Australia news live: Sydney drenched by month of rain in day; man arrested after woman found dead in Darwin

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The Coalition has questioned why the government is using drones to monitor people released from immigration detention.

Cabinet minister Murray Watt confirmed on Insiders earlier that “drones are being used as part of this operation, but more in the sense of monitoring the accommodation that people are living in, in for example ensuring that it’s not too close to schools or other areas that they’re not supposed to be living close to.”

There’s a couple of issues here. One, either Andrew Giles accidentally and casually disclosed a previously secret drone surveillance program operating domestically in Australia in a Sky News interview with your colleague Kieran Gilbert. Or he made it up and it’s not actually happening at all.

And in a fresh statement provided by the Department of Home Affairs to SBS, I understand yesterday afternoon, they refer to using aerial surveillance to look at people’s locations and other buildings in the area.

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Giorgia Meloni has emerged as a kingmaker for the EU – but will she turn to centre right or far right? | Jon Henley

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Even her toughest opponents admit she’s played it cleverly. Yet the long-term aims of Italy’s prime minister remain unclear

When she became Italy’s prime minister in October 2022, Giorgia Meloni looked like Brussels’ worst nightmare. Until then, the fiery leader of the Brothers of Italy – a party with neofascist roots – had seemed anything but EU-friendly.

For years, railing against the bloc had been Meloni’s stock in trade: the euro amounted to enslavement, the European Commission was effectively a loan shark. “Bring down this EU!” she urged the 2019 conservative CPAC conference in the US.

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China’s defence chief repeats threat of force against Taiwanese independence

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Dong Jun rails at length about democratic island’s ‘separatists’ during Shangri-la Dialogue defence conference in Singapore

Peaceful “reunification” with Taiwan remains China’s goal but the prospect is being eroded by Taiwanese “separatists” and external forces, the Chinese defence minister, Dong Jun, has said.

Taiwan – which is democratically governed, and has never been ruled from the Communist-run People’s Republic of China – on 20 May inaugurated its newly elected president, Lai Ching-te. The routine democratic transition was greeted with fury by the Chinese Communist party, which staged war games around the island as a “punishment”.

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Minnesota representative Dean Phillips calls on New York governor to pardon Trump

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Failed contender for the Democratic presidential nomination says Kathy Hochul should grant pardon ‘for the good of the country’

The outgoing Democratic US congressman who failed in his presidential primary challenge against Joe Biden called on the New York governor, Kathy Hochul, to pardon Donald Trump over his criminal conviction for hush-money payments to influence the 2016 election “for the good of the country”.

Minnesota representative Dean Phillips, who was the first Democrat to call on fellow party member Henry Cuellar to resign following bribery charges against the Texas congressman, urged for the pardon on Friday in a post on X.

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Labour is already dominating the online general election campaign | Matthew McGregor

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Starmer’s party was quicker out of the digital gate, with slicker, more engaging content than the Tory offering

The video opens with an old clip of Cilla Black singing her classic ‘Surprise, Surprise!’. The caption reads “POV: Rishi Sunak turns up at your 18th birthday to send you to war.”

This appeared on Labour’s TikTok account the day after the Conservatives launched their national service policy. It fitted perfectly with TikTok’s meme-heavy, wry and sarcastic culture and has been watched 4.5 million times. The video racked up almost 700,000 likes, more than double the likes on all the Tories’ TikToks put together.

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Being a politician was ‘very yucky’, ex-MP Rory Stewart tells Hay audience

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Former Tory minister admits at festival that he felt a fraud due to need to give the impression he was in three places at once

Former Conservative MP Rory Stewart found being a politician “very yucky” and felt like a fraud, he told an audience at Hay festival on Saturday.

Asked whether he would consider going back into politics, he said that he found being a politician “personally very, very unpleasant” and “didn’t like it”, adding: “I feel like a fraud all the time, in a whole series of ways.”

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Record number of NHS mental health patients kept in hospitals longer than necessary

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Lack of care and support leaves patients stranded on units when they are clinically ready to be discharged

The number of patients stuck in NHS mental health units in England despite being clinically ready to leave has reached its highest level in at least eight years.

“Delayed discharges” of patients from hospitals in NHS mental health trusts reached 49,677 days in March, according to an analysis – a higher figure than in any month since at least January 2016, when NHS Digital started publishing the data.

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Israel’s opposition leader urges Netanyahu to accept ceasefire proposal

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Israeli PM says his country’s conditions for ending conflict have not changed after US president presented ceasefire plan

Benjamin Netanyahu has reiterated that Hamas must be completely destroyed before Israel will agree to end its war in Gaza, casting doubt on Joe Biden’s announcement of a new Israeli-led ceasefire proposal.

