French president addresses Congress, presenting himself as an advocate of liberal world order - the opposite of Trump?€?s image
After spending a day of intimate presidential fraternity with Donald Trump, Emmanuel Macron made an impassioned speech in Washington on Wednesday advocating many of the things Trump has spent much of his presidency trying to destroy.
Enhanced controls will allow parents to handpick videos among a host of new features, but campaigners say YouTube must do more
Google is updating its YouTube Kids app to improve the control over the videos and channels that can be watched by children.
YouTube Kids is a separate app for smartphones and tablets that provides access to a subset of the videos available on the main site. There have been 70bn video views since the app, which is used by 11m families, launched in 2015. In the app?€?s biggest change yet, Google is giving parents much greater control over what their children can find and watch.
Leaked files reveal cost of agreement to taxpayers as opposition calls for more transparency
The European commission approved a monopoly energy deal with Azerbaijan under which Maltese taxpayers could be losing tens of million of euros a year, according to an analysis of leaked files.
A whistleblower gave a cache of data to the journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia, who was killed by a car bomb in October.
A spectacular pileup of 14 galaxies soon after the Big Bang has been seen and recorded for the first time
The colossal merger of 14 galaxies more than 12 billion years ago has been captured by astronomers who used the world?€?s most powerful telescopes to peer 90% of the way across the observable universe.
The cosmic pileup occurred 12.4 bn years ago and the resultant gigantic galaxy will have continued to snowball in size ever since. Calculations suggest that by the present day, hundreds more galaxies would have been swallowed up by the cluster, propelling it to a mass equivalent to 1,000 trillion suns, which would make it the largest known object in the universe.
Swedish journalist?€?s dismembered remains found at sea after she failed to return from trip on Madsen?€?s submarine
A Danish inventor has been sentenced to life in prison for the premeditated murder and sexual assault of the Swedish journalist Kim Wall on his submarine in August last year.
The judge, Anette Burkø, and two jurors found Peter Madsen, 47, guilty of all three of the main charges of premeditated murder, aggravated sexual assault and desecrating a corpse.
Imperial College professor arrested by Revolutionary Guards, says watchdog
British officials are investigating claims a British-Iranian academic has been detained by authorities in Tehran.
Abbas Edalat, a professor of computer science and mathematics at Imperial College London and a political activist, was arrested by Iran?€?s Revolutionary Guards on 15 April, according to a US-based watchdog.
The Minneapolis police officer accused of murdering Australian woman Justine Damond will plead not guilty and fight the charges at trial, court documents suggest.
Mohamed Noor, 32, will seek to argue self-defence and reasonable force, according to court documents seen by the Guardian.
Tokyo opposes South Korea?€?s mango mousse showing map of Korean peninsula, including disputed islands
Japan has demanded that South Korea rethink a mango mousse dessert it plans to serve at summit with the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un, because it features a map of the Korean peninsula, including islands disputed with Japan.
The mousse, labeled ?€?Spring of the People?€? in a publicity photo, features islands known as Takeshima in Japan and Dokdo in Korea, which lie about halfway between the east Asian neighbours in the Sea of Japan, which Seoul refers to as the East Sea.
Ali al-Marri, declared an ?€?enemy combatant?€? by George W Bush, insists he is innocent - and wants to challenge his FBI interrogators in court
A convicted ?€?sleeper terrorist?€? linked to the 9/11 planners has spoken for the first time about his treatment in detention, claiming he was tortured and abused during 13 years of incarceration on American soil.
Three years after his release, Ali al-Marri claims he is innocent and wants his FBI interrogators brought to account.
Larger-than-expected population in Africa gives hope for species survival, scientists say, but animal remains critically endangered
There are far more gorillas left in the world than previously thought, according to a landmark new survey, with numbers as much as double earlier estimates.
However, their populations are continuing to fall fast, down 20% in just eight years, leaving them critically endangered. Furthermore, 80% of the remaining gorilla troops do not live in protected areas, leaving them vulnerable to the threats the researchers summarise as ?€?guns, germs and [felled] trees?€?.
