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  • Three tons as record-breaking Australia crush South Africa

    Three tons as record-breaking Australia crush South Africa

    Cameron Green slapped a 47-ball century with Travis Head and Mitchell Marsh also blasting tons as Australia crushed South Africa by 276 runs in a record-breaking third and final one-day international on Sunday in Mackay.

    The hosts were playing for pride, down 2-0 in the series, and responded magnificently, posting an ominous 431-2 after opting to bat — their highest ODI total on home soil.

    They then dismissed the Proteas for 155 in the 25th over, with spinner Cooper Connolly taking 5-22.

    Travis Head was supreme in blazing 142 off 103 balls, ably supported by skipper Marsh (100 from 106).

    Their 250-run platform at Great Barrier Reef Arena was Australia’s highest ever opening partnership against the Proteas, bettering the 170 by Matthew Hayden and Adam Gilchrist in Durban in 2002.

    Cameron Green then took over with a whirlwind 118 not out to mark the first time Australia’s top three have all scored centuries. Alex Carey was unbeaten on 50, with the 18 sixes slogged between them also a record  at home.

    Read more: Australia’s Connolly scripts history with five-for against South Africa

    “A pretty crazy day, a full performance by the lads,” said Mitchell Marsh.

    “But full credit to South Africa, they played outstandingly well in the first two games and were too good for us.”

    South Africa did themselves no favours by resting quicks Nandre Burger and Lungi Ngidi, with their second-string attack outplayed.

    After Marsh won the toss, the openers made an aggressive start, driving Australia to 86 after the 10-over powerplay.

    Travis Head was in ominous touch, crunching boundaries with ease to reach his half-century off 32 deliveries.

    At the other end, Mitchell Marsh slammed two big sixes as he also got in the groove, going after the Proteas’ fresh new-ball pairing of Kwena Maphaka and Wiaan Mulder.

    – Batted beautifully –

    With the bowlers running out of ideas, Head cruised to a seventh ODI century, pushing Senuran Muthusamy for an easy single.

    He then really let rip with a series of big hits before being caught in the deep by Dewald Brevis off Keshav Maharaj after crunching 17 fours and five sixes.

    Marsh battled to three figures soon after but was out next ball, taken on the run by wicketkeeper Ryan Rickelton after he skied Muthusamy.

    But the onslaught was far from over with Cameron Green producing a sizzling display of power-hitting, including three giant sixes in a row off Muthusamy to post his maiden ODI century.

    Only Glenn Maxwell (40 balls) has scored a faster hundred for Australia.

    “The two openers, they batted beautifully so me and ‘Kez’ (Carey) could just bat with a lot of freedom,” said Green.

    South Africa’s chase started badly with four wickets down for 50 inside nine overs.

    Sean Abbott accounted for Aiden Markram (two) and skipper Temba Bavuma (19) while Xavier Bartlett took care of Rickelton (11) and Tristan Stubbs (one).

    The visitors’ big hope was Brevis and he produced some fireworks in his 49 before Green caught him on the ropes off Connolly, who then cleaned up the tail.

    “We were under the pump from the first ball and didn’t really pitch up today,” said Bavuma. “They put us under pressure and we didn’t have the answers.”

  • Former presidents back Sri Lanka’s jailed ex-leader

    Former presidents back Sri Lanka’s jailed ex-leader

    COLOMBO: Three former presidents of Sri Lanka expressed solidarity with jailed ex-leader Ranil Wickremesinghe on Sunday and condemned his incarceration as a “calculated assault” on democracy.

    The trio, former political rivals of Wickremesinghe -— president between July 2022 and September 2024 -— said the charges against him were frivolous.

    He has been accused of using $55,000 in state funds for a stopover in Britain while returning home after a G77 summit in Havana and the UN General Assembly in New York in September 2023.

    Wickremesinghe, 76, was rushed to the intensive care unit of the main state-run hospital in Colombo on Saturday, a day after being remanded in custody.

