The jailing of pro-democracy activists, omnipresent surveillance and a distrust of the police have driven people into a fearful silence
Growing up, I had always dreamed of becoming a police officer like my uncle. In my childhood in the 1980s and 90s, the police had a positive and brave image. I remember when I was in first or second grade, struggling with English, my uncle would tutor me. After our lessons, I would stay at his house to play. Next to his bed was a punching bag, and he would teach me how to throw punches and do one-handed push-ups.
My uncle would show off the muscles on his arms, telling me his dream was to become a police officer who fights crime and protects the innocent. He eventually did. And in his police uniform graduation photo, he stood tall and proud – a hero in my eyes.
The Arab world is increasingly divided between those who are losing everything, and those who have everything
For the past few months, there has been a grim new ritual whenever I meet people from some Arab countries. It’s a sort of mutual commiseration and checking in. How are things with you? Where is your family? I hope you are safe, I hope they are safe. I hope you are OK. We are with you.
There is a comfort to it, and also an awkwardness. Comfort because the words are earnest, the solidarity almost unbearably meaningful. Awkward because the scale of what many are enduring is too large to be captured in those words. Everything feels shot through with survivor’s guilt, but also with a little bit of resolve in the knowledge that the calamities tearing apart our nations have closed the distances between us.
Written complaints about DWP double, while prisons, the NHS and higher education experience big increase
Complaints about public services have soared by more than a third since 2016 with substantial jumps in relation to benefits, prisons, the NHS and higher education, according to a leading thinktank.
Demos, a cross-party organisation, found that between 2015-16 and 2023-24 complaints across key public services increased steadily by evermore than 100,000 from 309,758 to 425,624 – aside from a sharp drop during the pandemic.
A National Trust viewing platform at Corfe Castle offers visitors a glimpse into the king’s royal quarters in Dorset
A luxurious suite of “rooms with a view”, built for the son of William the Conquerer but partly destroyed in the English Civil War, has become accessible to visitors for the first time in almost 400 years, thanks to a new viewing platform at one of England’s most dramatically situated castles.
The King’s Tower was built in 1107 for William’s son Henry I at Corfe castle, which sits on top of a steep hill on the Purbeck peninsula near Wareham in Dorset. Constructed from gleaming white limestone inside the imposing fortification, the 23-metre tower was Henry’s personal penthouse, built to the highest standards of luxury and including an “appearance door” from which he could be seen by his subjects far below.
Congressional Republicans ripped into President Biden after he issued a pardon for his son Sunday night – hammering the lame-duck commander in chief for reversing his vow not to intervene in Hunter's federal criminal cases.
Tony Blair Institute says global carbon emissions would be 6% lower if not for ‘inaccurate narrative’ over 1986 disaster
Global carbon emissions would be 6% lower than today if not for the “inaccurate narrative” against nuclear power since the Chornobyl disaster that has created “unfounded public concern”, according to Tony Blair’s thinktank.
A report from the Tony Blair Institute (TBI) has found that if the nuclear power industry had continued to grow at the same pace as before the 1986 nuclear disaster, the carbon savings would be the equivalent of removing the emissions of Canada, South Korea, Australia and Mexico combined.
Emma Kamio describes ‘abuse’ of act after daughter’s alleged involvement in action against Israeli arms company
A Swansea woman has said she was left traumatised after being arrested under the Terrorism Act and held incommunicado for five days because her daughter was allegedly involved in an action against an Israeli arms company.
Emma Kamio, 57, who runs her own homeopathy and pilates business, was led away in handcuffs from her home in front of her son and neighbours and had three laptops and mobile phones seized, after a Palestine Action protest at an Elbit Systems UK building near Patchway on the outskirts of Bristol.
Wren has been at the forefront of broadcast news for 25 years, editing Newsnight and now Channel 4 News. She talks about slippery politicians – and the blockade on journalism in Gaza
“I’m not joking,” says Esme Wren. She has just told me that she often spends her free time watching old Jeremy Paxman interviews with Tony Blair. Why? Back then, “politicians kind of enjoyed it – they felt like if they passed the Paxman test, it made them a better politician. And they answered the questions, they engaged, they felt that was their duty, to be accountable. So although we weren’t delivered senior members of the cabinet every night, we got our fair share.” The editor of Channel 4 News is remembering her time on the BBC’s Newsnight, which she first worked on in 1998 as an intern, and helmed as editor from 2018 to 2021.
Wren is sitting in the cafe-foyer of the ITN building in central London, which houses the broadcast studios of ITV1, ITV London, Channel 4 and Channel 5. Everything about her – posture, expression, hair, outfit – is exquisitely composed and radiates calm. She attributes this to her 13 years at Sky between 2005 and 2018: “When you’re in a rolling news environment, you learn not to react. My adrenaline’s gone. I’m like Andrew,” she says, wryly. Not someone to laugh at her own jokes, she is referring to the 2019 Newsnight interview between Prince Andrew and Emily Maitlis, so dramatic that two TV programmes have been made of it: Prime’s A Very Royal Scandal (in which Wren is played by Lydia Leonard) and Netflix’s Scoop (in which she is played by Romola Garai).
Some tried to defend Irish MMA fighter after civil jury ruled against him in rape case but others hope it will open space for conversation about masculinity
The ruling made headlines across Ireland and around the world, sending womenspilling into the streets of Dublin with signs that read “Thank you Nikita”.
Days after a civil court jury ordered mixed martial arts fighter Conor McGregor to pay nearly €250,000 over claims he had “brutally raped and battered” Nikita Hand, the case has prompted calls for a rethink of how society interacts with power, wealth and a “manosphere” intent on pushing its own notions of masculinity.
Employees take action over plans to axe at least three plants in first domestic closures in company’s 87-year history
Workers at Volkswagen factories in Germany will strike from Monday over the carmaker’s plans to lay off thousands of people, cut pay and close plants for the first time in its home country.
Announcing that “warning strikes”, which usually last a few hours, will begin at all VW plants, Thorsten Gröger, the union IG Metall’s lead negotiator with VW, said: “If need be, it will be the toughest collective bargaining battle Volkswagen has ever seen.”
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