World news | The Guardian

Speculation climate protesters could be responsible for phosphorescent patch that appeared by Rialto BridgePolice in Venice are investigating the source of phosphorescent green liquid that appeared on Sunday in the city’s Grand Canal, amid speculation it was caused by climate protesters.Gondoliers could be seen punting through the phosphorescent waters while tourists took photographs of the green patch, from the Rialto Bridge up and along part of the canal. Continue reading...

Ukraine says it shot down 52 Iranian-made devices but debris killed one person and injured two

As the stalemate continues, union infighting has added a new dimension while universities are threatening to dock payWhen Jo Grady, general secretary of the University and College Union (UCU), stood at the podium of its annual congress yesterday, she said she had “never been so proud to be part of this union as I have in recent weeks, watching you all stand firm in the face of vindictive, bullying behaviour from employers.“Our wins this year have been achieved through unity,” she told the assembled lecturers. “Facing the fights ahead, let’s focus our energy on the real enemy: the employers.” Continue reading...

Exclusive: More than a dozen potentially dangerous devices on sale despite rise in fatal firesE-bike chargers that pose a risk of fire and electric shock have been found on sale on Amazon, eBay and Wish.com amid a sharp rise in blazes associated with battery-powered bicycles and scooters.More than a dozen low-cost devices, several with substandard, unfused plugs, were on offer on all three websites, a Guardian investigation with the charity Electrical Safety First (ESF) found. Continue reading...

Rescue operation off Torbay recovered two men in their 20s and one was declared dead at the sceneTwo men in their 20s have died after being pulled from the sea off the coast of Torbay, Devon and Cornwall police said.Officers were called to assist the coastguard at about 9am on Saturday after reports of concern for two people off Oddicombe beach. Continue reading...

‘The success of this referendum will depend on millions of conversations, between Australians of all backgrounds and faiths and beliefs’, PM to say

Ukrainian adviser says preliminary operations for major offensive underway; explosions shake Kyiv; Russian threat to Nato countries could get worse if Putin is ousted, says RAF chief

Two men charged with aggravated trespass after pitch invasion during Gallagher Premiership contestTwo men have been charged over a Just Stop Oil protest at the Gallagher Premiership rugby union final at Twickenham on Saturday when activists invaded the pitch and threw orange paint powder during live play.The Met police said Samuel Johnson, 40, of Reydon, Suffolk and Patrick Hart, 37, of Brislington, Bristol had been charged with aggravated trespass. Continue reading...

Broadcaster says show will return as normal on Monday amid speculation some hosts have threatened to quitITV has said there are no plans to take its This Morning show off air after reports it could be axed over the Phillip Schofield controversy.The broadcaster denied speculation in Sunday’s newspapers about the show’s future, with a spokesperson saying: “As we said on the record yesterday [Saturday], This Morning is not under review and there are no plans for the show to be axed. This Morning will return as normal tomorrow.” Continue reading...

Man in his 30s was detained on Friday after opening emergency exit at about 200 metres above groundA South Korean court has issued an arrest warrant for a passenger who opened an Asiana Airlines plane door minutes before it landed, it has been reported.The man in his 30s was detained on landing on Friday after opening the door when the Airbus A321-200 was about 200 metres (700ft) above the ground in Daegu, South Korea, causing panic onboard. Continue reading...

Meeting of European Political Community in Chișinău will show solidarity in face of Russian threatThe EU is stepping up support for Moldova as 46 EU and European leaders descend on its capital in a show of financial and political solidarity in the face of the threat from Russia.Nestled between Ukraine and the EU, the country of 2.6 million people will be catapulted on to the international stage on Thursday when the European Political Community (EPC) meets for the second time, eight months after its inaugural meeting attended by Liz Truss. Continue reading...

Speaking at Hay festival former foreign secretary said some may see the west as being hypocritical in its anti-Russia stanceDavid Miliband has said that his support for the Iraq war was “one of the deepest regrets” from his time in politics.The former foreign secretary also said that the war and the period around it has subsequently caused “real damage” to western claims to stand up for core values of international order and justice. Continue reading...

