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Thursday briefing: 68 facts about the Bayeux tapestry as it goes on display

Good morning. If you live in the UK, you have probably heard about the Bayeux tapestry exhibition, which opens today, and you probably haven’t got a ticket. The digital queue was nine-hours long when they first went on sale in July, and the exhibition has already broken the British Museum’s record for the number of tickets sold in a single day. Some lucky individuals, including King Charles and aspiring overlord Peter Thiel, have been treated to early previews of the medieval tapestry. Guests staying at One Aldwych, a hotel where rooms go for £1,000 a night, can partake in the “Bayeux experience” with a themed cocktail (mead spritzer, anyone?), a full English breakfast and preferential access to tickets. In a break from our regular programming, this morning’s newsletter brings you 68 facts about the Bayeux tapestry for anyone who hasn’t been able to see the real thing. That’s one fact for each of its 68 metres (bonus fact: it’s 68.3m long). If that’s not your vibe, just be glad I didn’t manage to find 1,066 facts. First, here are the headlines. Five big stories Reform | The Met police will investigate allegations that Reform UK broke electoral law relating to overseas donations as part of a wider inquiry. UK- Israel | Prominent British rabbis have backed Ed Miliband’s sanctions on Israeli settlements, warning that the time for inaction on settler violence must come to an end. Technology | Just a day after three Anthropic researchers warned that artificial intelligence could kill off humanity within the decade, US politicians have begun lashing out about the risks of the burgeoning technology. UK news | Protesters who gathered outside a Portsmouth hotel mistook Pakistan’s under-19 cricket team for asylum seekers. US news | Donald Trump pledged to pay every adult citizen in the US $5,000 if Republicans retain the House and Senate in the midterm elections, during a marathon speech at the Republican midterm convention in Dallas. In depth: From nudity, a save from the Nazis and its restoration, a buffet of Bayeux facts 1. First of all, as the exhibition’s curator Michael Lewis points out in his book, the Bayeux tapestry isn’t really a tapestry. It’s “more accurately described as an embroidery”, Lewis writes. (Nobody actually calls it an embroidery, though, so we’ll stick with tapestry). 2. The embroidery tapestry tells the story of the events that culminated in the Battle of Hastings in 1066, when William the Conquerer defeated King Harold. 3. It was supposedly commissioned by Bishop Odo, William the Conquerer’s half-brother, for his newly built cathedral in Bayeux in 1077. He was prone to “self-aggrandisement” (in Lewis’s words), which is why he gave himself a starring role in the tapestry. 4. But it wasn’t made in Bayeux. Researchers think it was probably made in England, near Canterbury. 5. It’s embroidered on linen, with 10 colours of woollen thread likely dyed with woad, madder and indigo. 6. Its nine panels were embroidered separately, and then stitched together to form a continuous picture. 7. It features 623 men, 190 horses, 35 dogs, 37 buildings (including Mont-Saint-Michel) and 41 ships. 8. It may have had a single master designer who plotted its narrative, but … 9. The embroidery was almost certainly stitched by multiple women (William of Poitiers cited English women as skilled embroiderers). 10. It’s unclear how long it took them – one estimate reckons the stitching took between two and four years. 11. Yet, only three women actually feature in the tapestry. None of them are having a good time: one is weeping at her husband’s deathbed, another is fleeing a burning building and a third is being assaulted by a priest. 12. This third figure is Ælfgyva (meaning elf-gift), the only named woman in the tapestry. Scholars think that she could be Emma of Normandy, who was accused of having an affair with the Bishop of Winchester. 13. The tapestry conveniently doesn’t mention Edgar Ætheling, who had a stronger hereditary claim to the English throne in 1066 than either William or Harold. 14. The borders tell their own stories. They’re filled with fantastical beasts, creating what the Guardian’s art critic Jonathan Jones described as a “marginal world of monsters and myths”. 15. The upper border features one of the first depictions of Haley’s Comet. 16. The tapestry also shows a figure with the name Harold, depicting the famous (and probably apocryphal) moment he was struck in the eye by an arrow. Most scholars think Harold was actually hacked to death. 17. It was possibly designed to be interpreted by a live storyteller in front of an audience, much like an epic poem. 18. It’s damaged at the end, and incomplete. Nobody knows what scene would have finished the tapestry (some think it could have been a depiction of William’s coronation at Westminster Abbey in 1066). 19. It survived at least three fires in Bayeux Cathedral. 20. The first recorded reference to the tapestry was in the 1476 inventory of Bayeux cathedral, which described a “very long and narrow hanging of linen, embroidered with figures and inscriptions representing the Conquest of England.” 