Despite his wife’s protests and his friends’ many jokes, the writer Isaac Fitzgerald spent three days in London shopping for a hat straight out of Peaky Blinders. Here’s what it taught him about personal style. Source link
The case of a man whose confession was made public by Irbil security forces last month has raised questions about how the security forces in the Kurdistan Region treat people they arrest. Human rights groups and lawyers say this is not the first time something like this has happened. Click here for the full story in Kurdish. Source link
A British judge ruled against a man who wants to excavate a landfill where he says a hard drive with access to thousands of bitcoins was mistakenly dumped over 11 years ago. Since 2013, James Howells has been hoping to recover a laptop hard drive that he says contains the private key for cryptocurrency which he says he mined in 2009. Ars wrote about it at the time, noting that the value of a bitcoin had just passed $1,000, making 7,500 bitcoins worth $7.5 million. The alleged number of bitcoins has changed a bit, with Howells now saying he lost 8,000 bitcoins. The bitcoin price exceeded $100,000 last month and was $95,636 as of last Friday, or $765 million for 8,000 bitcoins. High Court judge Keyser KC issued his ruling last week, siding with the defendant in Howells v. Newport City Council. Howells has no realistic chance of success at trial, the judge ruled. Howells sought “an order that the defendant either deliver the hard drive or allow his team of experts to excavate the …
Luciano Pavarotti and James Brown are remembered as larger-than-life performers with an almost mythical-seeming presence and distinctiveness. But it wasn’t so very long ago that both of them were active — and even active onstage together. In the video above, the King of the High Cs and the Godfather of Soul get together on “It’s a Man’s World” in 2002. It happened at the penultimate Pavarotti & Friends concert, one of a series of yearly benefit shows that ran between 1992 and 2003, and also featured the likes of Andrea Bocelli, Grace Jones, Sting, and Lou Reed. “It’s a remarkable performance on so many levels,” writes Tom Teicholz at Forbes.com. “James Brown is in top form, his voice strong and pure. He commands the stage, and he dominates — he is in every sense an equal to Pavarotti, who sings in Italian with great subtlety, finesse, and emotion. The video is filled with moments of grace — such as when Brown, with a magisterial wave of his arm cedes the stage to Pavarotti to sing …
For the past decade, the Dutch immunologist Jacques (Sjaak) Neefjes has been on a mission to bring back a cancer drug that hasn’t been available in Europe since 2004. “I’m still flabbergasted that a compound that could have helped thousands of people was taken off the market,” says Neefjes. Why it was removed seems something of a mystery, but as far as he can tell, it was simply a lack of demand. His latest research shows that this drug, aclarubicin, can improve the survival of people with acute myeloid leukemia (AML) much better than other forms of chemotherapy. If it had been available in Europe for the past 20 years, Neefjes estimates that it could have helped 100,000 people. But while the maths sounds simple, the path of Neefjes’s research has been far from smooth. In his attempts to revive aclarubicin, he has smuggled small amounts from China, found old samples in a Finnish freezer, and funded part of his work using an inheritance from a Dutch MP who was murdered 10 years ago. “It …
Two years on and the war in Ukraine has approached stalemate. And it’s created a problem. At the beginning of the conflict hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians volunteered to fight. But with no end in site and recruits exhausted, enthusiasm has waned. In response, Ukraine has lowered the conscription age, sent patrols round to round up men of fighting age, and increased the punishment for dodging the draft. But for some young men, this is not enough to convince them to join up. Luke Harding explains why Ukraine has such a recruitment crisis, and what is being done to improve matters. Myroslav is one young man who felt desperate in the face of pressure to join the army. He explains why he did not want to fight and how he plotted his escape from Ukraine. And he tells Michael Safi how it feels being torn between his sense of self-protection and his sense of duty. Photograph: Sergei Supinsky/AFP/Getty Images Support The Guardian The Guardian is editorially independent. And we want to keep our journalism open …
Currently, the bishop of Sodor and Man sits by right on the Legislative Council – the upper chamber of the Isle of Man’s parliament, Tynwald. Muriel Garland explains why she supports the Constitution Bill, which would remove bishop’s vote. This opinion piece is adapted from a speech that Muriel hoped to present to the Legislative Council (LegCo) last month, before LegCo decided not to have an evidence session. Why do I believe Tynwald should abolish the bishop’s vote? Because I believe the Isle of Man should be a secular democracy, with a government that represents all people, of all religions and none, equally. A secular democracy promotes freedom of religion, and freedom from religion, in the public sphere. Secularism defends the civil liberties of everybody whatever their beliefs. Secularism separates religious institutions such as churches from state institutions like parliament. Each has a different role. Parliament is there to make laws and manage the country’s affairs. Religions are there to minister to the spiritual needs of their followers and to promote their beliefs. The separation …
Hoda Nagib and her husband had walked 20km in the baking sun in Saudi Arabia when she told him that she needed to rest. The couple, who are in their 60s, had just scaled Mount Arafat, along with thousands of other white-robed pilgrims on the hajj pilgrimage to Mecca, Islam’s holiest city, where temperatures as high as 51.8C have been recorded in the shade in recent days. Nagib’s husband left her to perform a ritual known as the stoning of the devil. When he returned she had disappeared, their neighbour Walaa Roshdy explained. Fellow pilgrims told him that his wife was suffering from exhaustion and had been taken to a hospital in Mina, Roshdy said. The husband – who Roshdy said had requested anonymity while he searches for his wife – went to the hospital, where staff told him she had been treated and had left. He has been unable to make contact since. Roshdy, who works as a tour guide in Saudi Arabia, knows the couple from their home town of Tanta, in Egypt. …
Stay ahead of the curve with our weekly guide to the latest trends, fashion, relationships and more Stay ahead of the curve with our weekly guide to the latest trends, fashion, relationships and more A man has gone viral for his detailed theory on when it’s appropriate to invite your significant other to an event. In a video posted to TikTok, podcaster Bran (@bran__flakezz) shared his hot takes about friendship and dating. Alongside a photo of a grid, the TikToker revealed when he thinks it’s suitable to bring your partner along to an event. “My opinion on if it’s okay for you to bring your significant other to our plans depends on two things,” Bran began the clip, which has been viewed more than three million times since it was posted on 11 April. “How formal are the plans? Am I inviting you to my wedding or am I just asking you if you want to get drinks after work?” One side of the horizontal axis was labelled, “Very formal event,” while the other end …
So you’re in love with a married man. Some might even call you his mistress, but in your eyes, your relationship means so much more than that. The experience of falling in love with a married man cuts across almost all cultures, age groups, ethnicities, religions, and education levels. Yet, despite the knowledge that this scenario is unethical, immoral, and guaranteed to bring pain to everyone involved, many otherwise smart, single women get their hearts tangled up this way. You already know this is a story that does not end well. Maybe today you’re only fantasizing about getting involved with an unavailable man, and you’re looking for a sign that the universe is warning you to stop, take a deep breath, and just walk away. Or maybe you did get involved and have been dating a married man, and now he has been the one to pull back. While it can be hard to get control of your emotions when you feel so connected to another person, you can at least control how you frame …
