A round-up of the coverage on struggles for human rights and freedoms, from Mexico to China
Continue reading...Category Archives: UK news
Murder of Kremlin critic in London ‘was made to look like suicide’
Nikolai Glushkov was strangled by assailant who then wrapped dog lead around his neck, inquest told
The prominent Kremlin critic Nikolai Glushkov was strangled at his home in south-west London by an unknown assailant who wrapped a dog lead around his neck in a crude attempt to “simulate” the appearance of suicide, an inquest heard.
Glushkov’s body was discovered on 12 March 2018 at his suburban home in New Malden. His daughter Natalia Glushkova told the hearing that she and Glushkov’s partner, Denis Trushin, had called round that evening after growing concerned.
Continue reading...Belfast police use water cannon on Northern Ireland rioters – video
Rioters have been blasted with water cannon by police on the streets of Belfast, Northern Ireland, as unrest continued into a seventh day.
Stones and fireworks were thrown at police by gangs of youths gathered on the nationalist Springfield Road, close to where riots took place on Wednesday night
After calls for calm this week, there was a heavy security presence, with water cannon and riot officers at the scene as police charged the youths with dogs
Continue reading...Publish figures on long Covid to show ‘untold suffering’, MPs urge
Cross-party group urge PM to give greater priority to potential harm posed by post-viral condition
The number of people suffering with long Covid should be published routinely, as happens with those infected with or hospitalised with coronavirus, MPs and peers are urging Boris Johnson.
The cross-party group of parliamentarians want the prime minister to ensure that the “untold human suffering” that the condition involves helps shape future government policy towards the pandemic.
Continue reading...UK recognition of EU’s vaccine effort would not go amiss, says Brussels
Europe could have fully vaccinated 70% of adults before UK reaches its target, says head of EU taskforce
The UK will be reliant on the EU to complete its vaccine rollout and a little recognition of that would not go amiss, the European commissioner leading Brussels’ vaccine taskforce has said – adding that Europe could have fully vaccinated 70% of adults before the UK reaches its own target of one dose for all over-18s by the end of July.
Thierry Breton also said AstraZeneca had agreed that almost all the Covid vaccine doses made in the Netherlands over which the UK has made a claim will stay in the EU.
Continue reading...Belfast: police use water cannon on rioters in seventh night of unrest
Gangs of youths gathered near the scene of Wednesday night’s violence and hurled stones and fireworks at police
Rioters have been blasted with a water cannon by police as unrest stirred on the streets of Northern Ireland once again.
After calls for calm this week, violence again flared up on the streets of west Belfast on Thursday. Stones and fireworks were thrown at police by gangs of youths gathered on the nationalist Springfield Road, close to where riots took place on Wednesday night.
Continue reading...Ex-police reveal bribes and threats used to cover up corruption in 70s London
BBC documentary to examine incidents that led to setting up of unit on which Line of Duty’s AC-12 is based
One of London’s most senior police officers, described by a colleague as “the greatest villain unhung”, was believed to be involved in major corruption in the 1970s but never prosecuted, according to a new documentary on police malpractice.
Former officers who exposed corruption at the time describe how they were threatened that they would end up in a “cement raincoat” if they informed on fellow officers and were shunned by colleagues when they did.
Continue reading...UK ministers silent on AstraZeneca vaccine shipment to Australia
Downing Street will not confirm or deny report that more than 700,000 Covid jabs were sent after EU blocked export
British ministers and officials did not deny that more than 700,000 shots of the AstraZeneca vaccine were secretly dispatched from the UK to Australia a few weeks ago as the EU blocked the drug’s export.
The Sydney Morning Herald reported that 717,000 AstraZeneca doses were dispatched in late February and March from the company’s British operations – also during a period when the EU was demanding the vaccine from the UK.
Continue reading...Brazilian Covid variant: what do we know about P1?
What threat does variant that is causing devastation in Brazil pose, and how is it different?
The P1 variant is causing devastation in Brazil, where an uncontrolled Covid pandemic is raging. P1, behind the terrible scenes of hospital overload in Manaus with patients’ relatives pleading for oxygen cylinders, is now the dominant form of coronavirus in many of Brazil’s cities and partly responsible for the high death toll. Other Latin American countries have closed their borders and restricted travel to and from Brazil but P1 is now in at least 15 countries in the Americas, according to the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO).
Continue reading...Sister of man who died after AstraZeneca jab urges public to have vaccine
Dr Alison Astles says her brother, Neil Astles, was ‘extraordinarily unlucky’ because risk of dying from vaccine is tiny
The sister of a man who died from a rare blood clot on the brain after receiving the AstraZeneca vaccine has urged the public to “keep saving lives” by continuing to receive the jab.
Neil Astles, a 59-year-old solicitor at Warrington council, was given his first dose on 17 March but died in hospital on Easter Sunday after suffering from 10 days of worsening headaches and loss of vision.
Continue reading...Northern Ireland executive holds emergency meeting over Belfast unrest
Chief constable briefs party leaders after political crisis intensified by another night of riots in Belfast
Northern Ireland’s power-sharing executive is holding an emergency meeting in Stormont after another night of riots scarred parts of Belfast and ratcheted up a political crisis.
