Category Archives: World News

Frances McDormand starrer Nomadland wins the Golden Lion at Venice film festival

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Drama featuring McDormand as a retiree forced on the road after the 2008 recession takes top honours on the Lido, while Vanessa Kirby is named best actress

Chloe Zhao’s Nomadland, a recession-era road trip drama starring Frances McDormand, won the Golden Lion for best film on Saturday at a slimmed-down Venice film festival, which was held against the backdrop of the coronavirus pandemic.

Zhao and McDormand appeared by video from the United States to accept the award, as en virus-related travel restrictions made reaching the Lido in the Italian lagoon city difficult if not impossible for many Hollywood filmmakers and actors.

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Record-breaking wildfires in Brazil threaten endangered species – video

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Record-breaking wildfires are threatening thousands of acres of one of the most biologically diverse areas on the planet, Brazil's Pantanal region.

'Sometimes we are a bit frustrated, but we try to have hope and to rescue the few animals we can,' said 26-year-old vet Karen Ribeiro at one of the shelters, where rescue units and volunteers are bringing in animals including jaguars for evacuation

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Go west: Trump and Biden take campaign to Arizona and Nevada

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Donald Trump was headed for Nevada on Saturday, aiming to erode poll leads enjoyed by Joe Biden there and in Arizona, another key state, as the 3 November presidential election draws near.

Related: Trump in Fox News interview to accuse Biden of taking drugs

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Erdoğan warns Macron: ‘Don’t mess with Turkey’

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Turkish leader hits back after criticism from French president over warship deployment

The Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, on Saturday warned his French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron, “not to mess” with Turkey, as tensions between the Nato allies escalated.

“Don’t mess with the Turkish people. Don’t mess with Turkey,” Erdoğan said during a televised speech in Istanbul on the 40th anniversary of the 1980 military coup.

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Trump uses Fox News interview to accuse Biden of taking drugs

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Fox News will broadcast an interview on Saturday night in which Donald Trump accuses Joe Biden of taking performance-enhancing drugs.

Related: Trump ally who sought to change CDC Covid reports claims he was fighting 'deep state'

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Belarus: dozens of peaceful female protesters thrown into vans by riot police

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Rally in Minsk against disputed re-election of Lukashenko was attended by thousands

Belarusian riot police detained several dozen women demonstrators and threw them into vans, as thousands took to the streets of the capital to protest against police violence and electoral fraud.

Before a massive protest expected on Sunday, columns of female protesters gathered in central Minsk for a peaceful women’s protest. Some beat saucepans with ladles and others chanted “Bring back our Masha”, referring to opposition leader Maria Kolesnikova by her diminutive name.

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UK move to classify Extinction Rebellion ‘organised crime group’ comes under fire

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Letter signed by 150 public figures hits back at move to scapegoat protesters

Stephen Fry, Mark Rylance and a former Archbishop of Canterbury are among 150 public figures to hit back at government moves to classify the climate protesters of Extinction Rebellion as an “organised crime group”. In a letter to be published in the Observer on Sunday, XR is described as “a group of people who are holding the powerful to account” – who should not become targets of “vitriol and anti-democratic posturing”.

It comes in response to the prime minister and home secretary’s reported move to review how the group is classified in law after it disrupted the distribution of four national newspapers, including the Sun and the Daily Mail, last Saturday.

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Crowd cheers as Charlottesville takes down statue of Confederate soldier

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  • Bronze known as ‘At Ready’ has stood for 111 years
  • University town rocked by white supremacist march in 2017

Engineers in Charlottesville, Virginia worked to remove a 900lb Confederate statue on Saturday, a moment of symbolic reckoning in the university town that was rocked by a white supremacist march in August 2017.

Related: Black Virginia state senator charged with 'injury' to Confederate monument

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Iranian champion wrestler Navid Afkari executed despite global outcry

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Afkari had been convicted of killing security guard during anti-government protests in 2018

Iran has executed a champion wrestler convicted of murdering a security guard during anti-regime protests in 2018, state media said on Saturday, despite an international campaign to spare his life.

Navid Afkari, 27, was executed “this morning after legal procedures were carried out at the insistence of the parents and the family of the victim”, the Islamic Republic News Agency quoted the head of the justice department in the southern Fars province as saying.

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Fire crews in Oregon and California fight blazes as officials warn of further deaths

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  • Dozens still missing and tens of thousands forced to flee
  • Lighter winds and rising humidity help firefighters’ efforts

Fire crews in California and Oregon reported making progress on several blazes over the weekend, as lighter winds and lower temperatures aided the battle against the massive fires raging across the west.

But officials in both states told residents to brace for bad news, as rescue teams start combing through towns and neighborhoods leveled by the infernos.

