Category Archives: Media

Emily Maitlis: ‘Prince Andrew was unleashed. He wanted to tell me everything’

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Newsnight was granted a rare audience with the royal ... and after a decade of silence, he was unstoppable. Its presenter shares the secrets of the interview of the century

Series 3, episode 4: The Crown. A BBC van pulls up at Buckingham Palace to record a royal documentary.

As in life, so with television: timing is everything. Had The Crown aired its new series one week earlier … Had the fictional Queen been spotted squirming at the TV crews in her midst … Had the distant memories of a now-banned palace interview been fresher in our minds … It is entirely possible, and more than probable, that the Prince Andrew interview would never have happened.

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Piers Morgan attacks Stormzy for telling schoolkids PM is a ‘bad man’

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Rapper defends remarks about Boris Johnson at his old primary school as ‘the truth’

Stormzy has defended himself after Piers Morgan took issue with him criticising Boris Johnson to a group of children.

The UK grime star was talking to young pupils at his old primary school in Thornton Heath, south London, when he was asked why he was not a fan of the prime minister. He replied that Johnson was “a very, very bad man”.

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Lawyers complain about lack of access to Julian Assange in jail

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Defence team say he is unaware of some evidence in his case because of blockage in visits

Julian Assange has been blocked from seeing evidence in his extradition case because his lawyers cannot get sufficient access to him, a court has heard.

The WikiLeaks founder, 48, appeared at Westminster magistrates court by video link on Friday for a hearing to extend his detention in Belmarsh prison, in south-east London.

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Russian TV axes show starring Ukraine’s leader after Putin joke

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Zelenskiy sitcom lasted just one night after alluding to Putin in crude sub-language

A Russian television channel has abruptly cancelled a sitcom starring Ukraine’s president after an allusion to a crude joke about Vladimir Putin was aired in Russia’s far east.

The political satire Servant of the People served as a platform for the former comedian Volodymyr Zelenskiy to gain popularity and eventually win the Ukrainian presidency, in a vote largely driven by anger at the country’s previous leaders.

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Guardian scoops three prizes at the British Journalism Awards

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Marina Hyde, Rob Davies, Simon Hattenstone and Daniel Lavelle were all honoured

Four Guardian journalists have been honoured at this year’s British Journalism Awards for their work for the title, which was itself highly commended in the news provider of the year category.

At the ceremony at the Hilton Bankside hotel in central London on Tuesday night, Marina Hyde was described as “clever, innovative and consistently on the ball” as she was handed the prize for Comment Journalism. She was recognised for her writing on subjects including Theresa May’s historic Brexit deal defeat, Prince Andrew and Jeffrey Epstein and Boris Johnson.

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‘I was hacked,’ says woman whose account claimed hospital boy photo was staged

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Woman denies posting false information that photo of four-year-old was political stunt

A medical secretary has claimed her Facebook account was hacked after it was used to post false information claiming that a photograph of an ill boy on the floor at Leeds General Infirmary was staged for political purposes.

The woman denied posting the allegation that four-year-old Jack Willment-Barr’s mother placed him on the floor specifically to take the picture which became symbolic of the NHS’s troubles after it appeared on the front page of Monday’s Daily Mirror.

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Alex Duval Smith, former Guardian journalist, dies at 55

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Tributes paid to former Africa correspondent, who died in Paris after sudden infection

Alex Duval Smith, the Guardian’s former Africa correspondent and most recently a freelance journalist across west Africa, has died aged 55.

Duval Smith had been undergoing intensive treatment for lung cancer diagnosed in August last year. She died in Paris on Saturday following a sudden and severe pulmonary infection, close friends said.

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Senate calls on government to expedite asylum claim of two gay Saudi journalists in ‘arbitrary’ detention

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Multiple global news organisations call for release of men, who fled their country only to become embroiled in Australia’s detention system

The Senate has passed a motion calling on the government to recognise the increased risk it has placed on two gay Saudi journalists by keeping them in detention after they claimed asylum last month.

Guardian Australia can reveal that multiple news organisations around the world have called for the release of the men, warning the Australian government they are watching the case closely.

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Leaked NHS papers ‘put online by posters using Russian methods’

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Questions about dissemination of documents do not mean they are fake, but poses new puzzle

Leaked documents said by Labour to prove that the NHS was “on the table” in trade talks with the US were initially disseminated online by anonymous posters operating in a way similar to a Russian information operation known as Secondary Infektion, according to a social media research firm.

A 19-page report published on Monday by the consultancy Graphika said that while it could not conclusively prove a Russian origin to the leak, the early distribution of the cache of files via Reddit, three German-language websites and an anonymous Twitter account reflected a method of operation seen repeatedly over recent years.

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‘Help me fight this fight’: Virginia Giuffre in plea to public over Prince Andrew scandal

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American tells BBC she was told to have sex with royal by Jeffrey Epstein’s friend Ghislaine Maxwell

A beleaguered Prince Andrew faced fresh embarrassment after his accuser Virginia Giuffre, who claims she was trafficked as a teenager to have sex with him, appeared on television to implore the British public to “not accept this as being OK”.

In her first UK broadcast interview, Giuffre repeated allegations she had sex with the prince when she was aged 17 on the instructions of Ghislaine Maxwell, a socialite and close friend of the US financier and sex offender, Jeffrey Epstein, who killed himself in August.

