Night-time tragedy at revered site in Indian-administered Kashmir happened as thousands of pilgrims massed to offer prayersAt least 12 people have died and 13 were injured in a stampede at a religious shrine in Indian-administered Kashmir as thousands of pilgrims massed to offer prayers.The disaster happened around 3am on New Year’s Day while it was still dark on the route to the Vaishno Devi shrine, one of the area’s most revered Hindu sites. Continue reading...
New York tradition brings some normalcy as coronavirus pandemic leads to cancellation of shows around the worldA Miley Cyrus wardrobe malfunction, a celebrity rant about outgoing New York City mayor, Bill de Blasio, and the traditional dropping of a six-tonne ball in Times Square were among the highlights as America welcomed the new year, and bid good riddance to the old one.The New Year’s Eve tradition of crowds at Times Square returned this year, though with only 15,000 of the usual 60,000 spectators there to watch the ball, encrusted with nearly 2,700 Waterford crystals, descend as couples embraced, some still wearing their masks. Continue reading...
by Mostafa Rachwani and Donna Lu (earlier) on (#5THK5)
NSW records 22,577 new cases and four deaths, Victoria 7,442 cases and nine deaths, Queensland 2,266 cases, South Australia 2,100, Tasmania 428, Northern Territory 54 and the ACT 448; Queensland makes masks mandatory indoors; SA clinic sends wrong test result to 11 people. This blog is now closed
Police had mounted a search operation after the young boy went missing in a community south-west of Alice SpringsA young boy has died after going missing from his home in a remote community south-west of Alice Springs in the Northern Territory.The boy’s family reported his absence to police after they had searched for several hours. Continue reading...
Residents of Pontedeume form patrol after brushes with man they suspect is escaped murder convict Alfredo Sánchez ChacónResidents of a town in north-west Spain have banded together to try to track down a convicted murderer – nicknamed the “Galician Rambo” for his multiple jailbreaks and extensive knowledge of survival techniques – who is believed to be living in a nearby wooded area.Alfredo Sánchez Chacón has been on the run since March when he failed to return to prison after being allowed out on a day pass. News that the 63-year-old was missing probably surprised few: Sánchez Chacón, who is due to be in prison until 2025 for a murder in 1996, was already notorious across Spain for slipping out of prison twice. Continue reading...
Iranian-Austrian Kamran Ghaderi is serving a 10-year sentence for spying and his family are still waiting for answersSix years ago on New Year’s Day, an Iranian-Austrian IT businessman said goodbye to his wife and three children and boarded a flight from Vienna to Tehran via Istanbul. Kamran Ghaderi was due to return five to six days later, but instead, on 2 January 2016, he was arrested and has now spent six years in Evin prison in Tehran.In October 2016, he was sentenced to 10 years for spying for a foreign country at a trial in which neither he nor his lawyer were able to say more than two words. His sentencing was based on a confession he gave under what his wife, Harika, says was torture, in the belief she might be in danger. No written judgment has ever been given to his family. Continue reading...
France takes over EU presidency, with Macron announcing an ambitious agenda while eyeing domestic re-electionEmmanuel Macron has declared “the year 2022 must be a turning point for Europe” as France took over the rotating presidency of the European Union.In a New Year’s Eve national address, the French president hailed the EU’s role during the Covid-19 crisis and announced an ambitious agenda for the bloc that could also serve his domestic campaign for re-election. Continue reading...
Kim’s focus on food and factories rather than nuclear weapons or US underscores country’s economic crisisThe North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un, has capped off his 10th year in power with a speech that made more mention of tractor factories and school uniforms than nuclear weapons or the United States.North Korea’s main goals for 2022 will be jump-starting economic development and improving people’s lives as it faces a “great life-and-death struggle”, Kim told a meeting of the ruling party’s central committee on Friday. Continue reading...
