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Friday briefing: How disabled creators are challenging an ableist world

Good morning. Among a display of slogan T-shirts in the V&A Dundee’s Design and Disability exhibition, the first that meets your eye reads “Access is love”. Then, lest you presume you’re in for an easy ride, the next one declares “Piss on pity”. That one’s a reference to the 1990 Block Telethon campaign, a pivotal moment when hundreds of disability activists gathered outside ITV studios in London during a live fundraising broadcast and noisily protested their portrayal as tragic victims and plucky heroes deserving of a charitable pat on the head from the public. Decades later, it is still not easy to be a disabled person in an ableist world where accessibility so often remains an afterthought. For today’s First Edition, I spoke to Frances Ryan, Guardian columnist and author of Who wants normal? Life Lessons from Disabled Women about access, adaptation and radical acts. Before that, this morning’s headlines. Five big stories UK politics | Regional mayors are to be given a leading role in the UK’s economic policy, Andy Burnham has said, as he called the opening of No 10 North “the biggest rebalancing of power our country has seen”. Trump tariffs | Donald Trump’s administration has imposed a fresh wave of sweeping tariffs on dozens of US trading partners to replace a 10% global duty that was set to expire early Friday morning, which includes the UK. UK news | The Southport killer Axel Rudakubana has been moved from prison to a psychiatric hospital after clinical assessment, the Guardian can disclose. Middle East | The US president has said he is close to deciding whether to launch “a massive attack” against Iran, on a scale larger than strikes already witnessed during the months-long conflict with Tehran. Environment | Parts of Wales are now in drought and all other areas of the country are experiencing prolonged dry conditions. In Europe, brutal heat has forced nearly 20,000 people to flee wildfires in France and a marine heatwave scalds the Mediterranean. In depth: ‘Good design can reach far beyond its initial purpose’ Upending the assumption that disabled people are a problem to be solved, Design and Disability, which I visited last month, is a celebration of DIY design and grassroots organising. Initially exhibited in London, the show celebrates the radical contributions of disabled, deaf, and neurodivergent people to contemporary design and culture, and has been re-imagined for the V&A Dundee, with new pieces from Scottish designers like Jamie O’Donnell, who makes airline seats for neurodivergent and low vision travellers. This footprint extends well beyond care settings and adaptive housing, like a harness that allows hearing-impaired gig-goers to feel music as vibrations on their chest, a self-tightening shoe and the ubiquitous fidget spinners, which have become a popular stress reduction – or stimming – object for neurodivergent people. There are adaptive bras and bikini briefs designed by Slick Chicks, who make underwear for people with limited mobility, and recently teamed up with a dating platform to discuss sex and relationships. It is a raucous testament to the big and small innovations that challenge daily exclusions, and shows how good design can reach far beyond its initial purpose. But adaptation doesn’t always mean progress. Tactile paving slabs, inspired by braille, were developed in the 60s to allow those with low vision to feel for the edge of train platforms and pavements. Nowadays they are regularly misused as decorative touches in urban design, confusing people who use them as navigational aids. “As someone born with a disability that means I use a wheelchair, I soon realised it was completely normal for me to be blocked off from every day parts of life, from the changing room in a clothes shop, a bar for a friend’s birthday, to the tube to get to the Guardian offices,” Frances told me when we spoke after my V&A visit. “But that isn’t ‘normal’, of course. It’s a choice society makes and can address if there is the political will.” But what’s also apparent is the snail’s pace of change. One item exhibited, the McGonagle Reader – an audio-assisted tactile voting device to help blind people vote independently – was only released in some parts of the UK for the 2024 general election. *** Design at the vanguard As I wandered through the exhibition, I was struck by how a non-disabled person like me can miss the inherent usefulness of an object. We’ve reported recently on profound privacy concerns around smartglasses: but many readers got in touch to remind us that smart technologies can be gamechanging for those with sight or hearing loss. One of them, Colin Hughes, a former BBC producer who lives with progressive muscular dystrophy and has worked with tech companies to improve their accessibility, told me: “Smart glasses are transformative for people like me who are paralysed … I can’t pick up my phone but by saying ‘take a photo’ I can share a picture with my family. You can’t put a price on that kind of independence”. Hughes also made the point that many disabled people are priced out of tech: “It costs thousands of pounds to make your home truly smart”. It’s something that Frances told me too: “It recently cost me £20k to build an accessible bathroom and I was just quoted £1.8k for a smart curtain rod.” These sums are out of reach to many: in research published earlier this month by the Disability Poverty Campaign Group, nearly three-quarters of respondents said their income does not consistently cover the cost of the food they need to stay healthy. “I’m lucky I have a job to fill in the extra costs – and the developments in tech are incredible – but it’s striking how much cash disabled people have to find just to live like everyone else. Non-disabled people spend their spare income on a holiday. We spend it on being able to open our curtains.” *** Protest works Alongside Block Telethon, the exhibition documents other historic protests and activism, like the 80s and 90s Campaign for Accessible Transport during which wheelchair users chained themselves to buses. Contemporary examples are also present, with images of disabled people protesting outside Westminster last summer, when campaigners risked their health in the searing heat to force Starmer’s U-turn on proposed cuts to disability benefits. Personal independence payments (Pip) are made to people aged 16 to 66 to assist with the extra costs they face through ill health or disability. One of Starmer’s proposals to fix the “broken” benefits system by tightening eligibility criteria was met with a fierce backlash from campaigners and MPs. Disability minister Stephen Timms has been tasked with reforming the whole system – Burnham kept him in post when he appointed his new cabinet this week – and there is a rare opportunity, according to Frances, to lobby for “an ambitious new safety net for 2026 and beyond”. She outlined how a progressive alternative to Pip, which was brought in by the coalition government in 2013, could radically rethink the current system of point-based assessments which don’t account for individual experience or fluctuating conditions. These tick box tests are given far more weight in assessments than evidence from a disabled person’s actual medical team and have also resulted in humiliating questioning: she was asked “How do you put your bra on?” last time around. Frances also wants to see the return of indefinite awards for people with permanent conditions, which were phased out in 2013. “Research by the anti-poverty charity Z2K shows there were more than half a million pointless reassessments last year of people with conditions such as cerebral palsy, learning disabilities and amputations – presumably to check someone’s leg hadn’t grown back”. *** Radical