World news and comment from the Guardian | guardian.co.uk

Catalan pro-independence parties keep their majority in snap poll
UN votes resoundingly to reject Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as capital
Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe case marked as eligible for early release
Slender Man case: girl who stabbed classmate gets 25-year hospital sentence
South Korea sports centre fire causes at least 29 deaths
Norway reindeer herder loses much-publicised appeal over cull order
Delhi police raid 'spiritual university' and find women behind locked doors
Lithuania calls on EU to stop adjusting clocks for daylight savings
Indigenous minister under fire over funding for remote housing
Pope condemns 'cancer' of cliques in Christmas message to staff
Kim Jong-hyun's fans bid an emotional farewell to K-pop star
Melbourne car ramming: four people critically injured and driver arrested
Hundreds of Philippines ferry disaster survivors pulled from the sea
Alaskan wonderland with a Twin Peaks flipside: North Pole in the spotlight
Hundreds gather for Stonehenge sunrise after winter solstice
‘Things aren’t easy between us’: Boris Johnson meets Russian counterpart in Moscow
The Syrian refugee child who started a school: 'The kids wanted an education' | Helen Nianias
Ramaphosa pledges corruption crackdown in first speech as ANC leader
Congress passes short-term spending bill to avert government shutdown
Hit Brazilian music video touches nerve over race, sexist abuse and inequality
New Zealand gives Mount Taranaki same legal rights as a person
Flinders Street crash: nine victims are foreign nationals
'An employer? No, we have a master': the Sikhs secretly exploited in Italy | Daniela Sala
'A travesty': Trump censured over UN Jerusalem vote comments
'Pay to avoid a lashing': women in trousers face threats and abuse in Sudan
Trump's bullying and bluster on Jerusalem is bad news for the UN | Patrick Wintour
Trump is politicising the courts – and our judiciary is under threat | Jill Dash
A new generation of young black politicians is coming – the Democrats should listen
’A slap in the face’ for Madrid: Puigdemont hails Catalonia election win – video
The moment the UN votes to reject Trump’s position on Jerusalem – video
'We will remember this’: US slams UN Jerusalem vote – video
Catalonia election - in pictures

Catalan pro-independence parties keep their majority in snap poll

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 11:23 PM PST

Result a severe blow to the Spanish government which had hoped the vote would halt the push for secession

Catalonia secessionist parties declare victory in regional elections

Catalan pro-independence parties have held their absolute majority in snap regional elections, dealing a severe blow to the Spanish government, which had called the polls in the hope of heading off the secessionist push.

The deposed Catalan president, Carles Puigdemont, described the result as a "a slap to the face" to the Spanish prime minister, Mariano Rajoy.

UN votes resoundingly to reject Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as capital

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 10:46 AM PST

The United Nations body's debate and vote highlighted for a second time in a week the international isolation of the United States over the Jerusalem issue

The United Nations general assembly has delivered a stinging rebuke to Donald Trump, voting by a huge majority to reject his unilateral recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital.

The vote came after a redoubling of threats by Nikki Haley, the US ambassador to the UN, who said that Washington would remember which countries "disrespected" America by voting against it.

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe case marked as eligible for early release

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 04:52 AM PST

Husband of jailed British-Iranian woman says her lawyer thinks Iranian authorities are preparing to release her

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, the British-Iranian woman serving a five-year jail sentence in Tehran, has been told by her lawyer that her case has been marked as being eligible for early release, in a development her husband said was positive.

Richard Ratcliffe, who has been calling on Iran to release his wife before Christmas, said on Thursday that the news did not mean her release was guaranteed but viewed it as a positive sign following the visit to the Iranian capital earlier this month by the British foreign secretary, Boris Johnson.

Slender Man case: girl who stabbed classmate gets 25-year hospital sentence

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 01:50 PM PST

Anissa Weier, 16, who said she was mentally ill when she and a friend attacked a fellow 12-year-old, is to be institutionalized until she is 37

One of two US schoolgirls who tried to kill a classmate to win favor with a fictional horror character named Slender Man was sentenced on Thursday to 25 years in a psychiatric institution.

