Scientists say bears in southern Greenland differ genetically to those in the north, suggesting they could adjust

Changes in polar bear DNA that could help the animals adapt to warmer climates have been detected by researchers, in a study thought to be the first time a statistically significant link has been found between rising temperatures and changing DNA in a wild mammal species.

Climate breakdown is threatening the survival of polar bears. Two-thirds of them are expected to have disappeared by 2050 as their icy habitat melts and the weather becomes hotter.

Move follows a disagreement with the largest grouping in parliament, with elections to be held within 45-60 days

Thailand’s prime minister, Anutin Charnvirakul, announced on Thursday that he is “returning power to the people”, moving to dissolve parliament and clear the way for elections earlier than previously anticipated.

Government spokesperson Siripong Angkasakulkiat said the move followed a disagreement with the largest grouping in parliament, the opposition People’s party. “This happened because we can’t go forward in parliament,” he told Reuters.

Papua New Guinea has one of the fastest growing HIV epidemics in the Asia-Pacific region, with many unaware they have the virus

After battling illness for years, Nancy Karipa tested positive for HIV in 1999. She had just given birth to her first child. “It was a crossroads moment for me, with the fear of denial, but I chose action,” Karipa, who is now in her 50s, said at an Aids awareness event in Papua New Guinea’s capital Port Moresby in December. She and the baby received treatment, and her child remains healthy.

Karipa, from East Sepik in northern PNG, is unusual in sharing her story. The stigma around the disease is high in the Pacific nation, but speaking out has never been more important. This year PNG declared HIV a “national crisis”.

Order, which lacks the force of law, also creates taskforce whose ‘sole responsibility’ will be challenging states’ AI laws

Donald Trump signed an executive order on Thursday that seeks to halt any laws limiting artificial intelligence and block states from regulating the rapidly emerging technology. The order also creates a federal taskforce that will have the “sole responsibility” of challenging states’ AI laws.

At a signing ceremony, the president touted AI companies’ enthusiasm for wanting to “invest” in the United States and said that “if they had to get 50 different approvals from 50 different states, you could forget it”.

Taken star lends his voice to a film that questions the legitimacy of vaccines and includes interview with RFK Jr

Liam Neeson has lent his voice to a new documentary that questions the legitimacy of vaccines and praises Donald Trump’s health and human services secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr.

The film, called Plague of Corruption, is narrated by the Taken actor and based on a bestselling book co-authored by Judy Mikovits, a disgraced former scientist who gained notoriety during the Covid pandemic. She claimed Covid was caused by a bad strain of the flu vaccine and urged people not to get vaccinated.

Gabriel Jesus is looking to impress, Daniel Muñoz is tough to replace and is this it for Mohamed Salah at Liverpool?

• Premier League top scorers: the Golden Boot race

This season Chelsea have held Arsenal after going down to 10 men and have beaten Barcelona, Liverpool and Tottenham. They have also dropped points against Atalanta, Brentford, Bournemouth, Brighton, Leeds, Qarabag and Sunderland. It is clear that winning against smaller sides remains a problem for Enzo Maresca. Chelsea rise to the big occasion but inconsistency flares when they are expected to win. They do not like playing against deep defences – Maresca has often reacted with dismay when opponents switch to a back five to counter his carefully formulated plans – and can be forgiven if they are edgy about hosting Everton on Saturday. David Moyes’s side have just recorded clean sheets at Bournemouth and Manchester United. They will back themselves to neutralise Chelsea’s attacking talents. Jacob Steinberg

Chelsea v Everton, Saturday 3pm (all times GMT)

Liverpool v Brighton, Saturday 3pm

Burnley v Fulham, Saturday 5.30pm

Arsenal v Wolves, Saturday 8pm

The PDC world darts championship is back, but could the new £1m winners’ cheque make this show too big?

A team of assistant referees walks into the Twelve Pins in Finsbury Park carrying linesmen’s flags and whistles. It’s 3pm on a Thursday, you think, they’ve probably just been reffing a local game. Then, you think, there isn’t a football pitch around here. And why haven’t they changed and showered? Then more referees walk in, more linesmen, one of them in a comedy wig. And eventually the penny drops.

Yes, “the Darts” is back: an indispensable festive trimming that – much like Christmas itself – always seems to roll around a little sooner every year. Fire up all the old cliches: “the beauty of set play”, “bent the wire”, “pressure the shot”. Wheel John Part out of the attic. Fingers poised on the 180 zoom. You know it’s serious, because it’s two hours before his match and Luke Littler is already on the practice board.

Platform fighting world-leading ban on grounds it contravenes implied freedom of political communication in constitution

• Will Australia’s social media ban survive a high court challenge?

