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Overnight News Digest [1]
['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']
Date: 2025-05-23
Welcome to the Overnight News Digest with a crew consisting of founder Magnifico, regular editors side pocket, maggiejean, Chitown Kev, eeff, Magnifico, annetteboardman, Besame, jck, JeremyBloom, and doomandgloom. Alumni editors include (but not limited to) Interceptor 7, Man Oh Man (RIP), wader, Neon Vincent, palantir, Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse (RIP), ek hornbeck (RIP), rfall, ScottyUrb, Doctor RJ, BentLiberal, Oke (RIP) and jlms qkw. OND is a regular community feature on Daily Kos since 2007, consisting of news stories from around the world, sometimes coupled with a daily theme, original research or commentary. Editors of OND impart their own presentation styles and content choices, typically publishing each day near 12:00 AM Eastern Time. Please feel free to share your articles and stories in the comments.
Happy (or at least happy ending) stories above the fold and the more serious ones below it. The photos of the week are from The Guardian and focus on Australia.
From The Globe and Mail:
The fossil feud One team of experts says it’s the jawbone of a new kind of mosasaur. Three Albertans say it’s fake. Soon, scans will test who is right Chaimae Chouiekh Ivan Semeniuk The sun-scorched mines of Morocco’s Oulad Abdoun Basin are some of the richest fossil-hunting sites in the world. Laid down between 70 and 50 million years ago, the basin’s rocks are valued for their phosphate but also for preserving the remains of prehistoric marine life, including those of mosasaurs – large swimming reptiles that were contemporaries of Tyrannosaurus rex.
A video from Deutsche Welle:
Giving life to Ghana’s discarded coconut shells Isaac Kaledzi 15 hours ago Coconuts are a natural beverage for quenching thirst, but what happens to the discarded shells? The waste is getting new life as it gets transformed into reusable household utensils, cups, and other decorative items.
From The Guardian:
Myth or mystery: are moose roaming the isolated wilds of New Zealand? Claims of a recent sighting in the vast Fiordland wilderness reignite public fascination in a story that has endured for decades Eva Corlett in Wellington Over 100 years ago, a ship dropped anchor in the frigid fjords of New Zealand’s South Island and released 10 nervous moose on to the shore. The crew watched as the animals – the last survivors of a weeks-long voyage from Saskatchewan, Canada – skittered out of their crates and up into the dense, lonely, rainforest. The moose had arrived on a flight of fancy, as part of the then premier’s grand vision to turn Fiordland national park into a hunters’ paradise. It was the second attempt to release moose into the region – in a country whose only native land-based mammals are bats – after nearly all of an earlier herd died crossing the seas. Red deer and wapiti, or elk, were also released around the same time for game-hunting.
From The Guardian:
Andrew Hunter Murray: ‘Every time I read Pride and Prejudice I find more jokes’ The author and podcaster on taking inspiration from The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, welling up to Charles Dickens, and the enduring appeal of Jane Austen Andrew Hunter Murray My earliest reading memory At a secondhand book sale at school, a kind teacher recommended my mum buy Brian Jacques’s Redwall. Noble monastic mice battle thuggish rats: catnip for a seven-year-old. My favourite book growing up The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. The mad robots and two-headed aliens are great for the teenage brain, but beneath all that is the sadness, and the questions about why life has to be like this, all filtered through poor Arthur Dent. I sometimes pull it off the shelf to read half a page, just to remind myself how comedy writing is done.
From the Toronto Star:
Opinion | Here’s what King Charles — and Canadians — need to remember about this country’s history By Brandi Morin As King Charles embarks on his official visit to Canada, I cannot help but feel a deep sense of irony. The pomp and ceremony that will greet him stands in stark contrast to the reality faced by Indigenous Peoples across this land. While red carpets are rolled out and dignitaries bow, our communities continue to struggle with boil water advisories, inadequate housing, a missing and murdered women and girls genocide, and systemic poverty. The Crown — which King Charles now represents — is bound to us through sacred Treaties. These were not mere historical documents to be displayed in museums or acknowledged in performative land acknowledgments. They were nation-to-nation agreements that made the very existence of Canada possible. Without these Treaties, there would be no Canada as we know it today.
From the BBC:
King's big moment in Canada after Trump row Sean Coughlan, Royal correspondent "This is a big deal for the King to do this," says Jeremy Kinsman, former Canadian high commissioner to the UK, as King Charles prepares for a historic visit showing support for Canada, which is facing pressure from US President Donald Trump. "I hope that Trump understands," says Mr Kinsman, ahead of the King becoming the first monarch to open Canada's Parliament in almost 70 years.
