UK law to send asylum seekers to Rwanda passed after months of wrangling
The controversial law is expected to come into force within days with the first deportation flights in weeks.
Australia news live: Arj Barker defends show ejection over ‘audio issue’; Beau Lamarre case to reconvene in June
Lamarre, 28, is being held in custody and is alleged to have murdered Jesse Baird, 26, and Luke Davies, 29, in February. Follow the day’s news live
Anglicare says government spending eight times more on private investors than building housing itself
The Anglicare Australia executive director, Kasy Chambers, says the government must step up and intervene, instead of leaving housing to the private sector:
We found that the government spends eight times as much propping up private investors as it does on building housing itself. This approach is wrong, and it’s supercharging rents and house prices.
Housing cannot be left to hobby landlords and private developers. Only our government can ensure that rentals are affordable by building homes itself, and by fixing Australia’s unfair tax system.
289 rentals (0.6%) were affordable for a person earning a full-time minimum wage.
89 rentals (0.2%) were affordable for a person on the age pension.
31 rentals (0.1%) were affordable for a person on the disability support pension.
3 rentals (0%) were affordable for a person on jobseeker.
0 rentals (0%) were affordable for a person on youth allowance.
This is not hyperbole. It is Australia’s new normal.
Continue reading...Sudan’s forgotten war – podcast
While conflicts in Gaza and Ukraine have captured global attention, the civil war in Sudan has been largely ignored. That can’t be allowed to continue, says the Guardian’s Nesrine Malik
With so much of the world’s attention on the wars in Gaza and Ukraine, one of the worst humanitarian crises of recent times is playing out almost unnoticed. Sudan’s civil war erupted in April 2023 and has led to tens of thousands of civilian deaths and a mass displacement of up to half of the country’s population.
As Nesrine Malik tells Helen Pidd, the battle between the Sudanese Army and rebel militia the Rapid Support Forces is finely balanced, with the effect that neither side has enough strength to win the conflict decisively and so no end is in sight.
Continue reading...‘Arrogant billionaire’: Australia, Musk in war of words over censorship
Elon Musk and Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese clash over order to remove X posts on church stabbing.
Bruce Lehrmann should pay Ten’s entire legal bill after ‘deliberately wicked’ decision to sue, network says
In court submissions, Ten’s lawyers argue Lehrmann should indemnify the network for its legal costs, estimated at $8m
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Bruce Lehrmann should pay all Network Ten’s legal costs because suing The Project for defamation was “deliberately wicked and calculated” and an abuse of process, Ten has told the federal court.
The former Liberal staffer lost the defamation case he brought against Ten and Lisa Wilkinson, with Justice Michael Lee finding that on the balance of probabilities Lehrmann raped Brittany Higgins on a minister’s couch in Parliament House in 2019.
Continue reading...Russia-Ukraine war: List of key events, day 789
As the war enters its 789th day, these are the main developments.
Antony Blinken rejects suggestion of ‘double standard’ on Israel
Comments come as US state department report finds that Gaza war has had negative impact on human rights in Israel
The US secretary of state has rejected the idea that Washington might have a “double standard” when applying US law to allegations of abuses by the Israeli military in Gaza, while suggesting that examinations of such charges are ongoing.
“In general, as we’re looking at human rights and the condition of human rights around the world, we apply the same standard to everyone. That doesn’t change whether the country is an adversary, a competitor, a friend or an ally,” Antony Blinken told a news conference as he announced the department’s annual human rights country reports.
Continue reading...Columbia faculty members walk out after pro-Palestinian protesters arrested
Hundreds of members of teaching staff demonstrate in solidarity with arrested students as protest tents put back up on campus
Hundreds of faculty members at Columbia University in New York held a mass walkout on Monday to protest against the president’s decision to have police arrest students at a pro-Palestinian encampment protest last week.
The solidarity protest came as students put protest tents back up on campus. They had been torn down last week when the New York police department arrested more than 100 students, who were also suspended by the university.
Continue reading...Australian taxpayers paid $466,000 for training of nation’s first female astronaut Katherine Bennell-Pegg
With Bennell-Pegg unlikely to go to space anytime soon, there are questions about the value of the spending by the cash-strapped Australian space program
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Australia’s first female astronaut, Katherine Bennell-Pegg, graduated from the European Space Agency’s (ESA) training program on Monday night.
She may be unlikely to take a giant leap into space anytime soon, but is on a mission to bolster the space industry and inspire women and girls.
Continue reading...Residents challenge plans to demolish Melbourne public housing towers
Knocking down all 44 public housing towers in Australia's biggest city could tear communities apart, residents say.
