As their classic second album ATLiens turns 25, we look back at the best from a duo who turned rap into a psychedelic, progressive playgroundThe title seems to refer to Outkast’s refusal to be constrained by musical boundaries and expectations as much as to the social struggles detailed in its lyrics: Liberation more or less abandons rapping entirely. Instead, there are vocals – from Erykah Badu and Cee-Lo Green, among others – and a defiant message: “You have a choice to be who you wants to be.” Continue reading...
Dolls found in rubbish dumps, radio parts and discarded flip-flops are among items used to create surreal costumes by a Kinshasa collective highlighting political and environmental issuesAs a child, Shaka Fumu Kabaka witnessed the atrocities that took place during the six-day war between Ugandan and Rwandan forces in his home town of Kisangani in June 2000.“It was not even our war, but a war between two foreign armies,” he said. Continue reading...
Nikki Kenward had a troubled childhood with little opportunity for play. But in her 60s she entered the world of the circus, where ‘anything goes and anything is possible’When Nikki Kenward was 30, she thought it was time to stop dancing. As a single parent, performance schedules were unforgiving. And, besides, that was the age at which dancers tended to retire. Now, at 67, she has taken up circus.The circus performer Katy Kartwheel lived nearby in Buckinghamshire. “I saw on Facebook that she was offering classes. I thought: ‘Classes in aerial in Marlow! That looks fun.’ So I emailed her and said: ‘Would you take a woman in her 60s?’ She said: ‘Great! Come along!’” Continue reading...
20 August 1991: Boris Yeltsin rallies resistance as Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev is put under house arrestBoris Yeltsin, Russia’s president and most popular politician, was holding firm last night against the dawn coup which ousted President Gorbachev. The action by communist hardliners threatened to end the longest and most successful period of democratic advance in the country’s tumultuous history.Related: Gorbachev coup 20 years on: the scoop that got away Continue reading...
The end of one of Europe’s most complex political relationships is likely to focus on UkraineAngela Merkel’s “farewell visit” to the Kremlin on Friday will mark the end of one of Europe’s oldest and most complex political relationships, a tense 15-year tug-of-war between Europe’s elder statesperson and the bloc’s chief antagonist in Vladimir Putin.Though deeply strained, their relationship never snapped. The German chancellor was reportedly distrustful of the former KGB officer from his first appearance in 2001 before the Bundestag, where he wooed MPs in fluent German as he called for unity against international terrorism. Continue reading...
History judges uninterested bystanders harshly. New Zealand must commit to saving more Afghans from the Taliban regimeWhat is unfolding now in Afghanistan is a moment that Afghans can’t turn away from. It will mean separated families, death, torture and sexual slavery – women, the rainbow community, journalists and human rights defenders will be most zealously targeted. At this critical moment, they have hope of rescue. But in Aotearoa New Zealand, our government is at risk of letting this hope slip away. History judges uninterested bystanders harshly. It isn’t like us to be one of those.This week our government announced we would send a New Zealand defence force (NZDF) vessel to bring a limited category of people back from Kabul. On Thursday one of our air force Hercules planes left for Afghanistan, and I acknowledge the risks our defence force personnel are taking in this time of Covid-19 to save the lives of people who have helped us. Continue reading...
by Agence France-Presse in Ouagadougou on (#5NGXP)
Death toll from the assault near northern town of Gorgadji leaves 59 civilians dead, along with six militiamen and 15 military policeBurkina Faso’s president has declared three days of national mourning after suspected jihadists killed 80 people, including 59 civilians, in an attack in the north of the country.The attack was the latest bloodshed in an area with high levels of Islamist violence. Continue reading...
Despite the loss of income, some people say they enjoyed the peace of border closures while the environment had a chance to recoverFor nearly a year and a half after the onset of the pandemic, the Cook Islands didn’t see a single tourist.In early 2020 the south Pacific country was forced to close its borders to keep Covid-19 out. In doing so it shut the doors on an industry that contributes two-thirds of the remote island country’s GDP. Continue reading...
