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Brisbane supreme court finds Sharon Graham, 63, was architect of plot to kill Bruce Saunders for insurance money

Case brought by 24 defrauded investors alleges auditors were negligent, engaged in deceptive conduct and breached the Corporations Act

In today's newsletter: Wars around the world can have a huge impact on children. So how do we help them navigate the endless cycle of bad news? Sign up here for our daily newsletter, First EditionGood morning. With the cost of living crisis, political chaos, and two full-blown wars, the news cycle is possibly the bleakest it's ever been. Waking up to more bad news every day is hard. It's hard for you to read, and it's hard for us to report on. But it's hardest of all for the children - in Gaza, Israel and Ukraine, of course, but also those hearing about it from a distance and perhaps encountering the horrors of war for the first time.In less than three weeks, it is thought that more than 2,360 children have been killed in Gaza, while more than 30 children were killed by Hamas during the attack in Israel and dozens have been taken hostage. Unicef described the simply staggering" child death toll as a growing stain on our collective conscience" as it called for an immediate ceasefire to stem the loss of young lives.Israel-Gaza | The US military has launched airstrikes on two locations in eastern Syria linked to Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), the Pentagon has said, amid growing fears that the war between Israel and Hamas could escalate into a regional conflict.Maine shooting | A suspect in the killing of 18 people and wounding of 13 in two shootings in Maine was on the run on Thursday as authorities issued arrest warrants for multiple counts of murder.Westminster | A senior Conservative MP, Crispin Blunt, has been arrested on suspicion of rape and possession of drugs. Blunt, who has since been suspended by the party, made a statement after Surrey police said a man in his 60s had been arrested on Wednesday and later released on bail.Domestic violence | Wiltshire police force is reviewing thousands of applications made under Clare's law, which gives people the right to ask whether a partner has a violent past, after it came to light that wrong or incomplete information had been given. One member of staff has been suspended, the chief constable has apologised and told anyone who felt they were in immediate danger to dial 999.Music | Now and Then, the long-awaited final" Beatles song featuring all four members, is to be released next week thanks to the same AI technology that was used to enhance the audio on Peter Jackson's documentary on the band, Get Back. Continue reading...

This blog has now closed. You can read our full report on the EU summit hereAhead of the leaders' summit, a group of Irish members of the European parliament from different political families called for a ceasefire in Gaza.

MP for Reigate makes statement after Surrey police said man in his 60s was arrested and later released on bailA senior Conservative MP, Crispin Blunt, has been arrested on suspicion of rape and possession of drugs.Blunt, who has since been suspended by the party, made a statement after Surrey police said a man in his 60s had been arrested on Wednesday and later released on bail. Continue reading...

US warned over genocide in Palestine', as foreign ministers challenge targeting of civilians and international law breaches

Mid-morning programme now heard by 6.9m people as opposed to 8.2m who tuned in before veteran's departure in MarchVernon Kay's BBC Radio 2 show has lost 1.3 million listeners since he took over from the presenter Ken Bruce, the latest figures show.Bruce, 72, worked at the station for 31 years before leaving in March and joining Greatest Hits Radio (GHR) the following month. Kay, 49, took over the station's mid-morning slot in May. Continue reading...

Police say five men have been arrested on suspicion of causing serious injury by dangerous drivingSix children are in hospital in Oxford after a BMW collided with the people carrier in which they were travelling.Thames Valley police said officers tried to stop a car driving erratically" at high speed on the city's eastern bypass at 11.10pm on Tuesday. Continue reading...

Marten and Gorden plead not guilty to all charges, after daughter's remains found in Brighton in MarchAn aristocrat and her partner accused of the manslaughter of their baby have denied all the charges they face.Constance Marten and Mark Gordon pleaded not guilty to five counts relating to their daughter, Victoria, during a hearing at the Old Bailey on Thursday. Continue reading...

Forty-nine of party's 199 MPs have either said they want a ceasefire or signed a motion calling for one

The wife, son, daughter and grandson of Wael al-Dahdouh, the bureau chief in Gaza, were targeted at a relief camp, outlet saysAn Al Jazeera correspondent is mourning the loss of his entire immediate family after they were killed in an Israeli airstrike in Gaza.The family of Wael al-Dahdouh, Al Jazeera's bureau chief in Gaza, had moved to a house in the Nuseirat camp in central Gaza after Israel's warning on 13 October to those in the northern half of the territory to leave. Continue reading...

