The GuardianFormer Australian prime minister Bob Hawke’s youngest daughter says she was raped by a confidant of her father in the 1980s, but was urged not to report the assaults to protect the leadership ambitions of Hawke, who died in May. “I thought to myself I could not make any bigger sacrifice to [my father’s] political career if I had tried,” she wrote. Hawke first mounted a leadership challenge in July 1982, but was unsuccessful. Bill Hayden resigned as Labor leader in February 1983, with Hawke emerging as the successor. Hawke won the March 1983 election and became one of the Labor Party’s most successful prime ministers.

Commenting on Liu’s remarks, Garden of Hope Foundation chief executive officer Chi Hui-jung (紀惠容) said that gender should not be binary. Gender qualities, gender identity and sexual orientation are all diverse, she said, adding that the choice of each individual regarding their gender is a human right. If parents cannot accept the gender identity of their children, those children become even less confident, she said. As a result, it is easy for children to accept LGBT groups, but difficult for older people to do the same, she said. LGBT people existed before same-sex marriage was legalized, Equal Love Taiwan public relations manager Lee Cheng-han (李政翰) said.

The Bureau of Energy on Friday unveiled its preliminary feed-in tariff (FIT) rates for renewable energy sources, including solar, wind, biomass, biodegradable waste, geothermal and hydropower, which are to take effect next year. In contrast, the FIT rates for wind power projects next year are to be 7 to 8 percent lower than this year, when levels decreased 5 percent. Wind power developers have called on the agency to recalculate the rates in a more realistic manner. Therefore, establishing the appropriate rates remains a major challenge to the optimization and effective implementation of the FIT scheme. However, the scheme should involve more citizens and small businesses in the generation of renewable energy.

Cheng, who was in Taiwan from Aug. 30 to Nov. 29, on Saturday told the Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper) that someone had begun following him after he told foreign media in Taipei about how he was tortured during his 15 days in detention in China. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that the British Office Taipei had warned it that he would be interviewed in the city. While in the bookstore, the man — whose identity and intentions he was unsure of — was watching him while pretending to read, Cheng said. Chinese police told him during his interrogation that many Hong Kong protesters who had been arrested were sent to China where they were being detained, Cheng told the Liberty Times. Liu has said the Hong Kong protests have “nothing to do with democracy,” and that Beijing never asked Hong Kong to change its laws.

Four opinion polls published on Saturday put the lead of Johnson’s Conservative Party over the main opposition Labour Party at between eight and 15 points, five days before the national election. At the lowest end of that range, Johnson cannot count on winning the majority in British Parliament he needs to take the UK out of the EU by Jan. 31, especially if voters choose to put aside their usual allegiances to vote tactically over Brexit. However, one poll, published before the 2017 election, by YouGov, was more accurate in predicting the number of seats won by each party. Known as an MRP poll — an acronym for its multilevel regression and post-stratification model — it predicted 93 percent of results in individual constituencies correctly. However, tactical voting by 41,000 voters in just 36 swing seats could prevent Johnson from getting a majority, it said.

In practical terms, it means banks need to pass on their data for free to non-banks, provided that customers agree. The board’s report said that reducing entry barriers for big tech might ultimately hurt competition in financial services. As an example, the board highlights China, where just two big tech firms account for more than 90 percent of the mobile payments market. “Big data lives off selling information about you and me, so that other companies can target us more specifically,” Berg said. “The potential real game changer is big data, depending on what they choose to do.”That is because “they know more about us than anyone else,” he said.

A brokerage employee in the territory is looking for a new job because she disagrees with her bosses’ politics. An investment banker says he avoids talking to most colleagues about the unrest, fearing it might damage his career. At financial firms across Hong Kong, personal political views that used to have little bearing on work are taking on new significance, as the territory’s pro-democracy protests harden opinions on both sides of the debate. Law Ka Chung (羅家聰), former chief economist at Bank of Communications (Hong Kong), has gone public with his concerns, saying on Tuesday last week that he suspects he was ousted in part because his research contradicted the Chinese government’s narrative on Hong Kong. Conversations between some JPMorgan staff from mainland China and their peers from Hong Kong have become less frequent since the protests began, two people said.

AFP, NEW DELHIAt least 43 people were killed yesterday in a devastating fire that ripped through a bag factory in the cramped, congested old quarter of the Indian capital, New Delhi, trapping scores of workers who were sleeping inside. Tearful relatives spoke of receiving desperate calls from factory workers from about 5am pleading to be freed from the inferno in the dark, poorly lit premises in the commercial hub of Sadar Bazar. “Most of the casualties happened because of suffocation,” witness Mohammed Khalil told reporters. “I have been to the factory and this tragedy was waiting to happen,” he told reporters. Families of the victims told reporters that they were mostly migrant workers who had come from Bihar, one of India’s most impoverished states.