Reddit has filed a challenge against Australia’s under-16s social media ban in the high court, lodging its case two days after implementing age restrictions on its website.

The company said in a Reddit post on Friday that while it agreed with protecting people under 16, the law “has the unfortunate effect of forcing intrusive and potentially insecure verification processes on adults as well as minors, isolating teens from the ability to engage in age-appropriate community experiences”.

Reddit said there was an “illogical patchwork” of platforms included in the ban.

President Nayib Bukele entrusting chatbot known for calling itself ‘MechaHitler’ to create ‘AI-powered’ curricula

Elon Musk is partnering with the government of El Salvador to bring his artificial intelligence company’s chatbot, Grok, to more than 1 million students across the country, according to a Thursday announcement by xAI. Over the next two years, the plan is to “deploy” the chatbot to more than 5,000 public schools in an “AI-powered education program”.

xAI’s Grok is more known for referring to itself as “MechaHitler” and espousing far-right conspiracy theories than it is for public education. Over the past year, the chatbot has spewed various antisemitic content, decried “white genocide” and claimed Donald Trump won the 2020 election.

• Collins discloses stage 4 glioblastoma diagnosis

• Former NBA trailblazer pursuing new therapies

• Symptoms appeared and worsened rapidly

Jason Collins, the former NBA player who became the first openly gay man to play in a major US pro sports league, said Thursday he’s battling “one of the deadliest forms of brain cancer”.

Collins, who revealed in a brief statement in September that he was undergoing treatment for a brain tumor, said in an interview with ESPN’s Ramona Shelburne published Thursday that he has stage 4 glioblastoma.

Roundhouse apologises after animation projected behind band appears to show Star of David entwined with swastika

A music venue in London has apologised after antisemitic imagery was allegedly displayed on stage during a Primal Scream gig.

A video appearing to show the Star of David entwined with a swastika was said to be screened during the Scottish band’s show at the Roundhouse in Camden on Monday.

Measure to redistrict, which would add two GOP-friendly seats, failed 19-31 after 21 Republicans joined 10 Democrats

Indiana Republicans rejected an effort to redraw the state’s congressional map on Thursday, a stunning and blunt rebuke of Donald Trump and Republican efforts to reconfigure the state’s congressional districts to add two more Republican-friendly seats.

The measure failed 19-31, with 21 Republicans joining 10 Democrats in rejecting the new maps.

The media company is investing $1bn in OpenAI – and allowing its characters to be used in generated videos

Users of OpenAI’s video generation app will soon be able to see their own faces alongside characters from Marvel, Pixar, Star Wars and Disney’s animated films, according to a joint announcement from the startup and Disney on Thursday. Perhaps you, Lightning McQueen and Iron Man are all dancing together in the Mos Eisley Cantina.

Sora is an app made by OpenAI, the firm behind ChatGPT, which allows users to generate videos of up to 20 seconds through short text prompts. The startup previously attempted to steer Sora’s output away from unlicensed copyrighted material, though with little success, which prompted threats of lawsuits by rights holders.

Roger Federer, an ardent Basel supporter, was up in the stands, in the posh seats to be precise, but even he could surely ignore his allegiances and appreciate the grace with which Youri Tielemans clinched victory for Aston Villa.

Unai Emery turned to Tielemans at half-time and the midfielder delivered within eight minutes, his classy first-time finish regaining the lead, after Evann Guessand’s early strike was cancelled out. This represented a 14th victory in their past 16 matches and it felt a significant one, too, given the pileup at the top of the table amid the scrap to advance automatically to the last 16 in March.

This might be Crystal Palace’s first European campaign but they are learning very quickly. Having arrived in Dublin missing some of their big-hitters including star striker Jean-Philippe Mateta and the marauding wing-back Daniel Muñoz, they left with a comfortable victory that virtually assured them of a place in the Conference League playoffs.

Oliver Glasner has already said that he will play a weakened team against Finnish side KuPS in their final group stage match next week despite slipping up against Strasbourg on their last outing as Palace are in the middle of a marathon December in which they will play eight times. So it was heartening for him to see some of his fringe players shine, as Christantus Uche capped only his second start since joining on an initial loan from Getafe in the summer with a well-taken goal and Eddie Nketiah scored for the second game in succession.

Two matches is not an adequate window in which to judge a manager. Nonetheless, these are worrying times for Wilfried Nancy and Celtic. Seriously worrying, in truth.

Back-to-back losses since the Frenchman’s arrival would be bad enough without the rampant manner in which Roma ensured six points from six in visits to Glasgow during this season’s Europa League. What a canter this proved from minute one.

