Investigation into the 2015 incident revealed the 0.50-caliber weapon for the Jalisco cartel was purchased in Portland, OregonThe 0.50-caliber gun used by the Mexican Jalisco cartel to shoot down a Mexican military helicopter in 2015 came from a gun supplier in Portland, Oregon, a joint Mexico-US investigation has found.On Wednesday, the Louisville Courier Journal reported confirmation of the connection between the incident and Portland, Oregon by federal firearm officials. Continue reading...

Dogue, run by a trained chef, has garnered outrage for the high cost of pampering pups but pet parents have been supportiveSan Francisco is a foodie heaven with plenty of Michelin-starred restaurants. And San Franciscans love dogs. So it might come as no surprise that an entrepreneur has decided to combine the two passions, creating what’s believed to be the first restaurant exclusively for man’s best friend.Dogue, which rhymes with “vogue”, opened last month in the city’s trendy Mission District. Continue reading...

A second world war-era boat, half emerged B-29 plane and five other bodies have so far been found in the receding watersYet another set of human remains was pulled from the shallows of Lake Mead this week, marking the sixth time this year the receding water levels uncovered bodies from the past.The National Park Service confirmed on Wednesday that a human bone discovered by a diver directed a park dive team to an area where the skeletal remains were found. Continue reading...

Wyoming congresswoman, who lost her Republican primary, endorses Elissa Slotkin in seventh congressional districtRepublican congresswoman Liz Cheney on Thursday endorsed Democratic congresswoman Elissa Slotkin of Michigan and plans to campaign for her.It is the first time that Cheney, a critic of Donald Trump who lost her Republican primary, has crossed party lines to formally support a Democrat. Continue reading...

Albuquerque Head, who pleaded guilty to assaulting officer Michael Fanone on January 6, sentenced to seven and a half yearsSentencing a January 6 rioter who assaulted a police officer to 90 months in prison, a judge warned the “dark shadow of tyranny” continues to loom nearly two years since the Capitol insurrection that attempted to overthrow the results of the US presidential election.Albuquerque Head of Tennessee was sentenced on Thursday to the second-longest punishment of anyone involved in the Capitol attack so far. Head had already pleaded guilty to dragging officer Michael Fanone away from the police line while shouting “I got one!” Continue reading...

Controversial series is concluding at the Blue Monster at Doral with players insisting they are happy to have left the PGA TourBy the time Team Trump reached the 10th tee, the acolytes were waiting in line. “That swing looks like another four years!” bellowed one as Donald carried the water with a decent drive. “You think Biden could do that?” asked the 45th president of the United States. “He wouldn’t even reach the [ladies’] tee.” Neither could Eric Trump, who topped his shot into an alligator-infested pond. The War on Drugs blared out in the background, secret service agents patrolled the fairways. We really are experiencing the wildest and weirdest of golfing times.It is poetic that this $50m finale to LIV Golf’s maiden season is taking place at the Trump-owned Blue Monster at Doral. Many believe Saudi Arabia has created one with this ostentatious scheme, which finds itself in direct and frequently vicious conflict with golf’s traditional ecosystem. Continue reading...

Republican men can be accused of any number of horrors, and not risk their party’s supportIt’s possible that Herschel Walker is the worst candidate the modern Republican party has ever run for national office, and in an era of conspiracy theorists, Christian nationalists and Donald Trump, that’s saying a lot. Walker embodies everything the Republican party has claimed to oppose: violent crime, abortion, homes broken by absentee fathers, race-based affirmative action and straight-up incompetence. And yet no matter what Walker is accused of, up to and including acts many Republicans define as murder, he retains the support of the Republican party, and his race for a Georgia Senate seat remains a tight one.It’s not just that the modern Republican party has accepted as a norm that there should be absolutely zero moral or ethical expectations from the people they run for office. It’s that they seem to relish breaking the rules they want to set for others. It’s not hypocrisy so much as the celebration of conservative male impunity.Jill Filipovic is the author of OK Boomer, Let’s Talk. Continue reading...