acts At the opening of Design and Disability in Dundee, curator Natalie Kane told the colourful crowd that the exhibition was “an act of joy and resistance.” These words resonate against the current backdrop of deliberately fostered hostility towards minority groups – which Frances highlighted back in April when she reported on how blue badge users are being harassed, questioned and even assaulted as anti-benefits rhetoric becomes more mainstream in the UK. Kane said the daily reality of disabled living demanded “one radical act at a time”, a sentiment Frances echoed. “I never underestimate the power of every day protest. Wear your favourite summer dress with your scars visible. Kiss your boyfriend when the waiter asks if your ‘carer’ wants the bill. Speak incredibly loudly to the hotel receptionist when she directs her questions to the non-disabled person behind you. In a world that still too often says disability is miserable and shameful, living a life of freedom and joy is a radical act.” What else we’ve been enjoying Our appetite for tribute acts is insatiable, and Daniel Dylan Wray investigated why. I can highly recommend the scouse Dolly Parton who played at my friend’s wedding. Michael I’d read a shopping list if our US culture writer Alaina Demopoulos had written in. In this typically smart feature, she examines how the right has weaponised women’s menstrual phases. Libby I’ve already spent 15 minutes and counting exploring this interactive story which ranks the world’s most powerful passports. Michael I nearly filed my newsletter late because I couldn’t stop watching this incredible footage of young orcas playing with a giant sunfish. Sad times for the sunfish of course, as the point of the game is to explode it into smithereens. Libby Since my own reporting trip to the Antarctic, I’ve been obsessed by Ernest Shackleton’s legendary expedition to the continent. These freshly digitised images of his early 20th-century adventure are remarkable. Michael Sport Commonwealth Games | The surreal sight of King Charles and Queen Camilla stepping out of a Tardis – and a mechanical Loch Ness monster roaring the first few bars of Flower of Scotland – marked the opening of the Games in Glasgow. Cycling | Richard Carapaz won stage 18 of the Tour de France, but uncertainty surrounds the health of race leader Tadej Pogacar’s UAE Team Emirates XRG, which has been swept by a virus since Monday’s rest day. Cricket | The Middlesex chief executive, Andrew Cornish, has been dismissed after misconduct charges against him were upheld by an independent disciplinary panel. Something for the weekend Our critics’ roundup of the best things to watch, read, play and listen to right now TV A Toxic Love Story | ★★★★☆ The sound of barrel-scraping during true-crime documentaries is becoming more and more frequent at Netflix these days. A Toxic Love Story is a welcome, if doubtless temporary, return to form. It is a rigorous, 88-minute recounting of an astonishing story that became notorious about 10 years ago in the US and was known as “the Anaheim Craigslist case” or “the Anaheim Craigslist rape fantasy case”. “To put it lightly,” says one of the investigators, “this is a monster of a case.” The question of quite how many monsters it involves is one that keeps you watching, goggle-eyed and barely breathing, until the end. Lucy Mangan Music Charli xcx: Music, Fashion, Film | ★★★★★ Music, Fashion, Film is another gorgeously astute and disarmingly deep album about the instability of identity – not just as a vanguard songwriter striving for evolution, but how much we can ever know one another, or even ourselves. There’s no moralising side-eye: it is as acute as Brat in Charli’s scrupulous lens on how self-commodification is just the way we live now, how it might offer an escape from dire times, or helpfully beckon the hellfires faster. Does she contradict herself? Absolutely. Does that unsparing compulsion to lay it all out for us – the ego and self-hate; the defensiveness and chagrin – make Charli our most consistently bracing pop star? God, yes. Laura Snapes Film Nostalgia | ★★★★★ Andrei Tarkovsky’s 1983 film is a mysterious, imagist cine-poem about alienation and belonging, whose title means a yearning not simply for a lost time or lost place but for something, anything, else – with a profound anguished sense that the here-and-now of existence is unsatisfactory. A distinguished Russian scholar, Andrei, is in Italy to research the life of the (fictional) Russian composer Pavel Sosnovsky who is supposed to have travelled there before being overwhelmed by homesick longing. On arriving in the Tuscan spa town of Bagno Vignoni, Andrei appears to be overcome by a kind of breakdown or emotional paralysis. It is an unimprovably stark, sad film. Peter Bradshaw Theatre Sweeney Todd | ★★★★☆ (at Birmingham Rep) The story of a serial killer who provides the grisly contents for his landlady’s pies is ripe with the kind of dark gothic humour that appealed to the Brothers Grimm. Director Joe Murphy gives Sweeney Todd the full operatic treatment. His superb staging is as rich in detail as it is austere in execution. This is a London rendered in grimy monochrome, where the period costumes in pastel shades of mustard, lime and peach stand out in defiance of the poverty around them. Seriousness of purpose, however, does not make it heavy going. Yes, an excellent Ramin Karimloo never cracks a smile in the title role, but that only gives the blade-wielding barber a nobility that belies his actions. His chilling surface calm suggests all his efforts are going into suppressing a murderous rage. Mark Fisher The front pages “Burnham: No 10 North is Britain’s biggest ever rebalancing of power”, is the Guardian’s front page today. The Telegraph leads with “Burnham orders halt to early release”, the Times says “Burnham eager to get drilling in North Sea”, and Metro, on Burnham cutting rates for pubs, has “Ahead on pints”. The FT writes “Oil hits $100 as Trump weighs ‘massive’ strike on Iran targets”, the i Paper has “State pensioners with no other income will be exempt from tax”, and the Mail says “Every single advanced AI model ‘goes rogue’ in testing”. The Express runs with “New cells will end the early release scandal”, and the Mirror splashes “Tragedy on beach trip”. The Latest Gary Lineker calls for Burnham to introduce wealth tax for millionaires Millionaires including former footballer Gary Lineker are asking Andy Burnham to tax their wealth more. More than 100 wealthy Britons have signed an open letter to the prime minister, saying: ‘We want you to tax us. We can afford it.’ So should the government introduce a wealth tax? And why is the idea getting more popular? Nosheen Iqbal speaks to columnist and senior economics commentator Aditya Chakrabortty. Cartoon of the day | Ben Jennings The Upside A bit of good news to remind you that the world’s not all bad Sustainable forestry in Guatemala’s Maya Biosphere Reserve shows how community‑run concessions can halt deforestation. In the multiple‑use zone, cooperatives harvest only a few carefully selected trees per hectare under strict rules, keeping forest loss near zero. Communities such as Carmelita and Uaxactún earn income from value‑added timber, carpentry, tourism and non‑timber products, boosting local jobs and services. Others, like La Pasadita, focus on restoration, growing more than 120,000 seedlings to regreen degraded pasture and reduce wildfire risk. Forest cover in several concessions is increasing, proving that livelihoods tied to sustainable use can protect biodiversity while raising incomes. The model is now shaping national policy. It goes to show, says José Román Carrera, a forestry director at the Rainforest Alliance that “the forest is best protected by those whose livelihoods depend on it”. 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

