Ukrainian security council restricts app’s use on government and military devices after intelligence agency says Russia can snoop on users and messages. What we know on day 941

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Private was sentenced to 12 months of confinement and dishonourably discharged from army but has been released because of time already served

A US soldier who fled into North Korea last year has been sentenced to 12 months of confinement after pleading guilty to desertion as part of a plea agreement, his lawyer has said.

Because of good behaviour and time served, the soldier was released, the lawyer, Franklin Rosenblatt, said on Friday.

Victoria police seeking an extradition order for the 65-year-old over the 1977 deaths known as the Easey Street murders

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A man has been arrested in Italy over the 1977 murders of two women, Suzanne Armstrong and Susan Bartlett, who were found dead in their Melbourne home on Easey Street, Collingwood.

A 65-year-old man, a Greek-Australian dual citizen, was arrested at a Rome airport on Thursday evening, Australian eastern time.

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Nominee emphasizes support for abortion rights at rally in key state, and declares herself ‘the underdog in this race’

Kamala Harris campaigned in Madison, Wisconsin, the deep blue capital of the state and college town that Democrats hope will turn out enough voters to turn the election in the presidential nominee’s favor.

“We know this is gonna be a tight race until the very end,” said Harris. “We are the underdog in this race, and we have some hard work ahead of us.”

A laureateship will force government, academic and literary institutions to confront their wilful neglect of poetry – and ask poets to begin to look outward, too

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A good friend of mine, a Tasmanian writer with bone dry wit, says the federal government missed a trick in announcing its intention to establish a poet laureate. He jokes that an Australian poet laureate should rightfully be called a poet lorikeet.

It’s a quintessentially Australian joke, inherently suspicious of anything that might dare to take itself too seriously. But it also speaks to an anxiety that Australia may not be able to stick the landing of a laureateship with appropriate gravitas.

‘Sophia’ – a UN ambassador given legal personhood seven years ago – will open the new National Communication Museum at a 1930s phone exchange in Melbourne

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Australia’s newest museum will be launched over the weekend by a United Nations ambassador looking more like a science fiction film star than a diplomat.

Sophia, a robot which was appointed as the first non-human to be given a United Nations title when she was appointed innovation ambassador to the UN’s Development Program, arrived in Australia this week to launch the new National Communication Museum.

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If you’re ready (and brave enough) to ditch the Huggies, consider these things first

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One of the least enticing aspect of raising a baby is possibly dealing with the constant hassle, expense and wastefulness of nappies. If overflowing, smelly bins plus $20 (or more) a week spent on single-use products doesn’t appeal to you, you’re probably leaning toward modern cloth nappies.

Of course, cloth nappies are not for everyone. The first few months of a baby’s life are incredibly hard and not everyone will be in a position to do the extra laundry. Also, at $10 to $35 each, cloth nappies are an investment. While cheaper in the long run, it can feel daunting to spend big when a baby is coming.

Indigenous Queenslanders have spoken courageously at the truth-telling inquiry – but their quest could be cut short

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One day Aunty Flo Watson’s mother slapped her for being happy.

She had been walking with friends barefoot home from school, laughing and having fun.

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Our analysis suggests buyers are better off checking an automated price estimate than going by the real estate agent’s guide

• Full Story: Labor and the Greens hit an impasse on housing
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On a gloomy Saturday morning in Sydney, a small crowd with umbrellas and raincoats is waiting outside a terrace in the inner west for an auction to start.

The place is completely rundown, with peeling paint and water-stained ceilings. But the guide price online is $1.3m, and the house will sell for more than $1.8m after a six-minute auction marked more by a feeling of inevitability than excitement.

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Cal Fire says Robert Hernandez ignited blazes while off duty in forest land in north of state

A California department of forestry and fire protection employee was arrested on Friday on suspicion of starting five brush fires in northern California in recent weeks, officials said.

Robert Hernandez, 38, was arrested at the Howard forest fire station in Healdsburg, California, on suspicion of arson to forest land, the state agency said in a statement.