A 27-year-old man is in police custody after the incident at the West Kentish Road campgrounds in state’s north-westA man has allegedly driven a car through a tent at a campground in Tasmania in the early hours of New Year’s Day, injuring two adults and three children.They were taken to the Northwest Regional Hospital with injuries ranging from minor lacerations to suspected internal injuries. Continue reading...
by Rowena Mason Deputy political editor on (#5THKR)
Boris Johnson accused of ‘wrong priorities’ after David Winton Harding given award for services to philanthropy• New year honours feature Covid experts alongside actors and OlympiansA billionaire hedge fund founder who has given nearly £1.5m to the Conservatives has been knighted in the new year honours list, prompting accusations that Boris Johnson has “the wrong priorities”.David Winton Harding, who has been funding the Tories since 2006, was given the award for services to philanthropy. Continue reading...
by Interview by Paul Daley with Tony Birch. Produced on (#5THGG)
Paul Daley talks to Tony Birch about finding affection on the so-called margins of the inner city, the injustice of climate change and blak humour. Birch also describes why he doesn’t view his fiction as having a political messageYou can hear other episodes of Book It In hereDark as Last Night by Tony Birch was one of Guardian Australia critics and staff’s best Australian books for 2021 Continue reading...
Fun-seekers criticise Welsh restrictions on New Year’s Eve celebrations but say they’ll be carefulThey arrived at Bristol Temple Meads train station clutching cans of booze, a change of clothes and this year’s most essential New Year’s Eve accessory – a negative lateral flow test.The closure of nightclubs and restrictions in bars and pubs in Wales was not going to stop a determined band of Welsh fun-seekers hopping across the border for a big night out on the English side of the Severn. Continue reading...
Statistics on gender-based violence broadened beyond cases involving partners or exesOfficial statistics on gender-based violence in Spain will be broadened to include killings of women and children by men regardless of whether there was a prior relationship between victim and killer, in what is being described as a first in Europe.“What is not named does not exist,” said Spain’s equality minister, Irene Montero. “We have to recognise all of the victims and make visible all forms of violence – all machista [sexist] killings – so that we can put in place policies for prevention, early detection and eradication.” Continue reading...
Naples authorities refuse a public send-off for the convicted murderer known as Lady CamorraNo crowds attended the cortege for Assunta Maresca, better known as Pupetta Maresca, who died at home this week in Castellammare di Stabia aged 86. Maresca, a convicted murderer and mafia boss also known as Lady Camorra, had been the centre of such frenzied media attention in her life that Naples authorities declared she would not have a public send-off.“We are seeing on social media a glorification of this woman who is a symbol of the Camorra in our neighbourhood,” Francesco Emilio Borrelli, a regional councillor for the Europa Verde party, said in a letter to the Naples police. “The mythologising of bosses is to be avoided at all costs.” Continue reading...
Royal’s legal team say some of the disclosure requests in Virginia Giuffre lawsuit are ‘overbroad and oppressive’Lawyers representing a woman who has accused Prince Andrew of sexual abuse are demanding that he hand over documents explaining why he does not sweat.Virginia Giuffre’s legal team have requested a wealth of information from Andrew’s lawyers in response to his BBC Newsnight interview in 2019 when he said he visited a Pizza Express on the day of the claimed sexual encounter. Continue reading...
Tony Wilson, director of the Institute for Employment Studies, on whether the huge rise in vacancies in the UK offers an incentive to look for another jobWith the pandemic, workers have been saying “I quit!” in their droves. In the US, employees packed in their jobs at such pace that a new term was coined – the Great Resignation – and alongside it, countless newspaper articles appeared about career-switching. But in the UK, are as many people quitting as we think? And would the greatest new year’s resolution be to join in? I asked Tony Wilson, director of the Institute for Employment Studies.Is the Great British Resignation under way?
Man arrested on suspicion of affray after disorder between Avon Vale hunt members and protestersA man has been arrested on suspicion of affray after disorder at a Boxing Day hunt, according to police.Anti-hunt protesters and members of the Avon Vale Hunt clashed in the village of Lacock in Wiltshire on the morning of 27 December. Continue reading...