Safe injecting room in Melbourne’s CBD rejected by Victorian government
Government claims no appropriate location could be found for long-mooted second facility
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A proposed safe injecting room to be based in Melbourne’s CBD has been rejected by the Victorian government, which claimed it could not find an appropriate location for it.
The government on Tuesday announced that a new trial facility – which would complement the existing safe injecting room in nearby North Richmond – will not proceed after concluding there was no site that could balance the needs of drug users with the broader community.
Continue reading...Australian prime minister labels Elon Musk ‘an arrogant billionaire who thinks he is above the law’
Anthony Albanese responds to X owner who criticised Australian authorities demanding videos of a Sydney church stabbing be removed
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Australia’s prime minister has labelled the X owner, Elon Musk, an “arrogant billionaire who thinks he is above the law” as the rift deepens between Australia and the tech platform over the removal of videos of a violent stabbing in a Sydney church.
On Monday evening in an urgent last-minute federal court hearing, the court ordered a two-day injunction against X to hide posts globally containing the footage of the alleged stabbing of Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel last Monday evening that the eSafety commissioner had directed X to remove, but X had only blocked from access in Australia pending a legal challenge.
Continue reading...Maps: Earthquakes Shake Eastern Taiwan – The New York Times
- Maps: Earthquakes Shake Eastern Taiwan The New York Times
- Taiwan rattled by pair of strong earthquakes just weeks after deadly one Fox Weather
- 6.3 Magnitude Earthquake Hits Taiwan NDTV
- Earthquake today: Taiwan's Hualien hit by five quakes in nine minutes Mint
- Hualien earthquakes leave 2 buildings partially collapsed, no injuries Focus Taiwan
Designer Nancy Gonzalez sentenced to prison for smuggling crocodile and python handbags
Celebrity fashion designer, who recruited couriers to transport bags from her native Colombia to US on commercial flights, receives 18-month sentence
A leading fashion designer whose accessories were used by celebrities from Britney Spears to the cast of the Sex and the City TV series has been sentenced to 18 months in prison after pleading guilty in Miami federal court on charges of smuggling crocodile handbags from her native Colombia.
Nancy Gonzalez was arrested in 2022 in Cali, Colombia, and later extradited to the US for running a sprawling multiyear conspiracy that involved recruiting couriers to transport her handbags on commercial flights to high-end showrooms and New York fashion events – all in violation of US wildlife laws.
Continue reading...Mistrial in case of Arizona rancher accused of shooting migrant dead
George Kelly, 75, charged with second-degree murder over death of Mexican Gabriel Cuen-Buitimea, 48, on his property last year
An Arizona judge declared a mistrial on Monday in the case of a rancher accused of fatally shooting a Mexican man on his property near the US-Mexico border.
George Kelly, 75, was charged with second-degree murder in the 30 January 2023 shooting of Gabriel Cuen-Buitimea, 48, who lived just south of the border in Nogales.
Continue reading...IDF intelligence chief resigns; independent report on UNRWA released – The Washington Post
Tiny freshwater Snowy Mountains fish faces extinction, environmentalists say
The Yalmy galaxias is ‘on the verge of disappearing for ever’ and Labor on the brink of failing to meet its zero extinctions target
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Even on its best days, the Yalmy galaxias is hard to find. The small, native freshwater fish is only known to live in a couple of tributaries of the Snowy River in remote and mountainous East Gippsland.
It was last seen in March 2023, when a government survey found 20 survivors. Since then? Nobody knows.
Continue reading...UK passes bill to send asylum seekers to Rwanda
Lawyers prepare for legal battles on behalf of individual asylum seekers challenging removal to east Africa
Rishi Sunak’s Rwanda deportation bill will become law after peers eventually backed down on amending it, opening the way for legal battles over the potential removal of dozens of people seeking asylum.
After a marathon battle of “ping pong” over the key legislation between the Commons and the Lords, the bill finally passed when opposition and crossbench peers gave way on Monday night.
Continue reading...Psychologist becomes first person in Peru to die by euthanasia after fighting in court for years – Yahoo! Voices
Can AI image generators be policed to prevent explicit deepfakes of children?
As one of the largest ‘training’ datasets has been found to contain child sexual abuse material, can bans on creating such imagery be feasible?
Child abusers are creating AI-generated “deepfakes” of their targets in order to blackmail them into filming their own abuse, beginning a cycle of sextortion that can last for years.
Creating simulated child abuse imagery is illegal in the UK, and Labour and the Conservatives have aligned on the desire to ban all explicit AI-generated images of real people.
Continue reading...