World news | The Guardian

There are 7,000 Buy Nothing groups with more than 5 million members worldwide. But their appeal goes beyond the chance to swap everything from nettles to power toolsWho on earth wants fish tank wastewater, chicken poo, tumble-dryer lint, loo roll tubes, “a plaster mould of a Komodo dragon’s foot” or half a broken toilet? No one, you might think, but the Buy Nothing community begs to differ: these are all real “gifts” snapped up by more than 5 million members worldwide, who give away their unwanted items in the local community. It’s living proof that “one person’s trash is another’s treasure”, as Alisa Miller, the administrator of the Blackheath/Charlton/Lewisham group puts it.Miller offered her daughter’s broken toy birdcage with little hope anyone would want it; it was snapped up by a local flower-arranging enthusiast, and filled with succulents and trailing plants. Her co-administrator’s son is the current custodian of a toy helicopter that has been played with by five Buy Nothing families to date. Members ask for what they want and usually get it: anything from household appliances, furniture and gardening tools to clothes and baby gear. Continue reading...

After independence in 1960, the country cast off western influences and forged a new African style full of triangular forms, rocket-shaped obelisks and rammed earth. Is this spirit now being suffocated? Our writer takes a tour of the capitalVisiting the International Fair of Dakar is like taking a stroll through the ruins of some ancient Toblerone-worshipping civilisation. A cluster of triangular pavilions rises from a podium, each clad in a rich pattern of seashells and pebbles. These are reached by triangular steps that lead past triangular plant pots to momentous triangular entranceways. All around, great hangar-like sheds extend into the distance, ventilated by triangular windows and topped with serrated triangular roofs. All that’s missing is triangular honey from triangular bees.Built on the outskirts of the Senegalese capital as a showcase for global trade in 1974, this astonishing city-sized hymn to the three-sided shape was designed by young French architects Jean Francois Lamoureux, Jean-Louis Marin and Fernand Bonamy. Their obsessive geometrical composition was an attempt to answer the call of Senegal’s first president, the poet Léopold Sédar Senghor, for a national style that he curiously termed “asymmetrical parallelism”. Continue reading...

Rejection of men’s claims was against UK guidance not to force returns to Afghanistan and YemenThe Home Office has told asylum seekers from some of the world’s biggest conflict zones that it is safe for them to return there, the Guardian has learned.A 36-year-old from Yemen and a 21-year-old from Afghanistan have both had their asylum claims rejected by government officials on the basis that they would not be at risk in their home countries. Continue reading...

Mercury in Roebourne hits new high, according to the bureau of meteorology, as a severe weather warning issued in the state’s far-northParts of Western Australia’s Pilbara region have sweltered through their hottest day on record with the temperature hitting 50C.The mercury in Roebourne soared to its new high just before 12.30pm on Thursday, according to the Bureau of Meteorology. Continue reading...

Watchdog’s latest report argues autocrats around the world are getting desperate as opponents form coalitions to challenge themIncreasingly repressive and violent acts against civilian protests by autocratic leaders and military regimes around the world are signs of their desperation and weakening grip on power, Human Rights Watch says in its annual assessment of human rights across the globe.In its world report 2022, the human rights organisation said autocratic leaders faced a significant backlash in 2021, with millions of people risking their lives to take to the streets to challenge regimes’ authority and demand democracy. Continue reading...

Amid the derision, supportive papers try to rally around the PM but report that ‘ambitious’ Rishi Sunak is waiting in the wingsThe newspaper front pages have piled the pressure on Boris Johnson as the prime minister fights for his political life over the scandal of the “bring your own booze” lockdown-era party at Downing Street.The Mirror’s banner headline on Thursday is “Disgrace”, set below a picture of Johnson giving his humiliating apology to the Commons for “not realising” the event in the back garden of 10 Downing Street on 20 May 2020 was a party. Continue reading...

Zane Wedding said he initially thought the problem was just water in his ear and later gave the insect to the ear specialist as a mementoA New Zealand man has had a cockroach pulled from his ear three days after first feeling a squirming sensation.Zane Wedding said he initially thought the problem was just water in his ear. The Aucklander had been for a swim at a local pool on Friday morning and fell asleep on his couch that evening. He woke up with a blocked ear – and the feeling there was something wriggling inside. Continue reading...