The Israeli prime minister made a rare statement on Saturday, during the Jewish Shabbat, in which he said: “Israel’s conditions for ending the war have not changed: the destruction of Hamas’s military and governing capabilities, the freeing of all hostages and ensuring that Gaza no longer poses a threat to Israel.

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More than 2,000 officers police protests and Champions League final in London

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Forces outside the capital drawn on for Borussia Dortmund v Real Madrid match and a Tommy Robinson march and counter-protest

More than 2,000 officers have been deployed across London, including more than 400 from outside the capital, to police the Champions League final, a protest by the far-right activist Tommy Robinson and a counter-demonstration.

The final between Borussia Dortmund and Real Madrid takes place at Wembley on Saturday evening. And, earlier, a protest organised by Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, more commonly known as Tommy Robinson, set off from the Victoria area on Saturday, ending in Parliament Square where speeches took place.

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British kayaker who went missing found dead in Swiss lake

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Family and friends pay tribute to British record-holder Bren Orton, 29, who disappeared in the Melezza River

A British man who went missing while kayaking in Switzerland has been found dead, Swiss police have confirmed.

Bren Orton, 29, went missing on 16 May. Authorities searched for the professional kayaker for two weeks before a body was discovered in Lake Maggiore, which straddles Switzerland and Italy. His body was discovered by a sailor who contacted emergency services.

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Extend success of UK sugar tax to cakes, biscuits and chocolate, experts urge

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Exclusive: Co-author of analysis for WHO calls on government to control the food industry rather than being subservient to it

The sugar tax has been so successful in improving people’s diets that it should be extended to cakes, biscuits and chocolate, health experts say.

The World Health Organization wants the next UK government to expand coverage of the levy to help tackle tooth decay, obesity, diabetes and other illnesses.

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Seoul warns public of more balloons being sent from North Korea

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A city-wide message asks people not to touch the balloons and leave them for military to handle

Seoul warned the public on Saturday to avoid more balloons sent from North Korea and to report them to the military or police.

South Korea’s military said North Korea was sending more balloons carrying “filth” across the heavily fortified border.

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South Africa to embark on new political path after ANC loses majority

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After 30 years in power, the African National Congress, which took 40.2% of the vote, must engage in tricky coalition talks with rivals

The African National Congress’s (ANC) three decades of political dominance in South Africa has come to an end after it was announced that it had won just 40.2% of the vote in last week’s general election.

The ANC’s dramatic decline – the first time it has failed to win a majority of the votes since Nelson Mandela led it to victory in the first democratic election in 1994 – will lead to a chaotic round of coalition negotiations, with all of its potential partners posing difficulties.

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‘I miss my solitude’: Booker winner Paul Lynch says he is a ‘social introvert’

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Author of novel Prophet Song about an imagined fascist Ireland tells Hay audience he is not a political writer

“I miss my solitude,” last year’s Booker prize winner Paul Lynch told an audience at Hay festival on Saturday.

“In many ways I didn’t sign up for this. I’m an introvert who’s learned how to be social, a social introvert,” he said. “I signed up to sit in a room on my own for three or four years and write a book,” he said.

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Starmer has given in to the Labour left over Diane Abbott, says Sunak – as it happened

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SNP leader John Swinney has urged people to take part in a “Scottish national service” by using the general election to vote Tory MPs out of office, PA Media reports.

Scotland’s first minister said his party could “remove the remaining rump of Tory MPs”.

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Israel’s opposition leader urges Netanyahu to accept ceasefire proposal – as it happened

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At least 36,379 Palestinian people have been killed and 82,407 injured in Israeli strikes on Gaza since 7 October, the Gaza health ministry said in a statement on Saturday.

An estimated 95 Palestinians were killed and 350 injured in the past 24 hours alone, the ministry said.

Israel’s conditions for ending the war have not changed: the destruction of Hamas’s military and governing capabilities, the freeing of all hostages and ensuring that Gaza no longer poses a threat to Israel.

Under the proposal, Israel will continue to insist these conditions are met before a permanent ceasefire is put in place. The notion that Israel will agree to a permanent ceasefire before these conditions are fulfilled is a non-starter.

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Florida deputy who killed Black air force member in his own home fired

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Eddie Duran shot Roger Fortson within two seconds after the airman opened his door with his legally owned gun pointed down

A Florida sheriff’s deputy who fatally shot a Black US air force airman in the military member’s own home has been fired from his job, officials said on Friday.

The Okaloosa county sheriff’s office said it dismissed the deputy, Eddie Duran, after investigators found that his “use of deadly force was not objectively reasonable and therefore violated agency policy” in the killing of senior airman Roger Fortson on 3 May 2024.

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