Death toll in Russian overnight attack on Kyiv rises to 17 killed – Europe live
Meanwhile, the death toll following a Russian drone and missile attack on Kyiv has risen to 17, Ukraine’s emergency services said.
Russia ‘mounted drone surveillance of European nuclear sites over 18 months’
The Kremlin orchestrated a concerted surveillance campaign using drones launched from shadow fleet vessels over an 18-month period which targeted nuclear sites in the UK, France, Belgium and the Netherlands, researchers have said. Analysis by the International Institute of Strategic Studies (IISS) of 144 incidents in more than a dozen countries beginning in late 2024 concluded Russian intelligence had operated with “substantial impunity”, leaving authorities across Europe flat-footed and confused. Drones were repeatedly spotted over airbases and airports, yet none were captured or shot down by western militaries, exposing a strategic failure in Nato air defences that the thinktank said had been quietly acknowledged across Europe. RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk, a UK base that was being prepared to house US nuclear weapons, and France’s nuclear submarine base at Île Longue in Brittany were among the sites targeted by unarmed drones believed to have been launched at sea. European governments have been reluctant to accuse Russia of being behind the incidents, but Charlie Edwards, a senior IISS fellow, said “every government we spoke to said they would welcome the report being published”. The incidents analysed include: • Unusual drones flew low into RAF Lakenheath, RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire and at least two other US air force bases in England in late November 2024. US nuclear weapons were deployed at Lakenheath in July 2025. The drones may have been piloted from the Seasons 1 tanker in the North Sea near Essex, or the Hav Dolphin , a cargo vessel that was sailing towards Hull docks at the time. The Hav Dophin was also suspected of being behind drone sightings at a submarine base in northern Germany the following May. A police helicopter attempted to track drones flying into the UK on one occasion but pulled back for safety reasons. Firing an anti-drone laser “was suggested but ultimately not progressed”, the report said. • Five drones were detected over France’s Île Longue base, home to the country’s sea-launched nuclear missile arsenal, in December 2025. Three Russia-linked shadow fleet vessels were between 60 and 120 miles (100 to 200km) off shore, and the Hav Dolphin was 220 miles away near the Isle of Wight. • Drone incursions in November and December 2025 over Kleine-Brogel airbase in Belgium and Volkel in the Netherlands, where air-launched US nuclear weapons are stored, at a time when Russia-linked shadow fleet vessels were in international waters in the North Sea. Drones were likely to have been launched from “dark sailing” vessels operating off the coast of target countries with their transponder tracking devices switched off, the report said. Other ships are thought to have acted as recovery vessels or signal repeaters using drone control techniques first learned during the war in Ukraine. “It is our assessment that it is highly likely that the Kremlin conducted a coordinated UAV [unmanned aerial vehicle] campaign over Europe” spanning more than a dozen Nato countries and Ireland, Edwards said. It represented “a series of tactical successes for the Kremlin” and “a strategic failure of allied defences” which were designed for conventional military threats rather than low-cost, low-flying and relatively small drones, he said. Russian motivations are considered to be a mixture of nuclear surveillance, general reconnaissance, mapping military logistics and supply chains and “economic attrition and psychological warfare”, he said. Significant drone sightings across Europe peaked last year at more than 30 in September and again in November, with the most occurring in Germany. They appeared to have fallen off since European navies began to seize shadow fleet vessels in 2026. Other incidents include a series of drone sightings in September 2025 in Denmark that forced the closure of Copenhagen airport and others in the country. Four shadow fleet tankers were sailing near Denmark at the time, including the Boracay, which French commandos seized four days later. The Boracay was released a few days later, but the boarding revealed that the tanker had a Chinese captain and two Russian nationals employed by the Moran Security Group, a Russian private military company. “The identification of two Russian private military contractors confirmed the militarisation of shadow fleet tankers, not as hypothesis but as operational practice,” the IISS report said – in a campaign that it is believed to have been orchestrated by the GRU, Russia’s main foreign military intelligence agency. The researchers also suggested four drones had been spotted flying over an Irish navy ship towards the country’s coast in December 2025, on the evening after a visit by Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy. The Maltese-flagged Vezhen was sailing about 30 miles north-west of Dublin. Swedish authorities had detained the vessel in January 2025 in connection with damage to an undersea fibre-optic cable but released it after the incident was deemed to have been accidental. Several drone models are believed to have been used in the campaign, though none have been confirmed. The Orlan-10, a reconnaissance drone, has an operating range of 300 miles and can fly for about 12 hours, allowing it to be launched and piloted at a considerable distance from targets.