FDA head Janet Woodcock says most people will become infected, while Fauci says variant will ‘ultimately find just about everybody’Federal health authorities in America have said the Omicron Covid-19 variant is so contagious it is likely most people in the US will be infected, and compared the pandemic to a “natural disaster”.Authorities said even as Omicron shatters records for new cases, they are hopeful the surge will quickly subside, and said the US needs to focus on ensuring hospital systems do not collapse amid the surge. Continue reading...

William Wragg says Boris Johnson is damaging reputation of party as Douglas Ross calls for him to stand down after prime minister admits attending party

Legal experts say Duke of York has ‘no good options left’ given risks of giving evidence in court or settlingPrince Andrew faces the prospect of giving evidence in a high-profile trial after a New York judge refused to throw out a civil case over allegations he sexually assaulted Virginia Giuffre when she was 17 years old.Legal experts said the Duke of York has “no good options left” after he failed to have Giuffre’s case against him dismissed, with Manhattan federal court judge Lewis Kaplan rejecting his motion “in all respects”. Continue reading...

PC Daniel Wallwork dismissed without notice for gross misconduct over incident in April 2020A police officer has been sacked after he took a photograph of a dead woman lying face down and partially clothed on a bed and sent it to a colleague.PC Daniel Wallwork of Avon and Somerset police sent the image from his personal phone with the words “look who’s turned up dead” from the scene of the sudden death at around 7pm on 16 April 2020. Continue reading...

Civil claim against duke by longtime accuser Virginia Giuffre can move forward, federal judge rules in New York

If the ethnicity or gender of the character drives the role then that ethnicity should be prioritised, writes Maureen LipmanThank our mutual god for the intelligence and eloquence of David Baddiel (‘Why don’t Jews play Jews?’ – David Baddiel on the row over Helen Mirren as Golda Meir, 12 January). But may I take issue with the Guardian on one point? I did not attack Dame Helen Mirren (Maureen Lipman attacks casting of Helen Mirren as former Israeli PM Golda Meir, 12 January). I was asked by a reporter for my opinion in a continuing debate. (I don’t tend to charge out of the house to Speaker’s Corner with a loud-hailer and a dustbin lid.)My opinion was that if the ethnicity or gender of the character drives the role then that ethnicity should be prioritised, as it is now with other minorities. Continue reading...

Opposition figure shot and a soldier killed with an explosive device in a separate attacks in the regionA prominent opposition figure and a soldier have been killed in separate attacks in Cameroon’s restive anglophone regions, intensifying security concerns as the country hosts the Africa Cup of Nations football tournament.Henry Kemende, a senator for the Social Democratic Front party, was shot dead in Bamenda city in the north-west region. His party, who blamed separatist fighters for the attack, said gunmen forced him from his car and shot him in the chest. Continue reading...

Wang went for dinner at date’s house in Zhengzhou when Covid forced thousands into quarantine

Armed police stationed outside property where armed man has been holed up with his son since SundayA police standoff with an armed man who has barricaded himself in his home with his eight-year-old son has entered its fourth day, forcing local businesses and a school to stay shut and locking down neighbouring households.A 41-year-old man, who police say has weapons, is refusing to leave his ground floor flat in Earlsdon, Coventry, where he has been holed up with his son since the early hours of Sunday. Continue reading...

It wouldn’t be Guardian Australia ‘best of’ series without a bird episode! The regent honeyeater is an endangered native Australian songbird, with only a few hundred left in the wild. A few years ago scientists noticed something odd – they were mimicking other birds, and unable to sing their own song. Environment reporter Graham Readfearn and Dr Joy Tripovich explain how this species lost its song, and whether teaching it how to sing again could help save it from extinctionYou can also read: Continue reading...

US says it has heard nothing new from Moscow in four hours of talks aiming to defuse crisisNato discussions with Russia have concluded with no sign of progress towards narrowing substantial differences or defusing the crisis over Ukraine, and with the alliance’s secretary general warning “there is a real risk for a new armed conflict in Europe”.After four hours of talks, the US delegation leader, the deputy secretary of state, Wendy Sherman, said she had heard nothing in Brussels that differed from the Kremlin position laid out at bilateral talks in Geneva, demanding a guaranteed end to Nato expansion and a withdrawal of alliance troops in formerly Soviet bloc countries that joined the alliance after 1997. Continue reading...

