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People were overwhelmingly in favour of stopping oil drilling in Yasuni national park. Can this success be replicated elsewhere in the world?Joy and hope are all too rarely associated with the environmental movement, but both have been in abundant supply since Ecuador's people voted on Sunday to keep the country's oil in the subsoil of the Yasuni national park. The question now is whether this is a one-off triumph, or something that can be replicated in other countries.The referendum result obliges the state oil company to dismantle operations - 12 drilling platforms and 225 wells that produce up to 57,000 barrels a day - in block 43 of the Ishpingo-Tambococha-Tiputini (ITT) project, an area of the Amazon rainforest famed for its ecological diversity, and which is home to two tribes that live in voluntary isolation. With more than 5.4 million votes in favour of halting production and 3.7 million against, this is the most decisive democratic victory against the fossil fuel industry in Latin America and, arguably, the world.Jonathan Watts is the Guardian's global environment editor Continue reading...

Basketball's World Cup tips off on Friday in the Philippines, Indonesia and Japan. Who will stand out? Who will surprise? And can anyone stop Team USA? Our writers weigh inThe inevitable rise of Anthony Edwards. All signs point to this World Cup run being a star-solidifying turn for the 2020 No 1 overall pick as he makes his international debut for Team USA. The 22-year-old NBA All-Star has shown flashes of utter brilliance with the Minnesota Timberwolves but has yet to climb to the level of global superstar. Claire de Lune Continue reading...

Eight candidates gather in Milwaukee in hopes of catching up to former president in pollsRepublican presidential candidates clashed over Donald Trump's legal woes during the first primary debate of the 2024 campaign season, underscoring the former president's absence from the event and casting a spotlight on his potential vulnerabilities in a general election rematch against Joe Biden.Nearly an hour into the debate in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, the Fox News hosts Martha MacCallum and Bret Baier asked the eight candidates on the stage whether they would still support Trump as the Republican presidential nominee if he were convicted of the charges he faces. Six candidates - North Carolina's Governor Doug Burgum, Florida's Governor Ron DeSantis, the former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, the former vice-president Mike Pence, the entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy and South Carolina's Senator Tim Scott - indicated they would still support Trump. Only two candidates - the former New Jersey governor Chris Christie and former Arkansas governor Asa Hutchinson - said they would not. Continue reading...

Former president and frontrunner was absent, but cast a long shadow over the eight presidential hopefulsEight Republicans vying for the party nomination took the debate stage on Wednesday night in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, throwing punches over Ukraine, a federal abortion ban and more, hoping to increase their chances at defeating the no-show frontrunner.Absent was Donald Trump, whose pre-taped interview with the rightwing media personality Tucker Carlson simultaneously published on Twitter, now known as X, and sought to siphon away screen time from the debate housed on Fox News, which famously ousted Carlson earlier this year. Continue reading...

Vivek Ramaswamy, Mike Pence, Nikki Haley and others take the stage in Milwaukee as frontrunner Donald Trump opts to skip event Continue reading...

Biotech entrepreneur takes on Trump mantle in former president's absence, drawing heavy fire from other candidatesVivek Ramaswamy, the 38-year-old biotech entrepreneur running third in Republican polling, emerged in the absence of Donald Trump as a surprise focus of the first debate of the Republican primary, showing scant respect for other candidates and drawing heavy fire in return.We live in a dark moment," Ramaswamy declaimed, in the distinctly Trumpian and conspiratorial fashion that has become a hallmark of his campaign. Continue reading...

Ex-president also discussed Jeffrey Epstein's death and the amount of water in washing machines among pokes at his criticsDonald Trump has warned of a threat of conflict in the US after saying that he expects the Democrats to steal the 2024 election from him.The former US president also suggested to Tucker Carlson, in a Twitter interview with the far-right former Fox News host staged to undermine the first Republican primary debate in Milwaukee, that he is concerned the left" will try to kill him. Continue reading...

If you're going to turn yourself in to jail you may as well maximise television ratings Continue reading...

