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Despite US pushback, officials in west Africa say controversial hepatitis B study on pause amid ethics concerns

US health officials insisted it was still on. African health leaders said it was cancelled. At the heart of the controversy is the west African nation of Guinea-Bissau – one of the poorest countries in the world and the proposed site of a hotly debated US-funded study on vaccines.

The study on hepatitis B vaccination, to be led by Danish researchers, became a flashpoint after major changes to the US vaccination schedule and prompted questions about how research is conducted ethically in other countries.

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Development charity’s new co-chief executives signal shift from controversial sponsor a child scheme launched in 1972 to long-term grassroots funding

Child sponsorship schemes that allow donors to handpick children to support in poor countries can carry racialised, paternalistic undertones and need to be transformed, the newly appointed co-chief executives of ActionAid UK said as they set out to “decolonise” the organisation’s work.

ActionAid began in 1972 by finding sponsors for schoolchildren in India and Kenya, but Taahra Ghazi and Hannah Bond have launched their co-leadership this month with the goal of shifting narratives around aid from sympathy towards solidarity and partnership with global movements.

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Email sent to diplomats by state department office’s new boss is labelled ‘racist’ after dismissing Africa as a priority

US diplomats have been encouraged to “unabashedly and aggressively” remind African governments about the “generosity” of the American people, according to a leaked email sent to staff in the US state department’s Bureau of African Affairs this January and obtained by the Guardian.

“It’s not gauche to remind these countries of the American people’s generosity in containing HIV/Aids or alleviating famine,” says the email.

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Governments opting for oligarchy while brutally repressing protests over austerity and lack of jobs, charity report says

The world saw a record number of billionaires created last year, with a collective wealth of $18.3tn (£13.7tn), while global efforts stalled in the fight against poverty and hunger.

Oxfam’s annual survey of global inequality has revealed that the number of billionaires surpassed 3,000 for the first time during 2025. Since 2020, their collective wealth grew by 81%, or $8.2tn, which the charity claims would be enough to eradicate global poverty 26 times over.

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Yoweri Museveni wins seventh term but poll criticised by observers and rights groups over repression of opposition and internet blackout

Uganda’s president, Yoweri Museveni, fresh from winning a seventh term in office at 81, said on Sunday that the opposition were “terrorists” who had tried to use violence to overturn the election results.

Official results showed Museveni winning a landslide with 72% of the vote, but the poll was criticised by African election observers and rights groups due to the heavy repression of the opposition and an internet blackout.

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Court says alleged abuse and trafficking offences occurred outside Spain, leaving it without jurisdiction

Spanish prosecutors have shelved a complaint brought by two women who have accused the singer Julio Iglesias of sexual assault and human trafficking, arguing the country’s courts have no jurisdiction as the alleged offences took place outside Spain.

Two female former employees who worked at Iglesias’s Caribbean mansions 10 days ago accused the veteran entertainer of sexual assault, saying they had been subjected “to inappropriate touching, insults and humiliation … in an atmosphere of control and constant harassment”.

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Ryan Wedding turned himself in at US consulate in Mexico City and is due to appear in court in California on Monday

Ryan Wedding, the Canadian Olympic snowboarder turned alleged drug kingpin, has been arrested after turning himself in at the US embassy in Mexico, law enforcement officials announced on Friday.

Wedding, 44, had been sought by the FBI and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) for his role in overseeing what the US attorney general, Pam Bondi, called the “one of the most prolific and violent drug-trafficking organizations” in the world.

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Interim leader Delcy Rodríguez told influencers of US threat to kill leaders if they did not cooperate after capture of Maduro

The communications minister holds a phone up to a microphone before a gathering of regime-friendly influencers.

On speakerphone is Venezuela’s acting president, Delcy Rodríguez, who claims that when US forces captured the dictator Nicolás Maduro, she and other members of his cabinet were given 15 minutes to decide whether to comply with Washington’s demands – “or they would kill us”.

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While leaders of many liberal democracies declined to sign on, Mark Carney had, before Davos, accepted in principle

Donald Trump withdrew on Thursday an invitation for Canada to join his “board of peace” initiative aimed at resolving global conflicts.

“Please let this Letter serve to represent that the Board of Peace is withdrawing its invitation to you regarding Canada’s joining, what will be, the most prestigious Board of Leaders ever assembled, at any time,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post directed at the Canadian prime minister, Mark Carney.

