Global Pulse

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  • AFL 2026: Dean Solomon will sit down with Essendon next week to discuss his future

    AFL 2026: Dean Solomon will sit down with Essendon next week to discuss his future

    The race for Essendon Football Club’s vacant full-time senior coaching position has added a formal competitor, with interim head coach Dean Solomon confirming he will officially put his case forward for the permanent role in upcoming discussions with club leadership. Solomon steps into the contested process alongside other high-profile candidates including James Hird, Mark McVeigh, Jaymie Graham and Murray Davis, all vying for the top job at the AFL club. Solomon’s move to pursue the role comes after months of deliberate consideration, a delay he says was intentional to keep his focus where it matters most: guiding the team through a turbulent period following Brad Scott’s sudden sacking in May.

    In comments made to media on Thursday, the 46-year-old premiership-winning former Essendon player outlined that the timeline for formal discussions has arrived, after club president Tim Roberts told him four to five weeks prior to prioritize in-game coaching first. “It is a discussion I am going to have with the club in the next week and we’ve sort of had that contact now,” Solomon explained. “We will sit down and have a conversation over the next week or so, with all due respect, I will probably want to have that discussion with them first then work from there. I think I said many weeks ago that Tim (Roberts), sort of mentioned to me, four or five weeks ago, ‘take your time, concentrate on coaching (and) doing what you have to do for this group and this footy club’ … at some point in time he’ll give us a tap on the shoulder and have that discussion. So that time has sort of come and we’ll sit and have a good chat about all things and I’ll put forward my thoughts on the current situation and the future.”

    The former premiership Bomber also opened up about the multiple factors that extended his consideration process, most notably his family’s current residence outside of Victoria. “There’s multiple layers about where I’m currently at and the position I am in, my family, where they’re based,” he said. “That’s why it’s been a good thing to take the time to have a good think and respect the current position I am in, as well, as interim coach. My first priority always has been – and always will be – the players and making sure they get the best opportunity they can to be the best they can be.”

    Solomon’s tenure as caretaker has been marked by a slow start before a landmark breakthrough win: after nine straight winless matches across his two stints as interim coach (including three games at the helm back in 2017), Essendon snapped its long drought with a victory over Greater Western Sydney at Marvel Stadium a fortnight ago, which lifted the club off the bottom of the AFL ladder. Despite the challenging win-loss record for most of his time in charge, Solomon says he has deeply valued the opportunity to lead the side through transition. “I’ve thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity, massive challenge, obviously on the back of losing your coach, it’s always a challenge taking on the interim role and what flows on from that,” he said. “But I’ve thoroughly enjoyed the challenge with this, binding a coaching group, a football department and a playing group. Really working hard between Monday and Friday to ensure we get good momentum finishing the year off and making decisions around the medium-to-long term for the club.”

    He added that while the team’s results have not met expectations, the side has shown clear improvement in patches, and the coaching group has worked to implement meaningful shifts in the team’s playing style. “In all honesty, I’m just happy to play the role I’ve had to play for the past 12-13 weeks for this football club and I hope it helps it in the medium-to-long term,” Solomon said. The club will hold formal interviews with all candidates in the coming days, with a final decision on the permanent senior coach expected in the near future.

  • Russian strikes across Ukraine, from east to west, kill at least 8 and wound dozens

    Russian strikes across Ukraine, from east to west, kill at least 8 and wound dozens

    A wave of coordinated Russian missile and drone strikes targeting multiple regions across Ukraine overnight Wednesday into Thursday has left at least eight civilians dead and dozens more injured, marking the latest escalation in Moscow’s nearly weekly large-scale bombardment campaign that gained intensity over the summer months.

    Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy confirmed the breadth of the assault, noting targets stretched from the capital Kyiv and its surrounding suburbs to eastern cities including Dnipro and Kharkiv, and across western Ukraine including Lviv. In total, Russia launched more than 70 missiles—many of which were short-range ballistic missiles, which are difficult to intercept—and over 280 attack drones in the single overnight operation. Ukrainian air defense forces successfully intercepted more than 260 of the drones, a feat Zelenskyy called extraordinary given the persistent shortage of advanced air defense systems and missiles supplied by international partners.

    “Our warriors are accomplishing truly incredible things, demonstrating a very high level of professionalism,” Zelenskyy stated. “This Russian terror once again proves that protection against the Russian missile threat is the most important task when it comes to saving the lives of our people.”

    The deadliest single attack unfolded in the eastern Dnipropetrovsk region, where regional military administration head Oleksandr Hanzha confirmed six civilians were killed and 10 more injured. Among the fatalities were three children: a 6-year-old girl, an 11-year-old boy, and a 17-year-old boy, all killed in an attack on a residential neighborhood in Kryvyi Rih. Zelenskyy later confirmed the children’s parents were also killed in the same strike, while two additional children were pulled alive from the rubble of their destroyed home.

    “It was an ordinary home, blown into smithereens by a ballistic missile,” Zelenskyy said. He added that delays and shortages in deliveries of anti-ballistic missile defense systems from international allies directly enabled the level of destruction and loss of life seen in the attack, reiterating that accelerating defense support is critical to protecting Ukrainian civilians.