The company's specialized AI chips are in great demand, boosting its value to over $1tn, a first for a chipmakerThe chipmaker Nvidia has far surpassed quarterly expectations, raking in $13.5bn in revenue - over $2bn more than the $11.2bn Wall Street analysts had predicted - amid skyrocketing demand for its computer chips that power artificial intelligence (AI) systems.The blockbuster second quarter comes at a moment of intense hype around generative AI, a mood that Nvidia has been uniquely positioned to capture. The 30-year-old company is one of the biggest winners in the AI boom and is now valued at over $1tn, with its chips powering nearly all the world's major artificial intelligence apps, including ChatGPT. Continue reading...

In face of opposition from some Republican lawmakers, state department announces new terms for science and technology agreement (STA)The US is seeking a six-month extension to a decades-old science and technology agreement with China so that it can undergo negotiations with Beijing to strengthen" the pact, the state department has said.The landmark deal, signed when Beijing and Washington established diplomatic ties in 1979 and renewed about every five years since, has led to the geopolitical rivals cooperating across a range of scientific and technical fields. Continue reading...

Far-right congresswoman from Georgia tells the Guardian she would be honored' if chosen for the roleMarjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia knows" her name is on a list" of possible picks as vice-president to Donald Trump should he win the Republican nomination next year, the far-right congresswoman and conspiracy theorist told the Guardian on Wednesday.I'd have to think about it and consider it," Greene said, in Milwaukee ahead of the first Republican presidential debate. Continue reading...

Joe Biden has commented on the plane crash involving mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin, saying he is 'not surprised' by reports.The Russian aviation authority has confirmed Prigozhin was onboard when the Embraer plane crashed and all 10 in the aircraft - seven passengers and three crew - died.The US president also alluded to Vladimir Putin's involvement, saying: 'There's not much that happens in Russia that Putin is not behind'

Giuliani's surrender on racketeering charges marks a low point for the former prosecutor who made a name with racketeering cases

Authorities had earlier claimed the 27-year-old had lunged at officers with a knife, but now say he never stepped out of his carPhiladelphia's police commissioner said on Wednesday that a police officer who shot and killed a driver who was sitting in his car last week in north Philadelphia is being suspended and will be fired.Danielle Outlaw said that officer Mark Dial will be suspended with intent to dismiss him in 30 days for refusing to cooperate in the investigation of the 14 August shooting death of 27-year-old Eddie Irizarry. Continue reading...

Thomas Jefferson high school in Virginia is facing a legal challenge from a libertarian group over a policy that has boosted diversityStudents hoping to attend Thomas Jefferson high school for science and technology in Virginia, one of the most competitive magnet schools in the US, once took a rigorous standardized test for admission. They also had to pay a $100 fee to apply. Those requirements posed a barrier for many students, particularly those who lacked access to test preparation resources and low-income students whose families couldn't afford the fee.As racial justice protests flared across the US in 2020, the Fairfax county school board decided to abandon the test and application fee in response to criticism that the school did not enroll enough Black and Latino students. The board overhauled the school's admissions program, adopting a race-neutral approach and instituting a holistic evaluation of students' grades, problem-solving skills, and experience factors", such as free and reduced lunch eligibility and whether they were an English language learner. It also implemented a practice of guaranteeing seats for the top students at every middle school in the county. Continue reading...

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Panel overrode earlier decision in which top court decided a similar restriction was unconstitutionalSouth Carolina's new all-male highest court on Wednesday reversed course on abortion rights, upholding the state's strict six-week ban on the procedure.The panel overrode an earlier decision in which the court decided a similar restriction was unconstitutional. Continue reading...

The US has no precedents for a former president in the dock, but there are echoes of France's pursuit of Marshal PetainHistory teaches us few wider lessons. But there are rare exceptions. One of these is that for a nation to put its former leaders on trial is never straightforward. Although such cases are rare, when they do occur they frequently involve the pushing of pre-existing legal boundaries and the reshaping of constitutional norms and assumptions. The evolution of the doctrine of crimes against humanity after the Nuremberg trials in 1945 is the most significant modern example of this.Both at the time they occur and subsequently, the arguments that surround trials of this kind are almost inescapably political to a significant degree. That was true of the trial and execution of Charles I in 1649, an event that divided England then; and some of those divisions of the 17th century can still be felt today. But it will unquestionably also be true of the trials of the former US president Donald Trump, of which the latest step is due to be taken in Atlanta on Thursday. Continue reading...

