How 2-Tone brought new ideas about race and culture to young people beyond the inner cities: This Town, Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight’s latest drama for the BBC, brings to life a defining – if short-lived – era in the history of British youth culture and popular music. Set in the West Midlands against the …
The challenges African election bodies face go beyond ‘democratic backsliding’ – analysis: Election management bodies are essential democratic institutions. To deliver national polls effectively, they need to be properly resourced, impartial and free from government or malicious interference. Independent election bodies established in the 1990s played an important role in the early deepening of democratic …
US-led taskforce deploys in Red Sea as Middle East crisis threatens to escalate beyond Gaza: The US is reportedly considering strikes against Houthi rebels in Yemen that have been menacing commercial ships in the Red Sea since the conflict began in Gaza. The Pentagon has a range of options for missile attacks on Houthi positions …
Gaza Update: as Israel begins its ground offensive, the conflict’s reverberations are being felt far beyond the Strip: The ground assault on Gaza is now well underway and, as they advance into the Strip’s urban areas, the Israel Defence Forces are coming up against an elusive enemy that has been preparing for this conflict for …
Aziz Pahad: the unassuming South African diplomat who skilfully mediated crises in Africa, and beyond: Aziz Goolam Pahad, who has died at the age of 82, was a South African anti-apartheid activist, politician and deputy minister of foreign affairs in the post-1994 government. Together with a small group of foreign policy analysts, I worked with …
In Iran and beyond, arrests of singers and dancers show how music can be a powerful tool of resistance: Iranian women are prohibited from singing and dancing in public. Yet many are posting videos on social media dancing and singing along to singer Mehdi Yarrahi’s song Roosarito (Your Veil). The wave of videos comes after …
School concrete crisis: how Raac has been used well beyond its expiry date: More than one hundred schools in England have been fully or partly closed just days before the start of the new academic year, due to concerns over the safety of concrete roof panels. Problems with what the construction industry terms “reinforced autoclaved …
Have we really found the first samples from beyond the Solar System? The evidence is not convincing: Frank Romeo/Shutterstock Avi Loeb, an astrophysicist at Harvard University in the US, has published a press release claiming that some of the 700 or so spherical metallic fragments (spherules) he recovered from the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, …
Ukraine recap: fallout from death of Yevgeny Prigozhin will be felt far beyond Moscow: Where were you when you heard that Wagner Group boss Yevgeny Prigozhin’s aircraft had crashed and he was presumed dead? For Ukraine watchers it was something of a surreal JFK moment. And, like the Zapruder tape, the video footage of the …
Ukraine war: drones are changing the conflict – both on the frontline and beyond: As Kyiv’s counteroffensive to liberate Russian-occupied territories slowly advances in Ukraine’s east, the drone war continues to escalate. Beyond the symbolic value of high-profile strikes against targets in Moscow, deep in the Russian heartland, and Novorossiysk, a key Russian port and …
Beyond The Story: BTS biography is a humanising, literary portrayal of K-pop’s world-leading stars: In a climate of ever-increasing competition, it’s a real feat when any band makes it to their tenth anniversary bigger than ever. Such is the case with K-pop group BTS (short for bangtan sonyeondan, “bulletproof boy scouts” in Korean). The band …
Two years after Taliban takeover: why Afghanistan still poses a threat to the region and beyond: The dramatic and rapid Taliban offensive in the spring of 2021 culminated in its takeover of Kabul on August 15. The chaos of the western withdrawal that surrounded the return of the Taliban represented a sad endpoint of two …
Is there new physics beyond the Standard Model of particle physics? Our finding will help settle the question: Muon g2 experiment. Fermilab Despite its tremendous success in predicting the existence of new particles and forces, the Standard Model of particle physics, designed over 50 years ago to explain the smallest building blocks of nature, isn’t …
Space colonies: how artificial photosynthesis may be key to sustained life beyond Earth: shutterstock Supamotionstock.com/shutterstock Life on Earth owes its existence to photosynthesis – a process which is 2.3 billion years old. This immensely fascinating (and still not fully understood) reaction enables plants and other organisms to harvest sunlight, water and carbon dioxide while converting …
Aneurin Bevan’s writings still have lessons for contemporary politics – and far beyond the NHS: The NHS will turn 75 this year, a considerable legacy for the person responsible for establishing the service, Aneurin Bevan. But Bevan’s political career encompassed far more than this one achievement. When today’s politicians talk about Bevan’s values or principles, …
Rishi Sunak and Emmanuel Macron: beyond the bromance, what was discussed at their summit in Paris?: The theatricality of the warmth on show between British prime minister Rishi Sunak and French president Emmanuel Macron during their summit in Paris should not detract from how important it is that Franco-British cooperation has been renewed. Relations reached …
Jimmy Carter: the American president whose commitment to Africa went beyond his term: Former American President Jimmy Carter. Drew Angerer/Getty Images The office of former US president Jimmy Carter (98), who has been frail for some time, has announced that he will no longer seek hospital treatment for his ailments. He has instead opted for …
How Sylvia Plath’s profound nature poetry elevates her writing beyond tragedy and despair: I cannot stop writing poems! … They come from the vocabulary of woods and animals and earth. From a letter from Sylvia Plath to her mother, 1956 Popular perceptions of Sylvia Plath tend to dwell on a deeply troubled version of the …