I’m tired of always paying for my friends on nights out. What can I do about it? | Leading questions

We all see money differently, writes advice columnist Eleanor Gordon-Smith. If you want your friends to see it your way, you’ll have to communicate it

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I’m a university student with a good part-time job. I make about $250 a fortnight and I have always been taught how to look after my money and save responsibly. My two closest friends are both unemployed, but by choice. No matter how much I help them apply for jobs, they never do.

I often go out on the weekends drinking or partying, where naturally I spend money on alcohol, maybe some food and an Uber ride home.

Published: March 19, 2026, 10:49 pm

I asked my husband for five minutes of uninterrupted eye contact. It was harder than expected

A happiness researcher called prolonged eye contact ‘the best thing ever’, claiming it can bring couples closer. Does it really work?

In January, business professor and happiness researcher Arthur C Brooks appeared on the Modern Wisdom podcast to offer advice on optimizing morning and evening routines. His tips seemed reasonable – think exercising early and no alcohol before bed. Then, for couples, he made a kookier suggestion: every night before going to sleep, spend five minutes holding hands and staring into each other’s eyes.

“This is the best thing ever,” he enthuses, explaining that it can help with mood management and to strengthen your relationship.

Published: March 19, 2026, 4:00 pm

‘Our lead actor doesn’t know he’s in a television show!’ The return of an unbelievable TV hoax

Jury Duty’s first season convinced a member of the public he was taking part in a documentary about how courts work – but it was really a reality show where everyone else was actors. Its company retreat-based sequel ups the stakes brilliantly

If ever there was a TV show that you’d think should be left at a single season, it would be Jury Duty.

The Amazon series became a slow-burning, word-of-mouth hit through 2023 for pulling off a frankly unbelievable stunt: successfully convincing one man, Ronald Gladden, that he was taking part in an LA courtroom documentary when, actually, everything about the process was staged and he was the only participant who was not an actor.

Published: March 19, 2026, 1:06 pm

Buzz kill: US breweries shutter as fanfare over craft beers appears to fade

Covid-related downturns and reductions in alcohol consumption have taken a toll on a once booming industry

In the early 2000s, Chris Bell, then a student at University of Colorado Boulder, followed a common path among people interested in brewing beer. He started doing so at home, then spent years working at established craft beer makers Long Trail Brewing in Vermont and Avery Brewing in Colorado before opening Call to Arms Brewing Company in 2015 in Denver.

In a crowded market, the business was successful. Its More Like Bore-O-Phyll beer won a gold medal in the fresh or wet hop ale category at the 2018 World Beer Cup. A local outlet called it one of the city’s best breweries, and it had a 4.7 rating from more than 400 reviews on Google.

Published: March 19, 2026, 12:00 pm

Dear allies of America, please don’t confuse our president with us | Robert Reich

We are trying our best to resist him, contain him and remove him from office as quickly as we possibly can. Thank you for your patience

Donald Trump is alone.

That’s different from the United States being alone.

Robert Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is a professor of public policy emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley. He is a Guardian US columnist and his newsletter is at robertreich.substack.com. His new book, Coming Up Short: A Memoir of My America, is out now in the US and in the UK

Published: March 19, 2026, 10:00 am

Inside China’s robotics revolution

How close are we to the sci-fi vision of autonomous humanoid robots? I visited 11 companies in five Chinese cities to find out

Chen Liang, the founder of Guchi Robotics, an automation company headquartered in Shanghai, is a tall, heavy-set man in his mid-40s with square-rimmed glasses. His everyday manner is calm and understated, but when he is in his element – up close with the technology he builds, or in business meetings discussing the imminent replacement of human workers by robots – he wears an exuberant smile that brings to mind an intern on his first day at his dream job. Guchi makes the machines that install wheels, dashboards and windows for many of the top Chinese car brands, including BYD and Nio. He took the name from the Chinese word guzhi, “steadfast intelligence”, though the fact that it sounded like an Italian luxury brand was not entirely unwelcome.

For the better part of two decades, Chen has tried to solve what, to him, is an engineering problem: how to eliminate – or, in his view, liberate – as many workers in car factories as technologically possible. Late last year, I visited him at Guchi headquarters on the western outskirts of Shanghai. Next to the head office are several warehouses where Guchi’s engineers tinker with robots to fit the specifications of their customers. Chen, an engineer by training, founded Guchi in 2019 with the aim of tackling the hardest automation task in the car factory: “final assembly”, the last leg of production, when all the composite pieces – the dashboard, windows, wheels and seat cushions – come together. At present, his robots can mount wheels, dashboards and windows on to a car without any human intervention, but 80% of the final assembly, he estimates, has yet to be automated. That is what Chen has set his sights on.

Published: March 19, 2026, 5:01 am

Middle East crisis live: Netanyahu suggests need for ‘ground component’ in Iran war

Israeli prime minister says you can’t ‘do revolutions from the air’ and that ‘there has to be a ground component as well’ amid growing signs of tensions between Israel and US

• Iran says it will show ‘zero restraint’ if energy infrastructure is targeted again

• ‘Doomsday scenario’: a visual guide to the oil and gas site attacks

• US may remove sanctions on Iranian oil stranded in tankers, Bessent says

Israel pounded Tehran with airstrikes on Friday as Iranians marked Nowruz, or the Persian New Year, in the midst of a war that has sent shock waves through the global economy and risked drawing Iran’s Arab neighbours directly into the conflict.

Activists reported hearing strikes around Iran’s capital. The attacks came a day after Israel pledged to refrain from more strikes on a key Iranian gas field and Iran intensified attacks on oil and natural gas facilities around the Gulf.

Published: March 20, 2026, 4:05 am

Trump mocks Japan about Pearl Harbor in response to question about Iran war

US president was meeting with Japanese PM when he said: ‘Who knows better about surprise than Japan?’

• Middle East crisis – live updates

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It would be funny if it wasn’t so Trumpy.

Hosting the Japanese prime minister, Sanae Takaichi, in the Oval Office on Thursday, Donald Trump could not resist mocking Japan about its 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor during the second world war.

Published: March 20, 2026, 12:45 am

Reliant on imported fuel, Pacific islands appeal for help as oil prices surge

Samoa and Tonga raise supply concerns with foreign partners as businesses and residents in Papua New Guinea grapple with higher fuel prices amid the Iran war

The leaders of some Pacific countries have appealed for help with oil supplies while others urge against “panic buying” as the import-reliant nations grapple with fears over possible fuel shortages and escalating costs caused by war in the Middle East.

Oil prices have surged to nearly $110 a barrel after strikes against energy infrastructure in Iran and the Gulf states.

Published: March 20, 2026, 2:52 am

The war on Iran cost the US $12.7bn by day six. Here’s how it’s been spent – in charts

Now, the total is likely to have exceeded $18bn and counting. Where are America’s war dollars going, in a war that was never declared in the first place?

Published: March 19, 2026, 10:00 am

‘Doomsday scenario’: a visual guide to the oil and gas site attacks in the Middle East

Attacks on facilities by both sides in the conflict this week threaten grave consequences for the global economy

• Middle East crisis – live updates

The escalating attacks on key oil and gas projects in the Middle East are expected to fuel a new phase of the ongoing conflict, with profound consequences for the world’s energy supplies and the global economy.

The Iran regime has vowed to target a string of key energy infrastructure across the region after warning that an Israeli strike on a production facility for its largest gasfield at South Pars on Wednesday had ignited a “full-scale economic war”.

Published: March 19, 2026, 3:58 pm

Senate committee advances Markwayne Mullin’s nomination to lead homeland security

Republican senator’s nomination will now be considered by full Senate, where the GOP appears poised to confirm him

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A key Senate committee on Thursday advanced Markwayne Mullin’s nomination to lead the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) on a near party line vote, a day after the Republican senator faced questions at his confirmation hearing about his approach to Donald Trump’s immigration enforcement agenda and accusations of encouraging violence.

Nearly all eight Republicans on the Senate committee on homeland security and governmental affairs voted to advance Mullin’s nomination, with the sole exception of the panel’s chair, Rand Paul of Kentucky, who the day prior had harshly criticized his colleague for comments he made about a neighbor who assaulted Paul in 2017, and an incident six years later in which Mullin readied himself to fight a witness at a committee hearing.

Published: March 19, 2026, 2:27 pm

Seven-year-old Canadian girl with autism and mother detained by ICE in Texas

Mother and child held in notorious Rio Grande Valley detention centre despite presenting visa, family says

A Canadian mother and her seven-year-old daughter, who has autism, have been detained by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Texas since Saturday, family members have said.

