Source: United Kingdom – Executive Government & Departments
News story
Pedestrian hit by train at Blue House Lane footpath crossing
Preliminary examination into a pedestrian being hit by a train at Blue House Lane footpath crossing, Sunderland, 18 April 2025.
Blue House Lane footpath crossing.
At around 09:00 on 18 April 2025, a Tyne & Wear Metro service travelling from Newcastle to South Hylton hit a pedestrian on Blue House Lane footpath crossing. This crossing is located near East Boldon, Sunderland.
As the driver approached the footpath crossing, they saw a dog walker and another pedestrian on the crossing. The driver immediately applied the emergency brake and sounded the train’s warning horn, but the second pedestrian was hit by the train. This second pedestrian received serious injuries. The train was travelling at an approximate speed of 29 km/h (18 mph) when the collision occurred, and it came to a stand around 20 metres beyond the crossing.
RAIB were notified of the accident soon after it occurred. We have since gathered evidence from the railway industry and carried out a preliminary examination into the circumstances surrounding the incident. We have concluded it is unlikely that further investigation will lead to new recommendations for the improvement of railway safety. Consequently, RAIB will not investigate further or produce an investigation report.
However, our preliminary examination found that the factors present during the accident at Blue House Lane are similar to those identified during RAIB’s earlier investigation into a pedestrian struck by a train at Lady Howard footpath and bridleway crossing on 21 April 2022 (RAIB report 01/2023). At both locations, a risk was identified that trains passing each other near to the crossing might mean that pedestrian crossing users are unaware of the approach of a second train.
Recommendation 1 in our report into the accident at Lady Howard had the intention ‘to reduce the risk at footpath and bridleway level crossings of a second train approaching being hidden from the view of crossing users by a previously passing train’. The status of the recommendation, as reported to RAIB by the Office of Rail and Road (ORR) in March 2024, is ‘Closed’.
ORR reported in its response to RAIB that Network Rail had taken substantive actions in response to this recommendation. This took the form of a sign being fitted to all level crossings (with two lines or more) as an interim solution which warned users that ‘oncoming trains can be hidden by other trains’ and for users ‘not to cross until all lines are clear’. RAIB’s preliminary examination found that this sign was fitted to the entrance gates at Blue House Lane footpath crossing.
ORR also reported that Network Rail’s long-term intent was to fit miniature stop lights through normal risk management protocols, where they are demonstrated to manage risk so far as is reasonably practicable. However, Network Rail has stated that, while the likelihood of an event where a second train approaching is potentially hidden by another train can be influenced by factors such as the numbers of user and trains, and that other factors, such as topography and the type of crossing user, mean that it is too complex in practice to identify those crossings which have the highest risk of this occurring.
RAIB’s Annual Report for 2024 stated that, despite the actions taken by Network Rail in response to this recommendation, RAIB remains concerned about the underlying risk which this recommendation sought to address.
RAIB has written to the Office of Rail and Road, to draw its attention to the accident at Blue House Lane when considering the industry’s current and future management of this known risk, specifically considering its response to the Lady Howard report recommendation.
We have copied this letter to Network Rail, Nexus and the Rail Safety and Standards Board so that they are aware of its contents.
Glandale, California, July 03, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — RadCred, a leading innovator in financial technology, has launched a new platform providing $1,000 quick loan no credit check options for U.S. consumers with bad credit. Unlike traditional lenders that heavily rely on FICO scores, RadCred evaluates applicants based on income and repayment ability, ensuring that individuals with bad credit loans guaranteed approval can access the funds they need.
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Traditional Loans:
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RadCred’s bad credit personal loans guaranteed approval offer faster, more accessible lending solutions compared to traditional banks.
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Disclaimer:
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AI-powered assistive devices, like hearing aids, are changing how the people who use them experience public space.(Shutterstock)
New applications and the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) with wearable devices are changing the way users interact with their environments and each other. The impacts and reach of these new technologies have yet to be fully understood.
Connections between technologies and bodies is not a new thing for many disabled persons. Assistive technologies — tools and products designed to support people with disabilities — have played a part in mitigating built and institutional barriers experienced by disabled persons for decades.
While not strictly considered assistive, immersive and wearable technologies have the potential to change the relationship between disabled users and their experience of place.
For example, Ray-Ban’s Meta glasses use AI to describe what the cameras are capturing using the Be My Eyes app. Using OpenAI’s large language model, ChatGPT, this effectively turns a user’s smart phone into a vision assistant.
The availability and production of environmental data from these technologies may impact how we relate to each other, how we move through and understand space, and how we engage with the physical environment around us at any given moment.
Sam Seavey, founder of TheBlindLife.com, reviews the possibilities and limitations of Apple’s VisionPro. (The Blind Life)
We’re at a critical juncture where AI-enabled technologies used by individuals may profoundly impact our urban futures.
What happens, for example, when wearables make any “place” a digital work or play place? What does a largely private-sector, consumer-driven, AI-enabled digital intervention into a city’s spaces mean for planning, zoning and taxation? What are the environmental costs of the global AI project?
And crucially, who gets to participate in this digital reimagining?
AI and the city
While access can be challenging — wearables are often costly — ableist thinking regarding the use of technology to render invisible Blind and/or Deaf people and culture is also a problem. Some people might naively assume that all Blind and Deaf people are universally seeking a bio-technological “miracle.”
There are also other challenges: how a technology captures or describes its data may not match up to a user’s pre-existing sense of place. Moreover, access to tech can produce some unintended consequences, including the erosion of in-person community building among disabled people.
My hearing aids use AI and machine learning to sense and adjust my sound environment. They help me cope with the ways in which the places of my everyday life — such as my home or the lecture hall — are generally configured for people without hearing loss.
When I use my hearing aids, I find that the city has never sounded so wonderful, and yet sometimes irritatingly loud. The sound of birds is one thing; the grinding sound of a breaking subway is another entirely.
Cumulative exposure to noisy indoor and outdoor places of the city poses auditory health risks, such as noise-induced hearing loss or tinnitus, and can contribute to poor health more broadly. I have to be careful about ongoing noise exposure, and by adjusting the volume of my hearing aids, I can turn down the city when I want to.
Future bodies and urban futures
AI-powered technologies can exacerbate issues of access, privilege and freedom of movement. This happens both through who is able to purchase and use devices, as well as through data and their applications. Data may be biased in terms of race, gender, sexuality and disability.
Scientific research and media representations tend to highlight the benevolent possibilities of technologies for “repairing” bodies conceived as being functionally medically deficient.
Much less is said about disabled persons controlling the narrative, taking up key roles in the messy terrain of AI, machine learning and data governance, and in the planning and design of future cities.
Digital modelling
We are also witnessing growing interest in the digital twinning — creating highly accurate digital models — of everything from human hearts to entire cities.
Not everyone can, should or wishes to be technologically “assisted” or augmented. There are medical, identity and culture, affordability, legal, moral and ethical concerns.
Other issues raised by brain-computer interface research, for example, include concerns about legal capacity and ownership of the self, including ownership of device-generated data.
In a study on the impact of neural technologies, researchers shared the legal repercussions relating to two disabled people deprived of voting rights in Spain. The person who recovered the ability to communicate autonomously using their finger and a computer had their rights restored, while the other, who used a human intermediary, did not.
Where does the person end and the technology begin, and vice versa? Who gets to decide?
Future technologies
As the use of AI and assistive technologies increases in everyday urban life, we will need to address these questions sooner rather than later.
And if disabled persons are not adequately involved in these discussions and decisions, then cities will be less — rather than more — accessible.
Ron Buliung does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Mountains on the moon as seen by NASA Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. (NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University)
In science-fiction stories, companies often mine the moon or asteroids. While this may seem far-fetched, this idea is edging closer to becoming reality.
Celestial bodies like the moon contain valuable resources, such as lunar regolith — also known as moon dust — and helium-3. These resources could serve a range of applications, including making rocket propellant and generating energy to sustaining long missions, bringing benefits in space and on Earth.
The first objective on this journey is being able to collect lunar regolith. One company taking up this challenge is ispace, a Japanese space exploration company ispace that signed a contract with NASA in 2020 for the collection and transfer of ownership of lunar regolith.
The company recently attempted to land its RESILIENCE lunar lander, but the mission was ultimately unsuccessful. Still, this endeavour marked a significant move toward the commercialization of space resources.
These circumstances give rise to a fundamental question: what are the legal rules governing the exploitation of space resources? The answer is both simple and complex, as there is a mix of international agreements and evolving regulations to consider.
Space activities have exponentially evolved since the treaty’s adoption. In the 60 years following the launch of Sputnik 1 — the first satellite placed in orbit — less than 500 space objects were launched annually. But since 2018, this number has risen into the thousands, with nearly 3,000 launched in 2024.
Because of this, the treaty is often judged as inadequate to address the current complexities of space activities, particularly resource exploitation.
A longstanding debate centres on whether Article II of the treaty, which prohibits the appropriation of outer space — including the moon and other celestial bodies — also prohibits space mining.
The prevailing position is that Article II solely bans the appropriation of territory, not the extraction of resources themselves.
We are now at a crucial moment in the development of space law. Arguing over whether extraction is legal serves no purpose. Instead, the focus must shift to ensuring resource extraction is carried out in accordance with principles that ensure the safe and responsible use of outer space.
International and national space laws
A significant development in the governance of space resources has been the adoption Artemis Accords, which — as of June 2025 — has 55 signatory nations. The accords reflect a growing international consensus concerning the exploitation of space resources.
Notably, Section 10 of the accords indicates that the exploitation of space resources does not constitute appropriation, and therefore doesn’t violate the Outer Space Treaty.
Considering the typically slow pace of multilateral negotiations, a handful of nations introduced national legislation. These laws govern the legality of space resource exploitation, allowing private companies to request licenses to conduct this type of activity.
Among these, Luxembourg’s legal framework is the most complete. It provides a series of requirements to provide authorization for the exploitation of space resources. In fact, ispace’s licence to collect lunar regolith was obtained under this regime.
This first high-resolution image taken on the first day of the Artemis I mission by a camera on the tip of one of Orion’s solar arrays. The spacecraft was 57,000 miles from Earth when the image was captured. (NASA)
The rest of the regulations usually tend to limit themselves to proclaiming the legality of this activity without entering into too much detail and deferring the specifics of implementation to future regulations.
While these initiatives served to put space resources at the forefront of international forums, they also risk regulatory fragmentation, as different countries adopt varying standards and approaches.
In May 2025, the chair of the working group, Steven Freeland, presented a draft of recommended principles based on input from member states.
These principles reaffirm the freedom of use and exploration of outer space for peaceful purposes, while introducing rules pertaining to the safety of the activities and their sustainability, as well as the protection of the environment, both of Earth and outer space.
The development of a legal framework for space resources is still in its early stages. The working group is expected to submit its final report by 2027, but the non-binding nature of the principles raises concerns about their enforcement and application.
As humanity moves closer to extracting and using space resources, the need for a cohesive and responsible governance system has never been greater.
Martina Elia Vitoloni does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Source: United Kingdom – Executive Government & Departments
News story
Homes England supports Greencore Homes to build new affordable sustainable homes in Oxfordshire
£8 million development finance loan will help SME housebuilder as it seeks to reach its ambitious target to build 10,000 better than net zero homes by 2035.
Homes England has partnered with Greencore Homes, a sustainable housebuilder constructing better than net zero homes, to provide £8 million of funding to support the delivery of Greencore’s 42-home scheme, Milton Heights, in Oxfordshire.
The partnership reaffirms Homes England’s commitment to aid the delivery of more eco-friendly, low-carbon homes, while enabling Greencore to drive forward its delivery of low-carbon homes, creating climate positive places as it rapidly increases the number of homes it is delivering.
It also marks another significant milestone for Greencore at Milton Heights, where the Deputy Prime Minister, Angela Rayner, recently announced the government’s new measures to turbocharge housebuilding for small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) builders.
The finance comes from Homes England’s Home Building Fund, which is designed to support SME housebuilders to build more homes, more quickly and to create thriving communities. It also aims to encourage innovative methods of construction in housebuilding like the homes being built by Greencore at Milton Heights.
Currently under construction, Milton Heights will deliver 42 homes in a development that will prioritise increased access to green spaces, as well as safe and considered walking and cycling routes, serving both residents and the broader community.
Designed by HTA Design, the landscape-led scheme enhances the existing setting and incorporates a mix of 27 open market and 15 affordable homes, located just under three miles from Didcot Parkway Station.
Built to Passivhaus standards using Greencore’s innovative Biond panels that lock up more carbon than they emit, these homes will target ultra-low embodied carbon overall and a net zero energy balance in occupation. Assembled on site, the panels also enable rapid and efficient construction, accelerating project delivery and directly addressing the UK’s housing shortage.
Alongside the existing £45 million equity investment from majority shareholder M&G, this funding will support Greencore as it seeks to reach its ambitious target to build 10,000 better than net zero homes by 2035.
Marcus Ralling, Chief Investments Officer at Homes England, said:
The completion of this £8 million development finance facility is a perfect example of where intervention from Homes England can help to unlock housing delivery by providing financial support for ambitious SME housebuilders like Greencore to build more environmentally friendly and low-carbon homes.
Jon Di-Stefano, CEO of Greencore Homes, said:
This partnership with Homes England represents a pivotal moment for Greencore and our delivery of 42 sustainable homes at Milton Heights. As we continue to drive housing delivery to reach our target of 10,000 homes by 2035, partnerships such as this with Homes England will be essential. We look forward to hopefully working together again in the future, to continue to develop climate positive places together
We are the government’s housing and regeneration Agency, and we’re here to drive the creation of more affordable, quality homes and thriving places so that everyone has a place to live and grow.
We make this happen by working in partnership with thousands of organisations of all sizes, using our powers, expertise, land, capital and influence to bring investment to communities and get more quality homes built.
Greencore Homes builds homes that are better than net zero and develops climate positive places. With significant investment from M&G’s Catalyst fund, strong relationships with partners and an experienced senior leadership team, Greencore aims to build 10,000 homes by 2035.
The lack of reliable information about health facilities across sub-Saharan Africa became very clear during the COVID-19 pandemic. Amid a surge in emergency care needs, information was lacking about the location of facilities, bed capacity and oxygen availability, and even where to find medical specialists. This data could have enabled precise assessments of hospital surge capacity and geographic access to critical care. Peter Macharia and Emelda Okiro, whose research focuses on public health and equity of health service access in low resource settings, share the findings of their recent study, co-authored with colleagues.
What are open health facility databases?
A health facility is a service delivery point where healthcare services are provided. The facilities can range from small clinics and doctor’s offices to large teaching and referral hospitals.
A health facility database is a list of all health facilities in a country or geographic area, such as a district. A typical database should assign each health facility a unique code, name, size, type (from primary to tertiary), ownership (public or private), operational status (working or closed), location and subnational unit (county or district). It should also record services (emergency obstetric care, for example), capacity (number of beds, for example), infrastructure (electricity availability, for example), contact information (address and email), and when this information was last updated.
The ideal method of compiling this list is to conduct a census, as Kenya did in 2023. But this takes resources. Some countries have compiled lists from existing incomplete ones. Senegal did this and so did Kenya in 2003 and 2008.
This list should be open to stakeholders, including government agencies, development partners and researchers. Health facility lists must be shared through a governance framework that balances data sharing with protections for data subjects and creators. In some countries, such as Kenya and Malawi, these listings are accessible through web portals without additional permission. In others, such facility lists do not exist or require extra permission.
Why are they useful to have?
Facility listings can serve the needs of individuals and communities. They also serve sub-national, national and continental health objectives.
At the individual level, a facility list offers a choice of alternatives to health seekers. At the community level, the data can guide decisions like where to place community health workers, as seen in Mali and Sierra Leone.
Health lists are useful when distributing commodities such as bed nets and allocating resources based on the health needs of the areas they serve. They help in planning for vaccination campaigns by creating detailed immunisation microplans.
By taking account of the disease burden, social dynamics and environmental factors, health services can be tailored to specific needs.
Detailed maps of healthcare resources enable quicker emergency responses by pinpointing facilities equipped for specific crises. Disease surveillance systems depend on continuously collecting data from healthcare facilities.
At the continental level, lists are crucial for a coordinated health system response during pandemics and outbreaks. They can facilitate cross-border planning, pandemic preparedness and collaboration.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, these lists informed where to put additional resources such as makeshift hospitals or transport programmes for adults over 60 years of age.
The lists are used to identify vulnerable populations at risk of emerging pathogens and populations that can benefit from new health facilities.
