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‘Severe’ stress on oceans as rate of sea level rise doubles in 10 years, UN warns
Global effort needed to limit effects of pollution, industrial fishing and climate crisis, World Ocean Assessment says The world’s oceans are under “severe and accelerating” pressure from human activities, with the rate of sea-level rise double that of a decade ago, according to a damning assessment from the United Nations. The “intensifying” stressors, which include pollution and large-scale industrial fishing, are cumulative, said the report, resulting in widespread biodiversity loss and putting ocean systems under “severe strain”. Continue reading...
WSL2 side Durham warn they will ‘cease operations’ without cash injection in 21 days
‘Do not have sufficient funds to operate in 26-27 season’ Talks with potential investors ‘have fallen away’ Durham, the Women’s Super League 2 side, have issued an urgent plea for funding and warned that they will have to “cease operations” if they cannot find fresh investment within the next 21 days. The independently run club, who are not affiliated to a professional men’s side, have been competing in the second tier of the English women’s football pyramid for 12 years, but say their owners can “no longer keep pace” with the women’s game’s development. Continue reading...
Calls to review ‘unduly lenient’ sentence for rapist in Andrew Malkinson miscarriage of justice
Paul Quinn will serve at least 14 years for the 2003 rape in Salford and could spend less time in prison than Malkinson The government’s most senior law officer has been asked to review the “unduly lenient” prison sentence handed to a rapist who evaded police for nearly two decades in one of Britain’s biggest miscarriages of justice. Paul Quinn was jailed last week for a minimum of 14 years, meaning he could spend less time in prison than Andrew Malkinson, who was wrongly convicted of his crime. Continue reading...
Manchester United think they can beat City to £100m-rated Elliot Anderson
Nottingham Forest rejected City’s £80m bid for midfielder United’s Jason Wilcox also monitoring Mateus Fernandes Manchester United remain intent on signing Elliot Anderson, with the club’s executives optimistic they can beat Manchester City in the race to acquire the 23-year-old midfielder, who is valued at about £100m by Nottingham Forest. Jason Wilcox, United’s director of football, is also monitoring Mateus Fernandes as another option to strengthen the midfield department of Michael Carrick’s squad. West Ham are believed to want in the region of £80m for the 21-year-old Portuguese, though this may prove an unrealistic fee. Continue reading...
Did you solve it? Do you have a snout for numbers?
The answer to today’s puzzle Earlier today I set this elegant number puzzle. Here it is again with a solution. Nose to tail Continue reading...
I have found the perfect book group – we discuss problematic text messages | Zoe Williams
My friends and I were keen to meet regularly, but couldn’t agree on what to read. Then we found an excellent solution There comes a point in every friendship ecosystem when someone suggests starting a book group. It’s a beautiful moment, the platonic modern equivalent of the 1950s “shall we go steady?” It means you want to see one another at least every six weeks, preferably on a fixed day in the calendar, so that when someone tries to pinch that day for another, less interesting thing, you can in perpetuity reply: “I can’t, I have book group.” Since nobody ever disbands a book group, it is adult‑speak for “friends for ever”, which, if you stare at it hard enough, is almost tearjerking. So, anyway, this poignant moment arrived with my newish friends R and S, then immediately hit the road hump that none of us wanted to read a book. Nothing against books, guys, it’s just I am generally reading something weird that I wouldn’t want to impose on you. S suggested a poem group; R nixed that. I said maybe we could read Poems on the Underground while we were on the underground on our way to the poem group. That was nixed, too. Continue reading...
Challenges of treating and living with a brain injury | Letters
Readers respond to an article on how early intensive rehabilitation after a stroke or head injury is crucial for recovery Rather like Ian Sample himself trying to read Orlando Swayne’s book, I was nervous reading his article, braced for half-digested truths or oversimplifications on neurotherapy (The doctor who mends broken brains: why there is room for hope after a stroke or head injury, 3 June). But he paints an accurate picture of the way brains retain neuroplasticity and the reality of the postcode lottery around therapy and rehabilitation services. I am a speech and language therapist specialising in stroke and neurorehabilitation, and I can attest to what he and Dr Swayne state in the article – that sadly, for some people, the damage caused by neurotrauma cannot be recovered from, but for others, the vital neuroplasticity continues for months and, in some people I have seen, years at a time. Continue reading...
Loneliness influencers: why are people suddenly boasting about having no friends?
Chronicling your humdrum, solitary life has become an online trend. It’s certainly perplexing. Is it also empowering? Name: Loneliness influencers. Age: A few months old. Continue reading...
Britain must do more to safeguard migrant workers’ rights | Letter
A major overhaul is required if protections against unscrupulous employers are not to become illusory, says Emma Wilkinson Your article (Indian man awarded almost £30,000 after UK employer failed to provide work, 31 May) and editorial (3 June) rightly highlight the significance of the employment tribunal decision in the claim brought by Shabin Shaji against Swan Care Solutions and the importance of introducing stronger safeguards against such abuses of migrant workers. This is just one of many such cases involving migrant workers, but the vast majority never bring such claims, partly because it is extremely difficult to obtain the sort of pro bono assistance that the Work Rights Centre provided to Mr Shaji, and partly because, although lawfully resident here, they fear that such action is likely to jeopardise their precarious status. Rather than leaving it to individual claimants, there is a clear role for the newly established Fair Work Agency to support the enforcement of such rights. But to be able to do so it needs to be properly resourced and financed, something that is far from clear at the moment. Continue reading...
