President signs memo allowing people from Hong Kong currently residing in US to live and work in country for 18 monthsJoe Biden has granted temporary refuge to people from Hong Kong amid the Chinese government’s effort to crush the pro-democracy movement and tighten its control on a city once known for its freedom.Related: Hong Kong singer and activist arrested over ‘corrupt conduct’ Continue reading...

Melbourne enters its sixth lockdown from 8pm on Thursday. Among the latest cases is a woman who works at Al-Taqwa College, a school that was the centre of a large outbreak last year

Nicola Priest and Callum Redfern convicted of manslaughter over death of Kaylee-Jayde in SolihullA woman and her then-boyfriend have been found guilty of killing her three-year-old daughter, after a court heard the child had suffered a long-running catalogue of physical abuse.Kaylee-Jayde Priest was found dead at the flat in Solihull where she lived with her mother, Nicola, on 9 August 2020. Continue reading...

Trade bodies and unions accuse government of merely confirming arrangements that already existTrade bodies and unions representing British musicians have expressed frustration at a government announcement on European work visas that they say changes nothing.Musicians and performers continue to accuse the government of ignoring their plight by failing to negotiate any Brexit deal that would reinstate the previous visa-free working arrangements. Continue reading...

Officers had considered rearresting Sudesh Amman, who went on to stab two people, but decided there were insufficient groundsPolice predicted that a convicted terrorist would attack the public when he was released from prison, less than a month before he went on a knife rampage in south London, an inquest has heard.MI5 and police officers discussing intelligence about Sudesh Amman said an attack would be a case of “when, not if,” two weeks before he was released from Belmarsh prison for terror offences in early January 2020. Continue reading...

Lesbian couple faced hate campaign after supermarket chain VkusVill called the promotion ‘a mistake’A lesbian couple and their family, who were featured in an advert for a Russian supermarket chain that led to a national scandal have fled the country after facing online abuse and death threats.Mother Yuma, daughters Mila and Alina, and Alina’s girlfriend Ksyusha have said they were forced to leave Russia for Spain after they featured in an ad in which they said they enjoyed VkusVill’s onigiri rice balls and hummus. Continue reading...

Acquittal comes after attorney general said evidence insufficient to prosecute for unlawful assemblyA Ghanaian court has acquitted and freed 21 people who were arrested during a crackdown on homosexuality in May for attending an LGBTQ event.Gay sex is a criminal offence in the West African country and members of the LGBTQ community often face discrimination. Continue reading...

Proposed amendments allow government to sanction individuals for ‘gross human rights violations’ or serious corruptionForeign government officials could face sanctions for “gross human rights violations” while corrupt business people could be banned from travelling to Australia and have their assets and bank accounts frozen.New sanctions powers – announced by the Morrison government on Thursday and expected to be presented to parliament by the end of the year – will allow Australia to target “perpetrators of egregious acts of international concern”. Continue reading...

Move comes despite Home Office ‘agreement’ not to remove those who arrived in Britain under age of 12Preparations are being made for the deportation of a number of Jamaican nationals who came to the UK as children, in an apparent reversal of an earlier agreement not to deport people who arrived in this country as minors.A charter flight to Jamaica is scheduled for 11 August, returning several dozen people whose criminal convictions have triggered deportation orders. However campaigners have protested that it is unreasonable to remove people who have spent a lifetime in the UK to a country where they no longer have any ties. Continue reading...

Analysis: Krystsina Tsimanouskaya stunned, but Lukashenko regime’s brutal suppression of all criticism is proving pervasiveThe saga of the sprinter Krystsina Tsimanouskaya has shown how the Belarusian government’s brutal suppression of all criticism has politicised the lives and actions of even those hesitant to openly oppose the country’s president, Alexander Lukashenko.“I am stunned that this situation has become a political scandal,” Tsimanouskaya said during a press-conference in Warsaw, where she arrived from Tokyo via Vienna on Wednesday. “This situation was only about sport … all that I wanted was for people to take responsibility.” Continue reading...