Thursday briefing: Why Britain must adapt to the new age of warfare or risk falling behind
It is a modern dystopia: a group of young men gathered around computer screens in a hidden bunker searching for someone to kill. On their screens, a soldier realises he has been spotted as he moves through heavily forested frontlines. It is too late. The screens go blank as the drone explodes. In eastern Ukraine, scenes like this play out every day on both sides of the conflict. The rise of new drone technology, particularly fibre optic first-person drones, has changed war for ever. Expensive tanks, aircraft and multimillion-pound logistics equipment can be destroyed in an instant. Upgrading the UK’s drone warfare capabilities were a key part of the government’s new defence strategy, which was announced by outgoing prime minister Keir Starmer on Tuesday ahead of next week’s Nato summit in Turkey. An extra £5bn will be spent on drones that operate on land, sea and air, but some military experts are still questioning whether it is enough. For today’s First Edition, I spoke with senior international correspondent Luke Harding, who has reported extensively from Ukraine, about the new menace of drone technology – and whether the UK has really woken up to the threat they pose. But first, the headlines. Five big stories UK news | The NHS will have to divert £45bn from essential services to pay for new medicines under the terms of the UK-US trade deal agreed last December, leading to more than 200,000 avoidable deaths of patients, analysis has found. UK politics | Andy Burnham is being urged to adopt an “economic populist” approach to combating the cost of living crisis if he becomes prime minister, as a detailed opinion poll shows radical policies could help Labour to retain its majority at the next election. US news | Donald Trump has again been accused of “brazen crypto corruption” after financial disclosures revealed his family’s cryptocurrency ventures generated more than $1bn. Environment | The month of June was the warmest in England on record, driven by a searing heatwave in the final days of the month, according to Met Office data. World news | Four Venezuelan police officers have been arrested and are facing dismissal after being accused of looting from a building that collapsed during last week’s devastating twin earthquakes. In depth: ‘You cannot outrun them. It’s like Blade Runner meets the first world war’ At first glance, the fibre optic cables look like spider webs. Draped over trees and bushes in eastern Ukraine, the tiny strands of glass and plastics glisten in the sun – but they provide the digital connectivity that otherwise makes the drones almost undetectable, and crucially unhackable. The cables stretch for miles: with the drones on the other end buzzing over enemy territory on the hunt for targets. The technology has played a key role in holding back Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Despite being vastly outnumbered, the momentum is now with Kyiv, according to several military analysts. Daily drone attacks by Ukraine on Russian infrastructure are causing chaos and fuel shortages. There are widespread reports that Vladimir Putin is fearful of an assassination attempt from the sky, particularly in the wake of Ukraine’s “operation Spiderweb” attack last year on Russian airbases, when drones destroyed dozens of Russian bombers and aircraft. In eastern Ukraine, soldiers on the frontline live in fear of a buzz from the sky. When attacks are recorded, a target’s final moments are often uploaded on social media once they are struck, to cause humiliation. In the future, British soldiers will probably face the same threats in a conflict. “I cannot overstate how terrifying these drones are,” says Luke. “On my most recent trip to Ukraine, I went to Zaporizhzhia to see a Ukrainian reconnaissance drone unit. We were outside taking photos of them and an FPV drone appeared on the tree line and turned towards us. We didn’t know if it was Russian or Ukrainian so we all threw ourselves back in the dugout. Thankfully, it was Ukrainian. But you cannot outrun them. It’s a bit like Blade Runner meets the