A Ukrainian peace plan, sent this week to Washington, pushes back against President Trump’s proposal that Ukraine give up more land for peace.

© Pool photo by Maxwells

Today we look at the state of American inertia.

Many understand the dance their leaders must perform to appease President Trump. But that doesn’t make them any less weary of the rounds and rounds of talks.

© Laetitia Vancon for The New York Times

Russia has been targeting energy infrastructure in Ukraine, leaving multiple cities without electricity. Kim Barker, who’s been covering the war, gives us a glimpse into the daily life of Ukrainians living with power cuts.

Minneapolis residents show apathy toward massive Somali fraud scandal, with white guilt overshadowing billion-dollar taxpayer losses in Minnesota.

The FBI is investigating more than 350 subjects in sweeping probe of '764,' an online network targeting minors with violence and sexual exploitation.

After wrapping “Oh. What. Fun.", Michelle Pfeiffer plans a 2026 hiatus to focus on being a grandmother after decades of on-and-off Hollywood work.

WWE NXT star Sol Ruca will be a part of history on Saturday as she will appear on the same card as John Cena's

Holiday hot chocolate may weaken bones due to its high sugar content, experts are warning. They offer healthier ways for people to enjoy the seasonal treat.

Royal Caribbean faces wrongful death lawsuit after cruise passenger allegedly died from restraint following 33 drinks, body stored in ship morgue.

On the heels of Minnesota’s still-unfolding massive social services fraud scandal, a whistleblower is exposing a similar scheme occurring among the Ohio Somali community.

Whether this is a one-year hiccup or the start of a new era, the NFL enters the final month of the regular season with an unlikely group of contenders.

• Skier breaks record after destroying field at San Moritz

• One of favourites for 2026 Winter Olympics downhill

Lindsey Vonn’s extraordinary comeback from retirement and serious knee surgery gathered pace on Friday when she became the oldest skier to win a World Cup race at the age of 41.

The American, who had not raced for five years until she returned to the circuit last year, destroyed the women’s downhill field in San Moritz to win by nearly a second.

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© Photograph: Luciano Bisi/AP

© Photograph: Luciano Bisi/AP

© Photograph: Luciano Bisi/AP

A good puffer coat is like a good piece of armor: reliable, resilient, resistant to sudden shocks and attacks (of rain, snow, sleet, wind and other weather-related terrors). But the best puffer is easy, rich and impossibly elegant, too. Or maybe we should say the best puffers, plural. Max Mara The Cube reversible down jacket,...

A Toronto woman says her luggage was tossed out of a vehicle by an Uber driver when he heard her speaking Hebrew to her husband. The driver then refused to take them home from the airport after they arrived from a trip in the middle of the night in February. Read More

The singer’s tears over the Islamic State terrorist plot against her show and Southport attack make this behind-the-scenes docuseries about her world-conquering tour more moving than anyone could have anticipated

Swifties had long guessed that there would be a documentary going behind the scenes of Taylor Swift’s blockbuster Eras tour. The 2023 Eras Tour concert movie didn’t show any of the inner workings of this three-and-a-half-hour behemoth, which ran for 149 dates from 2023-24. Fans put some bits together, such as how Swift arrived on stage being pushed inside a cleaning cart. Plus, given the two albums she wrote during and about the Eras tour – 2024’s The Tortured Poets Department and this year’s The Life of a Showgirl – it wouldn’t be Swiftian to overlook another lucrative IP extension.

What fans could never have imagined was that Disney was set to start filming as the Eras tour was due to hit Vienna on 8 August 2023 – the first of three shows in the Austrian capital that were cancelled owing to an Islamic State terrorist plot. We learn this in episode one of the six-part docuseries The End of an Era, when Swift and her longtime friend Ed Sheeran are backstage at Wembley, hours before he guests at her first concert after the thwarted attack. “I didn’t even get to go,” Swift tells him of Vienna. “I was on the plane headed there. I just need to do this show and re-remember the joy of it because I’m a little bit just like …” She can’t find the words.

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© Photograph: Emma McIntyre/TAS24/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management

© Photograph: Emma McIntyre/TAS24/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management

© Photograph: Emma McIntyre/TAS24/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management

Malak A Tantesh lauded for her ‘vital coverage of a war most journalists were banned from witnessing’

Malak A Tantesh, the Guardian’s former Gaza correspondent, was given a standing ovation at the British Journalism Awards, as she was recognised for reporting that included her own journey home following January’s ceasefire deal.

