Sunday, 5 June 2022

The Guardian

The Guardian

Putin warns that Moscow will hit new targets if the west supplies Ukraine with long-range missiles – as it happened

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 05:25 PM PDT

This live blog is now closed, you can find our latest coverage of the Russia-Ukraine war here

President Vladimir Putin said Russia would strike new targets if the United States started supplying Ukraine with longer-range missiles, the TASS news agency reported on Sunday.

The TASS news agency reports:

Putin said that if such missiles are supplied, that Russia will strike at those targets which we have not yet been hitting", in an Rossiya-1 state television channel

Putin did not name the targets Russia planned to pursue if western countries began supplying Ukraine with longer-range missiles.

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Wales seal place at 2022 World Cup as playoff final win ends Ukraine hopes

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 11:05 AM PDT

This was never going to be an occasion short of lasting images. Perhaps the most memorable from a night Wales will always treasure was the sight of Gareth Bale singing along to Yma o Hyd as the entire squad, some wearing tricolour bucket hats that are a nod to their last appearance at a World Cup in 1958, all moonlighting as Dafydd Iwan's backing choir, swayed to the soundtrack of their journey to Qatar. Tony Roberts, the goalkeeping coach who rushed to Wayne Hennessey at the final whistle following his heroic performance and led the team on an impromptu conga down the tunnel, played the role of conductor. After a glossary of painful near-misses, Wales will again play on the world stage after edging out Ukraine in a nail-biting and fraught playoff final.

From Bale being deep in conversation with Oleksandr Zinchenko seconds after the final whistle to all four sides of this stadium applauding Ukraine as they trudged off the pitch, emotions were, understandably, in overdrive. Then there was Aaron Ramsey pulling his shirt over his head, fresh from clutching his son, wearing a replica No 10 shirt, in his arms. Connor Roberts collapsed to the floor and repeatedly punched the air in a state of disbelief. Daniel James piggy-backed a member of backroom staff. Bale blew kisses towards his family, Robert Page beat his chest.

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UK to send long-range rocket artillery to Ukraine despite Russian threats

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 04:01 PM PDT

M270 launch systems have 50-mile range and can target Russian artillery that has been attacking cities in eastern Ukraine

Britain is to supply long-range rocket artillery to Ukraine, despite a threat on Sunday from Russia's president, Vladimir Putin, to bomb fresh targets if similar weapons from the US were delivered to Kyiv.

The UK will send a handful of tracked M270 multiple launch rocket systems, which can hit targets up to 50 miles away, in the hope they can disrupt the concentrated Russian artillery that has been pounding cities in eastern Ukraine.

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‘I believe in our army’: life in Donbas as the frontline creeps closer

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 07:49 AM PDT

Living conditions getting steadily worse as Moscow continues to concentrate its firepower on Ukraine's east

After five grimy days on the frontline, Slava Vladimirovich stripped to his underpants and plunged into the gleaming Torets River. A seagull flapped over the water and willow trees. "Life goes on, even in wartime," Slava said. Wringing out his khaki T-shirt, he added: "In battle there is nowhere to wash."

Slava ran up a muddy embankment and showed off his armoured transporter. On the roof was a joystick-controlled machine gun. Shrapnel had dinted the vehicle's right side. There was a crack in a porthole-like window. "A Russian rocket landed 20 metres from us. We were OK but two civilians got killed," he said.

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Schiff: DoJ decision not to indict Trump ex-aides Meadows and Scavino a ‘grave disappointment’

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 09:54 AM PDT

Member of Capitol attack committee says decision not to charge the two with contempt of Congress could 'impede our work'

California congressman Adam Schiff – a member of the select House committee investigating the deadly Capitol riots – said Sunday it was "a grave disappointment" that federal prosecutors opted against charging two former Trump White House officials who ignored subpoenas seeking information on the January 6 attack.

Schiff said on CBS's Face the Nation that he couldn't see why the federal justice department would treat Donald Trump's former chief of staff Mark Meadows and communications coordinator Dan Scavino differently than it did ex-aides Peter Navarro and Steve Bannon.

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Philadelphia, Tennessee and Michigan shootings leave at least nine dead and 27 wounded

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 04:57 PM PDT

Gunfire erupted Saturday night in Philadelphia's downtown area and near a Chattanooga nightclub and north-west of Detroit on Sunday morning

Gunfire killed three people and wounded at least 11 in one of downtown Philadelphia's most popular entertainment districts late on Saturday night, hours before separate shootings in Tennessee and Michigan left six dead and at least 16 wounded, authorities said.

The violence erupted as many, including US president Joe Biden, call on Congress to enact meaningful gun control measures, especially in the wake of deadly mass shootings last month in Buffalo, New York, and Uvalde, Texas.

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‘We’re still struggling’: low unemployment can’t hide impact of low wages and rising inflation

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 11:00 PM PDT

Workers in Las Vegas are still feeling the effects of employers' pandemic cuts – all made worse by rising inflation and low wages

In the rotating restaurant at the top of the Strat hotel and casino, guests can once again enjoy $20 cocktails or a $90 shellfish display for two while taking in the expansive views of downtown Las Vegas from its landmark tower. After the Covid shutdown, Vegas is back in business. But not everyone seems happy, or sure how long it will last.

On a recent afternoon, just out of view of the hotel's 1,000-plus feet (350-metre) spike, a couple of hundred hospitality service workers were gathered in a nearby car park. In baking 90F ( 32C) heat, speakers told the workers that they must fight to get improved contracts and controls for soaring rents. "Sí, se puede" – yes, we can – they shouted outside the headquarters of Nevada's powerful Culinary Workers Union.

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NBA finals Game 2: Boston Celtics v Golden State Warriors – live!

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 06:33 PM PDT

Alec John Such, founding member of Bon Jovi, dies aged 70

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 02:54 PM PDT

New York-born Such played bass for American rock band in its 1980s heyday

Alec John Such, the bassist and a founding member of Bon Jovi, has died. He was 70.

Jon Bon Jovi on Sunday announced the death of Such, the New Jersey rock band's bassist from 1983 to 1994. No details of when or how he died were immediately available.

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Nigeria: gunmen kill dozens in ‘satanic’ attack on Catholic church

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 10:12 AM PDT

At least 50 people killed and dozens more injured in assault during Sunday mass in Ondo state

Gunmen launched an assault on a Catholic church in Ondo state in Nigeria during mass on Sunday, killing more than 50 people in a "satanic attack", local officials and volunteers said.

The attackers targeted the St Francis Xavier Catholic Church in the town of Owo as the worshippers gathered on Pentecost Sunday, according to local officials. They gunned down parishioners and detonated an explosive device, local media reported.

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Johnson prepares fightback as allies admit confidence vote now likely

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 12:07 PM PDT

PM will launch last-ditch attempt this week to win over critics in Tory ranks with health and housing policy announcements

Boris Johnson's allies will switch their focus to winning a vote of no confidence, after conceding that they now have little chance of stopping one being triggered.

The prime minister will this week launch a health and housing policy fightback in a last-ditch attempt to win over his critics. He is widely expected to face a vote on his leadership as soon as this week, with some MPs predicting that the threshold of 54 letters asking for one has already been exceeded.

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South Korea and US fire eight missiles into sea in show of force to North Korea

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 05:29 PM PDT

Monday morning launches demonstrate 'capability and readiness to carry out precision strikes' on regime, a day after it carried out its own launches

South Korea and the United States fired eight surface-to-surface missiles early on Monday into the sea in response to North Korea's launch of a barrage of short-range ballistic missiles the previous day, a South Korea defence ministry official said.

The action off South Korea's east coast was a demonstration of Seoul's "capability and readiness to carry out precision strikes" against the source of North Korea's missile launches or the command and support centres, Yonhap news agency cited the South Korean military as saying.

