Category Archives: World News

Macron’s clash with Islam sends jolt through France’s long debate about secularism

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President has become a hate figure in Islamic world over response to death of Samuel Paty

On 6 October, when Samuel Paty, a popular history and geography teacher at a school in a quiet Paris suburb, presented a copy of the cartoons of the prophet Muhammad that provoked the attack on Charlie Hebdo magazine five years ago, he self-evidently had no idea of the tragic consequence for his own life, French society or France’s relations with the Islamic world. What was intended as a classroom exploration of the freedom of thought has turned into a mini-clash of civilisations.

Ten days later, Paty was killed, allegedly by a Russian-born teenager of Chechen heritage, sending an electric shock into France’s long debate about secularism, or laïcité. The French president, Emmanuel Macron, responded by saying France would not “renounce the caricatures”.

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Survey uncovers widespread belief in ‘dangerous’ Covid conspiracy theories

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False claims that pandemic is a hoax or was started deliberately are attracting adherents around world

Significant numbers of people around the world believe Covid-19 was created deliberately, has killed far fewer people than reported, or is a hoax and does not actually exist, according to a global survey.

Along with belief in other conspiracy theories – such as that the world is run by a secret cabal – the YouGov-Cambridge Globalism Project, a survey of about 26,000 people in 25 countries designed in collaboration with the Guardian, found widespread and concerning scepticism about vaccine safety.

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France urges end to boycott of French goods as Macron defends Muhammad cartoons

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Calls for boycott of French goods after president’s remarks at tribute to murdered teacher Samuel Paty

France has appealed for foreign governments to stamp out calls by what it calls a “radical minority” for a boycott of French products after Emmanuel Macron’s public backing of the Muhammad caricatures.

The appeal came as anger escalated across the Islamic world over the president’s remarks at a national tribute to the murdered high-school teacher Samuel Paty last week, with Turkish leader, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, calling on Monday for a complete boycott of French products in Turkey.

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Chileans vote by huge majority to replace Pinochet-era constitution – video report

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Chileans celebrated on the streets after voting overwhelmingly to tear up the country's constitution, imposed four decades ago under the military dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet. 

In Santiago's Plaza Italia, the focus of massive protests last year that led to the poll, fireworks rose above a crowd of tens of thousands of people singing in unison as the word 'rebirth' was beamed on to a tower above. Exit polls showed that 78.24% of people had voted to approve a rewrite, while 21.76% rejected the change. Many have expressed hopes that new guiding principles will temper an unabashedly capitalist ethos with guarantees of more equal rights in healthcare, pensions and education

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‘We do not get a chance at happiness’: the Bangladeshi fishermen caught by debt

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Hilsa fishermen must borrow to buy equipment but have to sell their catch at a low price to moneylenders – creating a generational debt trap

Kalam Sheikh’s life revolves around the few months when he goes in search of Bangladesh’s prized hilsa fish. When he gets a good catch, he can make enough money to live on for the rest of the year. He can pay off some of his debts and even improve his home.

But this fragile annual cycle has been broken this year, with bad catches bookended by months off the water by the coronavirus pandemic and government restrictions to stop overfishing.

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Wild hing makes India’s heart sing as favourite spice is home-grown at last

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Asafoetida is a mainstay of the country’s cuisine, but only now are the first saplings being planted on Indian soil

What’s in a name? Plenty, when it comes to asafoetida or “devil’s dung”. The evil-smelling spice is a stink bomb that unquestionably lives up to its moniker. Inhalation at five paces can make someone with a blocked nose stagger back. It has to be stored away from other spices to prevent it overwhelming them. Just a smidgen can cure indigestion. Yet it is a staple in Indian cuisine, adding a certain subtle aroma, pungency and flavour. For the Jain community, whose religion forbids the use of onion and garlic, “hing”, as it is called in India, is a lifesaver for the flavour it adds. Hing is India’s answer to Japan’s umami.

Yet, until now, no one in India has grown the spice.

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‘Thrown to the wolves’: how Covid-19 laws are being used to silence garment workers

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Campaigners report job losses and jailing of those airing grievances – and urge global fashion brands to stand up for workers’ rights

On the morning of 4 May, Zar Zar Tun, a Burmese garment worker, led a strike at a factory in the city of Yangon. Within 24 hours she was an inmate at Myanmar’s notorious Insein prison.