Subscriber-only website synonymous with pornography will now focus on more mainstream contentOnlyFans, the subscriber-only website synonymous with pornography, has announced it will ban adult material from the site after pressure from its payment processors.The company will continue to allow some posts containing nudity but “any content containing sexually-explicit conduct” will be banned, with the site instead focusing on more mainstream content. Continue reading...
by Helen Pidd, Josh Halliday and Diane Taylor on (#5NHM9)
Ministers facing serious questions after boy falls from ninth floor of city’s Metropolitan hotelMinisters are facing serious questions after a five-year-old boy whose family had recently fled the Taliban fell to his death from a ninth-floor hotel window in Sheffield.On Thursday night, police named the boy as Mohammed Munib Majeedi. Continue reading...
by Aubrey Allegretti Political correspondent on (#5NHAY)
Ex-Labour MP charged with making fraudulent invoices to Independent Parliamentary Standards AuthorityThe former Labour and independent MP Jared O’Mara has been charged with seven counts of fraud.O’Mara will appear in court next month alongside former aide Gareth Arnold, who is charged with six counts of the same offence Continue reading...
The Law and Justice party’s authoritarian grip on the country’s politics has been weakenedAt a glance, it has been business as usual this summer for Poland’s conservative-nationalist government. There has been a fierce row over attempts to introduce a disciplinary system to keep judges in line. A controversial new bill threatens to further compromise media independence, by banning non-European ownership of broadcasting companies. Both the European Union and the United States have railed at these latest anti-democratic manoeuvres, designed to strengthen the authoritarian grip of the Law and Justice party (PiS). But, despite all the international criticism, PiS remains ahead of its rivals in the polls.So far, so familiar. But six years after PiS won power, turning Poland into a bastion of European illiberalism alongside Hungary, the party’s polarising playbook is not working the political magic it once did. This week Warsaw backed down on the judges dispute, which was in danger of becoming a tipping point in its vexed relations with the EU. Under pressure from Brussels, it has disbanded the supreme court chamber – packed with political appointees – to which court verdicts would have been answerable. Having gone to the brink, Poland blinked first. Continue reading...
by Patrick Butler Social policy editor on (#5NHGT)
Government accused of failing to communicate £20 reduction as many families unaware of imminent cutLabour has accused the government of failing to prepare struggling low-income families for October’s £20-a-week cut in universal credit payments after it emerged that up to 2 million claimants were unaware of the imminent reduction.Separate surveys carried out by poverty charities indicate that between 18% and 36% of claimants did not know their income will fall by £90 a week or £1,050 a year after September – the biggest cut to social security payments since the second world war. Continue reading...
Ayten Amin’s Souad is a razor-sharp portrayal of sisterhood and sexual awakening that is rarely represented on screenWhen the Egyptian director Ayten Amin was 10 years old, a classmate’s sister killed herself. The news gripped the school. But, in a society where suicide is a sin, no one talked about it; instead, they mourned the girl as though she had died mysteriously, or in an accident. “When I was shooting my first film, it suddenly hit me,” Amin says over a video call from her home in Cairo. “How did my classmate feel back then? How did she grow up knowing what happened, but with no one talking about it?”In her new film, Souad, Amin explores precisely this: the hidden lives of teenage girls in Egypt. It follows the title character (played by Bassant Ahmed) and Rabab (Basmala Elghaiesh), sisters of 19 and 13 living in Zagazig, a small city 40 miles north of Cairo in the Nile delta. To her family and friends, Souad is as religious as she is studious – but she lives a different life online. She has virtual relationships with men and becomes enthralled by the glamorous-seeming Ahmed (Hussein Ghanem), an influencer from the fashionable Mediterranean city of Alexandria. Their relationship begins to sour when Souad stands up Ahmed for a real-life date; it gets steadily worse as a cycle of sexts and arguments sets in. Then tragedy strikes. Continue reading...
World’s largest carmaker will slash output by 40% in September as Covid-19 outbreaks hit semiconductor suppliesVolkswagen and Toyota have become the latest carmakers to warn about production cuts because of the global computer chip shortage.German car manufacturer Volkswagen said a semiconductor supply crunch could force it to slow production lines during the autumn, adding to cuts that have been in place since February. Japanese firm Toyota also reported that it would slash output by 40% in September. Continue reading...
