26 m. ago Two Ukrainian men believed to be working with Russia identified as suspects in Polish rail sabotage attacks – Europe live

Donald Tusk warns Polish parliament of an ‘escalation’ of Russian intelligence activities ‘across the whole of Europe’Poland’s prime minister Donald Tusk has just told lawmakers that the authorities investigating the rail sabotage incidents over the weekend identified two main suspects.He says the suspects are Ukrainian men, who crossed into Poland from Belarus this autumn, and are believed to have been working for Russian intelligence services. Continue reading...

Events

67 m. ago 'I thought I had a spot, but it was the start of stage four cancer'

Rebecca has now had part of her lung removed and doctors say it is down to a mistake when she was younger

Politics

1 hour ago Sally Rooney says UK prisoners linked to Palestine Action face ‘shocking mistreatment’

Exclusive: author urges ministers to engage with those on hunger strike, who want better conditions, bail and lifting of banSally Rooney has pleaded with the UK government to address the “shocking mistreatment” of Palestine Action-affiliated prisoners who are on hunger strike, saying she fears for their welfare.Six prisoners awaiting trial are refusing food, including two who have been on hunger strike for more than two weeks and are already said to have lost considerable weight and be struggling physically. Their demands include improved jail conditions, release on bail and lifting the ban on Palestine Action. Continue reading...

Events

1 hour ago Stained log burner glass will be 'like new' in seconds if you use 1 natural waste item

One woman was left with heavily stained glass on her log burner and asked for recommendations on how to remove the black build-up

Events

1 hour ago Love Island star shares devastating cancer diagnosis as she pledges to 'fight'

The reality star is battling head and neck cancer months after announcing her engagement

Science

1 hour ago California farms applied millions of pounds of PFAS to key crops, study finds

‘Forever chemicals’ sprayed on almonds, grapes, tomatoes and other crops as activists warn of ‘obvious problem’California farms applied an average of 2.5m lbs of PFAS “forever chemicals” per year on cropland from 2018 to 2023, or a total of about 15m lbs, a new review of state records shows.The chemicals are added to pesticides that are sprayed on crops such as almonds, pistachios, wine grapes, alfalfa and tomatoes, the review of California Department of Pesticide Regulation data found. The Environmental Working Group nonprofit put together the report. Continue reading...

Politics

2 h. ago 'Engaging' thriller with 'stellar' cast gets streaming date and it's days away

A new thriller starring Julia Roberts and Andrew Garfield is set to be added to Prime Video very soon

Politics

2 h. ago Israel needs to face accountability for our genocide. And so does the US | Yuli Novak

The international community allowed all of this to happen. We must not look away or move onGenocide is a process, not an event. When genocide happens, its roots, and the conditions that allowed it, often become visible only in retrospect. If those conditions remain unchanged and there is no accountability, there’s every reason to believe the violence will return, perhaps even worse, especially if it was never fully halted. This is exactly what we are seeing in the case of Gaza. Demanding accountability from Israeli leaders isn’t just about the past, it’s the only way to challenge a system designed to repeat such violence.A strange kind of calm has settled over Israel in the weeks since the Gaza ceasefire was declared. The sirens stopped. The hostages who survived the 7 October attack and nearly two years in captivity came home. But this calm – which has not been extended to Gaza, where more than 200 civilians have been killed since the ceasefire supposedly went into effect is built ...

Politics

2 h. ago Bone Lake review – holiday rental house of horror is fun for everyone

You don’t need to be a fright flick aficionado to enjoy this smart and witty tale of a romantic weekend break going gruesomely wrongIt is certainly unusual to see in closeup an arrow fired into a naked scrotum before the title of a film has even been shown, but this is that rare film. The scrotum in question belongs to a man fleeing unclothed through the woods from an unseen assailant, together with an equally naked female companion who also comes swiftly to a sticky end. As opening salvoes go, it hits the spot, as it were.Then the film proper begins. A couple arrive at a bougie rental home only to find themselves facing the ultimate millennial nightmare: you’ve shelled out your hand-earned cash on a place for the weekend but find another couple have also booked it. This is the problem of listings on multiple platforms! Or is something more sinister going on? (If the ballsack shish kebab didn’t tip you off, another clue lies in the fact that the movie is called Bone Lake, not Airbnb...

Society

2 h. ago Is Shabana Mahmood’s plan to seize the jewels of asylum seekers a joke? | Zoe Williams

The home secretary’s idea makes her sound so much like a cartoon villain that I initially assumed it couldn’t be true ...You can’t react to every piece of flotsam on the unending tide of nastiness that emanates from Westminster on the subject of immigration, or you’ll start to feel like you’re the idiot. Are we surprised that a Labour home secretary would want to remove any prospect of permanent citizenship for all refugees, thereby ending Britain’s standing as a place of sanctuary? Petty, vindictive, counterproductive, narrow-minded, yes, but you could hardly call this surprising.But, finally, a policy arrived that was so out of the normal run of things that I assumed it was a joke – a piece of satire, floated on X by some member of the wokerati, to make Shabana Mahmood sound truly heinous. Apparently, she wanted to seize the jewellery and other valuables to pay for their accommodation.Deploying exaggeration to underscore how much like a cartoon villain a politician sounds is a lit...

