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Foreign ministry's claim follows death of ex-Royal Marine charged with spying in Britain for Hong KongChina has accused the UK of false accusations, wanton stigmatisation" and arbitrary arrests after the unexplained death of a man charged with illegally assisting Hong Kong's foreign intelligence service.China's foreign ministry office in Hong Kong said in a statement on its website on Saturday that it strongly condemned Britain for what it said were false accusations against Chinese citizens, infringing their lawful rights. Continue reading...

Billionaire developer jokes he in fact spends no time at penthouse with record-breaking 175m asking priceThe billionaire British property developer Nick Candy has said he only spends about 20 days a year in his 175m penthouse flat at One Hyde Park in London.Candy, 51, who developed the superluxe" Knightsbridge apartment building overlooking the royal park and acquired one of the flats for himself, said it irritated him that he was paying service charges of up to 161,000 a year (or 3,000 a week) when he was rarely there. The development has a private cinema, 21-metre lap pool, as well as sauna, gym, golf simulator, wine cellar, valet service and room service from the five-star Mandarin Oriental hotel next door. Continue reading...

Foreign ministers confident of agreement to use bank assets as security for Ukraine reconstruction loanHopes of a multi-country deal to use $300bn of Russian state assets frozen in the European banking system to support Ukraine have grown after it emerged that G7 ministers were confident of overcoming technical and political obstacles at a meeting in northern Italy on Saturday.The Canadian finance minister, Chrystia Freeland, said she was optimistic that G7 leaders would reach an agreement, as support coalesced around a plan to use frozen Russian central bank assets as security for a $50bn (39bn) loan. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Radosaw Sikorski also says he favours deepest possible inclusion of UK in EU defence structuresA long-term rearmament of Europe, in which the UK can play the closest possible role, is necessary to defeat Russian imperial ambitions, Poland's foreign minister has said.Radosaw Sikorski also called for majority voting for EU sanctions and a 5,000-strong EU mechanised brigade, and said Poland was willing to back an EU-wide scheme to incentivise Ukrainian draft dodgers to return to their homeland. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Experts say changes to Grand Mosque of Shadian mark completion of five-year sinification campaignThe last major mosque in China to have retained Islamic-style features has lost its domes and had its minarets radically modified, marking what experts say is the completion of a government campaign to sinicise the country's Muslim places of worship.The Grand Mosque of Shadian, one of China's biggest and grandest mosques, towers over the small town from which it takes its name in south-western Yunnan province. Continue reading...

More than 500,000 chickens from two farms in Meredith and Terang have been culled after detection of H7N3 cases

Staff raise concerns as Wyee rehoming centre abruptly closed after steep drop in gambling revenue for governing body

IDS says a change in ownership may lead to material uncertainty' over the company's futureRoyal Mail's owner has warned that a potential 3.5bn bid by the Czech billionaire Daniel Ketinsky could create risk around the company's finances.The warning came as the industry regulator Ofcom announced that it had opened an investigation into the parent group, International Distributions Services (IDS), for failing to meet its annual delivery targets for the second year in a row. Last year, Ofcom fined the company 5.6m for failing to meet its first-class and second-class delivery targets in 2022-23. Continue reading...

Child fell from upper floor of flat on Hotspur Street in Kennington on Friday afternoon and died at the scene, police saidA child has died after falling from a block of flats in south-east London. The child fell from the upper floor of a flat on Hotspur Street in Kennington on Friday afternoon and died at the scene, the Metropolitan police said.Police were called to the address at 4.23pm, and said that so far there was nothing to indicate that the incident is suspicious". Continue reading...

Billionaire investor, who had turned his back on former president, says he will donate to Republican contender's 2024 campaignThe billionaire private equity tycoon Stephen Schwarzman, a former ally of Donald Trump who turned his back on the ex-president, has decided to support him in the 2024 race for the White House.Schwarzman, widely seen as one of the most powerful men on Wall Street, defected from Trump less than two years ago, when he declared that the time had come for a new generation of leaders to take over the Republican party. Continue reading...

The son of Beat poet Lucien Carr and author of the bestselling 1994 crime novel, later adapted into a TV series, has died of cancerCaleb Carr, the son of the Beat poet Lucien Carr who endured a traumatizing childhood and became a bestselling novelist, accomplished military historian and late-life memoirist of his cat, Masha, has died at 68.Carr died of cancer on Thursday, according to an announcement from his publisher, Little, Brown and Company. Continue reading...

