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In the wake of the Brexit vote we're seeing the summer of leadership campaigns. A political realignment is key to UKIP, which to all intents and purposes has achieved its goal and could shut up shop and walk away. | Deborah McGurranPolitical editor, East of England
Instead, along with Labour and the Green Party, UKIP is going through a leadership contest. For a party forged to force a referendum and pull us out of Europe, the challenges, now that has been achieved, are obvious. What next for the hundred plus councillors in this region, for its three MEPs and for the only UKIP MP?
Clacton MP, Douglas Carswell, has told us he is not going to publicly endorse any of the candidates, but is still stirring the pot over the former leader, Nigel Farage, whom he says was not always easy to work with. Mr Carswell hopes with good will and trust all that will change in the future.
Those are sentiments that have seemed in short supply in the contest so far, as three members of UKIP's National Executive quit after one of the favourites to take over as leader was kept off the ballot paper.
While Mr Carswell is going to keep his own council, East of England MEP Patrick O'Flynn has pinned his colours to the mast and is backing Cambridgeshire councillor Lisa Duffy for the top job.
"Lisa is a fantastic organiser, she's got an unrivalled commitment to UKIP... she personifies a grassroots approach and I think that will stand UKIP in very good stead, post the EU, in winning first-past-the-post elections in Britain," he told me.
'Prison is punishment'
Lisa herself has outlined the kind of policies she would like to see.
"The biggest policy for me is law and order... being tough on crime. Sentences meaning what they are, if you get five years, you serve five years... People need to understand the prison is punishment, not a holiday camp," she said.
"But also we need to be the party of the NHS. We have to make sure it is the national service, not the world health service... it needs the investment and the time. It needs developing doctors and nurses from this country, as well as taking experts from around the world."
Ms Duffy says she is setting out a positive vision for Muslims in our country, but doesn't step back from the argument over wearing the burka in public.
"We want to make sure that face coverings and that includes hoodies, crash helmets and balaclavas are not worn in areas of high security - public areas. What people do in their own home is entirely up to them, but it you are in a court, in an airport lobby or in areas such as banks, they need to be able to see your face."
UKIP's new vision
This is part of what UKIP calls a new softer approach. "We have been really hard line on immigration and we've been hard line about coming out of the EU. Now is about a softer message," said Lisa Duffy.
"It is about showing the electorate we have a wide range of policies and good ideas to suit the working man. That will make us have more than one MP in Westminster. We will be electable," she pledged.
Patrick O'Flynn agreed: "She [Lisa Duffy] is exactly the sort of person we need for the next phase of UKIP, post Nigel Farage. We don't want an imitation Nigel Farage."
We will know in September whether her particular brand of UKIP wins out, but there's no doubt the party will change, said Mr O'Flynn.
"The party needs reform. It has a choice. Does it go back to being a dry libertarian ultra-Thatcherite party that wants to cut taxes for the rich and turn a blind eye to tax avoidance by corporations?
"Or should it be a more blue collar, proper working people party, in the centre ground, fully supporting the NHS and taking corporate tax avoidance more seriously, and focussing its tax cutting offer on ordinary working people?"
He agreed that whenever there's a leadership contest, there's a battle for the hearts and minds of the party. "People get to set out their stall. You get rival camps, rival visions of the future."
For UKIP, a lot depends on which view wins.
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A "turnaround specialist" is needed to head up the new tourism group Visit Jersey, its director has said. | Kevin Keen, Visit Jersey's transition director, said a chief executive would soon be in charge with an aim to attract more visitors.
Visit Jersey will be independent of the government and replace the current department, Jersey Tourism.
Kevin Keen, Visit Jersey's transition director, said it was close to choosing a preferred candidate.
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Part of the Caen Hill section of the Kennet and Avon Canal in Wiltshire has been closed after a boat damaged a pair of lock gates. | A spokesman for British Waterways said the gates were damaged beyond repair. Replacing them could take up to two weeks.
The stretch of water is closed between locks 22 and 24.
The flight of 29 locks over a 2m (3.2km) stretch of the canal near Devizes helps raise barges 237ft (72m).
A £500,000 gate refurbishment programme is under way. It will see 16 new gates installed.
The damaged gates were part of that refurbishment but will now be replaced earlier than scheduled.
Visitors to the tourist attraction can still use the tow path, which remains open.
Related Internet Links
British Waterways
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A pharmacist has denied murdering his wife at their Middlesbrough home. | Mitesh Patel, 37, pleaded not guilty to the murder of Jessica Patel when he appeared via videolink at Teesside Crown Court.
Mrs Patel, 34, who ran the Roman Road Pharmacy in Middlesbrough with her husband, was found dead at the couple's home on The Avenue in May.
Mr Patel was remanded in custody until his trial, which is due to start in November.
