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Updated 2026-04-28 03:17
Pride and privilege: why Australia needs grand designs for containing corporate greed
The desire to contain greed was a crucial dimension of early 20th-century nation-building. Do we have the political will to restrain it in the 21st?The ACTU recently identified Harvey Norman as the face of corporate greed after its refusal to pay back $22m of jobkeeper despite doubling profits to $462m during the pandemic while resisting calls for a 3.5% increase in the minimum wage. The company has not been alone in deciding not to return the government subsidy, a choice also taken by Solomon Lew’s retail group, Premier Investments, which enjoyed a 90% profit increase in the six months when it received $15m in wage subsidies. A total of 25 ASX companies that received the payment have been found to have paid executive bonuses totalling $24m in the 2020 financial year.It is tempting to imagine that allegations of greed have been an unchanging feature of the rhetoric of the left throughout Australia’s history. But the real story is more complex, and more interesting. Continue reading...
Denmark end Wales’ Euro 2020 dreams as Dolberg double caps dominant win
This was exactly the kind of party Denmark had mapped out. On an Amsterdam evening on which the locals turned out to send their love to Christian Eriksen, another former Ajax prodigy propelled Denmark into the quarter-finals of the European Championship. Twenty-nine years to the day since Denmark won Euro 92 Kasper Dolberg scored twice, the first a delicious effort from outside the box, to help dispatch Wales with relative ease before Joakim Mæhle and Martin Braithwaite sealed victory late on.There was always only going to be enough room for one rousing tale to continue. “Guld for Eriksen,” were the words emblazoned on one Denmark flag draped over the top tier of this stadium and everywhere you looked there were banners in support of the midfielder. Kasper Hjulmand clutched Dolberg’s face with joy as the striker left the pitch to a hero’s ovation and when Mæhle scored the Danish prime minister, Mette Frederiksen, could not hide her delight. Wales were stunned when Harry Wilson was surprisingly sent off as stoppage time loomed but by that point the game was well gone. Continue reading...
Le Pen looks to Provence for last hope of victory in French regional elections
Poll on knife-edge as parties form alliances in a bid to defeat far-right RN partyAt the 17th-century town hall in the Provençal city of Arles, a large tricolour flapped vigorously outside the open window of the mayor’s office last week, animated perhaps by what locals call the mistralet, a gentle summer version of the strong wind that blows through the Rhône valley.The world heritage city – the largest commune in metropolitan France – has been marked by foreign influence throughout its history: the Romans conquered it in 123BC, leaving the magnificent arena, theatre, necropolis and aqueduct; much later came the artists, Dutchman Vincent Van Gogh and Spanish-born Pablo Picasso among them. Continue reading...
Raves from the grave: lost 90s subculture is back in the spotlight
Driven by a ‘groundswell’ of young devotees and fortysomething nostalgia, a series of events is celebrating the youth movementIt is perhaps one of the most ignored subcultures in modern British history, but rave music and the free party movement of the early 90s is coming back into focus.Over the next few months, a series of films, exhibitions, memoirs and podcasts will reappraise free parties and the crackdown on them by John Major’s government, as well as their modern echoes. Continue reading...
Hong Kong needs law to tackle ‘hostility against the police’, says force’s new chief
Raymond Siu blames protests on ‘fake news’ – but critics fear the label will be used to muzzle dissentHong Kong’s new police chief has called for a “fake news” law to tackle “hostility against the police”, in what analysts see as an indication of the next phase of the crackdown on free speech in the former British overseas territory.“I understand that there are residents who are still hostile against us,” Raymond Siu, 55, said at his first media briefing since taking office on Friday. “In this regard, I told my colleagues that many of these torn relationships and hostility against the police are due to fake news.” Continue reading...
Photographer Donavon Smallwood: ‘What’s it like to be a black person in nature?’
