World news | The Guardian

Astonishing rock paintings discovered in Colombia hold a lesson for today’s rainforestIn the past week, remarkable images of ancient cave art have hit the headlines: rock paintings made in South America around 12,000 years ago. The art, created on rock faces in the Serranía de la Lindosa, on the northern edge of the Colombian Amazon, is a riot of ochre-coloured geometrical pattern, handprints, and images of animals and humans. Until recent excavations, the works of art had been unknown to the international community. Their exuberant creativity will soon be revealed to a broad audience in the UK thanks to the Channel 4 series Jungle Mystery: Lost Kingdoms of the Amazon.The people who made these works of art were, it is believed, among the earliest humans to occupy the region, after migrations across what is now the Bering Strait some 25,000 years ago. Preliminary study of the iconography of the art has led scholars to speculate that among the deer, tapirs, alligators, bats, serpents, turtles and porcupines, long-extinct megafauna are also represented: mastodons, American ice-age horses, giant sloths, camelids. Continue reading...

Thomas Davies, 29, boasted of travelling from John o’Groats to Land’s End in under 10 hoursA car enthusiast who boasted that he had set a speed record by travelling from John o’Groats to Land’s End in less than 10 hours has been cleared of dangerous driving.Thomas Davies, 29, was prosecuted after telling newspapers and radio stations he made the trip, which according to the AA is 837 miles, in nine hours and 36 minutes in his silver Audi A5. Continue reading...

The superb Puerto Rican vocalist is now the most streamed artist on Spotify globally, but has never had a UK hit – something he’s determined to changeEach December, Spotify announces who has been the world’s most streamed artist that year, and this generally tallies with who has been popular in the UK. Drake, the Canadian rapper who has had six UK No 1 singles, was first in in three of the previous five years, with fellow UK chart-toppers Ed Sheeran and Post Malone leading the others.But in 2020, someone who has never had an album or solo single in the UK Top 100 is the world’s most popular artist: 26-year-old Puerto Rican vocalist Bad Bunny, streamed more than 8.3bn times this year on Spotify alone. Granted, he has featured on one UK Top 10 hit, but that was back in 2018, appearing on it for less than a minute: Cardi B’s I Like It. He appears nowhere in Spotify’s 50 most-played songs in the UK today, with Brits preferring Christmas classics and Gen Z pop stars such as Billie Eilish, Internet Money and 24kGoldn. Meanwhile, Bad Bunny’s current (and superb) single Dakiti is the most-played in the world at time of writing, earning more than 7m plays each day, 3m more than Ariana Grande’s Positions in second place. Continue reading...

Study says poor equipment could be a reason for higher British fatality rate in Iraq and AfghanistanBritish soldiers were 12% more likely to have been killed than their American counterparts during the “war on terror” in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to a study of casualty figures.The research – intended as a lessons learned exercise – also concludes that UK forces were 26% more likely to have been killed by improvised explosives, validating longstanding complaints about the poorly armoured Snatch Land Rover. Continue reading...

Special reporters take government to task over proposed legislation that would give police more power

The substantial meal debate at least distracted us from PM and Matt Hancock’s dull briefingsWhere’s Priti Patel, Michael Gove, Dominic Raab, Alok Sharma and Oliver Dowden when you need them? They may all have their limitations as cabinet ministers but they did used to liven up the Downing Street press conferences with their incompetence. I especially miss Sharma who was a joy to sketch as he never knowingly answered a direct question with a direct answer and I could never quite work out whether that was because he hadn’t really understood the question or genuinely had no idea of the answer he was expected to give. Perhaps both. Now the twice weekly briefings are shared between Boris Johnson, who tends to hog the ones where there might be some good news on offer, and Matt Hancock – the prime minister’s preferred patsy – who gets to do all the ones where there is bad news or no news. They are much more boring as a result as Boris just waffles on in a sub-Churchillian haze while Hancock sounds more and more like the floor manager in a department store. In some weeks I find myself sketching Hancock at least twice and I long for the time when I can ignore him for a month as I’m worried I’m running out of anything new to say about him. But I find myself obliged to carry on, like someone engaged in a dysfunctional relationship, just to see how the whole thing pans out. Still, we have had the scotch egg drama to keep us entertained as the government once again tried to make up policy as it went along. First we had the environment secretary, George Eustice, saying a scotch egg constituted a substantial meal, only for him to be contradicted by Gove, who maintained that two scotch eggs were a decent starter. Personally, I’ve never much liked them anyway but if I was invited out for a meal only to be served a single scotch egg, I’d feel mighty pissed off. Continue reading...