Zar Zar Tun, 31, was arrested outside the Blue Diamond bag factory in Dagon Seikkan, an industrial district of Yangon, where she and more than 100 other garment workers had been protesting over pay, working conditions and the right to strike.

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Coronavirus live news: China confirms 137 local cases as Spain enters state of emergency

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Restrictions eased in Australian state of Victoria; WHO warns against ‘vaccine nationalism’; Israel to begin first vaccine clinical trials next month. Follow the latest updates

South Korea urged citizens to get vaccinated against influenza and reduce the chances of an outbreak that coincides with the battle against the coronavirus, as it kicked off free inoculations for the last eligible group, Reuters reports.

Public anxiety over the safety of flu vaccines has surged after at least 48 people died this month following vaccinations.

Authorities have said they found no direct link between the deaths and the flu shots and have sought to reassure South Koreans about the safety of the vaccines against flu, a disease that kills at least 3,000 each year.

However, last month, about 5 million doses had to be disposed of after not being stored at recommended temperatures.

Singapore has temporarily halted the use of two influenza vaccines as a precaution after these deaths, becoming among the first countries to publicly announce a halt of the vaccines’ usage. Singapore has reported no deaths linked to flu vaccinations.

India’s total coronavirus infections stood at 7.91 million on Monday, having risen by 45,148 cases in the last 24 hours, health ministry data showed.

The world’s second-most populous country also has the second-highest number of infections after the United States, which has around 8.1 million.

However, India recorded its lowest death toll in about four months on Monday with 480 deaths reported in the last 24 hours, taking total fatalities to 119,014.

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US Senate to hold final vote on Amy Coney Barrett confirmation – live

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Here again is a link to the interview with Donald Trump published on Sunday by 60 Minutes, an institution in US television news known for editorial balance and seriousness of purpose. Significantly, the program also reaches millions of older voters, who overwhelmingly supported Trump in 2016 but who appear to be splitting their vote this year between the candidates.

In this clip, via Vox’s Aaron Rupar, Trump whines about the difficulty level of the questions he is being confronted with, after interviewer Lesley Stahl refuses to endorse one of his conspiracy theories about the Russia investigation.

I don’t understand how anyone can watch this and draw any conclusion other than Trump is completely unfit for his job pic.twitter.com/DA87zGehXI

Hello and welcome to our round-the-clock coverage as the 2020 US election enters its final lap. Only eight days to go.

On Sunday, the number of early voters in the election surpassed 58m, the number who voted early in 2016. That means the 2020 election will mark the first time in history that more than half of the overall US vote was cast early.

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Senate votes on Amy Coney Barrett’s confirmation to supreme court – live

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Voting has begun...

As McConnell continues his cynical, revisionist version of how we’ve ended up at this moment – awaiting the confirmation of Amy Coney Barrett – the supreme court, one member short, is still working.

Just now, the court upheld a federal appeals court ruling that blocks a deadline extension for mail-in-ballots, awarding a victory for Republicans in a crusade against expanding voting rights and access.

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Belarus police fire stun grenades at peaceful protesters – video

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Belarusian police have used stun grenades against protesters as tens of thousands of people headed towards Independence Palace in the capital, Minsk, demanding that President Alexander Lukashenko resign. They were marching to give what they called a 'people’s ultimatum' to Lukashenko: step down, or face a nationwide strike that could cripple the economy. Protesters were met with a violent crackdown from riot police as explosions and white smoke filled residential areas. It is the 11th straight weekend of mass protests since a disputed election plunged the country into turmoil

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China: new coronavirus outbreak detected in Xinjiang city of Kashgar

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Authorities test 2.84 million people after 137 asymptomatic cases found - the first local infections in China since 14 October

China has detected 137 new asymptomatic coronavirus cases in Kashgar in the north-western region of Xinjiang after one person was found to have the virus the previous day – the first new local cases for 10 days in mainland China.

All the cases detected on Sunday were linked to a garment factory where the parents of a 17-year-old girl who was found on Saturday to have the virus – but showed no symptoms – worked, a Xinjiang health commission official told a press briefing.

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‘I was absolutely terrified’: Australian witness recounts Qatar strip-search ordeal

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Kim Mills was one of nine women taken off a Qatar Airways flight in Doha, and the only one not to be strip-searched as authorities hunted the mother of an abandoned newborn baby

An Australian woman has described the “terrifying” experience of being taken off a Qatar Airways flight by authorities who strip-searched passengers as they tried to identify the mother of an infant found in the Doha airport toilets.