Low-lying atolls around the world will be overtaken by sea-level rises within a few decades, according to a new study
Hundreds of thousands of people will be forced from their homes on low-lying islands in the next few decades by sea-level rises and the contamination of fresh drinking water sources, scientists have warned.
A study by researchers at the US Geological Survey (USGS), the Deltares Institute in the Netherlands and Hawaii University has found that many small islands in the Pacific and Indian Oceans will be uninhabitable for humans by the middle of this century. That is much earlier than previously thought.
Inadequate support for Hong Kong?€?s ageing population means for some older citizens, scavenging and selling boxes and scrap is the only way to scrape by
Miss Wong, 65, scavenges the streets of Hong Kong?€?s Sheung Shui area in search of disused cardboard to sell to local recycling plants. She starts her day at 7am and often works until 9pm, seven days a week. For her efforts, she receives about HK$41 (£3.60) per day.
Wong is one of an estimated thousand senior citizens nicknamed ?€?cardboard grannies?€? who collect and sell waste boxes and other scrap across nine of the poorest districts in the city.
?€?Bicycle Day?€? on 19 April is the 75th anniversary of the day Albert Hofmann accidentally discovered LSD, changing his perceptions - and the city?€?s future
Seventy-five years ago, the Swiss chemist Albert Hofmann experienced the world?€?s first full-blown LSD trip on his way home from his lab in Basel. Hofmann had been researching the ergot fungus, hoping to develop a drug to treat fatigue. Among the compounds he was analysing was lysergic acid - Lysergsäure-Diethylamid in German, also known as LSD. On Friday 16 April 1943, Hofmann left the lab feeling a little dizzy: ?€?I lay down and had these wonderful dreams - I saw every thought as an image,?€? he said in an interview for his 100th birthday. The chemist concluded that he had accidentally touched the substance, and was intrigued by its powerful effect.
Three days later, on 19 April, he returned to the lab and swallowed a tiny amount just to see what would happen: ?€?As it later turned out, it was five times too much and gave me a horror trip.?€? He asked an assistant to take him home by bicycle, and Basel transformed into a panorama of hellish and heavenly visions. The bike seemed to freeze to the spot; a friendly neighbour turned into an evil witch. Hours later, Hofmann felt wonderful. ?€?LSD called me, I didn?€?t seek it out,?€? he recalled. ?€?It came to me.?€?
For decades, Haifa has been Israel?€?s model of what a ?€?mixed?€? Jewish-Arab city could be. But as the country?€?s 70th anniversary nears, the strain is showing
Ben-Gurion Boulevard climbs from the bustling port on Haifa?€?s Mediterranean shore up Mount Carmel towards the famous Bahai shrine, its gleaming golden dome surrounded by lush terraced gardens. On the south side of the palm-lined road, on a spring lunchtime, the Fattoush restaurant is packed with customers chatting noisily in Arabic and Hebrew over Levantine and fusion salads, cardamom-flavoured coffee and exquisite Palestinian knafeh desserts.
Fashionable eateries like Fattoush are one reason why Israel?€?s third largest city and its biggest ?€?mixed?€? one, as officially classified, is held up as a model of Jewish-Arab coexistence. Not everyone agrees with the concept, of course, and the ?€?c?€? word is often qualified, placed in inverted commas, or simply dismissed as propaganda. Official figures say Arabs make up 14% of Haifa?€?s 280,000-strong population; unofficial estimates are closer to 18%, swelled by students and commuters from nearby Galilee. Public spaces, at least, are open to all. And the ever-present Israeli-Palestinian conflict is, usually, softer-edged than elsewhere in the country.
Australia is one of the most urbanised countries in the world, with a full 40% of its population living in either Melbourne or Sydney: large, sprawling, coastal cities with very different personalities. Factoring in the other state, territory and national capitals - Adelaide, Brisbane, Canberra, Hobart, Perth and Darwin - takes that share to two-thirds of the total population of nearly 25 million.