Sales boom in England, Ireland, France and Belgium but Covid restrictions cost £430m

The fallen tycoon leaves behind a mountain of debt, much of it owed to exploited people in Asia earning as little as £4 a dayThe collapse of Arcadia in the lead-up to Christmas, and with it the demise of Sir Philip Green’s controversial reign over the UK high street, has a Dickensian feel to it. Over the years, Green has embodied the role of billionaire boss, brazenly handing his wife a tax-free £1.2bn dividend in 2005 (four times the actual annual profits made by the company), while relaxing on his luxury yacht in Monaco. He has rarely showed concern for the workers propping up his empire.The stark prospect of 13,000 workers losing their jobs and an estimated £350m pensions deficit during a global pandemic is more than enough to constitute the bleak reality of Christmas present, and Arcadia’s collapse will send further shockwaves throughout the fashion industry. Already, news has emerged that Debenhams faces liquidation as JD Sports pulled out of rescue talks, a knock-on effect following the closure of Arcadia’s concession outlets in the department retailer. Continue reading...

Top US scientist says he did not mean to imply ‘sloppiness’, while EU defends slower approach

Chinese official says article labelling it as biggest threat to democracy since WWII is ‘concoction of lies’China has rejected as a “concoction of lies” an incendiary article by the US’s most senior intelligence official, who labelled China the biggest threat to democracy and freedom since the second world war.In a Wall Street Journal column John Ratcliffe, the US director of national intelligence, said China was bent on world domination and the US needed to prepare for an “open-ended period of confrontation”. While intelligence agencies had historically prioritised concerns over Russia and counter-terrorism, China should now be the primary national security focus of the US, he warned, and it posed “the greatest threat to America today, and the greatest threat to democracy and freedom worldwide since world war two”. Continue reading...

Unusually loud thunder claps heard over Scottish capital during rare meteorological phenomenonFrightened Edinburgh residents contacted the emergency services when they were woken in the early hours by loud explosions they feared were the result of a plane crash or a building collapsing.Police explained that their rude awakening had been caused by the phenomenon known as “thundersnow”, which happens when thunderstorms form in wintry conditions, giving rise to heavy downpours of snow. Continue reading...

Named the ‘winner of winners’ of the Women’s prize, Bernardine Evaristo, Maggie O’Farrell and others ask the author about the #EndSars protests in Nigeria, writing about Trump, and the culture that got her through 2020In your Ted Talk in 2009, you warned of the danger of cultural misunderstandings arising from readers hearing only a single story. Do you feel that in the intervening years there has been an improvement in this regard, or are we still clinging to single narratives? Maggie O’Farrell

Home affairs will be ‘tough-minded’ if fraud is proven, Michael Pezzullo tells Senate estimatesThree Australians who received visas with the help of the disgraced former New South Wales Liberal MP Daryl Maguire could be stripped of their citizenship if it was obtained through fraud, the home affairs department chief has warned.Michael Pezzullo made the threat in Senate estimates on Friday when he promised his department would be “tough-minded” if fraud was proven after a departmental and Australian Border Force investigation into the cash-for-visa scheme. Continue reading...

After complaint from consul general, description of Covid-19 as virus ‘originating in China’ was changed and Taiwan included in map of ChinaThe state museum of Western Australia has changed a display that stated mainland China was the “origin” of the coronavirus and included Taiwan in a map of China, after a complaint from the WA Chinese consul general.The WA Museum Boola Bardip said the exhibit was changed for “factual” reasons, not political pressure, because the World Health Organization has not yet determined where the virus technically originated. Continue reading...

Dennis Richardson says the relationship between China and Australia is ‘going to bounce along the bottom for quite a while yet’. Follow all today’s news

Originally a means of preserving vegetables during winter, kimchi is emblematic of Korean cuisine and accompanies almost every meal served in the country. Kimchi-making is still an important annual ritual for many families. Continue reading...

Indonesian man impersonated film executives, including Rupert Murdoch’s former wife Wendi Deng, to swindle victims, FBI allegesA suspected con artist who allegedly impersonated top female Hollywood executives to swindle wide-eyed aspiring stars out of hundreds of thousands of dollars has been arrested in Britain after a US extradition request, the FBI has said.Dubbed the “Con Queen of Hollywood”, the suspect led investigators on a years-long, global manhunt so improbable it has even been optioned for a book deal. Continue reading...

Can Trump really pardon himself for as yet unspecified crimes? He sure can! And he can pardon you too!

