Writer tells Edinburgh festival audience she wants to focus on short stories and theatreHilary Mantel has spent the last 15 years consumed by Tudor intrigue and writing award-winning historical fiction, but fans should not expect much more in that vein.“I haven’t got another big historical novel in view,” she told the Edinburgh international books festival on Sunday. “I think that’s quite important to say, so I hope people will stop writing to me with suggestions. It’s lovely that people have the appetite for it but considering the pace at which I proceed, I would like some life before it’s too late.” Continue reading...

Labour calls on PM to cancel planned break as Tory MPs deluged with complaintsBoris Johnson has been urged to get a grip on the exams crisis as Labour and backbench Conservatives united in their criticism of the botched handling of A-level results in England and headteachers came out in favour of a Scotland-style solution using teachers’ assessments.The government’s attempt to placate angry parents and students backfired over the weekend when the exams regulator Ofqual scrapped rules allowing pupils to appeal against their grades using the results of mock exams, hours after the rules had been published and endorsed by ministers. Continue reading...

Ex-regional chief prosecutor calls on PM’s chief aide to reveal mobile phone and vehicle tracking information

Belarusian leader seeks Kremlin support against external threats as analysts predict an end to his ruleIsolated from the west and besieged by mass protests, the Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko has made repeated calls for Vladimir Putin to intervene and save his 26-year-old regime.In telephone calls to the Kremlin on Saturday and Sunday, he sought confirmation that Russia would provide military assistance against external threats, while warning supporters that the country was under foreign pressure. Continue reading...

Belarusians assemble en masse in Minsk as an extraordinary week of rising sentiment comes to a close. 'I made my choice and my vote was thrown in the bin, so I'll keep coming out until our president leaves,' said one demonstrator. Seven days after the country’s authoritarian ruler, Alexander Lukashenko, claimed to have secured 80% of the vote in a presidential election, his legitimacy is in tatters and his regime faces its biggest crisis since he came to power 26 years ago

The Guardian’s Middle East writers reflect on a week of devastation and anger after a blast that shocked the worldFor most of my 15 years in the Middle East, I’ve had a home in Beirut. It’s been a sanctuary to return to from countless trips around the region, a place where the rigours, and sometimes dangers, of Iraq, Syria, Libya and elsewhere could be set aside for a while. Continue reading...

As many as 100,000 people attend biggest protest in country’s history in defiant and euphoric moodLooking out across the vast crowd, the protesters could not quite believe it. Was this really Belarus? How had their country changed so quickly?A week ago in the same spot, riot police had used batons and rubber bullets to terrorise those protesting against Alexander Lukashenko’s rigged election victory. Yet despite thousands of arrests and the shocking violence meted out to so many of them, the mood in the country has turned from despair to resilience to euphoria as the week progressed. Continue reading...

Police say woman in her 40s was known to the child, who was found at address in ActonA woman has been arrested on suspicion of murder after a boy, 10, was found dead in a west London flat.The woman, in her 40s, attended a police station and spoke to officers at about 2.30am on Sunday. Officers and paramedics attended a residential address in Cumberland Park, Acton, where they found the body of a 10-year-old boy. Continue reading...

Asylum seekers give accounts of injuries, as Priti Patel says many refugees feel France is racistAsylum seekers in the UK and France have described injuries they have received at the hands of French police, as Priti Patel said many were making the perilous journey across the Channel because they believe France is racist.The home secretary made her comments in a conference call with Conservative MPs concerned about the recent surge in numbers attempting the voyage in small boats. Continue reading...

Critics say PHE is being scapegoated for government’s failings during pandemic

Security companies and return travellers may also be called to give evidence at judicial inquiry this week

Some people seem to be above the law. Those people do not include the whistleblower and his lawyer, Bernard CollaeryTimor-Leste only achieved independence in 2002. It was Asia’s poorest country and desperately needed revenue. Revenue from massive gas resources in the Timor Sea was its big hope. But it needed to negotiate a treaty with Australia on their carve-up. Australia ruthlessly exploited that fact: delays from the Australian side in negotiating a treaty for the carve-up of those resources, and repeated threats of more delays, were a constant theme of the negotiations. In November 2002 the former Australian foreign minister Alexander Downer told Timor-Leste’s prime minister, Mari Alkatiri: “We don’t have to exploit the resources. They can stay there for 20, 40, 50 years.” In late 2003 Timor-Leste requested monthly discussions. Australia claimed it could only afford two rounds a year. Poor Timor-Leste offered to fund rich Australia’s expenses. Australia didn’t accept.Related: Witness K and the 'outrageous' spy scandal that failed to shame Australia Continue reading...

