Tommy Wright was allegedly handed cash in undercover newspaper investigationA former assistant head coach at Barnsley accepted a £5,000 bribe to leak commercial information about the football club’s players, a court has heard.Tommy Wright was allegedly handed an envelope of cash during an undercover investigation by the Daily Telegraph. Continue reading...

The Irish PM said on Thursday he had 'mixed feelings' over the Brexit deal reached between the UK and the EU. Speaking at a press conference after the deal was ratified and sent to the UK parliament for approval, the taoiseach said he regretted Brexit but added that 'there will always be a place at the table for the United Kingdom, if they ever choose to come back'

Duke of Sussex reveals emotional toll of following in footsteps of Diana, Princess of WalesThe Duke of Sussex has described the emotional impact of walking in his mother’s footsteps, and how dealing with her death is a “wound that festers”, in a new ITV documentary.In an interview with ITV News at Ten anchor Tom Bradby, Prince Harry was asked how he felt retracing the steps of Diana, Princess of Wales, during the recent southern Africa tour with the Duchess of Sussex, 22 years after his mother’s death. Continue reading...

Aid agencies struggle to respond as 300,000 people are displaced from their homesShifting frontlines and allegiances in Syria are making it difficult to respond to the growing humanitarian crisis triggered by Turkey’s offensive on Kurdish-controlled parts of the country, aid groups have said.After eight days of the Turkish operation about 300,000 people have been displaced from their homes and at least 71 people killed in north-east Syria, according to the UN and a human rights monitor. Local officials on Thursday put the number of dead at 231. Over the border in Turkey, 20 civilians have been killed in counterattacks. Continue reading...

Students say remarks by Indian freedom fighter mean proposed sculpture would be an ‘insult’Manchester city council should reject a statue of the Indian independence leader Mahatma Gandhi on account of his “well-documented anti-black racism”, according to student activists.The planned 2.7-metre (9ft) bronze statue is due to be erected outside Manchester Cathedral in November to coincide with the 150th anniversary of Gandhi’s birth. An open letter is calling for the council to acknowledge Gandhi’s “vile comments” and reverse the decision, which it says is an “insult” to Manchester’s black and Kashmiri communities. Continue reading...

In response to the changing meaning of the red poppy, Anthony Matthew argues that military pomp can hide the disaster of war, while Barbara Crowther describes a local memorial to all victimsThe Royal British Legion has modified the meaning of the red remembrance poppies to include “innocent civilians who have lost their lives in conflict and acts of terrorism” (Report, 16 October).This broadening of the scope of remembrance still falls short of that represented by the white poppies distributed by the Peace Pledge Union, which covers all those who have died in armed conflict, whether military or civilian, whatever side they belonged to. Only that way can war be remembered as a disaster, not something to be celebrated with military pomp. Continue reading...

Ed Husic says federal government spends ‘more money on government advertising than on countering violent extremism’Labor MPs have welcomed spy agency Asio’s recognition that the threat from extreme rightwing terrorism in Australia is on the rise but will now push the government to do more to counter the threat.On Thursday, Labor MP Anne Aly – a former academic specialising in countering violent extremism – said the recognition of the threat was “a long time coming” and suggested Australia had been slow to recognise the alleged Christchurch massacre shooter was “one of us”. Continue reading...

European commission president puts pressure on British MPs to pass new Brexit deal by pouring doubt on the possibility of any further extension. Arriving in Brussels for the EU summit, Juncker said there was no argument for further delay

Duchess of Sussex is suing Mail on Sunday for copyright infringement and invasion of privacyMeghan, the Duchess of Sussex, kept a copy of a highly personal handwritten letter she sent to her father Thomas Markle, suggesting she may have correctly feared it would later be leaked to the media.Court filings seen by the Guardian show that the duchess has a full record of the correspondence, including unpublished sections, which is now being used to assist her legal case against the Mail on Sunday for copyright infringement and invasion of privacy. Continue reading...

Subpoenas to Southwest Airlines and American Airlines seek information about flight crew training and 737 Max software MCASLawyers representing families of passengers killed in a Boeing 737 Max crash in Ethiopia in March are set to issue subpoenas to Southwest Airlines and American Airlines, the two biggest US operators of the jet, according to documents seen by Reuters.The subpoenas will be issued over the next couple of days, the lawyers separately told Reuters. Continue reading...