Homes still lack water and power three weeks after at least 187 people diedThree weeks after catastrophic floods in western Germany devastated communities and claimed at least 187 lives, those affected are calling on the government to increase its effort to salvage homes and businesses.More than 20 people are still missing after the disaster, which came after heavy rainfall caused scores of rivers to burst their banks, and led to the loss of large numbers of houses, roads and bridges. Continue reading...

Forty contestants will compete to launch businesses from villages of fewer than 5,000 peopleIt’s a TV genre that has yielded countless hours of escapism and fuelled the rise of billionaires, pop stars and even an American president. Now a new reality series has set its sights on one of Spain’s thorniest challenges: rural depopulation.Set to air in October on Twitch and YouTube, the 20-episode show known as Ruralmind will feature 40 contestants competing to launch and develop a business idea. The only catch is that they must be able to launch the idea from a village of fewer than 5,000 people. Continue reading...

Warning that risk to life is ‘shameful’ as people in small boats so far this year include record 482 on one dayCharities have criticised a “shameful” lack of safe alternatives for migrants after the number making the life-threatening journey across the Channel in small boats this year surpassed 10,000.The total includes at least 482 people who succeeded in crossing the Dover strait on Wednesday onboard 21 boats – a record for a single day. Continue reading...

Coalition partners among those to oppose proposals to exclude people from restaurants and other facilities

Youngsters went to look for cattle near Ngorongoro conservation area on MondayThree young children have been killed by lions near Tanzania’s world-renowned Ngorongoro wildlife reserve as they went to look for lost cattle, according to local police.The youngsters aged between nine and 11 had arrived home from school on Monday and gone into a forest near the Ngorongoro conservation area to search for the missing animals, Arusha police chief, Justine Masejo, said. Continue reading...

Ahead of her performance to millions of Fortnite players this weekend, we rate the best of Grande’s permanently passionate popAfter the double whammy of Sweetener and Thank U, Next – albums that dealt with life-changing shocks – there’s something deservedly braggadocio about this Positions album track. After a brief rundown of her daily routine – meeting, meditation, studio to listen “to some shit I wrote” – it expands to pontificate on the benefits of a positive mental attitude. Blessings come tinged with pain, however: “Take my pen and write some love letters to heaven,” she sighs as the music drops briefly in remembrance. Continue reading...

Thunderstorms could bring up to 100mm of rain in some places on Friday and Saturday, forecasters sayHeavy downpours and thunderstorms could cause flash flooding across parts of the UK as the unsettled weather continues.Forecasters say as much as 100mm (4in) of rain could fall in some places, with the potential for between 20 and 30mm in the space of an hour. Continue reading...

Meet the skateboarding silver medallist and veteran equestrian proving age is but a numberThe Olympics may be thought mostly to be the preserve of the young, but there are some sports where experience brings an advantage. The Australian equestrian Mary Hanna is 66 – the oldest competitor atTokyo, her sixth Games.Her teammate, Andrew Hoy, became Australia’s oldest Olympics medallist at 62, winning an individual bronze in the eventing after leading his team to silver. Asked whether age or experience was more important, he said: “Age.” Continue reading...

The juicy fruit is newly in season and delicious in both savoury and sweet dishes. Here are some tried and tested delightsThis is a cake made using the traditions of Italy. Sharp plums or damsons are placed atop a simple almond and polenta cake. Flourless and dairy-free, it is not intentionally health conscious; it just ends up being delicious this way. It will stay fresh for three days if wrapped in foil. Continue reading...

Exclusive: David Cameron’s government said to have been one of ‘biggest supporters’ of idea in 2016The British government was one of the “biggest supporters” of EU plans to require non-EU nationals to obtain authorisation and pay a fee to enter the bloc’s passport-free travel zone, the Guardian has learned.David Cameron’s government backed the idea when it was floated by the European Commission in April 2016, three months before the EU referendum, when few foresaw the €7 (£5.95) fee would one day hit British travellers. Continue reading...

