Category Archives: World News

New Zealand passes world-first tobacco law to ban smoking for next generation

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The country is believed to be the first to implement an annually rising legal smoking age

New Zealand has introduced a steadily rising smoking age to stop those aged 14 and under from ever being able to legally buy cigarettes in world-first legislation to outlaw smoking for the next generation.

Associate health minister Ayesha Verrall said at the law’s passing on Tuesday: “Thousands of people will live longer, healthier lives and the health system will be $5bn better off from not needing to treat the illnesses caused by smoking, such as numerous types of cancer, heart attacks, strokes, amputations.”

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Jacinda Ardern caught on hot mic calling minor opposition party leader an ‘arrogant prick’

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New Zealand PM apologised for comment made live on parliament television during question time

New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Ardern has become the latest leader to fall victim to a hot microphone, after her comment that the leader of a minor opposition party was an “arrogant prick” was picked up and broadcast on parliament television.

During question time in the house on Tuesday, the leader of the libertarian Act party, David Seymour, asked Ardern if she could “give an example of her making a mistake, apologising for it properly, and fixing it”.

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Peru’s Castillo calls new president a ‘usurper’ as protest death toll reaches seven

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Ousted president calls successor Dina Boluarte the ‘snot and slobber of the coup-mongering right’ in a letter written behind bars

Ousted Peruvian president Pedro Castillo has derided his successor as a “usurper”, and vowed to continue as head of state as the death toll from growing protests against the new government of Dina Boluarte rose to seven.

Demonstrations in support of Castillo spread from city to city on the sixth day of unrest, with widespread vandalism and looting showing little sign of abating.

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Scores of executions feared in Iran as 23-year-old hanged in public killing

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Human rights group warns death of Majidreza Rahnavard ‘a significant escalation of violence against protesters’

Fears are growing that Iran is preparing to execute scores more protesters after authorities hanged a 23-year-old man from a crane, in a public killing carried out less than a month after he was arrested and following a secretive trial.

Majidreza Rahnavard was sentenced to death by a court in the city of Mashhad, a centre of the protests, for allegedly killing two members of the paramilitary Basij force and wounding four others. The Basij, affiliated with the country’s feared Revolutionary Guards, has been at the forefront of the state crackdown.

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Ukraine calls for Patriot missiles to defend its grid and stop rise in refugees

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Prime minister Denys Shmyhal says western air defence systems needed to counter Russian attacks and stop people from fleeing

Ukraine has called for the west to supply Patriot missiles batteries and other modern air defence systems, amid growing concern that attacks by Russia on its electricity grid could prompt a new wave of refugees from the wartorn country.

The country’s prime minister, Denys Shmyhal, speaking on Monday before a Ukraine humanitarian aid conference the following day in Paris, said Russia wanted “to trigger another wave of migration toward Europe” during the depths of winter.

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Police search European parliament offices as bribery inquiry grows

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Belgian prosecutors say 20 searches conducted since Friday, prompting warning that EU’s credibility at stake

Belgian police have searched European parliament offices as part of a growing investigation into alleged bribery and corruption, as senior EU leaders warned the credibility of the bloc was at stake.

Belgium’s federal prosecutor announced on Monday it had carried out 20 searches since Friday, including 19 at private homes and one at the European parliament offices.

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Canada: son of murdered billionaire couple triples cash reward to C$35m

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Barry and Honey Sherman found dead in Toronto home five years ago but family frustration mounts as crime remains unsolved

The son of a billionaire couple murdered five years ago has tripled a cash reward for information about the unsolved crime amid frustration over a lack of progress in the investigation and deep rifts within the family.

Barry Sherman, the founder of drug giant Apotex, and his wife, Honey, are believed to have been killed in their Toronto home on 13 December 2017. A realtor found the couple in the basement pool area of their home two days later, with belts looped around their necks and attached to a pool railing.

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No year-end press conference for Putin amid Russia’s faltering war in Ukraine

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Kremlin says traditional event will not take place in further sign leader is becoming more remote

Vladimir Putin will not hold a year-end press conference for the first time in at least a decade, in what Kremlin-watchers view as a break with protocol due to his war in Ukraine.

The marathon press-conferences are traditionally an occasion for the Russian president to burnish his image, a campy spectacle that allows Putin to play the populist on national television each December.

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Germany at risk of gas shortages as consumption cutting target missed

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Country has scrambled to open up new sources of energy since start of Ukraine war

Germany is saving less gas than necessary to rule out shortages this winter, the head of the German grid agency has said, as the country missed its crucial target of a 20% cut in consumption last week amid dropping temperatures.

Germany, which used to draw about half of its natural gas needs from Russia before the start of the Ukraine war, has scrambled to open up new sources of energy during the last ten months.

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Freed Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout joins ultranationalist party

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Bout, who was released in prisoner exchange, could seek a seat in parliament, and has spoken of ‘pride’ in Putin

The Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout, who returned home last week in a prisoner exchange for the American basketball star Brittney Griner, has joined the pro-Kremlin far-right Liberal Democratic party (LDPR), in a move that could see him seek a seat in the Russian parliament.

In a video posted on telegram, LDPR’s leader, Leonid Slutsky, who was standing next to Bout, said: “I want to thank Viktor Anatolievich [Bout] for the decision he has made and welcome him into the ranks of the best political party in today’s Russia.”

