Supreme court upholds order against Zamira Hajiyeva, who spent £1m a year at Harrods
A woman who spent £1m a year at Harrods will be forced to give up her £15m home unless she reveals the source of her fortune following the UK’s first McMafia-style “dirty money” investigation.
Zamira Hajiyeva, the wife of a former boss of the Azerbaijani state bank jailed for fraud, has lost her final appeal against a court order forcing her to reveal how she came by so much money.
Continue reading...Britain risks weeks without trade transition plans from 1 January after missing EU parliament Sunday deadline
Negotiators of a Brexit trade deal inched towards a compromise on fishing rights on Sunday but missed a major deadline, raising the prospect of weeks without arrangements from 1 January even in the event of agreement.
The teams led by the chief UK negotiator, David Frost, and his EU counterpart, Michel Barnier, were expected to continue talks on Monday despite the European parliament’s notice that it would not vote on a deal if not secured by midnight on Sunday.
Continue reading...Met Office predicts a ‘seasonal feel’ to the weather after a rainy start to the week
Those dreaming of a white Christmas will be left further disappointed this year after the Met Office forecast no more than frosty conditions for the UK.
Temperatures across most of the country will stay in mid-single figures on Thursday and Friday, and no snow was expected to settle.
Continue reading...Anne Sacoolas was charged with causing the teenager’s death by dangerous driving 12 months ago
The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) has told Harry Dunn‘s parents it will continue to pursue the prosecution of their son’s alleged killer, despite the high court ruling she had diplomatic immunity.
Anne Sacoolas was charged with causing the teenager’s death by dangerous driving 12 months ago after a fatal road crash outside a US military base in Northamptonshire on 27 August last year.
Continue reading...The Labour leader labels the decision on Saturday 19 December to cancel the planned Christmas relaxation of Covid restrictions an 'act of gross negligence by a prime minister who once again has been caught behind the curve'. Boris Johnson announced swaths of the south-east of England would be put in a new tier 4 to contain a new strain of the virus just days after he insisted Christmas plans could go ahead. 'We have a prime minister who is so scared of being unpopular that he is incapable of making tough decisions until it is too late,' Starmer says.
Extra officers to be deployed to clamp down on non-essential journeys after chaotic scenes at London railway stations
Police have said they will fine people for travelling in and out of tier 4 areas without a reasonable excuse, but have admitted they have no intention to set up roadblocks or routinely stop vehicles, amid warnings not to persevere with now-trashed Christmas plans.
As forces deal with the fallout of the government’s last minute U-turn on Christmas gatherings, extra officers will be deployed at railway stations to clamp down on non-essential journeys, following crowded scenes at transport hubs in London.
Continue reading...There is a 'long way to go' before a return to normality, the health secretary, Matt Hancock, has warned, after saying a new Covid variant was 'out of control' in the UK. Speaking on the BBC's Andrew Marr Show and Sky's Sophy Ridge on Sunday, Hancock suggested the new tier 4 restrictions announced on Saturday may have to remain in place for several months until vaccines have been administered across the country
Professor warns of ‘political agenda’ to discredit researchers exploring slavery links
The academic at the centre of an escalating row over the National Trust’s efforts to explore links between its properties and colonialism has warned of a “political agenda” to “misrepresent, mischaracterise, malign and intimidate” those involved in the project.
Professor Corinne Fowler has drawn comparisons between the vilification of academics, including herself, and attacks by climate-crisis deniers on scientists warning about global heating. She suggested they were a product of social tension.
Continue reading...Throngs of travellers congregated at London's St Pancras train station on Saturday 19 December as they sought to flee the city before it was placed in tier 4 at midnight. Swaths of south-east England were placed in the new highest tier as Boris Johnson abandoned attempts to relax Covid restrictions over Christmas to counter a highly infectious new strain of the virus. The announcement prompted a rush on London train stations
Ireland restricts travel from Britain as Italy, Belgium and Netherlands stop UK travel; Cases of new strain reported outside UK, says WHO
The Italian health ministry is reporting that they have found a patient infected with the same mutated strain of coronavirus as the UK.
The infected patient returned to Italy from the UK with his partner in the past few days and landed in Rome’s Fiumicino airport. They’re now in isolation, the ministry said.
El Salvador has banned travellers who have been to the UK or South Africa in the last 30 days.
President Nayib Bukele announced the new decision on Twitter after linking a Reuters story on European countries closing their borders to UK passengers.
A partir de ahora, queda prohibido el ingreso a nuestro país, de cualquier persona que su itinerario de vuelo haya incluido el Reino Unido o Sudáfrica o que haya estado en alguno de esos dos países en los últimos 30 días.
Cc. @R_Cucalon, @anliker1980 https://t.co/UQyL6ROsUN
The virus is likely to have spread more widely than the south-east of England, so the lockdown is likely to expand
While the country has obsessed over the Christmas restrictions over the last few weeks the real story lay elsewhere, it transpires. A new strain of the coronavirus emerged a couple of months ago, probably somewhere in the north-east corner of Kent, but went unnoticed for weeks. New viruses emerge all the time, but they usually don’t cause problems. And it usually takes a long time for a new strain – starting from just a single case – to become visible to public health authorities.