    Adjacent to Dnipropetrovsk, in the central Poltava region, a drone strike targeting private sector warehouses killed one civilian, regional governor Vitalii Diakivnych reported. A separate attack on a delivery hub sparked a large fire that was quickly contained by emergency response teams, with no additional casualties reported at that site.

    In western Ukraine’s Lviv region, which has increasingly become a target of Russian strikes in recent months, rescue operations continued through Thursday morning after an early morning strike around 4:45 a.m. Local military administration head Maksym Kozytskyi reported the number of injured rose to 30, while Lviv Mayor Andrii Sadovyi confirmed two multi-story residential buildings were heavily damaged. More than 20 additional homes, a local school, and two kindergartens also suffered damage, and multiple children were among the wounded, with one child hospitalized for serious injuries.

    In the capital Kyiv, a 31-year-old civilian was killed and two more injured when Russian ballistic missiles struck residential areas, Ukrainian national police confirmed. The attack damaged multiple apartment buildings, a local market, vehicle storage garages, and private cars. Just outside the capital, in the Kyiv region’s Brovary district, acting regional governor Ruslan Oliinyk reported five additional injuries, including a child and two women.

    In Moscow, Russia’s Defense Ministry issued its standard statement framing the strikes as a targeted attack on Ukrainian military infrastructure, claiming the operation hit air bases, arms production facilities, military telecommunications nodes, and logistics hubs across the regions attacked. The ministry also claimed Russian forces hit a military cargo ship in Ukraine’s Pivdennyi port and two additional vessels near Odesa, and that Russian air defenses downed 258 Ukrainian drones launched overnight in cross-border strikes.

    Cross-border attacks on Russian territory were confirmed by local officials, who reported fires at two warehouses operated by Wildberries, Russia’s largest domestic online retailer. Penza Governor Oleg Melnichenko said a Wildberries depot in his region caught fire, leaving one person injured and forcing the evacuation of more than 200 employees. A second Wildberries warehouse in Sarapul, located in the Udmurtia republic roughly 600 miles east of Moscow, was also struck by a Ukrainian drone and caught fire, with all employees evacuated safely. The strikes mark the latest in a string of attacks on Wildberries facilities across Russia that have caused hundreds of millions of dollars in damage.

  • Australian watchdog files legal action against Telegram, saying it failed to remove violent content

    Australian watchdog files legal action against Telegram, saying it failed to remove violent content

    Australia’s national online safety regulator has launched landmark civil legal proceedings against global messaging platform Telegram, accusing the service of failing to eliminate violent extremist and pro-terrorism content that includes graphic footage of two of the deadliest white supremacist mass shootings of recent years and Islamic State beheading videos.

    In a public announcement Thursday, eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant laid out the charges against the UAE-headquartered platform, which claims more than 1 billion monthly active users across the globe. If Australia’s Federal Court rules against Telegram, the company faces a maximum fine of 54.6 million Australian dollars, equivalent to roughly 38 million U.S. dollars, for its alleged persistent failure to identify and remove material that promotes terrorist violence.

    This court proceeding marks a high-stakes test of Australia’s 2021 Online Safety Act, which mandates that large digital platforms implement rigorous systems to exclude illegal and terrorism-linked content from their services. The case specifically centers on the availability of content tied to the 2019 Christchurch mosque attack, which left 51 Muslim worshippers dead at the hands of an Australian white supremacist who livestreamed his violence, and the 2022 Buffalo supermarket shooting that killed 10 Black people, carried out by a white supremacist who cited the Christchurch attacker as inspiration. It also covers the presence of Islamic State propaganda videos depicting executions.

    Regulators have long struggled with the persistence of these extremist digital artifacts years after the original attacks, as the graphic footage and accompanying manifestos continue to be shared by radicalized users to recruit new sympathizers and inspire copycat violence. Inman Grant emphasized that the content in question remained accessible on Telegram long after the platform was formally notified of its existence, noting that the platform’s unique structure — which supports public channels with unlimited audience reach and large group chats — creates an outsized responsibility to proactively remove harmful material. Channels linked to these attacks have been repeatedly used to host copies of the attack footage and praise the perpetrators.

    Telegram has issued a firm denial of all allegations, stating in a written statement shared via the platform that it “reject these allegations and will contest them in court.” The company argues that its ongoing anti-terrorism work is a matter of public record, pointing to published data showing it has blocked more than 150,000 terrorist-linked communities on its platform so far in 2024. The company also framed its approach to content moderation as a defense of fundamental digital rights, noting that it has supported pro-democracy movements across the world, from Russia and Iran to Myanmar and Hong Kong, by protecting user privacy and preserving freedom of speech and assembly.

    Inman Grant countered that the regulator first pressed Telegram to remove the problematic content and align with Australian rules in March 2024, but received no response for months. She added that the platform’s stance only shifted after French authorities arrested Telegram founder and CEO Pavel Durov in August 2024. Durov, a Russian billionaire, was held for four days of questioning over allegations that Telegram was used to facilitate a range of illegal activity, including drug trafficking and the spread of child sexual abuse material, before being released on 5 million euro bail. According to Inman Grant, Telegram became temporarily more cooperative with Australian and global regulators following Durov’s arrest, but still maintains what she called a “permissive hosting environment for terrorist content.”