21. The tapestry hasn’t always been well looked after. For centuries it was rolled out for cathedral visitors. One visiting English antiquary observed in the early 1800s that it was “much rubbed at the beginning, torn towards the end.” 22. In 1792, during the French Revolution, the tapestry was nearly used to cover a wagon (it was saved at the last minute by an official who swapped it for a piece of canvas). 23. In 1794, an proposal was briefly floated to cut the tapestry into strips to decorate a festival float. 24. A 19th-century British artist secretly snipped off two fragments that ended up in a London museum (these were eventually returned to Bayeux). 25. In 1803, Napoleon had the tapestry temporarily moved from Bayeux to Paris, where it hung on display at the Louvre, to rally support for his planned invasion of Britain. 26. The first full photographic copy of the tapestry was made for the South Kensington Museum in 1872 (now the V&A museum). 27. A group of women in Staffordshire created the largest Bayeux reproduction in 1885, which is displayed in Reading Museum. It took them 18 months. 28. They removed 93 penises from their reproduction, 88 belonging to horses and five to men. 29. The Nazis saw the tapestry as a propaganda tool, and wanted to establish that Normans were actually the descendants of Viking settlers. 30. They appointed a professor of Viking archaeology as the leader of “Special Assignment Bayeaux” to study it. 31. Heinrich Himmler tasked two SS officers in 1944 to seize the Bayeaux tapestry from the basement of the Louvre, where it was being stored. 32. A group of local resistance fighters tipped off by code breakers at Bletchley Park managed to intercept the officers and protect the tapestry. 33. Since 1983, the tapestry has been displayed at the Bayeux museum, in a 17th-century seminary near Bayeux’s medieval town centre. 34. When the tapestry arrived at the Bayeux museum in the 1980s, photos show that it appeared to have been folded and hoisted up a stairwell. 35. It’s incredibly fragile, and liable to fray. A 2020 study found the tapestry had “24,204 stains, 16,445 wrinkles, 9,646 gaps in the cloth or the embroidery” and “30 non-stabilised tears.” 36. The first request for the Bayeux tapestry to be loaned to Britain was in 1953, for Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation. The French refused. 37. Another request was made in 1966, to mark the 900th anniversary of the Battle of Hastings. The French refused, again. 38. In 2013, a committee was formed to advise on how the tapestry could be redisplayed. It raised the prospect of a loan to the UK (“I did sort of bang on about it,” Lewis, a committee member, later recalled, “until I was a bit like a broken record”). 39. The Bayeux museum was scheduled to be closed for refurbishment, creating an opportunity for the tapestry to travel on loan. 40. In January 2018, Emmanuel Macron announced at a summit with Theresa May that the French had agreed to loan the tapestry. Although France had “found the best experts of the world to explain in perfect detail” why the loan “was impossible”, Macron said that the French government had “decided” otherwise. 41. Many people insist it should never have been moved. Arts journalist Didier Rykner started a petition against the loan that gained more than 70,000 signatures. 42. The late David Hockney agreed, described the loan as “madness,” and said “some things are too precious to take a risk with.” 43. And two expert reports in 2021 and 2022 advised Macron against the transportation of the tapestry. 44. The loan specified the tapestry had to be stored lying flat, and couldn’t be subject to tremors any greater than two millimetres per second during its transportation. 45. A team of conservators and experts, including a German vibration technology scientist, were involved with its relocation. They designed a meticulous solution for transporting the tapestry involving a “paravent”, a hinged folding screen on wheels. 46. The paravent was designed so it could be closed into a rectangular block with the tapestry inside, effectively folded 28 times. 47. It took ninety people in blue latex gloves seven hours working to extract the tapestry from its case and transfer it to the paravent. 48. It then had to be stored in a specially manufactured crate for shipping. The art logistics firm Hizikia built two nesting crates, with an outer aluminium crate designed to reduce the impact of movement. 49. The firm also provided a customised reinforced truck to dampen vibrations. 50. Experts carried out two dry runs, one with a replica tapestry transported across the channel that made its way to an art warehouse in south London. 51. Data from these dry-runs showed that French roads are smoother than British roads. 52. The tapestry has been insured by the Treasury’s indemnity scheme for £800m, which is more than twice the value of the most expensive artwork ever sold at auction (Salvator Mundi, a painting of Jesus attributed to Leonardo da Vinci). 53. Two threads were reportedly broken when the tapestry arrived in London. 54. At the British Museum, it will be housed in a custom-made case, believed to be the longest ever constructed, and will be exposed to a limited number of light hours per day. 55. When the lights are switched on, they’ll be dimmed to 50 lux, the international museum standard for sensitive materials. 56. Andy Burnham, Emmanuel Macron and King Charles viewed the tapestry last Wednesday. 