Kevin McCarthy’s warning of no ‘blank check’ and progressive Democrats’ premature call for negotiations were unfortunateOn 24 October, 30 members of the House Democratic Progressive Caucus released a letter to President Biden calling for a “proactive diplomatic push” on Kyiv to work toward a ceasefire and “direct [US] engagement” with Moscow to end the Russia-Ukraine war. One week earlier, Republican House leader Kevin McCarthy’s no “blank check” for Ukraine comment raised questions about future congressional support for US assistance to that embattled country.The letter, even though it has now been withdrawn, and McCarthy’s comment are unfortunate. Vladimir Putin will take encouragement from both as Russia wages its war. The suggestion of cracks in US backing for Ukraine will increase his incentives to continue fighting. Continue reading...

The planet cannot afford a second term for the far-right president who has resurged in the pollsOn Sunday, Brazilian electors will cast their vote in a tight contest that will not only set the course for this extraordinarily polarised country but also have a powerful impact on the future of the world. Hopes that the far-right incumbent, Jair Bolsonaro, would be decisively rejected in the first round were dashed when he fared far better than expected, with 43% of votes, and his challenger, the former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, fell just short of an outright majority with 48%. Eleventh-hour handouts to the poorest and lavish quantities of disinformation have aided Mr Bolsonaro’s recovery.The hope is that his momentum is already fading. But the polls vary, and a second presidential term would be bad news not just for Brazilians but also the rest of us. The primary danger is climate catastrophe. As the UN’s environment agency warns that there is no credible route to limit global warming to 1.5C, deforestation in the Amazon is at a high: a carbon sink could become a carbon emitter. Criminal syndicates of loggers and ranchers race to do their worst for fear that a new administration will rein them in. More than 2bn trees have been felled during Mr Bolsonaro’s term in office. He has also fostered an increasingly dangerous culture for environmental defenders – as exposed by the murder of the activist Bruno Pereira and the Guardian contributor Dom Phillips this June. In contrast, analysts suggest a victory for Lula could see an 89% cut in rainforest loss. Continue reading...

Daily Beast reports that Holland & Knight, where governor once worked, made nearly $3m in state contracts from 2018 to 2020The old law firm of Florida’s Republican governor, Ron DeSantis, has received millions in state funds during his tenure, according to a new investigation.The Daily Beast reported that two law firms, Holland & Knight and Holtzman Vogel, received millions of dollars in state business in recent years from DeSantis’s administration. Continue reading...

With days to go, the calm belies what is at stake: the hard right empowered so a beleaguered figure can win and possibly evade justiceAs Israel heads to the polls on Tuesday for its fifth election since the spring of 2019, its politics are fractious, but stop short of visceral acridity. The country’s rival tribes are content to jostle each other. It’s an eerie quiet before what could be a terrible storm. With just days to go, Benjamin Netanyahu and the right lead in hypothetical match-ups, but may fall short of the 61 seats needed in the 120-member Knesset, Israel’s parliament, to dislodge Yair Lapid, the current prime minister.As for Lapid, his chances of securing an outright victory are slim. Talk on the street is of a Seinfeld election – much ado about almost nothing. The country is tired. Yet there is greater internal consensus than one would glean from the rhetoric bandied on the campaign trail.Lloyd Green served in the served in the US Department of Justice from 1990 to 1992 and is a regular freelance contributor to Guardian USDo you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. Continue reading...

The Democrat, who had a stroke in May, struggled in the debate format. But on the merits, he’s better than his Republican rivalJohn Fetterman can still become the next senator from Pennsylvania, the Democrat who safeguards their fragile majority. He is effectively tied or leads in many reputable polls, and he’s been a prodigious fundraiser throughout the race. Few left-leaning Democrats, in such foreboding terrain, have engineered a coalition this formidable.All of this must be stated outright because Fetterman’s lone televised debate performance was disastrous. In May, he suffered a stroke, and he could not speak consistently and coherently on Tuesday against his Republican opponent, Dr Mehmet Oz. While partisans online defended his speaking style and pleaded for empathy – all victims of health calamities certainly deserve it – it was inarguable that Fetterman struggled, and even sympathetic observers acknowledged a debate format was a steep challenge. Fetterman is simply not the candidate he was before his stroke.Ross Barkan is a writer based in New York Continue reading...

