Invertebrates don’t get the attention lavished on cute pets or apex predators, but these unsung heroes are some of the most impressive and resilient creatures on the planet. So when the Guardian opened its poll to find the world’s finest invertebrate, readers got in touch in their droves. A dazzling array of nominations have flown in for insects, arachnids, snails, crustaceans, corals and many more obscure creatures. Patrick Barkham tells Madeleine Finlay why these tiny creatures deserve more recognition, and three readers, Sandy, Nina and Russell, make the case for their favourites
Nasdaq futures tumbled 3.3% and in after-hours trade as $760bn was wiped from the market value of ‘Magnificent Seven’ technology leaders
Stocks dived and investors scrambled to the safety of bonds, gold and the yen on Thursday as Donald Trump unveiled a bigger-than-expected wall of tariffs around the world’s largest economy, upending trade and supply chains.
The technology sector was pummelled as manufacturing hubs in China and Taiwan faced new tariffs above 30%. In total, China now faces an eye-watering 54% in tariffs on its exports to the US.
Australian prime minister surprised after external territories – including tiny Norfolk Island and remote islands home to penguins – targeted by US president
A group of barren, uninhabited volcanic islands near Antarctica, covered in glaciers and home to penguins, have been swept up in Donald Trump’s trade war, as the US president hit them with a 10% tariff on goods.
Heard Island and McDonald Islands, which form an external territory of Australia, are among the remotest places on earth, accessible only via a two-week boat voyage from Perth on Australia’s west coast. They are completely uninhabited, with the last visit from people believed to be nearly 10 years ago.
Trump announces ‘reciprocal’ tariffs on largest US trading partners; Elon Musk may leave government role at end of 130-day cap. Here’s your roundup of key US politics stories from 2 April 2025
Donald Trump announced sweeping tariffs on some of its largest trading partners on Wednesday, upending decades of US trade policy and threatening to unleash a global trade war on what he has dubbed “liberation day”.
Trump said he will impose a 10% universal tariff on all imported foreign goods in addition to “reciprocal tariffs” on a few dozen countries, charging additional duties onto countries that Trump claims have “cheated” America.
Myanmar’s military junta has been losing territory for months. Will the earthquake and a new ceasefire help it turn the tide? Rebecca Ratcliffe reports
“It took around four to five minutes for the earthquake to shake and then it stopped and shook again. It is the most severe earthquake I have experienced in my life.”
Esther J is a reporter based in Bangkok, Thailand, more than 600 miles (966km) away from her home country of Myanmar – the epicentre of last week’s 7.7 magnitude earthquake.
Fandom isn’t a good look on a critic; we’re supposed to be sober and impartial, analytical and measured. What to do, then, when called upon to review your favourite idol, the singer who first turned you on to the power of pop? Judicious rumination or tinny screams of delight?
There’s room for both in this swan song from 80s pop eccentric Cyndi Lauper, as irrepressible here as when I saw her as a teenager, then touring her new album True Colours. She’s had an illustrious career, including a side gig composing musicals – Kinky Boots, and soon an adaptation of 80s workplace comedy Working Girl – but the bulk of her hits are drawn from her first two albums, including the astonishing debut She’s So Unusual.
Girls Just Wanna Have Fun – the song that gives this farewell tour its name – is also by far Lauper’s most famous – though the audience has to wait till the very end for it, in a riot of colour and light directly inspired by Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama. In the buildup, we get a pockmarked history of Lauper’s roots and musical inclinations. Those less familiar with her are likely to be shocked by her power and versatility, her voice ranging across blues, jazz, rock and country without ever losing its bright pop sensibility.
The night opens with the quirky, infectious She Bop, followed quickly by The Goonies ‘R’ Good Enough – a song she refused to play live for many years until she was badgered by Australian fans into including it. Both are performed with elan and vigour, Lauper’s signature jittery moves and syncopated inflections demonstrating the idiosyncrasy of her talent. I Drove All Night comes soon after, sultry and looping, her voice still carrying plenty of heft and texture.
Throughout, the show is peppered with numbers from later albums in a retrospective of Lauper’s outre career. We get an excellent rendition of Who Let In the Rain, from her 1993 record Hatful of Stars, the LED screens providing a torrential background to the sweetly melancholic ballad. Sally’s Pigeons, also from that album, is supported by a vivid recollection of her childhood in blue-collar Queens, including a video essay of memories and associations.
