Read the daily news to learn English

France and Germany summon Russian ambassadors over alleged cyber attacks as Macron hosts leaders for Ukraine talks – Europe live

But Macron’s words and his Ukraine meeting later today are not dominating the headlines in France, with most focusing on a fire raging in the historic and much-visited Fontainebleau forest south of Paris. Earlier today, the fire prompted evacuations of some residential neighbourhoods and disrupted train and highway traffic, AP reported. Two water-dumping planes were deployed over the area along with hundreds of firefighters, regional fire service spokesperson Paul Laurain told public broadcaster France-Info. France is experiencing the peak of its third heatwave of the summer, with temperatures surpassing 40C across western and central areas and up to 37C in Paris.

Iran launches attacks on American military facilities in Bahrain and Kuwait after fresh US strikes – Middle East crisis live

In a statement published to social media, the Iranian embassy in the UK claims Tehran is complying with the memorandum of understanding with the US, having established “a temporary safe and secure maritime corridor” free of “technical and military barriers”. “Meanwhile, the US which has done nothing but violate the MoU since day one, is pushing vessels toward a dangerous southern parallel route,” it wrote on X. See the post at 11.18 which explains the southern vs northern routes through the strait of Hormuz. “That route is not only legally questionable but also unsafe, unreliable, and prone to accidents. Adding to the threat, US military aggression, including attacks on Iran’s port & tower infrastructure, has turned the strait of Hormuz into a tense, high-risk zone for maritime traffic,” the embassy, based in London, wrote. “Those who enabled this perilous situation must reconsider their stance, if they truly seek safe passage through the strait of Hormuz. Security is a two-way street.” The US has said its forces were prepared to ensure “freedom of navigation” across the strait, declaring the waterway open to all commercial vessels. The Joint Maritime Information Center, a US-led military organisation, has recommended vessels take a route through Omani territorial waters in the south of the strait, rather than the Iranian-approved northern route.

Conwy villagers flee homes as wildfires burn in Wales and England

Villagers were evacuated from their homes as a wildfire swept across a mountainside in north Wales, prompting firefighters to declare a major incident. People described hearing the crackling fire advancing down Conwy Mountain towards homes as ash fell from a sky turned dark by thick smoke. A second major incident was declared in Derbyshire, where fire chiefs said they were working to protect homes, infrastructure and wildlife. Wildfires have also burned in places including County Durham, Greater Manchester, East Sussex, West Sussex, Devon, Somerset and Greater London over the last few days. Natural England said there remained an “exceptional fire risk” in pockets of southern Britain and a “very high” risk for much of England and Wales. A combination of continuing hot weather and high winds is making it hard to tackle the wildfires currently ablaze and increasing the risk of more starting. North Wales fire and rescue service was called to Conwy Mountain in the early hours of Sunday and declared a major incident later that day. It said “hundreds of acres” of land were affected, and that at one point the front of the fire measured almost a mile across. The fire service said the steep terrain made it hard to contain the blaze, which was whipped by strong winds. A spokesperson asked people to avoid the area. “Local residents should keep windows and doors closed if affected by smoke. Everyone close to the Conwy Mountain who needed to evacuate has been contacted and supported through this process.” One resident, Ben Campbell, fled with his wife, Michelle, and their three sons from Capelulo as the fire neared their home. He told the BBC: “The sound was worse than anything. It was so loud, the crackling. You could hear it coming down the mountain.” Another said she had felt helpless and scared as she was evacuated from her home. Derbyshire fire and rescue service (DFRS) said there was a “large scale wildfire” at Tintwistle Moor caused by “tinder dry” ground. The operation to douse the flames included dropping water from helicopters. Ellie Gillatt, a DFRS area manager, said: “Firefighters continue to face challenging conditions as they work to tackle the wildfire and protect the surrounding infrastructure and environment. This remains a significant and complex incident. DFRS has deployed multiple fire appliances and specialist wildfire resources.” Extra firefighters from neighbouring services were called in to help, along with mountain rescue teams and the police. Greater Manchester fire and rescue service was called to a moorland fire near Dovestone Reservoir. A spokesperson said: “Due to strong winds, smoke from the fire travelled significant distances, with people reporting haze and the smell of smoke as far as Manchester city centre.” In Walthamstow, east London, 125 firefighters tackled a blaze that affected a house, gardens and sheds and a railway embankment. Some residents were evacuated and two rest centres were set up. The cause of the fire is under investigation. About 50 firefighters from London fire brigade also fought a wildfire in Orpington in the south-east of the capital. The fire service said several acres of grass were alight across two fields. Friederike Otto, a professor of climate science at Imperial College London, said last week that the climate crisis was making every heatwave hotter, with events such as this month’s heatwave more likely to occur. “The heat we have seen this summer is only possible because of the 1.4C of climate change we have to date, due to the burning of fossil fuels,” she said. Otto said it was misleading to use the term “new normal” when describing this year’s scorching summer heat. “The climate we have today is not stable and continues to warm as long as we continue to burn fossil fuels. As a result, what is ‘normal’ keeps shifting and we’re likely to see much hotter heatwaves like this one in the years to come.”

