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Story of a yakuza turf war survivor smuggled to Brazil has real style and a devil-may-care cheekJonathan Rhys Meyers has turned up in some rum old places of late. He gave one of his best performances as a Gestapo officer in the Norwegian drama The 12th Man, largely overlooked in early 2019. Now the roaming Irishman can be seen playing second blade to the singer-actress Masumi in a thriller set among São Paolo’s Japanese community, the most populous of its kind outside Japan.Vicente Amorim’s film is fundamentally an exercise in shifting fistfuls of tropes – and cliches: beardy senseis, terse men named Takeshi, ambient Christopher Doyle lighting – halfway around the globe for the heck of it. Reheated 10,000 miles from source, these ingredients are presented medium-fresh. Like street-cart fusion cuisine, this film will fill a hole, if you have a particular hankering. Continue reading...

One of Bollywood’s most bankable actors has written a revolutionary pregnancy book that lifts the lid on libido, caesareans and more. She discusses power, pay and the reality behind the glamourDays after giving birth to her first child – an emergency caesarean after the cord had wrapped itself around the baby’s neck – Kareena Kapoor Khan stood undressed and alone in front of a mirror in her bedroom. “There I was: scarred, chubby, puffy, tired,” she recalls of that moment in 2016. “I saw the baby bulge, the dark circles, the dressing bandage of my C-incision. I cannot describe how I felt.”

Academic finds that lines widely reproduced in the eastern Roman empire are ‘stressed’ in a way that laid the foundations for what we recognise as poetryFor Taylor Swift, the “haters gonna hate”, but she’ll just “shake it off”. Now research by a Cambridge academic into a little-known ancient Greek text bearing much the same sentiment – “They say / What they like / Let them say it / I don’t care” – is set to cast a new light on the history of poetry and song.The anonymous text, which concludes with the lines “Go on, love me / It does you good”, was popular across the eastern Roman empire in the second century, and has been found inscribed on 20 gemstones and as a graffito in Cartagena, Spain. Continue reading...

I thought I had unleashed the full force of my student intellect in a history essay. The formidable Betty Behrens let me know I did not understand what scholarship wasI held them in awe. My supervisors at Newnham College, Cambridge, in the 50s were of the generation who had served in the war: Bletchley Park, the Board of Trade, that kind of thing. They were fiercely intelligent in a way my schoolteachers had not been. I was brimming with admiration and fear. It was why I had studied hard to be there, to pit my wit against the finest in the land. But I was to come a cropper severely. In the end, it served me well enough. But the pain remains.I had studied economics in my first year. My supervisor was Ruth Cohen, who sat on the floor in dishevelled tweeds, her legs wide and an ashtray between, to catch the ash from her continual smoking. Needless to say, she was brilliant. Soon she would be made college principal, take herself off for a makeover and emerge, neat, tidy, almost smart, to lead the college with style. Continue reading...

A group of young people are not only eschewing excess material items, but also meaningless relationships and ‘emotional clutter’Ronald L Banks was just 21 when he stood in front of his closet containing 60 pairs of jeans, a huge collection of shoes, and a wardrobe full of T-shirts and thought, “this has to stop”. He took out each item of clothing, examining them closely. Inspired by the Marie Kondo method, he asked himself the meaning that each held – and if he couldn’t answer, he donated them.Banks, a prominent YouTuber, has a channel of 130,000 fans. He broadcasts from his apartment in Wisconsin – which is pristine. His furniture consists of a sofa, a TV, a wood table and four chairs, some houseplants and paintings. He just has enough basics to get by. He chooses to live with this little, he explains, because “minimalism is living with more of what matters by choosing to want less of what doesn’t,” he says in a video. Continue reading...

