Three days of mourning declared as police say crush caused by gang attack on crowdAt least 29 people in Liberia, including 11 children and a pregnant woman, have died in a crowd crush of worshippers at a Christian ceremony in a densely populated area of the capital, Monrovia, officials say.The crush occurred when a gang of thugs armed with knives attacked some of the hundreds of people attending the ceremony at about 9pm on Wednesday night, a police spokesperson, Moses Carter, said. Continue reading...
Group says it hopes going public will prompt action from heavily indebted property developerA group of international bondholders in the embattled Chinese property developer Evergrande have hired an offshore law firm and warned of legal action if the company continues to refuse “substantive engagement” over its finances and restructuring plans.The group of unnamed bondholders, who describe themselves in a statement as “large and reputable international investors with deep experience and high standing in the international capital markets”, said they had been forced to consider legal action after repeatedly receiving “little more than vague assurances of intent, lacking in both detail and substance”. Continue reading...
Syrian schoolboy who won libel case against Anti-Islam activist has not seen penny of £100,000 damagesThe far-right activist Tommy Robinson is being pursued for an estimated £2m by creditors after he claimed bankruptcy during a high court libel trial.The English Defence League founder, whose real name is Stephen Christopher Yaxley-Lennon, declared himself bankrupt in a high court trial last year in which he was ordered to pay £100,000 in libel damages to a Syrian schoolboy he defamed online. Continue reading...
New foreign minister won critics’ respect after meeting with Sergei Lavrov, but has work cut out in push for diplomacyJust one month into taking up her office as Germany’s new foreign minister, Annalena Baerbock has her work cut out. At stake: nothing less than the attempt to stop the outbreak of war between Russia and the west.The news outlet Der Spiegel called her meeting this week with her Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, “a baptism of fire”; Die Zeit, her “first major test of character”. For the tabloid Bild, it was the equivalent of “entering the cave of a bear”. Continue reading...
Team in Hampshire ties sausage to drone as ‘last resort’ to rescue Millie the jack russell from mudflatsAs the tide rose, it began to look perilous for Millie the jack russell-whippet cross, who had defied the efforts of police, firefighters and coastguards to pluck her from treacherous mudflats.So the rescuers had to think imaginatively, and came up with the idea of attaching a sausage to a drone and hoping the scent of the treat would tempt Millie to safety. It worked gloriously and Millie has been reunited with her grateful owner after following the dangling sausage to higher, safer ground. Continue reading...
It’s 550 years since the islands became part of Scotland, and the archipelago is still not for the faint-hearted. But it has inspired its own diverse music, where fiddles and accordions meet the sub-bass of the seaFive hundred and fifty years ago next month, the king of Norway lost a deposit he had put down to settle a debt: more than a hundred wild, treeless islands in the sub-arctic North Sea. The Scottish king, James III, had wanted Rhenish florins, but he had to settle for Shetland instead.The archipelago eventually became part of the UK and has since developed a diverse, distinctive musical culture. This weekend, at the annual Celtic Connections festival in Glasgow, the Shetland 550 concerts will celebrate it, bringing together experimental composers, jazz performers, poets and players of traditional tunes. The series is co-curated by the award-winning fiddler Chris Stout, who was born in the three-mile-long Fair Isle (population: 68) before moving to the Mainland at eight (population: 18,765). “Although, even there, you’re still only ever three miles from the sea,” he says. Continue reading...
Two cases involved abusers who were allowed to continue with pastoral duties, says lawyerThe former pope Benedict XVI failed to act against four priests accused of child sexual abuse when he was archbishop of Munich, a German investigation has claimed.Benedict, who stood down as leader of the global Roman Catholic church in 2013, has denied the charges, said a law firm commissioned to investigate historic abuse allegations. Continue reading...
