Australia paid companies linked to suspected drug and weapons smuggling to run offshore detention, review finds

Home affairs minister Clare O’Neil says scathing report shows offshore processing ‘used as a slush fund by suspected criminals’

Contractors suspected of drug smuggling and weapons trafficking were handed multimillion dollar contracts due to a lack of due diligence in the administration of Australia’s offshore detention regime, a scathing report has found.

The home affairs minister, Clare O’Neil, has seized on the findings of the inquiry to claim that the now opposition leader, Peter Dutton, oversaw “an offshore processing regime being used as a slush fund by suspected criminals” when he was the responsible minister.

A company whose owners were suspected, through the ownership of another company, of seeking to circumvent US sanctions against Iran, and with extensive suspicious money movements suggesting money laundering, bribery and other criminal activity;

Companies under investigation by the Australian federal police (AFP)

A company whose chief executive was being investigated for possible drugs and arms smuggling into Australia, “although, at the time it would have been unrealistic to have expected those responsible for contract and procurement to be aware of this”; and

An enterprise suspected of corruption.

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Fujitsu won £1.4bn in new government contracts after court ruling on Post Office software bugs

MPs find Treasury-affiliated bodies have engaged Horizon firm since damning 2019 high court judgment

The Japanese technology company Fujitsu, whose flawed technology for the Post Office led to the wrongful prosecution of hundreds of subpostmasters, is confirmed to have held contracts worth more than £3.4bn linked to the Treasury since 2019.

Figures published by the Commons’ treasury committee show £1.4bn of contracts were awarded to Treasury-affiliated organisations after a high court ruling in December 2019 over the company’s software. The judgment found that “bugs, errors and defects” in Fujitsu’s Horizon system could cause shortfalls in Post Office branch accounts.

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Philippines rescuers find girl alive 60 hours after landslide

Three-year-old has given fresh hope of finding more survivors in a gold-mining village where death toll has climbed to 27

The rescue of a child nearly 60 hours after a landslide hit a gold-mining village in the southern Philippines has been hailed as a “miracle” after searchers had given up hope of finding more survivors.

The girl, who the Philippine Red Cross said was three years old, had been among scores of people missing after the rain-induced landslide hit the village.

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Beijing accused of using spying, threats and blackmail against Tibetan exiles

China ‘threatens relatives in Tibet’ to exert control over activists in exile, with greater transnational repression at Tibetan new year

Thousands of Tibetans around the world have been subjected to spying, blackmail and threats against family members still living in Tibet, according to a new report.

The Chinese government’s repressive policies in Tibet continue to be documented, but the new report by the Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy (TCHRD) is the first to investigate the widespread targeting of exiles in countries including the US, India, France, Australia and Canada, researchers say.

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German firm BASF to pull out of Xinjiang after Uyghur abuse claims

Chemicals producer says audits revealed no wrongdoing but recent media reports crossed red line

The German chemicals producer BASF has said it will withdraw from its two joint ventures in Xinjiang, after media reports about alleged human rights abuses relating to its partner company, which BASF’s CEO said crossed a red line.

In a statement on Friday, BASF said that while “regular due diligence measures including internal and external audits have not found any evidence of human rights violations in the two joint ventures”, the recent reports “indicate activities inconsistent with BASF’s values”.

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China has seen a fourth month of falling prices, but will it act to curb deflation?

Plunge in consumer prices has fuelled calls for a stimulus package – yet Beijing may stick to the new normal of lower growth

• China consumer prices plunge at fastest rate for 15 years

China’s economy has gone from bad to worse – and it is only February.

Figures released on Thursday showed consumer prices fell by 0.8% in January compared with a year earlier, outstripping economists’ expectations and marking the biggest contraction in 15 years.

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China consumer prices plunge at fastest rate for 15 years as deflation fears deepen

Plummeting food prices feed steep annual drop amid renewed calls to stimulate economy and offset weakening demand

China’s consumer prices fell at their fastest pace in 15 years in January, as the world’s second-largest economy sank deeper into deflation amid weakening demand.

Data released on Thursday showed that China’s consumer price index tumbled last month, falling by 0.8% compared with a year earlier. It marks the fourth consecutive month of declines, as well as the sharpest drop since September 2009, when the global economy was still grappling with aftershocks from the 2008 banking crisis.

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Lionel Messi: outcry in China and Hong Kong after star returns from injury in time for Japan match

Hong Kong fans need answers over missed fixture, government says, amid online furore over Inter Miami tour

Chinese state media, Hong Kong politicians and fans have cried foul after Lionel Messi played in a match in Japan, just days after he stayed on the bench for a highly-anticipated match in Hong Kong.

Many in Hong Kong were dismayed on Sunday when the 36-year-old Argentinian player did not come on to the field during a much-hyped Inter Miami fixture to a sell-out crowd with fans demanding answers and a refund. Miami’s head coach Gerardo “Tata” Martino said Messi was deemed unfit to play in Sunday’s match in the Hong Kong friendly.

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Japan court lets transgender man change official status without sterilisation in legal first

Ruling comes months after supreme court ruled that requiring sterilisation before a change of gender in official records was unconstitutional

A court in western Japan has approved a transgender man’s request to have his gender changed in official records without undergoing sterilisation surgery, the first known ruling of its kind since the country’s top court struck down a surgery requirement for such record changes.

Tacaquito Usui, 50, could get the gender listed for him in his family registry updated to male, the Okayama family court’s Tsuyama branch ruled on Wednesday. Usui’s original application for the revision was rejected five years ago.

