by Vikram Dodd Police and crime correspondent on (#5P9Z9)
Extension said to have been granted because those most likely to replace her are not yet seen as suitableThe government has offered the Metropolitan police commissioner, Cressida Dick, a two-year extension to her term in office.The decision was made by the home secretary, Priti Patel, in consultation with the London mayor, Sadiq Khan, and Downing Street. Continue reading...
Aleksey Chupov and Natasha Merkulova’s film is an impressively deadpan triller about a security agent on a mission to redeem himselfWith a title that nods to Robert Bresson and a high concept script that doffs its cap to The Fugitive, this film is in fact very much its own beast, a rollicking cat-and-mouse thriller pungently set in a Soviet Russia where everybody is a subject, even the soldiers in charge. It’s late-30s Leningrad and the purges are in full swing. The captain craves redemption, a last-minute pass into heaven. In the meantime he’s running like a rabbit through hell.Yuri Borisov plays Volkonogov, a shaven-headed strongman with the national security service who absconds with a folder carrying a list of the dead. His plan is to notify the family members who are still posting socks, scarves and letters to the gulags every week, believing that their loved ones are alive and will one day be released. The truth is a shock, but it also brings closure. Volkonogov figures that if he can convince one person to forgive him, his own soul might be saved. Continue reading...
Yevgeny Zinichev, a former KGB officer and Putin bodyguard, died ‘trying to save life of cameraman’Russia’s emergencies minister has died during a training exercise in the Arctic Circle city of Norilsk after officials said he jumped from a cliff in an apparent rescue attempt.Yevgeny Zinichev, a member of the influential security council and minister of emergency situations since 2018, died “while saving a person’s life in the course of an interdepartmental exercise … in the Arctic zone”, the ministry of emergency situations confirmed in a statement. Continue reading...
by Angela Giuffrida Rome correspondent on (#5P9NR)
Treats delivered to city’s two prisons during one of hottest summers on record in ItalyPope Francis sent 15,000 ice-creams to prisoners to help them cool down during what has been one of the hottest summers on record in Italy.The ice-creams were delivered to Rome’s two prisons – Regina Coeli in the centre of the city and Rebibbia on the outskirts – by the Vatican’s almoner, Cardinal Konrad Krajewski. Continue reading...
Despite kooky touches including a talking foetus, this is an insightful look at a young woman’s lifeThis hilarious and sneakily brilliant comedy from Norway begins like half a dozen unwanted-pregnancy movies you might already have seen. Rakel (Kristine Kujath Thorp) is a 23-year-old graphic design dropout who has not remotely got her life together yet. When she discovers she’s pregnant, she books a termination: “This is Norway. I can get an abortion.” The baby’s father goes with her, endearingly dorky aikido teacher Mos (Nader Khademi), with whom she had a one-night stand. At the clinic Rakel is appalled to discover she’s actually seven months gone – she’s had no symptoms, no bump, no nausea. She’s beyond the limit. Mos is out of the picture as daddy.Director Yngvild Sve Flikke, who co-wrote the script based on an acclaimed graphic novel by Inga Sætre, craftily leads us down the garden path of happily-ever-after endings. Oooh, what if Rakel and Mos could make a go of it anyway? Maybe she could raise the baby with soulmate best friend flatmate Ingrid (Tora Christine Dietrichson)? But at its heart Flikke’s film has unapologetic, uncompromising things to say about women choosing – or choosing not to – have children. She’s less interested in nurturing Rakel’s maternal side than her creative life. Rakel is furious at her unabortable baby. “Thinks it can chill here for nine months and sneak out,” she fumes. She doodles it – a scrawny ugly foetus with a black mask – and calls it Ninjababy. He comes to life on the screen, funny and needy. Continue reading...
