The shooting occurred along Interstate 75 in a rural area south of Lexington, near the city of London authorities said

Kentucky police reported an “active shooter situation” on Saturday evening near Interstate 75 in London, Kentucky, south of Lexington, where “numerous persons” had been shot in traffic.

In a video statement, London mayor Randall Weddle said seven people were hurt, but not all of those were wounded by gunfire. Some of the victims were injured in a vehicle accident, he said.

“There are no deceased at this time. No one was killed from this, thankfully, but we ask that you continue to pray,” Weddle said.

The sheriff’s office also announced that a “person of interest” has been identified in connection with the shooting, saying he should be considered armed and dangerous and people should not approach him.

Bill Burns calls Vladimir Putin a ‘bully’ whose ‘sabre-rattling’ should not always be taken literally

Western leaders should not be intimidated by Kremlin threats of nuclear escalation, the head of the CIA said on Saturday, amid a debate over whether Anglo-French Storm Shadow missiles should be used inside Russia.

Bill Burns, on a visit to London alongside the head of MI6, said the US had brushed off a previous Russian nuclear scare in autumn 2022, demonstrating that threats from Moscow should not always be taken literally.

Demonstrators accuse Emmanuel Macron of perpetrating ‘denial of democracy’ by choosing conservative politician

Thousands of angry leftwing protesters took to French streets on Saturday two days after Emmanuel Macron appointed a conservative prime minister.

Demonstrators accused the president of a “denial of democracy” after his decision to name the former EU Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier, 73, as leader of the government.

• Belarussian keeps composure to beat American 7-5, 7-5
• World No 2 has won two grand slam titles this year

As Aryna Sabalenka has cemented herself at the top of her sport over the past two seasons, in so many of the biggest grand slam matches her greatest opponent has been herself. Even when she has come in radiating with confidence, her game in full bloom, her head so often gets in the way. Recovering from so many painful collapses has required resilience beyond measure.

Nowhere have these struggles been more evident than in New York, a city that perfectly suits her electrifying game and outsized personality but where the positives from her two semi-finals and a final in the past three years had been blunted by brutal losses.

Two former senior advisers to Keir Starmer say their UK election strategy could benefit Democratic campaign

• Lessons of Labour UK win could help Harris defeat Trump

Keir Starmer’s former pollster, Deborah Mattinson, is to meet Kamala Harris’s campaign team in Washington this week to share details of how Labour pulled off its stunning election win by targeting key groups of “squeezed working-class voters who wanted change”.

The visit comes ahead of a separate trip by Starmer to Washington on Friday to meet US president Joe Biden, his second since becoming prime minister. It will also be his first since Biden stepped down and Harris became the Democratic nominee.

Palestinians say they have no faith in Israel Defense Forces inquiry into killing as US officials insist Gaza ceasefire is near

US officials have insisted that a ceasefire in Gaza is close even as fighting rages unabated in the blockaded Palestinian territory and violence spirals in the occupied West Bank, where witnesses told the Observer an American-Turkish dual national was killed by Israeli forces on Friday.

William Burns, who is also the US’s chief negotiator in the indirect talks between Israel and Hamas, echoed secretary of state Antony Blinken during a speech in London on Saturday in which he said that “90% of the text had been agreed but the last 10% is always the hardest”.

Opponents holed up for months in the Argentine ambassador’s residence say the building has been surrounded by security forces

Venezuela’s government has said that Brazil can no longer represent Argentina’s diplomatic interests in the country, putting several anti-government opponents holed up for months in the Argentine ambassador’s residence seeking asylum at risk, as reports emerge that the embassy has been surrounded by security forces.

Venezuela’s foreign ministry said in a statement that it had notified Brazil of its decision, which will take effect immediately. It said it was forced to take action based on what it called evidence – which it hasn’t shared – that those who sought refuge in Argentina’s diplomatic mission were conspiring to carry out “terrorist” acts.

Brazil said that it had received the communication “with surprise” and Argentina said shortly afterwards that it rejected the “unilateral” decision by Venezuela. Both countries urged the government of Nicolas Maduro to respect the Vienna convention on diplomatic relations.

Spanish director’s first English-language movie starring Tilda Swinton and Julianne Moore tackles euthanasia

Spanish director Pedro Almodóvar’s first English-language movie, The Room Next Door, which tackles the hefty themes of euthanasia and the climate crisis, won the prestigious Golden Lion award at the Venice film festival on Saturday.

Starring Tilda Swinton and Julianne Moore, the film received an 18-minute standing ovation when it premiered at Venice earlier in the week – one of the longest in recent memory.

Former prime minister also under fire for hiring ex-aide Charlotte Owen as VP despite her lack of energy sector experience

Boris Johnson failed to disclose that he met a uranium lobbyist while prime minister before entering into a new business with a controversial Iranian-Canadian uranium entrepreneur, the Observer can reveal.

Johnson’s new company Better Earth Limited also employs Charlotte Owen, a junior aide with just a few years work experience whom he elevated to the House of Lords last year at the age of 29, sparking intense controversy.

The virile bird was euthanized by Maryland zoo due to health problems, and is survived by Mrs Greedy

A zoo in Baltimore is mourning the death of an African penguin that helped save his kind from extinction by leaving behind more than 200 descendants while living far longer than expected.

The remarkable creature in question is Mr Greedy, who was euthanized because of health problems related to his age: 33, or well past African penguins’ 18-year median life expectancy, said an announcement from his home, the Maryland zoo.

The prevalence of slot machines – known as pokies – in pubs and clubs across the country and betting on sport has created a culture of wagering

It is a quiet night in Fairfield, in Sydney’s western suburbs. Inside a small brick building, a dozen Gamblers Anonymous members help themselves to coffee, tea and miniature meat pies. The meeting is taking place in a suburb that has one of the city’s lowest median incomes, and highest levels of gambling losses. A fifth of the state of New South Wales’s 25 most profitable gaming clubs are here, according to government data.

One of these clubs, Fairfield Returned and Services League (RSL), is just a two-minute walk away. It is a building totally at odds with the modest apartment blocks and shabby train station nearby. A pedestrian walkway inside is lined with palms and ferns, it has an elaborate fountain, a grand lobby. It seems incongruous, that is, until you realise that its surroundings are its blood supply. Inside the club, just out of view of the street, are hundreds of gaming machines. Fairfield RSL and Clubs Australia did not respond to requests for comment.

The deep historical, political and cultural split between east and west acts as a brake on the rise of the AfD nationwide

The media are alive with crumbling firewalls (Brandmauer) in Germany. State elections in Thuringia have delivered the first win for the extreme right since 1945 in the region where the Nazis first entered regional power in 1929, and on the date Adolf Hitler invaded Poland in 1939.

“The East will do it!” The Alternative für Deutschland’s (AfD) campaign mixed the usual right-populist themes with the suggestion that the East is where the real Germany resists the liberal horrors of multiculturalism and windpower.

Humorists are using the plight of this small corner of Kursk region to make a point about Russian hypocrisy – but the invasion is no joke for either side

One morning recently, historian Yevhen Murza and comedian Feliks Redka, both from the city of Sumy in eastern Ukraine, hitched a lift into Ukrainian-occupied Russia. Their mission on arrival in Sudzha, the town that has been at the centre of Ukraine’s dramatic push into Russia’s Kursk region, was an unusual one: to record the latest episode of their long-running podcast series, dedicated to popularising Ukrainian history.