Many problems arise if we don’t know where health facilities are or what they offer. Healthcare planning becomes inefficient. This can result in duplicate facility lists and the misallocation of resources, which leads to waste and inequities.
We can’t identify populations that lack services. Emergency responses weaken due to uncertainty about where best to move patients with specific conditions.
Resources are wasted when there are duplicate facility lists. For example, between 2010 and 2016, six government departments partnered with development organisations, resulting in ten lists of health facilities in Nigeria.
In Tanzania, over 10 different health facility lists existed in 2009. Maintained by donors and government agencies, the function-specific lists didn’t work together to share information easily and accurately. This prompted the need for a national master facility list.
What needs to happen to build one?
A comprehensive list of health facilities can be compiled through mapping exercises or from existing lists. The health ministry should take responsibility for setting up, developing and updating this list.
Partnerships are crucial for developing facility lists. Stakeholders include donors, implementing and humanitarian partners, technical advisors and research institutions. Many of these have their own project-based lists, which should integrate into a centralised facility list managed by the ministry. The health ministry must foster a transparent environment, encouraging citizens and stakeholders to contribute to enhancing health facility data.
Political and financial commitment from governments is essential. Creating and maintaining a proper list requires significant investment. Expertise and resources are necessary to keep it updated.
A commitment to open data is a necessary step. Open access to these lists makes them more complete, reliable and useful.
Peter Macharia is funded by Fonds voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek- Belgium (FWO, number 1201925N) for his Senior Postdoctoral Fellowship.
Emelda Okiro receives funding for her research from the Wellcome Trust through a Wellcome Trust Senior Fellowship (#224272).
Source: The Conversation – UK – By Roger Fagge, Associate Professor in the Department of History, University of Warwick
When Carlos Alcaraz beat Jannik Sinner at the Roland Garros men’s final on June 8 2025, in what is already seen as a classic match, there was some comment on the sartorial choices of the two players.
They both wore Nike tops. Alcaraz’s was collarless, with horizontal blue bordered green and black stripes, and black shorts. Meanwhile Sinner wore a green polo-style shirt with collar, blue shorts and a blue Nike cap. Sinner’s shirt bore more than a passing resemblance to an Irish rugby union top, and was seen by some as somewhat incongruous on a tennis court.
In the women’s final on June 7, meanwhile, Coco Gauff brilliantly defeated Aryna Sabalenka, the number one seed. Gauff wore a custom New Balance kit with a dark blue marbled effect, finished off with a stylish grey leather jacket worn to and from the court. Sabalenka wore a colourful Nike tennis dress.
Technology, design and fashion all play a role in a player’s choice of tennis kit, as does their commercial potential – Sabalenka’s exact dress can be bought from the Nike website. But things are different at the Wimbledon championships, where “almost entirely white” kit is still a requirement.
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Founded in 1877, making it the oldest and most prestigious tennis tournament in the world, at Wimbledon, any colour must be limited to a 10mm strip.
White clothing was enforced at Wimbledon from the 19th century, in part because it covered up unwelcome signs of sweat. White clothing was also seen as cooler in the summer heat. But as time went on it became tied in with a sense of history and tradition, and the uniqueness of the Wimbledon tournament. Though there have been some occasional notable revisions.
Many women in the tennis community, including Billie Jean King, Judy Murray and Heather Watson, have argued that women players find white undershorts problematic when they are menstruating. As a result, the All England Club revised the rules in 2023 to allow dark undershorts, “provided they are no longer than their shorts or skirt”.
There had been earlier controversies over clothing at Wimbledon, sometimes over propriety, as in 1949, when Gertrude Moran challenged dress codes with “visible undergarments”. More recently in 2017 Venus Williams was asked to change during a rain break in a match because of visible fuchsia bras straps. The following year, Roger Federer, chasing his eighth Wimbledon title, was asked to change his orange-soled Nike shoes. They all acquiesced.
This history of all-white kits
All-white clothing is also linked to cricket, which shares elements of class and tradition with tennis. Playing in the summer sun meant cricket “whites” were a sensible option. However coloured caps of a player’s county or nation, were allowed by the cricket authorities, and cricket jumpers for the not so sunny days typically had the colours of the team on the v neck.
White clothing is also associated with cricket. Shutterstock
By 2020 the international Cricket Council (ICC) allowed larger sponsorship on shirts. The move to limited overs games played under floodlights saw the introduction of coloured kit, sometimes displaying a garishness that surpassed football shirts. However Test matches and longer-form cricket like the four-day county championship matches are still played in cricket whites.
And white shirts and kit have played a role in other sports, including football. If white shirts suggest respectability and style, somewhat ironically, the powerful white-clad Leeds side of the mid 1960s-70s, managed by Don Revie, earned the sobriquet “dirty Leeds” for their feisty approach to the dark arts of football. History and tradition matter as much in football as any sport, and fans of a certain age at other clubs, still refer to the Yorkshire club by this moniker.
But that’s enough football, as we’re firmly in Wimbledon season. So break out the Pimm’s, scones and jam, and let’s enjoy the tennis. Thankfully for the traditionalists among us there will be no marbled, green or blue kit on the centre court.
This article features references to books that have been included for editorial reasons, and may contain links to bookshop.org. If you click on one of the links and go on to buy something from bookshop.org The Conversation UK may earn a commission.
Roger Fagge does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
A new flood barrier is being built to prevent climate-induced Flooding in Chittagong in Bangladesh. amdadphoto/Shutterstock.com
At a coastal port in Chittagong, Bangladesh, something remarkable is underway. With support from a US$850 million (£620 million) investment from the World Bank, engineers are building flood-resistant infrastructure that can survive rising seas and stronger storms. A new 3.7-mile-long barrier will protect people, homes, and trade in one of the world’s most climate-vulnerable regions.
Projects like this do more than save lives. They show why investing in climate
adaptation is one of the smartest financial opportunities of our time. There are plenty of global conferences where leaders discuss climate change and make big
promises. Yet, less than 5.5% ofglobal climate finance actually reaches the countries most at risk. That is not just a failure of fairness. It is a missed chance for real impact.
As the world gathers in Seville, Spain for the fourth international meeting on development financing, the focus must go beyond pledges and shift toward practical, on-the-ground investment in resilience.
At the previous UN climate finance meeting, also held in Seville, leaders focused
on fixing how public money flows through global institutions. But just as important is the need to invest in climate adaptation. This means helping people live with the changes already happening, including more floods, longer droughts, rising seas and intense heat.
While mitigation is about stopping climate change getting worse (by switching to clean energy or protecting forests that absorb carbon, for example), adaptation is about coping with the effects we can no longer avoid. It includes building stronger homes, growing more resilient crops, and improving hospitals and schools so they can keep working during extreme weather. Both approaches are necessary, but adaptation often gets less attention. And less money.
Private investors have already committed large sums to clean energy projects. But they have done much less to support communities on the frontlines of climate change. Many of these countries struggle with limited budgets, complex rules for accessing finance, and a lack of support to develop viable projects. So promising ideas often go unfunded.
That is beginning to change. New tools are helping investors take on less risk and back more projects. These include low-interest loans, partnerships between public and private institutions, and guarantees that reduce the risk of failure.
The Green Climate Fund is the largest source of dedicated climate finance for developing countries. By the end of 2023, it had approved US$13.5 billion in funding, rising to US$51.9 billion when co-financing is included. This money helps unlock adaptation efforts that were previously out of reach.
We can already see progress. In Kenya and Ethiopia, farmers are using drought-resistant seeds to grow more food in changing conditions. In the Caribbean, solar energy is powering schools and clinics in remote communities. And in Bangladesh, the new port infrastructure in Chittagong is protecting a vital economic hub while boosting local businesses.
Working with nature
In coastal areas, restoring mangrove forests can reduce the force of incoming storms, protect biodiversity and support fisheries. The Pollination Group, a climate investment firm, is helping turn “nature-based solutions” like these into projects that attract private finance.
In his previous role as the Prince of Wales, King Charles III launched the Natural Capital Investment Alliance, an initiative that aims to mobilise US$10 billion for projects that restore and protect nature while offering solid financial returns. The alliance also helps investors better understand these kinds of opportunities by creating clearer guidance and standards. This supports the Terra Carta, a charter created by King Charles III that offers a roadmap for businesses to align with the needs of both people and the planet by 2030.
Investors who step into these emerging spaces gain more than financial returns. They build long-term relationships with governments and local communities. They help shape future policy. And they create lasting foundations for growth in places that are ready to lead if given the chance.
Adaptation projects also bring real benefits to people. They improve access to clean water, protect food supplies, create jobs, strengthen education and support healthcare systems. For families already facing climate disruption, these changes are not just improvements. They are lifelines.
By creating stable and welcoming environments for responsible investment, governments can accelerate this shift. By simplifying how money is accessed, international institutions can make it easier for good ideas to become funded projects. Philanthropic groups and development agencies can help build local skills and prepare projects for funding. Private investors can bring capital, innovation and experience.
Investing in climate adaptation is no longer just a moral issue. It is a smart, scalable and necessary response to a changing world.
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Ali Serim does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Labour MPs have forced a major government climbdown over disability benefit cuts, in an embarrassing turn of events for Keir Starmer. The prime minister has blown a hole in his budget by agreeing to scrap plans to tighten eligibility criteria for disability benefits via the universal credit and personal independence payment bill.
In return, MPs passed what was left of the bill – although 49 of them still rebelled, voting against the government. The bruising encounter bodes poorly for the future. Starmer’s Number 10 operation has been shown to be unable to communicate effectively with MPs. The team was neither able to win MPs over when the bill was being developed, nor bring them into line when agreement could not be reached.
The question now must be whether Starmer will ever be able to push through any difficult legislation in the future. He now needs to give serious attention to his relationship with MPs.
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The government has insisted that welfare costs are becoming unsustainable. Back in March, it unveiled plans to cut sickness and disability benefits in order to save £5 billion a year from the welfare budget by 2030. However, the government’s own figures suggested that 250,000 people could be pushed into poverty because of the changes, which led to criticism from many Labour MPs and disability charities.
The threat of rebellion forced a partial u-turn by the government which appeased the vast majority of rebels. Although the remaining rebels failed to pass their wrecking amendment in the end, the fact the government was continuing to negotiate and offer concessions well into the debate on the night of the vote shows that the whips still felt there was a prospect of defeat. This behaviour during the debate is highly unusual and could all have been prevented.
Whenever there is disagreement between the government and its own backbench MPs, the role of the whips becomes even more vital. The whips have an important role in informing backbench MPs of which way the party leadership expects them to vote during divisions in the House of Commons.
However, this is in fact a two-way channel of communication. Whips are also responsible for reporting concerns and dissension among MPs to the chief whip, who then has a duty to report such issues to the prime minister and cabinet.
There has clearly been a breakdown in this two-way channel of communication in the case of the disability benefits cuts. Reports suggest that whips were warning that trouble was brewing to ministers but were being ignored.
How to avoid a repeat incident
A key complaint among Labour backbenchers was that they were not consulted on the proposals before they were announced. As the potential consequences of the changes became clearer, more MPs raised concerns about them.
A lesson for the government here is that adequate groundwork is needed to get MPs on side with policies. That might mean allowing select committees to have more insight into the government’s thinking. It’s notable that select committee chairs were leading figures in this rebellion.
It might also mean making greater use of departmental groups within the Parliamentary Labour Party to allow backbench MPs to feed into discussions at an earlier stage. Crucially, it also means more one-to-one, informal conversations.
All this helps MPs feel like they have a vested interest in the policy and have had their voices heard. If you implement such a safety valve early on, the need for views and frustrations to be expressed so publicly later on in the process is reduced. Instead, in this case, we’ve had Labour backbenchers revealing to the media that, a year into office, they’ve still never even met Starmer.
We have seen a trend in recent years of MPs becoming more focused on their constituency role. This, combined with the large rise in the number of MPs who hold marginal seats (meaning they are at greater risk of losing those seats at the next election) means that they prioritise constituents concerns over the party line. MPs who are worried about holding their seat at the next election have little to lose from threats about losing the whip.
Labour’s position in the polls over recent months has exacerbated this problem. An analysis by the Disability Poverty Campaign Group in April suggested that for dozens of Labour MPs, the number of people claiming the benefits that were to be cut in their constituencies was greater than the size of their majority. In other words, there was a direct line to be drawn between voting for the bill and election loss.
An additional factor that must be considered is that the sheer number of Labour MPs currently in parliament means that the usual incentives for loyalty don’t necessarily apply. Loyalty is often negotiated with promises of ministerial office in the future, but Starmer doesn’t turn over his team often and, in any case, there simply aren’t enough such carrots to dangle in front of everyone when a party has more than 400 MPs.
Labour would also have to win a second term for such promises to be meaningful and that is currently in jeopardy. All this means there are fewer incentives for MPs to play the long game.
What is clear is that Starmer’s approach to party management is not working. Given how the changing nature of politics in the UK, MPs are likely to get a taste for rebellion – particularly if, as happened in this case, rebellions deliver results. This is something any government should seek to avoid.
Clearly there is a need for more groundwork to give MPs a sense of ownership over policy. There is also an argument for the prime minister and senior members of the cabinet to spend more time doing the rounds in the House of Commons tearooms, speaking to the parliamentary party at large and listening to their concerns directly. This might improve parliamentary party relations and keep the lid on future rebellions.
Thomas Caygill is currently in receipt of a British Academy/Leverhulme Small Research Grant for research on post-legislative scrutiny in the Scottish Parliament and has previously received funding from the Economic and Social Research Council.
Narendra Modi’s trip to Ghana in July 2025, part of a five-nation visit, is the first by an Indian prime minister in over 30 years. The two countries’ relationship goes back more than half a century to when India helped the newly independent Ghana set up its intelligence agencies. Ghana is also home to several large Indian-owned manufacturing and trading companies. International relations scholar Pius Siakwah unpacks the context of the visit.
What is the background to Ghana and India’s relationship?
It can be traced to links between Kwame Nkrumah, Ghana’s first president, and his Indian counterpart, Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, in 1957. It is not surprising that the Indian High Commission is located near the seat of the Ghana government, Jubilee House.
Nkrumah and Nehru were co-founders of the Non-Aligned Movement, a group of states not formally aligned with major power blocs during the cold war. Its principles focused on respect for sovereignty, neutrality, non-interference, and peaceful dispute resolution. It was also a strong voice against the neo-colonial ambitions of some of the large powers.
The movement emerged in the wave of decolonisation after the second world war. It held its first conference in 1961 under the leadership of Josip Bros Tito (Yugoslavia), Gamal Abdel Nasser (Egypt) and Sukarno (Indonesia) as well as Nehru and Nkrumah.
The relationship between Ghana and India seemingly went into decline after the overthrow of Nkrumah in 1966, coinciding with the decline of Indian presence in global geopolitics.
In 2002, President John Kufuor re-energised India-Ghana relations. This led to the Indian government’s financial support in the construction of Ghana’s seat of government in 2008.
Though the concept of the Non-Aligned Movement has faded this century, its principles have crystallised into south-south cooperation. This is the exchange of knowledge, skills, resources and technologies among regions in the developing world.
South-south cooperation has fuelled India-Ghana relations. Modi’s diplomatic efforts since 2014 have sought to relaunch India’s presence in Africa.
In recent times, India has engaged Africa through the India–Africa Forum Summit. The first summit was held in 2008 in New Delhi with 14 countries from Africa. The largest one was held in 2015, while the fourth was postponed in 2020 due to COVID-19. The summit has led to 50,000 scholarships, a focus on renewable energy through the International Solar Alliance and an expansion of the Pan-African e-Network to bridge healthcare and educational gaps. Development projects are financed through India’s EXIM Bank.
India is now one of Ghana’s major trading partners, importing primary products like minerals, while exporting manufactured products such as pharmaceuticals, transport and agricultural machinery. The Ghana-India Trade Advisory Chamber was established in 2018 for socio-economic exchange.
Modi’s visit supports the strengthening of economic and defence ties.
The bilateral trade between India and Ghana moved from US$1 billion in 2011-12 to US$4.5 billion in 2018-19. It then dipped to US$2.2 billion in 2020-21 due to COVID. By 2023, bilateral trade amounted to around US$3.3 billion, making India the third-largest export and import partner behind China and Switzerland.
Indian companies have invested in over 700 projects in Ghana. These include B5 Plus, a leading iron and steel manufacturer, and Melcom, Ghana’s largest supermarket chain.
India is also one of the leading sources of foreign direct investment to Ghana. Indian companies had invested over US$2 billion in Ghana by 2021, according to the Ghana Investment Promotion Center.
