Actor Peter Cullen, voice of Optimus Prime and Eeyore, dies aged 85

• India is simultaneously engaging in high-level diplomatic efforts with five key nations: Russia, China, Japan, Canada, and the United States. • This strategic outreach, reported on August 27, 2026, emphasizes a foreign policy rooted in flexibility and strategic autonomy.

• The UN and humanitarian partners are providing emergency relief in Nepal and China following severe flooding that resulted in multiple deaths and missing persons. • Response teams are deploying essential personnel and critical supplies, including food, shelter, and medical equipment, to affected regions.

Grand jury declined to indict anyone but said there was a ‘sophisticated scheme’ to use funds for political activityUS politics live – latest updatesA Florida grand jury has found that the administration of the governor, Ron DeSantis, “misappropriated” $10m in taxpayer money from a Medicaid settlement into the Hope Florida Foundation, a charity with ties to DeSantis’s wife, before the money was reportedly “funneled” into “two political action committees”.In the grand jury report, which remains sealed but was obtained and published by CBS News Miami on Wednesday, the grand jurors wrote that “we conclude that these funds were misappropriated as part of a sophisticated scheme to fund political activities” but said that they found “insufficient evidence to charge anyone criminally”. Continue reading...

Congressman Jamie Raskin asks president’s son to detail firm’s recent success after he joined 1798 Capital as partnerDemocrats on a powerful US congressional committee have launched an investigation into a venture capital firm which has thrived since recruiting Donald Trump’s son.Donald Trump Jr joined 1798 Capital as a partner just days after his father won a second term in office in November 2024. Congressman Jamie Raskin, ranking member of the US House of Representatives judiciary committee, has asked the president’s son to detail the firm’s recent success. Continue reading...

Representative Mike Collins has been dogged by associations to white nationalism and antisemitismUS politics live – latest updatesThe US senator for Georgia Jon Ossoff, a Democrat, has slammed a “disgraceful and disqualifying” report that a former staffer for his Trump-backed Republican challenger Mike Collins shared images online of a swastika and depicting himself in Ku Klux Klan robes.It is the latest instance of someone in Collins’s orbit facing scrutiny over racist or white nationalist conduct. Ossoff called the report “stunning” and said it “should shock the conscience of every Georgian”. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Campaigners accuse prime minister of U-turn after he decided not to back funding cap in elections billAndy Burnham recently supported an even lower donations cap than previously reported, according to correspondence seen by the Guardian, as the row over next week’s elections bill escalates.The prime minister wrote to a campaigner in May outlining his support for a £500,000 individual donations cap, which he said would “guard against the perception of any one party being unduly influenced or swayed by one person or organisation”. Continue reading...

Unusual heat this year may have melted ice and thawed bonds that hold glaciers in place – leading to catastropheNepal-Tibet flash flood – latest updatesWhat caused the flash flood in Nepal and Tibet?The devastating flash flood that ripped through the border communities of Nepal and Tibet has heightened fears that the climate crisis is destabilising the geology of mountain and polar regions, threatening millions of people.Satellite imagery suggests a glacier collapse high in the Himalayas was the primary cause of the deadly torrent of mud, water and ice that tore along the Bhotekoshi River on Wednesday. It swept away buildings and roads and left at least 360 dead and 1,400 missing. Continue reading...

‘Godzilla’ event currently brewing could push 50 million people into acute hunger before the end of next yearA series of strong El Niño climatic patterns in recent decades, such as the “Godzilla” event currently brewing that is set to warp weather around the world, have been supercharged by the broader overheating of the planet caused by the burning of fossil fuels, a major new study has found.El Niño is a naturally occurring phenomenon, taking place every two to seven years, when the waters of the eastern tropical Pacific Ocean heat up, causing a cascade of impacts around the world. The latest developing El Niño, set to peak later this year, is set to be the strongest in living memory and has been informally dubbed a “Godzilla” event. Continue reading...

Symbolic move to rename lake bordering New York and Canada comes amid escalating trade war with northern neighborUS politics live – latest updatesDonald Trump signed an executive order on Thursday directing the federal government to rename Lake Ontario, making it Lake America.The largely symbolic move comes amid an escalating trade war with Canada. Continue reading...

Sally-Anne Bowen, now 65, convicted of assaulting boys at Christ’s College, Finchley, where she was chemistry teacherA chemistry teacher has been found guilty of indecently assaulting two teenage pupils at an all-boys school in the late 1980s.Sally-Anne Bowen, who taught at Christ’s College in Finchley, north London, assaulted the teenage boys when they were aged around 14 to 15 and she was in her mid-20s. Continue reading...

Jes Staley made the comments to US lawmakers investigating his links to Jeffrey EpsteinThe former Barclays boss Jes Staley has denied having sex with a woman dressed as Snow White, after being questioned about an infamous email exchange about Disney princesses with Jeffrey Epstein.The comments were detailed in newly released transcripts from a closed-door interview last month with US lawmakers as part of their investigation into Epstein, who died in prison in August 2019 while awaiting trial on child sex-trafficking charges. Continue reading...