Kim Mills was one of nine women taken off a Qatar Airways flight bound for Sydney on 2 October and led through the bowels of the Hamad International airport to what appeared to be a dark carpark or turning circle, where three ambulances were waiting to perform medical examinations to determine if any of the women had recently given birth.

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Big tech accused of avoiding $2.8bn in tax to poorest countries

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Reform of international corporate taxation could transform health and education, says report

Big US technology companies are exploiting loopholes in global tax rules to avoid paying as much as $2.8bn (£2.1bn) tax a year in developing countries, according to research by the anti-poverty charity ActionAid International.

Facebook, Google and Microsoft have been accused of failing to pay a fair amount of taxes in poor countries where governments are struggling to provide even basic healthcare or education to their citizens.

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‘This will make lib heads explode’: Donald Trump Jr posts 2024 picture

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Donald Trump Jr posed in front of a “Don Jr 2024” sign in Nevada on Saturday, posted the picture online and waited for “the lib heads to explode”.

Related: 'Owning the libs': how Donald Trump Jr became the unlikely political heir apparent

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Australia is part of a Black region, it should recognise Kanaky ambition in New Caledonia | Hamish McDonald

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Australia’s un-nuanced support for French dominion is unhelpful in a region where decolonisation is unfinished business

Kicking the can down the road is a time-honoured solution to deadlocks over statehood and identity: hoping time, consultation and money can end up in agreement.

But in New Caledonia, the French territory of 290,000 people in the Melanesian island chain to Australia’s north-east, the road is running out after more than two decades of can-kicking.

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White House chief of staff says ‘we’re not going to control pandemic’, after Pence staffers test positive – live

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Andrew Cuomo, the governor of New York state, is having a field day over the comments of the White House chief of staff Mark Meadows this morning. In a rare moment of transparency, Meadows admitted to a Sunday political talk show that the Trump administration had no intention of containing coronavirus, saying: “We’re not going to control the pandemic”.

Cuomo said that thinking was tantamount to giving in to the virus. “They surrendered without firing a shot. It was the great American surrender,” he said on Sunday, as reported by the Daily News.

After the Senate voted to move forward with the final vote to confirm Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court, Mitch McConnell spoke on the Senate floor, celebrating the lasting influence of the vote for posterity.

“By tomorrow night, we’ll have a new member of the United States Supreme Court,” he told the chamber.

McConnell, just after the Senate votes to limit debate on Amy Coney Barrett: "A lot of what we’ve done over the last four years will be undone sooner or later by the next election. They won’t be able to do much about this for a long time to come."

Also, McConnell's right hand, which was deeply bruised earlier this week and prompted several Qs about his health, appears much better. Most of the bruising is gone https://t.co/WPFJcqsog2

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Chile: millions head to polls in referendum on constitutional reform

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Abolishing Pinochet-era constitution was key demand of last year’s protests

Chilean streets filled on Sunday for the first time since the start of the coronavirus outbreak as millions of people turned out to vote on whether to get rid of the country’s Pinochet-era constitution in favour of a fresh charter drafted by citizens.

A new constitution was a key demand of fierce anti-government protests that erupted last year over inequality and elitism in one of Latin America’s most advanced economies, and have simmered ever since.

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Belarus protests: nationwide strike looms after ‘people’s ultimatum’ rally

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Opposition leader calls for action on Monday as Lukashenko defies demand from 100,000 marchers in Minsk to step down

Belarusian riot police launched another violent crackdown in Minsk on Sunday evening, throwing stun grenades into crowds of peaceful protesters, chasing people through courtyards and making arrests as they attempted to curtail the 11th consecutive Sunday of protest in the country.

At least 100,000 people marched through the centre of the Belarusian capital earlier in the day to give what they called a “people’s ultimatum” to Alexander Lukashenko: step down, or face a nationwide strike on Monday that could cripple the economy.

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Hopes rise for approval of coronavirus vaccine by end of this year

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US expert Dr Anthony Fauci says it should be known by early December if vaccine is safe to roll out

Hopes are rising that a coronavirus vaccine will be approved by the end of the year, with healthcare workers receiving their first dose in early 2021.

Dr Anthony Fauci, the US’s leading expert in infectious diseases, said on Sunday it should be known by the end of November or early December if a vaccine was safe and effective.

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