Author: staff
For some British schoolchildren, history homework this autumn is going considerably further than a worksheet on the year 1066. A new competition is asking primary students across the UK to design and stitch a new final panel for the Bayeux Tapestry, a 70-metre-long embroidered account of the Norman conquest of England with a famously missing final section. Nobody knows exactly what it originally showed. Rather than trying to reconstruct the lost scenes, however, the children are being asked to imagine what might have come after the conquest, picturing a “better tomorrow” rather than another battle. What is the Bayeux Tapestry?…
The demand comes at a sensitive moment. Latvia has been one of Europe’s staunchest supporters of Ukraine, sharply increasing defense spending since Moscow’s full-scale invasion, even as sanctions and the collapse of bilateral trade have cut deeply into economic links that once ran eastward. But ahead of an Oct. 3 national election, parties arguing that Riga should demand more in return for sanctions and military support are gaining ground. The European Commission has proposed substantially increasing EU-level defense funding in the 2028-2034 budget, including a €125.2 billion security, defense industry and space pot in the European Competitiveness Fund. That money…
Published on 17/08/2026 – 12:26 GMT+2 Eurostar could finally be getting some competition on its London to Europe routes. Virgin Trains has cleared another major hurdle towards launching services to Paris, Brussels and Amsterdam, with approval now in place to run up to 20 daily return journeys through the Channel Tunnel from 2030. The move would end Eurostar’s three-decade monopoly on passenger services through the tunnel and give travellers another option for crossing the Channel by train. Virgin still has several regulatory boxes to tick before tickets can go on sale, but its plans are now looking increasingly realistic. On…
Published on 17/08/2026 – 11:40 GMT+2 Two pieces of data collided in Tokyo within hours of each other. Bond investors pushed the 10-year Japanese government bond yield to a three-decade high before the government reported that growth had come in at barely half the pace economists had forecast, a pairing that says a great deal about what is really driving Japan’s markets right now. The economy expanded at an annualised rate of 1.1% in the second quarter, Cabinet Office data showed, well below the 2.0% forecast and down from a downwardly revised 1.9% pace in the first quarter. Quarter on…
From palaces to prisons, historic buildings around the globe are finding a new lease of life as boutique places to stay. The latest to join their ranks? A former water tower at Sandringham Estate, King Charles III’s private country retreat in Norfolk, England. Originally built in 1877, the structure is designed in neo-Byzantine style by renowned engineer James Mansergh, best known for his work on the Elan Valley Reservoirs in Wales. The building is topped by a 32,000-gallon cast-iron tank which once supplied water to the main house and wider estate for more than a century, but today is a…
The Panathenaic Stadium has welcomed marathon runners, rock stars and the athletes of the first modern Olympic Games. Built entirely of white marble, it is undergoing its first comprehensive cleaning in more than a century. Reconstructed for the first modern Olympic Games in 1896, it also serves as the venue for the Olympic Flame handover ceremony, including ahead of the 2028 Los Angeles Games. The cleaning process requires special care, as the stadium is made from the same gleaming marble used on the Acropolis, making the endeavour particularly delicate and demanding. “The Kallimarmaro is a unique monument for the global…
Footage from Saturday’s hike posted to Babiš’ Facebook page showed the prime minister climbing with a small bunch of flowers before laying them at a monument on the summit. Babiš was joined by two ministers, ANO politicians and supporters on the 1,324-meter peak, the highest point in the Moravian-Silesian Beskids. An environmental expert working for an organization overseen by the Czech Environment Ministry told Czech local media outlet iDNES that Babiš had picked two thoroughly ordinary species — narrow-leaved willowherb and Fuchs’ ragwort — and was unlikely to face punishment. “They are completely common flowers,” said the expert, whom the…
Security camera footage shows two goats briefly boarding a TriMet bus in Portland, Oregon, on Tuesday, 11 August. The animals follow passengers through the middle doors, which close behind them, before reopening moments later. An overhead view shows the driver noticing the unexpected passengers and opening the doors again. The goats then hop back onto the pavement as people help guide them away. They had been reported wandering loose in the area and later disappeared towards a nearby shopping centre. The animals were eventually identified as Billy the Kid and Billy the Goat and reunited with their owner.
Europe is tackling a spate of wildfires spurred by high temperatures and tinder-dry conditions due to a historically hot summer that has already contributed to the deaths of thousands of people. Scientists blame ever hotter and more frequent heatwaves on human-caused climate change. Here are the latest developments this Monday morning. Belgium fire threatens German town Water-dropping aircraft and farmers’ tractors helped firefighters battling Belgium’s largest modern-day wildfire at an inaccessible area near Germany, where the border town of Monschau ordered a partial evacuation because of the growing threat. Military helicopters backed by tractors on the ground hauled water to…
An extremist Israeli lawmaker in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition publicly advocated for killing “30 to 40” people in Gaza each night, comments that surfaced on Sunday, and were quickly shared by media outlets around the world. Minister of National Security Itamar Ben-Gvir made the statement while speaking to a former Gaza-held hostage, Rom Braslavski, on his podcast. The pair were discussing Israel’s recovery from Hamas’ 7 October attack, when Ben-Gvir criticised Israel’s recent drawdown of strikes in Gaza. “It’s no secret, I disagree with the prime minister,” he said. “I think targeted assassinations should be carried out in Gaza,…