World news | The Guardian

Group, whose constituencies have derelict or at-risk pools, are campaigning to make outdoor swimming available for allCooling, blue expanses of water have been a lifesaver for many lucky enough to live near a lido during the recent UK heatwave.Now, a group of 20 MPs, along with the Fabian Society, are calling for this relief to be made accessible for all by getting water companies to fund the reopening of the country's lost lidos. Continue reading...

The programme, aimed at keeping 1m girls in school across Africa, Asia and the Middle East, withdrawn after aid cutsA leading higher education programme, aimed at keeping 1 million girls in school across Africa, Asia and the Middle East, has been axed by the British government just two years after it was announced.The scheme, Strengthening higher education for female empowerment (SHEFE), which was unveiled with some fanfare two years ago by the outgoing Conservative government, had a 45m budget to increase access to higher education for 1 million students worldwide. It has now had its tender withdrawn, the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) said. Continue reading...

Annie's lawyers argue that prosecution was so badly executed it breached her human rightsAt her kitchen table, in a village in southern England, Annie* sits with a blue folder stuffed with court documents, witness statements and correspondence relating to the trial of her stepfather, whom she had reported to police for alleged childhood abuse.As she prepared to tell her story for the first time, she was flooded with emotion when a photograph fell from the folder. The square Polaroid showed a young girl standing in a field beside a pony, dressed in jodhpurs and a riding hat. Continue reading...

Popular national pastimes of drinking and football will make post-Mexico Monday a day of sore heads and sleepy childrenEngland are through to the round of 16 in the World Cup and, as is customary in the run-up to a major international footballing fixture, the country may be losing its mind.Because piled on top of the 60 years of hurt for the men's team, England fans have another obstacle to overcome with the forthcoming fixture: a gruelling kick-off time of 1am BST. Continue reading...

Home fee' qualification ends in 2028, leaving those hoping to study in UK not now eligible for British loansBritish teenagers living in the EU could be priced out of UK universities in two years' time as a Brexit rule change means they face the double whammy of paying costlier international fees, while losing access to student finance.British passport holders living in the EU still qualify for home fee" status at UK universities. But this will no longer be the case when the grace period ends in 2028, meaning the first wave to be affected are starting their A-levels, or equivalent, this autumn. Continue reading...

Politicians brace for constitutional turmoil if Nigel Farage's party end up in government - or even as a strong oppositionThe rise of Nigel Farage has prompted political leaders across Ireland, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales to game the unthinkable: the breakup of the United Kingdom.Unionists who wish to save the union and nationalists who wish to end it are bracing for constitutional turmoil if Reform UK emerges triumphant - with Farage as prime minister or official leader of the opposition - after the next election. Continue reading...

The gap between America and Britain has grown economically as Trump asserts the UK is dying'. Culturally, however, it's a different storyOn 1 June 1785 John Adams travelled to London to become the first US ambassador to Britain, in which capacity he was to meet George III. By his own admission, Adams trembled at the encounter. After all, it had been less than a decade since he helped Thomas Jefferson write the Declaration of Independence denouncing the king as an absolute tyrant" who had plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people".A trepidatious Adams trudged through the London drizzle to St James's Palace, where he presented his credentials to King George. He bowed three times, then declared he would be the happiest of men if I can be instrumental in recommending my country more and more to your Majesty's royal benevolence". Continue reading...

Bureau of Meteorology says city's mean temperature reached 16.1C, surpassing the previous record of 15.7C set in 1991

The New South Wales premier warns of rising threat of Pauline Hanson's party as he addresses party conference

Darweish Mohamed was found critically wounded outside Craigieburn community hospital on Wednesday evening

Singer and fiance Travis Kelce have been coy but festivities are getting under way at Madison Square GardenThe streets of New York City and the first-class lounges of Heathrow and JFK airports were crawling on Friday with celebrities on their way to attend the wedding of the year.Taylor Swift had kept fans guessing about whether it was her nuptials that had caused the closure of 11 streets in midtown Manhattan and the endless deliveries of flowers, food and decorations to the huge Madison Square Garden arena. Continue reading...

Prime minister also speaks of his intensely personal decision' to step down in first interview since resigningKeir Starmer has warned his likely successor, Andy Burnham, that it will not be possible to spend less time focusing on international affairs.Speaking during a BBC interview, he also spoke of his intensely personal" decision to announce his resignation last month after two years as prime minister. Continue reading...

People gather outside Madison Square Garden despite security keeping them from seeing anything noteworthyTaylor Swift's fans gathered in the heat outside New York's Madison Square Garden on Friday for her wedding - or at least the celebration of it - to Travis Kelce, and the sense of being close to the superstar singer-songwriter and her NFL champion groom on their big day.Whether or not Swift and Kelce have already tied the knot, which has been at the center of contradictory reports, fans said they were thrilled at the union - and the location. Continue reading...