What are the key areas of interest?
The key areas of collaboration are economic, particularly:
energy
infrastructure (for example, construction of the Tema to Mpakadan railway line)
defence
technology
pharmaceuticals
agriculture (agro-processing, mechanisation and irrigation systems)
industrial (light manufacturing).
What’s the bigger picture?
Modi’s visit is part of a broader visit to strengthen bilateral ties and a follow-up to the Brics Summit, July 2025 in Brazil. Thus, whereas South Africa is often seen as the gateway to Africa, Ghana is becoming the opening to west Africa.
Modi’s visit can be viewed in several ways.
First, India as a neo-colonialist. Some commentators see India’s presence as just a continuation of exploitative relations. This manifests in financial and agricultural exploitation and land grabbing.
Second, India as smart influencer. This is where the country adopts a low profile but benefits from soft power, linguistic, cultural and historical advantages, and good relationships at various societal and governmental levels.
Third, India as a perennial underdog. India has less funds, underdeveloped communications, limited diplomatic capacity, little soft power advantage, and an underwhelming media presence compared to China. China is able to project its power in Africa through project financing and loans, visible diplomatic presence with visits and media coverage in Ghana. Some of the coverage of Chinese activities in Ghana is negative – illegal mining (galamsey) is an example. India benefits from limited negative media presence but its contributions in areas of pharmaceuticals and infrastructure don’t get attention.
Modi will want his visit to build on ideas of south-south cooperation, soft power and smart operating. He’ll want to refute notions that India is a perennial underdog or a neo-colonialist in a new scramble for Africa.
In 2025, Ghana has to navigate a complex geopolitical space.
Pius Siakwah does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Scopolamine, more chillingly known as “devil’s breath,” is a drug with a dual identity. In medicine, it’s used to prevent motion sickness and nausea. But in the criminal underworld, particularly in parts of South America, it has gained a dark reputation as a substance that can erase memory, strip away free will and facilitate serious crimes. Now, its presence may be sparking fresh concerns in the UK.
While most reports of devil’s breath come from countries like Colombia, concerns about its use in Europe are not new. In 2015, three people were arrested in Paris for allegedly using the drug to rob victims, turning them into compliant “zombies”.
The UK’s first known murder linked to scopolamine was reported in 2019 when the Irish dancer Adrian Murphy was poisoned by thieves attempting to sell items stolen from him. In a more recent case in London, a woman reported symptoms consistent with scopolamine exposure after being targeted on public transport.
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Scopolamine, also known as hycosine, is a tropane alkaloid, a type of plant-derived compound found in the nightshade family (Solanaceae). It has a long history: indigenous communities in South America traditionally used it for spiritual rituals due to its potent psychoactive effects.
In modern medicine, scopolamine (marketed in the UK as hyoscine hydrobromide) is prescribed to prevent motion sickness, nausea, vomiting and muscle spasms. It also reduces saliva production before surgery. Brand names include Kwells (tablets) and Scopoderm (patches).
As an anticholinergic drug, scopolamine blocks the neurotransmitter acetylcholine, which plays a vital role in memory, learning, and coordination. Blocking it helps reduce nausea by interrupting signals from the balance (vestibular) system to the brain. But it also comes with side effects, especially when used in high doses or outside a clinical setting.
How it affects the brain
Scopolamine disrupts the cholinergic system, which is central to memory formation and retrieval. As a result, it can cause temporary but severe memory loss: a key reason it’s been weaponised in crimes. Some studies also suggest it increases oxidative stress in the brain, compounding its effects on cognition.
The drug’s power to erase memory, sometimes described as “zombifying”, has made it a focus of forensic and criminal interest. Victims often describe confusion, hallucinations and a complete loss of control.
Recreational users are drawn to its hallucinogenic effects – but the line between tripping and toxic is razor thin.
In Colombia and other parts of South America, scopolamine, also known as burundanga, has been implicated in countless robberies and sexual assaults. Victims describe feeling dreamlike, compliant, and unable to resist or recall events. That’s what makes it so sinister – it robs people of both agency and memory.
The drug is often administered surreptitiously. In its powdered form, it’s odourless and tasteless, making it easy to slip into drinks or blow into someone’s face, as some victims have reported. Online forums detail how to make teas or infusions from plant parts, seeds, roots, flowers – heightening the risk of DIY misuse.
Once ingested, the drug works quickly and exits the body within about 12 hours, making it hard to detect in routine drug screenings. For some people, even a dose under 10mg can be fatal.
Signs of scopolamine poisoning include rapid heartbeat and palpitations, dry mouth and flushed skin, blurred vision, confusion and disorientation, hallucinations and drowsiness.
If you experience any of these, especially after an unexpected drink or interaction, seek medical attention immediately.
Dipa Kamdar does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Israel’s attack on Iran last month and the US bombing of the country’s nuclear facilities, the first-ever direct US attacks on Iranian soil, were meant to cripple Tehran’s strategic capabilities and reset the regional balance.
The strikes came after 18 months during which Israel had effectively dismantled Hamas in Gaza, dealt a devastating blow to Hezbollah in Lebanon, weakened the Houthis in Yemen, and seen the collapse of the Assad regime in Syria – a longstanding and key Iranian ally.
From a military standpoint, these were remarkable achievements. But they failed to deliver the strategic outcome Israeli and US leaders had long hoped for: the collapse of Iran’s influence and the weakening of its regime.
Instead, the confrontation exposed a deeper miscalculation. Iran’s power isn’t built on impulse or vulnerable proxies alone. It is decentralised, ideologically entrenched and designed to endure. While battered, the Islamic Republic did not fall. And now, it may be more determined – and more dangerous – than before.
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Israel’s attack – dubbed “operation rising lion” – began with attacks on Iranian radar systems, followed by precision airstrikes on Iranian enrichment facilities and senior military officers and scientists. Israel spent roughly US$1.45 (£1.06 billion) billion in the first two days and in the first week of strikes on Iran, costs hit US$5 billion, with daily spending at US$725 million: US$593 million on offensive operations and US$132 million on defence and mobilization.
The day after the US strikes, the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, spoke with Donald Trump about a ceasefire. He and his generals were reportedly keen to bring the conflict to a speedy end. Reports suggest that Netanyahu wanted to avoid a lengthy war of attrition that Israel could not sustain, and was already looking for an exit strategy.
Crucially, the Iranian regime remained intact. Rather than inciting revolt, the war rallied nationalist sentiment. Opposition movements remain fractured and lack a common platform or domestic legitimacy. Hopes of a popular uprising that might topple the regime expressed by both Trump and Netanyahu were misplaced.
In the aftermath, Iranian authorities launched a sweeping crackdown on suspected dissenters and what it referred to as “spies”. Former activists, reformists and loosely affiliated protest organisers were arrested or interrogated. What was meant to fracture the regime instead reinforced its grip on power.
Most notably, Iran’s parliament voted to suspend cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), ending inspections and giving Tehran the freedom to expand its nuclear programme – both civilian and potentially military – without oversight.
Perhaps the clearest misreading came from Israel and the US treating Syria as a template. The 2024 fall of Bashar al-Assad was hailed as a turning point. His successor, Ahmed al-Sharaa – a little-known opposition figure, former al-Qaeda insurgent and IS affiliate – was rebranded as a pragmatic reformer, who Trump praised as “attractive” and “tough”.
For western and Israeli strategists, Syria offered both a way to weaken Iran and a blueprint of how eventual regime change could play out: collapse the regime, install cooperative leadership in a swift reordering process. But this analogy was dangerously flawed. Iran’s stronger institutions, military depth, resistance-driven identity and existence made it a fundamentally different and more resilient state.
Both Israel and Iran, however, came away with new intelligence. Israel learned that its missile defences and economic resilience were not built for prolonged, multi-front warfare. Iran, meanwhile, gained valuable insight into how far its arsenal – drones, missiles and regional proxies – could reach, and where its limits lie.
Most of Iran’s drones and missiles were intercepted — up to 99% in the cases of drones — exposing critical weaknesses in accuracy, penetration, and survivability against modern air defenses. Yet the few that did break through caused significant damage in Tel Aviv, striking residential areas and critical infrastructure.
This war was not only a clash of weapons but a real-time stress test of each side’s strategic depth. Iran may now adjust its doctrine accordingly – prioritising survivability, mobility and precision in anticipation of future conflicts.
Israel’s vulnerabilities
Internally, Israel entered the war politically fractured and socially strained. Netanyahu’s far-right coalition was already under fire for attempting to weaken judicial independence. The war has temporarily united the country, but the economic and human toll have reignited deeper concerns.
Israel’s geographic and demographic constraints have become clear. Its high-tech economy, tightly integrated with global markets, could not weather prolonged instability. And critically, the damage inflicted by the US bombing was more limited than hoped for. While Washington joined in the initial strikes, it resisted deeper involvement, partly to avoid broader regional escalation and largely because of the lack of domestic appetite for war and high potential for energy inflation, if Iran was to close the Strait of Hormuz.
What happens now?
The war of 2025 did not produce peace. It produced recalibration. Israel emerges militarily capable but politically shaken and economically strained. Iran, though damaged, stands more unified, with fewer international constraints on its nuclear ambitions. Its crackdown on dissent, withdrawal from IAEA oversight, and deepening ties to rival powers suggest a regime preparing not for collapse, but for survival, perhaps even confrontation.
The broader lesson is sobering. Regime change cannot be engineered through precision strikes. Tactical brilliance does not guarantee strategic victory. And the assumption that Iran could unravel like Syria was not strategy, it was hubris.
Both sides now better understand each other’s strengths and limits, a clarity that could deter future war – or make the next one more dangerous. In a region shaped by trauma and shifting power, mistaking resistance for weakness or pause for peace remains the gravest miscalculation.
Bamo Nouri does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
The UK is now more than halfway (50.4%) to achieving a net zero carbon economy, which means it has reduced its national emissions significantly compared to 1990.
We should even celebrate that 0.4%. Why? Because every tonne of carbon saved from the atmosphere and every fraction of a degree celsius of warming avoided saves lives and leaves more life-sustaining ecosystems intact for our children and grandchildren.
It also reduces the risk of triggering irreversible, devastating tipping points in the Earth system. We absolutely do not want to go there. Though, it may already be too late to save 90% of warm-water coral reefs, on which hundreds of millions of people depend for food and protection from storms.
Luckily, tipping points can also work in our favour. Researchers like us call them positive tipping points, which kickstart irreversible, self-propelling change towards a more sustainable future.
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Solar energy has already crossed a tipping point, having become the cheapest source of power in most of the world. Because it is quick to deploy widely and in a variety of formats and settings, solar is expanding exponentially, including to the roughly 700 million people who don’t have electricity.
Electric vehicle sales have also crossed tipping points in China and several European markets, as evidenced by the abrupt acceleration of their shares in national vehicle fleets. The more people buy them, the cheaper and better they get, which makes even more people buy them – a self-propelling change towards a low-carbon road transport system.
Recent findings from the Climate Change Committee, independent advisers to the UK government on climate policy, show that the UK too may be on the cusp of a positive tipping point for electric vehicles (EVs), but that further work is needed to reach a tipping point for heat pumps.
EV sales are racing ahead
According to the CCC, more than half of the UK’s success in decarbonising its economy since 2008 can be attributed to the energy sector. Here, the transition from electricity generated by coal to gas and, increasingly, renewable sources like solar and wind, has occurred “behind the scenes”, without much disruption to daily life.
However, over 80% of the greenhouse gas emission cuts needed between now and 2030 (the UK aims to reduce emissions by 68% by 2030) need to come from other sectors that require the involvement and support of the public and businesses.
The adoption of low-carbon technologies by households, including the buying of EVs and installing of heat pumps, is a critical next step to determining the success or failure of the UK’s ability to achieve net zero. Cars account for about 15% of the UK’s emissions and home heating a further 18%.
Encouragingly, and despite concerted misinformation campaigns to discredit EVs, sales in the UK accounted for 19.6% of all new cars in 2024, which puts this sector close to the critical 20-25% range for triggering the phase of self-propelling adoption, according to positive tipping points theory.
This rise in EV sales is happening for two main reasons. First, the UK has a rule that bans the sale of new petrol and diesel cars from 2035, which gives carmakers and buyers a clear deadline to switch.
Second, they are becoming a better choice all round. They’re getting cheaper (some are expected to cost the same as petrol cars between 2026 and 2028), more appealing (with longer ranges and faster charging), and easier to use (thanks to more charging points and better infrastructure).
If this positive trend continues, emissions saved by EV adoption will be sufficient to achieve the UK road transport sector’s 2030 emissions target.
Where is the heat pump tipping point?
Heat pumps have been slower on the uptake in the UK, leading the CCC to identify their deployment as one of the biggest risks to achieving the 2030 emissions target.
The UK government has set a target of installing 600,000 heat pumps a year by 2028. But despite 90% of British homes being suitable for a heat pump, only 1% have one.
There are signs that installations are picking up pace, however. In 2024, 98,000 heat pumps were installed – an increase of 56% from 2023. Deployment will need to be increased more than six times its current rate over the next three years to reach the installation target. In other words, we urgently need to trigger a positive tipping point in this sector.
The triggering of self-propelling change depends on the relative strength of feedbacks that either resist change (damping or negative feedback) or drive it forward (positive feedback).
One important negative feedback highlighted by the CCC is the UK’s high electricity-to-gas price ratio, which increases the running costs of a heat pump on top of the high upfront cost of buying and installing one. Addressing this issue has been at the top of the CCC’s policy recommendations for the last two years.
One positive feedback that needs to be strengthened is the perception among installers of household demand for heat pumps. When installers perceive demand, they are more likely to invest in the training and certifications needed to meet it.
Two ways the CCC suggests the government could encourage installer confidence are to extend the boiler upgrade scheme (which provides grants to households to install heat pumps) and clean heat mechanism (which obliges manufacturers and installers to prioritise heat pumps) and to reinstate the 2035 phase-out rule for new fossil fuel boilers.
An understanding of positive tipping points helps us identify key leverage points where intervention can be most effective in tackling the remaining half of the UK’s emissions. When implemented as part of a coherent national strategy, positive change can be accomplished at the pace and scale required. There is no time to lose.
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Kai Greenlees receives funding from the Economic Social Research Council, through the South West Doctoral Training Partnership.
Steven R. Smith does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Source: The Conversation – UK – By Dafydd Townley, Teaching Fellow in US politics and international security, University of Portsmouth
Donald Trump is continuing his run of political wins after his keynote legislation, nicknamed the ‘big beautiful bill’, squeaked through the Senate.
While the bill, which includes major cuts in tax and government spending, must now go back to the House of Representatives for another vote, passing the upper house is highly significant. Trump lost the support of just three Republican senators, and with the help of a tie-breaking vote from Vice-President J.D. Vance managed to push the bill forward.
Democrats, the minority in both the House and Senate, have been unable to do anything but sit by and watch as Trump claims victory after victory. These include progress in his attempt to end birthright citizenship, the claimed destruction of significant Iranian nuclear sites (yet to be independently verified) and the convincing of Nato member states to increase defence spending to 5% of their GDP. Trump may even be getting closer to a peace deal between Israel and Hamas.
And now the Democrats have failed in their desperate attempts to stop this bill. In the Senate, it was felt that there could be enough Republican senators concerned about cuts to Medicaid (the US system that provides essential healthcare to those on low incomes), the closure or reduction of services at rural hospitals, and the increase in national debt to potentially hinder the bill’s progress. However, Democrats were unable to do anything apart from delaying the voting process, and the bill is progressing with some changes but not enough to be severely weakened.
It had seemed likely that the Democrats could work with the Maga-focused Freedom Caucus group of representatives, whose members include Marjorie Taylor Greene, in the early stages in the House to stop its initial passage. But Speaker Mike Johnson managed to calm most of their fears about the rise in the deficit to get the bill through the House.
The lack of effective opposition from the Democrats reflects their congressional standing. The Republicans control the Senate 53-47, and they also have a majority of 220-212 in the House, with three vacancies.
While Democrat numbers in Congress is the primary issue in opposing this bill, their future congressional power will rely on strong leadership within the party and, more importantly, a clear set of policies with appeal that can attract more support at the ballot boxes. Failure to address this will probably allow Republicans to dominate Congress and shape American domestic and foreign policy any way they wish for longer.
Trump’s agenda has now passed the Senate.
What could Democrats do differently?
While Democrat Hakeem Jeffries has been a diligent minority leader in the House, he has attempted to operate as an obstacle to Republican policies with little success, rather than reaching across the political divide to create a consensus with dissenting Republicans.