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Biden commerce secretary shifts blame for inflation onto Russia’s war in Ukraine

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 11:35 AM PDT

Gina Raimondo's comments seen as part of a White House push to deflect blame for nation's economic troubles away from Biden

Joe Biden's commerce secretary Gina Raimondo attempted on Sunday to shift blame for the US inflation crisis back onto Russia's war in Ukraine, days after another cabinet member admitted the presidential administration had made failures in predicting its impact on the economy.

Janet Yellen, the treasury secretary, conceded last week she made an error in 2021 when she said inflation, which has only recently dropped from a near 40-year high, posed merely a "small risk".

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Google ordered to pay John Barilaro $715,000 over Friendlyjordies YouTube videos

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 05:02 PM PDT

Tech giant and comedian Jordan Shanks may face contempt of court charges over videos published during trial

Google has been ordered to pay former New South Wales deputy premier John Barilaro more than $700,000 over a series of "racist" and "abusive" videos published on YouTube channel Friendlyjordies.

On Monday, federal court justice Stephen Rares ruled that Barilaro had been left "traumatised" by a campaign of "relentless cyberbullying" by comedian Jordan Shanks, who uses the nom de plume Friendlyjordies

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Diabetes drug leads to notable weight loss in people with obesity – study

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 09:02 AM PDT

Experts say the apparent effects of a weekly dose of tirzepatide are potentially game changing

A weekly dose of a diabetes drug appears to lead to significant weight loss in people with obesity, in a development experts have hailed as gamechanging.

Obesity causes 1.2 million deaths in Europe each year, according to the World Health Organization, and the UK has one of the worst obesity rates.

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‘Humbled and deeply touched’: Queen thanks nation as four-day jubilee ends

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 12:18 PM PDT

In a message at the climax of celebrations, monarch acknowledges her fragility but commits to continue her reign

The Queen crowned her historic platinum jubilee celebrations with a last-minute appearance on the balcony of Buckingham Palace on Sunday, bringing to a close four days of festivities that revealed not only the contents of her handbag, but a nation's undiminished appetite for a party.

The 96-year-old monarch waved to cheering crowds gathered in the Mall for the carnival climax of the four-day bank holiday weekend.

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Rafael Nadal defies time and Casper Ruud to win his 14th French Open title

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 08:33 AM PDT

  • Nadal seals dominant 6-3, 6-3, 6-0 win at Roland Garros
  • Spaniard takes his record career grand slam tally to 22

In recent years as he has edged ever closer towards the twilight of his career, Rafael Nadal has continually discussed his advancing age with total disdain. While many see its silver linings in its maturity, he sees none.

It has gradually taken away one of the greatest assets, his athleticism. It has made his body, which has had far too many injuries, even more prone to them. Regardless, for 20 years he has approached his career with the same positive attitude, the same calmness, the same acceptance and fight, and in the process has continued to perform wonders so long into it.

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Newly released doctor’s letters show Adolf Hitler’s fear of illness

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 05:10 AM PDT

Carl Otto von Eicken, an ear, nose and throat specialist, treated Nazi dictator for 10 years from 1935

The Swiss descendant of one of Adolf Hitler's doctors has released details of letters that show how he treated the Nazi dictator for voice problems, the newspaper NZZ am Sonntag reported on Sunday.

The letters show Hitler's fear of serious illness. "If there is something bad, I absolutely have to know," Hitler told the doctor after their first consultation in May 1935, according to the letters.

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Will Los Angeles re-elect its scandal-plagued sheriff?

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 03:00 AM PDT

Elected on promises of reform, Alex Villanueva is now derided as the 'Trump of LA' while fueling controversy after controversy

Los Angeles county voters are headed to the polls on Tuesday to decide the fate of a scandal-plagued sheriff who critics have derided as the "Donald Trump of LA".

The Los Angeles county sheriff, Alex Villanueva, runs the largest county sheriff's office in the US and manages one of the world's largest jail systems, overseeing thousands of officers who patrol nearly 200 southern California towns and cities.

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‘How could I sit at my desk as Ukrainian children die?’: small-town newspaperman heads to war

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 03:15 AM PDT

The editor-reporter-photographer says he'll do whatever he can to help and hopes others will follow his lead

Lee Zion is preparing to head to Ukraine this summer.

"I have gotten all my shots. I have started putting personal possessions into storage, giving other things away. I've adopted out two cats," he said. "And minor things – I'm trying to learn the language. I can at least communicate some basic needs. Like 'me want cookie,'" he said.

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‘I see this money as not mine’: the people giving away fortunes from slavery and fossil fuels

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 01:00 AM PDT

What would you do if your inherited wealth was built on slavery, fossil fuels or came at the price of neglect? Meet the guilty rich who want nothing to do with their money

Morgan Curtis's life story is the American Dream in reverse. Her great, great, great grandfather was a banker in early 1800s New York – he invested in railroads, while his brother invested in Central American mines. The family wealth grew as it passed through the generations, and Curtis's father added to the pile as a management consultant for "major" firms. Naturally, Curtis had a gilded childhood: educated in west London private schools; going on annual Swiss ski holidays; her own pony. But today, Curtis, now 30, lives on a farm in California with 40 other people. She lives on $25,000 (£20,000) a year.

Curtis did not make bad investments, or lose the family money in Las Vegas. She has chosen to give up 100% of her inheritance and 50% of the income she earns as a coach, "redistributing" it to grassroots social movements, Black liberation organisations, indigenous land projects and climate justice groups. She has even created a publicly accessible, colour-coded spreadsheet listing her annual donations.

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‘I’m living in the bubble’: the man who helped bring Nixon down, 50 years on

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 11:00 PM PDT

John Dean speaks on the 1972 Watergate break-in and why he has never been more concerned about US democracy than now

"I've never escaped Watergate," says John Dean, as once again he allows the years to melt away, the old faces to crowd in and the secret tapes to whirr in his mind. "There's just no choice. I'm living in the bubble. It's become a fact of life."

America has never escaped Watergate either. The biggest political scandal of the 20th century, and the only one to cause a presidential resignation, has become a byword for lost innocence and lost faith in institutions. Along with the Vietnam war, it marked the end of an era in which a president's words were met with automatic trust rather than default scepticism.

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I’m 80, and a needy widower won’t take no for an answer

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 10:00 PM PDT

It sounds like you will have to be explicit at setting boundaries

The dilemma At the advanced age of 80 it seems a bit strange for me to ask for help in dealing with the expectations of an elderly admirer. Surely at this age I should be able to sort myself out. My beloved husband of many years died a few years ago. The children and grandchildren have been a huge comfort. I am still working and I live a busy solo life.

I was introduced to an older widowed man by a friend. Before I knew what was happening I found myself almost immediately swept into an affair. At first it was a bit romantic and made me feel desirable again. But, oh dear, I am afraid the desire wore off fast when I discovered more about his habits and how needy he was. I found I was expected to be, at all times, available for messages and telephone calls, as well as chauffeur him about and to help run his life. He said he'd fallen in love with me and wanted to spend what was left of his time on earth with me. But was I in love with him? The answer was no. I could not cope with his emotional needs and the physical side of things was most unsatisfactory. He is an amusing and educated man, but wholly self-interested and seemingly obsessed with capturing me. It drains my energy.

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The federal government is offering $10bn to small businesses – here’s how to apply

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 04:00 AM PDT

The program offers funds to minority-owned businesses, or those in low-income areas, as well as to companies that have trouble attracting financing

A not-so-new federal program to help small businesses just began distributing funds this past week. How much? How does $10bn sound?