Health secretary says projects instead involve ‘a range of things’ including new wings and refurbishmentsThe health secretary has admitted the government is not building 40 new hospitals by 2030, as long promised, but said the projects involved “a range of things” including new wings and refurbishments.Steve Barclay, who nonetheless sought to insist that this did not break the Conservatives’ manifesto promise for 40 new hospitals, also argued that the public were not concerned about the distinction as long as the facilities they used were new. Continue reading...

Criminal turf wars are a sign of deeper problems in country that has EU’s highest cigarette taxesOutside a station in Pantin, a town that nudges up against Paris’s north-eastern border, young men hollered “cigarettes!” at commuters. They flashed two or three packets of what looked like ordinary Malboros or Camels for €5 (£4.35), about half the legal price. “There are so many illegal cigarette sellers near stations, they’re taking over the pavements,” said a customer at a local bakery.The French government has warned of an “explosion” in contraband cigarettes since the Covid lockdowns, as the number of smokers in France remains stable and has even risen among women over 18. Men selling cheap contraband packets near stations in and around Paris, from the Gare du Nord to Barbès or Noisy-le-Sec and La Courneuve, are so commonplace that some residents’ groups deem greater Paris a “giant, open-air, illegal tobacconist’s”. Continue reading...

Relative of Harvey Evans, 15, says he and Kyrees Sullivan, 16, were ‘chased to their death’ by South Wales policeThe aunt of one of the teenage boys who died in a road traffic accident on an electric bike in Cardiff has accused South Wales police of causing their deaths.Kyrees Sullivan, 16, and Harvey Evans, 15, died on Monday night shortly after they were seen on CCTV being followed by a police van. Continue reading...

With public hearings into government’s handling of the pandemic set to the begin, here are some of the answers to the big questionsThe government is already at loggerheads with Heather Hallett, chair of the Covid-19 inquiry, over the scope of her remit. The inquiry will start public hearings shortly, with government decisions, political reputations and use of public funds “under the microscope”. Continue reading...

The only colour study by Frederic Leighton for his famous painting is set to go on show at restored museumFlaming June, surely the most romantic and summery of all well-known British paintings, is finally returning home, to the London house where Frederic Leighton first imagined his fiery image almost 130 years ago.Now, as temperatures rise in the run-up to June, the museum in the artist’s former home has been unexpectedly given the smaller, first version of the world-famous work that Leighton painted in 1894. Continue reading...

Man, 28, charged with domestic violence offences including stalking and contravention of an AVO

Independent senator also foreshadowed abstaining from Senate vote on Indigenous voice referendum in interview with ABC

She was 15 when she was last seen alive in Rome. Her brother explains why he backs a new theory featured in a TV showNot long before she disappeared in the summer of 1983, Emanuela Orlandi went to Piazza del Catalone, a small square just outside of the Vatican walls, to meet friends.There was still a party vibe during that sweltering June just a few weeks after AS Roma clinched the Serie A title. In a photograph taken at the time Orlandi, who was then 15, is wearing a headband in yellow and red, the football team’s colours, that her mother had made. It was one of the last photographs taken of the teenager before she vanished without trace on 22 June 1983, an image that has come to define the campaign of her older brother Pietro Orlandi’s unrelenting search for the truth. Continue reading...

Observer reveals that companies are getting big contracts in spite of paying penalties for corruption or fraudCompanies that have paid hundreds of millions in fines and penalties, have defrauded Whitehall or have faced corruption investigations are among those making the most money from UK government outsourcing, the Observer can reveal.Observer analysis of data from UK regulators has found the Strategic Suppliers, the 40 private companies that play the biggest role in running outsourced government services, have received well over £500m in financial penalties from regulators since 2010. Continue reading...