Outside of Congress, California governor Gavin Newsom, widely touted as a potential candidate for the next presidential election, has offered some resistance to the Trump administration, particularly over Trump’s assumption of national command over the state-controlled National Guard to deal with protests in California against the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. However, Newsom’s reputation is still relatively regional, although it is on the rise.
Zohran Mamdani has won the Democratic nomination for New York mayor.
There will be jostling over the next couple of years for the Democratic presidential nomination, and this will have an impact on the platform that the party runs on. Party members and those voting for the next presidential nominee will need to decide whether to continue with the mainly centrist position that the party has adopted since the 1990s or adopt something more left-wing.
A more radical candidate, such as New York representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, might offer a substantially different proposal that could seem attractive to Democratic voters and those Trump supporters who may feel dissatisfied with the current Republican administration.
However, democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani, recently selected as the Democratic nominee for the New York mayoral election, has already been vilified by some in the Republican party.
Concerns about such a supposedly “radical” candidate may concern many voters in red states in middle America. However, getting elected is one thing but implementing progressive, left-leaning policies is another thing entirely. They also need to deliver solutions to major issues, such as crime, at all levels, to show their abilities to solve problems.
It is not just the policies that matter for the Democrats, but who they want to represent. Last year’s election suggested that the Democrats had been ousted as the representatives of the working class. Some significant labour unions, a foundation of Democratic support for the majority of the 20th century, failed to endorse Kamala Harris.
Mamdani’s success in New York stemmed from the mobilisation of a grassroots campaign that used social media effectively. It targeted young working-class voters disenchanted with the Democratic party. He also resonated with voters in areas that had seen an increase in Republican voters in the 2024 election.
All this may offer some lessons to the Democrats. They need to reassess their policies, their image and their tactics, and show Americans that they can solve the problems that the public sees as most important, including the high cost of living. While they can expect to gain seats in the House in next year’s midterms, they need to look for a leader and policies that will capture the public’s hearts.
Dafydd Townley does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
US Food and Drug Administration, Office of Regulatory Affairs, Health Fraud Branch
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has issued an urgent warning about tianeptine – a substance marketed as a dietary supplement but known on the street as “gas station heroin”.
Linked to overdoses and deaths, it is being sold in petrol stations, smoke shops and online retailers, despite never being approved for medical use in the US.
But what exactly is tianeptine, and why is it causing alarm?
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Structurally, it resembles tricyclic antidepressants – an older class of antidepressant – but pharmacologically it behaves very differently. Unlike conventional antidepressants, which typically increase serotonin levels, tianeptine appears to act on the brain’s glutamate system, which is involved in learning and memory.
It is used as a prescription drug in some European, Asian and Latin American countries under brand names like Stablon or Coaxil. But researchers later discovered something unusual, tianeptine also activates the brain’s mu-opioid receptors, the same receptors targeted by morphine and heroin – hence it’s nickname “gas station heroin”.
As a prescription drug, tianeptine is sold under various brand names, including Stablon. Wikimedia Commons
At prescribed doses, the effect is subtle, but in large amounts, tianeptine can trigger euphoria, sedation and eventually dependence. People chasing a high might take doses far beyond anything recommended in medical settings.
Despite never being approved by the FDA, the drug is sold in the US as a “wellness” product or nootropic – a substance supposedly used to enhance mood or mental clarity. It’s packaged as capsules, powders or liquids, often misleadingly labelled as dietary supplements.
This loophole has enabled companies to circumvent regulation. Products like Neptune’s Fix have been promoted as safe and legal alternatives to traditional medications, despite lacking any clinical oversight and often containing unlisted or dangerous ingredients.
Some samples have even been found to contain synthetic cannabinoids and other drugs. According to US poison control data, calls related to tianeptine exposure rose by over 500% between 2018 and 2023. In 2024 alone, the drug was involved in more than 300 poisoning cases. The FDA’s latest advisory included product recalls and import warnings.
Users have taken to the social media site Reddit, including a dedicated channel, and other forums to describe their experiences, both the highs and the grim withdrawals. Some report taking hundreds of pills a day. Others struggle to quit, describing cravings and relapses that mirror those seen with classic opioid addiction.
Since tianeptine doesn’t show up in standard toxicology screenings, health professionals may not recognise it. According to doctors in North America, it could be present in hospital patients without being detected, particularly in cases involving seizures or unusual heart symptoms.
It can be bought online from overseas vendors, and a quick search reveals dozens of sellers offering “research-grade” powder and capsules.
There is little evidence that tianeptine is circulating widely in the UK; to date, just one confirmed sample has been publicly recorded in a national drug testing database. It’s not mentioned in recent Home Office or Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs briefings, and it does not appear in official crime or hospital statistics.
But that may simply reflect the fact that no one is looking for it. Without testing protocols in place, it could be present, just unrecorded.
Because of its chemical structure and unusual effects, if tianeptine did show up in a UK emergency department, it could easily be mistaken for a tricyclic antidepressant overdose, or even dismissed as recreational drug use. This makes it harder to diagnose and treat appropriately.
It’s possible, particularly among people seeking alternatives to harder-to-access opioids, or those looking for a legal high. With its low visibility, online availability and potential for addiction, tianeptine ticks many of the same boxes that once made drugs like mephedrone or spice popular before they were banned.
The UK has seen waves of novel psychoactive substances emerge through similar routes, first appearing online or in head shops, then spreading quietly until authorities responded. If tianeptine follows the same path, by the time it appears on the radar, harm may already be underway.
Michelle Sahai does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Source: The Conversation – UK – By Lillian Hingley, Postdoctoral Researcher in English Literature, University of Oxford
With her latest album, Virgin, Lorde is stretching the concept of the virgin beyond the common definition. Some may consider the album’s title and its cover art – an X-ray of Lorde’s pelvis showing an IUD – to be contradictory.
But while Lorde could still be using contraception for purposes beyond birth control, its presence shows that the album doesn’t shy away from discussions of sexual activities and the risk of pregnancy (two themes that are clearly discussed in the track Clearblue).
As she also shows with her approach to gender in the album’s opening song, Hammer (“Some days, I’m a woman, some days, I’m a man”), Lorde is testing and muddying common dualisms.
The scientific perspective offered by the album art forces the viewer to look through Lorde’s body, but we are also looking beyond her reproductive organs. Certainly, Lorde sometimes conceptualises virginity as something that can only be given once, as she explains on David.
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In Hammer, her quip “don’t know if it’s love or if it’s ovulation” is a comedic musing on whether an experience is profoundly transcendental or just the product of hormones. But what strikes me is the fact that her concepts and themes are not static or singular.
This album is exploring the idea of being made, or even remade, through experience. In If She Could See Me Now, Lorde recounts how painful moments “made me a woman”.
Like French philosopher Simone de Beauvoir’s phrase “one is not born, but rather becomes, a woman”, Lorde is exploring how her body is being changed by what she has been through. As she sings in What Was That?: “I try to let whatever has to pass through me pass through.”
Again, while she on the one hand describes something moving through her body, she’s also describing an attempt to move through something that has happened to her – turning a passive experience into one of acceptance and action. Here we might think of another notion of virginity: a substance before it is processed. Virginity is part of the experience of being changed, or reborn, into something else.
This is not to say that Virgin is uninterested in the body. Lorde’s discussion of her eating disorder in Broken Glass is a case in point.
Lorde as performance artist
The visuals accompanying Virgin emphasise Lorde’s status as a performance artist. The crescendo of the What Was That video is a spontaneous public performance of Virgin’s first single.
TRYING TO MAKE IT SOUND LIKE A FONTANA, LIKE PAINTING BITTEN BY A MAN, LIKE THE NEW YORK EARTH ROOM. THE SOUND OF MY REBIRTH.
The simile here, or the idea of making music sound “like” visual art, emphasises the tactility of Lorde’s work. Each artistic piece referenced here is concerned with physically intervening into the conventional art gallery set-up.
Italian artist Lucio Fontana’s Spacial Concept series (1960) included slashed canvases a disruption of the body of the artwork with yonic – in other words, vulva-like – imagery (indeed, it challenges how “damaged” artworks are usually hidden from audiences, waiting to be restored).
Similarly, American artist Jasper Johns’ Painting Bitten by a Man (1961) is an encaustic painting (derived from the Greek word for “burned in”), which shows off the markings of someone who has bitten into the canvas.
The video for Man of the Year.
The music video for Man of the Year is filmed in a room that is filled with dirt. This is a clear nod to American sculptor Walter de Maria’s New York Earth Room (1977). The piece also fills a white room in New York with this unexpected material: earth inside a building, where mushrooms can grow.
The video for Man of the Year may also be referencing another artwork. Lorde is shown using duct tape to bind her breasts. While this points to Lorde’s exploration of her body and gender identity, the material also recalls Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan’s duct-taped banana artwork, Comedian.
Offering phallic imagery to Fontana’s yonic imagery, Cattelan’s piece mirrors Lorde’s concern with ontology, or definition. What makes something art?
Prometheus (Un)bound?
But just as Lorde is binding herself in new ways, she is unbinding herself in others. In If She Could See Me Now, Lorde declares: “I’m going back to the clay.”
Here that the album recalls the Prometheus myth: the ancient Greek story that Prometheus fashioned humans out of mud (or clay) and gave his creations fire.
The closing track, David, offers another ancient allusion, this time about David and Goliath. David – who, as a harpist, is a musician like Lorde – kills the giant man with stones. This reference furthers the song’s discussion of the problem of treating a man, a lover, like a god.
In David Lorde explores similar themes to Mary Shelley.
This subtle reference to the killing of Goliath adds another layer to the euphemism for male testicles explored in Shapeshifter: “Do you have the stones?”. Perhaps Virgin is doing what Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1818) did with the Prometheus tale: both exploring what happens when a man tries to create and determine the fate of another being, whether nature or nurture make a person, and how a new body can be refashioned from old ones.
After listening to the entire album, I was struck by how Lorde is exploring different facets of another question: who, exactly, is Lorde? Especially now that she is embracing who she is beyond the yoke of other people – or the demons – that have shaped her? Virgin shows that Lorde now wants to return “to the clay”, or to remake who she is, now that she is unbound by Prometheus.
This article features references to books that have been included for editorial reasons, and may contain links to bookshop.org. If you click on one of the links and go on to buy something from bookshop.org The Conversation UK may earn a commission.
Lillian Hingley does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Hearing improvements were both rapid and significant after patients received the gene therapy we developed.Nina Lishchuk/ Shutterstock
Up to three in every 1,000 newborns has hearing loss in one or both ears. While cochlear implants offer remarkable hope for these children, it requires invasive surgery. These implants also cannot fully replicate the nuance of natural hearing.
But recent research my colleagues and I conducted has shown that a form of gene therapy can successfully restore hearing in toddlers and young adults born with congenital deafness.
Our research focused specifically on toddlers and young adults born with OTOF-related deafness. This condition is caused by mutations in the OTOF gene that produces the otoferlin protein –a protein critical for hearing.
The protein transmits auditory signals from the inner ear to the brain. When this gene is mutated, that transmission breaks down leading to profound hearing loss from birth.
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Unlike other types of genetic deafness, people with OTOF mutations have healthy hearing structures in their inner ear – the problem is simply that one crucial gene isn’t working properly. This makes it an ideal candidate for gene therapy: if you can fix the faulty gene, the existing healthy structures should be able to restore hearing.
In our study, we used a modified virus as a delivery system to carry a working copy of the OTOF gene directly into the inner ear’s hearing cells. The virus acts like a molecular courier, delivering the genetic fix exactly where it’s needed.
The modified viruses do this by first attaching themselves to the hair cell’s surface, then convincing the cell to swallow them whole. Once inside, they hitch a ride on the cell’s natural transport system all the way to its control centre (the nucleus). There, they finally release the genetic instructions for otoferlin to the auditory neurons.
Our team had previously conducted studies in primates and young children (five- and eight-year-olds) which confirmed the virus therapy was safe. We were also able to illustrate the therapy’s potential to restore hearing – sometimes to near-normal levels.
But key questions had remained about whether the therapy could work in older patients – and what age is optimal for patients to receive the treatment.
To answer these questions, we expanded our clinical trial across five hospitals, enrolling ten participants aged one to 24 years. All were diagnosed with OTOF-related deafness. The virus therapy was injected into the inner ears of each participant.
We closely monitored safety during the 12-months of the study through ear examinations and blood tests. Hearing improvements were measured using both objective brainstem response tests and behavioural hearing assessments.
From the brainstem response tests, patients heard rapid clicking sounds or short beeps of different pitches while sensors measured the brain’s automatic electrical response. In another test, patients heard constant, steady tones at different pitches while a computer analysed brainwaves to see if they automatically followed the rhythm of these sounds.
The therapy used a synthetic version of a virus to deliver a functional gene to the inner ear. Kateryna Kon/ Shutterstock
For the behavioural hearing assessment, patients wore headphones and listened to faint beeps at different pitches. They pressed a button or raised their hand each time they heard a beep – no matter how faint.
Hearing improvements were both rapid and significant – especially in younger participants. Within the first month of treatment, the average total hearing improvement reached 62% on the objective brainstem response tests and 78% on the behavioural hearing assessments. Two participants achieved near-normal speech perception. The parent of one seven-year-old participant said her child could hear sounds just three days after treatment.
Over the 12-month study period, ten patients experienced very mild to moderate side-effects. The most common adverse effect was a decrease in white blood cells. Crucially, no serious adverse events were observed. This confirmed the favourable safety profile of this virus-based gene therapy.
Treating genetic deafness
This is the first time such results have been achieved in both adolescent and adult patients with OTOF-related deafness.
The findings also reveal important insights into the ideal window for treatment, with children between the ages of five and eight showing the most pronounced benefit.
While younger children and older participants also showed improvement, their recovery was less dramatic. These counter-intuitive results in younger children are surprising. Although preserved inner-ear integrity and function at early ages should theoretically predict a better response to the gene therapy, these findings suggest the brain’s ability to process newly restored sounds may vary at different ages. The reasons for this are not yet understood.
This trial is a milestone. By bridging the gap between animal and human studies and diverse patients of different ages, we’re entering a new era in the treatment of genetic deafness. Although questions still remain about how long the effects of this therapy last, as gene therapy continues to advance, the possibility of curing – not just managing – genetic hearing loss is becoming a reality.
OTOF-related deafness is just the beginning. We, along with other research teams, are working on developing therapies that target other, more common genes that are linked to hearing loss. These are more complex to treat, but animal studies have yielded promising results. We’re optimistic that in the future, gene therapy will be available for many different types of genetic deafness.
Maoli Duan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Motorcycle-taxis are one of the fastest and most convenient ways to get around Uganda’s congested capital, Kampala. But they are also the most dangerous. Though they account for one-third of public transport trips taking place within the city, police reports suggest motorcycles were involved in 80% of all road-crash deaths registered in Kampala in 2023.
Promising to solve the safety problem while also improving the livelihoods of moto-taxi workers, digital ride-hail platforms emerged a decade ago on the city’s streets. It is no coincidence that Uganda’s ride-hailing pioneer and long-time market leader goes by the name of SafeBoda.
Conceived in 2014 as a “market-based approach to road safety”, the idea is to give riders a financial incentive to drive safely by making digital moto-taxi work pay better. SafeBoda claimed at the time that motorcyclists who signed up with it would increase their incomes by up to 50% relative to the traditional mode of operation, in which riders park at strategic locations called “stages” and wait for passengers.
In the years since, the efforts of SafeBoda and its ride-hail competitors to bring safety to the sector have largely been deemed a success. One study carried out in 2017 found that digital riders were more likely to wear a helmet and less likely to drive towards oncoming traffic. Early press coverage wasparticularlyglowing, while recentacademicstudies continue to cite the Kampala case as evidence that ride-hailing platforms may hold the key to making African moto-taxi sectors a safer place to work and travel.
Is it all as clear-cut as this? In a new paper based on PhD research, I suggest not. Because at its core the ride-hail model – in which riders are classified as independent contractors who do poorly paid “gig work” rather than as wage-earning employees – undermines its own safety ambitions.
Speed traps
In my study of Kampala’s vast moto-taxi industry – estimated to employ hundreds of thousands of people – I draw on 112 in-depth interviews and a survey of 370 moto-taxi riders to examine how livelihoods and working conditions have been affected by the arrival of the platforms.
To date, there has been only limited critical engagement with how this change has played out over the past decade. I wanted to get beneath the big corporate claims and alluring platform promises to understand how riders themselves had experienced the digital “transformation” of their industry, several years after it first began.