Premier Daniel Andrews says lockdowns will be targeted rather than statewide if new clusters emerge in the future

The clinic, which set up an online page to book $85 consultations for the drug, has been listed as a coronavirus exposure site

Overlooking Hanoi’s deserted streets, tiny balconies have become places of refuge during the coronavirus lockdown as city residents squeeze desks, yoga mats and chairs into the spaces to get their share of fresh air. Below them, everyday objects – bamboo poles, beer crates and ladders – form makeshift barricades on the Vietnamese capital’s streets as authorities try to slow the spread of CovidBalconies photographed by Nhac Nguyen. Barricades photographed by Manan VatsyayanaEight million people living in the Vietnamese capital have been under a strict stay-at-home order since late July, allowed out only for trips to get food or hospital visits. Continue reading...

Life for single mothers in Afghanistan has always been marred by stigma and poverty. Now with the Taliban in control, what few protections they had have disappeared

Supporters and critics of Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro gathered in their thousands across cities throughout Brazil during the country's Independence Day. Supporters of the far-right President, dressed in the green and yellow of the Brazilian flag, in a show of support for his attacks on the country's Supreme Court. But Bolsonaro's detractors also took to the streets to voice their concerns on issues including the president's handling of the pandemic and Brazil's low vaccination rates.

A man was killed and buildings were damaged in the resort city of Acapulco, and the quake was also felt in Mexico CityA powerful earthquake has struck south-west Mexico near the beach resort of Acapulco, killing at least one man who was crushed by a falling post, and causing rock falls and damaging buildings.The US Geological Survey (USGS) said a 7.0 magnitude quake struck 11 miles (18km) north-east of the resort of Acapulco, Guerrero, in the early hours of Wednesday sending people running into the street for safety. Continue reading...

After 15 years campaigning, Satya Naresh believes it’s time for government action to stop the custom that causes a woman to die every hour through murder or suicideFor more than a decade, Satya Naresh has been trying to persuade India’s men to stop a wedding custom that he sees as one of the country’s worst social evils.He wants men to declare: “I don’t want dowry”. The line is the name of the website he set up in 2006 as part of his campaign. Naresh wants Indian men not to expect the money, motorbike, sofa, TV, iPhone, gold jewellery or fridge that a future wife is expected to come with. Continue reading...

The past 18 months have left many parents and carers feeling overwhelmed, irritable and wrung bone dry. Can balance ever be restored?“I’m tired of how blurred the lines are between home and work,” Julia Thomas tells me as her two boys repeatedly ask for snacks in the background. Thomas lives in London with her husband, twin 11-year-old boys and a daughter, seven. She is a civil servant, but says she is feeling so burned out by childcare that she’s considering quitting her job completely. She isn’t sleeping properly, her back and hips ache from sitting at a desk all day and her constant to-do list makes life feel chaotic.“Quitting my job feels like a big deal. I feel guilty, as if I’m letting the sisterhood down – but this situation is untenable,” she says. “The children are downstairs, while my husband and I are upstairs on Zoom meetings. We can still hear the sibling fights, even when we’re working, and when it gets bad they bring the problem to you.” Continue reading...

Despite a fifth day of falling cases, planned reopening early next year will be changed to grade countries by vaccination and case numbersSee all our coronavirus coverageNew Zealand’s plans to reopen its borders to the world early next year will have to undergo a complete reworking, the government has warned, as the country races to stamp out an outbreak of the highly infectious Delta variant.The nation recorded 15 new cases of coronavirus in the community on Wednesday, bringing the total number in the outbreak to 855. Continue reading...

Kompas TV showed footage of firefighters trying to put out huge flames from the top of a building in Banten province in western JavaA fire at a jail in Indonesia has killed 40 people, authorities have said.The fire in the prison in Banten province broke out at some time between 1am and 2am on Wednesday morning, a spokesperson for the prison department of the law and human rights ministry said. Continue reading...

