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NSW Health says patients of Burwood doctors Darrel and Brinda Weinman since 2010 may need to be re-vaccinatedThousands of patients of a Sydney GP clinic may need to be re-vaccinated after it was discovered some shots were incorrectly stored or out of date.NSW Health on Wednesday warned vaccines administered by doctors Darrel and Brinda Weinman at their Burwood practice since 2010 may not have been effective. More than 3,000 patients have been notified so far. Continue reading...

Government audit says strategy not properly evaluated and does not meet government guidelinesLabor, the Greens and peak Indigenous groups say the government must overhaul its Indigenous advancement strategy after a report found that the $5.1bn program was not being properly evaluated and did not align with the government’s policy objectives.The strategy was a huge shakeup in Aboriginal affairs funding introduced by the Abbott government in 2014, designed to “eliminate waste and duplication” by consolidating more than a 120 economic, health, education and cultural programs under the prime minister’s department. More than $500m was cut from Indigenous spending. Continue reading...

After several high profile cases, the government has launched a campaign to bring the issue into the openIt was morning at a Hanoi school when a teenage student stumbled into class. As she sat at her desk, blood began to pool under her chair; just that morning she had been sexually abused. When her teacher’s response was that she should sit on some tissues until the bleeding stopped, the young girl began to cry.The incident, recounted by a Huynh Mai, a school psychologist, made headlines in Vietnam last month. Yet it was reflective of a culture of ignorance, indifference and stigma that has surrounded child sex abuse in the country for generations, according to teachers, victims and NGOs. Continue reading...

Figures also show 3% fall in consumption of alcohol in Scotland last yearAlcohol sales in Scotland have fallen to their lowest level in 25 years after the introduction of price controls, figures show.Scotland’s health secretary, Jeane Freeman, welcomed the figures, which also reveal a 3% fall in the consumption of alcohol last year, and said they showed the introduction of a 50p a unit minimum price in May 2018 was having an effect. It was a promising start in tackling Scotland’s difficult relationship with alcohol, she said. Continue reading...

Austrac says it suspects Afterpay breached anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing lawsLast week Australia’s financial watchdog, Austrac, ordered the popular buy now, pay later company Afterpay to appoint an external auditor over concerns about the company’s compliance with anti-money laundering and terrorism-financing laws.Stocks in the company have tumbled, and questions are being asked about the timing of the audit – announced only a day after the company raised more than $300m in a share offering on the Australian stock exchange. Continue reading...

Battleground states of Victoria and Queensland were biggest beneficiaries, receiving $422m and $331m respectivelyThe Coalition awarded almost $1.4bn in grants through its regional development program in the lead-up to the election, with about half of the funding not subject to a competitive tender process.The spending included grants made through the Stronger Communities program, a political slush fund that gives every lower-house MP $150,000 to spend on small community projects costing between $1,500 and $20,000. Almost $100m has been paid out under the scheme since it was first announced in the 2015 budget. Continue reading...

Government urged to offer places as events celebrate 80 years since KindertransportThere have been fresh calls to bring 10,000 child refugees to safety in the UK amid events celebrating the 80th anniversary of the Kindertransport trains that saved many children from the Nazis.The home secretary, Sajid Javid, announced a new resettlement scheme for the most vulnerable refugees on Monday but did not say how many children would be included. Continue reading...

The YouTuber Elijah Daniel has bought – and rebranded – a midwestern community to protest against the president’s ban on LGBT flags at US embassiesAge: 178 years, or a day – it depends.Depends on what? That’s quite a difference. Whether we’re talking about Hell (178 years) or Gay Hell (one day). Continue reading...

Airlines bear brunt of cost with easyJet alone putting its compensation bill and lost revenue at £15mThe drone attack that disrupted Gatwick for three days in December cost the airport £1.4m.While early estimates of the costs ran into tens of millions, the brunt has been borne by airlines – although Gatwick has since spent an extra £4m on anti-drone technology. Continue reading...

