Indholdsfortegnelse for 20 January 2023 i Guardian Weekly

Dune safari Argentina’s Kevin Benavides powers through the desert between Saybah and Al-Hofuf during stage 13 of the Dakar Rally. After almost 9,000km and more than 44 hours of racing, the Red Bull KTM rider prevailed over his team-mate Toby Price by just 43 seconds, the closest margin of victory in the motorcycling race’s history. The Guardian Weekly Founded in Manchester, England 4 July 1919 Guardian Weekly is an edited selection of some of the best journalism found in the Guardian and Observer newspapers in the UK and the Guardian’s digital editions in the UK, US and Australia. The weekly magazine has an international focus and three editions: global, Australia and North America. The Guardian was founded in 1821, and Guardian Weekly in 1919. We exist to hold power to account in…

Sônia Guajajara should have been making history last Tuesday afternoon, being sworn in as the head of Brazil’s first ministry for Indigenous peoples at a ceremony at the presidential palace in Brasília. Instead, with that building wrecked on 8 January by thousands of far-right extremists, she sat in her office overlooking Brazil’s similarly ransacked congress, reflecting on the stunning attempt to overthrow one of the world’s biggest democracies. “It was truly frightening … such insanity,” said the politician who hails from the Amazon and worked as a cleaner and nanny before becoming a leading Indigenous activist. “They say they are patriots who are fighting for Brazil … [but] this is terrorism … and this was engineered by people with economic and political power,” Guajajara said, as her government tried to…

An infantry carrier moves quickly across a devastated landscape, traversing a flat expanse dotted with lines of shattered buildings, some reduced to rubble by artillery fire. The drone footage shows the carrier, marked with a red cross, halt beside a building missing part of its roof and many of its windows. A Ukrainian medic darts out and peers briefly around the corner of the building as a casualty is brought out on a stretcher. Loaded quickly, the carrier heads away at speed, coming under Russian artillery fire. Pictured in the footage are the ruins of the small Donbas saltmining town of Soledar, and a fleeting scene from a battle where life, death and injury has been measured in the past week in such near and not-so-near misses. Last Friday, as…

At the French national assembly, Thomas Ménagé straightened the smart suit and tie that the far-right leader Marine Le Pen insists her parliamentarians wear to prove they are serious and respectable. “We’re a new generation,” said the 31-year-old who used to work as a middle-manager in a property firm. “We’ve shown we work hard in parliament and the aim now is to prove we’re capable of governing the country when Marine Le Pen becomes president in 2027.” Le Pen’s far-right National Rally continues to send shockwaves through French politics as the biggest single opposition party in parliament, pitching itself as a counterweight to the centrist grouping of president Emmanuel Macron. Le Pen’s strategy is to use the presence of 89 far-right lawmakers in parliament as a crucial step in her…

From Madrid to Berlin and Paris to Budapest, scientists and planners agree, trees, trees and yet more trees can help make Europe’s cities more comfortable – even survivable – as global heating strengthens its grip. But concrete pavements, highrise buildings, historical squares and underground car parks are a hostile environment for trees, and authorities are finding it hard to plant more. In fact, many EU cities are less green than they were a century ago. “It’s a massive challenge,” said Christophe Najdovski, the deputy mayor for revegetation and green spaces on Paris city council. “We know with enough trees we can lower the city’s summer temperature by up to 8C. They’re basically natural airconditioning. But planting them isn’t always easy.” The latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change…

Hatemon Nesa recalled hugging her young daughter tightly as the cramped, broken-down boat they were sitting on drifted aimlessly. They had set off on 25 November from the squalid Cox’s Bazar refugee camp in Bangladesh, where they had lived since 2017, when a brutal crackdown by Myanmar’s military forced more than 700,000 Rohingya to flee over the border. The 27-year-old, like many other Rohingya refugees, was hoping for a better life in Malaysia. But about 10 days into the journey the boat’s engine stopped working and food and water supplies began to run out. The roughly 30 children on board would cry out in pain from thirst and hunger. She feared her daughter would not survive. At least two children died during the doomed voyage. “When it rained a few…