Jake Davison, who killed five people including his mother, had shotgun licence reinstated last monthThe coroner overseeing the case of the Plymouth gunman, Jake Davison, who killed his mother and four other people, has asked a watchdog to examine whether changes to weapons licensing have been made since a man shot dead three women in the north of England almost 10 years ago.At the opening of inquests into the deaths of Jake Davison and his five victims, it emerged that the 22-year-old apprentice crane driver shot his mother in the head and torso after an argument. He went on to kill four people he did not know, including a three-year-old girl, in nearby streets and a park. He then shot himself in the head, the court was told. Continue reading...
Swedish furniture retailer wants customers to be ‘part of the furniture’ in a more immersive experienceThe typical set route customers have taken through an Ikea store for decades, independently following arrows through mocked-up rooms that, even if hours later, eventually lead to the checkout, may soon be consigned to history.The company has announced plans to introduce what it calls a more immersive experience. Continue reading...
Century-old festival ‘crossed various lines’, says Gijón mayor, citing residents’ opposition to bullfightingThe northern Spanish city of Gijón has cancelled its century-old bullfighting festival, accusing it of “crossing various lines” after two of the bulls slain this week were named “Feminist” and “Nigerian”.“The bullfighting festival is over,” the city’s Socialist mayor, Ana González, told reporters. “They have crossed various lines … A city that believes in equality between men and women, that believes in integration, that believes in open doors for everyone cannot allow these sorts of things to happen.” Continue reading...
A few days ago the capital was full of women going about their business. Now, the few that remain walk fast and full of fearFour days after the quick and unexpected invasion of Kabul by the Taliban, the streets of the Afghan capital are almost entirely devoid of women.The few women who are on the streets are wearing the traditional blue burqa, Islamic garb that, while customary in Afghanistan, was not used as widely in Kabul until now. Many women are dressed in the long black clothes commonly worn in the Middle East and Arab nations. Continue reading...
Footage shows desperate crowds passing children to US soldiers in the hope of getting them to safety at Kabul international airport. Taliban forces have set up checkpoints outside the airport, raising fears that even people with the correct documents needed to leave Afghanistan may not get through to their evacuation flights
The three-deck wizard’s new memoir details a life behind the decks, from the Houses of Parliament to Honolulu – and tragedy in Venezuela. Now, he says, his baking is as popular as his musicIn late November 2007, Carl Cox’s DJing career was over – or so he thought. A few days earlier he had played a set at a festival in Caracas, Venezuela, as part of a tour of South America. The vibe was good and the crowd was bouncing. “I heard all these fireworks go: ‘Bang, bang, bang.’ Everyone was going: ‘Woooo! Yeeaaaah!’” Cox mimics dancing behind the decks. “Then there were more bangs and I thought: ‘Yay, more fireworks!’ But then I looked at the crowd and something was wrong. They were dispersing. I realised: ‘Fuck, that’s not fireworks, that’s gunfire.’”Two rival gang members had met on the dancefloor and begun shooting. Cox got down on the floor and crawled to a backstage locker room where he and his tour manager barricaded themselves in. After an hour, they were escorted out to a car, past scores of police vans and ambulances. Four people had died and nine were injured. “Seeing people shot on the dancefloor and dying in front of me, blood everywhere …” Cox says, rubbing his eyes. “One minute we were having the time of our lives and the next we were cowering for our lives.” Continue reading...
As Covid continues to curb visits to see our iconic wildlife, now is the time to move away from western-led funding modelsThat African governments have failed to mobilise funds to conserve their vast protected areas is not in doubt. Countries were just about managing to pay basic salaries to rangers who barely had enough to put fuel in their patrol vehicles. Covid has exacerbated this already dire situation, with the loss of income from foreign tourism.The continent has more than 8,500 protected areas, described by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as government-led national parks, areas jointly governed by state agencies, communities, privately owned wildlife reserves, and public-private partnerships between governments, companies and NGOs. Included too, are what the IUCN calls “indigenous peoples and communities conserved territories and areas”. Continue reading...