Egyptian former president’s burial takes place under heavy security in remote area of CairoEgypt’s former president Mohamed Morsi has been buried in a remote area of Cairo as his treatment in custody before his death was denounced as torture.Morsi, the only democratically elected civilian leader in Egypt’s history, fainted in court on Monday and was pronounced dead on arrival in hospital. He was prosecuted on numerous charges after his one-year rule was brought to an end by a military coup in 2013. Continue reading...

German capital’s government agrees outlines of law in effort to halt runaway gentrificationBerlin’s government has agreed to freeze rents in the German capital for five years from 2020 in the city’s latest attempt to halt runaway gentrification.Once described as “poor but sexy”, Berlin’s housing costs have doubled over the last decade as employees lured by the strong job market move into the city. Continue reading...

Release of colour images adds more clarity to debate but fails to prove responsibilityThe sophistication of the attacks on two shipping tankers in the Gulf of Oman last week had already led most independent analysts to conclude Iran was responsible for the high-profile explosions.But there has been scepticism from some key countries, including Germany and Japan, after the US initially released a grainy black and white video it said showed Iranian forces removing an unexploded mine from one of the two targeted ships. Iran has denied involvement. Continue reading...

In these open-minded times, one taboo has held steady: never having had sex at all. Four thirtysomething virgins explain how they deal with the stigma

Businessman also faces charges over allegedly buying two yachts to launder moneyThe former BHS owner Dominic Chappell has appeared in court to face charges of a £500,000 tax fraud and that he allegedly bought two yachts to launder money.Chappell, 52, of Dorset, who was wearing a slate grey suit and open-necked blue shirt, spoke only to confirm his personal details as he appeared at the City of London magistrates court. Continue reading...

Thousands of passengers face disruption to services as part of five-day walkout over guardsCommuters have described the disruption caused by the latest South Western Railway strike over the role of guards on trains as “chaos”.Members of the Rail, Maritime and Transport union began the action shortly after midnight on Tuesday as part of a five-day walkout. Continue reading...

Girl’s family has spent 15 months in detention since being arrested at their home in Biloela, QueenslandA two-year-old girl who was taken into immigration detention with her family from their home in Biloela has been denied a cake on her birthday.It was her second birthday inside the Melbourne detention centre and the second time visitors were blocked from bringing in a cake to celebrate, despite her father, Nades, going through the required rigorous application process, including submitting a “special purpose food and/or medication request” to Border Force. Continue reading...

The two medical workers in Punjab who survived a dramatic end to their rooftop hunger strike over staff rightsEveryone who works at Rajindra hospital in Patiala knows Karamjit Kaur Aulakh. Their eyes follow the 35-year-old nurse as she walks around the hospital with the support of her crutch. Others stop by to ask how she is after her fall.On 28 February Aulakh jumped from the dome of the main building at Rajindra hospital, where she had sat for 23 days on a rooftop hunger strike. The leap of almost 15 metres was a desperate cry for attention to her cause, and left her with three major fractures in her right leg. Joining her in the protest was her colleague Baljit Kaur Khalsa, who was not injured in the jump. Continue reading...

Legislators realize what some voters do not: in many places in the US, voters don’t choose politicians – politicians choose votersPublic opinion polls in Alabama, Georgia, Ohio and elsewhere have all found that a majority of citizens in those places prefer to keep abortion legal. Yet Republican-controlled legislatures in each of those states have, in the past three months, passed laws that would outlaw abortion in most cases.Related: This all-male council in Texas just voted to ban abortion Continue reading...

‘Given the chance at a new life, we have grabbed it with both hands,’ Abbas Nazari saysOne of the asylum seekers the Norwegian cargo ship Tampa rescued in 2001 has won a prestigious Fulbright scholarship to undertake postgraduate studies in the US.Abbas Nazari was seven years old when his family boarded a fishing boat from Indonesia to Australia. He was one of more than 430 people, predominantly of the ethnic minority Hazaras of Afghanistan, who were caught up in an international standoff when the boat foundered. Continue reading...