Relatives of Tania Warner and her daughter Ayla Lucas say they were detained unlawfully. They are uncertain about what problem ICE found with their immigration paperwork.

Published: March 20, 2026, 12:02 am

ABC pulls new season of The Bachelorette over domestic violence footage

Secret Lives of Mormon Wives star Taylor Frankie Paul’s season of hit dating show won’t air as scheduled after newly leaked video

ABC has decided to pull the new season of hit dating franchise The Bachelorette after footage of its central star physically assaulting her former partner was leaked.

Taylor Frankie Paul, who gained fame on reality show The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives, had been cast as the central Bachelorette for the 22nd season, which was due to start on Sunday.

Published: March 19, 2026, 8:36 pm

Trump-appointed panel approves 24-karat-gold coin featuring his face

Federal law says living presidents can’t appear on currency, but commission approves design for US’s 250th birthday

A federal arts commission on Thursday approved the final design for a 24-karat gold commemorative coin bearing Donald Trump’s image to help celebrate the US’s 250th birthday on 4 July.

The vote by the US Commission of Fine Arts, whose members are supporters of the Republican president and were appointed by him earlier this year, was without objection. It clears the way for the US Mint to begin production on the coin, whose size and denomination are still under discussion.

Published: March 20, 2026, 12:53 am

Body of missing Illinois student found in waters off beach of Barcelona

James ‘Jimmy’ Gracey was at nightclub in Spanish city for spring break when he separated from friends at about 3am

The body of James “Jimmy” Gracey, a 20-year-old college student from Illinois, was found Thursday in the water off a Barcelona beach, police in Spain said.

Gracey’s body was found by police divers and positively identified, the press office for Catalonia’s regional police in Barcelona told the Associated Press.

Published: March 19, 2026, 9:54 pm

Georgia woman charged with murder after police say she took pills to induce abortion

If prosecuted, case against 31-year-old would be one of first in Georgia since it passed 2019 law banning most abortions

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A 31-year-old Georgia woman has been charged with murder by police who say she took pills to induce an illegal abortion.

If state prosecutors decide to move forward with the murder charge brought by local police against Alexia Moore, her case would be one of the first instances of a woman being charged for terminating a pregnancy in Georgia since it passed a 2019 law banning most abortions.

Published: March 19, 2026, 11:05 pm

March Madness: VCU fight back from 19 down to oust UNC in first-round stunner

• Rams overcome 19-point deficit to beat No 6 UNC

• Coach lashes out after High Point stun Wisconsin

• No 1 Duke survive upset scare against No 16 Siena

• Nebraska ends NCAA drought with rout of Troy

Terrence Hill Jr made a stepback three-pointer with 15 seconds left in overtime and 11th-seeded VCU erased from a 19-point second-half deficit to stun sixth-seeded North Carolina 82-78 on Thursday night in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.

Hill finished 7 for 10 from three-point range and scored 20 of 34 points after halftime as VCU (28-7) won their first NCAA Tournament game since 2016.

Published: March 19, 2026, 8:39 pm

US military is not preparing for Cuba takeover, top general tells lawmakers

US Southern Command chief briefed senators amid Trump’s increasing use of force in the region and comments about taking Cuba

The US military is not rehearsing for an invasion of Cuba or actively preparing to militarily take over the island, the top general overseeing American forces in Latin America has told lawmakers.

But Gen Francis Donovan, head of US Southern Command, said the Pentagon stands ready to address any threats to the US embassy in Havana, defend its base at Guantánamo Bay and aid US government efforts to address any mass migration from the island, if needed.

Published: March 19, 2026, 7:33 pm

Archaeological site in Chile upends theory of how humans populated the Americas … again

Discovery at Monte Verde puts north-to-south expansion theory back at centre of heated debate on continent’s human history

A groundbreaking new study may have once again upended our understanding of human prehistory in the Americas.

For years, the predominant theory of how humans arrived in the western hemisphere centred around the Clovis culture, which crossed the Beringia land bridge from Asia between 13,400 and 12,800 years ago, and spread south.

Published: March 19, 2026, 6:00 pm

Trump news at a glance: president claims ignorance of Israel’s plan to strike Iranian gasfield, exposing rift

Trump claimed on Truth Social that he had known nothing about the targeting of Iran’s gas reserves in advance – key US politics stories from 19 March 2026 at a glance

The US-Israeli war against Iran has exposed further divisions between the two countries after an Israeli strike on Iran’s largest gasfield angered US allies in the Gulf and prompted Donald Trump to say he knew nothing in advance about the attack – a claim that Israeli officials disputed.

Speaking in the Oval Office on Thursday, Trump said he had spoken to Benjamin Netanyahu following the strikes on Iran’s South Pars gasfield – part of a reserve shared with Qatar – and had told the Israeli prime minister to refrain from further attacks that could escalate a regional war on energy infrastructure.

Published: March 20, 2026, 1:17 am

Why is the FBI buying people’s location data and how is it using the information?

FBI director, Kash Patel, revealed agency had resumed purchasing private information en masse in possible constitutional violation

Kash Patel’s disclosure Wednesday that the FBI has resumed buying location data on Americans has many people, including members of Congress, wondering: how does private information get into the hands of the US government in the first place – and how can federal law enforcement use that information to track peoples’ whereabouts?

Federal law enforcement agencies generally must obtain a warrant, which requires establishing probable cause in the eyes of a judge, to gather historical or real-time cell phone location data. The US supreme court has ruled that the fourth amendment to the US constitution, which protects against “unreasonable search and seizure”, prohibits the warrantless collection of individuals’ location histories. Buying such information, usually en masse, can circumvent this requirement, leading many privacy advocates to label the practice unconstitutional.

Published: March 19, 2026, 10:30 pm

Independent autism committee that challenges RFK Jr’s overhaul draws criticism

Kennedy’s appointees promoted ‘treatments’ like bleach enemas, but new committee has only one autistic member

The first public meeting of US autism advisers – notably, since Robert F Kennedy Jr reshaped the committee – was cancelled recently with few details, coinciding with the creation of a rival organization that has prompted some questions within the autistic community about their focus.

Kennedy, the secretary of the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) who has long argued for a debunked link between vaccines and autism, chose entirely new members for the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee (IACC) in late January, with fewer autistic people and several anti-vaccine advocates.

Published: March 19, 2026, 11:00 am

Denmark reportedly flew blood bags to Greenland in preparation for a US attack

Amid Trump threats, Copenhagen also sent over explosives intended to blow up runways, according to Danish media

Denmark reportedly readied itself for potential attack from the US in January – flying bags of blood to Greenland and explosives to blow up runways in case of a battle with its former closest ally.

During the tense days when Donald Trump threatened to take over Greenland – a largely autonomous territory that is part of the Danish commonwealth – “the hard way”, Copenhagen was so shaken that it started preparing for US invasion, according to Danish public broadcaster DR.

Published: March 19, 2026, 4:00 pm

China has been preparing for a global energy crisis for years. It is paying off now

As other Asian economies race to conserve energy, China has huge reserves of oil and gas as well as alternative energy sources like wind and solar

• Middle East crisis – live updates

Xi Jinping has been preparing for a crisis like this for years. China must secure its energy supply “in its own hands”, its president was reported to have said during a visit to one of its vast oilfields in 2021.

The US-Israel war on Iran plunged the Middle East into a deep conflict, with the strait of Hormuz – one of the most important waterways in global trade – all but closed and key energy facilities across the region under attack.

Published: March 20, 2026, 1:14 am

‘Will this fracture last a generation?’ – your ICE crackdown questions answered

The Guardian’s Maanvi Singh has been on the frontline of the Trump administration’s brutal ICE crackdown. She answered your questions about what it’s been like to cover this stark moment in American history.

The unprecedented occupation of American cities by a bulked up Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has led to a series of shocking scenes over the past 12 months, including the killing of Alex Pretti and Renee Good by federal officials in Minneapolis. It has also led to an incredible community response as people banded together to protect their neighbours.

Guardian US immigration reporter Maanvi Singh has spent the past few months covering this story, including spending a week on the block where Alex Pretti was killed.

Across the US, polls suggest that support for the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration enforcement tactics is slipping. In February, following the killing of two US citizens by immigration officers in Minneapolis, 65% of Americans said Immigration and Customs Enforcement has “gone too far”. That was an 11-point increase compared to the previous summer.