The GuardianNew Zealand has been hit by a weekend of severe storms, with landslides and flooding in the South Island cutting off towns and trapping an estimated 1,000 foreign tourists. Food and water deliveries were being arranged for those who were stuck, Westland Mayor Bruce Smith told the New Zealand Herald. New Zealand Minister of Civil Defence Peeni Henare traveled to the affected area yesterday, but had been forced to drive from Christchurch after flights were canceled. Civil defense director Sarah Stuart-Black urged people to avoid the affected regions and to stay up to date, because “the situation continues to change rapidly” as the severe weather system moved north. More than 300,000 lightning strikes hit the nation and its surrounding waters yesterday alone, the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research said.

By Lee I-chia / Staff reporterThe Food and Drug Administration (FDA) yesterday said that it has asked drug companies producing metformin, a first-line medication for type 2 diabetes, to examine their products for a potential cancer-causing impurity: n-nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA). The Singaporean Health Sciences Authority last week recalled three types of metformin medication that contained unsafe levels of NDMA, after it tested all 46 types of locally marketed metformin. In September, ranitidine medications for stomach ulcers and heartburn that were contaminated with NDMA were recalled. FDA Medicinal Products Division section chief Hung Kuo-teng (洪國登) said that the three types of metformin recalled in Singapore are not imported to Taiwan, but there are 140 drug permits for metformin medication in Taiwan, of which 110 types are being manufactured. It would continue to test medications for NDMA contamination and announce the results, the agency said.

APA surprisingly strong US jobs report on Friday put investors in a buying mood, driving stocks on Wall Street broadly higher and extending the market’s winning streak to a third day. Technology, financial and industrial stocks drove much of the gains. The latest gains also helped stem some of the losses for the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the NASDAQ. The Dow Jones Industrial Average on Friday climbed 337.27 points, or 1.2 percent, to 28,015.06, but shed 0.1 percent from 28,051.41 a week earlier. One of the risks we’ll have in the coming week is you still haven’t gotten the phase-one deal.”

Chris Paul on Friday scored a season-high 30 points and the Thunder pulled off an improbable 139-127 overtime victory over the Minnesota Timberwolves. With the Timberwolves ahead 121-119 and 1.1 seconds remaining in regulation play, the Thunder fouled Karl-Anthony Towns. Danilo Gallinari made the technical free throw for the Thunder, then Towns shot his second free throw at the other end. He made it, putting the Timberwolves up two, but giving the Thunder a chance at a throw-in. Schroder scored 25 points for the Thunder, while Adams had 22 points and 11 rebounds, and Gallinari racked up 21 points.

Thousands of weary firefighters, who have been battling bushfires for a month, were fighting nearly 100 blazes in New South Wales. The mega-fire north of Sydney, Australia’s largest city, was created on Friday when several fires merged and was burning across 335,000 hectares. That’s really what is going to stop it,” the New South Wales Rural Fire Service said. New South Wales Health on Friday said that about 1,140 people had sought medical assistance for breathing issues or asthma in the past week — a quarter more than in a typical week. New South Wales Ambulance fielded about one-third more calls.

Ligue 1, Coupe de France and Champions League,” she told reporters at Visa Europe’s headquarters in London. “I think I’m in the best club in the world and I want to beat records now. “I am disappointed about the World Cup, because we could be better and it’s not a good memory on the pitch. We didn’t play well and I didn’t enjoy the game,” Le Sommer said. We have good players, but maybe we miss something and we want to be better every day,” added Le Sommer, who has 167 caps for her country.

AFP, ANGELES CITY, PhilippinesTo the untrained eye, arnis — the stick-wielding martial art of the Philippines — is brutal and frenzied, but behind the chaos lies a tradition dating back hundreds of years. Filipino arnisadors are fiercely proud of their country and of the sport that symbolizes their spirit of battle and revolution. “We consider this the martial art of Lapu-Lapu,” said Philippine Senator Miguel Zubiri, who is president of the Philippines Arnis Federation. At the SEA Games, men and women from just four nations — the Philippines, Myanmar, Cambodia and Vietnam — fought in bantamweight, featherweight, lightweight and welterweight divisions. They are on course to repeat the feat, as the SEA Games’ program is flexible and events can be included in the hosts’ favor.