Ireland urged to put pressure on Germany over pro-Palestinian activist’s trial

A cross-party delegation of Irish politicians has urged Dublin to send observers to a high-security trial of pro-Palestinian activists in Germany and to raise concerns about the Irish defendant’s detention when the German chancellor visits next week. Mairéad Farrell of Sinn Féin, a member of the seven-member delegation, said she and her colleagues had attended the hearing in Stuttgart on Wednesday of the so-called Ulm 5 activists, who are facing charges over an attack on an Israeli arms company. Farrell and two other members of the delegation visited Daniel Tatlow-Devally, the Irish defendant being tried as part of the group, in prison. “I was quite shocked by the treatment that he is receiving. He is 23 hours a day in his cell,” Farrell said, calling on the Irish prime minister, Micheál Martin, to discuss the issue with the German chancellor, Friedrich Merz, when he visits on Tuesday. Farrell said: “His cell, from what I understand, is 5x2 metres. He doesn’t have much in his cell, so he’s stuck there for 23 hours a day. He only has an hour of visitation per month, which is obviously incredibly short. “It just seems that there’s very harsh conditions that seem unwarranted for the scale of the fact that these people haven’t harmed people.” German prosecutors say Tatlow-Devally was part of a group of five activists who trespassed on to a site owned by Israel’s Elbit Systems last September in the southern city of Ulm, shouting pro-Palestinian slogans as they destroyed equipment and smashed windows. They allegedly caused about €1m (£850,000) in damage. The activists posted videos online in which they claimed responsibility for the attack, saying it was aimed at drawing attention to Germany’s support for Israel and its actions in Gaza. Germany is the second biggest supplier of arms to Israel, after the US. The defendants have remained defiant throughout the proceedings, with Tatlow-Devally telling the court in May that the group was motivated by “urgent humanitarian concerns” and sought to “make a fuss … in the hope to at least interrupt” Elbit’s deliveries to Israel. Last month, a British judge imposed lengthy custodial sentences on four Palestine Action activists who smashed up drones and other equipment at an Elbit Systems UK factory, after ruling that there was a “terrorist connection” to their offending. Farrell said German authorities had not allowed the Irish delegation to discuss the case with Tatlow-Devally. “That felt, I suppose, quite unusual for us,” she said. The politicians also found fault with the trial itself. The defendants, Farrell said, “are basically in a glass cage or behind a glass wall, unable to communicate with their lawyers in … a kind of free manner”. She said: “One of the accused said that they felt that they couldn’t really participate fully in the trial … because of these barriers that have been put in place.” Lawyers for the defendants, Berlin-based activists who are British, Irish, German and Spanish citizens, have repeatedly raised the issue of the glass wall with the court, saying it hinders their clients’ right to representation. The five activists have been charged with trespassing, destruction of property and membership of a criminal organisation – Palestine Action Germany – under section 129 of the German criminal code. That charge means authorities consider the accused a threat to society, allowing them to deny bail, even after the six-month limit of pre-trial detention had passed. If found guilty, they face up to five years in prison. Court representatives have said the conditions of the defendants’ detention are warranted based on the severity of the charges against them. Before the trial began in April, Stuttgart’s higher regional court ordered the continuation of pre-trial detention for all defendants based on “a risk of flight, which would not be sufficiently mitigated even by the posting of bail”. Farrell said it was “absolutely crucial” for the Irish government to send envoys to regularly attend hearings until a verdict was delivered. “That was something that couldn’t have been clearer coming out of that trial yesterday: that there is a need for observers,” she said. Farrell urged Martin to bring up the Ulm 5 case when Merz visits for talks focused on Dublin’s six-month presidency of the EU, which began on 1 July. She said the Irish prime minister needed to raise concerns expressed by the defendant, his family and the delegation related to his treatment in prison and “his access in terms of legal representation as part of the trial”. The delegation included the MPs Richard Boyd Barrett and Ruth Coppinger, both of the People Before Profit-Solidarity party, Barry Ward of Fine Gael and Duncan Smith of Labour, as well as senator Patricia Stephenson of the Social Democrats and MEP Lynn Boylan of Sinn Féin. Farrell said the group aimed to return to Germany before the trial wrapped up, probably in January: “This isn’t the end for us. We will be keeping an eye on this trial.”