But of course, in cities that experienced these massive immigration raids directly, support is even lower. In Chicago, for example, about 33 per cent approve of Donald Trump’s overall job performance, while 35 per cent approve of his handling of immigration, according to a survey by polling firm GBAO this month.

Much of the Trump administration’s immigration agenda was outlined in Project 2025. For example, the document called for the mandatory detention of immigrants with pending cases – a departure from the previous administration when many such immigrants were released under supervision. The document also called for a major expansion of detention facilities. It called for the collapsing of several agencies within the Department of Homeland Security (such as ICE and Customs and Border Patrol) with staff focused on the unified goal of arresting and detaining immigrants. Although these agencies haven’t been officially combined – they have been increasingly working together, with Customs and Border Patrol increasingly working in cities such as Chicago, Minneapolis and Los Angeles.

And finally, Project 2025 called for limits on legal immigration – cutting off refugee admissions, scrutinizing student visas and winding down or reducing the number of H2-A and H2-B “low-skilled” seasonal work visas.

Published: March 19, 2026, 2:24 pm

Meet the Seattle families living communally to bring down costs – in pictures

As Americans face a housing crisis, this development shows how communal living can bring homeownership within reach – and foster connection

Published: March 19, 2026, 6:00 pm

I asked AI to explain my mother to me. It translated her worldview

A chatbot won’t fix your family drama, but it might help you hear what someone’s really trying to say

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Last autumn, I was pacing my living room with my phone on speaker, trapped inside one of those looping conversations with my mother, the kind that starts politely and ends in static.

We were talking about land and legacy – what gets passed down, and what doesn’t – that familiar terrain where ideals and inheritance collide.

Published: March 19, 2026, 4:00 pm

‘My taste is superb. My eyes are exquisite’: Dianne Wiest’s 20 best film performances – ranked!

The Oscar-winning star of Bullets Over Broadway and Hannah and Her Sisters has three major movies coming up. To mark her 78th birthday, we cast an eye over an (almost) immaculate back catalogue

Every great performer should have at least one baffling movie on their CV, and this curio, produced by Ismail Merchant, is Dianne Wiest’s. The plot is bananas: she plays an opera singer leading her gay teenage son to believe that his father (Simon Callow) is dead, by taking the boy to visit a fake grave each year. Guess what? He’s alive! Not for long, though: he’s soon murdered by his own gay pickup, with his son witnessing it all from inside a wardrobe. Wiest flails around Paris in a turban and a tizzy, while Jane Birkin is a fake therapist under the illusion that she is Vanessa Redgrave. The real Redgrave pops up briefly, as does Jerry Hall, because why not?

Published: March 19, 2026, 2:19 pm

‘Criminal’ or ‘kids throwing snowballs’? How a viral snow fight provoked Mamdani’s schism with NYPD

Though two men were arrested for allegedly pelting officers with snow, the mayor waved off the incident

A blizzard brought New York to a standstill on 23 February, with schools across the city closed. Restless young people without anywhere to go began to gather in Washington Square Park, summoned by Instagram chatshow Sidetalk, which wanted to stage an almighty snowball fight. A sea of young men in ski goggles gathered, armed with phones in one hand and balls of ice in the other. Cannonballs of snow flew across the sky. Others backflipped off snowmen or wrestled on the snow. The scene was of good-natured pandemonium.

“But it started getting chaotic once people were throwing gigantic blocks of ice. That’s when I left,” says Gabriella Yankovich who stopped by on her lunchbreak. “Boys being boys.”

Published: March 19, 2026, 4:00 am

Why are UFC fighters training the FBI? | Dave Schilling

The two-and-a-half centuries of American life have all been building to this, the natural evolution of our culture

I’m a regular guy, just like you. I promise. There’s no one more normal than someone who publicly declares they’re normal. Here’s me, the average, everyday Joe, who can’t get enough of people beating the crap out of each other. I love a good scrape, a sloppy donnybrook, or a casual beating. This is what defines me as an American.

When I go to the cinema and large stretches of the film don’t involve actors smashing each other with baseball bats, I immediately start texting my friends about how boring Hamnet is. What’s all that clear liquid coming out of that man’s eyes? It’s not blood. Shouldn’t he be swearing revenge against his enemies right about now?

Published: March 19, 2026, 12:00 pm

Is anyone as ill-suited for great office as Donald Trump? Yes, Pete Hegseth – that’s why Potus likes him | Emma Brockes

Bizarre outbursts at the press, a backstory full of mishaps – the US ‘secretary of war’ earns his keep as the loyalty hire par excellence

Has there ever been a more ludicrous political character than Pete Hegseth, the US government’s so-called secretary of war, who makes Ronald Reagan look understated and urbane? Last week, Hegseth launched an attack on the American press for its coverage of Iran, which he called insufficiently “patriotic”. (A CNN commentator and former Republican congressman came back with “punk” and “cry baby” to describe Hegseth’s own demeanour.) When he stands at the podium with his Mr Incredible jaw and head extended, turtle-like, way out in front of his body, all you can think is this: which is a greater threat to American national security, Iran’s nuclear ambitions or Hegseth’s failure to meet even the most entry-level requirements for a person in his position?

The majority of Americans who know who he is – only about 70% of them, according to a recent survey by the Pew Research Center – don’t like the guy, and his petulant outbursts last week at the Pentagon can’t have helped. Since Donald Trump appointed him in January last year, what has become evident about Hegseth is that, like so many bullies, he backs down sharpish if he meets any significant pushback. “Jennifer, you’ve been about the worst,” snapped Hegseth to a Fox News reporter last June in a phrase we should all have had printed on T-shirts. (Jennifer Griffin elegantly countered “I take issue with that,” and Hegseth backed away and pivoted to another point.)

Published: March 19, 2026, 8:00 am

We can tell you who will really get rich from this oil crisis – and how we can stop them | Isabella Weber and Gregor Semieniuk

Soaring oil costs signal the great transfer of wealth away from households, but also a new opportunity to redistribute it

The strait of Hormuz is now at the centre of the world. While the US-Israeli war against the Islamic Republic leads to death, destruction and pollution across the Middle East, the whole of the global economy is bracing for the fallout from the conflict. Shipping through the narrow passage has come to a near halt. Already, crude oil prices have shot to above $100 per barrel, up from $60 a barrel at the beginning of the year, while gasoline prices are jumping and airlines are announcing price hikes. Governments of oil-importing countries are scrambling to contain the fallout, announcing measures ranging from shorter work weeks to conserve fuel to price regulations. What they are not yet discussing – and what they should – is who, exactly, is about to get very rich from this.

The 2022 oil and gas crisis offers a template. It was the last time we saw a price explosion of this magnitude, triggered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. In our recently published paper in Energy Research & Social Science we map, in unprecedented detail, where those profits went. We also suggest there are ways to prevent profiteering, and redistribute the gains and losses from these shocks more fairly.

Isabella Weber is an associate professor of economics at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and author of the forthcoming book Anti-fascist Economics. Gregor Semieniuk is an associate professor of public policy and economics at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and researches the economics of climate change mitigation

Published: March 19, 2026, 10:00 am

Trump thinks brute force will arrest the US’s decline. His heavy-handed actions in Iran are only accelerating it | Owen Jones

From Venezuela to the Middle East, this is gangsterism fused with colonialism. It repudiates the moral language through which US power once justified itself

Gone are any pretences about saving the Iranian people. “They really are a nation of terror and hate,” Donald Trump says of Iran. Asked if he would like to help its people, he replied: “I’d like to, if they can behave, but they’ve been very menacing.” Perhaps even he sensed the counterproductive ugliness of this, hastily adding that they are “great people … smart, brilliant, energetic”.

It gets worse. Trump wrote on Truth Social that Iran had “plans of taking over the entire Middle East” and “completely obliterating Israel,” adding: “JUST LIKE IRAN ITSELF, THOSE PLANS ARE NOW DEAD!” Pronouncing the death of a nation hardly screams liberation.

Owen Jones is a Guardian columnist

Published: March 19, 2026, 12:00 pm

We need to be honest about Iran – and how our rampant greed for oil is causing mayhem | George Monbiot

Oil has empowered capitalism, and some of the world’s most exploitative regimes. Move away from it and we can solve some of the key issues we face

I realise this is a serious breach of etiquette. But could we perhaps abandon good manners and contextualise Donald Trump’s attack on Iran? The intense western interest in the Middle East and west and central Asia, sustained for more than a century, and the endless attempts by foreign governments to shape and control these regions, are not random political tics. They are somewhat connected to certain fuel sources situated beneath the ground.