    The legal action comes amid mounting global pressure on Durov and Telegram: just days before the Australian claim was filed, Russia’s Federal Security Service added Durov to its international wanted list, accusing him of aiding terrorist activity, marking the latest in a string of legal challenges for the executive that have also included previous cases in Russia and France.

  • New dinosaur discovered in Zimbabwe

    New dinosaur discovered in Zimbabwe

    Paleontologists have uncovered a previously unknown dinosaur species on the shores of Zimbabwe’s Lake Kariba, offering groundbreaking new insight into the early diversification of dinosaurs across southern Africa some 210 million years ago. Dubbed *Musango matusadonaensis*, this new find marks only the fifth distinct dinosaur species ever formally named and documented from Zimbabwe, shining a long-overdue spotlight on a region vastly understudied compared to fossil-rich sites in Europe and North America.

    The specimen dates back to the Late Triassic period, a critical evolutionary era when dinosaurs were first expanding their range across the globe, millions of years before they rose to become Earth’s dominant terrestrial vertebrates in the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods. At the time of *Musango*’s existence, modern-day Zimbabwe sat within the massive supercontinent Gondwana, a landmass that also incorporated what is now South America, India, Australia and Antarctica.

    This international research effort, a collaborative project between teams from the United Kingdom, South Africa and Zimbabwe, has yielded a fossil assemblage including key bones from the dinosaur’s spine, forelimbs and feet. Analysis of these remains confirms the individual was nearly fully grown at the time of its death, at approximately eight years of age, measuring 4.5 meters in length — roughly the size of a medium passenger vehicle.

    *Musango matusadonaensis* is classified as a sauropodomorph, an early ancestral relative of the massive long-necked sauropods that would later evolve, such as *Diplodocus*. Unlike its four-legged descendants, this early species walked on two legs. Researchers also concluded it was an omnivore, feeding on a mixed diet of plants and meat that likely included crocodile-like phytosaurs, lungfish and smaller contemporary dinosaur species.

    Lead study author Professor Paul Barrett of London’s Natural History Museum, whose findings are published in the *Journal of Systematic Palaeontology*, noted that long-standing scientific consensus assumed dinosaur communities across southern Africa were largely homogeneous. “However, these discoveries are showing that this part of the ancient supercontinent Gondwana was actually made of a series of smaller ecosystems — each with a different cast of characters,” Barrett explained. This new find adds crucial data to the sparse fossil record of Late Triassic African dinosaurs, helping paleontologists piece together a more accurate picture of how early dinosaur communities diversified and spread across the globe.

  • Nolan’s ‘Odyssey’ boosts sales of mythology tales in UK

    Nolan’s ‘Odyssey’ boosts sales of mythology tales in UK

    When Christopher Nolan’s highly anticipated big-screen adaptation of Homer’s *The Odyssey* hit theaters in mid-July, industry experts expected it to dominate global box offices—what no one predicted was the unprecedented ripple effect it would create across the UK’s publishing industry, reviving widespread public interest in ancient Greek and Roman mythology.

    The latest data from market research firm NielsenIQ tells a striking story: in the four weeks leading up to July 25, print sales of Homer’s original epic jumped 1,400% compared to the same period in 2025. It is not just the classic text that has flown off shelves, either. Emily Wilson’s widely praised 2017 translation of the millennia-old poem has seen an equally explosive surge, with Britain’s largest bookstore chain Waterstones reporting that sales of Wilson’s edition have risen more than 1,000% year-over-year, and growth continues to climb week over week alongside sales of every other available translation of the text.

    The boom has extended far beyond *The Odyssey* itself. NielsenIQ records show significant sales uplifts for a whole range of related mythology works, from Homer’s *The Iliad* to modern reimaginings such as Madeline Miller’s *Circe* and Margaret Atwood’s *The Penelopiad*. On Amazon UK’s bestseller list for history, Stephen Fry’s adaptation of *The Odyssey* currently holds the top spot, with Fry’s two other classics-focused books *Mythos* and *Troy* taking second and fifth place respectively. Even audiobook platforms are sharing in the success: Spotify reports that searches for *The Odyssey* translations have skyrocketed 310% in recent weeks.

    For academics working in the field of Classics, this unexpected cultural wave brings cautious optimism. Many hope the blockbuster’s mainstream popularity will translate to higher student enrolment in ancient studies programs at the university level. Richard Kendall, a Classics lecturer at the University of Exeter and this year’s first expert-in-residence at the UK’s The Classical Association, called the sales spike “fantastic,” noting that ancient myths have retained their pull on audiences for millennia. “These are ripping good yarns,” Kendall told AFP. “It’s wonderful that this has created so much popularity. People are reading more, but this is just this iteration… People will always return to these stories.”