    Doctors said he was suffering from severe dehydration on top of acute diabetes and high blood pressure.

    “What we are witnessing is a calculated onslaught on the very essence of our democratic values,” former president Chandrika Kumaratunga said in a statement.

    The 80-year-old Kumaratunga said the consequences of Wickremesinghe’s jailing would go beyond the fate of an individual and could affect the rights of all citizens.

    “I join wholeheartedly in expressing my unreserved opposition to these initiatives, which all political leaders are duty-bound to resist,” Kumaratunga added.

    Her successor Mahinda Rajapaksa, 79, also expressed solidarity with Wickremesinghe and visited him in prison on Saturday, shortly before he was moved to intensive care.

    Maithripala Sirisena, 73, who sacked Wickremesinghe from the prime minister’s post in October 2018 before being forced by the Supreme Court to reinstate him 52 days later, described the jailing as a witch hunt.

    “What we are seeing is a systematic campaign to silence opponents of the new government,” Sirisena said. “They are polishing the lid of a coffin to bury democracy.”

    Wickremesinghe’s own United National Party (UNP) said on Saturday it believed he was being prosecuted out of fear that he could stage a comeback.

    He lost the presidential election in September to Anura Kumara Dissanayake, but has remained politically active despite holding no elected office.

    Wickremesinghe was arrested as part of Dissanayake’s campaign against endemic corruption in the island nation, which is emerging from its worst economic meltdown in 2022.

    He has maintained that his wife’s travel expenses in Britain were met by her personally and that no state funds were used.

    Wickremesinghe became president in July 2022 after then-leader Gotabaya Rajapaksa stepped down following months of street protests fuelled by the economic crisis.

  • Kneecap to play Paris concert in defiance of objections

    Kneecap to play Paris concert in defiance of objections

    PARIS: Irish rap group Kneecap, one of whose members faces a British terror charge for allegedly supporting Hezbollah, are to perform outside Paris on Sunday, despite objections from French Jewish groups and government officials.

    The local authorities have also withdrawn their subsidies for the music festival where the trio will play — the annual Rock en Seine festival, held in the Paris suburb of Saint-Cloud — after organisers kept the controversial band on the programme for their slot from 1630 GMT.

    Strongly backing the Palestinian cause and bitterly criticising Israel, the group from Northern Ireland, which is part of the UK, have turned concerts into political events.

    Liam O’Hanna, 27, who performs under the stage name Mo Chara, was charged in England in May accused of displaying a flag of the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah during a London concert in November.

    They played a closely scrutinised concert at the Glastonbury Festival in June, where Chara declared: “Israel are war criminals.”

    The group later missed playing at the Sziget Festival in Budapest after being barred from entering the country by the Hungarian authorities, a close ally of Israel.

    Kneecap, who also focus on Irish republicanism, are controversial within the UK and Ireland, more than two-and-a-half-decades after the peace agreement that aimed to end the conflict over the status of Northern Ireland.

    The group takes its name from the deliberate shooting of the limbs, known as “kneecapping”, carried out by Irish Republicans as punishment attacks during the decades of unrest.

    ‘Confident’

    “We are confident that the group will perform in the correct manner,” Matthieu Ducos, director of Rock en Seine, told AFP ahead of the festival.

    The municipality of Saint-Cloud for the first time withdrew its 40,000-euro ($47,000) subsidy from Rock en Seine.

    The wider Ile-de-France region that includes Paris also cancelled its funding for the 2025 edition.

    However, such moves do not jeopardise the viability of the festival, whose budget was between 16 million and 17 million euros this year.

    The group has already played twice in France this summer — at the Eurockeennes festival in Belfort and the Cabaret Vert in Charleville-Mezieres — both times without incident.

    But the concert comes against a background of concerns about alleged high levels of antisemitism in France in the wake of the October 7, 2023 attack by Palestinian militant group Hamas on Israel and the devastating assault on the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip that Israel launched in response.

