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RAIL ROAD

Head coach must make changes for Ireland’s visit after his error-strewn side lacked the nous to fight back after the hosts’ fast start

England arrived at Murrayfield announcing their intentions to be “bulletproof”. Truth be told this was Scotland shooting fish in a barrel. Punishing mistakes, of which there were a litany, Gregor Townsend’s team exposed the glaring limitations of Steve Borthwick’s side that will be desperately difficult to recover from.

Defeats happen, England’s winning run was always going to end sooner or later, but the paucity of this performance is some setback for a side whose grand slam hopes are over for another year. Two years ago Borthwick bemoaned how England had “played small” after a fast start, unable to stem Scotland’s momentum after giving up the initiative. Here they barely played at all. For England unravelled at Murrayfield again. It is as if Flower of Scotland flicks a switch in these players and Murphy’s law makes a mockery of them.

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• Updates from 8pm kickoff (GMT) at Anfield

• Follow us over on Bluesky | And get in touch: email Scott

1 min: Whigfield lied about the air. It’s a cold night on Merseyside.

After an exuberant rendition of You’ll Never Walk Alone, Brighton get the ball rolling. They’re kicking towards the Kop in this first half.

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Concern grows over Narges Mohammadi’s health, family says, after reports of ‘life-threatening mistreatment’

Iranian authorities have without prior warning transferred Nobel peace prize laureate Narges Mohammadi to a prison in the north of the country as concern grows over her health, her family said on Saturday.

Mohammadi, who won the peace prize in 2023 in recognition for more than two decades of campaigning, was arrested on 12 December in the eastern city of Mashhad after speaking out against Iran’s clerical authorities at a funeral ceremony.

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Football’s interminable video assistant refereeing debate has its latest chapter following a bizarre evening, and refereeing performance, at Villa Park. With the FA Cup not allowing the video protocol until the fifth round, here was an occasion to make the abolitionists think twice. Is elite football already too far gone to referee without a bank of screens in a faraway business park? Or was Chris Kavanagh, the referee, and his assistants, just having a nightmare day at the office?

Sandro Tonali’s two goals, and Nick Woltemade’s clincher booked Newcastle’s fifth round place, completing a comeback that came in the face of officiating mistakes weighing against Eddie Howe’s team. Eventually, they prevailed over an Aston Villa team who lost discipline, and should have been down to ten men earlier than they eventually were.

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De opluchting waarmee de woorden van Marco Rubio zondag in München werd ontvangen, verhulde de harde kritiek die in zijn toespraak verscholen lag. De Europese delegaties hadden het dit jaar meer over zichzelf dan over de VS.

Jens van ’t Wout heeft zich overtuigend gekwalificeerd voor de halve finales van het shorttrack op de 1.500 meter. Hij ging in zijn race als eerste van de zes over de finish.

Net als op de 1.000 meter pakte Jenning de Boo zilver achter topfavoriet Jordan Stolz. Toch overheerste al snel de trots. „Ik geloof dat ik hem kan verslaan.”

“In December, they lost 35,000 of their own men, and in January — 30,000,” the NATO secretary general told MT at the Munich Security Conference.

Thematica aims to deliver long-term investment and financial returns while pivoting society in a sustainable direction. They redefine traditional asset allocation by focusing on supply chains within disruptive megatrends, challenging investors to lead the way in a changing world. The funds offer exposure to breakthrough technologies of innovative companies, targeting a pure-play selection that aligns investments with the energy transition. Stockholm Design Lab has worked with Thematica to develop a brand platform, bridging strategy to a creative concept based on their vision, focus on disruptive technologies and future perspective. The brand identity is applied across multiple applications with the digital platform forming the hub for information while guiding both retail and private investors to enable and unlock the next sustainable evolution.

CORTINA D'AMPEZZO (ANP) - Skeletonster Kimberley Bos is er na haar bronzen medaille van vier jaar geleden in Beijing bij de Olympische Spelen niet opnieuw in geslaagd op het podium te eindigen. De 32-jarige Nederlandse beleefde in het Cortina Sliding Centre twee teleurstellende dagen en moest zich tevredenstellen met de dertiende plaats.

Bos noteerde vrijdag tijdens haar eerste twee runs tijden van 57,88 en 57,98 seconden. Zaterdag was ze met 58,12 en 58,26 seconden langzamer.

Het goud ging naar de Oostenrijkse Janine Flock, die over vier runs 0,30 seconden sneller was dan Susanne Kreher. De Duitse werd tweede, voor haar landgenote Jacqueline Pfeifer. De Duitse olympische titelverdedigster Hannah Neise kwam nu niet verder dan de vierde plaats. Kim Meylemans, de regerend Europees kampioene uit België, werd zesde.

"Het is wat het is, ik heb gestreden voor wat ik waard was", reageerde Bos, die regerend wereldkampioene is, telefonisch. Ze zei in aanloop naar de Spelen dat ze haar hele seizoen had afgestemd om in Cortina d'Ampezzo te pieken. "Het heeft aan mijzelf gelegen. Mijn materiaal was in orde. Het is mij niet gelukt om deze baan snel onder controle te krijgen. Daar heb ik meer tijd voor nodig. Het kan wel mijn baan worden in de toekomst, maar nu nog niet."

