Good morning. Today marks the fifth day of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, as countries and companies around the world boycott Russia. In Australia, more rain is set to prolong devastating floods in south-east Queensland, and the UN releases its latest and “bleakest warning yet” on climate impacts.
Russian rocket attacks killed “dozens” of people in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv as officials from both countries met for ceasefire talks, with Moscow facing unprecedented western sanctions that it said had created “a new economic reality”. The Élysée Palace said after a call between Emmanuel Macron and Vladmir Putin the Russian president was “willing to commit” to ending attacks on civilians and civil infrastructure during the talks. Russia could receive backup from Belarus, who may be preparing to send its soldiers into Ukraine in support of the Russian invasion, according to a US defence official. Meanwhile, the Nigerian government has condemned the treatment of thousands of its students and citizens fleeing the war amid concerns that African students are facing discrimination by security officials and being denied entry into Poland. Companies have also condemned Russia, with Shell announcing it will exit its joint ventures with Russian state energy firm Gazprom a day after BP said it would offload its 20% stake in Kremlin-owned oil firm Rosneft, amid mounting criticism that the oil industry has helped empower Putin. Fifa and Uefa have also acted in unison to suspend Russian teams from international football competition.
The United Nations warned of another crisis today: climate change. After the release of the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report, the UN warned that even at current levels, human actions in heating the climate are threatening devastation to swathes of the natural world and rendering many areas unliveable. The comprehensive IPCC assessment, based on 34,000 studies, documents “widespread and pervasive” impacts on people and the natural world from increasingly frequent and intense heatwaves, droughts, wildfires, storms and floods. Some impacts are now irreversible. The report, approved by 195 countries, is the “bleakest warning yet” on impacts of climate breakdown. In Australia, it said extreme events exacerbated by emissions – heatwaves, droughts, floods, storms and fires – were causing death, injury and financial and emotional stress. Their impacts were “cascading and compounding” across nature, society and the economy.
The flood crisis continues to unfold across two states. Eight people have died, more are missing and hundreds have been rescued as flooding hits Brisbane, Lismore, Murwillumbah and Grafton. Yet the federal government has only used a fraction of $4.8bn emergency fund. The minister for emergency management, Bridget McKenzie, said the federal Emergency Response Fund was “operating as envisaged” despite mounting Labor criticism that it had only spent a fraction of its budget. Labor’s shadow emergency management minister, Murray Watt, has previously criticised the government for what he claimed was a failure to spend money put aside in the ERF, an investment vehicle which began in 2019 with $3.9bn. Meanwhile, the people of Lismore and Kyogle have banded together to rescue neighbours and save homes. Record flooding will force Lismore shire council to rework its new flood management strategy even before it is implemented, and other regions will probably follow suit as insurers tally the cost of worsening climate extremes. These before and after pictures show the full scale of disaster.
Australia
The New South Wales coroner is considering an inquest into the deaths of four food delivery riders killed in road accidents between October and November 2020.
General practitioners should have access to training to provide patients with more advanced mental healthcare in response to the critical shortage of psychiatrists, the peak body for GPs has recommended.
Independent Zoe Daniel has appealed against a council ruling that political signs cannot be erected until the election is called, arguing it is inconsistent with its own advice and neighbouring councils which have allowed Josh Frydenberg signs.
Tim Winton has used his closing address at Perth festival’s Writers Weekend to voice his opposition to the ongoing reliance of Western Australian arts organisations on sponsorship from the fossil fuel industry.
The world
Pressure is mounting on Israel to conclude the trial of a Gazan aid worker accused of funnelling relief money to Hamas in a six-year-old case widely derided by the international community as “not worthy of a democratic state”.
Over the past decade the two most intense cyclones recorded to date in the southern hemisphere ripped through the Pacific. Tropical Cyclone Pam, the second worst, devastated Vanuatu in 2015 while in 2016 Tropical Cyclone Winston, the worst, ravaged Fiji. Both not only caused extreme environmental damage but economic damage worth 64% and 20% of the respective nations’ GDP.
Police leaders in England and Wales will decide not to accept that their forces are still institutionally racist as they try to battle their way out of a race crisis.
A senior official has admitted the government knew 15 years before the Grenfell Tower disaster that plastic-filled cladding panels – which fuelled the fatal fire – burned “fast and fierce” and he believed they should not be used on tall buildings.
Recommended reads
Omar Sakr, a bisexual Turkish-Lebanese Muslim poet, has explored the multiplicity of his identity in literary publications, anthologies and his own poetry collections: These Wild Houses, and the Prime Minister’s Literary Award-winning The Lost Arabs. But it is in his debut novel Son of Sin that he really leans into his lived experience growing up queer and Muslim in a broken family in western Sydney.
Cash Savage’s most memorable gig can be summarised in one image: “our violinist was vomiting into a large McDonald’s cup”. Epic hangovers, a spitting contest gone wrong and a busted tyre were an ominous start to the final show of the Melbourne band’s European tour.
Bob and Ann Paton thought they were just moving to their dream country home – until they had the idea to turn its six acres into a small farm.
Listen
When the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, began his invasion of Ukraine he expected to quickly take control of the capital, Kyiv. But the resistance his forces have encountered has been greater than he anticipated, Emma Graham-Harrison tells Michael Safi.
The UN refugee agency has said the number of people fleeing Ukraine has reached 368,000, and that it could rise to four million. Ilyas Verdiev, an IT professional, made the difficult decision to leave his home in Kyiv with his wife, Nataliya, and their two young children after the entire family spent several hours sheltering in the bathroom on Thursday.
He describes their journey out of the city and the situation for friends and family left behind.
Full Story is Guardian Australia’s daily news podcast. Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or any other podcasting app.
Sport
Swimming Australia has declared it will boycott the World Short Course Championships in Russia, saying it is “appalled” by the country’s invasion of Ukraine. Despite the championships in Kazan being scheduled for December, the sporting body has made it known it will refuse to send teams to any events in Russia.
Media roundup
The Australian defence force has been deployed to an aged care facility in the New South Wales central west after an outbreak of Covid-19, the ABC reports. Some Ukrainian Australians are flying to the other side of the world to defend their homeland, the Sydney Morning Herald reports.
And if you’ve read this far …
As delicate as they are sentimental, vintage tees require special handling to keep their magic. This is how to care for your beloved t-shirt.
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