The outspoken vaccine minister is favourite for the top job partly thanks to his large social media following and backing from young peopleJapan’s straight-talking, social media-savvy minister for vaccines and reform, Taro Kono, is the frontrunner to become the country’s next leader. Seen as a maverick in Japan’s staid political world, Kono has set his sights on shaking up the nation’s entrenched bureaucracy.Kono has used his platform on Twitter – where his Japanese account has nearly 2.4 million followers and his English-language one nearly 50,000 – to berate civil servants for working into the wee hours and holding late-night press conferences. Continue reading...

Jamie Spears, conservator of the pop singer’s estate since 2008, says ‘recent events’ called the arrangement into questionBritney Spears’ father has filed an unexpected request to terminate the controversial conservatorship that has controlled the singer’s life for 13 years.In a stunning move, Jamie Spears, who is the conservator of his daughter’s estate, said “recent events” called into question whether she still needed a court to oversee her personal affairs and finances. Continue reading...

As Melbourne continues to record new Covid cases, Victoria has announced a statewide lockdown. Is there a 5km or 10km travel radius limit? Is mask-wearing compulsory? Is there a curfew? Here are the rules

Channel 4’s Grenfell: The Untold Story will include previously unseen recordings of pleas to former MP and landlord executivePreviously unseen footage of Grenfell Tower residents pleading with their MP and landlord to end their mistreatment in the months before the 2017 disaster is to be broadcast for the first time.Recordings of acrimonious meetings with Victoria Borwick, the then Conservative MP for the area, and Peter Maddison, the council landlord’s senior executive in charge of works at the time, shed fresh light on how the concerns of residents were handled in the run-up to the fire on 14 June 2017. Continue reading...

Overall jabs administered in the UK stand at 91,827,909; Sweden will remove virtually all Covid restrictions on 29 September

Aaron O’Halloran’s ‘idiotic actions’ resulted in a 15-month sentence and delays on the line of up to eight hoursA man has been jailed for 15 months after driving a car half a mile down a railway track, causing passenger delays of up to eight hours.Aaron O’Halloran’s “idiotic actions” on a stretch of track between Duddeston and Aston stations in Birmingham on 9 May, which were caught on CCTV, caused more than £23,000 worth of damage, British Transport Police (BTP) said. Continue reading...

Court orders Coahuila to remove sanctions for abortion from criminal code, clearing a path to decriminalisation across MexicoMexico’s supreme court has struck down a state abortion law, ruling that criminal penalties for terminating pregnancies are unconstitutional, in a decision which advocates say provides a path to decriminalisation across the country.In a unanimous 10-0 ruling, the top court ordered the northern state of Coahuila to remove sanctions for abortion from its criminal code – with several justices arguing the prohibitions on voluntarily interrupting a pregnancy violated women’s rights to control their own bodies. Continue reading...

Delta has prompted ‘long overdue discussions’ on our tolerance for serious illness and hospital capacity, Prof Catherine Bennett says

Two armed robbers are in custody after a police chase, with a hunt under way for remaining suspectsA group of thieves have struck the Bulgari store on the Place Vendôme in Paris, making off with about €10m (£8.6m) in jewellery. They then led police on a high-speed chase during which two of the suspects were captured, sources have told AFP.Three individuals, wearing sharp suits and armed with guns, robbed the recently revamped boutique on the Place Vendôme in central Paris, where the Ritz hotel is located, shortly before midday on Tuesday, police said. Continue reading...

Thousands rallied in the capital behind the far-right populist but polls suggest his presidency is coming off the rails ahead of next year’s electionsAndré Meneses made a gun sign with his hands to convey what he thought should happen to those who opposed Jair Bolsonaro’s project for Brazil.Related: Bolsonaro supporters clash with police before major rally in Brasília Continue reading...

One London officer is alleged not to have passed on medical information about Richard OkorogheyeTwo Metropolitan police officers have been placed under investigation for alleged errors made when Richard Okorogheye went missing, a fortnight before he was found dead in Epping Forest.The 19-year-old, who had sickle cell anaemia, went missing from his west London home in March with his concerned family raising the alarm with police. One officer is alleged not to have passed on potentially important medical information about Okorogheye’s vulnerabilities. Continue reading...