first world war.” *** The implications are terrifying Luke insists that the drone age is already with us – and the UK must react. The major disruption of Gatwick airport by drones in 2018 remains the most high profile incident involving the technology, causing hundreds of flight cancellations when a drone was reportedly spotted near a runway. Defence chiefs are especially concerned about future drone attacks from Russia, particularly once the war in Ukraine comes to an end. Last summer, Russian drones entering Polish airspace caused panic and a huge air response from the Nato military alliance as they scrambled to shoot them down. “There’s pretty compelling evidence that Russia is using its shadow fleet to send drones to overfly airports, ports and military facilities in western Europe. Russia thinks it is at war with the west in a rolling, existential struggle with European countries, particularly the UK. For whatever reason, they really hate the UK. It’s portrayed by state TV as a place of unsleeping, tea-drinking spies who wake up every morning plotting to destroy and humiliate Russia,” he says. “This fear of Russia is not imaginary.” But hostile states are not the only potential threat. Organised crime and terror groups are likely to try to use the technology to target the UK, too, says Luke. “The new drone technology has enormous implications for criminal gangs and terrorism. I remember back in the 90s when the IRA managed to fire a mortar at Downing Street. Now, if you send in 20 drones and two get through, that’s a success. The implications are terrifying,” he says. *** A horrifying insight into war in 2026 The rise of drone technology is also changing what a soldier looks like, says Luke. “Weedy gamers” who are often best at operating drones due to their experience playing video games have become crucial fighters in Ukraine. The headsets and goggles they would usually use for the PlayStation and Xbox have become tools of war. “Forget the macho guy with a serrated knife. Think of a bloke in a basement with a latte tracking a drone on a screen,” says Luke. A documentary film about life inside one of these units in Ukraine was recently produced by the Kyiv Independent, and shows young men vaping and playing with pet kittens as they hunt for Russian soldiers on their monitors. The film is a horrifying insight into war in 2026 – and it is likely a division that other militaries will seek to replicate to keep their countries safe. Luke says that part of the UK’s investment in drone technology could come in the form of a new drone division staffed by some of the country’s best video gamers. “We need a Royal Naval Drone College in Greenwich where we hire a whole load of gamers and train them. They then become the drone squadron,” he says. *** Tough decisions on funding defence Once Keir Starmer’s successor is in place, they will face tough decisions about how to fund new defence spending – including on drones. With a £4.7bn black hole in the budget for Starmer’s replacement, which will almost certainly be Andy Burnham, the new leader may be tempted to trim spending, rather than look to tax rises – which will inevitably raise more questions about how the government balances the competing demands of the defence department with the needs of a population already squeezed to breaking point since 2008. Of the £300bn total investment to go into the UK’s armed forces over the next four years, £5bn has been pledged towards our drone capabilities – but anyone tempted by expensive tanks over drones should think again. Indeed, at the Nato summit in Turkey next week, many leaders will want to impress US president Donald Trump with investments in new tanks, fighter jets and other expensive military equipment. But war has changed for ever, says Luke, and Nato leaders have to be alive to that fact. “The invasion of Ukraine has transformed all wars in the 21st century. They are completely different to things that governments have previously prepared for. Whether it’s battle cruisers or armoured vehicles, these big-ticket items are becoming obsolete. They are dodos. You can take even a cheap first-person view drone and destroy