Zaghari-Ratcliffe condemns Iran’s ‘cruel’ rearrest of wildlife activist couple

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe has described the rearrest of two Iranian environmentalists, one of whom she met at Evin prison, as “unimaginably cruel and alarming”. Husband and wife Houman Jokar and Sepideh Kashani were arrested by the ministry of intelligence at their home on 1 July. No reason has been given and their whereabouts are unknown. Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who has dual Iranian and British citizenship and spent six years in an Iranian jail between 2016 and 2022, said Kashani was not a political person and that she could not imagine how she must be feeling, given the environmentalist had previously spent two years in solitary confinement. “It must be a different level of torture,” Zaghari-Ratcliffe said. Kashani and Jokar worked for the now defunct Persian Wildlife Heritage Foundation, dedicated to saving the Iranian cheetah from extinction. They were among a group of environmentalists arrested in 2018 and jailed on charges of using wildlife camera traps to spy on Iran. The convictions were widely condemned as baseless by the international scientific community. The then minister of intelligence said several times that the environmentalists were not spies and that they had not done anything wrong. Zaghari-Ratcliffe said Kashani’s sister Sima was also arrested on 1 July, and all the couple’s electronic devices were taken. The news was broken by Hojjat Kermani, their defence lawyer, who has also worked on the Zaghari-Ratcliffe case. The arrests were confirmed by Iran’s ministry of intelligence. Zaghari-Ratcliffe said: “Jokar had dedicated his entire life to looking after the critically endangered Asiatic cheetahs in Iran. He has an amazing knowledge of their life, their wellbeing and their habitats. Whilst he was in prison the officially approved wildlife channel showed his programmes. He could watch himself in prison. It was so bizarre. He is so knowledgable and the most polite prisoner. “Sepideh,” she added, “is a wonderful person. After completing her sentence – some others were pardoned – she never left Iran, but she was not allowed to return to her work so they were eating into their savings and could not afford to go to the seaside for her holidays. They were not politically active or on social media, and had stayed in Iran for family reasons. “All we know of them is that they have been allowed to make two phone calls, and we do not know if the arrests are related to the previous case. I can only hope the two sisters are together.” Zaghari-Ratcliffe said her own biggest nightmare involved being rearrested. “Can you imagine being sent back to the cell in which you spent two years in solitary confinement, and knowing that they are capable of keeping people for six years for doing nothing? They have the power to do that. “What is so shocking is that she has been through this whole nightmare once, and knows what she may be facing. She went through solitary confinement for two years. Solitary confinement is just a different level of torture. “She was extraordinary when she came on the ward because we felt after two years in solitary she would be psychologically traumatised. But she is such a kind, generous and hilarious person, always helping those in prison that did not have enough money to buy something to eat. She is the kind of person to say: ‘That is enough mourning and crying. I am craving pesto pasta.’” The latest arrests are just a sliver of a severe crackdown on Iranian civil society and dissidents. More than 6,000 people have been detained since the launch of the US-Israel war on Iran, according to Amnesty International. Siamak Namazi, an Iranian-American man who was imprisoned in Iran for eight years and was cellmates with Jokar, said in a social media post: “The Islamic Republic speaks of the need for ‘national reconciliation’. Explain how dragging away two of Iran’s finest people, along with a woman with MS who was caring for her recovering father, without charges, without transparency, and without due process is reconciliation.” He said the original convictions were one of Iran’s “most notorious miscarriages of justice.”