That's not a joke. The federal government is making available $10bn and all small businesses in the country are eligible for the money. This is not the paycheck protection program or the economic injury disaster loan program. Both of those Covid-relief efforts have expired. This is also not a loan program from the Small Business Administration. It's from the treasury department. The program is called the state small business credit initiative, or SSBCI, and it works like this.

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How the acclaimed Billy Wilder tried and failed to snub Hollywood

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 01:00 AM PDT

The new film 'Mr Wilder & Me' reveals how a search for funding led the director on an uneasy journey back to the central Europe he fled

Some Like It Hot, Double Indemnity and The Apartment were just some of the classics that made Billy Wilder one of the most successful and lauded directors in Hollywood.

But when, in his 70s, he set out to make a movie telling the story of how an ageing screen siren, Fedora, is lured out of retirement, he was snubbed by the very studios that had once feted him.

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Timid Biden condemns Ukrainians to an agonising war without end | Simon Tisdall

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 01:00 AM PDT

By failing to act boldly and face down the Russians, Nato ensures this conflict will run and run

It seems odd, to put it mildly, that Joe Biden is happy to supply Ukraine with advanced rockets as long as it does not fire them at Russia. Vladimir Putin can aim missiles at Ukrainians from across the border whenever he wants – but Volodymyr Zelenskiy's troops can't shoot back at their tormentors.

Strange, too, that the UN is seeking Russia's agreement for convoys to escort grain from Odesa and other Ukrainian ports. It's Putin who is preventing 22 million tonnes of grain reaching the Middle East and Africa, where millions face famine. Don't ask permission. Send a multinational force to smash his illegal blockade.

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Hillary Clinton is right: the age of the showman leader has damaged politics| Will Hutton

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 01:00 AM PDT

The former US secretary of state worries that it's not enough to get things done. Candidates need brazen performance

Performative politics is on trial and, for all its successes, has begun to be found wanting. Boris Johnson's electoral triumphs that delivered the debacle of Brexit and what is now obviously a zombie government have shown the limits of theatre and showmanship over substance, reason and integrity.

However, mastery of "performative politics", the term used by Hillary Clinton in an interview with me last week, has been until now a prerequisite for democratic success. Johnson is, or was, a master, the former US secretary of state acknowledged: the rumpled hair, artful self-deprecation and ever-present penchant to find the comic angle all a smokescreen to cover his ambition, entitlement and rightwing views. Masters also are Donald Trump, her husband, Bill, and Barack Obama, but the latter two both predated the worst of today's social media.

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The great Coronapause is over, but history tells us that complacency can be a killer | Mark Honigsbaum

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 01:30 AM PDT

Just as in the flu pandemic of the 19th century, waves of infections in the US and Portugal should remind us that Covid shows no signs of going away

Shortly before the first British lockdown, the Italian novelist Francesca Melandri wrote an open letter to the UK describing our soon-to-be coronavirus future. At the time, Melandri had been under lockdown in Rome for three weeks and cemeteries in Lombardy, in northern Italy, had run out of plots to bury the dead. "We are but a few steps ahead of you in the path of time, just like Wuhan was a few weeks ahead of us," Melandri warned. "You [will] hold the same arguments we did until a short time ago, between those who still say 'it's only a flu, why all the fuss?' and those who have already understood."

Melandri's predictions proved spot on. As British ICU wards filled with coronavirus patients, some commentators dismissed the measures as a media scare, arguing that Covid-19 was no worse than the 2009 swine flu. Others, grasping the urgency of the situation, offered to get the shopping in for elderly neighbours while cursing panic-buyers and joggers who refused to keep their distance.

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Platinum jubilee pageant mixes British eccentricity with a touch of chaos

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 12:36 PM PDT

Sunday's parade descended into random silliness after a bizarre and forgetful look at the UK through the decades

Forget Diana Ross, Rod Stewart and Elton John phoning in an appearance from abroad. It was always going to be a hard act to follow Paddington Bear and the corgi light show at Saturday night's party at the palace. But the royal family had decided that there had to be four days of platinum jubilee celebrations, and so the show had to go on. This time to a pageant that at times looked as if it had been organised by Prince Edward for It's a Royal Knockout.

The BBC's coverage began an hour and a half early at 1pm and presenter Kirsty Young initially looked as if she could not face another day of having to ask random guests about why the monarchy was so important both to them and the nation. She had already heard just about every possible answer, most of which were variations on duty, service and no one having come up with anything better.

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Sheryl Sandberg’s influence reaches all of us. But it’s a troubling legacy | Stephanie Hare

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 12:00 AM PDT

From epic data mining to shocking failures of content moderation, Meta's COO passes on a vast clean-up job

If you are reading this, odds are that you are one of the 2.87 billion daily users of the products offered by Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp. If you are not using any of these products, you are connected to people who do use them. And this connects you to Sheryl Sandberg, who resigned last week from her role as Meta's chief operating officer.

Even if you have never met her, interacted directly with her or read her books on corporate feminism or bereavement, Sandberg has had an impact on your life. She's not the only reason that our data is tracked online, whether we use Meta's products or not. Many others have helped to create and exploit an entire industry that profits from our data. What's more, lawmakers and regulators worldwide have done little to stop this, in no small part because companies like the ones Sandberg helped run spend millions of dollars every year lobbying to prevent or water down any attempts at regulation.

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JD Vance is firmly against banning guns – but he’s keen on banning porn | Arwa Mahdawi

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 06:00 AM PDT

In a 'newly unearthed' interview, the Republican opined that porn is one reason why birth rates in the US are declining. Porn is not to blame – but blaming it is easy

Like all Republicans, JD Vance thinks that banning guns is a very bad idea. On Thursday the Republican Senate candidate and bestselling author of the memoir Hillbilly Elegy tweeted a long explanation as to why Joe Biden's ideas about gun control are misguided. Enacting new laws won't do anything to improve the gun violence problem in the US, he tweeted. Bans don't work.

Arwa Mahdawi's new book, Strong Female Lead, is available for order

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Don’t let wasps spoil your jubilee picnic – be like an Argentinian, not like a badger | Seirian Sumner

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 03:00 AM PDT

Wasps are ecologically and economically important – and they don't want to sting you, they just want your sugar and sausages

Every summer, with the predictability of hay fever and impromptu barbecues, I am asked by friends, family, strangers and the media: "What's the point of wasps?"

Although some people will be starting to worry about wasps as they set out their jubilee picnics this bank holiday weekend, wasp complaint season usually kicks off in mid-August in the UK. It's my summer holiday calibrator, and generally peaks just about the time when I've started to unwind from the busy chaos of my life as an academic. I'm not grumbling (my family does that for me); I never turn down the chance to evangelise about wasps. But I am beginning to sound like a stuck record.

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A passenger chased me down the plane galley – for cabin crew, this is just a normal day at the office | Anonymous

Posted: 02 Jun 2022 10:00 PM PDT

Flights delayed, airports in state of pandemonium, holidays ruined: airlines blame Covid and Brexit, but it's all their fault

I've worked as cabin crew for six years, and I've never been so exhausted. I'm not the kind of person who usually suffers with fatigue, but crew are facing catastrophic and sustained levels of understaffing. Despite what you might hear about the travel chaos facing hard-working families who just want to get away for a well earned half-term break, being asked to travel with hand luggage alone to try to alleviate the huge delays and cancellations, the pandemonium at Britain's airports doesn't affect passengers alone.

Crew members are flying more than ever. Our hours are longer, our schedule more gruelling and our pay a pittance. Working for airlines used to be about luxury and glamour. Now, many of us can't even afford to live near the airports, so we drive for hours to get home after long-haul flights on dangerously little sleep. Crew members are so tired they are having accidents – closed social media groups are full of tips for staying awake at the wheel.