a lot of this equipment – or anything else that moves on the ground. This has profound consequences,” he says. What else we’ve been reading I cannot and will not stop watching videos of Neil the seal, a 1,000kg play-fighting elephant seal wreaking havoc on the streets of Tasmania. Michael Ammar Kalia has had quite the week rampaging through London’s themed bars. The podcast-inspired bar is my idea of hell, but I will definitely check out the Cayote Ugly Saloon. Patrick George Monbiot’s column on the class politics of extreme heat is searing. From one UK study he references, he concludes that “steady temperatures are the preserve of the rich.” Michael World Cup 2026 On the pitch England 2-1 DR Congo | England will face Mexico in the last 16 on Sunday after Harry Kane rescued his team with two late goals to leave the Democratic Republic of the Congo, who had taken an early lead in Atlanta, heartbroken. Belgium 3-2 Senegal | Youri Tielemans scored twice, including a late equaliser and an extra-time winner from the penalty spot, as Belgium came from behind to win a thrilling encounter in Seattle. USA 2-0 Bosnia and Herzegovina | Folarin Balogun scored and was then sent off but the co-hosts still progressed to the last 16, where they will play Belgium. Off the pitch USA | With more than 3 million people born outside the US, from more than 150 countries, New York City is home to football fans of every denomination. Adam Gabbatt meets locals with a serious case of World Cup fever. Mexico | Three people have died from suffocation in Mexico City, as thousands of fans crowded the streets during World Cup celebrations following Mexico’s 2-0 victory over Ecuador. World Cup Daily podcast | Want to digest the England result in good company? Max and Barry are hard at work in North America throughout the tournament producing an episode of the Guardian’s football podcast every day. Listen to the latest episode here. Today’s Fixtures Spain v Austria, 8pm on BBC Portugal v Croatia, midnight on BBC Switzerland v Algeria, 4am on BBC Sport Tennis | Novak Djokovic defeated Stefanos Tsitsipas 6-3, 6-4, 6-2 to reach the third round at Wimbledon. The front pages “US trade deal on medicines will cost the NHS £45bn”, is the Guardian’s front page today. The Times says “Burnham’s first job will be to find £7bn of cuts”, and the Telegraph has “Defence black hole triples to £15bn”. The i Paper has “Rayner fights for Cabinet return with housing job pitch to Burnham”, the FT leads with “BlueCrest questions UK as a business destination after £200mn tax defeat”, and the Mail says “Fresh fury at prostate betrayal”. The headline in the Express is “I fear for my safety after gang boss is freed”. On the World Cup, the Sun’s splash is “Cong phew!”, and the Mirror says “That was Tuch and go, Harry.” The Latest Crypto, Bibles and watches: how Trump made over $2bn last year Donald Trump cashed in on more than $2bn from crypto and other business ventures last year. As the US races to become the self‑declared ‘crypto capital of the world’, the president and his family have turned digital tokens, meme coins and merchandise into an unprecedented revenue stream. But just how rich can a sitting US president get? Lucy Hough speaks to the Guardian reporter Aisha Down. Cartoon of the day | Ben Jennings The Upside A bit of good news to remind you that the world’s not all bad Music-lovers from across Europe one again flocked to Paris for its annual Fête de la Musique this summer, offering an opportunity to celebrate how Black culture is now gaining recognition in the French capital and beyond. In this week’s edition of The Long Wave newsletter, Morgan Ofori explores how Paris draws together communities from west, central and north Africa, as well as the Caribbean, and creates a new space: “A city where ideas, languages and traditions from across Africa and its diasporas meet, evolve and become newly visible.” Sign up to the Long Wave here 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. Martin Belam’s Thursday news quiz Quick crossword Cryptic crossword Wordiply
‘It’s peak tick season!’ Should Charli xcx really have been lolling around in long grass?