Then foreign secretary said in 2022 there was a credible threat of mass suicide' from group stuck on Diego GarciaLiz Truss recommended that a group of Tamil asylum seekers stranded on a tiny British territory in the Indian Ocean be brought to the UK due to a credible threat of mass suicide", documents show.Diego Garcia is part of the Chagos Islands, which the UK calls the British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT) and over which it continues to claim sovereignty despite a UN court ruling that they are part of Mauritius.In the UK and Ireland, Samaritans can be contacted on freephone 116 123, or email jo@samaritans.org or jo@samaritans.ie. In the US, you can call or text the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline on 988, chat on 988lifeline.org, or text HOME to 741741 to connect with a crisis counselor. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. Other international helplines can be found at befrienders.org Continue reading...

The resort city of Acapulco was devastated by the category 5 hurricane, with hundreds of windows blown out and electricity cutAt least 27 people died due to Hurricane Otis and four others were still missing, Mexico's government said after one of the most powerful storms to hit the country smashed into the Pacific resort city of Acapulco a day before.President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said the government was working to re-establish power and clean up the devastation wrought by the category 5 hurricane that tore through the southern state of Guerrero, and left Acapulco incommunicado. Continue reading...

Business that bought rights to Neil Young and Beyonce back catalogues must now restructure or face being wound upShareholders in the music royalties investment fund Hipgnosis have voted overwhelmingly against continuing the business in its current form, throwing the future of the group into question.At an extraordinary general meeting on Thursday, 83.2% of shareholders voted against Hipgnosis Songs Fund securing another five-year mandate to run as an investment trust. Continue reading...

Amina Noor, 39, found guilty of assisting non-UK person to carry out FGM - in first conviction of its kindA woman has been found guilty of handing over a three-year-old British girl for female genital mutilation (FGM) during a trip to Kenya in the first conviction of its kind.After a trial at the Old Bailey, Amina Noor, 39, was convicted of assisting another person to carry out the procedure in 2006. The conviction, which carries a maximum sentence of 14 years, is the first for assisting in such harm under the Female Genital Mutilation Act 2003. Continue reading...

Engineering group in talks with German ministers to secure 80% of an initial 10bn funding tranche

Court upholds law against indecent acts' between military personnel, as well as law criminalising HIV transmissionSouth Korea's constitutional court has upheld two anti-LGBTQ+ laws including the country's notorious military sodomy law" for the fourth time, in a ruling that activists are calling a setback for equality rights.The court, in a five-to-four vote, ruled that article 92-6 of the military criminal act, which prescribes a maximum prison term of two years for anal intercourse" and any other indecent acts" between military personnel, even while on leave and consensual, was constitutional in response to several petitions made challenging the law. Continue reading...

Artist creates new edition of Orwell classic after Swansea charity shop had its fill of Dan Brown bestsellerSix years after an Oxfam shop amusingly, but seriously, pleaded for no more copies of The Da Vinci Code, the artist David Shrigley has completed a project to collect and recycle 6,000 copies of the novel into a new edition of George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four.This weekend copies of the new Pulped Fiction" edition of the Orwell classic will be displayed and sold at the Swansea charity shop that inspired the project. Continue reading...

Authorities warn of extreme fire danger' as 60 fires burn in Queensland and 110 in New South Wales

Deputy PM, Oliver Dowden, calls Cobra meeting to discuss hostages and aid but rules out call for ceasefire Israel and Hamas at war - live updatesUK government ministers are to hold an emergency committee meeting as work intensifies to secure pauses" in the conflict between Israel and Hamas after a tank raid of Gaza.Oliver Dowden, the deputy prime minister, said he would chair a Cobra meeting with figures from the Foreign Office, Ministry of Defence and Cabinet Office on Thursday morning. Continue reading...

Changes to Queensland law allow for naming of Lehrmann, who was thrust into national spotlight after being accused of raping Brittany Higgins, a claim he strenuously denied

Police describe confronting crime scene' as officers search for another school employee to assist with the investigation

WA Corruption and Crime Commission report finds Cameron Blaine shared sensitive case details with 22-year-old woman

This blog is closed. Our latest live coverage is here.A Palestinian American woman whose 6-year-old son was killed in a Chicago suburb in what police called a hate crime has asked the public to pray for peace" as she recovers from her injuries, Associated Press reports.Hanaan Shahin thanked authorities, doctors and others and remembered her son Wadea Al-Fayoume as an intelligent and funny child who cared about the planet and liked to join her in prayers. Continue reading...