Nineteen-year-old completes 52,000km journey that took in 31 countries and five continentsA Belgian-British teenager has flown into the record books by becoming the youngest woman to fly solo around the world.Zara Rutherford, 19, touched down at Kortrijk-Wevelgem airport in Flanders just after 1pm local time on Thursday, completing a 52,000km (28,100 nautical mile) journey that took in 31 countries across five continents. Continue reading...
by As told to Emma Graham-Harrison and Akhtar Mohamma on (#5V7G1)
Along with her sister, Mariam was forced to stop practising her sport when the Taliban came to power*Mariam and her sister were on the national boxing team and the youth boxing team. They were ordered by the Taliban to stop practising, and are frightened they may be targeted in future. The interview was interrupted by a hail of gunshots near the place they are staying.About two weeks after they took Kabul, the Taliban sent two gunmen to our doorstep. They told us: “Forget your dreams. The Islamic emirate is here now, you should stop boxing, and not go to the stadium.” Continue reading...
The Walking Dead and Save Me actor and writer on his return to theatre, why he left to work in the US, and what his mum would think of his career choiceLennie James has missed being on stage. It is where he started out and it’s still how he measures himself as an actor. But now that he is back in a rehearsal room, he’s got the jitters. “I’m petrified,” he says, a bearded head-and-shoulders on Zoom in a back room of the Old Vic theatre, London, in preparation for his part in Caryl Churchill’s two-hander A Number.The play, revived from 2002, is set in a near-future world where cloning is widespread and is structured round a series of confrontations between a father and a series of clones of his son. Exploring identity and what it means to be human, James will play the father to Paapa Essiedu’s son. “I’m more scared than I have ever been in my life … I don’t know what made me think it was a good idea but I was very much looking to be challenged, and this play certainly does that.” Continue reading...
Footage has emerged from Tonga showing buildings covered with ash, as well as damage to properties and infrastructure. The Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai volcano erupted on Saturday evening, triggering tsunami waves of up to 15 metres. Water supplies were seriously affected by volcanic ash, according to the government
The upcoming drama based on Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee’s 90s sex tape scandal has a scene with animatronic genitalia. The network was initially baffled by the ideaThe team behind Disney+’s highly anticipated drama about Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee have revealed there was pushback about one possibly controversial scene.According to the show’s makers, a scene featuring Sebastian Stan (who plays Lee) having a conversation with an animatronic version of his own genitals initially baffled the network who commissioned the programme. “There was gentle pushback, because you’ve got to push back a little when a talking penis is presented to you. But Hulu was extremely supportive,” writer Robert Siegel told Variety, of the network who produced the show, before Disney+ decided to bring it to the UK. Continue reading...
FAA gives approval for more types of planes to land in low visibility near 5G signalsThe long-haul carrier Emirates has said it will resume its Boeing 777 flights to the US after halting its use of the aircraft there over concerns new 5G services in the country could interfere with planes’ instruments that measure altitude.International carriers that rely heavily on the wide-body 777 and other Boeing aircraft cancelled early flights or switched to different planes on Wednesday after warnings from the Federal Aviation Administration and the Chicago-based plane-maker about possible 5G interference with radio altimeters. Continue reading...
by Jessica Murray Midlands correspondent on (#5V7B6)
Freda Walker, 86, was found dead and her husband, Ken, 88, is in hospital in critical conditionA 33-year-old man has been arrested on suspicion of the murder of an 86-year-old woman and the attempted murder of her 88-year-old husband, who was left with life-threatening injuries after they were attacked in their home.Freda Walker was found dead at the couple’s home in Langwith Junction, Derbyshire, on Saturday morning by a neighbour. Walker’s husband, Ken, a former district councillor, remains in hospital in a critical condition. Continue reading...
Foreign secretary to travel to Brussels on Monday with target of finalising post-Brexit arrangementsLiz Truss, the foreign secretary, will travel to Brussels on Monday with a target of agreeing a deal with the EU on the post-Brexit arrangements for Northern Ireland by the end of February.The two sides have agreed that a window of opportunity for an agreement will close when campaigning starts for May’s elections to the Northern Ireland assembly. Continue reading...
