by Hosted by Jane Lee. Written by Calla Wahlquist. Re on (#5QSPP)
After the black summer bushfires it is time for politicians to act on global heating, Greg Mullins says. Assistant news editor Rosemary Bolger recommends Calla Wahlquist’s profile about courage and crisis on the fire front
The Booker-winning author on starting late as a writer, her clear recall of growing up in Cairo, and the TV programme that kept her going during lockdownPenelope Lively, the author of many novels and short story collections, is the only writer to have won both the Booker prize (in 1987, for her novel Moon Tiger) and the Carnegie Medal, an award that recognises an outstanding book for children and young adults (in 1973, for The Ghost of Thomas Kempe). Among her memoirs is Oleander, Jacaranda, about her childhood in Cairo before and during the second world war. Her latest book, Metamorphosis: Selected Stories, spans 40 years of writing. She lives in London.You edited Metamorphosis yourself. Was it hard to choose which stories to include?
by Vikram Dodd Police and crime correspondent on (#5QSGE)
Counter-terrorist officers say attack on MP linked to Islamist extremismCounter-terrorism detectives are investigating whether David Amess was specifically targeted for attack by a man who stabbed the MP multiple times, then waited for police to arrest him.The suspected terrorist attack just after midday on Friday, at the constituency surgery of the backbencher for Southend West, has stunned Westminster and forced a review of MPs’ security. Continue reading...
The 80-strong bloat, originally part of the Colombian drug lord’s estate, present an environmental concern as an invasive speciesA group of rampant hippopotamuses, introduced by the late Colombia drug lord Pablo Escobar to his private zoo, are being sterilized by the country’s wildlife services, after mounting concern that the 80-strong herd presented a potential environmental disaster as an invasive species.The so-called “cocaine hippos”, whose number has more than doubled since 2012, were sterilized after worries have mounted over their environmental impact, including a threat to human safety. Continue reading...
Since 2006, the acclaimed writer has lived in fear for his life, following publication of his exposé on the criminal gangs. The Observer takes a trip back to Naples with him and his mindersOn a Friday in autumn 2006, local newspapers and prosecutors in Italy’s south-western region of Campania received the same anonymous letter. Computer-typed and delivered by hand in the early morning, it detailed the Neapolitan Mafia’s plan to execute a 26-year-old Italian writer. His name was Roberto Saviano and his book, Gomorrah, a devastating denunciation of the Camorra’s criminal activity, was on its way to becoming a bestseller.The unpublished letter, seen by the Observer, refers to a meeting held in a betting office in Casal di Principe, Saviano’s hometown, in which local bosses, known as some of the most violent in the Camorra, decreed that Saviano must die, saying that his murder would take place “when the waters are calm”. Continue reading...
Police say tourists who had been staying in village of Qerret were aged between 31 and 60 years oldFour Russian tourists have been found dead at a beach resort in western Albania, police have said.Albanian police issued a statement on Saturday saying the tourists were found asphyxiated in a hotel sauna in the village of Qerret late on Friday. Continue reading...
Pentagon says it is also working to relocate any of those relatives to the US, almost two months after Kabul strikeThe Pentagon has offered unspecified condolence payments to the family of 10 civilians who were killed in a botched US drone attack in Afghanistan in August during the final days before American troops withdrew from the country.The US defence department said it made a commitment that included offering “ex-gratia condolence payments”, in addition to working with the US state department in support of the family members who were interested in relocation to the United States. Continue reading...
Witnesses to atrocity in Paris music venue that killed 90 tell court of playing dead and trying to help the woundedBritish and Irish survivors of the 2015 terrorist attack on the Bataclan concert hall in Paris have told a court how they played dead on the ground in a river of blood to avoid being shot, or crawled across the floor between bodies as gunmen murdered concertgoers one by one.English-speaking witnesses travelled to Paris on Friday to testify at France’s biggest ever criminal trial over the attacks claimed by Islamic State on 13 November 2015, which killed 130 people and injured more than 400 in synchronised suicide bombings and mass shootings across the French capital. Continue reading...
Government will ask court to reverse appeals court decision leaving in place the law that all but bans abortions in the stateThe Biden administration said on Friday it will turn next to the US supreme court its attempt to halt a Texas law that has banned most abortions since September.The move by the justice department comes after an appeals court on Thursday night left in place the law known as Senate Bill 8, which bans abortions at roughly six weeks, or before most women know they are pregnant. The appeals court, the fifth circuit, is among the most conservative in the nation. Continue reading...