Volodymyr Zelenskiy says Ukraine is preparing for renewed Russian attacks on its energy infrastructure ahead of winter; Russia claims to have conducted a simulated nuclear strike

Antonio Guterres had said Hamas attacks had been in context of years of suffocating occupation' but denied justifying acts of terror'

A pioneer of the Dangerous Sports Club at Oxford University, he jumped off Clifton Suspension Bridge in 1979The man who performed the world's first ever modern-day bungee jump, while wearing a top hat and tails and holding a bottle of champagne, has died aged 78.David Kirke, one of the pioneers of the Dangerous Sports Club at Oxford University, jumped off Clifton Suspension Bridge on 1 April 1979. Continue reading...

Charity Care4Calais says Wethersfield airbase in Essex is a de facto prison camp' for about 200 peopleThe Home Office has been accused of unlawfully segregating asylum seekers from the local population based on their nationality by falsely imprisoning" them on a remote Essex airbase.A legal challenge launched by the charity Care4Calais against the home secretary, Suella Braverman, has warned that about 200 people accommodated at Wethersfield airbase are being subjected to segregation by nationality". Many living at the base, which is almost 12 miles from the nearest town, Braintree, come from countries including Eritrea and Afghanistan, while the majority of the population in villages close to the base are white. Continue reading...

Ricardo dos Santos, who was stopped with his partner, Bianca Williams, said he has been left traumatised'Two Metropolitan police officers who claimed to smell cannabis as they stopped and searched the athletes Bianca Williams and her partner, Ricardo dos Santos, lied and were guilty of gross misconduct, a police disciplinary panel has found.Dos Santos - speaking after the tribunal sacked PC Jonathan Clapham, 31, and PC Sam Franks, 29 - said he had been left traumatised" after suffering more than 20 stop and searches. Continue reading...

After backlash, company will no longer separate catalog at school fairs, which allowed districts to opt out of diverse booksAfter facing backlash, Scholastic has reversed course on its controversial decision to separate certain book titles in school fairs by race, gender or sexuality, allowing districts to opt in or out of the catalog.The separate catalog, called Share Every Story, Celebrate Every Voice, was a response to dozens of state laws restricting how the topics are discussed in schools and which could threaten school districts, teachers or librarians. Continue reading...

Lianne Sharabi and her two teenage daughters were murdered when Hamas militants stormed their home in Kibbutz Be'eriAmid the pomegranate groves of Kfar HaRif, a collective farm in southern Israel, thousands of people gathered as the sun began to set for the funerals of Lianne Sharabi, a British-Israeli woman, and her teenage daughters, Noiya and Yahel.The family were murdered on 7 October after militants from the Palestinian group Hamas stormed their home in Kibbutz Be'eri. Their father, Eli, is missing, and his brother, Yosi, has officially been declared one of the 220 hostages taken back to the Gaza Strip. Be'eri suffered such destruction, and so many of its 1,000 residents are dead or missing, that the Sharabis can't be buried there; instead, on Wednesday, they were laid to rest in a cemetery 25km (16 miles) away. Continue reading...

Defence minister's comments come after earlier announcement of plans to withdraw from global treaty banning nuclear weapons testsIn its latest intelligence update, the UK's Ministry of Defence highlighted Russia's capability to strike targets near the Dnipro River with artillery.As in most sectors, a decisive factor is almost certainly the combatants' ability to bring accurate, intense artillery fire to bear. Initial indication suggests that Russia has maintained a significant artillery capability within range of the river," it stated. Continue reading...

Documentary tells story of David Holmes who sustained a spinal injury during filming of The Deathly Hallows: Part 1Daniel Radcliffe has teamed up with his Harry Potter stunt double, who became paralysed after an on-set accident, for an HBO documentary.David Holmes worked closely with Radcliffe on the Harry Potter films until he sustained a spinal injury during filming for The Deathly Hallows: Part 1 in January 2009. The gymnast from Essex, who was selected to play Radcliffe's double in the first film, broke his neck and was paralysed from the chest down. Continue reading...

Yuval Baron has not heard from the Siegels since they were kidnapped by Hamas gunmen

Shoppers who have bought affected packs of Taste the Difference Iberico ring told to return them for refundSainsbury's has warned shoppers not to eat one of its own-label chorizo products over fears some packs could contain listeria.The retailer, which operates 600 supermarkets and 800 convenience stores, told the UK public to return all packs of Taste the Difference Spanish chorizo Iberico ring with use by dates from 23 November to 16 January. Continue reading...

Families talk of devastation at not being able to protect children from abuse of serving police officerThe victims of Lewis Edwards and their families have spoken of the deep trauma they suffered and the psychological effects of his crimes.Some of the girls he targeted contemplated suicide or self-harmed and said they could never trust the police again. Relatives described their guilt at not spotting what was going on, feelings of failure at not being able to protect their children, and devastation that the abuser was a serving officer. Many expressed heartbreak that Edwards stole the innocence of their daughters. Continue reading...