Do we need to worry about ticks in the UK? How serious are the risks associated with the diseases they can carry? Should we avoid rolling around in long grass à la Charli xcx in the video for her latest single, Wink Wink? These are questions that have been circulating on social media this week, after the release of the pop star’s video, filmed in Essex, and sightings of celebrity couples Zoë Kravitz and Harry Styles and Sarah Pidgeon and Joe Alwyn lounging in the long grass on Hampstead Heath in London. Charli xcx responded to one fan’s concerns on her Instagram stories: “i won’t lie i was really stressed about this.” While some social media users were quick to brush off these worries, being alert to the presence of ticks is important, according to Julia Knight, who works for Lyme Disease UK. She says Lyme disease is the most common tick-borne disease, adding: “We’re at the peak of tick season at the moment.” And while tick populations are generally associated with heathland and forests, Knight says: “They have been found in urban parks and gardens.” So what is a tick? Despite their insect-like appearance, ticks are arachnids – like spiders and scorpions – and feed on the blood of mammals and birds. When a tick finds something (or someone) to feed on, it will cut into its host’s skin and insert its feeding tube. Depending on its species, it may also secrete a cement-like substance as it feeds, which helps to keep it in place, and makes it harder to remove cleanly. A tick bite will generally cause only minor irritation. The main danger is the risk of contracting the diseases ticks can transmit. If left untreated, Lyme disease can have serious consequences, including heart problems, pain and swelling in joints and nerve pain. The number of ticks has been on the rise in England in recent years, as well as in the rest of the UK, while rates of Lyme disease have risen steadily since the first confirmed case in the UK in 1985. Infected ticks can be found in every county of the UK, but some areas are known to pose a higher risk, including the Scottish Highlands, south and south-west England, and parts of East Anglia. However, the reason we don’t see the same rates of Lyme disease (the most common tick-borne disease) in the UK as documented in, say, France and Germany, Knight says, is that “we just don’t know how many cases we have each year,” as official figures are based on laboratory-confirmed cases. When the symptoms of the disease are obvious (this usually means a red rash forming a ring around the bite, often referred to as a bull’s eye rash), there is no need for a doctor to take a blood test before prescribing antibiotics. These cases do not get officially counted. This “uptick” in cases, Knight tells me, groaning at her own pun, can be attributed to a heating climate. Typically, “tick season” would have been between early spring and late autumn, but warmer winters have meant that ticks can stay active all year. Work is being done to create vaccines and drugs to tackle Lyme disease, but for now, the best advice is to take precautions when you are in grassy or wooded areas. This means covering your skin as much as possible, sticking to pathways, using repellant, and checking your skin for ticks after potential exposure. Knight advises scanning your entire body thoroughly, because, at the “nymph stage”, the creatures can be smaller than poppy seeds and even at their largest after a blood meal are no bigger than a baked bean. Ticks are drawn to the warmest parts of our bodies and can be lodged in hidden crevices, so check between toes, behind knees, under armpits and between your legs. If you have been lying down in long grass, or if you are checking a child whose head may have brushed against grass, check hairlines and behind the ears. If you do find a tick on you, NHS advice is to remove it as soon as possible, grasping it as close to your skin as you can and pulling slowly upwards with fine-tipped tweezers or a tick-removal tool so as not to squeeze or crush it. Ideally, you want to get it all out in one go. You need to seek medical attention only if you then develop a rash or start to feel unwell: flu-like symptoms can be associated with Lyme disease, even if you don’t have a rash. While I laughed out loud at a parasite-related meme shared on Reddit of a tick at a computer, typing the popular social media retort “touch grass”, we don’t need to stop spending time in nature. Anyone who wants to canoodle with a loved one in Hampstead Heath’s long grass “definitely can still go and do that,” says ecologist Dr Bethan Purse, who researches tick-borne infections. “They just need to have an eye on it.”