The deal was agreed via Instagram with a fan of their podcast who is serving in the Ukrainian army. In exchange for a drone that Redka had bought with proceeds from a recent standup tour, the soldier agreed that he and his friends would give the pair a ride to Sudzha and back.

The man who made bossa nova an international sensation has died at 83, after a 60-year, 35-album career that straddled musical genres

Bringing Brazilian music to the world and the world to Brazilian music: for decades, this was Sérgio Mendes’s mission and passion.

The artist died on Friday at the age of 83, after a 60-year career that produced more than 35 albums.

The Pulitzer prize winner on uniting Olive Kitteridge and Lucy Barton in her new novel, her unfathomable dreams, and how she went from ‘blabbermouth’ to writer

Pulitzer prize winner Elizabeth Strout, 68, has wooed readers and critics alike with a string of bestselling novels set in Maine, where she grew up and now mostly lives. Her latest, Tell Me Everything, unites two recurring protagonists from recent books – self-effacing author Lucy Barton and abrasive nonagenarian Olive Kitteridge – with sometime lawyer Bob Burgess, who first appeared in her 2013 novel The Burgess Boys, and is now set to be hauled out of semi-retirement by a murder case. As a New England winter finally yields to spring, pathos and dry humour gild tender reflections on loneliness and connection, and the redemptive power of storytelling.

What made you want to bring all three characters together?
I never ever intend to keep writing about the same people, but it gradually came to me that they are all living nearby. I wanted to get Olive and Lucy together – that was a propelling force. I just thought it would be so much fun, and of course Olive can’t stand her at first. The working title was The Book of Bob because Bob has always intrigued me. He’s such a decent person and doesn’t know that about himself, and I wanted him to come out of semi-retirement and do something big and meaningful.

At 74, Spain’s finest director has won the Golden Lion – incredibly, his first major victory at a film festival – for his debut English language feature. Better late than never, even if The Room Next Door isn’t quite his finest work

Pedro Almodóvar’s The Room Next Door is a tender, heartfelt drama about a driven former war correspondent who’s in search of the perfect final scene. She wants an ending that she can script and control, and a handpicked loving audience to applaud her when she goes.

As played by Tilda Swinton, the heroine doesn’t have it entirely her own way. But the film itself has fared rather better. It bowed out in a blaze of glory and scooped the crowning Golden Lion award in the dying seconds of this year’s Venice film festival.

Women limit exercise and commuting because of poor nighttime lighting – and the feeling that they’re unsafe at night

When Claire Watson moved to Sydney in 2022, the keen runner was excited to try out the famed track around the city’s vast, picturesque Centennial Park.

But when the 29-year-old turned up for her first run shortly after 6am before work one morning, she was stunned.

May B Wild was only looking for a ‘Sunday lover’. But in a bike accessories shop she was unexpectedly moved by Chris’s gesture of care

• Get our weekend culture and lifestyle email

My love life has not been straightforward to say the least. I’ve been married – and also divorced. By 2016, I had pretty well given up on men and was happy to live alone with my dog. I was working full-time in Brisbane and busy six days a week. But Sundays were lonely and I decided to get a Sunday lover.

I created a profile on a dating site and offered a challenge to potential suitors: “I dare you to excite my synapses.” I was hoping to meet a very intelligent man this time.

Toronto film festival: an empty-headed attempt to give the star her version of The Wrestler is a regrettable misfire

The desire to see Pamela Anderson receive her flowers after being mistreated and denigrated by numerous parties – from the media to men in the industry to most recently Hulu – is strong enough to initially outweigh other concerns over her big-screen comeback. Even framing it as such feels like an understatement, the star having never received anything like the dramatic lead she’s been given in Vegas-set character drama The Last Showgirl. It’s a genuinely huge moment for Anderson after regaining control of her narrative with a well-received turn in Chicago on Broadway and a likable Netflix documentary which allowed her to right some wrongs.

But while goodwill might have propelled her here, to a ritzy Toronto film festival premiere, it can only take her so far. The film, directed by Francis Ford Coppola’s daughter Gia, is wholly unworthy of any hype that might have preceded it, a forgettable, empty trifle at just 85 minutes, failing to give us enough of anything and certainly, sadly, failing to prove Anderson’s mettle as a dramatic actor. It would, inarguably, be a challenge for even the most equipped of performers to make much of TV writer Kate Gersten’s vapid script but it’s truly insurmountable for her. It’s an awkward misjudgment of a performance, the star retreating to the same shticky sitcom excess she used in her short-lived comedy series Stacked, relying on manic overemphasis regardless of the occasion. She just can’t make any of it work and Coppola almost seems aware of this, overstuffing her film with ponderous, dialogue-free scenes of the character looking wistfully off into the distance. Well-shot but dramatically inert, these moments are indicative of the film at large, seeking meaning out of nothingness.

The Last Showgirl is screening at the Toronto film festival and is seeking distribution

Journalists and other writers are employed to improve the quality of chatbot replies. The irony of working for an industry that may well make their craft redundant is not lost on them

For several hours a week, I write for a technology company worth billions of dollars. Alongside me are published novelists, rising academics and several other freelance journalists. The workload is flexible, the pay better than we are used to, and the assignments never run out. But what we write will never be read by anyone outside the company.

That’s because we aren’t even writing for people. We are writing for an AI.

Sometimes being the subject of a ‘parasocial’ relationship can be positive. But then come the messages about my body, health or life choices … and it all gets a bit weird

A close friend of mine once cried so dramatically when I told her she would never marry the lead singer of her favourite metal band that you’d have thought she’d just been jilted. Granted, we were 13 and she was in the depths of hormonal angst, but her reaction was genuine nonetheless. Somewhere in her journey to becoming a devoted fan of the band’s music, she’d developed a personal connection with the frontman and become convinced they were meant for each other. Their music was so important to her that she assumed there must be more to it. How could she feel this strongly and not be destined to know him personally? The realisation that millions of other people also felt he was singing directly to them, and that the direction of adoration all went one way, was incredibly painful for her, and somewhat hilarious for me.

This is, I think, a good example of a parasocial relationship – a term coined by social scientists in 1956 to describe the way some people reacted to the new level of access TV and film gave them to their favourite performers. These new visual media offered “an illusion of intimacy”, allowing the audience to be more than just spectators – they felt as if they knew these celebrities. A bond was created, one that has mushroomed since. Back then, access was still tightly controlled. However strong your lust for Elvis, there was a line that couldn’t be crossed. The information you might glean about the snake-hipped singer was meted out in gushing magazine interviews, presided over by cautious managers.

• USA 73-69 Great Britain
• Steve Serio stars as champions make it three in a row

There was to be no dream finish for Great Britain, just a series of what ifs and maybes, as perennial champions the USA kept completed the threepeat in men’s wheelchair basketball.

After achieving their greatest success in the event since 1996 by reaching the final, victory proved a step too far for captain Phil Pratt and his team, who flickered in moments but left themselves too much to do even as they attempted their customary fourth-quarter charge.

