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Teenager announced dead at scene after police called to Clowes Park on Sunday morningA murder investigation has been launched after a 17-year-old boy was found stabbed in a park in Salford. Greater Manchester police (GMP) were alerted about an “unresponsive male” and called to Clowes Park at about 7.30am on Sunday.Emergency services attended but the teenager, who had suffered a stab wound, was pronounced dead at the scene. His next of kin have been informed and detectives are following a number of lines of inquiry. Continue reading...

UN special adviser Stephanie Williams warns of resurgence of Islamic State if country is dividedLibya’s political class should stop conducting musical chairs to stay in power and focus instead on preparing for nationwide elections to be held by June, the special adviser to the UN secretary general has said.Stephanie Williams also warned of a possible resurgence of Islamic State if Libya were to fall back into total division. Continue reading...

With more than 2 million kids across NSW and Victoria returning to in-person education this week, and Covid cases still in the thousands, experts have warned that Covid is likely to circulate in schools for at least the next 12 months. But state and federal leaders are determined to keep schools open.Laura Murphy-Oates speaks to reporter Calla Wahlquist about the plan to keep NSW and Victorian schools open over the coming yearRead more: Continue reading...

FoI requests reveal sovereign wealth fund also has investments in arms companies linked to Myanmar militaryAustralia’s sovereign wealth fund, the Future Fund, has invested more than $90m in weapons manufacturer Raytheon Technologies, whose laser-guided bomb was allegedly used in an airstrike on a detention centre in Yemen this month killing nearly 100 civilians.Documents released under freedom of information laws show the Future Fund, which invests on behalf of the Australian government, had $91.22m invested in Raytheon as of December last year. Continue reading...

Gusty winds and falling temperatures plunged the US east coast into a deep freeze after a powerful nor’easter dumped mounds of snow, flooded coastlines and knocked out power for tens of thousands of people

British schools with branches in the Middle East are abandoning principles for profit and it’s simply wrongThe private education system, I’m beginning to suspect, just isn’t that into me. I blame myself – I’ve been playing hard to get. Pointing out the divisions in British society that having private schools causes, mentioning how the fees have gone up hugely ahead of inflation and questioning their charitable status in light of that. But still, in my heart I was up for being seduced.I went to private schools and was generally fond of those institutions. As a left-leaning centrist but also a conservative with a small “c” (a woolly position that makes me a massive “c” in the eyes of some), I’m uncomfortable with abolishing, or otherwise driving out of existence, non-profit-making educational institutions. I don’t like banning things in general. I can see the logic that these schools, which undoubtedly provide something good for thousands of children, might nevertheless be causing societal harm overall. But I’m squeamish about taking that logic and commissioning some politicians to turn it into a great big illiberal bunch of laws. So the truth, private education system, is that I was still fluttering my eyelashes at you. Continue reading...

After many attempts to polish its public perception, the county is yet again pouring money into a campaignWhat is it with Essex and makeovers? It was reported that the county council is to invest more than £300,000 to put its best face on and “challenge people’s preconceived ideas of how they see Essex on TV”. Council bosses wanted to banish thoughts of The Only Way Is Essex, fake tan and fast cars synonymous with the south of the county, replacing them with the Constable-country vistas, windmills and nice thatched cottages of north Essex.We’ve been here before. The council’s drive to combat the Essex stereotype is almost as old as the stereotype itself. In 1997, moves to improve the county’s image were reported in the national press. “Difficulties arise when overseas investors come to the UK, go to competitor locations, and hear jokes about Essex girls having more shoes than books,” said the head of the Essex Economic Partnership, Terry Conder. The council said it often received letters from residents about Essex’s reputation. Continue reading...

Guilt over Nazism’s crimes is affecting Berlin’s approach to Moscow – and that equivocation has frustrated its alliesWhen Germany’s new chancellor, Olaf Scholz, shook hands on a coalition deal with his liberal-green partners last month, they energetically vowed to “risk more progress”.Less than two months on, however, Berlin’s allies in Kyiv, Washington and neighbouring European capitals worry the country remains stuck in passive old ways. As tension mounts on the border between Russia and Ukraine, they fear Scholz is falling back on foreign policy instincts honed by his most recent centre-left predecessor, the ex-chancellor-turned-lobbyist Gerhard Schröder. Continue reading...