Victoria to lift regional lockdown for most areas after 221 new coronavirus cases; NSW records nine deaths and 1,480 cases, says international quarantine period likely to be reduced for vaccinated travellers; Morrison throws support behind vaccine certificates for travelThis blog is now closed
Talks involving up to 20 nations come as militants ignore calls to form inclusive government in AfghanistanThe US is convening an expanded group of western nations to set a framework for cooperation with the new Taliban government, amid fears that isolating the militant group could backfire.The meeting on Wednesday, chaired by the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, and the German foreign minister, Heiko Maas, faces an all-male, Pashtun-dominated caretaker government that has ignored calls to form an inclusive administration. Continue reading...
It is every climber’s worst nightmare. In this extract from his thrilling book about the glorious – and treacherous – Cuillin Ridge on Skye, Simon Ingram recalls the day its wild peaks almost took his lifeI had been out of signal for most of the day, so when my phone suddenly stirred in my pocket, I decided to have a look. Remembering a climbing maxim – “Don’t try to do two things at once” – I shouted for my friend Kingsley to hang on, stopped and took out my mobile. The message was junk, but I took the opportunity to send some that weren’t and then check my voicemail.Wandering absent-mindedly to where a boulder jutted off into the mist, I noticed Kingsley moving down the path. Shouting to alert him that I’d stopped, I brought the handset up to my ear and looked out at the cloud hanging off the Cuillin Ridge, waiting for the phone to connect. I took another step, just a small one to the left. And then everything went wrong. Continue reading...
Vietnam was a Covid success story but the latest lockdown, with people unable to leave the house even for food, is leaving tens of thousands hungryWhen the strictest lockdown to date was imposed in Ho Chi Minh City, Tran Thi Hao*, a factory worker, was told that the government would keep her and her family well fed – but for two months they have eaten little more than rice and fish sauce.She was put on unpaid leave from her job in July, while her husband, a construction worker, has not worked for months. They are behind on their rent, with another payment due soon. Continue reading...
Anniversary of 9/11 and fall of Kabul trigger questions over US interventionismThe 20th anniversary of 9/11 and its fallout was always going to be a moment of deep soul searching about what has been lost and learned.But the retrospective, until a few weeks ago, risked having a historical, even sepia, quality as the attention of political leaders moved to a more contemporary set of threats – health pandemics, climate emergencies, Big Tech and great power competition, including the rise of China. The “war on terror”, after all, looked if not won, at least drawn. It was even possible Islamist terrorism was a temporary manageable phenomenon, increasingly confined to Africa and some lethal loners in European shopping centres. Continue reading...
Victorian premier Daniel Andrews has announced that from 11.59pm tomorrow night the majority of regional Victoria will come out of lockdown. The one exception being the hard-hit Shepparton region.► Subscribe to Guardian Australia on YouTube
Chow Hang-tung, a barrister and organiser of the Hong Kong Alliance, wrote on Twitter ‘Any farewell words for me?’ before she was detainedHong Kong police have arrested senior members of the group that organised the city’s annual Tiananmen Square massacre vigil, after it was accused of foreign collusion.The Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China said police arrived at the offices or residents of several members early on Wednesday morning. The arrests come amid increasing crackdown on political, professional and civil society groups, which the government has accused of unpatriotic conduct or national security offences. Continue reading...
The victims, mostly suffering from Covid, died when the flood knocked out electricty to the hospital in Hidalgo stateSee all our coronavirus coverageSeventeen patients, most of them suffering from Covid-19, have died after a hospital in central Mexico flooded when torrential rain caused a river to burst its banks.More than 40 other patients in the public hospital in the town of Tula in Hidalgo state were evacuated by emergency service workers on Tuesday, and an initial assessment showed about 2,000 houses had flood damage, the Mexican government said in a statement. Continue reading...
by Vincent Ni China affairs correspondent on (#5P95V)
Analysis: China’s handling of troubles in Afghanistan, Myanmar and North Korea will differ to the west, and mould its identity as a global powerFirst it was North Korea. Then came Myanmar. Now it is Afghanistan. The three ongoing crises in China’s neighbourhood seem to have little in common. But for Beijing they pose the same question: how to deal with strategically important yet failing states on its border, and how will China’s response define its identity as a global power.For many years China watchers in the west have been looking for clues to how a rising power will exercise its influence on the world stage through its involvement in Africa or its relations with the US. But the way China approaches the three neighbouring countries may provide a clearer picture. Continue reading...