Trump’s war aims are typically incoherent: apparently incomprehensible even to himself. But Iran would not be treated as an “enemy of the west” were it not for what happened in 1953, when Winston Churchill’s government persuaded the CIA to launch a coup against the popular democratic government of Mohammad Mossadegh. The UK did so because Mossadegh sought to nationalise the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company: to stop a foreign power from stealing the nation’s wealth. The US, with UK support, tried twice to overthrow him, and succeeded on the second attempt, with the help of some opportunistic ayatollahs. It reinstated the shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. In 1954, the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company became British Petroleum, later BP.

George Monbiot is a Guardian columnist

Published: March 19, 2026, 6:00 am

Iran could be the US's Boer war: a hollow victory that marks the beginning of the end of empire | Larry Elliott

US leaders anticipated a walkover. Now they’re embroiled in a conflict that could hasten the end of US economic dominance

Nobody gave the Boers a prayer when the war in South Africa began in 1899. It was farmers ranged against the might of the British empire, and the expectation was that resistance would quickly crumble.

Eventually, might did prevail. Britain won the Boer war, but it was a hollow victory that took the best part of three years to achieve and came at a high cost. The blow to British prestige – coming at a time when its global hegemony was under threat from fast-growing countries such as the US – was severe. Far from highlighting the extent of Britain’s power, it exposed its limitations.

Published: March 19, 2026, 2:00 pm

Disgraced Juan Carlos wants to return from exile a hero. But Spain’s murky history still dogs him | Giles Tremlett

The ex-king has been stranded in Abu Dhabi after a series of scandals. Now newly released files support his claim to have saved Spanish democracy

When Spain’s King Juan Carlos fell over and broke his hip while on an elephant hunt with a former girlfriend in Botswana in 2012, he probably thought that Spaniards would accept this as a minor gaffe after a lifetime of public service. The monarch had, after all, weathered numerous scandals, including a string of extramarital affairs and investigations into his family’s financial affairs, during the previous 37 years of his reign. Money was hardly a problem in his life.

This time, however, Spaniards had had enough. It was the height of the eurozone crisis and there was outrage that Juan Carlos was on what was reported to be a free hunting trip while people endured the poverty, mass unemployment and terror of an economy in freefall. Within two years, the king had abdicated and was passing the crown to his son, Felipe VI.

Published: March 19, 2026, 5:00 am

The Guardian view on the Iran war escalation: as Trump breaks things, who will pick up the pieces? | Editorial

The US president wanted an easy win, but the conflict is spiralling following Israel’s attack on a gas field and Iranian retaliation across the region

Shortly after the US and Israel began their illegal assault on Iran, with the US president still preening himself over the kidnapping of Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro the previous month, a state department official joked that Donald Trump had a new foreign policy credo: “Decapitate and delegate”. It was a reversal of Colin Powell’s invocation of the “Pottery Barn rule” ahead of the invasion of Iraq: you break it, you own it.

Gen Powell, then secretary of state, was warning that wars can escalate beyond expectation and are harder to exit than enter. It remains unclear what precisely the Trump administration expected from this conflict – perhaps not least to the White House itself – but it is certain that the president was not paying heed when people described the likely consequences.

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Published: March 19, 2026, 6:36 pm

Premier League and Carabao Cup: things to look out for this weekend

Igor Thiago looms over Leeds, Newcastle need to bounce back from Barça and Viktor Gyökeres aims for hero status

• Premier League top scorers: latest top-flight standings

Though Manchester United continued to win after playing brilliantly against Manchester City and Arsenal in Michael Carrick’s first two games as manager, the quality and coherence of their performances decreased thereafter. Lacking balance without the injured Patrick Dorgu, they’ve been rescued on three separate occasion by Benjamin Sesko’s goals – goals which eventually forced him into the team at the expense of Amad Diallo. But though Amad is easier to omit than Bryan Mbeumo and Matheus Cunha, both of whom are older, dearer and more productive, without him United lacked a dribbler: a player eager to run at opponents, who isn’t necessarily seeking the quickest route to goal, and whose quick feet in tight spaces are invaluable against disciplined defences. It is no coincidence that on his return to the starting XI, against Villa last weekend, United delivered their best display since those early weeks. Though, at some point soon, Sesko’s form will again demand his inclusion, this time it is unlikely to be Amad who makes way. Daniel Harris

Bournemouth v Manchester United, Friday 8pm

Brighton v Liverpool, Saturday 12.30pm

Fulham v Burnley, Saturday 3pm

Everton v Chelsea, Saturday 5.30pm

Leeds v Brentford, Saturday 8pm

Newcastle v Sunderland, Sunday 12pm

Published: March 20, 2026, 12:00 am

Detroit Pistons star Cade Cunningham to miss extended time with collapsed lung

• Cunningham to miss time with playoffs near

• Detroit star may now fall shy of awards cutoff

• Pistons lead East but face uncertain timeline

All-Star guard Cade Cunningham of the Eastern Conference-leading Detroit Pistons has a collapsed lung and is expected to miss at least two weeks and possibly more, a person with knowledge of the situation told the Associated Press on Thursday.

The exact timeline for a return to play is still unknown, the person said.

Published: March 19, 2026, 3:25 pm

It’s a knockout: why are there so many goals in the Champions League? | Jonathan Wilson

Theories range from obvious mismatches to Premier League clubs not being able to defend from open play

There were 68 goals in the last 16 of the Champions League, which is not only a lot but goes against the trend of the previous four seasons. What’s going on? Has football suddenly become more attacking again? This surely can’t all be down to Premier League sides struggling to defend against teams who don’t just rely on corners but actually attack from open play, can it?

An average of 4.25 goals a game is highly unusual, particularly given the recent context. Before 2008-09 there was only one season when the knockout phase of the Champions League yielded more than three goals a game; between 2008-09 and 2019-20 there was only one season when goals per game dipped below three. There then followed four campaigns in which the average did not climb above 2.72 (and in 2022-23, it was as low as 2.34), before bouncing back to 3.29 last season (including the playoff round). The playoff round this season produced 3.94 goals per game – and there were no Premier League teams involved; this is not purely an English issue.

Published: March 19, 2026, 7:30 pm

‘The only thing left for me was death’: meet the meth-addict long jumper who has been to hell and back

Three years ago Luvo Manyonga knew he must change his life or die. In Poland this week, the former world champion makes an extraordinary return to athletics’ top table

Sprawled prone in the dirt, the cold metal of a baseball bat cracking against his skull, spine and down to the legs that had once propelled him to glory, Luvo Manyonga experienced an epiphany. This existence could not continue; he must change his life or die.

Manyonga had been a drug addict for as long as he could remember, seeking recreational highs that provided the opposite of the performance-enhancing shortcuts that some of his deceitful athletics rivals might have pursued.

Published: March 19, 2026, 8:00 am

The MLS ‘sprint season’ explained: 14 games, playoffs, cup qualifiers and more

• 2027’s short season will precede full calendar switch

• Five Concacaf Champions Cup berths will be awarded

• No inter-conference play until MLS Cup

The typical cliche for a regular season is that it’s a marathon, not a sprint. In 2027, Major League Soccer will be the exception.

On Thursday, MLS revealed how its short 2027 “sprint season” will be formatted as it nears flipping its schedule to a fall-to-spring format next year. The competition’s structure will be familiar in many ways, with the regular season table seeding a postseason bracket and culminating with MLS Cup. Lasting just under three months, it’ll proceed at a breakneck pace that could be an enthralling departure from the league’s usual flow.

Published: March 19, 2026, 6:00 pm

Inter Miami’s Concacaf exit is a reminder that time rolls on for Lionel Messi

The Herons are out of the Champions Cup after defeat to Nashville. Now it’s back to the same old hits for the club

Concacaf may not have the world’s most hallowed Champions League. The confederation is so aware of that fact that it rebranded the competition as a Champions Cup two years ago.

Nonetheless, winning the continental competition is the ultimate aim for MLS’s most ambitious clubs, even though (or perhaps because) only one of its last 25 installments has seen an MLS team crowned as Concacaf’s best. Liga MX continues to dominate the competition, boasting 21 winners since 2001, even as MLS improves. Even Costa Rica’s Liga Promerica has more titles since the turn of the century thanks to back-to-back victories for Alajuelense and Saprissa in the mid-2000s.