Thousands of protesters have taken to the streets in Belarus to contest the claimed election victory of the president, Alexander Lukashenko, and met a violent police response. Hanna Liubakova, a Belarusian journalist, describes being on the ground, while the Guardian’s Andrew Roth looks at how Lukashenko has remained in power for 26 yearsThis episode first aired on Today in Focus, the Guardian’s global daily news podcast.On 9 August, presidential election day, clashes broke out across Belarus as riot police used rubber bullets, flash grenades, teargas and water cannon to quash protests. Alexander Lukashenko, who has ruled for 26 years, claimed he had won a landslide victory in an election marred by accusations of vote-rigging. The election commission announced the next day that he had taken 80.23% of the votes while his main opposition challenger, Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, who has held some of the country’s largest political rallies since the days of the Soviet Union, had only 9.9%. Continue reading...

Activists demand dissolution of parliament in one of biggest marches since 2014 coupAt least 10,000 demonstrators, mostly students, gathered at Bangkok’s iconic democracy monument on Sunday, as they stepped up their calls for political change, including reforms to the monarchy.The protest was one of the biggest since the 2014 coup, and follows a month of almost daily rallies that have drawn support from high school and university students across the country. Continue reading...

Muhammad Azhar Shabbir, 18, and Ali Athar Shabbir, 16, got into difficulty off Lancashire coast on SaturdayTwo teenage brothers are feared dead after getting into difficulty at sea on a family day out to the coast.Muhammad Azhar Shabbir, 18, and Ali Athar Shabbir, 16, could not be found despite an extensive search and rescue operation off the coast of Lytham St Annes in Lancashire. Continue reading...

Opposition protesters turn out in their tens of thousands in Minsk to dispute the country’s presidential election result. Supporters of Alexander Lukashenko also hold rallies as he rejects calls for a new vote and urges supporters to ‘defend your country’ Continue reading...

Exclusive: Figures show UK forces drawing or discharging stun guns disproportionately on non-whitesChildren from black, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds are almost three times more likely to have a Taser electronic weapon used on them by police than their white counterparts.The proportion of BAME 11- to 17-year-olds having electronic stun guns used on them in comparison white children has been rising as growing numbers of officers are equipped with the weapons, responses to Freedom of Information requests show. Continue reading...

Potential exposure took place just days after the Brass Rail Tavern, one of the city’s best-known strip clubs, was allowed to re-openHealth officials in the Canadian city of Toronto have warned that as many as 550 people may have been exposed to the coronavirus at a downtown strip club after an employee tested positive for the virus.The potential exposure took place just days after the Brass Rail Tavern, one of the city’s best-known strip clubs, was allowed to re-open. The employee worked four shifts in early August, the city said in a statement, without detailing the capacity in which the employee worked. Continue reading...

Daniel Andrews says a joint state-federal response unit is needed as 81 active coronavirus cases are linked to 53 disability facilities• Shorten lashes out at profit-driven aged care and Morrison government over Covid failingsThe Victorian premier, Daniel Andrews, has called on the federal government to take a greater role in the management of Covid-19 outbreaks with the disability sector, arguing for a response similar to the unit established for aged care.There are currently 81 active cases linked to more than 50 disability accomodation sites – the majority of which are regulated by federal authorities under the NDIS or are transitioning to commonwealth oversight – but experts and disability advocates say the crisis roiling the aged care sector shows the situation could quickly escalate. Continue reading...

Workers at Greencore factory at centre of outbreak found it difficult to comply due to sick pay warning, say reps

Former spy chief Saad Aljabri, who is in hiding in Canada, says Mohammed bin Salman flipped his country’s support for rebels on its head in 2015In the summer of 2015 Mohammed bin Salman, then Saudi defence minister and third in line to the throne, turned his country’s foreign policy on its head and gave a covert green light for Russia’s intervention in Syria, according to a lawsuit by a former top intelligence official.In his complaint filed in a federal court in Washington, Saad Aljabri alleges that the abrupt switch of course by the man who is now Saudi Arabia’s crown prince alarmed the then CIA director, John Brennan, who met Aljabri in July and August of 2015 to pass on a rebuke from the Obama administration. Continue reading...