Firefighting planes scrambled from south of France to tackle huge wildfire near Paris

Firefighters are tackling a blaze of unprecedented scale sweeping through Fontainebleau forest south-east of Paris. The fire began late on Sunday afternoon in the one-time royal hunting preserve about 40 miles (60km) from the capital, which today is dotted with villages. The blaze, which is unusual in its proximity to Paris, raced across about 800 hectares (2,000 acres) of forest and was still spreading early on Monday, officials said. On Sunday, it caused the partial closure of the A6 highway, France’s main north-south artery, and disrupted key train lines. The Paris region remains under the highest heatwave alert. The mayor of Fontainebleau, Julien Gondard, said he was shocked and angered. “This exceptional area is consumed by flames, we’ve never seen anything like this,” he told local TV ICI Paris Île-de-France. “The forest is fragile and it’s in a critical condition.” Fire officials said it could take several days to several weeks to fully contain the fire. They described it as “very virulent” and of “exceptional scale”. The interior minister, Laurent Nuñez, visiting an operations room in Fontainebleau on Monday morning, said: “The aim is to contain the fire.” Nuñez said about 900 homes had been evacuated but that no home had yet been burned and no one had been injured. He said an investigation was under way to determine the cause of the fire. “The fire began at several points at the end of yesterday afternoon – around 10 points, which would suggest it could have been voluntary in origin. I won’t say more because an investigation is ongoing.” Nuñez said that in total forest fires had burned 32,000 hectares of land in France this year, adding: “That is already more than the 2025 season and it’s only 13 July.” He added that since the start of the summer, 44 people had been arrested across the country on suspicion of being responsible for the outbreak of fires. High-speed rail was affected after the fire broke out on Sunday because key lines pass near the forest. The French rail company SNCF said there were delays of up to eight hours for trains arriving at or leaving from Paris’s Gare de Lyon. Rail services were returning to normal on Monday morning. Half of the 700 residents of the village of Le Vaudoué were evacuated and firefighters were operating in several other towns in the area, the local Seine-et-Marne fire service said. Without the use of firefighting planes, other villages would already have been evacuated, said Olivier Compta, who was overseeing the firefighting operation. About 400 firefighters have been working to contain the fire, which erupted two days before the 14 July Bastille Day national holiday. Eric Brocardi, a spokesperson for France’s national federation of firefighters, said it was the first time firefighting planes had been sent up from the normally drier and hotter south of the country to extinguish fires in the Paris region. Two firefighting helicopters and an observation aircraft were also helping to tackle the blaze, he said. “The aim is to save lives and property.” Earlier, firefighters dealt with a fire that had blocked a highway running east from Paris and disrupted a high-speed train line to the south of France. The Paris region, along with large parts of the rest of France, has had a succession of heatwaves since May that have also broken temperature records in several other countries across Europe and have caused thousands of excess deaths, according to estimates in Belgium, Britain, France and Spain. The June heatwaves would have been “virtually impossible” without climate change, the World Weather Attribution group of scientists has said. Human-caused climate breakdown is supercharging extreme weather across the world, driving more frequent and more deadly disasters such as heatwaves and wildfires.

More than 16,000 refugees unable to reunite with families in UK, says Refugee Council

