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Iran protests: deaths in custody spark human rights concerns
North Korea agrees to send athletes to Winter Olympics after talks with South
Turkish Cyprus set for coalition after rightwing party fails to get majority
China's women break silence on harassment as #MeToo becomes #WoYeShi
Netanyahu son bragged about gas deal outside strip club, tape reveals
US says 200,000 people from El Salvador must leave within 18 months
James Damore sues Google, alleging intolerance of white male conservatives
Stunning victory for Bundy family as all charges dismissed in 2014 standoff case
Juncker calls on EU countries to make up Brexit hole in its budget
French town bans pork-free school meals in move branded 'anti-Muslim'
High school student killed in protests as price of bread doubles in Sudan
India's highest court to review colonial-era law criminalising gay sex
Trump Tower fire: three people injured in New York City blaze
Abducted at nine to be a girl soldier for Kony: 'Now people call me a killer' | Samuel Okiror
Boy, 16, arrested over murder of north London shop worker
Eurozone jobless rate hits near nine-year low, German industrial output surges - business live
Grace Mugabe's PhD investigated by Zimbabwe's anti-corruption watchdog
Mueller investigators interested in interview with Donald Trump
Venezuela opposition looks to military to oust Maduro. Dream on
Coming of age ceremony in Yokohama – in pictures
Australian same-sex couple marry after 30 years together – video
Phone calls, Facebook and the odd nap: life as a judge in Myanmar | Joshua Carroll
Fire breaks out at Trump Tower – video

Iran protests: deaths in custody spark human rights concerns

Posted: 08 Jan 2018 09:00 PM PST

At least three demonstrators believed to have been killed in custody amid violent crackdown on anti-government protests

Human rights activists in Iran have raised concerns about mass arrests during the country's largest protests in nearly a decade after at least three demonstrators died in a notorious Tehran jail.

Two members of the Iranian parliament close to the reformist camp confirmed on Monday that one detainee, Sina Ghanbari, had died in Evin prison.

North Korea agrees to send athletes to Winter Olympics after talks with South

Posted: 08 Jan 2018 09:34 PM PST

Delegation including cheerleaders will travel to Games despite rising tensions over Pyongyang's nuclear weapons programme

North Korea will send athletes and cheerleaders to next month's Winter Olympics in South Korea, after the two countries held their first official talks for more than two years.

The North Korean party will also include performing artists and journalists, South Korea's vice unification minister, Chun Hae-sung, said after the first session of talks ended on Tuesday.

Turkish Cyprus set for coalition after rightwing party fails to get majority

Posted: 08 Jan 2018 02:39 PM PST

Voters in parliamentary election showed their dissatisfaction with UBP party, seen as corrupt and too subservient to Turkey

Efforts are set to begin on forming a coalition government in Turkish-occupied northern Cyprus after the rightwing National Unity party won parliamentary elections but failed to secure a majority in parliament.

In a setback for forces seeking to reunite the island's feuding ethnic communities, the UBP won 35.6% and 21 seats in the 50-member house – a reflection of its control over the levers of power after 27 years in office. The pro-solution and centre-left Republican Turkish party (CTP) came in with 20.9% and 12 seats.

China's women break silence on harassment as #MeToo becomes #WoYeShi

Posted: 08 Jan 2018 07:45 PM PST

Beijing's strict social control mean few have risked speaking out about misogyny but campaigners are beginning to make their voices heard

It has been 12 years since Luo Qianqian says she was pounced upon by her PhD supervisor while she was studying in Beijing. "Please don't do that," she remembers protesting. "I'm still a virgin."

Netanyahu son bragged about gas deal outside strip club, tape reveals

Posted: 08 Jan 2018 11:51 AM PST

While on tour of clubs with minder in tow, Yair Netanyahu is heard telling friend: 'My dad made an awesome deal for your dad'

Lawyers for Israel's prime minister, Benjamin Netanayhu, tried to stop the broadcast of an embarrassing audiotape in which Netanyahu's son Yair suggested his father helped push through a $20bn deal to the benefit of a gas tycoon.

The recording of the conversation, which took place outside a strip club, is the latest revelation to cast light on the Netanyahu family's relationships with wealthy tycoons, which have so far spawned two corruption investigations into the prime minister's activities.

US says 200,000 people from El Salvador must leave within 18 months

Posted: 08 Jan 2018 10:58 AM PST

Trump administration names fourth country in four months to lose protection under TPS program, which since 1990 has provided deportation relief

Nearly 200,000 people from El Salvador must leave the US in the next 18 months or change their immigration status, the US Department of Homeland Security said on Monday.