From the groundbreaking dramas of the 60s, through the early-90s resurgence to the unexpected box office successes of recent years, we assess the director’s outputKen Loach’s contribution to this short-film package of film-makers’ responses to 9/11 is a perfectly serviceable account of a different September 11: an activist’s letter to America about the coup against President Salvador Allende in Chile in 1973. At the time it seemed jarring, and in retrospect very much not what was needed; but it’s not the worst of the bunch – González Iñárritu gets nul points for incorporating footage of people jumping from the collapsing World Trade Center in a sound/image collage. Continue reading...

Ex-footballer acquitted of sexual assault and an alternative charge of assault by batteryThe former England footballer Paul Gascoigne has been found not guilty of sexually assaulting a woman he kissed on a train.Gascoigne, 52, was accused of drunkenly grabbing the woman’s face and “forcibly and sloppily” kissing her on the lips on 20 August last year. Continue reading...

Officers took three hours to respond to 999 call about man who stabbed partner 173 timesThe police watchdog has found no misconduct from Essex police in a case where a woman died after being stabbed more than a hundred times by her mentally ill partner and officers took almost three hours to respond to a 999 call.The attacker’s parents, who made the call but were unable to go to the scene because they were overseas, expressed dismay at the ruling. Continue reading...

Some observers say Delhi’s promises falling flat and unrest likely to increaseFive people were killed in Indian-administered Kashmir on Wednesday, thought to be the deadliest day in the region since it was stripped of its autonomy this summer.Two non-Kashmiris – an apple trader from Punjab and a migrant labourer – were killed in separate attacks by suspected militants in Shopian and Pulwama, south Kashmir. A second apple trader was in a critical condition. Continue reading...

Boris Johnson unaware of plan for meeting with Harry Dunn’s family, says spokeswomanDowning Street has denied that Boris Johnson asked Donald Trump to organise a meeting between the family of Harry Dunn and the wife of an American diplomat who has admitted she was driving on the wrong side of the road before the teenager died in a collision.At a briefing on Wednesday, the US president said he had arranged the widely criticised meeting at the suggestion of the British prime minister. Continue reading...

Jury told to find Ivor Bell not guilty in case based on alleged admissions to Boston projectThe case against a former IRA commander accused of involvement in the murder of a Belfast widow who was kidnapped, killed and buried in secret has collapsed.Ivor Bell, a veteran republican, was cleared of soliciting the murder of Jean McConville in 1972. McConville became known as one of the “disappeared” of the Northern Ireland Troubles. Continue reading...

Gergely Karácsony was elected on Sunday, beating Viktor Orbán’s far-right candidateThe newly elected mayor of Budapest has vowed to prove to the rest of Europe that there is more to Hungary than the politics of its far-right prime minister, Viktor Orbán.Gergely Karácsony, 44, who stood on a platform of a greener and fairer Budapest, won Sunday’s election with more than 50% of the vote, beating Orbán’s candidate despite a concerted campaign against him in government-friendly media and a threat that some federal funding would be withdrawn if Karácsony won. Continue reading...

South considering complaint over match, played in empty stadium amid media blackoutNorth Korea’s football team played like it was “waging a war” during a World Cup qualifier in Pyongyang against South Korea, the South’s manager has said.The two national teams played out a scoreless draw on Tuesday at the huge Kim Il-sung Stadium, which was empty of spectators. The match took place under a media blackout, and the South Koreans first spoke to journalists about the conditions on their return to Seoul on Thursday. Continue reading...

The EU's Brexit negotiator, Michel Barnier, has said Brexit talks have at times been difficult but a deal has been agreed between the UK and the EU, and the agreement is divided into four parts.EU regulations will apply to all goods in Northern Ireland, which will remain in the UK’s customs territory and benefit from UK trade policy. But it will remain an entry point into the single market. There will be a consent mechanism. Four years after the arrangements starts, the Northern Ireland assembly will decide by a simple majority if these arrangements stay

Police figures show a 7% rise in offences involving a sharp instrument over the past yearKnife crime in England and Wales reached an unprecedented high in the year to June, increasing by 7% on the previous 12 months, according to figures.Police-recorded offences involving a knife or sharp instrument rose to 44,076, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said, the highest figure recorded since 2010-11 when comparable data began. Continue reading...

Minister for Indigenous Australians says ‘we have to be pragmatic’ about recognitionKen Wyatt says he’s on the brink of producing a concrete proposal to legislate a voice to parliament, and insists a referendum to recognise Indigenous Australians in the constitution needs to happen before the next federal election.The minister for Indigenous Australians told the ABC on Thursday he was about to take “a series of propositions to do with constitutional recognition, the voice and truth telling” to Scott Morrison, and he planned to meet with other Indigenous parliamentarians next week to try and achieve consensus. Continue reading...

