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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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Museveni’s opponent, Bobi Wine, alleges that members of polling staff were kidnapped and called for peaceful protests

Yoweri Museveni, has won the Ugandan election and his seventh term with more than 70% of the vote, state election authorities have said, amid an internet shutdown and claims of fraud by his opponent.

His opponent, a youthful musician known as Bobi Wine, condemned what he called “fake results” and alleged that members of polling staff were kidnapped, among other election irregularities. He called for peaceful protests to pressure the authorities to release what he called the “rightful results”.

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Analysts warn that Trump will probably demand more action from Mexico to counter drug-trafficking groups

Mexico’s President Claudia Sheinbaum has defended the latest transfer of 37 Mexican cartel operatives to the US as a “sovereign decision”, as her government strives to alleviate pressure from the Trump administration to do more against drug-trafficking groups.

It was the third such flight in the year since Donald Trump returned to the White House, but analysts warn that while it remains an effective pressure valve, the returns may be diminishing.

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US president singles out Mark Carney day after prime minister warned world is undergoing geopolitical ‘rupture’

• Trump news at a glance: at Davos, president rambles, backs down and touts ‘future deal’ on Greenland

Donald Trump has said Canada should be “grateful” for the “freebies” it gets from the US, a day after its prime minister, Mark Carney, warned the world was undergoing a geopolitical “rupture”.

Speaking those attending the World Economic Forum annual meeting in Switzerland, the US president singled out Carney’s speech that was sharply critical of US foreign policy.

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Far-right incoming president picked Judith Marín, who has publicly decried bills to decriminalise abortion, for the role

Chile’s incoming far-right president José Antonio Kast has named a vehement opponent of abortion who has repeatedly stated her support for life “from conception to natural death” as the country’s new women and gender equality minister.

Judith Marín, 30, was once ejected from Chile’s senate by police for screaming “return to the Lord” during a vote to decriminalise abortion under restricted circumstances.

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Church leaders cite Greenland threats, Venezuela action and aid cuts as undermining human dignity and peace

Three cardinals in the US Catholic church have criticized the Trump administration’s foreign policy, saying its push to obtain or otherwise seize Greenland, recent military action in Venezuela, and cuts to humanitarian aid risk “destroying international relations and plunging the world into incalculable suffering”.

“Our country’s moral role in confronting evil around the world, sustaining the right to life and human dignity, and supporting religious liberty are all under examination,” said a joint statement from Blase Cupich, Robert McElroy and Joseph Tobin, respectively the archbishops of Chicago, Washington DC and Newark, New Jersey.

The Associated Press contributed

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Salvatore Mancuso given 40-year sentence, which could be reduced after truth and reparation activities

A Colombian court has sentenced a former paramilitary leader to 40 years in prison for crimes committed against Indigenous communities in the province of La Guajira, including homicides, forced disappearances and the displacement of people from 2002 to 2006.

The special tribunal that hears cases from the country’s armed conflict said in its ruling that Salvatore Mancuso was responsible for 117 crimes committed by fighters under his command in La Guajira. However, it added that Mancuso’s time in prison could be reduced to eight years, if he collaborated with truth and reparation activities that benefited victims of his former paramilitary group.

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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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Chow Hang-tung, Lee Cheuk-yan and Albert Ho, who led Tiananmen Square vigils, accused of inciting subversion

The national security trial of three pro-democracy activists who organised an annual memorial in Hong Kong to mark the Tiananmen Square massacre opened on Thursday, in another landmark case brought under the Beijing-imposed law that has practically crushed protests in the semiautonomous Chinese city.

Chow Hang-tung, Lee Cheuk-yan and Albert Ho are charged with inciting subversion under Hong Kong’s national security law. Their trial is one of the most high-profile national security cases to be heard in Hong Kong since Beijing imposed the law in 2020. The defendants face a maximum penalty of 10 years’ imprisonment if convicted. The law has a near-100% conviction rate.

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Archaeologists say stencil painted with ochre in limestone cave on Muna Island was created at least 67,800 years ago

The faded outline of a hand on a cave wall in Indonesia may be the world’s oldest known rock art, according to archaeologists who say it was created at least 67,800 years ago.

The ancient hand stencil was discovered in a limestone cave popular with tourists on Muna Island, part of south-eastern Sulawesi, where it had gone unnoticed between more recent paintings of animals and other figures.