The writer works as cabin crew for a major airline. As told to Lucy Pasha-Robinson

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USMNT show support for gun control before draw with Uruguay

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 04:43 PM PDT

  • US Soccer asks Congress for tighter gun legislation
  • American forward again fail to find net in 0-0 draw

The US men's national team wore orange armbands in support of tighter gun control before their 0-0 draw with Uruguay on Sunday.

The move came after the US Soccer Federation wrote to Congress asking for stricter gun laws following several mass shootings in America in recent weeks. The US House of Representatives is set to vote on gun legislation in the next week.

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Minjee Lee wins her second major title with dominant victory at US Women’s Open

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 04:08 PM PDT

  • Australian wins by four strokes at Pine Needles in North Carolina
  • Lee holds nerve to extend overnight three-shot lead

Minjee Lee has joined Australia's all-time golf greats as a multiple major champion with a runaway victory at the US Women's Open in North Carolina.

Lee converted a three-stroke third-round lead into a four-shot triumph at Pine Needles Country Club to pocket a cheque for $US1.8m ($A2.5m).

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Injured Mets ace Max Scherzer confirms pitching hand was bitten by dog

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 10:36 AM PDT

  • Scherzer's dog bites pitching hand, Mets ace says no worries
  • Bizarre ailment follows Francisco Lindor's hotel door injury

Injured Mets ace Max Scherzer confirmed Saturday that his dog bit his pitching hand this week, but he says the wound won't slow his recovery from an oblique strain.

The New York Post reported Saturday that the right-handed Scherzer was bitten by a dog on his left hand, a second bizarre injury for New York this week after shortstop Francisco Lindor got his right hand caught in a hotel door and fractured the tip of his middle finger.

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Canada men’s team refuses to train amid World Cup compensation disagreement

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 08:09 AM PDT

  • Canada's training sessions scrapped amid compensation talks
  • Friendly against Panama on Sunday in Vancouver at risk

Canada's preparations for this year's World Cup were plunged into further turmoil as players went on a de-facto strike in Vancouver ahead of the country's hastily re-arranged friendly with Panama on Sunday.

John Herdman's squad refused to train on both Friday and Saturday in an apparent protest over compensation and player perks for Qatar 2022, with months of fruitless talks reaching a head. The players and Canada Soccer are reportedly still markedly apart on demands with an initial report from TSN suggesting the players had asked for a 40% cut of World Cup revenues with the association offering just 10% of a Fifa windfall that is likely in the $10-15 million range.

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Australian George Kambosos Jr loses world lightweight titles to Devin Haney

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 09:52 PM PDT

  • Haney consigns Kambosos to first loss of career in Melbourne
  • American takes control to extend unbeaten record to 28 wins

Australian boxer George Kambosos Jr has relinquished his three world title belts with a unanimous defeat to American Devin Haney in their lightweight blockbuster in Melbourne.

Haney inflicted on Kambosos the first loss of his 21-fight career at Marvel Stadium on Sunday to add the WBA, WBO and IBF titles to the WBC strap he already held.

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‘Apocalyptic skies’: the dust storms devastating Gulf states and Syria

Posted: 03 Jun 2022 12:51 AM PDT

Rising frequency of storms due to climate crisis is causing more loss of life and more destruction, say experts

Blankets of thick gritty haze and ominous orange skies since early April have sent thousands to hospitals and resulted in at least four deaths in Iraq and in Syria.

The apocalyptic scenes have affected everyone. Hospitals in Syria have been on standby for residents unable to breathe. Iraq forced schools and offices to close in some provinces, and on 16 May declared a state of emergency. In the Gulf states, flights were halted in Kuwait, and both Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates issued dust storm alerts.

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From bricks to bags to eco art: six innovative uses for plastic waste around the world

Posted: 02 Jun 2022 11:45 PM PDT

From upcycled school benches in India to plant pots in Peru, people are finding enterprising and ingenious solutions to a perennial problem

When it rains in Uganda, plastic waste clogs street drains. For Faith Aweko, growing up in a slum in Kampala, the capital city, heavy downpours meant water flooding into the family home at the side of the road.

"During rainy seasons most of the roads here in Kampala are full of plastic bottles and bags because people dispose of plastic in trenches and gutters. This makes it hard for people like me in the slums," says Aweko. Along with Shamim Naluyima and Rachel Mema, two women she met on a course on social innovation, she launched Reform Africa in 2018, turning plastic waste into waterproof bags.

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How to feed the world without destroying it | podcast

Posted: 02 Jun 2022 07:00 PM PDT

George Monbiot on the growing global food crisis and the degradation of our soils. Can the solution be found in the lab?

When farming is degrading our soils and people are still going hungry, is it time to change how we get our food?

"Ninety-nine percent of our calories come from soil. Everything we are, everything we have built, everything in our lives comes from the soil. Without it, we're finished," says the author and environmentalist George Monbiot. "And yet, we treat it with extreme disrespect and disregard."

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Teenager Leila Mottley on writing her debut novel: ‘I’ve always done things at a warp speed’

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 06:00 AM PDT

The 19-year-old's uncommonly assured book Nightcrawling, about marginalised lives in her home town of Oakland, has won fans including Dave Eggers and Ruth Ozeki

"When I step away," says Kiara, of her latest, hopeless attempt to find herself a job, as a shop assistant, "I make sure to make a fist and pound lightly on the glass display counter. Not hard enough to risk breaking it, but enough that the twentysomethings look over at me with fear in their eyes before I swing out the door and back on to the street."

Kiara is the sparky 17-year-old protagonist of a debut novel by Leila Mottley, who is just two years older and looks set to face no such problems. With days to go to publication, Nightcrawling is already accumulating fans among writers such as Dave Eggers and Ruth Ozeki with its portrait of hard-scrabble life in the California city of Oakland.

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Russia: Revolution and Civil War 1917-1921 by Antony Beevor review – butchery of the Bolsheviks

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 05:00 AM PDT

Personal testimonies humanise the Stalingrad author's mesmerising study of the bloody battle for power after the collapse of the tsarist regime

The Russian Revolution is an event that, even over a century later, remains buried under layers of myths, lies and ideological romance. In a crude sense the fiction still persists in progressive circles that Lenin was an enlightened leader whose premature death led to Stalin's betrayal of the revolution's great promise.

One problem historians have encountered when attempting to disinter the truth is the sheer level of chaos that reigned after the collapse of the tsarist regime of Nicholas II in early 1917. Every colour of reactionary and revolutionary emerged to lay claim to the future, of which the Bolsheviks were far from the largest grouping.

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Happy-Go-Lucky by David Sedaris review – laughter in the dark

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 11:00 PM PDT

In this latest collection of anecdotes, the American humorist riffs on Covid, death and family, looking for catharsis in comedy

David Sedaris got his start in comedy as Crumpet the Christmas elf, campily dancing attendance in Santa's grotto at Macy's department store while clad in green knickers and a spangled bonnet. As he recalls in his first book, Barrel Fever, his merriment with the squalling brats and their bossy mothers barely concealed his outrage.

No longer elfin, Sedaris has matured into a devilish imp who scourges human folly and filth. In his later books he listens to strangers apoplectically effing at each other in the street, visits "a mall with cancer" in Manila, where every shop is an excrescent tumour, and dodges buoyant turds at his local swimming pool. "Grotesque is a plus," he announces when browsing in a Notting Hill antique shop, which prompts the owner to bring out a French rococo snuffbox carved in the shape of a hunchback straining over a bowel movement. As seen by Sedaris, the deformed, indecent, preposterously decorative figurine is the embodiment of our species.

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Because Our Fathers Lied review: Robert McNamara, Vietnam and a partial healing

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 11:00 PM PDT

The son of John F Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson's defense secretary delivers a searing memoir of war, betrayal and love

In the mid-1960s, Craig McNamara and his mother were both diagnosed with ulcers. Craig has a theory about why they were afflicted simultaneously: "I think we both felt the weight of my father's decisions throughout our bodies and in every part of our minds."