Yana Leonova faces multiple charges including fraud and conspiracy for smuggling US aviation parts to Russia

An ongoing FBI investigation into a Belarusian woman accused of smuggling US aviation parts and electronics to Russia is teetering on the brink of collapse after being caught in what one judge called a “Kafkaesque” case brought on by the Trump administration’s attempts to deport her before she faces trial.

Federal prosecutors had worked for over a year to secure the extradition of Yana Leonova, who faces multiple charges including fraud, conspiracy, and money laundering. But their efforts unraveled when immigration officials abruptly issued an order to detain and deport her soon after she was flown into the US last month, a move that plunged the case into legal chaos.

• Kalimuendo and Jesus goals give Forest 2-1 away win

• Robbie Keane’s Ferencvaros defeat Rangers 2-1

Igor Jesus’s late goal sealed Nottingham Forest a 2-1 win in Utrecht and boosted their hopes of a top-eight finish in the Europa League group phase. Arnaud Kalimuendo’s second-half opener for Forest was cancelled out by the Utrecht substitute Mike van der Hoorn before Jesus stepped off the bench to fire home the visitors’ late winner.

Forest bounced back from last weekend’s disappointing defeat at Everton to secure their third win in this season’s competition – their first on the road – and move on to 11 points after six matches. Murillo, Oleksandr Zinchenko and Douglas Luiz returned from injury as Sean Dyche made nine changes from Saturday’s 3-0 loss, and his rejigged side made an impressive start to the first competitive meeting between the two teams.

Utah judge weighs media access in prosecution of Tyler Robinson, 22, who is charged with aggravated murder

The 22-year-old Utah man charged with killing Charlie Kirk made his first in-person court appearance on Thursday as his attorneys push to further limit media access in the high-profile criminal case.

A Utah judge is weighing the public’s right to know details in the prosecution of Tyler Robinson against his attorneys’ concerns that the swarm of media attention could interfere with his right to a fair trial.

Move interpreted as escalation of US policy as Vladimir Putin ‘reaffirms’ support for South American dictator

• US politics live – latest updates

Diplomatic pressure on Nicolás Maduro has grown after the US interdicted a “dark fleet” tanker off the coast of Venezuela in a move that has been interpreted as an escalation of the Trump administration’s pressure on the South American dictator.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt on Thursday said that the US would take the seized oil tanker, the Skipper, to a US port one day after military and law enforcement boarded it off the coast of Venezuela.

New York attorney general dodges indictment for second time in a week as Trump’s justice department seeks retribution

A federal grand jury has declined to indict Letitia James, the New York attorney general, on mortgage fraud charges for the second time in a week, according to a person familiar with the matter, in an embarrassing blow to the Trump justice department as the president has sought retribution against one of his political rivals.

The department has attempted to twice file new charges against James after a judge dismissed an indictment against her after determining the prosecutor handling the case had not been properly appointed.

Trump hands 760 acres of California public land to the navy for a new defense zone, deepening border militarization

The US’s southern border is poised to become more militarized following an announcement by Trump administration officials that armed forces would now oversee 760 acres of public land for a three-year period.

The US Department of Interior said in a statement that jurisdiction over this acreage – located in California’s San Diego and Imperial counties – would be transferred to the US navy “to establish a National Defense Area to support ongoing border security operations”.

UC Berkeley apologizes to Israeli sociologist and dance teacher and Pomona to create taskforce on Jewish life

Two California colleges have reached settlements with Jewish organizations and individuals who filed complaints alleging antisemitism arising from pro-Palestinian campus protests, including a $60,000 payment to an Israeli sociologist and dance researcher who says she was not rehired by the University of California, Berkeley despite the popularity of her class.

The UC Berkeley chancellor, Rich Lyons, on Wednesday issued an apology to Yael Nativ, a visiting 2022 professor who was found in a campus investigation to have been the victim of discrimination, the Los Angeles Times reported. She is also invited to teach her class in a semester of her choosing.

Author whose Shopaholic series of romcom novels were global bestsellers and adapted into a Hollywood film

Sophie Kinsella, who has died of a brain tumour aged 55, was one of Britain’s most successful novelists, selling more than 50 million copies of her books, including the globally successful Shopaholic series. Through three decades she retained a loyal and passionate readership with her deceptively light and intricately plotted comic novels.

Like her best-known heroine, Becky Bloomwood, Kinsella began her writing career in financial journalism, but, realising she was uninspired (and probably not very good at it), she wrote a book, The Tennis Party, that was published in 1995, when she was 25, under her given name, Madeleine Wickham (“Maddy”). This was followed by five subsequent standalone “Aga sagas”, which all achieved moderate chart success and critical acclaim.