The self-taught 27-year-old discusses Languor, a prize-winning series of portraits shot in Central Park over the past yearSince he was seven years old, Donavon Smallwood had lived in the same apartment in Harlem close to the northern tip of Central Park. As a teenager, he hung out there with his friends and, later, as he became interested in photography, he would often wander through the park with his camera looking for hidden places where the clamour of the city seemed a world away. “So many urban communities don’t have any nature spaces,” he says, “so I was lucky to have one close by.”In 2019, he had “a vague idea for a project about walking and looking”, a flaneur’s take on the park as a place in which to lose oneself. Throughout the spring and summer of 2020, while New York was in lockdown, he photographed in and around the wooded north-western corner of the park, where ravines, glades and manmade waterfalls give the impression of a natural wilderness. Often, on his way there and back, he encountered the same people, locals mainly, for whom the park was a place to escape the constrictions of the Covid pandemic. Continue reading...
Man captures moment tornado hits his house in Czech Republic – video
An eyewitness video captured the moment a tornado hit a house in the southern Czech city of Hodonín on Thursday evening. The footage shows trees being bent and broken by winds that knock through a wall and send debris flying through the air before the tornado hits the man's house, blowing a window in. At least five people were killed and hundreds injured after the tornado ripped through towns and villages around Hodonín, near the Czech Republic's borders with Austria and Slovakia. The man who filmed this footage was not injured
Hundreds of thousands of EU citizens ‘scrabbling’ to attain post-Brexit status before deadline
Pressure grows for UK to extend Wednesday’s settlement-scheme cut-off date as backlog of applications grows and helplines crashEU citizens are struggling to apply for post-Brexit settled status as the Home Office reaches “breaking point” coping with a last-minute surge in applications.With three days before the deadline of the EU settlement scheme this Wednesday, campaigners say late applicants are being stuck in online queues as others find it impossible to access advice on the government helpline. Continue reading...
‘People aren’t looking for just a model’: meet the amazing Ryan Zaman
When he caught the eye of the fashion world, he couldn’t believe his luck. Now Ryan Zaman is modelling alongside Kate Moss – and promoting the rights of disabled peopleWhen he was five years old, Ryan Zaman walked in a fashion show at his primary school. The catwalk was made from gym mats laid out in a T, and the front row was populated not by Wintours and Kardashians but by rapt parents on tiny chairs. Zaman’s mum shot a video and it should be issued with an “extreme cuteness” advisory. At the end, a teacher with a microphone buttonholes Zaman and asks, “Are you famous?”“Yeah,” he replies. Continue reading...
Why pick a holiday in Gibraltar? ‘We couldn’t go anywhere else’
Prized green-list status attracts younger British tourists to the Rock for the first time as vacation choices remain slimIf the residents of Apes’ Den are pleased to see a larger than usual number of Britons snapping them, cooing over them or, indeed, edging gingerly away from them, they give little indication of it.It is not much of a stretch to suggest that the social, political and economic ramifications of the current pandemic have been wholly lost on the crag-haunting, tourist-attracting Barbary macaques as they lounge around their lair high above the busy streets and marinas of Gibraltar. Continue reading...
Can the British countryside cope this summer?
During the first lockdown, farmer James Rebanks was astonished by a visitor-free Lake District. Ahead of a super-season of domestic tourism, he wonders if there’s a better wayLast March, I stood in the middle of the A66 between Penrith and Keswick and gawped at what had become a ghost road. It is one of the main routes in and out of the Lake District, where I’ve lived all my life, and usually roars with traffic. But there wasn’t a vehicle for miles. I just stared, stunned by the silence. The sun was shining in a deep-blue sky, the birds were singing, but it felt apocalyptic, as if I were the only person left in the world.In those first weeks of lockdown, the whole landscape came to seem radically different. The shores of the lakes were abandoned, even on sunny days; the car parks were empty; the footpaths and fells silent. It felt wrong to enjoy this time that was terrible for so many people, but, in truth, many of us did. The 19 million visitors a year to the Lakes are an accepted fact of our day-to-day lives, and I never imagined they would not be here. Now I could see what it might be like to live without them all around us, something perhaps a lot of rural people had long wanted. Continue reading...