Middle East crisis is ‘getting out of control’, UN chief warns – as it happened

Our live coverage of the Middle East crisis is now ending, but you can read our latest story from the region here. The US military carried out a 13th consecutive night of strikes on Iran, targeting drone facilities, coastal surveillance sites and more. The wave of attacks lasted more ⁠than two hours, according to the US Central Command. Iranian state media reported explosions along the strait of Hormuz in Qeshm and Bandar Abbas, where two people were reportedly injured, as well as to the north-west near Andimeshk and Omidiyeh. The UN secretary general, António Guterres, warned that the Middle East is being pushed to the “edge of the unimaginable” amid mounting fears over the trajectory of the conflict. “The situation is getting out of control. It is teetering on the edge of the unimaginable. The region is being pulled into an ever-widening circle of confrontation. One crisis feeds another. One escalation triggers the next,” Guterres told a security council meeting. “As this dynamic spreads, the political objectives are becoming increasingly obscured by the confrontation itself.” It comes after Donald Trump said he was close to deciding whether to launch “a massive attack” against Iran, on a scale larger than strikes already witnessed during the months-long conflict with Tehran as the US president flounders in his attempts to get a grip on the spiralling crisis in the region. Speaking to Axios, the US president said: “I am considering a massive attack. Bigger than ever before. I am close to making a decision. We are all set for it.” He acknowledged that such a decision would have consequences but said he had not yet made a final determination. Israel “would join in two minutes if I ask them to”, he added, before saying: “We don’t need anybody.” Trump’s comments followed the earlier threat of “major military punishment” against Iran and the Houthis, after the Iran-backed Yemeni militia’s attacks on two Saudi Arabian oil tankers in the Red Sea. The Houthi attacks threatened the safety of a second major maritime route connecting the Suez canal to the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden. They also came amid reports that Iran had sent military advisers and drone parts to the Houthis 10 days ago. Trump wrote on social media: “If [the Houthis] do this again, the US will hold Iran responsible, in that the Houthis are a Surrogate and/or Proxy of Iran, and major military punishment will be inflicted upon Iran and, of course, the Houthis, themselves.” In a separate development, Trump clarified that an announced agreement that the US would help Saudi Arabia with its civilian nuclear programme would require the kingdom to normalise relations with Israel through the Abraham Accords, a move Saudi Arabia has long resisted until there is demonstrable movement on Palestinian rights and statehood. During Thursday’s press briefing, Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, reiterated that the Saudi Arabia nuclear deal is “contingent” on the kingdom on joining the Abraham Accords. “The president is always the final dealmaker, as you know... He has said, if they don’t join the Abraham accords, the deal is off,” she said. It emerged later that Trump had not spoken to Saudi Arabia about the new condition. Oil prices once again surged past the symbolic $100 for a barrel of Brent crude, the international benchmark, and amid indications the price could go higher still.

‘We feel like we are failing’: Myanmar doctor speaks out as health system teeters on ‘brink of collapse’