A massive part of Lauper’s appeal as a live performer, apart from the sheer virtuosity of her voice, is the rambling, discursive monologues that bookend many of the songs. They give a sense not only of the warmth and humility of the woman but the audacity and authenticity of the artist, who shot like a strange comet from the working-class Italian-American family of her youth. There is something endearingly homespun about the show, like an extremely well-resourced slide night.
Kryvyi Rig hit while Kharkiv endures barrage of Shahed drones; Nato foreign ministers including Marc Rubio to meet in Brussels. What we know on day 1,135
The new US tariffs “will only create losers” with US consumers particularly hard hit, the German Automotive Industry Association (VDA), has said in a statement, calling on the EU “to act together and with the necessary force, while continuing to signal its willingness to negotiate.”
The body, which represents the powerful German auto industry, said the tariffs marked
the United States’ departure from the rules-based global trade order – and thus a departure from the foundation for global value creation and corresponding growth and prosperity in many regions of the world.
The US president has announced new taxes on imports to the US starting at a baseline of 10% – here is the front-page reaction in Britain
Donald Trump’s tariff “day of liberation” arrived with the US president imposing markups on imports while accusing other nations, including allies, of “looting, pillaging, raping and plundering” the US.
The UK got off relatively lightly with the basic 10%. Here is how major British newspapers see it.
I’ve become addicted to the show. But as a scientist I wonder: how many couples actually stay together?
It has finally happened. After a decade of avoiding the show, my wife and I decided that we would try out the new season of Married at First Sight. We consume quite a bit of reality TV, so it’s not that we avoided it precisely, but something about the idea of watching people struggle to build a healthy relationship amid a storm of cameras and manufactured drama just never drew us in. At least until we watched Married at First Sight and realised it was actually kind of fun.
Relationship drama makes for addictive viewing. But after watching most of a season of weird “marriages”, screaming matches and couch quizzes accompanied by deep and meaningful music, one part of the show has struck me as really weird. Everyone keeps referring to the saga as an “experiment”. From the narrator to the experts who counsel the hapless couples on their relationship dramas, the entire show seems to be calling the experience a social experiment for which we don’t know the outcome.
How many couples stay together until the end of filming?
How many couples stay together after filming is completed?
How many couples are still together and is it fewer than we’d expect?
Barricades go up in Seoul as court prepares to rule on whether to uphold Yoon’s impeachment or restore his powers
The usually quiet streets outside South Korea’s constitutional court in Seoul are now a political ground zero for a decision that will determine the country’s future.
Months after Yoon Suk Yeol imposed martial law and triggered South Korea’s worst political crisis in decades, the court will on Friday decide whether to uphold the suspended president’s impeachment or return him to office.
Automotive industry and prime minister Mark Carney note that 25% tariffs on Canadian steel, aluminum and automobiles will still come into effect within hours
Canada’s exemption from Donald Trump’s global tariffs was “like dodging a bullet into the path of a tank”, say business leaders as other levies are poised to hit key industries that drive the country’s economy.
In a theatrical unveiling of tariffs on countries with “unfair” practices on Wednesday afternoon, Canada was noticeably absent, alongside trade ally Mexico.
Trump pledged to liberate the nation from higher prices, and is betting tariffs won’t raise them too high, for too long
For weeks, Donald Trump and his aides sought to brand Wednesday as “liberation day” in America. Many in the US could be forgiven for wondering what exactly they’ve just been liberated from.
After much hype, the president unveiled his plan for a new era in global trade: a blanket 10% tariff on goods imported into the US starting Saturday, and higher “reciprocal” tariffs (of up to 49%) on countries taxing US exports starting next Wednesday.
President promised liberation yet may have plunged the US into recession and the world into an economic scramble
Donald Trump is finally making good on his campaign promises to “build that wall” – but instead of steel fencing along the Mexican border, it will be constructed from tariffs, and will enclose the entire United States.
In his pugnacious and typically rambling speech on the White House lawn on Wednesday, Trump set out plans for across-the-board import taxes, ranging from 10% to more than 40%.
Donald Trump has hit the UK with tariffs of 10% on exports to the US as he ignited a global trade war that could wipe billions off economic growth.
The US president accused other nations, including allies, of “looting, pillaging, raping and plundering” the US, as he announced tariffs on economic rivals including 20% on the EU and 34% on China as part of what he dubbed “liberation day”.
Insiders say Musk will leave soon, when 130-day cap on government service expires but ‘Doge’ team set to continue
Elon Musk’s polarizing stint slashing and bashing federal bureaucracy will probably soon end, with the world’s richest person’s government service hitting its legal limit in the coming weeks.