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It's hard to believe that Jonestown ever existed. | By Sarah GraingerBBC News, Guyana
The patch of rainforest in remote northern Guyana where Jim Jones moved his People's Temple in the 1970s has been almost entirely reclaimed by the jungle.
Locals say if you search long enough, you can still find remnants of a tractor used for transport and agriculture and a filing cabinet that would have kept documents about the community.
The metal drums in which Jones mixed cyanide and fruit punch in preparation for the mass murder-suicide which took place at the site 33 years ago are also still in place.
"We should make sure it's not forgotten by the young people. They should know what can happen," says 80-year-old Wilfred Jupiter, a labourer who helped clear the land and build Jonestown in the 1970s.
Guyana is still the undeveloped backwater that first attracted the self-appointed Reverend Jim Jones. A former British colonial outpost in South America, its tropical location has done little for its tourist industry. It lacks the turquoise waters and white sandy beaches of nearby Caribbean islands.
But some Guyanese would like to see the notoriety it gained through its connection with Jones converted into tourist dollars.
Carlton Daniels is the former postmaster in Port Kaituma, a scrappy mining town close to the old Jonestown compound. He's one of the few residents who remembers what happened there.
"Bringing in some tourist dollars could be good for development. There's a lot of gold mining right now, but minerals don't last for ever," he says.
'Most horrific scene'
Guyana unwittingly became the focus of media attention when Jones leased land there in 1974 to set up a branch of his People's Temple. In Jones' native United States, the cult had garnered criticism; some members had defected.
English-speaking and largely undeveloped, Guyana offered a place for Jones to set up a commune away from prying eyes. Cult members built a school, a pavilion and cottages, growing what food they could in the tropical heat. But the critics' worst fears were realised on 18 November 1978.
After escaped cult members complained that the organisation was being run like a prison camp, US Congressman Leo Ryan visited Jonestown to try to help some residents to leave.
As they got ready to board a plane at a nearby airstrip, some of Jones' security guards opened fire. Ryan was killed, along with four others.
"It was the most horrific scene, and it hasn't left me yet," says Gerry Gouveia.
As a young pilot in the military, he was one of the first on the scene.
"The priority was to evacuate the wounded from the airstrip and then we went back for the bodies, but we still had no idea about what was happening in Jonestown itself."
After the shootings at the airstrip, Jones had gathered the remaining residents of the People's Temple and made them drink punch laced with cyanide.
Many "drank the Kool-Aid" but others were shot or had their throats cut. Jones himself was found shot dead. A total of 918 people died, all of them US citizens.
In memory
The compound was reclaimed by the jungle while Guyana dropped out of the headlines. Now, some Guyanese would like to see Jonestown redeveloped as a way of bringing much-needed income to the local area and putting this forgotten country on the tourism map.
"What we need to do is attract people to come to Guyana, whether that attraction is Jonestown or Kaieteur Falls or birding or ecotourism or cricket, to see what a wonderful country Guyana has turned out to be," says Mr Gouveia, who now runs his own airline and tour company.
The country erected a plaque at the site two years ago that reads "In Memory of the Victims of the Jonestown Tragedy".
Events are sometimes held on 18 November to commemorate the tragedy, although this year the anniversary is overshadowed by upcoming presidential elections. But the authorities in Guyana acknowledge that much more could be done.
"It's possible to recreate something to give people a walk-through experience, to show the videos and literature, to put up a museum of Jonestown," says Indranauth Haralsingh, director of the Guyanese tourism authority. "There could be targeted marketing first to the US and then elsewhere."
Other nations have shown that it's possible to commemorate atrocities with compassion and provide the opportunity for tourists to reflect on past events.
At the former concentration camp at Auschwitz, visitors can tread the same path as those who were about to enter the gas chambers. In Kigali, a memorial centre remembers the Rwandan genocide, a tragedy less than 20 years old.
But Guyana's government is wary of marrying the country's public image inextricably to Jonestown.
"We don't want to bring back the association with Jonestown and tragedy," Mr Haralsingh says. "So it's not our priority."
Advocates for a memorial centre at Jonestown face one huge hurdle - the remote location of the site.
Like much of Guyana's interior, there are no paved roads and few flights into this section of the rainforest. Jonestown will likely be left deep in the jungle.
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Welcome to the Daily and Sunday Politics manifesto tracker. As the name suggests, it tracks the progress the government is making - or not - in achieving the promises made by the Conservatives in their 2015 general election manifesto and major policy announcements. | The traffic light scorecard above shows the current status of all of the policies. The tracker will be updated over the course of this parliament.
The tracker has been broken down into policy areas, which can be explored by clicking on each of the links below.
Manifesto tracker by theme
This section deals with housing. This is a devolved area: read more.