57. It will be displayed at the British Museum until July 2027, before it returns to a newly built museum in Normandy that will open later next year. 58. Nicholas Cullinan, director of the British Museum, has said he hopes the Bayeux loan could revive the prospect for a loan of the Parthenon marbles. 59. The tapestry has inspired numerous copycats, including the Bloody Sunday Tapestry created by the artist Darren Cullen in 2013. 60. There’s also a Game of Thrones Tapestry at the Ulster Museum in Ireland. 61. The Sun newspaper commissioned a “Bye-EU” tapestry in 2018 to commemorate the Brexit vote, which depicted Boris Johnson in chain mail and Theresa May surrounded by the decapitated corpses of Brussels bureaucrats. 62. A helmet from Sutton Hoo, and the Lewis chess pieces, were both loaned to Normandy museums as part of the Bayeux loan. 63. My favourite bit of any trip to the British Museum is the gift shop (eds: does this count as a fact?), where you can now buy a replica Norman helmet and bottle of Bayeux mead with your Tutankhamun pencil tin. 64. Speaking of Bayeux tat, Nigel Farage sported a Bayeux-themed tie during the 2014 Rochester byelection, a reminder of “the last time we were invaded and taken over”. 65. Radio 4 has devoted a special day of broadcasts to mark the arrival of the tapestry. 66. And the museum’s videos about the tapestry’s arrival are narrated by the Traitors presenter Claudia Winkleman. 67. Philippe Bélavel, Macron’s former culture adviser, has said “such a loan will only happen once and never again.” 68. The next wave of public tickets for the tapestry, which cost £33, will go on sale on 21 October at 10am. Best of luck getting yours. What else we’ve been enjoying I loved Micha Frazer-Carroll’s brilliant newsletter exploring how and why generations of Black athletes have become style icons. Sign up to receive the Long Wave in your inbox here. Michael Segalov, newsletters team J Oliver Conroy’s long piece on what happened to Turning Point USA in the year after the killing of Charlie Kirk is a compelling, frightening read on the future of the American right. Charlie Lindlar, newsletters team Among all the tributes, I found these reflections on Gloria Steinem’s legacy from a host of contemporary feminist writers to be a particularly powerful homage. Michael Resident sex expert Alix Fox hosted this riveting reader Q&A yesterday, fielding your queries on making time for intimacy in parenthood, the rise of audio erotica, and why trendy sex toys are apparently shaped like fruit now. Charlie I watched the trailer for Andrew Garfield’s new film The Uprising while at the cinema last weekend (the Odyssey; quite long?), and Peter Bradhsaw’s cutting review confirmed my initial instinct to steer well clear. Michael Sport Cricket | England lead Pakistan by 23 runs at Edgbaston, after 14 wickets tumbled on the opening day of the third Test. Tennis | Elena Rybakina will become the No 1 woman in the world for the first time after orchestrating a supreme recovery to reach the semi-finals of the US Open with a 3-6, 6-1, 6-4 win over the Olympic champion Zheng Qinwen. Cycling | Matthew Brennan claimed a fifth stage victory on Wednesday as the young British rider edged a bunch sprint in Seville to win the 17th stage. The front pages “Police launch inquiry into alleged overseas donations to Reform UK”, is the Guardian’s front page today. The Times says “Farage faces Met inquiry over Reform donations”, the i Paper also has “Police set to interview Farage over Reform UK donations”, and the Mirror writes “Farage faces cop quiz on donors”. The FT has “US spy chief to take stronger role in stalled Ukraine talks”, the Mail writes “Burnham: National security can’t come at the expense of social security”, and the Express leads with “The King has spoken with Harry since return”. The Telegraph splashes “Labour’s new tax assault on hospitality”, and on air traffic chaos, Metro has “Ready for departure?” Today in Focus: The Latest Why is Trump silent on UK sanctions against Israeli West Bank settlements? The foreign secretary, Ed Miliband, is facing a backlash over the government’s sanctions against illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank after the chief rabbi, Ephraim Mirvis, said the safety of British Jews could be at risk. Miliband has rejected the warnings, emphasising that ministers can confront the actions of Benjamin Netanyahu’s government while also fighting antisemitism. US president Donald Trump, however, has failed to comment on the UK government’s action. Lucy Hough speaks to diplomatic editor Patrick Wintour. Cartoon of the day | Ella Baron The Upside A bit of good news to remind you that the world’s not all bad For decades, Robert Ashton contended with paruresis: a condition that meant, if in the presence of others, his shy bladder left him unable to urinate. Turns out, all that was needed to alleviate this affliction was a trip to an Essex naturist club. Stripping down helped Robert let go of his inhibitions and alleviated a lifetime of anxieties – he’s been free-flowing ever since. Sign up here for a weekly roundup of The Upside, sent to you every Sunday Bored at work? And finally, the Guardian’s puzzles are here to keep you entertained throughout the day. Until tomorrow. Quick crossword Cryptic crossword Wordiply