Anissa Weier, 16, pleaded guilty in August to being a party to attempted second-degree intentional homicide, but she claimed she wasn't responsible for her actions because she was mentally ill. In September, a jury agreed.

South Korea sports centre fire causes at least 29 deaths

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 06:51 PM PST

Fire department says number of casualties could rise after search of building that houses swimming pool and restaurants

At least 29 people have died in a fire at a sports centre in the central South Korean city of Jecheon on Thursday night, and another 29 are injured.

Norway reindeer herder loses much-publicised appeal over cull order

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 04:59 PM PST

Sami herder, who claims cull will affect his ability to make a living, will appeal decision in the European court of human rights

A small reindeer herder from the indigenous Sami community in the Norwegian Arctic lost a much-publicised appeal with Norway's top court on Thursday over a ruling that he must cull 41 of his 116-strong herd.

Jovsset Ante Sara, who has twice successfully challenged an order to reduce the size of his herd, claimed he can't make a living with that scale of slaughter.

Delhi police raid 'spiritual university' and find women behind locked doors

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 05:06 AM PST

Women held at compound run by guru appear drugged, with city's commissioner for women fearful it is a site for sexual exploitation

Police in Delhi have discovered a "spiritual university" in the north-west of the city where inspectors say up to 200 women and girls are being held behind a series of locked doors.

Conditions inside the building were "shocking", said Swati Maliwal, the Delhi commissioner for women, who took part in a raid on the four-storey facility this week.

Lithuania calls on EU to stop adjusting clocks for daylight savings

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 04:27 PM PST

Advisor to the prime minister says discussions will start with the EU about whether daylight saving is 'still relevant'

Lithuania has said that it would push the European Union to abolish its law on daylight saving time, claiming that most people find it annoying to have to adjust their clocks twice a year.

The Baltic nation's parliament voted 76 to seven, with seven abstentions, in favour of the government's proposal to open negotiations with the EU Commission.

Indigenous minister under fire over funding for remote housing

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 04:33 PM PST

Western and South Australia want Nigel Scullion to focus on renewing funding deal rather than home ownership targets

Funding to address overcrowding in remote Indigenous communities should take precedence over Nigel Scullion's push to introduce home ownership targets to Closing the Gap goals, the Western Australian and South Australian governments have said.

Scullion, the federal Indigenous affairs minister, is under fire from the Labor state governments who say the federal government does not plan to extend the 10-year $5.4bn National Partnership Agreement on Remote Housing (NPARH), which expires in June 2018.

Pope condemns 'cancer' of cliques in Christmas message to staff

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 06:02 AM PST

Francis says some of those chosen to help him reform Holy See have shown themselves to be not up to the task

Pope Francis has rebuked Vatican colleagues in a Christmas message, denouncing the "cancer" of cliques and how bureaucrats can become corrupted by ambition and vanity.

"Reforming Rome is like cleaning the Egyptian sphinxes with a toothbrush," Francis told cardinals, bishops and priests who work for him on Thursday. "You need patience, dedication and delicacy."

Kim Jong-hyun's fans bid an emotional farewell to K-pop star

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 04:43 AM PST

Grief-stricken crowds in grey and black line streets of Seoul for funeral of SHINee lead singer who died in suspected suicide

Grief-stricken music fans have lined the streets in Seoul to farewell Kim Jong-hyun, the lead singer of the top South Korean K-pop band SHINee, who died this week in a suspected suicide.

Crying and embracing one another, young men and women dressed in grey and black turned out on Thursday as a hearse carrying Kim's coffin left the hospital in the South Korean capital.

Melbourne car ramming: four people critically injured and driver arrested

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 05:14 AM PST

Police say no evidence of terror link after vehicle collides with pedestrians on Flinders Street
• What we know so far
• Witnesses tell of horror scenes

Four people have been critically injured after a car ploughed through a busy intersection outside the Flinders Street station in Melbourne in what police have described as a "deliberate act".

