NSW detectives have located what they believe are human remains near a golf club in Pitt Town, 11 days after 85-year-old abducted from North Ryde home Detectives have found what they believe to be human remains on Sydney’s outskirts as they searched for missing 85-year-old Chris Baghsarian. New South Wales police said on Tuesday that detectives investigating the mistaken kidnapping of Baghsarian had discovered remains near a golf club in Pitt Town at about 8am on Tuesday. Continue reading...

When the most profound human emotion becomes an automated transaction in an online shop, the techlords have won The Guardian reported on the arrival of “Fate” and, friends, I laughed. Or maybe I cried. It’s apparently the first “agentic AI dating app”. An AI personality named “Fate” interviews users, runs data matches on their hopes and dreams, then suggests five potential matches based on the hard data of observable complementary language patterning, “No swiping involved!”. Continue reading...

Anthropic says three Chinese firms used ‘distillation’ technique to extract information from its Claude chatbot US artificial intelligence company Anthropic said on Monday it had uncovered campaigns by three Chinese AI firms to illicitly extract capabilities from its Claude chatbot, in what it described as industrial-scale intellectual property theft. OpenAI leveled similar charges last month. Anthropic said DeepSeek, Moonshot AI, and MiniMax used a technique known as “distillation” – using outputs from a more powerful AI system to rapidly boost the performance of a less capable one. Continue reading...

Company had suspended account of Tumbler Ridge shooter in June 2025 over ‘furtherance of violent activities’ Canada’s artificial intelligence minister says he has summoned representatives from the technology company OpenAI after the company declined to alert police after suspending the account of a user who became the perpetrator of one of the country’s the worst-ever school shootings. Evan Solomon says he is “deeply disturbed” by reports the company, which operates the popular ChatGPT chatbot, suspended the account of Jesse Van Rootselaar over the “furtherance of violent activities” in June 2025 but did not reach out to Canadian law enforcement. Continue reading...

The World Nature Photography awards have announced the winners for 2026 and Australian Jono Allen has taken out the top prize Continue reading...

New Vic, Newcastle-under-Lyme The cast in this four-person capsule telling of the Conan Doyle thriller bring vigour and charm but it’s hard to discern any point to the exercise To get the measure of how tiresome this Sherlock Holmes adaptation is, you just have to think of its antecedents. The joke is that there are only four actors to represent the famous detective, his sidekick John Watson, various members of the Baskerville family, plus servants, neighbours and yokels, not to mention number 221B Baker Street, windswept moorland a country pile. The impossibility of achieving such a task comes at the expense of theatre itself: the shaky props, the hasty costume changes and the over-stretched stage manager. Laughing at the medium is an old idea. But when, say, Victoria Wood did it in Acorn Antiques, she had a reason. Yes, daytime TV soaps were an easy target for satire, but a target nonetheless. And when the National Theatre of Brent attempted two-man epics such as Wagner’s Ring Cycle or The Messiah, the crazy ambition was funny in itself. Continue reading...

Designer Daniel Lee’s trenchcoats and bomber jackets fizz with urban energy in collection that embraces bad weather In a winter of record-breaking rain, Burberry – purveyor of the stalwart British coat – is back in the zeitgeist. A season of downpours has provided an apt backdrop for a return to form, as the brand re-entered the FTSE 100 last autumn after an ignominious year out of the charts. The classic check scarf was ranked the fourth hottest fashion item in the last quarter of 2025 on the search, sales and social media metrics of the Lyst index, with overall demand for the brand up 239% year on year. Continue reading...

Sir Jim Ratcliffe must be seriously conflicted. Manchester United’s advance towards the riches of the Champions League continued to gather pace under Michael Carrick thanks to the impact of Slovenia’s Benjamin Sesko for the second game in succession. The summer signing came off the bench to condemn Everton to another home defeat with a clinical finish and lift United to fourth in the table, only three points behind Aston Villa. Sesko, who preserved Carrick’s unbeaten record as United manager last time out at West Ham, was again their savour to settle a hard-fought contest with David Moyes’s side. It is now five wins and one draw from Carrick’s six games in charge. The audition for the permanent job could not have gone much better thus far. Continue reading...