Each of these cities has its own character, typically a result of its geography or weather. There?€?s Perth, the westernmost city, closer to Bali than the east coast. Canberra, the flat, planned federal capital of fake lakes and roundabouts. Melbourne, with its changeable weather. Harbour-centric Sydney. Hobart, Australia?€?s second-oldest city. Brisbane, split by the river. Darwin, the largest city of the Northern Territory, changing character from wet season to dry. Post-industrial Adelaide.
A three-year dig has uncovered the shocking violence with which the inhabitants of the coastal village of Sandby Borg were struck down
Archaeologists in Sweden have uncovered startling evidence of a massacre more than 1500 years ago, when the inhabitants of a small village were struck down in their houses or as they fled along the street, and their bodies left to rot where they fell - with their treasures including beautiful jewellery and Roman gold coins.
At Sandby Borg on the shore of Öland island, off the south-east coast of Sweden, there was no escape. In one house an old man was smashed on the skull so that he fell into the fire in the open hearth, where his body was charred to the bone. In another a teenage boy, possibly trying to flee, tripped over a body lying on the floor, and died where he fell.
?€?Unprecedented personal abuse?€? comes as court rejects last-ditch appeal by seriously ill boy?€?s parents to fly him to Italy
Police have vowed to tackle online threats over the case of Alfie Evans, the seriously ill boy at the heart of a protracted legal battle, after the hospital where he is being treated said medical staff had experienced ?€?unprecedented personal abuse?€?.
The warning came after a court rejected a last-ditch appeal by the 23-month-old?€?s parents on Wednesday against an earlier ruling preventing them from flying him to Rome for further care.
Documents discuss huge political difficulty of accepting any of the proposals for resolving problem
Senior British officials privately conceded last year that the UK?€?s preferred solution for avoiding a hard border with the Republic after Brexit would threaten the EU?€?s single market and that all possible outcomes would be damaging for the province.
A series of leaked letters and briefing papers from the Northern Ireland executive - at least one of which was sent to Olly Robbins, the prime minister?€?s most senior Brexit adviser - lay bare the huge difficulties created by Brexit.
Ted Cruz and others have called the legal battle over British child?€?s treatment a ?€?grim reminder?€? of socialized medicine
A legal fight in the United Kingdom over whether a terminally ill child should be allowed to leave the country for medical treatment has captured the attention of American conservatives.
The case of Alfie Evans, a 23-month-old child with a neurodegenerative disease that has left most of his brain destroyed, has received extensive coverage from outlets like Fox News and become a rallying cry for social conservatives.
Mexico City police found 416 totoaba swim bladders, prized for their purported rejuvenating qualities, in passenger?€?s suitcases
Mexican authorities have arrested a Chinese airline passenger after a strong smell emanating from his suitcases led to the discovery that he was transporting body parts from hundreds of endangered fish.
Police at the Mexico City international airport ?€?found 416 totoaba swim bladders in [the passenger?€?s] two suitcases,?€? the prosecutor general?€?s office said in a statement on Wednesday.
Report builds on evidence that site is unstable after sixth nuclear test and puts Kim Jong-un?€?s pledge to no longer use site in a new light
The mountain above North Korea?€?s main nuclear test site has collapsed under the stress of the explosions, rendering it unsafe for further testing, a study by Chinese geologists has shown.
The findings, by the scientists at the University of Science and Technology of China, may shed new light on North Korean leader Kim Jong-un?€?s announcement that his country would cease its testing program.
Despite a 2011 update to FPA regulations which made the publication of expelled advisors?€? names standard practise, the FPA continued to keep their identities secret until at least 2014 - with names redacted on an FPA website about its actions against breaches of conduct.
Similarly with a number of advisors who have been subject to summary disposals.
De Gori tells the commission he thinks ?€?expulsion?€? from the FPA is the most serious available sanction.
Asked what he thinks would bring this action, he says: ?€?Any major harm caused to a client, deliberate harm, fraud, systemic breaches of the code, some very serious cases of conduct, which would mean the member was not fit for practice.?€?