Rodrigo Duterte, the 74-year-old president of the Philippines, was filmed riding his motorbike in the compound of the presidential palace in a video shared on social media by a senator. The leader later crashed, hurting his elbow and knee, but suffered no major injury, senior aides have said

I wanted to teach the inmates about female empowerment. Instead, they overturned my views on everything from sex work to marriageI thought I knew about feminism. I had the word “FEMINIST” written in black marker pen across the front of my homework diary aged 15, along with an anti-war sticker that incongruously involved a cupcake. I had graduated from the “girl power” of my primary school years to reading Germaine Greer on a beanbag in the college library. I felt sorry for the girls in sixth form getting Brazilians, who, unlike my enlightened self, clearly hadn’t clocked that waxing was a tool of patriarchal oppression. I studied feminist theory, went to feminist gatherings and listened to feminist podcasts. I had spent several evenings sitting cross-legged at a “collective” organised by other middle-class, university-educated women talking about intersectionality and Frida Kahlo. By the time I graduated from university, I had firmly absorbed a list of the correct ideas and words that I needed to be a “proper feminist” (but was probably not someone you wanted to invite to a dinner party).In 2015, two years after graduating, I began a job working in a high-security women’s prison. I had read enough statistics and policy reports before I started to know that women in prisons were in desperate need of a little female empowerment. But what I quickly learned was that my feminist education had a thick wedge of information missing: namely, the part where it connected to actual women being very fundamentally oppressed because of their gender. Confronted by someone whose cervix had been plugged with four egg-sized capsules of crack cocaine on the behest of a controlling boyfriend who would reap the profits, I found it difficult to work out quite how my Frida Kahlo T-shirt and mansplaining radar were going to help things. Continue reading...

PM’s proposed deal suffers another blow as party objects to customs and VAT terms

President injures hip after falling off his vehicle as he reached for his shoe, aides sayRodrigo Duterte, the 74-year-old president of the Philippines, has hurt his hip and suffered scratches in a motorcycle accident, senior aides have said.Duterte, whose health has been the subject of intense public speculation, suffered the mishap at the Malacañang presidential palace compound late on Wednesday, according to his spokesman, Salvador Panelo. Continue reading...

Mahamadou Issoufou calls for ‘responsible parenthood’ as he warns population boom will undermine climate adaptationA misreading of Islam led to Niger’s explosive birth rate, hampering the country’s fight to adapt to the climate crisis and preserve its shrinking resources, the country’s president told the Guardian.Feted by Emmanuel Macron and Angela Merkel as one of Africa’s most articulate leaders, Mahamadou Issoufou stressed that this nexus of issues is set to have an increasingly direct impact on European politics, warning migration may exceed the levels seen during the second world war. Continue reading...

Carrie Lam abandons chamber again after lawmakers decry assault on protest leader

Opposition will support trade agreements with Indonesia, Hong Kong and Peru but push for a range of concessionsThe unions have blasted Labor for siding with the government on new free trade deals, accusing the party of abandoning workers and the ALP’s national platform.Labor agreed to support the trade agreements with Indonesia, Hong Kong and Peru after a special caucus meeting on Thursday, but has resolved to demand a range of concessions from the government on labour market conditions and “outdated” clauses relating to investor legal rights. Continue reading...

Government has invested in infrastructure and social programs, but critics fear ‘the end of democracy’ if Morales winsEarly every morning Juanita Flores walks ten minutes down a newly paved road to climb onto a sparkling new cable car that whisks her to her job selling vegetables in a renovated market in the centre of Bolivia’s capital.“I get here in half the time it used to take me,” she says, “and in the rainy season I don’t have to slosh through mud anymore.” Continue reading...

Bruno Dey, 93, accused of being accessory to murder of 5,230 people in what could be one of last of such casesA former guard at Stutthof concentration camp will go on trial in the northern German city of Hamburg on Thursday, in what could be one of the last criminal cases of an individual charged over the Holocaust.The 93-year-old man, Bruno Dey, was 17 when he joined the SS-Totenkopfsturmbann (Death’s Head Battalion), which manned the watchtowers at the concentration camp east of what is now the city of Gdańsk, in Poland. Continue reading...