Country will once again be officially known as an Islamic emirate, as at least two people killed in protestsThe Taliban have announced an all-male caretaker government including an interior minister wanted by the FBI, on a day when at least two people were killed by violent policing of street protests against the new authorities.The leadership unveiled on Tuesday is drawn entirely from Taliban ranks, despite promises of an inclusive cabinet, and many of its senior figures are on UN sanctions lists, which is likely to complicate the group’s search for international recognition. Continue reading...

Now 19 years old, the woman was accidentally switched with another baby in a hospital in La RiojaA woman is seeking €3m (£2.5m) in damages from a regional health department in northern Spain after it emerged that she and another baby were accidentally handed to the wrong families hours after they were born almost two decades ago.The maternity ward mix-up, which health authorities in the La Rioja region have attributed to “human error”, came to light by chance after a DNA test. Continue reading...

Survey from Mission Australia and Black Dog Institute indicates an increase in young people dealing with mental health issuesDuring Sydney’s lockdown last year, David Zhang started noticing a difference in himself.“I was having some panic attacks, which was completely new to me, and kind of reaching new levels,” he said. “That’s when I was like, ‘Hey, I should probably check in with someone.’” Continue reading...

Protesters also hit bodyguard but prime minister plays down incident on election campaign stop

Force fined £100,000 over incident in which woman lay undiscovered for three days after crash was reportedPolice Scotland has apologised after being fined £100,000 for admitting that its failings “materially contributed” to the death of a woman who lay seriously injured next to her deceased boyfriend in their crashed car for three days after the incident was first reported to the police.The force on Tuesday pleaded guilty to health and safety failings after the deaths of John Yuill, 28, and Lamara Bell, 25, who died after their car crashed off the M9 near Stirling in July 2015. The fine was handed down at the high court in Edinburgh. Continue reading...

US reviewers have lauded the film, but complain it is too difficult to understand and needs subtitlesKenneth Branagh’s new autobiographical film, Belfast, is tipped for Oscar glory, but his home town will not be happy if it’s in the foreign language category.Hollywood reviewers who have lauded the film’s storytelling and acting complain the Northern Ireland accents are difficult to understand and require subtitles. Continue reading...

Acting president of self-declared government calls on civilian armed groups to target military that seized power in February coupMyanmar’s self-declared parallel government, which was set up by pro-democracy politicians, has announced a “defensive war” against the junta, calling for civilian armed groups to target the military and its assets.Duwa Lashi La, the acting president of the National Unity Government (NUG), said Tuesday marked the beginning of a nationwide revolt. He warned people to avoid unnecessary travel and stock up on essentials. Continue reading...

Thousands of ethnic Koreans left Japan for North Korea decades ago lured by promise of a better lifeA Japanese court has summoned North Korea’s leader to face demands for compensation by several ethnic Korean residents of Japan who say they suffered human rights abuses in North Korea after joining a resettlement programme there that described the country as a “paradise on Earth”, a lawyer and plaintiff have said.Kim Jong-un is not expected to appear in court for the hearing on 14 October, but the judge’s decision to summon him was a rare instance in which a foreign leader was not granted sovereign immunity, said Kenji Fukuda, a lawyer representing the five plaintiffs. Continue reading...

Government says plan will ensure polls remain secure while critics argue it is unfair and undemocraticThe elections bill, which will be debated in the Commons for the first time on Tuesday, is, according to the government, an ambitious and timely set of plans to ensure elections remain fair and secure. To critics, it is undemocratic and intended to rig elections in favour of the Conservatives. So what does the bill set out? Continue reading...

