Health worker Naushaba Roonjho was ostracised by her family in Pakistan for wanting to work but now she is campaigning for political office
When Naushaba Roonjho became the first girl anyone in her district knew to have passed Pakistan’s national secondary school exam, the news was not celebrated. At home, in her village of Sheikh Soomar in southern Sindh, her father told her: “This is enough, you don’t need to study more. You should stay at home now.”
It was 2010 and Roonjho was 17; within weeks she was married, to Muhammad Uris, a labourer. Although, like all the girls in Thatta district, she had left school after primary, Roonjho had kept up her studies independently.
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© Photograph: Courtesy of Leader TV
© Photograph: Courtesy of Leader TV
© Photograph: Courtesy of Leader TV
British military doctors and therapists provide support at base where innovative treatments aid recovery of those who have lost limbs
At a specialist treatment centre in Ukraine, as other amputees play volleyball nearby, Vladislav shows a video on his phone of how he lost his left leg. He found the footage – of a drone closing in rapidly on a buggy, Vladislav standing exposed at its rear – on a Russian military social media channel.
The 31-year-old, an arbitration lawyer before Russia launched its full-scale invasion in 2022, makes a double whistling noise to describe the drone’s ominous progress. “That’s me,” he says, pointing at the video, filmed from a fibre optic drone, chasing him down with terrifying ease as the vehicle slows for a corner. Then the screen goes blank.
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© Photograph: Julia Kochetova/The Guardian
© Photograph: Julia Kochetova/The Guardian
© Photograph: Julia Kochetova/The Guardian
We were colleagues, had both been put up for adoption and were from the same place – but the paperwork said we weren’t related. Then a DNA test changed everything
I grew up in a small town in Connecticut. I always knew I was adopted: my mum told me that, as well as her, I had my “tummy mummy”. I was adopted from the Dominican Republic. My mum there was called Julianna, and she and my dad gave me up for adoption because they were poor.
Fast-forward to 2013, and I was 24 and working in a restaurant in New Haven. One day, one of my co‑ workers, Julia, noticed my Dominican Republic flag tattoo. She told me she was from there, too. I said I was adopted from there, and she said she was as well.
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© Photograph: Aníbal Martel/The Guardian
© Photograph: Aníbal Martel/The Guardian
© Photograph: Aníbal Martel/The Guardian
When I started as a reporter in Paris in the 1970s, long, boozy lunches were the norm. Now only fast food and fine dining are thriving
Spare a thought for the poor French restaurateur. Once the iconic image of a sybaritic nation that loved nothing more than a boozy meal out with friends or colleagues, the French restaurant is in deep crisis. Traditional restaurants are closing faster than you can shout “garçon!”, as eating habits change and the cost of living pinches.
“It’s a catastrophe for our profession,” Franck Chaumès, president of the restaurant branch of the Union of Hospitality Trades and Industries (UMIH) said in a television interview recently. “Some 25 restaurants are going out of business every day.” The UMIH has demanded – so far in vain – that the government ration the opening of new restaurants, in proportion to the local population, and license only professionals who are qualified in cooking and accounting.
Paul Taylor is a senior visiting fellow at the European Policy Centre
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© Photograph: David Bagnall/Alamy
© Photograph: David Bagnall/Alamy
© Photograph: David Bagnall/Alamy
Both stars have bigger films on release but are hugely proud of The History of Sound, which has been four years in the making. They talk about the vulnerability of singing, the cost of inhabiting a role – and rationing future parts
All things considered, telling Paul Mescal I once placed a bet on him is not quite the icebreaker I had hoped. Or rather, it breaks the ice in an unusual way.
“The key question,” he says, his voice betraying a hint of trepidation, “is what was the bet? Most Likely to Join the 27 Club?”
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© Photograph: Ruven Afanador
© Photograph: Ruven Afanador
© Photograph: Ruven Afanador
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