An NGO has recut and overdubbed a Venezuelan telenovela to raise awareness of sexual healthUganda has one of the highest birth rates in the world. It also has some of the most dedicated soap opera watchers anywhere in Africa.Now a group of enterprising Ugandans is aiming to tackle the former through the medium of the latter. Soap operas are expensive to make, however, so they plan instead to “hack” a Venezuelan import, recutting the existing series and overdubbing it with Ugandan actors. Continue reading...

On 5 October 1999, two trains collided at speed in west London, killing both drivers and 29 passengers. Barrister Greg Treverton-Jones, who survived the crash and worked on the harrowing inquiry, pieced together what went wrong• Warning: this article contains graphic descriptions of injury and traumaThere was no warning and no screech of brakes – just a huge bang, and then we were crashing. I was sitting with my back to the direction of travel, towards Paddington, and felt the impact through my seat, as well as hearing it. For a moment or two, it seemed that we might be all right, because the train continued on its way. But then we derailed, and the wheels started to plough over the sleepers and through the ballast beside the tracks. I became aware of a bright yellow light over my right shoulder, and realised that it was a fireball. It moved along the outside of the carriage from front to rear, and then was gone. The carriage tilted to its right and, out of the window to my left, which was now below me, I could see one or two small fires. A body drifted slowly past that same window. It was that of a middle-aged male. The body was intact, and the man’s eyes were closed. I was struck by the peaceful look on his face as he rolled slowly below us. I remember hoping that he was not hurt, and wondering where on Earth he had come from.Back then, in 1999, by a strange coincidence, I was acting as junior counsel for Great Western Trains Ltd at the public inquiry into the Southall rail crash, which had taken place two years earlier, in September 1997, and killed seven people. Many weeks earlier, I had been chatting to Richard George, managing director of Great Western Trains Ltd, about his experience as a passenger in the Southall crash. He had demonstrated to me how he had got out of his seat and crouched in the aisle as the train had slowed. Continue reading...

Arab and Asian visitors were on a bus when it collided with another heavy vehicleThirty-five foreign tourists were killed and four others injured when a bus collided with another heavy vehicle near the Muslim holy city of Medina, Saudi state media said on Thursday.The accident on Wednesday involved a collision between “a private chartered bus ... with a heavy vehicle (loader)“ near the western Saudi Arabian city, a spokesman for Medina police said, according to the official Saudi Press Agency. Continue reading...

Bodmin Moor, Cornwall: A wet walk up Hawk’s Tor reveals vibrant colours and verdant pasturesFrom North Hill village, drab hedge banks are dominated by faded ferns, rotting blackberries, dull leaves and sycamore keys. Yet a spell of afternoon sunshine picks out the scarlet berries of honeysuckle and enhances the verdancy of pastures beside the glittering Lynher, swollen after days of rain.Across the river, steep woods edge the eastern side of Bodmin Moor; in the prevailing shade, spirals of gnats dance above upright fronds of buckler and male ferns, lit by sunbeams. Emerald moss-shrouded gateposts, stoned-up walls, tall tree trunks and fallen wood host pennywort seedlings and polypody ferns that thrive in the damp atmosphere. Shoals of leaves, beechmast and sparkling growan (decomposed granite) have been washed down the stony track and, from below, we hear the sound of the Withey Brook, rushing over the waterfall and towards the local hydroelectric power plant. Continue reading...

Eight green groups send letter to express concern over planned market floatEnvironmental groups have warned the banks linked to Saudi Aramco’s planned market float that they risk financing the destruction of the planet by supporting the public listing of the world’s biggest oil producer.The eight green groups, including Oil Change International and Friends of the Earth, warned that the world’s largest IPO would be “the biggest single infusion of capital into the fossil fuel industry” since global governments signed the Paris climate accord in 2015. Continue reading...

The number of elected officials under 30 doubled in city and district elections. Here a selection of them speak about their prioritiesThey took gap years to stay at home and run for office. They list as their political heroes progressive leaders such as Jacinda Ardern and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. And they plan to juggle their new roles as elected officials with university exams and shifts at McDonald’s.The record number of young New Zealanders, some still in their teens, who surged to victory in the country’s local government elections on Saturday – in what was dubbed a “youthquake” by commentators – were not lured by dreams of high-profile posts in national politics. Continue reading...

The unusual organism has no mouth but can detect and digest food, and no brain yet can learnA Paris zoo has showcased a slime mold, dubbed the “blob”, a yellowish, unicellular, small living being which looks like a fungus but acts like an animal.This newest exhibit of the Paris Zoological Park, which goes on display to the public on Saturday and is widely used in scientific experiments, has no mouth, no stomach, no eyes, yet it can detect food and digest it. Continue reading...