Property in Chorley suffered severe fire, with deceased believed to be a man in his 50sA man has died after a house collapsed following an explosion in Lancashire.Emergency services were called to reports of a house fire in Clayton-le-Woods, Chorley, at about 1.20pm on Friday. Continue reading...
Underground space in Basil Street car park, Knightsbridge, costs nearly as much as average UK houseAn underground car parking space opposite Harrods has gone on sale for £250,000 – just under the average price of a UK home and enough to buy a six-bedroom detached house in Middlesbrough.Despite its price tag, the parking space is actually too small to accommodate large cars as favoured by the super-rich, who are the most likely to shell out for the luxury of being able to park in Knightsbridge. Continue reading...
by Hosted by Jane Lee. Recommended by Alyx Gorman. Wr on (#5QQBE)
Farhad Bandesh made wine in Iran before he was forced to flee. He has now brought that ancient tradition to Australia. Lifestyle editor, Alyx Gorman, recommends this story about one of the many ways that asylum seekers and refugees contribute to Australia’s vibrant food and wine cultureYou can read the original article here: Taste of freedom: a Kurdish winemaker’s journey from Manus Island to the Yarra Valley. Continue reading...
Trevor Cadieu is the latest senior military officer to be embroiled in a misconduct investigationThe Canadian military has delayed the appointment of its next army commander after allegations of sexual misconduct were made against the man chosen for the role – the latest in a string of senior officers to be investigated for misconduct.Lt Gen Trevor Cadieu was to be sworn in as the head of Canada’s army at a ceremony in early September. But that event was cancelled after the military learned of “historical allegations” against Cadieu. Continue reading...
A dramatic rise in the number of aerial sorties over the sea separating the Chinese mainland from Taiwan has served as a reminder that the strait has the potential to be one of the most dangerous places on Earth.
For 70 years, the ramshackle Dheisheh refugee camp near Bethlehem has been a site of displacement. Why is this ‘heritage of exile’ not enough for Unesco to grant it the status it gives Macchu Picchu and Venice?The Dheisheh refugee camp near Bethlehem doesn’t look much like your usual Unesco world heritage site. For a start, there are no souvenir stalls or swarms of trinket hawkers. Instead, cracked concrete walls covered with Arabic graffiti frame the entrance to a corner shop, where an old photocopier stands next to a few meagre shelves of provisions. A taxi loiters on a potholed street between piles of broken breeze blocks, while electricity cables and phone wires dangle precariously overhead.But a new exhibition at London’s Mosaic Rooms sets out to argue that this ramshackle site of mass displacement should be considered worthy of the same protected status as Machu Picchu, Venice or the Taj Mahal. “We want to destabilise conventional western notions of heritage,” says Alessandro Petti. “How do you record the heritage of a culture of exile? When world heritage sites can only be nominated by nation states, how do you value the heritage of a stateless population?”
They had screaming fans and transatlantic hits as part of the 60s’ British invasion – an unlikely result for a band of jazz and blues heads. Still touring as the Manfreds, they look back on one of the strangest catalogues in UK popIn an office in the middle of Pinewood Studios, former members of Manfred Mann are discussing their EP The One in the Middle. It was recorded in 1964, at the height of their first flush of fame – between the first and second sessions for the EP, their single Do Wah Diddy Diddy had gone to No 1 in the UK and the US. But, in spite of that success, it is perfect evidence of how different Manfred Mann were from their contemporaries in what was then called the beat boom.The EP features a version of Herbie Hancock’s Watermelon Man. With the greatest respect to the Swingin’ Blue Jeans, you didn’t get a lot of repurposed hard bop from them. It also features a Bob Dylan cover, six months before the Byrds released Mr Tambourine Man and sparked a trend for taking Dylan songs in new directions. Manfred Mann, for their part, retooled With God on Our Side as a kind of epic southern soul-influenced piano ballad. And then there’s the title track, an extraordinarily early example of pop music in self-referential, meta mode. Continue reading...
Five people have died in armed clashes that broke out in Beirut during a protest demanding an end to a judicial investigation into the massive blast in the city’s port last year.