Seventy-eight Tory MPs are quitting rather than standing, beating 1997's record numberMichael Gove and Andrea Leadsom have joined the now record-breaking exodus of Conservative MPs quitting the Commons, with the former saying it was time for a new generation" to lead the party.Gove's announcement in a letter tweeted on Friday evening had been anticipated by some given the strong Liberal Democrat challenge he faces in his Surrey Heath constituency, but adds to the sense of Tories fleeing in the face of a likely general election loss. Continue reading...

Members of Assad regime sentenced in absentia to life imprisonment on Friday after landmark trial in ParisA French court has found three Syrian officials of the regime of Bashar al-Assad guilty of crimes against humanity and war crimes, sentencing them in absentia to life imprisonment on Friday after a landmark trial in Paris.The verdicts against Ali Mamlouk, head of the Syrian secret services and security adviser to Assad, Jamil Hassan, who was head of the Syrian air force intelligence unit until 2019 and a member of Assad's entourage, and Abdel Salam Mahmoud, intelligence director at the notorious Mezzeh detention centre, send a strong message about the long arm of international justice. Continue reading...

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In the ad, to be distributed across the US, De Niro says that Trump is threatening to be a dictator, to terminate the constitution'Joe Biden's re-election campaign has released a high-profile new video ad they are calling Snapped, which attacks Donald Trump as a candidate who will stop at nothing to grab power again.The aggressive, 30-second spot is voiced by an old Hollywood foe of the former president, the actor Robert De Niro, and will be distributed nationally. Continue reading...

Party leader's remarks follow expulsion of predecessor, who decided to stand as independent candidate in general electionJeremy Corbyn's days of influencing Labour party policy are well and truly over", Keir Starmer has said, as a war of words erupted with his predecessor on the second day of the general election campaign.Corbyn was expelled from the Labour party on Friday after announcing he would stand as an independent candidate in the 4 July vote. Continue reading...

Police make statement after postmortem of Matthew Trickett, an immigration officer charged under National Security ActThe death of a former Royal Marine accused of assisting the Hong Kong intelligence service is not being treated as suspicious, police say.Matthew Trickett, an immigration enforcement officer and private investigator, was found dead in Grenfell Park in Maidenhead, Berkshire at around 5.15pm on Sunday after a report from a member of the public. Continue reading...

Having initially vowed to oppose any offensive, Washington and London are showing signs of having backed down

Exclusive: Over 2.5m for MPs such as Fox and Mordaunt in what will be the highest-spending UK electionConservative donors have poured more than 2.5m into key election battlegrounds to shore up support for MPs, such as Liam Fox and Penny Mordaunt, who are in danger of losing their seats.The 2024 election will be the highest-spending UK contest, after the government raised national election limits to 34m per party - leaving the Conservatives and Labour in an arms race to raise cash. Continue reading...

High court rules abuse could defame broadcaster who sued ex-footballer after he also called him a pedo defender'The former footballer and manager Joey Barton calling the broadcaster Jeremy Vine a bike nonce" on social media was defamatory, a high court judge has ruled.The high court ruled on Friday that 11 social media posts could defame Vine, the radio and TV presenter who is suing Barton after he called him a bike nonce" and a pedo defender" on X, formerly known as Twitter, between January and March. Continue reading...

King makes first official link with Moray school where he experienced angst and opportunity as teenage boarderKing Charles III has agreed to become a patron of the Gordonstoun Association, reflecting an affection for his alma mater in Scotland despite the teenage angst he experienced there.The patronage is his first official link with the Moray institution, which he attended from 1962 until 1967, and was welcomed by the school principal, Lisa Kerr, as a great honour". Continue reading...

Incident in Belfast follows gaffe in Welsh brewery and campaign launch where Labour anthem was played

There were times during Horizon inquiry when victims of scandal struggled to keep composure as former chief executive pleaded ignoranceIt was difficult for the victims attending the public inquiry into the Horizon scandal on the fifth floor of Aldwych House in central London to demur from the conclusion of Moya Greene, a former chief executive of Royal Mail and Paula Vennells' boss until the Post Office split off in 2012.I think you knew," Greene had written to Vennells in January, according to a text message published by the inquiry this week. Continue reading...