“He’s got a big company to run … at some point he’s going to be going back,” Donald Trump told reporters on Monday.
World No 12 switched allegiance from Russia last week
She overcomes nerves to beat Lauren Davis 6-1, 6-1 in Charleston
“And please welcome from Australia, Daria Kasatkina!” With those words from the MC introducing her on court at the Charleston Open on Wednesday, Australia’s latest tennis import admitted she was left feeling a bag of nerves about the advent of her new adventure.
She need not have worried. For just over an hour later, following her consummate first triumph as an Australian player, Kasatkina was soaking up the cheers of the US crowd amid the strains of “I come from a land Down Under”, while beaming a smile of relief mixed with joy.
Pacific country this week declared state of emergency over power cuts that have caused huge disruption to businesses and daily life
Samoa is in the grip of an “energy crisis” prime minister Fiame Naomi Mata’afa said this week, as she declared a state of emergency over power outages that have swept the country for weeks, causing huge disruption to businesses and daily life.
The government is scrambling to provide relief to affected businesses and households, with temporary power generation units due to arrive next week.
Díaz set up Jota’s goal after coming from offside position
‘Do I like the rule? No. It does not help attacking teams’
Arne Slot said he hates the rule that allowed Diogo Jota’s winner in the Merseyside derby to stand as Liverpool restored their 12-point lead at the Premier League summit with a hard-fought victory over Everton.
David Moyes, the Everton manager, claimed that Jota’s 57th‑minute strike should have been disallowed for an offside against Luis Díaz in the buildup. Díaz came from an offside position to regain possession from a James Tarkowski attempted clearance to set up Jota for the winner. According to the rulebook, however, the Colombian had to be “clearly attempting to play a ball which is close when this action impacts on an opponent” to be adjudged offside. He did not.
Fenerbahce coach clashed with Galatasaray’s Okan Buruk
Stuttgart sink Leipzig to book place in DFB-Pokal final
José Mourinho appeared to grab rival manager Okan Buruk’s nose amid wild scenes at the end of Fenerbahce’s 2-1 Turkish Cup defeat to bitter rivals Galatasaray.
Video footage showed Mourinho appearing to pinch Buruk’s nose following the final whistle, with the Galatasaray head coach falling to the pitch and holding his face in his hands. Buruk was left lying on his back as Mourinho was dragged away, following an ill-tempered game where three players were red-carded from the bench.
Lawsuit alleges department’s ending of wide array of grants is ‘unlawful’ and poses ‘serious harm to public health’
Twenty-three states and the District of Columbia are suing the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the health secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr, alleging the abrupt terminations of $11bn in public health funding were “harmful” and “unlawful”.
The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Rhode Island, says that in March 2025, HHS unexpectedly ended a wide array of grants supporting immunizations, infectious disease tracking, and mental health and substance abuse services. The federal government justified the cuts by claiming that the funds were “no longer necessary” because their “limited purpose” had ended along with the Covid-19 pandemic.
Semi-final: Atlético Madrid 0-1 Barcelona (agg 4-5)
Barça v Real Madrid final for first time since 2014
More than a decade later, the Copa del Rey will have a clásico final. First Barcelona played, then they resisted, expertly suppressing Atlético Madrid’s brief rebellion at the Metropolitano, and together those two halves, those two faces, took them through. A wild and open first leg, 4-4 at Montjuic, gave way to a tighter second won by a single Ferran Torres goal. Seville awaits football’s greatest rivals, both of them still chasing a treble. “Dreaming is allowed,” Hansi Flick said, “but we will have to work hard. At the club they have a lot of space for more titles.”
For Diego Simeone’s side, meanwhile, this was The End. In the five weeks since the first leg of this semi-final, a season that had set up to be superb instead escaped Atlético, all three major competitions gone. They have won just one of five games since then, and that was the Champions League second leg in which Madrid knocked them out on penalties. They also slipped nine points off the top in La Liga and now their cup run is over. They had taken their opponents to the line but could not get over it themselves. “There’s nothing to reproach,” the coach said.
Retaliation may not be needed as Britain likely to be ‘front of the queue’ in agreeing deal to redraw trade relationship
What is the best way to respond to Donald Trump and his sweeping tariffs? Keir Starmer thinks the answer is to tread softly, softly – while engaging in intensive negotiations behind the scenes.
There are signs that this strategy is bearing fruit. On Wednesday night, the president announced “reciprocal tariffs on countries throughout the world” including a 10% import tax on UK exports to the US – crucially, lower than the 20% imposed on the EU. The 10% rate was the lowest rate Trump announced and applied to several other countries including Australia, Singapore and Brazil.