UK Conservatives are only party to charge press delegates for accreditation at annual gatheringIt looks as if there will be empty seats in the rows usually reserved for members of the press at the annual Conservative party conference in Manchester this autumn, with media organisations across the political spectrum refusing to pay recently imposed fees.No other British political party charges for press accreditation, but last year a fee was introduced by the Conservative party. This summer the charge of £137 for each journalist’s application is being challenged by a broad coalition of newsrooms, on the basis that paying for media access sets a bad and undemocratic precedent. Continue reading...

People in the Lincolnshire market town were enthusiastic leavers, but seven years on there’s growing disappointment and disillusionThe breeze of change is wheezing through Boston – although not nearly hard enough for most people here. Voters in the Lincolnshire market town were the most enthusiastic supporters of Brexit, with 74.9% backing leave in the 2016 EU referendum. Now even they are sceptical that Brexit will deliver the transformation they’re still waiting for seven years later.As the Best in Britain poll in the Observer reveals on Sunday, in the Boston and Skegness constituency more than twice as many people (40%) now want closer links with the EU against just 19% who want relations to become even more distant. Continue reading...

Speeding fines and immigration statements lead to fall in trust for UK home secretary, even among Conservative votersSuella Braverman has suffered a collapse in personal support among the public in the wake of rows over a speeding fine and her handling of immigration, a new poll for the Observer has revealed.With some Tories accusing the home secretary of positioning herself as a future leader, the latest Opinium poll found that her personal approval rating had slumped to -36 among voters. While 14% said they approved of the job she is doing, 50% said they disapproved. Continue reading...

Dramatic reversal in public opinion seen even in those constituencies that recorded the highest votes to leaveA clear majority of British voters now favours building closer relations with the European Union, according to new polling that highlights a dramatic reversal in the tide of public opinion since Brexit.Even in those constituencies that recorded the highest votes to leave the EU in 2016, more than twice as many voters now believe the best route forward is to move in the opposite direction – and forge closer ties with Brussels. Continue reading...

As outgoings exceed income, people can’t afford to pay for the support they need along with normal expensesDisabled people are paying “a tax on disability” by being forced to fund soaring care charges out of their benefits as the cost of living pushes care users into financial crisis.Charities and disabled people’s organisations (DPOs), including Mencap, Scope, the MS Society, Inclusion London, Dimensions, and WinVisible, told the Observer that disabled care users are being pushed into severe financial hardship with some forced to go without essential home care because they can’t afford the fees. Others face up to £20,000 of arrears to their local authority, with some seeing bailiffs called in over care fee debts. One DPO said some disabled women are being coerced into sex by acquaintances after turning to them for care because they couldn’t pay care charges. Continue reading...

Questions raised on loopholes in ban on foreign donations to political parties and their effects on the electoral systemThe head of the government’s ethics advisory body has called for an overhaul of the rules on political donations, warning stronger safeguards are required against the influence of foreign money.Lord Jonathan Evans, chair of the independent committee on standards in public life, told the Observer that the government needed to implement new measures which would establish the true source of donations and improve diligence checks. Continue reading...

Chair of the Covid inquiry has threatened legal action if the former PM’s unredacted WhatsApp messages and diaries are not releasedWhen Boris Johnson finally agreed to hold a judge-led public inquiry into the government’s handling of the Covid pandemic, he showered praise on the eminent former judge he chose to lead it.“She brings a wealth of experience to the role, and I know shares my determination that the inquiry examines in a forensic and thoroughgoing way the government’s response to the pandemic,” the former prime minister said of Heather Hallett and her future endeavours, back in December 2021. Continue reading...