With his odd symbols and signs, the East German painter created a ‘democratic’ style in defiance of the state. A new exhibition shows how his vision was inspired by the trauma of conflict and the cold warIn 1979, the Stasi entered Ralf Winkler’s Dresden studio and trashed the place. It was the culmination of a harassment campaign against the artist, who found fame under the pseudonym AR Penck, for refusing to make social-realist propaganda.Instead, his paintings featured oft-repeated hieroglyphs, odd symbols and signs, seemingly child-like naive scrawls and simple stick men (often with outsized penises). The authorities were right to be suspicious of this new painterly style: Penck sought the construction of a new language, one that mixed the linguistic and pictorial, that was both “universal” and “democratic”. It was a wish born of the trauma of the second world war, particularly witnessing the destruction of Dresden as a child, and the ensuing dystopia of the German Democratic Republic. Continue reading...
Country celebrates new year amid record rise in Covid cases and sweltering temperaturesAustralia has welcomed in the new year more cautiously than usual, with far fewer people attending firework displays and other events.But after a tumultuous 2021 the prime minister, Scott Morrison, said Australians had much to be thankful for. “Despite the pandemic, despite the floods, the fires, continuing drought in some areas, the cyclones, the lockdowns, even mice plagues, Australia is stronger today than we were a year ago. And we’re safer,” he said in a New Year’s Eve message. Continue reading...
Remember being inundated with invitations and parties? If the last two years have taught me anything, it’s that you don’t have to go to any of themIt was never my intention to hide in the toilet. There was lots going on outside: highbrow small talk and top-tier networking; free drinks, air kisses, and cold canapés that – I’d quickly discovered, following glances – were very much, like my fellow attenders, there only for show. The gallery was filled, I’d been assured, with fashion figures and media leaders. I was lucky to have been invited to this salon, one of the hosts had informed me, generously. Exactly what a “salon” is, I’m still unsure.Deep down, I just didn’t want to be there. Only 90 minutes previously I’d been watching Gogglebox and scoffing Pringles in bed. But I went along out of some sense of duty. Perhaps a desire to broaden my horizons, or a compulsion to step outside my comfort zone, where I had become too safe and snug. Now here I was, sitting in a locked cubicle counting down the minutes before I could leave without seeming rude. Continue reading...
Germany and UK are big exporters of plastic, much of which lies rotting in ports in Turkey, Vietnam and other countries141 containers filled with rotting plastic waste have been on a journey for more than a year. Scattered between Turkey, Greece and Vietnam, far from their origins in Germany, the containers’ voyage sheds light on the hidden global trade in plastic waste.Arriving in Turkey in late 2020, shortly before a ban on mixed plastic waste imports came into force, the containers quickly became the centre of a battle between traders, a shipping line, multiple governments and environmental campaigners demanding their return. Continue reading...
Analysis: expect more daunting challenges, from an arms race in space and possible war in Ukraine to increasing populism … not to mention the pandemicOn the brink of a new year, the world faces a daunting array of challenges: the Covid pandemic, the climate emergency, the epic struggle between democracy and authoritarianism, humanitarian crises, mass migration, and trans-national terrorism. There is also the danger of new inter-state conflicts, exacerbated by the breakdown of the rules-based international order and the unregulated spread of lethal autonomous weapons employing artificial intelligence. All in all, for most people on Earth – and a handful in space – 2022 will be another year of living dangerously. Continue reading...
This follow-up to the 2016 flop makes a scattershot attempt at fusing celebrity satire with a riotous musical plot“Fans are fickle. You never know when taste might change. It’s a numbers game, and I’m going to play it,” says Bodi, the guitar-hero hound from the village of Snow Mountain. While Rock Dog 2 nominally denounces selling out, perhaps mindful of how the 2016 original – one of the most expensive Chinese-produced animations ever – bombed, it hectically plays the numbers game itself. Half modern entertainment-biz trawl, half nostalgic Asian rural fable, this messy sequel tries to cover both western and Chinese angles – and toss around enough scattershot energy to keep everyone happy.Bodi’s power-pop trio True Blue are the hottest new act on the block, their music radiating cyan energy waves out to their following. But they have popped up on the radar of Lang, a music-impresario sheep with a fluffy pompadour and British Invasion accent, who has multiple agendas: not just to separate Bodi from his bandmates by teaming him up with starlet Lil’ Foxy, but to shut down Rock’n’Roll Park where the city’s diehard guitar warriors keep the flame burning. Meanwhile in Snow Mountain’s Tibet-style fastness, Bodi’s family are fretting about his sudden fame – though, making a killing selling keychains to True Blue-mad locals, possibly succumbing to the mania themselves. Continue reading...