North Korea has built new uranium facility to expand nuclear arsenal, UN agency says

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has voiced “serious concern” over evidence that North Korea has built a facility capable of enriching weapons-grade uranium to bolster its nuclear arsenal. The new building, located at the the country’s main Yongbyon nuclear facility, can house up to 28 centrifuge cascades – machinery commonly used to enrich uranium – according to a report by the nuclear watchdog released this week. The regime has also expanded operations at an enrichment site in Kangson, near the capital Pyongyang, according to the report, which was based on analysis of satellite imagery and open-source material, including photographs published by the country’s state media. The IAEA, whose inspectors were expelled from North Korea in 2009, identified the Yongbyon building as the site’s second uranium ‌enrichment facility after comparing satellite images taken during its construction with media photographs of a visit in early June by the country’s leader, Kim Jong-un. During his visit, Kim claimed the North’s capacity to produce weapons-grade nuclear material had more than doubled over the past five years, according to state media, promising “vast future plans to exponentially strengthen the country’s nuclear forces”. Citing a 2025 analysis by the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies in the US, South Korea’s Chosun Daily said the potential 28 cascades comprising 4,592 centrifuges at the Yongbyon facility could yield about 85 kg of weapons-grade highly enriched uranium a year – enough to build three or four additional warheads. In a statement released this week, the IAEA’s director general, Rafael Grossi, said: “The ongoing operation of enrichment facilities at Kangson and Yongbyon and the reported further expansion of [North Korea’s] production of weapons-grade nuclear material is a cause for serious concern.” “The continuation and further development” of North Korea’s nuclear programme are “clear violations of relevant UN security council resolutions and are deeply regrettable”, he added. South Korea’s defence minister, Ahn Gyu-back, said in August that the North possessed between 80 and 120 nuclear warheads – a much higher number than the 57 cited by Donald Trump the same month. The South Korean figure was based on estimates by private research organisations, Ahn told lawmakers, adding that the country’s military could not confirm the numbers. North Korea has made rapid progress in its ballistic missile and nuclear programmes in recent years, as it demands international recognition as a legitimate nuclear state. North Korea has conducted multiple long-range missile tests since 2017, the year it last tested a nuclear weapon. In a report submitted to the UN security council in 2020, international experts said the North had “probably developed nuclear devices to fit into the warheads of its ballistic missiles”.

