Prominent Australian academic denies links to powerful Iranian politician

• Diplomatic efforts between the United States and Iran have advanced ceasefire talks, with both nations signaling willingness to negotiate a formal agreement to end months of escalating regional conflict. • Officials from both countries met in a neutral location this week to discuss terms, including sanctions relief, prisoner exchanges, and military de-escalation measures along disputed maritime boundaries.

• President Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping held high-stakes talks in Beijing focusing on resolving escalating trade tensions, technology competition, and coordinating responses to Middle Eastern developments. • The two leaders discussed tariff rollbacks, semiconductor supply chain restrictions, and potential joint initiatives on artificial intelligence regulation, with both nations seeking to avoid further economic deterioration.

Transcripts reveal billionaire Ted Waitt’s relationship with Epstein accomplice and $7.2m breakup payoutSign up for the Breaking News US newsletter email Ted Waitt, the billionaire cofounder of the Gateway computer company, told lawmakers during a closed-door interview that he was in a romantic relationship with Ghislaine Maxwell from 2004 to 2010, but said that “if I knew then what I know now about Ms Maxwell, I never would’ve befriended her or allowed her to be around my four children”, according to a transcript of his testimony released by the House oversight and reform committee.“I never would’ve spent six years in a romantic relationship with her,” Waitt said in his opening statement before the committee on 30 April, according to the transcript released on Wednesday. His testimony provided new details about his relationship with Maxwell, and he also disputed Maxwell’s previous statements that their relationship ended after a mysterious blackmail attempt related to Epstein’s civil cases. Continue reading...

Government social care commissioner says system relying on exhausted unpaid carers to plug gaps in supportUK politics live – latest updatesMillions of unpaid carers in the UK are “living an agony” while propping up an outdated, fragmented and confusing social care system, Louise Casey, the head of the government’s adult social care commission, has said.Lady Casey, who is leading an independent review of adult social care, criticised a system that “still behaves as if we are living in 1948 and not 2026” by relying on female carers to plug gaps in services. Continue reading...

Now former health secretary and Manchester mayor could be about to make an unlikely deal to oust Keir StarmerWho said the Labour party needs “a battle of ideas, not of personalities or petty factionalism … It needs to be broad, and it needs the best possible field of candidates”?Until this morning, almost everyone would have attributed those words to Andy Burnham, the mayor or Greater Manchester. But those were the closing paragraphs of the former health secretary Wes Streeting’s resignation letter, a cadence so similar to Burnham’s own that it cannot be accidental. Continue reading...

Island breathes sigh of relief as fears recede that US could jettison longstanding supportTrump China visit live – latest updatesBefore this week’s summit between the Chinese and US presidents, Taiwan had been cast as the anxious bystander.Observers suggested that Taipei feared the unpredictable and transactional Donald Trump might overturn Washington’s longstanding support for the island democracy, which Beijing claims as a breakaway province, during Thursday and Friday’s talks. Continue reading...

All 11 aboard survived after the plane made an emergency landing near the BahamasSign up for the Breaking News US newsletter emailA military rescue crew in Florida has spoken of the “pretty miraculous” survival of all 11 people it saved from a plane crash in the Atlantic Ocean, and its own scramble to safety with five minutes of fuel left.Members of the 920th rescue wing, based at Patrick Space Force base, not far from Cape Canaveral, raced on Tuesday to reach the passengers and crew in choppy seas. They had emerged from a small Beechcraft twin-propeller aircraft that ditched into the water about 80 miles east of Melbourne on Florida’s east coast. Continue reading...

Widespread nature of attacks prompts warnings that Moscow is trying to overwhelm air defence systemsRussian missiles and drones are pounding Ukraine for a second day, as almost continuous heavy attacks hit the country, with Kyiv bearing the brunt of an assault that has killed at least eight people, including a 13-year-old, and injured 44 in the capital.The overnight attacks followed heavy daylight raids with missiles and drones across the country on Wednesday, one of the longest single attacks of the war. Continue reading...

Shawn Montgomery, whose parked vehicle was hit by a speeding driver, says top US freight broker should be liableThe supreme court on Thursday allowed a man to sue a major logistics company after he lost part of his leg in a semi tractor-trailer crash, a decision that could have ripple effects across the trucking industry.The US’s highest court ruled unanimously in favor of Shawn Montgomery, whose parked vehicle was hit by a speeding truck driver on an Illinois highway in 2017. Continue reading...

Exhibition of Melsonby hoard in York challenges ideas about life in northern Britain 2,000 years agoIron age objects that tell a dramatic story of female power and which dispel the myth that northern Britain was a left-behind backwater have gone on display for the first time.The objects exhibited in York are from the Melsonby hoard, the largest trove of iron age metalwork ever found in the UK, which experts say could alter our understanding of life in Britain 2,000 years ago. Continue reading...

Veteran broadcaster accuses channel of ‘clear violations’ of Ofcom’s due impartiality rulesUK politics live – latest updatesThe former Sky News political editor Adam Boulton has said GB News should lose its broadcasting licence, as he accused Britain’s media regulator of failing in its duty to protect impartial television news.Boulton, who was Sky News’s political editor for 25 years after the channel launched in 1989, said he believed it was too late to revoke GB News’s broadcasting rights, despite bringing a partisan brand of coverage to British television since its debut in 2021. Continue reading...

William Majcher was accused of helping Chinese police coerce a Vancouver-area real estate investor, accused of fraud, to return to ChinaA retired police officer Canada accused of being an agent for China has been acquitted of national security charges after prosecutors failed to prove he acted illegally.William Majcher, who served in the RCMP’s financial crime unit, was charged in 2023 over allegations he had breached Canada’s Security of Information Act by helping Chinese police coerce a Vancouver-area real estate investor, accused of fraud, to return to China. Continue reading...