As the ex-president hints at running once again, his future could lie in the courtroom, not the Oval Office
He’s Teflon Don no more, at least when it comes to court.
Donald Trump, no longer insulated by claims of presidential protections, faces a host of increasingly serious legal problems in some of the US’s most high-profile courts, including both criminal investigation and civil litigation.
Continue reading...Sister punched crocodile in head after it attacked in a lagoon where they had been swimming
A British woman is in a medically induced coma in Mexico after she was attacked by a crocodile in a lagoon where she and her twin sister had been taken by a tour guide.
Melissa and Georgia Laurie, 28, from Berkshire, had been swimming in the lagoon, about 10 miles from Puerto Escondido, Oaxaca, on the south-east coast of the country, when Melissa was attacked.
Continue reading...Critics say US president’s realpolitik ignores Sisi regime’s ‘hostage-taking tactics’ against dissidents
“It’s a hostage negotiation and it has been all along,” said Sherif Mansour, describing the arrest of his cousin Reda Abdel-Rahman by Egyptian security forces last August as an attempt to intimidate Mansour into silence.
Abdel-Rahman has been imprisoned without trial for nine months. Mansour, an outspoken human rights advocate in Washington with the Committee to Protect Journalists, has since learned that he and his father are listed on the same charge sheet, all accused of joining a terrorist group and spreading “false news”.
Continue reading...UK considering unilaterally extending grace periods under Northern Ireland protocol
The row between the UK and the EU over checks on sausages and other chilled foods sent from Britain to Northern Ireland has deepened, with the Brexit minister telling Brussels that trade war threats will not wash with voters.
As a major meeting on Wednesday approached, Lord Frost said: “Further threats of legal action and trade retaliation from the EU won’t make life any easier for the shopper in Strabane who can’t buy their favourite product. Nor will it benefit the small business in Ballymena struggling to source produce from their supplier in Birmingham.”
Continue reading...European and Australian police join forces with FBI to seize weapons, drugs and $148m in cash
A global sting in which organised crime gangs were sold encrypted phones that law enforcement officials could monitor has led to more than 800 arrests in 18 countries.
The operation by the FBI and Australian and European police, ensnared suspects in Australia, Asia, Europe, South America and the Middle East involved in the narcotics trade.
Continue reading...One of nine drones tracking a herd of elephants crossing through China’s south-western Yunnan province has filmed them taking a rest. All but one baby elephant can be seen lying flat out on the ground asleep. Last week, images of the herd of 15 Asian elephants walking through a residential area appeared on social media and sparked intense media interest. Chinese authorities dispatched a taskforce to track them. State TV has spent days following their every footstep
Continue reading...Female genital mutilation has revived under Covid but activists are pushing hard to save girls at risk
It was when the phone started ringing with calls from worried mothers in Somalia that Ifrah Ahmed knew she was making an impact. The women told her their daughters had been bleeding for hours after undergoing female genital mutilation and asked what to do. Ahmed told them to seek medical attention, and probably saved lives by doing so.
The mothers called because they had heard the story of a 10-year-old girl who had bled to death after being cut in central Galmudug state in July 2018. It was the first confirmed death in years in a country where any complications arising from FGM are generally denied and it gained worldwide attention. The death was first revealed by a local activist who had been trained by Ahmed’s foundation in how to use the media to publicise her work.
Continue reading...A Jerusalem hospital parking lot has collapsed into a sinkhole, Israeli police say, but no casualties have been reported. Security video distributed by the Jerusalem Shaare Zedek Medical Center, showed cars falling into the sinkhole. Israeli police, backed by fire and rescue services, blocked the roads surrounding the hospital to conduct searches in the area. Hospital officials said they believed the collapse to have been triggered by a highway tunnel being dug nearby.
Continue reading...Luis Abreu once thrived on servicing India’s many typewriters but computers are eclipsing his trade
In Goa’s capital, Panaji, on Rua São Tomé, not far from the main post office, is a shop that offers packaging services. For a small fee, they will wrap your parcel in a sheet of muslin sewn with precise stitches to protect its contents from being damaged in the post.
It started as a sideline to the main business of the store, but now it is the main earner for Luis Francisco Miguel de Abreu as he struggles to maintain one of the last typewriter repair shops in this Indian state.
Continue reading...Achieving herd immunity is possible – and necessary – but requires quick action, say experts
As ambitious declarations go – even for Boris Johnson – it was a big one. At the weekend, the UK prime minister said he would urge the G7 leaders to vaccinate the world against Covid by the end of next year.
But is this feasible? That rather depends on your definition. No country will vaccinate every adult. Vaccinating enough to achieve herd immunity, which could be 60% or 70%, is the real aim. It is possible to achieve that by December 2022, say experts, but only if the G7 leading economies move immediately to make it happen.
Continue reading...The US vice-president, Kamala Harris, said she had held 'robust' talks with the Guatemalan president, Alejandro Giammattei, as she sought to find ways of deterring undocumented immigration from Central America to the United States. Speaking during a news conference with Giammattei, Harris delivered a blunt message to people thinking of making the dangerous journey north: 'Do not come'
Newly released audio from a 2019 phone call between Rudy Giuliani, US diplomats and a senior adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has added credence to the claims that Trump’s longtime adviser pressured the Ukrainians to help the former president politically.
In the call — which occurred prior to the infamous conversation between Trump and Zelensky that led to his first impeachment — Giuliani pushes the Ukrainians to publicly announce unfounded investigations into Joe Biden.