HOUSING
Extend the Right to Buy to Housing Association tenants
- Manifesto, page 51
Deliver 275,000 additional affordable homes by 2020
- Manifesto, page 52
Build 200,000 quality Starter Homes over the course of the next Parliament, reserved for first-time buyers under 40 and sold at 20 per cent below the market price
- Manifesto, page 52
Continue the Help to Buy mortgage guarantee until the start of 2017, and the Help to Buy equity loan until at least 2020
- Manifesto, page 52
Ensure that 90 per cent of suitable brownfield sites have planning permission for housing by 2020
- Manifesto, page 52
Aim at least to double the number of custom-built and self-built homes by 2020
- Manifesto, page 52
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In 1872, rugged, frontier Australia was lauded for overcoming the tyranny of distance to connect itself to the world via the "bush telegraph", a two-year project stringing 3,200km (2,000 miles) of wire through the outback that became part of the nation's folklore. | By Trevor MarshallseaSydney
By contrast today, while striving to be seen as an "innovation nation", Australia stands condemned, even ridiculed, for its latest drive for connectivity: a modern, fast internet network.
Three letters - NBN - have come to strike dread into the minds of consumers, with the National Broadband Network symbolising for many a template in how not to do things.
Given Australia's large size and sparse population density of three people per square kilometre, the NBN is the country's largest ever infrastructure project.
The total budget sits at A$49bn (£29bn; $38bn). Of that budget, around 35% must be spent connecting the final 10% of users, including wiring to remote areas, erecting many of the required 2,600 wireless towers and, most expensively, putting two satellites in the sky.
This week, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull called the NBN a mistake and a "calamitous train wreck" by a previous Labor government. Former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd hit back by saying the project's issues "lie all on your head" - meaning the current conservative government.
The escalating blame game, the NBN's slow roll-out, and a switch to inferior technology midstream have combined with other factors to leave Australians frequently asking the question: Why is our internet so slow?
In 2013, Australia ranked 30th for average internet speeds. The NBN was meant to improve that, but the most recent standings ranked Australia 50th.
The State of the Internet survey by US internet firm Akamai put Australia - with an average of 11.1 Mbps (megabits per second) - behind countries including Kenya, Hungary and Russia. And while it promotes itself as part of go-ahead Asia, Australia sits only eighth in the region, behind neighbours such as Thailand (21st overall) and New Zealand (27th).
Some comparisons are misleading. Only 1.75% of Kenyan homes have fixed-line internet, compared with 90% in Australia. For many, particularly inner-city Australians on the best NBN technology, fixed-line speeds are adequate, particularly if you pay more.
But there's no escaping Australia has been overtaken by many countries on the internet table.
What's worse is that with many of those connected to the NBN reporting no improvement over old ADSL connections, of the homes equipped to take the new service, only 40% have chosen to do so. In business, and international competitiveness, the fears are perhaps more serious.
"Going lower in ranking is alarming, and just not acceptable," says University of Sydney academic Dr Tooran Alizadeh, who has researched the NBN extensively and, like others, worries Australia's best minds will be lost to countries with better technology.
"Australia wants to be in the first 10 or so economies in the world. Obviously if you want to do that your internet access cannot be ranked 50th."
The history
In 2007, Mr Rudd announced 98% of Australian homes would be on the NBN by 2020. It was a breathtakingly ambitious idea. It was also, according to critics, backed by inadequate research into logistics and costs, initially put at A$15bn.
The natural starting point was Australia's oldest telecom company, Telstra. Elsewhere, countries like New Zealand simply used the infrastructure already laid by their major telecom company to install fast internet cabling. But Telstra, halfway privatised at the time, clashed with regulators over how it might onsell broadband access to its competitors, and so pulled out of the running to build the network.
Eventually, the government announced it would simply start a whole new semi-autonomous company from scratch. Called the NBN, it would set up the infrastructure to connect Australians with state-of-the-art fibre optic cables to their homes, selling bandwidth wholesale to retailers.
Progress was slow, sporadic, and expensive.
With Australia's preference for underground wiring, often concrete driveways would have to be dug up and relaid. Costs thus blew out for connecting houses from an envisaged average of A$4,400 to, in some cases, more than A$20,000, an NBN spokesman says.
Complaints soon arose over why some regions were connected before others, with schools and hospitals, for example, getting very unequal standards of internet quality. Accusations of government pork-barrelling, however, were wide of the mark.
"The government just wanted progress, so it became a matter of which places were easiest and quickest to connect," one source with intimate knowledge of the subject told the BBC. "Often this came down to issues like basic geology - where was the rock easiest to drill through?"
After the conservative government attained power in 2013, the NBN struck more upheaval, with copper wire ordered for the final stretches of connection, surrounding neighbourhood broadband nodes.