The first fixed-wing electric passenger aircraft took off from Grant County international airport in the US state of Washington in September. The nine-seater charter plane – known as Alice – soared to 1,000 metres for eight minutes. Northern Territory Air Services, a scheduled airline and charter operator, put in an order less than two months later to bring 20 of the aircraft to Australia with plans to fly passengers from Darwin to Uluru and Mount Isa. It’s a small sign that the winds may be changing for zero-emissions aviation in Australia, one of the most flight-dependent countries in the world. Even though there was no industry body making the case for change until recently, a small crop of startups and aviation companies have been working, away from the spotlight, on…

More strikes are coming to Britain, with 100,000 civil servants due to strike on 1 February. For 18 days across February and March, 150 universities will be shut down by University and College Union action. Last week, 45,000 junior doctors began voting on strike action. They will join transport workers, nurses, ambulance workers and a number of other public and private professionals – an objection of strikers, to suggest a collective noun. Their caricatures have been vividly painted – “ fat cat” trade union leaders, entitled workers, uncaring healthcare professionals who are taking advantage of bad times to snatch a higher paycheck; all at the expense of small businesses and poorly patients. These are compelling portrayals. Life is already hard, and those making it immediately and practically harder are easier…

I’m listening to the accelerated, chipmunk voice of the British singer Raye on Escapism, a rebound-sex anthem that’s currently topping the UK charts. Raye has a low, brassy singing voice, but I’m not listening to her official version. This one is paced 150% faster than the original song, making it sound like she has inhaled helium. Who wants to listen to a song that sounds like a triple shot of espresso? Perhaps more people than you might think. The remix can be found on Sped Up Songs, a Spotify-produced playlist liked by more than 975,000 people. It runs over four hours and manipulates songs such as Steve Lacy’s recent TikTok anthem Bad Habits and older hits like Summertime Sadness by Lana Del Rey. On YouTube, users upload hours-long videos of…

It’s more than a week since Prince Harry’s memoir Spare was published and what thrillingly hectic days they’ve been: hard to pick a highlight. Amusing as it was to find Nicholas Witchell reporting for the BBC on the book’s release by filming the sole person queueing outside Waterstones’ London flagship store to buy it, I think the sound of the ex-Sun hack Dan Wootton railing flatulently in the Daily Mail at Harry’s description of him as a “sad little man” just edged it for me. Meanwhile, in the US, Harry went on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert, where he performed a skit with some trumpets and Tom Hanks and spoke of his “frost-nipped todger” – said todger being, by the way, just one of dozens of be-nicknamed rude mechanicals…

Magnus Carlsen versus the young guns was due to start last Saturday, with the opening round (of 13) of the “chess Wimbledon” at Tata Steel Wijk aan Zee in the Netherlands. Carlsen, 32, the triple world champion at classical, rapid and blitz, faces a grandmaster field that includes five teenagers – three from India, one each from Germany and Uzbekistan. The Norwegian’s own top priorities are to win Wijk for a record ninth time, see off the challenge from Generation Z, and hopefully to kickstart another attempt to scale his own elusive chess Everest of a 2900 rating. The youngest of the challenging teenage quintet is India’s Dommaraju Gukesh, 16, who at 12 narrowly missed becoming the youngest ever GM. The other teenagers are Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa, 17, also from India;…

Another month, another Russian military reshuffle: Vladimir Putin changes the general in charge of his forces in Ukraine with something of the frequency of a Premier League club desperate to secure immediate success. It is obvious that such inconsistency demonstrates that the Kremlin is dissatisfied with the conduct of the war but the decision to put Gen Valery Gerasimov, the head of the armed forces, in charge of the invasion is eye-catching for other reasons too. Demoted to being one of three deputies is Gen Sergei Surovikin after just three months in charge. Surovikin, the commander of the aerospace forces, earned the nickname “General Armageddon” after ordering the destruction of Aleppo from the air in 2016 to break rebel resistance, which led to the fall of the Syrian city later…