Wednesday: Doctors warn NSW emergency departments will face five times as many Covid patients as intensive care wards. Plus: new Taliban government includes minister wanted by FBIGood morning. Health professionals want a coordinated approach to the looming Covid crisis in New South Wales hospitals to mitigate stress on the already overburdened systems. The Taliban has appointed a new all-male interim government. And we have something extra for your ears with a new podcast in your Morning Mail today.Doctors are warning that hospital emergency departments in NSW will face almost five times the number of Covid patients than intensive care wards. Medical experts have raised concerns of potential bottlenecks in hospitals straining under the surge of Covid patients, based on what has been seen in outbreaks overseas. The president of the Australasian College for Emergency Medicine, Dr John Bonning, said the ICU requirements were the “tip of the iceberg” for the expected demand on the hospital system. Bonning said that states needed to ensure that patients were being properly coordinated across the state’s hospital network, warning that failure to do so would see unnecessary diversions and inefficiencies. Meanwhile, intensive care doctors will ask the commonwealth to consider a national plan to fly ICU specialists into Sydney from interstate if pressure on the NSW hospital system worsens in coming weeks and have raised concerns over the the idea of abandoning nurse-to-patient ratios floated by the NSW government on Monday. Continue reading...
Suggestion to home secretary condemned as breach of UN convention on human rightsConservative MPs have urged the home secretary, Priti Patel, to send back immediately anyone including children who boards an illegal crossing of the Channel from France.They claimed the measure should be enacted because the UK needed to “up the stakes” with the French government, which has been blamed by the home secretary for failing to curb the number of migrants sailing across the channel. Continue reading...
by Gerard Finin and Terence Wesley-Smith on (#5P8TZ)
The US is proposing big spending, but initiatives are designed to undermine China rather than address actual needs on the islandsAfter decades of ambivalence, the United States plans to expand its footprint in the Pacific islands region to dimensions larger than at any time since the second world war.But the Biden administration may be on the brink of embracing a flawed foreign policy initiative spanning almost one-third of the globe. Continue reading...
by Presented by Jane Lee. Recommended by Alyx Gorman. on (#5P8S4)
Picturing western Queensland as the floor of an ocean takes imagination – but it doesn’t take long to find evidence of prehistoric plenty. Guardian Australia lifestyle editor Alyx Gorman recommends this story where we go back to a time when dinosaurs roamed the countrysideYou can read the original article here: Fossil fever: driving and digging in a long lost sea on Australia’s dinosaur trail Continue reading...
Nayib Bukele tweeted advice as the cryptocurrency became legal tender – not entirely smoothly – but critics call it a big distractionOn the day El Salvador adopted bitcoin as legal tender, its president spent the morning providing technical support from his Twitter account after the digital wallet used for transactions was deactivated.The country’s Chivo wallet – which offers $30 worth of bitcoin free for local users – launched at midnight, but five hours later was disconnected due to a lack of server capacity. Seemingly unfazed, President Nayib Bukele asked for patience, announced that the government had purchased an additional 150 bitcoins, bringing the total holdings to 550 ($26m). Then he retweeted a US bitcoin journalist who had successfully paid for his McDonald’s breakfast using the cryptocurrency. Continue reading...
by Presented by Jane Lee. Recommended by Lenore Taylo on (#5P8QP)
The Covid pandemic has highlighted that we still cling to old state rivalries. Lenore Taylor, Guardian Australia’s editor, recommends Thomas Keneally’s essay that explores the history of Australia’s federation and what is pulling us apartYou can read the original article here: A fractured federation? How the closing of state borders in the Covid crisis has raised old quarrels – Thomas Keneally Continue reading...