Judge says evidence indicates attack on Pouria Zeraati outside home was carried out on behalf of Tehran regimeTwo Romanians who took part in a targeted" knife attack on a television journalist in London on behalf of the Iranian state" have been jailed.Pouria Zeraati, who worked for the Persian-language channel Iran International, which is critical of the Tehran regime, was left bleeding in the street after being stabbed three times outside his home in Wimbledon. Continue reading...

Weekend's high temperatures and humidity virtually impossible' without climate crisis, researchers sayThe scorching heat blanketing much of the US this week would have been virtually impossible" if not for the climate crisis, researchers have found, warning that the high temperatures could threaten Independence Day celebrations and World Cup matches this weekend.The climate the country has today is fundamentally different to the one it had when the founding fathers signed the Declaration of Independence," said Theodore Keeping, extreme weather and wildfire researcher at Imperial College London, in a press release. Continue reading...

Party had justified plan to hang flags in Nottinghamshire on basis that local businesses would foot 75,000 billA 75,000 scheme by a Reform-led council to hang union flags at sites across the county, which the party said would not cost the taxpayer a single penny" as it would be sponsored by local businesses, has failed to attract a single sponsor, it has emerged.The plan to attach the flags to brackets on about 180 lamp-posts and other places was agreed in the autumn by Nottinghamshire's council, won by Nigel Farage's party in last year's May elections. Continue reading...

Pope Leo urges Americans to live up to the ideals of the Declaration of Independence in his first major address to the USPope Leo has used his first major address to his home country to praise the US history of welcoming migrants, urging Americans to live up to the ideals put forward in the Declaration of Independence.In his latest implicit rebuke to Donald Trump, the first US leader of the Roman Catholic church said the word America" had become a byword for freedom" across the world because of the way the country welcomed migrants. Continue reading...

Zoe Watts and Amanda Stanhope launched network after being repeatedly assaulted by partners while unconsciousTwo women who were drugged and raped by their partners while they were unconscious have said hundreds of people - including about 80 in the UK - have come forward to an international support group for victims of the crime.Zoe Watts and Amanda Stanhope, who were both repeatedly assaulted by their partners while unconscious, are calling for tighter laws to stop men sharing images and videos of sexual assaults and rape online. Continue reading...

Port expansion and protections for whales part of BC and Alberta plan to expand country's presence overseasThe governments of Canada and the province of Alberta will move forward on a major new oil pipeline after the pair announced a plan to ease concerns of British Columbia and First Nations on the Pacific coast.Canada's prime minister, Mark Carney, shuttled between British Columbia and Alberta on Thursday to announce more than C$150bn in new investments in both provinces, part of a broader project of reducing trade with the United States and expanding his country's presence in overseas markets. Continue reading...

McKee, 29, died after being hit by a bullet as she observed rioting in Derry in Northern Ireland in April 2019Three men from Derry have been found not guilty of murdering the journalist Lyra McKee in 2019.Her family said the verdict at Belfast crown court meant the justice system had completely failed" them and McKee. Continue reading...

Avoiding traditional questions and stilted broadcast clips, PM-in-waiting has evolved his style of media managementHe is due to become prime minister in just over a fortnight as parliament begins its six-week summer break. But at a marquee speech this week, he took precisely zero questions. So is Andy Burnham, as opposition leader Kemi Badenoch claims, dodging scrutiny? His allies say no: he is simply going about it in his own way.The former Greater Manchester mayor is very obviously a different type of communicator from Keir Starmer, and thus always likely to convey his message in methods beyond Starmer's traditional questions after a speech and the occasional stilted broadcast clip. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Data shows buyers are not rushing to get into the market, despite lower prices and less competition

Exclusive: Shabir Ahmed, jailed in 2012 for rape, abuse and trafficking of girls, was deemed three years ago to present high risk of sexual offending'The leader of the Rochdale grooming gang was deemed to pose a very high risk of serious harm" towards children just three years ago, the Guardian can reveal.Shabir Ahmed, 73, was freed from HMP Leeds on Thursday despite three failed attempts to secure parole, the most recent of which was in October 2024. One document, relating to a previous review in 2023, shows Ahmed was seen to present a high risk of sexual offending". Continue reading...