Published: March 19, 2026, 1:52 pm

New bill would bar ICE raids near World Cup matches in US host cities

Nellie Pou’s bill follows refusal of ICE chief Todd Lyons to rule out enforcement near stadiums and fan festivals

A New Jersey congresswoman introduced legislation on Thursday to block immigration enforcement from conducting raids within a mile of a Fifa World Cup soccer match or fan festival in the US this summer.

The Save the World Cup bill, introduced by Nellie Pou, a Democrat, is meant to assure visitors that they will not be detained and to remove the chilling effect of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations on the events, she said in a release. The World Cup’s first US match begins on 12 June.

Published: March 19, 2026, 4:26 pm

Striking gambit: Erling Haaland invests in new world chess championship

• ‘There are clear similarities to football,’ says Norwegian

• Compatriot Magnus Carlsen, the world No 1, likely to play

Erling Haaland has become a significant investor in a new world chess championship tour that is expected to star his fellow Norwegian Magnus Carlsen, the Guardian can reveal.

The deal was agreed shortly before Manchester City played at West Ham last Saturday, with Haaland shown on Sky Sports wearing a Norway Chess cap as he entered the London Stadium – without anyone noticing.

Published: March 19, 2026, 1:25 pm

Historic March heatwave in US west shatters high-temperature records

Some highs in California, Nevada and Arizona recorded at 25-35F above normal, with widespread alerts and closures

States across the US south-west recorded blistering temperatures at the tail end of winter, including some of the hottest March temperatures ever recorded in the US, with forecasts indicating hotter days are still to come.

California, Nevada and Arizona were all under heat warnings on Thursday amid record-breaking temperatures.

Published: March 19, 2026, 11:56 pm

Concerns raised over ex-Putin interpreter’s key role in monitoring Hungary vote

Daria Boyarskaya coordinating OSCE mission overseeing vote in which pro-Moscow Viktor Orbán could lose power

Hungarian rights groups have raised concerns over the appointment of Vladimir Putin’s former interpreter to a key role in an international election monitoring mission, amid fears of Russian interference ahead of Hungary’s crucial vote next month.

Daria Boyarskaya, who worked for many years for Russia’s foreign ministry and interpreted in numerous high-level meetings including one between Putin and Donald Trump, is now a senior adviser at the parliamentary assembly of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE-PA), based in Vienna. She is coordinating the body’s mission to monitor next month’s parliamentary election in Hungary.

Published: March 19, 2026, 5:05 pm

US moves to soften capital rules: ‘Big banks can declare mission accomplished’

Fed officials expected to lower capital requirements for banks such as Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase by 4.8%

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US federal regulators are trying to soften bank requirements, loosening the amount of capital US banks must have, in what would be some of the biggest changes to bank restrictions since the 2008 financial crisis and a huge win for financial institutions.

On Thursday, US Federal Reserve officials are expected to vote to lower capital requirements – the funds they need to cover risky assets – for the biggest banks by 4.8%, which could free up capital for banks such as JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley.

Published: March 19, 2026, 5:38 pm

AC/DC guitarist Stevie Young hospitalised ahead of Buenos Aires concerts

Young undergoing medical tests but ‘in good spirits’ and expected to perform, says events promoter

AC/DC guitarist Stevie Young has been hospitalised in Buenos Aires after feeling unwell, just days before the band’s scheduled sold-out concerts in the city.

According to the event’s promoter, the guitarist for the legendary Australian rock band was undergoing medical tests but remains in good spirits and was expected to perform.

Published: March 19, 2026, 11:44 pm

Joseph Duggar, former reality TV star, arrested on child molestation charges

Duggar, 31, was taken into custody in Arkansas and was awaiting extradition to Florida, where he faces charges

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Former reality TV star Joseph Duggar is facing a child molestation charge in Florida, almost five years after his brother Josh, who also starred in the TLC show 19 Kids and Counting, was convicted of downloading child sexual abuse images.

Joseph Duggar, 31, was arrested in Arkansas, where he lives, and was awaiting extradition to Florida on Thursday. Duggar is charged with lewd and lascivious behavior toward a child under 12 years old, according to an arrest affidavit from the Bay county sheriff’s office in Panama City, Florida.

Published: March 19, 2026, 5:39 pm

Longtime Epstein lawyer ‘had no knowledge’ of his crimes, he testifies to House committee

Attorney for survivors says ‘claimed ignorance’ from Darren Indyke, co-executor of Epstein’s estate, is ‘deeply troubling’

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Darren Indyke, Jeffrey Epstein’s longtime lawyer, told US House lawmakers on Thursday that he “had no knowledge whatsoever of Jeffrey Epstein’s wrongdoings” during his employment.

The deposition before the House oversight and reform committee on Thursday morning is behind closed doors, but according to a copy of Indyke’s opening statement provided to the Guardian by his attorney, Indyke told lawmakers that that his primary role “was to provide corporate, transactional and general legal services to Mr Epstein and his companies, and I did so”.

Published: March 19, 2026, 4:02 pm

Nigel Farage stops accepting Cameo requests after revelations about his use of platform

Reform leader ‘unavailable’ on service after Guardian investigation unearths clips of him repeating extremist slogans

• Farage videos reveal support for rioter, neo-Nazi event and far-right slogans

Nigel Farage has stopped using the personalised video platform Cameo after revelations that the Reform UK leader has filmed a string of highly questionable paid-for clips.

On Thursday morning, Farage’s page on the website said he was “unavailable”, and a source said he had paused his use of the platform over security concerns.

Published: March 19, 2026, 4:27 pm

US states sue Trump EPA over decision to repeal bedrock climate finding

Lawsuit says rescission of endangerment finding – which ruled greenhouse gases threaten public health – was illegal

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A coalition of 24 states, alongside a dozen cities and counties, has sued the Trump administration over its decision to revoke the bedrock scientific determination underpinning virtually all US climate regulations.

The new lawsuit, filed in the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on Thursday, is being led by the states of Massachusetts, California, New York and Connecticut. It argues that the Environmental Protection Agency’s February rescission of the 2009 endangerment finding – which the White House described as the “single largest deregulatory action in US history” – was illegal.

Published: March 19, 2026, 7:54 pm

Women and girls bearing brunt of water shortages globally, UN warns

Unesco calls for action as lack of access and sanitation hit health, education and food security of women

Women and girls are bearing the brunt of water shortages and a lack of sanitation around the world, hindering the economic and social development of poorer countries, the UN has warned.

Women are responsible for collecting water in more than 70% of rural households that do not have access to mains water across the developing world. Women and girls collectively spend 250m hours a day collecting water globally.

Published: March 19, 2026, 8:00 am

US startup advertises ‘AI bully’ role to test patience of leading chatbots

$800-a-day position involves exposing a chatbot’s inconsistencies as it forgets, fudges or hallucinates

Imagine a day at work where your main task is to pick a fight with a computer. No meetings, no emails – just you, a chair and a chatbot with the maddening tendency to think it has the cleverest mind in the room.

The job title alone raises an eyebrow: “AI bully”. But this is precisely what a California startup called Memvid is offering: $800 to spend eight hours testing the patience and memory of artificial intelligence.

Published: March 19, 2026, 10:00 am

Meta on trial over child safety: can it really protect its next generation of users?

New Mexico prosecutors allege Meta prioritized profit, even as child abuse surged on Instagram and Facebook

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Meta is facing a reckoning over its child safety practices as a trial surfaces fresh allegations that the company prioritized profit incentives and engagement over protecting children.

The landmark trial in New Mexico has now completed its fifth week, with the state attorney general resting the case on 5 March. Proceedings are expected to continue for another week as Meta presents its defense before the jury begins deliberations.

Published: March 19, 2026, 9:00 am

PwC partners who fail to embrace AI have no future at firm, US CEO warns

Paul Griggs says senior staff at consulting firm who are not ‘paranoid about being AI-first’ are likely to be replaced

• Business live – latest updates

The US boss of PricewaterhouseCoopers has warned that partners who do not get to grips with AI have no future at the consulting firm.

Paul Griggs said senior staff who were not “paranoid about being AI-first” would probably be replaced by others who were ready to embrace the technology. “I don’t think anyone gets a free pass here. Anyone,” Griggs told the Financial Times.