‘The march is like our Christmas – the biggest night of the year, where women celebrate half naked and anything goes’In San Francisco, the night before the annual Pride parade is reserved for the Dyke March, a celebration of lesbian life throughout the city. It was like our Christmas – the biggest night of the year – and half of us would be so hungover we wouldn’t make it to Pride the next day.I remember getting a call from an editor at On Our Backs, a lesbian magazine run by women that billed itself as offering “entertainment for the adventurous lesbian”. It was a bedrock of the lesbian community – one of the few ways to communicate with one another, and to celebrate sex and educate each other about it at a time when Aids had brought so much devastation to queer communities. The editor wanted me to shoot a kiss-in, but the tone of her voice sounded almost guilty – like she couldn’t quite bring herself to ask me to work on the biggest party night of the year. But to me, it was the most fun I could imagine. Continue reading...

The Sex and the City sequel has taken a while to settle into its new skin. But, despite its many flaws, it is developing new charms of its ownAnd Just Like That did not have the smoothest of landings. The Sex and the City sequel found itself draped in controversy from the moment its return was announced. There would be no Samantha Jones, with the core group reduced to a trio, after Kim Cattrall did not return to the franchise. (Was she invited? Did she decline? I look forward to an inevitable Ryan Murphy dramatisation of events – Feud: Cosmos and Cupcakes.) The films had been middling, then terrible, then a third thankfully ditched before it got too far. Could a series that was built on being so brassy and brash survive in the tetchy 2020s?Then it finally arrived, and the drama rolled on. The big twist, or the Big twist, at the end of episode one was briefly a moment, controversial largely for the fact that instead of weeping and hugging her still-conscious husband as he had a heart attack, Carrie might have considered calling an ambulance instead. To think that the reputation of Peloton was the main topic of conversation. Shortly after it aired, allegations of sexual assault were made against Chris Noth by multiple women. He issued a denial, but his co-stars published a message of support for his accusers, and a rumoured cameo at the end of the season was reportedly scrapped. Continue reading...

Ex-Syrian intelligence official Anwar Raslan is charged with crimes against humanity, rape and murderA German court is expected to issue a verdict against a former Syrian intelligence official accused of overseeing the murder of 58 people and the torture of thousands of others, in a landmark case expected to declare the actions of the Assad regime over the last decade a crime against humanity for the first time.The verdict against Anwar Raslan, a former colonel loyal to the regime who later defected and fled Syria, is both a highly symbolic moment for the Syrian opposition in exile and a potential risk for those seeking to bring more war criminals to justice in the future, some of whom say a harsh sentence could discourage other defectors from talking openly to authorities. Continue reading...

Minister says proposed law would allow for release of information regardless of parents’ wishesIreland will allow adopted people automatic access to their birth records for the first time under new laws the government hopes will end a “historic wrong”, including for thousands sent for adoption in secret by Catholic institutions.International laws say all children should be able to establish their identity but tens of thousands of adopted people in Ireland have no automatic right to their birth records or access to tracing services. Continue reading...

Interior minister says armed guards and metal detectors make visitors feel like terroristsThe Czech Republic’s new coalition government is on a collision course with the country’s populist president after it vowed to end controversial security arrangements at Prague’s historic castle, established supposedly to prevent terror attacks.Vít Rakušan, the interior minister, said he would ask police and security services to review measures in place at the 70,000 sq metre complex, which is the country’s most visited tourist attraction, and also the official residence of the Czech president, Miloš Zeman. Continue reading...

EU leaders warn of consequences in response to further aggression against UkraineAfter months of sabre-rattling from Vladimir Putin over Ukraine, Russian officials have been on a diplomatic tour of Europe this week, meeting the US in Geneva and Nato in Brussels. Amid this diplomatic whirl, Europe’s biggest diplomatic club has been absent. The EU has no formal role in the talks, although its officials are drawing up possible sanctions to levy against Russia if the Kremlin decides to invade Ukraine.The EU’s exclusion from talks on war and peace in its own backyard hurts. “Between Putin and Biden, Europe is sidelined,” ran a Le Monde headline last week. The EU’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell,struck an insouciant note. “I don’t care,” he said when the BBC asked whether the US should have gone ahead with the Geneva talks. The Russians, he said, had “deliberately excluded the EU from any participation” but he had been assured by the US that “nothing will be agreed without our strong co-operation, coordination and participation”. Continue reading...

