Fully vaccinated visitors from New Zealand will be able to enter freely from Monday, as Australia prepares gradually reopen its borders

Australian prime minister defends move to ditch French submarine contract as ‘the right decision’ at G20 in Rome

UK figures down from 43,467 new infections and 186 deaths on Friday; authorities in Thailand issue order as country prepares to open to tourists

After the worries over ‘wokeness’, hunting was the day’s big issueThose who care deeply about the stately homes of Britain tuned in on Saturday from a dozen countries around the world to watch a peculiar spectator sport: the National Trust annual general meeting.The stage was set for a tournament that promised one victor: either the reforming board of the National Trust, determined to move with the times, or a rebellious contingent calling for a return to first principles of preservation and established scholarship. Continue reading...

Firms defend paying no corporation tax after government handed out billions to energy giantsShell and BP, which together produce more than 1.7bn tonnes of greenhouse gases a year, have not paid any corporation tax on oil and gas production in the North Sea for the last three years, company filings reveal.The oil giants, which have an annual global footprint of greenhouse gases more than five times bigger than Britain’s, are benefiting from billions of pounds of tax breaks and reliefs for oil and gas production. Continue reading...

There are concerns rising metal prices will lead to more illegal scavenging unless the government acts to protect wrecksVera Ryan doesn’t know much about her uncle Jack. Petty officer Jack Messenger was one of 35 men who were on the HMAS AE1 submarine when it sank in the early days of the first world war.But she knows the site of the wreck is an important place, a place of memories for her and the hundred-odd other descendants and families of the Australian and British sailors who died. Continue reading...

Killers said they were Taliban but government denies responsibility and says two of them have been arrestedGunmen presenting themselves as Taliban attacked a wedding in eastern Afghanistan to stop music being played and killed at least three people, the government has said.Taliban government spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said on Saturday that two of the three attackers had been arrested, and denied they were acting on behalf of the Islamist movement. Continue reading...

Annual memorial procession calls out names of growing number of people who died in prison or police custodyHundreds of friends and relatives of people who died in prison or police custody have held a procession through central London in remembrance and calling for justice for their loved ones.Supporters of the United Friends & Families Campaign gathered in Trafalgar Square just after midday on Saturday for the march, which has taken place every year in London since 1999. Continue reading...

Pro-coup forces reportedly use live ammunition and teargas in Khartoum and OmdurmanSudanese security forces have opened fire on massive demonstrations across the country against last week’s military coup, killing at least three protesters and injuring many more.According to reports on social media and claims by Sudanese pro-democracy organisations, pro-coup security forces have used live ammunition and teargas in several locations in Khartoum and its twin city Omdurman as well as in the city of Nyala. Continue reading...

Expulsion ordered a day after similar move by Saudi Arabia in response to criticism of the Riyadh-led interventionKuwait has given Lebanon’s envoy to the emirate 48 hours to leave, a day after Saudi Arabia made a similar move over a minister’s criticism of the Riyadh-led military intervention in Yemen.The diplomatic row, in which Saudi Arabia has also suspended imports from Lebanon and Bahrain has expelled Beirut’s envoy to Manama, is another blow for a country already in the grip of crippling political and economic crises. Continue reading...

Chris Riddell on ghouls, Brexit and the budget• You can order your own copy of this cartoon Continue reading...

A role in the sci-fi epic Dune has transformed the young actor into a bona fide leading man – but not one from the old Hollywood mouldIn September, the Met Gala in New York – Anna Wintour’s annual fusion of fundraising gala and celebrity parade – redesigned itself for generation Z. Instagram sponsored the event, Justin Bieber was its headline performer, and four young whippersnappers were enlisted as co-chairs: singer Billie Eilish, tennis player Naomi Osaka, poet Amanda Gorman and – the elder statesman of the quartet at 25 – Timothée Chalamet.Chalamet turned up, typically tousle-haired and puppy-eyed, in an outfit of two halves. Up top, a cropped, snugly tailored satin tuxedo jacket by avant-garde designer Haider Ackermann, complete with cummerbund and blingy brooches. Below, a pair of baggy cream jogging bottoms, tucked into white socks and Converse trainers. Half princely film star, half kid at play: it’s a look that encapsulates the persona of the biggest, most hysterically obsessed-over teen idol to emerge from the movies since the heyday of Twilight. Continue reading...