Published: March 19, 2026, 12:04 pm

Efforts to shut down pro-Palestinian speech face series of setbacks in court

Rulings in cases alleging antisemitism on US campuses say common pro-Palestinian speech is constitutionally protected

Few debates from the last few years have been more contentious than whether criticism of Israel and Zionism is antisemitic, threatens Jewish people or violates their civil rights. Allegations of antisemitism have cost people jobs, provided pretexts for censorship and fueled an unprecedented crackdown on protest over Israel and shows of support for Palestinian rights, especially at universities.

Pro-Israel groups have filed hundreds of lawsuits or legal actions in an effort to silence some of this speech, with the vast majority filed since 2023 in response to the protest movement surrounding Israel’s recent war in Gaza. The most important rulings to have come out of these cases, experts say, have found that speech and slogans at the heart of the controversies are protected by the first amendment.

Published: March 19, 2026, 10:00 am

Ukraine war briefing: EU president von der Leyen vows to pay loan to Kyiv despite block by Hungary

€90bn loan has been held up by resistance from Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán; US and Ukrainian negotiators to meet on Saturday. What we know on day 1,486

The EU will find ways to pay out the promised €90bn ($104.2bn) loan to Ukraine despite Hungary’s ongoing resistance, European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen said early on Friday. “We will deliver one way or the other,” von der Leyen told reporters after a summit in Brussels, where EU leaders failed to convince Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán to lift his blockade on the vital EU loan to Ukraine.

EU leaders earlier failed to persuade Orbán to lift his block on a massive loan to support Ukraine’s war effort at summit talks on Thursday, leaving the much-needed funding in limbo. Moscow’s closest partner in the bloc, the nationalist prime minister has long resisted helping Kyiv to repel Russia’s invasion, stalling EU aid and repeated rounds of sanctions.

The Kremlin said on Thursday that talks between Washington, Moscow and Kyiv on ending the war in Ukraine were on “situational pause” after the start of the Iran war, but Ukraine’s president said new discussions were expected this weekend.

Ukrainian and US negotiators will meet in the United States on Saturday in a bid to revive stalled talks on Russia’s invasion, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said.

Belarus’ authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko on Thursday ordered the release of 250 political prisoners as part of a deal with Washington that lifted some US sanctions, the latest step in the isolated leader’s effort to improve ties with the West. Lukashenko pardoned the prisoners after meeting with US President Donald Trump’s special envoy for Belarus, John Coale, in the Belarus capital of Minsk.

International Monetary Fund staff are in Kyiv this week to meet with Ukrainian authorities about how they plan to meet their commitments under a new $8.1bn lending program approved last month, IMF spokesperson Julie Kozack said on Thursday. Kozack said IMF staff would also meet with members of the Ukrainian parliament to discuss fiscal reforms and tax changes required under the IMF program.

A pro-Kremlin figure who unexpectedly denounced Russian President Vladimir Putin and the war in Ukraine in a social media post this week that went viral has been placed in a psychiatric facility, the hospital said on Thursday. Ilya Remeslo made a career denouncing Putin’s critics until he became one himself, posting a manifesto late on Tuesday to his 90,000 followers on Telegram entitled: “Five reasons why I stopped supporting Vladimir Putin.”

As Russia’s war rages on in Ukraine, the Red Cross said Thursday it was facilitating the exchange of about 1,000 bodies each month between the sides, while “thousands and thousands” of dead remain unidentified. Just back from a visit to Ukraine, International Committee of the Red Cross director-general Pierre Krahenbuhl said he was struck by “the scale and the scope of the consequences when these military means are deployed between states”.

Published: March 20, 2026, 12:41 am

Tropical Cyclone Narelle hits far north Queensland as 250km/h winds tear off roofs and fell trees

Authorities warn of strong winds, heavy rain, flooding and coastal storm surges as cyclone makes landfall in far north Queensland

• Live updates: Severe Tropical Cyclone Narelle – latest news

• Cyclone Narelle path tracking map

• How did global heating fuel Tropical Cyclone Narelle?

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Severe Tropical Cyclone Narelle has made landfall in far north Queensland as a “high-end” category 4 system, posing a severe threat to several remote communities.

The system began to lose intensity as it crossed the Cape York peninsular on Friday morning to become a still-severe category 3 storm.

Published: March 20, 2026, 2:09 am

Glamming up ‘dirty war’: teens in Mexico glorify 1970s secret police on TikTok

AI videos let young people adopt the guise of DFS agents, sparking debate over glorifying corruption and impunity

Young people in Mexico are taking to TikTok to imagine themselves as agents from the country’s 1970s secret police, the DFS – a force which was infamous for torturing, murdering or disappearing thousands during the country’s “dirty war”.

The trend, which has sparked condemnation by some users on the social media platform, has seen young people use AI to transform themselves into agents glorifying the “absolute impunity” afforded to the notoriously corrupt and brutally violent secret police.

Published: March 19, 2026, 11:00 am

King opens world’s longest managed coastal walk – but much of it is still closed off

Landowner disputes, coastal erosion and disused ferry hindering completion of King Charles III England coast path

The longest managed coastal walking route in the world has been opened by the king at the Seven Sisters cliff walk.

However, large parts of the King Charles III England coast path are still closed to the public after objections from landowners, fears about coastal erosion and a disused ferry.

Published: March 19, 2026, 4:09 pm

‘The male ego is even more fragile than it ever was’: Kim Gordon on shyness, AI and Zohran Mamdani’s cool

As she releases her new solo album, Play Me, the former Sonic Youth star answers your questions on acting for Kristen Stewart, doing Basquiat’s photocopying, and who really invented punk rock

Did you plan to change rock music for ever? Were you envisaging a decades-long career, or was it all a bit more haphazard? Nepthsolem
When Sonic Youth first started, there had been such a high bar set for music that achieved something that people hadn’t done before, it was difficult to know how to add to that. There was the Velvet Underground, who cast a huge shadow, and then all the no wave bands, and when you’re faced with all that coolness, and you feel like you don’t belong, how do you make something happen? You have to focus on the thrill of making something that is like nothing that existed before. It sounds pretentious to say, “We wanted to do something new”, but that was it, and then you have to see what happens. And that’s still my approach. Honestly, I had no intention of doing solo records – I’d been playing in an improv-based project with Bill Nace, Body/Head, but that was all. And it was this producer in LA, Justin Raisen, he kept bugging me to make a solo record. There was no plan; in the end, again, I was like, let’s see what happens.

Your memoir, Girl in a Band, is one of my favourites. It reads almost like a novel. Have you ever considered writing a novel? timwthornton
I’ve thought about it. I consider myself more as a visual artist who writes, rather than a writer. I won’t say I won’t ever try to write a novel, but writing is always a challenge, just the getting started part, and I’m such a procrastinator. But once I get into it, I really, really enjoy it. It’s the thinking I love. A lot of times I actually don’t know what I think about something until I start writing about it.

Published: March 19, 2026, 3:30 pm

Underscores: U review – ultra-imaginative auteur has pop’s most brilliant brain

(Mom+Pop)
Performing, writing and producing everything herself, April Grey pares back her hyperpop electronics for an LP in thrall to 90s pop-R&B, with songs that big stars would die for

April Grey is a US bedroom producer beloved of an impressive range of other artists – experimental pop duo 100 Gecs are fans, so is rapper Danny Brown and Blink-182 drummer Travis Barker – but thus far it’s been hard to accurately pin her down. It’s a challenge to sum up the sound of the first album she recorded under the name Underscores, 2021’s Fishmonger, or its follow-up, a concept album based around three young female inhabitants of a mythical Michigan town called Wallsocket: there really was an awful lot going on on both of them. But if you were forced to come up with a shorthand description, you might plump for hyperpop meets emo pop-punk, a sonic cocktail that, as you might imagine, occasionally proved a bit too flavoursome for its own good.

There was no getting around the heavily-caffeinated pop thrills provoked by her best work, but while Wallsocket was bombarding you with distorted guitars, stammering vocal samples, dive-bombing brostep basslines, honking rave electronics, nu-metal riffs, heaving shoegaze textures, gunshot sound effects, vintage video-game bleeps, drums that split the difference between dancefloor pulse and the double-time thunder of hardcore punk, and vocals alternately delivered in a bratty drawl or a full-throated, heavily distorted scream, there were definitely moments when you wished Grey might consider the wisdom of the old adage about less sometimes being more.

