Ice Memory Foundation’s specially dug ‘sanctuary’ offers storage for cores, which hold thousands of years of history Last month the Ice Memory Foundation opened the first ever sanctuary for mountain ice cores in Antarctica, where samples will be stored for centuries to come. The cores, typically 10cm in diameter and a metre or more long, are stored in a specially excavated ice cave. The first to be laid down came from two Alpine glaciers that are rapidly shrinking. Continue reading...

Landslide in Niscemi in January tore away entire slope of town and carved 4km chasm Firefighters in Sicily have rescued about 400 rare books from a library in Niscemi that hangs on the edge of a mudflow, after a devastating landslide in January tore away an entire slope of the town and carved a 4km chasm. The library stands on the lip of the precipice gouged out by the landslide, with part of the building in effect hanging in mid-air. The recovery operation, which began on Monday, was preceded by a detailed study of floor plans and interior photographs to map the position of the books. Continue reading...

It’s almost time to swap your chunky winter jumper for a knitted polo top. Here are three ways to style it Continue reading...

The classic cake reimagined as a cookie When it comes to British cakes, coffee and walnut is such a staple that if there isn’t one present at a bake sale or coffee morning, I’ll raise an eyebrow. I’ve taken the classic combination and put them in a cookie for something fun and quicker to make. Full of toasty walnuts and a hit of that very nostalgic instant coffee flavour, I finish them off with a white chocolate button as a nod to the sweet, creamy icing. Continue reading...

The latest rush of docudramas seems to suggest that anyone in the public eye must expect a degree of intrusion. But where does that end? Was that really Peter Mandelson getting into a police car on Monday? Was it really the same Mandelson who had supposedly been about to flee to the British Virgin Islands, the man called “a traitor” to his country and the buddy of a sex trafficker of girls? Was he really to be questioned for nine hours by the police over “misconduct in public office”, an offence few people have ever heard of? For a moment, I thought it must be a trailer for a new Epstein docudrama “inspired by real-life events”. For two months, news desks on both sides of the Atlantic have been trawling through the Epstein files, daily releasing sensational details. This one story – now years old – is crushing out many others. The name of Jeffrey Epstein this past week has claimed precedence over Donald Trump, China, Iran and Ukraine. Each night’s BBC television news has demoted Keir Starmer, the NHS, tax reform and student loans. Preference is relentlessly ceded to Epstein, with bit parts for the former prince Andrew, Mandelson, Bill Gates, the Clintons and a galaxy of billionaires and celebrities. Continue reading...

The annual competition draws thousands of entries from across the world and brings together images from below the water’s surface that show the diversity and challenges of subaquatic life All photographs courtesy of Underwater Photographer of the Year 2026 Continue reading...

Exhibits pay homage to Ukrainians’ resilience and bring home the reality that war is going on in Europe Descending into the windowless basement of a second world war air-raid bunker built for civilians in central Berlin is arguably an eerie enough evocation of what it means to endure life in a conflict. But in a modern twist, before they have even walked into the first room of the city’s new Ukraine Museum inside the bunker, visitors are “targeted” by a Russian drone just before its operator prepares to release the lethal shot, and see themselves in the firing line on the screen of the weapon’s camera. Continue reading...

Kendrick Lamar has sampled my track. I’d love to ask him if he knows my story Growing up in North Miami Beach in the 1980s was a lot of fun. We might not have had TikTok, but we weren’t bored: we would ride our bikes around and blast music from our boomboxes all weekend. In my mid-teens, I did a work placement at a record store. I loved it, and became something of an expert in R&B and rap, listening to Grandmaster Flash, Run-DMC and 2 Live Crew on repeat. One day in 1984, when I was 17, a record producer named Tony Butler – better known as “Pretty Tony” – came into the store. He heard me speak and asked me whether I wanted to make some music. I thought, “Why not?!” Continue reading...