As quest for answers over massive port blast begins, a tribunal is expected announce findings on death of Rafik HaririA military judge in Beirut will, on 17 August, start examining a report into the cataclysmic explosion that levelled parts of the city 12 days ago, and determine who might face charges. A day later, five thousand miles away in The Hague, an international tribunal is due to hand down a verdict into a blast that took place 15 years earlier, killing the country’s former prime minister Rafik Hariri and unleashing a generation of havoc, from which it is yet to recover.The tales behind the two explosions are the most important events in the modern history of Lebanon. The 2005 assassination of a leader credited by many with leading a broken nation from the rubble of war had remained a searing wound, while the annihilation of much of Beirut on 4 August has left gaping new scars on the country’s psyche. Continue reading...

Hundreds of titles will flood the market because of Covid. It’s bad news for minority authors, says former Booker prize judgeOver the summer, novelist and screenwriter David Nicholls has been something of a hero. With a humorous nod to the less glamorous aspects of publishing life – hastily defrosted canapés and eked-out warm white wine – the author of One Day and adaptor of the Patrick Melrose novels has thrown a series of Twitter book launches, amplifying new releases from writers including (but far beyond) the big names who will automatically elicit review space and window displays. The responses from the authors, especially the debutants, to gaining the imprimatur of a much-loved and huge-selling colleague, and from readers to discovering books to connect with in a time of such immense disconnection, has been powerful and touching. It’s a particularly nice example of someone paying it forward.Nicholls’s virtual launches have been held every Thursday, the day new books are traditionally published in the UK, but this week’s will be his last. Quite possibly, his publishers have reminded him that the paperback edition of his own book, Sweet Sorrow, needs some love, or perhaps he wants to get on with writing another. Continue reading...

Turkey’s aggression towards its rivals and allies alike is posing a threat to regional stability, yet nobody is prepared to actMuch opprobrium has been heaped in recent days on the “elective dictatorship” of Alexander Lukashenko and his violently fraudulent bid to secure a sixth term as president of Belarus. Josep Borrell, the EU’s foreign affairs chief, led a chorus of condemnation, rejecting last Sunday’s poll as “neither free nor fair”.Yet Europe’s righteous wrath and sanctions threats seem a tad confected. Nobody really expected Lukashenko to play fair. Democratic reform in Belarus, a country firmly stuck in Russia’s orbit, is not an EU priority. There is no discernible appetite for the kind of robust intervention that might actually make a difference. Continue reading...

The world’s greatest supermodel has been a fearless champion of diversity in fashion for decades. Now she’s relishing a moment of changeAn upside of our new Zoom-operated civilisation is supposed to be the abolishment of lateness. It’s harder to justify when the commute is from your bed to the living room. Unless you’re Naomi Campbell, of course. Twenty minutes into waiting for her to join our call, a message pops up from a representative apologising that she’d be a few minutes late. Another 20 minutes and I’m told she’s “just working out how to sign in”. I’ve been expecting the wait, comparatively tame compared to the tales of four-hour stake-outs I’d heard from other journalists.And then, suddenly, she enters, and the atmosphere changes even in a virtual room, international accent first and then the face that launched 1,000 covers; skin dewy and glowy, goddess-like; impossibly high cheekbones and honey-blonde highlights. “Hi,” she says coyly. Polite but unapologetic. It’s fascinating to witness in real time this acute awareness of her own mythology; an unspoken agreement with anyone she encounters that she will be operating according to her own time zone. Continue reading...

Nations from New Zealand to Cuba closed borders promptly with strict quarantine rules, but the UK won’t admit its ‘serious mistake’Island nations have an advantage when it comes to stopping travellers importing disease, be it Covid or other infections.Seas are usually harder to cross than land, and beaches are easier to police. There are no cross-border towns, and fewer ways to sneak over frontiers. Continue reading...

