CATEGORIES

The mystery of Austria's silence over dual citizens held in Iran

Six years ago on New Year’s Day, an Iranian-Austrian IT businessman said goodbye to his wife and three children and boarded a flight from Vienna to Tehran via Istanbul. Kamran Ghaderi had been due to return five or six days later, but he was arrested and has spent six years in Evin prison in Tehran.

Macron – and the west – are now prey to France's toxic populism

France is both beautiful and brutally bleak. It is a country studded with towns and rural vistas that take your breath away, but pockmarked with districts of soulless, desolate concrete, especially in the suburbs of its cities, the banlieues. It’s as though French planners and architects, in their embrace of modernity, lost touch with what it means to be human. It has been an important trigger for a toxic brew of Islamophobia and wider cultural despair.

Living with Covid: Planning beyond virus does not mean dropping all precaution

Reports in the UK last Sunday that free lateral flow tests could be axed within weeks under a strategy of living with Covid were met with a swift backlash. The British government promptly denied the suggestion that people would soon have to pay for the tests.

Inequality is driving protests against an authoritarian system

Almaty, the commercial capital of Kazakhstan , is the kind of mirage that oil-rich nations so often produce. It has all the trappings of comfort and consumer excess: swanky shopping malls, luxury car dealerships, high-end hotels. This is the image of prosperity that the country’s rulers enjoy projecting. For decades, Kazakhs have been encouraged to take out expensive loans to buy flats, cars and even holidays they can barely afford.

Djokovic furore hides trail of unanswered questions

The tennis star was released from detention, having gained a new fanbase of anti-vaxxers and far-right figures

America divided: BEHIND THE LINES

With the perception of reality between Democrats and Republicans so distorted, could civil war really happen? Some experts doubt an armed conflict could arise – but others foresee a Northern Ireland-style insurgency …

A natural film star who quietly pioneered a revolution Sidney Poitier

For postwar America, Sidney Poitier became something like the Black Cary Grant: a strikingly handsome and well-spoken Bahamian-American actor. He was a natural film star who projected passion, yet tempered by a kind of refinement and restraint that white moviegoers found reassuring.

UK and the EU likely to remain best of enemies

When Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission president, gave her lengthy “state of the union” speech in September, there were mentions aplenty of the EU’s vital relationships with Turkey, the western Balkans and Africa.

A rise in political pressures over the protocol

Brexit has forced Northern Irish businesses to deal with new barriers, while the delicate political balances have been strained.

The moon is once again within touching distance

Elon Musk claims his Starship rocket will carry passengers to Mars within five years

Omicron and decline in trade threaten growth

Britain’s economy heads into the new year weighed down by a decline in trade and falling business and consumer confidence.

A post-Covid New Deal could bring much-needed hope to the world

Christmas 1941 was grim.

‘He's clueless' In a Tory stronghold, PM's stock plummets

After a torrid week, doubts about Johnson’s abilities were heard even in the Brexit-supporting heartlands of Kent

Will the son of a Nazi drag us back to the dark days of Pinochet?

For more than 70 years, 10 December has been celebrated around the world as Human Rights Day, a way of commemorating the anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, proclaimed in 1948 by the UN. In Chile, my country, the date took on a special meaning after the 1973 coup by General Augusto Pinochet that overthrew the democratically elected government of socialist president Salvador Allende. During the 17 years of dictatorship that followed, it was an occasion to publicly rally for those rights that were being egregiously violated, as the regime arrested, tortured, executed or exiled opponents, and abrogated free speech and the right to assemble peacefully.

Trump still looms large over Pence's White House ambitions

‘Hang Mike Pence!” was the chilling chant of the mob at the US Capitol on 6 January. Can the same constituency be persuaded to vote for Mike Pence on 5 November 2024? He, for one, appears to think so.

Will Putin strike?

A game of nerves on Ukraine’s frontline

On the brink

He was the Tory saviour of Brexit – but sleaze, ‘partygate’ and Omicron have beset Britain’s PM. Now, many of his own MPs want him gone

Omicron could be fatal for us – or fatal for our faith in authorities

The emergence and rapid spread of the Omicron variant feels like a flashback to last year’s grim festive season when much of the world went into lockdown to avert the worst of the Alpha variant wave. But though the sense of eerie, impending doom feels familiar, the epidemiological and political situations are different from one year ago.

How vaccine makers are adapting to mutations

A focus on the exciting potential of T-cell immunity is spurring the sector on to create a new generation of jabs

Crude insult Recovery is slow from a Gulf War act of vandalism

Oilwells set alight by Iraqi forces in 1991 were put out within months, but insidious pollution still mars the desert

Can't find a PS5 console? Just head to Gaza City

It is surrounded on all sides, regularly bombed, and plagued by shortages of vital medicines. Yet in the lead-up to Christmas, the isolated Gaza Strip has had ample supplies of something the rest of the world craves but can rarely find: a brand new PlayStation 5. Sony’s flagship video game console is hot property this holiday season, although most people who have asked for one will be disappointed on Christmas morning.

Boosters What makes them more effective than the first two jabs?

Only recently, the rollout of boosters to older age groups was seen as contentious. Now they’re the single biggest focus. So why do boosters help so significantly compared with first and second jabs, and are we on a conveyor belt towards needing an ever-increasing number of top-ups?

For Trump's appointees, judgment day comes ever nearer

The growing gap between what the six conservative judges say and do threatens to ruin the court’s legitimacy

The next wave

Is the pandemic likely to fizzle out... or get much worse?

Johnson faces rising tide of voter distrust over sleaze

Trust in politicians to act in the national interest rather than their own has fallen dramatically since Boris Johnson became prime minister, according to figures in a disturbing study of the state of British democracy.

True colours

How abortion focused white evangelical anger

‘No quick fix'

Ultra-violent gang crime shocks a liberal nation

Nurdles: the worst toxic waste that you've never heard of

Billions of tiny plastic pellets are fl oating in the world’s oceans – and causing as much damage as oil spills

OUT OF THE BLUE

Before the pandemic, planes were in constant motion, pinballing between continents. But in March 2020 all that came to a halt. What did a year without flying do to our jobs, our horizons – and the planet?

Roe, Wade and America

The conservative-dominated US supreme court is considering a case that could lead to the reversal of the 48-year-old ruling on a woman’s right to choose. What damage would such a verdict do to the nation – and how did it come to this?