Andy Foster says financial backing from Lord of the Rings director was not reason for his victory in New Zealand capitalWellington’s new mayor, Andy Foster, has hit back at suggestions he is a “puppet” of Sir Peter Jackson, whilst still refusing to reveal how much the Lord of the Rings director and wife Fran Walsh donated to his campaign.Andy Foster won local elections in New Zealand’s capital city over the weekend, ousting one-term incumbent Justin Lester. Continue reading...

Frank Bainimarama’s heated argument with opposition MP Pio Tikoduadua was captured on videoNo assault charges will be laid against the prime minister of Fiji in relation to an incident with an opposition MP outside parliament, despite there being “sufficient evidence for the matter to proceed to court,” the country’s department of public prosecutions has ruled.Frank Bainimarama was accused of assault by Pio Tikoduadua, an opposition MP for the National Federation Party, who alleges the prime minister grabbed and shoved him outside Fiji’s parliament in Suva, causing his glasses to fall to the ground and break. Continue reading...

Uighurs living in Germany, the Netherlands, Finland, Sweden, and France have complained of intimidation by BeijingTwo days after Abdujelil Emet sat in the public gallery of Germany’s parliament during a hearing on human rights, he received a phone call from his sister for the first time in three years. But the call from Xinjiang, in western China, was anything but a joyous family chat. It was made at the direction of Chinese security officers, part of a campaign by Beijing to silence criticism of policies that have seen more than a million Uighurs and other Muslim minorities detained in internment camps.Emet’s sister began by praising the Communist party and making claims of a much improved life under its guidance before delivering a shock: his brother had died a year earlier. But Emet, 54, was suspicious from the start; he had never given his family his phone number. Amid the heartbreaking news and sloganeering, he could hear a flurry of whispers in the background, and he demanded to speak to the unknown voice. Moments later the phone was handed to a Chinese official who refused to identify himself. Continue reading...

Palfreeman says ‘fascist party’ may try to set him up by planting drugs and using a false witness if he is sent back to prisonAustralian Jock Palfreeman, who has been freed from detention but banned from leaving Bulgaria, has said he fears systemic corruption within that country’s criminal justice system could see him returned to jail for years beyond his original sentence.In an interview with the ABC shortly after being released from immigration detention, Palfreeman said he feared the influence of far-right political movements, which are seeking to have him reimprisoned, on the judiciary and criminal justice system. Continue reading...

Work begins on scheme that will encourage river to flow through multiple channelsPioneering work to return a river to its natural path in an attempt to improve the diversity of flora and fauna and reduce the risk of flooding has been launched on Exmoor in Somerset.The scheme, the first of its kind in the UK, has been inspired by projects in the north-west of the US, in which rivers and streams have been encouraged to flow through multiple channels, pools and shallow riffles as they would have done before mankind arrived and began moulding them into shapes to suit farming and settlement. Continue reading...

No 10 refuses to confirm Boris Johnson’s travel plans but PM could make early Brussels dash to push talks along

Protesters set cars alight and attack police after sentencing of nine pro-independence leadersStreet violence escalated in Barcelona late on Wednesday, as protesters set cars on fire and threw acid at police officers in a third night of unrest following the imprisonment this week of nine pro-independence leaders for their roles in the failed 2017 push for regional independence.Officers from the Catalan force, the Mossos d’Esquadra, were reported to have fired teargas and run over two protesters during clashes that quickly spread after a earlier demonstration turned into a series of running battles with police. Continue reading...

With 282 days to go, the Tokyo 2020 organisers have held a World Press Briefing at some of the venues to show how preparations are progressing Continue reading...

Catalonia braced for third night of unrest after imprisonment of nine pro-independence leadersSpain’s prime minister has warned that his government will not be provoked into overreacting as Catalonia braces for a third night of unrest following the imprisonment this week of nine pro-independence leaders for their roles in the failed push for regional independence two years ago.Speaking on Wednesday evening after holding talks with other political party leaders, Pedro Sánchez said the government would defend Spain’s constitution and peaceful coexistence but would not be tempted into inflaming tensions. Continue reading...

Canadian PM responds with ‘Thanks my friend’ after Obama gives apparently unprecedented endorsement by former US presidentBarack Obama has urged Canadians to re-elect Justin Trudeau, an apparently unprecedented endorsement of a candidate in a Canadian election by a former American president.Obama tweeted on Wednesday that he was proud to work with Trudeau and described him as a hard-working, effective leader who takes on big issues like climate change. Continue reading...