The US secretary of defense, Pete Hegseth, indicated multiple operatives were killed and no civilians were harmed
The US military has conducted airstrikes against Islamic State (IS) operatives in Somalia, the first attacks in the African country during Donald Trump’s second term as president.
Trump said on Saturday that he ordered strikes on a senior IS attack planner and others from the organisation.
Brazilian’s injury-blighted career highlights iniquities of the game, from inflated expectations to curse of celebrity excess
Never go back, but sometimes going back is all that remains. Just 18 months after he joined Al-Hilal, Neymar and the Saudi club have agreed to terminate his contract, allowing him to return to Brazil and rejoin Santos. Al-Hilal paid £77m to sign Neymar from Paris Saint-Germain on a salary of £2.5m a week. He will be paid 85% of that for the remainder of this season, meaning he cost the club £322m for seven appearances, three assists and one goal. Like so much of Neymar’s career, it all seems such a dreadful waste.
His is a story almost designed to highlight the iniquities of the modern game, from the impossible pressures placed on young players to the curse of celebrity and financial excess. Neymar’s great misfortune was to emerge just after Lionel Messi. Argentina had seemingly found a second Diego Maradona, so Brazil needed a second Pelé. When, in June 2011, the 19-year-old Neymar scored the opening goal in the final as Santos won the Copa Libertadores for the first time since Pelé had inspired them to the trophy in 1963, it seemed they had found him. But, of course, nobody can live with such comparisons and so Neymar remained always a prisoner of his potential.
Tens of thousands rally against government and in memory of railway station roof collapse that killed 15
Serbia’s powerful populist leader Aleksandar Vučić was facing his biggest challenge yet as student-led demonstrations intensified at the weekend in what was being called the Balkan country’s greatest ever protest movement.
Three months to the day after a concrete canopy collapsed at the entrance of Novi Sad’s railway station, tens of thousands of protesters converged on the northern city, blockading its three bridges in commemoration of the 15 people killed in the accident. The tragedy has been blamed squarely on government ineptitude and graft.
Sam found himself getting sucked deeper and deeper in to betting, sometimes risking £11,000 in a day. Now a judge has ruled he was unlawfully targeted
At 1.17pm on 15 August 2018, Sam* logged in to his online betting account and gambled five days’ worth of wages. Already deep in debt – having taken out 13 loans over three years, and with his marriage under strain – he had been desperate to quit.
But Sky Betting & Gaming, operator of Sky Bet, Casino, and Vegas, had other ideas. Having labelled him a “high value” customer, and not realising he was at risk, it had sent him an email promising a £100 bonus if he spent £400 on a casino game. “Well done on making it past level 2. Can you make it even further this week?” it said. Soon after receiving it, Sam deposited £400.
Home fans irate after Liverpool awarded first-half penalty
Visiting goalkeeper makes vital saves to keep clean sheet
“Having Mo Salah definitely helps,” said Arne Slot after the Premier League’s leading goalscorer notched twice at Bournemouth to stretch Liverpool’s lead in the title race as the Egyptian continued to write his name in the record books.
A 2-0 win at the Vitality left Arsenal with a deficit of nine points to bridge. “If you want to win here, maybe you need a bit of luck as well, because the margins are so small,” said Slot. Andoni Iraola’s team had previously beaten Manchester City, Arsenal and, last week, Nottingham Forest 5-0 but Liverpool forged on where their rivals had slipped.
Gambling companies in Britain could be forced to overhaul their advertising practices after a betting firm was ruled to have unlawfully targeted a problem gambler who was bombarded with more than 1,300 marketing emails.
In a ruling at the high court, a judge found that Sky Betting & Gaming sent the man personalised marketing without proper consent after gathering hundreds of thousands of pieces of data about him and his gambling habits.
New arrivals are set to push the population to 72.5 million but the numbers matter less than how well people fit in once here
Last week some startling numbers hit the headlines. If the Office for National Statistics is correct, net migration will add five million people to these islands in the span of a decade. That will account for almost all population growth in that time, driving us up to 72.5 million by 2032.
Is it good news or bad? Many commentators reacted with alarm: there is already a great deal of strain on housing, education and health services. But others like the idea. They point out that birthrates are falling across the world, and that Britain, like other countries, is due to get increasingly decrepit with time. We will eventually have to live off the life force of skilled young people from overseas, over whom everyone else will be competing.
Three tries after break get champions off to winning start
The opening weekend of a Six Nations campaign is all about starting fast and then sustaining that momentum. England were encouragingly quick out of the stalls but, not for the first time, were unable to kick on when it really counted. Instead it is the reigning champions Ireland who are up and running, courtesy of an uninterrupted blast of 22 second-half points that condemned Steve Borthwick’s side to a seventh defeat in their last nine Tests.
