Fryzo Nieuwsheadlines The Guardian van woensdag 22 maart 2023 10:18:08

Just 16.9% of unionist and nationalist voters oppose post-Brexit deal, survey finds

People in Northern Ireland who support Rishi Sunak’s post-Brexit deal vastly outnumber those who oppose it, according to a survey.

Asked if they opposed the Windsor framework, just 16.9% of voters agreed, suggesting there is a desire to move on from political battles over trading arrangements. Overall 45% of voters did not oppose the revised deal, with around a third neither agreeing or disagreeing.

UK Ministry of Defence says some Russian units have been ‘reallocated to other sectors’

• Russia-Ukraine war at a glance

Suspilne, Ukraine’s state broadcaster, reports from Zaporizhzhia: “During the past day, 21 March, the Russian military shelled civilian infrastructure in the area of 20 settlements of the Zaporizhzhia region.”

The claim has not been independently verified.

This is Martin Belam taking over the live blog in London. You can contact me at martin.belam@theguardian.com

Leifer has been on trial for nearly six weeks on over the alleged abuse of three sisters when she was principal of the Adass Israel school

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Jurors have begun deliberating over allegations former ultra-Orthodox Jewish principal Malka Leifer sexually abused three vulnerable students.

After nearly six weeks of evidence and addresses from lawyers, 12 jurors retired to consider their verdicts on Wednesday afternoon.

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Joel Russo raped the woman and held her head under water at Merri Creek in 2019

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A man has admitted to holding a female jogger’s head under creek water and repeatedly raping her in an attack described by a Victorian judge as “every woman’s nightmare”.

Joel Russo, 28, pleaded guilty in Victoria’s county court to rape, sexual assault and conduct endangering a person after attacking a woman in Melbourne’s north in 2019.

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Messages sent prior to violent confrontation encouraged group to ‘grab them and drag them by their fucking hair’

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Videos circulating on WhatsApp in the days before LGBTQ+ activists say they were set upon by a mob outside a church in Sydney urged people to disrupt the protest and “drag” the LGBTQ+ activists away “by their fucking hair” and to “defend our family values”.

Two men were arrested after a violent altercation between a group of men and LGBTQ+ protesters outside a Catholic church in the south-west Sydney suburb of Belfield, where One Nation’s Mark Latham was giving a speech about “parental rights” and “religious freedom”.

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Opposition attempts to move bill but possible expulsion of Moira Deeming from Liberals threatens to expose party faultlines

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Peter Dutton has proposed a federal ban on Nazi symbols as the Coalition takes up Labor’s challenge to condemn Nazi glorification, but deflects calls to back the expulsion of Victorian MP Moira Deeming.

On Wednesday morning the Coalition unsuccessfully attempted to suspend standing orders to move a private member’s bill to criminalise Nazi symbols, as states, including Victoria and New South Wales, have done.

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• Peter Dutton proposes criminalisation of Nazi symbols after Tuesday’s question time stoush
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Voice negotiations

The referendum machinery legislation will set up how the voice referendum will run – the machinery surruounding the vote, if you will.

We’re negotiating in good faith in the Senate that’s being led by Jane Hume who is doing an outstanding job. What we said to the government in the beginning is what we’re saying to them now and that is that we are not prepared to trash decades of referendum precedent, and not do this in a way that Australians expect us to, in their interests, for their information.

We’re asking for a pamphlet to outline the yes and no case, and we’ve talked about that. We’re asking for equal funding of the yes or no case, not the millions of dollars that may go into a public campaign on either side of this debate, but just the administration funding.

Fifty-seven per cent of the population does not want to open new coal and gas mines and I think there’s a very clear message coming through there. Secondly, no, I have got a lot of time for Jacqui Lambie, but we had an emissions trading scheme in this country and she was part of a party that voted to repeal it so let’s let’s not get too carried away with the spin here.

We’re in a climate crisis, as the UN secretary general has made clear. The decisions that we make now will reverberate for generations to come and the big decisions that we’ve got to make, do we open new coal and gas mines or not?

Gavin Fineff, who stole millions of dollars from clients and friends to service his addiction, sends message to politicians in Canberra

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The man who triggered a gambling regulator’s “most significant decision of the decade” has urged federal politicians to launch a “radical intervention” to stop the harm caused by online sports gambling.

The former financial adviser Gavin Fineff stole millions of dollars from his clients and friends – some of whom were elderly and vulnerable – to service his gambling addiction. He lost more than $8m to sports betting companies, which has not been returned to his victims.

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In Australia, Gambling Help Online is available on 1800 858 858. The National Debt Helpline is at 1800 007 007. In the UK, support for problem gambling can be found through GamCare on 0808 8020 133. In the US, the National Council on Problem Gambling is on 800-522-4700

Chinese capital saw more deaths than births in 2022 as high cost of living and education as well as legacy of one-child policy take their toll

Beijing’s population has declined for the first time in almost two decades, new population figures have revealed.