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Han Duck-soo verdict marks first judicial ruling stemming from ex-president Yoon Suk Yeol’s 2024 martial law decree

South Korea’s former prime minister Han Duck-soo has been sentenced to 23 years in prison for his role in an insurrection stemming from the former president Yoon Suk Yeol’s failed martial law declaration.

The judge, Lee Jin-kwan, ordered Han’s immediate detention.

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Prime minister’s reported trip follows approval by UK government for Beijing to build new embassy in London

• UK politics live – latest updates

• Davos live – latest updates

Keir Starmer will reportedly visit China next week after controversial plans for Beijing to build a vast embassy in London were approved by his government.

The UK prime minster will lead a delegation of blue-chip British companies, according to Reuters. The same firms, which include BP, HSBC, Intercontinental Hotels Group, Jaguar Land Rover and Rolls-Royce were also said to be among those who will join a revamped “UK-China CEO council”.

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Survivors join the family of victims on the stage of the Sydney Opera House as the PM apologises that the nation ‘could not protect your loved ones’

• Children cook meals for the needy and mourners lay wreaths for Bondi attack victims on national day of mourning

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At 7.01pm on Thursday evening, a crowd of 1,500 mourners packed into the Sydney Opera House descended into a heavy silence. Television stations paused their coverage. Gatherings fell still.

Six weeks after 15 people were gunned down celebrating the first night of Hanukah in Bondi, in the worst terror attack on Australian soil, the nation was still coming to terms with the weight of its loss.

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The removal of sulphur from shipping fuels caused ‘a lot of extra sunlight’ to get through atmosphere and hit reef in 2022

Steps to clean up the shipping industry by removing sulphur from fuels intensified a major coral bleaching event on the Great Barrier Reef by allowing more of the sun’s energy to hit the oceanic wonder, according to a new study.

Sulphur pollution can cause respiratory problems for humans and cause acid rain, but it also has a shading effect and can make clouds brighter, providing more shade to areas underneath.

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• Children cook meals for needy and mourners lay wreaths for Bondi attack victims on national day of mourning

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Nationals senator Bridget McKenzie said she hopes the Coalition is not broken, but said that is “up to Sussan Ley” now.

McKenzie spoke to ABC News this morning, just before party leader David Littleproud is set to speak amid the fallout. She said:

Obviously, Sussan Ley has chosen to accept our resignations and the consequence of that is the National party broader shadow ministry has also tended their resignation to the opposition leader. And now, obviously, that’s a matter for her and David to discuss the fallout. …

We took this as a very serious and principled decision as a party room. … But ultimately, we did not have the comfort we needed around the hate laws … and our room, with a heavy heart, made the decision.

As my dad used to say, for every action, there’s an equal and opposite reaction. And I would call for calmer heads to prevail, because we are Coalitionists.

We need to do everything we can to confront hate preachers and those that spread vile antisemitism and racism in our community and this law helps us do that. So I’m glad it’s in place, I think it’s important that it was supported.

They’re really important in terms of keeping the public safe. We think we’ll get thousands and thousands of guns off the street, and I’m very grateful that most gun owners have said that they can participate in the buy back program, give their guns back and make Sydney safer.

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Two women and a man have have died after a shooting at Lake Cargelligo as police urge locals to stay inside

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Three people have been fatally shot and a gunman is on the run after a shooting in a country town in central western New South Wales.

NSW police said on Thursday that a police operation was under way at Lake Cargelligo, 240km south-west of Dubbo, after shooting, with the suspected gunman believed to be “on the move” in a vehicle.

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A leadership challenge could be likely if Ley’s conservative rivals, Angus Taylor and Andrew Hastie, agree on who should be the candidate

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Sussan Ley passed a milestone this week.

While locked in a string of party room meetings and tense negotiations with Anthony Albanese over Labor’s hate speech bill, she surpassed eight months and eight days as her party’s leader.

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Mette Frederiksen makes comments after European leaders give cautious welcome to US president’s tariff U-turn

• Davos live – latest updates

Denmark’s prime minister has called for “constructive” talks over Greenland that respect its territorial integrity, as Europeans gave a wary welcome to Donald Trump’s decision to drop tariff threats against countries opposing his plans to seize the island.

“We can negotiate all political aspects – security, investment, the economy – but we cannot negotiate our sovereignty,” Mette Frederiksen said on Thursday, after the US president suggested a deal was in sight to end the dispute over the territory.