We would like to know how people who are shielding feel about the rule change, which comes into effect on 26 JanuaryBoris Johnson has announced the end of all Plan B Covid restrictions in England from 26 January. We would like to know how people who are shielding feel about the rule change. How has your experience of shielding been? Do you have any concerns? Continue reading...
On 19 and 20 January every year, Piornal celebrates the idiosyncratic Jarramplas festivalFew teenagers dream of dressing up as a demonic cattle thief to be chased through the streets of their hometown and pelted with more than two tonnes of turnips.But in the town of Piornal, which lies in the Cáceres province of the south-western Spanish region of Extremadura, there is no greater honour.Top: Ernesto Antonio Salgado gets a good luck kiss from his girlfriend, Paula, before heading out to face the turnip-wielding crowds. Above left: Pérez, Pollo and Franchy, three of the mayordomos, or helpers, in this year’s festival, pose with a drum as they prepare to help Julio Antonio Rubio Moreno into his costume. Above right: José y Edu, two other mayordomos, assist Ernesto as he climbs into his Jarrampla suit Continue reading...
From the Med to the Pentland hills, our tipsters find their pace by azure seas, medieval city centres, ancient woods and up lofty ridgesI love running in Ghent. It is completely flat, so encouraging for beginners and people aiming for personal bests. There is a rowing lake with a 5km track around the outside called Watersportsbaan. This connects with a nature reserve called Blaarmeersen on an 8km loop (with an artificial sandy beach to play volleyball, or swim in afterwards). To extend your route, there are gorgeous paths following the Leie River out into the countryside or through the historic city centre. If that isn’t enough, there is another nature reserve, full of wader birds and canals, called Bourgoyen-Ossemeersen, surrounded by a 10k loop. I will be running my first marathon in Ghent in March 2022. Beer, waffles and chocolate after, anyone?
Letter to head of Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights comes amid fears over democracy standardsA cross-party group of MEPs has called for a large-scale election observation mission to Hungary, citing fears about democratic standards.Hungarians go to the polls on 3 April in parliamentary elections that will decide the fate of the incumbent prime minister, Viktor Orbán, whose last 12 years in office have seen tighter executive control over courts, a withering of independent media and widespread concerns about corruption and cronyism. Continue reading...
PM who shot to fame at Cop26 climate talks vows to ‘lead country first to safety then to prosperity’Mia Mottley, who shot to international fame during the Cop26 climate talks and oversaw Barbados’s break with the Queen last year, has won a second term as the Caribbean nation’s prime ministerThe 56-year-old’s Barbados Labour party (BLP) won all 30 seats, up from 29 in 2018 in an election marred by complaints that thousands of Covid-positive Bajans were denied a vote. Continue reading...
Kelly Duda faces fascist-era charge of ‘offending the honour or prestige’ of prosecutor in case alarming free speech advocatesAn American film-maker has been put on trial in Italy for “offending the honour or prestige” of an Italian prosecutor after testifying in a criminal case against a former health ministry chief and representatives of a pharmaceutical company accused of supplying Italians with tainted blood products.Kelly Duda, who revealed how contaminated blood taken from prisoners in Arkansas was sold around the world, faces up to three years in prison if found guilty of an offence that dates back to Italy’s fascist period. Continue reading...