• Wales 31-24 Australia
• Kate Williams scores decisive try with last play

Australia’s women’s rugby union team suffered another international defeat but only after a late, late try from Wales consigned them to a 31-24 loss at Newport’s Rodney Parade.

The Wallaroos had been coming a humbling 36-10 defeat by Ireland in Belfast on Saturday, but they were far sharper on Friday night (Saturday AEST) as they matched the home side for the most part in a dramatic contest.

About £300m added to deal for UK’s biggest online real-estate portal after first proposal unanimously rejected

The Rupert Murdoch-controlled Australian property group REA has upped its proposed offer for Rightmove, the UK’s biggest online property portal, to £5.9bn.

REA, in which Murdoch’s News Corporation has a 61% stake, has sweetened its initial proposal by about £300m after Rightmove’s board last week unanimously rejected the first offer as “fundamentally undervaluing” the company.

Spurs manager enjoyed a stirring start to reign last season but is now enduring difficult questions from grumbling fans

Ange Postecoglou agrees because he knew just as well as anyone how it would have been painted. “Firstly, you can say that if we lost the other night, we would have been in crisis,” the Tottenham manager says. He is discussing the Carabao Cup tie at Coventry on Wednesday, which came three days after the home loss to Arsenal, a result that left Spurs with four points from the opening four Premier League games.

Postecoglou had fallen at the first hurdle in last season’s Carabao Cup, going out on penalties at Fulham, having made nine changes to his starting XI. He swapped eight players at Coventry and there is no doubt that relief was the most prominent emotion when the substitutes Djed Spence and Brennan Johnson scored late goals for a 2-1 comeback win.

• Uruguayan yet to start under new manager
• Coaches at club working on striker’s positioning

Arne Slot has backed Darwin Núñez to be influential at Liverpool despite not starting him in the first five matches of his tenure. The Uruguayan, who has scored once in 17 club appearances since mid-March, has come off the bench in the past four games.

Núñez will likely be a substitute again for the visit of Bournemouth on Saturday, with Slot preferring different combinations for his front three. Mohamed Salah, Diogo Jota and Luis Díaz started the first four Premier League games but Cody Gakpo took his chance at San Siro after replacing the Colombian in the starting lineup. Victory in Italy helped Liverpool bounce back from defeat by Nottingham Forest last Saturday but Slot could be without Alisson, who has a tight hamstring.

It’s slick, fast – and doesn’t feature the caped crusader once. The Irish actor is a revelation in a series that’s so twisty it leaves you breathless

Though it stars Colin Farrell, reprising his part from Matt Reeves’ 2022 film The Batman, and is set just after the catastrophic events in Gotham that the Riddler masterminded at the end of the third act, you’re better off thinking of the Penguin as a kind of YA Sopranos than an addition to the Batverse. The Caped Crusader doesn’t appear and all the villainy on show – including that of the Penguin, now known as Oz Cobb instead of Oswald Cobblepot in a further move away from cartoonishness – is of a very human kind.

Carmine, his boss and head of the Falcone crime family, was killed at the end of The Batman. There is now a power vacuum in the city and the series follows the Penguin’s attempts to rise from his position as a mid-level gangster, trusted to run a nightclub and a portion of the gangsters’ drug business but never fully accepted. It is his yearning for respect that drives him on through the deadly game of snakes and ladders towards his goal of dominating Gotham and makes The Penguin into much more than just another money-grubbing spin-off of a famous franchise.

• Bath 38-16 Northampton; Spencer one of five tryscorers
• Statement win in repeat of last term’s Premiership final

Bath would have preferred to win last season’s Premiership final but maybe now this is destined to be their time. This bonus-point ­victory over the reigning champions, Northampton, gave an early glimpse of their capabilities and first-half tries from Joe Cokanasiga, Ted Hill and Ben Spencer paved the way for a strong performance that lays down a marker to all their rivals.