• France beat Argentina 3-2 on penalties after 1-1 draw
• Frédéric Villeroux scores the decisive spot-kick

Was La Marseillaise rousing? Yes it was. Did the sky blush obediently behind the Stade Tour Eiffel on cue? Yes it did. Was an elegant young woman in a jumpsuit and heels clutching a cuddly Paralympic Phrges outside a 7eme restaurant? Yes she was. Did the afternoon rain stop? Yes. Was the stadium full? Yes. Did the many tricolours fly and the fans sing? Yes. Did the Eiffel Tower light up like a golden goddess bestowing beatitudes, behind the stadium and into the night? Mais bien sûr. Was the blind football final between France and Argentina a fitting finale to a triumphant Paralympic Games? Oui, Oui, Oui!

That France won 3-2 in a penalty shootout was the icing on top of whatever the most perfect éclair is in the most exclusive Parisian pâtisserie. All the tension of a normal penalty shootout only with the added jeopardy that the players can’t see (although the goalkeeper can) and possibly the most beautiful footballing backdrop in the world.

• Cockroft wins T34 800m by more than seven seconds
• Cyclist Graham sprints to victory in men’s C1-3 road race

Hannah Cockroft stormed to the ninth gold of her Paralympics career with a huge victory in the women’s T34 800m. Despite finishing 11 seconds outside her personal best, the 32-year-old’s time of 1min 55.44sec was 7.68sec clear of fellow ParalympicsGB athlete Kare Adenegan. Eva Houston of the USA took the bronze.

Cockroft led from the start to add to her 100m gold from last Sunday. “It’s like being back in London, I love it,” she said, as she reflected on a run that has resulted in at least two golds at every Paralympics from 2012 onwards (she won three in Rio). “This is how many people love Para sport. This is what we want to see. It doesn’t end here, we have world and European championships year on year, it’s not a four-year gap for us.”

• Japanese rival wins 6-2, 4-6, 7-5, avenging doubles loss
• Hewett unable to convert match point at 5-3 in third set

Alfie Hewett will have to make do with just the single golden slam, for now at least, after he was edged out in a thrilling men’s wheelchair tennis singles final 6-2, 4-6, 7-5 by Tokito Oda.

In what is developing into an abiding rivalry at the top of the men’s wheelchair game, the Japanese teenager repeated his success over Hewett in the final of the French Open two years ago. A combination of power and brave shot-making ultimately won out for Oda, just 18 years of age, after Hewett – who sustained a groin injury in the first set – had earned match point at 5-3 in the third.

Judo, Kayaking and athletics action as we showcase some of the best images from day ten in Paris

Our correspondent enjoys an empty Champs Élysées, watches a legend and gets a lift from Paris’s volunteers

If you really want to see Paris at its best, I suggest getting up before dawn to head to Pont Alexandre III for triathlons that don’t exist. Pollution concerns had forced all races to be postponed for 24 hours. The decision, however, was made at 3.30am and communicated via the media channels of World Triathlon, to which I am unfortunately not subscribed. Still, alongside a few other bemused punters, I got to see the heart of picture-postcard Paris as the sun came up and walked the length of the Champs Élysées practically alone. Not bad.

• Manager praises squad after opening reign with 2-0 win
• Grealish happy after ‘one of worst summers of my life’

A modest Lee Carsley played down compliments about his tactics and style of play after opening his reign as England’s interim head coach with a dominant 2-0 win over the Republic of Ireland in Dublin on Saturday night.

Carsley, who is looking to land the job on a permanent basis after taking over from Gareth Southgate, preferred to direct the praise towards his players for beginning their Nations League campaign with a fine performance at the Aviva Stadium. The 50-year-old enjoyed victory in his first game thanks to early goals from Declan Rice and Jack Grealish, but he steered clear of accepting that England’s fluidity in possession was evidence of “Carsball” clicking into gear.

• Third Test, day two: England 325 all out; Sri Lanka 211-5
• Dhananjaya de Silva and Kamindu Mendis in strong stand

One of the tenets of so-called Bazball is to put on a show for the crowd and on the second day of this summer’s final Test match – a day that transported the spectators back to the village green at times – Ollie Pope tried his best to adhere to it.

But at 5.35pm, Pope having deployed spin from both ends for 17 straight overs after tea in a bid to keep the game moving, the umpires Joel Wilson and Chris Gaffaney decided enough was enough. Bad light had once again brought an early close at the Oval – the crowd almost resigned to the prospect and so less agitated than on day one – with Sri Lanka having reached 211 for five in reply to England’s slightly wasteful 325 all out.

• Australia suffer 67-27 loss as Los Pumas run in nine tries in Santa Fe
• Visitors lead by 17 points before conceding most points in rugby Test

The Wallabies have fallen to a humiliating Rugby Championship defeat against Argentina, giving up the most points in their history in a shock 67-27 loss in Santa Fe. Despite leading 20-3 early, a second half implosion saw Australia leak 64 points to Los Pumas and sink to a defeat that, while not quite rivalling their 53–8 to South Africa in Johannesburg in 2009, will nonetheless leave new coach Joe Schmidt fuming.

Rueing the loss of key front-rowers Angus Bell and Taniela Tupou in the second half, Schmidt admitted his side “fell off a cliff” as the Argentinians ran in nine hot tries, showing the slick play that shocked New Zealand in the TRC’s opening round. A heavy reckoning must now follow as a shattered Wallabies squad tries to pick up the pieces before the Bledisloe Cup series against New Zealand starts on 21 September.

The economic boom that reformed the top flight in 1992 could be about to devour one of its original ‘big five’

It’s 40 years since the greatest season in Everton’s history, when they won the league and the Cup Winners’ Cup and reached the FA Cup final. But it was a strange glory, coming as it did at a time when it was hard to see how English football, devastated by tragedy and disaster, could go on. Everton were – along with Manchester United, Arsenal, Liverpool and Tottenham – one of the “big five” clubs who led the Premier League breakaway in 1992, an event now widely regarded as having been a necessary step in the rebirth of the game.

But the move also led to football’s embrace of neoliberal economics: Everton’s only trophy since the breakaway is the 1995 FA Cup and, after three straight league defeats at the start of this campaign, they look like spending a fourth successive season battling relegation.

• Zirkzee sparks 5-2 win for Dutch against Bosnia
• Germany thrash Hungary 5-0 with Füllkrug on target

The Netherlands endured some nervy moments but in the end proved too strong for Bosnia and Herzegovina as they began their Nations League campaign with a 5-2 triumph at the Philips Stadion on Saturday.

Joshua Zirkzee scored on his first start for the Dutch to give the hosts a 13th-minute lead in their League A Group 3 encounter but they were caught by a swift counterattack 14 minutes later that saw Ermedin Demirovic equalise.

• Arsenal 1-0 Rosenborg; Maanum 19
• Hosts give strong display to reach qualifying round two

Jonas Eidevall said he was glad that no English team will have to go through the Champions League mini-tournament qualifying format again, calling it a “relic of the past” and criticising the 72-hour turnaround between the fixtures, with the format of next year’s competition changing.

Eidevall’s Arsenal beat Rangers 6-0 on Wednesday night in a mini-tournament semi-final, and then Rosenborg 1-0 in the final, to progress to round two of Champions League qualifying.