Far-right conspiracy theorist denied the allegations and accused one of the lawyers of framing himLawyers for relatives of some victims of the Sandy Hook Elementary school shooting allege that far-right conspiracy theorist Alex Jones sent them documents relating to the court battle they are fighting that included electronic files containing images of child sexual abuse, as the latest twist in the defamation case against the Infowars website host.Jones denied the allegations during his web show last Friday and accused one of the lawyers involved of framing him. Continue reading...

Political row sparked after government gave US permission to use island for anti-narcotics flights

Tuesday: The EU and China question government’s commitment to meeting climate targets. Plus: Egypt’s former president collapses in courtGood morning, this is Helen Sullivan bringing you the main stories and must-reads on Tuesday 18 June. Continue reading...

Iván Duque decries social acceptability of drug that inflicts environmental and social damage on producersMiddle-class cocaine users are inconsistent hypocrites if they fail to recognise the environmental and social damage their drug use is inflicting on producer countries, the Colombian president has said during a visit to London.In an interview with the Guardian on Monday, Iván Duque said that cocaine’s social acceptability had to end. “There are many people who present themselves as environmentalists, and if they want to be coherent, they must understand all the environmental damage that is caused by the production of cocaine – not just destroying tropical forests, [but] spreading chemicals in protected areas and destroying human capital,” he said. Continue reading...

Countries also raise concerns about rise in Australia’s transport emissions and the use of Kyoto carry-over creditsThe Morrison government has been challenged by the European Union and by China about whether it can meet its Paris commitments given rising emissions, and about growing pollution from vehicles, ahead of a progress meeting about climate commitments in Bonn next week.Nineteen countries, including Australia, will gather in Bonn on 24 and 25 June for a multilateral assessment of progress made under international climate commitments, and ahead of that session countries have submitted a range of questions about the performance of signatories in meeting their climate targets. Continue reading...

Civil liberties groups vow to challenge new law that bans public employees from wearing religious symbolsCivil liberties and Muslim groups have vowed to challenge a new law in the Canadian province of Quebec that bans some public sector employees from wearing religious symbols during work hours, arguing it triggered the “politics of fear”.Critics said the long-expected Bill 21 that was passed by the predominately French-speaking province’s legislature on Sunday mainly targeted Muslim women who wear hijabs. Continue reading...

Suzanne Collins has written a book set in Panem 64 years before the original dystopian trilogy and Lionsgate has confirmed interest in adapting it for the big screenSuzanne Collins is writing a prequel to her best-selling Hunger Games trilogy with a potential movie adaptation also on the way.The currently untitled book will be released in May 2020 and will be set in the world of Panem 64 years before the events of the dystopian franchise. It will focus on the time after the so-called “Dark Days,”, a failed rebellion. Continue reading...

London Ambulance Service chief told inquest ‘chaotic conditions’ had caused issuesCommunication issues meant that police and members of the public were left treating victims of the London Bridge terror attacks, not knowing why paramedics were not coming to their aid, a London Ambulance Service boss has admitted.The inquest into the eight people killed heard that at least two LAS staff knew there were casualties in the vicinity of the Boro Bistro courtyard below street level on the night of 3 June 2017. Continue reading...

Vatican summit to discuss proposal to address clergy shortage in remote Amazon areas

Hunt and Stewart stand out in Tory leadership TV debate … Hong Kong protesters call for Carrie Lam to quit … why cycle lanes are a ‘waste of money’Good morning briefers. I’m Martin Farrer and these are the top stories this morning. Continue reading...

The struggling German lender will move poorly performing assets and drastically shrink its investment banking arm, the FT saysDeutsche Bank has drawn up plans for a radical restructuring which will involve the creation of a “bad bank” to hold tens of billions of euros of toxic assets and a round of severe cuts to its investment banking operations, according to reports.The bad bank would house or sell assets valued at up to €50bn (£45bn) comprising mainly of long-term trades that have been a major drag on the struggling bank’s balance sheet, the Financial Times reported, citing four people briefed on the plan. Continue reading...

