Defying reports of an incapacitating stroke and even his death, the Libyan strongman General Khalifa Haftar has returned to Libya from hospital in Paris and ordered a fresh military assault on Islamist-controlled areas. Numerous sources has reported that Haftar, 75, had either died or suffered a stroke of such severity that his public career was at an end, prompting speculation that his chief backers, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and France, were locked in secret discussions over a successor likely to play a decisive role in Libya’s future.

But Haftar’s return to Benghazi via Cairo to a triumphant reception on Thursday, and a televised statement in which he declared he was well, scotched those reports, which emanated from Paris and were largely promoted by Islamist sources. There had also been reports that lung cancer had spread to his brain. One of Haftar’s allies said: “He was ill. He is 75, but we played along with the idea he was as ill as reported since the frenzy was to our advantage.” Some have speculated Haftar’s allies did not do more to quash the rumours because he wanted to use the vacuum to flush out those disloyal to him inside his self-styled Libyan National Army (LNA). His absence in Paris coincided with a car bombing on 18 April intended to kill Abdulrazzak Al-Nazuri, the LNA’s chief of staff.(theguardian)…[+]

More than 10 million Syrians who have fled the country’s raging war have been told to lay claim to their homes by early May or risk forfeiting them to the state.

A property law announced this month has raised widespread fears that Syrian citizens who have opposed Bashar al-Assad face permanent exile and that other people considered loyalists may be given access to their communities. With the majority of internally displaced and overseas refugees unable or unwilling to return to prove ownership of properties, analysts and exiles say the law, known as article 10, and the tight timeframe surrounding it could serve as an instrument of demographic change and social engineering.

It has drawn parallels with laws enacted in Lebanon after the civil war to seize land in central Beirut, and the absentee property law in Israel in 1950 that legalised seizures from Palestinians driven from their lands. The Syrian law empowers local administrations to re-register property ownership within their areas, a move that requires landowners to be present. Syrian legal experts say the law focuses on war-damaged areas around Damascus and does not include areas unscathed by the fighting. However, critics and exiled landowners say the regulation has a clear political dimension and carries implications that extend well beyond selective re-zoning.(theguardian)…[+]

Latin America has suffered more than 2.5m murders since the start of this century and is facing an acute public security crisis that demands urgent and innovative solutions, a new report warns. “The sheer dimensions of homicidal violence are breathtaking,” says the report by the Igarapé Institute, a Brazil-based thinktank focused on security and development issues.

The publication, released on Thursday, paints a bleak portrait of what it calls the world’s most homicidal continent. Latin America suffers 33% of the world’s homicides despite having only 8% of its population. One-quarter of all global homicides are concentrated in four countries – Brazil, Colombia, Mexico and Venezuela – all of which are gearing up for presidential elections in which security is a dominant theme.

“The overall trend right now in Latin America is one of increasing homicides and deteriorating security,” said Robert Muggah, one of the report’s authors. “Latin America is a large area and there are lots of variations. But as a region – including Mexico down to Central America and South America – the rate of homicide is set to continue increasing up until 2030. The only other places we are seeing similar kinds of increases are in parts of southern and central Africa and some war zones.”

The report lays bare how young Latin Americans are disproportionately affected, with nearly half of all homicide victims aged 15–29. It also denounces the “astonishingly” large role of guns. Muggah said: “In addition to having these exceedingly high, epidemic levels of homicide, the vast majority of these homicides are committed with firearms. Over 75% of homicides are gun-related.” The global average is about 40%.(theguardian)…[+]

North Korea’s main nuclear test site has partially collapsed under the stress of multiple explosions, possibly rendering it unsafe for further testing and leaving it vulnerable to radiation leaks, a study by Chinese geologists has shown.The findings could cast doubt on North Korea’s sincerity in announcing last weekend that it would stop testing nuclear weapons at the site ahead of Friday’s summit between the country’s leader, Kim Jong-un, and the South Korean president, Moon Jae-in.

The test site at Punggye-ri, in a mountainous area in North Korea’s north-east, has been the location for all six of the regime’s nuclear tests since 2006. The findings, by scientists at the University of Science and Technology of China, suggest the partial collapse of the mountain that contains the testing tunnels, as well as the risk of radiation leaks, have potentially rendered the site unusable. The study was published soon after Kim said his country would stop testing nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles, and close down Punggye-ri before his meeting with Moon just south of the countries’ heavily armed border.(theguardian)…[+]

An Indian court has found a guru guilty of raping a teenage girl in 2013 and sentenced him to life in prison. The verdict against Asaram Bapu, 77, was read out inside a prison in Jodhpur, Rajasthan state, due to fears that his followers might resort to violence.Security was tight around the prison complex and in states where the guru has a large following. It is the latest high-profile rape case in India, following others that have fuelled public protests and raised questions about how police handle allegations and treat victims. In August, another popular guru, Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh, was sentenced to 20 years in prison for raping two female followers.

Responding to widespread outrage over the recent rape and killings of girls and other attacks on children, India’s government last week approved the death penalty for people convicted of raping children under the age of 12. The judge, Madhusudhan Sharma, announced the prison term for Bapu and sentenced two of his associates to 20 years in prison each for helping him in the crime. Sharma convicted Bapu on charges of criminal conspiracy, wrongful confinement and rape.(theguardian)…[+]

Malaria could be quickly eliminated in south-east Asia by an all-out effort to dose whole populations with drugs that treat the disease, regardless of whether people have symptoms or are healthy, say experts. The radical programme may be the best way to outpace rapidly spreading resistance to anti-malarial drugs, they believe.