Midfielder wants to win silverware with Real Madrid and inspire girls and boys in Scotland as the SFA launches Galáctica, a documentary about her
In a Dunfermline back garden, a young girl doing keepy-uppies in her No 5 Zidane Real Madrid kit turns, shoots and scores in the bottom corner of a green, handbuilt, wooden board, painted by her dad to mark the outlines of a goal. Her family’s video footage is a reminder that the one club Caroline Weir always wanted to play for was Real Madrid.
Fast forward two decades and that same all-white shirt – this time with Weir on the back – hangs on the walls of an Edinburgh cinema as the 29-year-old greets guests attending the premiere of a documentary the Scottish Football Association have made to honour their 108-times-capped midfielder. It feels fitting the film is being released within a fortnight of Weir scoring two decisive late goals in the women’s team’s first el clásico victory over Barcelona.
Fabian Hürzeler has had better weeks. After the agony of being dumped out of the FA Cup quarter-finals on Saturday by Nottingham Forest in a penalty shootout, there was more heartache for the Brighton manager as Marcus Rashford’s third goal in his last two matches, yet another for Marco Asensio and Donyell Malen’s first for the club gave Aston Villa a crucial victory in the battle for a top-five finish.
It meant Unai Emery’s side moved above Brighton and vastly improved their chances of matching last season’s achievement of qualifying for the Champions League. They still have to play fourth- and fifth-placed Manchester City and Newcastle in the run-in but after making some shrewd acquisitions in January, including Rashford and Asensio – who now has eight goals for Villa since joining on loan from Paris Saint-Germain – you wouldn’t bet against them doing it.
There were fist-pumps from Arne Slot as he headed down the Anfield tunnel and roars from the Kop in answer to Andy Robertson’s beseeching. The 246th Merseyside derby proved not merely another step towards the Premier League title for Liverpool but a cathartic release, and the reactions showed it.
The league leaders cleansed themselves of recent torment against Everton and two deflating cup defeats in quick succession to secure a deserved derby win courtesy of Diogo Jota’s fine individual goal.
If Newcastle’s rivals for a Champions League place had hoped Eddie Howe’s players might be partied out after ending that 70-year domestic trophy drought, they were destined for disappointment.
Howe’s team were not at their very best but, thanks to the most eye-catching of winning goals from Sandro Tonali they found a way to defuse Brentford’s ever-present threat.
While the president has identified the need to do things differently, his strategy risks a slump, hitting the very Americans he claims to champion
It would be “liberation day” in the US, the White House announced. Well, we shall see. Yet even if one puts the noise and nastiness that accompany a Donald Trump announcement to one side – in this case tonight’s pronouncement that there will be an executive order announcing “reciprocal tariffs on countries throughout the world”, a 10% tariff on the UK and 20% on the EU – the significance of the theatre is hard to miss. Whether they presage the US’s liberation, or instead the disintegration of the global trading order, Trump’s tariffs add up to an attempt to transform a badly broken economic model. And that is something that affects us all.
Trump’s announcement was awash with insult and rambling nonsense. The rest of the world had looted, raped and pillaged, had scavenged and ransacked America – shocking claims if they had come from any other US president, yet water off a duck’s back today. But the hard core was there all the same: tariffs on the whole of the rest of the world. The shutters were up.
Martin Kettle is a Guardian columnist
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Jack Grealish scored a first Premier League goal in 16 months then dedicated it to his brother, Keelan, on the 25th anniversary of his passing in an emotional post-victory tribute.
The attacking midfielder’s strike came after only 70 seconds as Leicester were shredded by a Savinho dart down the right; the Brazilian found Grealish who beat Mads Hermansen to the goalkeeper’s right. Afterwards on Instagram, Grealish said: “With me always, especially this day – that was for you Keelan.”
The Zambia women’s national team have decided to remove their four US-based players from their squad for upcoming games due to concerns about the Trump administration’s immigration policy, the country’s football federation announced on Wednesday.
The policies have created significant uncertainty for foreigners looking to leave or re-enter the United States after time abroad. In March, a French scientist was detained and his phone was searched upon arriving in Houston for a conference.
National security adviser and team shared ‘sensitive information’ in group chats on app, sources tell Politico
Donald Trump’s national security adviser, Mike Waltz, and his team have created at least 20 different group chats on the encrypted messaging app Signal to coordinate sensitive national security work, sources tell Politico.