    “They are desecrating the memory of the 50 French victims of Hamas on October 7, as well as all the French victims of Hezbollah,” said Yonathan Arfi, president of the Representative Council of Jewish Institutions of France (CRIF), calling for the concert to be cancelled.

    Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau said vigilance would be required against “any comments of an antisemitic nature, apology for terrorism or incitement to hatred” at the event.

  • N. Korea test-fires two air defence missiles: KCNA

    N. Korea test-fires two air defence missiles: KCNA

    SEOUL, South Korea: North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has overseen the test-firing of two “new” air defence missiles, state media said Sunday, after Pyongyang accused Seoul of fomenting tensions at the border.

    The test-firing, which took place Saturday, showed that the two “improved” missile weapon systems had “superior combat capability”, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported.

    The KCNA report did not explain the new missiles in any detail, only that their “operation and reaction mode is based on unique and special technology”. It also did not say where the test had been carried out.

    “The firing particularly proved that the technological features of two types of projectiles are very suitable for destroying various aerial targets,” KCNA said.

    On the same day, Kim also communicated an “important task” for the defence science sector to carry out before a key party meeting, the report said.

    South Korea’s military said Saturday it had fired warning shots at several North Korean soldiers who briefly crossed the heavily militarised border separating the two countries on Tuesday.

    UN Command put the number of North Korean troops that crossed the border at 30, Yonhap news agency reported Sunday.

    Pyongyang’s state media quoted Army Lieutenant General Ko Jong Chol as saying the incident was a “premeditated and deliberate provocation”.

    “This is a very serious prelude that would inevitably drive the situation in the southern border area where a huge number of forces are stationing in confrontation with each other to the uncontrollable phase,” Ko said.

    South Korea’s new leader Lee Jae Myung has sought warmer ties with the nuclear-armed North and vowed to build “military trust”, but Pyongyang has said it has no interest in improving relations with Seoul.

    The missile tests also come as the South and the United States conduct extensive joint military drills.

  • Fire at nuclear plant after Russia downs Ukrainian drone

    Fire at nuclear plant after Russia downs Ukrainian drone

    MOSCOW: A fire broke out Sunday at a Russian nuclear power plant after the country’s military downed a Ukrainian drone, the facility said after the blaze was put out.

    The “device detonated” upon impact at the Kursk Nuclear Power Plant in western Russia, sparking a blaze which the facility said, “was extinguished by fire crews”.

    There were no casualties from the drone smashing down at the site, where capacity was reduced.

    “The radiation background at the industrial site of the Kursk NPP and the surrounding area has not changed and corresponds to natural levels,” the plant wrote on Telegram.

    The International Atomic Energy Agency has repeatedly warned of the dangers of fighting around nuclear plants following Russia launching its military offensive on Ukraine in February 2022.

    The plant is near the Russia-Ukraine border and sits to the west of Kursk city, the region’s capital with a population of around 440,000.

    Russia now controls around a fifth of Ukraine, including the Crimean peninsula which it annexed in 2014.

    The fighting has killed tens of thousands, forced millions to flee their homes and destroyed cities and villages across the east and south of Ukraine.

    Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly rebuffed calls by Kyiv and the West for an unconditional and immediate ceasefire.

  • South Africa pushes for Putin-Zelensky meeting

    South Africa pushes for Putin-Zelensky meeting

    South African President Cyril Ramaphosa on Saturday added his voice to diplomatic pressure to end the war in Ukraine by calling for a meeting between Kyiv and Moscow.

    According to a statement from Pretoria, Ramaphosa made his comments during a phone conversation with his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky.

    They come as hopes of a Russia-Ukraine summit appeared to fade, despite US President Donald Trump speaking to both sides over the course of a week.

    Trump had raised expectations on Monday by saying that Russian President Vladimir Putin and Zelensky had agreed to meet face-to-face — but on Friday he likened the two men to “oil and vinegar”.

