Ex-paratrooper accused of killing James Wray and William McKinney, and attempting to murder five others
An army veteran will stand trial on Monday charged with murder in relation to Bloody Sunday, when the Parachute Regiment shot dead 13 civil rights protesters in Derry in 1972.
The former paratrooper, known as Soldier F, is charged with two murders and five attempted murders during a military operation that became a defining event of Northern Ireland’s Troubles.
Scotland Yard made formal request to interview Christian Brueckner, due for release from seven-year rape sentence
The prime suspect in the disappearance of Madeleine McCann has refused to be interviewed by the Metropolitan police before his pending release from prison in Germany, the force has said.
The Met confirmed it had submitted a formal international request to question Christian Brueckner, the 49-year-old German national who has long been under investigation in connection with Madeleine’s disappearance, but the suspect declined.
What once seemed a pretty fringe subculture of hobbyists riffing on stories that got them privately hot is now bringing mainstream cinema to a rolling boil
There was a time when fan fiction meant furtive scribbles uploaded to shadowy corners of the internet, in which Mr Darcy was recast as a moody vampire flatmate, Captain Kirk discovered his inner romantic, or Gandalf finally got around to opening an artisanal shop in the Shire. It was an underground hobby that could never trouble Tinseltown’s accountants. And yet here we are in 2025, with the news in the Hollywood Reporter that Legendary Pictures has just paid at least $3m – (£2.2m) – an unprecedented amount – for the screen rights to a forthcoming novel called Alchemised that began life as an unauthorised and kinky Harry Potter spin-off.
The backstory behind Alchemised, by SenLinYu, sounds pretty freaky. SenLinYu’s original book, titled Manacled, inhabited a strange sub-niche of Potterverse named “Dramione” in which Hermione Granger finds herself regularly involved in unlikely and transgressive romantic encounters with Draco Malfoy. Now stripped of all reference to Hogwarts, butterbeer and Nimbus 2000s, and with renamed characters, Alchemised will hit shelves and online bookstores later this month as the dark fantasy tale of a young woman with memory problems who finds herself at the mercy of a powerful and cruel necromancer.
Agreements include plan to build 12 reactors in Hartlepool with Centrica, creating 2,500 jobs, and fast-tracking UK and US safety checks
Labour’s plans for a massive expansion of nuclear power have been given a boost with a string of transatlantic deals for new modular reactors announced before Donald Trump’s visit.
The UK and US governments have promised to fast track safety checks, and announced several new private sector investment deals, with Labour emphasising the potential benefits for jobs and growth.
Allies indulged the US president on the basis they wouldn’t be bombed or suffer economic damage. So much for that idea
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All over the world, political leaders are gathering in hastily convened summits and meetings. Last week, after Israel’s strike against Hamas leaders in Doha – a colossal violation of the sovereignty of a country that is not only a close ally of the US, but an anchor of Gaza peace talks – Gulf leaders sprang to show solidarity. The president of the United Arab Emirates, Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, arrived on an unscheduled visit to Doha and embraced the Qatari emir. It was a public show of fraternity that would have been unfathomable only a few years ago when the two countries were locked in a bitter feud. Qatar’s other adversary in that feud, Saudi Arabia, called after the Israeli strike for “an Arab, Islamic and international response to confront the aggression” and Israel’s “criminal practices”. On Sunday, heads of Arab and Muslim states were en route to Doha for an emergency summit.
A little more than a week before, another gathering pointed towards other new coalitions. The leaders of India, China and Russia met in Tianjin, producing an image of smiling warmth that is likely to be an artefact of this era. The summit was convened in the wake of Donald Trump’s alienation of another ally, Narendra Modi. After Trump’s second election, Modi was one of the first leaders to visit Washington DC, where he was called a “great friend”, and the two countries set the target of doubling their trade to half a trillion dollars by 2030. A few months after that, Trump slapped India with a 50% tariff on the country’s imported goods, a tariff doubled as punishment for India’s purchase of Russian oil. He then proceeded to call the Indian economy “dead”, and commented on the Tianjin summit by posting: “Looks like we’ve lost India and Russia to deepest, darkest, China.” He is now lobbying the EU to impose tariffs of up to 100% on India and China.