Some holidaymakers found about the change when they reconnected to wifi at their arrival airport

Jim Steer responds to an article by Simon Jenkins that said the high-speed rail link was of little use to the north, and Mark Sullivan hopes the West Midlands gets the transport hub it rejected a decade agoSimon Jenkins’ latest piece on HS2 (Depleted and unwanted, HS2 hurtles on as Johnson’s £100bn vanity project, 30 July) repeatedly mischaracterises both the case for, and the benefits of, a rail project that will transform connectivity in the UK.He talks as if services will only go from London to Birmingham, stating confidently that “Britain’s new high-speed railway will not – repeat: not – get to the north of England”. But this is simply untrue. Construction work on the Birmingham-Crewe section is now under way, and detailed planning and consultation prior to a parliamentary bill submission is under way for Crewe-Manchester. HS2 services will reach Edinburgh, Newcastle, Liverpool, Leeds and more than a dozen other cities across the country. Continue reading...

As he reissues his debut solo album, the Queen guitarist recalls how making it helped him cope with a time when his band, marriage and the life of Freddie Mercury were coming to an endBrian May has been up to his neck in it, and he is fed up. We are talking a little more than a week after we were meant to, our initial chat having been postponed because the basement of May’s London home was filled with effluent after torrential rain caused the capital to flood and sewers to spew forth their contents.

While Saied’s shutdown of parliament has outsiders worried, in Tunisia he has 87% support and civil society remains strongOutside Tunisia, the president’s sacking of the prime minister and shutdown of parliament looked like a coup. Inside, however, activists and journalists are still struggling to define what is happening to their country – and what to do about it.“The day after the president acted, we had a conversation in the newsroom about whether it was a coup,” said Thameur Mekki, the editor-in-chief of the influential media platform Nawaat. Other news outlets aired programmes debating the “coup” question, and activist groups started worrying. But then, said Mekki, the president, Kais Saied, personally called leading civil society groups and “gave assurances about their freedom to operate”. Continue reading...

First-of-its-kind ruling paves way for trove of secret documents to be made publicThe parliamentary committee scrutinising the Morrison government’s handling of the pandemic will demand a trove of secret documents after an extraordinary judgment finding national cabinet records can be accessed under the freedom of information regime.The first-of-its-kind case in the Administrative Appeals Tribunal was brought by Senate crossbencher Rex Patrick, who argued the prime minister had no grounds to extend cabinet confidentiality to his national cabinet meetings with state premiers and chief ministers. Continue reading...

(RCA)

Musan, a gallery of sculpture by Jason deCaires Taylor exploring our relationship with nature, has opened off Ayia Napa Continue reading...

Court hears Troy Van Den Bemt was shot six times by undercover officer during the hold-up of a bottle shop in Park OrchardsAn undercover police officer who shot dead an armed robber during the hold-up of a bottle shop had been told to let the crime occur rather than intervene, a Victorian court has heard.Coroner Jacqui Hawkins is holding an inquest into the death of Troy Van Den Bemt, who was killed in 2018 by an officer who had been monitoring the armed robber and his associates as part of a covert police operation in Melbourne’s eastern suburbs. Continue reading...

Investors fear sectors may be next target after Beijing’s crackdown on digital gaming and tech companiesChina’s liquor and e-cigarette companies have emerged as the latest market casualty in Beijing’s crackdown on “vice industries” after reports from state media that suggest they could be the next targets for stricter regulation.Shares in e-cigarette and liquor makers slumped on Thursday after reports in the Chinese media of adolescent e-cigarette use and links between alcohol and cancer spooked investors who fear the state may be planning to broaden its crackdown on digital gaming and technology companies. Continue reading...