Former boss claims IT executives and legal counsels let her down and tells inquiry she loved the Post Office'Paula Vennells, the former Post Office chief executive, has named five executives who she said were to blame for the Horizon scandal, including a missing IT expert and a former in-house lawyer who has refused to appear at the public inquiry.During a third day of tearful evidence in front of the inquiry, Vennells denied she had given craven and self-serving" testimony but readily provided the names of those she claimed had let her down. Continue reading...

After his wife died in childbirth, Aaron Horsey found he did not have automatic right to paternity leaveA father who was left without the right to parental leave after his wife died in childbirth has won a change to the law in England, Wales and Scotland on the last day of this parliament.Aaron Horsey found himself battling bureaucracy as well as grief after his wife, Bernadette, 31, died while giving birth to their son, Tim, at Royal Derby hospital in 2022. Continue reading...

Police officer detained after shooting of 48-year-old man as death toll reaches seven following days of upheaval linked to proposed voting changesPenny Wong, the Australian foreign minister, has said that 282 Australians and their family members have now returned from New Caledonia."We are planning further flights from Noumea tomorrow," she added. Continue reading...

Organisers expect 75% of identified bacterial pollution will be gone by the time the starting gun fires for the open water eventsBeside a sign saying No swimming", Pierre Fuzeau defiantly pulled on his swimming cap, slipped into the green water of the Ourcq canal on Paris's northern edge, and set off with a strong front-crawl.The 66-year-old company director regularly joins his open-water swimming group for well-organised illegal dips, including in the River Seine, where swimming has been banned since 1923 largely as a result of the health risk from unclean water and bacteria from human waste. Continue reading...

ICJ president says humanitarian situation in Gaza's southernmost city is now classified as disastrous'

Victims' lawyer responds to tearful monologue by former Post Office chief executive

Police response to protest over closure of Park Guell for glitzy event was totally out of proportion', resident saysCatalan police have been criticised for baton-charging people protesting against the closure of Barcelona's Park Guell for it to host a Louis Vuitton-organised fashion show, as anger grows that the city is being overrun by tourists and glitzy international events to the detriment of local life.A residents association complained that in the lead-up to the event the whole neighbourhood had been cordoned off. For days the neighbourhood has been saturated with police and private security companies," said one resident, Aida Almirall Serra, adding that armed police had demanded ID cards and searched parents' bags when they picked up their children from nursery. Continue reading...

Investigation under way after four people killed and 16 injured in Medusa Beach Club in PalmaInvestigators on the Spanish island of Mallorca are looking into whether overloading and structural issues caused the collapse of a beachfront restaurant and club, killing four people and injuring 16 others.The two-storey Medusa Beach Club in Palma de Mallorca collapsed at about 8.30pm local time (7.30pm BST) on Thursday night, killing at least four people and leaving many others trapped in the rubble. One firefighter told the local newspaper Ultima Hora he had arrived to find a nightmarish" scene, with people screaming and crying and rubble piled high on the ground floor. Continue reading...

Lib Dems, Greens and SNP could lose out as broadcasters focus on head-to-heads between Sunak and StarmerThe Lib Dems, Greens and SNP face being cut out of televised leadership debates, as broadcasters plan to focus on two head-to-head contests between Rishi Sunak and Keir Starmer.ITV is working on a debate featuring only the leaders of the Labour and Conservative parties, according to sources at the broadcaster, in line with the format demanded by Labour. Continue reading...

April's wet weather leads to steeper fall than forecast, with clothing and toy stores among most affected

Children's author tells Hay festival he is aware of need to be inclusive but it should not be imposedThe children's author Anthony Horowitz has said writers should not be instructed to make their books more diverse.The author of the Alex Rider novels has previously sparked controversy over his views on the subject. In 2017 he was criticised by other children's authors when he claimed he had been warned off" writing Black characters in his books. Continue reading...

Agreement will create lender with almost 5m customers and 89bn balance sheetThe Co-operative Bank is to return to its mutual roots after Coventry Building Society confirmed that it will acquire the bank from its hedge fund owners for 780m.The deal has now been finalised after Coventry said it had made a non-binding cash offer for the bank last month that will create a lender with almost 5 million customers and an 89bn balance sheet. Continue reading...