The first time I worked in an office, I was the boss of a group of sceptical youngsters. They looked for my weak spots – then became my first full-sighted friendsMy first experience of office life was daunting. You might expect one’s first experience of working in an office environment to be pretty gentle: making the tea, a bit of filing, running errands for the boss. Not a bit of it, in my case. Aged 20, with no experience of office life, I was the boss. And, just to add a little spice to the task, I was totally blind.My job as a community service volunteer at Youth Action York was to persuade a sceptical group of teenagers to give a helping hand to local elderly or disabled people who were struggling – assisting them with their shopping, perhaps, or tidying up their garden. It felt like a challenge, and my teenage volunteers made sure it was. Continue reading...
by Maya Wolfe-Robinson North of England correspondent on (#5V71B)
In Prestwich town centre, voters from across the political spectrum would like to see their MP tested at the pollsChristian Wakeford said he was elected as a centrist and remains a centrist after his defection to the Labour party, amid calls in his Bury South constituency for a byelection.Wakeford, who supported a backbench bill in 2020 that called for any MP who switches parties to face a recall petition, said it’s “quite clear” his former party would lose the seat at a byelection. Continue reading...
Did Dark Reign foresee Trump? Was Iron Man about US military might? Who was Unbeatable Squirrel Girl – and was her superpower really non-violent conflict resolution? Only one man knows …This should not be too hard, I thought, as long as I stay disciplined. All I have to do is read 27,000 comic books, then write about them. I had just signed a contract to write All of the Marvels, a book about reading every superhero story Marvel has published since 1961 as one single gigantic narrative. The Marvel story is omnipresent – its characters are everywhere, in movies, on television, even gracing shampoo bottles and bags of salad – yet also unknowable. It purports to be one big story: any episode can refer to, and be compatible with, any earlier one. But not even the people telling the story have read the whole thing. That’s not how it was meant to be experienced.I did not, however, read six decades of stories in order. That would have been unbearable – and it is one of the two mistakes Marvel-curious readers often make. It is a surefire route to boredom and frustration as the fun lies in following your whims. The other error is trying to cherrypick the greatest hits, the pivotal single issues. Taken in isolation, these are peaks without mountain ranges. Their dramatic power comes from their context. Continue reading...
First aid supplies have arrived in Tonga amid fears over contaminated water sources after volcano eruptionFresh pictures of the devastation in Tonga have emerged five days after an enormous volcano eruption and subsequent tsunami cut off contact with the outside world, as the first plane carrying international aid landed.A series of photos tweeted by the Tongan consulate late on Wednesday show trees and buildings flattened and covered in ash. Others show debris piled up outside homes and damaged vehicles. Continue reading...
State governor says surprise operation against drug gangs and mafia groups is start of ‘transformational’ occupationHundreds of heavily armed police have stormed one of Rio’s largest favelas at the start of what authorities claimed was a “transformational” attempt to wrest back control from the drug gangs and paramilitary mafias which dominate huge swaths of the Brazilian city.The operation began at daybreak on Wednesday as security forces in camouflage gear and armoured personnel carriers swept into Jacarezinho, a bustling redbrick community that has been a stronghold of the Red Command drug faction since the 1980s. Continue reading...
by Luke Harding in Kyiv, Andrew Roth in Moscow and Ju on (#5V6R4)
US president alarms government in Kyiv by saying Nato was divided on how to respond to ‘minor incursion’Joe Biden has said he thinks Russia will attack Ukraine, warning that Moscow would face a “stiff price”, but he admitted Nato was divided on how to respond if there is only a “minor incursion”.The White House was forced to issue a hasty clarification to that last point, saying that any movement of Russian forces over the border would be treated as invasion. Continue reading...
Volcanic eruption caused spill, described as the worst ecological disaster to hit country in recent history, at refineries operated by Spanish oil giant RepsolPeru has demanded compensation from the Spanish oil giant Repsol after freak waves from a volcanic eruption near Tonga caused an oil spill described as the worst ecological disaster to hit the South American country in recent history.Peru’s prime minister, Mirtha Vásquez, told journalists on Wednesday that the Pampilla refinery, run by Repsol, “apparently” did not have a contingency plan for an oil spill. Continue reading...