He has been in prison for 41 years for killing five members of his family – despite no DNA linking him to the crime. New analysis of the crime scene photographs for the Guardian suggests the prosecution’s central argument may have been wrong On 7 August 1985, five people were found dead at White House Farm in Essex, England: 28-year-old Sheila Caffell (familiarly known as Bambi); her six-year-old twin sons Daniel and Nicholas; and her adoptive parents, June and Nevill Bamber. All five had been shot with a rifle. Caffell’s 24-year-old brother Jeremy Bamber, who was also adopted, had alerted Essex police to a disturbance inside the farmhouse – he said his father had called to tell him – and had been outside with the police for four hours before the bodies were discovered. Caffell, who had recently been hospitalised with schizophrenia and is said to have feared her children were going to be taken into foster care, was found with the rifle lying on her chest, pointing towards her neck. There were two gunshot wounds to her neck and chin, and a bloodied Bible by her side. The case was initially thought to be open and shut, a tragic murder-suicide committed by Caffell. But a month later, Jeremy Bamber was arrested. He has now been in prison for 41 years, and questions have always swirled regarding the safety of his conviction. These have grown recently. The proper body to examine this is the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC), but it is in disarray; it has already taken the CCRC four years to consider less than half the evidence that Bamber has submitted to them. In a short series we are considering discrete pieces of evidence, with analysis from forensic experts. Continue reading...

After drummer Neil Peart died in 2020, many thought the Canadian prog legends would never reform. As they book a mammoth global tour, Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson explain how their lifelong bond drew them back together The two men on the sofa, Rush’s Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson, have known each other for 60 years now. “When we first met in junior high school, we sat beside each other, and we laughed,” says Lee, the elder by a month. “He’s the funniest guy I’ve ever known, and I make him laugh, too.” Lifeson, who has been gazing at his friend happily, nods vigorously. “Yeah!” The two of them gently tease each other, and speak of each other with such happy admiration, that I feel suffused with warmth from the off. “Everybody wants to have a bestie like this guy!” Lee says at one point, beaming. It’s only because they like each other so much that they’re in this posh London hotel suite. Lifeson came over to Europe for some health checks, and Lee decided to come with him. Once they were here, they decided they may as well talk to some journalists about Rush’s upcoming R50 reunion tour, and the decision to add 24 European and South American shows to the 58 arena dates they’d already announced for North America (they’ll play the UK in March 2027). The interviews were meant to be separate, but they decided it would be more enjoyable to speak together. Honestly, if you ever want to see a model for male friendship, spend time with Rush and feel cleansed. Continue reading...

With poor Sam Claflin virtually banished from screen, it’s up to the Big Bang Theory star to keep this woefully formulaic show afloat – and it’s a losing battle Buckle up, buttercups! Three hours of overstuffed nonsense split into four 45-minute bursts is about to come atcha, and fast. Vanished stars Kaley Cuoco, who found fame in The Big Bang Theory from 2007-2019, then starred in The Flight Attendant a few years back. Cuoco played an ordinary, if functionally alcoholic, stewardess who found herself in the wrong place at the wrong time, and enmeshed in an ever-deepening mystery, then mortal peril. She found unexpected reserves of courage and resourcefulness and managed to stay half a step ahead of the bad guys until it was time for vanquishings and comeuppances all round. Vanished is on Prime Video now. Continue reading...

Back then, France punched above its weight when it came to tech. The EU needs it to rediscover its taste for the cutting edge In the 1960s, France became the third country, after the US and Soviet Union, to independently place a satellite (Astérix) into orbit, and the only country to send an animal into space and – crucially, for Félicette the catstronaut – bring it back alive. A decade later, the Franco-British Concorde flicked passengers across the Atlantic in three and a half hours and the TGV began to propel them through the countryside first at 250km/h (155mph), and then 320km/h. Then, in the late 1980s, the French space agency designed a crewed spaceplane, Hermès, that corrected for the Nasa space shuttle’s vulnerability by being integrated into its launch vehicle rather than perched atop it. A concerted buildout of nuclear power left France with one of the least carbon-intensive economies in the world. And then, of course, there was the Minitel. More than a decade before anyone was typing “www” into their web browsers, French users were able to buy train tickets, check film showings, do their banking, play games, find recipes, read their horoscopes, or even log into, yes, erotic chats – la messagerie rose, as it was known. Continue reading...

Hannah Spencer elected as party’s first MP in northern England after overturning 13,000-vote Labour majority The Green party has pulled off a landmark victory in the Gorton and Denton byelection in a significant blow to Keir Starmer. Hannah Spencer, a local plumber and Green party councillor, was elected as the party’s first MP in northern England after overturning Labour’s 13,000-vote majority. Continue reading...

Turnout in Gorton and Denton byelection over 47%, with 36,903 verified votes cast as Greens, Reform and Labour contest the seat Labour is defending a 13,413-vote majority in Gorton and Denton, where nearly 80% of voters backed a party on the left at the 2024 election. Angeliki Stogia, a councillor, was selected as the Labour candidate after Andy Burnham was prevented from standing. Continue reading...