    At University College London, where Nolan himself studied Homer as an undergraduate English student, department leaders are already preparing for a long-term boost. “The buzz around the film has been tremendous, and we’re hoping to see a bounce in student numbers in the next few years,” said Phiroze Vasunia, head of UCL’s Greek and Latin Department. He added that the surge in interest sparked by the film aligns with a broader, steady rise in public enthusiasm for Classics and ancient studies that has been building in recent years.

    Since its release, Nolan’s film has been a commercial juggernaut. The director’s first feature since his 2023 Oscar-winning *Oppenheimer*, it has topped the North American box office for two consecutive weeks and has already grossed more than $640 million globally, earning widespread praise from audiences for its sweeping take on Odysseus’ 10-year journey home from the Trojan War. Starring Matt Damon as the legendary hero, Anne Hathaway as his loyal wife Penelope, and Tom Holland as their son Telemachus, the adaptation brings one of Western literature’s oldest stories to life for a new generation of moviegoers.

    Yet for all its commercial success, the film has not escaped sharp criticism from leading voices in the classics world. Emily Wilson, whose award-winning translation Nolan has publicly praised, published a blistering takedown of Nolan’s screenplay this week that made headlines across the globe. In an essay for the *London Review of Books*, Wilson argued the adaptation “lacks psychological, emotional, political and ethical depth,” writing “I would be ashamed to have written any part of this” and adding that it strips out many of the core elements that make Homer’s original poem a masterpiece.

    Prominent British classicist and historian Mary Bead echoed Wilson’s critique, though she also welcomed the renewed public interest in Homer that the film has generated. Writing in *The Times*, Beard argued that the poem’s original “erotic puzzles, the teasing ironies, the intriguing questions about truth and falsehood” had been replaced in Nolan’s adaptation with “a rather ponderous Hollywood message about civilisational decline.”

    Regardless of the critical divide, one outcome is clear: *The Odyssey* has turned ancient mythology into one of the UK’s hottest literary trends of 2025, introducing thousands of new readers to stories that have shaped Western culture for nearly 3,000 years.

  • Uefa to hold emergency meeting over Fifa World Cup plans

    Uefa to hold emergency meeting over Fifa World Cup plans

    Global football is facing a growing political and commercial crisis after global governing body Fifa tabled a controversial plan to sell a 20% stake in its flagship competitions to private investors, prompting European football’s governing body UEFA to convene an emergency virtual meeting of all 55 of its member associations this Thursday.

    The plan, led by Thrive Capital, an investment vehicle founded by Joshua Kushner — brother-in-law to former US President Donald Trump’s daughter Ivanka — has sparked widespread outrage across the global football community ever since details of the proposal, and Fifa’s aggressive push for member approval, came to light. Documents obtained by the BBC reveal Fifa sent official letters to all 211 of its member associations, setting a 19 September deadline to accept the deal in exchange for an initial payout of $40 million, half of which would be paid immediately if they agree to back the proposal. The offer will be withdrawn entirely for associations that do not comply by the deadline.

    In an official statement responding to the ultimatum, UEFA said: “We have learned of Fifa’s deadline to associations to support their proposals or have the one-off payout offer withdrawn. This says everything you need to know about this plan.” This marks UEFA’s second public rebuke of the plans, with the body previously saying Fifa had “crossed a line” with the proposal. Widespread opposition has already emerged from multiple continental confederations, including the Asian, South American, and North and Central American football bodies, echoing UEFA’s deep unease over the plan.

    Many member associations have expressed fury over the lack of transparency surrounding the proposal, with several senior leaders — including Football Association (FA) chairwoman Debbie Hewitt, one of Fifa’s own vice-presidents — confirming they received no advance warning of the plans, and only learned of the details through media reports. Former FA and Manchester City chairman David Bernstein has gone as far as calling for England to withdraw from the 2026 World Cup entirely if the proposals are pushed through.

    Three of the eight 2026 World Cup semi-finalists are drawn from UEFA’s 55 members, and the governing body is acutely aware that a coordinated exit from the tournament by its members would completely undermine the financial viability of Fifa’s new plan. This “nuclear option” is widely viewed as the most extreme possible outcome, however, as at least one UEFA member has already signaled it is open to backing the proposals. Czech Football Association president David Trunda noted: “We can see the pragmatic benefits for Czech football.”

    After days of widespread condemnation of both the substance of the plan and its closed-door development, Fifa released an eight-page defensive document on Wednesday evening laying out its justifications for the proposal. The body argues that too little of football’s rapidly growing commercial value has been distributed to under-resourced parts of the global game, and that the private investment deal would unlock much-needed funding for grassroots development. In a pre-recorded video defending the plans, Fifa president Gianni Infantino framed the proposal as “an offer, not an obligation”, arguing it would “turbocharge the development of the game globally” by delivering funding for “better pitches, stronger national teams, more pathways for young players, and greater support for women’s football”.

    Fifa further pushed back against critics by pointing to past development successes, such as the first-time qualification of Cape Verde, Curacao, Jordan and Uzbekistan for the World Cup — a milestone partially enabled by the body’s earlier decision to expand the tournament to 48 teams. It also cited major sporting properties including Formula 1, La Liga, Ligue 1 and the Bundesliga as examples of organizations that already use dedicated private sector-aligned commercial operations, and stressed that private investors would “absolutely not” gain any decision-making influence over the World Cup or its operations.