Calls for government leader to stand down after an estimated two million march over unpopular extradition billHong Kong’s political crisis has entered its second week, after protestors who had filled the city’s streets in record numbers on Sunday rejected an apology from leader Carrie Lam, and vowed to continue their fight against a controversial law she championed.After the sweeping protest – which organisers say attracted 2 million people, the largest in the city’s history – Lam apologised in a statement for the way the government had handled the draft extradition law. Continue reading...

Foreign secretary says it is wrong to commit rigidly to leaving the EU by 31 OctoberJeremy Hunt has said the Brexit deadline of 31 October should not be a “hard stop” and that Boris Johnson is posing a “stark choice”, between leaving the EU without a deal and a general election.As the five remaining rivals to Boris Johnson prepare for a televised debate on Sunday evening, Hunt warned it would be wrong to commit now to leave the EU by Halloween, come what may. Continue reading...

Males aged 17 and 18 accused of killing man who was stabbed in Wandsworth on FridayTwo teenagers have been charged with the murder of an 18-year-old man who was stabbed to death in south-west London. The man was among three people killed in separate attacks in the capital within 24 hours on Friday and Saturday.A 17-year-old from Merton, who cannot be named for legal reasons, and Mohammed Nadir Dafallah, 18, from Wandsworth, were charged on Sunday. They will appear in custody at Wimbledon magistrates court on Monday. Continue reading...

From architecture to highways and the Olympic stadium, how does reality shape up against Katsuhiro Otomo’s 1988 animated dystopia?It’s 2019 and Tokyo is a sprawling megalopolis preparing for the 2020 Olympics. The city is crowded, fraying at the edges. The young are aimless and underemployed, obsessed with cars and clothes. Cynical new religious movements are on the rise. Motorcycle gangs race at night on the expressways. There is a worrying trend of militarism after years of peace. The government is showing signs of corruption. And everyone seems terrifyingly eager to ignore the lessons of a recent nuclear catastrophe.The real city of Tokyo and the imagined Neo-Tokyo of the 1988 anime film Akira are nearly indistinguishable. 2019 is the “year of Akira”: the date the apocalyptic science fiction film was set, a couple of decades after a mysterious nuclear-esque disaster had wiped out the original city. Continue reading...

The Booker-winning Indian author casts an exacting eye over inequality, gender politics and imperialismWith its gold-striped spine, crimson endpapers and silky leaves, My Seditious Heart is a handsome edition of previously published essays by Booker-winning writer Arundhati Roy. Despite the stately presentation and the fact that some of the essays first appeared 20 years ago, these studies are trenchant, still relevant and frequently alarming. Roy reveals some hard truths about modern India and makes powerful analytical forays into American and British foreign policy, aid, imperialism and attitudes.Roy’s India is one of extreme wealth and extreme poverty; opportunity and exploitation; cynicism and hypocrisy; ambition and greed; dynamism and thuggery. “India lives in several centuries at the same time. Somehow we manage to progress and regress simultaneously.” She describes emaciated workers toiling by candlelight through the night to lay broadband cable to accelerate the country’s digital revolution. The Greater Common Good looks at (futile) resistance to the Sardar Sarovar Dam in the Narmada valley, the forced displacement of local people and the slandering of activists as troublemakers. Another essay looks at uranium mining in Jadugoda, while in another piece Roy accompanies tribal anti-government fighters in the forests of Dantewada in Chhattisgarh. Continue reading...

Home affairs minister calls for ‘sensible discussion’ about whether Australian Signals Directorate should gain new powersPeter Dutton has confirmed that a plan to create new powers to spy on Australians – which sparked police raids at the centre of the press freedom row – is still on the table.On Sunday the home affairs minister claimed it was “complete nonsense” that the government supported spying on Australians but, in the next breath, called for a “sensible discussion” about whether the Australian Signals Directorate should gain such powers, which he argued could help disrupt paedophile networks and stop cyber-attacks. Continue reading...