    Kyiv and Moscow have blamed each other for the stalled peace efforts.

    “President Ramaphosa stressed the urgency of holding bilateral and trilateral meetings between the leaders of Russia and Ukraine and the United States as key to signal a firm commitment to ending the war,” the statement read.

    After their call, Zelensky reiterated on social media his willingness to hold “any format of meeting with the head of Russia”.

    “However, we see that Moscow is once again trying to drag everything out even further,” the Ukrainian leader said on X, calling on the Global South to send “relevant signals and (push) Russia toward peace”.

    Pretoria’s statement said Ramaphosa, who currently chairs the G20, had also spoken with the French and Finnish presidents and was expected to speak with “other European leaders” in the coming weeks.

    Ramaphosa spoke on Monday with Vladimir Putin, whom he described in October at the BRICS summit as a “dear ally” and a “valued friend”.

    However, for the first time since Russia’s attack on Ukraine, South Africa voted earlier this year in favour of a UN resolution declaring that Russia had launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

  • ‘KPop Demon Hunters’ hits theaters after topping Netflix

    ‘KPop Demon Hunters’ hits theaters after topping Netflix

    Netflix’s gargantuan hit film ‘KPop Demon Hunters’ has captured the global zeitgeist this summer, smashing streaming and music chart records.

    Now it is coming to movie theatres.

    An animated musical about a trio of Korean pop starlets who fight demons with infectious songs and synchronised dance moves, ‘Demon Hunters’ has been watched 210 million times and currently has five of the global top 10 songs on Spotify.

    Lifestyle News – Latest Entertainment News, Celebrity Gossip

    In an unlikely journey, the streaming mega-hit is tipped by analysts to hit number one at the box office this weekend, with thousands of cosplaying fans headed to sold-out ‘singalong screenings’ in theatres across five countries.

    “Insane, crazy, surreal,” singer EJAE, who co-wrote the film’s biggest track ‘Golden’ and performs heroine Rumi’s songs, told an advance screening at Netflix’s Hollywood headquarters this week.

    “I’m just really grateful I’m able to be part of this crazy cultural phenomenon.”

    For the uninitiated, the film’s premise is bizarre yet simple.

    Demons who feed on human souls have been trapped in another realm by the powerful voices of girl group HUNTR/X.

    To fight back, the demons secretly send their own devilishly handsome boy band to steal HUNTR/X’s fans and feast on their essences.

    Rivalries ensue, loyalties fray, and an unlikely romance evolves over 90 minutes of power ballads and pop earworms, all against anime-style backdrops of Seoul’s modern skyline and traditional bathhouses and thatched hanok homes.

    Released in June, ‘KPop Demon Hunters’ is already Netflix’s most-watched animated offering, and sits second on the all-time chart for any original film. It is likely to take the top spot within the week.

    “This movie is a triple threat. It’s got fantastic writing. It has got stunning animation. And the songs are bangers,” said Wendy Lee Szany, a Los Angeles-based movie critic and K-pop devotee.

    Indeed, songs by the movie’s fictional HUNTR/X and boy-band rivals Saja Boys occupy three of the Billboard top 10 — a feat no movie soundtrack has achieved since the 1990s.

    ‘Memes’

    While combining the global K-pop craze with sexy supernatural monsters might sound like an obvious recipe for Netflix’s much-vaunted algorithm, nobody expected ‘Demon Hunters’ to take off on this scale.

    It was made by Hollywood studio Sony Pictures, intended for the big screen, but sold to Netflix during the pandemic when many theatres were shuttered.

    That may have worked to the film’s advantage, said John Nguyen, founder of pop culture website Nerd Reactor.

    “If Sony had released it in theatres, I don’t think it would have been as big,” he said.

    “It’s word-of-mouth. People shared it, talked about it, posted videos on social media of fans and families singing along in their living rooms.”