The former US secretary of state urged Republicans to question Donald Trump ‘directly under oath’ about his ties with the convicted sex offender Hillary Clinton appeared before a congressional committee investigating her supposed links to Jeffrey Epstein – and accused its Republican members of targeting her in a bid to distract from Donald Trump’s involvement with the convicted sex offender. The former US secretary of state answered questions for hours during a closed-door session on Thursday, a day before her husband, the former US president Bill Clinton, was also due to appear. Continue reading...

Federal Aviation Administration bars flights around Fort Hancock after reported use of anti-drone military laser The Federal Aviation Administration barred flights on Thursday in an area around Fort Hancock, Texas, after congressional aides told Reuters a military laser-based anti-drone system was believed to have accidentally shot down a US government drone. The FAA and Pentagon did not immediately comment but the FAA cited “special security reasons” in its notice about the restrictions on the airspace near the Mexican border posted on its Notam alert system, shorthand for “Notice to Air Missions”. Continue reading...

Lead plaintiff, now 20, says use of social media made her anxious and strained relationships with friends and family The young woman at the heart of the landmark trial about the addictive nature of social media testified for the first time on Thursday, saying she got hooked on YouTube starting at age six and Instagram at nine. By the time she was 10, she said she had become depressed and was engaging in self-harm. The woman, who is now 20 and known by her initials KGM, is the lead plaintiff in an expansive lawsuit against YouTube and Meta, which owns Instagram and Facebook. The crux of the case alleges social media companies intentionally create addictive products, leading to mental health issues in young people. Continue reading...

Fund says loan will resolve Ukrainian balance of payments problem while boosting reconstruction and growth prospects. What we know on day 1,465 The International Monetary Fund said its executive board had approved an $8.1bn, four-year loan for Ukraine, of which $1.5bn would be disbursed immediately. The IMF said on Thursday the new extended fund facility arrangement for Ukraine would help anchor a $136.5bn international support package for the war-torn country, which this week marked the fourth anniversary of Russia’s invasion. The IMF managing director, Kristalina Georgieva, said the loan would resolve Ukraine’s balance of payments problem and restore medium-term external viability while boosting prospects for reconstruction and growth after the war ended and helping to facilitate Ukraine’s steps to join the EU. Ukrainian and US officials met in Geneva on Thursday for talks on postwar reconstruction despite a deadlock in negotiations with Russia, and officials in Kyiv hoped to finalise key details of a settlement at a trilateral meeting early next month. Top Ukrainian negotiator Rustem Umerov said the participants at the meeting spoke to the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, after its conclusion. Zelenskyy, who spoke to the US president, Donald Trump, on Wednesday, said trilateral talks would probably take place in Abu Dhabi in early March and would aim to prepare the way for a meeting of Ukraine and Russia’s leaders. Russian president Vladimir Putin’s special envoy, Kirill Dmitriev, also held talks with US officials in Geneva on Thursday, Russia’s state-run RIA news agency reported. Dmitriev declined to comment on the outcome of the meeting, RIA said. Umerov said negotiators were working on economic and security issues to “make the next trilateral meeting involving the US and Russia as substantive as possible”. Romania scrambled fighter jets on Thursday when a drone breached its national airspace during a Russian attack on Ukrainian infrastructure near the border, the defence ministry said, in the second airspace breach in as many days. The EU and Nato member shares a 650km land border with Ukraine and has had drones breach its airspace and fragments fall on its territory repeatedly since Russia began attacking Kyiv’s ports across the Danube. Ukrainian missiles struck the Russian town of Belgorod, inflicting serious damage on energy installations and disrupting power, water and heating, the regional governor said early on Friday. The attack on Belgorod, 40km from the Ukrainian border, and the surrounding district was the second in five days to cause serious damage. Russia’s defence ministry said on Thursday its air defence units had downed 220 Ukrainian drones over a nine-hour period, including 24 headed for Moscow. The latest ministry statement said 53 drones were intercepted and destroyed in a three-hour period ending at 11pm. Many of the drones were intercepted over regions in central Russia. The ministry said 12 had targeted Moscow. Continue reading...