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OpenAI, Anthropic, SpaceX and Stripe are rumoured to be among ten of the biggest companies considering IPOs

You’ve probably heard of “unicorns” – technology startups valued at more than $1bn – but 2026 is shaping up to be the year of the “hectocorn”, with several US and European companies potentially floating on stock markets at valuations over $100bn (£75bn).

OpenAI, Anthropic, SpaceX and Stripe are among the big names said to be considering an initial public offering (IPO) this year.

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Nato chief Mark Rutte says there is ‘a lot of work to be done’, as some Danish MPs voice concern at Greenland apparently being sidelined in US president’s talks

Donald Trump’s announcement of a “framework of a future deal” that would settle the issue of Greenland after weeks of escalating threats has been met with profound scepticism from people in the Arctic territory, even as financial markets rebounded and European leaders welcomed a reprieve from further tariffs.

Just hours after the president used his speech at the World Economic Forum to insist he wanted Greenland, “including right, title and ownership,” but backed away from his more bellicose threats of military intervention – Trump took to social media to announce “the framework of a future deal with respect to Greenland” and withdrew the threat of tariffs against eight European countries. He later called it “a concept of a deal” when he spoke to business network CNBC soon after Wall Street closed.

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Researchers say event described as ‘major tipping point’ for clean energy in era of destabilised politics

Wind and solar overtook fossil fuels in the European Union’s power generation last year, a report has found, in a “major tipping point” for clean energy.

Turbines spinning in the wind and photovoltaic panels lit up by the sun generated 30% of the EU’s electricity in 2025, according to an annual review. Power plants burning coal, oil and gas generated 29%.

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President’s anti-Somalia tirade and insults to European leaders were in line with aide Stephen Miller’s worldview

Donald Trump turned up in Davos wielding an insult bazooka. He mocked Emmanuel Macron’s aviator sunglasses, chided Mark Carney (“Canada lives because of the United States”), asserted that the Swiss are “only good because of us” and had a dig at Denmark for losing Greenland “in six hours” during the second world war.

But beyond the fractious rhetoric, the US president brought a deeper message on Wednesday that sought to unify the west rather than divide it. It was his most dark, insidious and sinister project of all.

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US president repeats claims to have stopped eight wars as he hosts signing ceremony at World Economic Forum

• Davos live – latest updates

Donald Trump has claimed the world is “richer, safer and much more peaceful than it was just one year ago” as he hosted a launch event for his “board of peace” initiative at the World Economic Forum in Davos.

Hosting a signing ceremony for the new body, said the organisation would be “one of the most consequential bodies ever created in the history of the world”.

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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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US military says it has transported ‘IS fighters’ to Iraq after Kurdish-controlled prisons and camps changed hands

Concerned western officials said they were closely monitoring the deteriorating security situation in north-east Syria amid fears that Islamic State militants could re-emerge after the Kurdish defeat at the hands of the Damascus government.

The US military said it had transported “150 IS fighters” from a frontline prison in Hasakah province across the border to Iraq, and said it was willing to move up to 7,000 to prevent what it warned could be a dangerous breakout.

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Reporters had been in car on way to new camp, says media group, as two 13-year-old boys killed in separate incidents

Hospitals in Gaza say Israeli forces killed at least 11 Palestinians on Wednesday, including two 13-year-old boys and three journalists, in the latest violence to undermine a three-month-old ceasefire.

Palestinian health officials said the Israeli airstrike killed three Palestinian journalists who were travelling in a car to film a newly established displacement camp in the Netzarim area of central Gaza.

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Move follows withdrawal of Kurdish forces from al-Hawl, where 24,000 people are being held over alleged IS links

Syrian government forces have taken control of al-Hawl detention camp, which houses tens of thousands of suspected Islamic State members, after Kurdish forces withdrew.

Soldiers entered the heavily fortified camp on Wednesday, part of a handover from the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which oversaw the camp for the last seven years, as the Syrian government vowed to secure the facility.

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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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Climate concerns raised over redevelopment of 1960s Brutalist estate in south-east London

A legal challenge has been launched in an effort to halt the demolition of a 1960s Brutalist estate in south-east London that featured in Stanley Kubrick’s dystopian film A Clockwork Orange.

The challenge against Bexley council and Peabody housing association, which will be carrying out the redevelopment, has been launched by the Lesnes estate resident Adam Turk.

