General news

• Firefighters extinguish garage blaze

  11-06-2019 23:32 via uk.news.yahoo.com
  Firefighters were called to the scene in Bo'ness at around 4.30pm on Tuesday,
  
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• Israel-Gaza war live: Palestinians flee Rafah after Israeli strikes; ceasefire talks to resume in Cairo

  07-05-2024 07:37
  
  US pressing Israel to avoid attacks in densely populated areas, official says; Israel sending delegation to Cairo for indirect negotiations on truce with HamasGaza ceasefire hangs in balance as Israel carries out night airstrikes on RafahIsraeli assault on Gaza city of Rafah: what we know so farMiller confirmed that Hamas has “issued a response”, when asked about Hamas’s announcement that they accepted a ceasefire deal.“We are reviewing that response now and discussing it
  
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• ‘An exceptional experience’: Adrian Dunbar to curate Samuel Beckett festival in Liverpool

  07-05-2024 07:31
  
  Line of Duty actor will oversee classic plays as well as new pieces inspired by the Irish author in Beckett: Unbound 2024Adrian Dunbar is to curate a festival in Liverpool dedicated to the work of Samuel Beckett. The programme includes four specially commissioned productions, one involving prisoners at HMP Liverpool.The Line of Duty actor said of Beckett: Unbound 2024: “Engaging with Beckett makes you think about the fundamentals of life. Those fundamentals are sometimes hard to engage wit
  
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• TV tonight: Salman Rushdie tells his extraordinary story of being attacked

  07-05-2024 07:20
  
  The author opens up about being stabbed multiple times in 2022. Plus: Eurovision kicks off it’s finale week with a live semi-final from Sweden. Here’s what to watch this evening 9pm, BBC Two
  “One of the first thoughts I had as I saw him coming at me: ‘Oh, it’s you. So it’s you.’” Salman Rushdie tells his extraordinary version of being viciously stabbed multiple times – including in the eye – at a literary event in 2022, where he was abo
  
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• Israel-Gaza war live: ceasefire talks to resume in Cairo; Israeli strikes in Rafah ‘not a major military operation’, says US official

  07-05-2024 07:06
  
  Israel sending delegation to Cairo for indirect negotiations on truce with Hamas; US pressing Israel to avoid attacks in densely populated areas, official saysGaza ceasefire hangs in balance as Israel carries out night airstrikes on RafahIsraeli assault on Gaza city of Rafah: what we know so farMiller confirmed that Hamas has “issued a response”, when asked about Hamas’s announcement that they accepted a ceasefire deal.“We are reviewing that response now and discussing it
  
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• Wet weather woes cause damp start to spring for retailers and restaurants

  07-05-2024 07:00
  
  Consumer caution over high interest rates and energy bills adds to bleak start to the year for sectorCold wet weather and caution about spending amid high interest rates and energy bills have delivered a dismal start to spring for retailers and restaurants, the latest industry figures show.Sales were virtually flat across March and April against the same period a year ago, according to the latest figures from the British Retail Consortium (BRC) trade body and advisory firm KPMG. That was despite
  
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• Universal Music’s £119m CEO pay offer may provoke shareholder revolt

  07-05-2024 07:00
  
  Advisory firm urges shareholders to reject ‘excessive’ payout to Lucian Grainge, while Renault may also face backlashUniversal Music Group could become the latest company to face an embarrassing shareholder revolt this AGM season, after an influential advisory firm urged investors to reject an “excessive” €139m (£119m) payout for its chief executive, Lucian Grainge.Glass Lewis said it had “severe reservations” about supporting the Dutch-American mus
  
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• ‘The body is everything’: Sung Im Her’s insatiable desire for dance

  07-05-2024 07:00
  
  Each time she takes the stage, the Korean choreographer and dancer asks if it will be the last time. She reflects on crushing stereotypes, breaking into theatre and her 100 failed auditions Sung Im Her was 19 when she took her first dance class. On day one, the teacher told her to lose 20kg in a month and gave her something to bite on while forcing her legs towards the splits. “Harsh, very harsh. Absolutely not recommended,” says the now 47-year-old Korean choreographer and dancer. T
  
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• Rachel Reeves is right: this government is gaslighting us over the economy | Polly Toynbee

  07-05-2024 07:00
  
  Tories will crow about falling inflation and Britain’s waning recession. But the public sees the reality in its shopping basketLabour’s tanks roll relentlessly across Tory lawns, not pausing a heartbeat to celebrate phenomenal local election results in England. It treated the local polls as a military rehearsal for the general election, with ruthless focus on places that will deliver most seats: that includes the south, as well as the north and Midlands, and the party is heading for
  
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• Guernica-style battle of Orgreave painting stars in miners’ strikes exhibition

  07-05-2024 07:00
  
  Bob Olley’s unsettling vision of clash between miners and police is part of 40th anniversary show in Bishop AucklandBob Olley was there 40 years ago at the “battle of Orgreave”. “I saw the violence,” he said, shaking his head. “I thought I was in a foreign country when I saw what the police did. It is hard to believe it happened in this country.”The brutality he and others witnessed on 18 June 1984 as striking miners met 6,000 police officers on horses o
  