    Despite Fifa’s defensive arguments, criticism continued to flood in from across the industry on Wednesday. European Leagues, the body that represents top domestic competitions across the continent, described the plan as “a reckless and divisive development for world football”, adding: “The World Cup should not be for sale. It is not the Fifa president’s private equity asset.”

    Global players’ union Fifpro called on Fifa to immediately abandon the proposal, saying it had “noted with deep concern the proposal to transform the World Cup and other Fifa competitions into investable assets for private capital”. The union added that the plan “would fundamentally and irreversibly reshape the incentives underpinning the competitions” and noted that “it was particularly troubling that a project of this magnitude has been developed largely behind closed doors”.

    La Liga president Javier Tebas went even further, accusing Infantino of buying votes ahead of Fifa’s next presidential congress scheduled for March next year. “It doesn’t seem like a reform. It seems like an electoral campaign financed with the future of football,” Tebas said. “Development cannot be used to buy votes or silences. The competitions and commercial rights of Fifa are not the personal patrimony of Infantino. Whoever mixes politics, discipline, money and power without transparency cannot lead anything. Infantino is not the solution to Fifa’s governance. He is the problem.”

    Hans-Joachim Watzke, vice-president of the German Football Association and Borussia Dortmund president, told German outlet Kicker that Fifa’s plans amount to an “absolute attack on football”. “A line has been crossed here,” he said. “If European football stands united against these plans, that carries a great deal of weight.”

    The emergency meeting on Thursday will bring all UEFA member associations together to coordinate a unified response to Fifa’s proposal, with the entire global football industry waiting to see what action the most powerful continental confederation will take against the plan.

  • Surge in building approvals fails to close Australia’s growing housing shortage

    Surge in building approvals fails to close Australia’s growing housing shortage

    Australia’s latest housing construction data shows a welcome uptick in building approvals that has finally pulled the country ahead of annual population growth, but industry economists and housing analysts warn the nation remains far off the ambitious national target designed to fix decades of worsening affordability and chronic underbuilding.

    New data released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics reveals that June saw a sharp jump in total building approvals, driven largely by a surprise surge in multi-unit apartment developments. The data shows that approvals for private sector non-house dwellings – a category that includes apartments and townhouses – jumped 17.8% in June, bouncing back strongly from an 11% decline recorded in the previous month. At the same time, approvals for standalone private houses edged up 0.4%, marking the sixth consecutive month that approvals for single-family homes have stayed above the 10,000 mark. When combined, total national building approvals reached their highest level since August 2021.

    AMP senior economist My Bui explained that the full-year totals for the 2025-26 financial year now put the country in a better position than it has been in years, with almost 205,000 new dwellings approved over the 12-month period. That marks a notable increase from the 189,000 approvals recorded in 2024-25, and exceeds the roughly 190,000 new dwellings that industry analysts estimate are needed each year to keep pace with current population growth. “Despite some softness in the first quarter of this year, the recent strength in approvals has gotten us to a point where new supply is matching demographic demand for the first time in several years,” Bui noted.

    Yet this progress is not enough to get Australia on track to meet the federal government’s landmark National Housing Accord target. Launched by the current Labor government as a core policy response to skyrocketing housing costs and rental shortages, the NHA brings together federal, state and local governments to deliver 1.2 million new homes over five years ending in June 2029, which works out to a required annual average of 240,000 new dwellings. While approvals have risen steadily since mid-2024, per capita approval rates remain far below historical averages. In the 2025-26 financial year, only nine new dwellings were approved for every 1,000 Australian residents. That is substantially lower than the 12 approvals per 1,000 people recorded in early 2015, and represents only a marginal improvement from the eight per 1,000 recorded in June of last year.

    Most critically, the recent uptick is not large enough to offset the major underbuilding that occurred between 2022 and 2024, when new supply failed to keep up with rapid post-pandemic population growth. Bui added that because completed home construction lags approvals by months or even years – due to project delays, high cancellation rates and extended construction timelines – the accumulated national housing shortage is unlikely to shrink meaningfully any time soon. “Even with this improvement in approvals, we are not making much progress in closing the gap that has built up over the past three years,” she said.

    Looking ahead, economists warn that multiple headwinds will continue to pressure the housing construction sector over coming months. Commonwealth Bank associate economist Lucinda Jerogin noted that elevated interest rates remain a major constraint on new construction activity, while ongoing supply chain disruptions linked to the Middle East conflict and broad capacity constraints across the building industry are pushing construction costs higher. “Although cost pass-through to consumers and developers has been limited so far, the recent escalation of hostilities in the region increases the risk of renewed cost pressure that could derail new projects,” Jerogin explained.

    Housing Industry Association chief economist Tim Reardon added that shifts in market conditions typically take months to show up in official approval data, meaning the full impact of rising interest rates, global geopolitical instability and recent tax changes will not be visible in the numbers until late this year. “While leading indicators of industry confidence have deteriorated since the federal budget, and investors are already starting to pull back from the new home building market, these trends will not show up in approval figures for several months,” Reardon said.

