Ardern wins landslide in New Zealand election
WELLINGTON, Oct 17 (AFP) - Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern won a landslide victory in New Zealand's general election Saturday, leveraging success battling Covid-19 to gain an unprecedented outright majority and the chance to implement her reform agenda.
With two thirds of the vote counted, Ardern's centre-left Labour Party was on 49.2 percent and forecast to take around 64 seats in the 120-member parliament.
No leader has achieved an absolute majority since New Zealand adopted a proportional voting system in 1996, leading to a succession of multi-party governments.
While the count has not been finalised, the figures were enough for opposition leader Judith Collins to concede after phoning Ardern.
Chechen, 18, suspected of beheading teacher in France
PARIS, Oct 17 (AFP) - The man suspected of beheading a French teacher who showed his students cartoons of the prophet Mohammed was an 18-year-old Chechen, a source said Saturday, in what President Emmanuel Macron called an “Islamist terror attack”.
The attack took place late Friday afternoon near the middle school where the teacher worked in Conflans Saint-Honorine, a northwestern suburb around 30 kilometres (20 miles) from central Paris.
The assailant was shot by police and later died of his injuries.
Missile kills 12 in Azerbaijan city, escalating Karabakh conflict
GANJA, Oct 17 (AFP) - A missile strike levelled a row of homes in Azerbaijan's second city of Ganja on Saturday, killing 12 and injuring more than 40 people in their sleep in a sharp escalation of the conflict over the disputed NagornoKarabakh region.
The early hours attack, which saw a second missile strike another part of Ganja and a third reach the nearby strategic city of Mingecevir, came hours after Azerbaijani forces shelled the ethnic Armenian separatist region's capital Stepanakert.
The seeming tit-for-tat attacks further undermines international efforts to calm a resurgence of fighting between Christian Armenians and Muslim Azerbaijanis before it draws in regional powers Russia and Turkey.
'One-der-ful': Australia's coronavirus hotspot records single case
MELBOURNE, Oct 17 (REUTERS) - Australia's coronavirus hotspot of Victoria recorded a single case of the disease on Saturday - the lowest daily number since early June - and no deaths, with the state's top health official saying the figures were “one- der-ful”.
Victoria's capital Melbourne, which has been the epicentre of the country's COVID-19 outbreak, is in its third month of a stringent lockdown and Premier Daniel Andrews is due to update plans to ease restrictions across the state on Sunday.
UK and EU to discuss 'structure' of Brexit talks Monday
BRUSSELS, Oct 17 (AFP) - European and British negotiators will be in touch Monday to discuss the “structure” of post-Brexit talks, after London demanded a major shift in Brussels' approach to a trade deal.
An EU spokesman tweeted that EU negotiator Michel Barnier held video talks with his British counterpart David Frost on Friday after the results of European summit provoked an angry response in London.
“Both Chief Negotiators agreed to talk again on Monday to discuss the structure of these talks,” Daniel Ferrie said.