Tina Ince, Tom Watson and Alex Britton died on A303 near Andover after collision involving HGVTributes have been paid to three people who died after a lorry crashed on a dual carriageway.Tina Ince, 58, and Tom Watson, 30, who were from Southampton, had both pulled over to help Alex Britton, 28, from Portsmouth, whose vehicle was at the side of the A303 near Andover on the morning of 25 August after breaking down. Continue reading...
Campaigners say Sam Pybus’ sentence for killing Sophie Moss sends ‘dreadful message’A man who strangled a vulnerable womanduring sex after drinking 24 bottles of beer has been sentenced to four years and eight months in prison.Sam Pybus, 32, from Darlington, pleaded guilty to manslaughter after accepting he had killed Sophie Moss by applying pressure to her neck during consensual “rough” sex, but that he did not intend to hurt her. Continue reading...
Environmental party given highest one-off sum in its history by Dutch tech entrepreneurGermany’s Greens have so far received more large donations ahead of this September’s federal elections than the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) of outgoing chancellor Angela Merkel, after a Dutch tech entrepreneur gave the German environmental party the highest one-off sum of cash in its history.Steven Schuurman, co-founder of software company Elastic, whose net worth is listed by Forbes magazine as 2bn US dollars (£1.45bn), on Tuesday transferred the German Green party a donation of 1.25m euros (£1m). Continue reading...
A shocking new exhibition reveals the thriving postwar careers of artists the Führer endorsed as ‘divinely gifted’. Many made public works that remain on show todayA photograph from 1940 shows three conquering Nazis in Paris against the backdrop of the Eiffel Tower. Within a few years one of these men, Adolf Hitler, was dead by his own hand; another, Albert Speer, was writing his memoirs in Spandau prison, having eluded a death sentence at the Nuremberg trials. But the third, Arno Breker, was alive and free, making sculptures in the new West Germany that in their bombast and iconography echoed those he had made during the Third Reich. Continue reading...
Outgoing chancellor implores public to pick Armin Laschet over his surging centre-left rivalAngela Merkel has used what is likely to be her last speech in the German parliament to make her most impassioned intervention in the electoral race so far, urging the public to vote for her party’s beleaguered candidate over his surging centre-left rival.The chancellor, who will stand down after federal elections on 26 September, warned of the possibility of the Social Democratic party (SPD) and the Greens governing the country in a coalition with the far-left Die Linke. Continue reading...
Ruling party failed to comply with order on judicial independence, European Commission claimsPoland’s nationalist government risks daily fines for flouting a European court order, after EU authorities in Brussels urged financial penalties over what are seen as threats to judicial independence.The European Commission called on the European court of justice (ECJ) to hit the Polish government with daily fines “to ensure compliance”, in a move hailed as a watershed moment in the struggle over the rule of law in the central European country. Continue reading...
Residents up in arms about local council’s decision to recommend 44-year-old amenity be shut for goodEast London residents are fighting to save one of the oldest city farms in the capital after Newham council recommended its closure.The cows, horses, goats, sheep, rabbits, guinea pigs and even a kookaburra at Newham City Farm have been enjoyed by generations of schoolchildren and local residents since the farm opened in 1977. Continue reading...
Production expected to fall to lowest level in decades after frosts, poor weather and diseaseFrench wine makers are expected to produce nearly a third less wine this year than usual, after their vineyards were struck by frosts, poor weather and disease during the spring and summer.The country’s wine output is predicted to tumble by 29% this year compared with 2020, to the lowest level in decades, according to France’s agriculture ministry. Continue reading...
Israeli media describe errors that allowed rare jail break for high security Palestinian prisonersThe escape of six high security Palestinian prisoners from an Israeli prison took place amid a parade of farcical errors that included the reported availability of prison blueprints online and a sleeping guard in a watchtower.As hundreds of Israeli troops scoured villages and the countryside for the escapees from Gilboa prison, including five members of Islamic Jihad and a high-profile figure from Fatah’s al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade, reports in the Israeli media detailed a series of bungles by the country’s prison authority that allowed the rare jailbreak. Continue reading...
