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Overnight News Digest: UK Bees in danger due to Asian hornets [1]
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Date: 2023-09-04
BBC
Record sightings of Asian hornets are raising fears of catastrophic consequences for the UK's bee populations for years to come. The invasive hornets are wreaking havoc in mainland Europe and threaten to get a foothold in the UK, with nests found in East Sussex, Kent, Devon and Dorset. The insects feed on native bees and wasps, damaging biodiversity. The warning comes as leading scientists release a global report into the threats caused by invasive species.
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BBC
Barbie has officially become the year's biggest box office hit, after the doll's big-screen earnings overtook the Super Mario Bros Movie's total. The Barbie movie, which sees Margot Robbie's titular toy swap her pink fantasy home for the real world, has now made $1.38bn (£1.1bn) globally. That has taken it past the $1.36bn taken by the Super Mario Bros Movie. Barbie has also helped the US summer box office reach the $4bn (£3.2bn) mark for the first time since the pandemic. Analysts did not expect cinemas to reach that milestone, but the success of Barbenheimer - Barbie and Christopher Nolan's Oppenheimer, which were released on the same day in July - propelled takings past last year's total of $3.4bn (£2.7bn).
Al Jazeera
At least three people have died after heavy rains lashed Spain, triggering flash floods that forced the closure of Madrid metro lines and high-speed rail links. Helicopters were sent to rescue people who had sought refuge on the roofs of their homes in the central city of Toledo, about 50km (31 miles) southwest of Madrid, on Monday. Three people died in the countryside around Toledo, where the weather service Aemet registered record rainfall of 90 litres per square metre on Sunday. Spanish media said a man was found dead by police during a rescue attempt on a road near Bargas, while another man died as rescuers tried to reach him in the tow of Casarrubios del Monte. The third person who died was a 50-year-old man who had been reported as missing. His body was found on Monday afternoon floating in a river near his home in the town of Camarena.
Al Jazeera
Guatemala City, Guatemala – Guatemala continues to be roiled by political turmoilfollowing last month’s election run-off, with rallies picking up again in cities and towns around the Central American nation to protest efforts to undermine the vote. But while many Guatemalans are caught up in the crisis, others have more pressing everyday concerns, such as making ends meet in a country where nearly 60 percent of the population lives in poverty. The poverty rate is closer to 80 percent for Indigenous people while roughly 70 percent of workers in Guatemala labour in the informal economy. Maribela Ixcoy is among them. An Indigenous Maya K’iche’ single mother originally from Santa Cruz del Quiche, she earns between $5 and $10 a day selling candy, gum and cigarettes from a shopping cart in the capital, Guatemala City.
Guardian, UK
Ministers will this week announce a series of changes designed to make it easier for developers to win planning permission to build onshore wind turbines. The government could publish proposals as soon as Tuesday on how to adapt the planning system to stop local authorities standing in the way of almost every new wind power development on land. Downing Street hopes that the changes will placate a group of potential Conservative rebels who have been pushing for the law to be liberalised and have threatened to intervene in Tuesday’s debate over the government’s energy bill. But even if they do, onshore wind developers warn that the changes are unlikely to be sufficiently wide-ranging to kickstart significant new generation.
Guardian, UK
A group of young Israeli men have been detained in Cyprus after local police said they needed time to investigate accusations of gang-rape from a British woman on holiday in Ayia Napa. The five men, all aged 19 or 20, were remanded on order of a district court magistrate in Famagusta for a further eight days after their arrest late on Sunday. The Briton, who is 20 and cannot legally be identified, told police she had been sexually assaulted by the Israelis after being “taken by force” from the pool area of her hotel to her room. “They will be kept in custody in our holding cells in Paralimni,” said a police officer in Ayia Napa. “We take these allegations seriously.” The Briton was described as “highly distressed.”
Guardian, Australia
More Australians intend to vote no than yes in the voice referendum on 14 October, but a chunk of respondents are either equivocating or still unsure about how they will cast their ballots, the latest Guardian Essential pollshows. The new poll of 1,151 respondents was taken after the official launch of the yes campaign in Adelaide last week and the results indicate 48% intend to vote no and 42% yes, with 10% unsure. Last month, no was ahead of yes 47% to 43%. The topline data suggests the yes campaign for the voice remains in trouble. More poll respondents report being a hard no (41%) at this stage than a hard yes (30%).