Enrich corn’s natural sweetness in a creamy and earthy curry, and in a fresh, herby chutney
Inspired by a corn curry from Maharashtra, today’s recipe has the perfect umami flavour: a bit of heat from the chillies, some gentle sweetness from the sugar and lots of sourness from the lime juice, along with the creamy coconut milk and juicy corn. The sharpness of a fresh, herby chutney with salty butter, meanwhile, makes the perfect topping for barbecued corn on the cob. I often cook the corn straight on the hob, which is a bit tricky, but it’s how we did it when I was growing up in India.
A key climate crisis funding treaty struck as Pacific leaders backed Australia’s bid for Cop31 despite some criticism of its environmental credentials
China, the climate crisis and security concerns dominatedthe agenda as Pacific leaders gathered for the region’s most important annual meeting last week.
The week-long Pacific Islands Forum (Pif) in the Solomon Islands capital, Honiara, brought together Australia, New Zealand and 16 Pacific countries and territories at a time of fraught geopolitical tensions, and with accusations of outside interference in the region never far from the headlines.
In her apocalyptic new film, everything’s sorted – but you have to die at the age of 50. The actor talks about tech shocks, doomscrolling and the agent who told her to go back to Canada
This summer, Sandra Oh stood behind a lectern at a graduation ceremony in New Hampshire, preparing to give university-leavers words of hope at a time of permacrisis. She rose to the challenge, opening up about her past battles with depression and anxiety, before making a heartfelt case for embracing discomfort and kindness “so we can meet cruelty again and again and not lose our humanity”. This was increasingly important, she explained, when many world leaders “claim power through fear and oppression”. And then came the moment that would go viral. Oh instructed everyone to stand up and do something Cristina Yang,her career-making character on Grey’s Anatomy, used to do when times got tough. “Dance it out!” she exhorted as David Guetta’s Titanium washed over the crowd. “Remember this feeling!”
“I was very, very, very nervous about it,” says Oh. “I worked really hard.” She had been putting herself into the mindset of 20-year-olds not just worried about their own futures but about the larger picture. “The world is burning!” she says, imagining their dark thoughts. “There’s wars all over! My heart is so heavy, so all I’m going to do is doomscroll.” But, crucially, Oh wanted her audience to find their way to joy – thus the dancing. “Sitting there trying to bear the pain in the world,” she says, neatly summing up the philosophy she shared that day, “will help you figure out how to be in the world.”
In the remote state of Meghalaya, foraged foods are helping to diversify state-provided menus – and tackle chronic malnutrition
Excited chatter and the clattering of steel plates drown out the din of the monsoon rains: it is lunchtime in Laitsohpliah government school in the north-east Indian state of Meghalaya. The food has been cooked on-site and is free for everyone, part of India’s ambitious “midday meal” – PM Poshan – programme to incentivise school enrolment.
The scheme covers more than 1m state-run schools across the country, but the menu at Laitsohpliah is hyperlocal, thanks to a recent charity initiative in the state.
A lunch of rice, dal, potatoes with east Himalayan chives, cured dry fish and sohryngkham, a wild berry pickle
As Paul Robinson, he was one of Ramsay Street’s most notorious scoundrels. Now, he’s hoping to dazzle on the dancefloor. Here, he talks about the loss of his brother, leaving soap acting and his wildest storylines
Stefan Dennis joined the cast of Neighbours as Paul Robinson, the git, for its first episode in 1985. He declines to tell me how old he was then. “See,” he says, with a glint of that Paul cunning: “That’s gonna give my age away if I tell you.” If I were to take a guess – looking at him today, in Boxpark in Wembley, pin neat and ready for anything (he could nip to the shops or go clubbing) in a Lacoste polo shirt, leaping on and off high chairs as gracefully as a cat, I would say early 60s. Wikipedia says he is 67 in October. My first and enduring impression is not his age, but the fact that he must, in some bigwig showrunner’s imagination, be this year’s Strictly Come Dancing crown prince. That’s just how it works – there are some irredeemably bad dancers who are fun to watch, there are some perfect physical specimens in their prime who look like the obvious contenders but then flame out, and then there’s the person who thinks they can’t cut a rug but has some inner dancer, that’s waited a lifetime to be activated, like a sleeper agent. Sorry to spoil it, everyone, but he is definitely that guy.