    Endless homespun TikTok dance videos have added to the momentum.

    “People who haven’t seen the movie yet are seeing these memes; they can’t escape it, so they just end up like, ‘Okay, I’m gonna sit down this weekend (and watch) on Netflix,” said Szany.

    “And then they fall in love with it.”

    Also Read: ‘KPop Demon Hunters’ debuts on Netflix with stellar RT score

    ‘Shattered’

    Seeking to capitalise, Netflix – usually averse to movie theatres – is hosting ‘sing-alongs’ at 1,700 North American cinemas this weekend.

    Fans are invited to dress up, whip their phones out and film themselves singing at their top of their voices.

    The approach has cinema traditionalists despairing, but earned Taylor Swift’s concert movie $260 million at the box office in 2023.

    Early estimates suggest ‘KPop Demon Hunters’ could make $15 million in domestic theatres and top this weekend’s box office.

    Analyst David A. Gross of Franchise Entertainment Research said that figure seemed ‘reasonable… for now’, but could get ‘shattered’ if a rush of demand causes theatre owners to add extra screenings.

    That would be a welcome shot in the arm for movie theatres, after the bleak years of Covid-19, Hollywood strikes, and younger audiences migrating to – ironically – streaming.

    “There were literally so many kids singing their hearts out,” said Szany, who attended Netflix’s advance singalong and has watched the film at least eight times.

    “I was like, wow, they know all the lyrics better than I do.”

  • Russia says captured two villages in Ukraine’s Donetsk region

    Russia says captured two villages in Ukraine’s Donetsk region

    MOSCOW: Russia on Saturday said its forces in east Ukraine had taken two villages in the Donetsk region, upping military pressure on the ground as world leaders struggle to broker an end to the conflict.

    Russian forces are slowly advancing in the embattled eastern region, grinding closer to Kyiv’s key defensive line in costly metre-for-metre battles.

    Moscow’s defence ministry said on Telegram that Russian forces captured the villages of Sredneye and Kleban-Byk.

    The taking of Kleban-Byk would mark a further advance towards Kostiantynivka — a key fortified town on the road to Kramatorsk, where a major Ukrainian logistics base is located.

    On Friday, Russia said its troops had captured three villages in the Donetsk region it claimed to have annexed in September 2022.

    The latest Russian advances come as hopes dim for a summit between Russian and Ukrainian presidents — a solution campaigned for by US President Donald Trump as part of his efforts to end the conflict.

    Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Friday “no meeting” was planned as Trump’s mediation efforts appeared to stall, while Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russia was trying to prolong the offensive.

    Also Friday, Trump told reporters he would make an “important” decision in two weeks on Ukraine peace efforts, specifying that Moscow could face massive sanctions — or he might “do nothing”.

  • Sri Lanka opposition says ex-leader jailed to stop comeback

    Sri Lanka opposition says ex-leader jailed to stop comeback

    COLOMBO: Opposition parties in Sri Lanka accused on Saturday the government of jailing the country’s former president over fears he could return to power.

    Former leader Ranil Wickremesinghe, 76, who lost the last presidential election in September to Anura Kumara Dissanayake, was remanded in custody Friday on charges of misusing state funds for foreign travel.

    Anti-graft units have ramped up investigations since Dissanayake came to power on a promise to fight endemic corruption in the island nation, which is emerging from its worst economic meltdown in 2022.

    Nalin Bandara, a member of parliament for the main opposition Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) party, who visited Wickremesinghe at Colombo’s New Magazine Prison, said the former leader had called for unity to challenge Dissanayake’s leftist administration.

    “What the former president says is that we should get onto a common stage to fight the oppression of the new government,” Bandara told reporters outside the prison.

    Wickremesinghe’s own United National Party (UNP), which has two seats in the 225-member parliament, said the government felt threatened by the former president.

    “They fear he might return to power, and that is why this action,” UNP General Secretary Thalatha Athukorala told reporters in Colombo.