From TfL to planning laws, allies of Sadiq Khan say figures close to the prime minister are steadily eroding the mayor’s influenceWhen Sadiq Khan recently announced plans to move his team out of City Hall, the striking Thames-side building that has been headquarters for the London mayoralty for almost 20 years, close observers noted some worrying symbolism in the cost-cutting measure. The proposal would see the mayor move from this prime spot, across the river from the regal pomp of the Tower of London, to less-prominent digs five miles away in London’s Royal Docks. Was this to be a diminished seat of power for a diminished office?For months now, allies of Khan have complained about an alleged power grab by the government. Across the mayor’s key powers over transport, housing, policing and planning – as well as funding – they claim a series of clashes add up to an attack not just on him, but on the office itself. Continue reading...

Thinktank warns of ‘Great Depression’ unemployment levels unless jobs support scheme is kept in place

Key staff say they cannot afford to lose two weeks’ work to self-isolate

Meaningless certificate was handed to a Hong Kong businessman with links to Communist Party in hope of receiving cash donationsAn Oxford academic handed out a “meaningless” university qualification to a Hong Kong businessman with ties to the Chinese authorities at a high-profile ceremony in Shanghai last year, in the latest incident to raise concerns about Chinese influence on UK higher education.Alan Hudson awarded the title “Belt and Road Academician from Oxford University” to Chan King Wai, who is a member of an advisory body to China’s rubber-stamp parliament, at a ceremony attended by an official from the British consulate and dozens of other people. Continue reading...

Wealthy visitors to South African ‘slums’ are understating hardships faced by residents in reviews on TripadvisorIs it time to rethink “slum tourism”? Researchers at the University of Bath believe the answer is a resounding yes. They claim that foreign visitors are glossing over the hardships of those living in poor areas with well-meaning attempts to portray their inhabitants in a positive light.The researchers analysed more than 400 Tripadvisor reviews for two townships outside Cape Town in South Africa regularly referred to as “slums”. They found that visitors to Langa and Imizamo Yethu underplayed the daily challenges facing people living there. Continue reading...

Chris Bowen calls on federal government to boost funding to local researchers

Last week’s agreement to normalise relations between Israel and the UAE does nothing to solve the Palestine impasseThe principal authors of last week’s agreement to normalise relations between Israel and the United Arab Emirates – Donald Trump, Benjamin Netanyahu and Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan – have strong personal reasons for hailing it as a “historic” breakthrough. Yet any rapprochement built on the ruins of Palestinian hopes of an independent state is suspect and fragile. This flawed deal may yet come to be seen as a historic mistake.

President says US will unilaterally reinstate sanctions a day after only two countries voted for prolonging embargo

Israeli forces say they bombed Hamas targets for a fifth consecutive night as clashes broke out along borderIsraeli aircraft have bombed sites belonging to the militant Hamas group in Gaza for a fifth night in a row, the Israel defence force says.The military said early on Sunday that the airstrikes were in response to arson balloons that Hamas-affiliated groups sent across the Gaza frontier into Israeli territory. Continue reading...

An inquiry into allegations of war crimes committed by a small number of elite troops in Afghanistan is expected to report imminently. Can the regiments survive the fallout?In the heart of the Australian War Memorial hang twin portraits of Ben Roberts-Smith, the most decorated soldier of his time and now its most controversial former special forces warrior.The first of Michael Zavros’s paintings is modestly sized, dignified in composition. Roberts-Smith, 41, stands in full military uniform, gazing intently, tunic breast filled with medals including his Victoria Cross, Australia’s highest honour. Continue reading...

City of Auckland is under coronavirus lockdown – and ahead of election the government is being criticised over border control, quarantine and testingWhen scientists in Auckland began modelling an outbreak of Covid-19 in the city’s densely populated southern regions – situated right by the country’s only international airport – they hoped they were participating in a drill scenario.“This is exactly the type of outbreak we were worried about, and in fact it’s exactly what happened,” said Professor Shaun Hendy, who works modelling the progression of the disease for the government. Continue reading...

Despite medical intervention, officer died at scene following incident off coast of PwllheliAn off-duty police officer has died after falling from a jetski. The alarm was raised shortly after 4.30pm on Saturday following the incident off the coast of Pwllheli, north Wales.Emergency services, including the Coastguard and RNLI, attended and the officer was retrieved from the water. Despite extensive medical intervention, he died at the scene. His next of kin have been informed, said North Wales police. Continue reading...

