Ukraine’s president says latest discussions on peace proposals with US were ‘constructive, although not easy’

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Volodymyr Zelenskyy will meet the leaders of the UK, France and Germany in London on Monday to discuss the latest US-authored peace proposal aimed at ending Russia’s war in Ukraine.

Days of negotiations between US and Ukrainian officials ended on Saturday without an apparent breakthrough. The Ukrainian president called the discussions “constructive, although not easy”.

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There are many contenders for “world’s greatest invention.” The wheel. The printing press. The steam engine.

According to a new book, however, that title should go to the mechanised sawmill invented by Dutchman Cornelis Corneliszoon in 1593.

STC troops now control all eight governorates, a major setback for Emirates’ regional rival Saudi Arabia

The United Arab Emirates-backed military leadership in South Yemen has seized power across the whole of the south of the country, a move that opens up the possibility that the South will declare independence and revert Yemen to being two states for the first time since 1960.

As many as 10,000 troops from the Southern Transitional Council (STC) poured into the oil-rich Hadramaut governorate last week and later into Marah, the less-populated governorate bordering Oman, which had not previously been under its control.

The big-name US talkshow host goes all Fab Four superfan in this historical take on the lives of John, Paul, George and Ringo. Plus, Naomi Fry delivers a rich deep dive into The Doors’ legacy

The popular show’s two-part special on the Fab Four has, bizarrely, prompted its Beatles sceptic co-host Dominic Sandbrook to refuse to appear. But his mega-starry replacement is Conan O’Brien, in for an engaging chat with Tom Holland through the career of John, Paul, George and Ringo. Their USP? Says Holland: “We’re a history podcast rather than a music podcast so we need to make the case that the Beatles are significant historically.” Alexi Duggins
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Collateral comedy spins out from underneath the repression and violence charted in this sobering documentary that follows three indefatigable women

There are many symptoms of totalitarian sickness gripping Alexander Lukashenko’s Belarus. You risk being arrested for wearing red and white together, the colours of the outlawed flag of the country’s opposition movement. Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four has been banned, which seems rather on the nose. But these are just some of the more farcical elements, the collateral comedy spinning from the deep repression, violence and psychological wounds charted in this sobering film that follows a trio of Belarusian activists, starting from the pandemic through to the invasion of Ukraine.

Director Juliane Tutein fashions a melancholic mood-piece which chronicles ineffectualness in the face of impregnable state machinery, and the meaning of resistance under such circumstances. Nina, who is 74, is a kind of Belarusian Batman; an indefatigable symbol of protest who is immune to repression because of her fame. Human rights activist Darya runs her organisation in exile in Vilnius after student activism landed her in hot water. Tanya has stuck it out near Minsk while her husband and son have fled to Kyiv, but her human-rights NGO and film festival are in the authorities’ crosshairs.

A meticulously researched account of the controversial businessman’s rise and shocking demise

At least two terrible ironies surround the death of Mike Lynch. One lies in the name of his superyacht, which sank off the coast of Sicily in the early hours of 19 August 2024. He had named the boat Bayesian to honour Bayes’s theorem, a mathematical rule that helps you weigh up the probability of something given the available evidence, which served as Lynch’s guiding light over the course of a tempestuous career. The theorem was “a beautiful key to our minds”, Lynch believed. But it was entirely incapable of predicting the outcome that morning, when the yacht capsized during a storm, killing seven people, including Lynch, his 18-year-old daughter Hannah and his US lawyer, Chris Morvillo.

A second irony lies in the fact that Lynch had just come through the trial of his life, one he felt was bound to end in jail, where he thought he could die. Somehow, to everyone’s astonishment, an American jury had acquitted him and his co-defendant on all 15 counts of fraud .

More councils expected to fall into bankruptcy in near future as they face nervous wait over government funding

Local authorities in England and Wales have warned their finances are at “breaking point” with more councils expected to fall into bankruptcy in future, as they face a nervous wait to discover their government funding this month.

Council leaders expect changes to annual funding arrangements will result in steep cuts for many local authorities, preventing many from balancing their books and providing basic services to citizens.

A reader found there seemed no way to cancel a subscription for Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana’s new party

I subscribed to Your Party at its shambolic start and am now finding it impossible to cancel my membership. No one replies to emails. My local party branch told me it can’t help.

The portal requires me to open a new account and commit to another payment in order to cancel anything.

A cultural initiative in Piedmont is unlocking a trove of priceless medieval frescoes in rural churches

The Santa Maria di Missione chapel in Villafranca Piemonte, northern Italy, stands at the end of a long cornfield. Behind it, the mountains rise gently, their outlines caressed by the sun. The colours of autumn frame the 15th-century frescoes that embellish the structure’s interior, painted by Italian artist Aimone Duce, of the Lombard school. The chapel is the municipality’s oldest religious building, serving about 4,000 inhabitants, and stands on the site of a pre-existing building dating back to 1037.

Inside the small chapel, my footsteps echo softly against the walls, breaking the stillness of the surrounding countryside. The sharp scent of plaster mingles with the earthy smell of the fields outside, carried in on the wind along with the sweetness of wheat. Light filters through the narrow windows, catching the vivid hues of a fresco that depicts the seven deadly sins – a theme often revisited in medieval iconography.