The new PM promised integrity and competence. Instead we got a dangerous dependency – which Labour can weaponise“Thank God Suella Braverman is back,” writes one Telegraph columnist. “Her determination to crack down on crime and illegal immigration undoubtedly chimes with the views of the country, and especially voters in the Red Wall. Thank God there is someone in the Cabinet to put forward those views.”Her return is not an oddity, not a pantomime joke, but proves how deeply Rishi Sunak is in hock to the hard right, like every Tory leader from John Major onwards. The party will rewrite the past week’s knife-edge drama as a smooth and inevitable coronation of its princeling, but his frantic scramble for the wrong votes tells another story. Restoring Braverman to the Home Office and boasting of party “unity” unites him with the obnoxious wing that drove the Tories to this post-Brexit dead end. The Express, closest to that faction, reveals that in the last hours battling with Boris Johnson, Sunak was so needy for rightwing support that he called Braverman no fewer than six times begging for her backing and that of the wing she represents; Keir Starmer called that out in PMQs as “a grubby deal”. The first heady days are a leader’s moment of maximum power with every job in their gift – and yet Sunak emerges as another Tory PM too weak to face down those old wrecking “bastards”.Polly Toynbee is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...

Police say mother of 19-year-old accused of killing two at high school on Monday wanted AR-15-style rifle removed from houseThe 19-year-old suspect who killed a teacher and a 15-year-old student in a shooting spree at a St Louis high school on Monday had the assault rifle he used confiscated by police just days before his attack.The St Louis police commissioner has confirmed that shortly before the school shooting, officers were called to the man’s home by his parents who were worried about him and wanted the AR-15 style rifle removed. Continue reading...

Trump’s former chief of staff must answer questions about alleged attempt to overturn 2020 election resultA judge on Wednesday ordered the former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows to testify before a special grand jury investigating whether Donald Trump and his allies illegally tried to overturn Georgia’s results in the 2020 election.Meadows is a key figure in the investigation. He traveled to Georgia, sat in on calls with state officials and coordinated and communicated with influencers either encouraging or discouraging the pressure campaign. Continue reading...

More liberal policies on environment, gun safety, labor, economic taxes and tobacco taxes associated with lower mortalityAmericans die younger in conservative states than in those governed by liberals, a new study has found.The authors wrote: “Simulations indicate that changing all policy domains in all states to a fully liberal orientation might have saved 171,030 lives in 2019, while changing them to a fully conservative orientation might have cost 217,635 lives.” Continue reading...

Oliver Laughland travels to Walt Disney World, Florida, to see how a law restricting the teaching of LGBTQ+ issues is affecting voters in the run-up to the midterm elections. Republicans extended their majority in the state in 2020, and with far-right Governor Ron DeSantis up for re-election, will his divisive culture wars help him win a second term?

With famine in Somalia almost inevitable, $100bn a year pledge criticised. Plus, China is locking down parts of Wuhan againGood morning.Billions of dollars ostensibly committed to addressing the impacts of the climate crisis in poorer countries are not being delivered, the UN’s humanitarian chief has declared. Martin Griffiths said he was “scrambling to try to understand” where a promised $100bn a year agreed at the UN climate change conference in 2009 by richer countries has gone.Follow the money. The Green Climate Fund was created as a way to deliver the money promised in 2009, but its impact has been limited since rich countries often channel their financing through the World Bank or regional development banks.‘Woman, life, freedom’. As many as 10,000 mourners attended Amini’s gravesite yesterday despite security services warning her family not to hold the ceremony and commanding a heavy presence in the city. The shootings appear to have happened when a smaller group marched to the governor’s office in Saqqez. Continue reading...

After Tuesday’s Senate debate, activists describe their career experiences and the standards by which we judge competenceWhen John Fetterman took the debate stage on Tuesday night in his high-stakes bid to become Pennsylvania’s next US senator, the focus wasn’t on his opponent Dr Mehmet Oz’s conspiracy theories or far-right views: it was on the effects of Fetterman’s recent stroke. The lieutenant governor used a close-captioning device and fumbled some of his sentences – which some commentators claimed was evidence that he was not “fit to serve”.But some people with disabilities saw things differently: someone adapting to a life crisis anyone could experience. Continue reading...

In two rural California counties, voters are showing increasing hostility and aggression toward election workersInside the office of the Shasta county clerk and registrar of voters, which runs elections for about 111,000 people in this part of far northern California, Cathy Darling Allen can see all the security improvements she would make if she had the budget.“We have plexi on the counter downstairs for Covid but that won’t stop a person. It’s literally just clamped to the counters,” the county clerk and registrar said. For about $50,000, the office could secure the front, limiting access to upstairs offices, she estimated. Another county put bulletproof glass in their lobby years earlier, she knew, something officials there at one point considered removing, though not any more. Continue reading...