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Melania Trump suspects Roger Stone behind nude photo leak, new book claims

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In Free, Melania, obtained by the Guardian, Kate Bennett also reports that president and first lady sleep in separate rooms

Melania Trump suspects Roger Stone, a longtime ally and adviser to Donald Trump, of being behind the release of nude photos from her modelling past, a new book claims.

Related: Trump's 'demeaning fake orgasm' made me speak out – ex-FBI lawyer Lisa Page

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Syrian war documentary For Sama triumphs at British independent film awards

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The chronicle of an activist who filmed the destruction in Aleppo wins prizes for best film, documentary, director and editing

For Sama, the acclaimed documentary about life under siege in the Syrian city of Aleppo, has unexpectedly triumphed at the British independent film awards, winning the top prize, best British independent film, as well as best documentary and best director for Waad al-Kateab and Edward Watts.

Described by the Guardian’s Mike McCahill as a film to “break your heart and sear your soul”, For Sama is a chronicle filmed by Syrian activist-director al-Kateab as Aleppo is targeted during the country’s ongoing civil war. Al-Kateab spends much of the time in a hospital where her husband, Hamza, works, recording the destruction and horror. For Sama won a total of four Bifas, including best editing – previously announced with other Bifa “craft” awards on 15 November.

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Maltese PM’s aide accused of being mastermind of Caruana Galizia killing

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Businessman Yorgen Fenech is telling police Keith Schembri was behind murder, sources say

Police investigating the murder of the journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia have questioned the prime minister’s closest aide over claims he was the mastermind behind the killing, according to sources close to the inquiry.

The allegations against Keith Schembri were made by a prominent businessman, Yorgen Fenech, who was arrested last week and is understood to be seeking legal immunity in return for his testimony.

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Facebook’s only Dutch factchecker quits over political ad exemption

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‘Final straw’ was refusal to allow partner to mark dubious claims by far-right parties

Facebook’s only Dutch factchecker has quit over the social network’s refusal to allow them to highlight political lies as being false.

The online newspaper Nu.nl had been Facebook’s only factchecking partner in the Netherlands since Leiden University dropped out of the programme last year. The website had sole responsibility for marking Facebook and Instagram news content for Dutch users as being false or misleading, in order to help power the social network’s tools that suppress distribution of misinformation.

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Egypt’s security forces raid online newspaper’s office in Cairo

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Mada Masr is the last major independent outlet amid clampdown on media freedom

Egyptian security officials have raided the offices of the country’s last major independent news outlet, which has been described as the last bastion of press freedom in Egypt.

“Plainclothes security forces have raided Mada Masr’s office in Cairo,” the website tweete. “Staff are currently being held inside, and their phones have been switched off.”

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Jeremy Clarkson finally recognises climate crisis during Asia trip

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Grand Tour host says impact of global heating on lake bed in Cambodia was ‘genuinely alarming’

Jeremy Clarkson has made what could be the biggest reversal of his 30-year career. The anti-environmental columnist has, for the first time, accepted the existence of global heating after seeing the impact for himself.

Clarkson’s epiphany came as he and his Grand Tour co-stars ran into difficulty while filming a 500-mile boat race from Siem Reap in Cambodia to Vung Tau in Vietnam.

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Selfies, influencers and a Twitter president: the decade of the social media celebrity

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From Gyneth Paltrow to Trump, today’s stars speak directly to their fans. But are they really controlling their message?

I have a friend, Adam, who is an autograph seller – a niche profession, and one that is getting more niche by the day. When we met for breakfast last month he was looking despondent.

“Everyone takes selfies these days,” he said sadly, picking at his scrambled eggs. “It’s never autographs any more. They just want photos of themselves with celebrities.”

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Prince Andrew’s private secretary steps down after Newsnight interview

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Amanda Thirsk will run mentoring initiative, as Barclays becomes latest organisation to sever ties with the prince

Barclays has become the latest among a growing number of organisations to sever ties with Prince Andrew, as it emerged that the aide who orchestrated the beleaguered royal’s disastrous interview about his links to convicted child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein is no longer his private secretary.

Amanda Thirsk, who was said to have played a key role in persuading him to agree to the BBC interview, has reportedly moved on to run his business mentoring initiative, Pitch@Palace.

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More than 80% of adolescents not active enough, warns WHO

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Sedentary lifestyles focused on screens are jeopardising health, says World Health Organization

More than 80% of adolescents worldwide are not active enough, putting their health at risk by sitting focused on a screen rather than running about, say World Health Organization (WHO) researchers.

The proportion of insufficiently active girls in 27 countries rose to more than 90% in 2016, the latest year for which figures are available. There was a significant gender gap, with girls lagging behind boys in physical activity, in all but four countries – Afghanistan, Samoa, Tonga and Zambia.

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Businessman arrested over Maltese journalist murder released on bail

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Suspect freed as deadline for charges over death of Daphne Caruana Galizia approached

Yorgen Fenech, a prominent businessman arrested on Wednesday in connection with investigations into the murder of Maltese journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia, has been released on bail, police sources said.

He will be under round-the-clock police surveillance as investigations continue.

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