Helicopter carrying Colombian president and senior officials hit by gunfire
Iván Duque says ‘cowardly’ attack will not stop him tackling drug trafficking, terrorism and organised crimeColombia’s president, Iván Duque, said a helicopter carrying him and several senior officials came under fire in the southern Catatumbo region bordering Venezuela, in a rare instance of a direct attack on a presidential aircraft.Duque said everyone on board the helicopter was safe, including the defense minister, Diego Molano; the interior minister, Daniel Palacios and the governor of Norte de Santander state, Silvano Serrano. Continue reading...
‘At first I thought, this is crazy’: the real-life plan to use novels to predict the next war
Three years ago, a small group of academics at a German university launched an unprecedented collaboration with the military – using novels to try to pinpoint the world’s next conflicts. Are they on to something?As the car with the blacked-out windows came to a halt in a sidestreet near Tübingen’s botanical gardens, keen-eyed passersby may have noticed something unusual about its numberplate. In Germany, the first few letters usually denote the municipality where a vehicle is registered. The letter Y, however, is reserved for members of the armed forces.Military men are a rare, not to say unwelcome, sight in Tübingen. A picturesque 15th-century university town that brought forth great German minds including the philosopher Hegel and the poet Friedrich Hölderlin, it is also a modern stronghold of the German Green party, thanks to its left-leaning academic population. In 2018, there was growing resistance on campus against plans to establish Europe’s leading artificial intelligence research hub in the surrounding area: the involvement of arms manufacturers in Tübingen’s “cyber valley”, argued students who occupied a lecture hall that year, brought shame to the university’s intellectual tradition. Continue reading...
Teenager stabbed to death in Sydenham, south-east London
Mother of 19-year-old victim visits scene as murder inquiry gets under way into killing on Friday eveningPolice have launched a murder investigation after a teenager was stabbed to death in south-east London.Officers were called to a street in Sydenham at 9.30pm on Friday but the 19-year-old man died at the scene. Continue reading...
Recipe for inflation: how Brexit and Covid made tinned tomatoes a lot dearer
Combine the pandemic with rising raw material costs, stir in a labour shortage, a twist of Brexit, add a pinch of poor weather and voila …Tinned tomatoes are a taken-for-granted store cupboard staple, relied upon by Britons to whip up home cooked favourites such as spaghetti bolognese. But the price could soon make you take notice, amid warnings of higher shopping bills, set against a backdrop of soaring global food prices.From the packaging to the transportation and the energy used in manufacturing, nearly all aspects of the production of this popular ingredient now cost more. The crushed tomatoes alone are 30% dearer than a year ago, at €0.48 per kilo. The same pressures are driving the prices of many foods higher, meaning Britons will probably face bigger bills for groceries or meals out this autumn. Continue reading...
Met police brace for ‘busy weekend’ of major London protests
Dance music acts along with anti-lockdown, anti-austerity and climate activists will all converge on capitalSome of the UK’s leading dance music acts are expected to join a protest march in London calling for the government to scrap Covid restrictions on nightclubs, as the capital gears up for a weekend of mass demonstrations.Anti-lockdown protesters, anti-austerity campaigners and environmentalists will also stage protests in London on Saturday and Sunday, and the Metropolitan police said they were preparing for “a busy weekend”. Continue reading...
‘I knew how dangerous things could become’: the perils of childbirth as a Black woman
When she was pregnant, Anna Malaika Tubbs was thrilled – then terrified, knowing the shockingly high death rate of Black women in childbirth. Could she find a way to stay safe?In the bathroom of a friend’s house in Washington DC, I waited anxiously for a few minutes before turning to look at the pregnancy test. It was positive. My eyes filled with tears; I was overjoyed, grateful and excited, but also very scared.I think many parents can relate to this feeling, which seems to start as soon as we see that test result, and continues until our children are adults; we are overwhelmed with happiness for their mere existence while simultaneously terrified of the possibility of losing them. But as a Black feminist scholar, I was well aware that I had even more reason to worry. Continue reading...
‘I get nightmares’: Turks fear impact of Erdoğan’s $65bn Istanbul canal
The louder opposing voices grow, the more determined the president becomes to go ahead with his ‘grand fantasy project’There isn’t usually a lot going on at the Sazlıdere dam north-west of Istanbul, one of several reservoirs providing the megacity with fresh water. Yet this week the calm expanse of forest, farms and marshland was at the centre of the latest battle of narratives in Turkish politics.On Saturday, President Recep Tayip Erdoğan is due to attend a ceremony here for an element of the biggest and boldest of the construction megaprojects that have come to define his two decades in office: his “crazy” Istanbul canal. Continue reading...
