NEED TO CATCH up? The Journal brings you a round-up of today’s news.

IRELAND

Taoiseach Micheál Martin attends the annual National Day of Commemoration 2025 at Royal Hospital Kilmainham.

• The man arrested in connection with the fatal assault of Michael Hayes in Limerick on Thursday night has appeared before a special court sitting charged with murdering a pensioner in Limerick last Thursday.
• Transport Minister Darragh O’Brien has said that the Government will be “fully mindful of the economic situation” when putting together the upcoming Budget.
• The local community in Freya Tobin’s Newcastle in Co Tipperary has rallied behind her family following her tragic death on Friday.
• President Michael D Higgins laid a wreath at a National Day of Commemoration event in Dublin.
• Tributes from across Irish journalism have flooded in for Mick O’Neill, an award-winning photojournalist who worked for The Irish Star and died yesterday as the result of a road crash.
• Plastic nets on fruit and vegetables and single-use plastic packaging for condiments and preserves, such as ketchup sachets, will be banned by the end of the decade under new EU rules.

INTERNATIONAL

French President Emmanuel Macron speaks to the army leaders flanked by Prime Minister Francois Bayrou, left, and Defence Minister Sebastien Lecornu at the Hotel le Brienne ahead of the Bastille Day parade in Paris. Alamy Stock Photo Alamy Stock Photo

#THE EPSTEIN FILES: US President Donald Trump has urged his political base to stop attacking his administration over files related to notorious sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, a case that has become an obsession for conspiracy theorists.

#GAZA STRIP: Israeli air strikes killed more than 40 Palestinians today, Gaza’s civil defence agency said, including at a market and a water distribution point, as talks for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas stalled.

#UKRAINE: Russia has declared it has taken over more villages in the west of Ukraine’s Donetsk region, as its troops advance towards the neighbouring Dnipropetrovsk region.

PARTING SHOT

The dispensaries will be available from tomorrow. Alamy Stock Photo Alamy Stock Photo

A PILOT PROGRAMME to dispense free sunscreen is to start in Cork city tomorrow.

The scheme is being run by Cork City Council and will be rolled out in four locations. It’s led the Irish Cancer Society to call on all city and county councils to provide free sunscreen dispensers.

With high temperature warnings across Ireland, the charity said that people “shouldn’t be priced out” of protecting their skin.