Failed by arrogant British passport officials | Letter
Gerald Harrison on being trapped in the middle of bureaucracy with his British and Irish passports Regarding the “colonial attitude” of the British Passport Office, which asked your letter writer’s sister to change her Greek surname (1 June), I am in a similar situation, but prefer to call it arrogance. I had an English dad and an Irish mum. For nearly 40 years, I used two passports. Last November, when I needed to renew my British passport, I enclosed my Irish one. My renewal was refused because my Irish passport has my first name and one middle name, whereas my British one has my first name and two middle names. Continue reading...
A mother’s work has enormous value | Letter
Polly Creed takes issue with a quote in an article that denigrated the importance of the work that mums do Robert dos Santos’s call to be more human, to connect and to challenge AI and the dark cloud it’s set to bring upon humanity is certainly laudable – a valiant rallying cry for the dystopian, uncertain times we’re living through (I’m asking people to do a lot, but that’s what it means to be a human’: why one man made the first straight-to-video movie in 20 years, 4 June). However, I found one comment the film-maker made baffling: “Someone once said that if your mum can do it, it doesn’t have value.” It’s frustrating that, in a world where we’ve made so much progress to combat everyday sexism, a sentiment like this could still be reeled off in a national newspaper. But also, who once said this? Whoever it was, they were clearly wrong. After all, how many mothers are doctors, artists, scientists, lawyers, cleaners, social workers, teachers? Does their work not have any value? Not to mention the unpaid domestic labour that mothers so often shoulder – the bedrock that holds up society and our economy. Continue reading...
Nationwide nearly doubles CEO’s pay packet to £4.7m despite bonus row
Debbie Crosbie receives £3.2m in bonuses after mutual building society’s takeover of Virgin Money Nationwide building society has nearly doubled the pay packet of its chief executive, Debbie Crosbie, a year after the board pushed through a controversial bonus scheme for its top boss. The mutual, which is owned by its members, released its annual report on Monday, showing Crosbie was handed £3.2m in bonuses – a combination of payouts for annual and longer-term performance – up from £1.1m a year earlier. It pushed her overall pay packet to £4.7m for the year to March 2026, marking an 88% jump on the near-£2.5m she earned for the previous year. Continue reading...
Revealed: David Sullivan’s Sunday Sport sold sexualised images of 15-year-old girls
Sunday Sport’s ‘Countdown to 16’ used revealing photoshoots with young girls to trail topless pictures published after their 16th birthdays In 1987, the tabloid press in Britain was at the peak of its powers. The Sun newspaper, with its brash celebrity scoops and strident support for Margaret Thatcher – who won her third general election that year – was selling almost 4m copies a day. Competition for stories and readers was relentless, resulting in ever more salacious and lurid editorial devices to win a slice of the readership from rivals on the newsstand. The Sun stood atop the tabloid market, its topless Page 3- girls credited with a share of its popularity. It was against this backdrop that the Sunday Sport, a red-top publication occupying the seediest corner of Fleet Street, launched a feature that even by its own standards appeared to plumb the depths of journalistic ethics. Continue reading...
Austria World Cup 2026 team guide
Established squad stays true to Ralf Rangnick’s methods with Konrad Laimer and bright new talent Paul Wanner lending some star quality This article is part of the Guardian’s 2026 World Cup Experts’ Network, a cooperation between some of the best media organisations from the 48 countries who qualified. theguardian.com is running previews from three countries each day in the run-up to the tournament kicking off on 11 June. Continue reading...
Muscle growth drug ‘could reduce loss of lean tissue’ when using slimming jabs
Trial suggests monoclonal antibody can help retain lean body mass when losing weight with GLP-1 medicines A drug that promotes muscle growth could significantly reduce the loss of lean body mass when using slimming jabs, research suggests. While GLP-1 based jabs such as Wegovy and Mounjaro have proved highly effective at helping people who are overweight or obese, experts have warned it is not only fat that is lost. Studies suggest 25-40% of total weight loss is down to a reduction in lean body mass – non-fat components of the body, including muscle. Continue reading...
City watchdog sues Neil Woodford for allegedly offering unauthorised investment advice
Move comes months after the FCA announced plans to ban the former investment star from holding senior City roles after collapse of popular equity fund The UK financial regulator is taking legal action against the former investment star Neil Woodford for allegedly offering unauthorised investment advice online, months after being banned from the City. The Financial Conduct Authority said it was seeking an injunction against Woodford and W4.0, a United Arab Emirates-registered company, to stop them carrying out “potentially unlawful activities”. Continue reading...
Iran war: who is fighting and why?