Efforts to rewrite constitution rocked after key figure Rodrigo Rojas Vade says on Instagram that he does not have leukaemiaChile’s efforts to rewrite its Pinochet-era constitution have been rocked by the revelation that one of its most prominent members has been lying about his very public battle with cancer.Rodrigo Rojas Vade, 37, admitted that he does not in fact have leukaemia – a major factor in his rise to prominence and eventual political career – after an investigation by La Tercera newspaper revealed inconsistencies in his story. Continue reading...
Criticism of move to end prosecutions says it is broader than almost 300 other amnesties around worldThe UK government’s plan to end all Troubles-era prosecutions in Northern Ireland would create an amnesty wider than the one Augusto Pinochet introduced to shield human rights violators in Chile, according to a study.Downing Street’s plan would offer a level of impunity more sweeping than almost 300 other post-conflict amnesties introduced around the world, said the report, published on Tuesday. Continue reading...
The leafy green vegetable isn’t just healthy, it is wildly versatile, whether you’re dusting it on popcorn, using it to make crisps, or layering it in an ingenious lasagneKale is an exhausting food – not because of how it tastes, but for its role in the never-ending culture war. It’s a symbol of wishy-washy, out-of-touch wellness culture, and is therefore considered with suspicion by a certain segment of society. Which is silly, not least because kale is actually excellent. Stop being a baby, buy some kale and then make these recipes. Continue reading...
Vicious attack in which eight hooded men forced their way into home of gay man sparks condemnationPolice in Madrid are investigating a vicious homophobic attack in which eight hooded men forced their way into the home of a young gay man, held him down at knifepoint and carved the word “faggot” into one of his buttocks.The assault, which took place in the central Madrid neighbourhood of Malasaña on Sunday afternoon, came two months after the murder of Samuel Luiz, a 24-year-old gay man who was beaten to death while out with friends in the Galician city of A Coruña. The killing sparked nationwide revulsion and protests, and led to calls for action to tackle hate speech and protect LGBTI people. Continue reading...
RTBF reporter unwittingly spoke to Salah Abdeslam, alleged kingpin of attacks that killed 130A day before he goes on trial in the French capital, Belgian public broadcaster RTBF has released an interview with the alleged kingpin of the Paris terror attacks, recorded as he was fleeing France in the aftermath of the 2015 massacre.Salah Abdeslam and 19 others are accused of planning, aiding and carrying out the 13 November suicide bomb and gun attacks on the Stade de France, bars, restaurants and the Bataclan concert hall that killed 130 people and injured 490. Continue reading...
Unicef says hundreds of children have been separated from their families in chaos of Kabul evacuationAccess to food aid and other life-saving services in Afghanistan is close to running out, the United Nations has warned, as concern mounts that the country is facing a “looming humanitarian catastrophe”.The grim assessment from the UN’s Office for the coordination of humanitarian affairs [OCHA] came amid an appeal for an extra $200m (£145m) in emergency funding in Afghanistan after the Taliban’s takeover sparked a host of new issues. Continue reading...
Analysis of alleged anti-terrorist shootouts reveals security forces routinely suppressing opposition, claims Human Rights WatchEgyptian security forces engaged in an extended campaign of extrajudicial killings of detainees, routinely masked as shootouts with alleged terrorists, according to a new report by Human Rights Watch.The report details what it alleges are a pattern of extrajudicial assassinations between 2015 and last year, a period in which the Egyptian interior ministry said publicly that 755 people were killed in alleged exchanges of fire with security forces, while naming just 141. Continue reading...