• England 38-19 France
• Red Roses set to face rivals New Zealand next weekend

When it comes to England v France there is no such thing as a friendly. The tense nature of the rivalry was on full display throughout, including a crunching collision between Ellie Kildunne and the France fly-half Lina Tuy, rips in tackles from the prop Hannah Botterman and a Kingsholm crowd in a feet-rumbling mood.

It was an atmosphere and physicality to reignite the history between the two foes and England’s head coach John Mitchell noted post-match that his team’s defensive work hurt France “mentally” and that the encounter was not “very friendly”. If the hostility alone was not enough to light a spark in this match, then the added backdrop of the first game of a season which will end with the Rugby World Cup, being held in England, certainly was.

• Irish rider finishes seven seconds clear on stage 20
• Roglic has 2min 2sec overall lead for Sunday’s time trial

Ireland’s Eddie Dunbar hung on to win stage 20 of the Vuelta a España on Saturday, his second stage win of the race, with three-times former champion Primoz Roglic coming in third and extending his overall lead ahead of Sunday’s final stage.

Dunbar, who also won stage 11 for his Team Jayco-AlUla, took off in pursuit of the leader Pavel Sivakov with five kilometres to the finish on the final climb of this year’s Vuelta to Picón Blanco and held off the chasing group by just seven seconds on the line after overtaking the Frenchman.

Black Americans whose ancestors were enslaved were still suffering a century later because they lived in states where Jim Crow laws were enforced

Persistence studies are all the rage in economics – using clever maths to show that events in the distant past drive political or economic outcomes today. One well-known example argued that Britain’s superior growth to France as late as 1800 was shaped by… the collapse of the western Roman empire a millennium before. Here, the collapse saw the population de-urbanise, while in France they remained in Roman-era towns that lasted. So when Britain’s cities re-emerged they were in places better suited to growth in the run-up to the Industrial Revolution.

Interesting stuff. But persistence studies also breed something dangerous: determinism. If ancient history is so influential, what hope do we have to shape our destiny? Which is why I love a new paper by Lukas Althoff and Hugo Reichardt, examining the lasting economic impact of slavery. Their findings look like the normal persistence story: black Americans whose ancestors were enslaved before the civil war have had significantly worse economic outcomes ever since, compared with black Americans whose forefathers were free – even in 2023, descendants of enslaved people had incomes $11,620 lower than other black Americans.

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a letter of up to 250 words to be considered for publication, email it to us at observer.letters@observer.co.uk

Two ex-senior Labour advisers reveal strategy Keir Starmer used to turn its fortunes around by targeting disillusioned ‘hero voters’ – and how it could benefit the Democrats

• US ‘hero voters’ key to Harris win say top Labour ex-aides

On 4 July, against all odds, Labour overturned the most shattering defeat in decades to win a stunning landslide. A talented and energetic party team deserves huge credit for this victory: effective communications, innovative digital output, creative policy culminating in the five missions, organisationally brilliant events and a super-efficient ground force – all under the leadership of campaign director Morgan McSweeney and political leads Pat McFadden and Ellie Reeves.

It was a cohesive campaign united by its sharp, disciplined focus on our very tightly defined “hero voters”. Could a similar single-mindedness help Kamala Harris beat Donald Trump on 5 November?

We’re warned not to assign human qualities to other species, but evidence of their complex abilities is mounting

The details differ, but really it’s the same story, turning up every few weeks, for around a decade now. The revelation – and it’s always presented with a dramatic flourish – is this: animals are much more like us than we thought.

Last week, it was that dogs could remember the names of their old toys – even when they hadn’t seen them for two years. Language acquisition, that “uniquely human” thing, was being encroached on, the researchers said: dogs could store words in their memory. Last month, it was that horses could strategise and plan ahead, overturning the assumption that they “simply respond to stimuli in the moment”. And in April, it was that there’s a “realistic possibility of consciousness” in reptiles, fish and even insects – according to a declaration signed by some 40 scientists. One of the studies backing the claims recorded bumblebees playing with wooden balls. The behaviour had no obvious connection to mating or survival, the authors thought. It was for fun.

We pride ourselves on egalitarianism, but paradoxically we’re still drawn to our dysfunctional royal family. For how much longer?

It should have been an Instagram-perfect wedding image, but it turned out to be something more embarrassing. In the picturesque village of Geiranger, the jewel of Norway’s fjords and a Unesco world heritage site, Princess Märtha Louise was hurried to a tent, covered by sheets to thwart rival photographers. The photo rights of her marriage last weekend to Durek Verrett, an American shaman, had been sold exclusively to Hello! magazine.

Netflix was presumedly present as well because it holds the movie rights to the improbable love story between the princess and the shaman. Whether the newlyweds – infamous for their relentless promotion of pseudo-scientific quackery, royal profiteering and, in Verrett’s case, a belief that he’s a hybrid reptile from Andromeda who can cleanse spiritual imprints in promiscuous women’s vaginas – have found a good fit in Rebecca Chaiklin, the Tiger King director, well, that remains to be seen.

Aslak Nore is a Norwegian author. His latest book is The Sea Cemetery

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Thirty years ago, Black women came up with the term reproductive justice. Today we fight for it more than ever

As the 2024 elections continue to heat up, there are increasing concerns about the rise of fascism around the world and in the United States. Regardless of the word or label used, Black people, living with the legacy of slavery and multiple forms of reproductive oppression including rape and forced pregnancies, sterilizations and the killing of our children and loved ones by vigilantes and police, have a lot of experience with authoritarian regimes that oppress and dehumanize.

There is a strategic agenda from the far right – laid out in clear language in Project 2025 to keep power in the hands of a chosen few and prevent the United States from becoming a truly representative, multiracial democracy that embraces and supports all people including those with the capacity for pregnancy.

The detainment of the murky messaging service’s founder in France shows online moguls can no longer act with impunity

On 24 August, a Russian tech billionaire’s private jet landed at Le Bourget airport, north-east of Paris, to find that officers of the French judicial police were waiting for him. He was duly arrested and whisked away for interrogation. Four days later he was indicted on 12 charges, including alleged complicity in the distribution of child exploitation material and drug trafficking, barred from leaving France and placed under “judicial supervision”, which requires him to check in with the gendarmes twice a week until further notice.

The mogul in question, Pavel Durov, is a tech entrepreneur who collects nationalities the way others collect air miles. In fact it turns out that one of his citizenships is French, generously provided in 2021 by France’s president, Emmanuel Macron. Durov is also, it seems, a fitness fanatic with a punishing daily regime. “After eight hours of tracked sleep,” the Financial Times reports, “he starts the day ‘without exception’ with 200 push-ups, 100 sit-ups and an ice bath. He does not drink, smoke, eat sugar or meat, and saves time for meditation.” When not engaged in these demanding activities, he has also found time to father more than 100 kids as a sperm donor and to rival Elon Musk as a free-speech extremist.

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a letter of up to 250 words to be considered for publication, email it to us at observer.letters@observer.co.uk

Driver Chris Begley’s death in August underscores a list of alleged heat-related incidents across Texas

Neysa Lambeth was in Florida caring for her ailing father on 23 August 2023 when she received a call from her husband, Chris Begley, who had worked as a UPS driver for 28 years in Texas.

Begley, 57, had collapsed from the heat while delivering packages. Lambeth said a manager picked him up and took him home to recover. He had fallen ill a couple of times from the heat over the previous two years, Lambeth said, and she had picked him up from the UPS service center on those occasions.

