BRUSSEL (ANP) - De vermindering van de Amerikaanse hulptroepen voor Europa is "onmiddellijk" ingegaan, zegt NAVO-topman Mark Rutte. Het is dus zaak dat Europa nu deze taken gaat overnemen. Maar als Europa daadwerkelijk zou worden aangevallen, zullen de Verenigde Staten nog altijd alles in het werk stellen om te helpen, verzekert Rutte.

De VS maakten de afgelopen weken duidelijk dat ze onder andere vliegtuigen en marineschepen niet langer reserveren om Europa te komen helpen verdedigen als oorlog zou uitbreken. Europese NAVO-landen maken zich zorgen, omdat Europa zelf nog niet in al die zaken kan voorzien. Ze vragen om tijd om zich te herbewapenen.

Het schrappen van de Amerikaanse toezegging geldt meteen, lichtte Rutte toe bij aankomst voor overleg met de defensieministers van de NAVO-landen. Maar het gaat om toegezegde versterkingen voor de NAVO-planning, benadrukt hij. "Ze zullen zich nog steeds tot het uiterste inzetten."

DEN HAAG (ANP) - De druk op de asielopvang blijft onverminderd hoog, de opvang is overbelast en blijft afhankelijk van noodlocaties. De oplossing ligt in stabiele opvang: locaties die voor langere tijd in een gemeente blijven, en die niet ineens dicht moeten als er minder opvang nodig is. De azc's van morgen zijn onderdeel van de samenleving. Dat stelt het COA (Centraal Orgaan opvang asielzoekers) in zijn Stand van de Uitvoering 2025.

Het aantal bewoners in de opvang steeg van meer dan 72.500 begin vorig jaar naar bijna 80.000 begin dit jaar. De verblijfsduur nam sterk toe. In 2025 steeg de gemiddelde wachttijd in de algemene en verlengde asielprocedure naar 67 weken. Zolang daar geen uitsluitsel over is, blijven bewoners in de opvang. Verder wachten - nu nog steeds - meer dan 19.000 mensen met een verblijfsvergunning op een huis in gemeenten. Het COA bepleit dat gemeenten de mogelijkheid moeten hebben om mensen met een verblijfsvergunning na drie maanden te huisvesten.

Veteran interviewees are forever trotting out the same anecdotes in response to unoriginal questions – until one fearless disruptor dared ask if ET had moist skin

For the most part, Steven Spielberg has avoided most of the indignities of the modern day press tour. He hasn’t had to subject himself to any spicy chicken wings, or summon any witticisms when presented with a cloche-covered sausage roll. Unlike many other celebrities, he hasn’t chosen to promote Disclosure Day by answering softball questions while simultaneously fashioning a Lionel Richie-style clay approximation of himself for YouTube. For this he should be applauded.

Instead, Spielberg has spent this promotional cycle on something more suited to his stature. A maestro tour, if you will, on which he gets to position Disclosure Day against a body of work that is second to none. Publications have run long oral histories about his entire career. He was a guest during the prestigious final week of Stephen Colbert’s talkshow. He was interviewed by the New York Times about the exact texture of ET’s skin.

José Luis López Vázquez’s phone box nightmare is short and sharp but Narciso Ibáñez Serrador’s TV fever dream overplays its hand

Two macabre Spanish TV plays from the 1970s are being released as a double bill: Antonio Mercero’s La Cabina (★★★★★) is a cult 1972 surreal short film lasting just 35 minutes but encompassing an entire dreamworld of anxiety. It was conceived for television in the spirit of Alfred Hitchcock Presents or Roald Dahl’s Tales of the Unexpected, but I can imagine it shown in cinemas as a curtain-raiser before Buñuel’s The Exterminating Angel.

