US Central Command said that at 4.45pm ET it had begun a third consecutive night of strikes against Iran at Donald Trump’s direction. “These strikes will continue imposing a heavy cost on Iranian forces and degrade their ability to attack innocent civilians and commercial shipping in the Strait of Hormuz,” Centcom said in a post on X.
EU sanctions nine people, four entities over Russian cyber espionage. The issue issued new sanctions over Russia’s “malicious cyber ecosystem targeting the EU, its member states and international partners”. UK sanctions 24 individuals and entities behind Russia’s destructive hybrid operations. The UK also updated its sanctions for those behind these operations, including an attempt to disrupt Poland’s electricity grid last year. Leaders arrive for Ukraine talks in Paris. British prime minister Keir Starmer, Nato secretary general Mark Rutte, Polish prime minister Donald Tusk and Denmark’s Mette Frederiksen were all present in Paris. Hungary MPs pass constitutional tweak to oust Orban-allied president. New prime minister Péter Magyar accused president Tamas Sulyok of being a “puppet” of hardline ex-leader Viktor Orbán. Russian anti-war politician summoned to court ahead of elections. Boris Nadezhdin, 63, was detained by police on Monday and ordered to stand before a court on Friday on “demonstration of extremist symbols” charges after planning to take part in the upcoming elections. UK joins 90bn EU loan to cover Ukraine’s defence. Prime minister Keir Startmer has announced a £78m loan to cover Kyiv’s most urgent defence and budgetary needs in 2026. Ukraine orders fighter jets and licence to produce French missiles, Macron says. Ukraine has acquired new French-made air defence systems, including 16 Rafale fighter jets.
Ukraine and nine other countries including the UK, Germany and France are to build a shared protection programme for Europe against ballistic missiles, using Kyiv’s experience in fighting Russia’s full-scale invasion for more than four years. “Our goal is to build a shared ballistic missile defence capability for Europe,” the 10 nations said in a statement on Monday as leaders met the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, for talks in Paris. The announcement came as the UK also signed up to participate in the EU’s €90bn (£77bn) support loan for Ukraine, meaning UK firms will be able to provide more weapons paid for by the funds. The move is the latest push by the EU and Britain to work more closely after Britain quit the bloc in 2020 as a result of the Brexit vote. The French leader, Emmanuel Macron, also announced after the meeting that the Multinational Force for Ukraine, to be deployed in the event of a ceasefire between Ukraine and Russia, will hold exercises in neighbouring countries in the coming months “to validate our deployment plans and demonstrate that we are ready, determined and credible”. Zelenskyy arrived in Paris on Monday keen to accelerate efforts with European countries to develop Ukraine’s air defences before winter, when Russia usually intensifies its attacks to deny Ukrainians electricity, heat and water. He asked the leaders of several European countries to join in developing measures against Russia’s missile attacks that have pummelled Ukraine and made the rest of Europe wary of Moscow’s wider ambitions on the continent. The coalition for anti-ballistic defence, which also includes Denmark, Italy, the Netherlands, Sweden, Norway and Spain, said it recognised “the growing threat posed by ballistic missiles”, which are harder to stop than cruise missiles or drones. The anti-ballistic programme would involve “an integrated missile defence architecture, to deter and neutralise future missile threats”, the statement said. “We recognise Ukraine’s unique experience, gained through its defence against the war of aggression waged by Russia.” But no timeframe for the anti-ballistic programme was given. Zelenskyy was also expected to meet national security advisers and defence companies that could take part. The British prime minister, Keir Starmer, said the UK’s move to join the EU support loan for Ukraine was crucial. “This agreement will help ensure Ukraine gets the support it needs to defend itself against Russian aggression, while backing British defence companies, supporting skilled jobs and strengthening our national security,” he said in a statement. Britain would provide “a fair and proportionate contribution to the costs arising from borrowing, commensurate with the value of contracts awarded to UK companies”, according to a joint statement from London and Brussels. Last month, the EU started paying out the large two-year loan to Ukraine that will go towards buying weapons for its forces and plugging budget shortfalls. An initial €6bn from the loan will go towards helping bolster the production of drones for Kyiv’s forces. The desperately needed funds come as Ukraine appears to be turning the tide in the four-year war by stabilising the frontline and striking deep inside Russia. Meanwhile, Macron warned European countries against go-it-alone national defence policies, as governments ramp up military spending in response to Russia’s threat and pressure from the US to increase military spending. His comments came a month after the collapse of a Franco-German project to develop a next-generation fighter jet after months of deadlock between defence companies, underscoring the industrial rivalries that risk undermining Europe’s drive to rearm together. “Every time we create fragmentation, we may feel good in the moment, but we are creating the delays of tomorrow. Every time we pander to nationalism, in France or elsewhere, we misunderstand our own history. Patriotism, yes; nationalism, never,” Macron said in his annual address to the French armed forces on the eve of Bastille Day, France’s national day.