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• Extra virgin olive oil prices tipped to top £16 a litre next month

  07-05-2024 07:00
  
  Price rise for mass-market types expected as global production falls to lowest level in more than 10 yearsOlive oil prices are set to climb further this year – heading to more than £16 a litre for a bottle of extra virgin – amid a drop in global production to the lowest level in more than a decade.Lower production in Greece, Morocco and Turkey as part of the natural cycle of olive growth is expected to offset an improving situation in Spain and Italy, where trees have suffered
  
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• Charlotte Higgins on The Archers: poor Alice is doomed

  07-05-2024 07:00
  
  Oh dear – Ms Carter, née Aldridge, had been flourishing and off the drink. But after a sexual slip, she succumbed to the siren call of a bottleThe Furies who had been circling for Alice Carter, née Aldridge, seemed for a time to have retreated. After the various catastrophes of her alcoholism, she had been flourishing in recent months: off the drink, managing the riding stables, pulling through her mother’s death, and successfully co-parenting her daughter Martha alongs
  
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• Asylum seekers ‘hide or flee to Ireland’ to avoid UK Rwanda detentions

  07-05-2024 07:00
  
  Charities fear ‘increasing risks of destitution and exploitation’ of refugees as they go into hidingThe Home Office is dealing with growing fallout from the high-profile round-ups of asylum seekers it wants to send to Rwanda, as some have gone into hiding while others have fled across the border to Ireland.Officials began rounding up asylum seekers to detain them for the Rwanda scheme a week ago, with at least one now on hunger strike and another threatening suicide. Continue reading
  
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• Why are the world’s cities sinking? - podcast

  07-05-2024 06:00
  
  A study has found that more than two dozen US coastal cities are sinking by more than 2mm a year. It’s a similar picture across the world. Nearly half of China’s major cities, as well as places such as Tehran and Jakarta, are facing similar problems. These issues are compounded by sea level rises caused by global heating. Madeleine Finlay speaks to Prof Manoochehr Shirzaei of Virginia Tech University and Prof Robert Nicholls of the University of East Anglia to find out what’s m
  
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• Train strikes to halt most trains in south-east England on Tuesday

  07-05-2024 06:00
  
  Commuter routes in and out of London hit as train drivers begin three days of rolling strikes amid six-day overtime banMost trains will not run in south-east England on Tuesday – including on key commuter routes in and out of London – after train drivers embarked on three days of rolling strikes at national rail operators.Drivers in the Aslef union are striking for 24 hours at each English operator between Tuesday and Thursday, while continuing a week-long nationwide overtime ban tha
  
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• Scottish salmon industry challenged over move to drop ‘farmed’ from labels

  07-05-2024 06:00
  
  Fish welfare campaigners say Defra decision facilitates greenwashing and will mislead consumersAnimal welfare campaigners are challenging the decision to allow producers of Scottish salmon to drop the word “farmed” from labelling.An application by the industry body claimed changing the protected name wording on the front of packaging from “Scottish farmed salmon” to “Scottish salmon” made sense because wild salmon was no longer sold in supermarkets, which cons
  
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• ‘I thought: “I’ve engineered the death of Hugh Grant!’’’ – the inside story of Four Weddings and a Funeral

  07-05-2024 06:00
  
  The low-budget romcom about Britain’s upper middle classes launched the careers of its writer Richard Curtis and Grant. Cast and crew share their stories – from Liz Hurley in that dress to Amber Rudd’s role as an ‘aristocracy coordinator’ It’s been 30 years since audiences first met Hugh Grant as a stuttering serial monogamist who falls hopelessly in love with a glamorous American (Andie MacDowell) in Four Weddings and a Funeral. The low-budget romcom, directe
  
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• Germans grill Olaf Scholz over soaring cost of doner kebabs

  07-05-2024 06:00
  
  Die Linke party is among those calling for a Dönerpreisbremse or price cap on the hugely popular street foodThe soaring cost of doner kebabs has led to growing calls in Germany for a government subsidy programme to keep the inflation-hit dish, one of the country’s favourites, affordable as politicians report it is frequently cited as a concern in doorstep conversations with voters.The chancellor, Olaf Scholz, has become so used to being asked about the price of kebabs during public ap
  
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• César Aira’s unreal magic: how the eccentric author took over Latin American literature

  07-05-2024 06:00
  
  He has published more than 100 novels, gives his work away, and his surrealist books have a massive cult following. Now Argentina’s favourite rule-breaker is tipped for the Nobel prizeA few years ago when Patti Smith played at a cultural festival in Denmark, she told the crowd that she was happy to be playing in the presence of one of her favourite authors. It was said she had only agreed to play the festival because the author, César Aira, would be in the audience. Aira, although c
  
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• ‘A colonial mindset’: why global aid agencies need to get out of the way

  07-05-2024 06:00
  
  With the world’s humanitarian system in crisis, many NGOs now recognise that local charities can deliver much more at far less costBefore civil war engulfed her Ethiopian home region of Tigray in 2020, Tsega Girma was a prosperous trader who sold stationery and other goods. But when hungry children displaced by the conflict started appearing in the streets, she sold everything and used the proceeds to buy them food.After that money dried up, Tsega appealed to Tigray’s diaspora for do
  