More than 16,000 refugees have been unable to reunite with families in the UK, leaving them either stuck in conflict zones or resorting to using people-smugglers to reach safety, according to the Refugee Council. The government suspended the refugee family reunion route last September. It allowed a person granted refugee status to apply to bring immediate family members such as a spouse and their children under 18 to reunite with them in the UK. The indication was that the suspension would last until the spring of this year. However, no confirmation has yet been made of any resumption of this route, which provides a lifeline for thousands of families separated by war. The Refugee Council calculated 16,300 people have been barred from applying since the suspension came into force 10 months ago, using published Home Office data from the months prior to the suspension. Nine out of 10 of those granted refugee family reunion are women and children. Based on the data, they estimate that this figure includes 9,273 children and 5,835 women. The government operates other safe and legal routes for the most vulnerable refugees, but these arrivals have fallen by more than a third in the last year. New routes have been announced, such as community sponsorship, where a community supports refugees of their choice with housing, finding a job and integration. However, Home Office sources told the Guardian that the scheme, as it has operated for the last decade, has brought just 1,000 individuals to the UK, mainly in family units, so only a small number of families have benefited from it each year. The government said it expected the new community sponsorship scheme, along with new study and work routes, would initially bring refugees in in the low hundreds. Several hundred asylum seekers cross the Channel in small boats on a moderately busy day. One Iranian refugee, who lives in London with her two children aged 21 and 16, said she was distraught about the refugee family reunion suspension as her husband was trapped in very dangerous circumstances in Iran. She and her children arrived here four years ago and claimed asylum but had to wait nearly a year-and-a-half for their initial Home Office interview. Their case was initially rejected and then won on appeal. “Had the Home Office processed our case quickly, we could have brought my husband here before the ban on refugee family reunion was imposed,” she said. “It is agonising torture knowing my husband is still trapped in Iran. In my view, what is happening is a clear and direct violation of human rights. It cruelly tears families apart and has stripped away our last shred of hope.” Imran Hussain, the director of external affairs at the Refugee Council, said: “Safe and legal routes save lives. Women and children attempting to flee devastating wars and brutal regimes in countries like Sudan and Afghanistan are being driven into small boats by desperation. No parent risks their child’s life crossing the Channel in a small boat unless they believe the dangers they are fleeing are even greater than those they face at sea. “We welcome the government’s commitment to creating new safe routes, but these must not come at the expense of existing pathways that have already saved lives. The government should urgently restore refugee family reunion, alongside expanding new safe routes, so families can find safety together, rebuild their lives, integrate and play their part in Britain.” A Home Office spokesperson said: “The immigration and asylum bill will reform human rights laws to preserve protection for those in need, while bearing down on abuse of the asylum system. “We have also recently announced that the rollout of new safe and legal routes for refugees will begin in the autumn. “Under this government’s reforms to create a fairer asylum system, family reunion will no longer be automatic. Those seeking to bring family members to the UK will need to meet stricter criteria.”

Monday briefing: You ask the questions – is Britain ungovernable?