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Trump ally who sought to change CDC Covid reports claims he was fighting ‘deep state’

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A former Trump campaign official now spokesman for the US health department sought to change key reports on the coronavirus pandemic, in some cases “openly complaining” that they “would undermine the president’s optimistic messages about the outbreak”, according to internal emails seen by Politico.

Related: Trump told a reporter his biggest secret: that he is a danger to the American people | Richard Wolffe

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Coronavirus: France hits daily record of over 10,000 cases; protests in Germany against restrictions – live updates

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Number of new cases in California falls; Cuba restricts internal travel; English hospitals stress test for a second wave. Follow all the developments

Brazil registered 814 coronavirus deaths over the last 24 hours and 33,523 additional cases, the nation’s health ministry said on Saturday evening.

The South American country has now reported 131,210 total deaths and 4,315,687 confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus.

El Salvador’s government said on Saturday it plans to reopen airports for international flights starting on 19 September, but with a twist: incoming passengers will be required to show a negative PCR coronavirus test no more than three days old.

Anyone lacking the test would be denied entry, according to the Associated Press.

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As fires burn the west, top Democrats stay quiet on the climate crisis

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Nancy Pelosi has been notably tepid on green legislation – so are the Democrats serious about fighting climate change?

With hundreds of thousands of Americans forced to evacuate their homes in the western US, Donald Trump hasn’t said a word about the wildfires blazing across multiple states in nearly three weeks.

Related: Oregon fires force hundreds of thousands to flee as deaths rise

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Toots Hibbert, pioneering reggae star, dies aged 77

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Frontman of Toots and the Maytals helped make reggae globally famous

Toots Hibbert, whose glorious songcraft as frontman of Toots and the Maytals helped make reggae globally famous, has died aged 77.

A statement from his family on Saturday read: “It is with the heaviest of hearts to announce that Frederick Nathaniel “Toots” Hibbert passed away peacefully tonight, surrounded by his family at the University Hospital of the West Indies in Kingston, Jamaica.

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UK urged to take in refugees after fire at Lesbos migrant camp

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Thousands have been left without shelter after blaze at Moria camp on Greek island

Pressure is mounting on the UK government to take in some of the thousands of asylum seekers left without shelter following a devastating fire at Europe’s largest migrant camp on the Greek island of Lesbos.

The blaze tore through the Moria registration and identification centre (RIC) overnight on Tuesday, incinerating tents that had been home to 13,000 people, including at least 4,000 children.

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Afghan peace talks with Taliban begin in Doha with rocky path ahead

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Securing a ceasefire and safeguarding rights of women and minorities are key challenges

The Taliban and Afghan government negotiators launched historic peace talks on Saturday, aiming to end decades of war through a political settlement that would be unprecedented in the country’s recent history.

Negotiations will be long and complicated; there is a yawning gulf between the Taliban’s vision of an austerely Islamic state and the government’s commitment to the constitution that guarantees democracy and women’s rights, even if its implementation is mixed.

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Three Rohingya refugees die days after seven-month ordeal on trafficking boat

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300 people disembarked in Indonesia in a ‘terrible condition’ after being held hostage at sea by traffickers demanding payment

At least three young Rohingya refugees have died this week since landing in Indonesia after seven months at sea, relief workers have said.

After being refused entry by several countries and held hostage at sea by traffickers, 296 refugees disembarked in Aceh province on Monday, weak and in poor health. Two-thirds of them were women and children.

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Dozens missing in Oregon as historic fires devastate western US

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Dozens of people are missing and at least 23 people are believed to have been killed as historic wildfires in the western US forced evacuations, stretched fire crews thin and spawned misinformation.

Residents of Portland, Oregon, awoke on Friday to air thick with smoke pollution that dimmed the sun and turned the skies blood-orange red. Hundreds of firefighters are battling two large wildfires that threatened to merge near the most populated part of Oregon, including the suburbs of Portland, and the governor said dozens of people are missing in other parts of the state.

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Brussels could ‘carve up’ UK if Tories reject Brexit bill, says Johnson

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PM claims internal market bill is needed to counter EU ‘threats’ to put a blockade in Irish Sea

Boris Johnson has said his controversial legislation to override parts of his Brexit deal is needed to end EU threats to install a “blockade” in the Irish Sea.

The prime minister said Brussels could “carve up our country” and “seriously endanger peace and stability” in Northern Ireland if Conservative MPs rebel to block the internal market bill.

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At least 50 killed in collapsed gold mine in east Congo, says NGO

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Cave-in occurred at artisanal mine, in an industry where fatalities are common

At least 50 people are thought to have died when an artisanal gold mine collapsed near Kamituga in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo, a local mining NGO said.

The cave-in occurred on the Detroit mine site at around 3pm local time (13.00 GMT) on Friday following heavy rains, said Emiliane Itongwa, president of the Initiative of Support and Social Supervision of Women.

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