Animal carcasses litter the land in areas where the rains have failed, as millions go without enough food and water in a country already grappling with civil warThe circumference of Nimo Abdi Duh’s upper arm measures just 12cm and, while the number means nothing to her, it does to the health workers treating her. Nimo, two, like so many children in the arid lowlands of Ethiopia, is suffering from malnutrition.“We have been affected by the drought,” says her mother, Shems Dire, looking anxiously on. “We don’t have milk to give to the children. My child is sick due to lack of food, and this happened because of the drought … Our cattle have been harmed by the drought. We have lost so many. Continue reading...

You’ve discovered that you and your husband have different views about porn – and this may have triggered your teenage traumaThe question I walked in on my husband watching porn and now I feel extraordinarily hurt and abandoned.My grown-up children have left home and I have managed to have a rewarding career. However, having a good relationship always eluded me until I was in my 50s. Continue reading...

Daily figures for UK are lowest since mid-December; Japanese infections set record for fifth consecutive day

Important paintings lay forgotten in storage since the early 80s until their discovery, muddy and mouldy, but intactBalgo is Country for all of us now. We were all born here, these generations here today. We are Wirrimanu kids. We belong to Balgo. That’s what we paint. That’s why we paint. This is our story.”

US president announces small troop deployment to eastern Europe amid fears of invasionKyiv has urged the west to remain “vigilant and firm” in its talks with Russia, as Joe Biden announced a small troop deployment to eastern Europe amid fears Moscow could invade Ukraine.Washington’s top defence officials warned on Friday that the Kremlin had massed enough troops and hardware at the border to threaten the whole of Ukraine, but called for further diplomatic efforts to avert a “horrific” conflict. Continue reading...

Once hunted close to extinction, the species is once again flourishing – but as their numbers grow, tensions are rising with their human neighboursOn the coastline around Kaikōura, the rocks seem to be moving. Jutting from the sea, shimmering in the summer heat, their grey planes begin to shift and ripple.Step closer and you recognise them, first by their sound: a distant honking, barking, yelping. Then, by their smell: thick and potent, a mixture of kelp and excrement. Seals, hundreds of them, possibly thousands, are coming ashore for pupping. They roll in constant, joyful helixes in the rock pools, emerge from the sea to glisten like puddles of oil, or bask unmoving in the sun like comatose adolescents recovering from a hangover. Continue reading...

Charlotte Bellis says Taliban offered her safe haven while quarantine backlog prevented her return homeA pregnant New Zealand journalist says she has had to turn to the Taliban for help after being prevented from returning to her home country due to quarantine rules.In a column published in the New Zealand Herald on Saturday, Charlotte Bellis said it was “brutally ironic” that she had once questioned the Taliban about their treatment of women and she was now asking the same questions of her own government. Continue reading...

A beach in eastern Thailand has been declared a disaster area as oil leaking from an underwater pipeline in the Gulf of Thailand continues to wash ashore and blacken the sand.The leak, from a pipeline owned by Star Petroleum Refining, started late on Tuesday and was brought under control a day later after spilling an estimated 50,000 litres (11,000 gallons) of oil into the ocean about 12 miles (20km) from the country’s industrialised eastern seaboard

Campaigners say a superyacht can produce 1,500 times more carbon than a typical family car, and the polluters should payThe rising fortunes of the world’s billionaires during the pandemic helped fuel a record £5.3bn in superyacht sales last year, prompting calls for new curbs on their emissions.New figures reveal that 887 superyachts were sold in 2021, an increase of more than 75% compared with the previous year. Yachting brokers say some of the demand has been from wealthy clients seeking a secure refuge from the pandemic. Continue reading...

The NFU president has been dismayed by the government’s post-Brexit deals, but has vowed to fight on for British producersThere are few jobs that allow you to see the fruits of your labours, season after season. Minette Batters has one of them. She has been producing beef, lamb and crops on 150 hectares (370 acres) in south Wiltshire for almost a quarter of a century – the place where she grew up and which was farmed for decades by her parents.“The fences weren’t here. The barn didn’t have a roof, it was derelict,” says Batters, recalling the state of the farm when she began running it in 1998. Continue reading...