When a lack of trained builders hampered reconstruction in earthquake-hit Nepal, women stepped up to the plate - yet their resourcefulness has perturbed some traditionalists
This time last year Phulsani Tamang was living in a makeshift temporary shelter on the terraced slopes of eastern Nepal.
Her home had been destroyed by the 2015 earthquake, which claimed close to 9,000 lives and left hundreds of thousands of people homeless.
Guardian investigation reveals $64bn fund includes investments in companies involved in bribery and major environmental damage
The United Nations is facing calls for a full review of its staff pension fund after the Guardian uncovered that it has around a billion dollars invested in companies whose activities are or have been incompatible with core UN principles and programmes.
Established in 1948 by the UN general assembly, the fund provides retirement, death and disability benefits to employees. At present it has 203,050 beneficiaries and a market value of $64bn (£45bn), of which nearly $1.5bn is invested in 24 publicly traded companies. Many of those companies have been or are being prosecuted for corrupt practices, implicated in human rights abuses or in environmental catastrophes.
Shocked by the humanitarian crisis she saw unfolding in Greece, Ayesha Keller got on a plane to see if she could help save lives
Ayesha Keller was horrified by the treatment of refugees in Europe and wanted to try to make a difference. She left her job and headed for the Greek island of Lesbos, where she found the beaches strewn with discarded lifejackets, and the formal refugee settlement overflowing. Thousands of people unable to get into the camp were huddled in freezing fields, with no facilities, food or shelter. Keller banded together with other volunteers who had gone to Greece in response to the tragedy. During her year-long stay, she helped crowdfund, establish and run a transit camp in a local farmer?€?s olive groves
Sounds from Lesbos were recorded by Cambria Bailey-Jones
Britain and the EU are under fire for engaging with a nation with one of the world?€?s worst human rights records - all in the name of stemming migration
When Amjed Farid was transferred to a small cell in Kober prison on 5 April, he had a sense of deja vu. ?€?I suddenly realised it was the same one I?€?d been in five years before,?€? he says. ?€?It brought back some unpleasant memories. I spent a month in solitary, and had hoped I?€?d never have to see the place again.?€?
Farid was one of hundreds imprisoned in Sudan in January following peaceful protests against government austerity measures. While some were released after a few weeks, dozens were detained for nearly three months without charge, including British citizen Sidqi Kaballo. Many were kept in a bitterly cold security centre in Khartoum notorious for interrogations and torture, dubbed ?€?the Hotel?€? by officials.
With the majority of rapes committed by someone known to the victim, the new law could drive offenders to murder to avoid detection
On Saturday India?€?s government approved the death penalty for convicted rapists of girls under the age of 12, amid a groundswell of public outrage following the gang-rape and murder of an eight-year-old Muslim girl in Jammu and Kashmir state.
The shocking case involved a girl from the Bakarwal nomadic tribe, who was out grazing her horses when she was abducted, drugged and murdered after a week of torture and repeated rape. It led to a nationwide outcry for swifter justice.
Experts say suit alleging election conspiracy could inform the public about Trump and Russia, but some Democrats have voiced concern
By suing the Trump campaign, the Russian government and others, the Democratic National Committee has opened up a new front in a legal battle that is either a campaign for justice or a pitiable attempt to overturn the 2016 election result, depending on whom you ask.
North Korean leader?€?s surprise freeze should be seen more as diplomatic manoeuvre than step towards giving up warheads
Rockets, satellites, missiles and atoms pepper the landscape in Pyongyang. They are the anchors of funfair rides, feature in extravagant floral tributes to the country?€?s ?€?dear?€? and ?€?supreme?€? leaders from the Kim dynasty, and appear on stamps, apartment buildings and school walls.
These celebrations of the country?€?s weapons programme serve as a constant reminder to residents and visitors of how critical North Korea?€?s nuclear project has been to its national identity and security.
Two-thirds of young people think abortion should be legal in all or most cases - a glimmer of good news in a time of few wins
The Week in Patriarchy is a weekly roundup of what?€?s happening in the world of feminism and sexism. If you?€?re not already receiving it by email, make sure to subscribe.