He's done his time in jail and now Billy McFarland has something new to sell. But who's going to buy it this time?You may remember Billy McFarland, if not the name then the image that, six years ago, frequently accompanied public mention of him: an open cheese sandwich sweating gently on a bed of white polystyrene. McFarland was jailed in 2018 for fraud after the collapse, a year earlier, of his Fyre festival, the disastrous party on a Bahamian island that took down a generation of mid-list influencers.Failure so large that it results in not one, but two documentaries, not to mention the prison sentence, might inspire shame in a lesser individual. But McFarland is back in business, and his plans are bigger than ever. Continue reading...

Tafari Campbell, 45, was pulled from a tidal inlet near the Edgartown after he went missing while paddleboardingThe death of Tafari Campbell, former US president Barack Obama's personal chef, has been ruled an accidental drowning in Martha's Vineyard, in a report by Massachusetts state medical examiner's office, officials said on Tuesday.Campbell, 45, was pulled from a tidal inlet near the historic port town of Edgartown on 24 July after he went missing while paddleboarding the previous evening. Continue reading...

Connor Halsa hooked billfold stuffed with cash and a business card with name of farmer who lost the wallet a year earlierA 14-year-old angler failed to land a big fish on a recent trip to a lake in Minnesota but did manage to hook a wallet with $2,000 cash inside that had been lost by a farmer a year earlier.Connor Halsa was fishing on Lake of the Woods when he felt his rod snag on something. Continue reading...

Governor Josh Green tells people to prepare for a lot more loss of life' as search continues for bodies in ruins of LahainaHawaii's governor, Josh Green, has warned residents to prepare for a lot more loss of life", as officials ask for DNA submissions and fingerprints from survivors to help identify relatives who were killed by the Maui wildfires, as huge numbers are still missing.Green urged Hawaiians to brace for a higher death toll from the destruction on the second largest island in the Hawaiian chain, as police still work to find those unaccounted for. Continue reading...

Claim that employee of ex-president flipped made in court filing by prosecutors in classified documents case

Despite the hatred the Australian attracts, there's still an air of expectation that hovers around him even as his career continues to stallWhen Australia launch their Fiba World Cup campaign against Finland on Friday, 10 years since Ben Simmons's last two appearances with the Boomers, they will at last be led by a tall point guard with freakish ball handling skills who's been hailed as a generational talent". But it will be Josh Giddey - 6ft 8in, 20 years old, fresh from two stellar opening seasons with Oklahoma City, and the youngest player in NBA history to score a triple double - running the Boomers' offense. Simmons - 6ft 10in, 27, beset by repeated physical and mental setbacks, and the most fined NBA player of all time - will miss the World Cup to recover from a nerve impingement in his back.Giddey represents the future of Australian basketball. Simmons was the future once, but increasingly it seems he is the past - a past that promised so much and delivered only in fits and starts. In his five full (or full-ish) seasons in the NBA, Simmons has shown all the versatility and durability that was expected of him when he emerged with Louisiana State University: but as a meme rather than as a player. There have been, to be fair, glimpses of the talent that saw the 76ers make him the No 1 overall pick in the 2016 draft: the falcon-like court vision, the power under the boards, that godly passing range and rolling, liquid comfort with the ball in hand. But Simmons has missed two full seasons: the first in 2016-17 thanks to injury, and the second, in 2021-22, owing to a combination of injury and the breakdown of his relationship with 76ers management. Since he was traded to the Nets in early 2022, Simmons has spent most of his time in the treatment room, surrounded by accusations that he is simply too weak for the NBA, a quitter. He earned $35m last season but started on the bench towards the end of 2022-23 before being shut down due to injury. Continue reading...