Politics

2 h. ago Conor McGregor 'to FINALLY marry his fiancée Dee Devlin next month after five years engaged'

The couple, who first sparked up a romance some 16 years ago, have been engaged for more than half a decade.

Politics

3 h. ago News | Argyll buys first London office since Crosstree takeover

News | Argyll buys first London office since Crosstree takeover  CoStar

Politics

3 h. ago Sephora Collection’s advent calendar has just dropped – and it’s perfect for teens

Expect entry-level beauty and an accessible price

Politics

4 h. ago Seriously Silly: The Life of Terry Jones by Robert Ross review – portrait of a Python

An affectionate biography of the polymath includes details of never-produced gems such as Monty Python’s Third World WarTerry Jones was a Python, a historian, a bestselling children’s author and a very naughty boy. He loved to play women in drag, started a magazine about countryside ecology (Vole), founded his own real-ale brewery and was even once a columnist for this newspaper, beginning one piece in 2011 like this: “In the 14th century there were two pandemics. One was the Black Death, the other was the commercialisation of warfare.” He even used to write jokes for Cliff Richard.It would be tempting in view of all this to call him a renaissance man, except that Jones rather despised the highfalutin Renaissance, preferring the earthiness of medieval times: his first published book was a scholarly reinterpretation of Chaucer’s Knight’s Tale, arguing that the hero’s fighting and pillaging was being presented satirically by the poet as something deplorable. Later he raided the Norse ...

Politics

4 h. ago Sadiq Khan's £1million bus lane is removed after just three months: Mayor accused of 'wasting' public money following resident backlash

The lane was installed on Regent's Park Road in Finchley, North London, in August in attempt to speed up journeys on buses by giving them more dedicated space on the road.

Economics

5 h. ago Chinese travellers cancel hundreds of thousands of trips to Japan amid rising tensions

Chinese airlines offer free cancellations and film releases postponed after Japanese PM’s comments on TaiwanChinese travellers are estimated to have cancelled hundreds of thousands of tickets to fly to Japan amid reports of suspended visa processing and cultural exchanges as a diplomatic dispute over Japan’s stance on Taiwan continues.Under pressure from business groups, Japan has sent a senior diplomat to Beijing in an attempt to calm tensions after Japan’s prime minister, Sanae Takaichi, said her country could get involved militarily if China attempted to invade Taiwan. Her comments prompted fury from China’s government, which issued warnings against Chinese travellers and students going to Japan. Continue reading...

Events

6 h. ago Council blames England flags for graffiti delays as locals fume at 'big spike'

Stoke-on-Trent City Council has seen a 'big spike' in graffiti complaints - with the authority taking too long to remove the offensive or non-offensive graffiti

Politics

6 h. ago The Wax Child by Olga Ravn review – a visceral tale of witchcraft

The author of The Employees goes back to 17th-century Denmark for an intensely poetic portrait of everyday sorcery and female solidarityOn 26 June 1621, in Copenhagen, a woman was beheaded – which was unusual, but only in the manner of her death. According to one historian, during the years 1617 to 1625, in Denmark a “witch” was burned every five days. The first time this happens in Danish author Olga Ravn’s fourth novel, the condemned woman is “tied to the ladder, and the ladder pushed into the bonfire”. Her daughter watches as she falls, her eye “so strangely orange from within. And then in the heat it explodes.”The child is watched, in turn, by a wax doll who sees everything: everything in this scene, and everything everywhere, through all space and all the time since it was fashioned. It sees the worms burrowing through the soil in which it is buried; the streets of the world in which it was made. It inhabits the bodies that walked those streets: “And I was in the king’s ea...

Politics

7 h. ago Feel a connection to a celebrity you don’t know? There’s a word for that

‘Parasocial’ crowned Cambridge Dictionary’s word of the year as ‘unhealthy’ relationships with celebrities riseIf you’re wondering why Taylor Swift didn’t respond to your social media post offering congratulations on her engagement, then Cambridge Dictionary has a word for you: parasocial.Defined as “involving or relating to a connection that someone feels between themselves and a famous person they do not know”, parasocial has been chosen by the dictionary as its word of the year, as people turn to chatbots, influencers and celebrities to feel connection in their online lives. Continue reading...

Politics

7 h. ago Inside the scandals of the school WhatsApp group – and what you really can’t say

As Rosalind Levine and her partner Maxie Allen win damages after being wrongfully arrested for complaints they’d made on a parents’ WhatsApp group, mum of two Charlotte Cripps looks at the perils of being a member of the class chat and what lines are too dangerous to cross

Politics