This presents a slower connection to the twice-as-expensive fibre optics. It also means residents, say 400 metres from the node, will have slower internet than a neighbour a few doors away. Critics also charge it's a false saving, since copper wire needs replacing far earlier than fibre optics.
Complaints and competition
Then came the NBN's high pricing to retailers, who buy limited supply to pass on to consumers, which leaves so many Australians staring in frustration while buffering or, worse still, service drop-outs occurring each peak hour.
"NBN has worked hard to bring the cost of bandwidth down but we cannot fill the pipes ourselves - it is up to the retailers to make sure that they are buying enough capacity to deliver a good quality of service," an NBN spokesman told the BBC.
Yet another complication is the number of retailers - 180 - making it hard for the NBN to police quality control for end users.
"We've had huge problems getting our house connected to the footpath node," says Matt Grant, a factory manager in suburban St Clair, just 39km from central Sydney. "But when I complained to the retailer, they told me to talk to the NBN. When I talked to the NBN, they sent me back to the retailer."
He was eventually connected, but said "it's no better than we had with ADSL, especially in peak times".
Last week, Australia's Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman revealed there had been a 159% increase in NBN-related complaints in the last financial year.
NBN chief executive Bill Morrow told the Australian Broadcasting Corp this week that it "turns [his] stomach" that some customers were being left behind, but he placed blame on retailers, and said the government would ultimately decide when to replace copper connections. He also noted increasing competition from mobile broadband technology.
"Look, it is a competitive environment, but I just want to repeat we are doing everything we can to ensure the NBN delivers a great service," he said.
The network says it's still on target to have 98% of homes connected by 2020, but Australia's internet malaise will still take some solving.
There's hope of improvement, but not until base prices can come down as the NBN gradually recoups its massive expenditure. And despite the political finger-pointing, Mr Turnbull's government insists the network will be "fit for purpose".
"Australia needs a 21st Century broadband network and this is not being delivered," said Laurie Patton, executive director of consumer advocacy group Internet Australia.
"The way we're heading now, whoever is in office in 2020 will have to deal with our biggest ever national infrastructure debacle."
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The fatal shooting this week at a house in Surrey took place at a house hired out for a pool party. But what exactly is the law surrounding party houses and what is it like for those living nearby? | By Laurence CawleyBBC News
In less than a minute, you can book a party house near Manchester for a three-night weekend for just under £4,000. You would be limited to 20 people. But for an extra £100 per guest, you can stretch that number up to 26 people.
And if that property does not tickle your fancy, there are plenty of others to choose from and plenty of companies willing to hire them out.
People wanting to hire out a house for a party - surely that's not too dissimilar to a holiday let? Or is it?
"Yes", says Karen Edwards, who lives in a mews in Brighton where one in eight properties are party houses. The nearest party house to her is next door but one.
"It has been an absolute nightmare," she said. "I sleep with earplugs in every single weekend."
Each of the three-bedroom party houses in Southdown Mews, she says, will have between 12 and 15 people staying there during the let.
It is a similar story further along the coast in Dorset. For Poole MP Robert Syms, the party house issue was serious enough to be raised in Westminster.
In a parliamentary statement on the matter, he recounted naked butlers turning up to hen parties, "blow-up dolls bought from a sex shop" being put up in gardens and "prostitutes being delivered well into the night".
He also reported: "Loud bass music thumping day and night, car doors banging through the night, taxis coming and going at all hours, bottles thrown into our garden."
Neighbours dealt with the issue, he said, by "barricading themselves into their homes" or, in one case, buying a caravan to visit at weekends for a decent night's sleep.
So what can residents do to tackle a party house?
According to Brighton and Hove Council, private prosecutions over noise nuisance and environmental health are possible but require independent evidence to support them, meaning it is "not a simple process".
It is also difficult to bring a case against a houseful of guests because "you cannot prove who is making the noise".
However, councils and the police do have powers to close a house under anti-social behaviour laws, if they believe the use of the premises has resulted in, or might result in, nuisance to members of the public. If the nuisance continues, the closure can be extended for up to six months.
Such closure orders have been used to deal with parties in private premises across England including Bacup in Lancashire, Headingley in Leeds and Gosport in Hampshire.
In Brighton, the local fire service reckons there are about 300 party houses.
However, the council believes the problem is worse than the records indicate as homeowners may be deterred from making a complaint because they are legally obliged to declare noise issues when selling their property.
Faced with mounting complaints, the Borough of Poole has used planning law to take action against one property, on the grounds using it as a party house constituted a material change of use. In a second case a noise abatement notice was served.
However, Brighton and Hove City Council has decided that, rather than taking a Draconian approach to party houses, it should seek to engage the party house sector. It has set up a system of voluntary self-regulation with the groups running the houses.