    With Australian housing affordability currently at its worst level in more than 30 years, Reardon emphasized that policymakers need to take additional action to boost long-term housing supply. “It is more important than ever that policymakers support housing investment and development by reducing the costs of home building, not increasing them,” he said.

  • My son’s not just a champion swimmer – he made me change my life

    My son’s not just a champion swimmer – he made me change my life

    Fourteen years after his name became a global sporting headline for upsetting swimming icon Michael Phelps to claim Olympic gold, South African swimmer Chad le Clos has etched his name deeper into the history books, becoming the most decorated athlete in the entire history of the Commonwealth Games.

    The 34-year-old swimmer reached the unprecedented milestone of 21 Commonwealth Games medals at the 2026 Glasgow Games this week, breaking the previous record held by Australian swimming great Emma McKeon. His historic bronze in the men’s 4x100m medley relay on Wednesday capped a run of three medals at the Games: it followed an earlier bronze in the 4x100m freestyle relay that earned him his 19th career Commonwealth medal, and a silver in the mixed 4x100m medley relay. As he celebrated the 19th medal, an emotional Chad called the moment a landmark for both himself and his family, expressing deep gratitude for the journey that brought him to that point.

    For anyone who knows Chad’s story, that journey has always been intertwined with his father, Bert le Clos, who became a household name in his own right after his unbridled, viral post-gold interview with the BBC’s Clare Balding immediately after Chad’s stunning 2012 London Olympic win. That electrifying reaction, where Bert exclaimed the moment felt like “dying and going to heaven”, turned him into an overnight celebrity, a status Chad has often joked means his father is more famous than he is.

    In a new wide-ranging interview with BBC Scotland from Glasgow, 69-year-old Bert opened up about the decades of behind-the-scenes growth, struggle and joy that led to this latest historic milestone, revealing how Chad not only built a legendary athletic career, but completely transformed Bert’s own life.

    The elder le Clos, born in Mauritius one of 10 children and raised in Durban, South Africa from age six, recalled how a 12-year-old Chad changed his path forever when he asked his father to give up smoking as his Christmas gift, instead of requesting a toy or present. Bert has not touched a cigarette since that day. He also overhauled other harmful habits: at the time he weighed 140kg and drank daily, but he cut out alcohol and dropped 41kg, a change he says saved his life. “I would probably be dead now if I had continued the way I was. That’s a good lesson for other parents,” Bert said.

    Bert, a serial entrepreneur who has built careers in butcheries and horse racing bookmaking, also shared the gentle parenting philosophy that he credits for allowing Chad to thrive still in the pool at 34, long after many of his peers have retired. When Chad first joined a local swimming club at age eight, Bert intentionally delayed pushing him into a gruelling six-day, 4:45 a.m. training routine, pushing back against the common trend of forcing young children into elite-level training too early. “A lot of parents and coaches they push the kids too hard too soon. Why would you want your 11 or 12-year-old doing as much mileage as an Olympic champion? That’s why Chad is still swimming at 34,” he explained. Bert added that he never forced Chad into swimming, letting the sport choose his son, who also played provincial-level football and rugby growing up. No matter how Chad performed in any race, Bert always celebrated him with a “man of the match ice cream”, focusing on encouragement over pressure.

    That patience paid off even after an early setback: when 13-year-old Chad finished second-last and third-last in his first international competition finals in Sheffield, Bert worried his son would never make it as an elite swimmer – but his coach insisted Chad had real potential, and just three years later, Chad was named junior swimmer of the year at the junior Commonwealth Games, racing the same competitors.

    Chad made his senior Commonwealth Games debut in Delhi 2010 at age 18, immediately claiming five medals, and two years later he delivered the upset that shook the global swimming world: at the 2012 London Olympics, he beat Phelps – who had not lost the 200m butterfly since 2001 and was already a 14-time Olympic gold medallist – by just 0.05 seconds to take gold. The moment left a stunned Chad staring at the scoreboard in disbelief, and a euphoric Bert celebrating wildly in the stands.

    The path to this week’s historic milestone has not been without hardship: in the lead-up to the 2016 Rio Olympics, both Bert and his wife Geraldine, Chad’s mother, received cancer diagnoses. Despite the immense stress, Chad still won two silver medals in Rio, becoming the most decorated South African Olympian in history. Later, ahead of the Covid-delayed Tokyo Olympics, Chad struggled with a severe spiral in his mental health, a challenge Bert said the family faced together with love and resilience. Today, after competing at the 2024 Paris Olympics, 34-year-old Chad has his sights set on qualifying for a fifth Olympic Games in Los Angeles in 2028.

    Off the pool deck, Chad has built a legacy beyond competition: he launched his own foundation focused on water safety education and life-saving swimming skills for vulnerable communities. For the le Clos family, the Commonwealth Games have always held a special place, dating back to Chad’s 2010 debut. Bert recalled the 2014 Glasgow Games as one of the family’s brightest highlights, when Chad won seven medals to equal Ian Thorpe’s record for the most medals in a single Games. When the 2026 Games lost their original Australian host to cost overruns, Glasgow stepped in to host for a second time, and Bert said even with a scaled-back format, the quality of competition remains world-class.