First 2024 debate will be held in a racially diverse Democratic stronghold and a battleground that could decide who winsThe Republican party faces an electability test on Wednesday when candidates including election deniers, climate deniers and anti-abortion extremists take the debate stage in a city that rebukes them and a state they cannot afford to lose.The first presidential primary debate will be held in Milwaukee, a racially diverse Democratic stronghold in Wisconsin, a battleground that could decide who wins the White House in 2024. Continue reading...

Former president had lawyers negotiate booking to take place during prime viewing hours on Thursday to get maximum TV ratings. Plus, could the vagus nerve be the key to depression, obesity, alcoholism - and more?Good morning.Donald Trump is expected to surrender at the Fulton county jail tomorrow evening on racketeering and conspiracy charges over his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election in the state of Georgia, according to two people briefed on the matter.Why isn't Trump taking part in tonight's Republican primary debate? The decision to spurn the debate in favor of a pre-taped interview with Tucker Carlson solves the political question of how to inflict damage on the 2024 field, but it also eliminates concerns his remarks in the high-profile event could increase his legal exposure, Hugo Lowell writes.Have any of the other co-defendants turned themselves in? The first two defendants in the Georgia election subversion case have been booked in the Fulton county jail. Scott Hall, an Atlanta-area bail bondsman, was booked at the Rice Street jail on Tuesday. John Eastman, a Trump attorney and allegedly one of the main people behind Trump's plan to halt the certification of Biden's victory, also voluntarily turned himself in later yesterday morning.What else is happening? Mark Meadows, Trump's former White House chief of staff, has asked a federal court to block his arrest in an emergency motion, according to court documents filed yesterday. Meadows has requested the case be moved to federal court, saying the charges concern his actions as an officer of the federal government.What else did he say? By his own admission, he sexually abused or harassed seven teenagers between about 1966 and 1979. Reports of his misconduct led to the 1988 conversation with the city's archbishop at the time, the late Philip Hannan, to whom he promised to never be in any such circumstances" again.What happened after the 1988 conversation? Hecker continued working. It wasn't until 1999 that persisting reports against Hecker prompted the archdiocese to send him to an out-of-state psychiatric treatment facility which diagnosed him as a pedophile. The facility recommended that the archdiocese prohibit Hecker from working with minors or other particularly vulnerable" people, according to a secret personnel file obtained by the Guardian and shared with WWL-TV. However, even then, Hecker did not stop working. In 2000, he was assigned to a church with an elementary school attached to it. Continue reading...

As cost of living continues to rise in the Golden state, some first responders have moved to Oregon, Arizona, Texas, Alabama, Florida - even AlaskaIs it OK if I talk from the car?" asked Kyle Conforti, a 40-year-old firefighter who works at the Orange county fire authority (OCFA) in southern California. There is still some last-minute preparation - suitcases to pack, bills to cancel and goodbyes to say - before the big day. Tomorrow, Conforti, his wife, Roxanne, and their two young kids will begin a 2,000-mile, cross-country drive from San Luis Obispo county to their new home in the suburbs of Nashville, Tennessee.In a few weeks, Conforti will arrive back in California to punch in at the same firehouse for another work shift. Continue reading...

Officials from Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand accuse the Denver Art Museum of possessing stolen antiquities and asked for return of eight pieces that were looted from temples and historical sitesHigh-level government representatives from three south-east Asian countries have complained that the Denver Art Museum continues to possesses looted artefacts and are demanding them back - as stolen antiquities remain an ongoing problem in US institutions.Officials from Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand have formally asked the Denver Art Museum (DAM) in Colorado to return eight pieces that were looted from temples and historical sites, the Denver Post first reported. The government officials notified DAM in May and June through correspondence from US investigators. Continue reading...