The late actor’s final film role was in a blazing new adaptation of the August Wilson play. Cast and crew remember camaraderie and competition on an emotional shootOne of the most powerful moments in Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom comes when Levee, the firebrand trumpeter played by the late Chadwick Boseman, gets into an argument with his bandmate about religion. The setting is a hot recording studio in 20s Chicago, where the blues singer Ma Rainey (played by Viola Davis) and her band have come to play some songs.The trombonist, Cutler, has just told a story about a black reverend who was persecuted by white people in Mississippi. “What I wants to know is, if he a man of God, where the hell was God when all of this was going on?” asks Levee. “Why wasn’t God looking out for him?” Levee becomes more and more worked up, declaring that “God can kiss my ass!” and getting into a fight with Cutler, pulling a knife on him, then finally stabbing into the air, tears streaked down his face, challenging God at the top of his voice: “Come on, what you scared of? Turn your back on me! Come on! Coward, motherfucker!” Continue reading...

The 117-year-old card is believed to gone on sale the same year Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol was publishedThe first commercially printed Christmas card is up for sale – a merry Victorian-era scene that scandalised some when it first appeared in 1843.The card, which is being sold online through a consortium run by Marvin Getman, a Boston-based dealer in rare books and manuscripts, depicts an English family toasting the recipient with glasses of red wine. Continue reading...

Operation to move 2,500 families begins despite safety concerns and lack of consent from refugeesBangladesh has begun moving Rohingya families from camps near the Myanmar border to a settlement on a remote island, despite concerns about its safety and a lack of consent from the refugees.More than 1,600 Rohingya refugees set sail on Friday from Bangladesh’s southern port of Chittagong for the remote island of Bhasan Char in the Bay of Bengal, a naval official said, Reuters reported. Continue reading...

Bureau of Meteorology says there is a moderate risk of thunderstorm asthma on Saturday, with heavy rain expected for MelbourneThunderstorms and strong winds are expected to lash Victoria on Saturday, with authorities urging residents to rethink their outdoor plans.Rain and damaging north to north-westerly winds with peak gusts up to 110 kmh are forecast to hit most of Victoria, including Melbourne and major regional centres. Continue reading...

Health officials warn infections at Christmas gatherings could lead to overwhelmed hospitals

Figures from Liverpool programme reveal lateral flow tests missed 30% of those with a high viral load

Activist group, Pride in Protest, says police should be excluded from the parade in recognition of the violence perpetrated towards First Nations communitiesMembers of the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras will vote on a contentious proposal to remove police and corrective services from the parade at the organisation’s annual general meeting on Saturday.The motion has been put forward by Pride in Protest, an activist group fighting for the event to return to its protest roots. Continue reading...

Director of national intelligence John Ratcliffe accuses Beijing of stealing US technology to aid military modernization planThe top US intelligence official has stepped up Donald Trump’s attacks on Beijing, labeling China the biggest threat to democracy and freedom worldwide since the second world war and saying it was bent on global domination.Related: US sets records for Covid deaths and hospitalizations as it nears 14m cases – live updates Continue reading...

Three staffers at one of the last rights groups still operating in Egypt were arrested last monthThree Egyptian human rights workers who were arrested and charged with terrorism-related offences last month have been freed after an outcry over the government’s crackdown on one of the last rights groups still operating in the country.The arrests and moves against the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, or EIPR, had underlined the extent to which President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi’s government has gone in silencing dissent and independent organisation during years of arrests and other forms of intimidation. Continue reading...

Progress stalls as robust lobbying from France alleged and tussle ensues over UK subsidies regulator

Midnight mass to be brought forward so worshippers can get home before 10pm curfew

Friday: Scott Morrison and Josh Frydenberg billed taxpayers for whirlwind trip from Canberra to Sydney and back. Plus: UK minister’s vaccine boastGood morning, this is Imogen Dewey bringing you the main stories and must-reads on Friday 4 December. Continue reading...

Cressida Dick says stop and search has helped save young black livesBritain’s top police officer has denied her force’s leadership were too slow to realise it had race a problem and said its controversial tactics have not oppressed young black men but saved scores from being stabbed.Hitting back at months of revelations and criticism, Cressida Dick said the Metropolitan police, who police more than half of Britain’s black population, had a “strong record”. Continue reading...

Police declare major incident following explosion involving chemical tanksFour people have been killed and one person injured after an explosion at a wastewater treatment plant in Bristol that could be heard more than a mile away.It is believed the five people were all working on top of or near a silo that contained biosolids – solid matter recovered in sewage treatment processes and turned into organic soil conditioner. A rescue operation involving urban search and rescue teams, tracker dogs and helicopters was launched following the explosion at the Wessex Water site in Avonmouth. Continue reading...