    Reflecting on his son’s 18 years of elite competition, 21 Commonwealth medals and a list of records that stretches from the Olympics to the world stage, Bert called the entire journey simply unbelievable. “How lucky am I? Do you think as a father I could imagine that this little rabbit could get all these accolades? Absolutely not. It has been beautiful. What a journey,” he said.

  • Oil prices slip and Asian shares are mostly lower as investors sell chipmaker stocks

    Oil prices slip and Asian shares are mostly lower as investors sell chipmaker stocks

    Global financial markets faced mixed yet broadly downward momentum this week, driven by a toxic mix of escalating geopolitical tensions in the Middle East, growing investor skepticism over overinflated artificial intelligence (AI) sector investments, and fresh uncertainty around U.S. monetary policy.

    The most dramatic movement has unfolded in South Korea, where the benchmark Kospi index has plunged into a steep correction after months of double-digit gains fueled by the global AI boom. By Thursday morning trading, the index dropped 1.3% to 5,587.82, extending steep losses from the prior two sessions that saw it fall 10.8% on Tuesday and nearly 6% on Wednesday. From its all-time high above 9,000 hit in June, the Kospi has corrected more than 35%, though it still holds a roughly 30% gain for the year to date. The sharp pullback has been widely interpreted by market analysts as a reflection of broadening doubts over the massive capacity expansion investments being poured into AI by the world’s largest technology firms.

    Individual South Korean tech stocks delivered mixed results despite strong earnings reports. Samsung Electronics climbed 2.4% after posting a record quarterly operating profit that matched consensus analyst estimates. However, top memory chipmaker SK Hynix dropped 4% on Thursday, after plummeting more than 9% a day earlier. Even though SK Hynix reported a sixfold jump in quarterly operating profit to a new record, the results fell short of market expectations, triggering a wave of profit-taking from disappointed investors.

    Elsewhere across Asian markets, performance was uneven. Japan’s Nikkei 225 bucked the downward trend to gain 0.6% to 61,778.02, even as SoftBank Group — a major investor in OpenAI — fell 2.7%. Chip sector stocks led gains in Tokyo: chip equipment manufacturer Tokyo Electron rose 4.4%, while memory chip producer Kioxia Holdings added 7.5%. Taiwan’s Taiex index, another market that has surged on the back of the AI boom, also advanced 0.8%, with leading contract chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) climbing 1.8% in intraday trading.

    Major East Asian indexes mostly closed lower. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index slipped less than 0.1% to 25,779.70, while mainland China’s Shanghai Composite Index dropped 1.2% to 3,784.55. Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 fell 0.9% to 8,959.90, and India’s Sensex posted a marginal gain of less than 0.1%.

    Oil prices retreated on Thursday despite renewed hostilities between the U.S. and Iran that have threatened global energy supply chains. The pullback came after the U.S. launched a “heavy wave” of airstrikes on Iranian targets this week, in response to an earlier Iranian attack on a U.S. military base in Jordan that killed three American service members. Maritime traffic through the Strait of Hormuz — a critical chokepoint that carries roughly a fifth of global daily oil consumption — remains constrained, which has put ongoing upward pressure on supply. Brent crude, the global benchmark for oil prices, fell 1% to $87.18 per barrel on Thursday, after spiking sharply in the prior session. U.S. benchmark West Texas Intermediate crude declined 0.9% to $83.74 per barrel. For context, both benchmarks traded around $72 per barrel in late February before the latest escalation of regional conflict.

    On Wednesday, U.S. equities extended the global pullback, with all three major indexes closing in negative territory. The broad S&P 500 dropped 1.5% to 7,316.15, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 2.2% to 51,594.14, and the technology-heavy Nasdaq Composite declined 1.7% to 24,442.94. Top AI and chip stocks led the losses: Nvidia shed 3.6%, Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) fell 5.5%, and Broadcom dropped 2.8%. U.S. futures ticked higher in early Thursday trading following Wednesday’s sell-off.

    The sell-off on Wall Street came shortly after the Federal Reserve announced it would hold interest rates steady at its latest monetary policy meeting, though the decision carried unexpected hawkish undertones. Several voting members of the Federal Open Market Committee pushed for a rate hike at the meeting, a shift that surprised investors who had widely anticipated rate cuts would begin in the first half of 2025. Fed Chair Kevin Warsh reaffirmed the central bank’s commitment to bringing annual inflation back down to its 2% target, after years of above-target price increases. He also confirmed the Fed would continue its current approach of providing less forward guidance to markets about upcoming rate moves, a policy that has increased uncertainty for investors. “Did the Fed take an explicit change in its policy rate today? No, but I think that’s the beginning of the story,” Warsh told reporters during a post-meeting news conference.

    In the U.S. bond market, the yield on 10-year Treasury notes rose to 4.70% on Wednesday, up from 4.61% the prior session, reflecting shifting rate expectations. In currency markets early Thursday, the U.S. dollar edged higher against the Japanese yen, rising to 163.49 yen from 163.41 yen. The euro slipped slightly to $1.1454, down from $1.1467 against the greenback.