Eighteen bodies found after suspected drug cartel shootout in northern Mexico
The victims appear to members of the Sinaloa and Jalisco gangs fighting for control of the narcotics trade in Zacatecas stateThe bullet-ridden bodies of 18 people were discovered after what appeared to have been a shootout between members of rival drug cartels in northern Mexico.The bodies were found in a remote, rural area of the north-central state of Zacatecas, state security department spokeswoman Rocío Aguilar said on Friday. Continue reading...
Car bomb injures 13 UN peacekeepers in Mali
Attack occurs in Gao region where insurgents linked to al-Qaida and Islamic State are activeThirteen UN peacekeepers have been wounded in northern Mali by a car bomb, the UN mission said, while Mali’s army said six of its soldiers were killed in a separate attack in the centre of the country.The attack on Friday in the north targeted a temporary base set up by the peacekeepers near the village of Ichagara in the Gao region, where Islamist insurgents linked to al-Qaida and Islamic State are active. Continue reading...
Queensland police officer hit and killed by stolen car north of Brisbane
A manhunt is under way for the driver of stolen white Hyundai Kona SUV who fled after the accidentA police officer has been hit and killed by a stolen car north of Brisbane and a manhunt is under way for the driver of a white Hyundai Kona SUV who fled.The 53-year-old male senior constable was responding to a suspected stolen vehicle when he was struck on the Bruce Highway at Burpengary just after 3am, police said. Continue reading...
Suspected tornado damages homes in east London
Garden walls torn down and dustbins sent flying hundreds of metres through the air, but no injuries reported
How do we stop the plunder of the Pacific? A panel of experts give their solutions
From education to legal reform, at the close of the Guardian’s Pacific Plunder series, leading Pacific thinkers offer solutionsOver the last month, the Guardian has run a major investigative series examining the extractives industries – mining, logging, fishing and the nascent industry of deep-sea mining – in the Pacific. Among the stories of environmental devastation and social harm are also stories of Pacific communities taking control of their resources and succeeding in resisting unwanted extractive projects.As the series comes to a close, four Pacific leaders and thinkers, from across the region, offer solutions to the problem of Pacific plunder. Continue reading...
Woman who killed stepfather after years of abuse in France found guilty
Valérie Bacot convicted of the premeditated murder of Daniel Polette after suffering over 20 years of violenceA French woman who killed her stepfather, who raped her at the age of 12 and later became her husband, has been convicted of premeditated murder.Valérie Bacot was subject to more than 20 years of violence at the hands of Daniel Polette, with whom she had four children. The court heard she shot and killed him after he began prostituting her to strangers, fearing that he was about to begin abusing their teenage daughter. Continue reading...
Trudeau says Canadians ‘horrified and ashamed’ of forced assimilation
• PM responds to discovery of graves at Indigenous schools• Trudeau stops short of ordering national investigationJustin Trudeau has said that Canadians are “horrified and ashamed” by their government’s longtime policy of forcing Indigenous children to attend boarding schools where nearly 1,000 unmarked graves have now been discovered – but stopped short of launching a national investigation.An estimated 751 unmarked graves were recently discovered on the grounds of the former Marieval Indian residential school in Saskatchewan which operated from 1899 to 1997. Last month, 215 remains were reported at a similar school in British Columbia. Continue reading...
Three aid workers found dead in Tigray, says Médecins Sans Frontières
MSF says it condemns attack on colleagues ‘in strongest possible terms’ after bodies found near carThree aid workers who had been working in Ethiopia’s Tigray region have been found dead, their organisation, Médecins Sans Frontières, announced on Friday.MSF said it had lost contact with the workers while they were traveling on Thursday afternoon. Their bodies were found near their empty car this morning. Continue reading...
