Handful of sick and wounded Palestinians allowed through Rafah crossing on first day

Numbers Israel permitted to enter Egypt after reopening border were far lower than expected following delays
A small number of sick and wounded Palestinians have begun crossing into Egypt to seek medical treatment after Israel permitted a limited reopening of the Palestinian territory’s Rafah border post as fragile diplomatic efforts to stabilise the conflict inch forward.
About 150 people were due to leave the territory on Monday, and 50 to enter it, according to Egyptian officials, more than 20 months after Israeli forces closed the crossing. However, by nightfall, Reuters reported that Israel had permitted 12 Palestinians to re-enter the territory, according to Palestinian and Egyptian sources. A further 38 had not cleared security and would wait on the Egyptian side of the crossing overnight, it said.
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Weather tracker: Cyclone Fytia in Madagascar kills several people and floods homes

Island’s first tropical storm of season may bring 150mm of rain – meanwhile, eastern Europe freezes with possible night-time lows of -30C
At least three people have died and nearly 30,000 people have been affected by flooding after Madagascar’s first tropical storm of the season hit over the weekend.
Tropical Cyclone Fytia formed to the north-west of Madagascar over the northern Mozambique Channel on Thursday.
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International law meant to limit effects of war at breaking point, study finds

Report covering 23 conflicts over last 18 months concludes more than 100,000 civilians have been killed as war crimes rage out of control
An authoritative survey of 23 armed conflicts over the last 18 months has concluded that international law seeking to limit the effects of war is at breaking point, with more than 100,000 civilians killed, while torture and rape are committed with near impunity.
The extensive study by the Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights describes the deaths of 18,592 children in Gaza, growing civilian casualties in Ukraine and an “epidemic” of sexual violence in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
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More than 200 killed in coltan mine collapse in eastern DRC, officials say

Rubaya mine produces about 15% of the world’s coltan, which is processed into tantalum, used in mobile phones
More than 200 people were killed this week in a collapse at the Rubaya coltan mine in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, Lumumba Kambere Muyisa, a spokesperson for the rebel-appointed governor of the province where the mine is located, told Reuters on Friday.
Rubaya produces about 15% of the world’s coltan, which is processed into tantalum – a heat-resistant metal that is in high demand by makers of mobile phones, computers, aerospace components and gas turbines. The site, where local people dig manually for a few dollars a day, has been under the control of the M23 rebel group since 2024.
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Islamic State claims attack on international airport and airbase in Niger

Motorcycle-riding militants launch strikes using heavy weaponry and drones, damaging planes belonging to Ivorian carrier and Togolese airline
Islamic State in the Sahel has claimed responsibility for an audacious assault at the international airport and adjacent air force base in Niamey, the capital of Niger, according to the SITE Intelligence Group, which tracks jihadist activity and communications worldwide.
The attack, which began shortly after midnight on Thursday, reportedly involved motorcycle-riding militants who launched a “surprise and coordinated” strike using heavy weaponry and drones, according to statements released via IS in the Sahel’s propaganda arm, Amaq news agency.
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Mexico’s president pledges to send aid to Cuba despite US efforts to cut oil access

Move from Claudia Sheinbaum comes after Trump signed an order threatening tariffs on countries that sell oil to Cuba
Mexico’s president Claudia Sheinbaum has pledged to send humanitarian aid this week to Cuba and said Mexico was “exploring all diplomatic avenues to be able to send fuel to the Cuban people,” despite efforts from Washington to cut off oil to the Caribbean nation.
Donald Trump last week signed an executive order allowing the US to slap tariffs on countries sending crude oil to Cuba and on Saturday said that Sheinbaum had agreed to halt shipments of oil at his request – a claim the Mexican leader rejected.
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Brazilian influencer who defended US immigration crackdown arrested by ICE

Trump supporter Júnior Pena falsely claimed migrants being rounded up, including Brazilians, were ‘all crooks’
A rightwing Brazilian influencer who claimed Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown targeted only “crooks” has been arrested by ICE agents in New Jersey.
Júnior Pena, whose full name is Eustáquio da Silva Pena Júnior, declared his support for the US president in a recent video message to his hundreds of thousands of social media followers.
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Trump’s Greenland threats open old wounds for Inuit across Arctic