Alfred Hitchcock described his third film, The Lodger, as the true beginning of his directorial career but it would prove a near fatal screen debut for its leading light June TrippDecember 1925 was a busy month for June. A fixture of the West End stage since childhood, her surname, Tripp, had been excised by the impresario Charles B Cochran because it “sounds a bit comical for a dancer”. She spent the days rehearsing for a musical, Kid Boots, the evenings starring in another, Mercenary Mary, and then would “rush to the studio at midnight”, to act in a horse-racing short film opposite the fading American film star Carlyle Blackwell. The studio was at Poole Street, Islington, in north London, built five years earlier by Paramount but now rented out, most often to a British company, Gainsborough, run by Michael Balcon.The short, Riding for a King, starred the celebrated jockey Steve Donoghue and had its premiere in January 1926, with June in attendance. Two days later, she collapsed during a performance of Mercenary Mary and shortly after underwent an appendectomy. Daily Express readers subsequently learned that she would “not be able to dance for six months”. By February, she was recuperating on the Riviera. It was there that she received a telegram from her old friend Ivor Novello, who offered film work. “No dancing required. You will act beautifully and we shall have fun.” Continue reading...

The deadly attacks come as Joe Biden raised concerns about recent airstrikes with Ethiopian PMNineteen people have been killed in drone strikes in Ethiopia’s Tigray, in the latest reported attacks in the war-stricken region.In the deadliest strike on Monday in the southern Tigray town of Mai Tsebri, 17 people working at a flour mill were killed, said one of the humanitarian workers, citing witness accounts. Continue reading...

Doncaster teenager not seen again after his image was captured on Kings Cross station CCTVDetectives investigating the disappearance of a teenage boy from South Yorkshire 14 years ago have arrested two men, aged 45 and 38, on suspicion of kidnap and human trafficking.Andrew Gosden was 14 when he left his home in Doncaster on a Friday morning, emptied his bank account of almost £200 and bought a one-way ticket to London. He was last captured on CCTV emerging from Kings Cross station. Continue reading...

Kärcher asserts political neutrality as presidential hopeful calls for pressure-washing criminals out of suburbsOne of the world’s leading makers of pressure washers and steam cleaners has formally asked French politicians not to use its name to score political points.Kärcher, a German family-owned company, issued a statement on Tuesday objecting to rightwing presidential candidate Valérie Pécresse taking its brand in vain. It is the latest of several similar complaints it has issued in recent years. Continue reading...

Latest data shows ‘we may be starting to turn a corner’, Nicola Sturgeon tells Scottish parliament

Rifleman Kasem Salem, 20, was called ‘Paki Rambo’ at north Yorkshire centre

For nearly three years, staff and volunteers have been going through about 70,000 boxes in a mammoth undertaking to digitise the collectionOutside the Australian Botanic Garden Mount Annan in south-western Sydney are four shipping containers with freezers inside.Over the next six months, more than a million plant specimens will be cycled through the containers, each spending about a week in the cold to rid them of any insects. Continue reading...

Money, media attention and fame will likely protect the tennis player from the same fate as those confined to years in detention by arbitrary and arcane law

After reviewing CCTV, prosecutors accuse Zandile Mafe of placing ‘lethal device’ in parliament complexA man suspected of starting a fire that gutted South Africa’s parliament appeared in court for a second time to face a new charge of terrorism, in addition to robbery and arson charges.Zandile Christmas Mafe, 49, was arrested around the parliament complex in Cape Town after the fire broke out on 2 January, and appeared in court three days later. Continue reading...

Paymaster general claims PM ‘retains confidence of the people of this country’ as Boris Johnson is criticised for failing to appear before MPs

Forza Italia leader will reportedly withdraw party from government if Mario Draghi is elected presidentSilvio Berlusconi has reportedly threatened to withdraw his Forza Italia party from Italy’s governing majority if the current prime minister, Mario Draghi, is elected president later this month.The scandal-tainted media tycoon, who served four times as prime minister, is in Rome from Tuesday on the hunt for votes as he ramps up his own presidential campaign. Continue reading...