In what city did Bond almost come a cropper, and which country ditched the Queen? See how much you remember from the world of travel in 2021 Continue reading...
Maseray Sei, 21, was found dead after undergoing the procedure in a centuries-old ritual carried out by a secret society for womenThe death of a young woman in Sierra Leone, almost immediately after undergoing female genital mutilation, has sparked outrage and revived calls to end the practice.The body of 21-year-old Maseray Sei was found on 20 December at Nyandeni village in Bonthe district, southern Sierra Leone, a day after the FGM took place. Sei’s family said that after the procedure the mother of two boys complained of a migraine and was in pain, with complications from FGM thought to be the cause, according to activists working on the case. Continue reading...
Cases have dropped nearly 30% in a week, say authorities, as Israel approves fourth booster shot and New Year’s Eve gatherings around the world are restricted
When I woke up alone, I was terrified he was in an alley somewhere, animals feeding on his face. I am forever grateful for what I learned that nightIt was New Year’s Eve, and we were in an unheated stone hut. Adam and I had hit it off at a silent meditation retreat in Minneapolis, and I’d invited him to spend Christmas break with me in India. At the time, ringing in 2018 in a little village framed by the granite formations and snow-streaked peaks of the Himalayas had seemed like a fairytale. But that night the mercury dipped so low that my vital organs muttered “system failure” and powered down. I buried myself under quilts with concrete-level cotton padding.“It’s 7pm,” Adam protested. Continue reading...
Staff and students say the recent destruction of massacre monuments is a manifestation of a new and uneasy culture on campusSophie Mak, a recent graduate of law and literature, had walked past the fiery orange monument between classes for five years. A month after her graduation ceremony at the University of Hong Kong (HKU), two nights before Christmas, workers erected barricades around the statue. Under the cover of darkness, they cut it down.“It’s an absolute disgrace that HKU removed the Pillar of Shame so callously and so furtively,” Mak says. Continue reading...
Authorities also tell inked players to remove or cover up their designs to set ‘a good example for society’Chinese authorities have banned footballers from getting tattoos and instructed national team players who have been inked to remove them or cover them up to set a “good example for society”.A growing number of high-profile Chinese players have tattoos, including the international defender Zhang Linpeng, who has previously been told to cover up while appearing for the national team and his club Guangzhou FC. Continue reading...
Leona Peach found at address in Lincolnshire as 34-year-old man arrested on suspicion of kidnapA 12-year-old girl who vanished from her home in Devon 10 days ago has been found safe and well almost 300 miles away in Boston, Lincolnshire.Leona Peach, from Newton Abbot in south Devon, was last seen wearing flip-flops and a fur coat. Police were working on the theory that she might have travelled to north Devon where she has family connections. Continue reading...
Coroner will investigate if Kim Sampson, 29, and Samantha Mulcahy, 32, contracted virus from surgeon during C-sectionsA coroner will investigate the deaths of two women from herpes following childbirth, amid fears they contracted the virus from their surgeon.Kim Sampson, 29, and Samantha Mulcahy, 32, died weeks apart after their babies were delivered by caesarean section at different hospitals in Kent. Continue reading...
From the frontline of Covid to inspirational sports personalities, our worldwide audience name their choicesGuardian readers were asked to offer suggestions of who they would choose as their person of the year. Dozens of names were put forward – from scientists to sports personalities, from healthcare workers to climate activists.And in a sign of the ongoing debate overgender issues, many readers also nominated the author JK Rowling, and online content creator Ranboo. Continue reading...