So @CNN got audio of @RudyGiuliani pressuring Ukrainian officials into announcing a fake investigation into @JoeBiden pic.twitter.com/OJljFCcH6h
Related: Giuliani pressured Ukraine to investigate Biden family, new transcript reveals
The new audio demonstrates how Giuliani aggressively cajoled the Ukrainians to do Trump’s bidding. And it undermines Trump’s oft-repeated assertion that “there was no quid pro quo” where Zelensky could secure US government support if he did political favors for Trump.
The call was one of the opening salvos in the years-long quest by Trump and his allies to damage Biden and subvert the 2020 election process — by soliciting foreign meddling, lying about voter fraud, attempting to overturn the results, and inciting the deadly January 6 assault on the Capitol”.
A Republican representative in Oregon may be ousted from his seat after video footage was published Friday showing he let violent protesters into the state capitol late last year.
On 21 December, far-right rioters descended on the statehouse, attacking police officers and assaulting journalists as lawmakers inside were meeting to discuss how to respond to the Covid crisis. Many of the demonstrators would also be among the mob that attacked the US Capitol on 6 January.
Update: Rep. Mike Nearman "willing to have some consequences for what I did" but says OSP and Salem police also to blame for not keeping armed demonstrators out of the Capitol after Nearman opened a door for the demonstrators. https://t.co/zd68zviL5Z #orleg #orpol
In her resolution, Kotek said personnel who were authorized to be in the Oregon Capitol described the events on Dec. 21 as intense and stressful, terrifying and distressing.
‘Law enforcement officers were visibly injured and shaken due to the demonstrators’ action,’ Kotek added.
Continue reading...Two women, a man and a girl were killed on Sunday when Nathaniel Veltman drove a pickup truck into pedestrians, police say
A 20-year-old Canadian man has been charged with four counts of first-degree murder and one of attempted murder after driving his pickup truck into a Muslim family in what police described as “a premeditated attack”.
Two women, aged 74 and 44, a 46-year-old man and a 15-year-old girl – a grandmother, mother, father and their teenage daughter – were killed on Sunday night when Nathaniel Veltman ploughed his black pickup truck into a group of pedestrians in the city of London, Ontario, police said.
Continue reading...Operation to recover cryptocurrency from Russia-based hacking group is first undertaken by new ransomware taskforce
The US Justice Department has recovered the majority of a multimillion-dollar ransom payment to hackers after a cyberattack that caused the operator of the nation’s largest fuel pipeline to halt its operations last month, officials said Monday.
The operation to recover the cryptocurrency from the Russia-based hacker group is the first undertaken by a specialized ransomware taskforce created by the Biden administration, and reflects what US officials say is an increasingly aggressive approach to deal with a ransomware threat that in the last month has targeted critical industries around the world.
Continue reading...Russian scientists find bdelloid rotifers deep in remote permafrost
A microscopic worm-like creature, labelled an “evolutionary scandal” by biologists for having thrived for millions of years without having sex, has now been shown to persist for at least 24,000 years in Siberian permafrost and then reproduce, researchers have found.
Multicellular invertebrates that are solely female, bdelloid rotifers are already renowned for their resistance to radiation and ability to withstand rather inhospitable environments: drying, starvation and low oxygen. They’ve also existed for at least 35m years – and can be found today in freshwater lakes, ponds, streams and moist terrestrial habitats such as moss, lichen, tree bark and soil.
Continue reading...But president’s Morena party keeps its majority in the lower house of congress
Mexican voters have denied President Andrés Manuel López Obrador a mega-majority in midterm elections, though his Morena party kept its majority in the lower house of congress with the support of a controversial ally.
Voters also showed little enthusiasm for Mexico’s rightwing opposition, which remains reviled after its decisive 2018 defeat by López Obrador, who swept to power promising to curb corruption and put the poor first.
Continue reading...Pedro Castillo is about 0.2% ahead of his far-right opponent, Keiko Fujimori, with more than 94% of the vote counted
The scion of a jailed autocrat and the son of illiterate peasant farmers are fighting vote by vote for the presidency of Peru, in an election which has thrown into sharp relief the Andean country’s deep fault lines of class and geography.
Related: Peru faces poll dilemma: a leftist firebrand or the dictator’s daughter?
Continue reading...WHO says continent urgently needs more jabs as eight countries report rise of 30% in cases in a week
African countries face a last-ditch battle against a third wave of Covid infections, as the supply of vaccines to the continent “grinds to a halt”, top health officials have warned.
“The threat of a third wave in Africa is real and rising. Our priority is clear – it’s crucial that we swiftly get vaccines into the arms of Africans at high risk of falling seriously ill and dying of Covid-19,” said Dr Matshidiso Moeti, the World Health Organization (WHO) regional director for Africa.
Continue reading... Usefulness of aducanumab is disputed but US approval will trigger push to make it available globally
A controversial new drug for Alzheimer’s disease, the first in nearly 20 years, was approved in the US on Monday, which will trigger pressure to make it available worldwide in spite of mixed evidence over its efficacy.
While doctors, patients and the organisations that support them are desperate for treatments that can slow mental deterioration, the usefulness of the new drug, aducanumab, is disputed by scientists. Two trials were stopped in March 2019 because the drugs appeared not to work. The manufacturer, Biogen, said the drugs were unlikely to improve people’s memory and thinking.
Continue reading...Plans blocked after a similar parade stoked tensions that contributed to last Gaza conflict
Israeli police have blocked a planned march by Jewish nationalists through Palestinian neighbourhoods of Jerusalem after a similar parade last month played a key role in building the tensions that led to the latest Gaza conflict.
In a statement, police said a permit for a different time or route might be considered.
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