La Cabina is a black comic nightmare in which a fussy middle-aged man, played by veteran Spanish comedy actor José Luis López Vázquez, steps into a phone booth that has just appeared in a suburban sidestreet. But the phone doesn’t work and then he can’t get out; the door is jammed. What to do? There’s no mobile phone to reach for; in 1972, the phone booth was the mobile phone. He gesticulates and waves in panic through the glass, though seems mysteriously robbed of the power of speech and is clearly inhibited by how ridiculous he must look. Crowds cluster round and try ineffectually to help. A callous, carnivalesque atmosphere develops. The man sees himself reflected in a mirror that one onlooker is carrying: trapped, absurd, bourgeois homo sapiens as zoo animal.

A riot of joy and hugging and screaming followed the Knicks’ historic win. Britons can be jolly (Arsenal fans just were), but this was the gold standard

There was a moment on Sunday morning when, scrolling through pages of content celebrating the New York Knicks’ spectacular NBA championship win in the city – videos in which it seemed people of every age, race, background and zip code put aside their differences to hug and scream – I wondered how far the principle of sport-as-the-ultimate-leveller might stretch.

For example: given the joy on Saturday night was so intense, could you have sent the most hated figures in the US into the ecstatic Knicks viewing parties – those gatherings of thousands who came together to watch the game projected on to the sides of buildings – and witnessed the joy of the event transform them into regular humans? Greg Bovino, say, the loathed former US border tsar in his soldier-of-fortune Halloween costume – pop a jaunty Knicks cap on his head and might he elicit high fives? What about ICE agents in Knicks jerseys? I tried to imagine Elon Musk – a man who has surely never thrown, caught or enjoyed watching a ball in flight in his life – attending a Knicks party and experiencing, possibly for the first time, a group of people who appeared genuinely pleased to see him.

Now in it’s 25th year, the Polish city’s Fotofestiwal opens on 18 June with a series of exhibitions reflecting on the concept of a collective experience rather than a binary world of “us” and “them”

With its echoes of Miranda July’s All Fours, this tragicomic tale of an American woman’s illicit romance is also a gripping murder mystery

The plot of A Little Bit Bad sounds like the setup for a joke: “Like, this white lady lusting after her hot Chicano roofer?” Perdita Jungfrau, the narrator, is describing her own situation. “Yuck.”

It’s 2009 and Perdita is 39 when she meets 25-year-old Nando, who is working on next door’s roof. “Burned out” after a decade as a hospital social worker, she’s a stay-at-home mother to a toddler, and pregnant again (though she doesn’t know it yet). She isn’t happy. Her husband is critical of her for quitting her job, and won’t look after the children: “Babies scare me!” Perdita is out in her San Diego backyard on the day that Nando falls from a ladder propped up against the neighbour’s house. She sees it happen, calls an ambulance and sits beside him on the grass to wait.

This wetland south of Syracuse was saved from developers and preserved as an unspoilt haven for migratory birds

We rented Il Nido because we thought other people wouldn’t like it. Small and basic, without internet, the property was supposedly beside a beautiful national park famous for its coastline and migratory birds. The online picture suggested it was pressed up against one of those concrete pillars (common around Sicily) supporting a deserted and rotting motorway flyover. I was writing a thriller with mafia connections. My partner wanted to scrape off six months of fumes from her new job in London. Our daughter needed fun.

“This is a bomb,” said the hostess, opening a cupboard under the sink. “You turn it anticlockwise to go off.”

The Socceroos and United States both made a fast start to their campaign – here is what the Group D rivals must do to maintain momentum in Seattle

Back Nestory Irankunda: the 20-year-old was expected to be an impact player at this World Cup, coming on as a substitute to affect matches against tiring opposition. A player of the match performance when starting against Turkey showed how Irankunda has become one of the Socceroos’ most important players. While still learning his wing-craft, his speed and determination without the ball are vital in a Socceroos outfit seemingly happy to give their opponents’ possession, and his ability to make the most of transition and direct opportunities – as seen for his opening goal against Turkey – can be a superpower.

Penelope worries this will teach her children it’s OK to trespass; Spencer sees no harm in them hopping over. No sitting on the fence – you decide who’s in the wrong

• Find out how to get a disagreement settled or become a juror

It doesn’t matter that it only takes five seconds. It’s a flagrant disregard for property rights

No harm was done to their garden. It’s just a lawn with a few shrubs. I don’t see the problem