Donald Trump has once again threatened to take control of the strait of Hormuz, as he announced the reimposition of a naval blockade on Iran and demanded a 20% tariff on all cargoes shipped through the key maritime passage. Declaring the strait “open”, Trump suggested in a post on his Truth Social platform that the US should be known henceforth as the “Guardian of the Strait of Hormuz”, as Iran and the US engaged in some of the heaviest drone and missile exchanges since an interim deal was negotiated to bring an end to the conflict. Trump has made numerous claims and threats during the war with Iran, including frequent claims of victory, many of which have had little grounding in reality, but on Monday evening the US Navy-led Joint Maritime Information Center said the US would begin enforcing the blockade on Iran on Tuesday. The blockade, covering all of Iran’s ports, oil terminals and coastal areas, will be enforced for all vessel traffic – regardless of flag – from 20.00 GMT on 14 July, the centre said in an advisory. “Any vessel suspected of entering or departing the blockaded area without authorisation is subject to interception, diversion and capture. Non-compliant vessels may be legally compelled with force,” the statement said. The centre said neutral transit through the strait of Hormuz heading to or from non-Iranian destinations will not be impeded. It remains unclear in practical terms how easy it would be for the navy to do this. Trump’s demand for a 20% tariff comes despite his administration’s previous insistence that no country should be allowed to charge fees for passages used for international navigation. That stance was reiterated last month by the US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, who said: “No country is allowed to charge tolls or fees on an international waterway. That’s existing international law.” Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) accused the US on Monday of jeopardising global oil and gas supplies by interfering in the strait, as Tehran threatened that any US moves would be “strongly contested”. The IRGC spokesperson, Hossein Mohebi, said Washington had “seriously endangered the security of the world’s oil and gas supply and must be held accountable”, adding in a post on X that Tehran would “continue to exercise sovereignty over and management of the strait of Hormuz”. The International Maritime Organization, the United Nations agency that oversees safety and security measures in international shipping, said it was waiting to find out more about Trump’s proposal, but added: “We have always been consistent on our stance on fees – IMO stands firmly against charging fees for passage through straits used for international navigation. There is no legal basis through which to introduce mandatory tolls simply to transit through a strait.” On Monday night, the US said it had launched its third consecutive night of strikes against Iran. US and Iranian forces exchanged missile and drone attacks on Monday. The IRGC said it had targeted US military facilities in Bahrain and Kuwait, destroyed radar systems in Oman and hit fuel tanks and ammunition depots at Prince Hassan airbase in Jordan in response to American strikes. The US military said it had struck Iranian air defence systems, coastal radar sites, missile and drone capabilities and small boats on Sunday using aircraft, naval vessels and drones. On Monday morning, loud explosions were heard on Iran’s Qeshm Island and in the port city of Bandar Abbas. Trump said the US would probably take over the strait and should be reimbursed for controlling the waterway. “We’re going to keep the strait, and we’ll probably run it,” Trump said in a phone interview on Fox News. “We’ll become the guardian of the strait. Maybe we’ll call it the guardian angel of the strait. And we should be reimbursed for that.” The exchanges marked an escalation in the pace and geographic scope of attacks over the past week after the near-total collapse of an interim ceasefire. Trump earlier said the US was “beating up” Iran, while also apparently leaving a door open for yet another round of talks. His administration has struggled to get a grip on the Middle East crisis triggered by the US-Israeli attack on Iran earlier this year. Iran’s top negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, posted on social media on Sunday: “The era of one-sided deals is OVER. We told you: keep your word or pay the price. Reality is knocking.” On Monday, Trump promised at least two more rounds of strikes on Iran, telling conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt: “We’re going to hit them very hard tonight and we’re going to hit them hard tomorrow — and there’s not a damn thing they can do about it. They have nothing. They have nothing going, other than they have big mouths.” Brent crude oil prices rose more than 3% on Monday, although they remained well below peaks reached earlier in the conflict. Iran and the US are in theory nearly halfway through the 60-day period of an interim deal that was supposed to set up talks for a permanent end to the war, which began in February with the assassination of Iran’s then supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in US-Israeli airstrikes. In reality, that deal has devolved into a series of attacks over the strait of Hormuz, worrying world leaders that the war could fully resume. The UN secretary general, António Guterres, said: “A return to full-scale hostilities would have catastrophic consequences.” The war has spread across the region, with Iran attacking US bases in