Editor Brian Harrod Provides Comprehensive up-to-date news coverage, with aggregated news from sources all over the world from the Roundup Newswires Network
Push for transparency comes at a time of heightened tensions in region
Secret archives concerning some of the most controversial episodes from the inception of Northern Ireland could be opened amid pressure from historians advising on its centenary commemorations.
They include an archive dedicated to the Ulster Special Constabulary (USC) – a quasi-military and overwhelmingly Protestant reserve police force known as the “B Specials” – and files potentially shedding light on their involvement in atrocities against the Catholic population.
Investigation finds one in six were solo and under 15, as experts say cross-border cooperation ‘nonexistent’
At least 18,000 unaccompanied child migrants have disappeared after arriving in European countries including Greece, Italy and Germany.
An investigation by the Guardian and the cross-border journalism collective Lost in Europe found that 18,292 unaccompanied child migrants went missing in Europe between January 2018 and December 2020 – equivalent to nearly 17 children a day.
People with mild Covid-19 could take a pill or capsule at home to prevent the illness turning serious and requiring hospital treatment, under government plans to fast-track development of treatments for the disease.
The government is launching an antivirals taskforce to find at least two drugs by the autumn that people can take to stop coronavirus in its tracks and speed up recovery from it.
Former prime minister told to release full texts he sent to chancellor at start of the pandemic
An influential group of MPs has ordered David Cameron to release texts he sent to the chancellor, Rishi Sunak, as part of a parliamentary inquiry into the Greensill lobbying scandal.
The Conservative-dominated Treasury select committee wrote to key figures in the scandal on Monday, asking for evidence that will help piece together the true impact of Cameron’s efforts to ensure the lender had access to emergency Covid loans and NHS staff records.
American Humanist Association criticises academic for comments about identity using ‘the guise of scientific discourse’, and withdraws its 1996 honour
The American Humanist Association has withdrawn its humanist of the year award from Richard Dawkins, 25 years after he received the honour, criticising the academic and author for “demean[ing] marginalised groups” using “the guise of scientific discourse”.
The AHA honoured Dawkins, whose books include The Selfish Gene and The God Delusion, in 1996 for his “significant contributions” in communicating scientific concepts to the public. On Monday, it announced that it was withdrawing the award, referring to a tweet sent by Dawkins earlier this month, in which he compared trans people to Rachel Dolezal, the civil rights activist who posed as a black woman for years.
Boris Johnson has promised football groups that the government will consider using what he called “a legislative bomb” to stop English clubs joining a breakaway European Super League, as official efforts to thwart the plan were stepped up.
The prime minister and Oliver Dowden, the sports and culture secretary, held a meeting with the heads of the Football Association and Premier League, as well as representatives of fans’ groups from Liverpool, Manchester United and Tottenham Hotspur, three of the clubs involved.
Tens of thousands of people did not claim universal credit during the early part of the pandemic because they felt too ashamed to sign on benefits, often despite struggling to pay rent and bills, a study has found.
The perceived stigma around benefits – with some people feeling, for example, that they were for “dole scroungers” and “freeloaders” – meant many refused state help, or put off making a claim until they ran into serious difficulty.
Manager posts critical statement on singer’s behalf after Panic on the Streets of Springfield airs
The Simpsons has earned the wrath of Morrissey after it parodied the former Smiths frontman in an episode of the show.
The singer was satirised during the episode Panic on the Streets of Springfield, which aired in the US on Sunday night. In the episode, Lisa Simpson becomes obsessed with a fictional band called the Snuffs and befriends its frontman, Quilloughby.
Sophie, who updated public on grieving royal family, and Edward look set to take on increasingly high profiles
In the immediate aftermath of the Duke of Edinburgh’s death, the royal who most regularly visited Windsor, gracing television screens and newspaper photographs, was the Countess of Wessex.
Through Sophie, 56, wife of Prince Edward, 57, the public learned how the royal family was navigating its grief.
Peaceful environmental protesters are being threatened, silenced and criminalised in countries around the world including the UK and the US, according to some of the world’s leading climate scientists and academics.
More than 400 leading experts – including 14 authors from the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) – say that non-violent civil disobedience from groups like the school strikers, Extinction Rebellion and the Sunrise Movement have transformed the debate around the climate crisis in recent years.
Ingenuity successfully takes flight, hovering at height of about 3 metres before touching back down
Nasa’s Ingenuity Mars helicopter has completed the first powered, controlled flight on another planet, the space agency has announced.