Reclaim These Streets raised tens of thousands of pounds to fund judicial review of Met’s decisionWomen’s rights activists argued at the high court on Wednesday that the police’s decision to ban a vigil for Sarah Everard in London was a breach of their human rights.The Metropolitan police were criticised last March after using force to break up the vigil on Clapham Common, close to where Everard, 33, was kidnapped by Wayne Couzens, an officer in an elite Met police firearms unit, before he murdered her. Continue reading...
by Mark Brown North of England correspondent on (#5V6JF)
Boy, who cannot be named because of his age, charged with possessing a terrorist publicationA 14-year-old schoolboy from Darlington has become one of the youngest people in the UK to be convicted of terror charges.The boy, who cannot be named because of his age, appeared before Westminster magistrates court on Tuesday charged with possessing a terrorist publication. Continue reading...
by Daniel Boffey in Brussels and Angelique Chrisafis on (#5V6D1)
France’s president hopes to restart four-ways talks between Russia, Germany, France and UkraineThe EU must open its own talks with Russia rather than rely on Washington, France’s president, Emmanuel Macron, has said as he warned of the prospect of the “most tragic thing of all – war”.In a wide-ranging speech in Strasbourg, Macron said it was not sufficient for the US to negotiate with the Kremlin over its threats to peace but that Europe needed to have its voice heard. Continue reading...
The most expensive show of all time reveals the title of a prequel that’s set to feature 20 different rings of powerThe mystery shrouding Amazon’s new JRR Tolkien adaptation has lifted slightly, as the show has revealed its title. The multi-series epic will be known as Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, setting viewers up for an on-screen representation of a new Middle-earth story.“The Rings of Power unites all the major stories of Middle-earth’s Second Age: the forging of the rings, the rise of the Dark Lord, Sauron, the epic tale of Númenor and the Last Alliance of Elves and Men,” said showrunners, JD Payne and Patrick McKay, in a statement accompanying a video that shows the programme’s title being forged in a blacksmith’s foundry. Continue reading...
by Presented by Nosheen Iqbal with Amie Ferris-Rotman on (#5V6CV)
After a harrowing escape from the Taliban, Afghanistan’s female politicians are regrouping in Greece to fight for their country. Amie Ferris-Rotman reports on the work of the Afghan women’s parliament in exileIn November, 28 former female MPs from Afghanistan gathered in Greece. They’d fled the Taliban in dramatic fashion, and were now reunited in a community centre run by Melissa Network, a grassroots organisation for female migrants and refugees that played a role in their evacuation.The journalist Amie Ferris-Rotman was there; she tells Nosheen Iqbal about the emotional first meeting of the Afghan women’s parliament in exile in Athens. There, the women – some junior politicians, some elder stateswomen, some from prominent wealthy political families, some from poorer backgrounds – traded stories of their escapes and shared hopes for the country they left behind. Shagufa Noorzai, 22, who had been the youngest member of parliament before the Afghan government fell, says she wants the women left behind in Afghanistan to know they have not been forgotten. Continue reading...
Omar is in hiding – concerned about his five daughters, he has applied to move to BritainOmar* worked for a UK-funded cultural programme, working on human rights and cultural projects. He lost his work when the Taliban arrived, and has applied to move to Britain. He has five daughters and is particularly concerned about their welfare.After the capture of Kabul by the Taliban, our lives changed completely because of my work for a British organisation. Although the Taliban said in a statement that they had declared an amnesty for government workers, they have not kept that promise. They are seeking revenge against those who worked with foreign institutions. I’ve heard reports of people being arrested at night and taken to unknown places. Continue reading...
Curators at National Archives showcase a decade of discontent, protest – and the ‘Nightclub Queen’From state surveillance of communists, to all women finally winning the vote, and a peek inside the No 43 Soho nightclub, a new exhibition on the roaring 20s aims to highlight a decade not just of postwar decadence but of huge discontent and social upheaval.Anchored on the recent release of the 1921 census, the free exhibition The 1920s: Beyond the Roar, which opens at the National Archives in Kew this week, covers international peace treaties, textile samples and lonely hearts adverts, alongside a reconstruction of the No 43, run by the “Nightclub Queen”, Kate Meyrick. Continue reading...