    Wickremesinghe stands accused of using state funds to finance a private visit to Britain in September 2023, while returning from attending the G77 summit in Havana and the UN General Assembly in New York.

    The offences carry a maximum punishment of 20 years in jail and a fine not exceeding three times the value of the misappropriated funds.

    His two-day UK visit was to participate in the conferring of an honorary professorship on his wife, Maithree, by the University of Wolverhampton.

    Wickremesinghe has maintained that his wife’s travel expenses were met by her and that no state funds were used.

    However, the police Criminal Investigation Department alleged that Wickremesinghe used 16.6 million rupees ($55,000) of government money for his travel.

    Wickremesinghe became president in July 2022 after then leader Gotabaya Rajapaksa stepped down following months of street protests fuelled by the economic crisis.

    He later secured a $2.9 billion bailout from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in early 2023, doubled taxes and removed energy subsidies to stabilise the economy.

    Since the new government came to power, two former senior ministers have been jailed for up to 25 years for corruption.

    Several members of former president Mahinda Rajapaksa’s family have also been charged with misusing state funds and are being prosecuted. Many of them are currently on bail pending court hearings.

    Dissanayake’s government this month impeached the police chief after accusing him of abuse of power. The prisons chief was also jailed for corruption.

  • US Defense Intelligence Agency chief among latest ousted officers

    US Defense Intelligence Agency chief among latest ousted officers

    WASHINGTON: The head of the US Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and two other senior officers are being removed, officials said Friday — the latest in a series of military firings this year.

    The removal of Lieutenant General Jeffrey Kruse, who led the DIA since early 2024, comes after the agency produced a preliminary assessment that said US strikes on Iran set back Tehran’s nuclear program by just a few months.

    The assessment — which was widely reported on by US media — contradicted claims from President Donald Trump that the strikes totally destroyed the nuclear sites, drawing the ire of both him and officials within his administration.

    Kruse “will no longer serve as DIA director,” a senior defense official said on condition of anonymity, without providing an explanation for the general’s departure.

    Prior to becoming director of the DIA, Kruse served as the advisor for military affairs for the director of national intelligence and also held positions including director of intelligence for the coalition against the Islamic State jihadist group.

    A US official separately said on condition of anonymity that two other senior officers — Vice Admiral Nancy Lacore, chief of Navy Reserve, and Rear Admiral Milton Sands, commander of the Naval Special Warfare Command — were also leaving their positions.

    Series of top officers fired

    In June, the United States launched a massive operation against three Iranian nuclear sites, an effort that involved more than 125 US aircraft as well as a guided missile submarine.

    Trump called the strikes a “spectacular military success” and repeatedly said they “obliterated” the nuclear sites, but the DIA’s preliminary assessment raised doubts about the president’s claims.

    The Trump administration responded with an offensive against the media, insisting the operation was a total success and berating journalists for reporting on the assessment.

    Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth insisted the assessment was “leaked because someone had an agenda to try to muddy the waters and make it look like this historic strike wasn’t successful,” and slammed “fawning coverage of a preliminary assessment.”

    Since beginning his second term in January, Trump has overseen a purge of top military officers, including chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff general Charles “CQ” Brown, whom he fired without explanation in February.

    Other senior officers dismissed this year include the heads of the Navy and Coast Guard, the general who headed the National Security Agency, the vice chief of staff of the Air Force, a Navy admiral assigned to NATO, and three top military lawyers.

    The chief of staff of the Air Force also recently announced his retirement without explanation just two years into a four-year term.

    Hegseth has insisted the president is simply choosing the leaders he wants, but Democratic lawmakers have raised concerns about the potential politicization of the traditionally neutral US military.

    Earlier this year, the Pentagon chief additionally ordered at least a 20 percent reduction in the number of active-duty four-star generals and admirals in the US military, as well as a 10 percent cut in the overall number of general and flag officers.