Arch-enemies Israel and Iran have returned to active confrontation while Donald Trump tries to present himself as mediator Middle East crisis – live updates Israel and Iran have returned to active war for the first time since a ceasefire was agreed two months ago in an exchange of rocket fire that threatened efforts to end the conflict. Donald Trump, who started the war in February alongside Israel but has since attempted to present himself as a mediator, told the two sides to stop shooting and said “final negotiations” on peace were proceeding. By late afternoon on Monday, the attacks had stopped. Continue reading...
Why preparation isn’t everything at a World Cup | Jonathan Wilson
From high-altitude training to made to measure kits, teams have resorted to all manner of things to adapt to conditions at the tournament • Predict the winner | Daily podcast | Download our app The heat and the altitude worried everybody. The 1970 World Cup in Mexico would not be a normal one. So the Bulgarian authorities sent their squad south of Sofia to get used to playing several thousand feet above sea level. Which seemed a great idea until somebody noticed that the temperature in the Pirin Mountains was not in the mid-20s celsius as it is in Mexico but somewhere near freezing. How then could they replicate the effect of playing in intense heat? By restricting water intake so that the players got used to performing while dehydrated. The plan was not a great success. Bulgaria lost their first two World Cup games in 1970 and had already been eliminated by the time they drew with Morocco. It’s safe to assume that preparations for this World Cup will be rather more sophisticated than they were 56 years ago. Most countries back then seemed to take the view that training at altitude was the logical way to prepare for games in Mexico City, Monterrey and Guadalajara. Israel went to Ethiopia and Colorado. Uruguay played in Quito and Bogotá. Mexico themselves held a five-month training camp that featured 13 friendly internationals in four months before a pair of games against the Scottish side Dundee United. This is an extract from Soccer Desk: World Cup edition, a newsletter from the Guardian US that will run regularly during the tournament. Subscribe for free here. Continue reading...
‘You escape the slaughter. But there’s a long tail of sadness’: musician Bedouine on the strangeness of Arab life outside the Middle East
With roots in Armenia, Syria and Saudi Arabia, the singer-songwriter now lives in the US. But despite her Carole King-style sound, her homelands are never far from her mind The title song to Azniv Korkejian’s fourth album as Bedouine, Neon Summer Skin, recreates a perfect day from childhood. “Being taken to the pool, where my only worry is being dragged away when the sun’s setting,” she says, calling from Los Angeles. “Later on, mom and dad wash me in the tub and put me to bed.” Steeped in dreamy 70s soft pop, the track isn’t merely an exercise in nostalgia. “I wanted to paint a picture of what it’s like to feel safe,” she says. “So much of the record is about not having the luxury to not consider your own safety. I think about this a lot when it comes to the children in Palestine and Lebanon, who are not afforded that right.” The conflicts that have ravaged the Middle East are context for Neon Summer Skin, but the album’s themes of displacement, identity and insecurity – wrapped in the deceptively soft sound of 1970s-style MOR pop – are also personal. Korkejian’s family are Armenian, but she and her parents were born in Syria, while her brothers were born in Saudi Arabia, where the Korkejians lived, “on a US compound that was like a gated community”, until 1995. That year, unnerved by the proximity of the recent Gulf war, the family successfully applied for the green card lottery and relocated to the US. “And thank God, because we would eventually have had to return to Syria,” Korkejian says. “I don’t know what would have happened to us then.” Continue reading...
Parents of Nottingham attacks victim say medics must breach confidentiality if patient is risk to others
Valdo Calocane was protected at expense of public safety in years before June 2023 stabbings, families of victims say The parents of a victim of the Nottingham attacks have said medical staff have a duty to breach patient confidentiality if the person they are treating is a risk to others. The families of the victims of the June 2023 attacks spoke at a news conference in London on Monday after evidence concluded in a 14-week public inquiry into the attacks. Continue reading...
Reigning champion Tatjana Maria shocked by Queen’s wildcard snub
Four British players receive wildcards for tournament ‘With respect for me, I thought I deserved a wildcard’ Tatjana Maria, the reigning Queen’s Club women’s champion, has revealed her shock at not receiving a wildcard to defend her title this week, suggesting her achievement in winning last year’s tournament should command greater “respect”. The German was snubbed for a wildcard in favour of four lower-ranked British players, forcing her to go through qualifying in west London. A year on from winning the title aged 37, she successfully navigated back-to-back matches on Sunday to make it through to the main draw. Continue reading...
Post your questions for David Byrne
As the former Talking Heads frontman releases his concert film American Utopia in 4K, he will join us to answer your questions The big suit is what you think of first when you think of David Byrne on stage – but the Talking Heads frontman has kept his pedigree as a live performer at an astonishingly high level right into his mid-70s. As he prepares a 4K cinema version of his acclaimed American Utopia tour, he’ll be joining us to answer your questions. Born in Scotland but later settling in the US with his family, Byrne brought erudition, passion and puckish wit to Talking Heads, who formed amid the astonishing creative maelstrom of 1970s New York. Across eight studio albums – including hits such as Once in a Lifetime and Burning Down the House – they created a very particular type of funky, spry new wave, which arguably found its finest form in the live concert film Stop Making Sense (with that big suit, a floor lamp as a dance partner, and more). Continue reading...