The president wants to detain thousands of people at a site that is notorious for its secrecy and history of abuse
It has been denounced as “America’s gulag”: a secretive, abuse-ridden Caribbean prison camp for terror suspects that Donald Rumsfeld once said contained “the worst of the worst”.
“All of us have scars in our souls, deformities, from living at Guantánamo,” a former Yemeni inmate recalled of his time at the notorious military detention facility in south-east Cuba.
Continue reading...Ex-chancellor makes rare intervention to criticise her own party for passing asylum policy with support of AfD
The former German chancellor Angela Merkel has criticised Friedrich Merz, her eventual successor as leader of the country’s conservatives, for pushing through proposals on migration and asylum with the backing of the far-right AfD party.
In a rare intervention in public affairs since stepping down from politics in December 2021, Merkel said Merz, who is tipped to become Germany’s next chancellor, had in effect performed a U-turn.
Continue reading...The poet, author and musician fell during a performance with Soundwalk Collective, who later posted ‘she is being cared for by the best doctors’
Patti Smith collapsed during a performance in Brazil after experiencing a severe migraine for several days. Smith, 78, was performing with the Berlin group Soundwalk Collective, in which she recites her writing to a musical backing.
Associated Press reported that the newspaper Folha de S Paulo said that Smith passed out about 30 minutes into the event while reading a piece about the climate crisis. After falling, she was taken backstage in a wheelchair.
Continue reading...Five arrested after Salwan Momika reportedly killed during TikTok live stream, hours before trial verdict due
Sweden’s prime minister has said a foreign power may have been involved in the fatal shooting of an anti-Islam campaigner just hours before a trial verdict over his burning of the Qur’an was due.
Police arrested five people over the killing of Salwan Momika, 38, who was shot late on Wednesday in a house in the town of Södertälje, near Stockholm. Authorities did not say whether the shooter was among those detained.
Continue reading...NIH fellows say policy changes including funding freeze would ‘severely limit’ researchers’ ability to do their work
A union representing about 5,000 researchers at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has issued a legally binding demand to bargain over Donald Trump’s sweeping policy changes, including a funding freeze, a communications blackout and a staff travel ban.
The NIH is the largest biomedical institution in the world, providing more than $40bn annually to fund health research, providing grants to more than 300,000 researchers at more thab 2,500 universities, medical schools and other research institutions globally, with nearly 6,000 scientists performing research in its own labs.
Continue reading...Group in northern Ontario argues crown failed to honour agreement and capped annual payments in 1874 at $4
A group of First Nations in Canada is turning to the courts in the hope of securing billions of dollars in compensation, after accusing the government of failing to engage in “meaningful negotiations” for money owed under a 175-year-old treaty.
“The governments’ refusal to come to grips with their treaty obligations has continued 175 years of broken promises, lies and neglect,” Wilfred King, chief of Gull Bay First Nation, said in a statement announcing plans to seek compensation that is “just, liberal, generous and honourable”.
Continue reading...Reported move would make Japanese group largest financial backer of US startup behind ChatGPT
The Japanese investment group SoftBank is reportedly in talks to invest up to $25bn (£20bn) in OpenAI in a deal that would make it the biggest financial backer of the startup behind ChatGPT.
The lender is considering putting a sum of between $15bn and $25bn into the San Francisco-based company, according to the Financial Times.
Continue reading...Abrupt decision to pause all foreign aid could exacerbate violence in region already struggling with organized crime
The Trump administration’s abrupt decision to immediately pause all US foreign aid programmes could exacerbate violence in Latin America, driving more migration from a region already struggling with the rise of organised crime, experts have warned.
The world’s largest aid provider by far, the US disbursed $1.5bn (£1.2bn) to South American countries in the 2023 financial year, funding a broad range of projects, including humanitarian, military, environmental and economic aid.
Continue reading...UN agency says work in West Bank and Gaza will continue amid concerns over impact on delivery of aid
International staff working for the UN’s main agency serving Palestinians have been forced to leave after Israel’s ban on the agency came into effect.
As the UN flag was still flying above the headquarters building in Jerusalem, Palestinian staff were not present at the site over security concerns amid a planned “celebration” by Israeli rightwing groups outside the compound.
Continue reading...Appointment of former leader of group that led operation to topple Assad comes amid other political changes
The former leader of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the Islamist rebel group which led the military operation to topple the former president of Syria, Bashar al-Assad, last month, has been appointed president of Syria for a “transitional period”.
The appointment of Ahmed al-Sharaa, who has been acting as the de-facto leader of the country since early December, came after a meeting of rebel faction leaders on Wednesday and was announced by a military spokesperson.
Continue reading...Howard Lutnick testified at his US Senate confirmation hearing for his nomination to head commerce department
Donald Trump’s nominee to run the commerce department, Howard Lutnick, said on Wednesday that Canada and Mexico can avoid looming US tariffs if they act swiftly to close their borders to fentanyl, while vowing to slow China’s advancement in artificial intelligence.
Lutnick, a billionaire Wall Street CEO, at his US Senate confirmation hearing said he has advised Trump to pursue across-the-board tariffs country by country to restore “reciprocity” to America’s trading relationships and said he would erect stronger curbs on China’s access to US technology, including advanced AI semiconductors.