Pair notice man jumping from platform and alert driver of a train moments before its departureA paramedic who was spending his day off trainspotting with his nine-year-old son saved the life of a young man who lay down in front of a train moments before its departure.Andy Nickolls, 57, and his son Jacob were the only ones who saw the man jumping from the platform at Taunton station in Somerset and lying on the rails.In the UK and Ireland, Samaritans can be contacted on 116 123 or email jo@samaritans.org or jo@samaritans.ie. In the US, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is 1-800-273-8255. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. Other international helplines can be found at www.befrienders.org. Continue reading...
Firework sales prohibited in Germany for second year in a row owing to Covid, resulting in growing stockpileGermans seeking to defy a government ban on the domestic selling of fireworks before new year celebrations are heading in their droves across the border to Polish shops and factories.A ban was announced this month for a second year in a row in an attempt to prevent large gatherings during the pandemic and to ease the burden on hospitals, which regularly have to treat serious injuries such as burns and lacerated limbs resulting from pyrotechnic accidents. Continue reading...
by Hosted by Jane Lee, recommended by Gabrielle Jacks on (#5TG9J)
Traditional owners are standing together to protect the Fitzroy – a ‘beautiful, living water system’. This story by Indigenous affairs editor Lorena Allam is one of our best episodes of the Guardian Australia Reads podcast in 2021You can read the original article here: A journey down WA’s mighty Martuwarra, raging river and sacred ancestorYou can find every episode of Guardian Australia Reads here, or subscribe by searching for Guardian Australia Reads wherever you get your podcasts Continue reading...
by Hosted by Jane Lee. Recommended by Rosemary Bolger on (#5TGCM)
There is a growing effort to reconnect swimmers with city waterways once thought permanently lost to pollution. Assistant news editor Rosemary Bolger recommends a story about alternatives to ocean swims
MoD reportedly warns of ‘mass damage and potential loss of life’ if ordnance on SS Richard Montgomery triggeredAn operation to remove the masts from a sunken cargo ship in the River Thames, containing 1,400 tonnes of unstable explosives onboard, will involve Royal Navy specialists.It is believed that if the unexploded ordnance on the SS Richard Montgomery were triggered it could lead to the nearby oil and gas facilities in Sheerness being damaged, the Daily Telegraph reports.This story was amended on 30 December to clarify the SS Richard Montgomery was a cargo ship. Continue reading...
In first interview since fleeing Kabul in August, former president says US ‘erased’ Afghans in years of peace talks with militantsThe former Afghan president Ashraf Ghani has broken his silence with his first interview since fleeing Kabul four months ago, in effect blaming the international community and in particular the Americans for the fall of the republic.Ghani told the BBC he was rushed into fleeing Kabul on a helicopter by his “terrified” national security adviser, Hamdullah Mohib, and the commander of the collapsing presidential security detail. Continue reading...
Actor couple Pyay Ti Oo and Eaindra Kyaw Zin and actor-director Lu Min given three years with hard labourA court in military-ruled Myanmar has jailed three prominent showbusiness figures for three years each for their part in protests against February’s coup, media reported.The military overthrew the elected government led by Aung San Suu Kyi on 1 February. In the early days of the protests that ensued, huge crowds gathered in cities and towns, and many actors and singers used social media to voice their support, with some speaking at rallies. Continue reading...
Temperatures on New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day have good chance of reaching record levelsRevellers will be celebrating on the beaches, in the hills, on rooftops, pub terraces and in back gardens as temperatures on New Year’s Eve soar towards record-breaking levels.Tens of thousands of people who will not or cannot throw a party indoors because of Covid concerns, restrictions or a lack of tests are expected to opt to see in the new year alfresco thanks to balmy weather. Continue reading...
It comes as US secretary of state calls for release of Stand News editors, saying ‘journalism is not sedition’A Hong Kong court has denied bail to two former senior editors charged with conspiring to publish seditious materials, a day after police raided Stand News, a pro-democracy media outlet, prompting its closure.About 200 officers raided the office of the online publication on Wednesday, froze its assets and arrested seven current and former senior editors and former board members, in the latest crackdown on the city’s press. Continue reading...
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