Marco Rubio to visit Rome, reportedly to ‘thaw’ US relations with Pope and Meloni 03. May 2026 (12:43) US secretary of state will be in Italian capital on Thursday and Friday, the one-year anniversary of Pope Leo’s papacyThe US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, is to travel to Rome this week for a visit reportedly aimed at thawing frosty relations with the Italian government and the Vatican.Rubio is scheduled to be in the Italian capital on Thursday and Friday, which will also mark the one-year anniversary of the papacy of Pope Leo, the first US-born pontiff. Continue reading...(The Guardian)
‘Apartheid in the US’: Arizona’s secretary of state fights Trump’s plot to amass a ‘master list’ of voters 03. May 2026 (12:00) Database could be used to regulate opponents, from ‘shutting off bank accounts’ to healthcare, official warnsDonald Trump is attempting to select his own citizenry and control who can vote by gathering the personal details of all Americans, Arizona’s top election official has warned.Adrian Fontes, Arizona’s Democratic secretary of state, fears that the Trump administration’s active efforts to forcibly extract voter files from 30 states including Fontes’s own are part of a bigger plan to gather vital information on all US citizens into a centralised database. “Trump is trying to amass a master list that will allow him to declare someone an enemy of the state,” he said. Continue reading...(The Guardian)
UK airlines given green light to cancel or consolidate flights to conserve jet fuel 03. May 2026 (11:11) Carriers examining which flights can be cancelled with least disruption under plans to avoid summer travel chaosUK airlines will be able to cancel or consolidate flights this summer under new plans to conserve jet fuel as the war in the Middle East continues to disrupt supplies.The measures are being taken to avoid major disruption as Britons jet off on their summer holidays. Airlines are looking carefully at their timetables to see which flights can be cancelled in advance and cause the least delays. Continue reading...(The Guardian)
Gaza flotilla activists from Spain and Brazil appear in Israeli court 03. May 2026 (11:02) Court extends detention of two men who were among 175 people intercepted in Mediterranean on ThursdayTwo foreign activists from a Gaza-bound flotilla who were brought to Israel for interrogation have appeared before an Israeli court, a rights group defending them has said.The flotilla of more than 50 vessels had set sail from France, Spain and Italy with the aim of breaking an Israeli blockade of Gaza and bringing supplies to the devastated Palestinian territory. Continue reading...(The Guardian)
UK ‘invention agency’ grants £50m of public money to US tech and venture capital firms 03. May 2026 (11:00) Exclusive: Brainchild of Dominic Cummings, Aria is aimed at funding ‘crazy’ scientific projects to benefit the UKBritain’s “invention agency” has pledged £50m of UK taxpayer money to US tech companies and venture capital projects.Dreamed up by Dominic Cummings to fund “crazy” ideas, the Advanced Research and Invention Agency (Aria) is meant to “restore Britain’s place as a scientific superpower”. Continue reading...(The Guardian)
‘It’s like a cat and mouse game’: on the frontline of Belgium’s fight against drug smugglers 03. May 2026 (10:00) Antwerp port is stepping up scanning of goods amid warnings country risks becoming a narco-stateSara Van Cotthem takes a safety knife and precisely slices open the side of a cardboard box to unpack its contents, an aluminium stepladder made in China. Working under harsh fluorescent lights at the border inspection post at the port of Antwerp, Van Cotthem checks the paperwork and taps the ladder with a magnet to check if it really is aluminium and not another metal.It is an everyday operation for customs officers at Antwerp, one of Europe’s main commercial gateways, which handled the equivalent of 13.6m 20ft-long (6 metres) containers last year. Everything is in order and the lorry, jam-packed with identical boxed ladders, can get on its way to Germany. Continue reading...(The Guardian)
One in three HR leaders face opposition to inclusion schemes, study finds 03. May 2026 (09:00) Exclusive: Resistance to equity, diversion and inclusion drives affects hiring chances of people with convictions, says charityMore than a third of HR decision-makers in the UK said they have faced pushback against equity, diversity and inclusion (EDI) initiatives over the past year, according to new research.The new YouGov poll, carried out for the national employment charity Working Chance, surveyed 565 HR decision-makers and found that resistance towards EDI was on the rise. Continue reading...(The Guardian)
Dynamic pay on platforms such as Uber should be banned, says TUC 03. May 2026 (08:00) Exclusive: Union body finds workers describing themselves as ‘gambling’ because wages felt like the outcome of chance rather than workThe practice of using “dynamic pricing” to set pay on gig economy platforms including Uber should be banned because it leaves workers at the mercy of shadowy algorithms with no certainty over their earnings, trade union leaders have urged.In a report exposing the human cost of the gig economy practice, the Trades Union Congress said pay was becoming decoupled from time, skill or effort. Instead, work had become a speculative practice with the rewards determined by an algorithmic process with little transparency. Continue reading...(The Guardian)
Polanski takes combative approach as Greens enter media spotlight 03. May 2026 (07:00) From legitimate scrutiny to lurid scare stories, the Green party’s rise has brought a sudden spike in attentionIt is the lot of smaller parties that grow rapidly that they tend to endure something of a trial by the media in the UK. The attention from some of the newspapers and broadcasters to the Green party before this week’s elections has occasionally borne an unlikely resemblance to the height of Clegg-mania in the spring of 2010, when the Liberal Democrat leader, Nick Clegg, was rewarded for his positive polling with the unlikely Daily Mail headline “Clegg in Nazi slur on Britain”.All manner of colourful tales have emerged about Green policies and personnel as the party has risen up the national opinion polls, making them something of a target for news editors and reporters. That attention has ranged from legitimate questions over the views of members to more eccentric warnings of a dire future for everyone in Britain from exotic animals to members of the clergy. Continue reading...(The Guardian)
Nato meetings with TV and film-makers prompt claims it is seeking ‘propaganda’ 03. May 2026 (06:00) Exclusive: Two ‘intimate conversations’ held with writers, directors and producers, with a third due in JuneNato is holding closed-door meetings with film and TV screenwriters, directors and producers across Europe and the US, the Guardian can reveal, prompting accusations the alliance is seeking to use the arts to generate “propaganda” for the bloc.The alliance has held three meetings with film and TV professionals in Los Angeles, Brussels and Paris and is due to continue its “series of intimate conservations” next month in London, meeting with screenwriter members of the Writers’ Guild of Great Britain (WGGB), which represents professional writers in the UK. Continue reading...(The Guardian)