I worried that I didn’t fit in and that my uninspiring admin role meant I couldn’t be creative. But my work pal made me feel part of the gangThe office was a strange and alienating terrain for me when I arrived in it at 23. I had dropped out of university years before, expecting something to happen to me that would focus my future and simultaneously bestow a great windfall. It hadn’t. But I was sick of being poor and I had a boyfriend I wanted to play house with. When a temporary admin contract at a medical institution in Dublin came up, I jumped at it.Immediately, I felt overwhelmed, and self-conscious about my stupid little outfits – pastiches of what professional women wear, which I had cobbled together from Topshop sale racks and charity shops. I was prickly, wary of saying the wrong thing, unable to relax. Continue reading...
The singer’s new Caesars Palace concerts are motivated by the search for fulfilment that plays out in her latest album – and will challenge audiences there for a good time to do the sameLas Vegas is a comfortable place to land for pop stars. It’s where you go to bask in the validation of a job well done, to rest on a solid legacy at a point where the future may have become less certain and any tentative steps into it may harm that legacy. It seemed, for a while, a safe harbour for Britney Spears after her troubles (until she said she was made to perform against her will); Lady Gaga and Katy Perry also set up shop in the desert after their imperial phases faded.Adele, whose three-month Caesars Palace residency begins this weekend, has no need for this lucrative safety net – her latest, 30, was the biggest album of 2021 with just six weeks on sale. She’s playing there for practical reasons: she hates touring and wants to be close to her son at home in Los Angeles. But there is also something quietly subversive about her presence, right now, in a place synonymous with light entertainment and celebrating adult milestones. Once known for supplying comfort and artistic consistency (even complacency, perhaps), Adele made one of last year’s most confrontational albums. Continue reading...
In a new exhibition, the long, difficult history of literary maps is explored, from James Joyce to Raymond ChandlerFrom efforts to map Odysseus’s journey to Borges’s commentary on map-making in On Exactitude in Science (where the only sufficient map is in fact as large as the territory it depicts), fictions and maps have long maintained a complicated, entwined relationship. While the right map can uniquely resonate with a literary text, this resonance exists amid an undeniable tension: a concern that the map might demystify or oversimplify a story, at worst imposing a single, reductive viewpoint on something that should be open and unbounded.Exploring this tension, while also charting the ways that the relationship between maps and literature has changed through eras and genres, the Huntington Library’s new exhibit Mapping Fictions brings together literary maps from hundreds of years of literary history. Drawing from the Huntington’s archives of rare literary texts, the exhibition goes back to the early days of modern literature with texts like The Pilgrim’s Progress and Journey to the Center of the Earth (not Jules Verne’s version but rather a 1741 book written by Norwegian writer Ludvig Holberg), continuing up to the contemporary era with mappings of Octavia Butler’s life and works and artist David Lilburn’s 2006 mapping of James Joyce’s Ulysses. Continue reading...
Authorities demolish house in East Jerusalem neighbourhood in early morning raid after standoffIsraeli police have forcibly removed a Palestinian family from their home in Sheikh Jarrah, the flashpoint occupied East Jerusalem neighbourhood where the issue of evictions helped trigger a round of fighting between Israel and Hamas last year.Around a dozen police officers arrived at the Salhiya family’s house in the early hours of Wednesday, dragging the 15 occupants outside and then demolishing the structure with a bulldozer. The eviction was the first to be successfully carried out in Sheikh Jarrah in nearly five years. Continue reading...
Abid Khan to appear in court after 18-year-old, who had been last seen at Windsor nightclub, is foundA 21-year-old man has been charged with a stalking offence over the disappearance of a teenager who went missing after leaving a Windsor nightclub.Abid Khan, of Reading, Berkshire, is accused of one count of stalking involving fear of violence and will appear at Reading magistrates court on Wednesday. Continue reading...
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