Daily Press Briefing by the Office of the Spokesperson for the Secretary-General

Bag, camera and pipe belonging to 86-year-old are latest relics uncovered as glaciers melt due to global heatingAn 86-year-old mountaineer has been reunited with his backpack and climbing equipment after they emerged from a melting glacier in Austria – more than 60 years after he was forced to leave them there.Items including an ice axe, camera and a pipe dating from the 1950s or 1960s were discovered on the Sulztalferner glacier in Austria’s Tyrol region, at an altitude of 2,955 metres (9,700ft) above sea level, by a hiker in July. Continue reading...

Gold collection known as Treasure of Villena, worth at least €1.7m, is latest target of ‘very well planned’ raidThieves in Spain have raided the Treasure of Villena – a stunning collection of bronze age gold artefacts that has been described as the most important prehistoric trove in Europe – in the latest high-profile smash-and-grab heist on the continent.The raid on Thursday morning of the 66 mostly gold objects in the Spanish town of Villena lasted just minutes, officials said. Continue reading...

Coroner told BBC veteran was dazzled by headlights and sustained rib and sternum fractures in collision, which led to bronchopneumoniaThe broadcaster Jenni Murray died days after being involved in a car crash which happened when she was dazzled by headlights, a coroner has heard.Murray, 75, was best known as the voice of BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour, hosting the programme for three decades and becoming the longest-serving presenter in its history. Continue reading...

Company that runs Manchester, Stansted and East Midlands airports says passenger safety is unaffectedBusiness live – latest updatesThree UK airports have been hit by a “cybersecurity incident” in which the data of about 8.7 million customers was accessed, Manchester Airport Group (Mag) has said.The company, which operates Manchester Airport, London Stansted and East Midlands airport, said that “at no point has passenger safety or aviation security been compromised” during the incident and that neither Mag nor the system hacked held customers’ bank or payment details. Continue reading...

Earth’s shadow will appear to be a reddish ‘blood moon’ due to the way sunlight is scattered by the atmosphereA near total lunar eclipse will be visible across large swathes of North and South America on Thursday night with millions of people expected to be able to see one of nature’s marvels.Lunar eclipses occur when Earth moves between the sun and the moon and its shadow is cast on to the lunar surface. Thursday night’s event will see 96% of the moon darkened by the Earth’s shadow at its peak moment. Continue reading...

Letters obtained by Guardian and AP contradict testimony that 2019 visit to Samoa had ‘nothing to do with vaccines’Newly obtained documents indicate that the US health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, lied during two congressional hearings last year, telling lawmakers who held the key to his confirmation that a 2019 visit to Samoa had “nothing to do with vaccines”.Letters obtained by the Guardian and the Associated Press contradict that testimony. In one he wrote to the Samoan prime minister before the trip, Kennedy explicitly said he wanted to study the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine in the Pacific island nation. In it, he used the words vaccine or vaccination eight times. Continue reading...

Plane was headed for airport in Seldovia from Anchorage, and was submerged in water after the crashA small plane carrying four people crashed into shallow waters next to a remote coastal town in Alaska on Wednesday, killing everyone on board, according to officials.The Piper PA-24 was headed for the airport in the small town of Seldovia after taking off from Anchorage, according to a statement from the Alaska Department of Public Safety. Seldovia’s airport is about 136 miles (219 km) south-west of Anchorage. Continue reading...

Motoring series to return after break since serious injuries to co-host Andrew ‘Freddie’ Flintoff in crash during filmingTop Gear, the long-running motoring show which has been off air since its co-host Andrew “Freddie” Flintoff was seriously injured in a crash during filming almost four years ago, is to return to the BBC, the broadcaster confirmed today.After Flintoff’s accident at Dunsfold Aerodrome in Surrey the BBC said the series would be “rested” for the foreseeable future. Continue reading...

Kremlin threatens retaliation after Burnham says UK will help Ukraine start producing long-range missilesUK politics live – latest updatesRussia has said it could retaliate against the UK for its support of Kyiv by striking military targets inside and outside Ukraine, amid reports that the director of the CIA warned the Kremlin against attacking Nato during a secretive visit this week.Andy Burnham, Britain’s prime minister, said on Monday the UK would allow Kyiv access to classified technology to start ⁠its own production of Storm Shadow ​long-range ​cruise missiles. Maria ⁠Zakharova, Russia’s foreign ministry spokesperson, said on Thursday Britain and France were “playing ⁠with ​fire”. Continue reading...

City residents had accused council of giving ‘free rein’ to campaign promoting England flags Birmingham city council is seeking an injunction to stop members of an anti-migrant group from erecting flags, including union jack and St George’s flags, on public infrastructure across the city.A nationwide campaign to give prominence to the England flag, which resulted in thousands of St George’s crosses being flown from lamp-posts, roundabouts and other public infrastructure, is believed to have started last summer in Birmingham. Continue reading...

Safety features including usage limits and night-time blocks to be set by default. Plus changes to famous French cheesesDon’t already get First Thing in your inbox? Sign up hereGood morning. Meta has agreed to significant changes to its Instagram and Facebook apps in a settlement that ended a landmark lawsuit. The agreement curtails a major trial in California and will require the social media company to pay up to $18bn. Meta agreed to establish safeguards for teenage users, including daily usage limits and blocks on night-time use nationwide in the US.California and 28 other US states sued the $1.36tn (£1tn) company over allegations that Meta deliberately designed addictive products that hooked young people, leading to mental health issues, including anxiety, depression and suicide. As part of the settlement, the company denies wrongdoing.What will be changing in the apps? The biggest alteration is that Meta, the parent company of Instagram and Facebook, is now required to make many of its safety limitations the default setting for accounts created by teens, a pivot from its previous opt-in approach to child safety. Nick Robins-Early and Johana Bhuiyan explain more in this piece: six key takeaways from the end of the Meta trial.Will other companies be affected? Meta is putting the agreement forward as a precedent for other social media companies to follow. The company’s chief legal officer, CJ Mahoney, said: “Because teens move fluidly across dozens of apps, we need an industry-wide solution. We therefore call on our industry peers … to implement this new framework.” Meta, YouTube, TikTok and Snap face thousands more similar US lawsuits brought by families, individuals, school districts and other attorneys general.Are campaigners satisfied with the result? Arturo Béjar, an ex-Facebook employee and whistleblower, said the outcome “is not an all-clear to say the product is safe. The limitations that are in the agreement are the equivalent of saying: ‘Well, you can smoke as many cigarettes as you can in two hours a day’. It doesn’t make the cigarettes any safer.”How did it happen? As this visual guide explains, at 8.37am on Wednesday an enormous section ⁠of a glacier in the Himalayas sheared free and crashed on to the valley floor in Nepal’s Langtang national park, about 60km north of the capital Kathmandu, near the mountainous Nepal-Tibet border. Continue reading...