Good morning. This week, we anticipate the arrival of Britain’s seventh prime minister in the space of a decade. Barring a sequence of events too freakish to contemplate this early in the day, Andy Burnham will be declared Labour leader on Friday and invited to form a new government thereafter. Sceptical as I am about doomy predictions on Britain’s chronic ungovernability, I wanted to speak to somebody who could offer some deeper context. Step forward Guardian columnist Andy Beckett, who also writes vivid modern histories about the country’s defining political ideas, and step forward you – First Edition readers – who responded when I asked what contemporary liabilities we should be talking about. So for this morning’s newsletter, we asked Andy about leadership churn, public impatience and what we can learn from recent political history. First, here’s a catchup on the weekend’s news. Weekend roundup Middle East | The US military has launched a new wave of attacks against Iran amid the escalating standoff over the strait of Hormuz, with Tehran saying the latest strikes had “rendered futile” all the diplomatic efforts of the past few months. UK news | Senior police figures and politicians have warned against speculation during the murder investigation into Ann Widdecombe’s death, after detectives said there was “nothing to suggest” political motivation. US politics | Senator Lindsey Graham, a key Trump ally in Washington, died this weekend after a short illness, his office announced. Far right | Elon Musk’s family foundation took Tommy Robinson to Russia, according to the billionaire X owner’s father. Lib Dem leader Ed Davey said on Sunday the news was a sign Britain “must do more to defend its democracy”. UK politics | Reform UK would have held just 15% of the donations it received last year if a proposed £100,000 cap on political donations had been in force, according to analysis shared with the Guardian. In depth: ‘Instability has become the new normal’ Our rapid leadership turnover, Andy Beckett argues, stems from a quarter-century crisis in the Conservative party, as successive prime ministers struggled to define themselves beyond Thatcher. That instability has now infected Labour. But Paul, a reader from Aberdeen, is interested in how this plays into voter expectations. He sees an electorate that is increasingly impatient, demanding quick solutions from politicians who aren’t always willing to be honest about difficult policy choices and the length of time that sustained change demands. Andy agrees: “A whole ecosystem of impatience has been created, that involves MPs, party members, voters and the media.” He dates “12 years of shocks” starting from the 2014 Scottish independence referendum – and I know what he means, having covered two referendums, four general elections, four Holyrood first ministers and five prime ministers (Liz Truss didn’t have time to meet the Scottish press) since then. “Instability,” he tells me, “has become the new normal and our expectations have been reshaped by that. So when you’re following the news, you follow the live blog and see whatever crisis is going on at Westminster – which is about changes in media and digital media, too.” What strikes Andy about his pub chats these days is that “friends who are well informed are completely unaware of some of the good things done by the Starmer government, like employment rights or renters’ rights legislation”. “Most people don’t have time to read policy documents, but voters now, including myself, have got used to being better informed about who may be a contender in the next leadership contest than the less dramatic details about what the government might actually do.” *** The demise of MP loyalty? Ruby from Kent wants to know to what extent MPs themselves are responsible for the constant turnover of PMs. The Commons has certainly become less disciplined in recent years, says Andy, as Starmer discovered when – despite a massive majority – he faced successive rebellions on issues such as welfare cuts. “It’s a vicious circle. Because there’s more instability, there are fewer safe seats, which means MPs are happier to rebel because they think, ‘So what? The person who I’m annoying may not be prime minister in a year’. The motivation to stay on the right side of the whips is much diminished.” *** The scunner factor? I wanted to ask Andy about the scunner factor, as we call it in Scotland: that long tail of voter disenchantment with all politicians that I think – a bit unfairly – coalesced around a raw hatred of Starmer. I remember encountering it on the doorstep pretty early into his premiership. “People absolutely loathe Starmer,” says Andy “and that’s quite strange. While he’s not a very good politician, I’d say he’s a 6.5 out of 10 as a prime minister – yet he’s treated by the public like a one out of 10.” “Maybe some of that is because a pent-up anger about all kinds of problems in Britain has been building up since 2010, or even before then.” Approval ratings of all party leaders have accelerated downwards over the past 30 years, he says, “reflecting a long-term sort of disillusionment with politics”. *** What does it mean for policy delivery? A number of readers raised the negative impact this regular change of leadership and, consequently, government ministers has on simply getting stuff done. First Edition reader Nicola, who works in education, is hoping for “some consolidation rather than constant change, to have ministers who master their brief rather than changing all the time”. “This is a big problem,” Andy says, “because all kinds of areas, including transport, education or defence, require really long-term solutions”. “In the past, it was tricky to get things moving within a full five-year term, and now we’re dealing in terms that are generally two or three years. But procurement processes are slow, as is construction, and you get a massive turnover of ministers who take time to understand what they’re doing.” *** Could electoral reform break the cycle? Stephen, from Llandeilo, asks whether radical change to the Westminster government electoral system is the answer. “There’s a potential, isn’t there?” Andy wonders. “With electoral reform, you could conceivably get, like in Germany, the same parties in power for a while but in slightly different alliances, so it could stabilise the system.” But he cautions that most