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Release of December quarterly CPI may be the most politically consequential set of numbers in recent timesFollow our Australia news live blog for latest updatesGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastInflation figures due out on Wednesday could “make or break” the case for a pre-election rate cut next month, according to economists, in one of the most politically consequential set of numbers of recent times.The market is pricing in an 84% chance of a 25 basis-point rate cut when the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) meets mid-next month, although those odds will rise or fall based on the December quarterly consumer price index.Sign up for Guardian Australia’s breaking news email Continue reading...

Exclusive: Monash University study suggests those who rely more on newspapers and public broadcasters more likely to score highly on ‘civic values’Follow our Australia news live blog for latest updatesGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastThose who believe global heating is a conspiracy get most of their information about news and current events from commercial and social media, according to a study by researchers at Monash University.The study, led by Prof Mark Andrejevic and Assoc Prof Zala Volcic, found that those who relied on social media as the main source of news scored lower on a measure of “civic values” than people who relied on newspapers and non-commercial media.Sign up for Guardian Australia’s breaking news email Continue reading...

US president insists leaders of both countries would agree to move that could be ‘temporary or long-term’Donald Trump has repeated his suggestion that large numbers of Palestinians should leave Gaza for Egypt or Jordan, despite widespread opposition to the proposal from Palestinian leadership, the UN and US allies in the region.Speaking to reporters onboard Air Force One on Monday night, the US president was asked about his comments over the weekend about “cleaning out” the Gaza Strip either “temporarily or long-term”. Trump reiterated he would “like to get [Palestinians from Gaza] living in an area where they can live without disruption and revolution and violence so much”. Continue reading...

Latest push to process migrants in Balkan country despite court challenge comes amid increase in boat arrivalsEurope live – latest updatesItaly has transported 49 people to Albania, in the latest push by Giorgia Meloni’s government to enforce a legally disputed plan to have asylum claims processed in the Balkan country as part of a hardline policy critics have called “disgraceful”.The Italian navy ship Cassiopeia arrived at Shëngjin port on Tuesday morning carrying passengers intercepted on Saturday in the Mediterranean south of the island of Lampedusa. They will be identified and have a health check before being transferred to a detention centre in Gjadër, about 12 miles away. Continue reading...

by Valentín DÌAZColombia on Monday sent two military aircraft to repatriate migrants from the United States after being forced to back down in a blazing row over deportations with President Donald Trump.President Gustavo Petro on Sunday stepped back from the brink of a full-blown trade war with the United States after Trump threatened Colombia with sanctions and massive tariffs for turning back two U.S. military planeloads of deported migrants.The foreign ministry said Monday that a Colombian Air Force plane left Bogota in the afternoon with medical staff on board for the US city of San Diego to repatriate 110 Colombians. Shortly after, it announced another had left for Houston, Texas.Petro, a former guerrilla, was the first Latin American leader to defy Trump over his plans for mass deportations, vowing he would only accept migrants returned on civilian flights who were not treated "like criminals."His announcement came amid an outcry in left-wing ally Brazil over the treatment of dozens of migrants who were flown home in handcuffs last week, prompting Brasilia to summon Washington's top envoy Monday to explain their treatment.But the resistance of Colombia's president quickly fizzled in the face of Trump's threats to impose tariffs on Colombian imports -- despite the two countries having a free-trade agreement -- and the suspension of U.S. visa applications.Trump claimed victory Monday, telling the congressional Republicans' annual retreat in Miami that "America is respected again." At the event, held at a Trump-owned golf club, the president insisted that "as you saw yesterday, we've made it clear to every country that they will be taking back our people, that we're sending out the criminals... the illegal aliens coming from their countries."If countries don't accept their migrants back "fast," added Trump, "they'll pay a very high economic price, and we're going to immediately install massive tariffs, and it'll be placed on them and other sanctions."Petro, for his part, wrote on X that Colombians were being brought home "without being handcuffed," adding: "This provision: dignity for deportees, will be applied to all countries that send deportations to us."Trump's plan for mass deportations of migrants has put him on a potential collision course with governments in Latin America, the original home of most of the United States' estimated 11 million undocumented migrants.Since he took office a week ago, thousands of migrants have been sent back to Central and South America -- but in most cases the deportations stemmed from agreements predating his return to power.- 'Tremendous irresponsibility' -Petro's standoff with Trump caused an outcry in Colombia -- one of the United States' closest allies in Latin America -- over what many saw as his reckless provocation of the country's biggest trading partner.Former right-wing president Ivan Duque accused the 64-year-old of "an act of tremendous irresponsibility."Cristian Espinal, a student who flew to Bogota from the city of Medellin for a visa appointment at the US embassy that was cancelled over the spat, told AFP he felt frustrated by Petro's "hasty, imprudent" behavior.Trump has called off his threatened tariff hikes but said the visa measures would stay in place until the first planeload of deportees returned.While previous US administrations also routinely sent home illegal migrants, Trump has vowed to carry out the biggest deportation wave in history.In a break with his predecessors, he has also begun using military aircraft, with at least one landing in Guatemala this week.Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum downplayed the impact of the operations, saying Monday that 4,000 migrants sent back over the southern US border during Trump's first week back in office was "not a substantial increase" on the usual rate.Just over 190,000 people were deported to Mexico from January to November 2024, according to government figures, representing around 17,200 per month.Sheinbaum too is trying to avert a trade war after Trump renewed his threat to impose 25 percent tariffs on imports from both Mexico and Canada unless they halted the flow of migrants and drugs into the United States.Honduras has called for an urgent meeting of leaders from the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) Thursday in its capital Tegucigalpa to discuss migration issues.© Agence France-Presse