Humboldt Forum delay follows series of other projects that arrived late and over budgetThe opening of a €600m super-museum in Berlin has been postponed to next year, raising sceptical eyebrows among locals wary of the German capital’s growing tendency to deliver large public building projects late and over budget.The Humboldt Forum will host blockbuster exhibitions about world culture, anthropology and ethnology, and is also expected to delicately touch on Germany’s under-explored colonial history. Continue reading...

Woman dies after sightseeing boat sinks as bad weather also damages vessels at annual Bol d’Or regattaA woman has drowned in Lake Geneva when her sightseeing boat sank as a violent storm battered parts of Switzerland on Saturday, police said.A man who was in the same boat was able to swim to another vessel from where he fired “two flares”, Joanna Matta, police spokeswoman for the canton (region) of Geneva, said. Continue reading...

Top Tories say attempt to appease hardliners means coalition of support for his leadership bid will not survive the autumnBoris Johnson’s attempts to appease hardline Tory Brexiters will tilt the party into a “disastrous general election” that could be just months away, senior Conservatives are warning.The runaway favourite to replace Theresa May is being told that the coalition of support set to deliver him Downing Street “won’t survive the autumn”, when he will have to decide whether to accept a deal with the EU or try to force a no-deal Brexit – a move likely to precipitate an election. Continue reading...

Labour leader urges UK to ease tensions in Gulf after Foreign Office links blasts to TehranJeremy Corbyn has called for the government to abstain from escalating tensions with Iran without “credible evidence” that Tehran was responsible for attacks on two oil tankers.The Labour leader said Britain risked increasing the threat of war after the Foreign Office (FCO) said it was “almost certain” in its assessment that “a branch of the Iranian military … attacked the two tankers on 13 June”. Continue reading...

His take on Shakespeare’s tragedy tapped the zeitgeist, but Zeffirelli’s whole body of work pulsated with an irresistible camp and romanticismFranco Zeffirelli was the mainstream maestro of high culture on screens big and small who dashingly made his international movie reputation with an exuberant and accessible adaptation of Romeo and Juliet in 1968; this had some pretty trad doublet-and-hose stuff and featured the syrupy “Love” theme composed for the film by Nino Rota which was to become notorious as the music for Simon Bates’s regular tearjerking Our Tune feature on Radio One.But there were also muscular and athletic performances from a bright-eyed young cast, vigorous and enjoyable playing all round and bold location work. The year before, Zeffirelli had directed Richard Burton and Liz Taylor in another Shakespeare adaptation: The Taming of the Shrew: clever casting of course, but it was the honeyglow-sunlit romanticism of young love in Romeo and Juliet — not cynical middle-aged love — which caught the public imagination, tuned into the zeitgeist and gave Zeffirelli his massive hit. Continue reading...

Company admits that fire extinguisher switch has failed a ‘small number’ of timesAirline pilots have voiced fears over the safety of a fleet of Boeing aircraft after a crucial fire-fighting system has been found to have the potential to malfunction.Boeing has issued an alert to airlines using its flagship B787 Dreamliner, warning that the switch used to extinguish an engine fire has failed in a “small number” of instances. The switch also severs the fuel supply and the hydraulic fluid to prevent flames spreading. Continue reading...

Blast claimed by Islamist insurgents follows attack in Mogadishu that killed eightA roadside bomb hit a police vehicle patrolling near Kenya’s border with Somalia on Saturday, killing several of the 11 officers inside, a Kenyan police spokesman has said.Separately, another blast in Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu, killed eight people, according to emergency services. Continue reading...