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Vote on legislation falls just short of number needed for passage, showing Mike Johnson’s tenuous hold on majority

The US House has rejected a resolution that would have prevented Donald Trump from sending US military forces to Venezuela, after a vote on the legislation fell just short of the majority needed for passage.

The tied vote was the latest sign of House speaker Mike Johnson’s tenuous hold on the majority, as well as some of the growing pushback in the Republican-controlled Congress to the US president’s aggressions in the western hemisphere. A Senate vote on a similar resolution was also tied last week until JD Vance broke the deadlock.

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Rescue efforts at Mount Maunganui site switch to recovery operation that police say could take several days

Efforts to rescue six people buried by a landslide at a New Zealand holiday park ended on Saturday, with police shifting into a recovery operation.

Police Supt Tim Anderson said human remains had been uncovered on Friday night beneath the mountains of dirt and debris that crashed into a campsite in Mount Maunganui on Thursday, adding that it could take several days to locate all of the victims due to the unstable ground.

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Conservationists hail the ‘desperately needed’ measures and urge greater protection after up to 11% of endangered Tapanuli orangutans wiped out

The floods and landslides that tore through Indonesia’s fragile Batang Toru ecosystem in November 2024 – killing up to 11% of the world’s Tapanuli orangutan population – prompted widespread scrutiny of the extractive companies operating in the area at the time of the ecological catastrophe.

For weeks, investigators searched for evidence that the companies may have damaged the Batang Toru and Garoga watersheds before the disaster, which washed torrents of mud and logs into villages, claiming the lives of more than 1,100 people.

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Search-and-rescue teams worked through the night at the campground, but there had been no progress in finding missing people, officials say

New Zealand is ‘full of grief”, the prime minister has said, after landslides tore through a house and busy campground, leaving two dead and at least six victims still missing.

Police said emergency crews were still searching for at least six people, including two teenagers, believed missing beneath the debris of a landslide which struck a Mount Maunganui campsite on Thursday morning. Police were attempting to contact another three people. Families enjoying the summer school holiday were among the campers. Recreational vehicles and at least one structure were crushed, images showed.

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Operator says it does not know when the problem at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant in Niigata province will be solved, after an alarm sounded during start-up

The restart of the world’s largest nuclear power plant was suspended in Japan on Thursday just a day after it went online for the first time in about 14 years, with the operator saying it does not know when the problem will be solved.

The Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant in Niigata province had been closed since the 2011 Fukushima disaster, but operations to relaunch it began on Wednesday after it received the final green light from the nuclear regulator.

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Reporters Without Borders said the ruling against the 26-year-old journalist showed a ‘blatant disregard for press freedom’ in the Southeast Asian nation

A young Filipino journalist who spent nearly six years in a crowded provincial prison was found guilty of terror financing on Thursday, in a case rights groups and a UN rapporteur labelled a “travesty of justice”.

Community journalist and radio broadcaster Frenchie Cumpio, 26, and former roommate Marielle Domequil broke down in tears and hugged each other as the guilty verdict was read and they were sentenced to 12-18 years in prison by judge Georgina Uy Perez of the Tacloban regional court.

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Police reveal Julian Ingram reported to local officers as part of his bail conditions hours before the shootings

• Warning: This article contains references to Indigenous Australians who have died

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Police have widened the search for a gunman suspected of killing his pregnant former partner and two others in remote New South Wales, as police explore whether the Lake Cargelligo local may be receiving help to evade authorities.

Julian Ingram, 37, was last seen driving out of Lake Cargelligo, in the NSW central west, on Thursday. Police suspect he is armed with at least one firearm, but confirmed he has never held a firearms licence.

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Exclusive: Comparison of online ‘per each’ price of 15 fruits and vegetables against price per kilogram found ‘completely arbitrary’ price variations

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Supermarkets are increasingly charging customers for fresh produce by the item, rather than by weight, in a strategy that is leading to “wild volatility” in pricing with some items more than 50% more expensive, new analysis shows.

A Sydney-based data analyst who compared the “per each” price online with the actual “per kilo” shelf price of 15 fruits and vegetables at their local Woolworths store found the price variations were “completely arbitrary”.

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Canadian backpacker, 19, was found dead on K’gari island earlier this week surrounded by pack of wild dingoes

The autopsy of Piper James, whose body was found on K’gari surrounded by a pack of dingoes, has found “physical evidence consistent with drowning and injuries consistent with dingo bites”.