Anyway, back to his age, which he insists is undisclosed. “The reason is, I was doing Flying Doctors …” This is the Australian drama about the outback. It was on in the daytime, if you were at school in the 80s you only watched it when you were ill, and I wonder how much the memory of it – very high drama, slightly terrifying, wide-open scenery, absolutely millions of sheep – was coloured by having a temperature. Anyway, Dennis was in the original miniseries but didn’t return for the series because, by that time, he was already Bad Paul in Neighbours. “And in the green room, I’m reading a magazine, and there was my wife on the cover, my first wife.”
France’s take on Farmer Wants a Wife challenges assumptions and forges empathy – and yes, it’s very cute
September is a key moment in French cultural and social life. School term begins, parliament returns to session, new novels flood the market for awards season, and television and radio stations air their latest programmes. Among all the new starts, though, many people want to go back to basics. An episode of L’amour est dans le Pré (Love is in the Meadow) can do the job. The most popular dating show in France just premiered its 20th season, and 3.6 million fans (19% of the total TV audience) were glued to their sofas. The opening credits rolled to the tune of Michael Bublé’s Haven’t Met You Yet, and loyal viewers were captivated by 15 new candidates (12 men and three women), looking for true love.
Just like Farmer Wants a Wife, its British equivalent (both are produced by Fremantle media), the reality TV programme depicts a cast of farmers from every part of rural France – including overseas territories – trying to find their soulmates. The contenders’ video bios are broadcast, people write in expressing their interest, and shortlisted suitors embark on a speed-dating session on a riverboat, docked at the foot of the Eiffel Tower. Two of them are then invited to stay with their chosen farmer for a week. With the camera’s lens as a witness, Cupid does his magic … or not, as the case may be. Over 20 years, dozens of love stories have mushroomed, and at least 60 children have been born to couples brought together by the show.
Anne-Laure Pineau is an independent writer based in Le Havre, France
Netflix’s breakout drama Adolescence has triumphed at this year’s Emmys, winning six awards.
The series, which became the streamer’s second most-watched show ever, won for limited series, directing and writing and also picked up three acting awards.
Miranda Cosgrove plays a woman involved in some reality show drama in another of the streamer’s many low-grade background watches
One could argue that The Bachelor, the ABC reality juggernaut that has reified Christian-lite dating norms for 27 seasons, should be considered scripted content. The connections can be genuine, and the feelings often real, but the situations are contrived and manipulated, a pioneering brand of deliberately saccharine, hokey and ridiculous in the name of love and for the sake of entertainment. Watching The Bachelor and its spinoffs, as I occasionally have over its two-plus-decade run, is to be baffled, frustrated, annoyed and ultimately hooked. The show, with its in-group rituals and shocking sincerity, casts a strange spell over its contestants and its viewers; if you stick through one episode, you’re liable to start caring about what happens.
No such spell exists for The Wrong Paris, Netflix’s latest attempt to build an in-house Hallmark Channel, in which Miranda Cosgrove plays a single woman who goes on a reality dating show for what Bachelor Nation would call “the wrong reasons”. No offense to the Hallmark Channel, which at its best can be laughably unserious fun. But The Wrong Paris, written by Nicole Henrich and directed by Janeen Damian, somehow serves the synthetic sugar of both The Bachelor and the Hallmark movie without any sweetness. The formula is there, but not the flavor, nor the drop of derangement – like, say, a hot snowman brought to life – required to beat the Netflix allegations of low-quality, lowest-common-denominator stuff.
As his most commercial film, 2004’s Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, is re-released, the critically acclaimed director says he can’t get a movie off the ground now – but will never give in to the ‘Hollywood machine’
Charlie Kaufman is in a funk. The genius screenwriter behind Being John Malkovich, Adaptation, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Synecdoche, New York, the devastating Buñuelian comedy of mortality that he also directed, can’t get a movie off the ground. “I’m having great difficulty,” he sighs. “I’m not a person that people want to trust with their money. It’s very frustrating.”
Earlier this year, production of a film he was preparing to make – Later the War, starring Eddie Redmayne as a manufacturer of dreams who diversifies into nightmares – was shut down in Belgrade; he hopes it will resume. To make matters worse, he sorely needs some shut-eye. “Not to get into it, but I’m not a great sleeper,” he says, reaching out of frame for his coffee. The webcam is angled in such a way that his bearded, bespectacled face is shunted into the bottom half of the screen, leaving ample space above him where a big, fluffy thought-bubble might go.