France liable for €78m in penalties every six months unless it meets its own greenhouse gas reduction targetsA French court has ordered the government to make up for its failure to meet its own greenhouse gas reduction targets, saying it needed to “repair” the emissions overshoots.Four NGOs backed by a petition signed by 2.3 million people took the French state to court in 2019 in what they called “the case of the century”, asking the judges to rule on the government’s alleged climate target shortcomings between 2015 and 2018. Continue reading...
by Lisa O'Carroll Brexit correspondent on (#5QPTB)
Paisley says Johnson told him he ‘would sign up to changing that protocol and indeed tearing it up’Boris Johnson gave personal assurances to the Northern Ireland MP Ian Paisley that he would commit to “tearing up” the Brexit protocol that is now the centre of a major row between the UK and the EU, it has been claimed.The Democratic Unionist party MP made the comments on BBC’s Newsnight just hours after the prime minister’s former adviser Dominic Cummings claimed it was always the intention to sign the withdrawal agreement in January 2020 but “ditch bits” they did not like in the protocol. Continue reading...
by Lisa O'Carroll Brexit correspondent on (#5QQ4B)
Data suggests 2 million more EU citizens want to stay in UK than was estimated in 2016The Home Office has a backlog of 400,000 applications from EU citizens and their family members to remain in the UK after Brexit, according to the latest government data.The latest monthly statistics for the EU settlement scheme also reveal the total number of applications now at more than 6.2m. This includes as many as 172,000 applications made after the deadline of 30 June for settled status. Continue reading...
Subtitling is an essential art form. So why, as the streaming giant scores more global hits with shows like Squid Game and Call My Agent, isn’t it trying harder to find the right words?“Once you overcome the one-inch-tall barrier of subtitles, you will be introduced to so many more amazing films.” So said the director Bong Joon-ho, as he accepted his best picture Oscar for Parasite in 2020, in a not-so-subtle dig at the dominance of English language content. The success of Netflix’s Korean series Squid Game, where contestants compete in deadly playground games to win a cash prize, has proved him more than right. It has become Netflix’s biggest hit yet, earning the title of its No 1 show in 90 countries, mostly within days of release and eclipsing even the mighty Bridgerton. But it has also sparked an intense debate about what gets lost in that one-inch block of text – and raised questions over whether Netflix is investing enough in creating accurate versions of foreign-language scripts.Even before Squid Game, some of Netflix’s biggest hits were “foreign language” series, among them Lupin (France), Elite (Spain), Dark (Germany) and Money Heist (Spain). This is partly about global viewers being increasingly open to seeking out the best entertainment experiences. But it also speaks, perhaps, to a sort of secret fantasy that we might understand more in another language than we think. In the same way that everyone who lapped up the Danish series Borgen convinced themselves they could speak Danish just because they could say “Tak, tak, Staatsminister” (“Yes, yes, Prime Minister”) in a dodgy Scandinavian accent, so viewers turned to French slang YouTube videos to try to decode their best bits from Call My Agent. The optimistic inquiry “Can I speak a language fluently just by watching TV?” yields 10.4 million Google results. Continue reading...
Ruling will put pressure on UK government to address ongoing lack of abortion facilities in regionThe Northern Ireland secretary, Brandon Lewis, has failed to uphold his duties to provide full abortion services in the region, a high court judge has ruled.The ruling will put the government in Westminster under pressure to address the situation in Northern Ireland, where women are struggling to access safe abortion services more than 18 months after the procedure was made legal in the country. Continue reading...
by Angelique Chrisafis in Paris and Agence France-Pre on (#5QQ1W)
Woman tells prosecutors she feels ashamed of her ‘stupidity’ after obstructing cyclists during race in JuneA spectator whose attempt to get noticed by TV cameras while cheering the Tour de France caused one of the biggest pile-ups in the race’s history has gone on trial charged with injuring dozens of riders.The 31-year-old from Brittany in France, whose identity was withheld after she was subjected to online abuse, told prosecutors she felt ashamed of her “stupidity”. Continue reading...
Brutal death of social media star Lhamo has shone spotlight on domestic violence in the countryA Chinese man has been sentenced to death after a court found him guilty of killing his former wife while she was livestreaming on social media last year.The intermediate people’s court of the Aba Tibetan and Qiang ethnic minority autonomous prefecture of Sichuan province said Lhamo, a 30-year-old Tibetan woman, died a little over a year ago in September 2020, after her former husband, Tang Lu, doused her with petrol and set her alight. Continue reading...