When Myanmar’s junta seized power in a 2021 coup, Elle* and a fellow doctor fled to the jungle to provide aid to the resistance movement, one of 45,000 healthcare workers to lend their support. Elle does not regret her decision, she supports the pro-democracy movement and later married the doctor with whom she escaped, but years of sacrifice have taken a toll. She treats patients from refugee camps at a clinic but does not earn enough to send money back to support her parents in their old age, which is her greatest wish. “We did everything we could for our country,” she says. “But for ourselves and our families, we feel like we are failing.” Five years into the civil war, the military has recently gained ground, bolstered by tens of thousands of new conscripts as well as weapons from China. After years of being targeted by the junta, Myanmar’s healthcare workers face a desperate situation, despite their enormous personal sacrifices, experts say the fragmented healthcare system is on the verge of collapse with increasing attacks on health infrastructure and a critical lack of essential medical supplies. Attacks on health care sites increased significantly, driven by intensified airstrikes, with the World Health Organization (WHO) verifying 70 attacks, 148 deaths and 186 injuries in 2025. Dr Andrew Green, chair of the British Medical Association’s (BMA) medical ethics committee, told a webinar this month that “the violations of international humanitarian law, and the principle of medical neutrality have resulted in the reduction, or, indeed, the complete destruction of medical services in the country.” The overall effect, he said, was that Myanmar’s healthcare system was now “on the very brink of collapse”. Military blockades have also compounded severe shortages of essential medical supplies across the country, including bandages, antiseptic, antibiotics, IV fluids and malaria tests as well as maternal and child health supplies. The shortages have in some areas triggered a resurgence of malaria, and outbreaks of other preventable diseases due to the rise in unsafe drinking water, while routine health programs have been interrupted. The ailing system presents a crucial barrier to the more than 16 million people who require life-saving assistance and protection services in the country, according to the WHO. ‘Clinics have been targeted from the air again and again’ Following a series of humiliating defeats in 2024, the military recaptured some ground this year. The gains amount to a small slice of overall territory but carry strategic value as they disrupted the resistance’s supply lines and operations. More than 100,000 people have now been killed since the conflict began in 2021, according to monitor ACLED (Armed Conflict Location & Event Data). In a six-month period around the elections, which ended in January and were widely condemned as a sham, the military was responsible for at least 702 civilian deaths, according to the UN. The healthcare industry has not been immune from the violence. There have been at least 1,948 incidents of violence against, or obstruction of access to healthcare staff, with 932 health workers arrested and 175 killed since the start of the conflict, according to data from Insecurity Insight. “These were not accidents of war,” a doctor from Global Health Partnerships, originally from Myanmar who wished to remain anonymous, told the BMA webinar. “Clinics in contested regions have been targeted from the air again and again, precisely because they kept communities alive and resistant to the military rule,” the doctor said. The junta has previously denied civilian deaths at healthcare sites, saying those killed or injured were not civilians, but terrorists and their supporters. Even before the conflict, there was a shortage of healthcare professionals, with only one health worker per 1,000 in Myanmar. Now, many professionals have been forced to suspend clinical practice, flee to safer areas, or leave the country. As Elle reflects on her decisions – she once had a position at a prestigious hospital – there are mixed emotions. Lacking phone reception, it was months before her husband learned his mother had died. Elle gave birth to her first child at a clinic for refugees, making the dangerous journey by motorbike to a border area. Eight days later, authorities arrested her husband, and she went through postnatal depression. Her husband was eventually released and together they now treat patients from refugee camps at a clinic, including many victims of the civil war. Despite their training, the impacts of the conflict are sometimes hard to bear. “Doctors see death,” she says, “But when I see dying [from this war], and especially children, injured or dying, it hurts.” “Now that I’m a mother,” she adds. “It could be my son.” * Name has been changed

Ukraine war briefing: EU sanctions oust Russian president of world chess

Arkady Dvorkovich, the president of the International Chess Federation (FIDE), said on Friday he ⁠was suspending his activity with the organisation after being placed on the EU list of sanctioned Russians. Dvorkovich, a former Russian deputy prime minister, complained that the designation was “unlawful and unfair”. A statement said Viswanathan Anand, an Indian world chess champion, would take over as the federation’s interim president. It came as the E⁠U has unveiled its largest sanctions package in four years against Russia, targeting 218 individuals ⁠and entities. The EU foreign policy chief, Kaja ⁠Kallas, said the measures hit more than 100 banks and cryptocurrency operators, more than 40 ‌vessels from Russia’s so-called shadow fleet, as well as several oil refineries. The package adds more ⁠than 50 military-industrial entities to the sanctions list, including key actors ‌involved in producing Russia’s long-range drones. The Russian oil price cap is frozen at $44.10 per barrel for 12 months, preventing an automatic increase that would have raised it to about $58.50. The new listings take the total number of designations to nearly 3,000. There is a full asset-freeze on ⁠94 Russian financial institutions, nearly all banks, and disconnection of 33 Russian banks from the Swift international payments system. Moscow’s stock exchange ⁠is added to the sanctions. Internationally, banks or cryptocurrency platforms are hit in countries including Mongolia, Kyrgyzstan, India, Georgia, Panama, the Marshall Islands, Belarus, the United Arab Emirates and Africa. The package also targets actors linked to Russia’s satellite communications system being developed as an alternative to Starlink. There are 56 entities and persons added to the sanctions list for involvement in Russia’s military industrial complex – most of them linked to long-range Garpiya drones. There are 51 entities added to list of companies that face export restrictions on dual-use goods and technology. Some ⁠are in third countries: China, including Hong Kong, India, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkey, and the UAE. Ukrainian drones hit a warehouse in Russia – reportedly part of the Wildberries chain – triggering a fire that filled the skies over St Petersburg with smoke, the Agence France-Presse and local officials said. The company said two of its warehouses in the city had temporarily halted operations, without giving more details. “St Petersburg came under attack by military-purpose unmanned aerial vehicles … the strike hit civilian infrastructure facilities,” said the local governor, Alexander Beglov. Ukrainian strikes have hit several Wildberries sites in the past week, including those serving Moscow. Kyiv says the Wildberries chain stores and ships sanctioned military goods. Volodymyr Zelenskyy remained under pressure to restore the ousted defence minister, Mykhailo Fedorov, to his post after Fedorov said he would not accept alternative roles in government put forward by the president. The Maga influencer Laura Loomer has turned up in Ukraine where she met with the president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, after recently reversing her stance on the war. It was unclear what had prompted Loomer’s trip or how she had arranged the meeting with Zelenskyy. Loomer spent years minimising Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, amplifying Russian propaganda and abusing Ukraine as “a country full of Nazi apologists … led by a jihadi apologist”. During her Ukraine visit, Loomer posted: “Just experienced my first air raid in Ukraine. Sirens blaring. This is everyday for every Ukrainian. I often said I don’t care. Looking back, that wasn’t very nice of me to say … We need to have moral clarity.” Loomer appeared to reverse her stance on Ukraine in June after her podcast editor visited Kyiv and Odesa just as they came under heavy attack, and after rival far-right influencer Candace Owens visited and praised Russia. Trump’s supposed Russia-Ukraine war peace broker, Steve Witkoff, has repeatedly visited Russia but has yet to go to Ukraine. A ⁠Russian attack ⁠on ⁠a food business in the ⁠Ukrainian city ⁠of Pavlohrad ‌killed ‌three and ‌injured at least 10 people, the regional ‌governor Oleksandr Hanzha said. The attack ⁠caused a fire. Ukrainian strikes killed three people, including a child, and wounded eight in Russia and in Moscow-annexed Crimea on Thursday, local authorities said.