It's a rare child who doesn't have some kind of love-hate relationship with his or her parents, and that was especially true for all of us who came of age in the 1960s. But as McNamara makes clear on every page of his searing memoir, those feelings are magnified a thousand times if your father was Robert McNamara, secretary of defense to John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson and the architect of the Vietnam war, America's worst modern foreign policy disaster.

I was participating in the antiwar movement in order to survive my own family trauma. This template of protest was the only thing available to make sense of the ugliness in my inner world. I was unable to articulate my own chaotic feelings, but the nation presented them for me … I was finding a truth that provided both relief and pain."

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Christo before Christo: Paris exhibition reveals artist’s earlier works

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 05:15 AM PDT

Exhibition to show items the artist experimented with before larger wrapped pieces that defined him

Long before scaling the heights of the Reichstag in Berlin or the Pont Neuf in Paris, the artist known as Christo started on a much smaller scale.

Having fled communist Bulgaria for Paris and working in a maid's room, the impoverished refugee began creating his first wrapped sculptures using everyday objects such as cans, bottles and – when he found a bigger studio – old oil barrels.

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Regenesis by George Monbiot review – hungry for real change

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 01:00 AM PDT

The environmental activist's proposals for remaking the global food industry, from changes in farming practices to 3D-printed steaks, make for urgent, essential reading

We are farming our planet to death. Half of the world's habitable land has already been colonised to produce our food. Nature, the many millions of other species, is forced to survive in the polluted, overhunted, degraded fragments of what remains. Extinction rates are around 1,000 times the natural background rate, largely because wild land has been lost to agriculture or polluted by it, or because of conflict with farmers. In spite of it all, around 800 million people go hungry, with 150 million children under five suffering from stunted growth.

In the coming decades, we will need to feed more people more food – at least doubling today's food production by 2050 – at a time when all the best lands have been taken and during an escalating climate crisis.

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The Queen in culture: how art puts a public face to a private life

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 03:00 AM PDT

She has appeared in plays, novels, paintings – even love songs. From Andy Warhol to Alan Bennett, artists, writers and musicians have changed our picture of the Queen we think we know

The Queen's daily life of duty and dilemma has been monitored closely for seven decades. Each diary appointment, along with every deadpan impromptu aside, has been noted by royal pundits and historians.

But the imagined private life of Her Majesty has been at least as powerful a cultural influence as the actual public life. In our collective stories, and even in our dreams, Elizabeth II has been a regular member of the cast: a constant symbol of authority and regimented splendour. And now, towards the end of her reign, in a less deferential age, the monarch's thoughts and concerns are familiar topics for literary speculation and satire. The image of the Queen, whether in profile on a postage stamp, or on canvas in regal portraiture, has been given a range of artistic treatments, many of them subversive, from Andy Warhol's pop art portrait, to the one where the monarch's eyes are shut, Chris Levine's 2004 Lightness of Being.

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Men review – Alex Garland’s rural retreat into toxic masculinity

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 12:00 AM PDT

Rory Kinnear in many guises plagues Jessie Buckley's abuse survivor in this twisted country-house horror

All men really are the same in this body-horror fairytale from Alex Garland, the writer-director behind the adventurous sci-fi oddities Ex Machina and Annihilation. Lent emotional heft by Jessie Buckley (who singlehandedly saved the flawed 2020 screen adaptation of Iain Reid's equally surreal I'm Thinking of Ending Things), it's a playfully twisted affair – not quite as profound as it seems to think, perhaps, but boasting enough squishy metaphorical slime to ensure that its musings upon textbook male characteristics are rarely dull, and sometimes deliciously disgusting.

Buckley is Harper, the survivor of an abusive relationship whose partner, James (Paapa Essiedu), tried to gaslight her into taking responsibility for his own urban self-destructiveness ("you will have to live with it on your conscience"). Now she has escaped into verdant surroundings for a fortnight in "the dream country house" – with the emphasis on "dream". From the oversaturated palette of Rob Hardy's cinematography (fields so green they glow, flowers that pop in purple-blues) to the bloody, chocolate-box interiors conjured by production designer Mark Digby and set decorator Michelle Day, we're in a world of big bad wolves (that axe by the fireside will come in handy) and poisoned apples. "Forbidden fruit" declares the rental house owner Geoffrey, a toothy, Tim Nice-But-Dim character whom Harper significantly describes as "a very specific type".

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The big picture: the Catalan capital finds its swagger

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 11:00 PM PDT

Francesc Català-Roca's shot of sailors in 1950s Barcelona captures a bankrupt regime courting the spoils of tourism

In 1951, General Franco's regime in Spain, bankrupted by two wars, did a deal that allowed the sixth fleet of the US navy and some Royal Navy ships to dock in Barcelona. The sailors found the Catalan capital, centre of resistance to Franco and fascism, on its knees. The city's economy was partly saved by the arrival of sailors, who brought not only dollars but jazz and rock'n'roll and a postwar lightness to the Ramblas. A recent book, The Sixth Fleet in Barcelona, by the Spanish journalist Xavier Theros, itemises this impact. Bars, tailors, souvenir shops – and the sex industry – boomed. Barcelona was reinvented as a tourist destination.

This photograph of sailors in Barrio Chino in 1953 was taken by the pioneering documentary photographer Francesc Català-Roca, who died in 1998, and whose centenary is celebrated this summer at the festival PhotoEspaña in Madrid. Català-Roca was the son of a Republican photographer, Pere Català-Pic, famous for an image of a peasant's shoe stepping on a swastika. The younger man made two landmark studies of postwar Barcelona and Madrid, though his work received little recognition during the repressive Franco years.

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Hustle review – Adam Sandler scores in rags to riches tale

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 04:00 AM PDT

A jaded basketball scout rediscovers his love for the game after spotting a prodigy hustling on the street

Not so much a sports movie, but rather a film that deals with the business of sport, Hustle has something in common with Oliver Stone's thunderous American football drama, Any Given Sunday. The sport in this case is basketball – Adam Sandler plays Stanley, a jaded scout who hauls himself around the world in search of fresh talent – but the film is charged with a similar kinetic crackle to that of Stone's picture.

Stanley's enthusiasm for the game is dulled by the corporate muscle flexing of his boss (Ben Foster), and his health is taking a beating from the room service. Then he spots a Spaniard, Bo Cruz (played by NBA star Juancho Hernangomez), playing ball on the street, hustling opponents for cash. And he sees raw talent.

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How to make big decisions more easily

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 05:00 AM PDT

Most of us shy away from life's hardest decisions. But there are ways to help us

Psychology professor Laurence Alison is an expert in how to make decisions, but in the early days of his career, it was all theoretical. Then one day he took a call from "someone very senior", who described a worrying trend: police chiefs were showing themselves unable, in critical situations, to make crucial choices. "He asked, 'Is there anything you can do to help?'"

There was. Alison – a straight-talking, no-nonsense person – started to translate what he knew from textbooks and turn it into practical advice. "Academic work on decision-making had concentrated on studying how they're made in theoretical settings," he says. "But I realised we needed to move it to real-time, lives-on-the-line situations: tsunamis, earthquakes, floods, where chances were, someone was being presented with a situation where almost every choice looked dire. I knew I had something to offer that would make a difference."

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Another fine mess: clearing up the dog poo problem

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 02:00 AM PDT

Free bags, DNA tracking, £100 fines… How can we solve the stinky issue of dog poo?

