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Nick Kyrgios won tennis’s latest Battle of the Sexes against Aryna Sabalenka in a dispiriting contest in Dubai that veered uneasily between exhibition, gimmick and outright circus, The Guardian reported. 

The Australian, who has won only one competitive singles match since the end of 2022 and has slipped to 671 in the world rankings, was sweating heavily and breathing hard as early as the fifth game of the match. Yet to no one’s great surprise, the extreme power of his serve, combined with the spin and velocity of his groundstrokes, proved too much for the women’s No 1 player.

“It was a really tough match,” the 30-year-old Kyrgios insisted after his 6-3, 6-3 victory. “ I didn’t know what to expect. She broke my serve numerous times and honestly she was hitting some amazing shots. She is a hell of a competitor. It could have gone either way," according to The Guardian. 

Two popular leaders have formed an alliance ahead of March parliamentary elections in Nepal that will challenge the older parties which have dominated the Himalayan nation's politics for over three decades, party officials and analysts said on Monday, Reuters reported. 

Rapper turned-Kathmandu mayor Balendra Shah, known as Balen, a popular elected official, joined the Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) or national independent party, led by a former TV host-turned politician Rabi Lamichhane on Sunday, party officials said.

They said under the agreement with RSP, 35-year old Balen will become the prime minister if the RSP wins the March 5 elections while Lamichhane, 48, will remain the party chief.

Both have vowed to address the demands raised during the "Gen Z" or youth-led protests against widespread corruption in September in which 77 people were killed and led to Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli resigning, according to Reuters. 

Sixteen people have been killed and three left injured after a fire tore through a nursing home for elderly residents in northern Indonesia, local authorities say, BBC reported. 

The fire department was alerted to a fire at Damai retirement home in the city of Manado, the capital of North Sulawesi province, on Sunday night at around 20:30 local time (12:30 GMT).

Many victims were found inside their rooms, the city's fire and rescue agency chief Jimmy Rotinsulu told news agency AFP, adding that they were likely elderly residents who were resting for the evening when the fire broke out, according to BBC. 

Political parties, including major ones, are preparing to submit their closed lists of candidates for the Proportional Representation (PR) system under the House of Representatives (HoR) election–2082 BS today, which is the second and final day for submission.

According to the schedule released by the Election Commission (EC), the submission of PR lists began on Sunday. 

While several smaller parties submitted their lists on the first day, major parties such as the Nepali Congress, CPN-UML,  Nepali Communist Party (NCP), and Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) are expected to submit their lists today. These parties have scheduled internal meetings before formally approaching the EC.

Political parties must submit supporting documents along with the lists, including confirmation that candidates’ names appear on the voter list, their voter ID numbers, and copies of citizenship certificates.

EC Spokesperson Narayan Prasad Bhattarai said that scrutiny of the lists submitted on December 28 and 29 will take place from December 30 to January 4. If corrections are required, parties will be allowed to make adjustments between January 5 and 11. Verification of the lists will be conducted from January 12 to 17. The preliminary closed list will be published on January 18, while the final list is scheduled for publication on February 3.

A total of 100 political parties, using 93 election symbols, have applied to participate in the PR system. Each party is required to submit a list containing between 11 and 110 candidates.

For the HoR elections scheduled for March 5, the number of registered voters stands at 18,903,689. Voters will cast their votes using two separate ballots: one for the direct election and another for the proportional representation system.