A sharp wind shunts clouds across the low and endless skies of La Mancha as Carlos Fernández stoops to pluck the last mauve flowers of the season from the cold earth. Their petals, which stain his index finger and thumb blue, enclose an almost weight-less prize – crimson threads that are treasured across the world. But despite the prices his crop fetches, the life of a saffron grower is not without its trials. As well as the back-breaking picking and painstaking sorting, there is foreign competition, unpredictable yields, increasingly evident effects of the climate emergency and, on this particular day, the infuriating discovery that thieves descended on his fields overnight. And then there are the dreaded words – “oro rojo”. “Calling it ‘red gold’ damages our saffron because it makes…

In the days after Shinzo Abe was shot dead last summer while making an election campaign speech, commentators struggled to articulate a motive for a seemingly senseless attack on Japan’s former and longest-serving prime minister. Abe’s violent death was an affront to democracy, said the prime minister, Fumio Kishida, adding that his mentor would be given a state funeral. But Kishida was mistaken if he believed that Abe’s controversial, and expensive, official farewell would achieve closure. Eight months on, the fallout from the killing is still being felt throughout Japan’s politics and will continue into this year. It has sent Kishida’s approval ratings plunging, triggered ministerial resignations, and ensnared hundreds of ruling Liberal Democratic party (LDP) politicians. At the heart of the scandal lies the Unification church, whose members are…

The discovery of government secrets at two locations associated with Joe Biden appears to have produced one big political winner: Donald Trump. The White House was in rare crisis mode last week as it emerged that lawyers for the president had found classified material at his thinktank in Washington DC and home in Delaware. At an unusually contentious press briefing, one TV correspondent dubbed the affair “garage-gate”. The justice department appointed a special counsel to investigate Biden’s handling of classified documents from his time as vice-president. It was a rare setback for an administration that promised to be transparent and scandal-free. It also complicated an investigation into Trump over an ostensibly similar matter. Another special counsel is already examining the former president’s retention of top secret papers at Mara-Lago, his…

The US prison at Guantánamo Bay opened 21 years ago this month. For 21 years, the extrajudicial detention facility has held a total of 779 men between eight known camps. In two decades, Guantánamo grew from a small, makeshift camp of chainlink cages into a maximum-security facility of cement bunker-like structures that costs close to $540m a year to operate. Twenty-one years is a long time – a generation was born and came of age in that time. Four American presidents have served. The World Trade Center was rebuilt. Of those 779 prisoners held at Guantánamo, nine died there; 706 have been released or transferred out; 20 have been recommended for transfer but remain there; 12 have been charged with crimes; two have been convicted; and three will be held…

Bran, the narrator of Nell Zink’s latest novel, is abandoned by her parents as a child, and grows up in southern California with the criminal family of her mother’s ex-boyfriend, the Hendersons. From early childhood she is used by them as unpaid labour in the plant nursery they run as a front operation. It’s a world of gang-affiliated bikers and exploited immigrant labourers, where Bran sleeps in an unheated lean-to and lives on canned food warmed with propane. But Bran is meant for better things, and the book describes her haphazard rise into the ranks of the middle-class artistic precariat. Zink is both a very satisfying and a frustrating writer. Her plots are shapeless but oddly propulsive. Her narrative style is a tissue of quips that strays into glibness. Within…

The Monadhliath, Scotland, UK When we leave the house, the sun is still hidden behind the Cairngorms and the sky is a luminous wash of palest blue, fading to cream. Above the hills, small drifts of cloud glow pink and gold. But we are headed the opposite way – to the older Monadhliath range, the Grey Hills. Not grey today though – they are cloaked in snow, and shining as they look towards the rising sun. The humpy camel’s back of Creag Dhubh is our destination, a hill we have summited several times from the southern end but have always been foiled from the north. Any semblance of path disappears into undergrowth, bog or spills of rock. But we are determined, and accept the inevitable stumbling across snowy tussocks through…