Thousands flee wildfires in France and Spain as temperatures reach extreme levels in southern Europe

Brutal heat torching southern Europe has forced about 30,000 people to flee wildfires in France and Spain as a marine heatwave scalds the Mediterranean and researchers warn that “Dantesque” scenarios cannot be ruled out as infernos worsen. France has requested assistance from ⁠the European Union to help it deal ⁠with a ⁠major wildfire near the country’s Atlantic coast, while Spain has declared a national emergency in the Madrid region and in the province of Avila, because of several wildfires burning out of control. President ⁠Emmanuel Macron on Friday wrote on X that the situation remained “extremely tense” with ⁠the fires particularly bad in Gironde in southwestern France. “France has requested the activation ‌of the European Union’s civil protection mechanism. We will soon be able to count on reinforcements from two Croatian Canadair ‌aircraft, two Portuguese Air Tractor planes, as well as two heavy Black Hawk helicopters from the Czech Republic and Slovakia,” he said. The fire on France’s Atlantic coast prompted the evacuation of more than 18,800 people, including thousands of tourists from campsites and holiday homes, as firefighters struggled to control the blaze. Spain late Thursday declared a national emergency in the Madrid region and in the province of Avila, near the capital, in the wake of several wildfires burning out of control. Around the Madrid region, the fires have forced the evacuation of 10,000 people, placing the response to the crisis in the hands of a military emergency unit. “The government has deployed every available resource to stop the terrible fires currently affecting numerous areas: Avila, Leon, Toledo, Madrid and other parts of Spain,” prime minister Pedro Sánchez said earlier on X, urging the public to exercise “great caution” and heed instructions from authorities. Almost 125,000 hectares have already burnt in Spain this year compared with 393,000 for the whole of last year, according to the European Forest Fire Information System. Extreme highs of 44.7C were recorded on Thursday in Cieza, in the Spanish province of Murcia, according to Aemet, the Spanish meteorological agency. The previous day, the Spanish cities of Albacete, Ávila and Teruel broke their July temperatures records with heat as high as 42C. A marine heatwave is affecting 80% of the Mediterranean Sea’s surface area, according to the Mediterranean Monitoring System. Daily temperatures on Tuesday had reached “extreme” levels in several parts, with some anomalies 5C hotter than the average from 1991 to 2020. The severity of fires in the EU has broken records for this time of year, data from the European Forest Fire Information System showed on Wednesday, and about twice as much land had burned by 22 July than the average for that date over the last two decades. France has broken records for the area burned; it and Spain have broken records for the number of fires. The fire in France began in a dense pine forest near the village of Saumos about 40km (25 miles) west of Bordeaux and just north of the bay of Arcachon, a popular tourist destination. It had burned more than 3,700 hectares (9,140 acres) in a little over 24 hours, firefighters said on Thursday. No casualties had been reported but several houses had succumbed to the flames, they said. The Gironde prefecture said that while 800 firefighters and four water-bombing planes were battling to bring the fire under control, the situation remained “unfavourable” and the blaze was not yet stabilised. “The fire is highly erratic and gaining very significant force,” said Marc Vermeulen, the regional fire service chief, on Thursday evening. “One of the main fronts is very close to a semi-urban area. We are defending house by house.” France has endured three almost back-to-back heatwaves since May as climate breakdown leads to more frequent and extreme weather events causing thousands of excess deaths, evaporating soils and waterways and fuelling wildfires. Patrick Martineau, 69, who was evacuated from the village of Le Porge, told Agence France-Presse that police had “come banging on the doors … It’s scary – hard to take in. When we bought a home here, we never thought there’d be a fire risk.” Sylvie, a holidaymaker from Paris staying in the relatively more built-up area of Lège-Cap-Ferret, said a neighbour had told her: “‘Get your bags ready, we’re going to be evacuated during the night.’ We put the bulk of our stuff in the car boot and left.” Elke Urbain, from Antwerp in Belgium, who holidays in the area every year, said she was advised while she was on the beach on Wednesday afternoon to “go back immediately to the campsite and gather your things. It’s just terribly sad.” In 2022, a wildfire burned more than 30,000 hectares in the same area, forcing about 50,000 people to be evacuated. In tinder-dry conditions and fanned by a strong wind, the latest blaze has torn through the forest, with flames reaching 10 metres high. Jean-Luc Helias, 54, from Le Porge, said he and his family had lived through that fire four years ago and “the firefighters do an amazing job to protect people’s homes. All that matters to me is that my family is safe; the rest is just material possessions.” Nine municipalities have opened reception centres for evacuees and were sheltering more than 2,500 people, the prefecture said. About 8,800 people were evacuated during the day on Thursday, 10,000 overnight. Numerous roads in the area, including those leading to the Cap Ferret peninsula a few kilometres to the south – home to the villas of celebrities and millionaires and one of France’s most exclusive holiday spots – were closed to all but essential traffic. Police have opened an investigation into the causes of the wildfire, which the mayor of Le Porge, Martial Zaninetti, said on Wednesday appeared to have been started by a machine that was clearing undergrowth. A fortnight ago, flames devastated a 10th of the Unesco-listed Fontainebleau forest outside Paris in a rare wildfire so far north. France’s interior minister, Laurent Nuñez, has said more than 12,500 wildfires had broken out since the beginning of the year. In Spain, authorities on Thursday ordered 3,500 people in a town west of Madrid to leave their homes because of a forest fire burning out of control. The emergency services said on X evacuation messages had been sent to people in Aldea de Fresno, about 60 kilometres (38 miles) south-west of Madrid. A fire that has burned 32,000 hectares in the province of Guadalajara, north of the capital, was described as stable. Spanish wildfire scientists said they were not surprised by the extreme figures as the abandonment of rural land had left more overgrown vegetation and the rise in temperatures from climate breakdown made it easier for such plant matter to dry out and burn. Víctor Resco de Dios, a professor of forestry engineering and global change at the University of Lleida, said: “Although it’s difficult to predict how far things might go, we will soon be unable to rule out Dantesque scenarios like those seen in California or Australia, with fires or fire complexes reaching hundreds of thousands of hectares or even a million hectares.” The marine heatwave in the Mediterranean is projected to shrink but stay strong from Sardinia to Greece, according to a forecast for Saturday from Mercator Ocean. From Gibraltar to the Balearic Islands, strong heat is expected to drop to moderate levels, despite intensifying locally in the Alboran Sea. Western Europe has been rocked by repeated heatwaves this summer, with extreme highs in June that scientists expect will have killed tens of thousands of people as hot days push bodies into overdrive and warm nights prevent them from resting. On Wednesday, an analysis estimated the cost of the June heatwave to the continent’s grain farmers at €2bn (£1.7bn) in lost revenue from 9m tonnes of destroyed crops. On Thursday, scientists found climate breakdown had contributed to drought conditions, making levels of soil dryness five times more likely in western Europe and 11 times more likely in eastern Europe.

