Good morning. Vladimir Putin increases the size of Russia’s armed forces. Peter Dutton has denounced the inquiry into Scott Morrison’s secret ministries as a “witch-hunt”. And tropical regions could experience dangerously high heat levels most days of the year by 2100.
Australia’s huge bureaucratic visa backlog has a very human impact: for example Huma, an Afghan woman set alight by the Taliban. She is waiting with her family in Pakistan in fear of deportation, anxiously waiting for a decision on her application which they lodged 12 months ago. This week the family’s Pakistan visa expired and they are in hiding. Their lawyer says their case is emblematic of thousands.