Based on the true story of amateur sleuths appalled at the dumping of sewage in our rivers, this drama starring David Thewlis is a blast of controlled fury – and could become the next Mr Bates vs the Post Office We know, because ITV’s Mr Bates vs the Post Office showed us, that television drama can suddenly intensify public disgust at a scandal, forcing official attitudes to change. Will Dirty Business, Joseph Bullman’s drama-documentary on the great English and Welsh water pollution shame – whose storylines are based on real-life events – be another TV show that moves the needle? If this doesn’t do it, perhaps nothing will: this is a fist in the face, a blast of controlled fury that mounts an unanswerable case for the prosecution. The Cotswolds, 2016. Two neighbours, recently retired and hungry for a project, notice brown murk in the previously beautiful River Windrush. By profession, Ashley Smith (David Thewlis) was a real-life “Line of Duty” cop investigating corrupt cops, while Peter Hammond (Jason Watkins) was an Oxford maths professor. Together they look into a curious dumping of sewage and, when the explanation given by the privatised local water company doesn’t add up, they dig in. Ash’s infallible nose for dishonesty, married with the algorithm Peter devises to find patterns in confusing data, builds a picture of water infrastructure destroyed by three decades of underinvestment, leading to environmental calamity on a staggering scale across the country, with thousands of instances of rivers and seas tainted by untreated sewage. Real footage, shot by campaigners to show the extent of the damage, is woven into the drama. Continue reading...

Charles Kushner had been summoned to explain comments relating to the killing of far-right activist Quentin Deranque Donald Trump’s ambassador to Paris has been banned from meeting French government ministers after failing to show up for a meeting at the foreign ministry to explain US comments about the killing of a far-right activist. Charles Kushner, whose son Jared is married to the US president’s oldest daughter, Ivanka, was summoned to the 7pm meeting by the foreign minister, Jean-Noël Barrot, after the US embassy in Paris reposted state department comments about the case. Continue reading...

The crowd of twentysomethings may not have impressed grizzled veterans but a near-record level of attendance at Friday Night Live! made a powerful impression There are times when it feels as though the entirety of British horse racing exists in a state of perma-gloom, bewailing an ageing fanbase, declining attendances and a moribund, factional leadership. It is, so the narrative goes, a sport in slow but irreversible decline, waiting for the inevitable moment in 10 or 20 years’ time when someone finally comes along to turn out the lights. However, every now and again, there are moments such as the Friday Night Live! card at Southwell last week which lift the mood completely, and offer hope that a 250-year-old sport has plenty of running left to give. Continue reading...

40-something fighters will meet in Las Vegas Mayweather won previous encounter in 2015 Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao will face each other on 19 September in Las Vegas in a rematch of one of the biggest fights in boxing history. Their first fight, in 2015, was generally seen as a tame affair with both fighters past their peaks. September’s bout, which will be streamed live on Netflix, is likely to be of a lower quality. Mayweather and Pacquiao will be 49 and 47 respectively when they fight. Mayweather’s last professional fight, which preserved his unbeaten record, came in 2017, although that was a glorified exhibition against UFC star Conor McGregor. Pacquiao fought for the WBC welterweight championship last year, but is far from the force he was in his prime. Continue reading...

Controversial doctor steps down as contributor after Epstein files reveal communication between the two men Controversial longevity expert Dr Peter Attia has resigned from his post as a CBS News contributor after correspondence between Attia and convicted sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein was made public. The Hollywood Reporter first broke the news of Attia’s departure. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Trump’s decision will be driven by envoys’ judgment on whether Iran is stalling on a nuclear deal Donald Trump’s decision to order airstrikes against Iran will hinge in part on the judgment of Trump’s special envoys, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, about whether Tehran is stalling over a deal to relinquish its capacity to produce nuclear weapons, according to people familiar with the matter. The president has not made a final determination on any strikes, as the administration prepares for Iran to send its latest proposal this week, ahead of what officials have described as a last-ditch round of negotiations scheduled for Thursday in Geneva. Continue reading...

As the drama shows, private firms no longer able to pollute the coast of England of Wales just switched to rivers instead There is a moment in Channel 4’s drama Dirty Business when Julie Maughan holds the body of her dead child and lets out an anguished cry. It is as brutal as it is compelling. Her eight-year-old daughter Heather had just died in hospital, two weeks after playing in the sea on the beach at Dawlish Warren in Devon, where she contracted E coli O157, a bug which comes from raw sewage. She became ill with diarrhoea and blood loss. Transferred to Bristol children’s hospital, her parents agreed to switch off her life-support machine after she suffered kidney failure and brain damage. Continue reading...

Sinners film-maker’s much-anticipated relaunch of the paranormal hit show finally receives official green light Ryan Coogler’s reboot of The X-Files has received the official green light with Danielle Deadwyler set as the first co-lead. The film-maker behind Black Panther and Sinners has long talked about his love for the hit paranormal drama series and how he wants to make some new episodes that are “really fucking scary”. Continue reading...

Other nations are catching up with the US in its traditional strengths such as snowboarding. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing for Americans In 2002, on home ice and snow in Utah, the USA obliterated its records for most gold medals (10, beating the previous high of six) and most overall medals (34, more than two times the previous high of 13) by the country in a single Winter Olympics. In 2026, the USA broke that national record for gold medals with 12, and broke the 30-medal mark for the first time outside North America (Norway broke the overall record with 18 golds). Continue reading...