‘They poison the population’: Swedish Muslims challenge far right ahead of election

Not far from one of Scandinavia’s biggest shopping malls, Kashif Virk stood on the pavement, handing out flyers and smiling at those who passed by. On a cloudy Tuesday afternoon, the Swedish-born imam had taken to the street to invite people to ask him anything they had ever wanted to know about Islam. For years, Sweden’s far right has peddled its own, distorted view of Islam, portraying it as being at odds with Swedish values. The Ask-a-Muslim – or Fråga en Muslim – campaign, conceived by Virk in 2017, was his way of fighting back. With the help of dozens of volunteers from the Ahmadi Muslim community, the campaign had called in at more than 150 farmers markets, squares and city centres, inviting strangers to strike up a conversation in hopes of dispelling myths and shedding light on Islam. “We have some radical parties and people are genuinely afraid about Islam,” said Virk. “Sometimes people get very rude. But most people in Sweden are lovely, friendly and interested – they want to learn more.” Ahead of Sweden’s general election on Sunday, polls show the centre-left opposition has a narrow lead, suggesting that the rightwing minority-run coalition supported by the far-right Sweden Democrats could be ousted. Such a result would not only be significant for the Scandinavian country; it could also reassure mainstream voters across Europe that far-right forces such as the Sweden Democrats or Germany’s Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) – triumphant after its best showing in a state election last weekend – are not inevitably on the rise. But even so, the Swedish polls have narrowed slightly in recent weeks, making many nervous, particularly as the right-leaning ruling coalition has for the first time said it would offer ministerial posts to the far right if it wins. Those who have borne the brunt of the far right’s time propping up the government worry that Sweden, long held up as a leading light when it comes to equality and freedom, may have been irrevocably changed, regardless of what happens on Sunday. “It’s a kind of Pandora’s box that has been opened,” said Munir Niazi, who has long worked with Virk on the Ask-a-Muslim campaign. During the government of the centre-right prime minister Ulf Kristersson, the far-right Sweden Democrats have used their leverage to steer policies on migration and crime, seizing on the spotlight to spread rhetoric linking the two and scapegoating migrants, Muslims and other minorities for all that ails the country. The result had shifted Sweden’s national conversation to the right, said Niazi. “In the past four years, the biggest opposition party, the Social Democrats, have slowly adopted and even voted with the right wing on migration, on crime. In the near future, at least, we don’t see the country going back to the policies of the 80s and 90s.” Virk nodded in agreement. “We see, unfortunately, that everybody plays the anti-Islam card when they need it.” The repercussions have been felt widely. Last year, a gunman killed 10 people in the Swedish city of Örebro, most of whom had an immigrant background. Across Sweden, mosques have regularly been vandalised and in 2023 the country grappled with a spate of protests in which copies of the Qur’an were burned or otherwise damaged. Speaking to commuters in Malmö making their way through Hyllie station, many said the politics had started to feel deeply personal, as though their existence in Sweden was a political battleground. “When the far right talk about my religion and my hijab, it feels like they’re talking about an animal,” said one nurse, 46, who asked not to be named. Originally from Lebanon, she had settled in Sweden in 1999. “The older people in the hospital say that myself and other immigrants have helped to build Sweden – why doesn’t the far right see this?” Sitting in a nearby park, Onyango, 42, said the atmosphere in Sweden had become “horrible” for migrants amid the far right’s steady increase in influence. “I feel like they poison the population,” he said. “They’ve created an environment where if you’re not a Swede, you are scared.” The hostile rhetoric, coupled with efforts by the government to tighten the rules around migration, had left the Kenyan national devising a backup plan despite nine years spent in the country and a good job working with supply chains. “You start thinking maybe I need to have an apartment in Kenya and set aside some money, just in case,” he said. Sitting next to him, his friend Waithira, 30, nodded in agreement. “Before you wanted to invest here, buy an apartment here, start a business. But now you start thinking twice,” she said. “We don’t know what the future holds, but it’s a bit less attractive than before.” In the southern reaches of Stockholm’s Södermalm district, Jonna Mannberg and Isaac Kuehnle-Nelson recalled how in 2015, about 1,700 people from across the country spontaneously turned up at the city’s central station, eager to welcome and help settle Syrian and Afghan asylum seekers as they arrived. In the 11 years since, the initiative, formalised into Refugees Welcome Stockholm, had unwittingly become a shorthand for the changes sweeping Sweden. “We’ve gone from being an organisation that was at the forefront of public political dialogue in Sweden to being a smaller organisation where our funding and ability to reach out have shrunk significantly,” said Kuehnle-Nelson. They had watched as policy stances once reserved for the far right became mainstream, from a slashing of refugee quotas from 5,000 to 900 people a year, to allowing residency permits to be revoked over the vaguely defined criteria of “bad behaviour”. “In 2015, people were met with open arms. We had the prime minister say: ‘My Europe doesn’t build walls,’” said Mannberg. “But the harsh reality is that we still have the same people that we were dealing with in 2015. We’re still with them in 2026 and they have not received legal status yet.” The psychological toll was laid bare during a recent programming course for young, undocumented asylum seekers. “There were days when many were unable to attend because they couldn’t get out of bed,” she said. “To have physically healthy, 20-year-old guys who have been so pushed down by life that they were unable to leave their beds, unable to see any future for themselves, that’s a really hard thing.” Among those caught up in the crackdown on asylum seekers was an undocumented 14-year-old who, despite being born in Sweden, was facing deportation to Armenia, along with his single-parent mother and his younger brother. “It’s like hell. I’ve been here my whole life,” he told the Guardian. “I feel Swedish.” His parents had come to Sweden as political asylum claimants, but their separation resulted in the claim becoming mired in bureaucracy. While there had been a visa category that might have given the family another chance of continuing the lives they had built in Sweden, it was scrapped recently by the rightwing government. Instead, the order looms over them, clouding the life of a child who had sung in a church choir and dreamed of a future as a civil engineer in Sweden. “It feels horrible,” he said, pointing out that he had never been to Armenia, did not speak the language and was terrified about the possibility of being forced to complete its mandatory military service. The changes to immigration policy, including recently introduced rules barring most asylum seekers from accessing permanent residency, were an example of how the political conversation in Sweden had been transformed by the far right’s time as power-brokers, said journalist Bilan Osman. “There’s a lot of proposals in Swedish politics today that we couldn’t even imagine 10 years ago,” she said, citing the tens of thousands of euros being offered to migrants to return home as an example. “People would have said: ‘You’re a lunatic.’ Now it’s like: ‘Let’s discuss it.’” Osman had long researched rightwing extremism, tracking the movement as they created their own media outlets capable of reaching new audiences. What emerged was a steady normalisation of their discourse, blaming migrants and minorities for Sweden’s social and economic ills, while the fallout of the country’s soaring inequality levels was largely overlooked. The resulting rhetoric had pushed some to the margins, recasting Sweden as a place where some belonged and others were made to feel as though they did not. It was a marked shift that would probably have long-lasting consequences, she said, citing Swedish Muslims, who make up an estimated 8% of the population, as an example. “I think we are at a breaking point right now in Sweden, where the main question is: ‘Is there a future for Muslims in this country?’” said Osman. “If we continue to have these kinds of discussions, I think a lot of Muslims will feel that there is not a future here. And that’s sad.”