The Canadian backpacker’s trip to Australia ended in tragedy when the 19-year-old was found dead on a beach on Monday on the world heritage-listed island formerly known as Fraser Island off the Queensland coast.

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Colleagues encourage former soldier to run as Sussan Ley declares she will remain opposition leader after Coalition split

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Andrew Hastie is emerging as a candidate to challenge Sussan Ley for the Liberal party’s leadership, as MPs privately push for the party’s first female leader to step aside.

As a defiant Ley declared she would survive the fallout from the latest Coalition split, internal rivals were adamant she had lost the support of the party room. This is despite the Nationals leader, David Littleproud, being blamed for the break-up.

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High to extreme fire danger expected across several states as inland parts of SA, Victoria, NSW and Queensland may have more than five days above 40C

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All-time temperature records could tumble in Victoria and New South Wales over coming days, as a dome of intense heat pushes into south-east Australia, bringing extreme to catastrophic fire conditions.

Starting Saturday, the Bureau of Meteorology has forecast a prolonged period of intense heat across South Australia, Victoria, NSW and southern Queensland. Some inland areas could experience more than five days above 40C.

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Preliminary report suggests fracture could have existed before high-speed train derailed in Andalucía

Experts investigating the deadly rail collision in southern Spain, which killed 45 people and left dozens more injured, believe the accident may have happened after one of the trains passed over a damaged section of rail.

The disaster occurred near the Andalucían town of Adamuz on Sunday, when a high-speed train operated by Iryo, a private company, derailed and collided with an oncoming high-speed train operated by the state rail company, Renfe.

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Moscow repeats call for Ukraine to leave Donbas before first trilateral talks since start of invasion in February 2022

Ukraine, Russia and the US have begun three-way talks for the first time since Russia’s full-scale military invasion began in February 2022, but with the Kremlin maintaining its maximalist demands for Ukrainian territory, it is unclear whether Donald Trump will be able to broker a ceasefire even by putting heavy pressure on Kyiv.

The talks in Abu Dhabi on Friday are the highest-level known summit between the three sides since the beginning of the war, and come as Trump’s demands to take over Greenland have strained tensions among Ukraine’s western allies as the country endures a harsh winter with much of its civilian energy infrastructure damaged by Russian attacks.

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Nord and Pas-de-Calais prefecture aims to stop anti-migrant groups travelling for ‘Operation Overlord’ protest

French authorities have announced a sweeping ban on British far-right activists planning to take part in a “stop the boats” protest against asylum seekers hoping to cross the Channel to the UK.

Friday’s announcement by the prefecture in northern France goes further than a previous ban by the French interior ministry on 10 unnamed far-right activists associated with the organisation Raise the Colours for “having carried out actions on French soil”.

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Two days of rare trilateral discussions have begun but hopes are low amid continued territorial demands by Russia

The European Commission has offered a bit more detail on the deployment of 447 emergency generators from EU reserves to Ukraine, mentioned in the earlier post (12:33).

“The generators – mobilised from rescEU strategic reserves hosted in Poland – will be distributed by the Ministry for Development of Communities and Territories of Ukraine in cooperation with the Ukrainian Red Cross to the most affected communities.

The EU will not let Russia freeze Ukraine into submission and will continue helping Ukrainians get through this winter.”

They are designed to break Ukrainian spirit. They will fail.

We won’t let Russia freeze Ukraine. We bring light and warmth where Russia sends darkness.

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Kanaan, a symbol of dining across religious and political divides, will shut its doors ‘probably in March’, say owners

An Israeli-Palestinian restaurant in Berlin conceived as an “island of peace” will close in the spring, but its Jewish and Arab owners say their dream will live on in a television series based on their unlikely partnership.

Kanaan, a decade-old casual eatery in the Prenzlauer Berg district of the German capital, gained an international profile for its message of “unity over hate” after the 7 October attacks on Israel by Hamas and the outbreak of the Gaza war.

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US president says ‘we have a lot of ships’ going in that direction and that Washington is watching Iran closely

Donald Trump has said an American “armada” is heading towards the Middle East and that the US is monitoring Iran closely, as activists put the death toll from Tehran’s crackdown on protesters at 5,002.

Speaking on Air Force One as he returned from the World Economic Forum in Davos overnight, he said: “We have a lot of ships going that direction, just in case. I’d rather not see anything happen, but we’re watching them very closely … we have an armada … heading in that direction, and maybe we won’t have to use it.”