by Marisol RIFAIA Frenchman is set to stand trial on Wednesday accused of fatally stabbing his former partner, who had complained of enduring years of abuse and repeatedly reported him to the authorities over his harassment.On July 2, 2021, the body of 31-year-old Sandra Pla was found in a pool of blood at her home in the southwestern French city of Bordeaux, where she lived with their four-year-old daughter. A neighbor had heard a woman screaming and alerted police. An autopsy revealed around fifty knife wounds, particularly to Pla's neck and face. Her former partner, Mickael Falou -- who she had left a few months earlier after a 10-year relationship -- was later arrested at his home in the Bordeaux suburb of Merignac. He was severely intoxicated.She had repeatedly complained to the authorities about the violence and harassment she had endured for years.Pla even petitioned French President Emmanuel Macron and other top officials, warning she was going to end up "like those women who are killed by their husbands", according to lawyer Elsa Crozatier.Crozatier, a lawyer representing Pla's mother and stepfather, said the woman's murder was a clear-cut case of "femicide"."This is a concrete and very explicit case," she said.- Physical and psychological violence - In police custody, the man, who was 36 at the time, admitted killing his daughter's mother but said he could not remember when he stabbed her. He said he had broken into Pla's house at around 4.30 am by climbing over the gate and hiding in the shed until she returned after taking their daughter to school.He told investigators that he had never planned to kill her and insists he has never abused her before.According to Falou, he broke into her home to accuse her of lying to the police, in order to have him stripped of custody of their daughter, about the physical and psychological violence she had reported."He denies and has always denied premeditation," one of his lawyers, Elena Badescu, told AFP.Pla and Falou met in the Paris suburb of Courbevoie in 2010 and entered into a civil partnership three years later. In 2018, a year after the birth of their daughter, the young woman began to confide in those close to her about the violence she had suffered."For years she had lived under a kind of hold from her partner. She didn't see it in the beginning," said Crozatier.A few months before her death, "she had begun to realize, little by little, what she had been through and she was freeing herself from it all. Hence the break-up and separation", said the lawyer.The victim knew she was in danger and "did everything" she could to alert the authorities, added Crozatier.- 'Sad litany' - Crozatier said the woman had lodged several complaints."She took her case to the family court," she said. "She even wrote to the president and the public prosecutor directly, urging them to do something, saying that she was going to end up 'like those women who are killed by their husbands'", said Crozatier.The lawyer has also initiated liability proceedings against the state on behalf of the family."That doesn't mean that the state is responsible for everything. It just means that there are things that should have been done that were not done", she added.The Planning familial de la Gironde, the local branch of French women's rights association Planning familial (Family Planning), has deplored a "sad litany of women who are victims of violence", saying many find the courage to lodge a complaint but are not protected.Police officers who take complaints of sexual or domestic violence "receive little or no training", said Nicole Blet, an activist and former president of the association, while acknowledging there have been some "improvements" in recent years.On average, a woman is killed every three days in France. In 2023, 96 women were killed by their partner or ex-partner in France, a drop of 19 percent from 2022, according to the latest figures from the interior ministry.The trial is to last until Friday.On Wednesday, several feminist groups plan to stage a protest before the beginning of the trial.© Agence France-Presse