The revelation, which cites four people with direct knowledge of the practice, follows heightened scrutiny of the administration’s handling of sensitive information after the Atlantic recently published messages from a chat that included the defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, sharing operational details of deadly strikes against Houthi rebels in Yemen.
Settlements, one with Doug Emhoff’s firm, come as many fear Trumps’s effort to target firms affiliated with his rivals
Two more legal firms have reached agreements with Donald Trump to avoid executive orders that could significantly harm their business.
The settlements come as many have expressed deep alarm at the US president’s effort to target law firms affiliated with his political rivals and see the actions as a thinly-veiled anti-democratic effort to intimidate lawyers from taking cases hostile to the administration.
Forecasters say potent storm system moving east could become supercharged and bring ‘life-threatening’ flooding
Potentially deadly flash flooding, high-magnitude tornadoes and baseball-sized hail could hit parts of the midwest and south on Wednesday as severe thunderstorms blowing eastward become supercharged, forecasters warned.
There were tornado warnings Wednesday morning near the Missouri cities of Joplin and Columbia – merely the opening acts of what forecasters expect will be a more intense period of violent weather later on Wednesday, as daytime heating combines with an unstable atmosphere, strong wind shear and abundant moisture streaming into the nation’s midsection from the Gulf.
Grizzlies star has been suspended twice for handling guns
Morant and Warriors’ Hield both given technical fouls
The NBA is investigating a gesture made by Memphis Grizzlies star guard Ja Morant that could be construed as mimicking shooting a gun, ESPN reported on Wednesday.
Morant extended his left arm and was seen using the finger gun gesture to taunt members of the Golden State Warriors during Tuesday’s game.
Dr Brian Morley claims Last Week Tonight host and show took his words out of context in a 2024 episode on Medicaid
A US healthcare executive has sued John Oliver for defamation following a Last Week Tonight episode on Medicaid, in which the British-American comedian quoted the doctor as saying it was okay for a patient with bowel issues to be “a little dirty for a couple of days”.
Dr Brian Morley, the ex-medical director of AmeriHealth Caritas, argues that Oliver – an outspoken comic whose show has not only addressed muzzling lawsuits but been subject to them – took the quote out of context in an April 2024 episode on Medicaid.
Bloc’s options include retaliating with tariffs on US goods and services and forming closer ties with other countries
Donald Trump is getting ready to impose sweeping and immediate tariffs on all foreign goods, thereby unleashing a trade war and upending the multilateral trading system that the US helped to build after the second world war.
Democrats have appeared lame and leaderless for 72 days, but then Cory Booker stood up and did something
“Would the senator yield for a question?” asked Democratic leader Chuck Schumer.
Senator Cory Booker, who on a long day’s journey into night had turned himself into the fighter that many Democrats were yearning for, replied with a wry smile: “Chuck Schumer, it’s the only time in my life I can tell you no.”
The Legacies of Enslavement programme aims to atone for the Guardian’s past while highlighting the lasting impact of transatlantic slavery
Illustrations by Ngadi Smart
Salvador, Bahia, Brazil. In capoeira – an art form whose origins were carried across the Black Atlantic by enslaved people, but which developed and grew into a cultural form of resistance in Brazil – we sometimes wish each other axé (pronounced “ah-shay”). In doing so, we would be bestowing on our interlocutor life force, vitality or just positive energy in the capoeira roda (circle where capoeira is played) or in life.
The term is also used in Candomblé and Umbanda, syncretic afro-Brazilian religions with African roots. For me it also symbolises the ability to harness ancestral knowledge and energy to enrich the jogo (game of capoeira), embodying and paying tribute to those who kept the art form alive.
If you would like to get in touch with the Legacies of Enslavement team, please email scotttrust.legacies@guardian.co.uk
Danny Mills, watching the Manchester City game, says he is “confused” by a Leicester side that is “almost waving a white flag”.
Ten minutes into the Manchester City game, and a load of fans are just coming in. The protest seems to have had decent numbers, even if the majority of supporters – certainly in the stand that runs along the side of the pitch opposite the TV cameras – were in their seats before kick-off.
You’ll Never Walk Alone is the next anthem to cascade down from the terraces. David Moyes, in his first Merseyside derby at Anfield in 12, years, looks nonplussed.
The players are in the tunnel. Szoboszlai looks like he has grown around three inches of hair over the international break, now dangling down towards his shoulders in an alice band. ‘Allez, Allez, Allez!’ is belted out around Anfield in anticipation of the teams.
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