Anti-abortion policies may have appeal, but with one in three Australian churchgoers born overseas, talk of a monoculture may put them off

Fifty-six state branches want the laws reviewed, while gambling, Aukus and Palestine are also on the agenda

The government said it had to react to England's progression in the World Cup, which was only confirmed on WednesdayDowning Street said it would continue to use X after the culture secretary, Lisa Nandy, announced she would stop using the social media platform.Nandy said yesterday the culture and media department will also stop using X because the site now favours abuse and misinformation over meaningful debate".It is for individual departments to decide what is right for them in this regard.Our full focus remains on making sure X is following the law, cleaning up its act and ensuring it is safe for women, girls, children and people right across the country." Continue reading...

Suspect seen in Germany after attack apparently targeting tycoon Vadym IermolaievThe main suspect in a Monaco bomb attack this week that seriously injured a Ukraine-born business tycoon and two of his family members is a Ukrainian woman living in Germany who disguised herself as a man, authorities have said.Interpol, the international police organisation, on Friday issued a red notice for Anastasiia Berezovska, aged 39, describing her as German-speaking with dark hair and a tattoo, possibly of a snake, on her right arm from the shoulder to the elbow. Continue reading...

Reports of stampede' for stays near water amid concerns over cancelled flights, higher air fares and EU border delaysSummer bookings at Britain's hotels and holiday parks have jumped, compared with last year, as fears about flight cancellations and long delays at EU borders have prompted many UK holidaymakers to stay closer to home this year.There has been a surge in last-minute bookings for UK holidays amid warnings that airlines will have to raise their fares because of higher jet fuel bills that have resulted from the war in the Middle East. Continue reading...

The London-based fintech says restructuring is necessary to reduce duplicate' roles

Late announcement' means forces will have to adapt plans and move officers away from communities, say chiefs

Visitors can get free peek at works by one of UK's most significant 20th-century artists and one of his successorsSwifts screech overhead, hares lope along the grassy paths and butterflies flutter in the woodland fringe. There is an orchard; there are chickens, beehives. It seems simply a lovely, if conventional, slice of English countryside - until you happen upon striking sculptures fashioned out of chunks of reclaimed steel or machinery parts salvaged from factories, shipyards and farms.The pieces are the stars of a show called Heavy Metal, which brings together work by one of the UK's most significant 20th-century artists, Anthony Caro, and one of his successors, James Capper. Continue reading...

UK provisional peak of 37.7C shatters previous record by huge margin, while Germany hits all-time high of 41.7CLast week's heatwave across western Europe shattered national June records and set new all-time highs.The UK recorded a provisional high of 37.7C at Lingwood in Norfolk on Friday 27 June, smashing the previous June record of 35.6C, set in 1976. Such a margin is exceptionally rare: temperature records are typically broken by 0.1C or 0.2C, not a remarkable 2.1C. Continue reading...

Exclusive: As well as citing personal reasons, Ridley says she is making way for a successor to work alongside new leader'Hollie Ridley, Labour's general secretary, is to step down this autumn after two years in the job, she has announced to party staff.Ridley, an ally of Keir Starmer who ran Labour's field operations in the 2024 general win election, said in an internal email she would stand down after the party's annual conference in September. Continue reading...

Huge scale of funeral for supreme leader across five cities is intended to relay message of resistance to rest of the worldIn the small hours of Friday the police roadblocks, stalls, posters and army vans were starting to appear across Tehran as millions of Iranians prepared to attend the long-delayed six-day funeral ceremony for Ali Khamenei's, Iran's supreme leader for 36 turbulent years.Khamenei was killed in the opening salvo of the US-Israeli attack on the country in February, and the funeral is intended to be an epic display of personal mourning, national power, resilience and social cohesion. Small groups of mourners carrying flags were gathering along the roads festooned with the red fist, the symbol of the funeral alongside the slogan We must rise". At a ceremony dedicated to the families of martyrs, Khamenei's coffin was displayed. Continue reading...

Premier apologised over organised crime in some of Victoria's largest construction projects, in op-ed that claimed a royal commission would not solve the issue

State opposition tells court it will not take any steps to disendorse MP while legal proceedings under way

Researchers say Stelios Kouloglou's device was compromised after he joined European parliamentary committeeNSO Group's hacking software was repeatedly used against a member of the European parliament while he was conducting an investigation of spyware abuses in Europe, according to a new report.Researchers at the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto said they could not attribute the attacks against Stelios Kouloglou to any particular government operator of Pegasus spyware. But their investigation found the attack against the Greek now-former MEP bore the hallmarks of a previous hacking campaign against exiled Russian and Belarusian journalists in Europe. Continue reading...

From Times Square to the Norwegian parliament and even in fighter jet cockpits, the choreographed row is everywhereThe fans have done it, in their thousands, in the stadiums. The players have done it on the pitch. Pretty much anyone who was there did it in New York's Times Square. Norwegian MPs did it in parliament.Prince Sverre Magnus, third in line to the Norwegian throne, rowed in an Oslo subway carriage. Care home residents in their 90s rowed in rural Norway and Norwegian Royal Air Force pilots rowed in their F-35 fighter jets. Continue reading...