This announcement came despite efforts by immigration advocates and El Salvador's government to persuade the Trump administration to continue providing lawful status and the ability to work to Salvadorans who have been protected from deportation since the country was hit by two devastating earthquakes in 2001.

James Damore sues Google, alleging intolerance of white male conservatives

Posted: 08 Jan 2018 03:10 PM PST

Class-action lawsuit led by fired engineer includes 100 pages of internal documents and claims conservatives are 'ostracized, belittled, and punished'

Google is facing renewed controversy over its alleged intolerance toward conservatives at the company, after a class action lawsuit filed by former engineer James Damore disclosed almost 100 pages of screen shots of internal communications in which employees discuss sensitive political issues.

Stunning victory for Bundy family as all charges dismissed in 2014 standoff case

Posted: 08 Jan 2018 02:39 PM PST

Cliven Bundy and sons cleared in case of 2014 armed standoff, a major defeat for the federal government that critics fear will empower far-right militia groups

A judge has dismissed conspiracy charges against rancher Cliven Bundy and his sons, marking an extraordinary failure by US prosecutors and a decisive victory for the Nevada family who ignited a land rights movement in the American west.

The Bundys, who led armed standoffs against the government in Nevada and Oregon, galvanizing far-right militia groups, saw all charges dismissed in Las Vegas on Monday. It was the second major court win for the ranchers in their decades-long battle to oppose federal land regulations.

Juncker calls on EU countries to make up Brexit hole in its budget

Posted: 08 Jan 2018 09:44 AM PST

EU commission president dismisses idea UK has changed its mind on leaving as he urges members to plug €13bn-a-year gap

Jean-Claude Juncker has dismissed the idea that the UK has changed its mind on Brexit and urged the remaining 27 EU member states to agree to pay more to fill the soon-to-be €13bn (£11.5bn) annual hole in its budget.

At an event with finance ministers to discuss the next period of EU spending, the European commission president made his case for the countries to be ambitious and increase the amount they send to Brussels for EU programmes, rather than lower its ambitions.

French town bans pork-free school meals in move branded 'anti-Muslim'

Posted: 08 Jan 2018 01:28 PM PST

Decision by far-right local authority in southern France, affecting about 150 mainly Muslim pupils, has been called 'an attack on the rights of children'

A far-right local authority in southern France on Monday scrapped pork-free school meals, a move branded "anti-Muslim" or "anti-Jewish" by an equality minister.

Julien Sanchez, the National Front mayor of Beaucaire, a town south of Avignon, abolished the scheme, brought in by his predecessor, on the first day of the new school term.

High school student killed in protests as price of bread doubles in Sudan

Posted: 08 Jan 2018 10:05 AM PST

At least five others injured as demonstrations spread across the country against price hikes caused by government austerity measures

Protests over rising bread prices broke out across Sudan on Sunday, leading to the death of a high school pupil and the arrest of a prominent opposition leader as authorities confiscated newspapers and began to clamp down on growing unrest.

The demonstrations followed a similar protest in the south-eastern city of Sennar on Saturday after bread prices doubled following the government's announcement late last month that it was eliminating subsidies in its 2018 budget.

India's highest court to review colonial-era law criminalising gay sex

Posted: 08 Jan 2018 04:46 AM PST

Supreme court to re-examine legislation activists say is used to blackmail LGBTI Indians and block HIV and Aids initiatives

India may be on track for a major victory for gay rights after the supreme court agreed to re-examine a colonial-era law outlawing sex between men.

The court said on Monday that it would refer the question of the validity of section 377 of the Indian penal code to a larger bench for examination before October.

Trump Tower fire: three people injured in New York City blaze

Posted: 08 Jan 2018 08:23 AM PST

Fire department says blaze 'was on top of the building'
Donald Trump was not in the building at the time of the fire

Two civilians and one firefighter were injured in a fire at Trump Tower in New York on Monday morning.

Abducted at nine to be a girl soldier for Kony: 'Now people call me a killer' | Samuel Okiror

Posted: 08 Jan 2018 03:33 AM PST

A former Lord's Resistance Army fighter feels marginalised and abandoned, failed by the Ugandan government after broken promises of help and support

When Agnes Acayo escaped from the rebel group who had abducted her at the age of nine, she felt overjoyed to be free and back home at last. She had spent 10 years in captivity as a child soldier and later was forced to marry a member of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) in Uganda.

Now 30, Acayo, like many of her fellow female ex-combatants, is stuck in a cycle of poverty, despite government promises that they would be helped. Acayo, who still has a bullet embedded in her right hand from a battle with Ugandan army troops, lives in a rented mud-grass hut with her three children in Gulu, in the north of the country.