Continue reading...UK foreign secretary issues direct warning during phone call with Rwandan president after escalation of conflict
Rwanda has put $1bn of global aid under threat by taking part in the invasion of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the UK foreign secretary, David Lammy, has said.
He made the direct warning in a phone call to the Rwandan president, Paul Kagame, on Sunday after also speaking to the US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, about the crisis.
Continue reading...Narrow passage of controversial CDU-CSU motion ends longstanding boycott on cooperating with far-right party
The German parliament has narrowly passed a motion urging tough restrictions on immigration that was highly controversial because it was backed by the far-right Alternative für Deutschland party.
The motion was brought by the conservative opposition CDU-CSU and backed by, among others, the AfD, breaking a longstanding taboo on cooperation with the anti-immigration party.
Continue reading...Palestinians in war-devastated Gaza and occupied West Bank expected to be hardest hit by ban on refugee agency
The main UN agency serving Palestinians in the occupied territories, including Gaza, looks likely to be shut down on Thursday as Israel defied widespread international support for the agency in a move Unrwa predicted would “sabotage Gaza’s recovery and political transition”.
Unrwa’s banning looks certain, as Israel’s high court of justice refused a last-minute request to intervene to suspend the law forbidding the agency from operating in Israel.
Continue reading...Claudia Sheinbaum says US government does not have right to change name of Gulf of Mexico to Gulf of America
Mexico will send a letter to Google to question its decision to change the name of the Gulf of Mexico for users of Google Maps in the US.
In a press conference on Wednesday, Mexico’s president, Claudia Sheinbaum, said the US government did not have the right to rename the entirety of the Gulf of Mexico, much of which is in international waters.
Continue reading...Man fined for flying device under influence as court applies same punishment it would for drunk-driving a vehicle
A man has been convicted for drunk-driving a drone in what is thought to be the first case of its kind in Sweden.
The 55-year-old man was found guilty in July of flying the device at a classic car event in Rättvik, a town in Dalarna, central Sweden, in a temporary no-fly zone.
Continue reading...Cells taken from blood and ‘reprogrammed’ into heart muscle cells may help patients with heart failure
Damaged hearts can literally be patched up to help them work, say researchers, in what has been hailed as a groundbreaking development for people with advanced heart failure.
According to a recent study, heart failure affects more than 64 million people worldwide, with causes including heart attacks, high blood pressure and coronary artery disease.
Continue reading...Ursula von der Leyen announces plans to cut red tape and boost innovation in second term as head of European Commission
The EU executive has announced “an unprecedented simplification effort” to cut regulations and boost innovation in an attempt to reverse Europe’s economic decline and better compete with China and the US.
In her first major policy announcement since starting a second term as the European Commission president last month, Ursula von der Leyen outlined policy proposals intended to boost Europe’s flagging economy.
Continue reading...Government plans to remove legal recognition of gender-based killings in latest attack on women’s rights
Femicide will be struck from Argentina’s penal code, according to a vow from the administration of Javier Milei, the president. It is his administration’s latest attack on women’s rights.
Mariano Cúneo Libarona, the justice minister, said the government will “eliminate the figure of femicide from the Argentine penal code” adding that feminism was a “distortion of the concept of equality”.
Continue reading...In today’s newsletter: After Donald Trump’s remarks, renewed alarm about what will follow the first phase of the ceasefire
Good morning. Donald Trump presented his proposal as one rooted in a concern for the safety of Palestinians: it was time to find many of the residents of Gaza somewhere else to live. “I’d rather get involved with some of the Arab nations and build housing at a different location where they can maybe live in peace for a change,” he said. “You’re talking about probably a million and a half people, and we just clean out that whole thing and say: ‘You know, it’s over.’”
That was more than stream of consciousness: Trump doubled down on his comments on Monday. But the idea of “cleaning out” Gaza is not welcomed by the Palestinians who live there – or the countries that Trump has in mind as their new home. And if they were to be forced to leave after Gaza was devastated by the Israeli military, it would appear to be a clear case of ethnic cleansing.
Kumbh Mela festival | Dozens of people are feared to have died in crowd crushes at India’s Kumbh Mela festival, local officials have said, as vast crowds went to bathe at one of the holiest sites of the Hindu gathering. People were crushed in the early hours of Wednesday as tens of millions flocked to immerse themselves in the sacred confluence of the Ganges and Yamuna rivers.
UK economy | Rachel Reeves is unveiling plans to create “Europe’s Silicon Valley” between Oxford and Cambridge as she stakes the government’s success on kickstarting economic growth. The chancellor will announce a blueprint to improve infrastructure across the region in the hope of adding £78bn to the UK economy within a decade.
Extremism | Yvette Cooper will reject internal Home Office advice to widen the definition of extremism to include violent misogyny and conspiracy theorists, the Guardian understands. The home secretary is expected to reject a report saying that authorities should adopt an “ideologically agnostic” approach in favour of focusing on Islamist and far-right violence.
Tax | Roman Abramovich, the billionaire Russian oligarch, may owe British tax authorities as much as £1bn, according to analysis of documents that suggests his companies failed to pay tax on profits made through an elaborate offshore investment scheme.
Technology | US tech stocks tentatively recovered on Tuesday after the emergence of the Chinese DeepSeek app wiped $1tn (£800bn) in value from the leading US tech index. Nvidia recovered somewhat from Monday’s 17% drop, rising 9%.
Continue reading...