  • Record-low Danube River affects tourism and industry as drought and heat grip Central Europe

    Record-low Danube River affects tourism and industry as drought and heat grip Central Europe

    As catastrophic wildfires scorch southern France and Spain and a second blistering heat wave builds across Western Europe, a years-long persistent drought is pushing one of Europe’s most critical waterways to unprecedented lows, laying bare the tangible, immediate impacts of human-caused climate change for communities and industries across the continent. The Danube River, which cuts a 1,770-mile path through 10 European nations from the Black Forest of southwestern Germany to the Black Sea, has dropped to never-recorded depths along most of its route, revealing long-submerged rock formations, sand bars, and century-old shipwrecks that have remained hidden for generations.

    In Budapest, the capital of Hungary, the country’s national water authority recorded a water level of just 23 centimeters (9 inches) on Wednesday morning, a full 10 centimeters below the previous all-time low set in 2018. With no meaningful rainfall forecast for the coming days and temperatures projected to surge past 38 degrees Celsius (100 degrees Fahrenheit) across the entire Danube basin, officials warn the river will continue to recede further.

    Much of Central Europe has faced persistent, extreme drought for the majority of 2022, and back-to-back record heat waves have accelerated evaporation, draining rivers and streams at an alarming rate. Data from the Hungarian Meteorological Service shows 90-day total precipitation across nearly the entire country is 80 to 130 millimeters (3.1 to 5.1 inches) below the long-term average for the period.

    On Tuesday, after the Danube hit its new record low, Budapest-based photographer Gábor Kertész traveled to the base of the city’s iconic Margaret Bridge — a spot that is almost always submerged, now exposed as a dry sand shoal — to capture the unprecedented scene. “The bare rocks, the dry sand bars around the bridge pillars… it’s all shocking to see how things were before and how they are now,” Kertész told reporters. “Where will this lead, what will happen? We don’t know that yet, but this must be the result of climate change.”

    The record low water has already upended key economic activities across every nation along the river’s path. Popular international river cruises, a mainstay of Central European tourism that brings millions of visitors to Budapest annually, have been forced to dock kilometers upriver from their customary terminals, forcing passengers to arrange alternate transportation to reach city sightseeing routes. Commercial cargo shipping has nearly ceased entirely across large stretches of the river, according to Hungary’s Ministry of Transport and Investment.

    In northwestern Bulgaria, where the Danube forms the natural border with Romania, authorities evacuated 186 passengers from the cruise ship Viking Ullur on Tuesday after the vessel ran aground on an unexpected shallow shoal near the port city of Vidin. The ship had been scheduled to restock food and water supplies in Vidin, but could not reach the port after running aground, leaving passengers without adequate provisions, according to Bulgaria’s state-run news agency BTA. While all passengers were safely evacuated, the ship’s 52-person crew may remain on board for an extended period while authorities assess navigation conditions and plan refloating operations, Bulgarian police confirmed.

    Further downstream in northern Serbia, hundreds of small recreational vessels and dozens of large cargo ships remain stranded on dried-out riverbanks near the city of Novi Sad. Radovan Segrt, a houseboat owner who operates popular river excursion tours for tourists, told the Associated Press that the Danube’s shoreline has retreated “some 15 to 20 meters (50 to 65 feet) from its original position.” “The summer season is over now, as far as boat riding is concerned,” Segrt said.

    Beyond transportation and tourism, the dropping water levels have also forced cuts to critical nuclear energy production across the region. The Danube’s cool water is routinely used to cool reactor cores at multiple nuclear plants along its banks, and reduced flow has made safe operation impossible for some facilities. In Romania, where Danube flow dropped to just 1,630 cubic meters per second — roughly one-third of the typical average for July — authorities shut down one reactor unit at the Cernavoda nuclear power plant on Tuesday for safety reasons, and announced a second unit would be taken offline imminently.

    In Hungary, the Paks nuclear plant — which generates nearly 40% of the country’s total electricity supply — began powering down one reactor on Wednesday after two consecutive rounds of output reductions at two other reactors over the prior 48 hours, all due to limited access to cooling water.

    The exposed riverbed has brought unexpected oddities alongside the widespread disruption, including both hidden dangers and rare opportunities for amateur historians and treasure hunters. Last week, Budapest officials closed the Margaret Bridge for 48 hours after an unexploded World War II aerial bomb was exposed by receding waters at the bridge’s base, forcing a controlled detonation by bomb disposal units.

    Amateur treasure hunter Zsolt Horváth told reporters he was taking advantage of the extreme low water to recover historical artifacts from the exposed riverbank on Tuesday, using a powerful magnet to pull metal objects from the mud. He said he had already uncovered rare items including an early 20th-century radio amplifier and bullet casings from both World Wars. “Having so little water in the Danube is a blessing for this kind of activity, otherwise, it’s a curse,” Horváth explained.

    The report featured contributions from Associated Press correspondents across four European nations, including Stephen McGrath in Leamington Spa, England, Veselin Toshkov in Sofia, Bulgaria, Béla Szandelszky in Budapest, Hungary, and Radul Radovanovic in Novi Sad, Serbia.