Author: Press Room

Philip Polkinghorne, who was charged with and acquitted of murdering his wife, has been sentenced to community work after a judge said the maximum available fine wouldn’t be enough.Polkinghorne was sentenced today for possessing methamphetamine and a methamphetamine pipe.They’re charges he pleaded guilty to just as his murder trial got underway in late July.The retired eye surgeon, 71, was the centre of a high-profile eight-week trial at the High Court in Auckland.The Crown accused him of murdering Pauline Hanna and staging the scene to look like a suicide.A jury found him not guilty of murder and manslaughter.Polkinghorne returned to the…

A $50 million community hub with wraparound support – believed to be the first of its kind in the world – has opened its doors in central Wellington.Whakamaru, developed and run by the Wellington City Mission, contains 35 apartments for vulnerable people and offers 24/7 support. It also offers services that can be accessed by anyone who needs it, including a medical centre, social supermarket, dental surgery, laundry service, and a café.The café, Craig and Gail’s, is open to the public during the day with a flexible pricing plan that allows coffee lovers to pay it forward. The public can…

State-owned carmaker SAIC Motor said it will take Brussels to the European Court of Justice to “protect its legitimate rights and interests,” as the ongoing trade row escalates into products like brandy, dairy products and chemicals. ADVERTISEMENTChina’s SAIC Motor plans to take the European Commission to the European Court of Justice over 45% tariffs imposed on its electric vehicles, the carmaker said on Wednesday, further escalating global trade tensions.It comes after the Chinese government said it filed a lawsuit at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) over an EU probe which the Commission says is “fact-based” and “anti-subsidy”.Brussels says Beijing is…

A court has heard evidence indicating the signal of real estate agent Yanfei Bao’s phone was picked up at the same locations around the city as her alleged killer on the day she disappeared.Tingjun Cao is on trial for the murder of the 44-year-old mum, a charge he denies.The defendant wasn’t in the courtroom at the Christchurch High Court today, with a Mandarin translation of proceedings instead provided to him remotely through a headset.The day after Yanfei Bao disappeared in July last year, her phone was found discarded alongside Christchurch’s Southern Motorway.Detective Michael Hawke told the court where he found…

The Belarusian leader accused the West of inflating facts to pressure EU and NATO and called for unconditional negotiations. ADVERTISEMENTFollowing reports of North Korean troops deployed in Russia, Belarus’ leader said no one had seen any Pyongyang soldiers on the frontline with Ukraine, accusing the West of “inflating the fact”, which may lead to escalation. “They are inflating it for what? To finally put pressure on the European Union and introduce NATO troops into (the war in Ukraine),” President Alexander Lukashenko said at the Minsk International Conference on Eurasian Security. All sides of the conflict should “sit down at the negotiation table without…

Central North Island iwi Ngāti Rangi is offering housing opportunities to tribal members in the iwi’s first housing development.The Orōnaki development in Ohakune has delivered four new three-bedroom homes. They will be offered to whānau as affordable rental properties.Ngāti Rangi pou ārahi/chief executive Helen Leahy said the small-scale initiative was the beginning of a long-held aspiration to address the lack of affordable, healthy homes in Ohakune.”We want to support whānau in meeting their housing aspirations, particularly those whānau where there is currently no support available to them,” Leahy said.The new houses on Foyle St were fully insulated to a higher…

Latest reports show the EU is bucking a global trend for continuously rising emissions, but still not on track to meet its own climate action targets. ADVERTISEMENTThe EU’s climate commissioner has seized on a sharp fall in emissions across the bloc as evidence that climate action is not incompatible with economic growth, as he prepares for the major UN climate summit in Azerbaijan next month.“As we head off soon to COP29, we once again demonstrate to our international partners that it is possible to take climate action and invest in growing our economy at the same time,” Wopke Hoekstra said…

Giving the world of lolly selling a go has paid off for a Dunedin business owner who recently opened her first physical store. SugarBOOM owner Kate Ashby opened the doors to the store on Saturday, before which people were forming lines down Albany St. “We weren’t really sure what to expect, but so many people came, so many students came over. “That was amazing.” Mrs Ashby opened the store digitally in 2022, operating it from a website and Instagram account. During that time she had opened many pop-up stores, including at the Meridian Mall and Alexandra Blossom Festival. She was…

WorkSafe’s lawyer has told a court the owners of Whakaari/White Island were responsible for ensuring the workplace it was granting access to, a volcanic island, was safe.Whakaari Management, and four other companies, were fined and ordered to pay more than $10m in reparations for health and safety failings in the lead-up to the 2019 volcanic eruption that killed 22 people.It is the second day of an appeal hearing in the High Court at Auckland, in which the owners of the island, James, Andrew and Peter Buttle, are challenging the criminal conviction of their company. Survivors and victims’ families are listening…

Dr. Ian Lesser of the German Marshall Fund says everyone is extra vigilant following attempts to over throw the 2020 election results. And although risks of this have grown, ‘everyone is watching’ he tells the Europe Conversation. ADVERTISEMENTIt may be several days before we know the result of the US presidential election, predicts German Marshall Fund Ian Lesser.‘There could be many legal challenges, even legitimate legal challenges, if it’s very close.’ ‘It’s quite conceivable that even a few days afterwards you really won’t know who won’, he tells the Europe Conversation on Euronews.One of the biggest fears among many is a…