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New Zealand's flood- and slip-prone regions do not have the mechanisms in place to cope with rapid environmental changes brought about by the climate crisis, Jacinda Ardern has said after visiting the aftermath of a monster storm.The prime minister was touring the site of devastating flooding and landslips around Nelson, at the top of the South Island, when she was asked if she was satisfied that New Zealand had the framework and investment to cope with weather events that are becoming more frequent.“No I'm not, which is why we're doing the national adaptation plan, which is why we will continue to work with local government,” she replied.The prime minister spent Monday morning in the hard-hit Nelson region, which received more than three times its average August rainfall in four-and-a-...

Rhaenyra Targaryen, before the Iron Throne. / RCThe new HBO production launches winks and presents credentials from the first minute to hook all the followers of the mother series'The House of the Dragon' has started on HBO. Next we review, with some spoilers, what the first chapter gives of itself. It doesn't take three minutes for the dragons to appear in the new HBO Max blockbuster and whose first chapter (of the ten of the first season) has already been released, after months of intense promotion. In the mother series we had to wait several episodes to see the creatures, but in this one everything goes much faster. There is no time to lose. Because this fiction is built for those who were followers of 'Game of Thrones', those who know its universe (even if some clueless person ...

The US and South Korea have begun their biggest joint military drills in years – a show of force that is expected to raise tensions with an increasingly hostile North Korea.The exercises, known as Ulchi Freedom Shield, are being seen as a sign of the allies' determination to restore large-scale training after they canceled some regular drills and scaled down others to facilitate nuclear talks, and because of the Covid-19 pandemic.Details of the operation have not been released, but past exercises have involved tens of thousands of troops and large numbers of aircraft warships and tanks.They will reportedly include simulated joint attacks, frontline reinforcements of arms and fuel, and removals of weapons of mass destruction.The two militaries said in a joint statement said the drills we...

When Giulia, 20, discovered she was pregnant she immediately decided that she wasn't ready to have a baby. Supported by her boyfriend and her family, she sought medical advice in her home town in Italy's central Marche region on how to obtain an abortion. She faced obstacles at every turn, from telephones not being answered and surgeries being closed, to one doctor who tried to persuade her to change her mind from her.Abortion in Italy was legalized via a referendum in 1978, overturning an outright ban enforced by the fascist dictator Benito Mussolini who deemed it a crime against the Italian race, but the high number of gynaecologists who refuse to terminate pregnancies for moral reasons – 64.6%, According to 2020 data – has meant women still encounter huge difficulties in accessing ...

Pakistan's former prime minister Imran Khan has been charged under the anti-terror act following accusations of threats to police and a magistrate, after a fiery speech to supporters at the weekend.Khan lost power in a no-confidence vote in April. He has been staging popular anti-government protests, escalating political tensions in the country as he seeks to return to office.Khan himself appeared to still be free and had not immediately addressed the police charge sheet being lodged against him. Pakistan's opposition Tehreek-e-Insaf party (PTI), Khan's political party, published online videos showing supporters surrounding his home to potentially stop police from reaching it.Pakistan's media watchdog banned television channels from broadcasting live addresses by Khan late Saturday ni...

Spoiler alert! The following contains details from “House of the Dragon” Season 1, Episode 1. Westeros is back, baby. HBO's highly anticipated "Game of Thrones" prequel "House of the Dragon" finally arrived Sunday, and it certainly has quite a few dragons, plus violence, sex and palace intrigue. It's a slice of the "Thrones" world, mostly within the walls of the Red Keep in King's Landing (that's the palace in the fictional nation's capital, if you've since forgotten "Thrones" ended in 2019). The first episode of the series, one of many potential spinoffs HBO developed to keep the "Thrones" mania going after the finale, has a lot of work to do, setting the table of players in Westeros – mostly the ruling Targaryen clan and their courtiers – 172 years before Daenerys Targaryen (Emilia ...

Alibaba has faced growth challenges amid regulatory tightening on China's domestic technology sector and a slowdown in the world's second-largest economy. But analysts think the e-commerce giant's growth could pick up through the rest of 2022.Guang Da | JiemianNews | VCG | Getty ImagesChinese tech giants Alibaba and Tencent often talk about all of their innovations and new products during earnings calls with investors.But the second quarter was different. Executives at China's two largest tech firms focused on something a little less flashy — keeping costs down.It comes after Alibaba and Tencent posted a set of second-quarter results that confirmed these once free-wheeling and high-flying behemoths are not growing anymore.China's biggest e-commerce player Alibaba reported flat grow...

Leon Vitali, the Barry Lyndon actor who became one of Stanley Kubrick's closest associates, has died at the age of 74.Vitali died on Friday in Los Angeles, his family said on Sunday. He died peacefully surrounded by loved ones including his three children, Masha, Max and Vera.“Leon was a special and lovely man driven by his curiosity, who spread love and warmth wherever he went,” his children said. "He will be remembered with love and be hugely missed by the many people he touched."Though Vitali was often described as Kubrick's assistant, the 2017 documentary Filmworker shed light on his enormous and largely unsung contributions to the work of one of cinema's greatest figures, from The Shining through Eyes Wide Shut. He did everything from casting and coaching actors to overseeing re...

Twenty years have passed since George Bush included Iran in what he called the "axis of evil" that threatened the world, along with Syria and North Korea. Neither the signing of the nuclear agreement in 2015, nor the advanced negotiations at this time to recover the pact have managed to get the Iranians to get rid of this label, although the new threat two decades later, according to the United States, would be made up of the axis formed by Russia and China, an axis to which Iran has turned in search of support to help it overcome the sanctions. Experts in the Islamic republic such as Luciano Záccara, an associate professor at the University of Qatar, think that the label is still valid. “If we see how the administrations of Joe Biden and Barack Obama have combined the stick and the ...