Talk about a game of two contrasting halves. Initially a bristling England were right up for it and led 10-5 at the interval. They reckoned without storming, game-turning tries from Bundee Aki, Tadhg Beirne and Dan Sheehan and a collective Irish power surge that allowed the hosts to weather a slightly sticky first 40 minutes and grasp a potentially vital try bonus point.
The singer-songwriter on the advice from Nick Cave that changed her life, acting in The OA and her guilty pleasure
What’s the best piece of advice you have ever received?
I don’t want to be name-droppy, but this advice definitely came at a time in my life where I really needed to hear it. In 2013, when I was on tour with Nick Cave, I was having a problem with my partner at the time. Our biggest fights always broke out when I would go on tour, because he felt like I was choosing my career over having a relationship.
On a months-long overseas trip, Melanie Kinsman craved someone to talk to other than Sam, her partner. He stepped up to the challenge with a comical impersonation
In 2004 I was a young writer at the University of Adelaide. I was working as an editor on an anthology of short stories when a piece by Sam came across my desk. We emailed back and forth for a while, working on the story, but I never met him in person.
A few months later, I was out in town with some friends and noticed he was there. While we’d never crossed paths in real life, I knew what he looked like. In my fairly inebriated state I decided a great way to introduce myself would be to walk up to him and start reciting excerpts of his story. I don’t know what I was trying to achieve, but I made an impression and he was obviously flattered.
The Australia Law Reform Commission will soon report on its review into justice responses to sexual violence. Here are three first-hand accounts of what it’s like to seek justice
Minnesota Democratic–Farmer–Labor chair to lead party still reeling from extensive losses
Ken Martin, chair of the Minnesota Democratic–Farmer–Labor party, won the crowded race to become the next chair of the Democratic National Committee on Saturday.
The move provides Martin with a powerful perch to determine the messaging and trajectory of a party that is still reeling from its extensive losses in the November election and confronting four more years of Donald Trump’s leadership.
US bank, world’s biggest bullion dealer, says it will deliver raw material against contracts that will expire in February
US banking giant JPMorgan plans to deliver $4bn of gold bullion weighing more than 937 tons to New York this month, before an anticipated escalation of Donald Trump’s trade-rebalancing tariff moves planned for Saturday.
The US bank, the world’s biggest bullion dealer, said it would deliver the hefty raw material, weighed as 30m troy ounces of gold, or 1.875m lbs, against contracts that will expire in February.
The loss of the young figure skaters whose lives were cut tragically short in the American Eagle flight 5342 crash has ripped a hole in the tightly knit world of figure skating
Everyone agreed it was the best camp they’d ever been to. The most fun. There was an interpretive dance class. Successful jump drills were met with high-fives all around. On the day of the Chinese new year, the kids all went out for hot pot. And parents and coaches, regardless of athlete rivalries, intermingled in camaraderie; when one parent noticed a coach’s voice grow hoarse, they pulled a ginger shot from out of their purse, handing it to her with a smile.
National development camps, such as the one that took place following the US figure skating championships in Wichita last week, are held for the highest performing juvenile, intermediate and novice skaters. The young athletes with the greatest potential are offered this chance to watch the stars of their sport compete, and then learn from some of the most elite coaches in the country.
Gas can be misused to artificially increase performance
UCI’s ban will come into effect on 10 February
Cycling’s governing body has banned the repeated use of carbon monoxide rebreathing that some riders allegedly misuse to artificially increase their performances.
Following a meeting of its executive committee on Saturday in France, the UCI said it approved a ban on repeated inhalation to protect the health of riders. The ban starts on 10 February.
The award-winning author on his move from short stories to novels, writing marginal characters in small-town Mayo and the Irish fiction he rates most
Born in Canada in 1982, Colin Barrett was raised near Ballina, County Mayo, and though he left as a teenager, studying creative writing at University College Dublin, Mayo has provided the setting for almost all his writing to date. His debut short story collection, Young Skins, came out in 2013, winning the Guardian first book award and yielding a film adaptation, Calm With Horses, starring Cosmo Jarvis and Barry Keoghan. He followed it with the 2022 collection Homesickness and last year’s Booker-longlisted novel Wild Houses, which revolves around a poorly-planned kidnapping in Ballina. Winner of the Nero debut fiction award, it is now out in paperback. Barrett lives in Dublin with his wife and two children.
What sparked Wild Houses? The first scene I wrote was the opening one. Dev Hendrick wakes up in the middle of night and there’s a car outside. Two men bring a teenage boy to the door. The men turn out to be Dev’s criminal cousins and Doll, the boy, is a bargaining chip in a haphazard blackmailing scheme. What attracted me was writing from the perspective of Dev, who is on the periphery. I was very taken with that situation, where a passive and withdrawn character is pushed right up against this dramatic and potentially traumatic event.