The small helicopter successfully took flight on the red planet on Monday morning, hovering in the air at an altitude of about 3 metres (10 feet), before descending and touching back down on the Martian surface.
Boris Johnson’s planned visit to India next week has been cancelled because of the country’s escalating coronavirus crisis, a joint statement by the UK and India has announced.
“In the light of the current coronavirus situation, prime minister Boris Johnson will not be able to travel to India next week,” said the statement, released by Downing Street.
East Kent hospitals trust admits failing to provide safe care for Harry Richford and his mother
An NHS trust has pleaded guilty to failing to provide safe care and treatment after the death of a baby boy.
Representatives for East Kent hospitals university NHS foundation trust were in court on Monday after the death of Harry Richford seven days after his emergency delivery.
Half of all adults in the US have received at least one Covid-19 shot, the government announced Sunday, marking another milestone in the nation’s largest-ever vaccination campaign but leaving more work to do to convince skeptical Americans to roll up their sleeves.
The Associated Press reports:
Almost 130 million people 18 or older have received at least one dose of a vaccine, or 50.4% of the total adult population, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported. Almost 84 million adults, or about 32.5% of the population, have been fully vaccinated.
The US cleared the 50% mark just a day after the reported global death toll from the coronavirus topped a staggering 3 million, according to totals compiled by Johns Hopkins University, though the actual number is believed to be significantly higher.
Guinea received on Sunday a shipment of 300,000 Sinovac Covid-19 vaccines purchased from China and is also set to receive a donation of 200,000 Sinopharm shots, Guinean foreign minister Ibrahima Khalil Kaba said.
Reuters reports:
Kaba gave no further details on the Sinopharm donation. Guinea is reporting 93 new coronavirus infections on average each day, 59% of the peak in March.
There have been 21,460 infections and 138 coronavirus-related deaths reported in the country since the pandemic began.
The scene has been made safe but members of the public are being advised to keep clear of the area
Beachgoers enjoying the warm April sunshine in Brighton were interrupted by police on Sunday afternoon after a possible unexploded mortar shell was found.
A large cordon was put in place by officers on the seafront.
Mary Lou McDonald says she is sorry the late Duke of Edinburgh’s uncle was killed by IRA bomb in 1979
The Sinn Féin president, Mary Lou McDonald, has apologised for the IRA’s 1979 murder of Lord Mountbatten, the Duke of Edinburgh’s uncle.
Speaking after the funeral of Prince Philip, she told Times Radio she was sorry that Mountbatten, 79, had been killed when the fishing boat he was on was blown up by an IRA bomb.
With the poignant sight of the widowed Queen, the world glimpsed an era that is not just ending, but inevitably on its way
You could barely see her, but you could glimpse the future. Maybe it was the sepulchral gloom of the dark wooden stalls of St George’s chapel, or perhaps it was the restraint of a TV director keeping their distance, respecting the privacy of the moment, but the Queen was hardly visible in the live coverage of her late husband’s funeral on Saturday. Masked and in an unlit corner, the monarch was all but unseen.
When the camera did catch her, it made for a poignant sight: the widow alone, an image that “broke hearts around the world,” in the words of the Washington Post, but one that will resonate in the UK especially. Even the sternest republican has long admitted that an extraordinary bond exists between Elizabeth and the people who have been her subjects for nearly seven decades. Now, if anything, that bond will be strengthened.
Foreign secretary hints he believes same Russian cell behind Salisbury poisoning and Czech explosion
The British foreign secretary, Dominic Raab, said the UK stood in “full support” of the Czech Republic after the country’s police announced they were hunting two Russians, suspected of carrying out the Salisbury poisonings, in relation to an explosion at an arms depot.
The steady stream of people at the two surge testing units in Finchley, north London, last week suggests that, more than a year after the pandemic hit, the public spirit to do something about Covid is still strong.
The effectiveness of surge testing is a more open question, however. The rapid testing of 5,000 households last week was an attempt to isolate the South African variant and others of concern. Yet although standard PCR tests come back within 24 hours, genomic sequencing tests to identify a Covid variant take 14 days – by which time the period of infectiousness is usually over.
British households were plunged into the Covid pandemic with lower savings, more debt and weaker welfare support than their French and German counterparts, according to analysis revealing how inequality increased the impact of the UK crisis.
High levels of income inequality also weakened the financial resilience of poorer households as the pandemic hit. The greater exposure of British households, revealed in an analysis by the Resolution Foundation thinktank to be published in full this week, comes despite similar levels of average income with our European neighbours.