Top World News

Researchers testing a cheap, homegrown oil in Uganda found what cats knew all along – it worked as well as the artificial chemical used globally A homegrown catnip lotion has proven “just as effective as Deet” as a mosquito repellant in trials carried out in Uganda.Catnip, or Nepeta cataria, is a common herb from the mint family. The chemical in the plant that causes feline euphoria – nepetalactone – also has insect-repelling properties but this has not previously been commercialised. Continue reading...

Celeste Amarilla could face charges after French Football Federation complains about social media posts over World Cup matchProsecutors in France have opened an investigation into the racist attack on Kylian Mbappé by a Paraguayan senator, with officials weighing whether to demand that the senator be charged with aggravated public insult or incitement to hatred or violence.The Paris prosecutor’s office told the Guardian on Tuesday it had launched the inquiry after the French Football Federation (FFF) filed a complaint with the national unit for combating online hate. Continue reading...

Amnesty International says Albanese has opportunity to ‘reaffirm mutual commitment’ to rule of law as thousands in diaspora expected at stadium eventFollow our Australia news live blog for latest updatesGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastThe Indian prime minister Narendra Modi’s first visit to Australia in three years has sparked calls for the federal government to raise human rights concerns, as excitement builds within the nation’s Indian diaspora.Modi’s visit begins on Wednesday evening and marks his third since becoming prime minister. It will see him return to Melbourne after more than a decade, with a stadium event expected to attract more than 20,000 people. Continue reading...

Following Donald Trump dismissing questions about the Iran war quagmire the U.S. is stuck in during a press availability preceding NATO talks in Turkey, retired United States Army Lieutenant General Mark Hertling pounced on the president for parroting Russian strongman Vladimir Putin.After live coverage of the question and answer period concluded on MS NOW, host Stephanie Ruhle noted, “General, let's start right there with the president's comments with regard to the war with Iran; he said, it is ‘not even a war, it's just a military operation.’”“I think he called it a ‘special military operation,' which sounds eerily familiar to what President Putin was calling the invasion in Ukraine,” Hertling shot back.“It is a war, Stephanie,” he continued. “I mean, it meets every definition of war that I've ever read in history books or doctrine or military theory. So it's just a canard that he's throwing out there to say, ‘yeah, this is no big deal, we won, everything's fine.”“But last night we saw more ships being struck by Ukrainian drones or, excuse me, Iranian drones. It's just a mishmash of information that he’s passing off to the press,” he accused. - YouTube youtu.be

A federal judge blocked part of President Donald Trump's immigration crackdown, citing the president's own "preference" for white immigrants.U.S. District Judge Algenon L. Marbley of the Southern District of Ohio issued the ruling Monday, blocking three U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services policies that had frozen green card and work permit applications for people from seven countries."This general hostility to immigration contrasts with an apparent interest in and preference for the migration of white people," Marbley wrote. "Aside from a stated desire for more Scandinavian immigration, President Trump has sought to welcome white South Africans."From October 2025 through May 2026, the ruling notes, 6,665 of the 6,668 refugees admitted to the U.S. were from South Africa.At a December 2025 rally in Pennsylvania, Trump asked: "Why can't we have some people from Norway, Sweden, just a few?... Send us some nice people.""In sum, both the President and the Vice President have publicly and repeatedly expressed outright hostility toward immigrants, both before and after the 2024 presidential election," the judge wrote, finding the pattern impossible to ignore."Their ire appears focused on immigrants from countries in the Caribbean, South America, Africa, and Asia," he added.Trump has claimed that white South African farmers face a "genocide" and made their plight a priority. "Farmers are being killed," he told PBS in May 2025. "They happen to be white."The administration has since proposed raising the U.S. refugee cap to 17,500 — with the additional 10,000 slots reserved exclusively for white Afrikaners."We are processing resettlement cases for white Afrikaners at a record pace," Sharif Aly, president of the International Refugee Assistance Project, told Democracy Now!. "This program has never been a fast program, and it's being expedited for just this one population."Marbley also cited Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan's dissent in a recent immigration case, calling Trump's statements about certain countries "repellent and racially inflected" — including his claim that immigrants from those nations are "poisoning the blood" of the United States.The ruling is the 11th of its kind. At the hearing, the government told the judge it expected to lose — and spent its argument focused only on how narrow the remedy should be.

Tropical storm causes extreme flooding in south of the country with heavy rainfall expected in coming daysA tropical storm has killed two people, caused dam breaches and forced tens of thousands to evacuate in southern China.Typhoon Maysak killed two people in Nanning, in China’s southern Guangxi province. Maysak, which lashed Vietnam and China’s southern island province of Hainan over the weekend, will dump the water it sucked up on its way ⁠across the South China Sea as it weakens and heads inland, meteorologists say. Continue reading...

Reporting on a Donald Trump press availability on Monday afternoon, where the president addressed the firestorm over his intervention to get US soccer player Folarin Balogun reinstated to play against Belgium in the World Cup despite a disqualifying red card, MS NOW’s Vaughan Hillyard said the president only made matters worse.Speaking with host Ali Vitali, Hillyard pointed out that the president made an admission that he found startling.“I think the president made one very head-spinning comment for all soccer fans around the world, and that was the fact that he didn't even know what a red card was before last week's U.S. matchup,” he told the host.Specifically, the president told reporters, “I spoke to [FIFA President] Gianni [Infantino], who's highly respected, who's produced the most successful World Cup in history, by, they say, four times they gave him a red card. I didn't know what that meant.”Trump continued, “I didn't think it meant much. Then I started hearing that that means he can't play in the next game. All I did, I asked for a review because I didn't think it was a foul. I related just that I didn't tell him what to do. I can't tell him what to do, but — and I don't believe he made the decision. I think it was a committee that made the decision and they made the right decision.”According to Hillyard, Trump’s admission about his ignorance of the rules raised the stakes for FIFA."And so the Belgian Football Association has appealed this decision here by FIFA,” he reported. “ And what? We're about six hours away from kickoff here in this matchup tonight, Ali. And the question is, will FIFA, which has not expressly articulated why they reversed their decision in the first place to keep Balogun on the field tonight, whether they will take up that appeal from Belgium and reverse course.”“This is not just a sports mess right now, but it's a global news mess here as well,” he added. - YouTube youtu.be

TKMS beats South Korean rival to multibillion-dollar contract that will deepen Canada’s Nato tiesCanada has selected a German consortium to build a dozen cutting-edge submarines in one of the country’s largest-ever defence contracts that will further deepen its Nato ties before a crucial summit this week.On Monday the prime minister, Mark Carney, announced the winner of a tightly contested battle for the lucrative government contract to replace its fleet of ageing, secondhand subs, most of which are undergoing maintenance. Continue reading...