In Pakistan’s capital, the army has been deployed, a public holiday has been declared and the streets are eerily empty Middle East crisis – live updates The streets of Islamabad were on strict lockdown as Pakistan’s capital prepared to play host to historic negotiations between Iran and the US that have dangled the promise of an end to war that has devastated the Middle East. Even as the US-Iran ceasefire looked increasingly precarious, amid Israel’s continued bombardment of Lebanon and disputes over the terms of the talks, Pakistani officials insisted that the make-or-break peace negotiations would be going ahead over the weekend as planned. Continue reading...

In his first television interview with an American broadcaster, Miguel Diaz-Canel says revolutionaries don’t give up and step down The Cuban president, Miguel Diaz-Canel, said he would not resign under US pressure in his first television interview with an American broadcaster, while Russia insisted it would never abandon or betray its ally. Diaz-Canel told NBC News on Thursday: “We have a free sovereign state, a free state. We have self-determination and independence, and we are not subjected to the designs of the United States. Continue reading...

Israel and Hezbollah continue to trade strikes as Trump tells US media he has asked Netanyahu to be more ‘low-key’ in Lebanon. Follow live news Netanyahu says there is no ceasefire in Lebanon as Israel launches fresh strikes Welcome to the Guardian’s continuing coverage of the crisis in the Middle East. The fragile ceasefire between the US and Iran showed further strain on Friday, a day before delegations from both countries are due to meet in Pakistan, as Donald Trump accused Tehran of breaching promises on the strait of Hormuz and Israel struck Lebanon with attacks that Iran claims violate the truce. Donald Trump has said he is “very optimistic” a peace deal with Iran was within reach as a diplomatic delegation led by his vice-president JD Vance prepared to head to Pakistan for high-stakes talks aimed at ending the war this weekend. Iran’s leaders “talk much differently when you’re at a meeting than they do to the press. They’re much more reasonable,” the US president said, in line with his administration’s narrative that there’s a disconnect between what Tehran says publicly and privately. Trump also confirmed that he had asked Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday to be “more low-key” in Lebanon to help ensure the success of the upcoming US-Iran negotiations in Islamabad. “I spoke with Bibi and he’s going to low-key it. I just think we have to be sort of a little more low-key,” Trump told NBC News, adding that he believed Israel was “scaling back” its operations in Lebanon. Netanyahu said he had instructed his cabinet to begin direct negotiations with Lebanon aimed at disarming Hezbollah – all the while insisting that “there is no ceasefire” in Lebanon and that Israel will “continue to strike Hezbollah with force”. Israel has since launched a fresh wave of strikes against what it called “Hezbollah launch sites” in Lebanon, after the IDF earlier ordered people to flee Beirut’s densely populated southern suburbs. Later in the day, Hezbollah said it had fired a rocket salvo towards northern Israeli settlements. While Israel continues to insist that the war will go on and “talks will be held under fire”, Lebanon is demanding a ceasefire before direct negotiations can begin. Joseph Aoun, the Lebanese president, said this was “the only solution”. Lebanon is also insisting that it needs the US as a mediator and guarantor of any agreement. Those talks will take place next week, hosted by the US state department in Washington. Iran’s ⁠president ⁠Masoud Pezeshkian said ⁠Israeli strikes on ⁠Lebanon violate the ceasefire agreement and would render ‌negotiations meaningless, adding that Iran would not abandon the Lebanese people. The speaker of the Iranian parliament, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, said Lebanon forms “an inseparable part of the ceasefire” deal. In a post on X, he said “there is no room for denial and backtracking”. Keir Starmer also said that Israel’s continued attacks on Lebanon “shouldn’t be happening”. The British prime minister also dismissed an argument put forward by US vice-president JD Vance on Wednesday that there had been “a legitimate misunderstanding”, saying the issue “isn’t a technical one of whether it’s a breach of the agreement or not”. It is “a matter of principles as far as I’m concerned”, Starmer said. A statement attributed to Mojtaba Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, said Iran will take management of the strait of Hormuz into a new phase, but did not elaborate on what that would be. In the statement, read out on state tv, he also said Iran remains determined to “take revenge” for his father, who was assassinated on the first day of the war, and all those killed in the war. “We will certainly demand compensation for each and every damage inflicted, and the blood price of the martyrs and the compensation for the wounded of this war,” he said. Continue reading...

Hawaii Volcanoes national park closed due to eruption of one of world’s most active volcanoes, located on Big Island Amber lava exploded over 200 meters into the air as Kilauea, one of the world’s most active volcanoes, located on Hawaii’s Big Island, erupted on Thursday. Lava fountains began to erupt from the volcano after 11 am local time, according to the United States Geological Survey (USGS). On Thursday evening, plumes of smoke and lava pouring downslope were observable on a livestream camera. So far, the episode has produced 3.6 million cubic yards of lava, USGS said. Continue reading...