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• Painting of vagina by French artist Gustave Courbet sprayed with ‘MeToo’ graffiti

  07-05-2024 05:18
  
  French-Luxembourgish performance artist Deborah de Robertis says she organised the stunt, after which two people were arrestedTwo women have sprayed the words “MeToo” on a 19th-century painting of a woman’s vagina by French artist Gustave Courbet in a stunt by a performance artist, a museum and the artist said.“The Origin of the World”, a nude painted from 1866, was protected by a “glass pane” and the police were on site to assess the damage, the Centre
  
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• Can Modi finally win over the southern states and reshape India’s electoral map?

  07-05-2024 05:00
  
  Making a breakthrough in Tamil Nadu and Kerala is crucial to the BJP’s ambitions to gain an even larger parliamentary majority – but it won’t be easyUnder Tamil Nadu’s scorching midday sun, K Annamalai waved at the crowd gathered around his campaign bus. Some people stretched their babies upwards to be touched by him, others threw flower petals and passed gifts through the window. A sea of mobile phones vied for space as people tried to squeeze the candidate into their se
  
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• Dresses made out of sand, corsets and power poses: the Met Gala 2024 – in pictures

  07-05-2024 04:46
  
  The theme was JG Ballard’s 1962 short story, The Garden of Time, which meant references to decay, lots of florals and more than one look that seemed to have nothing to do with anything Continue reading...
  
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• Non-doms are threatening to leave. Should they be convinced to stay? - podcast

  07-05-2024 04:00
  
  Multi-millionaire Bassim Haidar says ending the non-dom tax status is a mistake. He plans to leave the UK and says other non-doms will do the same. Should the government change their mind?The chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, announced in his spring budget that the government was going to scrap the “non-domicile” regime, which has allowed the multi-millionaire Bassim Haidar and 68,800 other non-doms to avoid paying UK tax on their overseas income for the past 225 years. It will raise £2
  
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• UCLA creates campus safety role amid condemnation of response to mob attack

  07-05-2024 02:11
  
  University and police denounced as masked group marched on campus and attacked pro-Palestinian demonstrators last weekThe University of California, Los Angeles, said that it would create a new office dedicated to campus safety following mounting criticism of authorities’ slow response to a brutal attack on pro-Palestinian protesters by a mob of “instigators”.The school’s chancellor, Gene Block, said on Sunday that urgent changes were needed to “better protect our co
  
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• Ukraine war briefing: US and most EU countries to boycott Putin swearing-in ceremony

  07-05-2024 02:02
  
  US spokesperson says no envoy will attend because Russian president’s election was not ‘free and fair’. What we know on day 804The US and most EU nations will boycott a Kremlin ceremony to swear in Vladimir Putin for a new six-year term as president on Tuesday, but France and some other EU states were expected to send an envoy despite a plea by Kyiv. “No, we will not have a representative at his inauguration,” Matthew Miller, a US state department spokesperson, said
  
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• Rachel Reeves accuses Tories of ‘gaslighting’ public over economy

  07-05-2024 01:14
  
  Shadow chancellor will highlight Labour’s plans to boost economy and say Conservatives are ‘out of touch’‘They’re everywhere’: Labour’s wooing of City goes into overdriveRachel Reeves will draw the economic battle lines for the next general election on Tuesday, challenging the government’s claims that the economy is turning a corner when millions are still struggling with the cost of living.The shadow chancellor will accuse Rishi Sunak and Jeremy H
  
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• Tom Daley to compete at record fifth Olympics to defend 10m synchro title

  07-05-2024 01:01
  
  Daley to become first British diver to compete at five GamesOlympic medallist came out of retirement for his young sonTom Daley will seek to end his extraordinary career with a fifth Olympic medal this summer after being selected for Team GB’s synchronised diving squad for the Paris Games.The 29-year-old, who only came out of retirement last July after his five-year-old son Robbie told him: “Papa, I want to see you dive at the Olympics,” will partner Noah Williams as he seeks t
  
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• Savills says UK house prices will rise this year in U-turn on earlier forecast

  07-05-2024 01:01
  
  Lower mortgage rates prompt property firm to change its outlook from 3% drop to a 2.5% increaseA decline in mortgage rates has prompted a forecaster to reverse its predictions of a fall in UK house prices in 2024, instead suggesting the average cost of a property could rise by £61,500 over the next five years.The property company Savills had forecast in November that it expected the average price of a home to fall by 3% this year because recent rises in the Bank of England base rate had he
  
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• UK armed forces’ personal data hacked in MoD breach

  07-05-2024 00:31
  
  Defence secretary to address MPs after names and bank details of armed forces members targeted by unnamed attackerThe Ministry of Defence has suffered a significant data breach and the personal information of UK military personnel has been hacked.A third-party payroll system used by the MoD, which includes names and bank details of current and past members of the armed forces, was targeted in the attack. A very small number of addresses may also have been accessed. Continue reading...
  
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