Demand by US that it take control of Arctic island is for many a reminder of troubling imperial past
On a bitterly cold recent morning in the Canadian Arctic, about 70 people took to the streets. Braving the bone-chilling winds, they marched through the Inuit-governed territory of Nunavut, waving signs that read: “We stand with Greenland” and “Greenland is a partner, not a purchase.”
It was a glimpse of how, for Indigenous peoples across the Arctic, the battle over Greenland has become a wider reckoning, seemingly pitting the long-fought battle to assert their rights against a global push for power.
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Fernández wins Costa Rican presidency, steering Latin America further right

Rightwing populist elected in landslide after promising to crack down on rising violence linked to cocaine trade
The rightwing populist Laura Fernández has won Costa Rica’s presidential election in a landslide after promising to crack down on rising violence linked to the cocaine trade.
Fernández’s nearest rival, centre-right economist Álvaro Ramos, conceded defeat as results showed the ruling party far exceeding the threshold of 40% needed to avoid a runoff.
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‘Pure apocalypse’: a photographer’s journey through the Pantanal wildfires

Ahead of a major exhibition in London documenting the South American wetland as it faces unprecedented threat, Lalo de Almeida recounts the stories behind his award-winning images

Lalo de Almeida is a documentary photographer based in São Paulo, Brazil. In 2021 his photo essay Pantanal Ablaze was awarded first place in the environment stories category at the World Press Photo contest. In 2022, he won the Eugene Smith grant in humanistic photography and World Press Photo’s long-term project award for his work Amazonian Dystopia, which documents the exploitation of the world’s largest tropical forest.
I have been photographing socio-environmental issues for more than 30 years, especially in the Amazon. 2020 was no different. News of the uncontrolled fires devastating the Pantanal began to catch my attention. So, together with a fellow journalist, I decided to go and see what was happening for myself.
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China to ban hidden car door handles on all EVs over crash safety concerns

Sleek car doors reduce vehicle drag but are prone to losing operability in the event of a crash, officials say
China will soon ban concealed door handles on electric vehicles (EVs), becoming the first country to do so after several deadly incidents triggered global scrutiny of the controversial design first popularised by Tesla.
According to regulations announced on Monday by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, cars sold in China will now be required to have a mechanical release on both the inside and outside of every door except the boot.
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Trump unveils $12bn critical minerals stockpile scheme in apparent move to counter China’s dominance

Other countries are expected to join Project Vault, which US president said would ensure that US businesses are ‘never harmed by any shortage’
Donald Trump has announced the creation of a critical mineral reserve worth nearly $12bn, a stockpile that could counter China’s ability to use its dominance of the hard-to-process metals as leverage in trade talks.
“Today we’re launching what will be known as Project Vault to ensure that American businesses and workers are never harmed by any shortage,” Trump said at the White House on Monday.
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US, UK, EU, Australia and more to meet to discuss critical minerals alliance

About 20 countries including G7 states in talks on rare earths including calls for US to guarantee minimum price
Ministers from the US, EU, UK, Japan, Australia and New Zealand will meet in Washington this week to discuss a strategic alliance over critical minerals.
The summit is being seen as a step to repair transatlantic ties fractured by a year of conflict with Donald Trump and pave the way for other alliances to help countries de-risk from China, including one centred on steel.
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Living hell of North Korea’s ‘paradise on Earth’ scheme back in spotlight in Japan

Plaintiffs in case say they were lured from Japan, exploited for labour and cut off from families for generations
It has been more than six decades since Eiko Kawasaki left Japan to begin a new life in North Korea. Then 17, she was among tens of thousands of people with Korean heritage who had been lured to the communist state by the promise of a “paradise on Earth”.
Instead, they encountered something closer to a living hell. They were denied basic human rights and forced to endure extreme hardship. Official promises of free education and healthcare plus guaranteed jobs and housing had been a cruel mirage. And to their horror, they were prevented from travelling to Japan to visit the families they had left behind.
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Starmer hopes his China trip will begin the thaw after recent ice age