multiple countries. Thousands of people have been killed, mainly in Iran and Lebanon. Iran’s strikes on Sunday extended to Qatar, a mediator in ceasefire talks that had not come under attack since April. The United Arab Emirates, which had not been targeted since early May, said its air defences had engaged missiles and drones from Iran. The conflict has caused global economic shockwaves since it began in late February, driving energy prices higher and fuelling global inflation. Higher prices – especially for petrol – are politically sensitive for Trump in the run-up to November’s US congressional elections. Iran condemned the latest wave of US attacks, with the foreign ministry saying they had “rendered futile all efforts of the past few months to reduce tension and establish peace in the west Asian region”. It added: “The US regime has also caused the return of insecurity in the strait of Hormuz and disruption of international commercial shipping by openly interfering in the process of Iran implementing the necessary arrangements in the strait of Hormuz.” The ministry said talks between Iran and Oman on Saturday – which focused on arrangements for managing the strait and transit routes – were unable to reach a deal as a result of “overt and covert” US pressure on Muscat. Iran has sought to establish a permanent system for collecting fees in the strait, through which about a fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas shipments transited before the war, and has warned vessels not to sail without its authorisation. Its recently created Persian Gulf Strait Authority said on Sunday that passage through the strait was not possible because of what it called recent illegal US military movements in the region. Permits would be issued “as soon as stability and calm are restored”, it added. The US, which revoked the licence authorising the sale of Iranian crude oil last Tuesday after earlier attacks on shipping, said its forces were positioned to safeguard freedom of navigation, despite what it described as “aggression, harassment, threats and arbitrary declarations” from Iran. The US Navy-led Joint Maritime Information Center reiterated guidance that despite a severe security threat, an “expanded” southern route near Oman was available for two-way traffic. Agence France-Presse, Reuters and Associated Press contributed to this report
Israel will hold national elections on 27 October, giving its citizens their first chance to pass judgment on the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and his coalition since the Hamas-led attacks of 7 October 2023. The Knesset, Israel’s parliament, will be dissolved on Friday. With just a few days left in session, the most far-right government in Israel’s history is now rushing to pass several controversial laws in an attempt to bolster its position before polling day. A deadly campaign of extremist violence to expand Israeli control in the occupied West Bank is expected to continue until election day, as settler militants and their political backers exploit their seat at the cabinet table. Netanyahu, 76, may be fighting for his personal freedom as well as his political future. He is on trial for corruption, despite interventions from Donald Trump calling for a pre-emptive pardon in the long-running case. Current polling indicates voters will kick him out of office, although the man who has led Israel for much of the last three decades is a consummate political survivor who has repeatedly defied expectations. It was on his watch that Hamas broke through the fence around Gaza to kill nearly 1,200 people, the majority of them civilians, on the bloodiest day in Israel’s history. Three years of regional conflict have followed, including this year’s war on Iran which most Israelis believe the country lost, and a campaign in Gaza deemed genocidal by a UN commission, academics, legal scholars, Israeli and international rights groups and a significant portion of diaspora Jews. Yet Netanyahu will see out his full term, the first Israeli prime minister to achieve that feat in decades. Complex coalition politics make early elections a feature of political life in Israel and the last time an election was held on schedule was 1988. He has put national security at the heart of his campaign, with an “unrelenting message” that only he can keep Israelis safe, according to the political analyst and polling expert Dahlia Scheindlin. “Given this government’s record, it’s either the most sophisticated, if cryptic, strategy ever – or desperate. Perhaps both,” Scheindlin wrote in a recent column for Israel’s Haaretz newspaper marking 1,000 days since the Hamas attacks in 2023. Israel’s electoral system allocates seats based on proportional representation from the total vote, with no geographic constituencies. That makes elections largely a national conversation, with limited impact from local concerns. After the election date was set on Sunday, coalition Knesset members were ordered to stay in Jerusalem until Friday, Israeli media reported, to ensure they were on hand for the efforts to pass a last spate of laws. These include legislation to split and weaken the powers of the attorney general and enshrining study of the Torah as a “foundational value”, equating it with military service in a step towards the draft exemption sought by ultra-orthodox parties that have been a core part of Netanyahu’s coalition. The leading opposition contender to replace Netanyahu is Gadi Eisenkot, a former chief of staff for Israel’s military whose son and two nephews were killed fighting in