Three dead and 10 wounded in stabbing attack in Germany – reports
Police said they arrested suspect after ‘major operation’ in south-eastern town of WürzburgThree people have been killed and several wounded in a stabbing attack in the southern German town of Würzburg, Bavarian authorities said on Friday afternoon, adding that police had stopped the suspected perpetrator with a shot to the leg.The suspected attacker is believed to be a 24-year-old Somali man who has lived in Würzburg since 2015, Bavarian interior minister Joachim Herrmann said in a statement. Continue reading...
UK tobacco firms fail in bid to have Malawi child labour case struck out
BAT and Imperial Tobacco deny they are responsible for farming families’ exploitationTwo big UK tobacco companies have failed to persuade the high court to strike out a case against them that alleges they are responsible for the exploitation of Malawian farming families and child labour in their drive for profits.British American Tobacco and Imperial Tobacco deny the allegations. They argued that the Malawian families could not prove that the tobacco they grew had ended up in their cigarettes. Continue reading...
Backstory to Polish nationalism | Letters
Michael Kowalewski on the reasons for the rise of illiberalism in PolandI cannot speak for Hungary, but the very nuanced account of Polish and Hungarian illiberalism (The long read, 24 June) omits some crucial dimensions – notably the influence on the Polish psyche of national messianism, a reaction to the partitions of Poland at the end of the 18th century, which led to the disappearance of Poland from the map. These events traumatised intellectuals and turned Polish poets and artists into guardians of the national soul through prophetic writings in which Poland appears as the Christ of Europe whose sufferings will lead to a wholesale resurrection of European culture.This influence – spread by the 19th-century Polish poets Adam Mickiewicz, Juliusz Słowacki and Zygmunt Krasiński – was strengthened by the papacy of John Paul II, which seemed to actualise what the poets had written about. Indeed, a poem by Słowacki prophesies the coming of a Slav pope who will set the country and all Europe free from tyranny. It is this background which is the cradle of Polish nationalism, even if the failures of western liberalism are a contemporary nurse.
Call for Spain to regularise immigration status of man who twice saved strangers
More than 1,800 people sign petition to help Mouhammad Diouf, from Senegal, who jumped into Bilbao river to stop drowningsMore than 1,800 people have backed a call for Spanish officials to regularise the immigration status of an undocumented Senegalese man after his second rescue of a stranger from drowning in the main river in Bilbao.Mouhammad Diouf was out with a friend on Sunday afternoon when he spotted a man who appeared to be feeling dizzy on one of the city’s bridges. “He was trying to grab on to the rail when he fell into the water,” Diouf told the Guardian. “We were quite far away. I threw down my rucksack and went running.” Continue reading...
Trump told top US general to ‘crack skulls’ of racism protesters, book claims
Greek PM rejects calls for EU-wide quarantine of British tourists
Bloc urged to speed up Covid jabs instead, but Balearic Islands ask Spain to tighten controls on Britons
Canada places US rightwing militia group Three Percenters on terror list
Ottawa says group linked to Capitol attack has active presence in Canada and could threaten national securityCanada has officially named the US rightwing militia group Three Percenters as a terrorist entity alongside Isis and al-Qaida, saying it had an active presence in Canada and could threaten national security.Related: Pence breaks from Trump and calls bid to reverse election result ‘un-American’ – live Continue reading...
Woman arrested at Sarah Everard vigil to start legal challenge against Met
Patsy Stevenson is preparing to initiate legal proceedings unless Met withdraw fixed penalty noticeA woman who was arrested at a London vigil for Sarah Everard has said she is preparing to initiate legal proceedings against the Metropolitan police unless they withdraw the fixed penalty notice they imposed on her.The image of 28-year-old physics student Patsy Stevenson being pinned to the floor by two male police officers, hands held behind her back, on 13 March was one of the defining images in criticism of how the vigil on Clapham Common was policed. Continue reading...
‘Lambeg Boogie makes you feel all right’: Irish drum track cuts across politics
Popularity of video fusing loyalist marching drum with Irish dancing leads to hopes it will promote reconciliationIt is one of the world’s loudest musical instruments and thunders across Northern Ireland during the loyalist marching season.While loyalists consider the Lambeg drum part of a centuries-old heritage, many nationalists view its ear-splitting volume as an attempt to intimidate. Continue reading...