Britain's biggest mortgage lender forecasts 5% drop over this year and another 2.4% decline in 2024UK house prices will continue to slide this year and in 2024 and will not start to recover until 2025, Lloyds Banking Group has forecast.The lender, which owns Halifax and is Britain's largest mortgage provider, said that by the end of 2023 UK house prices will have fallen 5% over the course of the year and are likely to fall another 2.4% in 2024. Continue reading...

Hurricane Otis is forecast to make landfall near the Mexican resort of Acapulco, with the US National Hurricane Center warning of nightmare scenario'Hurricane Otis strengthened from a tropical storm to a dangerous Category 5 hurricane in a matter of hours on Tuesday as it approached Mexico's southern Pacific coast, with the president urging residents to seek shelter.The storm was forecast to make landfall near the resort of Acapulco early on Wednesday and the US National Hurricane Center warned it will cause catastrophic damage. Continue reading...

A 17-year-old with a passion for robotics has produced a cheaper utensil that uses sensors to cancel out hand tremorsThe motivation for his invention came to Aarrav Anil last year when he saw his uncle Arjun, who has Parkinson's disease, struggle to eat. Some food spilled out of his mouth, the rest splattered on his clothes. Arjun attempted to keep his dignity but the frustration forced the retired civil servant, who is in his 70s, to give up and call his helper to feed him.The sight of his uncle's tremors shaking the spoon so violently inspired Aarrav, 17, from Bengalaru, south India, to turn to robotics. He locked himself in his room with microcontrollers, sensors, motors, and a 3D printer. What emerged was a prototype of a smart spoon that is now undergoing trials at the RV College of Physiotherapy in Bengalaru. Continue reading...

Statement describes Australian billionaire as one of Australia's foremost philanthropists'

Crossbench MPs raise alarm with minister as Services Australia data shows only 23% of calls were answered in July and August

Poll of 6,752 people of African descent in 13 countries finds almost half have experienced discriminationRacism is pervasive and relentless" and on the rise in Europe, with nearly half of black people in member states surveyed by the EU reporting discrimination, from the verbal abuse of their children to being blocked by landlords from renting homes.In every walk of life, from schools to the job market, housing and health, a survey by the EU's rights agency of people of African descent found high levels of discrimination, with some of the worst results recorded in Austria and Germany, where far-right parties have been on the rise. Continue reading...

In an interview with the Guardian, Jacov Milatovi says Brussels has an opportunity to renew its commitment to enlargementThe EU can demonstrate its renewed commitment to the principle of enlargement by admitting its longest standing applicant, Montenegro, within five years, the country's newly elected president has said.Our membership would be a story about more than Montenegro. It would show to accession countries that the path of reform pays off," Jakov Milatovi said in an interview with the Guardian. Continue reading...

Ian Leavers claims treaty would result in justice system favouring Indigenous people and says police fear latte sippers have grabbed control'

Coroner says inquiry offers chance to consider if response to such incidents could be improvedThe police and ambulance response to a white supremacist terrorist attack on two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, is under public scrutiny for the first time as an inquest begins into the deaths of 51 worshipers in the 2019 mass shooting.The coroner, Brigitte Windley, opening the inquest at the high court in Christchurch on Tuesday, said: This is an opportunity to consider if the response to such extraordinary events like this could be improved in the future, despite our strongest desire that we never again have to." Continue reading...

Equality and Human Rights Commission calls halt after review of process into how complaints against Kishwer Falkner were handledThe equalities watchdog has closed an investigation into a series of internal complaints against its chair after the equalities minister, Kemi Badenoch, ordered a review of the process.The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) said that following the review of how complaints against Kishwer Falkner had been dealt with, it had decided to close the investigation against her. Continue reading...

Ukrainian president says military pressure will continue, during video address in Prague that was marred by possible hack attack, says Czech parliamentThe Kremlin has rejected speculation about Vladimir Putin's health, saying the president is fit and well.In a regular call with reporters, Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin spokesperson, , also denied suggestions that the Russian leader was using body doubles, calling them an absurd hoax". Continue reading...

Sir Michael Wilshaw says Ofsted's headline judgments provide parents with false comfort'The former chief inspector of schools Sir Michael Wilshaw has poured scorn on Ofsted's judgment that almost nine out of 10 state schools in England are good", describing it as complete nonsense".According to the latest official statistics, 88% of schools were judged to be either good" or outstanding" by the schools inspectorate as of the end of last December, but Wilshaw told MPs that having visited some of those awarded a good" rating by Ofsted, he did not agree. Continue reading...

Family at London press conference say slow release of hostages creates more pain than hope