It was a struggle for Black Britons to make headway 50 years ago, and it still is now – but it is important to fight onFifty years ago, when racists called and wrote daily letters to ITV’s Today programme in 1968 telling the corporation “Get that nigger off our screens”, they were speaking about me, the first visibly Black TV journalist in Britain.It resulted in me losing my job, having been in post just nine months. The official excuse at the time was, “She didn’t fit in with the programme.” But this was not what I was told when the producer showed me the complaint letters, and then the door. Continue reading...

Acceptance of subpoena means former president must settle upon his response to sweeping demand from January 6 investigatorsDonald Trump’s attorneys have now accepted service of the subpoena issued by the January 6 select committee, setting into motion the countdown for the former US president to inform the panel investigating the Capitol attack whether he intends to cooperate with the congressional investigation.The acceptance of the subpoena means Trump must settle on his response to the sweeping demand from the panel – requesting documents and testimony about contacts with political figures as well as far-right groups that stormed the Capitol – that will set him on a path without room for reversal. Continue reading...

Independent hopeful with bipartisan support, along with funds from state’s richest man, could deliver victory to Christine DrazanFor the first time in more than 40 years, a Republican could win the governor’s seat in Oregon, breaching the seemingly solid Democratic line of states running along the Pacific coastline of the US.The tight race between former Oregon House speaker Tina Kotek, a Democrat, and former Oregon House minority leader Christine Drazan, a Republican, which in the latest polling showed Drazan with a hairline lead, indicates a rebuff of the current term-limited liberal governor, Kate Brown. Continue reading...

Brian Daboll has overseen plenty of narrow wins, which is often a sign of luck rather than skill. But his team are doing plenty of things rightBill Parcells’ old axiom that “you are what your record says you are” is a nice bit of football folklore but it can often be misleading.There are plenty of average teams who sputter their way to a winning record, only to be found out in the postseason. Conversely, there are good ones who fall away due to injuries, bad luck, or being stuck in an unusually competitive division with a tough schedule. Continue reading...

I’ve tried everything, from Pritt Stick to antiperspirant, but they refuse to stay putMy spectacles keep slipping down my nose. They’ve been doing so roughly every 10 minutes since the dark day in 1980 when an optician in Stourbridge lodged some specs on this 13-year-old and blighted his life for ever.Indoors or out, whatever the ambient conditions, down they slip. I’m writing this in my cool, calm, air-conditioned dressing room as I wait to appear on Loose Women on ITV. And down my specs are slipping. I push them back up, and back down they go. Up down up down up down, all day every day, for nearly half a century. Continue reading...

Lawyer Gloria Allred introduces woman as Jane Doe who alleges anti-abortion candidate drove her to a clinic in the 1990sAnother woman has claimed that Herschel Walker pressured her into having an abortion and drove her to a clinic to obtain one.On Wednesday, lawyer Gloria Allred – who has represented numerous alleged victims of sexual misconduct and assault – introduced to reporters a woman who alleges Walker, the anti-abortion Republican candidate for Senate in Georgia, took her to an abortion clinic to have an abortion in the 1990s. Continue reading...

Spike, a beloved marine animal known to scientists since 2018, was found washed ashore near Vancouver IslandThe nearly 32ft hulking frame of a male humpback whale was found splayed on sands near California’s Fort Bragg on Saturday – the fourth whale to wash ashore along the coasts of Mendocino this year.A day later, a young female humpback would also be found dead far north near Vancouver Island. She was known to scientists as “Spike”, after being first documented in 2018. Continue reading...

Jury deliberates for 35 minutes before returning death sentence for Robert Solis, convicted of shooting dead Sandeep DhaliwalA man was sentenced to death on Wednesday for the fatal 2019 shooting of a law enforcement officer who was the first Sikh deputy in his Texas agency.A Harris county jury deliberated for about 35 minutes before returning the death sentence for Robert Solis, 50, after convicting him of capital murder on 17 October in Harris county sheriff’s deputy Sandeep Dhaliwal’s killing. Continue reading...

Writer of over a dozen books and California’s ‘prophet of doom’ told the Guardian in August: ‘Despair is useless’Mike Davis, the California historian who became famous for his prophetic warnings of social unrest and ecological disaster, died on Tuesday after a long struggle with esophageal cancer. He was 76.In more than a dozen books, Davis exposed the power struggles and betrayals that shaped the landscape and the people of southern California, where he grew up, and also explored how similar power struggles between elites and working class people played out around the world. Continue reading...