Post-Covid hunger for travel is taking a heavy toll on the environment amid race to net zero, say experts

For some people, summer holidays are a relaxing break from daily life, a blissful chance to hit the sunbed and lie flat for as long as humanly possible. Other people are on the hunt for new places and adventure – plummeting down a hill on the back of a bike or tied to flimsy fabric and pulled through the air. Others still are on a quest for culture, cuisine or enlightenment – or, ideally, all three and then a nap. Travel is, most people seem to feel, amazing.

The result has been an economic boon for some parts of the world that has shifted money across oceans and into impoverished communities. But it has come at a cost to the planet that travellers have long overlooked.

A pioneering mission into a mysterious and violent world may reveal ‘speed bumps’ on the way to global coastal inundation

There are stadium-sized blocks of ice crashing from the soaring face of the Kangerlussuup glacier in western Greenland. Fierce underwater currents of meltwater are shooting out from its base and visibility below the surface is virtually zero thanks to a torrent of suspended mud and sand. It’s little wonder scientists have never explored this maelstrom.

Yet today, they are sending in a multimillion-dollar remotely operated submarine, potentially to its death. As the scientists onboard the Celtic Explorer research ship repeatedly say: “It’s a high risk, high reward mission.”

Plastic recycling is failing to scale anywhere near fast enough and remains a marginal activity in the sector

• Change by Degrees offers life hacks and sustainable living tips each Saturday to help reduce your household’s carbon footprint
• Got a question or tip for reducing household emissions? Email us at changebydegrees@theguardian.com

Here’s some sobering facts about plastic. Australia produces more single-use plastic waste per capita than any other country except Singapore, according to a Minderoo Foundation report. And our plastic consumption is going up: it increased by 60% from an estimated 92kg per person in 2000 to 148kg per person in 2020-21, according to the Australia Institute. Soft plastics – those that can be scrunched into a ball – are almost always single-use.

On top of that, the latest Plastic Waste Makers Index found that despite massive consumer awareness campaigns and regulations, there is now more single-use plastic in circulation globally than ever – an additional 6 million metric tons (MMT) generated in 2021 compared with 2019 – and it is still almost entirely made from fossil fuel-based “virgin” feedstocks.

Yagi registers as the world’s second-most powerful tropical cyclone this year and has caused power outages in more than 800,000 homes

Asia’s strongest storm this year, Super Typhoon Yagi, made landfall in northern Vietnam on Saturday, the meteorological agency said, killing at least four people after tearing through China’s island of Hainan and the Philippines.

Super Typhoon Yagi hit island districts of north Vietnam at about 1pm (0600 GMT), generating winds of up to 160kph (99mph) near its centre, having lost power from its peak of 234kph (145mph) in Hainan a day earlier.

Inquiry ramps up into blaze that killed 17 boys in dormitory, as president declares three days of national mourning

Kenyan police stepped up their investigation on Saturday into a fire at a boarding school that killed 17 boys, as the president announced three days of national mourning.

Detectives said DNA testing was due to begin to identify the remains of the children who died in the blaze.

One driver says rates do not account for waiting times, traffic, and customers taking time to answer the door

Deliveroo has been accused of ­paying drivers below a minimum pay floor the company agreed earlier this year as part of the first-ever union ­agreement to cover earnings in the gig economy.

Analysis carried out by Rodeo, an app that helps gig economy workers track their payments, showed that of 531 food orders completed in the past four months, 278 fell below the rate of £12 an hour agreed with the GMB union in May.

Officials believe victims were swept away in flash flood amid heavy storms, after body of British woman was also found on island on Wednesday

Police searching for a British man believed to have been swept away by heavy flooding in Mallorca have found a body.

It comes after the body of a British woman was found on the Spanish tourist island on Wednesday.

Britain’s pandemic response was among the worst and the NHS had been ‘seriously weakened’, says leading surgeon

• Three reports lay bare scale of NHS malaise, but will Reeves fund a remedy?

Britain was hit far harder by the Covid-19 pandemic than other developed countries because the NHS had been “seriously weakened” by disastrous government policies over the preceding decade, a wide-ranging report will conclude this week.

An assessment of the NHS by the world-renowned surgeon Prof Ara Darzi, commissioned in July by the health secretary, Wes Streeting, will find that the health service reduced its “routine healthcare activity by a far greater percentage than other health systems” in many key areas during the Covid crisis.

Muhammad Shahzeb Khan, 20, arrested near US border after allegedly planning attack with undercover agents

A Pakistani man living in Canada is facing federal criminal charges for allegedly planning to carry out a mass shooting in New York against Jewish people on the anniversary of the 7 October 2023 Hamas attack in Israel, the US justice department announced on Friday.

Muhammad Shahzeb Khan, 20, was arrested Wednesday in Canada and charged with attempting to provide material support as well as resources to a foreign terrorist organization – in this case, the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham.

James Shirah, 22, allegedly ran over groomsman with SUV, mortally wounding him, following argument on 30 August

A newly married couple from Michigan were arrested only hours after their wedding because the groom allegedly used a car to intentionally run over and kill one of his groomsmen, according to local police.

The groom, 22-year-old James Shirah of Flint, allegedly ran over his groomsman with an SUV, mortally wounding him, following an argument on 30 August, the Flint police department said on Facebook.

Starmer to hold talks with Irish counterpart on first official visit of a British PM to country for five years

Keir Starmer has said he believes there can be a “deep” reset of relations with Ireland after arriving in Dublin for his first official visit, with Northern Ireland, Brexit and joint international interests on the agenda.

It is the first official visit of a British prime minister since Boris Johnson visited in 2019 to try to salvage a Brexit deal after years of strained relations.

Anastasia Trofimova’s film Russians at War criticised for ‘distorted picture of reality’ in Ukraine after Venice premiere

A new documentary portraying the lives of Russian soldiers near the Ukrainian frontlines has faced fierce criticism for attempting to whitewash Moscow’s war crimes.

Russians at War, directed by the Russian-Canadian film-maker Anastasia Trofimova, chronicles seven months spent embedded with a Russian army battalion in eastern Ukraine, presenting itself as a unique window into the daily lives of Russian soldiers.

5 Live’s new politics show gets off to a solid start; the never-boring story of New Order is retold. Plus, Laurie Anderson on knob-twiddling

Matt Chorley (BBC Radio 5 Live) | BBC Sounds
Transmissions: The Definitive Story of Joy Division and New Order | Cup & Muzzle
In the Studio: Laurie Anderson (BBC World Service) | BBC Sounds

Matt Chorley, late of Times Radio, has a new daily show on 5 Live, in Nihal Arthanayake’s old afternoon slot. The programme, which broadcasts live from a studio close to Westminster, was announced a while ago; timed, you assume, to coincide with a UK general election. But Rishi Sunak decided to jump earlier than expected, the election’s done and dusted, and so Chorley is left to burst through the door, all political guns blazing, into a rather quieter parliamentary saloon than expected.

