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Officials often underestimate the dangers faced by failed asylum seekers who are forcibly sent home, writes Jackie FearnleyThe recent Human Rights Watch report on the harm done to Cameroonian asylum seekers, both while they were trying to make their claims in the US and when repatriated in a blaze of publicity, should be required reading for all asylum decision-makers (African migrants deported in Trump era suffered abuse on return, 10 February).From my experience of helping Cameroonian torture survivors over the past 14 years, I have noted that Home Office decision-makers, and many judges, can fatally underestimate the degree of risk attached to the forcible return process, particularly as failed asylum seekers are viewed as having brought the country into disrepute and can be punished with imprisonment. Continue reading...

Progress has been slower than in adults, with authorities blaming hesitancy among parents and some doctors as well as mixed messaging from experts

Festivals will not require vaccination, testing or masking while Coachella says ‘no guarantee’ attendees won’t be exposed to CovidIn a reversal of its previous policy, the Coachella music festival will not require Covid-19 vaccination, testing or masking when it resumes this April in southern California, the organizers said.The hugely popular festival saw up to 125,000 attendees leading up to the start of pandemic, during which it was cancelled three times. Continue reading...

Analysis: Duke’s tarnished reputation after Virginia Giuffre settlement leaves him with few options, say expertsThe price that Prince Andrew will pay for settling the Virginia Giuffre civil lawsuit will go far beyond the reported millions it has cost him financially.As he celebrates his 62nd birthday on Saturday, the duke will undoubtedly contemplate what a future without the red carpet and royal trappings he has enjoyed since birth will actually look like. Continue reading...

Government’s ‘trickle down disaster’ will further entrench inequality between men and woman, Greens say

Sadiq Khan and Marvin Rees call for action as major report launched during UN Migration WeekTwo of the UK’s leading mayors are calling for urgent action to prepare for mass migration to cities due to the climate emergency, as a major report into the issue launches at the UN headquarters in New York on Wednesday.Mass migration to some of the world’s cities due to the climate emergency is already under way and the World Bank has estimated that unless significant action is taken, 216 million people could be on the move by 2050. In 2020, 30 million people were displaced due to the climate crisis, and 70% of people internally displaced due to the climate crisis are living in urban areas. The World Bank predicts that more than 1 billion people are at risk of being driven from their homes for climate-related reasons. Continue reading...

Amber weather warnings issued across most of UK, with travel disruption and power cuts expectedAmber weather warnings covering most of the UK have been issued with the Met Office warning people to brace themselves for travel disruption, power cuts and heavy snow as back-to-back storms were forecast to bring gusts of up to 100mph .John Swinney, Scotland’s deputy first minister, said the coming days would be “very challenging” and urged everyone to plan their journeys in advance, exercise caution on the roads, and follow the latest travel advice. Continue reading...

Three people have moved back to Futaba, which aims to attract about 2,000 over the next five yearsLate last month, Yoichi Yatsuda slept in his own home for the first time in more than a decade.As a resident of Futaba, a town in the shadow of the wrecked Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, there was a time when simply spending the night in his family home had seemed an impossible dream. Continue reading...

Metropolitan police have launched investigation into allegations linked to Prince Charles charityScotland Yard has launched an investigation into cash-for-honours allegations linked to the Prince of Wales’s charity the Prince’s Foundation.In a brief statement, the Metropolitan police said it had launched the investigation after media reports alleging offers of help were made to secure honours and citizenship for a Saudi national. Continue reading...

Call for better labelling as research finds two glasses of some wines contain more calories than a hamburgerAdults can exceed their recommended daily limit of sugar by drinking just two glasses of wine, experts have warned.Drinks can also be packed with calories and in some cases two glasses of wine can contain more calories than a hamburger. Continue reading...