Despite the chancellor’s ‘levelling up’ cash, there were few signs of optimism in Pudsey marketIn the aftermath of his budget speech last week, Rishi Sunak sent a tweet trumpeting a £20m investment in transport in the Leeds West constituency. It was designed to goad the local MP and shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves. But as Reeves pointed out, the money was actually for next-door Pudsey, a Tory seat.Yet even in Pudsey last week, where the money will be spent on upgrading a main road, there was little support for Sunak’s supposed largesse, given that it comes after a decade of underinvestment. Continue reading...

Stonewall CEO comments come as first 29 people from this group arrive in the Britain after fleeing TalibanThe level of threat against LGBTQ+ Afghans is “escalating and escalating” a charity chief has warned, as the first 29 people from this group arrived in Britain.Nancy Kelley, the chief executive of Stonewall, the lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans equality charity, who has been closely involved in the operation to airlift LGBTQ+ Afghans to safety, working with the Home Office, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office and the Canadian organisation Rainbow Railroad, welcomed the safe of arrival of the group. Continue reading...

Boat was discovered in freshwater pool during construction of a tourist train to the ruins of Maya cityA wooden canoe used by the ancient Maya and believed to be more than 1,000 years old has turned up in southern Mexico almost completely intact, officials have said.The extremely rare canoe was found submerged in a freshwater pool known as a cenote, thousands of which dot Mexico’s Yucatán peninsula, near the ruins of Chichén Itzá, once a major Maya city featuring elaborately carved temples and towering pyramids. Continue reading...

Duke of York says Virginia Giuffre, who accused him of forcing her to have sex when she was 17, is seeking a ‘payday’ at his expenseIn a filing asking a US judge to dismiss a civil lawsuit in which he is accused of sexually abusing a woman when she was 17, Prince Andrew said his accuser, Virginia Giuffre, was seeking a “payday” at his expense.A filing with the US district court in Manhattan on Friday signed by the lawyer Andrew Brettle said: “Giuffre has initiated this baseless lawsuit against Prince Andrew to achieve another payday at his expense and at the expense of those closest to him.” Continue reading...

Traveller who had arrived on a flight from New Zealand on Wednesday tests positive

The Cop26 summit in Glasgow begins on Monday: our environment correspondent traces the long buildup – and the implications of failureIn the Marshall Islands people are used to the vagaries of the ocean. But recently the monthly “king tide” has brought new perils to this small group of islands in the Pacific about halfway between Australia and Hawaii. Waves crash over the roads and airport runways, especially when the unusually high tide coincides with a storm surge, cutting off communication and making daily business dangerous or impossible.The islanders’ lives are now full of inescapable reminders of climate breakdown, says Tina Stege, the climate envoy for the tiny nation of 60,000 people on 29 atolls. “We see stronger storms and storm surges. Droughts are more frequent and more intense and longer. Growing up I remember just one very intense drought; now they’re happening maybe every three years. We recently had a dengue fever emergency, a problem we’re seeing now in the winter months as they get warmer.” Continue reading...

Narendra Modi joins in mourning for much-loved star of southern Indian cinemaPuneeth Rajkumar, a leading star of southern Indian regional cinema, has died after a heart attack. He was 46.Rajkumar had performed lead roles in 29 movies and also appeared on television, where he was the host of a Kannada-language version of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? Continue reading...

From living in a dugout in Little Siberia to his friendship with Allen Ginsberg in New York, artist and activist Ai Weiwei reveals what drives his restless creativityAi Weiwei is hard to pin down. For the first few minutes of our Zoom call, him bleary-eyed at his computer, I think he’s talking to me from his new base in Portugal. My mistake – it’s Vienna, where he’s planning a show for next March. A year and a half ago, Ai was giving interviews about his new life in Britain; before that it was Germany, the country that offered him safe harbour when he finally left China in 2015, after years of hounding by the authorities and a spell in detention. So where does he actually live?“Yeah, the question always comes up,” he says sheepishly. He moved to Cambridge so his son, Ai Lao, could improve his English. His son is still there, but in the meantime, “I found a piece of land near Lisbon, so I’m kind of settled there, but that’s only for the past year”. Continue reading...

Retailers accused of ignoring soaring production costs to keep prices low, with Aldi singled out as leading way

Drone footage shows vast amounts of pumice pebbles, spewed out months ago by an undersea volcano, clogging up a fishing port in Kagoshima prefecture, in southern Japan. The pumice has so far affected 19 ports in Kagoshima, and 11 on Okinawa, putting hundreds of fishing boats out of action and damaging the tourism industry.