Across 5 Be very expensive (4,1,4) 8 Diaphragm that controls the size of the pupil (4) 9 Dry (8) 10 Superbrain (6) 11 Part of a poem (6) 13 Bust (6) 15 Coiffure (6) 16 Oriental sabre (8) 18 Skin complaint (4) 19 Arms smuggler (9) Down 1 Lever used by pilot (8) 2 Position in society (6) 3 Superior of a religious community (6) 4 Things that get fired (abbr) (4) 6 Nietzsche or Engels (9) 7 Chinese Communist leader (3,6) 12 Lively (8) 14 Essential characteristics (6) 15 Engaging (6) 17 Pout (4) Solution No 16,430…

We live in extraordinary times. The worst of the pandemic appears to be over, attitudes towards the climate crisis are changing and our investigative reporting continues to shed light on corruption and expose injustice and incompetence. But there is still a long way to go: in Ukraine, civilians’ lives are on the line, while in Russia, protestors are continually censored and silenced. Editorial independence has never been more important. The Guardian’s unique funding model means we’re free from the influence of shareholders and billionaire proprietors. We can hold the powerful to account and follow the truth wherever it leads. But to do this we need the support of our readers. Guardian Patrons are supporters who give a little more towards helping make our vital work possible - and are offered…

1 CLIMATE CRISIS El Niño will bring further record-breaking heatwaves The return of the El Niño climate phenomenon will cause global temperatures to rise “off the chart” and deliver unprecedented heatwaves, scientists have warned. Forecasts suggest El Niño will return this year, exacerbating extreme weather around the globe and making it “very likely” the world will exceed 1.5C of warming. The hottest year in recorded history, 2016, was driven by a major El Niño event. It is part of a natural oscillation driven by ocean temperatures and Pacific winds, which switches between El Niño, its cooler counterpart La Niña, and neutral conditions. There have been a run of La Niña events in the past three years. El Niño occurs during the northern hemisphere winter and its heating effect takes months…

INDUSTRIAL ACTION Schools set to close as teachers vote to strike Teachers and school support staff in the National Education Union have voted in support of strike action, which will close or partially close the vast majority of schools in England and Wales. Strike action will begin on 1 February, to coincide with the TUC’s national “protect the right to strike” day of action, followed by a series of regional strikes later in the month, the NEU said. The union is striking in pursuit of its claim for a fully funded, above-inflation pay rise, after the government announced last year that most teachers would receive a pay rise of about 5%, while starting salaries would go up by 8.9%. Overall nine out of 10 teacher members in the NEU voted…

In the days following the 6 January 2021 storming of the US Capitol, a Brazilian professor and expert on disinformation, David Nemer, gave an interview predicting the same thing would happen in Brazil two years later. This month’s insurrection in Brasília came just two days after the second anniversary of the Capitol attack. Nemer said his prediction was not the work of a seer, but was based on analysis of the close and growing symbiosis of the hard right in the US and Brazil – a bond that was built up around the Trump and Bolsonaro families and their entourages. “The reason why I was saying that was because the same sort of narrative that was flowing around social media in the US, it was also flowing in WhatsApp and…

As Spain enters an election year that will include municipal, regional and national votes, the woman who is, according to polls, its most popular politician is touring the country to build support for leftwing candidates. Yolanda Díaz, the deputy prime minister and a lifelong member of the Communist party, is heading Sumar (Unite), a platform to the left of the prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, that plans to field candidates at the general election due on 10 December. Last Saturday, 2,000 people filled the Auditori in Barcelona to hear Díaz speak, while a further 1,000 were turned away. She made her entrance to pounding, Rocky-style music and a standing ovation alongside Ada Colau, the Barcelona mayor and a leading supporter of the Sumar project. Colau introduced Díaz, saying she represented “hope…