The accused, all members of the National Security Agency, are being tried in absentia after the researcher’s kidnap and killing in CairoA court in Rome has begun the trial of four Egyptian security service officers accused of killing an Italian researcher, Giulio Regeni, five and a half years after his mutilated body was found in a ditch by a road in Cairo.Italian prosecutors accuse Gen Tariq Saber, Col Aser Ibrahim, Capt Hesham Helmi, and Maj Magdi Abd al-Sharif of the “aggravated kidnapping” of Regeni, while Sharif is also charged with “conspiracy to commit aggravated murder”. Kidnap carries a potential sentence of up to eight years in Italy, while Sharif could receive a life sentence. Continue reading...
The EU has made an offer to cut the checks on British trade with Northern Ireland. There’s a chance Johnson might accept itAfter days of rising tensions, the European Union has agreed to drop most checks on supermarket goods arriving in Northern Ireland from Britain. But it still fears that Boris Johnson will reject the new offer.According to Britain’s Brexit negotiator Lord Frost, speaking on Tuesday, the Northern Ireland protocol is not working – either in terms of its impact on trade or in terms of the hostility towards it from parts of the unionist population. Continue reading...
Skellefteå has wooden schools, bridges, even car parks. And now it has one of the world’s tallest wooden buildings. We visit Sweden to see what a climate-conscious future looks likeAs you come in to land at Skellefteå airport in the far north of Sweden, you are greeted by a wooden air traffic control tower poking up from an endless forest of pine and spruce. After boarding a biogas bus into town, you glide past wooden apartment blocks and wooden schools, cross a wooden road bridge and pass a wooden multistorey car park, before finally reaching the centre, now home to one of the tallest new wooden buildings in the world.“We are not the wood Taliban,” says Bo Wikström, from Skellefteå’s tourism agency, as he leads a group of visitors on a “wood safari” of its buildings. “Other materials are allowed.” But why build in anything else – when you’re surrounded by 480,000 hectares of forest? Continue reading...
A police official describes bow-and-arrow attacks in the Norwegian town of Kongsberg that have killed five and wounded two others. The government said police had launched a large-scale investigation. Kongsberg police chief Øyvind Aas said police would investigate whether the attacks amounted to an 'act of terror'. The death toll was the worst of any attack in Norway since 2011, when far-right extremist Anders Behring Breivik killed 77 people, most of them teenagers at a youth camp.
Analysis: app falling offline caused frustrated users to be turned away from flights and venuesIt’s always annoying if your phone battery dies while you’re travelling – but it’s even worse if malfunctioning technology means you can’t even begin your trip.Wednesday’s outage of the NHS app for England left frustrated users unable to prove their Covid vaccination status at airport check-ins, meaning many were unable to board flights. Others were turned away from venues that require evidence that people have been double-jabbed. Continue reading...
Campaigners hail MoJ decision to allow inmates to compete for first time using prison computersThe benefits of chess have long been extolled for retaining mental agility and as an escape from boredom, making it the perfect pastime for prisoners confined to four walls.So the decision to grant inmates at two prisons in England permission to play competitive chess in an international tournament for the first time, allowing them direct access to the internet to make their moves from prison computers, has been lauded by campaigners. Continue reading...
Black musicians have often been sidelined in Brazil, but by diving deep into their complex heritage, the likes of Jonathan Ferr and Amaro Freitas are making themselves heardJonathan Ferr thinks back to his youth. “Jazz was giving me freedom, while rap was showing me my place as a Black man in a racist society,” remembers the pianist, part of Brazil’s vibrant contemporary jazz scene. “Those were two Black musics that have brought me power to be myself.”Like their US forebears, who used jazz to advocate for – and simply experience – freedom in their racist country, Black Brazilian jazz artists such as Ferr are using music to stake a claim for their heritage in a culture that often sidelines it. Despite Brazil’s contributions to jazz – from bossa nova standards to fusion avant-gardists – its Black artists have struggled to succeed (particularly when playing bluntly Afrocentric themes) and many of the most successful proponents have been white or light-skinned. Black talents dismissed by their own country include Dom Salvador, Tania Maria and Johnny Alf. Maria and Salvador left Brazil to make a living as musicians in the US and Europe, while Alf, a bossa nova pioneer, had to sell his belongings to afford treatment for a cancer that eventually killed him. “Brazilian music is Black music,” says jazz pianist Amaro Freitas. “And what happened to these artists was racism.” Continue reading...