Swastika seen hanging from Margaret Street apartment complex in city’s CBDCongregants at a Brisbane synagogue were confronted by the sight of a Nazi flag flying from a nearby apartment window on Saturday.Visitors to the synagogue reported seeing the swastika symbol hanging from a UniLodge complex on Margaret Street in the central business district on Saturday morning, the Queensland Jewish Board of Deputies vice-president, Jason Steinberg, said. Continue reading...

Polls show the LDP may struggle to hold on to its sole majority in the 465-seat chamberThe party that has governed Japan almost without interruption for nearly seven decades is expected to win Sunday’s general election, but the new prime minister, Fumio Kishida, could emerge with his authority damaged.Kishida, who became president of the ruling Liberal Democratic party (LDP) last month, is hoping to capitalise on a dramatic fall in coronavirus cases in Japan in recent weeks and engage voters with promises of a “new capitalism” that will redistribute wealth to the country’s struggling middle class. Continue reading...

Victoria reported 11 deaths while NSW recorded 236 infections and three deaths

Fred, 26, PhD student, meets Laurine, 24, French teaching assistantFred on LaurineWhat were you hoping for?

The Labour politician is used to fighting battles – but can she win her latest: convincing her colleagues to back proper maternity cover for fellow members?Stella Creasy is dodging people on the pavement as we talk. She apologises for the background noise but it’s hard finding time for a conversation when you have a newborn son, a toddler daughter, and no proper maternity leave from a full-time job as Labour MP for Walthamstow; this walk to an appointment is the only window she has. Last month, she spoke in a Commons debate on childcare, baby Pip in a sling, sounding astonishingly composed for someone who had given birth four weeks earlier. I ask how she’s feeling and she laughs briefly and says: “Tired as hell, mad as anything.”And then it all comes tumbling out: the night before that debate, she’d been in hospital with an infection she thinks was brought on by doing too much. The day after her caesarean, she was dialling into meetings with the defence secretary from hospital – she has had about 200 cases in her London constituency of people seeking help getting family members out of Afghanistan – and has barely stopped since. “There wasn’t any alternative,” she says. “These are people ringing up my staff threatening to kill themselves because they’re so worried about family members. You can hear the terror in their voices.” Meanwhile, she’s grappling with “the mum guilt” for not taking more time off, while struggling to be patient with people in parliament who ask how she is, only to back away when answered honestly. Having lost a battle with the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (Ipsa) this summer over the maternity leave cover she wanted, Creasy refuses to draw a polite veil over the consequences. And if that means breaking the working mother taboo against admitting that everything is not in fact fine, then so be it. Continue reading...

Congresswoman Liz Cheney and Anti-Defamation League president denounce Fox News host’s ‘lies’ as he plugs new seriesThe conservative Republican Liz Cheney and the chief executive of the Anti-Defamation League led condemnation of Fox News and Tucker Carlson, after the primetime host announced a series about the supposed “true story” of the deadly attack on the US Capitol on 6 January.They denounced Carlson for spreading dangerous conspiracy theories in the latest scandal to engulf a man whose popularity belies his record of racist and untrue statements on issues from immigration to racial justice. Continue reading...

At the end of Black History Month, we ask prominent Black British figures to assess where the UK stands in terms of equality and cohesionIt’s hard not to see the past year as a missed opportunity. I’ve been banging on about racism for 30 years, but the voices for change are getting louder and more articulate. Yet though we’ve seen a range of books on our experiences, our hopes and our frustrations, it still feels like a huge section of the British public aren’t listening. This is a country that cherishes its history and its traditions, but unfortunately this means there’s a resistance to change. We need to start embracing difference. Continue reading...

Dozens of fishing vessels and ports have been damaged, with tonnes of the floating pebbles being removed from coastlines every dayVast amounts of pumice pebbles, spewed out months ago by an undersea volcano, has clogged dozens of ports and damaged fishing boats along Japan’s southernmost coastlines.Deputy chief cabinet secretary Yoshihiko Isozaki said on Friday that the pumice had so far affected 11 ports on Okinawa and 19 others in the Kagoshima prefecture, on Japan’s southernmost island of Kyushu, and forced the central government to establish a disaster recovery task force. Continue reading...

Red-armbanded ‘Chaoyang masses’ likened to KGB and MI6 have become a common sight on streets of China’s capitalThey are often seen wearing a red armband patrolling residential neighbourhoods of Chaoyang, the biggest district of Beijing, which is home to nearly 3.5 million people. On a sunny late autumn afternoon, they will sit with a group of retirees in the sun and chat away. But when an individual of interest turns up, their attention quickly diverts to them.In Chinese media and official police statements, these vigilante neighbourhood watchers are called the “Chaoyang masses”. Last week, the state-owned Global Times went a step further, quoting internet users as saying the mysterious group “could match four famous intelligence [agencies], the CIA, MI6, KGB and Mossad”. Some jokingly called it “the fifth largest intelligence agency in the world”. Continue reading...

