Two endurance sailors’ perilous voyage is supposed to lead them to empathy for refugees’ plight – but they sure take their time discovering that Here is a well-intentioned but brief, unsatisfying and oddly structured documentary, supposedly about refugees and boat people … although the refugees’ experiences are only discussed in the final 10 minutes or so. The film is actually about two Egyptians, Omar Nour and Omar Samra, energetic and prosperous young entrepreneurs who in 2017, in a spirit of adventure, took on the Talisker Whisky Atlantic Challenge, a well-established annual endurance event ..read more

Exclusive: Abdellatif released to join family after years of struggling to overturn denial of visa as a result of being convicted in Egyptian trial that used evidence obtained under torture Follow our Australia news live blog for latest updates Get our morning and afternoon news emails, free app or daily news podcast The Egyptian refugee Sayed Abdellatif has been freed after almost 12 years in Australia’s immigration detention facilities. Abdellatif was granted a temporary protection visa and released on Tuesday afternoon from Villawood detention centre before being driven by authorities to ..read more

Going public after I was attacked was hard, but it helped me overcome the shame that so many victims feel A few weeks ago, I had a difficult conversation with my teenage daughter. It came out of something that happened to me more than a decade ago, and which changed the course of my life and work. As a documentary photographer, I have travelled the world, taking portraits of survivors of trauma who shared their testimonies with me. It is a finely balanced exchange, in which they give me their trust, and my pictures attest to their resilience. But for many years, there was always a distance bet ..read more

Ras el–Hekma is part of a $60bn package to help the economy withstand the impact of conflict in Gaza, but critics fear the money will entrench a corrupt, oppressive regime It is one of the few undeveloped spots remaining on the Mediterranean coast. There are white sand beaches, a few olive groves and an ageing 1940s holiday home built by the deposed King Farouk. So far, there is nothing to suggest that, within 30 years, the tranquil Egyptian peninsula of Ras el-Hekma will host a major new city. On 23 February, the Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund ADQ announced plans to develop Ras el-Hekma as p ..read more

Around 9,500 tonnes of track will be provided for north African country’s first fully electrified mainline British Steel has won a multimillion-pound contract to supply rail for a new route in north Africa, the company has announced. Approximately 9,500 tonnes of track, produced in Scunthorpe, will be provided for Egypt’s first fully electrified mainline and freight network which stretches from the Red Sea to the Mediterranean ..read more

Agreement to be signed off on Sunday is part of bloc’s attempt to stop refugees crossing Mediterranean European leaders are set to sign off on a €7.4bn deal with Egypt just days after members of the European parliament accused Brussels of “bankrolling dictators”. The EU-Egypt strategic partnership agreement forms part of the bloc’s latest attempt to stop refugees crossing the Mediterranean and comes less than a year after the EU signed a controversial €150m (£128m) migration and economic pact with Tunisia ..read more

Members of justice committee say €150m in EU funding went straight to country’s president, Kais Saied The European Commission has been accused of “bankrolling dictators” by senior MEPs who have claimed that the €150m it gave to Tunisia last year in a migration and development deal has ended up directly in the president’s hands. A group of MEPs on the human rights, justice and foreign affairs committees at the European parliament launched a scathing attack on the executive in Brussels, expressing anxiety over reports that the commission’s president, Ursula von der Leyen, was about to seal a sim ..read more

Two days of negotiations in Cairo break up with Hamas accusing Israeli PM of not wanting to a deal Negotiations aimed at brokering a ceasefire in the Israel-Gaza war appear to have stalled, days before an unofficial deadline of the beginning of Ramadan. Two days of talks between Hamas and international mediators in the Egyptian capital, Cairo, have not yielded any significant breakthroughs, Palestinian officials said, after Israel declined to send a delegation to the latest round of negotiations ..read more

Officials at Cairo talks say list is first step in truce deal as militant group demands aid into Gaza Egyptian and Qatari officials are putting pressure on Hamas negotiators in Cairo to produce a list of hostages to be released as the first step in a phased ceasefire agreement with Israel, according to officials familiar with the talks. Israel has not sent a delegation to the second day of talks in Cairo, demanding that Hamas present a list of 40 elderly, sick and female hostages who would be the first to be released as part of a truce that would initially last six weeks, beginning with the mo ..read more

With their battered home one of few left standing, the Almodallals make an unsuccessful attempt to leave Gaza The view from the window of the Almodallals’ kitchen in Rafah is nothing but rubble. Piles of debris that used to be their neighbours’ homes surround them in the al-Zuhour neighbourhood, gaping holes ripped through what remains of the walls, leaving only mounds of broken glass and concrete that crack in the silent air when people tread on them. “We were targeted three times: To the right of our house, the left, and behind it. Now we joke that we’re next,” said Shahed Almodallal, a 21-y ..read more