Historians argue Roper’s story could have helped end US slavery earlier but supporters turned on himIn his day, the 19th-century fugitive from slavery Moses Roper was a well-known public figure who toured Britain and Ireland telling gripped and shocked audiences about his horrific experiences in Florida.Today he is largely overlooked but, two Newcastle University academics argue, the important story of this fascinating man represents a “lost opportunity” for the British abolition movement to have helped end slavery in the US earlier.‘I Am Not a Beggar’: Moses Roper, Black Witness and the Lost Opportunity of British Abolitionism is published in the journal Slavery and Abolition. Continue reading...

The 61-year-old scene-stealer and gay icon is back! She talks about her triumph over sexism, shame and self-doubtNot so long ago, Jane Lynch was walking her dog, happy as could be, and she paused and said out loud to herself: “God, I love being Jane Lynch.” She laughs at herself. “As if ‘she’ were something outside of me.” But things do seem pretty good: she recently finished her run of cabaret dates with her friend, the actor Kate Flannery. There’s a reboot of the underrated sitcom Party Down coming, and a fourth series of the Amazon show The Marvelous Mrs Maisel is about to start. Lynch won an Emmy for her role as Sophie Lennon, a bawdy superstar comic housewife from Queens (in reality, an upper-class Manhattanite, slumming it for financial gain and self-expression). This year, Lynch takes to Broadway, to be in Funny Girl, the fulfilment, at the age of 61, of a childhood dream. Last year, she got married for the second time. “I live in this really cute house in a little beach town,” she says. “I’ve got a beautiful dog, a fantastic wife.” She seems to marvel at it – she doesn’t sound remotely boastful, just grateful.Things haven’t always been so good. Lynch has been through divorce and alcoholism – giving up alcohol for the second time only fairly recently, after slipping back into addiction. As a teenager, she carried deep shame about her sexuality. Well into her 30s, she felt lonely and alienated, and it wasn’t until her 40s that her career took off. Lynch might be the perfect embodiment of the idea that It Will Get Better. Continue reading...

Analysis: Experts have little faith in announcement and say there are no signs of de-escalation on Ukraine’s borders

Law makes it an offence to perform so-called ‘therapy’ on anyone under 18 and comes with sentence of up to three years’ imprisonmentNew Zealand has banned conversion practices, with near unanimity, after all but eight National party members voted in favour of the law.Conversion “therapy” refers to the practice, often by religious groups, of trying to “cure” people of their sexuality, gender expression or LGBTQI identity. Continue reading...

Suddenly there was Kylian Mbappé once again. With 45 seconds left, just when it looked as if victory had evaded a Paris Saint-Germain side that could have won this match a lot earlier and three times over, he delivered the solution that they had sought all night. Dashing between Lucas Vázquez and Éder Militão, leaning one way and then the other, as smooth as he was swift, Mbappé dropped the shoulder and slotted through Thibaut Courtois’ legs.The release was immense at the Parc des Princes, where they could have been forgiven for becoming resigned to this moment never arriving, denied despite their dominance until that last magical moment. It took 22 shots, including a penalty that Lionel Messi had seen saved by Courtois, but at last the hosts had done it. It had been worth the wait and it had to be him: not just the man Real Madrid hope to sign but a footballer of rare gifts and the outstanding player here. Continue reading...

O’Rourke held a variety of roles, including editor-in-chief of National Lampoon and Rolling Stone’s foreign affairs desk chiefThe conservative writer and humorist PJ O’Rourke, whose acerbic wit and writings often won admiration on both sides of America’s political divide, has died, media reports and colleagues said. He was 74 years old.Peter Sagal, O’Rourke’s colleague and host of the NPR radio show Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me!, said on Twitter: “I’m afraid it’s true. Our panelist and my dear friend PJ O’Rourke has passed away.” Continue reading...

Agreeing a payout estimated to be at least $10m spares the duke from the risk of a poor performance on the witness stand

Out-of-court settlement in civil case means Duke of York is spared giving evidence at trial

ScotRail to stop running trains as country braces itself for Storm DudleyThe vast majority of train services in Scotland will end at 4pm on Wednesday as the country braces itself for the first of two storms.ScotRail announced on Tuesday its services would end early on Wednesday in preparation for Storm Dudley. The Met Office has issued an amber weather warning for the north of England and the central belt and south of Scotland. Continue reading...