The SES was dealing with more than 1,300 callouts for assistance as of Saturday morningMore than 100,000 Victorian properties are still without power after wild storms tore down power lines and damaged homes, causing widespread blackouts.Destructive winds lashed the state on Thursday night, with thousands of requests for emergency assistance and hundreds of properties damaged. Continue reading...

Duke of York files motion requesting New York court ‘respectfully moves to dismiss plaintiff Virginia Giuffre’s complaint’Prince Andrew has filed a motion requesting a New York court dismiss a sexual harassment lawsuit against him, a court document showed.Attorneys for the Duke of York said in the filing on Friday that Andrew “respectfully moves to dismiss plaintiff Virginia Giuffre’s complaint”. Continue reading...

ODNI reject bioweapons claims but says origins of virus may never be known, barring dramatic breakthrough in Chinese cooperationAllegations that the Covid-19 virus was designed as a bioweapon – a theory aired by some senior Republicans – are based on “scientifically invalid claims” whose proponents “are suspected of spreading disinformation”, the US intelligence agencies have reported.Most of the 17 US agencies also agree that the virus had not been genetically engineered, while observing it is becoming increasingly difficult to detect signs of such tampering. However, the intelligence community is still divided on the question of whether the virus was spread by animal-to-human transmission or as the result of a lab accident, concluding that that may never be known barring a dramatic breakthrough in Chinese cooperation. Continue reading...

Club remain weirdly in thrall to a 79-year-old man who has not coached in almost a decade when a cultural reset is neededIt was a few months into David Moyes’s ill-fated reign at Manchester United, and with results in freefall and the dressing room in mutiny, Patrice Evra decided to go to see the only man he knew who could fix things.“Boss, you have to help David,” he pleaded with Sir Alex Ferguson on a visit to his home in Cheshire. Continue reading...

The tiny town of Matatā provides a bleak preview of the challenges that could play out across the country in the decades to comeThere’s a moment on the road from Auckland to the Bay of Plenty, after hours of farmland, when the view of the sea rears up in front of you. The fields retreat, the horizon expands, the road is lined by Pohutukawa trees clinging to the cliffs. The change in view is as stark as an etch-a-sketch being wiped clean.Follow that road and you come to a tiny settlement, slipped between the sea and a steep spine of hills running down New Zealand’s Toi-te-Huatahi coastline. Gradually, the once-orderly and plush beachfront homes are disappearing. Houses are replaced with grassed lots, weeds push up through the cul de sac pavements. Soon, the view will be transformed further still, the last remnants of the neighbourhood replaced with a reserve stretching from the road to the sea. On one of the few remaining fences is a sign: “Leave our homes alone! Watch out the rest of New Zealand – you’re next!” Continue reading...

Joe Biden held an unusually long meeting with Pope Francis at the Vatican and gifted him a 'command coin' sometimes awarded to soldiers and leaders. 'You are the most significant warrior for peace I've ever met,' the US president told the pope. Citing what he said was a tradition linked to the coin, he joked: 'Next time I see you, if you don't have it, you have to buy the drinks'

Joe Biden tried to repair his personal and political relationship with Emmanuel Macron by acknowledging that the announcement of a security and technology pact that blindsided France was a 'clumsy' episode handled with a lack of grace. The US president and his French counterpart met at France’s Vatican embassy in Rome on Friday, before the G20 leaders’ summit this weekend, for their first in-person discussion since Macron was left feeling betrayed and humiliated by September’s security deal

The 66-year-old’s stabbing of her husband, David Jackson, became a test of courts’ attitudes towards coercive control

Both sides say serious gaps remain but negotiations will resume next weekTalks between the EU and the UK on the dispute over the Northern Ireland Brexit protocol have ended the week without a breakthrough.Both sides have indicated that serious gaps remain on thinking. The EU said it believed the UK was not taking its proposals, which it described as “unprecedented and far-reaching”, seriously enough. Continue reading...

Police say Communist party’s Valery Rashkin claimed to have found animal after it had been killedAn MP with Russia’s opposition Communist party is under investigation for allegedly hunting without a licence after police found the dismembered remains of an elk in the boot of his car.Valery Rashkin confirmed to local media that he was stopped by police while driving in Russia’s Saratov region with the elk carcass in his trunk but said he and a travel companion did not shoot the elk and had planned to report the animal’s death to police. Continue reading...

