Morning mail: Isis suspects escape, Wong targets PM, Scorsese's 'superb' new film

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/oct/14/morning-mail-isis-suspects-escape-wong-targets-pm-scorseses-superb-new-film

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Good morning, this is Helen Sullivan bringing you the main stories and must-reads on Monday 14 October.

Top stories

At least 750 people with suspected links to Islamic State have reportedly fled a displacement camp in north-east Syria, local officials have said, raising fears that the Turkish offensive against Kurdish forces could allow Isis to regain strength amid the chaos. The news came as the US ordered all 1,000 US troops to withdraw “as safely and quickly as possible” from the region after learning that the Turkish operation was likely to extend further than Ankara’s proposed 20-mile “safe zone” on the border between the two countries. The bloody conflict between Turkey and the formerly US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces fighters “gets worse by the hour”, said the US defence secretary, Mark Esper.

Penny Wong labels Scott Morrison’s warning against negative globalism “disturbingly lightweight” in a speech targeting his handling of foreign affairs and the China relationship. In a speech to the Australian Institute of International Affairs on Monday Labor’s shadow foreign affairs minister will argue that the prime minister makes decisions against the national interest for “short-term political gain”. Wong also takes aim at Morrison for echoing Chinese propaganda by suggesting that legitimate questions about the Liberal MP Gladys Liu’s links with China were racist.

At least 25 people have died and 15 are missing after Typhoon Hagibis. Recovery and rescue efforts are in full swing after one of the most powerful typhoons in decades struck wide areas of Japan’s main island on Saturday night. Hagibis, which means “speed” in the Philippine language Tagalog, forced the cancellation of hundreds of flights and affected bullet train services, the Japanese state broadcaster said, reporting that more than 100 people had been injured. Hagibis also caused disruption to international sports events, including the Rugby World Cup, forcing the cancellation of several pool matches.

World

Donald Trump’s secretary of defence said the Pentagon would cooperate with the House’s impeachment inquiry, while cautioning that Trump may try to restrict his disclosure of information. Mark Esper said in two interviews his department would work to comply with a subpoena from committees seeking records relating to the withholding of US military aid to Ukraine.

A breakthrough in the Brexit talks failed to materialise after a weekend of intensive discussion, leaving EU capitals fearing it may now be “impossible” for the UK to leave the union by 31 October with a deal.

The family of Atatiana Jefferson, a 28-year-old black woman, are demanding answers after she was shot dead inside her home by a white police officer in Fort Worth, Texas. Police were called by a concerned neighbour who noticed an open door.

Hong Kong protesters have deployed a new strategy of popping up in small groups in multiple locations across the city in an effort to avoid arrest, in their ongoing campaign against police and the local government.

An economics professor who says economics lacks common sense is one of the frontrunners for the Nobel memorial prize for economics. Ariel Rubinstein is notorious for claiming that his field too often pursues research with little application to the real world.

Opinion and analysis

Martin Scorsese’s The Irishman is his best picture since GoodFellas and one of his best films, writes Peter Bradshaw. “It’s a superbly acted, thrillingly shot epic mob procedural about violence, betrayal, dishonesty and emotional bankruptcy starring Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci and Al Pacino, set in a time before “toxic masculinity” had been formally diagnosed but when everyone lived with the symptoms. The film has been talked about for the hi-tech “youthification” technology which allows De Niro to appear as a younger man: it’s no more artificial than the traditional wigs, latex etc and it’s amazing how quickly you get used to it. De Niro’s eyes achieve an eerie, gluey gleam in this manifestation as a digital ghost from his past.”

Denationalisation, or stripping people of their citizenship, is an old punishment, writes Ben Doherty. “The Greek city states called it ‘banishment’, expulsion beyond the city walls. Following the brutal experience of Europe in the 1930s and the displacement of the second world war, the practice of denationalisation fell largely into disuse. Following 9/11, it has come roaring back into vogue, practised almost exclusively by rich, powerful, western states and practised discriminatorily almost always against Muslim citizens.” Governments like Australia’s argue it strengthens a country, but, “in truth, denationalisation weakens the citizenship of all, by making the fundamental right of having a nation to which to belong precarious and contingent on behaviour.”

Sport

Paula Radcliffe’s world marathon record, which has stood imperiously for more than 16 years, has been obliterated by Brigid Kosgei at the Chicago Marathon. The 25-year-old Kenyan ran 2:14:04 to beat Radcliffe’s best of 2:15:25 by an astonishing 81 seconds.

Japan have hung on to reach Rugby World Cup last eight and send Scotland out, 28-21. “Some results deserve to be lit up in neon and this historic victory for Japan was one of them,” writes Robert Kitson.

The A-League has returned. For all the criticism surrounding a lack of promotion before the season’s launch, “it appears the best marketing remains the on-pitch product”, writes Richard Parkin.

Thinking time: Teeny tiny mini-break

Tiny houses – which sprung up as a means of radical downsizing and rejection of burdensome traditional house ownership – are nowadays presented as the ultimate in back-to-nature minimalism. Helped along by the #cabinporn movement, tiny houses have begun to crop up in the travel world; a grown-up, highly Instagrammable evolution of glamping, without the bunting and fairy lights. So when Celina Ribeiro, her partner and their two children spent their two-night NSW holiday in a 15 sq metre off-grid eco-cabin, it presented its own small but unique challenges.

“During that time, my partner, predominantly good-naturedly, swept the floor approximately infinity times. Even by tiny house standards, 15 sq metres is at the very, very small end of the spectrum.” The house, dwarfed by eucalyptus trees on a rural property in Kangaroo Valley, had large window that stared patiently west, waiting for the sunset over the small field of ferns which lay before more gumtrees and the escarpment on the horizon. “The irony of having more space to ourselves was that we didn’t so much use it as watch it – drawn ever inwards to the tiny house, whether by novelty or the sheer force of comfort in the wild.”

Media roundup

The former deputy prime minister Barnaby Joyce has called on the government to stop Julian Assange’s potential extradition to the US, the Sydney Morning Herald reveals. The Australian’s headline on the announcement of a review into NSW Labor is “Rotten heart of ALP goes under the knife”. A Grattan Institute report recommends a congestion charge for all major Australian cities, the ABC says.

Coming up

Federal parliament resumes with the medevac regime, the climate emergency and Scott Morrison’s foreign policy comments about “negative globalism” likely to be among the talking points.

A Brisbane court will sentence the police officer Neil Punchard for leaking a woman’s address to her former partner, a convicted domestic violence offender.

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