Ukraine war briefing: Arctic attack extends Kyiv’s strike reach into Russian gas heartland

Ukraine’s special forces said ⁠they attacked two crucial natural gas plants in the Arctic about 3,000km (1,800 miles) from the Russian-Ukrainian border. Both lie in the heartland of Russian gas production: Novy Urengoy is Russia’s unofficial gas capital, ⁠located in the Yamal-Nenets region in north-western Siberia. The other plant is in the Purovsky district of Yamal-Nenets. A Ukrainian statement described the ‌two plants as “crucial for the gas condensate industry … Previously, this was considered an absolutely safe area away from the front for the aggressor.” Fire Point, a Ukrainian company that makes deep-strike weapons including the Flamingo cruise missile, posted: “Guess who just travelled over 3,300km and successfully hit the target?” Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the Ukrainian president, praised the strikes for their effect on the Russian economy. The Russian regional governor confirmed the attack and said the damage was being assessed. About 80% of all natural gas in Russia is extracted in the Yamalo-Nenets region, according to the Interfax news agency. Ukrainian forces also targeted Novorossiysk, a Black Sea port in Russia’s Krasnodar region. The attack hit the Russian naval base, including a terminal used to load oil, military port facilities, and warships carrying cruise missiles, Zelenskyy said. Ukraine and neighbouring Moldova played down reports that a plane carrying Volodymyr Zelenskyy was almost hit by a drone as it flew to Oslo. In fact, Zelenskyy’s departure for Norway was delayed when authorities closed Moldovan airspace due to a drone ⁠alert, a Moldovan ⁠government spokesperson said. The president’s plane was cleared for take-off from Moldova on Tuesday once it was established ⁠that the drone had come down. In all, three ⁠departures and four arrivals were delayed. Norway’s prime minister was among those who thought Zelenskyy’s plane had been attacked. The Moldovan president, Maia Sandu, denounced the drone intrusions as a “serious threat to people’s lives” and condemned an earlier Russian drone attack on a border crossing with Ukraine that killed two people. Three other people were injured in the strike on the Starokozache border crossing with Moldova. One person was killed and at least four people injured when a Russian drone struck an apartment building in Kyiv, while more strikes were reported in Dnipro, Mykolaiv, Kharkiv, Zaporizhzhia and Zhytomyr. A Russian drone strike on a shopping centre ⁠in the ⁠northern Ukrainian city of Sumy killed two people and injured ⁠20, four of them seriously, said the regional governor. Volodymyr Zelenskyy declared “there has been too little response from the international community to these strikes”. He added: “A response is needed – Moscow must not go into the winter believing that it can get away with missile and drone terror without consequences. The aggression must be stopped here and now, before it spreads any further.” He called for “effective” sanctions against Russia and support for Ukraine, saying “the partners who can help know exactly what is needed every day”. A Ukrainian couple got married anyway after a Russian air raid on the eve of their wedding wrecked their Kyiv apartment. Before going to bed, Liudmyla Ryzhak had hung on the bedroom door her dress, white skirt and her soldier fiance Leonid’s traditionally patterned shirt. As they slept a Russian strike hit a warehouse across the street from their building. They fled with Liudmyla’s six-year-old daughter and two guinea pigs to a bomb shelter – but soon returned to dig their wedding clothes out of the rubble of their ruined apartment. In the morning, amid more air raids, they forged ahead with the ceremony – only possible after Leonid had been able to make it back from the frontlines in eastern Ukraine. “If God gave me a continuation of life, then why should I put it off?” the bride said. “At least for now, I have the right to be happy. Both him and me.” – Associated Press Russia’s ⁠arms production poses a future threat that goes beyond the war in Ukraine, the German defence ⁠minister, Boris Pistorius, warned on Wednesday. “Moscow uses large ‌parts of its budget … to fill its inventories for future conflicts, not to deploy ‌weapons to the frontline in Ukraine,” he told the German parliament. “On average, only ⁠80 of the 150 short and medium-range missiles that Russia can produce ‌per month are being deployed to Ukraine.” In the UK, a man has been charged after allegedly assisting Russian spy services in planning a sabotage operation, Raphael Boyd writes. Joshua Cammidge, 31, was arrested in Swindon on Friday 4 September. Scotland Yard said it relates to alleged contact with a representative of the GRU Volunteer Corps, a group controlled by Russia’s military intelligence agency that has been accused of engaging in acts of sabotage against Britain and its allies. Cammidge would appear at Westminster magistrates court on Thursday, police said. Moscow wants peace talks to take place in Abu Dhabi, the UAE capital, said a Kremlin aide, Yuri Ushakov. Ushakov also said ‌the US should halt aid to Kyiv if the fighting is to stop. Moscow has been indignant throughout the war about Ukraine being able to defend itself with military aid from its allies. Another Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, cited a “confirmed political will” for the talks and suggested prisoner exchanges between the US and Russia might be part of the picture. Peskov was responding to a comment by the US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, about a ⁠possible roadmap to restart talks. There have been no talks between Russia and Ukraine ⁠since ⁠February.

Baby orangutans found in forest in India spark trafficking investigation

Five baby orangutans have been found in a forest in India, prompting authorities to investigate if they were trafficked into the country from south-east Asia. The orangutans, native only to the islands of Borneo and Sumatra and known for their shaggy red fur, were found in Balasore district of Odisha state, thousands of kilometres away from their natural habitat. Odisha’s environment minister, Ram Singh Khuntia, said wildlife investigators were trying to establish how the rare apes reached India. “We suspect that an international racket might be involved in this,” Singh said. International commercial trade in orangutans is prohibited under Cites – a global agreement governing trade in endangered wildlife. The five babies were found by forest department officials who were patrolling in the Jaleswar range in Balasore district. Officials believed the orangutans had been in the area for just a few days, and they have now been placed in quarantine at a zoological park in Odisha. According to the World Wildlife Fund, about 104,000 orangutans remain in Borneo and Sumatra, down from more than 230,000 a century ago. The Tapanuli orangutan (Pongo tapanuliensis), a third species, is classified as critically endangered, with fewer than 800 believed to survive in the wild. In November, conservationists found the Tapanuli population had been reduced by 7% after severe flooding in Indonesia. Between 33 and 54 Tapanuli orangutans were estimated to have been killed in widespread floods and landslides in North Sumatra province. Previous research has suggested annual losses of 1% of the Tapanuli orangutan population would be sufficient to lead to eventual extinction. The entire Tapanuli population dwells solely in the West Block of the Batang Toru, a forest threatened by mining, palm oil plantations and a large hydropower project.