In fact, we have one of the most comprehensive and sensitive molecular surveillance systems in the world and that allowed us to pick up this strain relatively quickly. However, the virus has also moved fast – very fast – and spread beyond Kent to Essex, London and elsewhere.
Continue reading...As the police search for Esther Dingley winds down in the Pyrenees, the theories around her disappearance multiply
Police in Spain have begun scaling back the search for a British hiker missing in the Pyrenees, almost a month after she disappeared without a trace.
Sharing an update of their investigation into the puzzling disappearance of Esther Dingley, the Guardia Civil also said that they were no longer using helicopters to scan the vast mountain range for signs of the 37-year-old.
Continue reading...In an exclusive interview as his wife faces her fifth Christmas as a prisoner, Richard Ratcliffe tells why he fears even the end of her sentence won’t see her freed
It was after they had decorated the Christmas tree that Gabriella Ratcliffe started crying herself to sleep again. “She has been quite tearful for a few nights now, asking me ‘when is Mummy coming back?’ – which she hadn’t been doing,” said her father Richard Ratcliffe. “It’s all the associations of Christmas and family.”
For the fifth year in a row, his wife Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe will spend Christmas Day – and her birthday, which is on Boxing Day – a prisoner in Iran. Only she isn’t merely a prisoner, Ratcliffe says; she’s a hostage. And it’s vital the government acknowledges that: “There has been a real reluctance on the part of the British government and the wider world to call out Iran’s hostage taking, which has enabled it.”
Continue reading...Spread of new Covid strain forces lockdown with a ‘stay home’ alert for London and south-east
The nation’s Christmas plans were plunged into chaos last night after Boris Johnson dramatically abandoned his attempts to avoid tighter Covid restrictions, and instead placed millions of people under new lockdown measures to try to curb a highly infectious new strain of the virus.
In a major U-turn that prompted an immediate backlash from his party, the prime minister placed a third of England’s population under new tier 4 restrictions to counter a Covid strain believed to be up to 70% more transmissible than previous variants.
Continue reading...Scotland and Wales also reduce five-day festive window for indoor mixing to one day
There will be a strict travel ban between Scotland and the rest of the UK throughout the festive period, and the five-day Christmas window for indoor mixing will be reduced to just Christmas Day, Nicola Sturgeon has said.
In Wales, first minister Mark Drakeford likewise scrapped festive relaxation plans for all but Christmas Day and brought forward the country’s lockdown which will now start from midnight on Saturday.
Continue reading...Anne Abbott challenged medical establishment and faced ‘shocking’ rebuffs
Anne Abbott is a scientist on a mission. She believes large numbers of debilitating strokes can be prevented without surgical interventions. Lifestyle changes and medication alone can make massive improvements to people at risk from the thickening of their arteries.
It is not an attitude that has endeared her to the medical establishment, however. For years, it has attempted to block her work while instead pressing for increasing use of carotid surgery and stents, she told the Observer last week.
Continue reading...Court found L&Q had misled black woman who was harassed by family and had to flee her home
A leading housing association has been condemned by a court for failing to support a tenant made homeless after a racist campaign by neighbours.
London & Quadrant (L&Q), which accommodates 250,000 people across London and the south-east, ignored a code of practice on protecting tenants from racial harassment and was guilty of defensiveness and insensitivity, according to a county court judgment issued last week.
Continue reading...European affairs minister, Clément Beaune, says Paris will not be rushed into deal over next 48 hours
The European parliament’s Sunday deadline may pass without agreement on a post-Brexit trade and security deal, France’s European affairs minister, Clément Beaune, has said, as British and EU negotiators continued to haggle over fishing rights.
MEPs have said they will stage a vote of consent on 28 December if terms are agreed by the two sides by midnight central European time on Sunday, raising the stakes for a weekend deal.
Continue reading...Critics say plan for third runway runs counter to UK’s legally binding target of net zero emissions by 2050
The government faces a legal challenge over its plan to expand Heathrow airport, with lawyers and environmentalists demanding it review its policy in line with its commitment to net-zero emissions by 2050.
The Good Law Project, a not-for-profit organisation with a focus on public interest cases including environmentalism and tackling poverty, argues that the government must update its plan for a third runway to take into account the emissions pledge it made following the approval for the airport expansion in June 2018.
Continue reading...Two Kurdish asylum seekers made frantic attempts to save lives of family whose boat capsized in rough conditions
Two asylum seekers who were in the same boat as a Kurdish Iranian family who drowned trying to cross the Channel have spoken out about their frantic attempts to save the family’s lives after the vessel capsized.
Rasul Iran Nezhad, his wife, Shiva Mohammad Panahi, both 35, and their children: Anita, nine, Armin, six, and 15-month-old Artin, were among 22 people who boarded the boat, a rigid polyester structure about 20ft long, in October.
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