European countries have proportional systems “and most are going through their own versions of instability, so it’s not going to solve it completely”. *** Things can only get better? What, I ask Andy finally, are the lessons he takes from recent history: is it possible to predict whether we’ll be having this same conversation in a year about Andy Burnham, and saying what a shame it is that his premiership didn’t last as long as Starmer’s? He directs me back to the 1970s, when there was a similarly rapid carousel of premiers – Wilson, Heath, Wilson, Callaghan. “At that time, lots of people said Britain was ungovernable, that there was going to be permanent political instability.” “Then we had Margaret Thatcher for 11 years, followed by John Major for seven years, then Tony Blair for 10 years. So, we have pulled out of instability before. But the technology is different now, the media are more obsessed with drama, voters are more impatient, and we’ve got a climate crisis that we didn’t have in the same way in the 70s.” Andy predicts that one significant destabilising factor – rightwing populism – may have peaked. “I don’t mean Reform will be unimportant, but they may have reached a ceiling.” Nonetheless, the next general election is likely to be dramatic: “Even if Labour recover quite a lot, there’s going to have to be some sort of coalition – and then how the hell would they hold that together?” For readers wanting to set their calendars, Andy believes a more stable period in British politics will come … but not in the next couple of years. “It could take a while for us to get out of this.” The week to come Monday | Green MP Hannah Spencer presents her Maximum Workplace Temperature Bill to the Commons, which would establish an independent body to recommend safe working temperatures. Tuesday | MPs debate capping political donations as they seek to strengthen a new law on party funding. Wednesday | Sir Keir Starmer will face his final PMQs. What else we’ve been reading Gaby Hinsliff has an incisive column on one of the biggest pickles Andy Burnham will find himself in when he enters Downing Street: how to deal with Donald Trump. Charlie Lindlar, newsletters team “I don’t really get shocked” – this interview with the heroic Bea Elton, who has made an unlikely career out of cleaning up the homes of desperate people, says some important things about how we handle shame and isolation. Libby I enjoyed this frankly ludicrous piece for our My holiday from hell series, in which Sarah Ann Harris recounts post A-levels girls’ trip to Corfu that began with being quarantined in hospital the moment she landed on the island. Charlie World Cup 2026 England | Jude Bellingham’s equaliser against Norway turned the tide of England’s quarter-final – but should it have been disallowed? Sachin Nakrani investigates what he’s choosing to call “cablegate”. Spain | The former Spanish conservative prime minister Mariano Rajoy is facing growing accusations of racism after writing in a World Cup newspaper column that the French national team “does not have any French players”. Yet more teams? | Fifa president Gianni Infantino has hinted at expanding the World Cup again for the 2030 tournament. After increasing the number from 32 to 48 this time round, the aim would be for 64 teams to compete. “Every nation should be allowed to dream of participating,” Infantino said. Sport Tennis | Jannik Sinner bounced back from dropping the first set to beat Alexander Zverev and retain his Wimbledon title, 6-7 (7), 7-6 (2), 6-3, 6-4. Tumaini Carayol reported from Centre Court that the tin “further establishes him among the best tennis players of his time”. Cricket | Brendon McCullum has been sacked as the England men’s Test coach, with the England and Wales Cricket Board opting for a completely fresh start for the side after the recent retirement of the red-ball captain, Ben Stokes. McCullum, who was “gutted” by the decision, remains coach of the T20 side. Cycling | Tadej Pogacar called for radical change to the professional racing calendar after another day of stifling temperatures, as Mathieu van der Poel won the shortened ninth stage of the Tour de France from Malemort to Ussel, with Tom Pidcock finishing third. The front pages “June heatwave killed 440 a day at its peak, say climate scientists”, is the Guardian’s front page today. The Times leads with “Widdecombe ‘killer drove 300 miles with weapon’”, the Telegraph, similarly, says “Widdecome suspect drove 300 miles to her house”. The i Paper has “New Widdecombe murder arrest but no sign of political motive, say police”, and the Express says “Our sadness at losing ‘one of a kind’ Ann”. Metro has “Widdecombe killing ‘not political’”. The FT leads with “New US strikes on Iran pose biggest test for interim deal” and the Mirror, on the Hillsborough Law, goes with “I’m over the moon”. Today in Focus China’s massive AI rollout While the spread of AI has been met perhaps with a lot of scepticism in the west, China has fully embraced the technology, explains our senior China correspondent Amy Hawkins, from millions of users talking to AI doctors, to the use of intelligent robots in factories, and drones delivering food on the Great Wall of China. She talks to Annie Kelly. Cartoon of the day | Nicola Jennings The Upside A bit of good news to remind you that the world’s not all bad Go big – and regret nothing. These are some of the secrets of success shared by late bloomers – from a seventy-something standup comedian to the founder of a highly successful spice business – on how to have a stunning second act. They reveal why it’s never too late to embark on the life of your dreams. Along with sensible truisms such as pursuing what you are truly passionate about, there is great wisdom in taking a long view. “People should remind themselves that they only have one life,” says Lisbeth Dreyer, a literal late bloomer who became a flower farmer and florist in her 60s. “And if there is something you want to do, you should try it. I think people feel bad inside if they don’t try what they want to do. If it doesn’t work, at least you tried. It is easier to live with it if you try.” Sign up here for a weekly roundup of The Upside, sent to you every Sunday Bored at work? And finally, the Guardian’s puzzles are here to keep you entertained throughout the day. Until tomorrow. Quick crossword Cryptic crossword Wordiply