At the age of 90, the Star Trek star is set to board Jeff Bezos’s space ship today. It’s just the latest chapter in a long relationship between the sci-fi smash and real-life space odysseys
The man suffered head and chest injuries at the St Peters gym and could not be saved by paramedicsNew South Wales police are investigating after a man fell 13 metres to his death while climbing a wall at an indoor climbing gym in Sydney.Emergency services were called to Sydney Indoor Climbing Gym in St Peters, in the city’s inner west, before midday on Wednesday following reports a man had fallen. Continue reading...
Norway’s indigenous people seek permanent ownership of artefact seized after 17th-century trialNorway’s indigenous people are asking for a sacred drum confiscated by Denmark after a witchcraft trial in 1691 to be returned to them permanently, and they have asked the Danish queen for help.The drum belonged to a Sámi shaman, Anders Poulsson, who was arrested and imprisoned, according to court records. It was confiscated and became part of the Danish royal family’s art collection before being transferred to Denmark’s National Museum in 1849. Continue reading...
As Nottinghamshire’s top officer, she saw the best of the police – and the very worst, experiencing two indecent assaults. Now she is working to make misogyny a hate crime
Oliver Dowden’s comments come after reports of large vessels bringing goods from Asia being diverted awayThe backlog at the UK’s largest container port is “improving”, so Britons should shop normally for Christmas, a cabinet minister has said, after reports of large vessels bringing goods from Asia being diverted away.Oliver Dowden, the new Conservative party co-chair, told Sky News that authorities at Felixstowe “have said the situation is improving” at the Suffolk port, which handles about 40% of containers coming in and out of the UK. Continue reading...
by Caitlin Cassidy (now) and Matilda Boseley (earlier on (#5QN2W)
So there has been a bit of drama in the South Australian parliament, with a Liberal party defector somehow taking the Speaker of the House role in a late-night upset.Dan Cregan, who left the Liberal party to sit on the crossbench last week, managed to take the job in a secret ballot. Continue reading...
Survey of 1,718 performers, creatives and staff reveals microgression, pay disparities and discrimination are rifeDespite increased representation within the British music industry, the UK sector remains hostile to Black creators and professionals, according to a report that highlights the effects of systemic racism on mental health and a racial pay gap that disproportionately affects Black women.The first Black Lives in Music study found that 63% of Black music creators had experienced direct or indirect racism, including explicit racist language or different treatment because of their race or ethnicity, and 67% had witnessed such behaviour. Racial microaggressions were rife, experienced by 71% of Black music creators and witnessed by 73%. Continue reading...
In a new exhibition, the female abstract artists between 1930 and 1950 whose work was sidelined at the time finally get their space in the spotlightIn 1934, the abstract painter Alice Trumbull Mason wrote her sister, Margaret Jennings, a letter, noting that she was eager to resume painting, which she had temporarily stopped in order to raise her children.“I am chafing to get back to painting and of course it’s at least a couple of years away,” Mason wrote. “The babies are adorable and terribly interesting. I’m not saying anything against them, but … I can’t be just absorbed in them.” Continue reading...
A new trailer has surfaced for Home Sweet Home Alone, which looks to be a sequel that’s also a carbon copy of an original that doesn’t need betteringThe trailer for the Disney+ movie Home Sweet Home Alone is really quite something. In it, a large and chaotic family tie themselves in knots ahead of a holiday to Tokyo only to discover that, in their haste, they have accidentally left one of their children behind. While they scramble to return to their home, the boy is left to fend for himself – a danger that is only compounded when two sly burglars pick his home to be robbed. What follows is an orgy of cartoonish violence as the abandoned boy jerry-rigs a selection of household items to cause maximum damage to the intruders. Brilliant.Basically, then, Home Sweet Home Alone appears to exist in order to answer one simple question: what if Home Alone was, um, Home Alone? Continue reading...
by Ludo Hekman, Ana Rojas, Dani Dominquez and Ashifa on (#5QNCA)
Exclusive: pork industry’s role in pollution of one of Europe’s largest saltwater lagoons may be greater than publicly acknowledged, investigation revealsPollution from hundreds of intensive pig farms may have played a bigger role than publicly acknowledged in the collapse of one of Europe’s largest saltwater lagoons, according to a new investigation.
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