The driver of the vehicle, a 32-year-old man, was arrested by an off-duty police sergeant who was on the scene within 15 seconds of the incident, the acting police commissioner, Shane Patton, told reporters at a press conference on Thursday night.

Hundreds of Philippines ferry disaster survivors pulled from the sea

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 02:55 AM PST

At least four people killed and others missing after ship carrying more than 250 people was battered by fierce winds

At least four people have died and seven others are missing after a Philippine ferry carrying more than 250 passengers and crew, including Christmas holiday travellers, sank in stormy conditions.

About 240 people were pulled alive from the rough seas, some with injuries, after the M/V Mercraft 3 sank in the Polillo Strait in the north-east coast of the country, officials said.

Alaskan wonderland with a Twin Peaks flipside: North Pole in the spotlight

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 11:30 PM PST

It's Christmas all year round in this festive fantasia, which attracts 500,000 letters to Santa a year. Just don't ask about the black market for drugs

Opportunism comes with bells on at this Alaskan commuter town next to the Richardson Highway, south-west of the city of Fairbanks. What was once a nondescript homestead called Davis incorporated itself as North Pole in 1953, becoming an unlikely centre of Christmas-based commerce and tourism despite being 1,700 miles south of the real thing. Letters addressed to "Santa Claus, North Pole" often wind up in this 2,000-strong community, and the streets have names like Santa Claus Lane and Kris Kringle Drive. Paul Brown, who currently manages Santa Claus House, the cavernous red-trimmed gift shop that evolved from a trading post set up by his wife's grandparents, says living in this fantasia can lead to festive desensitisation: "For ordinary people, there's more of a sense of emphasis on the holidays that is less so when you live in North Pole, just because we are living Christmas every day."

Hundreds gather for Stonehenge sunrise after winter solstice

Posted: 22 Dec 2017 01:15 AM PST

The weather was soggy but the mood joyful among the stones, which have been found this year to help mental wellbeing

Some of those attending the winter solstice celebrations at Stonehenge were there to worship, others to party or to simply to enjoy the rise of the sun after the longest night and look forward to lengthening days and springtime.

Despite it being a gloomy, soggy morning in Wiltshire, there was a joyful atmosphere as hundreds of people gathered to witness the light return.

‘Things aren’t easy between us’: Boris Johnson meets Russian counterpart in Moscow

Posted: 22 Dec 2017 01:27 AM PST

Sergei Lavrov blames UK for increasing tensions amid first visit to Russia by a British foreign secretary for five years

Boris Johnson has begun talks in Moscow with the Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov as he makes the visit to the country by a British foreign secretary for five years.

In public comments before the talks, Lavrov chided Johnson for his public criticism of Russia and said the miserable state of bilateral relations was London's fault.

The Syrian refugee child who started a school: 'The kids wanted an education' | Helen Nianias

Posted: 22 Dec 2017 02:00 AM PST

For a 12-year-old boy in a Lebanese refugee camp, learning about photography ended his isolation, and inspired him to get funding for a school there

So much of being a child can feel like sitting around, waiting around for your life to start. For Mohamad Al Jounde, now 16, the problem was chronic – forced to flee from his home country, out of school, no money, nowhere to go, nothing to do. When he picked up a camera for the first time in a refugee camp in Lebanon, it started a chain of events that ended with him opening a school in a camp when he was 12, and culminated with Malala Yousafzai presenting him with an award. Life comes at you fast.

Mohamad left the city of Hama, in Syria, two years ago after the regime abducted his mother twice for her activism and threatened to kill her. The family ended up in Aley, near Beirut in Lebanon, safe but destitute. They had no money to send Mohamad and his sister to school, and time ebbed past without purpose.