An experimental programme which involved giving drugs to 365,000 people in malarial “hotspots” across 18,000 square kilometres of Myanmar has succeeded in substantially reducing and even sometimes clearing malaria completely from villages.

The Oxford University team who ran the study believe this “nuclear option” is urgently needed to wipe out malaria in south-east Asia before growing resistance to the best drugs now available – the artemisinin compounds – spreads to India and Africa.

They are calling for urgent political and financial backing from donor governments and the World Health Organization. “It is hard. People don’t want to move outside their comfort zone of the current approaches. We need very high level political commitment and the money,” said Professor Sir Nick White, chair of the Mahidol Oxford Tropical Medicine Research Unit which ran the study and board member of the Worldwide Antimalarial Resistance Network (Warn). “We think the risk to the rest of the world is significant and we can’t afford to let this get out of control. If it extends to India and Africa that’s it. All the gains could be reversed.”(theguardian)…[+]

The president of Madrid’s regional government has resigned after video footage emerged of her apparently being caught stealing two tubs of face cream seven years ago. Cristina Cifuentes, one of the most high-profile figures in the conservative People’s party (PP) led by the prime minister, Mariano Rajoy, had been under pressure to quit over allegations that she faked her master’s degree.

She said on Wednesday she was stepping down to spare her colleagues and her family any further embarrassment and discomfort. Cifuentes had managed to cling on for weeks and had attempted to shift responsibility for the degree on to the university that awarded it to her, but the release of the video to the news site OKdiario appears to have sealed her fate. Speaking at a hastily convened press conference, Cifuentes said the footage showed nothing more than an “involuntary mistake” she had made in 2011. She said she had become the subject of a very public and very personal “lynching” over recent days and weeks.(theguardian)…[+]

A Canadian police officer is being hailed for the restraint and professionalism he showed in arresting the suspect in the Toronto van attack without firing a single shot.

On Monday afternoon, a white van ploughed into pedestrians along one of Toronto’s busiest streets, killing 10 people and injuring more than a dozen others in what one official described as “pure carnage.” Soon after, the alleged driver of the van was arrested by a lone police officer in an incident lasting less than a minute and caught on video by bystanders. “Get down,” the officer shouts.“Kill me,” the man tells the police officer. “I have a gun in my pocket.”

The officer’s voice remains calm as he again orders the man to get down, warning that he will shoot if the man does not cooperate. “Shoot me in the head,” the suspect replies. Weapon drawn, the officer advances towards the suspect. The suspect steps backwards, dropping what he was holding and raising his hands in the air. The officer proceeded to single-handedly arrest the suspect. The arrest came as police forces across North America – including in Toronto – have been criticised for using excessive force to subdue mentally ill or unarmed suspects. Police identified Alek Minassian, a 25-year-old from the nearby town of Richmond Hill, as the man who had been arrested. He is expected to appear in court on Tuesday.(theguardian)…[+]

A Peruvian judge has ordered the arrests of two men accused of lynching a Canadian man last week in a remote Amazonian village. The Canadian, 41-year-old Sebastian Woodroffe, had been accused by villagers of murdering an indigenous medicine woman in the region of Ucayali and was killed in revenge by a mob, according to Peru’s interior ministry.

A minute-and-a-half-long mobile phone recording of the lynching, which was posted on Facebook, showed two men dragging Woodroffe by a noose around his neck as others looked on. His body was later found buried nearby. Prosecutors have identified the two men and are working to determine who else took part in the lynching, according to the judicial ruling that ordered their arrests.Less is known about the killing of Olivia Arevalo, 81, a revered shaman of the Shipibo-Conibo tribe who was shot dead near her home on Thursday.

Ricardo Jimenez, the head of a group of prosecutors in Ucayali, said no one witnessed Arevalo’s shooting, the murder weapon has not been found and a test for gunshot residue on Woodroffe’s body was expected to take 15 to 20 days. Woodroffe had been Arevalo’s patient and her family claims he killed her because she refused to conduct a ritual in which the hallucinogenic Amazonian plant brew ayahuasca is used for healing and spiritual growth, said Jimenez.(theguardian)…[+]

Hillary Clinton unleashed a “fuck-laced fusillade” on aides in a 2016 debate prep session, according to a new book about the presidential campaign by New York Times journalist Amy Chozick.

The candidate was squirming with frustration over lingering concerns about her “authenticity” and racked with loathing for Donald Trump she was determined not to vent in public. “Aides understood that in order to keep it all together onstage, Hillary sometimes needed to unleash on them in private,” Chozick writes in Chasing Hillary: Ten Years, Two Presidential Campaigns and One Intact Glass Ceiling. “‘You want authentic, here it is!’ she’d yelled in one prep session, followed by a fuck-laced fusillade about what a ‘disgusting’ human being Trump was and how he didn’t deserve to even be in the arena.”

Rife with such anecdotes, Chozick’s book, a copy of which the Guardian obtained from a bookseller in New York, is released on Tuesday. It comes hard on the heels of the current politics blockbuster, A Higher Loyalty by James Comey. The former FBI director devotes a chapter of his book to his handling of the Clinton emails investigation, which the candidate and her team still blame for her loss. Chozick captures the reaction in the campaign’s Brooklyn headquarters to what they saw as Comey’s reckless and misguided behavior.(theguardian)…[+]