The French fashion house took a team of 300 to a Loire castle for a blowout event this week, despite the pandemic preventing anyone from attendingHow important is a catwalk show to a fashion house? Important enough, in the case of Chanel, to take a team of 300 – including the actor Kristen Stewart, the photographer Juergen Teller and a small army of models – to put on a show in one of the most magnificent chateaux in France, despite an audience capped at zero.

Urgent alert issued over millions struggling with ‘catastophic levels’ of hunger as less than half of required aid receivedThe window to prevent the return of famine to Yemen is rapidly closing, UN agencies have warned, with a new assessment showing millions could head further into hunger in the coming months.The alert came as a World Health Organization food security assessment showed thousands of people are slipping into famine – a number that is predicted to triple in the first half of next year – while millions more have seen declining access to food. Continue reading...

Airline defies Covid pessimism and concerns public may avoid model due to safety fearsRyanair has ordered a further 75 Boeing 737 Max planes worth up to $9bn (£6.7bn), defying aviation industry pessimism over coronavirus and concerns that the public may avoid the model due to safety fears.Europe’s biggest short-haul airline has now ordered a total of 210 of the aircraft that its chief executive, Michael O’Leary, has described as a “gamechanger” for the carrier’s business model. Continue reading...

The film has topped a poll for the most rewatchable film. Its director, Mike Newell, sees why. So why would Curtis, who wrote the script, rather rewatch Elf?Richard Curtis rarely rewatches Four Weddings and a Funeral. “There isn’t a natural circumstance where I say: ‘I’ll tell you what I’ll do for the next two hours, see one of my films.’” Partly, it is knowing the punchlines. Partly, it is being a bit busy. On the wall of Curtis’s Notting Hill home office (stucco fireplace, neon art, whopping clock), just out of frame of his laptop camera, are six Post-it reminders of pre-Christmas tasks. Wrap presents? Make pud? Nope: rewrite a film, cast an online panto, appoint a new CEO for Comic Relief. Et cetera.Anyway, for those of us a bit less pressed, things are different. Four Weddings – in which Hugh Grant’s stuttering bachelor, in a series of morning suits, woos Andie MacDowell – was the runaway winner in a new, slightly strange poll to find Britain’s most rewatchable movie. In a list of 50 films co-curated by the British Film Institute and Google Pixel, the tale of Charles and Carrie took 49% of the votes, with Skyfall on 37% and Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban on 33%. Continue reading...

Wales residents can go to tier 1 and 2 English areas while Welsh pubs banned from serving alcohol

Some criticise jingoistic tone of announcement and say longer process may prove preferable

Tensions arise between a writer and her coterie aboard an ocean liner in Steven Soderbergh’s sweet, unfocused dramaThere’s an awful lot going on in this new movie from Steven Soderbergh. The title is appropriate: it’s garrulous, elegant, bristling with classy performances from an A-list cast, and Deborah Eisenberg’s screenplay has a theatrical intimacy. It’s loosely and waywardly plotted, perhaps as a result of having gone through many drafts, though maybe not enough. It is slightly unfocused and uncertain as to where its emotional centre really lies – though there is a charm and a big dramatic finale.The story is mostly set (and economically filmed, by Soderbergh himself) on a luxury liner, , the Queen Mary 2, crossing from New York to Southampton. Meryl Streep plays Alice Hughes, a renowned novelist whose reputation and sales rely chiefly on a sensational early book about the collapse of a woman’s marriage. Her agent (Gemma Chan) takes her out for lunch and has to charm her cantankerous client into going to London to accept a prestigious award; she is also nervous about the fact that Alice still hasn’t delivered her latest manuscript but excited at the rumours that it could be a sequel to the sensational early book. Continue reading...

Former French president who brought in socially liberal reforms but whose grand style ultimately proved offputting to votersAs Valéry Giscard d’Estaing became the Grand Old Man of French politics – a position he held for at least two decades – it became harder to recall the intellectually brilliant and reforming politician who in 1974 became the Fifth Republic’s youngest president.Giscard, who has died aged 94, was 48 when he became president and only 55 when he stopped, after one seven-year term, meaning he experienced his political career go into decline at an age when most of his contemporaries were only just making a bid for high office. Thereafter Giscard fought to remain relevant, particularly in European politics, as he saw off his bitter rivals – François Mitterrand and Jacques Chirac – to become the longest lived former French president in history. It would be a mistake, however, to remember Giscard, or VGE as he was often known, solely for his longevity. Continue reading...

