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Paralympics

THE arrival of Ukrainian athletes at Beijing’s Winter Paralympics is a “miracle”, the team’s top official has said, with some narrowly escaping bombs as they left during the Russian invasion.

Ukraine Paralympic committee president Valeriy Sushkevych, seated, said his team had been overwhelmed with solidarity since arriving in Beijing on Wednesday.

“I can say that this is a miracle that we managed to be here at the Paralympic Games,” he said. “But we couldn’t give up and not come.”

On Thursday, a week after Moscow sent its troops into neighbouring Ukraine, the International Paralympic Committee banned Russian athletes from competing in the Games.

Australia

EMERGENCY services in Australia ordered as many as 200 000 people to flee from a storm that killed at least 13 people in record-setting east coast floods this week.

The authorities issued rain and flood warnings from Queensland to Sydney in New South Wales (NSW). However, Sydney – home to five million people – seems to have been spared the worst of the deluge as the storm moved off the coast, dumping the heaviest rain.

Emergency services said more than 70 evacuation orders were still in force across NSW owing to the size of the storm system which would take a while to ease off.

Scientists say climate change is making Australia’s floods, bushfires, cyclones and droughts more frequent and more intense. | AFP

India

AMARAVATI erupted in celebrations after the Andhra Pradesh High Court pronounced its judgment yesterday on petitions challenging Jagan Mohan Reddy-led government’s decision to create three state capitals.

A three-judge bench directed the government to complete implementation of the Amaravati capital city masterplan in six months. The court also asked the government to hand over developed plots with all basic amenities to farmers within three months.

Farmers and women, who have been agitating for over 800 days, welcomed the judgment as a victory of truth and justice. | IANS

Auctions

SOTHEBY’S auction house is almost three centuries old but its top brass are embracing technology and all of its buzzwords – metaverse, non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and crypto among them.

Charles Stewart, Sotheby’s American chief executive said: “For a lot of young technology investors NFTs have been a gateway into the broader art market.”

By way of example, crypto entrepreneur Justin Sun shelled out more than $70 million (R1 billion) at Sotheby’s for a work by Swiss artist Alberto Giacometti last year.