Gaza. Netanyahu’s two sons have not served in the war. Eisenkot’s Yashar party overtook Netanyahu’s Likud for the first time this week, a poll commissioned by Kan News found. He would claim 24 seats to the prime minister’s 23 if elections were held now. The son of Moroccan immigrants, who grew up far from Israel’s centres of wealth and power, Eisenkot has crafted a powerful political message of professional success and personal sacrifice. An ad released by Netanyahu’s aides last month, mocking his heavily accented English, underlined a difference that increasing numbers of Israelis may see as an advantage. Netanyahu, a fluent English speaker who spent parts of his childhood and early adult years in the US, has always touted his diplomatic skills and international connections as a key part of his leadership credentials. But his policies over the last few years have isolated Israel internationally, with support tumbling even in the US, Israel’s most important ally. The US presidential hopeful Rahm Emanuel, whose Jerusalem-born father fought in the country’s war of independence, warned during a visit to Tel Aviv last week that Israel had become a “pariah”. Even if voters oust Netanyahu, however, it is unclear whether any potential successor would have the desire or capacity to chart a significantly different political course on relations with Palestinians. Eisenkot, who was military commander in the occupied West Bank during the second intifada, also served for nearly eight months in the unity government Netanyahu formed after the 7 October attacks. That included a period in which Israel cut off food, electricity and fuel to Gaza, in defiance of international law. Israeli attacks on Gaza until 5 June 2024 killed more than 36,000 Palestinians, around a third of them children, according to health authorities.
French firefighters are tackling a blaze of unprecedented scale sweeping through Fontainebleau forest south-east of Paris, while in southern Spain the prime minister visited the scene of a deadly wildfire and warned: “The climate emergency kills.” The fire in Fontainebleau, a one-time royal hunting preserve about 40 miles (60km) from the French capital that today is dotted with villages, began late on Sunday afternoon. The blaze, which is unusual in its proximity to Paris, raced across about 800 hectares (2,000 acres) of forest. By Monday afternoon it had not been contained and “continued to progress moderately”, said Pierre Ory, the prefect of the Seine-et-Marne department. The Paris region remains under the highest heatwave alert. The mayor of Fontainebleau, Julien Gondard, said he was shocked and angered. “This exceptional area is consumed by flames, we’ve never seen anything like this,” he told the local TV station ICI Paris Île-de-France. “The forest is fragile and it’s in a critical condition.” Fire officials said it could take several days to several weeks to fully contain the fire. They described it as “very virulent” and of “exceptional scale”. The interior minister, Laurent Nuñez, visiting an operations room in Fontainebleau on Monday, said: “The aim is to contain the fire.” Nuñez said about 900 homes had been evacuated, no homes had yet been burned and no one was injured. He said an investigation was under way to determine the cause of the fire. “The fire began at several points at the end of yesterday afternoon – around 10 points, which would suggest it could have been voluntary in origin. I won’t say more because an investigation is ongoing,” he said. Nuñez said forest fires had burned 32,000 hectares of land in France so far this year, “already more than the 2025 season and it’s only 13 July”. He added that, since the start of the summer, 44 people had been arrested across the country on suspicion of being responsible for the outbreak of fires. High-speed rail was affected after the fire broke out on Sunday because key lines pass near the forest. The French rail company SNCF said there were delays of up to eight hours for trains arriving at or leaving from Gare de Lyon in Paris. On Monday morning, rail services were returning to normal. Half of the 700 residents of the village of Le Vaudoué were evacuated and firefighters were operating in several other towns in the area, the local Seine-et-Marne fire service said. Without the use of firefighting planes, other villages would already have been evacuated, said Olivier Compta, who was overseeing the firefighting operation. About 400 firefighters have been working to contain the fire, which ignited two days before the 14 July Bastille Day national holiday. Eric Brocardi, a spokesperson for France’s national federation of firefighters, said it was the first time firefighting planes had been sent up from the normally drier and hotter south of the country to extinguish fires in the Paris region. Two firefighting helicopters and an observation aircraft were also helping to tackle the blaze, he said. “The aim is to save lives and property.” Earlier, firefighters dealt with a fire that had blocked a highway running east from Paris and disrupted a high-speed train line to the south of France. The Paris region, along with large parts of the rest of France, has had a succession of heatwaves since May. Temperature records have also been broken in several other countries across Europe and the heatwaves have caused thousands of excess deaths, according to estimates in Spain, France, Belgium and Britain. In Spain, where 13 people are known to have been killed by last week’s deadly wildfire in the south-eastern region of Almería, and where 10 people are still