Category: UK

Helen Mirren, one of the world's most acclaimed actors, was added Friday to a very select group of people recognized by King Charles III for their “major contribution” over the years to British life.
The 80-year-old was named a “Companion of Honour,” one of the highest awards the king can bestow to citizens in the United Kingdom and across the Commonwealth, limited to only 65 people at any time.
Mirren's elevation to the group, which also includes British environmentalist David Attenborough, Canadian author Margaret Atwood and former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, was one of the highlights of Charles' latest award of honors.
The honors, which aim to reward individuals for their contributions to British life, are awarded twice a year to celebrities and public figures as well as ordinary people, once at New Year’s, and then in June, to mark the king’s birthday.
Nearly 1,200 people received honors in the king’s 2026 birthday list,
The award recognizes Mirren'..

Donald Trump backed down and announced a new pick to be his director of National Intelligence on Thursday after Democrats threatened to allow a key piece of surveillance legislation expire rather than allow one of the president’s political operatives to temporarily serve in the role.
The president wrote on Truth Social on Thursday afternoon that Jay Clayton, a former chair of the Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) and attorney for the Southern District of New York would take over the role, pending Senate confirmation. His statement came only a few short hours after Democrats halted an attempt to extend the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) for three weeks while Congress worked over the impasse.
“I am pleased to announce the Nomination of very Highly Respected Jay Clayton, former Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, the former Head of Sullivan & Cromwell, one of the most prominent and successful Law Firms anywhere in the World, and the current United States A..

DeAnna Brandon, a 48-year-old blood cancer survivor, cherishes the simple moments of splashing in a kiddie pool with her grandchildren.
Yet, these precious afternoons are overshadowed by a looming fear: new Medicaid work requirements, set to begin next year, could jeopardize her health coverage and the life-saving treatment keeping her multiple myeloma in remission.
Brandon, who lives in Rockwell, North Carolina, had anticipated qualifying for a medical frailty exemption. But new guidance introduced last week by the Trump administration has cast doubt on her eligibility.
The interim final rule, released by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, stipulates that her extreme exhaustion and memory challenges, direct consequences of her treatment, may no longer be sufficient to bypass the work mandates. She will now be required to attest, and subsequently prove, that these symptoms “significantly impair” her ability to fulfill the requirements.
Should her case not be accepted by ..

Kai Trump, the granddaughter of President Donald Trump, posted a clip on Instagram of her and the president standing for the national anthem at the NBA Finals Game – but it lacked the audio of the crowd’s boos and only cheers were overlaid.
The roughly 10-second-long clip, posted Tuesday on her Instagram account, appears to be the moment Kai Trump was captured on the jumbotron standing alongside her grandfather for the national anthem during Game 3 of the NBA Finals at Madison Square Garden.
However, the audio appears to have been swapped for the sound of a crowd cheering, rather than the NBA Finals crowd, which mostly booed the president.
The original audio also features Avery Wilson singing the national anthem at the start of Game 3 between the New York Knicks and San Antonio Spurs. That is absent from Kai Trump’s video.
“Thank you to 15SOF for capturing this special moment with my Grandpa,” Kai Trump wrote in her caption, referring to 15 Seconds of Fame, an app that allows people fe..

'We're going to hit them hard', says Trump as he accuses Tehran of 'playing us for suckers'The U.S. military has launched a fresh wave of attacks on Iran after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth promised the country’s forces would be “busy tonight.”
“U.S. Central Command forces began launching additional self-defense strikes today at 5:15 p.m. ET against multiple targets in Iran at the Commander in Chief’s direction. The strikes are in response to Iran’s unwarranted and continued aggression,” CENTCOM’s X account stated on Wednesday evening.
Earlier, Trumpsaid that the U.S. is going to attack Iran “very hard” unless a peace deal is finalized.
“We'll see what happens, but we hit them hard yesterday, and we're going to hit them again hard today”, Trump told reporters at the White House.
After urging de-escalation between Israel and Iran earlier in the week, Trump vowed to press on “attacking [Iran] very hard,” citing the downing of a U.S. Apache helicopter i..