In 2022 there were more deaths than births in the Chinese capital, home to more than 21 million people, resulting in a natural population growth of minus 0.05 per 1,000 people. It is the first time the population has gone backwards since 2003.

Tsai Ing-wen will visit allies Guatemala and Belize next week, and stopover in the US, after Honduras said it would establish ‘official relations’ with China

Taiwan’s defence ministry has contingency plans for any moves by China during Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen’s visit to the US and Central America, deputy defence minister Po Horng-huei has said ahead of Tsai’s departure next week.

China, which claims democratically governed Taiwan as its own territory, carried out large-scale, live-fire war games around the island last August after a visit to Taipei by then-US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

Love Better campaign includes a video that encourages teenagers to delete their exes on social media

“OK, I’m doing it. I’m officially deleting my ex from all my socials,” a young woman says, looking determinedly into her phone screen. She leans closer and whispers: “I’m moving on.”

The footage appears in a New Zealand government video which affirms the universal truth that “breakups suck”, as part of an unusual new campaign to support young people through their experience of being dumped and suggest healthy ways to process their feelings.

Aircraft will take off and land vertically, and carry a single passenger between transport hubs, says capital’s airports operator

Athletes are getting in shape for the Paris Olympic Games in 2024, and so is the world’s first electric air taxi network.

“We are going to make it happen,” Solène Le Bris of Paris airports operator Groupe ADP told an industry audience at Amsterdam Drone Week. “We are trying to launch the first e-VTOL [vertical takeoff and landing] pre-commercial service in the world: that’s our ambition.”

Human rights campaigners condemn bill introducing capital and life imprisonment sentences

MPs in Uganda have passed a controversial anti-LGBTQ+ bill, which would make homosexual acts punishable by death, attracting strong condemnation from rights campaigners.

All but two of the 389 legislators voted late on Tuesday for the hardline anti-homosexuality bill, which introduces capital and life imprisonment sentences for gay sex and “recruitment, promotion and funding” of same-sex “activities”.

Russian leader reacts to comments by UK defence minister that Britain will supply armour-piercing rounds to Kyiv

• Russia-Ukraine war – latest news updates

Vladimir Putin has sought to exploit a British statement that it would supply Ukraine with tank shells made with depleted uranium, arguing that the delivery of the armour-piercing weapons would prompt a Russian response.

The Russian leader’s comments, made during the visit to Moscow by his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping, came in response to a parliamentary answer given by a junior British defence minister in the House of Lords on Monday.

But US warns against ‘any tactical move by Russia to freeze the war on its own terms’

Vladimir Putin has welcomed China’s proposals for peace in Ukraine at a joint press conference with Xi Jinping in Moscow – a plan the west has warned would allow the Kremlin to “freeze” its territorial gains in the country.

Speaking at the Kremlin during a joint news conference after the second day of talks with China’s president, Xi Jinping, Putin said Beijing’s peace plan “correlates to the point of view of the Russian Federation” and said that Ukraine’s western allies so far have shown no interest in it.

Rishi Sunak’s attitude ‘much more responsible’ than that of Boris Johnson, says former EU negotiator

The EU’s former Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier has praised the agreement on Northern Ireland between the union and the British government as a positive step that turns a page in relations between the two sides.

In an interview with the Guardian, the veteran French politician said the Windsor framework agreement signed by Rishi Sunak and the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, last month, “operationalised” the Northern Ireland protocol he had negotiated with the British government in 2019. “There was a spirit of goodwill for the first time in three years, to find solutions that are concrete, operational and realistic.”

‘Specialized support force’ urged for Caribbean state where 530 have been killed in gang-led violence so far this year

The United Nations has called for the deployment of an international “specialized support force” to impede Haiti’s accelerating tumble into extreme violence after more than 530 people were killed in the opening weeks of this year.

“Clashes between gangs are becoming more violent and more frequent,” the spokesperson for the UN human rights office, Marta Hurtado, warned on Tuesday, voicing “grave concern” that the security situation was spiraling out of control.

Lenin Artieda was one of several journalists targeted by explosive devices mailed out across the country

An Ecuadorian television presenter was wounded after a bomb disguised as a USB stick exploded when he inserted it in his computer, after explosive devices were sent to journalists across the country.

Lenin Artieda suffered minor injuries in the blast, which happened in the newsroom of Ecuavisa TV in Guayaquil.

Distributor gives no reason for cancellation, but Chinese censors have targeted Pooh before due to Xi Jinping comparisons

The screening of Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey, a British slasher film due to be released in Hong Kong this week, has been cancelled, its distributor said on Tuesday, without giving a reason for pulling it.