unaccounted for, the prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, renewed his calls for joint national action to address the effects of the climate emergency. “A third of all the land that burned in Europe last year was here in Spain,” he said during a visit to the affected area on Monday morning. “That’s not just down to the fires that have traditionally happened; it’s also due to a worsening because of climate change that’s happening across the Iberian peninsula and especially in Spain.” Sánchez repeated his calls for a “state pact” to tackle the changing climate. “It’s not just about reacting when these fires hit; it’s also about preventing them, building perimeters, and about teaching people how to react when a fire – or any of the civil emergencies that are unfortunately becoming more common – hits.” He added: “I’ve said it many times before, but the climate emergency kills. We’re seeing that across Europe and we’re seeing that in Spain.” Spanish authorities said on Monday that five British nationals were among 13 bodies recovered from the fire zone. Three Belgians, one French national and one Spanish citizen have also been identified – all adults. Among the dead were a married couple, the husband Spanish and the wife British, and a British couple. The June heatwaves that hit Europe would have been “virtually impossible” without climate change, the World Weather Attribution group of scientists has said. Human-caused climate breakdown is supercharging extreme weather across the world, driving more frequent and more deadly disasters such as heatwaves and wildfires.
Israel tried to recruit Iran’s intensely anti-Zionist former president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to lead a new post-Islamic regime in Tehran, and even sent its top spy to Budapest to meet him, according to media reports. The remarkable quest to turn a leader who had denied the Holocaust and called for Israel’s erasure began in 2022, according to reporting by the New York Times and the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, and continued even after Israel became engaged in a brutal campaign in Gaza against Hamas, a key Iranian ally. Ahmadinejad – who is now believed to be in the custody of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), according to a New York Times report citing Iranian officials – had begun in previous years to distance himself from the regime, improve his English and redefine his image. The effort to install him as a new Iranian leader gathered steam after Ahmadinejad was invited to speak at the same university in the Hungarian capital that had been addressed just two months earlier by Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s prime minister, in 2025. According to the New York Times, recruiting Ahmadinejad became such a priority that David Barnea – then the head of the Mossad, Israel’s foreign intelligence agency – travelled to Hungary to meet him after he had been invited to speak at Ludovika University at a climate conference the year before. Barnea’s involvement was confirmed in Haaretz’s report, which suggested that the former Mossad director even skipped a security consultation with Netanyahu, aimed at discussing the war in Gaza at a time when the fighting with Hamas was at its peak, to focus on Ahmadinejad. After the meeting with Barnea, the NYT reported, the Mossad informed the CIA that it had been in contact with Ahmadinejad. The relationship apparently initially gained momentum after the former president visited Guatemala in 2023. Israeli officials are even said to have paid Ahmadinejad for housing and travel, with Mossad operatives meeting him several times, including on trips to Hungary at a time when the country was led by the far-right prime minister Viktor Orbán, a close ally of Israel and Donald Trump. Details of the effort have emerged amid speculation about Ahmadinejad’s fate after the US and Israel began military strikes against Iran on 28 February, which killed several Iranian senior figures, including the supreme leader, Ali Khamenei. Ahmadinejad appeared last week among mourners at Khamenei’s funeral, his first public appearance in several months. The NYT – which has previously reported that Israeli and US officials had identified him as a potential leader of a new post-theocratic regime – reported he had been driven from his home after the strike by four Mossad agents, who then kept him at a safe house in Tehran. However, Ahmadinejad is said to have become upset about the “frantic” rescue mission and disillusioned about the plan to install him in power. He left the safe house under “mysterious circumstances” and is since believed to have been taken into the custody of the IRGC intelligence wing, the NYT reported, citing Iranian officials. The attempt to woo Ahmadinejad is striking in part because of his key role in intensifying tensions with Israel and the west over Iran’s nuclear programme after he was elected president in 2005. During his presidency, Ahmadinejad sponsored a “scientific” conference purporting to examine the authenticity of the Holocaust, but in practice setting out his then vocal belief that the murder of six million Jews by the Nazis during the second world war was a “myth”. But Israeli officials are said to have been alerted to the deterioration of his relationship with Khamenei and other regime elements after he left office in 2013, which was exacerbated by his being rejected three times in another attempt to run for president by the Guardian Council vetting body for candidates. For his part, Ahmadinejad began