The idea was to let the kids run around for the weekend while my wife, suffering from poor mental health, would unwind at home. And it worked, until it very much didn’tMy youngest son is almost four, so the sleep-deprived agony of newborn parenting has fully receded. My sleep is no longer jittery and surface-level, primed to be wrecked by the tiniest disturbance. When I sleep now, I expect to sleep.Then last month, like a dummy, I took my kids camping. True, I did everything to maximise the amount of sleep I’d get. I booked a slightly upmarket campsite, complete with actual beds, and did some sums. The sun went down late and came up early, so my sons would wake up at the crack of dawn. But if I drifted off when they did, and everything worked out perfectly, I could just about cram in six hours. Continue reading...
Alex Bovaird the costume designer behind the chaotic new show, talks Gatsby kaftans, Gwyneth Paltrow-inspired aesthetics and dressing up ideologiesIf pandemic TV has doubled as a mood board for fashion looks we crave, HBO’s The White Lotus, Mike White’s six-part trippy drama about holidaymakers on a luxury retreat, does the opposite. Its sharply drawn ensemble of grand guignol poshos have been dressed with a whip smart sense of satire.Not since Succession has TV created such a perfect moment of visual costuming of the 1%-ers. Continue reading...
Lahore police open case against 300-400 unidentified people captured on videoPolice in Pakistan have opened cases against hundreds of unidentified men after a young woman was sexually assaulted and groped by a crowd of more than 400 men in a park in Lahore as she made a TikTok video.The shocking assault was captured on several videos, which went viral and showed a mob descend on the woman as she was in Lahore’s Greater Iqbal park making a TikTok video with friends. In broad daylight, the men picked up the young woman and tossed her between them, tearing her clothes and assaulting and groping her. Continue reading...
Dylan biographer Clinton Heylin claims musician was not in New York at time of abuse alleged in new lawsuit, which is challenged by accuserA lawyer for the woman who has accused Bob Dylan of sexually abusing her in 1965 when she was 12 years old has challenged claims by Dylan’s biographer that the singer-songwriter was not in New York at the time of the alleged abuse.Dylan, 80, is accused by an anonymised woman, JC, of establishing “an emotional connection” with her to “lower her inhibitions with the object of sexually abusing her, which he did, coupled with the provision of drugs, alcohol and threats of physical violence, leaving her emotionally scarred and psychologically damaged to this day”. Continue reading...
by Sarah Martin Chief political correspondent on (#5NGVB)
It is understood Scott Morrison did not advise state and territory leaders of the decision to make 16-39-year-olds officially eligible from 30 August before the announcement
Andy Li and Chan Tsz-wah were accused of conspiring with media mogul Jimmy Lai to call for sanctions on China and Hong KongThe Hong Kong activist Andy Li and paralegal Chan Tsz-wah have pleaded guilty to foreign collusion, becoming the second and third convictions under the year-old national security law which has been used to crush government opposition in the city.Li, 31, and Chan, 30, were accused of conspiring with media mogul Jimmy Lai and others between July 2020 and February this year, to lobby external forces to impose sanctions on Hong Kong and China. Lai is yet to face trial on the charge. Continue reading...
Mohammed El Halabi is accused of stealing relief money and giving it to Hamas for their war effort against Israel. But five years on, the evidence against him looks seriously flawedAt about 9am on 12 July 2016, dozens of Israeli security officers stormed through the gates of the Augusta Victoria hospital complex in East Jerusalem. They surged past the hospital, which mostly serves the local Palestinian population, and through the main car park to a three-storey building where the offices of the international charity World Vision were located.The officers, some armed with rifles, ordered the charity’s few dozen staff into a meeting room and seized their phones to prevent them contacting the outside world. According to witnesses, they were kept there for the next four hours. Occasionally, Israeli police and intelligence agents called an employee out of the room for questioning, while others roamed the offices, searching through files. Continue reading...