Toronto film festival: there are two excellent performances at the centre of a time-hopping romance that tackles well-trodden ground with maturity

There was a warm late summer surprise to be had with last month’s surprisingly thoughtful and tender adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s supermarket bestseller It Ends With Us. It was a proud and powerful resurrection of the sort of glossy melodrama that had grown terribly unfashionable, mostly demoted to the small screen and almost always the subject of easy derision. Its shock commercial success (nearing $300m globally) will undoubtedly lead to more but already, premiering weeks later at the Toronto film festival, we have another heart-over-head weepie in We Live in Time, a smart and sensitive crowd-pleaser that should prove similarly irresistible to an impassioned yet underserved audience.

There’s also a touch of the golden era Working Title romcom here, before that formula became harder to love and easier to parody. It’s a tale of attractive, sweary Londoners flirting and falling in love but here they’re also grappling with some knottier, less cosy issues. It’s no spoiler, given both the trailer and the film’s time-jumping structure flitting back and forth, that it’s also about late-stage cancer, a development that has become something of a red flag given the rote nature of many disease-of-the-week dramas. But Irish stage and screen director John Crowley, who found his biggest success with 2015’s Brooklyn, has found a way to breathe life into a film about death, not aiming for wheel reinvention exactly but confidently relying on the power of big, honest emotions and two A-game stars who can easily sell them.

(Culture Shock)
The Trinidad-born musician and his 22-piece ensemble excel in all styles, from Benny Goodman and Eartha Kitt to Charles’s own Carib-flavoured compositions

“Wow! A big band record – a dream come true,” writes Trinidad-born trumpet player Etienne Charles in the cover notes to his 10th album. A gifted player and composer, Charles has been waiting for a stab at his grand opus for the past decade, since singer René Marie asked him to arrange big band parts for her. Since then he has become a celebrated arranger, collaborating with the New York Philharmonic and the Charleston Jazz Orchestra among others.

His command of his 22-piece Creole Orchestra proves impeccable and absolute, dovetailing elaborate woodwind and brass parts with finely wrought solos. There’s a nod to big bands past on Benny Goodman’s Stompin’ at the Savoy and Jimmy Forrest’s Night Train, but the standouts are Charles’s own. A torrent of horns and percussion opens the album on Old School, while the jaunty Douens, named after creatures of Trinidadian folklore, is one of several Carib flavours. Joe Henderson’s A Shade of Jade allows saxophonist Michael Thomas to parade his hard bop chops, while Poison refashions Bell Biv DeVoe’s 1990 R&B hit. Marie shines with feline charm on Eartha Kitt’s I Wanna Be Evil and her own sultry Take My Breath Away. A brilliant recasting of tradition – “sometimes it takes a village,” says Charles.

The Spanish film-maker on the raw, real life experiences behind his first collection of short stories – and why his mother is his inspiration

One day when he was nine years old and living in a small Extremaduran town of makeshift adobe houses, steep slate streets and dusty, meagre horizons, Pedro Almodóvar caught his mother out in a lie.

The family had recently moved south from La Mancha and Francisca Caballero was making ends meet by reading and writing letters for her illiterate neighbours. As he read over his mother’s shoulder, Almodóvar realised the words on the page did not correspond to the words on her lips.

Painter’s Bay of Cadiz, Moonlight, bought by Leighton House Museum in June, will star in November exhibition

He was the most distinguished artist of the late 19th century – a grandee who entertained Queen Victoria at his home in Holland Park and was president of the Royal Academy for nearly two decades.

Frederic Leighton was feted for his portraits of women, especially his stunning Flaming June, currently the centrepiece of an exhibition at the Royal Academy. But he actually preferred painting landscapes and very occasional seascapes, one of which, Bay of Cadiz, Moonlight, he adored.

A young woman becomes obsessed with the trial of a man accused of three horrific livestreamed murders in Canadian director Pascal Plante’s stylish psychological thriller

There’s something rather unsavoury about our collective fascination with true crime, and, in particular, with serial killers. The need to unpick the grisly details; the voracious appetite for atrocity podcasts and series – it all holds up a mirror to a less than flattering aspect of society.

It’s this morbid curiosity, taken to an obsessive extreme, that Canadian director Pascal Plante taps into with his chillingly accomplished third feature, Red Rooms. A stylish, unsettling blend of courtroom drama and psychological thriller with a touch of cyber-paranoia thrown in, this French-language film focuses not so much on the horrific crimes and the man on trial for them, but on a young woman whose curiosity about the case starts to consume her.

In UK and Irish cinemas

With his Ibiza-set novel just out, the bestselling author recalls his drug-fuelled partying years, recovery, and the island’s complicated relationship with tourism today

The thing that might surprise you about Ibiza is the quiet. Even in August, there are pockets of tranquillity all over the island. Walking along the nature trail between and behind two of its most famous beaches – Es Cavallet and Ses Salines – you hear nothing but the chirp of cicadas and the soft whisper of the Mediterranean. You will also see, if you turn away from the dunes and pinewoods, the salt pans that dominate this southern tip of the island with an almost eerie stillness, a flamingo or two standing like ornaments on the mirror-like water.

As with many parts of Ibiza – from the hilly forests of the north to the views of the rocky islet of Es Vedrà in the south – it is easy to feel like you have passed into another world. Even more so if you catch them at sunset, when the sky becomes gold and whatever clouds are around become luminous lines of orange-like furrows in some heavenly field.

Tilda Swinton turns fashion designer, Mabel supports Grenfell and rugby style makes a comeback

As trends go, the double-breasted jacket is one of the easiest to try. Get ahead this autumn with our tips on how to wear it

If you’re looking to add a bit of swag and stature, a double breasted blazer is just the thing. Worn as a full suit, a double-breasted look adds gravitas and feels instantly pulled together. But its usefulness doesn’t stop there. Keep the look feeling modern by following the lead from the runways, where the DBJ was styled not as part of a suit, but thrown over the top of a casual dressed-down outfit. It was spotted on the catwalk at Amiri in a heavy tweed worn with metallic trousers and a printed shirt, while at Dries van Noten it came oversized in a light lilac. Wales Bonner’s camel version sported matt gold buttons and was worn with jeans – see also Gant’s preppy styling over a hoodie with denim and trainers (7, below).

It’s a hit with celebrities, too. Twisters star Glen Powell chose a green double-breasted suit for the LA premiere. Naturally, DB himself (Mr Beckham) is a fan of the style, opting for a brown check version for a recent photocall with King Charles (also a loyal advocate of the cut).

The photographer co-opted hair artist Afro Ele to find the perfect rip curl

Last year, visual artist Fede Kortez travelled to the west of Ghana to direct a documentary on surfers. His base was Busua Beach, well known for attracting the worldwide surfing community to its swells. Kortez took a day out of the documentary schedule for the shoot, the idea for which he had been ruminating on for more than a year.

“I wanted to take some boys with their boards and style them up with vibrant hairstyles and cool accessories, with the beach in the background,” he says.

Ellen and Santiago have a long-distance marriage, so stoke the flames of their relationship remotely

How do you do it? Share the story of your sex life, anonymously

I was initially against monogamy, but I realised that being exclusive brings us closer

My sex life is satisfying – maybe that would be different if I didn’t feel comfortable masturbating

You don’t need to be a straight A student to cook these easy instant noodles

I wrote this recipe for all the students heading back to university this week, but it’s too nice to withhold from everyone else, especially because it’s the sort of thing I like to eat on any day of the working week. It’s cheap, quick and delicious, and you need no skills to make it. The first eight ingredients are stirred together; the ninth, spring onions, just need a quick chop and a fry with the 11th ingredient, cabbage, which could be done while ingredient number 10, the noodles, are on the boil. A final flourish with some chopped peanuts and you’re ready for dinner.

