Crack in California chemical tank averts ‘catastrophic’ blast but thousands remain evacuated

The venue is expected to host a mixed martial arts fight on 14 June to also mark the US’s 250th anniversarySign up for the Breaking News US newsletter emailConstruction is under way on the White House lawn for an Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) arena that will host a cage match next month to mark the US’s 250th anniversary and Donald Trump’s 80th birthday.The mixed martial arts fight is planned for 14 June. Continue reading...

Anne Keast-Butler will also warn of narrowing window to stay ahead of China in ‘new era of radical uncertainty’Russia is relentlessly targeting Britain’s infrastructure and democracy while there is only a narrowing technological window to stay ahead of a fast-developing China, the head of the spy agency GCHQ will warn in a lecture on Wednesday.Anne Keast-Butler, giving an inaugural annual lecture, will say that the UK is caught in a “new era of radical uncertainty” and that “the risk of miscalculation” is as high as she has ever seen it as hacker attacks from the two states continue. Continue reading...

Attorney, speechwriter and confidante of King was involved in some of US civil rights movement’s key momentsClarence B Jones, a former speechwriter and confidante of Martin Luther King who helped pen his famous “I have a dream” speech, has died. He was 95.Jones died on Friday at a senior living community in the San Francisco Bay Area suburb of Cupertino, according to a statement released by family members, who were at his side. Continue reading...

In highly unusual intervention, ex-PM says his party’s ‘almost infinite capacity for self-delusion’ makes it likely to lose next electionAnalysis: Tony Blair’s essay on Labour failings gets full marks for being unhelpfulTony Blair has accused Keir Starmer, Andy Burnham and Wes Streeting of putting Labour’s future at risk by abandoning the centre ground, warning that the party’s “almost infinite capacity for self-delusion” means it is likely to lose the next election.In a scathing 5,700-word attack on the prime minister and his would-be successors published on Tuesday night, Blair argued that the party’s agenda should move firmly to the right, calling for the government to crack down on welfare spending, abandon net zero goals and support Donald Trump. Continue reading...

Jerome Laxale breaks ranks to publicly back reforms that would also wind back the diesel fuel rebateFollow our Australia news live blog for latest updatesGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastThe Labor MP Jerome Laxale says it’s “reasonable to expect more” from mining giants, breaking ranks to publicly back changes to the generous tax concessions blamed for holding back decarbonisation after revelations BHP delayed major projects to cut emissions.Labor’s grassroots environment action group has also renewed calls to wind back the diesel fuel rebate following an exclusive investigation by the Guardian and the ABC, which revealed BHP scrapped a project to significantly reduce global emissions, delayed vast renewables projects in the Pilbara and war-gamed options to push the electrification of its polluting diesel truck and train fleets into the next two decades. Continue reading...

Intervention by former PM almost feels designed to inflict maximum annoyance on his partyTony Blair says Labour must abandon net zero, support Trump and cut benefitsDid Tony Blair ever mention he was quite good at winning elections? If you happened to miss it, then his 5,700-word opus on where Labour, Keir Starmer and the UK more generally have gone wrong is here to remind you. Several times.“I led the Labour party for 13 years and through three general elections,” goes the second sentence. Further on, Blair laments that when the party tries to puzzle out how to win a second term, the one thing ruled out was “learning from the only time in the party’s 120-year history it has ever done so”. Continue reading...

Lawmakers cite studies linking weedkiller to Parkinson’s as pressure mounts for a wider US banVermont is the first US state to ban the weedkilling pesticide paraquat, backed by lawmakers who cited concerns about research showing the chemical substantially increases the risk of the incurable brain ailment known as Parkinson’s disease.Phil Scott, the governor, signed the legislation on Tuesday. The new law takes effect 1 November, though it contains a provision allowing state regulators to issue special permits for paraquat use on fruit-producing tree orchards, berries and other “small fruit” crops up until 31 December 2030. Continue reading...

Australia’s foreign affairs minister Penny Wong met with US secretary of state Marco Rubio in New Delhi meeting. Follow today’s news liveGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastReacting to the Quad meeting, Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning said that cooperation “should not be directed against any third party”, AFP reports.“We also do not support exclusive cliques or bloc confrontations,” she told reporters. Continue reading...

Three lunar landings are planned for this year in preparation for the construction of a $20bn moon baseSign up for the Breaking News US newsletter emailNasa announced on Tuesday ambitious plans for three uncrewed lunar missions this year to kickstart construction of a $20bn moon base, and said it had chosen Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin, ahead of Elon Musk’s SpaceX, to conduct the first.The revelation by Nasa’s administrator, Jared Isaacman, at a press conference in Washington DC marked the first detailed public explanation of how and when the moon base will be built. Continue reading...

Bid to remake maps before midterms and reduce Democratic voters in Jim Clyburn’s district fails in state senateRepublican lawmakers in South Carolina have defied Donald Trump and rejected a breakneck bid to redraw the state’s congressional districts ahead of November’s US midterm elections.In a 26-18 vote, state senators rejected mid-decade redistricting in a special session of the legislature, ending hope in Washington to split up congressman Jim Clyburn’s district and add to the list of gerrymandered gains for Republicans. Continue reading...

Channel quietly debuts over weekend with Only in Monroe video days after Thursday’s final Late Show episode Stephen Colbert hasn’t even been off the air for a week, but is already causing some hubbub with the launch of a new YouTube channel that has garnered more than 120,000 subscribers.The popular late-night host, who aired his final episode of The Late Show last Thursday, quietly debuted the channel over the weekend with a single video titled: “Only In Monroe --- May 22, 2026.” Continue reading...