Fractious EU summit rejects Franco-German plan for Putin talks
Bloc to explore sanctions instead, as gathering also holds ‘emotional’ debate over Hungary’s LGBT lawsA Franco-German plan to restart talks with Vladimir Putin has been rejected at a fractious EU summit that resulted in a decision to explore economic sanctions against Russia instead.The two-day gathering in Brussels also included an “emotional” debate over LGBT rights in Hungary, as EU leaders confronted Viktor Orbán over a law that will ban gay people from being shown in educational and entertainment content for minors. Continue reading...
France regional elections: Greens hope to win first region in 30 years
Focus is on few close-run races in Pays de la Loire in west and in Île-de-FranceThe French Green party stepped up campaigning in the Pays de La Loire on Friday in the hope of narrowly winning its first region in almost 30 years in the final round of elections this Sunday.But after a record abstention rate in last week’s first round of French regional and local départmentales elections – where over 66% of voters failed to turn out across the country – traditional rightwing candidates were expected to hold on to the majority of regions. Continue reading...
Frank Gehry’s Luma Arles tower to open in south of France
Building is architect’s tribute to Arles’ most famous residents: the Romans and Vincent Van GoghRising from the skyline of Arles, the tower appears like a futuristic structure from a Marvel movie with nearly 11,000 stainless steel panels gleaming in the Provençal sun.Here, at what was once the centre of the Roman empire in France, this twisting structure is the 92-year-old architect Frank Gehry’s tribute to Arles’ most famous residents: the Romans and the artist Vincent Van Gogh. Continue reading...
Sasha Johnson shooting: four accused expected to plead not guilty
Court to press for earliest possible trial date for four men accused over shooting of BLM activistFour men charged over the shooting of the Black Lives Matter activist Sasha Johnson at a birthday party in south London have indicated not guilty pleas.Johnson was left in a critical condition in hospital after being shot in the head during a silent disco in the garden of a house on Consort Road in Peckham just before 3am on Sunday 23 May. Continue reading...
Underground tunnels of Rome’s Colosseum fully opened to public
Hypogeum of 2,000-year-old monument – its ‘backstage’ – restored with walkways for visitorsFor the first time, visitors to the Colosseum in Rome can fully explore the underground tunnels and chambers where gladiators and wild animals once prepared for battle.Spread across 15,000 square metres, the hypogeum of the 2,000-year-old monument is open to the public following the completion of a restoration project funded by the Italian fashion house Tod’s. Continue reading...
Love Island earns ITV £12m before new series as advertisers jostle to take part
The most commercialised show on British television has signed up nine official partnersLove Island has netted ITV more than £12m in revenues even before the first episode of the new series of the hit reality show airs on Monday, as sponsors and advertisers rush to attach themselves to the most commercialised show on British television.With uncertainty over Covid restrictions scuppering holidays abroad for a second successive year, the arrival of the feelgood summer juggernaut could not be more perfectly timed to tap into a viewer and advertising boom. Continue reading...
Calls for inquiry into asylum seekers deaths in Glasgow
Grassroot groups set to mark first anniversary of attack at Park Inn HotelCalls for an inquiry into a series of asylum seeker deaths are intensifying as Glaswegians prepare to mark the first anniversary of the tragic events at the Park Inn Hotel, where a Sudanese man stabbed six people before being shot dead by police.Pinar Aksu from Refugees for Justice, a grassroots group which formed in response to the events of last June, is helping to organise an act of remembrance at Glasgow’s George Square on Saturday, encouraging locals to bring flowers and candles. Continue reading...
Football thriving in Wales as Bale and co raise Euro 2020 hopes
More children playing football than rugby, and streets will be empty as national team take on DenmarkOne lad was wearing an FC Barcelona shirt and another a Swansea City top. But the vast majority of the young footballers training on the pristine 3G pitch as a salty breeze whipped in from Carmarthen Bay were in the vivid red of their local semi-pro club, Llanelli Town AFC, or that of the Welsh national shirt.Eight-year-old Noah paused for a chat and named his favourite players as the Welsh team’s poster boys, Gareth Bale and Aaron Ramsey. “They’re both brilliant,” he said. “It’s great to watch them in the Euros.” Continue reading...