In 2014, the Brighton and Hove Holiday Rental Association (BHRA) was set up. Its homepage invites anybody "currently experiencing excessive noise disturbance" to report it.
Has it made a difference?
Ms Edwards said: "Things are improving.
"Noise is the main problem. It used to be every single weekend - it was so stressful. It is now once every few weeks."
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Eyebrows furrowed, feet hesitantly tapping, the Turkish choir of Berlin gets to grips with a new piece of music. They've been singing songs of heartbreak and history here for more than 30 years. Men and women for whom two countries, Germany and Turkey, will always feel like home.
They are among the 1.4 million people of Turkish heritage eligible to vote in Germany in an election that will decide the future of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. | By Jenny HillBBC Berlin correspondent
Officially the choir doesn't do politics and has no affiliation or associations but, when the singing stops, election talk flows as freely as the tea from the Turkish samovar steaming in the corner.
"Erdogan's been in power for 16 years now and we're sick of him," says one man. "For me it's about freedom of press, democracy, the oppression by the state. We are sick of that. We want him gone."
Last week, before the polls here closed, many queued outside the Turkish consulate in Berlin. Cars parked at crazy angles, jammed into every available space as more arrived.
Turkey's expats and the vote
Security guards checked passports and performed desultory pat-downs before waving people inside to vote in an election which is really all about one man.
"Recep Tayyip Erdogan!" exclaimed one man, beaming excitedly when I asked for whom he'd voted. "He's been in power for 16 years and he does everything for us!"
If re-elected Mr Erdogan will assume far greater powers that come into force as a result of a constitutional referendum last year. In that vote in April 2017, 63% of German Turks supported him - although only half of those eligible to vote are thought to have done so.
"Everyone calls him a dictator," says ardent Erdogan supporter Erkan. "But if he was a dictator do you think other parties would even have a voice?"
A woman further along the road sees democracy as Turkey's biggest election issue: "Everything that goes wrong in Turkey really worries me. Erdogan did his duty in the first two terms but then he just failed."
Who are Erdogan's main challengers?
If Mr Erdogan fails to secure 50% + 1 vote on 24 June, a run-off follows on 8 July.
It has been several years since the German authorities allowed President Erdogan to campaign on German soil.
There were protests in Cologne in 2016 when the constitutional court stopped a planned rally by video link.
And Turkish-German relations are rarely, if ever, serene.
The government in Ankara has likened the German authorities to Nazis. It has locked up German citizens, including journalist Deniz Yücel, who was held for more than a year without charge. In March, the German government said that four citizens were still in Turkish custody.
Berlin has threatened sanctions and issued travel warnings.
A German comedian published a satirical poem mocking Mr Erdogan which infuriated the Turkish government.
But, despite the many diplomatic storms, the countries are still bound together: by an EU migrant deal, of which Chancellor Angela Merkel was the main architect, and by the sheer size of the Turkish diaspora.
Some four million Turks live in Germany, the largest community outside Turkey.
The anticipated election tirades against Mrs Merkel and the so-called EU elites that have characterised other Turkish elections in recent years are this time comparatively muted.
But this election is rather different because of Turkey's faltering economy, argues Oezguer Oezvatan, a research fellow at the Berlin Institute for Integration and Migration Research.
"I would say that [President Erdogan] can count on Turkish votes in Germany because we see that generally those people have socially conservative attitudes," he says. And yet he believes the opposition's campaign focus on rising inflation in Turkey may have an effect.
For many of the singers in the Turkish choir in Berlin, there is a sense that something might be shifting back in Turkey.
"'In the future there'll be lots of very open-minded young people in Turkey who have a long-term perspective," one woman tells me. "Turkey may have a few years of difficult times ahead but in the future it will be better."
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New services that enable consumers and small businesses to record telephone calls, store them to "the cloud" and then read transcripts or carry out key-word searches of the audio database, are potentially revolutionising the way we treat the spoken word. | By Matthew WallBusiness reporter, BBC News
Skype - the internet voice, video and text messaging giant - offers its customers a number of call recording apps from companies such as Amolto, Callnote and PrettyMay.
Appetite for the service is clearly strong, as several such apps top the company's download charts.
And Apple's iTunes store features an app, CallRec.me by MotionApps, allowing iPhone and iPad users to record and transcribe their phone conversations.
But one award-winning UK startup, Calltrunk, is attracting particular attention for enabling its customers to record phone conversations made from any phone, anywhere, and make keyword searches of the audio database stored on its servers.
Calltrunk hopes its ARGOsearch software will do for voice calls what Google did for text and image search.
Searching high and low
The company has won three technology awards for the way its search engine indexes time-stamped keywords from audio files, then adds meta-data to create a richer search experience.