Despite a frostily aloof demeanour, my dog, Oscar, is a prodigious pooper. I dread to think how much of my one wild and precious life has been spent standing in all weathers watching him squat, bony spine rounded, nether regions a-quiver, wondering what his stony stare conveys: shame, defiance, gratitude, enjoyment? I can, however, estimate quite easily how many times I have placed a thin plastic bag over my hand and picked up his ejections: at least four times daily for 13 and a half years. That adds up to more than 18,000 bags of warm shit. Well, mainly bags: like any dog owner, there are the times I have been caught short, being forced to use tissues, leaves and even, recently, a surgical mask (quite effective, actually).

Of course I pick up, even when it's tricky. Everyone I know picks up. Everyone you ask picks up. And yet, there is dog poo everywhere – as much, if not more, than ever. I've been intrigued ever since my friend Rob, a sociologist, drew my attention to the horrible flowering of turds during the first Covid lockdown. By early 2021 he was vindicated: we were widely considered to be "in the grip of a dog mess emergency". Being a sociologist, Rob called it a "statement of populist nihilism" in the face of an existential threat. Other, more prosaic explanations included the decline in levels of social surveillance in unusually empty lockdown streets allowing people to indulge their innate irresponsibility, and the explosion in pandemic dog ownership, with inexperienced owners discovering and rejecting this unappealing side to caring for their new companions.

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My son, the rock god | Séamas O’Reilly

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 01:30 AM PDT

Being a big brother brings responsibilities, to crying babies and cooing monsters of rock

Brotherhood appears to be bringing out the best in our boy. On the way back to Ireland, our son offered to hold the hand of a two-year-old child who was blocking the escalator to the plane. She'd been spooked by the movement and was causing a gridlock on the motorised stairs that would have been quite tense, had his response to it not been so comically adorable.

He asked why she was crying and told her there was nothing to worry about, drawing admiring awwwws from our fellow passengers. As my son counselled her through the horror, the growing line of people behind us seemed not irritated but, and I can scarcely believe I'm telling you this, charmed by the whole event. As strange and delightful as that was, this event was made even more surreal by the fact the passengers directly behind us were the full lineup of American emo behemoths My Chemical Romance, en route to play two sold-out Dublin shows as part of their massive comeback tour. As they cooed over my good young boy and his caring ways, I found myself wishing I knew even one of their songs so I could end this article with a knowing reference to their work. Alas, my teenage music tastes ran mostly to abstruse electronica and I only knew them then as that band my friend Eoghan liked. Now, of course, I know them mostly as kind men, with great taste in sons, and maybe I prefer it that way. 'Thanks, My Chemical Romance' I thought, but did not say, since my wife would have killed me if I had.

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Indira Varma: ‘I wanted to be a clown. Or David Attenborough’

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 06:00 AM PDT

The actor, 48, on Star Wars, bubble baths, and doing the Spitting Image voice of Priti Patel

My mum would leave me in Bath's public library on Saturday mornings so she could go and do the shopping. I was three or four. You wouldn't do that these days, but I remember it as a safe place. Thrilling, too. It felt like freedom, all the books and endless possibilities. My mum's nickname for me was "Muni" – if she couldn't find me, she'd call it really loudly. In a library. Mortifying.

Be unafraid. That's what I try to teach my daughter. Be brave in your choices, don't worry so much about what other people think.

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Shower in your bra and cook in the kettle? Putting ‘extreme frugality’ to the test

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 06:00 AM PDT

The internet is full of creative hacks from people who pride themselves on their ability to scrimp and save. Are they worth trying?

As a general rule, I try not to think about Tory ministers while I bathe. But recently, while taking a post-workout shower in my sports bra, its wicking fabric creating a dry zone on my skin, I thought about the environment secretary, George Eustice, and his advice that families struggling to cope during the current cost of living crisis ought to switch to value brands. Eustice was quickly lampooned for patronising the public with this staggeringly obvious suggestion, and for minimising the pain people are experiencing through the biggest drop in living standards since the 50s.

Meanwhile, I was weeks into my exploration of "extreme frugality" – a money-saving practice that is booming online. Somewhere between a hobby and a way of life, extreme frugallers take money-consciousness to new levels, utilising ingenious, creative and sometimes controversial methods that often require a leap of faith. Such as wearing your bra in the shower. The logic goes that as I'm already paying for energy and water for a shower, I may as well use it to clean bras, too. This way, I reduce the number of washing machine loads I need.

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Nigel Slater’s goat’s cheese tart and gooseberry pudding recipes

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 02:30 AM PDT

Give the green light to early summer berries and savoury tarts

While I wait impatiently for the red and blackcurrants to appear in quantity and at a reasonable price, I make the traditional juice-saturated summer puddings with gooseberries instead. The first of our short-season summer fruits, their exceptional tartness is welcome, but can be softened with a little honey and a splash of elderflower cordial. My inclination is to serve them particular version with a jug of cream – in fact I would call it essential. Gooseberries, whether in a pie or a crumble, beg for cream rather than more piquant crème fraîche or yoghurt – which is why they make such a blissful fool.

The colour of such desserts, fools, ice-cream and this version of summer pudding is soft, reminiscent of a midsummer afternoon spent in the shade of the spreading canopy of a tree. You can lift this with a sprinkling of mint sugar, which will provide not only a splash of green but also a touch more sweetness for those who need it. I bring the pudding to the table with a jug of warm gooseberry juice sweetened with honey and one of cream, too.

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‘Significant’ consequences if lawmakers fail to act on gun control, Democrat warns

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 08:49 AM PDT

Senator Chris Murphy says measures passed in Florida after Parkland shooting could attract Republican support

The Democratic senator leading his party's push for stronger gun laws said on Sunday he believed measures passed in Florida following the 2018 high school shooting in Parkland could attract Republican support and provide a workable template for action in Congress.

Chris Murphy of Connecticut, speaking on CNN's State of the Union, said he was optimistic that recent mass shootings in Buffalo, New York, and Uvalde, Texas, could finally prompt enough bipartisan support for legislation that has previously proven elusive.

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Biden gives far fewer interviews than his predecessors – could his caution backfire?

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 11:00 PM PDT

With op-eds and speeches but no one-on-ones, observers say the president risks losing the public's trust and reporters' good will

He delivered a primetime address to the nation. He wrote two columns in leading newspapers. And he took some off-the-cuff questions from reporters. But once again Joe Biden did not this week sit down for an interview with a broadcaster or newspaper. Nor did he hold a press conference.

The US president, who promised to rebuild trust and transparency after Donald Trump's adversarial tenure, is facing criticism as Sunday marks 116 days since his last press interview.

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Suspected shooter who killed retired Wisconsin judge in ‘targeted’ attack identified

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 02:15 PM PDT

John Roemer, who sat on the Juneau county circuit court bench for 14 years, was found dead in his home by police

A retired Wisconsin judge was gunned down and killed in his home on Friday, and his suspected killer – a former defendant in his courtroom – shot himself in the basement, a government official familiar with the investigation said Saturday.

The official confirmed John Roemer, 68, who sat on the Juneau county circuit court bench for 14 years beginning in 2004, was found shot dead in his home in the community of New Lisbon about 6.30am Friday. His alleged killer, identified Saturday as 56-year-old Douglas Uhde, was then discovered in the basement with a self-inflicted bullet wound, and was brought to a hospital.

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How Texas boys’ dream trip ended in family massacre at hands of fugitive

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 07:07 AM PDT

Mark Collins took his four grandsons to his ranch but within hours they fell victim to an escaped prisoner on a murderous rampage

Mark Collins had brought his four grandsons Waylon, Karson, Hudson and Bryson up to his ranch north-west of Houston on Thursday for what sounded like a southern boy's dream: shooting guns, taking boats on big ponds and fishing.