Human rights groups said the verdict was part of a troubling trend in Greece’s criminal justice systemAn Athens court has handed two prominent human rights defenders prison sentences, suspended for three years, after finding the pair guilty of “falsely accusing” a Greek Orthodox bishop of racist hate speech.The three-member tribunal sentenced the activists to 12-month jail terms after acquitting the bishop, Seraphim, the Metropolitan of Piraeus, of antisemitic rhetoric. Continue reading...

The image with ‘no innocent explanation’, showing Giuffre with the duke and Ghislaine Maxwell, was clicked by Jeffrey EpsteinIt was a simple photograph, taken late in the evening on 10 March 2001, that came to symbolize Virginia Giuffre’s case against Prince Andrew and eventually led to the astonishing settlement announced on Tuesday.The one with the Duke’s arm around the 17-year-old’s waist, with Ghislaine Maxwell beaming to one side, and the man behind the camera, clicking the shutter but hidden by the flash’s reflection in a window behind, being Jeffrey Epstein, the disgraced late financier and sex trafficker. Continue reading...

Wednesday: Duke of York agrees to donate to Virginia Giuffre’s charity in remarkable turnaround. Plus: new film documents songwriters’ devotionGood morning! There is plenty of commentary this morning about Prince Andrew’s surprise settlement with Virginia Giuffre, as well as developments in the face-off between Russia and Ukraine.The Duke of York has reached a settlement in the civil sex claim filed by Virginia Giuffre in the US. In the unexpected development, Prince Andrew agreed to make a “substantial donation” to Giuffre’s charity and accepted that she “suffered as an established victim of abuse”. The move is a remarkable turnaround for Andrew, who had pledged to fight to clear his name in court. A document submitted to court on Tuesday said the prince also regretted his association with the financier Jeffrey Epstein, who took his life in prison while facing trial for sex trafficking. The prince “was never going to win”, writes former Guardian royal correspondent Stephen Bates: “And now his stupidity and arrogance have cost him almost everything he values.” Continue reading...

UK health agency notes research that also suggests jabs can improve long Covid symptoms among unvaccinated

Protesters against Covid-19 rules seem unfazed by possible police action as prime minister invokes emergency powersA day after Canada’s prime minister announced a dramatic escalation in his government’s fight against blockades across the country, protesters in the nation’s capital were scheduling hair cuts and receiving massages, apparently unfazed by the prospect of ramped-up police enforcement.Hundreds of semi-trucks which have been parked out front of Canada’s parliament since late January have become emblematic of the protests, but planning and logistics for the occupation is run from a second site in a hotel parking lot on Coventry Road, five kilometres east of the downtown area. Continue reading...

Move could be sign of de-escalation but western officials say there are no immediate signs of Russian drawdown

Conwy to Douglas pipeline ‘was shut immediately’ after the hydrocarbon release, reported on MondayAuthorities are monitoring parts of the north Wales coast for an oil slick, after hydrocarbons were released into the sea following a pipeline failure.The pipeline, which connects two oil installations in the Irish Sea, suffered a failure about 33km (20.5 miles) from the north Wales coast. According to Eni UK, the company which operates the pipeline, the incident – which involved “less than 500 barrels” – was reported on Monday. Continue reading...

Many in the Ukrainian capital are sceptical about an attack taking place, regardless of the exodus of diplomats

Three crew rescued from life raft as international mission combs icy seas for survivorsAt least seven people have died and 17 are missing after a Spanish fishing boat sank in bitterly cold seas off the north-east coast of Canada early on Tuesday morning.Spain’s maritime rescue service said an international operation was under way to locate the crew of the Villa de Pitanxo, a boat from the north-western Galicia region that went down 280 miles (450km) off the Newfoundland coast. Continue reading...