One of the things I found was that, from a safety perspective, the ride-hail model represents a paradox. We can think of it as a kind of “speed trap”.
On one hand, ride-hail platforms try to moderate moto-taxi speeds and behaviours through managerial techniques. They make helmet use compulsory. They put riders through road safety training before letting them out onto the streets. And they enforce a professional “code of conduct” for riders.
In some cases, companies also deploy “field agents” to major road intersections around the city. Their task is to monitor the behaviour of riders in company uniform and, should they be spotted breaking the rules, discipline them.
On the other hand, however, the underlying economic structure of digital ride-hailing pulls transport workers in the opposite direction by systematically depressing trip fares and rewarding speed.
Under the “gig economy” model used by Uganda’s ride-hail platforms, the livelihood promise hangs not in the offer of a guaranteed wage but in the possibility of higher earnings. Crucially, it is a promise that only materialises if riders are able to reach and maintain a faster, harder work-rate throughout the day – completing enough jobs that pay “little money”, as one rider put it, to make the gig-work deal come good. Or, as summed up by another interviewee:
We are like stakeholders, I can say that. No basic salary, just commission. So it depends on your speed.
And yet, it is precisely these factors that routinely lead to road traffic accidents. Extensive research from across east Africa has shown that motorcycle crashes arestronglyassociated with financial pressure and the practices that lead directly from this, such as speeding, working long hours and performing high-risk manoeuvres. All are driven by the need to break even each day in a hyper-competitive informal labour market, with riders compelled to go fast by the raweconomics of their work.
Deepening the pressure
Ride-hail platforms may not be the reason these circumstances exist in the first place. But the point is that they do not mark a departure from them.
If anything, my research suggests they may be making things worse. According to the survey data, riders working through the apps make on average 12% higher gross earnings each week relative to their analogue counterparts. This is because the online world gets them more jobs.
But to stay connected to that world they must shoulder higher operating costs, for: mobile data (to remain logged on); fuel (to perform more trips); the use of helmets and uniforms (which remain company property); and commissions extracted by the platform companies (as much as 15%-20% per trip).
As soon as these extras are factored in, the difference completely disappears. The digital rider works faster and harder – but for no extra reward.
But it is important to remember that these are private enterprises with a clear bottom line: to one day turn a profit. As recentreports and my own thesis show, efforts to reach that point often alienate and ultimately repel the workers on whom these platforms depend – and whose livelihoods and safety standards they claim to be transforming.
A recent investment evaluation by one of SafeBoda’s first funders perhaps puts it best: it is time to reframe ride-hailing as a “risky vehicle” for safety reform in African cities, rather than a clear road to success.
Rich received funding for this research from the UK’s Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC).
Stephen Spielberg’s original Jurassic Park film (1993) instilled awe and trepidation in his characters and audience alike. As his protagonists wrestled with the unintended consequences and ethical dilemmas of reanimating extinct apex predators, viewers marvelled at the novel use of CGI. At a keystroke it seemed to consign the hand-crafted stop-motion wonders of dinosaur films past to the archive.
Alongside pulse-pounding action set pieces delivered with trademark Spielberg panache, that first film flamboyantly inaugurated a new era in fantasy effects. And it solicited delight and wonder from its audience. On opening day in New York the dinosaurs’ first appearance prompted a spontaneous ovation: I was there and clapped too.
Thirty-two years, six Jurassic iterations and countless monstrous digital apparitions later, that initial wow factor is a distant memory. By Jurassic World: Rebirth (set nearly 35 years after the original film) dinosaurs are treated by their human prey as barely more than inconvenient obstacles. They’re dangerous, of course, but certainly not wondrous.
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Palaeontologist Dr Henry Loomis’s (Jonathan Bailey) delight in coming face-to-face with his objects of study is a pale echo of the giddy euphoria that overtook Sam Neill and Laura Dern’s characters all those years ago.
In fact, early in the film we’re told that the public have since lost all interest in dinosaurs. Wildlife parks and museum displays are closing and the animals themselves have mostly died off outside their quarantined tropical habitat.
As this has information has little bearing for the plot, it’s hard not to sense some ironic commentary from screenwriter David Koepp (returning to the franchise for the first time since 1997) on the exhaustion of the Jurassic Park model. Always incipiently reflexive – as a blockbuster set in a theme park – by this stage in the game, the franchise machinery is inescapably visible.
Almost as ironic is a plot line promoting the open-source sharing of intellectual property for the benefit of the whole world rather than exploitative corporations. I doubt NBCUniversal-Comcast would agree.
The Jurassic World Rebirth trailer.
The Jurassic franchise
The Jurassic Park format is among the most unforgivingly rigid of any current film franchise.
Each instalment (bar to some extent the last, the convoluted 2022 Jurassic World: Dominion, whose characters and story the new release completely ignores) places humans in perilous proximity to genetically rejuvenated sauropods. And generally does so in a remote, photogenic tropical location with minimal contact with the outside world. (Will the franchise ever run out of uncharted Caribbean islands where demented bio-engineers have wreaked evolutionary havoc?)
The human characters in this new film are the usual pick-and-mix of daredevil adventurers, amoral corporate types and idealistic palaeontologists. And there are the mandatory school-age children too – important to keep the interest of younger viewers. The real stars of course, are the primeval leviathans who grow larger and more fearsome – though not more interesting – with each new episode of the franchise.
How this human-dino jeopardy comes about tends not to matter very much. Jurassic World: Rebirth produces one of the least interesting MacGuffins in movie history (meaning something that drives the plot and which the charcters care about but the audience does not). Blood drawn from each of the three largest dinosaur species in the aforesaid remote tropical island will produce a serum to cure human heart disease (dinosaur hearts are huge, you see, so … never mind).
This feeble contrivance suffices for sneery Big Pharma suit Martin (Rupert Friend) to hire freebooters Zora (Scarlett Johansson) and Duncan (Mahershala Ali) for his expedition. Along the way they encounter a marooned family (dad, two teens, one winsome but plucky grade-schooler) who subsequently have their own largely self-contained adventures before reuniting for the big climax.
Franchise filmmaking is generally an auteur-free zone. Welsh blockbuster specialist Gareth Edwards is no Spielberg (though he pays homage at several point, notably in a waterborne first act studded with Jaws references). But he handles the action with unremarkable competence.
In truth, Jurassic World: Rebirth suggests that the intellectual property so expensively vested in the franchise would benefit from some genetic modification.
Barry Langford does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
There are more refugees in the world today than at any other point in history. The United Nations estimates that there are now more than 120 million people forcibly displaced from their homes. That is one in every 69 people on Earth. Some 73% of this population is hosted in lower or middle-income countries.
From the legacies of European colonialism to global inequality, drone warfare and climate instability, politicians have failed to address the causes driving this mass displacement. Instead, far-right parties exploit the crisis by inflaming cultures of hatred and hostility towards migrants, particularly in high-income western countries.
This is exacerbated by visual media, which makes refugees an easy target by denying them the means of telling their own stories on their own terms. Pictures of migrants on boats or climbing over border walls are everywhere in tabloid newspapers and on social media. But these images are rarely accompanied by any detailed account of the brutal experiences that force people into these situations.
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Many different kinds of visual storytelling live under the umbrella of refugee comics. They include short strips and stories, such as A Perilous Journey (2016) with testimonies from people fleeing the civil war in Syria, and Cabramatta (2019), about growing up as a Vietnamese migrant in a Sydney suburb. They also include codex-bound graphic novels, such as The Best We Could Do by Thi Bui (2017), and interactive web-comics such as Exodus by Jasper Rietman (2018).
They include documentaries made by journalists about the specific experiences of individual refugees. They also include fiction by artists who combine elements of several refugee testimonies into representative stories. Additionally, there are both fictional and non-fictional artworks made by migrants and refugees themselves.
Refugee comics address different forced mass displacements over the 20th and 21st centuries. These include the 1948 Nakba in Palestine, the 1970s flight of refugees from Vietnam and the 2010s displacement of people from Syria and other countries across sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East.
These refugee comics challenge anti-migrant images in at least three ways. First, they often integrate the direct testimonies of refugees. This is enhanced by the combination of words and pictures that comprise the comics page, which allows refugees to frame the way we see and respond to images of displaced people.
For example, in The Unwanted by Joe Sacco (2012), familiar images of migrants crossing the Mediterranean on small boats are narrated by a refugee called Jon. Jon’s testimony turns our attention to the fears and desires that drive people to attempt dangerous sea crossings.
A second way comics challenge anti-migrant images is by allowing refugees to tell their stories without disclosing their identities. Because comics are drawn by hand and use abstract icons rather than photographs, refugees can tell their stories while also avoiding any unwanted scrutiny while also maintaining personal privacy. This reintroduces refugee agency into a visual culture that often seeks to reduce migrants to voiceless victims or security threats.
For example, in Escaping Wars and Waves: Encounters with Syrian Refugees (2018) German comics journalist Olivier Kugler dedicates two pages to a man he calls “The Afghan” because he didn’t want his name or identity revealed. Kugler presents this man’s testimony of failed attempts to get to the UK, but he never draws his face or refers to him by name.
The third way comics challenge anti-migrant images is by shifting our attention from refugees themselves to the hostile environments and border infrastructures that they are forced to travel through and inhabit. Refugee researchers describe this different way of seeing as a “places and spaces, not faces” approach.
For instance, in Undocumented: The Architecture of Migrant Detention (2017), Tings Chak walks her readers through migrant detention centres from the perspective of those who are being processed and detained.
Drawing displacement
This emphasis on place and space is built into the structure of our own book, Graphic Refuge. We begin by focusing on graphic stories about ocean crossings, particularly on the Mediterranean sea. We then turn to comics concerned with the experience of refugee camps, and we also ask how interactive online comics bring viewers into virtual refugee spaces in a variety of ways.
It is the obliteration of homes that forces people to become refugees in the first place. Later in the book, we explore how illustrated stories document the destruction of cityscapes across Syria and also in Gaza. Finally, we turn to graphic autobiographies by second-generation refugees, those who have grown up in places such as the US or Australia, but who must still negotiate the trauma of their parents’ displacement.
Where most previous studies of refugee comics have focused on trauma and empathy, in Graphic Refuge we take a different approach. We set out to show how refugee comics represent migrant agency and desire, and how we are all implicated in the histories and systems that have created the very idea of the modern refugee.
As critical refugee scholar Vinh Nguyen writes in our book’s foreword, while it is difficult to truly know what refugee lives are like, those of us who enjoy the privileges of citizenship can at least read these comics to better understand “what we – we who can sleep under warm covers at night – are capable of”.
This article features references to books that have been included for editorial reasons, and may contain links to bookshop.org. If you click on one of the links and go on to buy something from bookshop.org The Conversation UK may earn a commission.
The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
The global ecosystem of climate finance is complex, constantly changing and sometimes hard to understand. But understanding it is critical to demanding a green transition that’s just and fair. That’s why The Conversation has collaborated with climate finance experts to create this user-friendly guide, in partnership with Vogue Business. With definitions and short videos, we’ll add to this glossary as new terms emerge.
Blue bonds
Blue bonds are debt instruments designed to finance ocean-related conservation, like protecting coral reefs or sustainable fishing. They’re modelled after green bonds but focus specifically on the health of marine ecosystems – this is a key pillar of climate stability.
By investing in blue bonds, governments and private investors can fund marine projects that deliver both environmental benefits and long-term financial returns. Seychelles issued the first blue bond in 2018. Now, more are emerging as ocean conservation becomes a greater priority for global sustainability efforts.
By Narmin Nahidi, assistant professor in finance at the University of Exeter
Carbon border adjustment mechanism
Did you know that imported steel could soon face a carbon tax at the EU border? That’s because the carbon border adjustment mechanism is about to shake up the way we trade, produce and price carbon.
The carbon border adjustment mechanism is a proposed EU policy to put a carbon price on imports like iron, cement, fertiliser, aluminium and electricity. If a product is made in a country with weaker climate policies, the importer must pay the difference between that country’s carbon price and the EU’s. The goal is to avoid “carbon leakage” – when companies relocate to avoid emissions rules and to ensure fair competition on climate action.
But this mechanism is more than just a tariff tool. It’s a bold attempt to reshape global trade. Countries exporting to the EU may be pushed to adopt greener manufacturing or face higher tariffs.
The carbon border adjustment mechanism is controversial: some call it climate protectionism, others argue it could incentivise low-carbon innovation worldwide and be vital for achieving climate justice. Many developing nations worry it could penalise them unfairly unless there’s climate finance to support greener transitions.
Carbon border adjustment mechanism is still evolving, but it’s already forcing companies, investors and governments to rethink emissions accounting, supply chains and competitiveness. It’s a carbon price with global consequences.
By Narmin Nahidi, assistant professor in finance at the University of Exeter
Carbon budget
The Paris agreement aims to limit global warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels by 2030. The carbon budget is the maximum amount of CO₂ emissions allowed, if we want a 67% chance of staying within this limit. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) estimates that the remaining carbon budgets amount to 400 billion tonnes of CO₂ from 2020 onwards.
Think of the carbon budget as a climate allowance. Once it has been spent, the risk of extreme weather or sea level rise increases sharply. If emissions continue unchecked, the budget will be exhausted within years, risking severe climate consequences. The IPCC sets the global carbon budget based on climate science, and governments use this framework to set national emission targets, climate policies and pathways to net zero emissions.
By Dongna Zhang, assistant professor in economics and finance, Northumbria University
Carbon credits
Carbon credits are like a permit that allow companies to release a certain amount of carbon into the air. One credit usually equals one tonne of CO₂. These credits are issued by the local government or another authorised body and can be bought and sold. Think of it like a budget allowance for pollution. It encourages cuts in carbon emissions each year to stay within those global climate targets.
The aim is to put a price on carbon to encourage cuts in emissions. If a company reduces its emissions and has leftover credits, it can sell them to another company that is going over its limit. But there are issues. Some argue that carbon credit schemes allow polluters to pay their way out of real change, and not all credits are from trustworthy projects. Although carbon credits can play a role in addressing the climate crisis, they are not a solution on their own.
By Sankar Sivarajah, professor of circular economy, Kingston University London
Carbon credits explained.
Carbon offsetting
Carbon offsetting is a way for people or organisations to make up for the carbon emissions they are responsible for. For example, if you contribute to emissions by flying, driving or making goods, you can help balance that out by supporting projects that reduce emissions elsewhere. This might include planting trees (which absorb carbon dioxide) or building wind farms to produce renewable energy.
The idea is that your support helps cancel out the damage you are doing. For example, if your flight creates one tonne of carbon dioxide, you pay to support a project that removes the same amount.
While this sounds like a win-win, carbon offsetting is not perfect. Some argue that it lets people feel better without really changing their behaviour, a phenomenon sometimes referred to as greenwashing.
Not all projects are effective or well managed. For instance, some tree planting initiatives might have taken place anyway, even without the offset funding, deeming your contribution inconsequential. Others might plant the non-native trees in areas where they are unlikely to reach their potential in terms of absorbing carbon emissions.
So, offsetting can help, but it is no magic fix. It works best alongside real efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and encourage low-carbon lifestyles or supply chains.
By Sankar Sivarajah, professor of circular economy, Kingston University London
Carbon offsetting explained.
Carbon tax
A carbon tax is designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by placing a direct price on CO₂ and other greenhouse gases.
A carbon tax is grounded in the concept of the social cost of carbon. This is an estimate of the economic damage caused by emitting one tonne of CO₂, including climate-related health, infrastructure and ecosystem impacts.
A carbon tax is typically levied per tonne of CO₂ emitted. The tax can be applied either upstream (on fossil fuel producers) or downstream (on consumers or power generators). This makes carbon-intensive activities more expensive, it incentivises nations, businesses and people to reduce their emissions, while untaxed renewable energy becomes more competitively priced and appealing.
Carbon tax was first introduced by Finland in 1990. Since then, more than 39 jurisdictions have implemented similar schemes. According to the World Bank, carbon pricing mechanisms (that’s both carbon taxes and emissions trading systems) now cover about 24% of global emissions. The remaining 76% are not priced, mainly due to limited coverage in both sectors and geographical areas, plus persistent fossil fuel subsidies. Expanding coverage would require extending carbon pricing to sectors like agriculture and transport, phasing out fossil fuel subsidies and strengthening international governance.
What is carbon tax?
Sweden has one of the world’s highest carbon tax rates and has cut emissions by 33% since 1990 while maintaining economic growth. The policy worked because Sweden started early, applied the tax across many industries and maintained clear, consistent communication that kept the public on board.