Ramaphosa pledges corruption crackdown in first speech as ANC leader

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 05:11 AM PST

New leader, likely to become next president of South Africa, vows to expedite job creation and speed up land transfer to black people

Cyril Ramaphosa, the new leader of South Africa's governing ANC party, has said he aims to pursue a policy of "radical economic transformation" that will speed up expropriation of land without compensation and stamp out corruption.

Ramaphosa, a 65-year-old union leader who became a businessman and is now one of South Africa's richest people, is likely to become the country's next president after elections in 2019, because of his party's electoral dominance.

Congress passes short-term spending bill to avert government shutdown

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 08:11 PM PST

Senate passes legislation before deadline
Immigration and healthcare issues to remain unresolved until the new year

Congress has averted a shutdown of the federal government, narrowly passing a temporary spending bill that will now go to Donald Trump to sign but that will only delay the reckoning for a month and will kick contentious issues such as immigration and healthcare into the new year.

Congress had until midnight on Friday to pass a "continuing resolution" to keep government operations running. The House bill passed by 231-188 and the Senate shortly afterwards by 66-32. The concerted Republican effort will push the deadline back by funding the government through 19 January.

Hit Brazilian music video touches nerve over race, sexist abuse and inequality

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 11:00 PM PST

Anitta's hit Vai Malandra, shot by Terry Richardson and viewed more than 31m times on YouTube, prompts accusations of cultural appropriation

The video for the latest hit from the Brazilian pop sensation Anitta opens with a close-up of her sashaying buttocks before weaving through the streets of a Rio favela and eventually showing the star dancing in a tiny bikini on a flooded rooftop.

Since its release on Monday, Vai Malandra (Go Bad Girl) has been watched more than 30m times on YouTube – and become the first song in Portuguese to enter the Spotify Global top 20 chart.

New Zealand gives Mount Taranaki same legal rights as a person

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 09:18 PM PST

The sacred mountain in the North Island is the third geographic feature in the country to be granted a 'legal personality'

Mount Taranaki in New Zealand is to be granted the same legal rights as a person, becoming the third geographic feature in the country to be granted a "legal personality".

Eight local Māori tribes and the government will share guardianship of the sacred mountain on the east coast of the North Island, in a long-awaited acknowledgement of the indigenous people's relationship to the mountain, who view it as an ancestor and whanau, or family member.

Flinders Street crash: nine victims are foreign nationals

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 11:11 PM PST

Three people still critical, including two South Koreans, as alleged driver of car that ploughed into pedestrians in Melbourne is released from hospital

Three people, including two South Korean nationals, remained in a critical condition in hospital 24 hours after a car ploughed into pedestrians on Flinders Street in Melbourne on Thursday.

The white SUV drove on to tram tracks and then into an intersection crowded with pedestrians about 4.45pm, injuring 18 people before hitting the concrete base of a tram stop.

'An employer? No, we have a master': the Sikhs secretly exploited in Italy | Daniela Sala

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 11:00 PM PST

After years of arduous, badly paid work in the fields of southern Italy, Singh reported his employer to the police. But in a country where justice moves at a glacial pace, abused migrant workers have scant incentive to come forward

Singh was full of resolve the day he walked into an Italian police station to report the abuse he was facing in the fields of southern Italy. "I am a Sikh," says the farm worker from Punjab in northern India. "And when a Sikh takes a decision, he will go forward, no matter what."

Singh knew the risk he was taking. A few days after his visit to the police station, he says, the threats and intimidation began in earnest. Within a week, he had lost his job and been forced to move home.

'A travesty': Trump censured over UN Jerusalem vote comments

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 10:13 AM PST

As UN declares US attempt to have Jerusalem recognised as Israel's capital void, experts warn Trump's proposed aid cuts would have devastating consequences

Donald Trump's threat to withhold US aid from countries voting in favour of a UN general assembly resolution rejecting his recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital has been described as a "travesty" by experts.

On Thursday, an emergency session of the UN general assembly voted 128-9 against Trump's declaration, pronouncing it "null and void". There were a total of 35 abstentions.

