Melbourne CBD turned into no-go zone as police prepare to disrupt protest planned in Sydney

• New Doherty modelling advises ‘medium’ Covid restrictions until 80% vaccination target reached
• Youth corrections officer dies from Covid
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2.02am BST

NSW has recorded 1,331 new locally acquired cases of Covid-19, and six deaths.

1.58am BST

A spokesperson for the foreign affairs minister, Marise Payne, has provided a response to France recalling its Australian and US ambassadors:

We note with regret France’s decision to recall its ambassador to Australia for consultations following the decision on the Attack class project.

Australia understands France’s deep disappointment with our decision, which was taken in accordance with our clear and communicated national security interests.

Hundreds who worked for New Zealand military remain stranded in Afghanistan, destitute and fearing Taliban reprisals

Desperate and running low on food, Afghans who worked for New Zealand wonder if help is coming.

“The situation here is chaos,” says Sayed*, an Afghan interpreter who worked for the New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF). “People are scared, and all the banks are closed, people in desperate situations, running out of money. Food and other things are getting expensive. How do you describe it – it’s so dark. People are in so dire a situation.”

Animal and Plant Health Agency says infected animal was dead and has been removed from the farm

A single case of BSE – an infection commonly known as “mad cow disease” – has been confirmed on a farm in Somerset.

The Animal and Plant Health Agency (Apha) said the infected animal was dead and had been removed from the farm.

Prosecutors said multimillionaire killed friend because she planned to tell police what she knew about his wife’s death

The multimillionaire New York real estate heir Robert Durst has been convicted of murdering his best friend Susan Berman more than 20 years ago, in a case that took on new life following the documentary The Jinx.

Durst was found guilty of first degree murder on Friday after a jury in Los Angeles deliberated for about seven hours over three days. Berman was shot at point-blank range in her Beverly Hills home in December 2000 as she was prepared to tell police how she helped cover up the killing of Durst’s wife.

In-person events are part of industry’s ‘reset’ as models return to the catwalks and the party restarts

“Ecstatic” was how British Fashion Council chair Stephanie Phair summed up the mood as London fashion week returned to catwalks after 18 months of taking place on screen.

President Xi Jinping faces serious test of his financial reforms as struggles of property giant send ripples through real-estate sector

The crisis engulfing Evergrande, China’s second-biggest property company, is the greatest test yet of President Xi Jinping’s effort to reform the debt-ridden behemoths of the Chinese economy. It could also be the most significant test that China’s financial system has faced in many years.

As angry protesters occupied the headquarters of the troubled property developer in recent weeks, some analysts have described the Evergrande crisis as “China’s Lehman Brothers moment”. Only this time it’s a credit-fuelled housebuilder that suddenly can’t pay its $300bn debts, rather than a blue-chip investment bank that many assumed was too big to fail but was instead thrown to the wolves 13 years ago.

• Reports say Pelé readmitted due to acid reflux
• Doctors and daughter insists he is in stable condition

Pelé is said to be recovering following reports he had re-entered an intensive care unit at São Paulo’s Albert Einstein Hospital in an apparent deterioration of the three-time World Cup winner’s health after he left the unit earlier this week.

ESPN Brasil reported on Friday that Pelé was readmitted to the ICU due to acid reflux. The 80-year-old had a colon tumour removed this month and stayed in the hospital for further monitoring.

A US drone strike in Kabul last month killed as many as 10 civilians, including up to seven children, Gen Frank McKenzie, the head of Central Command, told reporters on Friday. Senior officers had said the 29 August strike which took place as foreign forces completed the last stages of their withdrawal from Afghanistan targeted an Islamic States suicide bomber who posed an imminent threat. 'At the time of the strike, I was confident that the strike had averted an imminent threat to our forces at the airport,' McKenzie said. 'Our investigation now concludes that the strike was a tragic mistake.'

• US admits Kabul strike killed 10 civilians and not Islamic State militants
  

First time France has recalled a US ambassador in alliance dating back to American revolution

France has recalled its ambassadors to the US and Australia for consultations sparked by the “exceptional seriousness” of Canberra’s surprise decision to cancel an order for French-built submarines and its security pact with Washington and London.

The French foreign minister, Jean-Yves Le Drian, said the order to bring the ambassadors back to Paris “immediately” was made at the request of the French president, Emmanuel Macron.

Gen Kenneth McKenzie says ‘it was a mistake’ and that it was unlikely those who died posed a direct threat to US forces

A US drone strike in Afghanistan last month killed 10 civilians – including seven children – and not an Islamic State extremist as first claimed, the Pentagon has admitted.

In a briefing on Friday, the commander of US Central Command, Gen Kenneth McKenzie, said he now believes it was unlikely that those who died were Islamic State militants or posed a direct threat to US forces at Kabul’s airport.

• Vote may be significant blow to Biden administration
• Panel does back boosters for those older than 65

Scientific advisers to the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) have voted not to recommend a third shot of the Pfizer vaccine for most Americans, a potentially significant blow to the Biden administration after it announced a plan to “boost” adults before advisory committees had a chance to review scientific evidence in public.

Related: ‘Fascist and tyrannical’: US vaccine mandates induce rightwing hysteria

Just two weeks before the bombshell, senior ministers from both countries met and declared they were ‘committed to cooperation’. How did it all go so wrong?

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Just two weeks before France complained of being “stabbed in the back”, two senior French ministers met with their Australian counterparts, Marise Payne and Peter Dutton, for what was meant to be a sign of ever-strengthening ties between the two countries.

The joint statement they issued now seems extraordinary, given the events that followed. “Both sides committed to deepen defence industry cooperation and enhance their capability edge in the region,” they said. “Ministers underlined the importance of the future submarine program.”

Overhaul in England aims to simplify travel by scrapping traffic light system and changing testing requirements

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An overhaul of England’s Covid-19 rules governing international travel has been announced by the Department for Transport, scrapping the traffic light system and signalling changes to requirements to undergo PCR testing on arrival.

The aim, according to the transport secretary, Grant Shapps, is to simplify rules and decrease the burden on people travelling by replacing the system with a single red list and one for the rest of the world.

Government announces re-opening of high schools for boys but makes no mention of girls

The Taliban have effectively banned girls from secondary education in Afghanistan, by ordering high schools to re-open only for boys.

Girls were not mentioned in Friday’s announcement, which means boys will be back at their desks next week after a one-month hiatus, while their sisters will still be stuck at home.

• General says calls were ‘perfectly within the duties’ of the chairman
• Far-right groups tell supporters planned rally is a government ‘trap’
• Biden criticized over crowded migrant camp near Del Rio, Texas
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6.54pm BST

Jared Polis has become the first openly gay governor in the US to marry in office.

Related: Jared Polis becomes first sitting governor to marry in same-sex wedding

6.34pm BST

Gen Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has defended phone calls in which, according to a new book by Bob Woodward and Robert Costa of the Washington Post, he reassured his Chinese counterpart that the US would make it through the transition from Donald Trump to Joe Biden without launching an attack on Beijing.

As reported by Woodward and Costa, Milley made “a pair of secret phone calls” to Gen Li Zuocheng.

Related: General Milley cannot undermine civilian authority. The US is not a military junta | Lt Col Daniel L Davis (ret)

Traffic light system replaced, with overseas destinations now listed as either ‘red’ or OK for travel

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Half-term holiday bookings are expected to surge after ministers unveiled a simplification of Covid foreign travel rules, replacing the traffic light system with a single red list and bringing in a laxer regime for tests.

But while the new system was hailed by MPs and some travel groups, airlines voiced anger that fully vaccinated travellers returning to England will still have to take a test after they return, even if this will be changed to a less-expensive lateral flow device.

Canada already shares intelligence with Australia, the UK, the US and New Zealand but was not included in Aukus pact

Justin Trudeau is facing harsh criticism from political rivals after Canada was excluded from a new international defence pact, days before the country votes in a federal election.

Australia, the United Kingdom and the United State on Wednesday announced a new intelligence sharing agreement meant to counter Chinese influence in the Indo-Pacific region.

Gomoh, 24, was ‘innocent and unsuspecting victim’ of brutal stabbing says judge

Four gang members have been jailed for the murder of an NHS worker they picked at random “simply for the sake of it”.

Muhammad Jalloh and David Ture, both 19 and of no fixed address, as well as 23-year-old Vagnei Colubali from Cambridge were found guilty of David Gomoh’s murder in August. Alex Melaku, who could not previously be named as he was younger than 18, was also convicted.

Major commitment with deadline of 2030 is big advance towards reaching 1.5C goal set out in Paris agreement

The US and the EU made a joint pledge on Friday to cut global methane emissions by almost a third in the next decade, in what climate experts hailed as one of the most significant steps yet towards fulfilling the Paris climate agreement.

The pledge came as the UN secretary-general, António Guterres, warned of a “high risk of failure” at the vital UN climate talks, Cop26, set for Glasgow this November.

PM will hope signing of this week’s Aukus deal will help the allies move on from the chaos of Kabul

Boris Johnson will fly to New York this weekend for his first foreign trip since the Covid pandemic, hoping to cement his relationship with the US president, Joe Biden, after a rocky summer marred by the chaotic Kabul airlift.

Two years ago, when Johnson made his first foreign trip as prime minister to the Biarritz G7 summit, the hope was that Donald Trump’s enthusiasm for the man he called “Britain Trump” would help smooth the way for a rapid post-Brexit trade deal with the US.