| The election result in Belarus sparked a night of defiance and violence. Tens of thousands of opponents of the country’s president of 26 years, Alexander Lukashenko, faced off with heavily armed riot police in Minsk. Unrest and violence erupted in the centre of Chicago after weeks of bubbling tension in a number of neighbourhoods across the city. Protests began on Sunday after a man was shot by police on the city’s south side. Privacy campaigners have expressed alarm after the UK government revealed it had hired an artificial intelligence firm to collect and analyse the tweets of citizens as part of a coronavirus-related contract. Donald Trump has denied that his team ever approached South Dakota’s governor about adding his face to the monument depicting four presidents at Mount Rushmore. But he said it sounded like a good idea. Recommended reads Australia’s “deficit bad, surplus amazing” mantra should finally be binned, Greg Jericho writes today. The budget balance gets far too much coverage, he says. “So unimportant is it that it should barely be mentioned – except to highlight that any boasting about it generally reveals its lack of connection with the economy.” Since travel is off the cards (for now), Andy Hazel is exploring the vast terrain of video game worlds. “One hackneyed answer to the question of why we travel is the wish to broaden the mind. If this is true, then each traveller leaves home looking to satisfy some kind of curiosity about the world and how they might be changed by being in another part of it.” Tobacco plants have been modified with a protein found in algae to improve their photosynthesis and increase growth while using less water. It’s an advance that could point the way to higher-yielding crops in a drought-afflicted future. Having proved the concept in tobacco plants, scientists at the University of Essex hope to further refine the technique and adapt it to crops, targeting soybeans, cowpea and rice. Listen Millions of people in Melbourne are living under the toughest lockdown laws in Australia. Residents are subject to a curfew and police patrol the streets to enforce stringent restrictions on leaving the house, with even exercise and shopping severely limited. The writer Anna Spargo-Ryan and Guardian readers share their experiences on Full Story. | 