Their latest report makes no mention of Greenland, Venezuela, or even Trump. This is just a pretence that normality continues

This week the IMF released an update to its World Economic Outlook, titled “Global Economy: Steady amid Divergent Forces” and, seriously, in what fricking world are they living? It was yet another example of international groups, governments and parts of the media sane-washing the utter crisis we all exist in because Donald Trump is an egomaniacal bully with the impulses of a spoiled toddler.

How’s this for timing: on Sunday Donald Trump announced from 1 February he will levy a 10% tariff “on any and all goods sent to the United States” from Denmark, Norway, Sweden, France, Germany, the UK, the Netherlands and Finland, and will increase it to 25% from 1 June unless they let the US gain control of Greenland.

At first Stephanie Wood felt out of her depth rafting the Franklin, but by the end, a world of new possibilities had opened up

I am old, I am unfit for this project and I am colder than hell frozen over but I am also stuck. A helicopter will not winch me out because my only injuries are the agonies of dodgy hips, screaming arm muscles and deeply wounded pride.

And there are miles and days to go before I sleep again on a mattress with clean sheets and a pillow and luxuriate in a hot shower and can be propelled forward in ways that do not require the use of my arms.

Mini breaks and micro-stretches could help strengthen your neck and reduce pain and stress, say experts

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If you’re reading this on your device, chin tucked into your chest, or leaning over your desk shaped like a question mark, pause for a moment. How’s your neck feeling?

The way we sit, scroll and work means we often hold static positions for too long, creating tension and stiffness that radiates through the upper body.

Mitzvahs – or charitable acts – will include preparing meals for vulnerable communities while the Sydney Opera House will host a memorial service

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Thousands of Australians are expected to perform acts of kindness on Thursday to commemorate the victims of last month’s Bondi terror attack, as the Jewish tradition of mitzvah spreads across faiths and backgrounds.

A mitzvah, which is a core value in Judaism, has come to mean any charitable act and is being requested of Australians to mark the national day of mourning.

I’ve got a feeling this is the year skirts regain their main character energy

I never stopped wearing skirts, I just sort of stopped thinking about them. They were a plus-one, not the main event. For the past few years I have planned my outfits around my obsession with pleated trousers, or my latest experimental jean shape. Or I have worn dresses. Sometimes I have ended up in a skirt, but the skirt was kind of an afterthought. For instance, at one point last year when it was chilly and I needed to look smart as well as cosy, I picked out a sweater and a pair of knee-high boots, and then slotted in a plain midi in satin or wool, just something to sit in between.

Things could be about to change. I’ve got a feeling that 2026 could be the year that skirts get main character energy again. For a start: hemlines are getting shorter again, which makes skirts more attention-grabbing. If you left the house with your eyes open at any point in 2025, you will have noticed this happening: generation Z and Alpha wear very, very short skirts – she says, trying and failing not to sound about 150 years old – but the trend for above-the-knee hemlines crosses all generations. Adult women with their legs out was very much a feature of the pre-Christmas party season. But what is noticeable is that the mini renaissance is much more about a skirt, than it is about a dress. A short skirt feels cooler; more about your style and less about your body than a minidress.

Manchester City have issues with injury and form, and need their big players to step up and turn the ship around

At Bodø/Glimt, in a first Champions League outing since 1 October, the 29-year-old appeared what he is: a player still recovering after 18 months out with a serious knee injury and several related setbacks. This was only a third start since his latest return began with the second 45 minutes of the goalless draw at Sunderland on New Year’s Day. Last week Rodri declared he was “ready to go” and said: “I’m really happy to be on the pitch every single day.” Yet in Saturday’s 2-0 loss at Manchester United he was a one-paced, non-factor unable to do what he did with ease pre-anterior cruciate ligament rupture: run midfield and so the contest. In Tuesday’s 3-1 humbling in Norway the Spaniard was the same, and two moments tell the tale of his form. First Jens Petter Hauge left him a statue before registering a memorable long-range strike for Bodø’s third goal; thencame the two yellow cards in two minutes that had Rodri sent off.

Agreement a milestone for British television as broadcaster teams up with world’s biggest video platform

The BBC has announced that it will produce tailor-made content for YouTube in a milestone for British television as the public service broadcaster teams up with the world’s biggest video platform.

The corporation has previously posted clips and trailers for BBC shows on YouTube but under the new deal it will make fresh programming for its online rival.

Snap’s chief executive had been due to testify in civil action also involving Meta, TikTok and YouTube

Snapchat’s parent company has settled a civil lawsuit shortly before it was due to start in California, but other large tech companies still face a trial under the case.

Snap’s chief executive, Evan Spiegel, had been due to testify in a tech addiction lawsuit which also involves the Instagram owner, Meta; ByteDance’s TikTok; and Alphabet-owned YouTube – which have not settled.

US civil rights activist who as a schoolgirl protested against segregation on Alabama’s buses

Although she was a pivotal figure in the US civil rights movement, Claudette Colvin, who has died aged 86, never received the full recognition she deserved for her courageous and groundbreaking protest against segregation.