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Kim Jong-un dogs end up at South Korean zoo after care costs row

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Moon Jae-in gave up hunting dogs claiming government refused to cover food and veterinary bills

A pair of dogs gifted four years ago by the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un, have ended up at a zoo in South Korea after a dispute over who should pay for the animals’ care.

Kim had given the two white Pungsan hunting dogs – a breed indigenous to North Korea – to the then South Korean president, Moon Jae-in, as a gift after their summit talks in Pyongyang in 2018.

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Hong Kong pressures Google to remove protest anthem from searches

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Authorities want Glory to Hong Kong axed from top results and replaced with China’s national anthem

Google has refused to change its search results to display China’s national anthem, rather than a protest song, when users search for Hong Kong’s national anthem, the city’s security chief has said, expressing “great regret” at the decision.

Google’s parent company, Alphabet Inc, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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Russia-Ukraine war live: Biden pledges to boost Ukraine’s air defence; EU and G7 leaders to meet to agree on more Russia sanctions

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This live blog is now closed. You can find our latest full report here:

A dispatch here from reporters working for Agence France-Presse in Bulgaria, as Russians in the seaside resort of Varna help Ukrainian refugees.

When Ukrainian Elena Bondarenko fled to Bulgaria after Russia invaded, she never imagined she would be taken in by a Russian there.

But that is exactly what happened to the bank clerk from Zaporizhzhia, one of many refugees fleeing the war who have been quietly sheltered by members of the country’s 17,500-strong Russian community.

We are doing everything to ensure that no strings are available to be pulled by the aggressor state that could make Ukrainian society suffer.”

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‘We’re really worried’: US supermarket mega-merger raises mass layoff fears

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Kroger and Albertsons seek deal through FTC but employees say previous merger experience has them deeply concerned

Thousands of workers at two of America’s biggest supermarkets are warning of potential mass layoffs as the giant firms push for a merger.

Kroger, the second largest grocery chain in the US, and Albertsons, the fourth largest, are pushing for a merger through the Federal Trade Commission, which is reviewing the proposal.

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Iran carries out second execution linked to nationwide protests

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Majidreza Rahnavard accused of fatally stabbing security force members early in protests sparked by Mahsa Amini’s death in custody

Iran has publicly hanged a man accused of killing two members of the security forces in its second use of capital punishment against anti-government protesters.

Majidreza Rahnavard’s family were woken early on Monday morning to be informed that he had been executed and that his body had been buried in a lot in the local cemetery.

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China scraps tracking app as zero-Covid policy is dismantled

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Health authorities sound warning on infection rate, with hundreds of thousands of doctors redeployed across the country

China has announced plans to scrap its primary Covid tracking app in the latest rollback of pandemic control measures, just days after abruptly abandoning its long-running zero-Covid policy.

It came as health authorities warned of widespread infections on the horizon, and redeployed hundreds of thousands of doctors and nurses to intensive care units in preparation for an Omicron surge through the population of 1.4 billion people.

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Renewed fighting in DRC raises fears of chaotic proxy conflict

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Conflict has displaced at least 400,000 people since March in a growing humanitarian crisis

In the camps on the flanks of the Nyiragongo volcano in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, they listen carefully. Not for warning of an eruption but to the dull thuds of distant mortar and artillery fire. Some days there are none, and hopes are raised. On other days, the sounds of war make clear to every one of the thousands of villagers huddled in their makeshift shelters that they will not be going anywhere very soon.

“We want to return home to cultivate our fields and keep our cows, sheep and goats because we are here and we are hungry. We are suffering a lot,” said Nsambimana Ashiwe, 64, at a displacement camp in Kanyaruchinya, a few miles south of the frontlines.

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Peru president paves way for early elections after two killed in latest protests

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Dina Boluarte says she will submit bill to move elections forward by two years as thousands take to streets after ousting of predecessor Pedro Castillo

Peru’s new president, Dina Boluarte, has announced plans to move forward with general elections amid deadly protests over the ousting of her predecessor Pedro Castillo after he attempted to dissolve congress.

In a televised address early on Monday, Boluarte said she would submit a bill to bring general elections forward two years, to April 2024. But her proposal is unlikely to placate surging protests as Castillo supporters call for Peru’s widely loathed congress to be closed and early elections.

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China preparing fresh pretext to practise future attacks, says Taiwan foreign minister

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Joseph Wu says that communication with China has become more difficult after a purge of some factions within the Communist party

Taiwan’s government believes China is preparing to find another “pretext for practising their future attack” on the island, its foreign minister has said, after a record-breaking year of military threats and incursions.

Joseph Wu also suggested cross-strait communications may diminish even further now that Xi Jinping has secured his third term, with last month’s extraordinary political purges of rival Communist party members severing the few unofficial ties remaining.

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Friend of Giorgia Meloni among three dead in Rome coffee shop shooting

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Suspect, 57, opens fire on a meeting of apartment block residents but police yet to comment on motive

A man who opened fire on a meeting of apartment block residents in a coffee shop in northern Rome has killed three people, including a friend of the Italian prime minister, Giorgia Meloni.

The suspect, 57, had been in a series of disputes with the residents’ association, a witness told Italy’s Rai News.

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