Study shows lower risk for multiple myeloma as well as pancreatic, prostate, breast and kidney cancers Vegetarians have a substantially lower risk of five types of cancer, a landmark study on the role of diet has revealed. The research, using data from more than 1.8 million people who were tracked over many years, found that vegetarians had a 21% lower risk of pancreatic cancer, a 12% lower risk of prostate cancer and a 9% lower risk of breast cancer compared with meat eaters. Combined, these cancers account for around a fifth of cancer deaths in the UK. Continue reading...

Escalation of violence between the volatile neighbours makes a Qatar-mediated ceasefire appear increasingly shaky Pakistan carried out airstrikes in Kabul and two other Afghan provinces early Friday, Afghanistan’s government spokesperson said, hours after Afghanistan launched a cross-border attack on Pakistan in the latest escalation of violence between the volatile neighbours that made a Qatar-mediated ceasefire appear increasingly shaky. At least three explosions were heard in Kabul, but there was no immediate information on the exact location of the strikes in the Afghan capital, or of any potential casualties. Continue reading...

I overheard the news from Clarke Gayford on a dancefloor at 2am. I’m thrilled for our former first couple I got the news that Aotearoa’s most (internationally) famous prime minister is moving to Sydney in a way that is only possible in New Zealand. I was at the final Splore festival in Tāpapakanga at the weekend (one of our longest-running and arguably most beautiful festivals) when Clarke Gayford, Jacinda Ardern’s husband, popped up next to me on the dancefloor dressed as a giant toadstool. “Yeah, we’re moving to Sydney,” he said to a man in funereal pirate garb. “Can’t wait!” Maybe it was the joy of a perfect tracklist at 2am, maybe it was getting this breaking news from the horse’s mouth, but I felt thrilled for our former first couple. Like Splore, NZ has the hungover malaise of a party being cancelled and the lights going out. Johanna Cosgrove is an award-winning actor/writer/comedian. She will perform her show Sweetie at the Melbourne international comedy festival and is now in NZ filming an exciting top-secret feature film Continue reading...

OpenAI-powered assistant will help to ‘understand overall service patterns’, company says, as move sparks backlash From hospitality workers to retail employees, the exaggerated “customer service voice”, often mocked in internet memes as wildly different from someone’s real voice, has long been a cultural trope. Fast-food giant Burger King is now taking that voice one step further, saying it will detect whether employees are using words like “please” and “thank you” through the assistance of artificial intelligence. On Thursday, Burger King announced it is rolling out a new AI chatbot connected to employee headsets at hundreds of locations in the US as part of a platform called BK Assistant, powered by OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT. Continue reading...

Chelsea must keep their heads at Arsenal, Anthony Gordon faces his old club and a key return for Sunderland Unai Emery has seen most things in this game but he has never won at Wolves. In three and a half years at Villa, he has lost two and drawn one of his three away games at Molineux. Twelve months ago they lost this fixture 2-0 and this week Emery shared his poor record to stress the difficulty of the challenge facing his side, particularly given they have won just one of their past five matches in all competitions. Emery even mentioned his visit to Wolverhampton with Arsenal in 2019, when his team trailed 3-0 at half-time and lost 3-1. For Emery, there is no better time to break his duck, with the schedule dictating that Villa could move nine points clear of fifth-placed Chelsea, who visit Villa on Wednesday, before Liam Rosenior’s side travel to Arsenal on Sunday. Victory would enhance Villa’s chances of returning to the Champions League but also pile pressure on a direct rival. Ben Fisher Wolves v Aston Villa, Friday 8pm (all kick-offs GMT) Bournemouth v Sunderland, Saturday 12.30pm Burnley v Brentford, Saturday 3pm Liverpool v West Ham, Saturday 3pm Continue reading...

Charities hail ‘groundbreaking’ scheme for grandparents and others who take full parental responsibility for a child Grandparents who step in to provide full-time care for their grandchildren to prevent them being taken into care will be given guaranteed financial support under a government pilot scheme. Charities welcomed the trial as groundbreaking and said if fully rolled out across England it had the potential to transform the lives of tens of thousands of children looked after under “kinship care” arrangements. Continue reading...

Democracy Volunteers say they saw 32 cases of apparent collusion – the highest levels in its 10-year history An election observer group has raised concerns over people appearing to collude on voting in the Gorton and Denton byelection. Democracy Volunteers, an organisation founded by Dr John Ault, and supported by Conservative peer and psephologist Prof Robert Haywood, deployed four accredited election observers across the constituency. Continue reading...