On 2 March 1955 Colvin, aged 15, was riding a bus home from school in Montgomery, Alabama, with seats in the front reserved for white passengers, while those in the rear were designated for black people. She was in a “neutral” zone from which, as the bus filled up, the driver could order black passengers to move to the back. When she refused to give up her seat to a white woman, the driver called the police, and Colvin was arrested. Soon afterwards she appeared before a juvenile court. Charges of violating segregation laws and disturbing the peace were eventually dropped on appeal, but her conviction for assaulting a police officer was upheld.

The Guardian’s picture editors select some of the most powerful photos from around the world

After years away​ revisiting my abandoned island uncovers new features, old memories and the quiet reassurance that ​you can go home again

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Nintendo’s pandemic-era hit Animal Crossing: New Horizons got another major update last week, along with a £5 Switch 2 upgrade that makes it look and run better on the new console. Last year, I threw a new year’s party for my children in the game, but apart from that I have barely touched my island since the depths of lockdown, when sunny Alba was my preferred escape from the monotonous misery of the real world. Back then, I spent more than 200 hours on this island. Stepping out of her (now massive) house, my avatar’s hair is all ruffled and her eyes sleepy after a long, long time aslumber.

I half-expected Alba to be practically in ruins, but it’s not that bad. Aside from a few cockroaches in the basement and a bunch of weeds poking up from the snow, everything is as it was. The paths that I had laid out around the island still lead me to the shop, the tailors, the museum; I stop by to visit Blathers the curatorial owl, and he gives me a new mission to find a pigeon called Brewster so that we can open a museum cafe. “It’s been four years and eight months!” exclaims one of my longtime residents, a penguin called Aurora. That can’t be right, can it? Have I really been ignoring her since summer 2021? Thankfully, Animal Crossing characters are very forgiving. I get the impression they’ve been getting along perfectly fine without me.

This creamy grain-free dish contains flaked almonds for extra crunch and protein – perfect if you’re cutting down on carbs

I’m fasting for three days a week for the whole of this month. It’s not for everyone, I know, and it’s important to talk to your doctor first, but the benefits are well researched and include improved digestion and immune function, and lowered blood pressure. When we fast, the body goes into ketosis, which breaks down fat for energy, and to stay in ketosis afterwards it helps to reduce carbs and increase protein, which is where today’s low-carb, zero-waste recipe comes in.

While Senegal’s victory in the chaotic final has made the headlines, we look at five other big takeaways from the tournament – from the strong diaspora representation to the floor-filling tunes

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Hello and welcome to The Long Wave! We are now a few days removed from Senegal’s dramatic win at the 35th Africa Cup of Nations. I made the trip to Morocco to experience my first Afcon, and it didn’t disappoint. The tournament, especially the final, had the sporting world talking – for better or worse.

From the iconography on display in the stands to the histrionics of those final moments in Rabat, and what it all means for Morocco’s grand events strategy, this week’s newsletter examines five key cultural and sporting reflections from an unforgettable tournament that had something for everyone, regardless of how much you like football. Here are five things we’ve learned from Afcon.

Trainee driver killed in accident near Barcelona just days after 43 died in collision between two high-speed trains

Spain’s rail network is under scrutiny after a commuter train crashed near Barcelona just days after at least 43 people died and 152 were injured in a collision between two high-speed trains.

The second crash in as many days occurred at approximately 9pm on Tuesday when a retaining wall collapsed on to the track near Gelida in the region of Catalonia in north-east Spain, derailing a local train.

• Pair will face off in NFC South next season

• Stefanski reportedly said QB ‘failed’ with Browns

Tampa Bay quarterback Baker Mayfield has vented his frustrations over the treatment he received from his former head coach Kevin Stefanski, who he will now face twice a year as an opponent.

Stefanski was Mayfield’s head coach at the Browns before Cleveland traded the quarterback to the Carolina Panthers in 2022. The two are now in the NFC South after Atlanta hired Stefanski on Saturday.

Mayfield appeared to be angered after an Atlanta Journal-Constitution reporter posted that Stefanski said Mayfield and another Browns quarterback, Deshaun Watson, had “failed” in Cleveland.

• Minister says there is ‘no desire’ to boycott tournament

• But Coquerel says US should be stripped of World Cup

The French government is not in favour of boycotting this year’s World Cup being co-hosted by the United States over Donald Trump’s Greenland threats, France’s sports minister has said.

Trump has targeted France among the eight European countries threatened with tariffs for their opposition to his drive to annex Greenland, an autonomous territory of Denmark.

PM says Trump’s Chagos Islands comment designed to put pressure on him to ‘yield’ over Greenland, but he will not comply

We’re not far off PMQs. Here is the list of MPs down to ask a question.

There will be two statements in the Commons after PMQs. At 12.30pm Ed Miliband, the energy secretary, will give one about the warm homes plan, and about an hour later Emma Reynolds, the environment secretary, will give one on the water white paper.

The Duke of Sussex said he would cut off anyone in his friend group if he suspected they were leaking information to the press

When asked by Antony White KC, for Associated Newspapers Limited, the Duke of Sussex said it was “pretty convincing” that journalists had sourced information about him from his friends at the time they were published.

He said: “That was the way the articles had been written, a source said this, an insider said this.”

Following the death of my mother in 1997 when I was 12 years old and her treatment at the hands of the press, I have always had an uneasy relationship with them.

However, as a member of the institution the policy was to ‘never complain, never explain’.

From firing lawyers and government officials to pursuing indictments – president has created a culture of vengeance

During his first year in the White House, Donald Trump has pursued a campaign of retribution unlike any other president in US history.

That Trump would pursue such a campaign is not surprising. Since he launched his first run for president in 2015, Trump has channeled the politics of grievance into political success. Returning to the White House after surviving two impeachments and four different criminal cases against him, Trump has used the might of the federal government to punish those he believes have wronged him.

Scale and speed of president’s moves have stunned observers of authoritarian regimes – is the US in democratic peril?

Three hundred and sixty five days after Donald Trump placed his hand on the Bible and completed an extraordinary return to power, many historians, scholars and experts say his presidency has pushed American democracy to the brink – or beyond it.

In the first year of Trump’s second term, the democratically elected US president has moved with startling speed to consolidate authority: dismantling federal agencies, purging the civil service, firing independent watchdogs, sidelining Congress, challenging judicial rulings, deploying federal force in blue cities, stifling dissent, persecuting political enemies, targeting immigrants, scapegoating marginalized groups, ordering the capture of a foreign leader, leveraging the presidency for profit, trampling academic freedom and escalating attacks on the news media.

• League wants tournament dates switched to summer

• Clubs and players believed to be opposed to schedule

The inaugural Women’s Club World Cup’s January 2028 dates “could be catastrophic”, the Women’s Super League has said, with the league raising serious concerns over the potential impact of the tournament on domestic calendars.

A WSL spokesperson said on Wednesday that the league is firmly against the dates and have made their case strongly to Fifa, who have announced that the competition will be held from 5–30 January 2028.

The Canadian poet, whose winning collection explores environmental and personal loss, discusses making art in existential times

Early on in her latest collection, the Canadian poet Karen Solie apologises: “I’m sorry, I can’t make this beautiful.” The line appears in a poem, Red Spring, about agribusiness and its sinister human impact: the world’s most widely used herbicide, glyphosate, is “advertised as non-persistent; but tell that to Dewayne Johnson // and his non-Hodgkin lymphoma”. In 2018, a jury ruled that Monsanto’s glyphosate weedkiller, Roundup, caused the former groundskeeper’s cancer.

Solie’s admission – that real horror can’t be prettified – recalls Noor Hindi’s viral 2020 poem, Fuck Your Lecture on Craft, My People Are Dying. We can’t “treat poetry like it’s some kind of separate thing” to what’s going on around us, says Solie, speaking to me in Soho, London, the morning after finding out she has won the TS Eliot prize for her collection Wellwater. “We all have to keep our eyes open”, but “that doesn’t mean we can’t say we’re scared, because it’s scary”.

We sat down with the basketball legend at the O2 to discuss his ties to Tottenham, Vancouver, Majorca and Macclesfield

By No Helmets Required

Does your background, growing up outside basketball’s mainstream on Vancouver Island with English parents, help you appreciate how people in places such as London or Berlin feel when a big NBA game comes to town? Yeah. That’s true. I didn’t watch much basketball on TV until I started playing at 13, so can relate to coming upon something new and exciting. At the same time, the world’s so small now with social media access. But it is interesting to go to parts of the world where basketball is smaller and see how can we make the game accessible to them.

Dirk Nowitzki, Tony Parker and John Amaechi were guests at the O2. But every team had a foreign player on opening night this season, with 135 players from 43 countries across the league; up from 7% in 1992 to 24% now. Are the current Europeans different to that generation or have they just had more opportunities? Europeans have always been quite good. It’s not like Serbia wasn’t always great at basketball but, as the game has grown, the possibilities grow. The world gets smaller with the internet and social media. There’s not as much difference; everyone has access to all the pertinent information. The NBA is more accessible nowadays to people from Europe, Africa and every corner of the world. It’s only natural that more Europeans have success in the NBA.

Revivals of this history play usually reflect the politics of the moment. Now a fresh RSC retelling arrives in a world of instability and fractured alliances

I have long argued that Shakespeare’s history plays have more urgent relevance today than his tragedies. The issues they raise – such as the nature of good governance and the difficulty of deposing a tyrant – are precisely those that still haunt us. Henry V, shortly to be given a new RSC production directed by Tamara Harvey, seems especially timely as we are living in a world where the threat of war is painfully real.

It is also a play that constantly changes its meaning. James Shapiro wrote in the Guardian in 2008: “There’s no better way to know which way the cultural and political winds are blowing than by going to see a performance of Henry V.” He reminded us that in 1599, when the play was first performed, playgoers anxiously waited to hear whether an Irish uprising had been suppressed.