Digested week: I’ll miss face masks. They give me freedom to mouth obscenities | Lucy Mangan
I’m as wearied by the pandemic as the next person, but anti-maskers don’t know what they’re missingNow that he has left the tender embrace of the select committee, Dominic Cummings has taken to – is the word explaining? – himself to paying subscribers via Substack. In the unlikely event that you are not prepared to part with cash to hear what the hobgoblin of chaos is currently divulging, here is the gist: Continue reading...
NSW toughens Covid rules for airport transport workers as police seek advice on Sydney limo driver
NSW police commissioner Mick Fuller says he’s received ‘mixed messages’ about whether Bondi limousine driver broke rules
Driving licence deal offers relief for Britons living in France
Agreement reached over recognition of UK licences issued before 2021 and ‘certificate of exchange’ systemFrench and UK authorities have reached agreement on the recognition of British driving licences in France, removing a major source of post-Brexit concern for thousands of UK nationals who feared being left without a valid licence.Paris announced late last year that although short-term visitors could continue to use British licences after the Brexit transition period, residents would need to apply to exchange theirs for a French one before 31 December 2021, or take a French test. Continue reading...
Covid Australia live update: Sydney hotspot declaration extended to trigger support payments
Everyone living or working in Woollahra, Waverley, Randwick and the City of Sydney must stay home as outbreak widens. Follow latest updates
Thomas Vinterberg: ‘There is a great need for the uncontrollable – but little room for it today’
The Danish director’s new Oscar-winning film Another Round is about a group of teachers who dedicate themselves to getting drunk. He talks about losing control, patching up his friendship with Lars von Trier and the death of his daughterThomas Vinterberg looks back on the past six months with disbelief. “I made a film about four white, middle-aged, semi-fat men teaching their students to drink. I didn’t think it would survive.” Instead, Another Round swept the award ceremonies (best foreign language film at the Oscars and Baftas; best film at the European film awards and London film festival), and proved a spectacular box office success in his native Denmark when it opened between Covid restrictions. Vinterberg is a boyish 52-year-old, with an open smile and chestnut hair that has a touch of gel. A priest’s cassock hangs from the bookcase behind his chair. It is easy to overlook the cassock but, like Chekhov’s gun, it fires in the final act.Vinterberg admits his film evolved in the making. “The initial idea was to be provocative. We wanted to celebrate alcohol and drinking. But that idea hit reality. It is a film about the generation divide. I hope it is a film about how we care for one another.” Another Round opens with a title card quoting the Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard: “What is youth? A dream. What is love? The dream’s content.” This thought comes alive as golden youths are seen racing around a lake on an idyllic summer’s day, carrying crates of beer that they must finish as a team. It is a summer bacchanal, drawn from real life. “Both of my oldest daughters took part in the Lake Run,” Vinterberg says. “When I described it to American friends, they were shocked. They listened to the rules: the winners are the first to finish the crate. They wanted to know, was I OK with this? How could I tell them, actually, I was kind of proud?” Continue reading...
Brazil’s inquiry into Covid disaster suggests Bolsonaro committed ‘crimes against life’
Televised congressional investigation looks at political decisions that lead to crisis that has killed half a millionA congressional inquiry into Brazil’s disastrous response to the coronavirus pandemic has found mounting evidence that Jair Bolsonaro’s administration committed “crimes against life”, according to the senior politician leading the investigation.Launched in April to scrutinize the government’s handling of a crisis that has killed half a million citizens, the nationally televised investigation is digging into the political decisions that led up to one of the cruelest moments in the country’s history. Continue reading...
‘Living hell’: deaths reported as Czech Republic tornado devastates villages
South Moravia governor voices shock at level of destruction as footage shows houses destroyedA tornado and hailstones the size of tennis balls has hit the Czech Republic’s south-east, rescuers said, razing houses and causing an as yet unknown number of fatalities.Video footage from the region on social networks showed destroyed buildings and cars, shorn tree stumps and several fires with thick black smoke. Continue reading...
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