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Curling: The comeback is on at the ice centre! After six ends, Britain have pulled the deficit down to just one point, the Italian leading 5-4.

Snowboarding: Britain’s Charlotte Bankes has made it safely through the first seeding run in the snowboard cross under the most perfect azure skies. It’s a decent time, 1:14:21, and should sneak her into the top 20.

⚽ Latest news, previews and updates before the weekend
⚽ Ten things to look out for in the FA Cup | And email Niall

Slot is asked where the FA Cup sits among his priorities for the season – he puts it on an equal footing with competing in this year’s Champions League, and ensuring qualification for next season.

He also praises Brighton, who knocked Manchester United out in the third round but are in a bad run of form – “we have a lot in common; they are so much better than their league position suggests.”

Case brought by the group’s co-founder is challenging the organisation’s ban under the Terrorism Act

The High Court is set to rule on whether the Home Office’s decision to proscribe Palestine Action as a terrorist group was lawful.

Huda Ammori, the co-founder of Palestine Action, took legal action against the government to challenge the decision by then-home secretary Yvette Cooper to ban the group under the Terrorism Act 2000.

Rolling coverage of the latest economic and financial news

Paul Thwaite is now the highest earning CEO at NatWest Group since his disgraced predecessor Fred Goodwin was handed £7.7m in the lead-up to the financial crisis (and, let’s not forget, its £45bn bailout) in 2006.

I asked during the earnings media call this morning whether Thwaite was comfortable with his new £6.6m pay package for 2025, and whether it was an appropriate moment to be returning to pre-financial crisis pay levels.

This was Thwaite’s response:

The first thing I’d say is that I recognise that senior roles in financial services, in banking and actually in wider professional services, are very well paid. I appreciate that. I know that, I believe I’m very fortunate, and it would be churlish for me to suggest otherwise.

The exec pay policy is set by the board, It’s voted on by shareholders. There’s obviously a very close link between reward and performance. And it goes up and down depending upon performance. So that’s all I’ll say on that, really.

I’ve been here a long time and very proud of what we’ve achieved over the last couple of years as the bank. We have a fantastic team and we’re trying to make sure we support the UK economy, and that’s where all my time and energy goes.”

All stones in Cortina are made from granite found on tiny island in Firth of Clyde and crafted in East Ayrshire

“It takes 60m years and about six hours to make a curling stone,” shouts Ricky English above the whine of the lathes. The operations manager at Kays Scotland is surrounded by wheels of ancient granite in varying states of refinement.

It is a small business with a big responsibility: the only factory in the world to supply the Winter Olympics with curling stones. Competitors don’t travel with their own stones, which weigh about 18kg each, and with 16 required for a game. Instead, this year, 132 stones were crafted in the East Ayrshire town of Mauchline and shipped to northern Italy.

(Epitaph)
Even after 35 years, the intricacies and emotional pangs of these masters of technicality remain undimmed, drawing from a seemingly bottomless well of inspiration

Metalcore has become a diluted premise, associated more with bands that write processed, sing-along choruses than the mix of metal technicality and punk-rock fury it started as. Converge’s 2001 breakthrough Jane Doe remains the masterpiece of the genre’s pre-bastardisation days: vicious as a pit bull, yet played by men unafraid to test the limits, as evidenced by the tormented, 11-minute title track. The New Englanders have never rested on their laurels, either, with subsequent releases emphasising different shades of their trademark anarchy.

The band’s 10th album and first in nine years (Chelsea Wolfe collaboration Bloodmoon: I not included), Love Is Not Enough condenses their carnage, intricacies and emotional pangs into their shortest-ever run time. Distract and Divide and To Feel Something are incensed and tightly arranged, as if Napalm Death and Slayer had joined forces to strangle you through the speakers.

German chancellor Friedrich Merz among key figures to speak as three-day security gathering opens

Guardian staff:

The US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, has said he will have a chance to meet Volodymyr Zelenskyy at this week’s Munich Security Conference.

What comes next for Europe with the transatlantic alliance in tatters? Guardian Europe editor Jon Henley will be answering readers’ questions live here from 12pm GMT. Join us then and post your questions and comments now

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Today’s opening of the Munich Security Conference marks a year since JD Vance’s blistering attack on European leaders signalled the start of a new world order – and huge questions for Europe about its future.

Writing in the This Is Europe newsletter this week, Jon described this as Europe’s moment of reckoning as it faces what Emmanuel Macron called a “tsunami” of competition from China and a US that is “openly anti-European”.

Munich Security Conference: Rubio flies in amid testing times for US-Europe ties – live
German chancellor Friedrich Merz among key figures to speak as three-day security gathering opens

Democrats at Munich security summit to urge Europe to stand up to Trump
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‘Made in Europe’ – an industrial strategy: an idea whose time has come
Defending European strategic interests must be a priority to level the economic playing field in an increasingly volatile world

(Self-released)
The Aymara musician takes inspiration from an Andean tradition, resulting in a scrappy sonic meditation with woozy melodies and pockets of warmth

The new album from Joshua Chuquimia Crampton takes its name from the Andean ceremony Anata, which gives thanks for the harvest before the rainy season. Made up of seven dense and distorted instrumentals, the record is the California-based Aymara musician’s attempt at capturing the energy of ceremonial music – not some rosy, polished version, but how it might sound recorded on a phone, clipping and all.