Late-night hosts discuss Facebook’s rebrand as ‘Meta’, tortuous negotiations for Biden’s social policy bill and Trump’s op-edStephen Colbert kicked off Thursday’s Late Show with news of Facebook’s rebrand to Meta, “as in, your aunt Gloria saying, ‘I met a guy on Facebook who says the vaccine makes his balls magnetic,’” he quipped. Continue reading...

Rococo painting to go back on show at Wallace Collection with greater depth and detailA complex and delicate conservation process on one of the most celebrated paintings in French art history has revealed fresh vibrancy and detail that shows the artist’s “true genius”.Jean-Honoré Fragonard’s The Swing, created in 1767, was considered by many contemporaries as highly risqué for its depiction of a young woman revealing a glimpse of her undergarments from her perch in a verdant garden. Continue reading...

Disengage from this visit, says Annalisa Barbieri. Explain to your children that you don’t want to see your exNext month my ex-husband is coming over from abroad to meet our son’s new baby. The whole family is viewing the prospect with alarm. He left when our son was one and our daughter four, and subjected me to all kinds of physical, verbal, financial and emotional abuse.Last time he came, he expected to be ferried about and have meals and laundry provided, and claimed to be unable to pay for anything – he is in his 60s and behaves like a spoiled teenager. My son lives in a small house and is considering paying for his dad to stay in a hotel. My daughter has no space and lives a distance away. Although my ex claims to have stopped, he smokes heavily, including cannabis, and my daughter has said she doesn’t want him doing this around her young child. Continue reading...

Aerial footage shows the devastating impact of flooding in Dumfries after the River Nith burst its banks, days before Cop26 climate talks in Glasgow. The conditions have also led to evacuations, the closure of schools as well as travel disruption in the south and west of Scotland

Other royals are stepping up, including at Cop26, as a monarch who doesn’t like to say no has to reduce her workloadAs Prince Charles steps up to welcome world leaders to the Cop26 climate summit next week, the Queen will appear in a recorded video from Windsor to address delegates in Glasgow. It could well be a defining moment.With the Queen’s advanced years, there has been a gradual devolving of some of the more arduous public engagements to younger members of the royal family. The Duke of Edinburgh’s death in April at 99 and the Queen’s recent cancellation of public engagements to rest on medical advice after undisclosed tests, which necessitated an overnight hospital stay, has focused attention on the inevitable transition – and what it entails. Continue reading...

The athlete turned activist joins forces with Ava Duvernay for a bold and devastating docudrama mixing the story of his early life with shocking stats on racial inequalityColin Kaepernick became famous in the US as an NFL quarterback. He became famous around the world, and infamous in his own country, when he became a civil rights protester and – shortly after that – no longer an NFL quarterback. Kaepernick drew admiration and condemnation when he took the knee during the playing of the US national anthem at a preseason game in 2016, in protest against US police brutality and racial inequality after multiple police shootings of black people and the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement.His actions inspired many more players to join him in similar actions – then president Trump to recommend that such players should be fired. At the end of the season, the managers at his team, the San Francisco 49ers, told him they were going to release him – a move largely seen as politically rather than practically motivated, despite the 49ers’ claim that he didn’t fit in with their new coach’s plans. His activism has increased and he has remained unsigned since. Continue reading...

In the run-up to the climate conference, the rock’n’roll poet reflects – with a little help from her daughter – on a life spent breaking barriers, hanging out with Dylan and learning to InstagramMore than two decades ago, Patti Smith and a group of other artists were sitting with the Dalai Lama when the late Adam Yauch of the Beastie Boys asked the Tibetan spiritual leader a question: what’s the number-one thing that young people can do to make a better world? Without missing a beat, the Dalai Lama replied: “Look after the environment.”“I thought it was so beautiful,” Smith says in her trademark New York drawl. “That was his number-one preoccupation. Not to free Tibet, but to take in hand a global concern that was going to affect us all, on a scale we haven’t seen before.” Continue reading...

Data shows extent of vaccine inequality between high and low-income countries

‘Historic’ gesture for bilateral talks on summit fringe is intended to emphasise continuityAngela Merkel will bring her likely successor as German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, along to bilateral meetings on the fringe of this weekend’s G20 summit, in a “historic” gesture to emphasise continuity between the outgoing and incoming governments.Social Democrat Scholz, who is conducting coalition talks to form a power-sharing deal with the German Greens and the Free Democratic party (FDP), is expected to attend bilateral meetings with the US president, Joe Biden, and Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, as well as the heads of state or government of Argentina, Singapore, India and South Korea. Continue reading...