to moderate his previously hardline views, and worked to improve his English, even giving a speech in Budapest in the language. He also underwent an image makeover, trimming his once-straggly beard, shedding his trademark white jacket and appearing to receive botox treatment. He also became critical of brutal regime crackdowns on protest movements, despite the fact that he himself had been at the centre of one of the most notorious of such actions: the suppression of the “green movement” that arose in response to his 2009 election victory, which opponents alleged was fraudulent. Ahmadinejad’s loyalties began to come into question as he concluded that Iran could not survive the international sanctions that had been imposed over its nuclear activities, which he believed had become a burden rather than an asset, according to Haaretz. The paper reported on disagreement within Israeli ranks over the regime change mission, called Operation Puss in Boots by Israel. Tzachi Hanegbi, the former national security adviser, dismissed the plans as “wild fantasies” and the Israel Defense Forces’ chief of staff, Eyal Zamir, ordered a halt three days before launch. Netanyahu overrode the disagreements and ordered it to proceed. Iranian officials had grown suspicious of Ahmadinejad after he slipped his security detail twice during a 2025 trip to Budapest, shortly before last summer’s 12-day war waged against the regime by Israel and the US, and confronted him about his disappearances. Alex Vatanka, the head of the Iran programme at the Middle East Institute in Washington, said Ahmadinejad’s disaffection with the Iranian regime was known to insiders, including Khamenei, who is said to have been unsettled by his former protege’s decision to visit Guatemala, which has close diplomatic ties to Israel. But he questioned the timing and motivation of the latest reports. “Why did the Mossad let Ahmadinejad walk out after rescuing him?” he said. “Would you, if you invested so much? Maybe these are just an effort to create tension inside the regime, which has its merits from the point of view of the regime’s adversaries.”
The Church of England is facing a legal challenge over Project Spire, its £100m plan to further reparative justice for historical links to enslavement, as staff come under “vile abuse” from critics. At the General Synod in York over the weekend, Stephen Cottrell, the archbishop of York, defended the project as a “work of healing, justice and repair”. Daniel Matovu, a barrister who represents the diocese of Oxford at the synod, told this month’s sessions the church had not only profited from the slave trade but “supported, defended and participated in” it. Project Spire was set up in 2023, after research into a church endowment fund dating back to 1704. It emerged that the fund, called Queen Anne’s Bounty, had invested in the South Sea Company, which is known to have transported more than 34,000 enslaved people across the Atlantic. The fund also received donations from individuals such as Edward Colston, a senior figure in the enslaving enterprise the Royal African Company. Subsequently, the Church Commissioners, the body that manages church assets, made a £100m funding commitment – which, it is expected, would develop an “impact investment fund”. That could involve backing startups in descendant communities for social and environmental goals as well as a financial return. However, Spire has faced criticism from the rightwing thinktank Policy Exchange and Tory politicians, including Katie Lam, as well as C of E members who say the project is “historically uninformed” and the church should be using the money elsewhere. Describing critics as “doubting Thomases”, Matovu said it was “thought the church generated roughly £5m per year in today’s money from directly running sugar plantations in Barbados between 1710 and 1838, which would have amounted to £640m in total”. He asked Graham Usher, the bishop of Norwich, whether he agreed that Project Spire was “but a pittance, a drop in the ocean”. The Anglican missionary organisation USPG, formerly known as the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, set up a £7m reparative justice project in 2024 after apologising for owning two plantations in Barbados where thousands of people were enslaved. Responding to Matovu, Usher said: “No amount of money can ever repay what happened to the people who were enslaved … I’ve stood in the dungeons of Cape Coast Castle, standing on the excrement and the blood and the sweat encased in the floor, and the hardships people faced on plantations … This is a start.” Usher confirmed Spire was facing a legal challenge and said Church Commissioners needed to take “full legal advice” to discuss it. The Rev Rachel Webbley, a vicar from the diocese Canterbury, said many people were glad Spire had not been abandoned. She asked Usher whether it could have been revealed where “the legal challenge against this careful and important work” had come from and if there were any links to “those who have sent hostile communications”. Usher said it was not possible to release further details at this time. “I would also encourage you to pray for the staff of the Church Commissioners, who … have had to put up with some of the most vile abuse and correspondence,” he added. The bishop of Norwich said that because Queen Anne’s Bounty “invested in transatlantic African chattel enslavement … we have a responsibility for that history, because that trade was so abhorrent – not only at the time but in the legacies that continue to disadvantage people today.”