While Collins knew authorities had been looking in the general area for a convicted murderer with ties to a Mexican drug cartel who had broken free from a prison bus three weeks earlier, he may not have known that the fugitive had apparently burglarized a home next door to the ranch, according to family friend David Crain.

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Mariah Carey being sued for $20m over All I Want for Christmas Is You

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 08:50 AM PDT

Songwriter Andy Stone claims he co-wrote song with the same name and did not give permission for it to be used

Mariah Carey is being sued for $20m (£16m) for alleged copyright infringement over her festive megahit All I Want for Christmas Is You – nearly three decades after it was released.

Since it came out in 1994, the song, which features on her album Merry Christmas, has become a global classic and a firm favourite in the pop Christmas canon.

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John Fetterman admits he ignored heart condition before his stroke: ‘I almost died’

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 10:18 AM PDT

The Pennsylvania lawmaker's condition is 'stable', says his doctor, and he should be able to return to the Senate campaign trail

John Fetterman, the lieutenant governor of Pennsylvania and Democratic senate nominee, said Friday that he "almost died" after suffering a stroke on 13 May. Fetterman, whose health problems have reportedly prompted concerns about his campaign, also revealed that he had cardiomyopathy, which makes it more difficult for the heart to pump blood throughout the body.

In a statement, Fetterman admitted that he had neglected his health. "As my doctor said, I should have taken my health more seriously. The stroke I suffered … didn't come out of nowhere," he said in a note, according to CBS News's Ed O'Keefe.

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Chris Jacobs withdraws reelection bid amid GOP fire on his gun control stance

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 07:55 AM PDT

Republican congressman said he would support measures limiting access to highly lethal firearms used in recent mass shootings

A Republican New York congressman who recently voiced support of gun control legislation announced on Friday that he will no longer seek reelection after receiving backlash over his stance.

Chris Jacobs' support of such legislation – which came in the wake of deadly mass shootings at a Buffalo, New York, grocery store and Uvalde, Texas, elementary school – had prompted his conservative and GOP colleagues to withdraw their support.

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To avoid ‘historic shellacking’ in midterms, Biden is promoting a sunny view of US economy

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 01:00 AM PDT

Much of America does not seem to be buying the optimistic vision that Biden and his team are selling

As he celebrated the impressive May jobs report on Friday, Joe Biden went to great lengths to paint a rosy picture of the US economy. While acknowledging the difficult reality of high prices caused by near record-high inflation, Biden pointed to the 390,000 jobs created last month to argue that the US is in a strong economic position.

"I know that even with today's good news, a lot of Americans remain anxious, and I understand the feeling," the US president said. "But there's every reason for the American people to feel confident that we'll meet these challenges."

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Michigan baby formula maker resumes production after safety shutdown

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 11:45 AM PDT

The Abbott facility was closed in February after a recall involving bacterial infections in infants which led to a nationwide shortage

The baby formula manufacturer Abbott announced that it would resume production at a key Sturgis, Michigan, plant on Saturday, months after a shutdown at the facility spurred a nationwide shortage. The company in February recalled baby formula made at that plant, after four infants who consumed products from there developed bacterial infections, with two of the babies dying.

Food and Drug Administration officials said they had encountered Cronobacter sakazakii bacterium at this plant. FDA and Centers for Disease Control testing determined the genetic sequence of these Cronobacter did not match that of bacterium in these infants – meaning they did not find a connection to Sturgis, CNN reported.

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Woman testifies that in 1975 Bill Cosby grabbed her and kissed her aggressively

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 09:51 AM PDT

The woman, now 61, took the stand during the civil trial over the lawsuit of Judy Hoth, who alleges she was assaulted during the same time

A woman testified Friday that she was 14 when Bill Cosby took her into a trailer on a movie set in 1975, grabbed her so she couldn't move her arms, and kissed her aggressively.

"I was struggling to get away," she said. "It was very shocking."

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Chinese fighter jet’s actions near Australian aircraft ‘very dangerous’, deputy PM says

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 07:27 PM PDT

Defence reports J-16 jet released 'chaff' including aluminium shards in front of Australian flight in South China Sea region

Australia has complained to China over its interception of a maritime surveillance flight in international airspace in the South China Sea region, which the deputy prime minister labelled "very dangerous".

The defence department has revealed the interception of a "routine maritime surveillance activity" in a statement on Sunday, claiming it resulted in a "dangerous manoeuvre" that risked the safety of the Australian aircraft and its crew.

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North Korea fires ballistic missiles a day after US-South Korean naval drills

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 10:50 PM PDT

Pyongyang's 18th round of missile tests this year comes after US aircraft carrier leads exercises in the Philippine Sea

North Korea has fired eight short-range ballistic missiles towards the sea off its east coast, a day after South Korea and the US wrapped up military exercises involving an American aircraft carrier.

Possibly setting a single-day record for North Korean ballistic launches, the missiles were fired in succession over 35 minutes on Sunday from at least four different locations, including from western and eastern coastal areas and two inland areas north of and near the capital, Pyongyang, South Korea's joint chiefs of staff said.

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At least 49 killed and hundreds injured in Bangladesh depot fire

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 07:50 AM PDT

Huge blaze breaks out at container storage facility 40km from country's main sea port, Chittagong, with toll expected to rise further

At least 49 people died and hundreds have been injured after a fire tore through a shipping container depot in Bangladesh, sparking a huge chemical explosion that engulfed many of those who had rushed to the scene to help. The death toll is expected to rise.

More than 300 people were injured in the incident, many of whom sustained life-threatening burns, and many bodies remain unrecovered as the fire continued to blaze for a second night in Sitakunda, near the busy southern port of Chittagong.

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‘Fear is increasing’: Hindus flee Kashmir amid spate of targeted killings

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 01:50 AM PDT

Increase in violence prompts protests and biggest exodus of Kashmiri Pandit families for two decades

Hundreds of minority Hindus have fled from Indian-administered Kashmir, and many more are preparing to leave, after a fresh spate of targeted killings stoked tensions in the disputed Himalayan region.

Three Hindus have been killed by militants in Kashmir this week alone, including a teacher and migrant workers, prompting mass protests and the largest exodus of Hindu families from the Muslim-majority region in two decades.

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Woman killed as storms cause chaos across France

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 03:51 AM PDT

Many more people injured as thunder and hail lead to flooding, power cuts and flight delays

One woman has been killed and 14 people injured in France as thunder and hailstorms hit the country, ravaging vineyards and delaying flights.

Residents of south-west France posted photos online of hail the size of tennis balls, and drivers in the Paris region shared images of flooded roads and daytime skies blackened by thunder clouds.

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Candles, flags and a howl of pain: Taiwan remembers Tiananmen

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 01:00 AM PDT

Taipei takes on the role of commemoration from Hong Kong as the only Chinese-speaking country to hold vigils

On a steamy summer's night several hundred people gathered at the foot of Taipei's grand Chiang Kai-shek memorial for one of dozens of vigils being held around the world to mark the 33rd anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre.

A man walked on to the stage, with the eyes of the crowd upon him, and voiced a timid welcome: "Hello everyone." Then he began to scream.

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What’s next for Boris Johnson? There are three possible scenarios

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 10:00 PM PDT

The prime minister faces a difficult week in which a vote on his leadership could be called, followed by two crucial byelections

While the country has been celebrating the Queen's 70 years on the throne, Boris Johnson has been desperately ringing round his MPs to try to ensure he can reach the milestone of a mere three years as prime minister.

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How India’s new taste for local whisky is shaking up the global drinks market

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 06:00 AM PDT

Sales of Indian single malts are booming as a new generation sheds old notions about the superiority of imported brands

For years, Mohinder Singh's trips outside India meant an obligatory stop at the airport duty-free liquor store, where he would join long queues to stock up on imported single-malt whisky. Then three years ago, he came across a brand – Paul John – that he had never heard of, at a tasting event a few miles from Delhi's Jawaharlal Nehru University, where he teaches politics. It was an Indian single malt; its smoky smell was rich, the taste was even better. Singh was hooked.