Force considers next steps amid warning stance on alleged breaches is sapping public trust in policing

From his Afrocentric jazz with Miles Davis and Lonnie Liston Smith to his chart hits for Roberta Flack and Stephanie Mills, we celebrate the best of the late musician

Search and rescue mission launched after latest in series of fatal accidents amid heightened tensions with ChinaTaiwan’s air force has suspended combat training for its F-16 fleet after a recently upgraded model of the fighter jet crashed into the sea in the latest of a series of fatal accidents.The island’s air force announced earlier that an F-16 fighter jet went missing over the sea off western Taiwan on Tuesday afternoon, 30 minutes after it took off from the southern Chiayi air base for routine training. Continue reading...

Eddie Hughes says local authorities can use part of £28m protect and vaccinate scheme to incentivise jabs

Angela Rayner lambasts PM as junior minister sent out to answer urgent question over May 2020 garden party

Private contractor Clearsprings takes action after the Guardian exposed poor conditions in west LondonA Home Office accommodation provider is making urgent improvements to flats for asylum seekers in the prime minister’s constituency after the Guardian exposed poor conditions there.Eighteen flats in Uxbridge, west London, housing dozens of asylum seekers, were found to be rife with damp, mould, water leaks and pest infestations. The Home Office admitted that the conditions “clearly fall short of the high standards we expect from our contractors”. Hillingdon council said conditions in the properties were under investigation. Continue reading...

US treasury secretary says the writer and civil rights campaigner’s appearance on the coin represents ‘what we value, and how we’ve progressed as a society’Maya Angelou has become the first Black woman ever to appear on a US quarter, after a coin featuring the late poet and activist’s image went into circulation on Monday.The quarter features an image of Angelou with her arms uplifted, a bird in flight and a rising sun behind her, with a portrait of George Washington on the “heads” side. The US Mint said the image of Angelou was “inspired by her poetry and symbolic of the way she lived”. Continue reading...

Man, believed to be armed, barricaded himself inside property with eight-year-old son on SundayA police standoff with a man who is believed to be armed and has barricaded himself inside his house with his eight-year-old son has entered a third day.Police attended the property in Coventry at 12.20am on Sunday to conduct a welfare check on a man and child. Continue reading...

Settling of debt will allow Duke of York, who faces large legal bills over sexual assault lawsuit, to sell chalet reportedly worth £18mThe Duke of York has settled a £6.6m debt with a French socialite allowing him to sell a Swiss chalet as he faces escalating legal bills over the sexual assault civil lawsuit brought by Virginia Giuffre, according to reports.Isabelle de Rouvre, 74, who sold the property to Prince Andrew and Sarah, Duchess of York, in 2014 for a reported £18m, said: “The war is over. He has paid the money.” Continue reading...

Very low-budget shocker sees American family stalked by the spectre of a bereaved mother taking vengeance on other people’s kidsSet in some densely forested, geographically-non-specific corner of Mexico, this very low-budget horror story features Autumn Reeser as suburban SoCal mom Carly Candlewood, who arrives for a holiday with her husband Andrew (Antonio Cupo) and young son Danny (Nicolas Madrazo). Together, they’re hoping to heal as a family after Carly’s recent miscarriage. Unfortunately, no one mentioned in the TripAdvisor reviews that the canals near the small hotel where the Candlewoods are staying have been haunted for years by a spooky ghost lady called La Llorona (Zamia Fandiño).The name relates to the fact that she’s always crying for her lost child, and her own way of dealing with bereavement is to steal other people’s kids, especially at night or at least when the camera has a red filter attached to create a murky, nocturnal look. What’s more, all the locals know about her, and a memorial wall nearby is plastered with pictures of missing children: an unpleasant echo of the legions of people abducted throughout the country in real life. La Llorona usually takes the form of an ectoplasmic, diaphanous figure with a flowing gown, generous embonpoint and a half-smashed face. But of late it seems she’s been gaining corporeality; the upside of which is that bullets seem to temporarily repel her. But her growing strength represents a near and present danger for little Danny, whom she keeps catching and then losing as Carly fights her off. Continue reading...

Europe director Hans Kluge demands immediate action to avoid Covid ‘tidal wave’ swamping health services

Newsrooms closures and exodus from territory are result of ‘draconian’ national security law introduced in 2020As the last news programme came to a close and anchors bade farewell to their online audience on 3 January, Chris Yeung, the founder and chief writer of Citizen News, gathered together his staff and tried to strike an optimistic tone.“Remember our very best memories,” he said, dressed in a blue shirt with sleeves rolled up and a crimson jumper draped on his shoulders. “No one knows what will happen next. Don’t worry. Just remember the happy things.” Continue reading...