Melissa Chiu, 54, director of Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, led the institution for 12 years A museum director at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington has announced that she is leaving to take over at the Guggenheim Museum in New York. Melissa Chiu has been director of the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden on the National Mall for 12 years. In an interview on Thursday, she insisted that her departure is not related to Donald Trump’s efforts to interfere with the Smithsonian. Continue reading...

Champion shares lead with Sam Burns after opening 67 McIlroy: ‘I was nervous, I was anxious like I always am’ So this is what Rory McIlroy’s new normal looks like. The defending champion is footloose and fancy-free at Augusta National. He is plainly no longer of a mind to revel in the events of the 2025 Masters. McIlroy returned to Augusta, for so long a place that exacted psychological torture on him, to deliver an emphatic statement. The floodgates are wobbling. Parallels between McIlroy on day one at this major and his win 12 months ago are valid. In both instances he played swashbuckling, theatric golf (and not always from fairways). Rafa Nadal, anxious to watch every swing from the galleries, must have admired what he witnessed. After round one, McIlroy is firmly on course to become only the fourth man to successfully defend at Augusta. Those who believed the 36-year-old’s history-making concluded with playoff glory over Justin Rose last year may be sorely mistaken. Continue reading...

There are protests planned at Anfield as Roberto De Zerbi starts his Tottenham tenure and Everton eye Europe Nuno Espírito Santo has rolled back the years in an attempt to save West Ham. He has gone old-school, switching to a gung-ho 4-4-2 system to give his side more threat in the final third. Pablo Felipe and Taty Castellanos, both January arrivals, have altered the face of the attack, but neither forward has been prolific. Castellanos has scored three goals in all competitions since joining from Lazio and Pablo, who is yet to open his account in English football, failed to convert during last week’s penalty shootout defeat by Leeds in the FA Cup. As a pair, though, Castellanos and Pablo have been oddly effective. Are they any good? Unclear. Do they run around a lot and give a previously ponderous West Ham more energy? Undoubtedly. Played together, Pablo and Castellanos do a worthy job for the team. Importantly, they create space for the wingers, Jarrod Bowen and Crysencio Summerville, who hopes to return from a calf injury for Friday night’s vital home game against Wolves. Bowen and Summerville are the big threats; they are West Ham’s main source of goals, but both are more dangerous with Pablo and Castellanos in the team. Jacob Steinberg West Ham v Wolves, Friday 8pm (all times BST) Arsenal v Bournemouth, Saturday 12.30pm Brentford v Everton, Saturday 3pm Burnley v Brighton, Saturday 3pm Liverpool v Fulham, Saturday 5.30pm Continue reading...

Astronauts prepare for re-entry several miles off coast of southern California after 10-day lunar fly-by mission The crew of Artemis II is set to return to earth on Friday following its historic 10-day lunar flyby mission, and Nasa leaders have described the precise logistics needed to get them home. The return will see the Orion capsule traveling at nearly 24,000mph before making a final splashdown several miles off the coast of San Diego. The operation requires multiple teams and careful coordination to safely extract the crew from the spacecraft. Continue reading...

The Bronx born rapper and DJ helped introduce hip-hop to the mainstream and was also accused of child sexual abuse The American rapper and DJ Afrika Bambaataa has died aged 67. The musician died in Philadelphia at around 3am local time due to complications from cancer, TMZ reported. The Hip-Hop Alliance, a group headed by musician Kurtis Blow, wrote: “Today, we acknowledge the transition of a foundational architect of hip-hop culture, Afrika Bambaataa. As the founder of the Universal Zulu Nation, Afrika Bambaataa helped shape the early identity of hip-hop as a global movement rooted in peace, unity, love, and having fun. Continue reading...

Fury: ‘I’m going to make an example of him’ Russian lifts Fury in the air during final face-off A cheerful Tyson Fury has promised his latest comeback to the ring will begin with a destructive knockout of Arslanbek Makhmudov at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in London on Saturday night. “It’s going to be different because, for the first time in forever, I’m the hunter,” Fury said at the fight’s final press conference. “I’m not the hunted, and we all know that when I’ve always been the hunter in the past, I’ve always fucked people up. “I actually feel sorry for Makhmudov because I’m going to make an example of him. He’s a big six foot seven lump, 18 or 19 stone. But I’ll knock his head right off his shoulders. I’m going to lay him unconscious like the gamecock on top of Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. He will be knocked spark out on the canvas looking up, thinking: ‘What just happened there?’ But it’s no shame because he’s fighting the great Tyson Fury.” Continue reading...