Former nurse denied permission to go to court of appeal over seven murder and six attempted murder convictionsThe former neonatal nurse Lucy Letby has been denied permission to appeal against her convictions for murdering babies.Letby, 34, was found guilty last year of murdering seven babies and attempting to kill another six at the Countess of Chester hospital, in north-west England, in 2015 and 2016. Continue reading...

Labour leader says we can't have both' given state of economy but system of university funding must change

Dangerously high temperatures follow wettest April since 1961 as country swings between extremesPakistan is in the midst of an intense heatwave, with hundreds of heatstroke victims being treated in hospitals across the country.Temperatures soared to 49C (120F) on Wednesday in Mohenjo-daro, in the southern Sindh province. These temperatures are more than 8C above May's average daytime temperature. Authorities in Punjab have been forced to close schools for a week and are advising people to remain indoors. Many labourers have, however, continued to work out of financial necessity. Continue reading...

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Glen Coleman acquitted of raping the woman but also convicted of abusing position of public office to procure woman, 19, for his own sexual gratification

Official figures show 251,377 abortions were carried out in 2022, a 17% increase on previous yearThe number of abortions in England and Wales has reached record levels, with financial pressures believed to be a factor in why women are choosing not to have a baby.There were 251,377 abortions for women resident in the two nations in 2022, official figures from the Department of Health and Social Care show, which is the highest since the Abortion Act was introduced almost 60 years ago and a rise of 17% on the 2021 figure. Continue reading...

Springsteen receives Academy fellowship as Raye named songwriter of the year, and Yussef Dayes, Victoria Canal and Speakers Corner Quartet pick up major awardsBruce Springsteen was the top honouree at the 2024 Ivor Novello awards, given an Academy fellowship - the first international artist to be handed that accolade.Paul McCartney presented him with the award in a playful speech: I couldn't think of a more fitting recipient," he said. Except maybe Bob Dylan. Or Paul Simon, or Billy Joel, or Beyonce, or Taylor Swift. The list goes on ... He's known as the American working man, but he admits he's never worked a day in his life." He reminisced about the pair's performance together on Glastonbury's Pyramid stage in 2022, calling Springsteen a lovely boy". Continue reading...

Former Labour leader confirms he will stand as an independent candidate in Islington NorthJeremy Corbyn has confirmed he will stand as an independent candidate in Islington North, vowing to fight for equality, democracy and peace.The former Labour leader, who has held the seat for more than 40 years, says he will defend policies that have not been adopted by Labour or the Conservatives, including rent controls and the abolition of the two child benefits cap. Continue reading...

Australian former US marine pilot faces potential prison sentence of up to 60 years on charges of arms trafficking and money laundering

Chef Josh Niland quite emotional' to learn his seafood spot named in extended list of restaurants ranked 51 to 100

Exclusive: Signatories cite union's continued apathy' to plight of Palestinians and seek official call for ceasefireMore than 200 staff members of EU institutions and agencies have signed a letter expressing growing concern" over the union's response to the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, arguing that it runs contrary to its core values and aim of promoting peace.The letter, signed by 211 people in their personal capacity as citizens and addressed to the EU's top three officials, begins by condemning the 7 October attacks in the strongest terms". Continue reading...

The artist used ephemera to convey how white Australia failed to come to terms with the country's Indigenous peoples

Victoria police confirm man, 32, was not wounded when shots fired in Thomastown on Friday morningA former Mongols bikie has survived a shooting in suburban Melbourne, two years after an assassination attempt outside a cemetery.Shots were fired at Suleiman Sam" Abdulrahim, a professional boxer who goes by the name The Punisher", as he left his Thomastown home early on Friday morning. Continue reading...

Coroner suspends inquest into death of man who consumed ayahuasca and frog toxin kambo at the Dreaming Arts festival at Arcoora in 2021

Watchdog says outstanding caseload has increased from 60,000 to 67,573 since MoJ set target of 53,000 in 2021The Ministry of Justice's ambition to reduce the backlog in crown courts in England and Wales to 53,000 by March next year is no longer achievable, a parliamentary watchdog has said.The MoJ set the target in October 2021 when the outstanding caseload was 60,000, but by the end of last year it had reached 67,573 - its highest level ever - according to a National Audit Office (NAO) report. Continue reading...