The concept might sound bizarre, but for fans of JCC, it makes total sense. His music, often self-released and proudly unmastered, is characterised by its murky textures and amp-blasting volume. He took this rudimentary approach to the max with last year’s collaborative project Los Thuthanaka, alongside his sibling Chuquimamani-Condori, which was splattered with cartoonish vocal samples, whistles and syncopated rhythms. Here he returns to his solo formula, with just guitar, bass and a few Andean instruments. You’d call it stripped-back if it wasn’t so noisy.

Preparing simple, repetitive meals is the key to 30 days of fasting

Ramadan arrives this year in February, in the heart of winter. Short days, cold evenings and the pressure of everyday work mean that preparation is no longer about producing abundance, but about reducing effort while maintaining care. For many households balancing jobs, children and long commutes, the question is not what to cook, but how to make the month manageable.

The most effective approach to Ramadan cooking is not variety but repetition. A small set of meals that are easy to digest, quick to prepare and gentle on the body can carry a household through 30 days of fasting with far less stress than daily reinvention. The aim is to do the thinking once, not every day.

Have you followed the big stories in the Six Nations, Winter Olympics, Premier League, Super League and Super Bowl?

The Norwegian showcased his skills in the chess.com speed championship, but the US star and streamer was twice beaten

Magnus Carlsen, the world No 1, visited Central London last weekend and won the chess.com speed championship for the fourth time in a row. The Norwegian, 35, defeated France’s Alireza Firouzja, 22, by 15-12 after a three-hour struggle. Last year in Paris the same two players met, but Carlsen’s winning margin was a much wider 23.5-7.5.

The format for speed chess is 90 minutes of five minutes blitz, 60 ­minutes of three minutes blitz, and 30 minutes of one minute bullet. All the segments had additional increments of one second per move.

For once, the party has done right by young people by proposing they get more of a say in a system rigged against them. Farage, beware

Here it is as promised, a bill introduced to parliament on Thursday proposing to give the vote to 16- and 17-year-olds by the next general election. Good. The accusation from the Conservatives and Reform last year was that this was gerrymandering. “Rank hypocrisy” says the Sun. If polls had shown that the young traditionally swing to the right, would Labour have espoused this? I don’t know.

Nigel Farage’s claim that the young are turning to him is largely overblown, according to YouGov polling, with only 9% of 18 to 24-year-olds saying they would vote Reform – no better than what Ukip achieved in 2015. However there is a gender gap, says More in Common, with boys nearly twice as likely to support parties on the right. The Tories, who will lose out, search for reasons to oppose the bill and come up with some rum arguments. I particularly enjoyed Claire Coutinho’s concern that young people do not need the “added pressure” of deciding whether to focus on their exams or “stay up to watch” political debates, as elections are often in the summer exam season.

Polly Toynbee is a Guardian columnist

In the 60s and 70s, he pioneered kitchen-sink drama and made bisexuality mainstream. So why did the director end up making Tory ads? Those who knew him best reveal all

Michael Childers was a 22-year-old Los Angeles student when a friend set him up on a date with John Schlesinger, a visiting British director nearly two decades his senior. The esteemed film-maker was licking his wounds: his most recent picture, Far from the Madding Crowd, which imbued its 19th-century rural characters with an anachronistic King’s Road style and panache, had flopped stateside.

Childers approached the date with mixed feelings. He adored Schlesinger’s previous movie, the jazzy Darling, starring Julie Christie as a model on the make, and had seen it three times.But he had heard the director described as “mercurial”. His solution was to take a friend along with him to the bar at the Beverly Wilshire hotel for backup. “I thought: This guy might be a total shit,” recalls Childers, now 81, on the phone from Palm Springs. “I told my friend, ‘Two kicks under the table means we’re out of here. One kick means you’re out of here.’”

This week’s best wildlife photographs from around the world

Ryan Murphy turns his increasingly unsteady hand to the tale of America’s privileged, cursed dynasty – even diehard fans will find this tedious drama a punishing slog

A new product from the Ryan Murphy brand is becoming ever less dependable a delight. Will it be a Nip/Tuck or Glee-level triumph? A return to inaugural American Horror Story form, as his recent outing The Beauty so nearly was? Or will it be something towards the other end of the scale, where the so-bad-it’s-bad, Kim-Kardashian-as-a-divorce-lawyer All’s Fair lurks?

