World news | The Guardian

Emily Whelan was suspected to have been killed but investigation was hampered by state of corpseThe family of a woman whom they suspect was killed has won a lawsuit against a health trust that allowed her body to decompose to the point that experts were unable to rule out third-party involvement in the death in a first-of-its kind ruling.In a judgment handed down on Friday, Judge Andrew Saffman concluded that Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS trust had breached human rights laws by failing to preserve Emily Whelan’s body, and awarded the family damages. Continue reading...

Elon Musk ought to turn his hand to printers, and if only Anthony Fauci could sort out US healthcareThe first full week under President Biden and life undergoes an immediate improvement: save for a few pieces about plunging membership at Mar-a-Lago, there are almost no photos of Himself on the front pages. The daily anger spike is gone, leaving in its place a flat, sour, hungover feeling, and a sense of not knowing quite what to do. Continue reading...

Most countries do not feel the need to pontificate about the failings of others. Change comes from within, not withoutBoris Johnson was last week pressed by senior Conservatives to “take a tougher stance against China” on Uighurs, Hong Kong and human rights. What this means is obscure.A British foreign secretary reaches his office each day amid images of imperial might. The Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office is a gallery of murals of Pax Britannica, foreign victories, dazzling potentates, cowering enemies and grateful native peoples. By the time the minister’s feet are under his desk, he must feel the world is straining for his command. Continue reading...

A new women-led initiative in Afghanistan is working to break down the barriers to help both victims and perpetratorsNabila felt her diesel-drenched clothes stick to her skin, her lungs filling with fumes, hot panic rising.It hadn’t been the first time an argument with her husband had escalated: he’d been beating her throughout their 30-year marriage, even tying her to a tree in the garden outside their small home in Afghanistan’s capital Kabul, leaving her freezing in the winter cold. Continue reading...

Letter says government needs to act quickly to resolve customs issues faced by exporters following BrexitThe leaders of Britain’s five largest business groups have warned the government that firms face “substantial difficulties” at UK ports since Brexit, with the prospect of a “significant loss of business” if the situation is allowed to continue.Following a round table meeting on Thursday evening with Cabinet Office minister Michael Gove, a letter was issued by the CBI, the British Chambers of Commerce, the manufacturers’ group Make UK, the Federation of Small Businesses and the Institute of Directors. Continue reading...

Another Covid vaccine, trialled in the UK and bought by the government, has been shown to be nearly 90% effective and work against the UK and South African variants of the virus.Stanley Erck, CEO of Novavax, has said numbers show ‘dramatic demonstrations’ of the new vaccine’s ability to develop an immune response against different strains of Covid-19.The UK vaccines taskforce has bought 60m doses of the Novavax vaccine which will be manufactured on Teesside in the UK

The federal court backs a finance department decision not to grant Ashby an ‘act of grace payment’One Nation staffer James Ashby has failed in his bid to sue the commonwealth to recover $4.5m in legal costs incurred in litigation with his former boss Peter Slipper.The federal court justice Robert Bromwich on Friday dismissed Ashby’s application for a judicial review of his request for an act of grace payment. Continue reading...

Treasurer Josh Frydenberg says it’s time for a ‘fresh start’ at Asic; Sydney’s limits on gatherings lift and masks no longer required while shopping. Follow updates live

Woniya Thibeault, the runner up on Netflix’s Alone, is offering an eight-week survival course, teaching more than how to skin a deer and tie a knotLeft to fend for herself on Arctic land, with only 10 pieces of gear – among them a sleeping bag, a pot, and a bow and arrows – Woniya Thibeault didn’t just want to survive. She wanted to find joy in the process of surviving.Scattered miles apart in the same rugged wilderness were nine other contestants looking to outlast one another and win big on the History Channel’s popular survival reality series Alone. In it, contestants compete to stick it out in the wilderness for the longest time with limited resources – all have the option to tap out if it gets too much. The prize money – $500,000 – would have changed Thibeault’s life, but winning wasn’t her top priority. She was there for the experience. Continue reading...

Men in Aceh province were detained by vigilantes before being caned in publicTwo gay men in Indonesia’s Aceh province have been publicly caned 77 times each after they were reported to police by vigilantes who raided their apartment.Human rights groups have condemned the spectacle, which was watched by dozens of people in the capital Banda Aceh, as brutal and medieval. Continue reading...

The number of new coronavirus cases in Australia has been dropping, but states remain on high alert for the UK variant of Covid-19, so what restrictions are still in place? Do I have to wear a mask and where can and can’t I go in Australia? Untangle Australia’s Covid-19 laws and guidelines with our guide

Kremlin critic will remain in jail until parole hearing next week where he could be sent to penal colonyKremlin critic Alexei Navalny has denounced the criminal proceedings against him, telling a Russian court via a video link from jail that while it had the power now to “keep me in handcuffs … that situation is not going to continue for ever”.As a Moscow appeal hearing has rejected calls to release him from jail and investigators charged Navalny’s top aides in a series of inquiries meant to disrupt the protest movement that has arisen in his support, he told the court he believed the proceedings were part of a campaign to intimidate the opposition. Continue reading...