Valuable Spanish painting left on street salvaged by man who liked its frame
The mystery of a small and very valuable picture by the Spanish artist Joaquín Sorolla that vanished over the weekend has been solved after a man told police he had mistaken the painting for junk when he found it on a Seville street but rescued it because he liked the frame. Rather than being entranced by the painting’s subject matter – two boats off a beach – Andrés Hurtado was instead captivated by its handsome gold frame. What Hurtado, 57, did not know when he happened across the work last Saturday was that it was a painting by Sorolla, a late 19th- and early 20th-century Spanish artist renowned for his mastery of light and his beach scenes. Nor did he know that the painting belonged to a Seville family who have owned it for many years, and who were in the habit of taking it on holiday with them. They had intended to pack the picture into the boot of their car as they headed to the beach but had accidentally left it leaning against a wall and driven off. By the time they realised what had happened, the painting was gone. Despite putting up posters appealing for information to help them locate “a painting of great sentimental value” – but carefully avoiding any mention of Sorolla or the picture’s value – they drew a blank until Tuesday. It has subsequently emerged that Hurtado, who lives 325 miles (525km) away in Murcia, had found the painting while in Seville with his family for the weekend and assumed someone had thrown it out. “We picked it up because of the frame, not because of the painting,” he told Radio Sevilla on Wednesday. After taking it back to Murcia, he set about researching the picture using AI and learned that it could be a Sorolla. “The AI came up with some crazy prices, so I looked online and called an auction house in Madrid,” Hurtado told El Mundo. “I sent them pictures and they came back to me very quickly, saying it was an original Sorolla.” But his time with the painting – valued at up to €150,000 (£130,000) – was short-lived. When news reached him of the “stolen” painting, complete with a picture supplied by the owners, he knew what he had to do. “I rang the police straight away and told them the news wasn’t true,” he told the paper. “I told them I hadn’t stolen it but just picked it up in the street.” Police have now returned the painting to the family in Seville, who have promised Hurtado a “small present” by way of thanks. “They told me there was a lot of traffic [on Saturday] and that all the other cars were beeping at them,” he said. “They got anxious and left the painting leaning against the wall.” It was not the first time in recent months that a valuable Spanish work of art had suffered a transport hiccup. In October last year, police set about searching for a small Picasso still life worth €600,000 after the painting appeared to vanish while en route from Madrid to an exhibition in Granada. The painting was recovered three weeks later after police discovered it had never left Madrid and had been inadvertently scooped up by one of its owner’s neighbours who had mistaken it for a forgotten delivery and taken it in for safekeeping.
Ukraine war briefing: More than 2 million military casualties caused by Russia’s invasion, study finds
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has caused more than 2 million military casualties, with Moscow’s forces bearing the brunt of the losses, according to an American thinktank. The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) estimates that between 400,000 and 450,000 Russian troops have been killed since Moscow invaded Ukraine in February 2022, out of a total of 1.4 million casualties that were killed, wounded or are missing. Ukrainian forces have meanwhile suffered between 125,000 and 150,000 fatalities out of between 525,000 and 625,000 casualties during the same period, CSIS said on Wednesday. “Russian fatalities in Ukraine are more than four times greater than all US fatalities in all wars combined since world war two,” it added, while the ratio of Russian to Ukrainian casualties has likely risen to about eight to one in the first half of this year. Russia launched an intense missile and drone attack on Kyiv overnight to Thursday, killing at least eight people and injuring dozens more. The large-scale strikes hit residential buildings in the Ukrainian capital and triggered a fire in a hotel on a central boulevard. People were trapped in a damaged nine-storey residential building while the roof of another high-rise apartment block was on fire, said Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko. He said the first to sixth floors of an apartment building collapsed after a direct hit and urged residents to remain in shelters, which were crowded with people amid Russia’s worst attack on the country since mid-June. At least eight people had been killed, said Kyiv’s military administration chief, Tymur Tkachenko, and a local official later said 56 more had been injured. Russia’s defence ministry said the attack, as well as strikes on several regions including Poltava and Dnipropetrovsk, were in retaliation for Ukrainian attacks on civil infrastructure. Russia has started seaborne imports of petrol from India, Reuters quoted two industry sources as saying on Wednesday, in a bid to mitigate nationwide fuel shortages triggered by Ukrainian attacks on its energy infrastructure. Russia’s energy ministry and India’s oil ministry did not immediately respond to Reuters requests for comment. The news agency quoted an industry source as saying at least 60,000 metric tons of gasoline had been sent from India to Russia, while another source said two tankers – carrying 30,000 to 40,000 tons each – had been sent. The claims could not immediately be verified. Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy, meanwhile, said Kyiv’s forces struck Russia’s major Ufa oil refinery in the Bashkortostan region for the second time in a week. German prosecutors said they had brought charges against a suspect in the 2022 sabotage of the Nord Stream gas pipeline linking Russia with Europe. Federal prosecutors confirmed to Agence France-Presse that a man had been charged over the explosion, with German media reporting that he was a Ukrainian national said to be the head of the team that carried out the operation. They said he was the same suspect who was arrested in summer 2025 in Italy and extradited to Germany the following November. Zelenskyy has said his government knew nothing about any plan to blow up the pipelines. Ukrainian arms manufacturers will be able to export products and components under a new framework that channels a percentage of revenues into a state defence fund, the prime minister said, as Kyiv seeks to raise funds for its burgeoning weapons industry. The scheme would levy 20% of proceeds from finished defence goods and 30% from components, Yulia Svyrydenko said on X on Wednesday. She said manufacturers would have to prove their capability to fulfil Ukrainian defence orders and export contracts simultaneously, and restrictions would apply to items placed on a list of critical goods.
China has accused Japan of ‘reckless militarism’. What’s behind the latest tensions?
Relations between Tokyo and Beijing have ebbed and flowed in the decades since the second world war, but hit an undeniable low this week. Denouncing what it proclaimed was Japan’s “reckless pursuit of ‘new militarism’”, this week China imposed new export controls on 40 Japanese companies over dual-use items, or items that can be used for both civilian and military purposes. The move came as Tokyo protested against joint exercises by Chinese and Russian bombers near its airspace, and claims that the Chinese coast guard had entered its Exclusive Economic Zone. Japan also announced it was deploying missiles launchers on its easternmost island. What has sparked the tit-for-tat tensions, and is an off-ramp likely? What led to the latest tensions? In November 2025, less than three weeks after taking office, Japanese prime minister Sanae Takaichi sparked controversy when she said that an attack on Taiwan could trigger the deployment of her country’s self-defence forces if the conflict posed an existential threat to Japan. Takaichi’s comments were not a deviation from official policy, but in the past Japanese leaders have avoided commenting on potential Japanese military involvement in Taiwan. Beijing’s response was swift and furious: it accused Takaichi of interfering in domestic Chinese affairs, implemented economic sanctions, cancelled diplomatic meetings and discouraged its citizens from visiting Japan. Flights have been reduced, academic and cultural exchanges cancelled, while a ban on the import of Japanese seafood has been continued. Do Japan and China have a history of hostility? Despite being colonised and exploited by foreign powers including Britain, France, the United States, Russia, and Germany, China feels keenly its suffering at the hands of the Japanese, a much smaller Asian neighbour that it influenced culturally and linguistically. Beijing believes Tokyo has never sufficiently apologised for Japan’s brutal second-war occupation of China. It is this wound that China evokes when it accuses Japan of remilitarising and threatening regional peace. Dozens of apologies have been made by Japanese prime ministers, cabinet members and major corporations, along with expressions of remorse by emperors and other senior figures. But Japan falls short in comparison with Germany, which went to extraordinary lengths to learn from its wartime history. At the same time, visits by Japanese politicians to Yasukuni Shrine, where the souls of “Class A war criminals” who were convicted of plotting and waging the war are said to be enshrined, fuel claims the nation is still in denial about a dark chapter in its history. Is Japan pursuing ‘neo-militarism’? China’s growing assertiveness and concerns about whether Japan can rely on the US under Donald Trump are driving its push to boost its defence capabilities. Japan has increased its defence budget by 9.4% to around $58bn this year, as it moves towards a target of spending 2% of GDP. Revisions of the pacifist clause in Japan’s constitution, imposed postwar by