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Exclusive: Blueprints describe a ‘case study’ community where residents submit biometric data to gain entry

The United Arab Emirates plans to fund “Gaza’s first planned community” on the ruined outskirts of Rafah, Gaza’s southernmost city. Palestinian residents there will have access to basic services like education, healthcare and running water, as long as they submit to biometric data collection and security vetting, according to planning documents and people familiar with the latest round of talks at the US-led Civil Military Coordination Center in Israel.

The planned city would mark the UAE’s first investment in a postwar reconstruction project located in the part of Gaza currently held by Israel. The wealthy Gulf state has contributed more than $1.8bn of humanitarian assistance to Gaza since 7 October 2023, according to UAE state media, making it Gaza’s largest humanitarian donor.

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Judge shelves inquiry into use of Israeli-made software to target ministers’ phones citing chronic lack of cooperation

Spain’s highest criminal court has again shelved its investigation into the use of Israeli-made Pegasus software to target the mobile phones of senior Spanish ministers, including the prime minister, citing a chronic lack of cooperation from the Israeli authorities that has violated “the principle of good faith” between countries.

The investigation began in May 2022 after the Spanish government revealed that the phones of the prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, and the defence minister, Margarita Robles, had been infected the previous year with the spyware, which, according to its manufacturers, NSO Group, is available only to state agencies. It was later established that the phones of the interior minister and the agriculture minister had also been targeted.

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Blueprint presented by Jared Kushner shows unified Gaza run by Palestinians, with Rafah crossing to open next week

Amid the hullabaloo and self-congratulation of Donald Trump’s “board of peace” launch in Davos, his administration laid out specific plans for the short- and long-term future of Gaza, aimed at a lasting peace.

The blueprint set out on Thursday was extremely ambitious. It envisages a unified Palestinian-run Gaza, which represents a rebuff to the aims of Israeli extremists, including some in the governing coalition, who have sought the deportation of Gaza’s population and the building of Israeli settlements in its place.

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Foreign secretary says Britain supports president’s Gaza plan but there are concerns around involvement of Putin

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Britain will not join Donald Trump’s “board of peace” on Thursday, Yvette Cooper has said, citing concerns about Russian involvement.

The foreign secretary said the UK strongly supported the US president’s 20-point plan for Gaza, which he is seeking to draw attention to at the World Economic Forum in Davos.

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Eastern region on high alert as authorities try to track animal tearing through villages in Jharkhand after apparently becoming separated from herd

Forest officials in India are on the hunt for an elephant that has killed more than 20 people in a days-long rampage through the eastern state of Jharkhand.

Since the beginning of January, 22 people have been killed by a single-tusked elephant that has been tearing through forests and villages in West Singhbhum district of Jharkhand.

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Delhi is world’s second largest purchaser of Russian crude, which is now cheaper than oil from Middle East

Russia is already working to circumvent the latest US sanctions to ensure India can continue to import high levels of cheap Russian crude oil, according to industry analysts.

Since the outbreak of the Ukraine war, India has become the world’s second largest purchaser of Russian crude oil, which has been heavily discounted due to the impact of western sanctions.

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Police ask Paramjeet Singh Pamma to install security cameras and reinforce door locks at his home

Police have advised a high-profile Sikh activist in the UK to install security cameras at his home and reinforce door locks because of threats from Hindu nationalist elements.

Paramjeet Singh Pamma, 52, said he had been visited by police and received verbal advice to increase his security due to intelligence suggesting threats to his safety.

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UN and many western countries as well as human rights groups say that in the absence of a meaningful opposition the election is neither free, fair nor credible

Voters in war-torn Myanmar queued up on Sunday to cast their ballots in the second stage of a military-run election, following low turnout in the initial round of polls that have been widely criticised as a tool to formalise junta rule.

Myanmar has been ravaged by conflict since the military ousted a civilian government in a 2021 coup and detained its leader, Nobel peace prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi, sparking a civil war that has engulfed large parts of the impoverished nation of 51 million people.

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Satat Sampada founders Harjeet Singh and Jyoti Awasthi say allegations are ‘baseless, biased and misleading’

Police have raided the home of one of India’s leading environmental activists over claims his campaigning for a treaty to cut the use of fossil fuels was undermining the national interest.

Investigators from India’s Enforcement Directorate (ED) claim Harjeet Singh and his wife, Jyoti Awasthi, co-founders of Satat Sampada (Nature Forever), were paid almost £500,000 to advocate for a fossil fuel non-proliferation treaty (FFNPT).