The World Health Organization has asked the world's richest countries to delay rolling out booster shots to their populations before at least 10% of the world is vaccinated.'We cannot accept countries that have already used most of the global supply of vaccines using even more of it, while the world’s most vulnerable people remain unprotected,' said the WHO chief, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.The WHO said the moratorium would help towards the goal of vaccinating at least 10% of every country’s population by the end of September, and would help fight a pandemic that has killed more than 4.25 million people worldwide

Labour MP contacted by concerned residents including a relative of alleged victims of Pablo EscobarA South American-themed restaurant called Escobar has been accused by an MP of “glamourising drug lords and terrorism” by featuring a mural of the drug trafficker Pablo Escobar.Nadia Whittome, the Labour MP for Nottingham East, said she had been contacted by residents who were distressed about the newly opened bar, including one constituent whose relatives were allegedly killed by the late narcoterrorist. Continue reading...

Far-right congregants fumed at clergyman after he criticised president over Covid in his serviceThe toxic politics bedevilling Jair Bolsonaro’s Brazil swept into Father Lino Allegri’s sacristy one Sunday in July, just after the octogenarian priest delivered a homily lamenting the president’s role in the Covid catastrophe that has killed more than half a million Brazilians.

Frustrations with government response and anti-vaxxers as country struggles to cope with variant

Hunter and upper Hunter in lockdown from 5pm as NSW records 262 Covid cases and five deaths; Queensland confirms 16 new cases; Scott Morrison gives Closing the Gap statement; Victoria records six new local cases. Plus question time. Follow all the day’s news

Israeli military says jets struck rocket launch sites, in a marked escalation of hostilitiesIsrael escalated its response to rocket attacks this week by launching airstrikes on Lebanon, the Israeli military has said.The military said in a statement that jets struck the launch sites from which rockets had been fired over the previous day, as well as an additional target used to attack Israel in the past. Several militant groups operate in Lebanon but none claimed responsibility. Continue reading...

Experts say so-called breakthrough cases remain rare, and deaths among vaccinated people are ‘effectively zero’The Delta variant caused an inflection point in the battle against the Covid-19 pandemic in the United States. So-called “breakthrough” cases, or Covid-19 infections in people who have already been vaccinated, upended the understanding of whether people in America needed to continue wearing masks to prevent spreading the coronavirus.But breakthrough cases remain rare, and hospitalization and death for vaccinated people is “effectively zero” in many US states reporting this data. Continue reading...

The release of Paris Hilton’s Netflix series where she semi-cooks semi-dishes is the latest in an increasing trend of stars spending more time in the kitchenTo state the obvious, nobody is going to watch Cooking With Paris to sharpen their culinary skills. The new Netflix series piggybacks on last year’s bizarre, almost Lynchian YouTube video where Paris Hilton cooked what can only be described an anti-lasagne, and stretches it out to a painful degree. In episode one, Hilton attempts to make marshmallows for Kim Kardashian and grunts with disgust when they make a mess of her lace gloves. In episode two, Hilton takes time out from making a funfetti flan to pose in the photo booth she installed in her living room. If you hang around long enough to find out what happens in episode three, you’re a braver soul than me.Related: Cooking With Paris review – Hilton in the kitchen? Prepare to have your mind blown Continue reading...

Charges laid over the death of five-year-old Logan Mwangi, who was found dead in a river in Bridgend last weekPolice have charged two adults and a 13-year-old boy over the death of five-year-old Logan Mwangi, who was found dead in a river in south Wales last week.John Cole, 39, of Sarn, Bridgend, has been charged with murder, South Wales police said. Continue reading...

Mutant strain may emerge amid vaccine hesitancy, experts say, as even medics reject jabs in DR CongoDr Christian Mayala and Dr Rodin Nzembuni Nduku sit together on a bench outside the Covid ward at Kinshasa’s Mama Yemo hospital.They are discussing the health of their father, Noel Kalouda, who contracted coronavirus weeks before, and is now lying in a hospital bed, breathing through an oxygen mask. Continue reading...