UK ‘ready to defend itself’ after Iranian threat over US bases

The government has said the UK is “ready to defend itself” after Iran’s military warned that any bases being used by the US were “legitimate targets”. The UK has allowed the US to launch “defensive” operations from British bases hosting American planes since the start of its war on Iran but has refused to help in offensive operations. That policy has not been altered by the new prime minister, Andy Burnham, who was notified last week that a decision had been made to extend the agreement with the US. Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said on Thursday that “any base used for aggression against Iranian territory constitutes a legitimate target for our forces”. In a statement published on the IRGC-linked Tasnim news agency, the group said American bombing missions had been launched from RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire two days earlier. The statement came after the US carried out a 12th consecutive night of strikes against targets in Iran. The Ministry of Defence has not commented on whether Fairford was used by the US for operations against Iran this week. The IRGC also accused the “British monarchy regime” of causing being the “primary cause of hardships in our region with a black record of partitioning Islamic nations, widespread massacres, imposing despotic regimes, and organising the occupation of Palestine”. It warned the government “not to weigh down its record any further”. A spokesperson for the British government said: “Our armed forces are ready to keep ⁠the United Kingdom safe from any kind of attacks, whether it’s on our soil ⁠or from abroad. The UK stands ready 24/7 to defend itself. “This includes through ‌operating a layered approach to air and missile defence, ‌provided by Royal Navy, British Army and Royal Air Force assets equipped with a range of advanced capabilities, working closely with our Nato allies. “We are committed to defending our people, our interests and our allies, acting in accordance with international law and not getting drawn into the wider conflict.” On 1 March a drone struck the RAF base at Akrotiri in Cyprus, hitting a hangar, and prompting a partial evacuation of the facility. On 19 March, Iran fired two ballistic missiles at the UK’s Diego Garcia base in the Chagos Islands. One reportedly failed mid-flight, while the other was shot down by a US airship. Iran has launched strikes against countries in the Gulf that house US military bases, including Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait, killing American service personnel in some of the attacks. Donald Trump said Iran would “pay a big price” for killing US troops. On Thursday afternoon, the US president said he was considering ordering a “massive attack” on Iran. “I am close to making a decision,” he told Axios. “We’re all set for it.” He said he believed Iran’s leaders “want to negotiate”, but aren’t yet ready to make a deal. In another sign of the conflict potentially escalating, Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels said they attacked two Saudi oil tankers in the Red Sea on Thursday, as oil topped $100 a barrel.