The home of Alstom and Rolls-Royce has often played second fiddle to others, but the city wants to change all thatDerby isn’t known as a tourist hotspot. Often overshadowed by nearby Nottingham, bypassed on the road to the Peak District, locals here know the hotels are quietest at weekends when visiting business folk leave.That hasn’t stopped its leaders making a tilt to become UK City of Culture 2025. Bidding to reinvigorate civic pride and economic growth after the fallout from Covid-19, the aim here is to showcase the city’s unique industrial heritage as a crucible for the art of manufacturing. Continue reading...

Singer-songwriter adds his own twist to boycott by Joni Mitchell and Neil Young over platform’s promotion of anti-vax podcasts

After a year in power, evidence is growing of regime scorched-earth tactics to terrorise the civilian populationOn the morning of 6 January, Boi Van Thang set out on a motorbike across the mountainous terrain of Chin state in western Myanmar. He would travel to a nearby village, he told his wife, and bring back meat for her and their seven children.He never returned. Three days later his wife, Thida Htwe, received a call. Boi Van Thang’s body had been found. The bodies of eight other men and one boy had also been discovered. Continue reading...

Hoardings erected around ‘martyrs slogan’ painted across bridge at University of Hong KongA Hong Kong university has covered up a painted slogan commemorating China’s Tiananmen Square crackdown, the latest instance of a public 4 June memorial being removed in Chinese-ruled Hong Kong.A Reuters journalist saw about a dozen construction workers erect grey metal hoardings around a “martyrs slogan” painted across the length of the University of Hong Kong’s (HKU) Swire Bridge. Continue reading...

A 17-year-old has been arrested in connection with the incident, which took place after an altercation, police saidA 17-year-old and a man have been stabbed to death in Doncaster after an “altercation” in the town.Emergency services were called to the scene in Silver Street at 2.39am on Saturday to reports that two men and a teenager had been stabbed after an altercation outside a licensed premises, South Yorkshire police said. Continue reading...

Taylor Steel, who was three times over the legal alcohol limit, has been banned from the road for two yearsA drink-driver has been banned from the roads after crashing into a McDonald’s restaurant in West Sussex, causing extensive damage.Taylor Steel was disqualified from driving for two years after the crash at Buck Barn services on the A24 near Horsham on 24 November. Continue reading...

Thousands of monks and disciples accompany coffin of Zen master and peace activist in processionA funeral has been held for the Vietnamese Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh, a week after the renowned Zen master and peace activist died at the age of 95 in Hue, central Vietnam.Thousands of monks and disciples trailed a procession of pallbearers carrying Thich Nhat Hanh’s coffin from Tu Hieu pagoda, where he spent his last days, to the cremation site. Others kneeled and clasped their hands in prayer on the roadside and bowed to the ground as the casket went past. Continue reading...

As support grows for André Ventura, Socialist party has lost ground to centre-right PSD after row over budget with its alliesBetween greeting regulars at the busy Lisbon bakery where she has worked for two decades – and reaching instinctively for their orders as soon as they cross the threshold – Susana Santos offers her thoughts on an imminent, and altogether less welcome, encounter.Like many of her compatriots, she does not relish the idea of Sunday’s snap general election, which arrives amid a stubbornly lingering pandemic and during a time of economic upheaval and political uncertainty. Continue reading...

Redacted version reportedly to be sent to Johnson over weekend amid further calls for it to be released in entiretyThe inquiry into Downing Street parties could be shared with Boris Johnson as soon as this weekend as cross-party demands mount for the report to be published in its entirety after an intervention by Scotland Yard.The timeline for the publication of the long-awaited report by the senior civil servant Sue Gray on alleged lockdown breaches at Downing Street and Whitehall was thrown into question this week when the Metropolitan police announced on Tuesday that a criminal investigation had been launched. Continue reading...

To me, Carlo was the activist who swept me off my feet. Only years later did I discover that nothing he told me had been real – and that he was a spy cop and already marriedIt’s September 2015 and my mum and my sister have come by train from Scotland to visit me at home on the Kent coast, hoping to catch the last of the autumn heat. They live in the rainiest part of the UK, and I’ve moved to the corner with the most sun.I close the kitchen door on my twin daughters playing in the living room, shushing the dogs away. Continue reading...

Hundreds of oil company workers and navy personnel deployed in clean-up of Mae Ramphueng shorelineA beach in eastern Thailand has been declared a disaster area as oil leaking from an underwater pipeline in the Gulf of Thailand continues to wash ashore and blacken the sand.The leak, from a pipeline owned by Star Petroleum Refining, started late on Tuesday and was brought under control a day later after spilling an estimated 50,000 litres (11,000 gallons) of oil into the ocean about 12 miles (20km) from the country’s industrialised eastern seaboard. Continue reading...