Notorious Ecuadorian crime gang designated a terrorist group by US

The US has designated Ecuador’s Los Tiguerones gang, which stormed a television station during a live broadcast in 2024, as a terrorist organisation as the Trump administration expands its campaign against narcotics traffickers it says are destabilising Latin America. The US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, made the announcement in Quito, where he met Ecuadorian president Daniel Noboa, one of several rightwing allies of Donald Trump whom Rubio is courting as a security partner during a three-nation tour through Latin America that began on Tuesday. Rubio said the Los Tiguerones gang was linked to narcotics trafficking, as well as attacks on civilians, law enforcement officers and journalists. “We are not talking about an ordinary mafia, nor are we talking about common criminals, we are talking about terrorists who, in many cases, possess weapons and equipment resembling the national armies of certain countries,” he said. The heavily armed gang’s attack on the TC Televisión network in 2024 prompted Noboa to declare a state of “internal armed conflict”, amid claims foreign drug gangs had descended on Ecuador to take control of important routes for coca grown in neighbouring Colombia and Peru and then shipped to the US. Live footage from the El Noticiero news programme showed men toting pistols, shotguns, machine guns, grenades and sticks of dynamite. The viral images quickly became a symbol of the drug violence destabilising the country. In its efforts to fight against narcotics trafficking and illegal migration from Latin America, the Trump administration has also empowered a number of hardline leaders through its “Shield of the Americas” coalition that aims to tighten security cooperation with rightwing allies in the region. During his trip, Rubio plans to visit several newly elected conservative leaders amid a significant political shift to the right in Latin America. On Wednesday, Rubio hailed Ecuador as being the Trump administration’s most “aggressive” partner in its military campaign against alleged drug traffickers, including in the controversial strikes against boats that have killed at least 227 people whom the Trump administration has called drug traffickers without providing evidence. Rubio said that he would seek $45m (£33m) in additional funding from Congress towards efforts aimed at “dismantling these terrorist groups”, although he did not go into details. He also told reporters that elite forces from both countries were “working jointly on a day-to-day basis in a way that has no precedent in order to try to dismantle these terrorist organisations”. Rubio visited Colombia on Tuesday, where he met its newly inaugurated president Abelardo De La Espriella, who narrowly won a June election against leftist leader Gustavo Petro with whom the Trump White House had cold relations. During his remarks, Rubio took something of a victory lap, saying that the two sides would seek to “[confront] the mistakes of the past four years” and called Petro’s leadership of the country “unnatural”. Colombia joined the Shield of the Americas initiative only after its change in government. During the meeting, the two men discussed security and counternarcotics policy, and signed memorandums of understanding on critical minerals and nuclear energy. Rubio is expected to next travel to Peru, where he will meet Keiko Fujimori, who defeated a leftwing candidate by a margin of just 50,000 votes during a close election in July. She has promised to fight crime with an “iron fist” and adopt some controversial policies from neighbouring El Salvador, which has been a close ally of the US on security policies.

Uganda to withdraw from Invictus Games ‘out of respect for King Charles’, says military chief

Uganda is withdrawing from the Duke of Sussex’s Invictus Games, the country’s military chief has said, out of respect for King Charles amid division over the “Harry-Meghan nonsense”. Gen Muhoozi Kainerugaba, son of the Ugandan president, made the surprise announcement in a post on X on Wednesday. Kainerugaba wrote: “In order not to be construed as being opposed to His Majesty King Charles III of the United Kingdom, whom we deeply revere, Uganda hereby withdraws from the Invictus Games. We shall not participate in anything that does not have His Majesty’s approval.” The timing of the post suggests it may be in response to an official letter to UK senior government and military officials on behalf of Charles that reiterated the Duke and Duchess of Sussex were not working royals and would not use their HRH styles. When asked by the Times about what had motivated the move, Kainerugaba is reported to have said: “I have factions in the Ministry of Defence that support that Harry-Meghan nonsense. I had to quash it straight away. I support the monarch. Period.” The news, first reported by the Uganda Pulse news website, will be a blow to Harry, who two months ago stood alongside Uganda’s defence minister, Kiryowa Kiwanuka, at an Invictus Games event in London to announce that the East African nation would be the 26th country to enter the multisport event for wounded service personnel. At the time, Kiwanuka praised the Ugandan president, Yoweri Museveni for his “visionary leadership” and Kainerugaba, a Sandhurst graduate, for “championing our team’s entry”, adding that their support “marks a new chapter for our servicemen and women”. The Ugandan government spokesperson Alan Kasujja confirmed to the BBC: “Gen Kainerugaba decides whether or not the UPDF [Uganda People’s Defence Force] participates in the Invictus Games. What you saw is his stated position. If it changes, he will let the world know.” The decision to withdraw may be an unintended consequence of the official letter, issued on Monday by the head of the royal household, the lord chamberlain, Richard Benyon, at Charles’s behest, clarifying the position of the Sussexes after their return to the UK two weeks ago. The letter directed that the couple were “no longer working members of the royal family”, that their charitable work “is a personal matter for them both and undertaken in their private capacity” and “their position is akin to private citizens with commercial and charitable interests”. Kainerugaba was appointed army chief in 2024 and is widely seen as his 81-year-old father’s successor to the presidency. He has made several provocative posts on X, including threats to invade neighbouring Kenya, demands that Jay-Z hand over his wife, Beyoncé, so he could marry her, and threats against Bobi Wine, Museveni’s principal political rival. The Invictus Games and representatives for the Duke of Sussex have been approached for comment.