Donald Trump says decision on ‘massive attack’ against Iran is close

Donald Trump has said he is close to deciding whether to launch “a massive attack” against Iran, on a scale larger than strikes already witnessed during the months-long conflict with Tehran. Speaking to the Axios news site, the US president said: “I am considering a massive attack. Bigger than ever before. I am close to making a decision. We are all set for it.” Trump made his remarks on Thursday as oil prices once again surged past the symbolic $100 for a barrel of Brent crude, the international benchmark, and amid indications the price could go higher still. He acknowledged that such a decision would have consequences but said he had not yet made a final determination. Israel “would join in two minutes if I ask them to”, he added, before saying: “We don’t need anybody.” Hours later the US carried out a 13th consecutive night of strikes on Iran lasting more ⁠than two hours. Iranian state media reported explosions along the strait of Hormuz in Qeshm and Bandar Abbas, as well as to the north-west of the country and in Tehran. The strikes however appeared to broadly match the scope and intensity of those the US has carried throughout the most recent escalation of violence. Trump’s comments on Thursday followed the earlier threat of “major military punishment” against Iran and the Houthis, after the Iran-backed Yemeni militia’s attacks on two Saudi Arabian oil tankers in the Red Sea. Underlining the sense of a region increasingly approaching an abyss, the UN secretary general, António Guterres, told the security council that the Middle East was being pushed to the “edge of the unimaginable” amid mounting fears over the trajectory of the conflict. “The situation is getting out of control. It is teetering on the edge of the unimaginable. The region is being pulled into an ever-widening circle of confrontation. One crisis feeds another. One escalation triggers the next,” Guterres told a security council meeting. “As this dynamic spreads, the political objectives are becoming increasingly obscured by the confrontation itself.” The UK announced it was temporarily withdrawing diplomatic staff from Iran on Wednesday, and the German military announced on Thursday that it would withdraw two vessels from the Red Sea. And as Israeli cities opened bomb shelters, the US state department warned Americans living in the region that flights may be cancelled. In a separate development, Trump clarified on Thursday that an announced agreement that the US would help Saudi Arabia with its civilian nuclear programme would require the kingdom to normalise relations with Israel through the Abraham Accords, a move Saudi Arabia has long resisted until there is demonstrable movement on Palestinian rights and statehood. It emerged later that Trump had not spoken to Saudi Arabia about the new condition. The Houthi attacks threatened the safety of a second major maritime route connecting the Suez canal to the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden. They also came amid reports that Iran had sent military advisers and drone parts to the Houthis 10 days ago. Quoting four sources, including two Iranians, Reuters reported on Thursday that Iran had transferred Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps personnel and military-related equipment on a flight from Tehran to Yemen on 13 July, as Tehran was calling for the Houthis to blockade the Bab el-Mandeb strait. Ships had begun turning back from sailing through the narrow strait this week after the Houthis announced a blockade of Saudi ports, most notably the Red Sea port of Yanbu, which Riyadh has been using to ship oil to Asia during the conflict that has all but halted shipping through the strait of Hormuz. The maritime data and analysis firm Lloyd’s List Intelligence said the Houthi attacks put Saudi oil shipments from Yanbu at risk and presented a “double whammy” on top of the Hormuz disruptions, , adding that the Houthi threat “raises questions on the viability of this route”. Trump wrote on social media: “If [the Houthis] do this again, the US will hold Iran responsible, in that the Houthis are a Surrogate and/or Proxy of Iran, and major military punishment will be inflicted upon Iran and, of course, the Houthis, themselves.” The Houthis’ Saba news agency said the rebels had struck two tankers, the Encelia and the Layla, causing fires on both. There were no reports of casualties in their first reported attack on a vessel since they announced the blockade of Saudi-linked shipping. The Bab el-Mandeb is a vital shipping chokepoint connecting the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden. About 12% of the world’s trade, including a fourth of global container traffic, passes through there, moving between Europe and Asia via the Suez canal at the northern end of the Red Sea. Trump has been escalating his rhetoric against Iran in recent days, hinting the US is prepared to bomb an underground tunnel complex at the “Pickaxe mountain” site where Israel alleges Tehran has hidden centrifuges used in uranium enrichment. As Trump has struggled to get a grip on the spiralling crisis, during which Iran has occasionally launched lethal strikes against US bases and Washington’s Gulf allies, he appears to have been sucked into an “escalation trap”, threatening ever more violent retaliation. On Wednesday, Trump said the US would destroy one bridge or power plant every time Iran shot at a ship in the strait. The US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, said Trump was seeking a “head for an eye” after the recent deaths of several US service members in an Iranian strike on the Muwaffaq Salti airbase in Jordan. However, speaking on the outskirts of the Asean conference in Manila, Rubio said Iran was “begging for a deal”, and insisted “they need to come to their senses” and that they will “pay a very heavy price for the things they are doing” – all claims US officials have made before. With Trump’s poll ratings in freefall, and his war against Iran deeply unpopular at home, the president and his administration are running short of time before the autumn midterm elections to find a resolution to the conflict on Washington’s terms. Underlining Trump’s growing political problems, the US House of Representatives narrowly passed a resolution on Thursday to halt US military action in Iran, the second such warning to the president.