Mayor confirms four of the victims were students at Baimbridge College in Hamilton, 300km west of Melbourne

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Police were called to a container logistics company in Port Botany after reports of a break and enter on Thursday night

After a year of walkouts and failed talks, the unions, ministers and operators are as far apart as everAlmost a year since the first national rail strike was called, another series of stoppages loom. Passengers who have been spared the usual round of disruptive bank holiday engineering works this weekend won’t be so lucky in the second half of the half-term break. Strikes by drivers and crew will more or less wipe out services on Wednesday and Saturday, shred schedules on Friday, and add a bit of scattergun disruption in between.This time in 2022, the mere prospect of the biggest rail strike in decades was causing consternation. Now, though, the latest guaranteed upheaval has not even produced a round of talks between unions and industry – let alone ministers – to try to head off the disruption. Continue reading...

Northern Ireland policeman was shot multiple times after a youth football team coaching session in FebruarySeven men have been charged with the attempted murder of a senior police detective in Northern Ireland, police said.DCI John Caldwell was shot multiple times at a sports complex in Omagh, County Tyrone, after a youth football team coaching session on 22 February in an attack linked to dissident republicans. His son was with him as he loaded footballs into the boot of his car when the gunmen approached. Continue reading...

The sailor, whose identity has not been disclosed, was from Greater Manchester, Sussex police sayA British man has died after falling from a yacht during a historic race in the Channel, police have said.The sailor, whose identity has not been disclosed, was from the Greater Manchester area, according to Sussex police. Continue reading...

Exclusive: spokesperson says six units more will open by the end of 2024 but declines questions about cause of delay

Hours-long delays were reported as IT problems also caused disruption on Dover-Calais ferriesPassengers arriving at major airports in the UK at the start of the bank holiday weekend faced long delays after problems with electronic passport gates.Travellers expressed their anger on social media over queues of several hours at a number of airports including Heathrow and Gatwick as arrivals had their passports checked by hand instead of the automated machines. Continue reading...

This Morning co-presenter wrote that subsequent admission of relationship he denied was ‘very hurtful’Holly Willoughby has claimed that former co-host Phillip Schofield had previously denied to her that he had a relationship with a younger ITV colleague and described his subsequent admission of the affair as “very hurtful”.In a statement on Instagram, the This Morning presenter, 42, said: “It’s taken time to process yesterday’s news. When reports of this relationship first surfaced, I asked Phil directly if this was true and was told it was not. It’s been very hurtful to now find out that this was a lie.” Continue reading...

Air Chief Marshall Sir Mike Wigston says Russian threat to UK could get worse if Putin was ousted. This blog is now closed

Raman Pratasevich was dragged off a plane and imprisoned two years ago. Now he praises the regime he used to denounceTwo years ago, Raman Pratasevich, a young Belarusian dissident blogger, was white-knuckled, begging a Ryanair flight crew not to make an emergency landing at Minsk airport.He said: “Don’t do this, they will kill me, I am a refugee,” according to a fellow passenger. The plane, escorted by a Belarusian Mig-29 fighter jet sent to force it down, landed anyway. Pratasevich was promptly arrested. Continue reading...

Comedian tells Hay literary festival Trump found her ‘obnoxious’ when she interviewed him in 1996Ruby Wax has said she thinks the reason Donald Trump did not make a pass at her when she interviewed him almost three decades ago was because she is too clever. “I’m not his type. I have a brain,” she told the Hay festival in Wales.Speaking at the literary festival to promote her latest book, I’m Not as Well as I Thought I Was, the broadcaster and comedian spoke about the 1996 interview on Trump’s private jet, in which she laughed when he told her he wanted to run for president. Continue reading...

Former prime minister says Cabinet Office gave entries to the Met police without checking their contentsBoris Johnson has insisted the idea that evidence in diaries given to police might suggest further lockdown rule-breaking during the Covid pandemic is “absolute nonsense”.The former prime minister said a Cabinet Office decision to give entries from his official diary to the police without checking their contents with him was “ridiculous”. Continue reading...

Formal identification yet to be confirmed as another boy, 14, remains in critical condition following River Eden incidentThe body of a teenage boy has been found in the River Eden in Carlisle after a 15-year-old went missing on Friday, Cumbria constabulary said.The discovery followed an extensive search operation. Police were contacted at 6.41pm on Friday after a report that four teenage boys had got into difficulty in a section of the river near the city’s Rosehill area. Continue reading...