Frank’s views were disturbing, a brazen assertion of white privilege. But with our fates more clearly tied together than ever, I needed to understand himOn 11 March 2021, I took a selfie at the Baltimore Convention Center and pressed send. I’d just received my first dose of a Covid vaccine. “Feels pretty momentous,” I texted an acquaintance. “It was exactly one year ago that our university shut down.” Frank wrote back immediately from his small town in southern Michigan. “Momentous, yes. But not for the reasons you subscribe to,” he wrote.Related: Battle for the Soul: can Joe Biden beat Trump’s Republicans in the war of words? Continue reading...
Authorities have warned more cases are expected, given the activity of those already diagnosed with the virusUp to 100 New Zealanders may have already been infected with the Delta variant before the first positive community case was announced on Tuesday, modelling exercises have predicted.Health officials are combing through the details of trans-Tasman arrivals to try to discover how the coronavirus that caused an outbreak in Sydney has led to a cluster of community cases in Auckland, with the nation on its second day of a snap lockdown. Continue reading...
Junta accused of ‘killing lives and democratic hopes’ in bloody crackdown since the February coupMyanmar’s security forces have killed more than 1,000 civilians since the military ousted Aung San Suu Kyi from power six months ago, according to an advocacy group.The country has been in turmoil since 1 February, when the armed forces seized power in a lightning coup, triggering dissent as protesters demanded a return to democracy. Continue reading...
Change in papal law in 1336 to allow twice-weekly consumption caused problems at Muchelney AbbeyIt may have seemed a good day for medieval monks when a papal decree allowed them to start eating meat including mutton, beef, pork and venison. It was not so good for their bowels.Research by English Heritage sheds light on the day-to-day lives and digestive troubles of monks at Muchelney Abbey in Somerset – in particular the consequence of a change in papal law, in 1336, which permitted the twice-weekly consumption of meat from four-legged animals. Continue reading...
Student union had expressed ‘deep sadness’ over death of a man who attacked a police officerFour student leaders from Hong Kong’s top university have been arrested for “advocating terrorism”, police said.Arrests were made in response to a controversial student union statement after a man attacked a police officer last month. Continue reading...
After nearly seven years of construction, the bridge reached a landmark moment when the massive arches were joinedOn 19 August 1930, at 10pm, 39,000 tonnes of steel spanning 503 metres was joined together to form the arch of the Sydney Harbour Bridge. Continue reading...
This year there will be a special focus on the species many of us are likely to see in lockdownBird of the year is back! The Guardian/BirdLife Australia poll for 2021 will begin on 27 September with a list of 50 shortlisted species.In 2017 the magpie fought off strong support for the white ibis to win. In 2019 the highly endangered black-throated finch, which is under threat from the expansion of the Adani Carmichael coalmine, triumphed after backing from a highly organised online campaign. Continue reading...
Sandra Cogswell convicted on eight counts of administering noxious substance and one of behaving in a disgraceful mannerA Canadian soldier accused of drugging comrades with cannabis-laced cupcakes during a live-fire training exercise has been found guilty by a military judge.Sandra Cogswell was convicted on eight counts of administering a noxious substance and one count of behaving in a disgraceful manner. Her case marks the first time in Canada that a soldier has been found guilty of administering cannabis to colleagues without their consent. Continue reading...
Chinese Communist party to crack down on almost weekly creation of billionaire company bossesChina’s president has vowed to “adjust excessive incomes” in a warning to the country’s super-rich that the state plans to redistribute wealth to tackle widening inequality.According to reports in state media, Xi Jinping told officials at a meeting of the Chinese Communist party’s central financial and economic affairs commission on Tuesday, that the government should “regulate excessively high incomes and encourage high-income groups and enterprises to return more to society”. Continue reading...
For Starmer, the point was ‘what are the human consequences when power is held by someone so unfit?’The initial shock of a packed House of Commons, recalled in recess for an emergency debate on Afghanistan, was how unfamiliar the packed green benches now look. Even before the pandemic, arguably since the prorogation of parliament, there’s been a question mark over the point of it all; does a debate have to end in a vote, in order to have meaning? Is it otherwise just theatre, and if so, what democratic purpose does it serve?The answer used to be very simple: it was to test and challenge the policy of the executive. It may have been ritualistic, but the ritual was dense with significance, indicating that no prime minister had the power simply to announce, every one must persuade. Continue reading...