Published: March 19, 2026, 12:45 pm

Ready or Not 2: Here I Come review – comedy horror sequel goes big and you should stay home

There’s even more screaming, running, swearing and exploding rich people in a follow-up to the 2019 sleeper hit that expands mythology we didn’t need expanded

To give 2019’s grating comedy horror Ready or Not some reluctant credit, it did arrive before Trump-era eat-the-rich became an entire, increasingly exhausting subgenre in itself. The film, about a woman finding out her new husband’s wealthy family members are game-playing devil-worshippers, was clearly indebted to/inspired by Get Out, but it landed before The Menu, Blink Twice, Triangle of Sadness, The Hunt, Knives Out, Infinity Pool, Opus and the many, many others, a medal for speed if not much else.

The follow-up has then taken a surprising amount of time, mostly due to the team behind it (directing duo Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett) being busy with the rebooted Scream franchise as well as toothless vampire dud Abigail, but also one imagines because of the difficulties in extending a film in which everyone, bar final girl, had spontaneously combusted at the end. In a world where both horror and superhero franchises have increasingly started to resemble daytime soaps in their absurd, no-rules-apply plotting (not dead, all a dream, different universe, etc), Ready or Not 2: Here I Come was still inevitable regardless of logic. What’s odd given the seven-year gap is that the second film takes place directly after the first, a la Halloween II, with heroine Grace, played by Samara Weaving, looking noticeably, understandably different.

Published: March 19, 2026, 4:31 pm

Through the Centuries: Songs of Madeleine Dring album review – puts paid to any idea that she was not a serious composer

(Chandos)
Whately/Drake
Kitty Whately and Julius Drake perform the fervent, fun and intoxicating works of a British musician whose fresh assessment is richly deserved

Born in 1923, Madeleine Dring studied at the Royal College of Music, where her teachers included Herbert Howells and Vaughan Williams. An unconventional career, including stints in theatre, pantomime and cabaret, was cut short by her death from a brain aneurysm at 53. Already considered a maverick, the fact that much of her music remained unpublished until the late 1990s threatened to condemn her to obscurity.

Enter Kitty Whately and Julius Drake, whose wide-ranging survey puts paid to any idea that Dring was not a serious composer. Drawing on poets from Shakespeare and his Elizabethan colleagues to the composer’s contemporaries, Dring’s canny knack for word-setting proves as effective as her ability to find a distinctive new melody for an old chestnut such as It Was a Lover and His Lass.

Published: March 19, 2026, 3:00 pm

Príncipe Discos: how Black DJs from Lisbon’s suburbs made Europe’s most exciting record label

From near-empty dancefloors to sold-out nights at Lisbon’s biggest club, the imprint has spent 15 years championing Afro-Portuguese beats, reshaping the city’s musical identity in the process

It’s just after 11.30pm on a Friday in early March, and the air at Lux Frágil is already thick with excitement. Groups of people are streaming in through the Lisbon club’s staircase, past a giant disco ball, and local DJ and producer Xexa is dazzling the crowd with a live set of vocal-sprinkled synthscapes. Soon, the downstairs disco will be heaving with sweaty dancers for scene heroes DJ Marfox, DJ Nervoso and Dariiofox, bodies bumping to the pulse-quickening batida.

Come the early hours of Saturday morning, the upstairs floor is bursting at the seams, with partygoers spilling on to the balcony overlooking the River Tejo, as they raise a 15th birthday toast to Príncipe, Portugal’s gamechanging dance music label, which has taken over the world-renowned nightspot for the first time.

Published: March 19, 2026, 2:01 pm

‘I woke up and couldn’t move’: Scottish rockers the Twilight Sad on births, death and breakdown

In the seven years since their last album, the Scots have faced down dementia and cancer. Now they’re returning with a visceral new sound – and eager to get back to globetrotting with the Cure

To say that James Graham has been through it in the seven years since the last Twilight Sad album would be an understatement. He lost his mother to dementia, became a father, and his own mental health struggles led to the band cancelling a tour with the Cure. The day we talk about the Scottish band’s sixth album, It’s the Long Goodbye, turns out to be the anniversary of his mum’s death. “It’s all right,” says Graham. “It seems like a good day to talk about it.”

Speaking from his home in north-east Scotland on a dark, murky evening, Graham is unflinchingly open about his experiences, often moved to tears as he recounts the last few years. “I was so ill at some points while I was writing these songs that it’s all quite hazy,” he says. “But the moments are coming back to me – of why I wrote a certain song. When I listen to one, I can feel it, ‘Fuck, you were really in it.’”

Published: March 19, 2026, 5:01 am

The Barbecue at No 9 by Jennie Godfrey audiobook review – secrets and lies in suburbia

Gemma Whelan and Stephen Mangan are among the cast in this multi-voiced tale of family tensions and trauma, set during the 1985 Live Aid charity concert

It is July 1985, two days before Live Aid, the historic charity concert taking place simultaneously in London and Philadelphia to raise money for famine relief in Ethiopia. Goth teenager Hanna Gordon has been asked by her mother, Lydia, to distribute invitations to their neighbours for a get-together at their house “in aid of the children”. Hanna suspects Lydia’s intentions may not be entirely charitable and that she wants to show off their new barbecue. Hanna’s longsuffering dad, Peter, isn’t keen, complaining “it’ll cost a fortune to feed the whole bloody street”.

Hanna, who is keeping a secret from her family, may be mortified at her mother’s party plans but she nonetheless does what she asks, delivering the invitations around their suburban cul-de-sac while only dimly aware of a mysterious figure lurking in the shadows. When Lydia spots the same figure a day later skulking in their garden, it is clear something is afoot on Delmont Close.

Published: March 19, 2026, 3:00 pm

A Queer Inheritance by Michael Hall review – the National Trust’s LGBTQ history revealed

It’s recently been accused of turning ‘woke’ – but the institution has been gay since the beginning, argues this deeply researched book

When it emerged that the National Trust had put vegan scones on the menu, it was seized on by some newspapers as a marmalade dropper – or strawberry jam dropper, perhaps – proof that the institution was woke. Wait until they hear about all the queer men and women who helped to make the Trust what it is today. The charity’s 5.4 million members and others visit its grand piles for a nice day out and a tea towel, unaware that they are surrounded by the ghosts of these figures. They are brought to life by Michael Hall, a former architecture editorof Country Life and author of books on Waddesdon Manor and the gothic revival in Britain.

Some of them, such as the buttoned-up Henry James, who lived at Lamb House, Rye, merely lent their lustre to properties that were later taken over by the trust. Others introduced features to the estates that continue to delight trippers to this day. They include Vita Sackville-West and Harold Nicolson, partners in a lavender marriage, who created the gardens at Sissinghurst, appropriately enough.

Published: March 19, 2026, 9:00 am

Mare by Emily Haworth-Booth review – profound story of a woman’s love for a horse

Where does it come from, this passion for an animal that isn’t even hers? An astonishing debut delves into deep truths about love, motherhood and care

Mare, Emily Haworth-Booth’s wonderful first novel for adults, is about a woman confronting three life-altering crises. The first is an early menopause that means that she can now never have a child. Second, after years of success as a children’s book writer, she finds herself bereft of ideas. The third should, by all rights, be the least important: a passion for a horse that isn’t even hers. She pays to ride, feed, groom and muck out for the animal a few times a week. Perverse though it seems, this horse soon becomes the centre of her life: her beloved.

In a sense, Mare is about childlessness. It opens with reflections on motherhood: “I knew a mother who said, You want to know what it’s like? Write a list of all the things you love doing and then cross them out, one by one.” But also: “I knew a mother who knew all the other mothers. As she walked through the park … this mother stopped every few strides to be greeted by other mothers, some with buggies, some pregnant. Other mothers stuck to this mother like burrs. Meanwhile I hung by her side, dragged along like a limp kite.” The narrator has decided against having a baby, not for things-you-love-doing reasons, but because the idea of her child’s future in this ailing world terrified her. Considering it, her mind filled with images of “abandoned landscapes hostile to life. Burning cities, flooded cities, desertified meadows.”

Published: March 19, 2026, 7:00 am

In the killer world of online gaming, there are no hits any more – just survivors

The fates of two ostensibly similar online games released this year, Marathon and Highguard, prove that success is becoming close to unattainable

What does success look like for developers of online video games? In 2026, the answer could not be clearer: no one has a clue.

Consider Highguard, 2026’s first big flop. Signs were promising on its launch on 26 January, with a peak of 100,000 concurrent players on Steam – plus those enjoying the game on PlayStation and Xbox, which do not make player counts public. As a free-to-play game, the barrier to entry for Highguard was low. And thanks to a prime advertising placement at the end of December’s The Game Awards – a buzzy spot usually reserved for known hitmakers, not free-to-play upstarts – curiosity was high.