Film colourisation experts have remastered footage of the last-known surviving Tasmanian tiger. The original footage was shot by Australian zoologist David Fleay in 1933 on black-and-white film. The National Film and Sound Archive scanned the original 35mm black-and-white negative into 4K and then colourisation experts in France matched the colour through drawings, sketches and paintings as well as pelts held in museum collections► Subscribe to Guardian Australia on YouTube

Figures based on reported number of US airstrikes highlight the human cost of the 20-year ‘war on terror’US drone and airstrikes have killed at least 22,000 civilians – and perhaps as many as 48,000 – since the 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001, according to new analysis published by the civilian harm monitoring group Airwars.The analysis, based on the US military’s own assertion that it has conducted almost 100,000 airstrikes since 2001, represents an attempt to estimate the number of civilian deaths across the multiple conflicts that have comprised aspects of the “war on terror”. Continue reading...

The author of the ground-breaking book Gender Trouble says we should not be surprised when the category of women expands to include trans womenIt’s been 31 years since the release of Gender Trouble. What were you aiming to achieve with the book?It was meant to be a critique of heterosexual assumptions within feminism, but it turned out to be more about gender categories. For instance, what it means to be a woman does not remain the same from decade to decade. The category of woman can and does change, and we need it to be that way. Politically, securing greater freedoms for women requires that we rethink the category of “women” to include those new possibilities. The historical meaning of gender can change as its norms are re-enacted, refused or recreated. Continue reading...

The Australian of the Year criticises the appointment of Lorraine Finlay, who has expressed concern about affirmative consent laws

Minister’s comments come as PM prepares to announce rise in NI contributions to fund social careA UK government minister has said he is “not comfortable with breaking any manifesto promises” as the prime minister prepares to announce an increase in national insurance contributions to fund health and social care and limit a rise in the state pension.Nadhim Zahawi, the vaccine deployment minister, was defending plans to fund an overhaul of social care and tackle the NHS backlog, which have attracted criticism from Conservative frontbenchers, former chancellors and the party’s so-called “red wall” MPs. Continue reading...

US puppeteer behind Sesame Street and Fraggle Rock honoured with plaque at former Hampstead homeJim Henson, the creator of the Muppets, has been honoured with a blue plaque at his former London home.The US puppeteer, acclaimed for his work on Sesame Street and Fraggle Rock and director of The Dark Crystal and Labyrinth, lived at 50 Downshire Hill in Hampstead from 1979. Continue reading...

The actor was best known for his role as Omar Little in the HBO series, and also starred in Boardwalk EmpireThe actor Michael K Williams, best known for his role as Omar Little in The Wire, has died at the age of 54.Confirming his death to the Hollywood Reporter, Williams’s representative said that it was “with deep sorrow that the family announces the passing of Emmy-nominated actor Michael Kenneth Williams. They ask for your privacy while grieving this unsurmountable loss.” Continue reading...

Firms accused of ‘rounding up workers like animals’ for compulsory vaccination as country acts to stop spread of virusThousands of workers in Zimbabwe have been told they will face the sack if they refuse to be vaccinated with one of the Covid-19 jabs, according to the country’s biggest worker’s union.The Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU), an amalgamation of 35 labour unions representing 189,000 people, has accused employers of infringing workers’ rights, saying there is no law providing for compulsory vaccinations. It has taken the government and six companies to court for ordering employees to have the vaccine, arguing that the companies are “taking the law into their own hands” by forcing the issue. Continue reading...

Industrial fishing of the tiny crustacea in a dietary supplements gold rush is threatening the very base of the food chain• This article was produced with the Environmental Reporting Collective, whose full report is part of the Oceans Inc collaborative investigative series on illegal, unreported and unregulated fishingIt’s a costly expedition, through some of the roughest seas in the world, to reach the Antarctic peninsula. A journey through Drake Passage to Subarea 48.1 faces treacherous weather, where waves can reach 12 metres (40ft) high.And yet it is a risk that 14 vessels considered worth taking last year alone, as countries increasingly venture into the Antarctic to catch a species with great value to the billion-dollar health supplement industry: krill. Continue reading...