Cindy Provost, 46, from Leominster, Massachusetts, a US Air Force professor of aerospace studies and commander of reserve officer training at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute, uses Calltrunk on her iPhone and computer to replay messages and conversations with her nephews.
"We move around a lot because we're in the military, so I don't get to see my family as often as I would like," she says.
"Conversations with my nephews are really important to me. In fact, being able to listen to them again really helped me get through a recent bout of breast cancer treatment."
Cindy also has two grandmothers, one aged 100 and the other turning 100 soon.
"I've already taken to recording their oral history when I see them in person," she says, "but as they're three hours' drive away, I'm going to start recording their telephone conversations as well using the voice recording service."
Calltrunk can record and store conversations made via any phone - fixed line or mobile - and has currently amassed more than 20,000 customers worldwide after just over a year of operation.
Skype customers can record all their calls for $5 (£3.13) a month, otherwise calls routed via its service cost about 13 cents a minute.
The search engine software shows users how often chosen keywords appear in a conversation and where in the timeline.
Of course, there is nothing new about voice recording per se - call centres and helplines have been recording customer conversations for years "for training purposes", and financial institutions now have to record mobile phone calls as well for compliance reasons.
The two biggest players in the US are Nice Systems and Verint Systems, both specialising in the collection and analysis of voice, video and text for surveillance purposes.
Most of their clients are big businesses, however, and as disruptive technologies like Calltrunk's come along there is increasing pressure to reduce costs.
This could be one reason why the two companies are reportedly in merger talks - a deal that could have antitrust regulators crawling all over it.
Small packages
But while big business is well served, there has been little around for consumers and small businesses.
Richard Newton, Calltrunk's marketing director, says: "Companies record us, so why shouldn't we record them? If there's a dispute, they hold all the cards. We wanted to put power back into the hands of the consumer".
But he argues the appeal of the service is much broader than a mere rebalancing of power for the purposes of dispute resolution.
These days, wearable sensors, such as Fitbit and Nike fuel bands, record our movements and sleep patterns; digital photos uploaded to social networking sites record key moments in our lives; Livescribe pens translate our handwriting into digital text; and closed-circuit television cameras monitor us on the streets.
"We see recording spoken conversations as just the next part of this journey," Mr Newton says.
"ARGOsearch will help people turn hundreds of thousands of hours of unstructured conversational data into something useful and valuable."
But James Barford, telecoms analyst at Enders Analysis, warns that consumers may need some convincing before voice recording goes mainstream.
"There are clear applications for this technology in certain industries, particularly financial services, but it stretches the imagination as to how useful this may be for consumers at large.
"Mobile phone call minutes actually dropped 2% in the final quarter of 2012, as people are communicating more by email, text, Twitter and Facebook these days.
"But I'm heartened that there is innovation going on in this sector given that voice technology has largely stood still over the last ten years."
Erik Snider, director of corporate communications at NICE Systems, says the company is not currently considering extending their recording and analysis services to consumers.
"We're all in favour of empowering the consumer, but at the moment they can already demand to have any recorded phone call played back to them, so the question is what would be the business case of offering a consumer call-recording service?" he says.
"The regulations in the area of consumer protection are always changing and complex, so one of our focuses remains on providing solutions to enterprises which help them remain compliant with these regulations."
Calltrunk certainly isn't focusing on the consumer market alone, and has a few global investment banks among its clients as well.
One of the reasons it recently secured nearly £2m in investment funding was the potential to outsource the ARGOsearch programme to big corporates.
Is it legal?
Another potential issue is consumer concern or confusion over the legality of recording voice calls.
Calltrunk maintains that when recording conversations for private purposes - as long as that recording is not shared with a third party - only one person needs to be aware of, and consent to, the recording.
Anthony Lee, data protection and privacy expert at law firm Bircham Dyson Bell, agrees, but only up to a point.
"This does not apply if you want to use a third party, such as a cloud service-provider, to store recordings, particularly if sensitive personal data is involved, or if the recording is to be stored on servers which are located outside of the European Economic Area," he says.
"The informed consent and, sometimes, the explicit consent of the individual or individuals concerned, will typically be required. It will be interesting to see the practice which emerges here."
Calltrunk disagrees and believes the law is analogous to that covering email, which, technically speaking, requires the consent of the sender before you can forward it. Practically no-one does this.
What is certain is that the law differs considerably from country to country. In the UK, Canada, and some states in the US, this so-called 'one party consent' is adequate (but businesses in the UK must tell people that calls are being recorded).
In 15 states of the US, however, all parties involved need to have consented. This is also the case in Australia.
In other words, before recording anything it is important to check what the legal situation is where you live.
Voice recognition and phones have had a troubled relationship over the years.