Tantesh, who reported for the Guardian from Gaza for 18 months, was named new journalist of the year and awarded the Marie Colvin award for outstanding up-and-coming journalists at a ceremony on Thursday night.

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© Photograph: Press Gazette/Adam Duke Photography

© Photograph: Press Gazette/Adam Duke Photography

© Photograph: Press Gazette/Adam Duke Photography

Fast-track entry to bloc being discussed by US and Ukrainian officials backed by Brussels in drive to end Russia’s war

Decision would anger environmental campaigners, who say it would amount to ‘gutting’ of green deal

• Business live – latest updates

The EU’s outright ban on the sale of new petrol and diesel cars from 2035 is poised to be watered down, a senior European parliament politician has said.

The decision, expected to be announced by the European Commission on Tuesday in Strasbourg, would be a divisive move, angering environmental campaigners who argue it would amount to the “gutting” of the EU’s flagship green deal.

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© Photograph: Bloomberg/Getty Images

© Photograph: Bloomberg/Getty Images

© Photograph: Bloomberg/Getty Images

Some students at Amherst College, say they were forced to sit through a "disgusting" orientation performance where people mimicked sex acts on stage and showered condoms "like confetti" on the crowd.

My offer to host dinner is declined. My cooking is never good. Triumph lies in the fact food is cooked and not full of bacteria

Yeah, I’m gonna say it – stop with the fetishisation of sandwiches, already! Obviously we’ve had the annual rejoicing over the advent (Ha! See what I did there?) of the Pret Christmas offering and the paler imitations thereafter by lesser chains and retail outlets. Now Harrods is getting in on the act with a £29 version on sale at its steakhouse, the Grill on Fifth. It consists of a burger patty (and listen, let’s get rid of the word ‘patty’ while we’re about it, shall we? Why? Because it’s viscerally hateful, that’s why), roast turkey breast, stuffing, a pig in a blanket, spiced red cabbage, cranberry sauce and turkey gravy.

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© Photograph: Xsandra/Getty Images/iStockphoto

© Photograph: Xsandra/Getty Images/iStockphoto

© Photograph: Xsandra/Getty Images/iStockphoto

Across Canada, there are millions of dollars worth of U.S.-made alcoholic products gathering dust in warehouses, all of it pulled from liquor store shelves in most provinces in retaliation for sweeping U.S. tariffs on Canadian imports. Read More

Scientists in Kansas believe Kernza could cut emissions, restore degraded soils and reshape the future of agriculture

On the concrete floor of a greenhouse in rural Kansas stands a neat grid of 100 plastic plant pots, each holding a straggly crown of strappy, grass-like leaves. These plants are perennials – they keep growing, year after year. That single characteristic separates them from soya beans, wheat, maize, rice and every other major grain crop, all of which are annuals: plants that live and die within a single growing season.

“These plants are the winners, the ones that get to pass their genes on [to future generations],” says Lee DeHaan of the Land Institute, an agricultural non-profit based in Salina, Kansas. If DeHaan’s breeding programme maintains its current progress, the descendant of these young perennial crop plants could one day usher in a wholesale revolution in agriculture.

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© Photograph: Jason Alexander/The Land Institute

© Photograph: Jason Alexander/The Land Institute

© Photograph: Jason Alexander/The Land Institute

Unhurried trippy bass lines and poet Iona Lee’s commanding, velvety voice conjure a glamorously unhurried sense of hypnosis

From Edinburgh
Recommended if you like Dry Cleaning, Massive Attack, Nick Cave
Up next Warm Days in December out now, new EP due early 2026

As fixtures of Edinburgh’s gig-turned-performance art scene, Acolyte’s eerie, earthy psychedelia is just as likely to be found on stage at the Traverse theatre as in a steamy-windowed Leith Walk boozer. Their looped bass lines and poet Iona Lee’s commanding, velvety voice conjure a sense of slow-burn hypnosis – and just like their music, Acolyte are glamorously unhurried. They’ve released only a handful of songs in the seven years since Lee and bassist Ruairidh Morrison first started experimenting with jazz, trip-hop and spoken word, but now the group (with Daniel Hill on percussion and Gloria Black on synth, also known for throwing fantastical, papier-mache-costumed club nights with her former band Maranta) are gathering pace.

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© Photograph: John Mackie

© Photograph: John Mackie

© Photograph: John Mackie