Analysis: recognition of Donetsk and Luhansk’s independence would be seen as considerable escalationRussian lawmakers have passed a direct appeal to Vladimir Putin to recognise the Russian-controlled separatist states of Donetsk and Luhansk, providing a way to up the ante in the regional crisis without launching an attack on Ukraine.Putin has said he will not immediately recognise the so-called republics but he is likely to wield that option as a bargaining chip as he continues to demand security guarantees from the west. Continue reading...

German chancellor Olaf Scholz said preventing war in Europe is the 'damn responsibility' of heads of state and government as he met with Russian president Vladimir Putin.Putin in turn raised questions about Ukrainian membership of Nato but was engaged in ongoing diplomatic efforts around military buildup on the Ukrainian border

Government funding for independent schools increased by $3,338 a student over a decade, compared to $703 more per student for public schools

The prime minister told reporters that while Russia had announced it had withdrawn some troops from the Ukrainian border, intelligence showed that it was still making preparations to invade. Johnson said that while these 'mixed signals' meant UK sanctions on Russia needed to be ready to go, the government had decided to keep its embassy open in Kyiv as 'an important symbol'

The much-hyped show about the theft of Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee’s sex tape offers a screwball meditation on consent – without the consent of one of its subjectsPam & Tommy, the Hulu series on the story behind the most infamous sex tape of the 1990s, is disconcertingly fun. The eight-part series created by Robert Siegel, half of which has aired, is front-loaded with 90s iconography and zany gags designed to provoke online discussion. There’s the brain-scrambling transformations of actors Lily James and Sebastian Stan into mid-90s rock it-couple Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee, and a mulleted Seth Rogen as Rand Gauthier, the stiffed carpenter who pulls off an impressive heist of the couple’s safe, played for suspense. There’s nostalgic needle drops from Nine Inch Nails to Fatboy Slim, a conversation between a high Tommy and his animatronic penis, and plenty of sex, drugs, videotapes and characters asking, with winking naivety, what the world wide web is.It’s a confusing, often entertaining watch, one that wants to have its fun and interrogate it, too, at best a heady blend of screwball comedy, madcap romance, expensive nostalgia and serious retrospective of a public scandal in which a woman’s privacy was invaded, her intimate moments exploited and judged without her consent. But there’s one detail that, for me, turns this whole palate sour: the real Pamela Anderson did not want this story retold. While Stan has confirmed that he spoke with Lee, who has praised his portrayal, Anderson did not respond to producers’ overtures. She has not spoken publicly about the series, but sources have expressed her discontent and disappointment in multiple outlets. Continue reading...

Prime minister says ‘intelligence is not encouraging’ and reveals Russian field hospitals in Belarus appear to be part of invasion preparations

Long Covid less likely to affect vaccinated people than unvaccinated people, says UK health agency;Japan reports 236 Covid-linked deaths on Tuesday

Officer had raised concerns in month before attack that ‘something could get through’ due to high workloadMI5 had enough intelligence to regard Salman Abedi as a threat to national security and open an investigation before he bombed the Manchester Arena, killing 22 people and injuring hundreds of others, an inquiry has heard.The Security Service was “struggling to cope” with an increased workload, and the team responsible for the north-west of England had declared an “amber” period of stress and high capacity the month before the attack in 2017. Continue reading...

Despite sniping from the Tory press Melinda Simmons is renowned as trailblazer who has thrown herself into the job

As girls are paraded through Kuria’s streets in the school holiday cutting season, hundreds more are hidden by a network of neighbours working to change attitudes on FGM from the ground up

EDPS says NSO Group’s software is ‘incompatible with our democratic values’ and should be banned in blocThe use of Pegasus spyware should be banned in the EU, the bloc’s data watchdog has advised, as it is a “gamechanger” offering unprecedented powers to intrude into targets’ lives.The European data protection supervisor (EDPS) said a prohibition was necessary as the software, developed by the Israeli NSO Group, was able to secretly turn a mobile phone into a surveillance device. Continue reading...

