UK three-month ILO unemployment rate 4.7% in August, below 5.0% expected and down from 4.9% previously.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Oct. 19 that Russian forces launched multiple waves of ballistic missile strikes without prior warning from partners. He said the attack involved 16 ballistic missiles aimed at Kyiv city and Kyiv region and more than 200 drones, with strikes stretching from Kharkiv and Dnipropetrovsk regions to western Volyn and Rivne and southern Odesa. Zelenskiy said the strikes caused casualties, damaged over 10 energy infrastructure sites, cut power to at least 550,000 households and hit medical clinics, schools, metro stations and residential buildings.

Indonesia ended a year‑long radiation emergency tied to contamination near Jakarta, saying radiation at 12 sites in West Java’s Cikande industrial zone is now below safety thresholds and no new contamination has been detected. After months of surveys, decontamination and monitoring, affected factories have been cleared to resume operations; authorities plan to spend IDR700bn (~$3.9m) to build a temporary storage facility for radioactive material currently held at a defunct metal smelter identified as the source. The episode prompted U.S. food recalls and unprecedented U.S. import restrictions on Indonesian shrimp — a sector that generated about $1.87bn in exports in 2025, with U.S. imports accounting for roughly 57%.