VII Pillars Entertainment said on its Facebook page that it was with “great regret” that the scheduled release of the film on 23 March had been cancelled. It did not give further details.

Ally’s criticism will be hard to dismiss as UK tries to push through £120m migrant scheme

Britain’s closest ally, the US, has criticised Rwanda’s dire human rights record, describing conditions in the country’s detention centres as harsh to life-threatening.

The British home secretary, Suella Braverman, took a group of journalists on a trip last week to reveal details of her £120m scheme to send all migrants arriving in the UK through irregular means to Rwanda whether they claim asylum or not. The legality of the scheme is due to be tested shortly in the UK court of appeal.

Previously unseen genomic samples suggest animals at Huanan market were potential source

Newly released data from early in the Covid-19 pandemic has offered a crucial insight into the outbreak’s origins, suggesting that Covid-infected animals were present at a market in Wuhan and could have been a “potential source of human infections”.

A pre-print report on Monday by a team of international researchers fleshed out analysis of previously unseen genomic samples collected by Chinese scientists at the Huanan market in Wuhan in the early days of the pandemic.

Chinese and Russian leaders to discuss Ukraine in formal talks after friendly dinner, while Fumio Kishida meets Volodymyr Zelenskiy in Kyiv

• Russia-Ukraine war: latest updates

Xi Jinping has invited Vladimir Putin to visit China this year in a symbolic show of support after the international criminal court issued an arrest warrant for Russia’s president over accusations of unlawfully deporting Ukrainian children.

The Chinese leader extended the invitation during a meeting on Tuesday morning with the Russian prime minister, Mikhail Mishustin, as part of his state visit to Moscow.

New report uncovers tragic scale of climate-led crisis and warns of up to 34,000 more deaths so far this year

A new report released by the Somalian government suggests that far more children died in the country last year due to the ongoing drought than previously realised.

The study estimates that there were 43,000 excess deaths in 2022 in Somalia due to the deepening drought compared with similar droughts in 2017 and 2018.

Invasive house mice threaten endangered seabirds and wildlife on Marion Island in Indian Ocean

Non-native house mice are to be removed from Marion Island in the southern Indian Ocean to protect the wandering albatross and other endangered seabirds, in the world’s largest eradication programme of its kind.

Mice accidentally introduced on to the remote island by 19th-century seal hunters have thrived in warmer and drier conditions over the past 30 years, devastating the island’s invertebrates and plants, and then devouring the chicks and even adults of ground- and burrow-nesting seabirds.

Ethiopian, Eritrean and rebel forces committed offences during two-year conflict, Antony Blinken has said

The United States has concluded that Ethiopian and Eritrean troops as well as rebels committed war crimes during the brutal two-year conflict, secretary of state Antony Blinken has said after visiting Addis Ababa.

Blinken, who had sounded upbeat in Ethiopia about the prospects for peace after a breakthrough 2 November accord, made a forceful call for accountability on his return to Washington.

Two victims and the student taken to hospital for treatment after incident in Halifax

Police officers have arrested a student on suspicion of stabbing two staff members at a high school in Canada’s Atlantic coast city of Halifax, police said.

The two victims and the student were taken to hospital for treatment after the attack on Monday, and the extent of their injuries remains unclear. Halifax regional police confirmed that the suspect is a student at the school.

Home secretary’s claims of ‘constructive’ talks regarding Strasbourg’s injunctions disputed by legal scholars

Legal experts have cast doubt on the UK’s claims of “possible reforms” to European court of human rights procedures that stopped an asylum seeker from being deported to Rwanda last year.

During a two-day visit to the country’s capital, Kigali, Suella Braverman told a selected group of government-friendly papers that she was “encouraged” by the government’s “constructive” talks with Strasbourg to overhaul court injunctions. An ECHR injunction last June prevented an Iraqi national from being deported from the UK to the east African country.

Jackie Lansing sues coffee chain for C$500,000 after cup of tea that ‘collapsed’ and spilled on her stomach and legs left her ‘disfigured’

An Ontario woman and her family are suing Canada’s best-known coffee chain for C$500,000 ($366,000), alleging Tim Hortons served her “superheated” tea in a defective cup that left her with “horrific” burns on her body.

Jackie Lansing, 73, ordered a black tea while at a drive-through in southern Ontario last year.

Magnitude 6.8 quake shakes area 50 miles south of Ecuador’s second city, Guayaquil, with one death reported so far in Peru

A strong earthquake shook southern Ecuador and northern Peru on Saturday, killing at least 15 people, trapping others under rubble, and sending rescue teams out into streets littered with debris and fallen power lines.

The US Geological Survey reported an earthquake with a magnitude of about 6.8 in the country’s coastal Guayas region. Its centre was about 50 miles (80km) south of Guayaquil, which has a metropolitan area of more than 3 million people.