A faith healer in the Dominican Republic falls foul of the US in this arresting, ambiguous dramaHere’s a striking and mysterious debut from the Dominican Republic, where film-maker Nino Martínez Sosa recounts a fascinating true-life story of occupation and resistance from the turn of the last century. Olivorio Mateo was a peasant and faith healer who became known to his disciples as Papa Liborio; he built a self-sufficient community in the mountains. But when US forces occupied in the 1910s, Liborio was branded a bandit, and killed.Not that you’d know any of the historical facts from watching this, which is set squarely in the arthouse endurance-test genre: there is little to no scene-setting or explainers, with the kind of pacing often euphemistically described by critics as “deliberate”. It begins after Liborio vanishes from his village during a hurricane, presumed dead. When he is found alive, he claims to have returned from God with healing powers and takes a band of followers up into the mountains. Continue reading...

Prime minister is said to be feeling well after taking flight with someone who tested positive

Number of infections rises by 19 as Games organisers warn of more cases in coming days

It’s been a year since Britain went alone. We asked EU nationals who returned to the continent after the referendum what they most miss about their former homeEveryone misses something. For some, it’s quite specific: PG Tips, Branston pickle, proper curry. For many, it’s more intangible: the atmosphere of an English pub; that greenness, everywhere; tolerance; and British openness.Then they pause. Actually, many formerly British-resident EU nationals say, what they miss is an idea. Or, to be precise, the idea of Britain they had before 24 June 2016: all of them remember, in painful, pin-sharp detail, how they felt, and what they did, the morning after. Continue reading...

Mitchell calls for her music to be removed from platform too, citing ‘irresponsible people spreading lies’In an act of solidarity between two veteran rock stars with a shared history of espousing progressive causes, Joni Mitchell has joined Neil Young in removing her music from Spotify in protest at it hosting a popular anti-vax podcast.Mitchell, whose 1971 album Blue is regarded as one of the greatest of all time, is the first high-profile musician to take a stand alongside Young against the streaming behemoth. Continue reading...

He’s been Paddington, Keats, and now a doctor in This Is Going to Hurt. He talks about his off-stage shyness and why he wasn’t delighted by the reveal of Q’s sexuality in No Time to DieBen Wishaw, quite apart from being one of the best British actors we have, is an expert dunker of his biscuits in tea. I’ve seen it: he’s a McVitie’s ninja, with a method all his own. We meet one afternoon in the offices of a London film company and I get the chance to observe his distinctive work first-hand, as digestive after digestive gets taken up by Whishaw, then dipped (sometimes double-handed) into a cuppa that he props on a table in front of him. Each biscuit gets submerged for so long, you suppose there’s no chance of it ever coming out whole. Each biscuit later re-emerges, sodden, milliseconds from ruin, still intact.“I’m no good at interviews,” Wishaw, 41, apologises, right away. Continue reading...

Remains of Roman wall that runs along city’s West Road deserve more recognition, campaigners sayPaula Robinson lives on a neat suburban cul-de-sac of 1930s houses that also contains the remains of a gateway to a mighty Roman fort once occupied by the Asturian cavalry regiment from northern Spain. Around the corner is the Temple of Antenociticus.Last year archaeologists found ancient pottery and deer bones in Robinson’s garden, which is close to one of Newcastle’s busiest roads, West Road. Exciting but not totally surprising as the house is on the site of Condercum, a huge hilltop outpost of Hadrian’s Wall. Continue reading...

NSW records 49 Covid deaths, Victoria 31, Queensland 12 and South Australia five. This blog is now closed

The author of Clinton Cash takes aim at the Bidens, the founder of Project Veritas stakes a claim for legitimacy. The results are murky – but offer a map for political battles to comeThe official investigation of Hunter Biden’s dealings in China and elsewhere rests in the hands of David Weiss, a Trump-appointed federal prosecutor in Delaware, and the US justice department under Joe Biden’s attorney general, Merrick Garland. Politically speaking, we now have Red-Handed by Peter Schweizer, who would very much like to help us digest the business past of the 46th president’s troublesome son.Schweizer’s works include Clinton Cash, a compendium of opposition research that helped shape the presidential election in 2016. These days, he is president of the Government Accountability Institute, a think tank funded by the Mercer family, part of the rightwing ecosystem. Continue reading...