the US, is a longstanding mission of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party’s right wing, of which Takaichi is a part. They argue that its restrictions on Japan’s ability to defend itself against a more powerful China and a nuclear-armed North Korea are unrealistic in the face of current geopolitical realities. Though China’s spending on defence is nearly five times larger than Japan’s at $275bn, its huge population makes its per capita spending lower, something Beijing emphasises in its claims about Japanese remilitarisation. However, many observers believe China understates its defence budget, partly by reclassifying military research and other related spending. How have tensions affected trade, and is a rapprochement likely? Frosty relations have hurt commerce. China has restricted rare earth exports (and recently arrested two Japanese nationals it accuses of flouting those regulations). Chinese tourist visits to Japan dropped 45% in February, while Japanese films have seen lucrative releases in China nixed. Despite vacillating political temperatures over the decades, business between the two continues to expand, topping $322bn in 2025. Though there are concerns about longer-term impacts, bilateral trade continued to grow in the first five months of this year. Ultimately, this economic interdependence may halt further escalation. Japanese diplomatic efforts are now focused on rapprochement via an expected meeting between Takaichi and China’s Xi Jinping at the APEC summit in Shenzhen this November. But senior Chinese figures, including foreign ministry spokesperson Lin Jian, have repeatedly called for Takaichi to withdraw her comments on Taiwan, something she will be loath to do given how popular they were with her supporters.
New Zealand finally gets a Google Maps tool that correctly pronounces Māori placenames
For years, Māori placenames have been distorted into nearly unrecognisable sounds by Google Maps in New Zealand. For those with attuned ears, it can be grating or offensive. Now the Māori language commission – Te Taura Whiri i te Reo Māori – has collaborated with Google to fix it, launching a New Zealand-accented voice for its navigation tool that can correctly pronounce Māori words. It is the culmination of a project that has been years in the making. “We can’t underestimate just how important this is in terms of normalising te reo Māori [Māori language],” Ngahiwi Apanui-Barr, the commission’s chief executive, told the Guardian. “When everybody who is learning te reo Māori, or who speaks the language, hears those placenames being used, their language journey is being supported.” While the government is pushing policies to limit the language in the public service, te reo Māori has undergone a major resurgence in the past decade. There are extensive waiting lists for classes, Māori songs often top the charts and Hollywood studios are releasing versions of movies in Māori. Māori is the second most widely spoken language in New Zealand, after English, according to the 2023 census. Between 2018 and 2023, there was a 15% increase in the number of Māori speakers. Apanui-Barr said he “giggled with glee” when he listened to the placenames being pronounced properly. “It just spoke directly to my heart, to hear my language being pronounced properly on an app … this is the future of my language, is one of the foundations we need to have in place, because if people hear the language being pronounced properly, they are going to say it properly too.” The project was an example of how a public organisation can work with a private sector company to do a “really good job”, Apanui-Barr said. The Google project has prioritised cities, towns and certain street names for its launch, with the goal of expanding into more roads and regions. In 2017, Google and telecommunications company Vodafone (now One NZ) launched a campaign, with support from the language commission, calling on the public to pinpoint which Māori names were being mispronounced. Google said it would correct the tool by the end of that year. More than 60,000 corrections were submitted but technological hurdles led to delays. Advancements in AI text-to-speech models have now enabled the project to get off the ground, said Caroline Rainsford from Google New Zealand. The model is not bilingual – it is English – but draws on the data of sounds and names, guided by the commission and publicly available New Zealand Geographic Board data. A voice actor was hired to record a large script of te reo Māori sounds, which then feeds the model. The commission retains guardianship of that data, to ensure Māori academics, researchers and communities can access the lexicon. A number of other countries are on the waitlist for voice capture of their Indigenous languages, and projects are under way in Australia and the US. Rainsford said technology plays an important role in the use and advancement of te reo Māori, and she was proud New Zealanders would now hear “a Kiwi voice” during navigation. “And [they] are going to be able to hear really incredible pronunciation of our very sacred placenames in New Zealand.”