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Home Office to set targets for response times and victim satisfaction as home secretary takes powers to intervene directly

Police forces will face new targets for crime fighting and those performing poorly will be named and shamed under government plans to take sweeping powers over law enforcement.

The new plans come as part of changes to policing in England and Wales to be announced on Monday by the home secretary, Shabana Mahmood. The Home Office claims the reforms are the biggest in two centuries.

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PM joins veterans in condemning claim that troops avoided frontlines and suggests US president should apologise

Keir Starmer has issued an unprecedented rebuke to Donald Trump for his “insulting and frankly appalling” remarks about British troops in Afghanistanand suggested he should apologise.

After a week of fractious relations with the White House, Starmer said he was not surprised that relatives of British soldiers killed in Afghanistan were hurt by Trump claiming they avoided the frontline.

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Alleged attacks took place in Cambridgeshire and Buckinghamshire against two prominent supporters of jailed former Pakistani prime minister Imran Khan

Three men have been charged after a series of “highly targeted” attacks against two Pakistani dissidents living in Britain.

Police carried out a series of seven raids and arrests this week in London, Essex and the Midlands after four attacks, which began on Christmas Eve.

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Judge described Nick Gratwick’s crimes – which included plotting to rape children as young as six – as ‘the stuff of nightmares’

A “dangerous” paedophile who had worked as a police informer spying on environmental and animal rights activists has been jailed for life.

Nick Gratwick had been found guilty of 38 offences, including arranging to rape children as young as six in the UK and abroad.

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Angela Rayner is expected to urge PM to let Greater Manchester mayor stand in Gorton and Denton byelection

Keir Starmer is facing mounting pressure not to block Andy Burnham from making a comeback to parliament, with Angela Rayner planning to urge No 10 to let him stand in a forthcoming byelection.

The prime minister’s allies have been trying to prevent Burnham’s return as a candidate in the Greater Manchester seat of Gorton and Denton, amid fears he could challenge the leadership.

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MSNOW reports that the Trump justice department’s decision distressed federal prosecutors and a leader of the FBI’s Minneapolis field office

Talks between Russia, Ukraine and the United States have begun in Abu Dhabi, according to the United Arab Emirates’ ministry of foreign affairs.

The UAE is hosting a rare set of trilateral talks, bringing together negotiators from Russia, Ukraine, and the US. The talks have started today, and are scheduled to continue over the next two days.

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DHS detain a toddler and her father on Thursday and fly them to Texas before returning child on judge’s order

Federal immigration agents detained a two-year-old girl and her father in Minneapolis on Thursday and transported them to Texas, according to court records and the family’s lawyers.

The father, identified in court filings as Elvis Joel TE, and his daughter were stopped and detained by officers around 1pm when they were returning home from the store. By the evening, a federal judge had ordered the girl be released by 9.30pm. But federal officials instead put both of them on a plane heading to a Texas detention center.

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Release of third activist, William Kelly, also involved in the demonstrations was also ordered by a judge

Nekima Levy Armstrong and Chauntyll Allen, who were arrested and charged for their role in an anti-ICE demonstration that disrupted Sunday church services in St Paul, Minnesota, have been released.

Video of the two women posted online showed them emerging from detention on Friday, raising their fists and embracing their loved ones. “Thank you all for being here,” Levy Armstrong said. “Glory to God!”

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The detention of Liam Conejo Ramos, age five, marks the turbocharging of a policy discontinued five years ago

This week, ICE’s detention of a five-year-old boy wearing a Spider Man backpack in the Minneapolis suburb of Columbia Heights quickly became a defining image of the Trump administration’s hardline immigration enforcement. Furious critics, including many local politicians, seized on Liam Ramos’s ordeal as glaring evidence that Trump’s mass deportation campaign has little to do with crime and a lot to do with terrorizing children and their families.

A homeland security spokesperson said ICE officers took the boy into custody only after his father fled during an attempted arrest. The superintendent of the school district in Columbia Heights said another adult living in the home was outside during the encounter and had pleaded to take care of Liam so the boy could avoid detention, but was denied.

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Since September, military has carried out more than 30 strikes against boats that it alleges smuggle drugs

The US military said on Friday that it carried out a strike on a vessel in the eastern Pacific, killing two people.

“Intelligence confirmed the vessel was transiting along known narco-trafficking routes in the eastern Pacific and was engaged in narco-trafficking operations,” the US Southern Command said in a statement.

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