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Minister says use of former army barracks at Crowborough is part of plan to move claimants out of hotels

• UK politics live – latest updates

A first group of asylum seekers has been moved into a former military camp in East Sussex, the Home Office has said, amid expectations of protests and legal challenges.

Crowborough training camp received 27 men in the early hours of Thursday morning, a statement said, which will be scaled up to 500 over several months.

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PM says he hopes focus will now shift to the ‘hard yards’ of maintaining security in the Arctic

Andy Burnham may have a new route to parliament after the MP Andrew Gwynne reached a settlement with the Commons that would allow him to retire and call a byelection, Pippa Crerar, Jessica Elgot and Josh Halliday report.

In her Sky News interview this morning, Kemi Badenoch also said she was opposed to the UK joining President Trump’s board of peace if Vladimir Putin is a member. She said:

We should not be, certainly, on any board with Vladimir Putin. That’s something I’m completely against.

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The actor is the latest to testify in court over a claim that the newspaper misused their private information

Prince Harry accused the publisher of the Daily Mail of wanting to drive him “to drugs and drinking” by placing his life under surveillance, as he told the high court that it continued to “come after” him and his wife.

The Duke of Sussex was on the verge of tears yesterday as he said Associated Newspapers Ltd (ANL) had continued to make Meghan’s life “an absolute misery” during his litigation against it.

Through the course of this litigation, it’s only got worse, not better. I think it’s fundamentally wrong to put all of us through this again when all we wanted was an apology and some accountability.

They continue to come after me. They have made my wife’s life an absolute misery, my lord.

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Exclusive: Gorton and Denton MP’s pension settlement allows him to potentially retire and call byelection

Andy Burnham may have a new route to parliament after the MP Andrew Gwynne reached a settlement with the Commons that would allow him to retire and call a byelection.

The mayor of Greater Manchester is said to be seeking a return to parliament to stand for the Labour leadership if there is a challenge to Keir Starmer, but was thought to have limited options for a byelection in the north-west.

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Operations continue in Minnesota and Somali communities are being targeted in Maine

Democrats set to vote against ICE bill

Hello and welcome to our live coverage.

Donald Trump is at the World Economic Forum in Davos, where on Thursday he, alongside several other leaders, signed the Board of Peace charter. While initially framed as a narrow mechanism to oversee the reconstruction of Gaza, the board is now instead being positioned as a standing global body, chaired by Trump himself, operating in parallel to the United Nations.

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Singing legend heralds ‘new tools in service of expression’, on compilation that also features an Art Garfunkel song using AI-generated piano backing

Liza Minnelli has released her first new music in 13 years, adding vocals to an AI-created dance track.

The track, Kids, Wait Til You Hear This – also the title of her upcoming memoir – is an unexpected foray into deep house for the 79-year-old Minnelli, who adds a handful of spoken declarations to the pumping backing.

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International coalition of legal groups focuses on political intimidation of lawyers and judges in US – once a role model

The US has been awarded a new dubious distinction: it has been selected as this year’s focus of an international coalition of legal groups and bar associations as a country where lawyers and judges are so politically intimidated that the rule of law is under threat.

The decision to put the spotlight on the US for Thursday’s “International Day of the Endangered Lawyer” underlines how rapidly America has plummeted in global esteem. For decades the US has been held up as a role model of a democratic judicial system.

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Majority of 213-strong House caucus expected to reject funding bill but party has no plans to enforce whip

Congressional Democrats are expected to overwhelmingly reject a bill to fund ICE, the agency spearheading Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown, amid mounting outrage over its heavy-handed and violent tactics in Minnesota and elsewhere.

Party leaders told a closed-door meeting on Capitol Hill on Wednesday that they would vote against the homeland security funding bill, citing insufficient provisions to rein in Immigration Customs and Enforcement, more widely known by its acronym.

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The president’s scramble to win back voter affection after negative polls has led him to spew incoherent proposals

“A vote for Trump means your groceries will be cheaper,” Donald Trump promised Americans on the eve of the presidential election. During the US president’s first year back in office, however, food prices rose faster than they did during Joe Biden’s last.

Facing negative poll numbers, Trump is taking a tack that few Republicans have dared contemplate before: spewing out a rain of often incoherent proposals to signal he feels voters’ pain, in order to recapture their affection.

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