Beach party in Newcastle triggers snap lockdown in Hunter and Upper Hunter, while virus found in sewage puts Armidale and Dubbo on high alert

New Zealand researchers seeking to protect the at-risk species from a warming world have made a surprising discoveryTuatara – the ancient, slow-moving, “living fossil” reptiles unique to New Zealand – have surprised researchers with their fast-moving sperm.The discovery came amid a new effort by scientists to gather and preserve the sperm of the protected at-risk species, to try to ensure it survives new threats and a warming planet. Continue reading...

As cases of blood condition pancytopenia persist, investigators suggest food fungi could be to blameCats are still dying in significant numbers from a mystery illness that investigators believe may be linked to widely sold cat food brands, prompting concern that not enough is being done to warn owners about a nationwide product recall.Vets around the UK are understood to have been swamped by cases of pancytopenia, a condition in which the number of red blood cells, white blood cells and platelets decreases rapidly, causing serious illness. Continue reading...

As violence causes a fresh wave of desperate journeys, populist politicians claim their country has become a ‘dumping ground’It was a journey that had taken weeks, and there were times when the 65-year-old Afghan widow, who walks with the aid of a stick, had to be carried by her son.Their trek, across 15 canyons she says, left Durdana with badly scarred feet. “I have not had a day of peace in over 40 years. I had to come to Turkey, there was no choice.” Continue reading...

Community Security Trust recorded 639 incidents in May, 49% of the total for the first half of 2021A charity that monitors antisemitism and provides security for British Jewish groups has said the Gaza conflict that broke out in May resulted in its highest recording of anti-Jewish hate incidents.The Community Security Trust (CST) recorded 1,308 such incidents nationwide between January and June 2021, a 49% increase on the same period in 2020 and the highest recorded in the first half of a year. Continue reading...

Analysis: Proof of vaccination is nothing new and any requirement that people use a ‘health pass’ will involve balancing various rightsWith greater numbers of people being vaccinated and countries looking to reopen borders safely, the introduction of some form of vaccine passport seems increasingly likely.For New Zealand, where the elimination strategy has been largely successful but which remains vulnerable to border breaches, proof of vaccination may well be a condition of entry. Continue reading...

It’s true farmers are facing a lot of regulation but only after decades of fighting off smaller reforms – we need them to changeIn July, an estimated 60,000, mostly rural New Zealanders took to the streets to protest environmental regulations farmers say are unworkable. Angry and frustrated, they rolled into 57 towns and cities on tractors and trucks to form the country’s biggest farmer protest.I grew up in rural New Zealand, and many of my family work in and around the dairy industry – so I have experienced a lot of this frustration first hand. Continue reading...

A statement said the 80-year-old drummer accepted he needed more time to recuperate from unspecified medical issueRolling Stones drummer Charlie Watts appears likely to miss the band’s upcoming US tour to allow him to recover from an unspecified medical procedure.A spokesperson for the musician said on Wednesday night that the procedure was “completely successful” but that the 80-year-old drummer needed time to recuperate. Continue reading...

Phillip Island centipedes devour up to 3,700 black-winged petrel chicks each year, trapping nutrients brought from the ocean by the seabirds and distributing them around the islandGiant bird-eating centipedes may sound like something out of a science-fiction film – but they’re not. On tiny Phillip Island, part of the South Pacific’s Norfolk Island group, the Phillip Island centipede (Cormocephalus coynei) population can kill and eat up to 3,700 seabird chicks each year.And this is entirely natural. This unique creature endemic to Phillip Island has a diet consisting of an unusually large proportion of vertebrate animals, including seabird chicks. Continue reading...

Billionaire reportedly made trip after his child fell ill in Fiji and needed hospital treatment in New ZealandThe billionaire co-founder of Google Larry Page was reportedly granted entry into New Zealand, despite the border being closed to non-residents.Stuff reported that Page, who is the sixth-richest person in the world, visited the country after his child fell ill in Fiji and required hospital treatment in New Zealand. Continue reading...