A win for security, but real acid test of Pyongyang?€?s intentions is whether it will give up the weapons it has already built
North Korea has announced it will cease testing nuclear devices and missiles, and promised to shut down its primary nuclear test site at Punggye-ri. If this is genuine, it is a serious step forward, but we should greet it with cautious optimism.
We have been on the cusp of a breakthrough with North Korea before, only to be disappointed. There will be a lot of questions. But there is no need to be recalcitrantly hawkish about this. Within the limits of North Korea?€?s strained credibility, this is a win for allied security.
Emmanuel Macron made an impassioned speech in Washington on Wednesday advocating many of the things, including the Paris climate change accord, that Donald Trump has spent much of his presidency trying to destroy.
A Korean ?€?reinterpretation?€? of the Swiss fried potato dish rösti is one highlight of the banquet planned for after Friday?€?s summit between the North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and South Korea?€?s president, Moon Jae-in
The French president is on the first state visit to the US under Trump's presidency. During the three-day trip, the two heads of state have shared some touching moments - including Trump brushing dandruff from Macron's suit - in between discussions on global affairs
The US president, Donald Trump, and his French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron, exchange a vigorous handshake at the White House. Macron is the first leader to be accorded a state visit since Trump came to power in January 2017
The US president has treated his French counterpart to a colourful welcome at the White House. As the two leaders stood for a photo-op, Donald Trump said he and Emmanuel Macron had 'a very special relationship' before brushing away what he said was a 'little piece' of dandruff from Macron's jacket to 'make him perfect'. While the French president has tried to develop a close relationship with Trump since taking office last May, he has so far seen few tangible results on issues from Iran to climate politics.
The French president and his wife Brigitte opened their pomp-filled three-day state visit with a double date with Donald and Melania Trump at George Washington?€?s house
I wrote this tool some months ago while developing on the xPresso publishing system (NO), and has done some rewriting this week to implement further functionality.
The Codificator now provides: - automatic code wrapping in DC board format - conversion of regular HTML-formatted text to DC board formatted text - link extraction from HTML to DC board format - auto fetch of webpages, with on-select conversion of content to DC board format.
It won't boil your coffee or knit you a warm sweater for the winter, but it may help you to be more efficient when you're online discussing politics.
**** Bug fix, new release **** Bug in bbsFunctions.php, xAuth.php and some language fixed. For fix of existing installation, download the package, then extract progs/bbsFunctions.php and progs/xAuth.php to replace your current versions. **** Bug fix, new release ****
AnoBBS is a opensource 3DES-encrypted Bulletin Board where users encrypt their messages before submit with a common known phrase, using javascript. The server does not know the key, so this is end-to-end encryption where the key is never submitted. The technology used is Ajax and PHP, the forum files are stored as XML. Below is a list of the basic functionality: - user authentication - topic list and topic view - three userlevels; admin, moderator and user - post threads - post and edit replies - print or save threads - edit, delete and lock threads (mod) - edit forumdata and users (admin) - save BBS (admin) - delete BBS (admin)
The BBS is very simple to install and even simpler to use. It requires only a standard php distro on the server and a javascript enable browser to function.
**** Bug fix, new release **** Bug in cFunctions.php fixed. For fix of existing installation, download the package, then extract progs/cFunctions.php to replace your current versions. **** Bug fix, new release ****
AnoChat is an opensource 3DES-encrypted chat where users encrypt their messages before submit with a common known phrase, using javascript. The server does not know the key, so this is end-to-end encryption where the key is never submitted. The technology used is JX, similar to Ajax. The chat is very simple to install and even simpler to use. It requires only a standard php distro on the server and a javascript enabled browser to function.
Large number of US citizens demonstrated against the war in Iraq (and the possible war in Iran) during this October weekend. Massive turnout in Boston and San Fransisco, and also in Chicago, LA and DC people took to the streets. The message was: NO more war in Iraq! NO to a war with Iran!