Trump says he expects to sign peace deal in ‘two or three days’Donald Trump’s military has launched retaliatory strikes after the US president accused Iran of shooting down an American helicopter.
Trump warned earlier Tuesday that the US “must, of necessity, respond” to the downing of an Apache helicopter that was patrolling the Strait of Hormuz overnight.
Two American service personnel were rescued from the vital waterway in a stable condition after the $40 million gunship went down, the military said.
US Central Command announced the “self-defense strikes” against Iran Tuesday evening, Washington time.
“The mission is a proportional response to unjustified Iranian aggression”, the military said.
Iranian state media reported explosions and air defense sirens heard along Iran's Persian Gulf coast, per The New York Times.
Trump said earlier Tuesday that the two pilots involved in the helicopter attack “both are safe and uninjured.” And he later tried to downplay the incident.
He ..

President Donald Trump and members of his family reaped about $500 million from the sale of $1.5 billion in cryptocurrency to a company that's since seen its stock price plummet — and left investors holding the bag, according to a report Monday.
Less than a year after Trump sons Don Jr. and Eric rang the Nasdaq opening bell to celebrate the crypto deal with Alt5 Sigma, the company — since renamed AI Financial Corp. — faces removal from the exchange if its shares don't rise above penny-stock levels in the next 15 trading days, and it's warned investors it may go out of business, CNBC said.
Shares in the company were trading at 68 cents each on Tuesday, down 93 percent from a year earlier and just above its 52-week low of 63 cents.
The situation led the anti-Trump Democracy Defenders Fund to call in April for a probe by the Securities and Exchange Commission, with chief anti-corruption counsel Virginia Canter telling CNBC, “The question is now: What happened to all that mo..

Chaos broke out at a massive “6-7” event that attracted hundreds of kids and teens, ending in fights and arrests, according to authorities.
A Sky Zone in Shrewsbury, Missouri, held what was meant to be a family-friendly event on Sunday to celebrate the “6-7” internet meme.
But chaos erupted outside the Sky Zone as 300 to 350 unaccompanied kids and teens were waiting in line after the indoor trampoline park reached capacity, according to authorities.
“With temperatures around 90 degrees, it did not take long for tempers to flare,” the Shrewsbury Police Department said in a press release.
Within minutes, at least eight fights broke out, according to authorities. Shrewsbury Police noted that Sky Zone ”had not arranged for additional security despite the anticipated large crowd.”
open image in galleryA massive '6-7' event that attracted hundreds of kids and teens ended in fights and arrests, according to authorities (Getty Images/iStock)As officers arrived outside the Sky Zone..

Sam Bankman-Fried, the imprisoned former cryptocurrency executive and billionaire, has asked the Trump administration for a pardon.
In 2024, Bankman-Fried was sentenced to 25 years in prison and $11 billion in forfeiture on a raft of fraud and conspiracy charges tied to the collapse of his FTX cryptocurrency exchange two years earlier.
The crypto fraudster asked this year for a “Pardon after Completion of Sentence,” according to a Justice Department website, though it doesn’t specify on which date he filed for the reprieve. Bloomberg previously reported the pardon effort.
Prosecutors accused Bankman-Fried, known by his nickname SBF, of misappropriating billions of dollars of customer funds for personal use, political donations and repayment on billions of dollars in loans tied to a sister trading fund. The Justice Department called the scheme “one of the largest financial frauds in history.”
In an interview with Fox Business earlier Monday, Bankman-Fried maintained that the original pr..

Emergency crews extinguish fires after Russian strikes in Ukraine’s Sumy regionRecommended‘Puffy-looking’ Putin is acting weirder than ever – and that should chill us to the boneUkraine hits St. Petersburg again after Putin rejects Zelensky’s offer for talksRussia threats to UK at highest level since the Cold War, military chief warnsIt’s advantage Zelensky in Ukraine’s push for peace with PutinPinnedRussian drone hits nuclear-fuel storage facility near Chernobyl, Ukraine saysRussian forces ​deliberately struck a storage facility for spent nuclear fuel near Ukraine's Chernobyl power plant, president Volodymyr Zelensky said on Sunday, in an “extremely vile” attack that did ⁠not lead to a spike in radiation.
The strike significantly damaged a fuel-reception building metres away from where “large amounts of nuclear material” is stored, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency, which said ⁠it had been briefed by ​Ukraine.
Kyiv's ⁠state atomic agency Energoatom said no ..