Not long now: Skippers Nelson Semedo and John McGinn lead their teams out on to the Molineux pitch with kick-off just a few minutes away. In a splendid piece of symmetry, the two clubs are separated by 21 miles geographically and the same number of points in the league table. Nice.
Fun fact: Aston Villa have failed to win any of the last six Premier League games they have contested following a midweek Champions League excursion, drawing three and losing three against West Ham (D), Nottingham Forest (L), Chelsea (L), Liverpool (L), Bournemouth (D) and Manchester United (D).
Critics accuse prime minister of pandering to Tripoli over migration after Osama Najim was freed despite an ICC warrant for alleged war crimes
After stepping off an aircraft belonging to the Italian secret services, Osama Najim was triumphantly carried on the shoulders of the crowd of supporters awaiting his arrival at Tripoli’s Mitiga airport.
Najim, also called Almasri, was not a footballer bringing home a trophy but a police chief wanted by the international criminal court (ICC) for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity, including alleged murder, torture, enslavement, rape and sexual violence.
The blazes killed 29 people and are estimated to have caused more than $250bn in damages
The Palisades and Eaton wildfires, which killed at least 29 people and burned across about 60 sq miles (155 sq km) around Los Angeles, have been fully contained.
California’s department of forestry and fire protection’s announcement on Friday came more than three weeks after the two blazes battered this highly populated area of southern California, laying waste to entire neighborhoods – including Pacific Palisades and Altadena. Containment refers to how much of a perimeter has been established around a fire to prevent it from growing, according to NBC News.
Liverpool marched on, though with no little relief, their post-match celebrations reflecting the importance of victory. Arne Slot’s team had not triggered the traps Andoni Iraola’s Bournemouth had used to snare the top-four contenders Manchester City, Arsenal and Nottingham Forest this season.
It was Mohamed Salah who snatched the three points. If his first came after a highly debatable penalty award, the second, a left-foot chip like a prime Tiger Woods approach shot, was a goal of inarguable beauty. In negotiating one of their most demanding remaining assignments, Slot’s team, now nine points clear, sent the pressure back into Arsenal’s fraying mindset. Salah’s goals are guiding Liverpool to their key objective. “My main target is to win the Premier League with the team, we are going in the right direction,” said the Egyptian king.
David Moyes did not play down the importance of Leicester’s final league visit to Goodison Park. “Crucial,” he called a contest that could not only nudge Everton towards Premier League safety but enable the club to start planning for a better future. A team reborn under his leadership delivered.
An opening blitz that included the fastest goal ever scored at the historic old stadium destroyed Ruud van Nistelrooy’s abject visitors and secured a third successive league win for Everton under their new manager. Sean Dyche managed three wins in five months and 19 games in the Premier League this season. Everton have now scored six goals from open play since the Scot returned, one fewer than the team had managed all season under Dyche.
England captain has most goals in 50 Bundesliga games
Dembélé scores another hat-trick in PSG’s 5-2 win at Brest
The Bundesliga leaders Bayern Munich conceded three goals in the second half but beat Holstein Kiel 4-3 on Saturday, with the striker Harry Kane scoring twice to set a league record for most goals after 50 games.
Bayern eased off in the second half and let in three goals in the last 28 minutes in a shaky second-half performance, but held on for the win that opened a nine-point lead at the top.
In some of the photographs you have to squint hard to see it – sandwiched between tree trunks or cloaked in fog. In others, it’s so close up that all you see are rivets or the cross-hatching of metal beams. In his series Thirty-Six Views of the Golden Gate Bridge (the title nods to Katsushika Hokusai’s famous woodcut prints of Mount Fuji), US photographer Arthur Drooker set out to defamiliarise the great Californian landmark, asking: “Is it possible to see the most photographed bridge in the world anew?” After two years on the project, he came away with “deep admiration” for its builders who defied predictions that the mile-wide strait could never be bridged. “What I found most resonant,” says Drooker, “even more than the span’s status as an engineering and architectural icon, is its power as a symbol of possibility.”
Thirty-Six Views of the Golden Gate Bridge is available from arthurdrooker.com
The cheap Chinese chatbot has stunned tech giants – and opened up the possibility that other countries, not just China, could now afford to enter the AI race
At 2.16pm California time last Sunday, the US billionaire tech investor Marc Andreessen called it. “DeepSeek R1 is AI’s Sputnik moment,” he posted on X.
A Chinese startup, operating since 2023 and helmed by a millennial mathematician, had unveiled a new chatbot that seemed to equal the performance of America’s leading models at a fraction of the cost.
Connexion