I got to know Sue Pearson in the late 1960s when she chaired what was then the Pre-School Playgroups Association, from which she went on to play a major part in early years education in Sheffield and beyond, through her Hallam University teaching role. I was inspired by her to make expanding nursery education a priority as a young Sheffield city councillor with two small children in the 70s.More recently we usually met up at the Holocaust memorial day event every August in the city’s Winter Gardens, where she often spoke very movingly about her own experiences. Sue was an inspiration to many. Continue reading...

Lone man on withdrawn social media image lounges on sofa, while females clean, iron and home-school

Chief medical officer warns virus could surge again if lockdown lifted too soon

Older Americans must often face a bewildering online sign-up system that may leave some of the most vulnerable waitingEarlier this month, the New York-based photographer Hee Jin Kang woke up at 3am and went online to register her elderly parents for the coronavirus vaccine. Continue reading...

Nobody in Moldova has received a Covid jab yet – and our neglected healthcare system is unable to cope“I am happy to work on the frontline and to see the Canadian medical system function so well,” Alecu Mătrăgună wrote in a Facebook post, “but I am sad that I was vaccinated before my mother, who works in the medical system in Moldova.” Mătrăgună is a Moldovan sonographer living in Montreal. His mother is 61 and a paediatrician with more than 30 years’ service under her belt. Yet, he told me, she has no idea when the Covid-19 vaccine might become available for her and for more than 53,300 other healthcare staff in Europe’s poorest country.I had a similar reaction to Mătrăgună’s about my family in Moldova when I saw a sign at my local London pharmacy as long ago as early December, announcing that the vaccine was on its way. At the time, my grandmother had just recovered and my father was still battling with the effects of the virus. Continue reading...

In a highly competitive field, the American actor has perfected the put-upon princess look for Spencer, the latest royal biopicSome films have to work harder than others to get bums on seats. Some can charm audiences with big stars, or the lure of a continuing franchise, or the promise of a scene where King Kong takes a swing at Godzilla like he’s half-cut in a Wetherspoons car park. And then, right at the other end of the scale, is Spencer.Make no mistake, Spencer will have to be brilliant to make people go and see it. Better than brilliant, even. It will have to be the perfect movie; entertaining and fun and moving and so technically accomplished that film historians will come to view it as the moment that cinema entered a new epoch. Anything less than that and Spencer is done for. Continue reading...

The Chinese government is upgrading its free trade agreement with Wellington as relations with Canberra remain frozenNew Zealand’s trade minister has phoned his Australian counterpart in an attempt to ease cross-Tasman tensions after he suggested Canberra should “show respect” and act more diplomatically towards China.The NZ minister, Damien O’Connor, had irritated some members of the Australian government with remarks he made in a television interview on Wednesday when asked about his country’s offer to mediate between Canberra and Beijing. Continue reading...

The standup won a book deal after an idle tweet. Two books later, his love for publishing was over. He talks about why he’s persisting with the third book in his scifi trilogy

Report warns of growing international threat to transparency amid Covid and finds Australia lagging behind regional leaders New Zealand and SingaporeAustralia has again failed to lift itself from a record low rating on perceived corruption, a new global report has found.Transparency International on Thursday released its annual corruption perceptions index, a barometer of perceived corruption in 180 nations. Continue reading...

Mark Butler has been moved from climate change to health and ageing, replaced by former treasurer Chris BowenAnthony Albanese has elevated his deputy, Richard Marles, to a super portfolio while clipping the wings of Jim Chalmers, Tanya Plibersek and Clare O’Neil in a frontbench reshuffle intended to shore up his leadership and sharpen Labor’s messaging ahead of a possible election later this year.Marles, the Victorian rightwinger and previous shadow defence minister, has been handed a new portfolio of national reconstruction post Covid-19 – which encompasses employment, skills and small business – and Albanese has elevated Brendan O’Connor, the Victorian leftwinger who backed Bill Shorten to become Labor leader over Albanese in the 2013 leadership contest, to defence. Continue reading...

Australia pauses trans-Tasman travel bubble until Sunday after three coronavirus cases in the NZ community are linked to the hotel• NSW hotspots; State-by-state restrictions and rules explained

Citizens from US, Britain, Switzerland and Denmark face charges for attending event police say was illegal under emergency lawsPolice have raided a party at a bar on a popular resort island in southern Thailand and arrested 89 foreigners for violating coronavirus regulations.The Tuesday night raid on the Three Sixty Bar on Koh Phangan also netted 22 Thais, including one identified as the bar’s owner and another who sold drinks there, said police Col Suparerk Pankosol, superintendent of the provincial immigration office. Continue reading...

The country’s most active volcano has unleashed a river of lava, searing gas and ash down its 3,000m slopes on Java island, threatening vulnerable villages

With a vaccine-hesitant public and jabs yet to begin, there are fears immunisations are off the pace

Claude Schmidt of French firm Arconic gives way after refusing to be a witness for seven monthsA senior executive at the firm that made the combustible cladding used on Grenfell Tower has agreed to give evidence to the public inquiry after refusing to do so for the last seven months.Claude Schmidt, the president of Arconic Architectural Products, the French company that supplied the plastic-filled panels that were the main cause of fire spread, was one of several witnesses wanted for questioning by the inquiry into the disaster who had refused, citing an arcane French law. Continue reading...

