Donderdag zijn er verkiezingen waardoor oud-parlementariër en burgemeester Andy Burnham terug in het Lagerhuis kan komen. Als hij wint, wil hij huidig premier Keir Starmer vervangen. „Andy Burnham is Labours laatste kans”, zegt een kiezer uit Makerfield.

Een Brits zeiljacht dat een Russisch fregat „gevaarlijk dicht naderde”, kreeg schoten voor de boeg. „Onwerkelijk”, zeggen de zeilers.

DEN HAAG (ANP) - Het Outbreak Management Team (OMT) had tijdens de coronacrisis weinig zin in de "gevraagde en ongevraagde" kritiek van het zogeheten 'Red Team', dat was opgericht om het OMT scherp te houden. Dat zei viroloog Amrish Baidjoe, een van de oprichters van het Red Team, tijdens zijn verhoor voor de parlementaire enquête over het coronavirus.

Er waren slechts "beleefdheidsgesprekken" met het OMT, waarin niet inhoudelijk gediscussieerd werd over de corona-aanpak, aldus Baidjoe. Volgens hem gaf OMT-voorzitter Jaap van Dissel het advies om kritiek vooral via de media te leveren.

Baidjoe durft niet te zeggen in hoeverre kritiek van het Red Team de adviezen van het OMT heeft beïnvloed. Wel zag hij "sommige elementen" van de feedback terug. "Maar ik weet niet of dat door ons kwam, of dat het OMT zelf tot bepaalde inzichten was gekomen."

ROME (ANP/RTR) - De Verenigde Staten hebben 800 miljoen dollar beloofd aan het Wereldvoedselprogramma (WFP) van de Verenigde Naties. Die stap volgt op een eerdere forse bezuiniging van de regering-Trump op de bijdragen aan de organisatie die voedselhulp verstrekt.

Volgens het WFP komt de Amerikaanse bijdrage op een belangrijk moment, want volgens voorspellingen van de organisatie neemt de acute honger in de wereld dit jaar toe. "We hopen dat de internationale gemeenschap zich aansluit bij deze toezegging", zegt waarnemend WFP-directeur Carl Skau.

De VS zijn de grootste donor voor het WFP. Maar onder president Donald Trump halveerde het land zijn bijdrage aan de hulporganisatie vorig jaar naar ongeveer 2 miljard dollar, als onderdeel van forse bezuinigingen op humanitaire hulp.

VB: Het huwelijk als artistieke samensmelting: Gil en Moti gaven elkaar 25 jaar geleden als eerste gaykoppel van Rotterdam het jawoord

This week’s newsletter spends a day with the Italy midfielder as she continues to battle her way back to a peak physical condition

“It was accepting that I couldn’t play football because it was my life. It was everything that I knew.” For Everton’s Aurora Galli, the past 20 months have been anything but straightforward. Her return from a serious knee injury has been difficult, one beset with obstacles before, ultimately, a long-awaited comeback.

It was September 2024, 83 minutes and three seconds into the first game of the Women’s Super League season to be exact, when Galli went down in agony. Everton were losing 4-0 to Brighton and, in her eagerness to salvage something for her team, the midfielder attempted to challenge for the ball when her standing leg buckled. As expected, it was confirmed that she had ruptured an anterior cruciate ligament.

This is an extract from our free email about women’s football, Moving the Goalposts. To get the full edition, visit this page and follow the instructions. Moving the Goalposts will be sent out once a week, on Wednesdays, in the close season but will be back on Tuesdays and Thursdays from September.

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With Two Weeks in August and the return of The Four Seasons, TV dramas about nightmare getaways are having a moment. Here are Guardian readers’ tales of their own

In early 1969, my parents booked a holiday in Belfast for one week and a bed and breakfast in Dublin for one week. When we arrived at our Belfast destination, The Elsinore Hotel, there wasn’t another car in the parking lot and the hotel was empty except for the aged husband and wife owners. Being 12 years old, I didn’t think too much at the time about the quiet, empty place but the owners invited the whole family down to the dining room every evening and we enjoyed some great meals. Lots of pictures of JFK and the pope adorned many of the hotel walls and being a Catholic family ourselves, the hosts made a big fuss of us.

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Six people suspected of bank helpdesk fraud are in custody after Dutch cops stormed an Amsterdam residence and caught them in conversation with a potential victim. Police say the individuals were aged between 15 and 30 and operated out of a makeshift call center they had established in an Amsterdam home. Authorities believe the accused committed bank helpdesk fraud, which has become increasingly popular across the Netherlands. Offenders were recently targeted as part of Game Over?!, a novel law enforcement scheme that successfully shamed criminals into submitting themselves to authorities. Helpdesk scammers typically operate call victims on the phone, using methods similar to voice phishing, or "vishing." They present themselves as bank employees contacting victims under various guises, all designed to steal their money. In this case, police say the alleged criminals tried to convince victims to "increase their limits," and in "several" cases, succeeded in stealing funds from their accounts. The precise cover story is largely irrelevant, however. The aim of the game is the same each time: Convince a prospective victim to surrender enough details to access their bank accounts and steal their money. While these scams mostly take place remotely, Dutch police said in their announcement on Tuesday that the crew sent members to visit victims in person, purportedly offering hands-on assistance to secure their accounts. The same tactic can often be observed with fake police officer shakedowns, which have also become popular in the country. Police say tens of thousands of elderly people, who make up the majority of targets for such scams, have fallen victim to the confidence scams. In these cases, fraudsters visit elderly individuals' houses and pretend to represent law enforcement, offering a service to safeguard their valuables. The crooks then steal those valuables, and police say previous cases have turned violent. Some have also ended in fatalities. Multiple victims of the helpdesk frauds reported their respective cases, according to the cops. The National Intervention Team for Digital Crime was called in to investigate, and during a raid on June 10, officers found the suspects mid-call with a potential victim. Officers seized multiple laptops and phones after apprehending the six suspects, and found several bank cards at the property. Further arrests have not been ruled out. ®