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Catherine Connolly is the third woman to become what? The Saturday quiz

From the Cloak of Invisibility and the Elder Wand to Eugène Manet on the Isle of Wight, test your knowledge with the Saturday quiz

1 Which European city changed its name in 1914, 1924 and 1991?
2 Which gun dog has won best in show at Crufts the most times?
3 Catherine Connolly is the third woman to become what?
4 Which arm of the Arctic Ocean is named after a Dutch navigator?
5 Which nut characterises Dubai-style chocolate?
6 What is the most abundant metal in the human body?
7 Where do you hear Hayley Sanderson and Tommy Blaize sing?
8 Where were the monumental Buddhas of Bamiyan destroyed in 2001?
What links:
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Court and King, 1973; Navratilova, 1992; Sabalenka, 2025?
10 Cloak of Invisibility; Elder Wand; Resurrection Stone?
11 AMS; AV; AV+; FPTP; PR; STV?
12 JB Books; Father Karras; Władysław Szpilman; László Tóth; George Valentin?
13 Bucentaure; Santísima Trinidad; Victory?
14 Adopt Me!; Dress to Impress; Flee the Facility; Grow a Garden; Steal a Brainrot?
15 The Cradle; Eugène Manet on the Isle of Wight; The Harbour at Lorient; Woman at her Toilette?

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© Photograph: Niall Carson/PA

© Photograph: Niall Carson/PA

© Photograph: Niall Carson/PA

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Electric ​cars ​go ​mainstream as ​adoption ​surges ​across ​rich and ​developing ​nations

A wave of affordable Chinese-made EVs is accelerating the shift away from petrol cars, challenging long‑held assumptions about how transport decarbonisation unfolds

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Last year, almost every new car sold in Norway, the nature-loving country flush with oil wealth, was fully electric. In prosperous Denmark, which was all-in on petrol and diesel cars until just before Covid, sales of battery electric vehicles (BEVs) reached a share of 68%. In California, the share of zero-emissions vehicles hit 20%. And at least every third new car now bought by the Dutch, Finns, Belgians and Swedes burns no fuel.

These figures, which would have felt fanciful just five years ago, show the rich world leading the shift away from cars that pump out toxic gas and planet-heating pollutants. But a more startling trend is that electric car sales are also racing ahead in many developing countries. While China is known for its embrace of electric vehicles (EVs), demand has also soared in emerging markets from South America to south-east Asia. BEV sales in Turkey have caught up with the EU’s, data published this week shows.

The Fukushima towns frozen in time: nature has thrived since the nuclear disaster but what happens if humans return?

The UK government didn’t want you to see this report on ecosystem collapse. I’m not surprised

The 16-month battle to reveal the truth about Sydney Water’s poo balls

Powering up: how Ethiopia is becoming an unlikely leader in the electric vehicle revolution

‘My Tesla has become ordinary’: Turkey catches up with EU in electric car sales

The electric vehicle revolution is still on course – don’t let your loathing of Elon Musk stop you joining up

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© Photograph: Americo Roberto/EPA

© Photograph: Americo Roberto/EPA

© Photograph: Americo Roberto/EPA

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England’s Joe Heyes: ‘People try to fit into moulds, be something they’re not. Screw that’

Leicester’s quirky prop on beating adversity, being second-string goalkeeper at Nottingham Forest and his love of ‘cooking with butter’

For some people the road to the top is painfully long and winding. Joe Heyes used to be a player whose dreams of making England’s matchday squad were constantly dashed. Driving home from Bagshot, having been omitted yet again, he would listen to Johnny Cash’s Folsom Prison Blues – “I ain’t seen the sunshine since I don’t when …” – and wonder if the hardship and sacrifice would ever be worth it.

And now? Less than two years later he is suddenly the most important player in England. The national management have already lost two injured tightheads in Will Stuart and Asher Opoku-Fordjour plus the loosehead prop Fin Baxter. If they had enough cotton wool England would be wrapping the now indispensable Heyes up in it.

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© Photograph: Patrick Khachfe/Getty Images

© Photograph: Patrick Khachfe/Getty Images

© Photograph: Patrick Khachfe/Getty Images

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The Muppet Show: this thrilling return is so great I can’t even count how many times I laughed

Sabrina Carpenter fangirling Miss Piggy, Beaker losing his eyes … yes, Kermit and co are back for a trip down memory lane – and it’s a perfect, saucy joy

The Muppet Show is back! We need this, don’t we? We need them. The TV show ended in 1981, yet decades later, memes of Kermit, Miss Piggy, Animal et al still circulate. We give their movies Oscars. Their version of A Christmas Carol is a non-negotiable tradition for anyone with sense. Jim Henson’s furry anarchists bring us together like few things can. As a beady eyed fun-sponge, I can’t help but wonder – why?

