Eighteen-year-old had pleaded guilty to murders of Alice da Silva Aguiar, Bebe King and Elsie Dot Stancombe and 10 charges of attempted murder

The Southport killer Axel Rudakubana has been jailed for a minimum of 52 years for the “ferocious” and “sadistic” murders of three young girls and attempted murder of 10 others at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class.

The 18-year-old refused to appear in the dock when a judge said the teenager would likely “never be released and he will be in custody for all his life” for the “harrowing and atrocious premeditated attack” last summer.

• Europa League updates from the 5.45pm GMT kick-off
• Live scores | Tables | Read Football Daily | Email Simon

At this moment, when they are wrecked by self-doubt and stink of the foul funk of failure, the footballing fates have handed Spurs the precious gift of encouraging fixtures. Sure, they played the first of those, against an Everton team that had scored one goal in their previous six league games, on Sunday and managed to make their opponents look like the 1970 Brazil side, concede three and lose, but they have a chance to make up for it (kind of) tonight, and another against Leicester this weekend. Their season can still come good (or, at least, better).

Hoffenheim, 15th in the Bundesliga, three points above 16th-placed Heidenheim and the threat of a relegation play-off, have lost six and won just one of their last 10 games in all competitions, that solitary victory coming against 17th-placed Holstein Kiel on Saturday. “I play football because I want to win, and when you don’t win for so long, it really gets you down,” said the defender Kevin Akpoguma. “In the changing room after the game, you could feel that a weight had been lifted. After a win, everything is just nicer. A win always energises you, that’s been noticeable in the past few days too. But we can’t ease off now, we need to keep it up. It’s important that we all develop a hunger for it, so that we have this feeling much more often.”

US president says his predecessor gave ‘everybody pardons’ but says it is a ‘sad thing’ he didn’t give himself one

• Trump defends January 6 pardons

Argentina’s president, Javier Milei, defended on Thursday what he described as an “innocent” hand salute made by US billionaire Elon Musk this week, as he criticised “woke ideology” in a fiery speech to the World Economic Forum.

Musk ignited controversy with two fascist-style salutes during Donald Trump’s presidential inauguration, with critics accusing him of giving the Nazi salute.

Part of a gifted generation of writers from Northern Ireland, Longley also gave years of service to the province’s arts council

Northern Irish poet Michael Longley, whom Seamus Heaney described as “a custodian of griefs and wonders”, has died aged 85, his publisher has confirmed. The writer, who won the TS Eliot prize in 2000 for his collection The Weather in Japan, died in hospital on Wednesday due to complications following a hip operation.

Robin Robertson, Longley’s longstanding editor, said it was “an honour to work with him … Not that I had to work very hard, as every poem was close to perfect.”

High court case demands inquiry into 1985 Cradock Four killings and ‘constitutional damages’ worth £7.3m

Lukhanyo Calata’s first memory of his father was the funeral. His mother sobbing, the earth beneath his feet shaking from the number of people gathered at the graveside, and the fear he felt aged three as the red box holding his father, Fort, was lowered into the ground.

Fort Calata was one of four men stopped at a roadblock in June 1985 by security officers. The Cradock Four were beaten, strangled with telephone wire, stabbed and shot to death in one of the most notorious killings of South Africa’s apartheid era.

From museums to wine bars, businesses are enticing consumers to carry logos on their arm. Demand is high, but the life cycle short

This year’s It bag isn’t made by any of the usual designers. And if this bag could talk, it wouldn’t say “calf leather” so much as “wash me at 40C”. What’s more, in an ideal world, you would never want to buy another again.

The “forever tote” is big business. Usually made from calico, an unbleached cotton designed to be reused, it’s similar to the cotton bags you have balled up at the bottom of a drawer, except it’s sturdy, with a reinforced base and handles, sometimes a pocket, often coloured (Yves Klein blue seems especially popular), and always conspicuously branded with logos. Demand is high.

Ultra-rich individuals are associating with Donald Trump as he ascends to the presidency for his second time

• ‘Government by the worst’: why people are calling Trump’s new sidekicks a ‘kakistocracy’

Joe Biden delivered an ominous message to Americans in his 15 January farewell address, warning that a privileged few could soon be poised to wield enormous power in the US.

Biden described a “dangerous concentration of power in the hands of a very few ultra-wealthy people and the dangerous consequences if their abuse of power is left unchecked”.

Faced with burning or transporting their garden waste, Thrupp residents in Gloucestershire built their own composting site

In the village of Thrupp, where houses are spread out over steep winding roads in the narrow Frome Valley, it’s difficult for lorries to get through to collect garden waste.

It leaves some people with the choice of lengthy car trips to a nearby town to take their green waste to a facility, or burning their rubbish in small bonfires that have prompted many irate social media posts.

From a Jennifer Lopez musical to an Ayo Edebiri horror to a provocative prison documentary, this year’s Utah-based festival has plenty to be excited about

Sundance remains one of the toughest festivals to truly predict – a smattering of unknown first-timers unfurling distributor-less films that are often shrouded in mystery – and so trying to guess what to see and what to miss of the 90-odd premieres can be something of a fool’s errand.

But a year on from a festival that gave us I Saw the TV Glow, Dìdi, My Old Ass, The Outrun and A Real Pain, there are enough reasons to suggest that this edition will be just as impressive. Here are the 10 I have my eye on right now:

Mariann Edgar Budde defends sermon asking president to show compassion to immigrants and LGBTQ+ people

The bishop at the National Cathedral prayer service in Washington on Tuesday who urged Donald Trump to “have mercy upon” immigrants and LGBTQ+ people, has defended her remarks and said that she will not apologize.

The Right Rev Mariann Edgar Budde’s sermon on Tuesday garnered national attention when she made a direct plea to Trump to show mercy and compassion toward scared individuals, including “gay, lesbian and transgender children in Democratic, Republican and independent families”, as well as immigrants, and those fleeing war and persecution.

As the 78-year-old star tours his latest solo LP, he answers your questions on his Everton terrace anthem, the making of I’m Not in Love and hosting Joey Ramone in Stockport

Do 10cc deserve more recognition for their contribution to forward-thinking music in the 70s? In my mind, you were up there with Sparks and Roxy Music – and way ahead of Queen. Flashbleu
I agree, but Queen had two very identifiable things in Brian May’s guitar and Freddie Mercury’s vocals. In 10cc, we had three No 1s [Rubber Bullets, I’m Not in Love and Dreadlock Holiday] with three different singers! Also, we were never a showbiz kind of band, but Queen are still performing with Adam Lambert and I’m touring our catalogue, so it shows that we’ve both stood the test of time. The songs are the stars of the show, really.

How on earth did you write For Your Love, Heart Full of Soul and Evil Hearted You for the Yardbirds as a teenager? Deckard85
From the age of 11, when I got my first guitar, music was it for me. I wasn’t good at school and my parents didn’t force me to go to university, because they recognised that songwriting is a gift and I was lucky enough to have it. At that age, I was listening to Buddy Holly, Eddie Cochran, the Everly Brothers, Little Richard, Chuck Berry and then guitar players like Hank Marvin with the Shadows. All my contemporaries have exactly the same influences. Then, of course, the Beatles. So you put it all together.

The Guardian’s picture editors select photographs from around the world

Francis calls for close oversight of technology that raises ‘critical concerns’ about humanity’s future

• Business live – latest updates

Pope Francis has warned global leaders in Davos that artificial intelligence raises “critical concerns” about humanity’s future and it could exacerbate a growing “crisis of truth”.

Francis said governments and businesses must exercise “due diligence and vigilance” to navigate the complexities of AI.

It’s Trump’s proclivity for deal-making and no mess I’m holding on to for progress toward a Palestinian state

The only thing we know for certain regarding a Trump Middle East doctrine is that the president-elect has no clear policy regarding that part of the world. Contradictions abound in his appointments and statements. Donald Trump’s first term perhaps offers clues – the signing and promoting of the Abraham accords with the Gulf states and Israel while also moving the US embassy to Jerusalem and shuttering the US consulate in Israel that catered to the Palestinians in east Jerusalem and the West Bank and Gaza, while also tossing the PLO representative out of Washington and shutting down that ambassadorial-rank office.

He allowed his US ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, to encourage increased West Bank settlement, himself a patron of the hardcore ideological Jewish settlers. None of these actions made an agreement between Israel and the Palestinians easier or more near, and now, after October 7, the terrain is more fraught and confused.

Jo-Ann Mort is co-author of Our Hearts Invented a Place: Can Kibbutzim Survive in Today’s Israel? She writes frequently about Israel for US, UK and Israeli publications

Barcelona and Benfica produced a classic that swung from the sublime to the ridiculous. We hand out honours and dishonours from the latest round of action

Barcelona

Rachel Reeves told the elites gathered in Switzerland she was relaxed about ‘wealth creation’. She’s in the minority on that

Rachel Reeves might give the impression of being someone who’s never late for social engagements, but she is increasingly late to the party. At a breakfast event on the second day of Davos, after she’d spelled out her faith in artificial intelligence and a high-skilled workforce, someone asked Britain’s chancellor how she felt about “wealth creation” – was she relaxed, in a Blairite sense? “Absolutely,” Reeves replied. “Absolutely relaxed.”

Wealth creation isn’t quite the same as just wealth, but “wealth creators” is famously the moniker the super-rich use for themselves. And so Reeves’s exceedingly relaxed tone here puts her in a minority – possibly a minority of one. As Elon Musk salutes his way into political power, not even rich people are relaxed about wealth any more. On the first day of the World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, the pro-tax campaign group Patriotic Millionaires released survey results from 2,000 high net-worth individuals across the G20: more than half of them thought extreme wealth was a threat to democracy, and over two-thirds agreed that the visible influence of the wealthy was leading to a decline in trust of the media, the justice system and democracy.

Zoe Williams is a Guardian columnist

His new film, The Seed of the Sacred Fig, is up for an Academy award – but the film-maker had to direct it from his sofa. Even under sentence of arrest and flogging, he won’t be silenced, he says

When mass protests erupted in Iran after the death in custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, who had been detained for not properly wearing her hijab, Mohammad Rasoulof was in jail. By night, out of earshot of the guards, the Iranian director – incarcerated for being critical of the government – and his fellow political prisoners gathered to discuss the turmoil unfolding outside. As the protests intensified and the number of detainees grew, a general pardon was issued and Rasoulof was released.

His time in jail helped inspire his new film: a drama about a paranoid state investigator who turns on his own family. Rasoulof had been mulling over versions of it for 15 years, fearing it was “too ambitious”. Free from prison, he set to work – but this time, in complete secret. He directed The Seed of the Sacred Fig almost entirely from his own sofa, using a broadband connection registered under someone else’s name.

Fianna Fáil leader’s formal reappointment to role of taoiseach comes 24 hours after chaotic scenes in the Dáil

• Europe live – latest updates

The Irish parliament has elected Micheál Martin as prime minister, 24 hours after chaotic scenes in the Dáil caused the cancellation of his formal appointment.

​Martin’s return to the role of taoiseach comes after a group of regional independent TDs (members of parliament), who are propping up his government, agreed a compromise to delay talks to resolve the dispute that derailed what should have been a set-piece ceremony on Wednesday.

Daniel Ball granted clemency by Trump over riot-related offenses but remains in jail under separate gun charge

• ‘Very minor incidents’: Trump defends January 6 pardons
• US politics – live updates

A Florida man pardoned for his role in the January 6 Capitol riot was swiftly rearrested on Wednesday on federal gun charges.

Daniel Ball, 38, of Homosassa, Florida, remains detained after federal authorities executed an arrest warrant for illegal firearm possession – a charge that predates but emerged from his involvement in the 2021 Capitol insurrection. The arrest marks a complex legal move that suggests presidential pardons may not provide absolute protection from prosecution.

House and Senate Republicans float ideas to pay for Trump’s immigration crackdown and to fund tax cuts

Republicans are reportedly prepared to cut Medicaid funding to pay for Donald Trump’s promised crackdown on immigration and to fund tax cuts that would mostly benefit the wealthy.

The GOP in the House and Senate have floated a series of ideas – many of which would target lower-income Americans – to cover the cost of extending tax cuts passed by Trump in 2017, the New York Times reported.

Many palm species in the city are receptive to embers, hard to extinguish – and probably helped spread the fires

When the Los Angeles wildfires broke out on the morning of 7 January, some of the most dramatic images were of palm trees set ablaze along Sunset Boulevard. In the days that followed, burning palms became a symbol to illustrate what may be the costliest wildfires in history, which left at least 25 dead and destroyed thousands of structures.

The trees are icons of the city. They also played a role in spreading the flames, researchers and fire officials say.

The landscape is not the dead relic of a foregone age. It is a living reminder of how knowledge tailored to the local ecology is essential

When I was 11, I was given the Atlas of Mysterious Places by a teacher and have been tragically obsessed ever since. It is why I have spent most of my life visiting these captivating places, while pursuing a career that gives me the excuse to do so.

The more extraordinary places you visit, the more you realise how truly incomprehensible the scale of human ingenuity and cultural innovation is. The wonder is in the unknown and the inspiration it instils towards greater learning. Perhaps that is why the “wonder” I am choosing is one I personally have more to learn about.

You don’t have to run screaming from this experience, writes advice columnist Eleanor Gordon-Smith. Focus instead on how you’ll handle the attraction from here

• Read more Leading questions

I’ve been in a happy relationship for eight years. I have always felt extremely lucky to have met someone so suited to me so young, and many friends and family have remarked on what a special connection we have.

This sense of security was rattled recently when I met someone towards whom I felt an immediate and strong attraction. The attraction was not just physical. This new person and I had many shared interests and conversation chemistry. I felt an intense desire to keep them in my life, hoping the attraction would die down. Unsurprisingly, it didn’t work like this – the more I talked to them, the more the feelings developed. After exchanging long messages daily, it dawned on me that I was having an emotional affair.

Do be the parent who sends friendly reminders about important school dates. Don’t be the parent who sends an accidental voice memo to people you’ll see at pickup

Anyone who has a school-age child is aware of the minefield that is the parent group chat. If you’re a parent who is about to enter the school years, buckle up – you’re in for a ride.

On a good day, the parent WhatsApp group (or Signal, or whatever your digital medium of choice) is a place of sheer beauty. It shows the best of humanity. Crises are averted. Generosity abounds.