Communication aid was altered in 1934 because original version was deemed ‘too Jewish’Germany is to scrap its phonetic spelling table introduced by the Nazis 86 years ago and temporarily replace it with the version the regime abolished because it was “too Jewish”.The table, in which codewords are assigned to each letter of the alphabet to aid communication and avoid confusion, particularly in radio transmissions and telephone calls, originated in the late 19th century. In 1934 it was adapted by the Nazis who cleansed it of all its Jewish names as part of the regime’s drive to reject all Jews from German life, which culminated in the Holocaust. Continue reading...

Former Productivity Commission chief, speaking ahead of federal-state talks, says public won’t be on board unless told of problemsThe former head of the Productivity Commission has warned that the Morrison government is failing to sell the need for industrial relations reforms.Speaking on Thursday ahead of the full release of the industrial relations omnibus bill next week, Gary Banks said it was “a bit of a concern” the Coalition had not set out the problems it was aiming to solve. Continue reading...

Breakthrough will allow start of negotiations to end nearly 20 years of civil warThe Afghan government and the Taliban have agreed framework rules for peace talks after more than two months of discussions, allowing negotiations on ending a nearly 20-year civil war to finally begin.The peace process, hosted by Qatar, is playing out against a backdrop of heavy violence on the ground in Afghanistan and an accelerated withdrawal of US troops. Continue reading...

Foreign minister calls on US to ‘show its good faith’ but appears to rule out renegotiating dealIran will come back into full compliance with its nuclear deal immediately after an incoming Joe Biden administration proves its bona fides by lifting all sanctions, the country’s foreign minister has said.Setting out the parameters for a new relationship with the US, Javad Zarif also said Iran would not require the US to rejoin the deal, known as the joint comprehensive plan of action (JCPoA), before lifting its sanctions, but would need some kind of assurance that once it has rejoined a Biden administration would not simply leave the deal again in the same way Donald Trump did. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Anderson will purr as villainous Cat in the British studio’s first collaboration with the streaming serviceGillian Anderson and Richard E Grant will lead the cast of Aardman’s first collaboration with Netflix, Robin Robin, the Guardian can reveal. The feature-length tale of a robin who is adopted by a family of mice after its egg rolls into a rubbish dump will be the British animation studio’s first musical, and marks a departure from its longstanding relationship with the BBC. Previous Aardman hits include Wallace & Gromit, Shaun the Sheep and Flushed Away.Anderson will voice the villain of the piece – Cat – while Grant will play Robin’s mentor, Magpie. Both will also provide their dulcet tones for their characters’ songs. Continue reading...

UK forces join 56 other countries in Minusma peacekeeping missionBritain has begun a three-year deployment of 300 troops to the west African country of Mali as part of a UN peacekeeping mission, entering a region beset by an increasingly dangerous violent Islamist insurgency.The UK forces are deploying to Gao, in the east of the country, where militants have repeatedly attacked French, European and local armed forces, including a deadly 2017 suicide attack on a military base that killed more than 50 Malians. Continue reading...

Workers are being forced into debt and facing food shortages as suppliers to western fashion brands cut wages and close factories

Interior minister says any found to be ‘breeding grounds of terrorism’ will be shutFrance’s interior minister has announced a crackdown on 76 mosques that the government suspects of “separatism” and encouraging extremism.Gérald Darmanin said the mosques would be inspected and any found to be “breeding grounds of terrorism” would be shut. Continue reading...

Study of sexual abuse in healthcare settings in England and Wales says behaviour was not questionedHealthcare practitioners who committed child sexual abuse commonly did so under the guise of medical treatment, which went unchallenged by other staff even when unnecessary or inappropriate because of their position of trust, research has found.An independent inquiry into child sexual abuse report into abuse in healthcare settings between the 1960s and 2000s found that perpetrators were most commonly male GPs or healthcare practitioners with routine clinical access to children. As a result their behaviour was not questioned by colleagues, the children or their parents. Continue reading...

Alieu Kosiah is also accused of being involved in killing of 18 civilians, rape and recruiting child soldierA former rebel commander accused of involvement in killing civilians, rape and eating pieces of a schoolteacher’s heart during Liberia’s civil war has decried his long pre-trial detention as proceedings began in Switzerland on Thursday.The trial is one of a handful of cases brought to international courts in connection with the west African country’s 1989-2003 civil war, in which hundreds of thousands of people were killed. Continue reading...