Hmm. The latest one is Love Story: John F Kennedy Jr & Carolyn Bessette. It is a nine-episode series that lasts roughly as long as the golden couple’s relationship did in real life and is (unlike All’s Fair) punishingly boring. Some of this will be due to the fact that for a UK audience the Kennedys simply do not hold the fascination they have always held for Americans. Ever since the patriarch Joe successfully manoeuvred his telegenic son John F Kennedy into politics, the political dynasty have been the United States’ answer to the royal family. The minutiae of their privileged, cursed lives have been breathlessly chronicled in books by hagiographic biographers, tabloid articles seeking scandal, and everything in between. Over here, of course, we have naturally been less enthralled.

The controversy over the IOC’s decision to bar the Ukrainian from competing has cast a long shadow over the Games

The Winter Olympics have been presented as a stage for unity – a place where nations set aside conflict, athletes chase excellence, and the world gathers in a shared celebration of human potential. Yet Thursday was shadowed by controversy for the International Olympic Committee that raise difficult questions about neutrality and the limits of political expression in sport.

The Ukrainian skeleton racer Vladyslav Heraskevych was barred from competing after he insisted on wearing what he called a “helmet of memory”, created to honour Ukrainian athletes killed during Russia’s war against his country. He was informed only 21 minutes before racing by the IOC president, Kirsty Coventry, who spoke to the media in tears after she could not persuade him to change his mind.

On game day, where fashion has become a huge part of athlete identity, professionals are reaching for codified displays of their wealth

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On Sunday night the Seattle Seahawks beat the New England Patriots in Super Bowl LX, Bad Bunny put on a spectacular half-time show, and multiple players all walked down the tunnel from the car park to the dressing rooms carrying the same logo’d bag. The bag in question, by luxury French brand Goyard, isn’t part of any official uniform – and isn’t really known outside of its 0.1% customer base. But it has become as ubiquitous a status symbol among American football players as their AirPods Max headphones and Richard Mille watches – and is part of a brave new world of tunnel fits.

Most primetime NFL games’ coverage start hours before kick-off, as photographers, fans and pundits alike pore over players’ sartorial choices just as they would their missed tackles and spectacular catches.

From 80s punk hangouts to celebrity hotspots to good old community boozers, readers reveal their much-loved locals

I started working at the Windmill in the Surrey Hills when I was 14 and the landlord, Cecil Baber Brendan Holland – Dutch to the locals – became my second father. My second son’s second name is Brendan, after him. Several photographers, entrepreneurs, sportspeople and musicians lived in the area – Eric Clapton’s house was just around the corner. Although I never quite got over answering the phone to someone asking for Mick and I made the mistake of asking “Mick who?”

Prosecutor says ‘newly discovered evidence’ in case against Alfredo Alejandro Aljorna and Julio Cesar Sosa-Celis ‘materially inconsistent with the allegations against them’

Federal prosecutors in Minneapolis have moved to drop felony assault charges against two Venezuelan men, including one shot in the leg by an immigration officer, after new evidence emerged undercutting the government’s version of events.

In a filing on Thursday, the US attorney’s office for the district of Minnesota said “newly discovered evidence” in the criminal case against Alfredo Alejandro Aljorna and Julio Cesar Sosa-Celis “is materially inconsistent with the allegations against them” made in a criminal complaint and a court hearing last month.

Number of males at RSPB Abernethy rises to 30, after ‘huge amount of work’ by conservationists in Highlands forests

After decades of decline, there are signs of hope for the capercaillie, one of Britain’s most endangered birds.

Populations of the charismatic grouse, which is found only in the Caledonian pine forests of the Scottish Highlands, have increased by 50%, from 20 males in 2020 to 30 in 2025 at RSPB Abernethy.

Exclusive: Manufacturers tell European Commission proposed ban would cause unnecessary confusion

More than a dozen food companies have urged the European Commission not to ban the use of words such as “sausage” and “burger” for non-meat products.

Companies including Linda McCarney Foods, Quorn and THIS have signed a joint letter calling on commissioners to “let common sense prevail” ahead of a debate on the proposed ban, which they say would cause “unnecessary confusion” for customers “without helping anyone”.

Ex-PM’s thinktank urges more drilling and fewer renewables, ignoring evidence that clean energy is cheaper and better for bills

A thinktank with close ties to Saudi Arabia and substantial funding from a Donald Trump ally needs to present a particularly robust analysis to earn the right to be listened to on the climate crisis. On that measure, Tony Blair’s latest report fails on almost every point.

The Tony Blair Institute for Global Change (TBI) received money from the Saudi government, has advised the United Arab Emirates petrostate, and counts as a main donor Larry Ellison, the founder of Oracle, friend of Trump and advocate of AI.

UK officials have seized almost 20m fake pills since 2021, many containing incorrect doses or toxic ingredients

Men have been warned against buying illegal erectile dysfunction pills online after nearly 20m pills – enough to fill two doubledecker buses – were seized in the last five years.

The “stigma and embarrassment” of erectile dysfunction is being “exploited by criminals”, according to the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA).