ER Report: Here is a summary of significant articles published on EveningReport.nz on May 28, 2025.
Is Vladimir Putin’s indiscriminate bombing of Ukrainian civilians ‘crazy’? It’s more a sign of impatience
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mark Edele, Hansen Professor in History and Deputy Dean, The University of Melbourne United States President Donald Trump was “not happy” with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, this week. For three consecutive nights, from Friday to Sunday, Russia launched about 900 drones and scores of missiles at
This rare alpine frog is fighting against a lethal fungus – by breeding faster and faster
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Laura Brannelly, Senior Lecturer in One Health and Biostatistics, The University of Melbourne Laura Brannelly, CC BY-NC-ND For a small frog, the alpine tree frog (Litoria verreauxii alpina) packs a lot of surprises. For one, this tree frog lives in snowy gullies and high mountain crags across
Being monitored at work? A new report calls for tougher workplace surveillance controls
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Joo-Cheong Tham, Professor, Melbourne Law School, The University of Melbourne Frame stock footage/Shutterstock Australian employers are monitoring employees, frequently without workers’ knowledge or consent, according to a new report. And when workers do know about surveillance, there is little they can do about it. Laws have not
‘Chaotic, sometimes dangerous places’ – why successful rehab for prisoners on remand will be hard to achieve
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Devon Polaschek, Professor of Psychology/Security and Crime Science, University of Waikato Getty Images Last week’s budget allocated NZ$472 million in new funding to deal with a growing prison population caused by greater use of prison remand and proposals to increase prison sentence lengths. The new funding comes
AI models might be drawn to ‘spiritual bliss’. Then again, they might just talk like hippies
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nuhu Osman Attah, Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Philosophy, Australian National University V Kulieva / Shutterstock / Anthropic When multibillion-dollar AI developer Anthropic released the latest versions of its Claude chatbot last week, a surprising word turned up several times in the accompanying “system card”: spiritual. Specifically, the
‘No support, no housing, no job’ – the vicious cycle pushing more women into prison
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hilde Tubex, Professor, The University of Western Australia For too many women, prison is “as good as it gets”. New research based on interviews with 80 female prisoners in Western Australia reveals most of these women were “criminalised” by circumstances outside their control before they became offenders.
Girls with painful periods are twice as likely as their peers to have symptoms of anxiety or depression
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Subhadra Evans, Associate Professor, Psychology, Deakin University Shutterstock Around half of teenage girls experience moderate to severe period pain. The mechanical force of the uterus contracting and inflammatory chemicals such as prostaglandins contribute to this pain. Moderate to severe period pain has a significant impact on daily
From surprise platypus to wandering cane toads, here’s what we found hiding in NSW estuaries
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Maarten De Brauwer, Senior Research Scientist in Marine and Estuarine Ecology, Southern Cross University Maarten De Brauwer Rivers up and down the north coast of New South Wales have been hammered again, just three years after devastating floods hit the Northern Rivers and Hawkesbury-Nepean Valley. The events
The ‘3 day guarantee’ for childcare starts next year. The challenge could be finding quality care
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Victoria Whitington, Associate Professor in Education Futures (Adjunct), University of South Australia One of the Albanese government’s headline election policies was a “three-day guarantee” for childcare. From January 5 2026, all eligible Australian families will be able to access at least three days of subsidised early education
Australia could tax Google, Facebook and other tech giants with a digital services tax – but don’t hold your breath
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Fei Gao, Lecturer in Taxation, Discipline of Accounting, Governance & Regulation, The University of Sydney, University of Sydney Tada Images/Shutterstock Tech giants like Google, Facebook and Netflix make billions of dollars from Australian users every year. But most of those profits are not taxed here. To address
One couple, two apartments, different surnames for the children: how ‘two places to stay’ is shaping families in China
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Xiaoying Qi, Associate Professor, School of Arts and Humanities, Australian Catholic University During fieldwork in cities in China I came across a new marital practice, locally described as liang-tou-dun, literally “two places to stay”. A bride and groom, each an only child of their respective family, receive
Discovering new NZ music in the streaming age is getting harder – what’s the future for local artists?
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Oli Wilson, Professor & Associate Dean Research, Te Kunenga ki Pūrehuroa – Massey University Getty Images New Zealand Music Month turned 25 this year, and there’s been plenty to celebrate – whether it be Mokotron’s Taite Prize-winning Waerea, Lorde’s recent return (though not to New Zealand –
Could a bold anti-poverty experiment from the 1960s inspire a new era in housing justice?
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Deyanira Nevárez Martínez, Assistant Professor of Urban and Regional Planning, Michigan State University Model Cities staff in front of a Baltimore field office in 1971. Robert Breck Chapman Collection, Langsdale Library Special Collections, University of Baltimore, CC BY-NC-ND In cities across the U.S., the housing crisis has
Plea for UN intervention over illegal PNG loggers ‘stealing forests’
RNZ Pacific A United Nations committee is being urged to act over human rights violations committed by illegal loggers in Papua New Guinea. Watchdog groups Act Now! and Jubilee Australia have filed a formal request to the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination to consider action at its next meeting in August. “We
Keith Rankin Analysis – Using Cuba 1962 to explain Trump’s brinkmanship
Analysis by Keith Rankin. People of a certain age will be aware that the 1962 Cuba Missile Crisis was, for the world as a whole, the most dangerous moment of the Cold War. The 1962 ‘Battle of Cuba’ was a ‘cold battle’ in the same sense that the Cold War was a ‘cold war’. (Only
Labor gains a Senate seat from the Liberals in South Australia, while Jacqui Lambie is re-elected
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne Buttons have been pressed to electronically distribute preferences for the Senate in South Australia, Tasmania and the Northern Territory. Labor gained a seat from the Liberals in
Most car-ramming incidents aren’t terrorism – but they’re becoming more common and crowds need better protection
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Milad Haghani, Associate Professor & Principal Fellow in Urban Risk & Resilience, The University of Melbourne Hundreds of thousands of Liverpool Football Club fans packed the centre of Liverpool on Monday to celebrate the club’s English Premier League title. Shortly after 6pm local time, a grey Ford
The fast-tracking of Brisbane’s Olympic infrastructure plans could backfire
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Millicent Kennelly, Senior Lecturer in Sport and Event Management, Griffith University Brisbane was awarded the 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games nearly four years ago under a reformed host selection process. The process aims to reduce games costs, improve sustainability and ensure lasting community benefits. Read more: Looking
Hate over love: conservative influencers have brought angrier anti-abortion politics to Australia
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Prudence Flowers, Senior Lecturer in US History, College of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences, Flinders University After two decades of abortion decriminalisation across Australian states and territories, there has been a sudden surge of anti-abortion activity online, in the streets and in parliaments. Since 2022, right-to-life bills
Earth is heading for 2.7°C warming this century. We may avoid the worst climate scenarios – but the outlook is still dire
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sven Teske, Research Director, Institute for Sustainable Futures, University of Technology Sydney Aliraza Khatri’s Photography/Getty Is climate action a lost cause? The United States is withdrawing from the Paris Agreement for the second time, while heat records over land and sea have toppled and extreme weather events