Firefighters were desperately trying to stop a cluster of fast-moving blazes in southeast Australia on Tuesday, as thousands of acres of national park burned and a farming community was forced to evacuate.Lightning strikes on Monday evening ignited several fires in the Grampians National Park, a forested mountain range about 300 kilometres (186 miles) west of Victoria's state capital Melbourne.A separate fast-moving fire in Little Desert National Park in the west of the state has torn through almost 65,000 hectares (160,000 acres) in less than 24 hours, emergency services said, scorching an area almost as large as Singapore. That fire had forced the evacuation of rural Dimboola before threat levels were downgraded on Tuesday afternoon."I'm incredibly thankful that no lives have been lost and we have no reports of injury either," emergency management commissioner Rick Nugent told reporters.Chris Hardman from Forest Fire Management Victoria warned that weather conditions over the next few days are increasing the possibility the fires will spread."Right now firefighters are planning to do everything in their powers to protect communities," he said. Bureau of Meteorology forecaster Kevin Parkyn said stifling heatwave conditions would settle over parts of Victoria on Saturday, escalating fire risks. "When we look at the next seven to 10 days the main message is that there will be a hot dome over Victoria. "Once we get into the weekend don't be surprised if we see heatwave conditions unfold across the state, and continue to intensify into next week. "The landscape is dry, and if we continue to see these hot conditions, it will continue to dry the landscape out further." Hotter temperatures are fueling increasingly severe natural disasters across Australia, researchers have found. Scientists have documented a marked increase in extreme fire weather across the country since the 1950s. The unprecedented "Black Summer" bushfires of 2019-2020 killed 33 people and millions of animals, razed vast tracts of forest and blanketed major cities in thick smoke.© Agence France-Presse

Nepali airlines have resumed rescue helicopter flights to the Everest region, an aviation industry official announced Tuesday, following weeks of suspension prompted by protests from locals citing environmental impact and loss of income from trekkers.Helicopters are a key means of transport and crucial for emergency rescue in many remote regions around mountainous Nepal, vast stretches of which are often inaccessible by road.But they have also been used to give mountaineering teams and tourists a shortcut over challenging terrain in the Sagarmatha National Park, home to Mount Everest, the world's highest peak. For those who can afford the $1,000 price tag, helicopters reduce the two-week long trek to Everest base camp to just a day -- depriving Nepalis along the overland route of a key source of revenue.In early January, the Airlines Operators Association of Nepal grounded all flights, blaming the halt on local youths who had blocked landing sites with flags.The association also said the protesters had warned pilots who landed that they would be forced to walk back on foot.On Tuesday, association official Pratap Jung Pandey told AFP that rescue flights were reopened Saturday "on humanitarian grounds". But commercial flights to the region were still suspended, as negotiations with locals for their resumption were ongoing. "It is going in a positive direction and it should reopen soon. But I cannot say exactly when," Pandey told AFP.Over 50,000 tourists visit the Everest region every year.According to the association, the Everest region sees about 15 helicopter flights per day in the winter and up to 60 per day during peak tourist season."Rescue flights are crucial in mountaineering to save lives of climbers if anything happens," said Mingma Gyalje Sherpa who runs Imagine Nepal, a mountaineering expedition company. Earlier this month, German mountaineer Jost Kobusch -- who has made several Himalayan ascents -- cited the lack of helicopter rescues as one of the reasons for ending his solo winter climb up Everest. "I have never been rescued due to an emergency in my career but right now there are protests going on... making helicopter rescues impossible," he said in a January 11 post on Instagram. Kobusch also cited other factors, like aftershocks from an earthquake causing riskier conditions.© Agence France-Presse