"That was a gamechanger for me," he says. Singh introduced his friends to the brand, which is now their drink of choice when they meet. "Everyone loves it."

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Romans ventured deeper into Wales than thought, road discovery shows

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 08:00 AM PDT

Evidence uncovered in Preseli Hills in Pembrokeshire extends known reach further west across Britain

The awe-inspiring beauty of the Preseli Hills and the surrounding wild moorlands have long drawn visitors to north Pembrokeshire in Wales. Now an archaeologist has found evidence that even the Romans were drawn to the area, with the discovery of an ancient road showing they travelled farther west across Britain than previously thought.

Dr Mark Merrony, a Roman specialist, tutor at Oxford University and "a native of Pembrokeshire", said the road had been completely missed. "This thing is just extraordinary. I'm astonished," he said.

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Enemy tongue: eastern Ukrainians reject their Russian birth language

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 06:08 AM PDT

In towns near Russia's border, Moscow's influence was strong and Ukrainian was rarely spoken. The war has changed that

Gamlet Zinkivskyi grew up speaking Russian in the city of Kharkiv, just like his parents. But when Vladimir Putin launched the invasion of Ukraine on 24 February, it was the final push for him to switch fully to Ukrainian.

"Unfortunately, I grew up speaking Russian, but it's not pleasant to speak the same language as the army that is destroying whole areas of our country," said Zinkivskyi, a 35-year-old street artist widely known to Kharkiv residents, who usually refer to him by his first name.

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Escape from Auschwitz: the most extraordinary Holocaust story you’ve never heard

Posted: 03 Jun 2022 11:00 PM PDT

A pair of Jewish prisoners plotted to break out of the death camp and tell the world the true horror of what they'd seen. How did they do it?

Escape was lunacy, escape was death. To attempt it was suicide. That much had been taught to Walter Rosenberg early, within a week of his arrival in Auschwitz, aged just 17, at the start of July 1942. One afternoon, he and thousands of others had been forced to stand in silence and watch a public hanging, performed with full ceremony. The SS men had lined up with guns over their shoulders and marching drums strapped around their necks, while out in front stood two mobile gallows, wheeled into position, one for each condemned man.

The stars of the show were announced as two prisoners who had tried and failed to escape. Walter and the others had to watch as the men were brought out; a Kapo, one of the prisoners deployed by the SS to do the brute work of enforcement, tied their ankles and thighs with rope, then placed a noose around each of their necks. Afterwards, the inmates were kept there a full hour, forbidden even to look away. They had to stand, in silence, staring at the two dead bodies twirling in the wind. The corpses had notices pinned to their chests, written as if the words were spoken by the dead themselves: "Because we tried to escape ... "

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She was jailed for losing a pregnancy. Her nightmare could become more common

Posted: 03 Jun 2022 10:00 PM PDT

Chelsea Becker, prosecuted for murder after her stillbirth, spent 16 months in jail: 'Why did the hospital call police?'

On 4 November 2019, TV stations across California blasted Chelsea Becker's photo on their news editions. The "search was on" for a "troubled" 25-year-old woman wanted for the "murder of her unborn baby", news anchors said, warning viewers not to approach if they spotted her but to call the authorities.

The next day, Becker was asleep at the home she was staying in when officers with the Hanford police department arrived.

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Free US school lunches were a dream come true. Now, a hunger crisis looms for 10 million children

Posted: 04 Jun 2022 03:00 AM PDT

Congress has failed to extend school meal waivers, expiring on 30 June, and the impact will be felt almost immediately

For the last two years, the notion that no kid should ever have to go hungry in the US has gotten closer to a reality, thanks to federal waivers that have expanded children's access to food. The waivers resulted in a simple but revolutionary outcome: free lunch, year-round, for every American schoolchild.

But that will come to an end in weeks, as Congress has failed to include an extension of the waivers, which have allowed schools to offer school lunches as well as summer lunch handouts, enabling an estimated 10 million more students to get a free meal.

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‘Victory will be ours’: Zelenskiy marks 100th day of war – video

Posted: 03 Jun 2022 12:34 PM PDT

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Friday pledged to continue defending his country as Russia's assault entered its 100th day. Flanked by some of his closest allies, including prime minister, Denys Shmyhal, and presidential adviser, Mykhailo Podolyak, Zelenskiy echoed a similar defiant video published shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine

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Royal family arrives at St Paul's for platinum jubilee event – video

Posted: 03 Jun 2022 04:54 AM PDT

Guests and dignitaries have taken their seats at St Paul's Cathedral for a jubilee service of thanksgiving for the Queen, which the monarch did not attend. The Prince of Wales stepped in for his 96-year-old mother after she pulled out after experiencing 'some discomfort' during Thursday's celebrations. Prince Harry and Meghan also attended the service, publicly reuniting with Prince William for the first time since their departure to live in the US

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Boris Johnson booed as he arrives at Queen's jubilee thanksgiving service – video

Posted: 03 Jun 2022 04:14 AM PDT

Boris Johnson was greeted by a chorus of boos as he arrived at the Queen's platinum jubilee thanksgiving service on Friday morning. Stepping out of his car when it pulled up at St Paul's Cathedral in London with his wife, Carrie, the prime minister was booed and whistled at by spectators. During an awkward 15-second walk up the stairs where senior royals, signatories and politicians were marking the second day of celebrations to honour the Queen's 70-year reign, Johnson appeared unfazed as he smiled and nodded

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Republican displays handgun collection during House hearing on gun reform – video

Posted: 02 Jun 2022 09:06 PM PDT

A Republican congressman used a House hearing on gun control in the aftermath of multiple mass shootings in the US to show off his own collection of guns and brandish them via remote video link. Greg Steube, a representative from Florida, displayed a succession of firearms he says would be banned under a bill being debated in response to the shootings. 'Here's a gun I carry every single day to protect myself, my family, my wife, my home,' he said while holding a firearm. When Sheila Jackson Lee, a Democrat from Texas, interjected and said she hoped the gun was not loaded, Steube replied: 'I'm in my house, I can do whatever I want with my guns'.

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Tulsa gunman targeted surgeon who treated him, police say – video

Posted: 02 Jun 2022 11:38 AM PDT

The police chief of Tulsa, Oklahoma, Wendell Franklin, says the gunman who killed four people at a hospital targeted the surgeon who treated him. The shooter killed Dr Preston Phillips, Dr Stephanie J Husen, Amanda Green, a receptionist, and William Love, a patient. Franklin said the suspect, identified as Michael Louis, had back surgery on 19 May and after being released from hospital on 24 May complained to his surgeon, Dr Phillips, about pain 

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Russia now occupying 20% of Ukraine’s territory, says Zelenskiy – video

Posted: 02 Jun 2022 09:14 AM PDT

Volodymyr Zelenskiy says Russian forces are occupying about 20% of Ukraine's territory, in a video address to the Luxembourg  parliament, adding that frontlines of battle stretch across more than 1,000km (620 miles). 

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Feline fine: the Melbourne cat lovers show – in pictures

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 10:30 AM PDT

Cats parade en masse at the Melbourne cat lovers show, with a special breed for everyone to discover

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Tea with Paddington and a Tiananmen vigil: the weekend’s best photos

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 06:23 AM PDT

The Guardian's picture editors select photo highlights from around the world

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Day four of the platinum jubilee celebrations – in pictures

Posted: 05 Jun 2022 03:19 PM PDT

Millions of people attended Big Jubilee Lunch picnics as a long weekend of festivities to honour Queen Elizabeth II's platinum jubilee concluded

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