🌏 Huge Riots Break Out In France After Teen Shot Dead By Police, Japan Trials Over-The-Counter Morning-After Pill And More

All the world news you need to know this week.

Hello and welcome to the Almost newsletter, a weekly email to help you stay updated and make sense of important stories happening around the world including:

  • 🌏 This Week’s Top Stories
  • đź‘© Women To Know
  • 🙌 Good News For Your Week

This 17-year-old French teen was shot dead by police and huge riots have broken out across the country.

Here’s what’s going on.

Also Happening Around The World

🇯🇵 Japan sent a man to lead a G7 meeting for women empowerment and gender equality.

🇮🇹 A man scratched his and his girlfriend’s names on the colosseum wall in Italy and people are furious.

🇪🇸 Spain is facing a drought so severe that an ancient bathhouse has reappeared from a drying dam.

After years of campaigning, women in Japan are one step closer to being able to buy the morning-after pill without a prescription after the country started a trial.

Previously, women had to go to a clinic or hospital in order to get a prescription for emergency contraception, even if they have been sexually assaulted.

But as part of the trial, the morning-after pill will be available at pharmacies with trained pharmacists and private rooms.

The move comes after the country finally approved the abortion pill in April.

Surgical abortions up to 22 weeks of a pregnancy are legal in Japan but have always required partner consent, unless certain circumstances were met, such as unidentifiable partner, death of partner, rape or when the mother’s life is in danger.

If women underwent abortion procedures without a partner’s consent or faked their signature, they could face up to one year in prison.

The emergency contraceptive trial will run until March 2024.

Just weeks earlier, the country also finally raised the age of sexual consent from 13 to 16.

Previously, Japan had the lowest age of sexual consent among developed countries.

More Women You Should Know About

🇲🇹 In a step for women’s rights, abortions are now allowed in Malta when a woman’s life is in danger.

Meet Molly, a dog in Canada who ran for mayor of Toronto with her human and almost won.

Molly, a six-year-old rescue dog from Russia, ran as honorary dog mayor alongside her human, Toby Heaps, who was the human candidate.

They were part of a record number of 102 mayoral candidates in Canada’s largest city this year.

Molly's campaign focused on building a kinder city and environmental issues, such as stopping the city from overusing salt on roads during winter, which can hurt animals’ paws and damage the environment.

A key part of their campaign also focused on fixing the housing crisis, increasing corporation taxes and banning fossil fuels in heating systems, according to the BBC.

On Monday June 26, Molly lost the electoral race but managed to receive 593 votes, placing among the top 20 candidates.

A human candidate, Olivia Chow, was elected as the city’s first Chinese-Canadian mayor.

Molly’s human thanked all their supporters, adding that they manage to achieve the goal of making politics more “pawsitive”.

More Good News For Your Week

🇨🇱 Chile held a “Trial” for Darth Vader to help people understand how courts work and it’s genius.

🇨🇭 A huge rockfall in Switzerland has stopped just centimeters away from a tiny village.

Thanks so much for opening this email. If you think a friend would like this, you can forward it to them! You can also follow Almost on Instagram, TikTok or YouTube. We also have a Chinese version.

Let us know your thoughts about this week’s news in the comments or by replying directly to this email ✨