A four-year-old girl missing for 18 days in a remote part of Western Australia has been found alive and well in a locked house, police have said. Cleo Smith disappeared from her family’s tent at a campsite near the town of Carnarvon on 16 October, triggering a massive search. A 36-year-old man is in custody and being questioned by detectives. Police smashed their way into a home in Carnarvon in the early hours of Wednesday, following forensic clues. “They found little Cleo in one of the rooms,” Deputy Commissioner Col Blanch from WA Police said in a statement. “One of the officers picked her up into his arms and asked her, ‘What’s your name?’ She said ‘My name is Cleo’.”(BBC)…[+]

Conservationists have welcomed the announcement by Ecuador that it will expand the marine reserve around the Galapagos islands by 60,000 sq km. President Guillermo Lasso announced the move at the COP 26 climate summit in Glasgow. Mr Lasso told the BBC that his government wanted to show that action rather than words was the most effective way to fight climate change. Conservationists called it “a brilliant first step”. The existing marine protection area around the Galapagos measures 133,000 sq km and was one of the first large-scale marine conservation areas to be created. It is one of the most productive marine ecosystems in the world. Conservationists hope that its expansion will protect the migration routes of endangered species such as the whale shark and make the reserve more resilient to climate change. Among those praising the move is Sarah Darwin, the great-great-granddaughter of biologist Charles Darwin, whose theory of evolution was inspired by the biodiversity he found on the Galapagos. Sarah, a botanist and an ambassador for the Galapagos Conservation Trust, told the BBC that she was “very, very excited that President Lasso is taking the Galapagos so seriously”.(BBC)…[+]

All sides in Ethiopia’s Tigray conflict have violated international human rights, some of which may amount to crimes against humanity, a new report states. Extra-judicial executions, torture, rape, and attacks against refugees and displaced people were documented. A joint investigation by the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission (EHRC) and the UN Human Rights Office said there could also be evidence of war crimes. The war broke out on 4 November 2020. It started when Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy ordered an offensive against regional forces in northern Tigray region. Government forces initially routed the rebels, but things changed in June with the Tigrayan fighters making significant territorial gains. They are now reportedly approaching the capital, Addis Ababa.(BBC)…[+]

Former Fifa officials Sepp Blatter and Michel Platini have been charged with fraud and other offences in Switzerland. Swiss prosecutors say Mr Blatter unlawfully arranged a transfer of two million Swiss francs ($2.19m; £1.6m) to Mr Platini in 2011. Prosecutors say the payment “damaged Fifa’s assets and unlawfully enriched Platini”. Mr Blatter and Mr Platini now face trial at a court in Bellinzona. The case was opened in September 2015 and led to both men being banned from football. The affair ended Mr Blatter’s 17-year spell in charge of Fifa and then-Uefa president Mr Platini’s campaign to succeed his former mentor. Both Mr Blatter, 85, and Mr Platini, 66, have previously denied any wrongdoing.(BBC)…[+]

More than 20 people have been killed and at least 16 injured in an attack on a military hospital in the Afghan capital Kabul, an official at the Ministry of Public Health told the BBC. A Taliban spokesman confirmed there had been two explosions – the first in front of the 400-bed Sardar Daud Khan hospital and the second nearby. Gunmen then broke into the hospital grounds, witnesses said. No-one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack. The Taliban spokesman, Bilal Karimi, told the BBC that fighters from the Islamic State affiliate IS-K had entered the compound after detonating the first explosion at the entrance gate. Mr Karimi said Taliban fighters shot and killed four IS-K attackers and captured one alive.(BBC)…[+]

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has said his Bezos Earth Fund will spend $2bn (£1.5bn) restoring landscapes and transforming food systems. He told the COP26 climate conference in Glasgow that he had grasped nature’s fragility when he travelled into space. Entrepreneurs including Mr Bezos have been criticised for spending money on trips into space instead of solving problems on Earth. Amazon has also been criticised by its workers over environmental practices. Speaking to the COP26 conference, Mr Bezos said: “In too many parts of the world, nature is already flipping from a carbon sink to a carbon source.” The Bezos Earth Fund plans to spend $10bn fighting climate change overall. In Glasgow the founder of the world’s biggest online retailer described the experience of travelling on his rocket ship, New Shepard, in July as a revelation of Earth’s vulnerability. “I was told that seeing the Earth from space changes the lens from which you view the world but I was not prepared for just how much that would be true,” he said.(BBC)…[+]

The UK is prepared to take legal action against France over the ongoing row about post-Brexit fishing rights, Foreign Secretary Liz Truss has warned. Last month, the UK and Jersey denied permits to dozens of French boats to operate in their waters. In retaliation, France threatened to block British boats from some of its ports and cut electricity to Jersey. Ms Truss told the BBC that France was acting “unfairly” in setting a deadline for issuing more fishing permits. Officials in Paris say that, unless this happens by Tuesday, they will take action. Representatives from the European Commission, France, the UK and the Channel Islands will hold talks on Monday afternoon. A commission spokesperson said they hoped the meeting would bring a “swift solution on the outstanding issues”.(BBC)…[+]

A bat has been named as New Zealand’s bird of the year, in a controversial move that has ruffled feathers. The long-tailed bat had swooped in to clinch the title in an online poll. Contest organisers had included the bat, one of the country’s few land-based native mammals, to raise its profile as a critically endangered species.

But the victory has annoyed some, with one commenter saying the country had gone “batty”. Outraged bird-lovers cried fowl on Twitter, calling it a “total farce”, a “stolen election”, as well as more colourful and unprintable terms. Some on social media also saw it as a much-needed public relations victory for bats, after a particularly trying two years.(BBC)…[+]

More than five million people are known to have died of Covid-19 worldwide, 19 months since the pandemic began, according to Johns Hopkins University. Vaccines have slowed the death rate, but some health experts say the true toll could be far higher. The milestone comes amid warnings from health officials that cases and deaths in some places are rising for the first time in months. Nearly 250 million cases of the virus have been recorded worldwide. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates the pandemic’s real global death toll could be two to three times higher than official records. In the US, more than 745,800 people have died, making it the country with the highest number of recorded deaths.It is followed by Brazil, with 607,824 recorded deaths, and India, with 458,437. But health experts believe these numbers are under reported, partly because of deaths at home and those in rural communities.(BBC)…[+]

A 55-year-old man has died after being gored at a bull-running event in the eastern Spanish town of Onda. The man was repeatedly attacked by the bull at the Fira de Onda festival, suffering a head wound and having an artery punctured in his left thigh. He died at a hospital in the nearby town of Villareal. Onda council said it had cancelled all bull-running events in the town’s festival, but other activities would go ahead. It was the first fatality of its kind since similar events were resumed in Spain, following a relaxation of Covid restrictions over the summer. But despite the rule changes, only a handful of bull-running events have gone ahead, as debate ramps up in Spain over whether they should be abolished.(BBC)…[+]