I have no great hope we will use this chance to transform for the better – but this is an unconvincing darkness, and we do not have to stay in it

As researchers, we have been shocked to find the most remote depths of the Pacific Ocean polluted by our plastic. And it will outlive us all.Another bottle. Yet another one. We are 200km from land, in the middle of the South Pacific, and this is the third bottle we’ve found already this morning.Everywhere is plastic. Continue reading...

Kidus Wondwosen died shortly after collision in Hulme area of city on SundayA family has paid tribute to a six-year-old boy who died after his bike was hit by a car. Kidus Wondwosen died a short time after the collision in Wilmott Street in the Hulme area of Manchester on Sunday.In a tribute issued through Greater Manchester police, his family said: “Kidus was a happy, friendly boy who was always smiling. He was very smart and his mum was proud that he was the smartest boy in his class at school. Continue reading...

End of cooperation ‘because of pandemic’ comes as extent of similar British contracts with foreign forces emergesThe government has barred UK military personnel from training the Hong Kong police force and two other organisations amid worsening relations with China.Both the army and the RAF run limited drill instructor programmes for Hong Kong’s police force, its Government Flying Service and its Sea Cadet Corps, but these have now been put on hold, the Ministry of Defence told the Observer. Continue reading...

A school with no classrooms, homework or grades encourages creativity and imagination, rather than an ability to sit still and nod• Time to reset: more brilliant ideas to remake the worldIn many places around the world, education has become something to be endured. A new generation is learning to run a rat race where the main metrics of success are your résumé and your pay cheque – a generation less inclined to colour outside the lines, less inclined to dream or to dare, to fantasise or explore.Can schools operate on a wholly different view of human nature? What if we give children much more freedom to play and learn on their own? Continue reading...

Priti Patel risks replicating Home Office failings that led to scandal, victims and human rights campaigners warnSurvivors of the Windrush scandal have attacked the home secretary, saying her approach to the Channel migrant crossings is creating “the same set of conditions” that led to the government victimising the children of Commonwealth immigrants.A letter to Priti Patel from 100 prominent refugee and human rights campaigners, including members of the Windrush generation, warns that the “pattern of ignoring expert advice, failing to engage with civil society and branding migrants as criminal” replicates Home Office failings that caused the 2018 Windrush scandal. Continue reading...

US diplomat David Hale calls for a thorough and transparent investigation into the blast

The royal family leads the UK’s commemorations on the 75th anniversary of VJ Day – the day the second world war ended with Japan’s surrender.Prince Charles led a two-minute silence at the National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire, as part of a service of remembrance. The prime minister also spoke at the event.

Pressure mounts on Alexander Lukashenko to go as protests threaten to spill beyond Belarus’s borders

The first step to change is to admit that systemic racism exists. To own it. Only then can we root it out• Time to reset: more brilliant ideas to remake the worldEver since I was a boy, it was my dream to become a policeman. Growing up in Toxteth, Liverpool, amid the riots of the 1980s, it must have seemed crazy: black gay scousers from working-class estates didn’t go into the police.I joined Greater Manchester police three months after 9/11. From training, through to my transfer to the Metropolitan police in London, racism blighted my career. I fell ill with depression, and challenged the police in the courts. The Metropolitan police was found to have harassed, victimised and discriminated against me, because of my sexuality and the colour of my skin. I was then forced out after 11 years’ service. Continue reading...

But the same measures that fight coronavirus are effective against the flu – and vaccines offer another weapon against itPublic health experts, researchers and manufacturers warn the coming flu season could bring a “double-barrel” respiratory disease outbreak in the United States, just as fall and winter are expected to exacerbate spread of Covid-19.At the same time, researchers said the strategies currently used to prevent Covid-19 transmission – namely, hand-washing, mask-wearing and social distancing – could also help lessen flu outbreaks, if Americans are willing to practice them. Continue reading...

Emergency services say all other residents of the building in North Fitzroy were evacuated safelyA child has died in a fire at a Melbourne public housing building.Emergency services attended the apartment block at the intersection of Clauscen and Nicholson streets in North Fitzroy about 12.30pm on Saturday. Continue reading...