If it helped that Bath kept 15 players on the field this time, unlike at Twickenham last June, they showed more than enough composure with and without the ball to suggest they will be a tough nut to crack this time around. A near faultless goalkicking display from Finn Russell, who supplied 13 points, was another plus and even an improved second half from Northampton failed to turn the tide.

• Leigh 18-12 St Helens
• St Helens consigned to worst league finish for 30 years

Momentum heading into a Super League playoff campaign is certainly not the be all and end all: but the reactions of both these sides at the finish of a thrilling night in Leigh underlined how crucial it could be, as well as the different trajectories the Leopards and St Helens are on as the business end of the year begins.

This was a night of huge significance for both. Leigh, who were ninth as recently as July, knew only victory here would ensure they guaranteed a spot in the playoffs. In the end, a 10th win from 12 games cemented fifth and a trip to Salford in the opening round next week.

“Vive la Révolution,” read the new banner amid faded neighbours behind the Chelsea goal in the first half, with a picture of Sonia ­Bompastor looking to the sky beneath the words. The Chelsea manager’s reign began with a 1-0 win against an Aston Villa side who likewise had someone new at the helm and top-six ambitions. Johanna Rytting ­Kaneryd’s first-half goal was the difference between the sides, though Villa came close to an equaliser in added time when their goalkeeper Sabrina D’Angelo came up for a free-kick and her header was tipped on to the bar and over.

Bompastor had said time and again in pre-season that she wants her Chelsea side “to be a dominant team”. They delivered in the summer, but would it translate to competitive play? Would the transition from Emma Hayes, in charge for 12 years, to the French winner of the Champions League (as a player and as a manager) affect their fluidity and dominance?

At Orepuki, on the remote south coast of New Zealand’s South Island, a bed of riches colour the shoreline, bringing gem hunters from near and far

Jack Geerlings crouches down at the shoreline to sift through a bed of stones. He picks up a small rough rock and turns it over in his hands. “This one is too coarse,” he says and flicks it back to the pile. Geerlings is after something a little more interesting.

Slowly, he walks along the vast sweep of beach, his gaze rarely lifting from the ground. “The sunlight helps to reveal the stones,” he says, bending to pick up and inspect rocks one by one. A little further on, he turns over a small red-brown stone, the colour and texture of a chestnut. “This one could be jasper,” he says, with more enthusiasm.

Former world heavyweight champion has suffered painful defeats but is eager to rewrite his legacy before retirement

‘I’m just ready to fight,” Anthony Joshua said earlier this month as he looked ahead to his bout against Daniel Dubois at Wembley Stadium on Saturday night. Dubois sat opposite Joshua at a table in a television studio and, replicating the often manufactured drama which pre-fight shows are meant to generate, he looked coolly at his more famous opponent and said: “Let’s go.”

His promoter Frank Warren, sitting alongside Dubois, smiled and added a little caveat to dilute the sudden intensity: “But let’s wait until the 21st.” Dubois, for once, ignored Warren and continued: “If he wants to swing, let’s go now.”

Benny and Susanne Anguiano are back home in California with Rayne Beau, who ran into woods during camping trip

For two months, a California couple was heartbroken, worrying about the whereabouts of their beloved cat after losing him in Yellowstone national park, a wilderness larger than some US states.

But as summer came to a close, so did their tragic story. Benny and Susanne Anguiano reunited with their lost feline Rayne Beau last month after an animal welfare group called to let them know their cat had been found in Roseville, California, about 800 miles (1,287km) from Yellowstone.

Mike DeWine criticizes pair in New York Times op-ed for repeating racist claims about Haitian immigrants

Ohio’s Republican governor, Mike DeWine, on Friday criticized former US president Donald Trump and his election running mate, JD Vance, for repeating racist rightwing claims about Haitian immigrants eating other residents’ pets in the city of Springfield, Ohio.

The conspiracy theories have caused uproar and led to an onslaught of threats and harassment.