A jangling score and unnerving camerawork build tension in story of a woman convinced her daughter is back from the deadAndrea Riseborough is a powerful actor who could bring emotional complexity to a tomato ketchup advert. Here she’s intense in an understated way as a grieving mother who becomes convinced that the girl next door is her daughter, back from the dead. That reincarnation storyline is not unfamiliar, and to be honest it made my heart sink a bit at first. But this atmospheric and unsettling slowburn drama from Northern Ireland pulls it off, just.Riseborough plays a woman called Laura whose daughter Josie died several years earlier; she lives in Antrim with her husband Brendan (Jonjo O’Neill) and their teenage son Tadhg (Lewis McAskie). They are a family getting on with it, bearing the unbearable. But beneath the dinner table banter, you sense that each of them is alone with their grief. Riseborough signals Laura’s loss and longing in every movement; it’s there in the way she holds herself stiffly upright, like she might fall apart from heartbreak. When 10-year-old Megan (Niamh Dornan) moves in next door, Laura invites her round for tea and picks her up from school in the car. Megan appears to know things that only Josie would know, recalls places that she can’t possibly have seen. Laura starts to believes she is Josie. Continue reading...

An intimate portrayal of methamphetamine addiction in the Czech Republic, Europe’s largest producer, through the life of Lenka, an addict of over 20 years.Lenka’s elderly parents rely on her for social care and labour on their land, while she relies on the drug to fuel all that is required of her at home. Beyond her home life, her relationship is breaking down and her dealer has gone awol, forcing her to make some painful decisions.The country has a long and complex history with the drug, which started gaining popularity in the 1990sWarning – this film contains strong language and some viewers might find the content distressingIn the UK and Ireland, for details of local services that provide counselling and treatment for drug addiction, please visit ‘Talk to Frank’ https://www.talktofrank.com/get-help/find-support-near-you Continue reading...

Family of Asian heritage criticise local FA for lack of support and say opposition team yet to say sorryThe family of a 12-year-old footballer of Asian heritage who was racially abused during a match has criticised his local Football Association for a lack of support and said he has received no apology from the opposition team involved.Sathi Balaguru, was playing in a nine-a-side game for Pitshanger FC in west London, when he was tripped and called an “Indian boy” during a penalty incident. Another player on the opposing side directed a racist Indian accent towards him. Sathi is British and of Sri Lankan heritage. Continue reading...

The government promised to learn from Windrush, but citizens trafficked to Syria by Islamic State have also been abandonedThe government’s proposed new powers to strip people of their citizenship without notice rang alarm bells in communities across Britain. Despite being the first Muslim woman in our country’s history to serve in the cabinet, my family and I could be deprived of our citizenship without being told about it, and cast out of our home country if the Home Office believed this would be conducive to the public good. Two in five people from ethnic minority backgrounds could be at risk.Successive British governments have torn down the basic belief that all British citizens in this country are and should be equal. The consequences of this government’s unprecedentedly broad use of citizenship-stripping powers have become even more clear to me after hearing directly from the families of British citizens detained in north-east Syria. Continue reading...

Krystyna Deuss has offered flat to Afghan judge Fawzia but she has not been allowed to move in

The Canadian prime minister, Justin Trudeau, announced the government would invoke the Emergencies Act as the country goes into a third week of 'illegal and dangerous' blockades.'We are not preventing the right of people to protest legally,' said Trudeau, adding that the military would not be deployed as part of the measures

Bas Javid says racism is an issue ‘but what I won’t do is describe all of the organisation as a racist organisation’A senior Metropolitan police officer has said racism is a problem in the country’s largest force.Deputy Assistant Commissioner Bas Javid, the brother of the health secretary, Sajid Javid, acknowledged “people who have racist views and are racist” were among the force’s staff. Continue reading...

Under-pressure prime minister tells party room ‘you haven’t seen me as focused as I can be yet … I know what the path is’

UK foreign secretary says invasion by Putin could embolden Iran and China to expand their ambitions

Attorney general tells Senate estimates no anti-corruption commission legislation will be introduced in this term; Labor probes Coalition’s bushfire response during extended question time; Australia records at least 46 Covid-related deaths. Follow live