Ollie Watkins enjoyed a feast in Italy’s culinary capital, scoring two second half goals against a pumped-up Bologna side to take a comfortable lead back to Birmingham and the prospect of a Europa League semi-final as a secondi piatti. Watkins’ brace, followed Ezri Konsa’s opening goal, and each goal was in some way due to Bologna errors. But they did not tell the whole story of the contest, with the Serie A side dominating much of the play. But after a flap by goalkeeper Federico Ravaglia had let Konsa in on the cusp of half-time, Villa managed the game effectively and responded to a late Bologna strike by their Englishman, Jonathan Rowe, by scoring a third in injury time. Continue reading...

On the night Chris Wood returned from six months on the sidelines, a comical own goal by the Porto defender Martim Fernandes earned Nottingham Forest a draw and feeling optimistic of advancing to the Europa League semi-finals. The New Zealand striker was withdrawn as anticipated at the interval, Vitor Pereira mindful of the bigger picture, with Sunday’s home match with Aston Villa the first of seven remaining matches to preserve their Premier League status. Continue reading...

Spring is in the air and it’s all beaming smiles again at Crystal Palace. A sensational performance blew away Fiorentina as Jean-Philippe Mateta scored on his first start since the end of January, Tyrick Mitchell added a second before Ismaïla Sarr’s late header left Oliver Glasner’s side with one foot in the semi-finals in their debut European campaign. Until now, Palace’s performances in front of their own fans in the Conference League have been far from impressive. But having had the luxury of three weeks to prepare for this match, Glasner showed why he has such a good record in knockout matches in recent seasons as his team executed their gameplan perfectly. Continue reading...

Lower those expectations, Succession fans. The star plays a scientist who shrinks his wife (Elizabeth Banks) to 6in tall, in a screwball sitcom that should have been so much better I wonder what it’s like to be the go-to actor whenever anyone needs a morally questionable, sappy-looking, fundamentally weak character to play the whipped dog to someone else’s headline character? You’ll always have work but … you’d have to be pretty secure in yourself, no? But all actors are, of course, so it’s probably OK to be Matthew Macfadyen, who started his career in a 1998 TV film adaptation of Wuthering Heights as Hareton Earnshaw – Heathcliff’s whipped dog – and has been giving us brilliant incarnations of beta cucks ever since. Even when he made it to Mr Darcy (opposite Keira Knightley’s Elizabeth Bennet) it was unfortunately 10 years after Colin Firth (opposite Jennifer Ehle and coming out of a lake) had rendered all future versions redundant milksops. Most recently, of course, he gave us the greatest – oh GOD, there is no single word for Tom Wambsgans unless it is in fact “Wambsgans”, so let’s go with that – Wambsgans there will ever be, courtesy of Jesse Armstrong’s masterpiece Succession. Jeremy Strong’s intensity drew the headlines, but Macfadyen’s performance, like a worm twisting round an oiled tightrope, was endlessly clever, subtle and just as astonishing. Continue reading...

Do No Harm activist group alleges ‘racial discrimination’ in program designed to support under-served communities Sign up for the Breaking News US email to get newsletter alerts in your inbox Conservative campaigners are targeting a decades-old federal scholarship program designed to provide Native Hawaiian students with funding to pursue healthcare careers and place practitioners in the state’s most medically under-served communities. Do No Harm, a Virginia-based advocacy group for healthcare clinicians “focused on keeping identity politics out of medical education, research, and clinical practice”, filed its federal lawsuit challenging the US health department’s Native Hawaiian Health Scholarship Program (NHHSP) last week. Continue reading...

Kremlin proposes 32-hour ceasefire starting on Saturday afternoon – with Ukraine expected to agree to plan Vladimir Putin has declared a 32-hour ceasefire in Ukraine over the Orthodox Easter weekend, after an earlier call from Volodymyr Zelenskyy for a pause. The president’s decree, released by the Kremlin on Thursday, orders Russian forces to observe a ceasefire starting on 4pm Saturday and lasting until the end of Sunday. Continue reading...

Authorities arrest driver and passenger of car after finding large amounts blood and unresponsive man in rear seat Northern California law enforcement officals pulled over the driver of a Chevrolet Suburban on Easter Sunday morning for a suspected registration violation, and came upon a grisly scene that ultimately led them to two homicide victims. The California highway patrol said in a statement that two people, the person driving the vehicle and a passenger, had been arrested in connection with the killings. The passenger attempted to flee when officers stopped the SUV in Clearlake, about 100 miles north-east of San Francisco, but was quickly detained, according to CHP. Continue reading...