Taste of Soul elevates Black cultural experience and aids local businesses through food, music and art in InglewoodAs the sun began to break through the clouds over Los Angeles, cousins Glynis Phillips and Kim Polk danced their way up Crenshaw Boulevard. Music blared from a nearby stage, and the smell of barbecue wafted from a food truck.“Oh, we ain’t done dancing,” Phillips said, reaching out to Polk with a laugh. Continue reading...

Darrell Brooks faces multiple life sentences for Milwaukee SUV attack that killed six and injured scores of other parade-goersA Wisconsin man was convicted on Wednesday of killing six people and injuring dozens of others when he drove his SUV through a Christmas parade last year, wrapping up a trial in which he defended himself with bizarre legal theories and erratic outbursts.It took the jury a little over three hours to find Darrell Brooks guilty of all 76 charges, including six counts of first-degree intentional homicide. He faces a mandatory life sentence on each homicide count. Continue reading...

Vladimir Putin’s defeat in Ukraine is needed for the restoration of hope to Russians wanting a better future for themselves as well as their neighboursVladimir Putin is losing the war in Ukraine, but this does not make him any less dangerous. A despot whose authority at home depends on projecting strength abroad cannot afford the humiliation of defeat. So far, the Russian president has responded to every setback with more aggression. That involves more indiscriminate attacks on civilians and civil infrastructure. But Mr Putin also makes more demands of Russians. When the war began, civilian support for what censorship laws insisted on calling a “special military operation” was high, but mostly passive. Saturated with Kremlin propaganda, most of the country accepted the deranged official version of events – that Ukrainians were crying out for “liberation” by Russian soldiers.But there was also dissent and protest in defiance of repression. Tens of thousands of people left the country in horror when the war began. Their number was then swollen by Mr Putin’s decision last month to declare a “partial mobilisation” of fighting-age men.Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. Continue reading...

Steve Long, defending Shotgun Willie’s over death of Randall Wright in 2019, found dead after evening at club earlier this monthA trial centering on the death of a retail company executive at a Colorado strip club in 2019 has been delayed after a lawyer defending the club died there too.Steve Long was defending the strip club, Shotgun Willie’s in Glendale, in a lawsuit alleging it was liable for the death of Randall Wright, a customer, three years ago. The case was supposed to go to trial on 7 November. Continue reading...

Ye’s actions are straight out of Trump’s playbook of chaos. But online trolling all too often has real-world consequencesIf there has been a single enjoyable aspect to the initially sad, latterly alarming downfall of Ye, the rapper and mogul formerly known as Kanye West, it has been the sound of screeching tyres this week as successive associates understood – finally – that supporting him wasn’t in their interests, and slammed on the brakes.Without Ye and his frothing antisemitism, we might have been denied a trot around the little known origins of Adidas, official sports shoe of the German Olympics team in 1936, and, until Tuesday, one of Ye’s many lucrative sponsors. Continue reading...

Ron Smith and his girlfriend, Brenda Jeanan Volpe, weren’t wearing helmets in fatal August crashFor almost a decade, Ron Smith, an attorney and avid motorcycle rider from Pinellas county, Florida, advocated against laws which said motorcyclists had to wear helmets to ride. Eventually, the state law changed.This August, Smith, 66, and his girlfriend, Brenda Jeanan Volpe, 62, died in a fatal motorcycle crash. Neither was wearing a helmet, the Tampa Bay Times reported. Continue reading...

Rightwing news outlets and commentators called for candidate to drop out of race while campaign said it raised $1m on back of eventAs the dust settled over Tuesday night’s sole televised debate in the crucial US Senate race in Pennsylvania, pundits were starkly divided over the impact of the Democrat John Fetterman’s struggles with speech in his recovery from a stroke.The Pennsylvania lieutenant governor raised the issue of his auditory processing disorder, which makes it difficult for him to understand certain spoken words, in his opening remarks in the debate with his Republican rival, the former TV doctor Mehmet Oz. Continue reading...

Joe Morrison, his father-in-law Pete Musico and Paul Bellar found guilty of providing ‘material support’ for terrorist actThree men accused of supporting a plot to kidnap Gretchen Whitmer, the governor of Michigan, were convicted of all charges on Wednesday, a triumph for state prosecutors after months of mixed results in the main case in federal court.Joe Morrison, his father-in-law Pete Musico and Paul Bellar were found guilty of providing “material support” for a terrorist act as members of a paramilitary group, the Wolverine Watchmen. Continue reading...

