Author: The Guardian

My partner, Paul, and I are dog lovers through and through but our office jobs meant it had never been practical, or fair, to have a dog of our own. In lockdown our working situations changed, however, so we visited Oxford Animal Sanctuary and met Buddy, a labrador/border collie cross. He was nine and very reactive to other dogs. Knowing he had spent three years in and out of kennels, we couldn’t bear the thought of leaving him in what must have been an incredibly stressful environment. So on 4 July 2020 we brought him home.With us, Buddy was docile,…

FSince the first coronavirus lockdown, our lives have largely returned to normal, although the effects of the pandemic remain. A collective amnesia appears to have begun. Politicians seem eager to move forward and not repeat the mistakes, delays and deaths of public policy and press conferences. However, we cannot forget such a cruel event. It is estimated that the new coronavirus has killed nearly 16 million people around the world in 2020 and 2021, and caused a decrease in life expectancy in 84% of countries, including the UK. A pandemic is not a one-time event. There is still a possibility…

Kremlin questions Islamic State responsibility for concert hall attackHello and welcome to the Guardian’s live coverage of the war in Ukraine.Russia has cast doubt on assertions by the US that the Islamic State militant group was responsible for the terrorist attack on the Crocus City concert hall outside Moscow which killed at least 137 people and injured 182 others.On Sunday, Islamic State released new footage of Friday’s deadly attack, corroborating the terror group’s claim to have masterminded the massacre, even as Russia sought to place the blame on Ukraine, which Kyiv denies.Russia’s foreign ministry spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, has now called…

FIn other words, of all the reports on the war in Ukraine, very few are from the perspective of soldiers on the front lines. But Jamie Roberts’ BBC Two documentary, which asked Ukrainians to wear helmet-mounted cameras as they faced relentless Russian attacks, captured the bloody reality of an increasingly forgotten conflict in the West.The intimate and harrowing film “Ukraine, Enemies in the Woods” was conceived in response to war fatigue, the director said. But if anything, the brutal and often unheroic struggle in the frozen forests northwest of Kupyansk highlights the enormous human toll Ukraine is taking to defend…

Solar eruptions are sending a stream of particles towards Earth, creating spectacular auroras in both hemispheres.The aurora borealis – in the northern hemisphere – will be potentially visible on Monday night in the US as far south as the midwest. The northern lights, more commonly associated with northern Europe, could also be visible in northern Britain.In the southern hemisphere, the aurora australis could be visible in southern Australia, from Victoria to Western Australia.The shimmering spectacle comes on the same night as a penumbral lunar eclipse, which will be visible around the world.Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology’s space weather forecasting centre issued…

The attack on Moscow’s Crocus City concert hall was the deadliest attack claimed by the Islamic State on European soil, with 137 confirmed dead.Attackers armed with assault rifles entered a concert hall in a Moscow suburb on Friday night and fired for nearly an hour as panicked concertgoers scrambled to escape. The attackers then set fire to the venue.The death toll is slightly higher than the devastating Paris attacks in 2015, which occurred at the height of the Islamic State’s power.Things have moved quickly since Friday, with four suspects, identified by Russian news agencies as Tajik citizens, appearing in court…

Ouch … Source link

Japan’s ancient sport of sumo is celebrating the birth of a new hero, with Muto becoming the first wrestler in more than a century to win the top division on debut.There were wild celebrations at Osaka’s Edion Arena on Sunday after he ended the 15-day tournament with an unblemished 13-2 record.The 24-year-old from northern Aomori Prefecture pushed his opponent Gonoyama out of the ring. soil fertilizer He won the Emperor’s Cup despite injuring his ankle the day before and having to be taken out in a wheelchair after losing a match.On Sunday, a shocked Takerufuji (real name Mikiya Ishioka) revealed…

Although it happened more than 60 years ago, Antonio Salazar-Hobson remembers every detail of his kidnapping. He says that if he closes his eyes, he is instantly taken back to that hot Sunday afternoon in 1960 when he was a four-year-old boy standing with his brothers and sisters in the red dust of his back yard on the outskirts of Phoenix, Arizona.Nearby, at the bottom of a short passageway connecting the back yard to the road out of town, a car is idling.A white man is leaning out of the window, calling Salazar-Hobson’s name. He is very afraid of this…

China is believed to have gained access to the personal information of millions of voters in its attack on Britain’s democratic process, ministers will say.The government is believed to have identified 43 people, including members of Congress and colleagues, who were targeted in Chinese government-backed cyber attacks. The UK can impose sanctions on individuals believed to be involved in these state-backed interferences, one of which was a separate attack on the Electoral Commission in which Beijing obtained the personal details of some 40 million voters.Ministers will release full details on Monday, with Deputy Prime Minister Oliver Dowden expected to tell…