Canada introduced a national carbon tax in 2019. In Canada, most of the revenue from carbon taxes is returned directly to households through annual rebates, making the scheme revenue-neutral for most families. However, despite its economic logic, inflation and rising fuel prices led to public discontent – especially as many citizens were unaware they were receiving rebates.
Carbon taxes face challenges including political resistance, fairness concerns and low public awareness. Their success depends on clear communication and visible reinvestment of revenues into climate or social goals. A 2025 study that surveyed 40,000 people in 20 countries found that support for carbon taxes increases significantly when revenues are used for environmental infrastructure, rather than returned through tax rebates.
By Meilan Yan, associate professor and senior lecturer in financial economics, Loughborough University
Climate resilience
Floods, wildfires, heatwaves and rising seas are pushing our cities, towns and neighbourhoods to their limits. But there’s a powerful idea that’s helping cities fight back: climate resilience.
Resilience refers to the ability of a system, such as a city, a community or even an ecosystem – to anticipate, prepare for, respond to and recover from climate-related shocks and stresses.
Sometimes people say resilience is about bouncing back. But it’s not just about surviving the next storm. It’s about adapting, evolving and thriving in a changing world.
Resilience means building smarter and better. It means designing homes that stay cool during heatwaves. Roads that don’t wash away in floods. Power grids that don’t fail when the weather turns extreme.
It’s also about people. A truly resilient city protects its most vulnerable. It ensures that everyone – regardless of income, age or background – can weather the storm.
And resilience isn’t just reactive. It’s about using science, local knowledge and innovation to reduce a risk before disaster strikes. From restoring wetlands to cool cities and absorb floods, to creating early warning systems for heatwaves, climate resilience is about weaving strength into the very fabric of our cities.
By Paul O’Hare, senior lecturer in geography and development, Manchester Metropolitan University
The meaning of climate resilience.
Climate risk disclosure
Climate risk disclosure refers to how companies report the risks they face from climate change, such as flood damage, supply chain disruptions or regulatory costs. It includes both physical risks (like storms) and transition risks (like changing laws or consumer preferences).
Mandatory disclosures, such as those proposed by the UK and EU, aim to make climate-related risks transparent to investors. Done well, these reports can shape capital flows toward more sustainable business models. Done poorly, they become greenwashing tools.
By Narmin Nahidi, assistant professor in finance at the University of Exeter
Emissions trading scheme
An emissions trading scheme is the primary market-based approach for regulating greenhouse gas emissions in many countries, including Australia, Canada, China and Mexico.
Part of a government’s job is to decide how much of the economy’s carbon emissions it wants to avoid in order to fight climate change. It must put a cap on carbon emissions that economic production is not allowed to surpass. Preferably, the polluters (that’s the manufacturers, fossil fuel companies) should be the ones paying for the cost of climate mitigation.
Regulators could simply tell all the firms how much they are allowed to emit over the next ten years or so. But giving every firm the same allowance across the board is not cost efficient, because avoiding carbon emissions is much harder for some firms (such as steel producers) than others (such as tax consultants). Since governments cannot know each firm’s specific cost profile either, it can’t customise the allowances. Also, monitoring whether polluters actually abide by their assigned limits is extremely costly.
An emissions trading scheme cleverly solves this dilemma using the cap-and-trade mechanism. Instead of assigning each polluter a fixed quota and risking inefficiencies, the government issues a large number of tradable permits – each worth, say, a tonne of CO₂-equivalent (CO₂e) – that sum up to the cap. Firms that can cut greenhouse gas emissions relatively cheaply can then trade their surplus permits to those who find it harder – at a price that makes both better off.
By Mathias Weidinger, environmental economist, University of Oxford
Emissions trading schemes, explained by climate finance expert Mathias Weidinger.
Environmental, social and governance (ESG) investing
ESG investing stands for environmental, social and governance investing. In simple terms, these are a set of standards that investors use to screen a company’s potential investments.
ESG means choosing to invest in companies that are not only profitable but also responsible. Investors use ESG metrics to assess risks (such as climate liability, labour practices) and align portfolios with sustainability goals by looking at how a company affects our planet and treats its people and communities. While there isn’t one single global body governing ESG, various organisations, ratings agencies and governments all contribute to setting and evolving these metrics.
For example, investing in a company committed to renewable energy and fair labour practices might be considered “ESG aligned”. Supporters believe ESG helps identify risks and create long-term value. Critics argue it can be vague or used for greenwashing, where companies appear sustainable without real action. ESG works best when paired with transparency and clear data. A barrier is that standards vary, and it’s not always clear what counts as ESG.
Why do financial companies and institutions care? Issues like climate change and nature loss pose significant risks, affecting company values and the global economy.
However, gathering reliable ESG information can be difficult. Companies often self-report, and the data isn’t always standardised or up to date. Researchers – including my team at the University of Oxford – are using geospatial data, like satellite imagery and artificial intelligence, to develop global databases for high-impact industries, across all major sectors and geographies, and independently assess environmental and social risks and impacts.
For instance, we can analyse satellite images of a facility over time to monitor its emissions effect on nature and biodiversity, or assess deforestation linked to a company’s supply chain. This allows us to map supply chains, identify high-impact assets, and detect hidden risks and opportunities in key industries, providing an objective, real-time look at their environmental footprint.
The goal is for this to improve ESG ratings and provide clearer, more consistent insights for investors. This approach could help us overcome current data limitations to build a more sustainable financial future.
By Amani Maalouf, senior researcher in spatial finance, University of Oxford
Environmental, social and governance investing explained.
Financed emissions
Financed emissions are the greenhouse gas emissions linked to a bank’s or investor’s lending and investment portfolio, rather than their own operations. For example, a bank that funds a coal mine or invests in fossil fuels is indirectly responsible for the carbon those activities produce.
Measuring financed emissions helps reveal the real climate impact of financial institutions not just their office energy use. It’s a cornerstone of climate accountability in finance and is becoming essential under net zero pledges.
By Narmin Nahidi, assistant professor in finance at the University of Exeter
Green bonds
Green bonds are loans issued to fund environmentally beneficial projects, such as energy-efficient buildings or clean transportation. Investors choose them to support climate solutions while earning returns.
Green bonds are a major tool to finance the shift to a low-carbon economy by directing finance toward climate solutions. As climate costs rise, green bonds could help close the funding gap while ensuring transparency and accountability.
Green bonds are required to ensure funds are spent as promised. For instance, imagine a city wants to upgrade its public transportation by adding electric buses to reduce pollution. Instead of raising taxes or slashing other budgets, the city can issue green bonds to raise the necessary capital. Investors buy the bonds, the city gets the funding, and the environment benefits from cleaner air and fewer emissions.
The growing participation of government issuers has improved the transparency and reliability of these investments. The green bond market has grown rapidly in recent years. According to the Bank for International Settlements, the green bond market reached US$2.9 trillion (£2.1 trillion) in 2024 – nearly six times larger than in 2018. At the same time, annual issuance (the total value of green bonds issued in a year) hit US$700 billion, highlighting the increasing role of green finance in tackling climate change.
By Dongna Zhang, assistant professor in economics and finance, Northumbria University
Just transition
Just transition is the process of moving to a low-carbon society that is environmentally sustainable and socially inclusive. In a broad sense, a just transition means focusing on creating a more fair and equal society.
Just transition has existed as a concept since the 1970s. It was originally applied to the green energy transition, protecting workers in the fossil fuel industry as we move towards more sustainable alternatives.
These days, it has so many overlapping issues of justice hidden within it, so the concept is hard to define. Even at the level of UN climate negotiations, global leaders struggle to agree on what a just transition means.
The big battle is between developed countries, who want a very restrictive definition around jobs and skills, and developing countries, who are looking for a much more holistic approach that considers wider system change and includes considerations around human rights, Indigenous people and creating an overall fairer global society.
A just transition is essentially about imagining a future where we have moved beyond fossil fuels and society works better for everyone – but that can look very different in a European city compared to a rural setting in south-east Asia.
For example, in a British city it might mean fewer cars and better public transport. In a rural setting, it might mean new ways of growing crops that are more sustainable, and building homes that are heatwave resistant.
By Alix Dietzel, climate justice and climate policy expert, University of Bristol
The meaning of just transition.
Loss and damage
A global loss and damage fund was agreed by nations at the UN climate summit (Cop27) in 2022. This means that the rich countries of the world put money into a fund that the least developed countries can then call upon when they have a climate emergency.
At the moment, the loss and damage fund is made up of relatively small pots of money. Much more will be needed to provide relief to those who need it most now and in the future.
By Mark Maslin, professor of earth system science, UCL
Mark Maslin explains loss and damage.
Mitigation v adaptation
Mitigation means cutting greenhouse gas emissions to slow climate change. Adaptation means adjusting to its effects, like building sea walls or growing heat-resistant crops. Both are essential: mitigation tackles the cause, while adaptation tackles the symptoms.
Globally, most funding goes to mitigation, but vulnerable communities often need adaptation support most. Balancing the two is a major challenge in climate policy, especially for developing countries facing immediate climate threats.
By Narmin Nahidi, assistant professor in finance at the University of Exeter
Nationally determined contributions
Nationally determined contributions (NDCs) are at the heart of the Paris agreement, the global effort to collectively combat climate change. NDCs are individual climate action plans created by each country. These targets and strategies outline how a country will reduce its greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to climate change.
Each nation sets its own goals based on its own circumstances and capabilities – there’s no standard NDC. These plans should be updated every five years and countries are encouraged to gradually increase their climate ambitions over time.
The aim is for NDCs to drive real action by guiding policies, attracting investment and inspiring innovation in clean technologies. But current NDCs fall short of the Paris agreement goals and many countries struggle to turn their plans into a reality. NDCs also vary widely in scope and detail so it’s hard to compare efforts across the board. Stronger international collaboration and greater accountability will be crucial.
By Doug Specht, reader in cultural geography and communication, University of Westminster
Fashion depends on water, soil and biodiversity – all natural capital. And forward-thinking designers are now asking: how do we create rather than deplete, how do we restore rather than extract?
Natural capital is the value assigned to the stock of forests, soils, oceans and even minerals such as lithium. It sustains every part of our economy. It’s the bees that pollinate our crops. It’s the wetlands that filter our water and it’s the trees that store carbon and cool our cities.
If we fail to value nature properly, we risk losing it. But if we succeed, we unlock a future that is not only sustainable but also truly regenerative.
My team at the University of Oxford is developing tools to integrate nature into national balance sheets, advising governments on biodiversity, and we’re helping industries from fashion to finance embed nature into their decision making.
Natural capital, explained by a climate finance expert.
By Mette Morsing, professor of business sustainability and director of the Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment, University of Oxford
Net zero
Reaching net zero means reducing the amount of additional greenhouse gas emissions that accumulate in the atmosphere to zero. This concept was popularised by the Paris agreement, a landmark deal that was agreed at the UN climate summit (Cop21) in 2015 to limit the impact of greenhouse gas emissions.
There are some emissions, from farming and aviation for example, that will be very difficult, if not impossible, to reach absolute zero. Hence, the “net”. This allows people, businesses and countries to find ways to suck greenhouse gas emissions out of the atmosphere, effectively cancelling out emissions while trying to reduce them. This can include reforestation, rewilding, direct air capture and carbon capture and storage. The goal is to reach net zero: the point at which no extra greenhouse gases accumulate in Earth’s atmosphere.
By Mark Maslin, professor of earth system science, UCL
Mark Maslin explains net zero.
For more expert explainer videos, visit The Conversation’s quick climate dictionary playlist here on YouTube.
Mark Maslin is Pro-Vice Provost of the UCL Climate Crisis Grand Challenge and Founding Director of the UCL Centre for Sustainable Aviation. He was co-director of the London NERC Doctoral Training Partnership and is a member of the Climate Crisis Advisory Group. He is an advisor to Sheep Included Ltd, Lansons, NetZeroNow and has advised the UK Parliament. He has received grant funding from the NERC, EPSRC, ESRC, DFG, Royal Society, DIFD, BEIS, DECC, FCO, Innovate UK, Carbon Trust, UK Space Agency, European Space Agency, Research England, Wellcome Trust, Leverhulme Trust, CIFF, Sprint2020, and British Council. He has received funding from the BBC, Lancet, Laithwaites, Seventh Generation, Channel 4, JLT Re, WWF, Hermes, CAFOD, HP and Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors.
Amani Maalouf receives funding from IKEA Foundation and UK Research and Innovation (NE/V017756/1).
Narmin Nahidi is affiliated with several academic associations, including the Financial Management Association (FMA), British Accounting and Finance Association (BAFA), American Finance Association (AFA), and the Chartered Association of Business Schools (CMBE). These affiliations do not influence the content of this article.
Paul O’Hare receives funding from the UK’s Natural Environment Research Council (NERC). Award reference NE/V010174/1.
Alix Dietzel, Dongna Zhang, Doug Specht, Mathias Weidinger, Meilan Yan, and Sankar Sivarajah do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Reacting to reports of mass detentions, torture and other ill-treatment of dozens of members of the Azerbaijani diaspora in Russia and Russian nationals in Azerbaijan, which led to the deaths of two ethnic Azeris in Russia’s Yekaterinburg, Marie Struthers, Amnesty International’s Director for Eastern Europe and Central Asia, said:
“The authorities in both Russia and Azerbaijan have shown complete disregard for human dignity and open contempt for their human rights obligations. Torture and other ill-treatment are absolutely prohibited under international law and there is no justification for it. This appears to be nothing more than tit for tat policing operations targeting people based on their ethnicity and nationality.”
“Due process and respect for human rights of people in detention must prevail over political tensions between states. Russian and Azerbaijani authorities must promptly, thoroughly, independently and impartially investigate allegations of unlawful killings and torture and other ill-treatment and bring those responsible to justice.”
The authorities in both Russia and Azerbaijan have shown complete disregard for human dignity and open contempt for their human rights obligations
Marie Struthers, Amnesty International’s Director for Eastern Europe and Central Asia
Background
On 27 June, Russian law enforcement carried out mass detentions of around 50 ethnic Azeris in Yekaterinburg, among them Russian and Azerbaijani nationals, reportedly in connection with an investigation into a killing committed in 2001 and other past crimes. Six individuals were charged and placed in pre-trial detention, while others were released after questioning.
According to one of the survivors, all those detained were beaten: slammed to the floor, hit with chairs and tortured with electric shocks for about an hour. Several people were hospitalized and two individuals, brothers Ziyaddin and Guseyn Safarov, died in custody. Azerbaijani authorities claim that the brothers, who both held Russian passports, died from torture and multiple injuries caused while in Russian custody. The Russian authorities have cited heart failure as the cause of death of one of the brothers and stated that they are clarifying the other’s cause of death. Heart failure is often given by authorities as the cause of death in Russian custody in cases where torture and other ill-treatment has been alleged.
In what appears to be retaliatory action, the Azerbaijani authorities detained at least eight Russian nationals in Baku between 30 June and 1 July, under accusations ranging from espionage to drug trafficking to computer hacking. These include two journalists – Igor Kartavykh and Evgeny Belousov – detained during a raid on the office of Sputnik Azerbaijan, a state-run Russian media outlet which the Azerbaijani authorities had earlier deprived of accreditation. Others included IT specialists who had left Russia after the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, and at least one person who was reportedly visiting Azerbaijan as a tourist. Videos and photos of the arrests distributed by Azerbaijani law enforcement channels and photos taken in court during the remand hearing show Russian detainees with visible facial bruising and head injuries.
Evidence gathered by Amnesty International demonstrates how over a month since the introduction of its militarized aid distribution system, Israel has continued to use starvation of civilians as a weapon of war against Palestinians in the occupied Gaza Strip and to deliberately impose conditions of life calculated to bring about their physical destruction as part of its ongoing genocide.
Heartbreaking testimonies gathered from medical staff, parents of children hospitalized for malnutrition and displaced Palestinians struggling to survive paint a horrifying picture of acute levels of starvation and desperation in Gaza. Their accounts provide further evidence of the catastrophic suffering caused by Israel’s ongoing restrictions on life-saving aid and its deadly militarized aid scheme coupled with mass forced displacement, relentless bombardment and destruction of life-sustaining infrastructure.
“While the eyes of the world were diverted to the recent hostilities between Israel and Iran, Israel’s genocide has continued unabated in Gaza, including through the infliction of conditions of life that have created a deadly mix of hunger and disease pushing the population past breaking point,” said Agnès Callamard, Secretary General of Amnesty International.