Het parket van Parijs richt een team op voor onderzoek naar zedendelinquent Jeffrey Epstein. De focus ligt daarbij op mogelijke misdrijven waarbij Fransen betrokken zijn.

In het kader van dit initiatief worden de dossiers rond Jean-Luc Brunel heropend. Hij was een voormalige modellenagent die banden had met Epstein. De Fransman werd in 2022 dood gevonden in een Parijse gevangenis, nadat hij was beschuldigd van onder meer seksueel misbruik en mensenhandel.

In verschillende Europese landen zijn onderzoeken gestart na de Amerikaanse vrijgave van de dossiers over Epstein. In de miljoenen pagina's komen onder meer verschillende Franse publieke figuren voor. Dat betekent niet direct dat zij betrokken waren bij misbruik.

Epstein stierf in 2019 in de gevangenis, waar hij zat op verdenking van sekshandel met minderjarige meisjes. Zijn vertrouwelinge Ghislaine Maxwell kreeg in 2022 twintig jaar cel voor haar hulp aan Epstein bij het misbruiken van meisjes en jonge vrouwen.

MILAAN (ANP) - Shorttracker Jens van 't Wout is bij de Olympische Spelen doorgedrongen tot de halve finale op de 1500 meter. De 24-jarige Nederlander, die donderdag op de 1000 meter als eerste Nederlander goud won op een individuele afstand op de Spelen, was in de vierde van zes kwartfinales de snelste. Van 't Wout kwam geen moment in de problemen.

Itzhak de Laat werd uitgeschakeld. De 31-jarige Leeuwardenaar finishte bij zijn derde Olympische Spelen als vijfde in de eerste kwartfinale.

Friso Emons, de derde Nederlandse deelnemer op de langste afstand, komt in actie in de laatste kwartfinale.

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SergioQ79 - Osanpo Photographer - posted a photo:

Arcore.
Una porta chiusa, due finestre sbarrate, intonaco che cede.
Non è abbandono spettacolare, è usura quotidiana.
Qui il tempo non distrugge: consuma.
E lascia tutto in piedi, così com’è.

アルコーレ。
閉ざされた扉、鉄格子の窓、剥がれ落ちる壁。
派手な廃墟ではない。ただの消耗。
時間は壊さない。
静かに削り取り、そのまま立たせておく。

Arcore.
A closed door, two barred windows, plaster giving in.
Not dramatic abandonment — just daily erosion.
Time doesn’t destroy here.
It wears things down and leaves them standing.

"Global temperatures have been rising for decades," reports the Washington Post. "But many scientists say it's now happening faster than ever before."

According to a Washington Post analysis, the fastest warming rate on record occurred in the last 30 years. The Post used a dataset from NASA to analyze global average surface temperatures from 1880 to 2025. "We're not continuing on the same path we had before," said Robert Rohde, chief scientist at Berkeley Earth. "Something has changed...." Temperatures over the past decade have increased by close to 0.27 degrees C per decade — about a 42 percent increase...

For decades, a portion of the warming unleashed by greenhouse gas emissions was "masked" by sulfate aerosols. These tiny particles cause heart and lung disease when people inhale polluted air, but they also deflect the sun's rays. Over the entire planet, those aerosols can create a significant cooling effect — scientists estimate that they have canceled out about half a degree Celsius of warming so far. But beginning about two decades ago, countries began cracking down on aerosol pollution, particularly sulfate aerosols. Countries also began shifting from coal and oil to wind and solar power. As a result, global sulfur dioxide emissions have fallen about 40 percent since the mid-2000s; China's emissions have fallen even more. That effect has been compounded in recent years by a new international regulation that slashed sulfur emissions from ships by about 85 percent.

That explains part of why warming has kicked up a bit. But some researchers say that the last few years of record heat can't be explained by aerosols and natural variability alone. In a paper published in the journal Science in late 2024, researchers argued that about 0.2 degrees C of 2023's record heat — or about 13 percent — couldn't be explained by aerosols and other factors. Instead, they found that the planet's low-lying cloud cover had decreased — and because low-lying clouds tend to reflect the sun's rays, that decrease warmed the planet... That shift in cloud cover could also be partly related to aerosols, since clouds tend to form around particles in the atmosphere. But some researchers also say it could be a feedback loop from warming temperatures. If temperatures warm, it can be harder for low-lying clouds to form.

If most of the current record warmth is due to changing amounts of aerosol pollution, the acceleration would stop once aerosol pollutants reach zero — and the planet would return to its previous, slower rate of warming. But if it's due to a cloud feedback loop, the acceleration is likely to continue — and bring with it worsening heat waves, storms and droughts.

"Scientists thought they understood global warming," reads the Post's original headline. "Then the past three years happened."

Just last month Nuuk, Greenland saw temperatures over 20 degrees Fahrenheit above average, their article points out. And "Parts of Australia, meanwhile, have seen temperatures push past 120 degrees Fahrenheit amid a record heat wave..."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Excelsior heeft voor het eerst sinds 10 januari weer een wedstrijd verloren. In eigen huis gaf de thuisploeg de voorsprong volledig weg in de slotfase van het duel. Parrot scoorde in de 92e minuut de gelijkmaker en Penetra maakte vier minuten later de winnende voor AZ.