Boy, 16, arrested over murder of north London shop worker

Posted: 09 Jan 2018 02:06 AM PST

Man – named in reports as Vijay Patel, 49 – was attacked in Mill Hill after refusing to sell cigarette papers to three teenagers

A 16-year-old boy who is alleged to have attacked a shop worker who refused to sell him cigarette papers has been arrested on suspicion of murder.

The victim, named as 49-year-old father Vijay Patel, was critically injured with a single blow on Saturday after refusing to sell the papers to three teenage boys at a north London shop because of their age.

Eurozone jobless rate hits near nine-year low, German industrial output surges - business live

Posted: 09 Jan 2018 02:09 AM PST

All the day's economic and financial news.

10.09am GMT

Newsflash: Unemployment across the eurozone has hit its lowest rate on almost nine years.

The euro-area jobless rate fell to 8.7% in November, down from 8.8% in October. That's the best reading since January 2009, when the global economy was crashing into recession.

*EURO-AREA NOV. UNEMPLOYMENT RATE FALLS TO 8.7%, MATCHING EST.

9.47am GMT

City analysts are welcoming today's strong German economic data, particularly the 3.4% jump in industrial production in November.

Jennifer McKeown of Capital Economics says German seems to be ending 2017 "with a bang".

"November's surge in German industrial production is a welcome confirmation that the economy approached the end of 2017 in very good health and the surveys point to further strength to come.

Better than expected German Trade and Production data affirmed what is already well known, i.e. that the German economy is in rude health.

Grace Mugabe's PhD investigated by Zimbabwe's anti-corruption watchdog

Posted: 08 Jan 2018 05:19 PM PST

Former first lady obtained her 2014 doctorate in just a few months but her dissertation has never been published

Zimbabwean anti-corruption investigators are probing whether former first lady Grace Mugabe fraudulently obtained a doctorate that she apparently received within months, the dissertation for which remains unpublished.

Grace Mugabe, whose apparent desire to succeed her husband prompted the army takeover that eventually saw Robert Mugabe resign, was awarded a PhD by the University of Zimbabwe in 2014.

Mueller investigators interested in interview with Donald Trump

Posted: 08 Jan 2018 11:27 PM PST

No details in place yet over move that would take inquiry to seat of power
Trump lawyers decline to comment but president has denied Russia collusion

Special counsel Robert Mueller's team of investigators has expressed interest in speaking with Donald Trump as its investigation into potential coordination between Russia and the president's election campaign looks set to reach right into the Oval Office, it emerged on Monday.

Venezuela opposition looks to military to oust Maduro. Dream on

Posted: 08 Jan 2018 11:30 PM PST

Having failed to dislodge President Nicolás Maduro, the opposition is openly talking of a coup but mutual benefit links the military with the ruling party

Now that anti-government protests in Venezuela have been crushed and President Nicolás Maduro has consolidated his power through dubious electoral maneuvers and a crackdown on democratic freedoms, some opposition leaders and international pundits have raised the possibility of a coup d'etat as the only realistic way to bring about regime change.

Julio Borges, head of the opposition-controlled congress, has called on the military to "break its silence", adding that "the immense majority of officers are against the chaos that is taking hold in Venezuela".

Coming of age ceremony in Yokohama – in pictures

Posted: 09 Jan 2018 01:00 AM PST

Coming of Age Day is a Japanese holiday held every January to celebrate people who have reached 20 – the country's official age of adulthood. Yokohama, with almost 37,000 people turning 20 in the past year, is holding one of the largest events in the country

Australian same-sex couple marry after 30 years together – video

Posted: 08 Jan 2018 11:30 PM PST

Marriage equality campaigners Ron van Houwelingen and Antony McManus tie the knot on 9 January, the first day most same-sex couples were legally allowed to marry in Australia. The pair made it official at David Williamson Theatre at Melbourne Polytechnic in Prahran, where they met as students in 1987

Phone calls, Facebook and the odd nap: life as a judge in Myanmar | Joshua Carroll

Posted: 08 Jan 2018 09:00 PM PST

New research suggests lax, poorly trained judges and shambolic court hearings that contravene local and international law are par for the course in Myanmar

Defence lawyer Zar Li Aye was eating lunch near a courthouse in Yangon, Myanmar's largest city, when her phone rang. "Where are you?" asked a colleague. "Your client just confessed."

The client, under pressure from a police officer, had agreed to fire her and submit a false guilty plea when the judge started the hearing early.

Fire breaks out at Trump Tower – video

Posted: 08 Jan 2018 05:59 AM PST

Firefighters are attending a minor fire, which has broken out at Trump Tower in New York. Donald Trump was at the White House during the incident