In the month following Israel’s imposition of a militarized “‘aid” scheme run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), hundreds of Palestinians have been killed and thousands injured either near militarized distribution sites or en route to humanitarian aid convoys.
This devastating daily loss of life as desperate Palestinians try to collect aid is the consequence of their deliberate targeting by Israeli forces and the foreseeable consequence of irresponsible and lethal methods of distribution.
Agnès Callamard, Secretary General of Amnesty International.
“This devastating daily loss of life as desperate Palestinians try to collect aid is the consequence of their deliberate targeting by Israeli forces and the foreseeable consequence of irresponsible and lethal methods of distribution,” said Agnès Callamard.
By continuing to prevent UN and other key humanitarian organizations from distributing certain essential items, like food parcels, fuel and shelter, within Gaza and by maintaining a deadly, dehumanizing and ineffective militarized ‘aid’ scheme, Israeli authorities have turned aid-seeking into a booby trap for desperate starved Palestinians. They have also deliberately fueled chaos and compounded suffering instead of alleviating it. The aid delivered is also way below the humanitarian needs of a population that has been experiencing almost daily bombings for the last 20 months.
Israel has continued to restrict the entry of aid and impose its suffocating cruel blockade and even a full siege lasting nearly eighty days.
Agnès Callamard.
“As the occupying power, Israel has a legal obligation to ensure Palestinians in Gaza have access to food, medicine and other supplies essential for their survival. Instead, it has brazenly defied binding orders issued by the International Court of Justice in January, March and May 2024, to allow the unimpeded flow of aid to Gaza. Israel has continued to restrict the entry of aid and impose its suffocating cruel blockade and even a full siege lasting nearly eighty days,” said Agnès Callamard.
This must end now. Israel must lift all restrictions and allow unfettered, safe, and dignified access to humanitarian aid throughout Gaza immediately.”
Amnesty International interviewed 17 internally displaced people (10 women and seven men) as well as the parents of four children hospitalized for severe malnutrition, and four healthcare workers, across three hospitals in Gaza City and Khan Younis in May and June 2025.
Devastating impact on children
Even before the imposition of a total siege on 2 March 2025, slightly but insufficiently eased some 78 days later, Israel’s deliberate imposition of conditions of life calculated to destroy Palestinians had had a particularly devastating impact on young children and pregnant and breastfeeding women.
Since October 2023 at least 66 children have died as a direct result of malnutrition-related conditions. This figure does not include the many more children who have died as a result of preventable diseases exacerbated by malnutrition.
The victims include four-month-old baby, Jinan Iskafi, who tragically died on 3 May 2025 due to severe malnutrition. According to her medical report, which was reviewed by Amnesty International, Jinan was admitted to the Rantissi pediatric hospital due to severe dehydration and recurrent infections. She was diagnosed with Marasmus, a severe form of protein-energy malnutrition, chronic diarrhea, and a suspected case of immunodeficiency. The pediatrician treating her told Amnesty International that she required a specific lactose-free formula, which was not available due to the blockade.
Gaza’s decimated health sector, already overwhelmed with the volume of injuries, is struggling to deal with the influx of infants and children hospitalized for malnutrition. According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), as of 15 June 2025, a total of 18,741, children were hospitalized for acute malnutrition since the beginning of the year.
The vast majority of children suffering from malnutrition, however, cannot reach any hospital due to access challenges posed by displacement orders and heavy bombardment and ongoing military operations.
Numbers barely scratch the surface of the suffering in Gaza
Accounts from healthcare workers and displaced individuals paint an even more harrowing picture.
Susan Maarouf, a nutritional expert at the Nutrition unit in the Patient Friend Benevolent Society hospital in Gaza City, supported by the organizations Medical Aid for Palestinians and MedGlobal, said that in June 2024 the hospital opened a dedicated department for children aged six months to and five years to manage cases of severe malnutrition.
“Back then, Gaza City and the North Gaza governorate were hit by malnutrition [as a result of the tight blockade]. But this year for us the situation began to drastically get worse again in April. Since then, out of approximately 200-250 children we have screened daily for malnutrition. Nearly 15% showed signs associated with severe or moderate malnutrition,” she said.
In the worst cases visible signs include pale skin, falling hair and nails, and alarming weight loss. She expressed the profound helplessness of offering nutritional advice amid severe shortages of food, with fruit, vegetables and eggs only available at exorbitant prices, if at all: “In an ideal world, I would recommend the parents to provide the child with nutritious food, rich with protein. I would advise that they maintain a hygienic environment for their children; I would stress the importance of clean water… In our situation… any recommendation you give … sometimes you feel like you are rubbing salt into these parents’ wounds.”
Dr. Maarouf described the relentless cycle of malnutrition stating that in some cases children were re-hospitalized after being discharged:
“We treated one little girl, aged six, for nutritional edema, she had severe protein deficiency when she came in early May; with the treatment we gave her she showed signs of improvement, including gaining weight, becoming livelier… unfortunately she was recently admitted again because her condition relapsed. Like most families in Gaza, her family is displaced; they live in a tent; they have to rely on the lentil or rice they get from the community kitchen. It’s a cycle. With no aid getting in, you feel like as a hospital you only patch up the wound but eventually it will burst again.”
Doctors have also warned that the lives of newborn babies are at risk amid acute shortages of baby formula milk, especially for children with lactose-intolerance or other allergies.
One doctor said: “There is a milk crisis in Gaza overall. Also, we notice that new mothers, because they themselves are not eating properly or because of the panic, trauma and anxiety, are unable to breastfeed. So, to secure baby formula at all is a struggle. But if your child has allergies, it’s almost impossible to find special formula in any of Gaza’s hospitals for infants the failure to secure special baby formula can be a death sentence.”
At Nasser hospital in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, Dr. Wafaa Abu Nimer confirmed the dire situation, reporting that by 30 June 2025, 9 children were still being treated for malnutrition-related complications at her facility alone. She described the scenes they have witnessed over the past two months as “really unprecedented” with severe cases of nutritional edema or marasmus, muscle wasting. She also said that some are additionally suffering from injuries due to explosions from which they have not recovered.
Dr. Abu Nimer said that since Israel’s new aid distribution scheme began there has been no signs of improvement in the situation with hundreds of children screened for malnutrition on a daily basis in their pediatric emergency room. Mass displacement orders issued to the Khan Younis governorate in May made Nasser hospital out of reach for thousands of displaced families.
Dr. Abu Nimer described to Amnesty how the impact on children extends beyond the physical. “One girl whose hair fell out almost completely as a result of nutritional edema, kept asking me ‘doctor, will my hair grow again? Am I [still] beautiful?’ Abu Nimer said. “Even if these children recover completely, the scars will always remain with them. Medically we know that malnutrition amongst infants and small children may have long-term cognitive and developmental effects, but I don’t think enough attention is being given to the mental health and psychological impact [of starvation and war] on children and parents.”
She also conveyed the exhaustion felt by medical staff: “We as doctors are also exhausted, we are malnourished ourselves, most of us are also displaced and live in tents, yet we do our best to offer medical care, provide nutrient supplements and as much support as we can. We try to save lives, we try to alleviate the suffering, but there is very little we can do after discharge.”
Weaponized aid
While Israeli authorities continue to impose their unlawful blockade on the entry of aid and commercial supplies into the occupied Gaza Strip, hundreds of aid trucks remain stuck outside Gaza, waiting for an Israeli permit to enter.
OCHA reported that as of 16 June 2025, 852 trucks for UN and international humanitarian organizations, the majority of which carry food supplies, remain stuck in Al-Arish in Egypt, yet to receive a permit from the Israeli authorities to enter Gaza. Moreover, the partial easing of the total siege on 19 May did not include easing restrictions on certain critical supplies, such as fuel and cooking gas, which have not been allowed into Gaza since 2 March. Without fuel, electricity cannot be produced to allow, for example, life-saving medical devices to function.
Only a trickle of the extremely limited aid allowed by Israel into Gaza reaches those in need. It is either distributed through the inhumane and deadly militarized scheme run by the GHF, or is offloaded by desperate starved civilians, and in some cases, organized gangs. This grim reality is compounded by Israel’s deliberate destruction of or denial of access to life-sustaining infrastructure, including some of Gaza’s most fertile agricultural land and food production sources, like greenhouses and poultry farms.
The World Food Programme and local organizations were for the first time permitted to distribute flour in Gaza City on 26 June 2025. The relatively smooth distribution that took place with thousands waiting their turn and no reported injuries is a damning indictment of Israel’s militarized GHF scheme. All the evidence gathered, including testimonies which Amnesty International is receiving from victims and witnesses, suggest that the GHF was designed so as to placate international concerns while constituting another tool of Israel’s genocide.
“Not only has the international community failed to stop this genocide, but it has also allowed Israel to constantly reinvent new ways to destroy Palestinian lives in Gaza and trample on their human dignity,” said Agnès Callamard.
“States must cease their inertia and live up to their legal obligations. They must exercise all necessary pressure to ensure Israel lifts immediately and unconditionally its awful blockade and ends the genocide in Gaza. They must end any form of contribution to Israel’s unlawful conduct or risk complicity in atrocity crimes. This requires immediately suspending all military support to Israel, banning trade and investment that contribute to Israel’s genocide or other grave violations of international law.
“States should also adopt targeted sanctions, through international and regional mechanisms, against those Israeli officials most implicated in international crimes and cooperate with the International Criminal Court, including by implementing its arrest warrants.”
Background
According to figures obtained from the Palestinian Ministry of Health, the under-five mortality rate for 2024 in Gaza was recorded at 32.7 deaths per 1,000 live births, representing a sharp increase compared to the 13.6 rate reported in 2022. Maternal mortality has also more than doubled from an estimated 19 deaths per 100,000 live births in 2022 to 43 deaths per 100,000 in 2024.
Source: United States House of Representatives – Representative Delia Ramirez – Illinois (3rd District)
As Republicans expand funding for DHS’s unlawful actions, Congresswoman Ramirez demands answers from Secretary Noem on ICE’s overspending and misuse of taxpayers’ dollars
Washington, D.C. –Today, ahead of the House vote on the Republican One Big Ugly Bill, Congresswoman Delia C. Ramirez (IL-03)rallied Members of Congress and advocatesto oppose the GOP’s extreme reconciliation bill, the biggest transfer of wealth and betrayal of working families in recent American history. The bill represents devastating cuts to the programs and services working families rely on while expanding Trump and Noem’s resources for their mass detention, disappearance, and deportation agenda.
“It is important for people to know what is in this bill. Do you know who continues to be left out and betrayed? Working people. People of Color. Immigrants. Women. People with disabilities. The exact people who’ve had to fight and demand every freedom, every liberty this country has denied them. The Big Ugly Bill is just different packaging on the same old imperialist, segregationist policies our communities know so well,” said Congresswoman Ramirez.“And that is why I am here with a number of members of Congress who are ready to fight like HELL for you–not for billionaire bosses, not for Donald Trump, not for Secretary Noem.”
Ramirez was joined by Reps. Pramila Jayapal (WA-07), CHC Chair Adriano Espaillat (NY-13), Veronica Escobar (TX-16), Judy Chu (CA-28), Becca Balint (VT-AL), Maxine Dexter, M.D. (OR-03), Lou Correa (CA-46), Ayanna Pressley (MA-07), Ro Khanna (CA-17), Rashida Tlaib (MI-12), and Hank Johnson (GA-04). They were also joined by Izzy Volpe from United We Dream, Senior Policy Analyst Wendy Cervantes from the Center for Law and Social Policy, and Human Rights First President Uzra Zeya.
Despite reports of Trump and Noem’s uncontrolled spending on an anti-migrant operation, the Republican legislation, if passed and signed into law, would infuse over $150 billion into the Department of Homeland Security. The budget would expand detention centers, militarize immigration enforcement, strip legal rights of immigrants– including children–, and further erode legal protections and pathways. At the same time, the bill cuts funding for health care and nutrition programs, and strips tax credits from children—including U.S. citizens—simply because their parents are immigrants.
As part of her effort, Congresswoman Ramirez led 51 members in a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem regarding the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) pattern of overspending. In May 2025, Secretary Kristi Noem admitted to spending far beyond appropriated levels. With the legislation providing more funding for mass detention, Members of Congress are demanding clarity on how the agency has been using its funding, who is receiving contracts, and how ICE is funding the contracts when it is exceeding its appropriated budget.
“This spending spree has been as inhumane as it has been costly to taxpayers, including approximately $259 million already awarded to enrich private prison corporations to jail families since the start of the Trump administration,” wrote the Members.“The Administration’s move to secure massive profits for its donors and corporate bosses through mass deportations and detention is an ineffective, wasteful, and negligent enterprise.”
“Given recent reports of troubling trends and worsening conditions in detention facilities, DHS and ICE must prioritize their responsibility to ensure U.S. taxpayer funds are not misused to contravene individual liberty, fairness, and equality guaranteed under U.S. law or to benefit entities that facilitate such acts,” the Member added.
The letter was signed by LaMonica McIver (NJ-10), Shri Thanedar (MI-13), Juan Vargas (CA-52), Jan Schakowsky (IL-09), Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC), Rashida Tlaib (MI-12), Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (NY-14), Ilhan Omar (MN-05), Robert J. Menendez (NJ-08), Yvette D. Clarke (NY-09), Bonnie Watson Coleman (NJ-12), Henry C. “Hank” Johnson, Jr. (GA-04), Jesús G. “Chuy” García (IL-04), Jared Huffman (CA-02), Yassamin Ansari (AZ-03), Danny K. Davis (IL-07, Alma S. Adams, Ph.D. (NC-12), Paul D. Tonko (NY-20), Bennie G. Thompson (MS-2), Lateefah Simon (CA-12), André Carson (IN-07), Janelle S. Bynum (OR-05), Pramila Jayapal (WA-07), Troy A. Carter, Sr. (LA-02), Lou Correa (CA-46), Adriano Espaillat (NY-13), Nydia M. Velázquez (NY-07), Sylvia R. Garcia (TX-29), Jasmine Crockett (TX-30), Jonathan L. Jackson (IL-01), Gabe Vasquez (NM-02), Mark DeSaulnier (CA-10), Jimmy Gomez (CA-34), Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick (FL-20), Maxine Dexter (OR-03), Darren Soto (FL-09), Greg Casar (TX-35), Dan Goldman (NY-10), Frederica S. Wilson (FL-24), Betty McCollum (MN-04), Mark Pocan (WI-02), Nanette Diaz Barragán (CA-44), Andrea Salinas (OR-06), Veronica Escobar (TX-16), Dina Titus (NV-01), Dwight Evans (PA-03), Nikema Williams (GA-05), Adam Smith (WA-09), Robin L. Kelly (IL-02), Val Hoyle (OR-04), and Summer L. Lee (PA-12).
Click here for the full text of the letter.
Click here for a recording of the press conference.
Liverpool’s Portuguese forward Diogo Jota, 28, died in a car crash near Zamora in northwestern Spain with his brother, the Portuguese Football Federation said on Thursday.
The regional fire department of Castile and Leon, where Zamora is located, said on its website a car crashed early on Thursday, shortly after midnight, and burst into flames, with two men, aged 28 and 26, found dead.
“We have lost two champions. Their deaths represent irreparable losses for Portuguese football, and we will do everything we can to honour their legacy every day,” the Portuguese Football Federation said in a statement.
Spanish police told Reuters they could not yet officially confirm the names of the deceased, but everything pointed to it being Jota and his brother. The Lamborghini they were travelling veered off the road, the spokesperson said.
The bodies have been taken to a forensics unit in nearby Zamora where autopsies will be performed, they said.
Jota, who got married on June 28, helped Liverpool win the Premier League last season and also won the FA Cup and League Cup with the Merseyside outfit.
Jota arrived at Anfield from Wolverhampton Wanderers in 2020 and scored 65 goals in 182 appearances for the club in all competitions.
He also made 49 appearances for Portugal, twice winning the UEFA Nations League.
India Inc has shown remarkable financial strength over the last five years, with corporate profits growing nearly three times faster than the country’s GDP between FY20 and FY25, a new report said on Thursday.
The profit-to-GDP ratio has risen significantly to 6.9 per cent — reflecting strong earnings performance despite economic challenges, according to the data compiled by Ionic Wealth (Angel One).
The report, titled ‘India Inc. FY25: Decoding Earnings Trends & Path Ahead’, highlights that FY25 was a resilient year for Indian companies.
Revenue of Nifty 500 firms grew by 6.8 per cent year-on-year (YoY), while EBITDA rose by 10.4 per cent and profit after tax (PAT) increased by 5.6 per cent.