'Pay to avoid a lashing': women in trousers face threats and abuse in Sudan

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 03:00 AM PST

Report reveals officials use risk of imprisonment or beatings over 'indecent dress' to swell coffers and target women the authorities wish to silence

Fines for wearing trousers and the threat of beatings are being handed to women in Sudan "like traffic wardens issuing parking tickets", say the authors of a study on the country's controversial public order regime.

Researchers who carried out detailed interviews with 40 women who had fallen foul of the country's discriminatory laws found corrupt officials are increasingly using the threat of flogging to elicit money.

Trump's bullying and bluster on Jerusalem is bad news for the UN | Patrick Wintour

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 10:49 AM PST

US hard-power diplomacy over Israel will end up being an expensive clash if Washington cuts its funding to the UN

"Strong, sovereign nations let diverse countries with different values, different cultures and different dreams not just coexist but work side by side on the basis of mutual respect," Donald Trump said in his first speech to the UN general assembly, in September, drawing sighs of relief.

Trump is politicising the courts – and our judiciary is under threat | Jill Dash

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 04:00 AM PST

Senate Republicans are wielding their power to control the judicial branch. It will do potentially irreparable harm to democracy

Almost one year into the Trump administration, we have fallen into a disturbingly familiar pattern of looking on as the daily news cycle tracks and parses the president's latest tweets, decrying the fact that this is not the way things are done around here. But as we look the other way, it is the Senate that he has chosen to erode norms and conventions in how judges are staffed to the federal courts, and which is breaking down our democracy at every turn.

The constitution requires that the Senate provide "advice and consent" on nominations made by the president. But long before Trump was elected, Senate Republicans crossed the ultimate line when the Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, calling it one of his "proudest moments", led his caucus to refuse to hold a hearing for Chief Judge Merrick Garland, President Barack Obama's carefully chosen supreme court nominee who had even won accolades from the right.

A new generation of young black politicians is coming – the Democrats should listen

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 03:00 AM PST

Democrats have every right to feel optimistic after a major win in Alabama, but keeping up momentum will require more than taking black voters for granted

The recent upset in the special election for US Senate in Alabama has Democrats fantasizing about a 2018 wave election, and rightfully so. When you couple the Doug Jones narrow win in Alabama with the big victories in Virginia and New Jersey, Democrats have every right to feel optimistic.

There is, however, one obvious similarity in each race: strong African American turnout fueled Democratic candidates to victory.

’A slap in the face’ for Madrid: Puigdemont hails Catalonia election win – video

Posted: 22 Dec 2017 01:18 AM PST

Catalan pro-independence parties have held their majority in snap regional elections, dealing a severe blow to the Spanish government, which had called the poll in the hope of heading off the secessionist push. Together for Catalonia - the party led by the region's deposed president, Carles Puigdemont – took 34 seats, the Catalan Republican Left (ERC) 32 and the far-left Popular Unity Candidacy four. Making his victory speech, a jubilant Puigdemont said the Spanish prime minister, Mariano Rajoy, had been 'sunk' in Catalonia

Catalan pro-independence parties keep their majority in snap poll

The moment the UN votes to reject Trump’s position on Jerusalem – video

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 10:11 AM PST

The United Nations general assembly votes on a resolution denouncing Donald Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. The resolution passes by a resounding majority, with just nine countries - including the US and Israel - voting against it. Members of the general assembly break into a round of applause when the result is announced

UN votes resoundingly to reject Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as capital

'We will remember this’: US slams UN Jerusalem vote – video

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 09:47 AM PST

The US ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, speaks at an emergency session of the general assembly ahead of a vote criticising Donald Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. Haley warns those countries voting in favour of the resolution that 'the United States will remember this day' when other nations call on the US to 'use our influence for their benefit'

UN votes resoundingly to reject Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as capital

Catalonia election - in pictures

Posted: 21 Dec 2017 07:26 AM PST

Catalans head to the polls to vote for a new regional government in an election pitting secessionists against unionists, which will determine the next phase of the region's long-running campaign for independence from Spain