Published: March 19, 2026, 12:30 pm

PEN America announce 2026 World Voices festival with Judith Butler and Bill McKibben

The 2024 festival was cancelled after multiple authors pulled out over the non-profit’s stance on the Israel-Gaza war

The literary free speech organization PEN America has announced plans for their 2026 World Voices festival. The four-day event will take place in New York and Los Angeles from 29 April to 2 May and feature writers from over 140 countries, with in person appearances from authors including Judith Butler, Bill McKibben, Cory Doctorow, Megha Majumdar and Katie Kitamura.

In a press release, the event is billed as a “testament to literature’s ability to unite us, and to counteract the closed mindedness that has resulted in a nationalist maelstrom. It continues to affirm PEN America’s commitment to championing writers and their work.”

Published: March 19, 2026, 5:00 pm

Indian film board blocks release of Oscar-nominated Gaza drama The Voice of Hind Rajab

Distributor says authorities warned screening Tunisian film-maker Kaouther Ben Hania’s docudrama could harm India–Israel relations

The Indian release of The Voice of Hind Rajab, the Oscar-nominated Tunisian film about the death of a five-year-old girl during the Israel-Gaza war, has been blocked by the country’s ratings body, according to the film’s Indian distributor.

In a report by Variety, Manoj Nandwana of Mumbai-based Jai Viratra Entertainment said that he was told that if the film was released, it would “break up” India-Israel relations.

Published: March 19, 2026, 5:24 pm

‘We keep secrets because we’re scared’: Guvna B on porn addiction and recovery

After writing about a racist attack on his last album, the award-winning musician wanted his new work to be happier. Then life took him down a different path. He discusses stigma, shame and how he got help

The past five years have been punishing for Isaac Borquaye, AKA the British rapper Guvna B. In 2021, he was left without sight in one eye for several months after being targeted in an unprovoked racist attack at his local coffee shop in east London. It left him shaken, but also motivated him to write his searing 2023 album The Village Is on Fire, which questioned structural racism. The album’s cover featured a closeup image of his bloodied eye.

In the opening track, the 36-year-old musician intersperses his own words – “Coffee in his hand and he dashed it in my face / Five seconds later, right hook to my socket” – with voice notes his cousin, the actor and writer Michaela Coel, left him in the days after the attack. The record immediately became one of his most streamed, with listeners drawn not only to his frank recounting of the attack but also to his thoughts on youth violence and gentrification, and his grief at the death of his father in 2017. His new, equally confessional album – more on which shortly – tackles even more thorny themes.

Published: March 19, 2026, 10:00 am

‘The world was hard – this movie was meant to be a hug’: Ugo Bienvenu on his heartwarming eco-fable Arco

The polymath French film-maker might be a pessimist, but his Oscar-nominated animated film is one of light and hope – even if he did have to fund it himself

There are grey clouds over Los Angeles, and the sky is spitting. “It never rains in LA,” says Ugo Bienvenu. “But every time I come here, it rains.” For the past eight months, the French animator has been on the campaign trail, in LA and elsewhere, with Arco, which was nominated for best animated feature at the Oscars on Sunday. It’s a gorgeous family animation, combining ET’s big heart with the artistry of Studio Ghibli. But travelling has meant being absent for long stretches from his home in Paris, where he lives with his wife and two small children.

This trip, Bienvenu’s family has flown out to LA with him for the first time, which explains why he’s speaking to me over a video call from a drizzly garden. “I’m outside, so they can make noise,” he says, lighting a cigarette. As he paces, I catch a glimpse through the patio doors of his four-year-old daughter kneeling at the coffee table, colouring.

Published: March 19, 2026, 8:00 am

You be the judge: should my boyfriend hold my hand in public?

Chantelle would like Hugo to show more affection when they are out. You decide who is being touchy
• Find out how to get a disagreement settled or become a juror

Friends and family have noticed that we don’t hold hands and it’s become a running joke

I find holding hands annoying. Besides, I’m quite caring and I tell her I love her on a daily basis

Published: March 19, 2026, 8:00 am

Zendaya and Tom Holland: are the gen Z power couple married? Nine things you need to know

They like to keep things private, but the Hollywood stars keep dropping clues. Did they recently tie the knot – or is this all just promo?

Congratulations to Zendaya and Tom Holland, the widely liked gen Z power couple who recently got married after nearly a decade together. Or did they?

Weeks after Zendaya’s stylist, Law Roach, seemed to spill the news on the red carpet, rumours are still swirling, with neither (alleged) bride nor (purported) groom rushing to put them to rest.

Published: March 19, 2026, 5:00 am

Stir-fries, crab cakes and carbonara: Georgina Hayden’s crab recipes

Sweet and delicate crab is a taste of spring. Here are five dishes perfect for lighter, sunnier days

It’s hard not to be excited by the arrival of spring and all the produce that will soon be gracing our kitchens. Asparagus, spinach and new potatoes can’t come soon enough, but it’s not just fruit and vegetables that I count down the days for – there’s plenty of seafood to celebrate too, and in particular crab. Sweet and delicate, its freshness mirrors the arrival of brighter, sunnier days. If you’re lucky enough to pick through a fresh crab, then it needs very little in way of adornment – a squeeze of lemon perhaps, and warm bread and salty butter. Thankfully for the time-poor among us, you can also buy pots of it pre-cooked and picked, which is glorious lightly spiced in a dip or for folding through pasta. However you decide to enjoy crab, though, make sure it is allowed to sing.

Published: March 19, 2026, 12:00 pm

Can an Austrian hostel give a luxury ski chalet a run for its money?

Ski accommodation can be prohibitively expensive, but a cosy youth hostel puts the Montafon resort and its glorious runs within reach for those on a budget

‘Want to come skiing in Austria at half-term?” I asked my 13-year-old son. “It’ll be just like one of those luxury chalet holidays, only we’ll make our own beds, cook our own dinners and carry our gear back to our accommodation ourselves.” Osian didn’t hear the caveats. “Sounds amazing,” he said, his eyes glazing to a cinematic sweep of white powder and the chance to perfect his 360.

For many families, the dream of a catered chalet – and its ready-lit fires, homemade strudels and chauffeured lift shuttles – remains just that. Apartments offer access to the slopes at less vertigo-inducing prices, but they tend to come with a minimum seven-night stay. If you only have a few days to spare, or a budget that won’t stretch to a full week’s lift pass, hotels fill the gap, but then you’re back navigating the moguls of cost.

Published: March 19, 2026, 7:00 am

Crossbreed dogs show more behavioural problems than pure breeds, study suggests

Research finds cockapoo, cavapoo and labradoodle dogs display more undesirable behaviours than breeds they derive from

The UK has oodles of doodles but a study might offer paws for thought: researchers have found some of these designer crossbreed dogs show more behavioural problems than the pure breeds from which they derive.

Crosses between poodles and other dog breeds have become increasingly popular in the UK, with research suggesting the trend is – at least in part – driven by the expectation such dogs will be hypoallergenic, healthy and good with children.

Published: March 19, 2026, 12:01 am

Jeffrey Epstein’s elite relationships visualised: the banker, the economist and the director

Day 2 of our Guardian analysis of more than a million Epstein emails exposes the child sex offender’s deep relationships with more high-profile figures

The Epstein files have led to intense scrutiny over links between the child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and the rich and powerful. But the vast trove of information has made it difficult to assess the extent of some of those connections.

In this second of a two-part series, The Guardian has focused on Epstein’s links to high-profile people in business and the arts – including the renowned economist and former US treasury secretary Larry Summers, the New York film director Woody Allen and Jes Staley, the former head of Barclays.

Published: March 19, 2026, 11:00 am

People aged under 25: are you still looking for a job after a year of unemployment?

We are looking to speak to young people including university graduates, school leavers who didn’t go on to higher education, and those who took up apprenticeships

Are you under 25 and still looking for a job after a year of unemployment? If so, we would like to speak to you.

The latest official figures from the Office for National Statistics showed unemployment increased to 5.2% in the final quarter of 2025, the highest rate since the start of 2021. Young people have been bearing the brunt of this rise, with 16% of those aged 16-24 unemployed, nearly an 11-year-high.

Published: March 19, 2026, 4:17 pm

Humanoid art and Eid al-Fitr preparations: photos of the day – Thursday

The Guardian’s picture editors select photographs from around the world

Published: March 19, 2026, 2:24 pm