In an 1810 essay, German poet Heinrich von Kleist argued that puppets demonstrate pure grace: a weightless unself-consciousness that humans long for but never achieve. He was talking about marionettes, suspended from strings. Yet Muppets are hand puppets; extensions of a body. They have weight. As for grace, have you seen how Kermit moves? His arms flap, and he bounces vertically, while moving forwards. It’s hard to imagine a less efficient walk. That frog, he silly.

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© Photograph: Disney+

© Photograph: Disney+

© Photograph: Disney+

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The day English football changed: 10 years on from Manchester City naming Pep Guardiola

That 1 February 2016 announcement led to Johan Cruyff’s gospel spreading to all corners of our game – and a bromance with Neil Warnock

It wasn’t quite without fanfare but when Manchester City announced, 10 years ago on Sunday, that Pep Guardiola was to be their manager from the next summer, it was a banal, bald press release that brought English football the news that would change it for ever. That was a simpler time, pre-Brexit and Donald Trump’s presidency, and before centre-halves in League Two would split wide for the keeper to pass out from the back to the holding midfielder, dropping in to receive the ball as a false 9 came deep to link with full-backs stepping into midfield.

“It’s not about coaches adapting to English football,” said Jordi Cruyff in 2016 as Guardiola began to make his mark on England. “It’s about English football adapting to the new things of the game.” And yet that typical Cruyffian confidence looked like hubris when Guardiola’s Manchester City got hammered 4-2 by Leicester, 4-0 by Everton and experienced Champions League humiliations at Barcelona and Monaco in that first season.

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© Photograph: Oli Scarff/AFP/Getty Images

© Photograph: Oli Scarff/AFP/Getty Images

© Photograph: Oli Scarff/AFP/Getty Images

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Mercedes and Hamilton shine in F1’s first pre-season test in Barcelona

  • Silver arrows finish 500 laps, well clear of all their rivals

  • Fears around new engines and regulations unfounded

Fears the swathe of new regulations and entirely new engines might be problematic on their first outing proved unfounded, after Formula One’s first pre-season test concluded in Barcelona on Friday. Mercedes put in an almost bulletproof performance in distance and reliability while Ferrari’s Lewis Hamilton grabbed the quickest lap of the week.

Held behind closed doors at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, it is believed at least partly to minimise attention on the potential negative impressions of the new formula that might be formed by new engines going bang and cars struggling on track, as happened when turbo-hybrid engines were introduced in 2012, the running was overwhelmingly positive given the challenge of the biggest regulation change of the modern era.

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© Photograph: Callo Albanese/Getty Images

© Photograph: Callo Albanese/Getty Images

© Photograph: Callo Albanese/Getty Images

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Ulez bomber: the retired electrician who turned bomb-making extremist

Shy 63-year-old’s decision to blow up London traffic camera linked to online conspiracy theories and Islamophobia

To his neighbours, Kevin Rees did not seem like an extremist. The shy 63-year-old lived on a tree-lined street in suburban Sidcup, in Bexley, south-east London. He appeared to be enjoying retirement after a career mending dishwashers and other domestic appliances. “He’s a quiet character – I’ve lived opposite him for 10 years and never really spoken to him,” says Sam, who declined to give her full name.

Behind the lace curtains, Rees was much more abrasive, at least online. Under the user name the “Exterminator” he ranted about London’s mayor, Sadiq Khan, and the ultra-low emission zone (Ulez) which in 2023 was expanded to the capital’s outer borough, including Bexley.

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© Photograph: Metropolitan Police/PA

© Photograph: Metropolitan Police/PA

© Photograph: Metropolitan Police/PA

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‘Humanity’s favourite food’: how to end the livestock industry but keep eating meat

Bruce Friedrich argues the only way to tackle the world’s insatiable but damaging craving for meat is like-for-like replacements like cultivated and plant-based meat

For someone aiming to end the global livestock industry, Bruce Friedrich begins his new book – called Meat – in disarming fashion: “I’m not here to tell anyone what to eat. You won’t find vegetarian or vegan recipes in this book, and you won’t find a single sentence attempting to convince you to eat differently. This book isn’t about policing your plate.”