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Killer whales trapped in drift ice off Japan’s Hokkaido coast escape

Pod of orcas in north Japan freed themselves as gaps between the ice grew, officials say

A pod of killer whales trapped by drift ice off the coast of Hokkaido, Japan’s northernmost main island, have apparently safely escaped, officials have said.

The orcas were initially spotted by a fisher who reported them to officials in the town of Rausu, on the north-east coast of Hokkaido, on Tuesday morning.

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New Zealand pilot kidnapped a year ago in West Papua will be freed, rebel group says

Separatist fighters who seized Phillip Mehrtens say he will be released to protect humanity and safeguard human rights, but did not say when

Rebels in Indonesia’s West Papua region have said they will release a New Zealand pilot who was taken hostage a year ago as a bargaining chip for their independence movement.

The chief of general staff of the West Papua National Liberation Army (TPN-PB), Terianus Satto, said in a statement the pilot would be released in order to protect humanity and safeguard human rights.

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Blizzards disrupt lunar new year travel for millions in China

Flights and trains cancelled as heavy snow and freezing rain leave many stranded during busiest travel period

Millions of people in China have had their annual visit home for lunar new year disrupted by blizzards and freezing rain, with delayed or cancelled transport leaving travellers stranded.

Videos on social media showed people hacking away at thick layers of ice that have brought roads to a standstill as millions of people try to get home before spring festival, which starts on 10 February.

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German firm BASF urged to quit Xinjiang over ‘gross abuses’ of Uyghurs

Exclusive: Politicians say chemicals producer ‘appears to be implicated’ in abuses of minorities in Chinese province

The German chemicals producer BASF “appears to be implicated in gross abuses” of Uyghurs in Xinjiang and should withdraw from the Chinese province, a group of politicians from around the world have said.

The group made the allegation in a letter to BASF’s chair, Martin Brudermüller, on Monday, after the German media outlets Der Spiegel and ZDF published a joint investigation on Friday.

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Papua New Guinea’s PM to address Australian parliament as Pacific security race with China builds

Anthony Albanese and James Marape to meet on Thursday amid rising domestic pressures on the PNG leader

Australia will roll out the red carpet to the visiting Papua New Guinea prime minister, James Marape, amid efforts to stall China’s security talks with the Pacific country.

Marape is due to arrive in Canberra on Wednesday before he addresses a joint sitting of the Australian parliament on Thursday – the first Pacific leader to be afforded this honour.

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Ukraine-born Miss Japan returns title after revelations about affair

Karolina Shiino had already caused controversy when she became first European-born woman to win title

A Ukraine-born woman who was criticised for not being “Japanese enough” after winning the Miss Japan contest last month has relinquished the title after a weekly magazine revealed she had been having an affair with a married man.

Karolina Shiino drew praise and criticism after she won the Miss Japan title last month, becoming the first woman of European descent to receive the accolade. The 26-year-old was born in Ukraine to Ukrainian parents, who moved to Japan when she was five.

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Concern for killer whales trapped in drift ice off the coast of Hokkaido in Japan

Japanese media report that pod of orcas became trapped in ice close to Rausu on Shiretoko peninsula

Concern is growing for the welfare of a pod of killer whales that appear to have become trapped in drift ice off the coast of Hokkaido in northern Japan.

Footage aired by the public broadcaster NHK on Tuesday showed at least 10 orcas poking out of a small gap in the surface of the water about 1 km off the coast of Rausu on the Shiretoko peninsula – a Unesco world heritage site famed for its abundant wildlife.

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Company worker in Hong Kong pays out £20m in deepfake video call scam

Police investigate after employee says she was tricked into sending money to fraudsters posing as senior officers at her firm

Hong Kong police have launched an investigation after an employee at an unnamed company claimed she was duped into paying HK$200m (£20m) of her firm’s money to fraudsters in a deepfake video conference call.

The Hong Kong police force said it had received a report from a worker that she had been tricked into transferring the money by someone “posing as senior officers of the company”.

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Comments on Weibo giraffe post bemoan state of Chinese economy

Social media users get around government crackdown on negativity via US embassy conservation update

A social media post about giraffe conservation has become the latest place for people in China who are unhappy about the economy to vent their frustration, as the Chinese government increasingly cracks down on negative commentary.

On 2 February, the US embassy in China posted an update on its Weibo account about tracking giraffes in Namibia using GPS technology. As of Monday afternoon local time, the post had received approximately 166,000 comments, many of them about China’s economic pains.

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Australian academic Yang Hengjun given suspended death sentence by Chinese court

Australia’s foreign minister says government is ‘appalled’ by sentence, which could mean life in prison

The Australian academic Yang Hengjun has been given a suspended death sentence by a Chinese court, after five years in detention on espionage charges. His sentence came on the same day that the women’s rights activist Li Qiaochu was sentenced to three years and eight months by a court in Shandong for “inciting subversion of state power”.

Yang was arrested in 2019 at Guangzhou airport, accused of spying for an undisclosed foreign country. The 57-year-old pro-democracy blogger is an Australian citizen who was born in China. He was tried in a one-day, closed-door hearing in Beijing in May 2021, with a verdict not publicly disclosed.

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Philippines says it is ready to use force to quell secession attempts as Duterte row deepens

Former president has called for his home town, Mindanao, to split from the Philippines as his alliance with President Ferdinand Marcos Jr crumbles

The Philippine government is ready to use “authority and forces” against attempts to divide the nation, a security official has said, after former president Rodrigo Duterte threatened to separate some southern islands from the rest of the archipelago.

Duterte has called for the independence of his home town, Mindanao, from the Philippines as his alliance with President Ferdinand Marcos Jr disintegrated this week over disagreements around efforts to amend the constitution.

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