With the right rebrand, even the most banal concept can capture the zeitgeist. Imagine being the genius who relaunched the ploughman's lunch as girl dinner'In my day, we called it depression". If you spent all day in bed, refusing to face the real world, then you were either 1) lazy, 2) hungover or 3) depressed.I've aged myself there, haven't I? In 2023, spending an entire day lying down may be a sign that you are having a menty-b" (gen Z slang for a mental breakdown) or that you're bed-rotting". Bed-rotting, while an evocative term, is difficult to define. Depending on which articles you consult from the million that have recently been published on the phenomenon, it either means you're practising self-care and opting out of imperialist white supremacist capitalist patriarchy norms, or it means you're a slob. Continue reading...

State Republican lawmakers who allegedly signed on as Trump's false electors in 2020 face anger, prosecution and recallWhen the news broke in 2020 that 16 Republicans in Michigan had signed a certificate falsely claiming to be electors for Donald Trump, Rose Herweyer was dismayed to find a prominent local politician, Kent Vanderwood, listed among the signatories.His willingness to sign a fake elector paper and try to send that in and negate Michigan's actual vote speaks to his integrity," Herweyer said of Vanderwood, who was then a member of the Wyoming, Michigan, city council. How can I trust anything he does?" Continue reading...

Trump could put himself at risk in debate when responding to questions about his four criminal casesDonald Trump's decision to spurn the Republican primary debate on Wednesday in favor of a pre-taped interview with Tucker Carlson solves the political question of how to inflict damage on the 2024 field, but it also eliminates concerns his remarks in the high-profile event could increase his legal exposure.The former president confirmed over the weekend that he would not attend the debate in Milwaukee, saying in a post on his Truth Social platform: New CBS poll, just out, has me leading the field by legendary' numbers... I WILL THEREFORE NOT BE DOING THE DEBATES." Continue reading...

Lawrence Hecker, 91, acknowledged he had committed overtly sexual acts' laid out in statement given to church leaders in 1999For the first time ever, one of the New Orleans Catholic church's most strongly suspected abusers has publicly admitted that he sexually abused or harassed several teenagers during his career as a priest. He's also described himself as remorseful yet unsure if he's deserving of any criminal consequences.Lawrence Hecker gave the rare admission when reporters for the Guardian and local news outlet WWL-TV asked him to discuss a statement he gave to New Orleans church leaders in 1999. In the statement, he acknowledged committing overtly sexual acts" with at least three underage boys in the late 1960s and 1970s and revealed his close relationships with four others stretching into the 1980s. Continue reading...

The team won the AL East by seven games last year. This season a series of injuries and a lack of depth have hit them hardAn unsuccessful season for the New York Yankees typically means one where they don't reach the World Series. No MLB team holds itself to higher standards, so it's little wonder there's a sense of despair in the Bronx as it becomes clear that the 2023 squad will miss out on the playoffs altogether. In fact, the Yankees are in danger of putting together their worst season in 30 years.The Boston Red Sox came to Yankee Stadium last weekend with an opportunity to effectively end the postseason hopes of their archrivals. Time may be running out for the mediocre Red Sox to leapfrog the teams ahead of them in the Wild Card race, but they came alive when given the chance to avenge the Boston Massacre" of 1978 (or perhaps its 2006 reboot). Continue reading...

From Germany's CDU to France's Republicains, politicians are looking to fringe ideologies for revitalisationEuropean conservatism is in crisis. Traditional centre-right parties are increasingly facing challenges from their right by parties with more energy and extreme proposals for addressing the multitude of crises facing the continent. While centre-right parties may not have much in the way of ideas to resolve Europe's polycrisis, they do still know how to fight for power. Their instinctive drive for self-preservation means conservatives are radicalising, particularly over issues of race, in order to cut off their insurgent rivals.Take France, where the formerly dominant Les Republicains (LR) party has entered a death spiral, with its last presidential candidate, Valerie Pecresse, failing to reach even the 5% vote threshold required to get her deposit back. LR's response was to elect as leader Eric Ciotti, a far-rightist who once declared that the great replacement" - a fascist conspiracy theory claiming there is a deliberate attempt to demographically annihilate white Europeans - was a priority of national importance. This sort of discourse was until recently confined to figures in the National Rally party (previously the National Front). Continue reading...