When Lemlem read that phone lines had been restored to parts of Ethiopia’s war-torn Tigray region last month, she attempted to call her elderly mother, who lives in the Tigrayan town of Adwa. “I tried 20 or 30 times but the call wouldn’t go through,” Lemlem said from her home in Maryland in the US. “When I finally heard her voice, it was so emotional. We were crying together and I was just so happy. For two years, I didn’t know if she was alive.” Tigray’s 6 million people were plunged into darkness when war erupted between Ethiopia’s federal government and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) in November 2020, their phone lines, internet, roads and air links severed. The fighting that followed killed 500,000 people from all causes, including…

After almost three years of little to no business, Thai tour guide operator Anchalee Vittayanun-tapornkul is more than relieved that Chinese tourists are allowed to travel again. “I’m sure if you ask anyone in the tourism industry, the only nationality that they are waiting to see come back is the Chinese tourists,” said Anchalee, who is based in Chiang Mai, northern Thailand. China has scrapped the requirement for inbound travellers to quarantine, making holidaying abroad much easier. The policy change is expected to boost the tourism sector across the region, including south-east Asia, which depended heavily on Chinese travellers before the pandemic. Anchalee, the ownerofCMParadise Tour, has hired extra Chinese speakers and drivers to take groups on tours of Chiang Mai’s Doi Suthep temple, its waterfalls and landscapes. When the…

For almost six years, the US embassy in Havana has lain silent in the withering Caribbean sun. Tiles have fallen from its facade, the fence has rusted and the awning of the consular section has been shredded in the fierce winds off the Florida Straits. Last year, though, a new blue awning appeared and US state department SUVs began to arrive. And then, this month, queues of Cubans appeared outside, as the embassy resumed full immigrant visa services for the first time since 2017. The return of full consular services comes as Joe Biden tries to stem the latest migration crisis on the southern border of the US. The president has announced that 30,000 migrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela will be allowed to legally enter the country every…

He was a company man. He did what he did to preserve the power and the assets of the church. If that meant thrashing victims of abuse through the courts and boxing them into tiny settlements, that was fine by him. That’s what made him the right man to clean up the Vatican’s financial mess. High among the achievements for which he deserves praise was the work he and his accountants did to begin tracking the missing billions in the Holy City. Soon after, he was in Melbourne facing a long purgatory in the criminal courts which ended in a unanimous acquittal by the high court. By that time, the so-called swimming pool charges had evaporated. No Australian priest has ever climbed as high as George Pell. Few figures in…

What are the advantages of pressure cookers? Charlie, Lincoln, England, UK What really sets pressure cookers apart from other bits of kitchen kit, notes food writer Catherine Phipps, is their versatility. “I don’t see them as a gadget, but just as a saucepan with a specially adapted lid,” says the author of Modern Pressure Cooking. “You can use them for everything you would a normal saucepan, and much more besides, plus you’re also cutting down 70-75% of the cooking time.” Stefano Arturi, of the Italian Home Cooking blog, adds: “I can make dishes that would otherwise take hours in a fraction of the time, and with no loss of flavour.” And for a fraction of the cost, too. Which pressure cooker you go for, however, depends on how many you’re…

★ All solutions published next week Across 1 On reflection, gang needs to accept bereavement to flourish (7) 5 Island’s problem with American transport: no terminus (7) 9 A second city’s somersaulting dance (5) 10 Fly with management, a feature of which is doubles all round! (9) 11 Light composition of Rice, incorporating classical composer (10) 12 Powder used by first alchemists (4) 14 Raven, dog and rodent eating new fruit (12) 18 Honourable dignitary’s after power lift (12) 21 Off-colour and about to enter shaft (4) 22 Paying for fine inlaid top furniture item (10) 25 Bad feeling of many against independence leader – one from Italy, maybe (9) 26 Fungus shape (5) 27 Drop gets player finally into touch (7) 28 Playing clarinet and briefly leaving performance (7)…