Guardian, Australia
Australia significantly increased the number of permits for the export of military equipment to Saudi Arabia last year despite calls for such sales to be banned because of the humanitarian crisis in war-torn Yemen. The Australian government continues to maintain significant secrecy over the type and value of weapons and military technology exported to nations such as Saudi Arabia. But figures provided to Greens senator David Shoebridge show Australia approved 21 permits for the export of military or dual-use equipment to Saudi Arabia between 1 January and 9 November 2022. That was already more than the 17 permits approved in 2021 and considerably more than the five between 23 August 2019 and 26 October 2020
Guardian, US
A high-end hotel in the liberal Texan enclave of Austin is playing host to a conference whose theme is boosting global birth rates, but which will in fact feature racist and eugenicist internet personalities and far-right media figures. The Natal conference – whose website warns that “by the end of the century, nearly every country on earth will have a shrinking population, and economic systems dependent on reliable growth will collapse” – is scheduled to be held on 1 December at the Line Hotel. Natal’s website claim the conference has “has no political or ideological goal other than a world in which our children can have grandchildren”, but the Guardian can reveal its organizer Kevin Dolan has been promoting the event on the far-right podcast circuit, and has explicitly linked the conference’s “pro-natalist” orientation to eugenics.
Guardian, US
Thousands trapped at Nevada’s Burning Man festival may have a chance of escape on Monday as improving weather conditions give the Black Rock desert a chance to dry out from torrential rains that hit the festival with heavy mud. Around 70,000 festival-goers, known as “burners”, were ordered to “shelter in place” and conserve water and food over the weekend after festival organizers said roads were impassable because of mud and not officially open. In an update on Monday organizers said the single road out of the Black Rock City site remained “too wet and muddy”, though added it was drying and “exodus” could happen later in the day.
Deutsche Welle
It's a historic decision: For the first time in Ukraine's history, a representative of the Crimean Tatars will head the Ministry of Defense. The position is a key post in the middle of the war of aggression that Russia has been waging against Ukraine since February 2022. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy made his nomination of Rustem Umerov public on Sunday, and parliament is expected to vote on it this week. The ministry needs "new approaches and new formats of cooperation both with the military and with society at large," Zelenskyy said in his daily televised address while talking about the decision to nominate Umerov.
NPR
MOSCOW — In closely watched talks in the southern Russian resort city of Sochi, Russian President Vladimir Putin rejected efforts by his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, to revive a United Nations-backed deal to allow the safe passage of grain from Ukraine — the latest setback in the grain deal since Moscow exited it in July. In a news conference at the conclusion of the one-day summit on Monday, Putin recycled a litany of complaints about the U.N. deal, arguing the agreement helped Ukraine export its grain but repeatedly failed to live up to promises to ease Russia's agriculture trade.
NPR
Steve Harwell, the former lead singer and frontman for the rock band Smash Mouth, has died at his home in Boise, Idaho. He was 56 years old. His death was confirmed by the band's manager, Robert Hayes, who said the cause was acute liver failure. He said Harwell was "surrounded by family and friends and passed peacefully and comfortably." Harwell founded Smash Mouth in 1994. He and the band, including Greg Camp on guitar, Paul De Lisle on bass and Kevin Coleman on drums, shot to fame with hits such the 1997's "Walking on the Sun" and "All Star" from the 1999 album Astro Lounge. "All Star" appeared in the 2001 animated movie Shrek, as did the band's cover version of the Monkees' classic "I'm a Believer."
Washington Post
Gen. Eric M. Smith has a vision for furthering the Marine Corps’ transformation from a force shaped by two decades of counterinsurgency warfare into one that’s optimized for a great-power clash, possibly with China. He can’t share it with anyone, though. The United States, Smith said in a recent interview, finds itself in an “interwar period” and must take full advantage of peacetime to regroup and advance new fighting concepts. But the general, selected by President Biden to become the Marines’ next top officer, is one of more than 300 senior military leaders whose nominations are on hold, caught in an acrimonious months-long dispute between Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) and the administration stemming from the Pentagon’s abortion policy. And so, Smith said, for now he must “ruthlessly adhere” to admonitions from the Senate that he not presume his next assignment is assured.
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