The hit drama cemented a film and TV boom in the West Yorkshire town and its surroundings – and now the cameras can’t stay awayPiece Hall, in the West Yorkshire town of Halifax, is among the great relics of the glory days of England’s industrial north, one of the few surviving cloth halls, where international business was carried out in the heart of textile-trade country from the late 18th century.Recently it’s had a transformation into a tourist attraction stuffed with independent shops that also hosts major outdoor concerts – this summer will see it play host to gigs by Madness, Rag’n’Bone Man, Hozier and Orbital. Continue reading...

Seth Kneller, 43, remanded in custody after appearing at Westminster magistrates courtA man who was arrested after a car crashed into the gates of Downing Street has been released under police investigation but charged separately with making indecent images of children, police have said.Seth Kneller, of Crewe, was initially detained by armed officers after a crash involving a silver Kia near the prime minister’s official residence in Whitehall at 4.20pm on Thursday. Continue reading...

Group was among the last opposition parties, as political dissent has been banned since 2020’s security lawThe Civic party, one of Hong Kong’s most prominent pro-democracy groups, has voted to disband because of a leadership vacuum, after its members were squeezed out of local councils and charged under Beijing’s national security law.Nicknamed “the barristers’ party”, it was founded in 2006 by professional elites – mostly from the legal sector – who wanted to promote democratisation and civil society in Hong Kong. Continue reading...

Presidential adviser says supply lines and depots already being destroyed as preliminary operations get under way• Russia-Ukraine war – latest updatesPreliminary operations have already begun to pave the way for a counteroffensive against Russian occupying forces, a Ukrainian presidential adviser has said.“It’s a complicated process, which is not a matter of one day or a certain date or a certain hour,” Mykhailo Podolyak said in an interview with the Guardian. “It’s an ongoing process of de-occupation, and certain processes are already happening, like destroying supply lines or blowing up depots behind the lines. Continue reading...

More than 2m litres of water pumped from dam on orders of food inspector who said device held sensitive government dataA government official in central India has been suspended after he ordered a reservoir to be drained to retrieve his dropped phone.Millions of litres of water were pumped over three days from the Kherkatta dam in the state of Chhattisgarh after Rajesh Vishwas, a food inspector, said his Samsung mobile held sensitive government data. Continue reading...

Government accused of backing ‘inhumane’ policies as 16 people are badly hurt by barrier blocking entry via Poland from BelarusRefugees and asylum seekers have been seriously injured by a “dangerous” razor-wire fence that the UK helped to build to keep asylum seekers out of Europe.At least 16 people have been gravely hurt, some hospitalised, when recently attempting to reach Europe by crossing a 5.5m-high barrier the British military helped to construct on Poland’s border with Belarus. Continue reading...

Bacari-Bronze O’Garro, 18, to appear again at Thames magistrates court after posting ‘prank’ videoA teenager is to appear in court after he was charged with breaching a criminal behaviour order imposed for posting a “prank” video on TikTok.Bacari-Bronze O’Garro, 18, known as Mizzy, of Hackney, north London, was made subject to the order at Thames magistrates court on Wednesday, banning him from posting videos on social media without the consent of those featuring in them. Continue reading...

Votes will allow the parties to hone their strategies before December’s general electionSpain heads to the polls on Sunday to elect 12 regional governments and 8,000 municipal councils in votes that will allow the governing Socialists and the opposition conservatives to gauge their strengths and hone their strategies before December’s general election.Isabel Díaz Ayuso, the rightwing, populist president of the Madrid region, will be aiming to secure an absolute majority for the People’s party (PP), while Barcelona’s leftwing mayor, Ada Colau, will be hoping to see off challenges from the regional branch of the Socialist party and a centre-right Catalan pro-independence party. Continue reading...