Simon Byrne, the chief constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland, briefed party leaders on the security situation on Thursday before a debate at the assembly, which has been recalled from its Easter break.
Continue reading...Body found in Epping Forest identified as Richard Okorogheye
Discovery by Essex police on Monday is confirmed to be 19-year-old student missing since 22 March
A body found in a lake in Epping Forest has been formally identified as missing 19-year-old Richard Okorogheye, the Metropolitan police has said.
Officers from Essex police made the discovery on Monday. The Met said the student’s death is being treated as unexplained and they do not believe at this stage there was any third-party involvement.
Continue reading...What do I need to know about the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine?
After a UK recommendation that healthy adults under 30 should have an alternative jab, here’s the latest information and advice
Concerns have been mounting over reports of rare but serious blood clots in a small number of recipients of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine, leading to a UK recommendation on Wednesday that healthy adults under 30 should have an alternative jab if they can. We take a look at the latest information and guidance.
Continue reading...Teenage refugee killed himself in UK after mental health care failings
Coroner rules seriousness of Mulubrhane Medhane Kfleyosus’s illness went unrecognised
A teenage refugee killed himself after the serious nature of his mental illness was not recognised, a coroner has concluded.
Mulubrhane Medhane Kfleyosus, 19, was the fourth from his friendship group of Eritrean refugees to take his own life within a 16-month period after arriving in the UK.
Continue reading...‘This is not an easy treasure hunt’: puzzle book offers readers chance to win €750,000 golden casket
Clues in The Golden Treasure of the Entente Cordiale could lead readers in the UK and France to a historic treasure presented by Britain to the French president in 1903
For all the armchair puzzlers for whom sudokus and crosswords have palled over the long months of lockdown, a fiendish new literary conundrum is about to slide on to bookshelves – with a rather lucrative and unusual reward.
Artist Michel Becker tracked down and bought the golden casket given to France by the UK ahead of the signing of the entente cordiale on 8 April 1904, which attempted to end centuries of antagonism between the two countries. Presented to French president Émile Loubet in July 1903, the casket was wrought by Goldsmiths and Silversmiths Company in London and contained a scroll celebrating friendship between the two countries. Valued at €750,000 (£646,000), the intricately decorated box is now the prize for whoever solves the clues in Becker’s forthcoming treasure hunt book, The Golden Treasure of the Entente Cordiale.
Continue reading...UK’s ‘headlong rush into abandoning human rights’ rebuked by Amnesty
Covid failings, crackdown on protest, police discrimination and resumed arms trade with Saudi Arabia all listed in annual report
Amnesty International has published a stark rebuke of the UK government’s stance on human rights, saying that it is “speeding towards the cliff edge” in its policies on housing and immigration, and criticising its seeming determination to end the legal right for the public to challenge government decisions in court.
In its annual report on human rights around the world, Amnesty International says the UK’s increasingly hostile attitude towards upholding and preserving human rights legislation raises “serious concerns”.
Continue reading...Patients in Wales to be first in UK to receive Moderna Covid vaccine
Nation’s mass rollout begins on Wednesday, while Scotland will administer first doses later this week
Patients in Wales will from Wednesday become the first in the UK to receive the Moderna vaccine as part of a mass vaccination programme, with the first doses in Scotland set to come later this week.
The initial jabs would be given at the West Wales general hospital in Carmarthen, the Welsh government said.
Continue reading...AstraZeneca Covid vaccine: weighing up the risks and rewards
Despite scientific advice to continue getting the jab, answers about fatal blood clots are urgently needed
Vaccines have side-effects, as do all medicines. Most often, jabs cause sore arms, a headache or a bit of nausea – none of which would be very significant when weighed against the toll of a serious virus such as Covid-19.
But sometimes the risk-benefit calculation may look less simple, as in the case of Oxford/AstraZeneca’s Covid jab and cerebral venous sinus thrombosis (CVST), the blood clots in the brain that have led to fatalities in the UK and Europe.
Continue reading...The UK needs a robust border policy, but right now we can’t see if it is working
Analysis: it is incredibly challenging to scrutinise the system because data on movement is so opaque
The official response to coronavirus at the UK border has been problematic from the start. It was not until February this year that the government introduced mandatory hotel quarantine – some 11 months after coronavirus was first recorded the UK – despite it being used in countries such as New Zealand from the off.
Even now with stricter requirements for arrivals in place, critics say the current border policy is seriously lacking. Reports claiming as many as 8,000 tourists a day are arriving in the UK have significantly fueled those concerns.
Continue reading...Israel and Chile both led on Covid jabs, so why is one back in lockdown?
Analysis: contrasting national outcomes highlight how easily UK could blow its chances
As mass vaccination programmes take hold around the world, some countries have begun to get on top of the virus while others have continued to struggle. Two countries that have streaked ahead with immunisations are Israel and Chile, but as Israel edges back to a new normal, Chile has been plunged back into lockdown. Can the UK and other countries repeat Israel’s success and avoid the setbacks of Chile?
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