by Mostafa Rachwani (now) and Matilda Boseley (earlie on (#5P7PC)
Eight deaths mourned in NSW; at least 90 of Victoria’s new cases linked to known outbreaks; Queensland leaders criticise federal government over vaccine supply as state records another Covid-free day – follow the latest updates
Joe Pantoliano stars as a disaffected executive setting out to revive his grandfather’s vineyard in this tiresomely whimsical taleAn Italian-American man in late middle age rejects the rat race and embarks on a voyage of self-discovery and winemaking in this lifelessly unfunny comedy. It’s Eat Pray Love for wealthy male boomers: embarrassingly sincere and iffily patronising to its Italian characters. The star is veteran character actor Joe Pantoliano, who played toupeed scumbag Ralph Cifaretto in The Sopranos – he looks deeply uncomfortable here as Marco Gentile, a nice-guy car industry CEO. For most of the movie Pantoliano keeps his mouth fixed in what is meant to be, I think, a warm, welcoming smile. But maybe it’s the Sopranos baggage: his grin looks to have a slight edge of hostility, like a shark flashing its teeth.At the beginning of the movie Marco impulsively quits his job, taking the moral high ground on an ethical issue with his Canadian company’s board. He books a ticket to Italy, where he left aged six for a better life in the US – though, of course, the lesson coming his way is that what a better life actually entails is the simple pleasure of sitting under a tree peeling an orange with a penknife while wearing a handkerchief as a makeshift hat. Continue reading...
Amid Trump, #MeToo and rising hate crime, science writer Melinda Wenner Moyer decided it was time to learn how to stop her kids becoming ‘assholes’. Her research became an unusual, much-needed parenting bookWhen Melinda Wenner Moyer looked around in the autumn of 2018, she saw everywhere what she would describe as “assholes”. In the US and the UK, hate crime was – and is – rising. Across the world, #MeToo allegations continued to come. Donald Trump was in the White House and “I just felt like there was so much bad behaviour everywhere,” says Moyer. “I started thinking about my kids and worrying about ‘Who were they going to become?’ and ‘What were they learning from this behaviour?’ if they were seeing it on TV or hearing about it from their friends.” Moyer realised: “What I wanted more than anything else was for my kids to not grow up to be assholes.”Moyer, a science journalist and parenting columnist, decided to go through the research and ended up writing a book with the pleasing title How to Raise Kids Who Aren’t Assholes. In the vast realm of parenting advice, there was plenty on diet, sleep and how to turn your child into a superhuman genius, but not a great deal on how to create a kind, compassionate person. Continue reading...
Violence erupts as rightwing activists attempt to break through blockade and force their way to congressPre-dawn skirmishes have erupted between police and supporters of Brazil’s president, Jair Bolsonaro, as rightwing activists tried to force their way towards congress before major pro-government rallies that have put Latin America’s biggest democracy on edge.Footage published by the Brasilia-based news website Metrópoles showed military police using pepper spray to repel a crowd of cheering Bolsonaristas in the early hours of Tuesday. Continue reading...
Country’s ‘foremost conceptual artist’ exhibited alongside Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein in pop art’s heydayPioneering New Zealand artist Billy Apple has died overnight, aged 85.The irreverent Auckland-raised artist, born Barrie Bates, was a major contributor to the pop art and conceptual art movements. Continue reading...
by Nanna Muus Steffensen in Mazar-e-Sharif on (#5P7V1)
Afghans forced to sell possessions on streets of Mazar-e-Sharif as fragile economy buckles under instabilityYasemeen sits in the back of an open trailer with a bundle of her family’s old clothes wrapped in scarves and some used notebooks already full of a child’s handwriting. The vehicle pulls over in a busy roundabout in central Mazar-e-Sharif, a city that until the Taliban takeover last month was known as the economic powerhouse of northern Afghanistan.Now, it is a scene of desperation as Afghanistan’s economic crisis sends ordinary people like Yasemeen on to the street to sell their last possessions. Continue reading...
Tinder profiles reveal desperate reality of trying to buy a home as survey shows housing is the number one concern for Kiwis, ranked above Covid“It is a truth universally acknowledged,” Jane Austen wrote in 1813, “that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.” Lose the gender binary, swap the fortune for half of a mortgage deposit and you have a maxim for our times.Two-hundred years later, young New Zealanders are still seeking partners to improve their otherwise-stagnant economic prospects, and as the country’s housing crisis worsens, more prospective first-time buyers are appealing to Tinder for a union that might assist them in acquiring a house. Continue reading...
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