She is back on the big screen as an assassin, is reportedly the highest-paid female actor of colour ever for a TV drama – and is moving into producing. She discusses fairness, film-making and why acting is still her first loveEven via a video call, from an anonymous-looking office in New York, against a backdrop of stacked cardboard boxes, Angela Bassett exudes glamour. Dressed down in a sleeveless white top, her hair long and dead straight, she still looks like a million dollars. But it is more Bassett’s irrepressibly expressive personality that leaps out of the screen. She is too self-deprecating and quick to laugh to be hammy, but even out of character she speaks as if she is delivering a monologue: clear and authoritative, with dramatic emphases on certain words, her face and hands in constant motion.When I ask if there are any roles left she would like to play, she says: “I used to say I wanted to play a queen, because I thought it would be really good for audiences to see a Black queen on their screens, you know, for people who grew up looking at queens not looking too much like me.” Continue reading...

Last year, three cryptocurrency enthusiasts bought a cruise ship. They named it the Satoshi, and dreamed of starting a floating libertarian utopia. It didn’t work outOn the evening of 7 December 2010, in a hushed San Francisco auditorium, former Google engineer Patri Friedman sketched out the future of humanity. The event was hosted by the Thiel Foundation, established four years earlier by the arch-libertarian PayPal founder Peter Thiel to “defend and promote freedom in all its dimensions”. From behind a large lectern, Friedman – grandson of Milton Friedman, one of the most influential free-market economists of the last century – laid out his plan. He wanted to transform how and where we live, to abandon life on land and all our decrepit assumptions about the nature of society. He wanted, quite simply, to start a new city in the middle of the ocean.Friedman called it seasteading: “Homesteading the high seas,” a phrase borrowed from Wayne Gramlich, a software engineer with whom he’d founded the Seasteading Institute in 2008, helped by a $500,000 donation from Thiel. In a four-minute vision-dump, Friedman explained his rationale. Why, he asked, in one of the most advanced countries in the world, were they still using systems of government from 1787? (“If you drove a car from 1787, it would be a horse,” he pointed out.) Government, he believed, needed an upgrade, like a software update for a phone. “Let’s think of government as an industry, where countries are firms and citizens are customers!” he declared. Continue reading...

New Zealand reported 21 new coronavirus cases on Tuesday, as everywhere except Auckland prepares to come out of lockdown

Prosecution of Julian Hessenthaler will deter whistleblowing and risks infringing press freedoms, says groupThe “excessive” criminal prosecution of a security consultant whose “Ibizagate” video brought down Austria’s government will deter whistleblowers and risks infringing fundamental press and information freedoms, rights groups have said.In an open letter, 15 Austrian and international organisations said the trial of Julian Hessenthaler, which is due to start on Wednesday, was based on “partially constructed accusations used to discredit and apprehend” him. Continue reading...

Dual US and Russian national Gene Bunin has documented the plight of Muslim minorities in China’s western regionsA prominent campaigner who has documented the plight of Muslim minorities in China’s Xinjiang region says he has barred from entering neighbouring Kazakhstan.Gene Bunin, a dual US and Russian national, is best known as the founder of the Xinjiang Victims Database, which contains entries for nearly 25,000 people incarcerated, detained or unaccounted for in Xinjiang. Continue reading...

Businesses reassess presence in territory amid curbs on movement and doubts about legal system’s reliability, with many building up offices in SingaporeInternational companies are being forced to reconsider their future in Hong Kong as China’s crackdown on civil liberties and the freedom of media and tech companies continues to gather pace, according to leading business figures in the region.With businesses already facing restrictions because of the pandemic, the introduction of the national security law last year and the government shutdown of the pro-democracy Apple Daily newspaper have sparked its biggest-ever exodus of people and rocked confidence in a city once synonymous with vibrant economic activity. Continue reading...