The technology can struggle to cope with background noise and some regional accents, resulting in accuracy rates too low to make services acceptable to a mass audience.
Apple's Siri voice recognition application, powered by Nuance, has certainly taken things to the next level, but there is still a long way to go. Calltrunk's word indexation accuracy is around 80%.
So a personalised Google for voice calls may still be a little way off, but there is no doubt new technologies could make us think differently about our phone conversations.
Next stop a Wikipedia for the spoken word?
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The funeral is being held for a popular Manx broadcaster who was known as the "voice of Tynwald". | Ian Cannell CBE died aged 83 on 17 June after a long-term illness.
Mr Cannell, who was the first official TT commentator for Manx Radio, also commentated on the annual Tynwald ceremony for more than half a century.
President of Tynwald Steve Rodan said his "dignified, fluent and informed commentary" had "illuminated proceedings" for 52 years.
Mr Cannell was made CBE in 2004 for his work with the Royal British Legion.
His funeral will be held on Wednesday afternoon in Peel Methodist Church.
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A Durham shopping centre which had been in administration has been bought for £11.85m by a London-based company. | The Gates Shopping Centre in Durham city, which includes retail units, residential properties and parking, has been bought by Clearbell Capital LLP.
The new owners hope to build a cinema, new restaurants and student accommodation at the site, as well as managing the existing complex.
The company said it hoped it would "improve the offering" to the area.
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Free public access wi-fi has been installed along Barry Island seafront. | Vale of Glamorgan council said it was believed to be the first resort in Wales to offer the beach service.
Local business have provided access points to make the service possible.
The council said it was trying to "boost digital inclusion" across the area with internet access also provided at council buildings and libraries.
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While Donald Trump remains steadfast in his plan to build a wall along the US-Mexican border, Mexico's new president wants fewer of his countrymen and women to feel the need to emigrate in the first place. | By Ann DeslandesBusiness reporter, Tijuana, Mexico
To help achieve this, Andrés Manuel López Obrador has started a new initiative to boost the economies of towns and cities along the Mexican side of the border.
The hope is that businesses will grow and employ more people, increasing prosperity. But what are the details of the new "zona libre" or free zone scheme, and will it work?
It is noon at the Hotel La Villa de Zaragoza in downtown Tijuana, the Mexican city directly across the border from California's San Diego. Chef Gerardo Santos Gonzales and waitress Patricia Olvera Martinez are swinging into their well-practised lunch service routine.
He is dry frying some oregano in a pan over a gas flame, while she takes the first orders in the restaurant. The freshly made salsas and corn tortillas are ready to go.
"The new zona libre should help people here get jobs," says Gerardo. "It could transform the lives of Mexicans here... and yes, some will not feel the need to look for work in the US."
The free zone scheme was introduced last month after President López Obrador announced it at the end of last year.
Running the entire length of the 3,180km (1,954 mile) US-Mexican border, and 25km wide, the sales tax inside the area has been halved from 16% to 8%.
At the same time, income taxes have been cut from 30% to 20%, and the minimum wage has been doubled to 176.20 pesos ($9.24; £7.12) per day.
In addition, fuel prices in the zone have been reduced to the same level as in the US.
President López Obrador, who is left-wing, hopes that in addition to reducing emigration to the US, the initiative will encourage more American companies to invest in Mexican firms, and therefore boost cross-border trade ties.
"It is a very important project for winning investment, creating jobs, and taking advantage of the economic strength of the US," he said.
Adrián Valdés, a young businessman in Tijuana, says he is hopeful that the scheme will indeed give companies in the border area a boost.
"Right now we import many finished goods, and we're not producing to our potential," he says.
Mr Valdés, who runs his own business advising companies on how to reduce their environmental impact, adds that it is vital that more knowledge, talent and production is kept on the Mexican side of the border.
The free zone scheme follows after a new trade deal between Mexico, the US and Canada was signed in November.
Nikia Clarke, from the San Diego Regional Economic Development Corporation, says that the new initiative by the Mexican government brings "additional clarity about cross-border production in the US/Mexico relationship".
However she cautions that it is as yet unclear "how the increase in the minimum wage will impact the bottom line of a lot of firms that are operating south of the border who might have gone there for cost reasons, or, whether the income tax cut will temper that".
At any rate, Ms Clarke says that "good strong economic development along the border region is good for Mexico - so in the long run it probably does help with some of the migration challenges, and in that way it's good for the US too".
Among the wider Mexican business community there is also concern about the doubling of the minimum wage within the border zone.
Carlos Castañeda leads the local chamber of commerce, or "Canaco" in Ciudad Juarez, which is across the Rio Grande river from the Texan city of El Paso.
He is fearful that the salary issue will now become "a struggle between a business and its employees".