Coronor says Philippa Day’s experiences with DWP were ‘predominant factor’ in her decisionA severely mentally ill young mother died from a deliberate overdose after the removal of her disability benefits left her destitute, trapped in a months-long state of high anxiety and haunted by suicidal thoughts, an inquest has concluded.The coroner, Gordon Clow, said Philippa Day’s long struggle with the benefits system had been a “stressor” in her decision to take the overdose in August 2019. She was found unconscious at home by her sister and father, and died in hospital two months later after not recovering from a coma. Continue reading...

EU health commissioner dismisses AstraZeneca argument it is contractually obliged to supply UK first

International Monetary Fund says there are concerns about share price bubbleGovernments and central banks must maintain their pandemic rescue programmes or risk triggering a stock market crash, the International Monetary Fund has said.Warning that there were legitimate concerns about a share price bubble, the Washington-based organisation said that without continued low interest rates and government subsidies it was possible a “correction” in stock markets would occur. Continue reading...

As the pandemic has forced the cancellation of most large gatherings, many institutions including the Auschwitz-Birkenau memorial museum in Poland, Yad Vashem museum in Israel and the US Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington DC are marking Holocaust Remembrance Day this year with online events Continue reading...

The Mermaid of Black Conch’s author explains why she expected ‘a quiet life’ for the formally daring, magical realist novel that has been declared book of the year

Interior minister says danger posed by recent mutations ‘requires drastic measures’

Two people had completed isolation at the same Auckland hotel as Sunday’s case, which was New Zealand’s first in months

The 32-year-old triathlete on trying to win a third Olympic gold in Tokyo and smashing the ironman record in the next 18 months“I’ve just been out training for three and a half hours and it has rained for every single second,” says Alistair Brownlee, in a tone that almost veers into relish. “The weather is horrendous. Everywhere’s flooded. You can hardly run anywhere because it’s so muddy and wet.” And yet the double Olympic triathlon champion still splishes and splashes on towards further glories, even in this bleakest of midwinters, having set his sights on an extraordinary double crescendo to cap his career.Related: Mo Farah claims Olympic athletes have been told they will get Covid vaccines Continue reading...

There are a string of reasons that have contributed to that extraordinary number

Officials have just weeks to slash costs, prompting fears that speed of cuts could cost livesBritish diplomats have been instructed to find at least 50% cuts in UK overseas bilateral aid in the next few weeks in advance of the next financial year, the Labour party has said.Sarah Champion, the Labour chair of parliament’s international development select committee, said: “Our ambassadors have today been instructed by the Foreign Office to cut 50-70% from the aid budget.” Continue reading...

Artwork celebrating pioneering women saved after city councillors step in to stop Vox party motion

Boris Johnson said it was ‘difficult to compute the sorrow’ for every life lost to Covid as the official UK death toll passed 100,000. The prime minister said he took ‘full responsibility’ for the government's response to the crisis, and insisted the government 'did everything we could' to limit deaths

Pawel Relowicz, 26, tells jury he offered Hull University student a lift home and denies raping herA 26-year-old man accused of raping and murdering student Libby Squire “only wanted to help”, a jury has heard.Pawel Relowicz told Sheffield crown court that he had consensual sex with Squire on the evening she disappeared, but said she was not “a target”. Continue reading...

Chanel and Valentino enrol artists from music and film as couture adapts to Covid by turning digital

Analysis: Drug company and scientific partners at Oxford University have strongly pushed back against German press report

Spain reports record number of new cases, France holds off on lockdown, and Germany discusses flights cut

When the banking royal commission wrapped up in early 2019, the government said it was committed to enacting change. Senior business reporter Ben Butler explains how two years on, most recommendations have either been delayed or abandoned

After outbreaks in Sydney threatened to spoil the state’s summer, health authorities once again seem to have contained a flare-up without resorting to a city-wide lockdown

Hornby and JD Sports among firms after space to offset port delays, extra freight costs plus new VAT and customs fees

Kaja Kallas, 43, heads new cabinet after former government collapsed in alleged corruption scandalEstonia’s new two-party coalition government has been sworn in with the first female prime minister since the Baltic nation regained independence in 1991.The 15-member cabinet of Kaja Kallas, a 43-year-old lawyer and a former MEP, was approved in the 101-seat Riigikogu legislature, after being appointed by President Kersti Kaljulaid. Continue reading...

European nationals added to voluntary returns scheme, which can include flights and up to £2,000 for resettlementEU citizens are being offered financial incentives to leave the UK, the Guardian has learned, months before the deadline to apply for settled status.From 1 January EU citizens have quietly been added to the government’s voluntary returns scheme where financial support is offered as an encouragement to return to their country of origin. Continue reading...

Nadhim Zahawi responds after the EU threatened to block exports of coronavirus vaccines to countries outside the bloc. AstraZeneca was accused of failing to give a satisfactory explanation for a huge shortfall of promised doses to EU member states