldiers to Milan after clashes with police and
[1:26] Speaker 1: looting this weekend. In Norway, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky met
[1:32] Speaker 1: with US President Donald Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff yesterday,
[1:37] Speaker 1: as well as Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Garstor and Finnish
[1:42] Speaker 1: President Alexander Stubb. Zelensky said yesterday that US intelligence sharing
[1:48] Speaker 1: with Ukraine was operational again. In Albania, yesterday was the
[1:54] Speaker 1: seventh consecutive day of protests against the government of Prime
[1:58] Speaker 1: Minister Eddie Rama. Americas In Canada, a referendum in the
[2:06] Speaker 1: state of Alberta has rejected seeking independence from Canada. With
[2:12] Speaker 1: about 90% of votes counted, around 75% of voters chose
[2:14] Speaker 1: for Alberta to remain a part of Canada. Prime Minister
[2:22] Speaker 1: Mark Carney said that it was a great result for
[2:26] Speaker 1: Canada and Alberta.
[2:28] Speaker 2: It's a great result for Canada. The Albertans have chosen unity.
[2:33] Speaker 2: They've chosen to build together. They've chosen to continue to
[2:37] Speaker 2: take care of each other, to move forward together.
[2:43] Speaker 1: In Brazil, President Lula da Silva has challenged presidential candidate
[2:48] Speaker 1: Flavio Bolsonaro to to make his bank, tax and telephone
[2:53] Speaker 1: records public, saying that he would do the same. The
[2:57] Speaker 1: second round of Brazil's presidential election is on Sunday. In
[3:02] Speaker 1: the United States, there is a surprisingly close race for
[3:07] Speaker 1: a Kansas Senate seat in the midterm elections in two weeks.
[3:12] Speaker 1: Kansas is considered an overwhelmingly Republican state, and it hasn't
[3:17] Speaker 1: elected a Democrat to the Senate for 94 years. However,
[3:22] Speaker 1: opinion polls are showing Democratic candidate Adam Hamilton neck and
[3:26] Speaker 1: neck with sitting Republican Senator Roger Marshall. Some of the
[3:31] Speaker 1: reasons being given for people moving towards the Democratic candidate
[3:36] Speaker 1: are rising fuel prices, rising costs for farmers, and the
[3:41] Speaker 1: unpopularity of the war in Iran. Opinion polls show that
[3:45] Speaker 1: the popularity rating of President Trump is at its lowest
[3:49] Speaker 1: ever score of minus 27%. Also in the US, a
[3:55] Speaker 1: Canadian man has been found guilty of animal cruelty after
[4:00] Speaker 1: taking a flamingo from a hotel to his hotel room.
[4:05] Speaker 1: The Canadian tourist insisted that it was drunken foolishness which
[4:10] Speaker 1: led him to move the flamingo from its habitat at
[4:14] Speaker 1: the Las Vegas hotel. However, prosecutors said that he had
[4:18] Speaker 1: hurt and scared the 27-year-old Chilean flamingo. Africa In Spain's
[4:28] Speaker 1: African enclave of Ceuta, eight human rights organisations have said
[4:33] Speaker 1: that grave rights violations are occurring. The organisations, including Amnesty
[4:40] Speaker 1: International and Oxfam, allege that Spain has forced migrants to
[4:44] Speaker 1: return to conflict-hit countries and denied migrants access to legal
[4:50] Speaker 1: assistance or interpreters. In Sudan, various reports suggest that around
[4:58] Speaker 1: 250 people have been killed in drone strikes over the
[5:01] Speaker 1: last few days. The Rapid Support Forces paramilitary group has
[5:06] Speaker 1: blamed the Sudanese army for an attack which they say
[5:09] Speaker 1: killed over 80 people in the town of Al-Dibad, which
[5:13] Speaker 1: is under RSF control. Yesterday, officials from the country of
[5:18] Speaker 1: South Sudan said that drone strikes conducted by the Sudanese
[5:23] Speaker 1: military killed over 150 people in the Special Administrative Area
[5:28] Speaker 1: of Abyei, which is considered to be part of both
[5:32] Speaker 1: countries as part of a 2005 agreement. Kenya has said
[5:37] Speaker 1: that it has now recorded nine cases of Ebola in However,
[5:41] Speaker 1: officials say that they are all from the same group
[5:45] Speaker 1: and there is no evidence of transmission outside of the group.
[5:51] Speaker 1: Asia and Oceania In Yemen, the city of Taiz has
[5:57] Speaker 1: been under siege by the Houthi group for the last
[6:00] Speaker 1: few days, with reports of a worsening humanitarian situation in
[6:05] Speaker 1: the city of almost a million people, the third largest
[6:09] Speaker 1: city in Yemen. Over the last few weeks, there has
[6:13] Speaker 1: been major fighting between the internationally recognised government of Yemen,
[6:18] Speaker 1: which is based in Aden, and the Houthis who control
[6:21] Speaker 1: the capital Sana'a. Over the last few days, the Houthis
[6:25] Speaker 1: have gained control of the road between Taiz and Aden,
[6:29] Speaker 1: stopping food, medicine and fuel from being able to get in.
[6:34] Speaker 1: There are also reports of rubbish piling up on the
[6:37] Speaker 1: streets as trucks cannot take the rubbish out. Yesterday, the
[6:42] Speaker 1: United Kingdom announced that British fighter jets would help to
[6:46] Speaker 1: protect Saudi Arabia from Houthi drones and missiles. However, the
[6:51] Speaker 1: UK Ministry of Defence said that the jets would not
[6:54] Speaker 1: conduct offensive actions against the Houthis. In Australia, Member of
[7:00] Speaker 1: Parliament Helen Haynes has lost a leg after being attacked
[7:05] Speaker 1: by a person deliberately driving a car into her Australian
[7:09] Speaker 1: police have said that a 44-year-old man was arrested at
[7:13] Speaker 1: the scene after the attack on Monday. And Japan launched
[7:19] Speaker 1: an unmanned spacecraft to one of Mars' moons yesterday. The
[7:25] Speaker 1: Japanese MMX mission is aiming to land a spacecraft on
[7:29] Speaker 1: the moon called Phobos for the first time. If the
[7:33] Speaker 1: mission is successful, then the spacecraft will land on Phobos
[7:38] Speaker 1: next year. we'll collect samples from Phobos, we'll then fly
[7:42] Speaker 1: close to Mars' other moon, Deimos, just observing and not landing,
[7:48] Speaker 1: and then we'll return to Earth in 2031. This podcast
[7:53] Speaker 1: is made possible by our amazing Send7 supporters, who also
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[8:02] Speaker 1: vocabulary lists, advert-free episodes, bonus episodes, worksheets, quizzes, and more.
[8:09] Speaker 1: and we give 10% of our profit to highly effective charities.
[8:14] Speaker 1: You can become a supporter at send7. org. Tomorrow, you will
[8:18] Speaker 1: be with Ben Mallett. Have a great day.

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