‘It’s a good start’: prominent Israelis welcome UK sanctions on illegal settlements

Prominent Israelis have welcomed new UK sanctions as a necessary response to settlement expansion and spiralling violence in the occupied West Bank. The intervention was described – by the president of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, a former prime minister, an ex-head of the army and former ministers and diplomats – as an “inevitable consequence” of Israeli government and security failures. “Sanctions [are being imposed] against Jewish terrorists, and not against the legitimacy of the state of Israel,” they wrote in a joint statement. “There is no basis to the [Israeli] government’s response that the decision to impose sanctions against Jewish terrorists is an expression of antisemitism.” Ed Miliband, the foreign secretary, had indicated Britain was planning new sanctions but the strength of his language and the scale of the controls he announced on Tuesday were a surprise. It was the most significant attempt in many years, from a close Israeli ally, to leverage economic power to force change in the occupied West Bank. “Israel’s government has caused a rupture in the longest-standing diplomatic convention of all: using obfuscation and plenty of ‘very concerned’ statements instead of actually doing anything,” Esther Solomon wrote in the Haaretz newspaper. The impact was multiplied when France and Canada announced plans for trade bans on settlement goods and 10 other European countries backed similar measures. Nor did any senior figure in the Trump administration, which was briefed in advance on the UK plans, criticise the measures. “Jerusalem had prepared for rain, but what arrived yesterday was a full-blown storm,” Itamar Eichner wrote in Yedioth Ahronoth. “Yesterday Israel was caught off guard, to the point that senior Israeli officials used the term ‘an intelligence-diplomatic failure’.” Nearly three-quarters of Jewish Israelis favour partial or total annexation of the occupied West Bank, a poll for the Jewish People Policy Institute found. All leading candidates in the upcoming election reject a Palestinian state. However, there is increasingly vocal opposition to settler violence and expansion from some members of the country’s security, political and cultural elites. They threatened legal action against their government this summer over its support for Jewish terrorism and an “ideology of ethnic cleansing” in the occupied West Bank. Prof David Harel, British-born president of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, is among those who signed a statement backing the UK measures. He said the sanctions offered urgently needed support for Israelis like him, who are trying to stop attacks on Palestinians and end the occupation. “I personally would fight until my last breath against antisemitism and against anti-Israelism. For that reason, I’m against general wall-to-wall boycott, divest, sanction-style sanctions on the state of Israel,” the leading scientist told the Guardian. “But what is justified, and I do support, is being anti things that Israel is doing, and these days in particular what it is doing in the West Bank.” He said that Israelis calling for a delay until after the elections were ignoring both the escalating violence that Palestinians faced every day and the risks the occupation posed to Israel’s future. “Getting out of there [occupied Palestine], or, at least for the present, stopping these things from happening and starting to really talk about a two-state solution is not only good for the Palestinians. It’s not that we’re doing these poor people a favour. We’re doing a favour to ourselves, no less, maybe even more.” The joint statement backing the UK sanctions was also signed by former prime minister Ehud Olmert, former commander of the Israeli military Dan Halutz, former ministers Yuli Tamir and Roni Bar-On and former ambassador to Germany Yoram Ben Zeev. “This decision is precisely what the state of Israel should have received in order to remove the disgrace of Jewish terrorism from the face of the country,” they wrote. Nadav Tamir, a former diplomat, also described the measures as good for Israel. “Any move to prevent annexation and ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians in the West Bank [and Gaza] is serving the long-term interests of the Zionist vision of Israel as the democratic homeland of the Jewish people,” he said. “It will help us to be more secure and moral.” The value of goods exported from occupied territories to Britain last year was only $45m (£33m) out of total $4.4bn trade in goods and services, according to Roey Fisher, head of Israel’s Foreign Trade Administration. However, plans to place sanctions on any company that finances or facilitates settlement expansion could force Israel’s main banks and insurance companies to choose between their business interests in the UK and those in occupied Palestine. Miliband has not provided details of the new measures but the move has the potential to slow or stop construction. Avraham Burg, a former speaker of the Knesset, thanked Miliband for setting a global example. “Like many Israelis and Palestinians I am grateful for the courageous moral leadership of Miliband. It’s a good beginning. Do not stop,” he said. But Israel’s foreign minister, Gideon Sa’ar, attacked Miliband for “blatant interference” in his country’s domestic affairs before a late October election. Opposition politicians suggested instead that Benjamin Netanyahu might weaponise the UK sanctions to bolster his campaign to remain prime minister. Dahlia Scheindlin, one of Israel’s leading political analysts, said the UK move was very unlikely to affect the October election, because Israeli voters were more focused on domestic issues. “Since 7 October [2023], Israel has become much more inward-looking and provincial, and generally the attitude to the rest of the world is just that ‘they all hate us’,” Scheindlin said. “If you are a Netanyahu supporter you might take this as evidence that they are against us because of antisemitism, and if you are in the opposition camp you might take this as further evidence that the world is turning against us because of Netanyahu’s policies. But it’s hard to see how these policies change the breakdown of the electoral map.” Miliband made his speech on a day when political parties finalised their candidate lists and Haaretz had a bombshell story about security warnings delivered to Netanyahu – and apparently ignored – before the 7 October attacks. Fourteen Israeli human rights organisations welcomed the sanctions. “This is an important and necessary first step to meet states’ legal obligation,” said the statement from groups including B’Tselem, Physicians for Human Rights Israel and Breaking the Silence. “We urge the international community to take further concrete measures to ensure that its relations with Israel no longer enable Israel’s settlement enterprise, forced displacement and ethnic cleansing in the occupied West Bank, or its broader assault on Palestinian human rights across all territories under its control.”