We would like to hear what you’ve loved about watching the Paralympics take place in Paris

The 17th Paralympic games are underway in Paris. We would like to hear what your favourite moment of the games has been so far – whether it’s a particular performance from the opening ceremony, or a memorable highlight. Tell us all about it below.

We would like to hear about when children are first given mobile phones and how often they use them

With children returning to school, many parents find themselves debating whether to give them their first phone. Pressure to do so can come from their own children,their friends at school or other families.

Whether you are a parent or teacher, we want to hear your experience with children and mobile phone usage. What age did you give your child their first phone and why? Was it a smartphone or dumb phone (one that cannot connect to the internet)?

We want to hear your views on which libraries are important to you and why – and any memories that have stayed with you

Council-run libraries have been under threat the last couple of years due to cuts in funding. Since 2016, more than 180 libraries run by councils in the UK have closed or have been given to voluntary groups, according to the BBC.

For Jack Reacher author, Lee Child, libraries should not be closed as they provide a place of reading and learning for many people. Child added that fictional character Jack Reacher would not exist without Birmingham’s libraries.

The Guardian is coming to Saginaw, Michigan, before the presidential election to find out which issues people there most care about – and we want your help

In the run-up to the US presidential election, the Guardian will be spending at least a month in Saginaw, a pivotal county in the key swing state of Michigan where voters were almost evenly divided between Donald Trump and his Democratic opponents in the last two presidential elections.

We will be listening to how local people see a race that has already taken dramatic and unexpected turns. We are interested not only in how you might vote, if at all, but what you think the candidates should be talking about, whether or not they are doing so.

Creating a fox-proof haven for endangered eastern quolls required a high, encircling fence. But what about the other wildlife?

• Follow our Australia news live blog for latest updates
• Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast

Eastern long-necked turtles are known for their “ridiculously cute grin”, says Nick Dexter, and a much less charming ability to release a pungent stink to ward off predators.

But what they’re not good at, unsurprisingly, is climbing fences.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s breaking news email

Users say harmful content from accounts they do not follow appears even after requests to block it

Debbie was scrolling through X in April when some unwelcome posts appeared on her feed. One showed a photo of someone who was visibly underweight asking whether they were thin enough. In another, a user wanted to compare how few calories they were eating each day.

Debbie, who did not want to give her last name, is 37 years old and was first diagnosed with bulimia when she was 16. She did not ­follow either of the accounts behind the posts, which belonged to a group with more than 150,000 members on the social media site.

Saga over contestant’s nationality reflects hatred of other Africans fuelled by poverty among black population

When Chidimma Adetshina entered Miss South Africa, she dreamed of being crowned and going on to represent – at the Miss Universe contest in November – the country she had lived in since birth. What she didn’t expect was a furious backlash that would end up with her winning the right to represent Nigeria instead.

A saga over the 23-year-old law student’s nationality has exposed a deep vein of xenophobia in South Africa against immigrants from other African countries that has festered since the end of apartheid, feeding off endemic unemployment, poverty and inequality, and periodically exploding into violence.

Ex-president tries to fend off criticisms of mental acuity that plagued Biden as he waffles about sharks and batteries

For those baffled by Donald Trump’s forays into meandering discourses about electrocution, bacons sales or cannibal killers at his recent political rallies, the former US president had an explanation.

Trump assured supporters in Pennsylvania on Saturday that what might look like incoherent ramblings as he frequently departed from his scripted speech were instead indicators of his brilliance that impressed other great minds.

In 2001, a badly broken body was found in a London car park. Police said the man had tried to enter the UK by hiding in a plane’s landing gear. Two decades after the Guardian first told his tragic story, there was an unexpected twist

Twenty-three years ago this summer, on a bright early June morning in south-west London, a staff member on her way to work at the Richmond branch of Homebase came across the body of a man who had died in the most brutal and traumatic manner.

His body was lying on the tarmac just inside the DIY superstore’s car park, a tangle of broken limbs in black jeans and a black T-shirt. His skull had smashed and his brain matter was splattered distressingly across a parked car.

Prime ministers, television presenters, journalists, MPs and political staffers all feature in the court transcript of the Perth trial

• Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast

What started as a defamation case between a senator and an alleged sexual assault victim ballooned into a who’s who of Australian politics and media.

Prime ministers, television presenters, journalists, members of parliament and political staffers featured in the court transcript in the Perth trial that pitted Senator Linda Reynolds against her former staffer Brittany Higgins, over social media posts the ex-minister claims damaged her reputation.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s breaking news email

Most of the time safety divers do not need to step in, but our presence gives athletes the security needed for their remarkable underwater feats

• Photography and videos by Piko Studios and Jack Lawes for the Guardian

Things started to go wrong as Gary McGrath was coming up from 95 metres below the surface, a feat managed entirely on one breath. McGrath, who holds the British freediving record of 112 metres, was met on his ascent by a team of safety divers who quickly noticed he was struggling as his movements started to slow. Then he stopped rising.

Protocols designed for such emergencies instantly came into play. One diver sealed Gary’s airways while another grabbed his hips, bringing him to the surface together, all while holding their breaths, too.

Gary McGrath in Dahab, on Egypt’s Sinai peninsula. He holds the British record after freediving to 112 metres

He says that acting is a gamble – but is a dead cert to terrify audiences with new film Speak No Evil. The Scottish actor talks about marriage, therapy – and why Ken Loach would never cast him

He is a funny character, James McAvoy. I meet him in one of those fancy Soho hotels where the cast of films that are about to be massive assemble so they can all be interviewed on the same day. And McAvoy’s new psychological thriller, Speak No Evil, will be massive. A remake of the 2022 Danish original, it is just as terrifying, with one difference.

McAvoy, 45, is personable and urbane. He is wearing a suit, but looks like a guy who changes into cargo shorts as soon as he gets home. “I’m really lucky in a lot of ways, mainly that my granny’s all over me,” he says. “I’ve definitely got a large dose of what she has.” His parents divorced when he was 11, and his mother was ill, so he went to live with his grandparents in Drumchapel, Glasgow. Later, considering class, he describes his childhood tangentially, talking about why Ken Loach would never cast him. “I’m too much of an actor. And I’m, like: ‘I grew up on the council estate you shot half your films on!’ But I’m too much of an actor.”

As sources of inspiration, havens from noise or social support service, council-run libraries have had a positive impact on lives all over the UK

“There’s a random element to life, which I think is important to preserve. Browsing through books is not a rational activity; it’s not like using a computer search to find what you want. Serendipity is another word that comes to mind.”

For Jamie Page, 66, libraries can provide the kind of chance encounter that you can’t find in bookshops that mainly tout new titles. In 1980, he was an unemployed graduate wondering what sort of career he might have. One day, at Brompton library in Kensington, he stumbled across a book on bacteria. “I found it fascinating, he says. “It started my career and I’ve been working in science ever since.”

For almost a century, opponents have removed the ‘ic’ from ‘Democratic’. Is it doing them any good?