PM flies out after courting world’s second biggest economy aware of difficult balance of risks and potential rewards
The last British prime minister to visit China was Theresa May in 2018. Before the visit, she and her team were advised to get dressed under the covers because of the risk of hidden cameras having been placed in their hotel rooms to record compromising material.
Keir Starmer, in Beijing this week, was more sanguine about his privacy, even though the security risks have, if anything, increased since the former Tory prime minister was in town.
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A hot economy? RBA’s rate hike justification is hard to swallow for Australians struggling with cost-of-living crisis

Economists and the central bank might see a roaring economy but workers and mortgage holders still feel like they’re doing it tough

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The Reserve Bank thinks the economy is running too hot and needed a rate hike to slow it down.
It sure doesn’t feel that way.
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Teen swims four hours through rough seas to save mother and siblings off Western Australia

The 13-year-old attempted to kayak back to shore to get help, but the vessel took on water, forcing him to swim 4km

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A teenager has saved his mother and two younger siblings by swimming for four hours in fading light and rough conditions after they were swept out to sea in south-west Western Australia.
The family were holidaying in Quindalup, 200km south of Perth, when strong winds pushed their inflatable paddleboards and kayak offshore from Geographe Bay on Friday afternoon.
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Man charged over allegedly giving Nazi salute to Jewish students at Melbourne airport – as it happened

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RBA interest rates decision: Reserve Bank increases cash rate to 3.85% in blow to mortgage holders

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Liberal politicians have joked they need “divine intervention” at a church service before parliament resumes today.
Federal parliamentarians are attending the ecumenical service, before sitting begins later. Media doorstopped most of the MPs on their way in, with reporters asking what they were praying for, whether they needed “forgiveness”, and whether they prayed for a Coalition reunion.
We know that inflation’s higher than we would like. People are under more pressure than anybody wants. And that’s why the responsibility that we have … is to continue to manage the budget in a responsible way, continue to roll out this cost of living relief.
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Palestine Action Group plans march against Isaac Herzog’s visit despite protest restrictions

Calls for NSW police to ‘exercise their discretion’ and facilitate a peaceful rally in Sydney on 9 February while Israeli president visits Australia

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The Palestine Action Group plans to march against the Israeli president, Isaac Herzog’s, visit to Sydney next week, despite the New South Wales police commissioner extending a restriction on protests.
A spokesperson for the group, Josh Lees, called for NSW police to “exercise their discretion” and facilitate a peaceful march from Town Hall to state parliament on 9 February as part of nationwide protests against Herzog’s visit.
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Family of Australian woman who died after Japanese ski lift accident remember their ‘beautiful girl’

Tributes for Queensland snowboarder Brooke Day recall a ‘cherished team mate’ who had an ‘infectious sense of humour’

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The family of an Australian woman who died in a ski lift accident in Japan have remembered their “beautiful girl” as someone who kept others safe as tributes pour in for the 22-year-old “vibrant spirit”.
The Queensland snowboarder Brooke Day sustained critical injuries on Friday after her backpack was caught in a ski lift at Tsugaike Mountain resort in Otari, near Nagano.
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Paris prosecutors raid France offices of Elon Musk’s X – Europe live

The raid is linked to a year-long investigation into alleged abuse of algorithms and fraudulent data extraction by X
Offices belonging to Elon Musk’s widely-used social media platform, X, in France are being raided by the Paris prosecutor’s office.
A search is being carried out at the French premises of X by the cybercrime unit of the Paris prosecutor’s office, a statement read, with the support of Europol.
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EU has ‘open mind’ on UK customs union talks, says official

Valdis Dombrovskis says bloc is ‘ready to engage’ amid meetings with ministers including Rachel Reeves

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The European Commission would be “open-minded” to discussing closer trade ties with the UK, including a customs union, a senior EU official has said.
The EU economy commissioner, Valdis Dombrovskis, told the BBC that the European bloc was “ready to engage with an open mind” when asked about a customs union.
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France passes budget after months of wrangling and no-confidence motions

PM Sébastien Lecornu pushes budget through using constitutional powers that avoided vote in parliament
France has finally passed a budget for this year after the minority government survived a series of no-confidence votes in a long-running political saga that has unsettled debt markets and alarmed the country’s European partners.
The prime minister, Sébastien Lecornu, told parliament on Monday, after months of wrangling, that French people “refuse this disorder and want our institutions to function”.
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Son of Norway’s crown princess arrested on new charges before start of rape trial