Notably, mid-cap and small-cap companies outshined large-cap firms in terms of profit growth, recording 22 per cent and 17 per cent PAT growth respectively, compared to just 3 per cent for large caps.
Sector-wise, BFSI (banking, financial services and insurance) emerged as a major driver of profitability, with its share of total profits nearly doubling since the pandemic.
Auto, capital goods, and consumer durables also posted healthy earnings growth.
Consumer durables led with a massive 57 per cent PAT growth in FY25, followed by healthcare at 36 per cent and capital goods at 26 per cent, as per the report.
Companies also benefited from margin improvements in sectors such as cement, chemicals, metals, and auto, helped by easing inflation and better input cost management.
The report also points to a significant jump in capital expenditure plans. India Inc. aims to nearly double its capex to Rs 72.25 lakh crore during FY26–30, with a majority of the investment expected to be self-funded.
Around 80 per cent of this capex is focused on upgrading existing operations and generating new income, with sectors like power, green energy, telecom, auto, and cement leading the next wave of investments.
Looking ahead to FY26, the outlook varies by sector. Banks and NBFCs may see loan growth stabilise as interest rates are expected to ease in the second half of the year.
The IT sector is likely to witness a recovery, driven by cost-optimisation deals and demand from BFSI clients.
Pharma growth will be supported by expansion in chronic therapies and hospital networks, while the FMCG sector is expected to benefit from improving rural demand and a good monsoon, the report said.
India Inc has shown remarkable financial strength over the last five years, with corporate profits growing nearly three times faster than the country’s GDP between FY20 and FY25, a new report said on Thursday.
The profit-to-GDP ratio has risen significantly to 6.9 per cent — reflecting strong earnings performance despite economic challenges, according to the data compiled by Ionic Wealth (Angel One).
The report, titled ‘India Inc. FY25: Decoding Earnings Trends & Path Ahead’, highlights that FY25 was a resilient year for Indian companies.
Revenue of Nifty 500 firms grew by 6.8 per cent year-on-year (YoY), while EBITDA rose by 10.4 per cent and profit after tax (PAT) increased by 5.6 per cent.
Notably, mid-cap and small-cap companies outshined large-cap firms in terms of profit growth, recording 22 per cent and 17 per cent PAT growth respectively, compared to just 3 per cent for large caps.
Sector-wise, BFSI (banking, financial services and insurance) emerged as a major driver of profitability, with its share of total profits nearly doubling since the pandemic.
Auto, capital goods, and consumer durables also posted healthy earnings growth.
Consumer durables led with a massive 57 per cent PAT growth in FY25, followed by healthcare at 36 per cent and capital goods at 26 per cent, as per the report.
Companies also benefited from margin improvements in sectors such as cement, chemicals, metals, and auto, helped by easing inflation and better input cost management.
The report also points to a significant jump in capital expenditure plans. India Inc. aims to nearly double its capex to Rs 72.25 lakh crore during FY26–30, with a majority of the investment expected to be self-funded.
Around 80 per cent of this capex is focused on upgrading existing operations and generating new income, with sectors like power, green energy, telecom, auto, and cement leading the next wave of investments.
Looking ahead to FY26, the outlook varies by sector. Banks and NBFCs may see loan growth stabilise as interest rates are expected to ease in the second half of the year.
The IT sector is likely to witness a recovery, driven by cost-optimisation deals and demand from BFSI clients.
Pharma growth will be supported by expansion in chronic therapies and hospital networks, while the FMCG sector is expected to benefit from improving rural demand and a good monsoon, the report said.
York residents looking for work, support with training or getting new qualifications are invited to this month’s York Jobs Fair.
The popular event will be held at from 11am- 2pm on Tuesday 8 July at The LNER Lounge, York Stadium, Huntington, and will showcase representatives from employers including Aldwark Manor, TempleSpa, Watches of Switzerland Group, Heart of Yorkshire Education Group and York Learning.
Specialist careers advisors will be available throughout the day to provide support and advice and answer questions. Quiet space will also be available for anyone wanting to complete an application form.
Cllr Pete Kilbane, Deputy Leader of the Council and Executive Member for Economy and Culture, with responsibility for Skills, said:
“Our jobs fairs are always incredibly popular with residents and employers, and rightly so.
“They have a great track record of providing employers with the right local candidates to fill their vacancies, as well as providing a host of opportunities to upskill.
“I’d urge anyone who’s looking for a job or who wants a change of career to come along and see what training and employment opportunities are available locally.”
Milan Kundera opens his novel The Book of Laughter and Forgetting with a scene from the winter of 1948. Klement Gottwald, leader of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, is giving a speech to the masses from a palace balcony, surrounded by fellow party members. Comrade Vladimir Clementis thoughtfully places his fur hat on Gottwald’s bare head; the hat then features in an iconic photograph.
Four years later, Clementis is found guilty of being a bourgeois nationalist and hanged. His ashes are strewn on a Prague street. The propaganda section of the party removes him from written history and erases him from the photograph.
“Nothing remains of Clementis,” writes Kundera, “but the fur hat on Gottwald’s head.”
Review: Memory Lane: The Perfectly Imperfect Ways We Remember – Ciara Greene & Gillian Murphy (Princeton University Press)
Efforts to enforce political forgetting are often associated with totalitarian regimes. The state endeavours to control not only its citizens, but also the past. To create a narrative that glorifies the present and idealises the future, history must be rewritten or even completely obliterated.
In a famous article on “the totalitarian ego”, the social psychologist Anthony Greenwald argued that individual selves operate in the same way. We deploy an array of cognitive biases to maintain a sense of control, and to shape and reshape our personal history. We distort the present and fabricate the past to ensure we remain the heroes of our life narratives.
Likening the individual to a destructive political system might sound extreme, but it has an element of truth. Memory Lane, a new book by Irish psychology researchers Ciara Greene and Gillian Murphy, shows how autobiographical memory has a capacity to rewrite history that is almost Stalinesque.
There is no shortage of books on memory, from self-help guides for the anxiously ageing to scholarly works of history. Memory Lane is distinctive for taking the standpoint of applied cognitive psychology. Emphasising how memory functions in everyday life, Greene and Murphy explore the processes of memory and the influences that shape them.
What memory is not
The key message of the book is that the memory system is not a recording device. We may be tempted to see memory as a vault where past experience is faithfully preserved, but in fact it is fundamentally reconstructive.
Memories are constantly revised in acts of recollection. They change in predictable ways over time, moulded by new information, our prior beliefs and current emotions, other people’s versions of events, or an interviewer’s leading questions.
According to Greene and Murphy’s preferred analogy, memory is like a Lego tower. A memory is initially constructed from a set of elements, but over time some will be lost as the structure simplifies to preserve the gist of the event. Elements may also be added as new information is incorporated and the memory is refashioned to align with the person’s beliefs and expectations.
The malleability of memory might look like a weakness, especially by comparison to digital records. Memory Lane presents it as a strength. Humans did not evolve to log objective truths for posterity, but to operate flexibly in a complex and changing world.
From an adaptive standpoint, the past only matters insofar as it helps us function in the present. Our knowledge should be updated by new information. We should assimilate experiences to already learned patterns. And we should be tuned to our social environment, rather than insulated from it.
“If all our memories existed in some kind of mental quarantine, separate from the rest of our knowledge and experiences,” the authors write, “it would be like using a slow, inefficient computer program that could only show you one file at a time, never drawing connections or updating incorrect impressions.”
Simplifying and discarding memories is also beneficial because our cognitive capacity is limited. It is better to filter out what matters from the deluge of past experiences than to be overwhelmed with irrelevancies. Greene and Murphy present the case of a woman with exceptional autobiographical memory, who is plagued by the triggering of obsolete memories.
Forgetting doesn’t merely de-clutter memory; it also serves emotional ends. Selectively deleting unpleasant memories increases happiness. Sanding off out-of-character experiences fosters a clear and stable sense of self.
“Hindsight bias” boosts this feeling of personal continuity by bringing our recollections into line with our current beliefs. Revisionist history it may be, but it is carried out in the service of personal identity.
‘Forgetting doesn’t merely de-clutter memory; it also serves emotional ends.’ Shutterstock
Eyewitness memories and misinformation
Memory Lane pays special attention to situations in which memory errors have serious consequences, such as eyewitness testimony. Innocent people can be convicted on the basis of inaccurate eyewitness identifications. An array of biases make these more likely and they are especially common in interracial contexts.
Recollections can also be influenced by the testimony of other witnesses, and even by the language used during questioning. In a classic study, participants who viewed videos of car accidents estimated the car’s speed as substantially faster when the cars were described as having “smashed” rather than “contacted”. These distortions are not temporary: new information overwrites and overrides the original memory.
Misinformation works in a similar way and with equally dire consequences, such as vaccination avoidance. False information not only modifies existing memories but can even produce false memories, especially when it aligns with our preexisting beliefs and ideologies.
Greene and Murphy present intriguing experimental evidence that false memories are prevalent and easy to implant. Children and older adults seem especially susceptible to misinformation, but no one is immune, regardless of education or intelligence.
Reassuringly, perhaps, digital image manipulation and deepfake videos are no more likely to induce false memories than good old-fashioned verbiage. A doctored picture may not be worth a thousand words when it comes to warping memory.
Memory Lane devotes some time to the “memory wars” of the 1980s and 1990s, when debate raged over the existence of repressed memories. Greene and Murphy argue the now mainstream view that many traumatic memories supposedly recovered in therapy were false memories induced by therapists. Memories for traumatic events are not repressed, they argue, and traumatic memories are neither qualitatively different from other memories, nor stored separately from them.
Here the science of memory runs contrary to the wildly popular claims of writers such as psychiatrist Bessel van der Kolk, author of the bestseller The Body Keeps the Score.
Psychology researchers Ciara Greene (left) and Gillian Murphy (right) want us to be humbler about our fallible memories. Princeton University Press
Misunderstanding memory
The authors of Memory Lane contend that we hold memory to unrealistic standards of accuracy, completeness and stability. When people misremember the past or change their recollections, we query their honesty or mental health. When our own memories are hazy, we worry about cognitive decline.
Greene and Murphy argue that it is in the very nature of memory to be fallible, malleable and limited. This message is heartening, but it does not clarify why we would expect memory to be more capacious, coherent and durable in the first place. Nor does it explain why we persist with this wrongheaded expectation, despite so much evidence to the contrary.
The authors hint that our mistake might have its roots in dominant metaphors of memory. If we now understand the mind as computer-like, we will see memories as digital traces that sit, silent and unchanging, in a vast storage system.
“Many of the catastrophic consequences of memory distortion arise not because our individual memories are terrible,” they argue, “but because we have unrealistic expectations about how memory works, treating it as a video camera rather than a reconstruction.”
In earlier times, when memory was likened to a telephone switchboard or to books or, for the ancient Greeks, to wax tablets, memory errors and erasures may have seemed less surprising and more tolerable.
These shifting technological analogies, explored historically in Douwe Draaisma’s Metaphors of Memory, may partly account for our extravagant expectations for memory. Expecting silicon chip performance from carbon-based organisms, who evolved to care more about adaptation than truth, would be foolish.
But there is surely more to this than metaphor. All aspects of our lives are increasingly recorded and datafied, a process that demands objectivity, accuracy and consistency. The recorded facts of the matter determine who should be rewarded, punished and regulated. The bounded and mutable nature of human memory presents a challenge to this digital regime.
Human memory is also increasingly taxed by the overwhelming and accelerating volume of information that assails us. Our frustration with its limitations reflects the desperate mismatch we feel between human nature and the impersonal systems of data in which we live.
Greene and Murphy urge us to relax. We should be humbler about our memory, and more realistic and forgiving about the memories of others. We should not be judgemental about the errors and inconsistencies of friends, or overconfident about our own recollections. And we should remember that, although memory is fallible, it is fallible in beneficial ways.
A person whose memory system always kept an accurate record of our lives would be profoundly impaired, Greene and Murphy argue. Such a person “would struggle to plan for the future, learn from the past, or respond flexibly to unexpected events”. Brimming with insights such as these, Memory Lane offers an informative and readable account of how the apparent weaknesses of human memory may be strengths in disguise.
Nick Haslam receives funding from the Australian Research Council.
Ice loss in Antarctica and its impact on the planet – sea level rise, changes to ocean currents and disturbance of wildlife and food webs – has been in the news a lot lately. All of these threats were likely on the minds of the delegates to the annual Antarctic Treaty Consultative Meeting, which finishes up today in Milan, Italy.
This meeting is where decisions are made about the continent’s future. These decisions rely on evidence from scientific research. Moreover, only countries that produce significant Antarctic research – as well as being parties to the treaty – get to have a final say in these decisions.
Our new report – published as a preprint through the University of the Arctic – shows the rate of research on the Antarctic and Southern Ocean is falling at exactly the time when it should be increasing. Moreover, research leadership is changing, with China taking the lead for the first time.
This points to a dangerous disinvestment in Antarctic research just when it is needed, alongside a changing of the guard in national influence. Antarctica and the research done there are key to everyone’s future, so it’s vital to understand what this change might lead to.
Why is Antarctic research so important?
With the Antarctic region rapidly warming, its ice shelves destabilising and sea ice shrinking, understanding the South Polar environment is more crucial than ever.
Research to understand these impacts is vital. First, knowing the impact of our actions – particularly carbon emissions – gives us an increased drive to make changes and lobby governments to do so.
Second, even when changes are already locked in, to prepare ourselves we need to know what these changes will look like.
And third, we need to understand the threats to the Antarctic and Southern Ocean environment to govern it properly. This is where the treaty comes in.
Fifty-eight countries are parties to the treaty, but only 29 of them – called consultative parties – can make binding decisions about the region. They comprise the 12 original signatories from 1959, along with 17 more recent signatory nations that produce substantial scientific research relating to Antarctica.
This makes research a key part of a nation’s influence over what happens in Antarctica.
For most of its history, the Antarctic Treaty System has functioned remarkably well. It maintained peace in the region during the Cold War, facilitated scientific cooperation, and put arguments about territorial claims on indefinite hold. It indefinitely forbade mining, and managed fisheries.
Because decisions are made by consensus, any country can effectively block progress. Russia and China – both long-term actors in the system – have been at the centre of the impasse.
Tracking the amount of Antarctic research being done tells us whether nations as a whole are investing enough in understanding the region and its global impact.
It also tells us which nations are investing the most and are therefore likely to have substantial influence.
Our new report examined the number of papers published on Antarctic and Southern Ocean topics from 2016 to 2024, using the Scopus database. We also looked at other factors, such as the countries affiliated with each paper.
The results show five significant changes are happening in the world of Antarctic research.
The number of Antarctic and Southern Ocean publications peaked in 2021 and then fell slightly yearly through to 2024.
While the United States has for decades been the leader in Antarctic research, China overtook them in 2022.
If we look only at the high-quality publications (those published in the best 25% of journals) China still took over the US, in 2024.
Of the top six countries in overall publications (China, the US, the United Kingdom, Australia, Germany and Russia) all except China have declined in publication numbers since 2016.
Although collaboration in publications is higher for Antarctic research than in non-Antarctic fields, Russia, India and China have anomalously low rates of co-authorship compared with many other signatory countries.
Why is this research decline a problem?
A recent parliamentary inquiry in Australia emphasised the need for funding certainty. In the UK, a House of Commons committee report considered it “imperative for the UK to significantly expand its research efforts in Antarctica”, in particular in relation to sea level rise.
US commentators have pointed to the inadequacy of the country’s icebreaker infrastructure. The Trump administration’s recent cuts to Antarctic funding are only likely to exacerbate the situation. Meanwhile China has built a fifth station in Antarctica and announced plans for a sixth.
Given the nation’s population and global influence, China’s leadership in Antarctic research is not surprising. If China were to take a lead in Antarctic environmental protection that matched its scientific heft, its move to lead position in the research ranks could be positive. Stronger multi-country collaboration in research could also strengthen overall cooperation.
But the overall drop in global Antarctic research investment is a problem however you look at it. We ignore it at our peril.
Elizabeth Leane receives funding from the Australian Research Council, the Dutch Research Council, the Council on Australian and Latin American Relations DFAT and HX (Hurtigruten Expeditions). She has received in-kind support from Hurtigruten Expeditions in the recent past. The University of Tasmania is a member of the UArctic, which has provided support for this project.
Keith Larson is affiliated with the UArctic and European Polar Board. The UArctic paid for the development and publication of this report. The UArctic Thematic Network on Research Analytics and Bibliometrics conducted the analysis and developed the report. The Arctic Centre at Umeå University provided in-kind support for staff time on the report.