Founder of FTX not being provided with a vegan diet and not being given Adderall needed to manage his ADHD attorney tells judgeWhile in federal custody, disgraced cryptocurrency entrepreneur Sam Bankman-Fried has been living off bread and water" because he's not being provided with the vegan diet he requested, his attorney told a judge Tuesday.During a hearing, Mark Cohen, lawyer for Bankman-Fried, said that improper diet and the jail's failure to give Bankman-Fried the Adderall he needs to manage his attention deficit hyperactive disorder, will impact his ability to participate in readying his defense case. Continue reading...

Joan Meyer, who died a day after raid, shouted at six officers who searched her home in incident that has drawn national scrutinyNewly released video shows the 98-year-old mother of a Kansas newspaper publisher confronting police officers as they searched her home in a raid that has drawn national scrutiny, at one point demanding: Get out of my house!"Video released by the newspaper shows Joan Meyer shouting at the six officers inside the Marion, Kansas, home she shared with her son, Marion County Record editor and publisher Eric Meyer. Standing with the aid of a walker and dressed in a long robe or gown and slippers, she seems visibly upset. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Trump had lawyers negotiate booking to take place during prime viewing hours to get maximum television ratingsDonald Trump is expected to surrender at the Fulton county jail on Thursday evening on racketeering and conspiracy charges over his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election in the state of Georgia, according to two people briefed on the matter.The former president - seeking to distract from the indignity of the surrender by turning things into a circus - in essence had his lawyers negotiate the booking to take place during the prime viewing hours for the cable news networks. Continue reading...

The American's thrilling victory in the 100m at the world championships was the culmination of a long journey of transformationSha'Carri Richardson's arms were already spread in triumph before the race was over, but her Usain Bolt impression didn't hold. Once she had crossed the finish line, the 23-year-old went from confidence to self-doubt as she searched the stadium scoreboard for her time. And even after her 10.65sec - and her 100m world title - was confirmed, she still couldn't believe what had happened. Neither could anyone else, frankly.In Budapest on Monday the American shocked the world, rallying past four of the fastest sprinters in history to win gold on the biggest stage outside the Olympics. This was after she scraped into the final and had to race from the outside lane as a result. Meanwhile, her Jamaican rivals Shericka Jackson and Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce - respectively, the world's top-ranked sprinter and a 10-time world champion - started their races from the middle of the track, much too far to see Richardson coming. As with Bolt, you can't help wondering how much faster Richardson's time could have been if she had run all the way through the tape - especially given her 0.07sec margin of victory. But what could have been hardly detracted from what is: a true redemption story. Continue reading...

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Former White House chief of staff is among 19 defendants charged in the Georgia election interference caseMark Meadows, the former White House chief of staff for Donald Trump, has asked a federal court to block his arrest in an emergency motion, according to court documents filed on Tuesday.Meadows, a named defendant in the sweeping election interference case against Donald Trump and 18 others in Fulton county, Georgia, has requested the case be moved to federal court, saying the charges concern his actions as an officer of the federal government. Continue reading...

Court to decide whether to remove them as Greg Abbott and other Republican governors defend militarization of border with MexicoA federal judge heard arguments on Tuesday about whether state authorities should remove huge buoys installed to stop migrants crossing the river that divides Texas from Mexico.The court hearing in Austin came a day after Texas's governor, Greg Abbott, and a group of hardline Republican governors gathered on the riverbank to defend local militarization of the US-Mexico border - while also acknowledging that the 1,000ft (305-meter) floating barrier had been adjusted after complaints that it had mostly drifted into Mexican territory. Continue reading...

About 1.3 million people under warning as storm moves inland over south Texas and governor deploys state's national guardThe skies began to darken over southern Texas on Tuesday as Tropical Storm Harold hurtled toward the state, just as California began cleanup from the historic storm system Hilary.Texas, still grappling with the effects of one of the hottest and driest summers on record, is now bracing for a deluge. As Harold continued on its westward trajectory after sweeping through the Gulf of Mexico, forecasters warned it could drop up to 7in of rain in some areas with risks of flash flooding. Continue reading...