Trump is on the verge of squandering a ceasefire that serves US interests for the sake of an unreliable ally When Pakistan’s prime minister, Shehbaz Sharif, announced that the US and Iran, along with their allies, had agreed to an immediate ceasefire on Tuesday night, he made clear that the truce applied “everywhere including Lebanon”. But hours later, the Israeli government insisted that the deal did not include halting its attacks on Lebanon, which had become one of the deadliest fronts of the regional war instigated by the joint US-Israeli attack on Iran. By Wednesday afternoon, Israel had launched its largest and most destructive attack on Lebanon in years, killing at least 300 people and wounding more than 1,100. Dozens of Israeli warplanes dropped bombs on 100 targets across Lebanon within 10 minutes, with the Israeli military claiming it was targeting Hezbollah “command centers” in an operation it called “Eternal Darkness”. But Israeli warplanes leveled several buildings in crowded residential neighborhoods of Beirut, spreading panic in the Lebanese capital and overwhelming hospitals with hundreds of casualties. Israel also continued bombing Lebanon’s infrastructure, destroying the last remaining bridge that linked southern Lebanon to the rest of the country. Mohamad Bazzi is director of the Center for Near Eastern Studies, and a journalism professor, at New York University Continue reading...

First lady calls on Congress to hold hearing with survivors of late financier’s abuse in statement delivered at White House US politics – live updates Sign up for the Breaking News US email to get newsletter alerts in your inbox Melania Trump, the first lady, told reporters on Thursday that she “never had a relationship” with the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and his accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell. It was unclear which specific accusations spurred the first lady to respond publicly. She delivered her scripted remarks at a podium in the same room Donald Trump used to address the nation on the war in Iran last week. Continue reading...

They’re pricier than the competition, but have key features: the music doesn’t skitter when you step out of Bluetooth range and they can handle water and dust How do Apple’s AirPods Pro 3 compare against hearing aids? I put them to the test Sign up for the Filter US newsletter, your weekly guide to buying fewer, better things Over the past eight years, I’ve reviewed dozens of portable speakers from every top brand. And I can confidently say that Sonos makes three of the best portable speakers of them all. There’s Sonos Play, the brand’s newest portable and the Goldilocks of its lineup in size, sound and features. The Roam 2, a Toblerone-shaped speaker that’s small enough to go anywhere. And the Move 2, a powerhouse that doesn’t sacrifice bass performance. The little one: Sonos Roam 2 Continue reading...

Singer, 55, said he had broken his sobriety after three ‘devastating’ bereavements and has not drunk alcohol since Chico Slimani, a memorable X Factor contestant, was found guilty of drink-driving on Thursday, telling the court that his arrest came just hours after he broke his sobriety. The singer, 55, whose real name is Yousseph Slimani, reached the quarter-final of the TV talent show in 2005, later releasing a No 1 single, It’s Chico Time. Continue reading...

Left-back who joined in 2017 is out of contract in summer Napoli, Juventus, Atlético and Spurs keen on the left-back Andy Robertson is to bring his illustrious Liverpool career to a close at the end of the season, the club have confirmed. The 32-year-old is out of contract this summer and will follow another iconic player of the Jürgen Klopp era, Mohamed Salah, in leaving Anfield on a free transfer. Napoli, Juventus, Atlético Madrid and Tottenham are all keen on signing the Scotland captain, who rejected a move to Atletico last summer. A return to Scotland is not thought to be in Robertson’s plans at this stage. Continue reading...

New study describes what may be the first case of a unified community of chimps, in Uganda, turning on itself On a June day in 2015, primatologist Aaron Sandel was quietly observing a small cluster of the Ngogo chimpanzee group in Uganda’s Kibale national park when he noticed something strange. As other members of the chimpanzees’ wider group moved closer through the forest, the chimpanzees in front of him began to display nervous behaviour. They grimaced and touched each other for reassurance, acting more like they were about to meet strangers than close companions. In hindsight, Sandel said, that moment was the first sign of what would become a years-long bloody conflict between a once close-knit group of chimps. Continue reading...

Cuba accuses US of ‘extorting’ countries in pushing them to axe deals with Havana to send doctors on medical missions Cuba’s foreign minister has accused the United States of “extorting” Latin American countries by putting pressure on them to cancel decades-old deals with Havana for the supply of doctors. Bruno Rodríguez said the United States was trying to “strangle” the economy of the communist island, which earns billions from its foreign medical missions, after several countries stopped deploying Cuban doctors. Continue reading...

Iconic star ball design has been in place since 2001 Nike to pay $45m a year to supply Uefa club competitions The iconic Champions League ball will be redesigned next year after Nike entered exclusive talks with Uefa to become the official match ball provider for the 2027 to 2031 cycle of the competition. The US sportswear group has beaten off competition from incumbent supplier Adidas and fellow challenger Puma after offering to double Uefa’s current fee to around $45m per year. Continue reading...