Lily James and Sebastian Stan are spot on as the gorgeous 90s stars so loved up they communicate in grunts – and they make this gratuituous romp such funIt’s a series that is at least partly about Tommy Lee’s penis, so let’s talk about length. Pam & Tommy (Star on Disney+, from Wednesday) is an eight-part series that could have been a movie instead.You realise this about seven minutes in: the first episode, which almost exclusively follows Seth Rogen’s pornographer turned builder Rand Gauthier, takes its time with every single scene. We see Rand nail together a bed while Pamela Anderson and Lee have outrageously loud sex upstairs. We watch him drive home, put his feet up on the sofa, light a cigarette then stub it out. We flashback to his childhood to find out why he doesn’t like pissing his pants. We see him try to charm his boss into helping him hijack a safe from Lee’s unfinished Malibu mansion, and we see that boss umm and ahh and eventually say no. All of this takes ages. All of this could have been cut. We could have had a neat two-and-a-half hour feature film, and it would have been fine. Instead, we have eight hours of streaming to do. Continue reading...

Ship was referred to as ‘Magic Roundabout’ during secret project at an old hangar in Pembroke DockIn a small Welsh town far, far away (perhaps), preparations are in hand to tell the story of how one of the most famous and beloved movie spaceships was secretly built in an old aircraft hangar.A permanent exhibition is to open later this year explaining how the Millennium Falcon that appeared in the Star Wars film The Empire Strikes Back came to be constructed from wood and steel by engineers in Pembroke Dock, in south-west Wales. Continue reading...

Tour operators see rise in bookings as people look for interesting culture and history at lower price than neighbouring destinationsAlbania has been on the radar for intrepid backpackers for some time, but this year tour operators are predicting the south-eastern Balkan country will become a mainstream holiday destination for UK travellers after a surge in bookings this January.Interest in the country has been gradually building over the past decade as it has slowly opened up after a 44-year dictatorship that ended in 1985. Tour operators have seen a notable increase in bookings for 2022 as Albania extends its appeal to people seeking beautiful beaches and landscapes as well as interesting culture and history at a lower price than neighbouring destinations. Continue reading...

Babies born in the first lockdown are now turning two, and have only ever known a world of masks and isolation. What will be the long-term impact?Until the spring of 2020, Rebecca Handford’s then two-year-old daughter Eadie was happily spending three days a week being looked after by her grandparents, enjoying trips out, and going to cafes.But then came the first lockdown, and her world closed in overnight. The family, who live in a small village on the border between Cheshire and Derbyshire, felt lucky to have a garden for Eadie to play in – although, as Handford ruefully puts it, while she was trying to work from home “Mr Tumble did a lot of the heavy lifting”. Continue reading...

Businesses warn of the biggest supply chain disruption in ‘living memory’ after flooding cuts major transport links

Top US officials call for diplomacy to address Russian military buildup on the Ukraine border, saying conflict is ‘not inevitable’The US has warned a Russian invasion of Ukraine would be “horrific” for both sides, while calling for a diplomatic solution as tensions over Moscow’s military buildup on the border of the country continued to simmer.Speaking at the Pentagon on Friday, top US officials urged a focus on diplomacy while saying that Russia now had enough troops and equipment in place to threaten the whole of Ukraine. Continue reading...

As Russia approaches war, in Moscow it feels as if the public has barely taken noteChoral music wafted through the nave of the Cathedral of the Russian Armed Forces as Alexei Rozhkov, a visiting priest, considered the question: was Russia standing on the precipice of a new great conflict in Ukraine?“There won’t be a war – there can’t,” he said quickly, glancing up at the skylights of stained glass depicting Soviet medals and religious symbols on the ceiling. Continue reading...

US rapper previously told Forbes getting vaccinated was ‘the mark of the beast’

Students who speak out against royal family’s role in universities face jail but can also be pressured by pro-monarchy parentsWhen 24-year-old Krai Saidee returned to his alma mater Chiang Mai University on 14 January, nearly two years after his graduation, he came not just to support his friends but to make a political statement.Painted gold, he held up a sign attached to a graduation gown: “You took my dream, and gave me this,” the message read. Continue reading...