From The Guardian:
Belgium’s future queen caught up in Harvard foreign student ban Princess Elisabeth has completed first year of master’s degree but Trump administration’s crackdown may jeopardise studies Princess Elisabeth, the 23-year-old future queen of Belgium, has just completed her first year at Harvard University but the ban imposed by Donald Trump’s administration on foreign students studying there could jeopardise her continued attendance. The US president’s administration revoked Harvard’s ability to enrol international students on Thursday, and is forcing current foreign students to transfer to other schools or lose their legal status in the US, while also threatening to expand the crackdown to other colleges.
From The Tab:
From The Guardian:
The least ‘integrated’ part of British society isn’t the immigrants – it’s the elite Andy Beckett Politicians and the rightwing press talk about integration in a selective and politically loaded way. The reality is quite different Amid all the acrimony surrounding Keir Starmer’s recent remarks on immigration – a row that could follow him into retirement and beyond – there has been one little-examined area of agreement between the prime minister and his critics. “When people come to our country,” Starmer said, “they should also commit to integration.” You may believe that integration is not best achieved by government decree, yet in conversations about what sort of society Britain should be, it has long been generally accepted that integration is a good thing – not just for immigrants but for everyone.
From The Guardian:
Labour blocks proposal for ‘swift bricks’ in all new homes MPs had previously backed Conservative amendment to ask developers to provide hollow bricks for endangered birds Patrick Barkham increasingly controversial planning bill. Providing every new home with at least one “swift brick” to help endangered cavity-nesting birds has been rejected by Labour at the committee stage of its The amendment to the bill to ask every developer to provide a £35 hollow brick for swifts, house martins, sparrows and starlings, which was tabled by Labour MP Barry Gardiner, has been rejected by the Labour-dominated committee.
Another from The Guardian:
The Guardian view on the BBC World Service: a boon to the UK, as well as audiences elsewhere Britain would benefit from pledging more sustained and committed support in this age of disinformation and global turmoil Two years ago, BBC Arabic radio left the airwaves after decades. Soon afterwards, Russia’s Sputnik service began broadcasting on the frequency left vacant in Lebanon. That detail illuminates a larger picture. China, Russia and others see global-facing media as central to their global ambitions and are investing accordingly – pumping out propaganda to muddle or drown out objective, independently minded journalism. These outlets are state-controlled as well as state-owned. Meanwhile, conspiracy theories and disinformation proliferate online, attacks on press freedom intensify and the Trump administration is dismantling media organisations including Voice of America and Radio Free Asia (RFA), which have been essential sources of information for audiences under repressive regimes. Official Chinese media were gleeful at what RFA’s president, Bay Fang, called “a reward to dictators and despots”.
And yet another (another opinion) from The Guardian:
From the day Britain left the EU, this reset was inevitable. What a pointless waste of time, money and effort Simon Jenkins Keir Starmer is not blameless when it comes to Brexit, but he is moving in the right direction. Even the Tories attacking him know that For the Tories to attack Keir Starmer’s first step towards a Brexit reset is monumental hypocrisy. Their Brexit led to £4.7bn being spent on implementing post-EU border arrangements, according to the National Audit Office, including a vastly expensive “take back control” border post at Sevington in Kent. No other country in the world can have erected such ludicrous barriers against its biggest trading partners. All are now wasted. At least the nonsense can stop. Memorial plaques to Boris Johnson should be pinned to their gates and passersby invited to sign a 50-page customs form in his memory. Meanwhile, Starmer should hang his own head in shame. He was Jeremy Corbyn’s Brexit henchman back in 2019, when Labour voted down Theresa May’s bid to negotiate a soft Brexit deal that would certainly have gone beyond what was signed this week. It was Starmer who helped to scotch at least a possible Commons coalition against hard Brexit and in favour of sanity. It was Corbyn and Starmer who could have stifled five years of the greatest act of self-harm by a British government since the Great Depression.
From the BBC:
Watch officer of ship that crashed into garden fell asleep, police say Sofia Ferreira Santos The watch officer of a large container ship that ran aground and crashed into a garden in Norway has told police he was asleep at the time of the incident. Investigators said the man, a Ukrainian national in his thirties, admitted to falling asleep while on duty on his own.
From Al Jazeera:
German woman arrested after mass stabbing at Hamburg train station Police say four victims face life-threatening injuries, suggest suspect may have have suffered a ‘psychological emergency’. Authorities in Germany have arrested a woman after at least 17 people were injured in a knife attack at the main train station in the northern city of Hamburg. At least four of the victims sustained life-threatening injuries in Friday evening’s mass stabbing incident, which took place in the middle of the city’s evening rush hour, emergency services said.
