Good Morning and Happy New Year Australia!! - Yemen rebels are allegedly stealing food from the mouths of the starving - An explosion rips through a crowded housing block - Trump gets his first 2020 challenger - And more in your CareerSpot Global News Briefs:

The United Nations World Food Program is demanding Yemen's Houthi rebels cease diverting food shipments meant for starving civilians.  Aid workers found out people on the ground in the capital Sanaa weren't getting the food, and they traced back the supply chain:  It turned out the food trucks were being sent to the open market, or that shipments were simply given to people who weren't entitled to it.  The civil war has left 20 million Yemenis in a state of food insecurity", and 10 million simply do not know when or where their next meal will arrive.

It's a desperate and sad New Year in the Russian city of Magnitogorsk after a suspected gas explosion tore through a Soviet-era housing block, causing 48 flats to collapse.  Searchers are going brick by brick in vicious, sub-freezing temperatures for any sign of the 40 missing people.  At least four are confirmed dead.  President Vladimir Putin and his staff immediately flew to the remote city north of the border with Kazakhstan to observe the recovery.  With little to no investment in housing in the post-Soviet years, such tragedies are becoming increasingly common as infrastructure decays.  In 2018, Russia had more than 40 fatal gas explosions in homes and flats.

Russian authorities arrested an American and charged him with unspecified spying.  The FSB state security agency identified that man as Paul Whelan, although the state department did not confirm that when requesting consular assistance for him.  Late late year, US authorities arrested Russian gun rights activist Maria Butina - she is said to be really, really cooperating with authorities.

US progressive icon Senator Elizabeth Warren announced she is forming an exploratory committee to run for President in 2020.  She's the first of the Democrats to make it official, getting a jump on the others to secure financing and campaign staff.  Warren positions herself on the Left side of the Democratic party, demanding higher taxes and regulations on corporations, championing increased rights for workers, and a calling for a significant rise in the minimum wage. 

More upheaval in the papacy of Pope Francis:  Vatican spokesman Greg Burke and his deputy Paloma Garcia Ovejero abruptly resigned as the Pope is trying to get a grip on the clergy sex abuse scandal.  "At this time of transition in Vatican communications, we think it's best the Holy Father is completely free to assemble a new team," Burke tweeted, "New Year, New Adventures."  Alrighty then, that's terse.  Francis appointed a longtime member of the Vatican's communications operations, Alessandro Gisotti, as an interim replacement.  

The office of UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is calling for restraint in Bangladesh.  The conservative and Islamist opposition calls "farcical" the weekend elections and does not accept the results that gave Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's Awami League party total control of parliament.  More than a dozen people were killed in election violence.

In the DR Congo, authorities shut down the internet as they count votes from the presidential election.  The government apparently is trying to  prevent social media speculation about the results after a day of balloting plagued by malfunctioning machines and other problems.  The poll was held even though the government delayed voting in three areas because of violence and the Ebola outbreak - three areas that just coincidentally happen to be opposition strongholds.