There’s more. Friedrich, a vegan for almost four decades, says meat is “humanity’s favourite food”.

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© Photograph: BZA/Alamy

© Photograph: BZA/Alamy

© Photograph: BZA/Alamy

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What makes Finland the happiest place on Earth?

For the last eight years, Finland has topped the list of the world’s happiest countries. Our writer embarks on a tour to discover their secret


I’ve been visiting the happiest country on Earth every year since I was a baby. At first glance, Finland doesn’t seem like an obvious breeding ground for happiness. In midwinter the sun only appears for two to five hours a day and temperatures can plummet to below -20C. (It would seem a warm-year-round, sunny climate is not a prerequisite to happiness.)

The World Happiness Report is based on a survey in which people rate their satisfaction with life – and the Finns have been happiest with their lot for the last eight years. Not short of marketing savvy, Visit Finland latched on to this with a “Masterclass of Happiness” advertising campaign. And it’s probably no coincidence that Lonely Planet named Finland in its 2026 Best in Travel guide as a country “for finding happiness in wild places”.

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© Photograph: Milamai/Getty Images

© Photograph: Milamai/Getty Images

© Photograph: Milamai/Getty Images

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Can you eat pineapple leaves and how do our taste buds work? The kids’ quiz

Five multiple-choice questions – set by children – to test your knowledge, and a chance to submit your own junior brainteasers for future quizzes

Molly Oldfield hosts Everything Under the Sun, a podcast answering children’s questions. Do check out her books, Everything Under the Sun and Everything Under the Sun: Quiz Book, as well as her new title, Everything Under the Sun: All Around the World.

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© Illustration: Hennie Haworth/The Guardian

© Illustration: Hennie Haworth/The Guardian

© Illustration: Hennie Haworth/The Guardian

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Idée cadeau : 3 produits reconditionnés utiles pour bien démarrer l’année

Le début d’année rime souvent avec bonnes résolutions. Et si l’une d’elles consistait à s’équiper en high-tech à moindre coût, tout en privilégiant l’économie circulaire, plutôt que de se tourner systématiquement vers le neuf ?Pour vous accompagner dans cette démarche plus responsable, voici trois produits incontournables disponibles en reconditionné...

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Publicité interdite pour les voitures thermiques dans l'espace public : cette capitale européenne franchit le pas

Le conseil municipal d’Amsterdam a annoncé l’interdiction de la publicité pour la viande et les produits liés aux énergies fossiles dans les espaces publics. Concrètement, les affiches pour les voitures à moteur thermique, les croisières ou les vols commerciaux ne seront bientôt plus autorisées dans les rues de la ville.

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Affaire Epstein : Trump, Gates, Musk... les personnalités citées dans les derniers documents

Au lendemain de la publication par le ministère américain de la Justice de trois millions de documents supplémentaires concernant Jeffrey Epstein, plusieurs personnalités sont citées : Donald Trump, Bill Gates ou encore Elon Musk. France 24 fait le point sur ce qui est dit sur ces personnalités de premier plan.

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Actualité : Waymo s’apprête à lancer ses robotaxis à Londres, une première en Europe

Les robotaxis pourraient arriver en Europe cette année. C’est ce qu’annonce la compagnie Waymo, qui voudrait lancer ses véhicules à Londres dans les prochains mois.Déjà implantée dans de très nombreuses villes américaines, comme San Francisco, Los Angeles ou Phoenix, cette installation dans la capitale pourrait servir de test pour le marché européen...

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Venezuela: la présidente par intérim annonce une amnistie générale, la Nobel de la paix et opposante Maria Corina Machado y voit une "réponse à la pression" américaine

La présidente vénézuélienne par intérim Delcy Rodriguez a annoncé vendredi une amnistie générale et la fermeture de l'Hélicoïde, redoutée prison politique de Caracas, moins d'un mois après la capture du président Nicolas Maduro par l'armée américaine.

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« ICE out » : les images des milliers de personnes rassemblées dans les rues des Etats-Unis pour protester contre la police de l’immigration

Les manifestants entendaient également dénoncer la politique de l’administration Trump et la mort de Renee Good et d’Alex Pretti, tués début janvier sous les balles d’agents fédéraux.

© CHARLY TRIBALLEAU/AFP

A Los Angeles, le 30 janvier 2026, une banderole reproduisant le préambule de la Constitution américaine est tendue au milieu du cortège.
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