Detention of Marius Borg Høiby comes as Epstein files pile pressure on his mother, crown princess Mette-Marit

The son of Norway’s crown princess, Marius Borg Høiby, has been arrested on new charges just days before the start of his rape trial, as his mother continues to face questions over her relationship with Jeffrey Epstein.
The Oslo police district said Høiby had been arrested on Sunday evening on suspicion of assault, making threats with a knife and violating a restraining order.
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Current world order ‘dead’, Draghi warns Europe, as he outlines US and China threats – as it happened

Former Italian PM and ECB chief says Europe must urgently unify on defence and foreign affairs
Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy said the country’s energy system remained “seriously” challenged by the impact of recent Russian strikes.
More than 200 buildings are still without heating in Kyiv, as temperatures plummeted to -17 Celsius, with “crews from many regions of Ukraine … deployed for the repair work.”
“Europe absolutely can defend yourself. Please stop whining. Why is this so much whingeing about [on], you know, if the US leave, what are we going to do? Come on.
… Europe … why are we so scared: ‘please, don’t leave the US leave…’ Please stand up to my president. Hold us accountable. Make us live up to our talking points.”
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Iran’s president says Tehran ready to pursue ‘fair’ talks with US

Masoud Pezeshkian instructs foreign minister to seek negotiations with US as Trump warns ‘bad things would happen’ if no solution agreed
Iran’s president said on Tuesday that he had instructed his foreign minister to “pursue fair and equitable negotiations” with the US, as the two countries reportedly prepared to send top envoys to Istanbul for high-stakes talks on the Iranian nuclear programme later this week.
President Masoud Pezeshkian said in a post on X: “I have instructed my minister of foreign affairs, provided that a suitable environment exists – one free from threats and unreasonable expectations – to pursue fair and equitable negotiations, guided by the principles of dignity, prudence, and expediency.”
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Music and dancing signify defiance at celebratory funerals of Iran’s protesters

Euphoric scenes are a snub to theocracy’s culture of piety, say analysts, and carry message of rebellion
Iranians killed in recent protests that rocked the country have been laid to rest in boisterous funerals featuring loud pop music and dancing, apparently intended to convey defiance to the ruling Islamic regime.
Instead of holding sombre traditional mourning ceremonies presided over by a Shia cleric, bereaved relatives are turning the burials into exultant celebrations of the lives of their loved ones in what analysts say is an intentional snub to the culture of piety demanded by Iran’s theocracy.
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First medical evacuee leaves Gaza as Rafah crossing reopens for handful of Palestinians – as it happened

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Sick and wounded Palestinians enter Egypt after Israel reopens Rafah crossing

More than 400 European former top diplomats and officials have urged the EU to increase pressure on Israel to end “excesses and unremitting violations of international law” over Gaza and the West Bank.
The statement, due to be sent to EU leaders on Monday, calls on the bloc and its member states to take action in line with its support for a UN resolution for a two-state solution and a just and lasting peace in the Middle East.
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Trump says Iran talking to US and hints at deal to avoid military strikes

US naval battle group gathers off Iran’s shores as supreme leader in Tehran warns attack would spark regional war
Donald Trump has said Iran is talking to the US, hinting at a deal that would avoid the use of military strikes, as Iran’s supreme leader warned that any attack by the US would spark a regional war.
The US president’s comments came as Washington deployed a naval battle group led by the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln off Iran’s shores, after Trump’s threats to intervene in Iran’s deadly crackdown on anti-government protests.
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Gaza’s Rafah crossing to reopen for Palestinians on Monday, Israel says

Officials say Gaza residents travelling on foot only will be allowed through border point, which was shut in May 2024
Gaza’s main border crossing in Rafah will reopen for Palestinians on Monday, Israel has said, with preparations under way at the war-ravaged territory’s gateway, which has been mostly closed for almost two years.
Before the war, the Rafah crossing with Egypt was the only direct exit point for most Palestinians in Gaza to reach the outside world as well as a key entry point for aid. It has been largely shut since May 2024.
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