Toronto film festival: Elizabeth Olsen must choose who she spends eternity with in an often ingenious throwback that can’t quite stick the landing
As we return to the 1990s, with Scream, Clueless, Buffy, Practical Magic, Happy Gilmore and My Best Friend’s Wedding having either returned or set for it, there’s also a broader sense of nostalgia that’s seeing the resurrection of certain genres. Already at this year’s Toronto film festival, Aziz Ansari admirably tried, and I would say sadly failed, to recall the spirit of the high-concept star-led comedy with fantastical elements in Good Fortune. There’s a far more convincing attempt from the Irish writer-director David Freyne with Eternity, an ambitious afterlife romance that could more neatly play alongside films of the era like Heart and Souls, What Dreams May Come and Ghost.
It’s not just the thought-through ingenuity of the set-up but also the gloss and grandness of the film-making, an A24 production that feels like it should have the Touchstone Pictures logo at the start. It’s the surprising next step for Freyne whose endearing queer comedy Dating Amber got a little buried in the hellish summer of 2020. That film – about queer high schoolers faking a relationship to kill suspicion – was small and semi-autobiographical for Freyne, and for his follow-up he’s gone from rooted in truth to floating in fantasy.
Jenna Ortega, Sydney Sweeney and Cate Blanchett were among the names at the 77th Primetime Emmys in Los Angeles. There was glamour, grace and subtle political statements on the red carpet – and many Armani gowns in tribute to the late designer
US president says he doesn’t want to ‘disincentivize investment’ after images of workers chained and handcuffed caused widespread alarm in South Korea
President Donald Trump has said foreign workers sent to the United States are “welcome” and he doesn’t want to “frighten off” investors, 10 days after hundreds of South Koreans were arrested at a work site in Georgia.
The climate change minister has mounted the case for the federal government to set a strong 2035 emissions reduction target after releasing a “confronting” report that warned no Australian community would escape the worsening risks of the climate crisis.
Chris Bowen said the “cost of inaction will always outweigh the cost of action” in a message to political and industry voices warning about the economic price of rapid decarbonisation.
Pollution could be on par with annual emissions generated by Brazil as experts warn of climate effects of war
A planned expansion of military spending by Nato countries could generate an additional 1,320m tonnes of planet-heating pollution over the next decade – on a par with the annual greenhouse gas emissions generated by Brazil, the fifth largest emitter in the world, according to a new report.
Military activity is fossil-fuel intensive, yet official country data on military emissions is patchy or non-existent.
New York governor endorses democratic socialist whose platform includes rent hikes for the wealthiest New Yorkers
Kathy Hochul, the governor of New York, has endorsed Zohran Mamdani in his run for mayor of New York City, a major boost for the democratic socialist.
Writing in a New York Times opinion piece, Hochul said: “In the four years since I took office, one of my foundational beliefs has been the importance of the office of New York governor working hand in hand with the mayor of New York City for the betterment of the 8.3 million residents we both represent.”
The clandestine networks were almost decimated by Covid border closures and are now under threat from a crackdown in South Korea
When Park Seung-hwan* has a moment to himself, he opens Google Earth and searches for his family home. The 30-year-old has been able to check that the roof was repaired and that crops are growing – tangible proof that the money he sent home had reached his family safely.
“Sending money was the simplest way for me to feel connected to my family,” Park says, adding that he worries that without it, his brother might be drafted and sent to fight in Russia because his family will not have enough to pay bribes so as to be exempt.
Royal Mint releases colourful coin featuring familiar symbols from the beloved board game
A commemorative 50p coin celebrating 90 years of Monopoly is being launched by the Royal Mint.
The colourful coin features game tokens and property cards, as well as the unmistakable Mr Monopoly (or Milburn Pennybags) holding bags of cash. The ‘GO’ sign will reveal the M money symbol when the coin is tilted.
I started law school in 1976. Gough Whitlam had abolished university fees, which meant a lot of older women who previously wouldn’t have been able to afford to study were arriving at uni for the first time.
I was 17 and nursing an otherness of my own. One day in class, our lecturer asked everyone who had attended a private high school to raise their hand. The sea of arms that shot up revealed that, in a class of 30 people, I was the only one who’d come from a state school. The lecturer didn’t do this cruelly – he was making a point about lawyers being privileged people, and how that affects the legal system. But I nonetheless felt very confronted by the different world my peers came from.
Connexion