This weekend marks 250 years since the signing of the declaration of independence, but Donald Trump is making the celebration all about himself. As the anniversary approaches, Jonathan Freedland talks to the Atlantic's Yoni Appelbaum about why so many Americans are feeling less patriotic these daysArchive: AP, Reuters Continue reading...

Painting by Jeremie Queyras shows former German chancellor in trademark jacket - at a time of nostalgia for her ruleOver months they met secretly in a studio in the government quarter of central Berlin - a young artist and his subject, the former German chancellor Angela Merkel. For hours at a time, while Jeremie Queyras painted her portrait, they bonded, Merkel has said, chatting about all and sundry". Sometimes they were silent, or they listened to classical music, taking it in turns to let each other choose the pieces.The result of what Merkel, 71, called their little adventure" was unveiled to an invited audience of family, friends and a handful of art critics this week in the neo-baroque Bode-Museum in Berlin. Continue reading...

In one area 76% of fishing boats were followed, with baby dolphins learning the technique from their parentsBottlenose dolphins in the Adriatic are increasingly following trawlers to scavenge for food, with baby dolphins learning the technique from their parents, a study has found.These days the easiest way to find [bottlenose dolphins] is to look for trawlers," said Giovanni Bearzi, a co-author of the study and the president of Dolphin Biology and Conservation in Italy. Many of them are followed by the dolphins that go to forage and scavenge in their wake. Continue reading...

Migratory giant petrel discovered near Hawks Nest north of Newcastle infected with H5. Testing under way to determine if it's highly pathogenic H5N1 strain

Exclusive: Documents also show the Catholic order sought financial support from the Holy See months before it declared it lacked money to pay survivors

Official statement offers the most detailed official account yet of the highly unusual and fatal incident in BeijingChinese authorities said the man who flew a small plane into Beijing's tallest skyscraper last week was a 66-year-old who had mental health problems.The statement published on Thursday offered the most detailed official account yet of the highly unusual incident that occurred in Beijing's central business district on the evening of 26 June. Continue reading...

Indian prime minister has a habit of collecting awards on his travels, some as their first and only recipientAs Narendra Modi touched down in Seychelles over the weekend, the archipelago nation in the Indian Ocean swiftly bestowed one of its highest" honours upon the Indian prime minister.Modi beamed as he accepted the Guardian of the Blue Horizon award from Patrick Herminie, the Seychelles president, complete with a trophy and certificate. Continue reading...

One of 11 surviving copies of Exeter printing' and only one known outside US was taken from American privateer shipFor Michael Scurr, a volunteer at the National Archives in Kew, west London, it was just a boring old Thursday morning" when he sat down in late May to catalogue a collection of documents from the British national collection that had never previously been recorded in detail.As he opened a volume of 18th-century Royal Navy correspondence, however, Scurr unfolded a document whose opening words he recognised. In Congress, July 4, 1776. A declaration by the representatives of the United States of America ..." Continue reading...

San Francisco jury fails to reach verdict on more serious felony conspiracy charge over April 2024 demonstration

Former Fox News host further said he doesn't want to be a candidate' for president and aired frustration with TrumpTucker Carlson, the rightwing broadcaster, wants to help build a new political party in the United States, he said in an interview - though he gave scant detail about the party, and did not indicate whether he was referring to a concrete project or merely musing.In the same interview, Carlson dismissed the idea of running for office as part of that new party. I don't want to be a candidate," he said. Continue reading...

Liz Murrill accused of trying to intimidate officials who opposed GOP-enacted law to overhaul local courtsLouisiana's Republican attorney general was indicted on Thursday on criminal charges by a grand jury in New Orleans, accused of trying to intimidate local officials who fought a law enacted by GOP legislators to overhaul the local courts.Liz Murrill, the attorney general, told eight New Orleans officials, including Helena Moreno, the mayor, and Jason Williams, the district attorney, that they could face removal from their jobs because of their opposition to the law. Continue reading...

Derrick Callella admitted he called and sent texts to Guthrie's family, demanding a bitcoin transactionA California man is facing up to two years in prison or a $250,000 fine after pleading guilty to sending Nancy Guthrie's family a phoney ransom note, federal authorities announced on Thursday.Nancy Guthrie, the 84-year-old mother of Today Show host Savannah Guthrie, was last seen on 31 January at her residence outside Tucson, Arizona. Inside the home, authorities observed her cellphone, medication and other basic essentials. Law enforcement also found drops of her blood near the porch. Continue reading...