1,000 people participated in the annual challenge, which removed 231 unwanted pythons from the wildA 19-year-old south Florida man captured 28 Burmese pythons in a 10-day competition created to increase awareness about the threat the invasive snakes pose to state ecology.Matthew Concepcion was among the 1,000 people from 32 states, Canada and Latvia who participated in the annual challenge, which removed 231 of the unwanted pythons, the Florida fish and wildlife conservation commission said. Continue reading...

Average interest rate on 30-year fixed-rate mortgage rose by 22 basis points to 7.16% last weekThe average interest rate on the most popular US home loan rose to its highest level since 2001 as tightening financial conditions weigh on the housing sector, data from the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) showed on Wednesday.The average contract rate on a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage rose by 22 basis points to 7.16% for the week ended 21 October while the MBA’s Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, fell 1.7% from a week earlier. Mortgage application activity is at its slowest pace since 1997. Continue reading...

From the US, there are clear lessons for other countries tempted to go down the same post-Brexit, mirage-filled roadThe last few months of Westminster drama are both so plainly watchable and so painfully bamboozling.It’s like being forced to sit through a game of cricket or baseball. The beer and the snacks are fine, but the game only makes sense to the insiders who have been thrilled by the secret strategies since childhood. Continue reading...

Teams owned by and named for Australian entrepreneur Adam Gilchrist will not compete but team in new city due in 2022Major League Rugby, the US men’s professional rugby union competition, will operate with 12 teams next season, down from 13 with the withdrawal of Los Angeles and Austin but with the addition of an expansion team, possibly based in Chicago.Announcing the news on Tuesday, the MLR commissioner, George Killebrew, said: “While we understand that this news is disappointing for the fans, players, and stakeholders of these two teams, this decision was made after much deliberation and counsel, and with the best interests of the league in mind. Continue reading...

New exhumations will be followed by new search for bodies in Oklahoma cemetery linked to 1921 atrocitySome of 19 bodies previously exhumed for testing in an effort to identify victims of the 1921 Tulsa race massacre and then reburied in an Oklahoma cemetery will be exhumed again starting on Wednesday, to gather more DNA.None of the remains recovered thus far have been confirmed as victims of the massacre, in which more than 1,000 homes were burned, hundreds were looted and a thriving business district known as Black Wall Street was destroyed. Continue reading...

Former president told Washington Post reporter: ‘We have stuff that Putin and Xi have never heard about before’In a taped conversation with Bob Woodward, Donald Trump boasted about US nuclear weapons development.“I have built a weapon system that nobody’s ever had in this country before,” the then president told the veteran Washington Post reporter. “We have stuff that you haven’t even seen or heard about. We have stuff that Putin and Xi have never heard about before.” Continue reading...

Two-time champions Portland Thorns are the favourites in Saturday’s game, but Kansas City Current have the beliefWelcome to Moving the Goalposts, the Guardian’s free women’s football newsletter. Here’s an extract from this week’s edition. To receive the full version once a week, just pop your email in below:Old meets new on Saturday evening at Washington DC’s Audi Field, which hosts the NWSL Championship final between the two-time champions Portland Thorns and a Kansas City Current side in their second season. Continue reading...

In this, one of a series of essays on the war in Ukraine from countries in or neighbouring the former Soviet bloc, a Georgian playwright says the government is out of step with the anti-Putin popular moodWhen Russia’s modern tsar escalated his war by announcing the partial mobilisation of reservists on 21 September, another wave of anxiety swept over Georgia. With due acknowledgment that every word written from this region at the moment should be about, or in support of, the Ukrainian people and their struggle, this anxiety is why I’m diverting to focus briefly on how we see this brutal war from Georgia, which, thanks to historical and geopolitical misfortune, happens to be a southern neighbour of Russia.The invasion of Ukraine has revived painful collective and personal memories of Russia’s 2008 war on Georgia. The trauma from this not-so-distant past rose to the surface again in February and has remained there. The current government of Georgia has tried to ignore it altogether, as if it had never happened. Continue reading...

US president and new British PM reaffirm ‘special relationship’ after Sunak becomes Britain’s third leader in 2022. Plus, TikTok risks being a vector of misinformation in run-up to midterm elections