The Democratic party? Robert F Kennedy Jr’s never heard of it.

On Tuesday, the former presidential candidate issued his latest condemnation of the “Democrat party”, endorsing a bizarre linguistic tradition among haters of the institution. As Donald Trump told a rally in 2018: “I call it the Democrat party. It sounds better rhetorically.” By “better”, of course, he meant “worse”, as he explained the next year: he prefers to say “the ‘Democrat party’ because it doesn’t sound good”.

Weekend is taking a little break. So for the next two weeks, we’re picking some of our favourite pieces from the last few months just in case you missed them…

Actor Julia Fox unpacks abuse, fame, and dating Kanye; should you blame yourself for your bad habits? And what happened when one man’s boat sank in the dead of night and he had to save his seven-year-old son.

We are raiding the Guardian Long Read archives to bring you some notable pieces from years past, with new introductions from the authors.

This week, from 2022: Five years after the fire that killed 72, the inquiry is nearing a close. Over 300 days of evidence, what have we learned about the failings that led to disaster? By Robert Booth

Kamala Harris and Donald Trump will meet face to face on the debate stage next Tuesday. Jonathan Freedland speaks to Paul Begala – who helped Al Gore to prepare for his 2000 debate against George W Bush – about what the 2024 candidates will be doing to prepare.

What can they do to increase their chances of coming out on top, and will this debate be as election-defining as the last?

Archive: CSPAN, ABC, MSNBC, CNN

After seven long years, the inquiry into a fire in a London tower block that left 72 people dead has concluded. But is justice for the victims – and survivors – any closer?

It’s more than seven years since Grenfell Tower burned. Now, finally, a public inquiry has finished sifting through thousands of documents, evidence from hundreds of public hearings and more than 1,600 witness statements. And its conclusions could not be more clear: every one of the 72 deaths was avoidable.

The Guardian’s social affairs correspondent, Rob Booth, has reported on the tragedy from the beginning, speaking to victims and experts about what happened on that terrible night and what has happened since. He tells Helen Pidd about the shocking revelations of the inquiry and why the companies and individuals who have been named and shamed have yet to be held accountable.

Max Rushden is joined by Barry Glendenning, Lars Sivertsen and Mark Langdon to discuss Aston Villa’s Champions League ticket prices, Leicester City avoiding a points deduction and the international break

Rate, review, share on Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, Audioboom, Mixcloud, Acast and Stitcher, and join the conversation on Facebook, Twitter and email.

On the podcast today: Aston Villa have announced the ticket prices for their home Champions League games and fans are justifiably angry – the club claim they have to do it to comply with PSR; the panel disagree.

Last month the World Health Organization declared the recent mpox outbreak that began in the Democratic Republic of the Congo a public health emergency of international concern. As scientists race to find out more about the new strain, Ian Sample talks to Trudie Lang, professor of global health research and director of the global health network at the University of Oxford, to find out what we still need to learn in order to tackle and contain the virus

Follow more Guardian reporting on mpox here

The 2017 Grenfell Tower fire in London was the result of ‘decades of failure’ by central government, the public inquiry into the catastrophe has found. The Guardian’s John Harris looks at the findings of the report with the social affairs leader writer Susanna Rustin. And, as Labour continues to warn ‘things will get worse before they get better’, we are joined by the economists James Meadway and Ann Pettifor to discuss whether a painful period of austerity-lite is the only way through the storm

Footage shows Danish police apprehending the activist Greta Thunberg at a Gaza war protest. Six demonstrators were detained at the scene, at the University of Copenhagen, after about 20 people blocked the entrance to a building and three entered, a police spokesperson told Reuters

• Greta Thunberg arrested at Gaza war protest in Copenhagen

On Saturday 24 April, the billionaire founder of the Telegram social media and messaging app, Pavel Durov, was arrested by French authorities as he disembarked from his private jet in Paris on his way from Azerbaijan. Officials said the arrest was part of an inquiry into criminal activity on the platform and a lack of cooperation with law enforcement. Durov has since been formally charged. 

In a statement on Sunday, Telegram said it abided by European Union laws and that its moderation was 'within industry standards and constantly improving'. 'Telegram’s CEO, Pavel Durov, has nothing to hide and travels frequently in Europe,' it said. 'It is absurd to claim that a platform, or its owner, are responsible for abuse of that platform.'

Durov, known as the 'Russian Mark Zuckerberg' for having founded a similar platform to Zuckerberg’s Facebook in Russia called VKontakte, is a self-styled champion of free speech and has cultivated a reputation for being unwilling to work with authorities to censor and more closely control what happens on his platform. His arrest has raised important questions about the extent to which tech executives are responsible for how users employ their social media networks. Chris Stokel-Walker, a technology journalist, explains the implications of Durov's arrest for the tech sector

• Telegram CEO charged in France for ‘allowing criminal activity’ on messaging app

• What the Telegram founder’s arrest means for the regulation of social media firms

Ukraine has made incursions into Russian territory, boosting morale and changing the dynamic of the two-year war that began after Russia's 2022 full-scale invasion.

Ukraine launched the surprise incursion into the Kursk and Belgorod regions of Russia with armour and infantry on 6 August, involving thousands of troops amounting to 14 brigades. While initial details of the attack were murky, Kyiv and Moscow have now acknowledged the operation into the Russian border regions, while independent analysts have verified claims about the scale of the advance by geolocating images posted by Ukrainian troops.

The Guardian's defence and security editor, Dan Sabbagh, explains how the incursion unfolded and what it means for the war raging in Europe

• Kursk incursion: how Ukraine turned the tables and struck back at Russia

US vice-president and Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris took to the stage on the final day of the Democratic national convention in Chicago, delivering the biggest speech of her political career. With less than three months left before election day - and with polls showing a tight contest against the Republican former president Donald Trump - Harris fired up the Democratic faithful by reflecting on her upbringing and past as a California attorney-general, asking the audience to ‘imagine Trump with no guardrails’, and calling on Americans to 'fight for this country we love'

• Kamala Harris’s big moment, and a message of hope: key takeaways from the Democratic convention’s final night

The preservation of egg shells and nests for study and display has been going on for more than 350 years, and London’s Natural History Museum has one of the most comprehensive collections. Douglas Russell , an NHM senior curator and author of the forthcoming book Interesting Bird Nests and Eggs , explains: “While I sometimes chose familiar species, like the blue tit, I often highlighted lesser-known examples, such as a buff-spotted woodpecker nest built in a termite mound, collected in Cameroon in the early 1900s .” Perhaps the most surprising, he says, is a house sparrow nest built in the exhaust of a RAF helicopter at the beginning of the second Gulf war. “Nests are wonderful time capsules of the habitat the birds were living in at that moment.”

• Interesting Bird Nests and Eggs is published by the Natural History Museum ( £12.99)

The evacuation of Pokrovsk, Israeli raids in the West Bank, the Paralympic Games in Paris and the West Indian Day parade in Brooklyn: the last seven days as captured by the world’s leading photojournalists

• Warning: this gallery contains images that some readers may find distressing

Photographer Jamila Filippone went behind the scenes to witness Strut & Fret’s circus cabaret show at the West End Electric for the Brisbane festival

The Guardian’s picture editors select photographs from around the world

The best of this week’s wildlife photographs from around the world