It is the third such attack in a week, and is part of increased US forces in the Caribbean The US military launched a strike on an alleged drug smuggling boat in the Caribbean which killed three men, in its third such attack over the course of a week. “Intelligence confirmed the vessel was transiting along known narco-trafficking routes in the Caribbean and was engaged in narco-trafficking operations,” US Southern Command, which oversees operations in Latin America and the Caribbean, said on Twitter/X. Continue reading...

On the eve of the fourth anniversary since Russia invaded Ukraine, Vladyslav Heraskevych has no regrets about sacrificing his Winter Olympic dreams in Milano Cortina It is the image that will forever define the 2026 Winter Olympics: a Ukrainian skeleton racer, stoic and unbowed, holding a helmet bearing the faces of 24 athletes killed by Russia. Behind him, the icy track serves as a reminder of the dreams he sacrificed for a greater purpose. It was an extraordinary act of bravery and defiance, which carried the tremors of Tommie Smith and John Carlos’s civil rights protest in 1968. But in his first in-depth interview since being disqualified from the Milano Cortina Games Vladyslav Heraskevych makes one thing clear. He has unfinished business with the Olympics. Continue reading...

Awarded best actor and rising star for role as man with Tourette syndrome in I Swear the 33-year-old was ‘mesmerising’ even when learning his craft in Hull What is Tourette syndrome, what are tics and what happened at the Baftas? Standing on stage, barely holding back tears and struggling to express his startled elation at being named best actor at last night’s Bafta awards in London, the first words to leave Robert Aramayo’s mouth were “wow”. His next few words, chosen after a brief and only half successful attempt to compose himself, were “I absolutely can’t believe this.” And how could he. Aramayo, 33, had not only unexpectedly beaten the likes of Leonardo DiCaprio and Timothée Chalamet to capture his grand prize, but had also collected the rising star award earlier in the evening, becoming the first actor or actress in history to win both awards on the same night. It was, in his own words, unbelievable. Continue reading...

Bridget Phillipson and her team are making sure MPs and the public grasp the need to overhaul the special educational needs system In her first week as a cabinet minister Bridget Phillipson held a meeting for new Labour MPs with one subject – special educational needs. Almost 100 MPs came to that first meeting. There were new MPs for whom the issue was personal to their own families – Jen Craft, Daniel Francis, Steve Race, as well as the then business secretary, Jonathan Reynolds. Dozens more knew the system was at breaking point because of their previous work in the charity sector, for unions and in the disability sector. Continue reading...

Anthony Albanese says Australia would not object to his removal from royal succession line A parliamentary inquiry into Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor’s links to Jeffrey Epstein is a matter for MPs, Downing Street has said, as ministers faced a new push to uncover details about the former prince’s role as a trade envoy. It comes as the Australian prime minister, Anthony Albanese, wrote to Keir Starmer to say his country would have no objection to Mountbatten-Windsor being removed from the royal line of succession. Continue reading...

US state department official says it’s ‘prudent’ to reduce their footprint to essential personnel Washington has evacuated dozens of non-essential personnel from its embassy in Lebanon as US ships and warplanes have been positioned in the region for a potential strike against Iran in the coming days. The diplomatic drawdown followed reports that dozens of US personnel had been evacuated through Lebanon’s Beirut-Rafic Hariri international airport to protect them from a possible Iranian counterattack if tensions between the US and Iran escalate into war. Roughly 30-50 US embassy personnel have left the country, estimates suggest. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Former health secretary throws weight behind campaign to boost diagnosis of placenta accreta spectrum Jeremy Hunt has urged leading doctors to do more to help maternity specialists detect a rare complication of childbirth that can lead to a women bleeding to death within minutes. The former health secretary has thrown his weight behind a new campaign, aimed at improving the NHS’s identification of placenta accreta spectrum. The campaign was set up by Amisha Adhia and her husband, Nik, after five hospitals failed to spot that she had PAS. Continue reading...

Follow updates from Monday’s 8pm (GMT) kick-off Ten talking points from the weekend | Email Daniel Human existence demands an endless search for narrative – consider religion, psychotherapy and the arts – so of course football, its most uniting obsession, does likewise. Consequently, every game Michael Carrick’s Manchester United face is an episode in his quest to earn the permanent manager’s job, the most daunting and meaningful obstacle always the next one. First, he was asked to beat good teams considered far superior to his own, and he did; then, he was asked to beat ones he was expected to, at home, and did that too; now, he’s being asked to beat difficult ones away, something United failed to do at West Ham. Continue reading...