Belarusian dissidents granted political asylum in the UK have revealed they are still being harassed and targeted by the repressive regime in their home country, 10 years after they formed a theatre group to protest against the rule of President Alexander Lukashenko.
“Putin is a saint,” says Father Savvas as he walks out of one of Greece’s most important cathedrals on Mitropoleos Street in downtown Athens. “But [Putin] will only help us if God wants it and the EU abandon us.” The monk, wearing sunglasses and a long white beard, is visiting Athens for a few weeks. Father Savvas has travelled down from Mount Athos, a remote peninsula in northern Greece which has been set as the spiritual capital of Orthodox Christianity for more than 1,000 years.
David Cameron is increasing the rhetoric against Muslim radicalisation, but he and others still pay lip service to “true” Islam as the religion of love. Just look, though, at scriptures and the behaviour of the religious, Muslim and Christian.
When, in the second half of the 19th century, Otto von Bismarck dreamed of an economic empire stretching from western Europe to the eastern Mediterranean, he surveyed a world in which great powers flexed their muscles in something like concentric circles of diminishing influence. It was an age of empire and regional rivalries, in which the further you got from these powers’ capitals, the less you felt of their force.
Long before their electoral catastrophe in May, it seemed that Tim Farron was a dead cert to be the next leader of the Liberal Democrats. He remains the strong favourite, but over the past few weeks doubts have emerged.
When the Prime Minister spoke about the role British Muslim communities can play in countering the apparent allure of Isis, he was fundamentally right. Indeed, all of Britain’s many, diverse communities have a responsibility towards the young, the impressionable and the vulnerable in their midst. In combating the drift of individuals to potentially dangerous extremes, positive social cohesion is vital.
Which party leader who won three general elections still casts a shadow over their party and divides opinion within it? Until last month, the answer would have been Margaret Thatcher. But some Conservative ministers now dare to whisper that David Cameron’s election victory has finally laid the ghost of Thatcher to rest.
Hippies. Radicals. Anarchists. Sore losers. Tomorrow, the right-wing press' response to Britain’s biggest anti-austerity protest for years will be nothing if not predictable, especially if there's even a hint of violence for them to pounce on.
Chijindu Ujah may be one of only six Britons to have dipped under the 10-second barrier in the 100 metres but he has yet to pass a relay baton to one of his Great Britain team-mates.
At next week’s Glastonbury Festival, visitors will not need to stir from the Pyramid Stage – where the headline acts play – if they want to catch an orchestra, complete with eminent classical conductor. The maverick maestro Charles Hazlewood will be bringing a 26-piece band to Worthy Farm to back the Northumbrian folk-based ensemble, The Unthanks.
Mo Farah has broken his silence for the first time in nearly two weeks to deny any wrongdoing over his missed drugs tests in the lead-up to the London Olympics.
As the dust gingerly settles on the pithy exchange between the London Mayor and a London cabbie, this question must be asked: Is Boris Johnson the new Winston Churchill?
Can you trust your Muslim neighbour?
A week after the Bank of England boss, Mark Carney, said that banks need to behave better, the latest technical meltdown at RBS has left thousands of its poorest customers struggling, as tax credits and benefit payments were not deposited in their accounts.
Among many wonderful scenes in Peter Kay’s recent sitcom Car Share, there is one I’ve watched over and over again online. In it, Kay’s character, John, is singing along to John Farnham’s “You’re The Voice” in his car. As he builds to the chorus, through those emotive lines, “We’re all someone’s daughter. We’re all someone’s son…”, he gets louder and louder and is at full bellow when he notices that the man in the next lane watching his antics and laughing. Embarrassed, he instantly stops singing... Читать дальше...
Creative solutions if you're caught short somewhere in a field in Somerset
In case you’ve somehow managed to miss the furore, the fourth 50 Shades of Grey book, Grey, has just been released.
It’s a cry for acceptance. Pop stars love to be seen as classical musicians too. And classical players usually have a secret desire to be part of the pop world. I remember being present when a beaming Paul McCartney premiered his Liverpool Oratorio. "Penny Lane" was a more memorable evocation of the city, but the oratorio flexed different muscles in its composer and spoke to a different audience.
I miss having pink hair. I wish I could say I didn’t. I wish I could tell you I was embracing life as a blonde, and that of course I don’t mind the fact that people no longer approach me in the street and ask me what dye I use, and tell me how fabulous I look. But that would be a lie. I hate to say it folks, pinks do have more fun.
It’s quite the thing these days, to decide on the Nation’s Favourite. Presumably because the accolade gives authority to familiarity. There is a TV documentary series choosing the Nation’s Favourite Pop Song (Abba, the Bee Gees, etc) and we now know the Nation’s Favourite Bird is the robin.
Mo Farah has released a statement in response to the allegations that he missed two drug tests in the build-up to the London 2012 Olympics, where he won two gold medals in the 5,000m and 10,000m.
It does not take a genius to anticipate the reaction on the day when the House of Commons and the House of Lords agree to spend billions of pounds of public money on restoring the Palace of Westminster. The cry will go up that politicians who have sacrificed the jobs of hundreds of thousands of public-sector workers and squeezed the incomes of the poorest in the drive for austerity suddenly have vast resources to spent on their own place of work.
Yesterday an act of domestic terrorism took place at the AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina. At the media briefing that took place afterwards, none of the state authority figures dealing with the massacre uttered those two words, though.
Italy's Capital of Culture in 2015 has 25 centuries of heritage, with new flights from the UK making it even more accessible. Simon Calder is your guide
Greek membership of the eurozone is a remarkable example of the persistence of error. It should have been obvious at the start that it was neither good for Greece nor sustainable, and it has been made more obvious since. Yet the Greek people and government seem determined to stay in and the rest of the eurozone is determined to keep Greece in.