From CNN:
Germany deploys permanent troops to another country for the first time since World War II brigade in Lithuania that is meant to help protect NATO’s eastern flank and declared Thursday that “the security of our Baltic allies is also our security” as worries about Russian aggression persist. Chancellor Friedrich Merz inaugurated a groundbreaking German brigade in Lithuania that is meant to help protect NATO’s eastern flank and declared Thursday that “the security of our Baltic allies is also our security” as worries about Russian aggression persist. He said Berlin’s strengthening of its own military sends a signal to its allies to invest in security.
From DW:
Russia declares DW journalist a 'foreign agent' 8 hours ago The Russian Justice Ministry has added DW's Alexander Smirnov to a list of people it deems to be "foreign agents." Russia's Justice Ministry on Friday declared DW journalist Alexander Smirnov a "foreign agent." The ministry said that Smirnov had participated in the creation and distribution of content for "foreign agents" — a label that was assigned to DW in March 2022 — and "undesired organizations." He is accused of spreading fake news about "politics and decisions of the Russian government."
From Al Jazeera:
DRC’s ex-president Kabila slams justice system after losing immunity Kabila, accused of ‘treason’ and ‘war crimes’, denies government accusations of links to M23 rebel group. Joseph Kabila, former president of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), has attacked the country’s justice system after the Senate voted to lift his immunity, paving the way for him to be prosecuted for alleged treason and war crimes. Kabila gave a livestreamed speech from an undisclosed location on Friday, a day after losing his immunity over alleged links to the M23 rebel group, saying that the justice system was “an instrument of oppression for a dictatorship desperately trying to survive”.
From DW:
Ugandan activist freed by Tanzania, 'indications of torture' Srinivas Mazumdaru 17 hours ago Tanzanian President Samia Suluhu Hassan warned earlier this week that foreign activists would not be allowed to interfere in the country's affairs. Tanzania has released Ugandan lawyer and activist Agather Atuhaire, who had been in custody since Monday after attempting to attend a treason trial for an opposition leader. Ugandan rights group Agora Discourse posted on X on Friday that Atuhaire had been found. "She was abandoned at the border by Tanzanian authorities," it said.
From ABC News:
Hundreds of workers remain underground after 'shaft incident' at South African gold mine, company says All 260 employees have been accounted for and have been provided with food. By Morgan Winsor and Jon Haworth LONDON -- Hundreds of workers remain underground at the Kloof gold mine near Johannesburg after a "shaft incident" occurred at Sibanye Stillwater's sub-shaft, the South Africa-based mining company said Friday. "We are actively implementing our safety and shaft examination procedures," Sibanye-Stillwater said in a statement. "Once these are completed, we will begin hoisting employees to surface. All 260 employees have been accounted for, are safe and have been provided with food."
From DW (link is to a video):
Temperatures soar in Pakistan heatwave Nehal Johri 16 hours ago Temperatures in parts of Pakistan have spiked up to 48 degrees Celsius, significantly above the average for this time in May. The country's meteorological service issued a heatwave alert and advised people to stay indoors.
From NDTV:
Storm, Screams, Hailstones: IndiGo's 8,500 Ft/Min Drop After Pak Refusal Once inside the thunderstorm, the IndiGo aircraft experienced severe hail impact and violent turbulence. Several critical systems began flagging malfunctions. Reported by: Vishnu Som, edited by Samiran Mishra A domestic flight from Delhi to Srinagar went through a chaotic situation on Wednesday, after the IndiGo aircraft encountered a violent hailstorm and severe turbulence, triggering multiple warnings, an 8,500-feet-per-minute descent, and a denied request for emergency passage through Pakistani airspace. New details indicate that the flight encountered a grave in-flight emergency after flying into an intense storm. These details, announced by the civil aviation watchdog Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), suggest that the pilots were fighting multiple cockpit warnings and instrument failures after entering a hailstorm. At one stage, the IndiGo A321neo aircraft operating as Flight 6E-2142 dropped 8,500 feet per minute. The normal rate of descent is 1,500 to 3,000 feet per minute.
From Asahi Shimbun:
Survey: 44% of Japanese have experienced ‘food security crisis’ By KEISUKE KATORI Nearly 44 percent of people in Japan have lost weight or gone an entire day without eating because they could not afford to buy food, a university survey showed. The survey, conducted by the Institute of Science Tokyo, placed such people who do not eat enough food to maintain their health into the “food security crisis group,” and this category has expanded because of rising food prices.
Also from Asahi Shimbun:
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