Trump says incident involving two vessels in Gulf of Oman has ‘Iran written all over it’The US has accused Iran of detaining the crew of one of two oil tankers attacked in the Gulf of Oman this week, as the UK also joined in formally blaming the country, saying no other nation or group “could plausibly be responsible”.Washington claims Iran is behind a succession of recent shipping attacks in the Gulf. It said grainy video published on the US Central Command’s website provided evidence of Iran’s involvement in Thursday’s attacks. The footage purportedly shows an Iranian boat removing an unexploded mine from one of the vessels. Continue reading...

Evidence suggests all five of the deceased ate affected products before withdrawal, says PHETwo more patients have died after eating pre-packaged sandwiches and salads linked to a listeria outbreak, taking the total number of deaths to five, Public Health England has said.The source of the infection is understood to relate to products supplied by the Good Food Chain and the affected sandwiches and salads have since been withdrawn from hospitals. Continue reading...

My husband, Roddy Kentish, who has died aged 87, was one of the “Mangrove Nine” arrested after a 1970 protest against police raids at the Mangrove restaurant in Notting Hill, west London. In the subsequent trial at the Old Bailey all were acquitted after two of the nine, Darcus Howe and Althea Jones-Lecointe, defended themselves by arguing that the prosecution had wrongly conflated black radicalism with criminal intent. The judge found evidence of racial hatred on both sides, and for the first time racial discrimination by police was acknowledged in UK law.After the trial Roddy fought for decent housing conditions in the area, played a key role in the establishment of the Notting Hill children’s carnival, and set up a project to train disaffected young people in a trade. Continue reading...

Guardian readers respond to Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett’s article on the Welsh languageMay I begin by saying how, as a Welsh speaker (albeit a vernacular one) I was delighted by Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett’s article (How Welsh became cool, G2, 13 June). The roots of the revival coincided with the popularity of Welsh bands in the era known as Cŵl Cymru (cool Wales). At the time (the 1990s/2000s) my late wife and I were living in Lesotho and I started my collection of Welsh band CDs in music stores across the border in Bloemfontein. It included those by Catatonia whose lead singer Cerys Matthews attended the same school as I did in Fishguard, but long after me I hasten to add.The revival was also helped by the introduction of Welsh medium schools in Wales: a complete reversal of the corporal punishment handed out to schoolchildren caught speaking Welsh in school in the time when my maternal grandmother grew up. Her great grandchildren have been the beneficiaries of the teaching revival. One is now a doctor and the other is about to graduate; how much more cool than that can you get?

Tracey Lindner says the scramble for Africa is largely about securing resources that are crucial for military and civilian digital technology. Terry McGinn shines a spotlight on the USForeign involvement in Africa is far from unique to Russia (Leaked documents reveal Russia’s efforts to exert influence in Africa, 12 June). The new scramble for Africa involves more powers than the first round over a century ago. This time it’s in part about securing resources such as oil, gas and rare earth metals crucial for military and civilian digital technology, and denying these resources to rival powers.The United States Africa Command (Africom) now has 7,500 American troops active in all but one African country, up from 6,000 in 2017. Apart from its huge base in Djibouti, controlling the narrow strait between the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, a vital chokepoint through which all shipping using the Suez Canal has to pass – most importantly (for the Americans) Chinese shipping – the US has constructed small “lily pad” bases, whose presence gives the US a strong military capability. Continue reading...

Iran’s foreign minister said US made allegations without ‘factual or circumstance evidence’ hours before Trump’s Fox News interviewDonald Trump has blamed Iran for recent attacks on two oil tankers near the strategic Strait of Hormuz, describing the country is a “nation of terror”.Speaking with Fox News on Friday, the president rejected Tehran’s denials that it was involved in the attacks and cited a video released by US Central Command late Thursday purporting to show an Iranian vessel removing an unexploded mine from one of the tankers. Continue reading...

Security commissioner reveals disinformation acts aimed at influencing EU electionsPro-Kremlin social media accounts spread false claims that the EU has Nazi roots, the European commissioner for security has said in the first analysis of disinformation acts aimed at influencing last month’s EU elections.Malicious actors sought to promote extreme views and polarise local debates, said Julian King, the British commissioner in Brussels. Continue reading...