Other Mexican business leaders have expressed concern that companies in other parts of the country will relocate to the border area, harming the area that they leave behind.
Back at the Hotel La Villa de Zaragoza waitress Patricia says the reduction in the rate of sales tax will be particularly helpful.
"Being able to buy most things more cheaply will make life easier," she says.
Global Trade
More from the BBC's series taking an international perspective on trade:
She also hopes that the scheme will create work for members of the so-called migrant caravan - migrants from Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador who have arrived in Tijuana and other border towns and cities with the hope of entering the US.
Patricia says they are very welcome to stay in Tijuana if they are willing to work and contribute to its economy.
Whether the free zone is successful remains to be seen, but it is too late for some of Patricia and chef Gerardo's respective children.
Both say that they have kids who moved - legally - to the US in search of a better life.
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After a battle of wills lasting more than 50 years, the ideological struggle between Cuba and the United States looks set to be entering its final phase. | With the first formal talks taking place, diplomatic correspondent Jonathan Marcus takes a closer look at the journey the two countries have taken to reach this point, and what barriers may still lie ahead.
Archive footage from British Pathe.
If you are unable to watch, here are the links included in this interactive video.
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Thousands of people have been killed in the bloody Maoist insurgency across swathes of central and eastern India. The BBC's Suvojit Bagchi, who was granted unprecedented access to a Maoist camp in the depths of the Chhattisgarh jungle, describes the rebels' precarious life. | After eight hours of walking in dense forest, in the early evening we entered a narrow, barren stretch of land hemmed in by hillocks.
At the far end stood a few blue and yellow tents.
Somji, one of the men who collected me between a small town in south Chhattisgarh and the thick central Indian forest, picked up speed as we approached.
A tall man standing guard with a rifle flung over his shoulder whistled and people started rushing towards us.
In under a minute, the camp members stood in formation and began singing a welcome song.
Each member in the queue raised their fist to whisper "lal salaam" - "red salute".
Mostly aged between 15 and 30 years old, the men and women in the camp wore rubber sandals, olive green battle fatigues and carried guns of various makes.
India's Maoist rebels say they are fighting for the rights of indigenous tribespeople and the rural poor. But the battle has been brutal: they frequently launch deadly attacks on India's security forces and those thought to support them.
In April 2010 Chhattisgarh was the site of the bloodiest Maoist attack yet on the security forces - 75 troops were killed. Paramilitary forces also launched attacks on tribal communities to restrict Maoist activities.
Camp security
Maoist platoons normally set up their camps in a semi-circle with one tent in the centre - the "headquarter".
Every time a camp is set up, the commander conducts a roll-call and updates camp members about their responsibilities if they come under attack.
Akash, 18, was in charge of my security at the first camp. He also gave me a few lessons in self defence.
He slept for about four hours each night: two hours were spent guarding the camp from under a mohua tree in drenching rain.
Nonetheless, he never failed to wake me up early for my walks through several kilometres of rain-sodden forest.
Though the purpose of these walks was to take me to villages and camps in the Maoist-controlled Dandakaranya forest, I learned the rebels walked long distances every few days for their own safety.
"If we stay in a place for long, chances are that information of our stay will get out and we will get encircled."
The constant movement, he told me, also helps them gather information about the whereabouts of security forces from villagers.
The relationship with villagers in areas they control is generally positive, but not always. Maoist will kill suspected informers and that has the potential to create a climate of fear. But they are also aware that harming ordinary villagers will simply erode their support base.
But this is a highly polarised area. In areas controlled by the paramilitary units there is little support for the Maoists - and villagers who display such sympathies have uncertain fates.
Camp routine
On days when we were not moving camp, I would rest on my makeshift bed of a plastic sheet, and watch the "comrade-soldiers" swinging their guns to instructions being shouted out by a platoon commander.
Ganita, 18 and a deft hand with a rifle, also gave me a detailed account of their daily chores.
Maoists participate in "community service", she said, such as helping elderly farmers, digging village wells and providing basic health care to locals.
This week Ganita was assigned to kitchen work.
Her kitchen was spread under one tent. Breakfast was limited to rice cooked with turmeric and ground nuts, while both lunch and dinner were just lentil soup and rice.
However, during my stay, frog, wild boar and monitor lizard meat were served a few times.
Evenings were dedicated to the study of party literature.
Published by the publicity wing of the Communist Party of India (Maoist), the writings highlighted party strategy and criticised the Indian state. They have about 12 magazines and the main one is published in the local tribal language, Gondi.
Each camp had one or two solar-powered car batteries that were used to power LED lamps that lit tents at night.
A couple of times each week, everybody assembled for a singing session in one of the plastic tents.
Local Gondi tunes were fused with revolutionary lyrics and hymns were sung to the memory of martyrs. The singing session would end with the BBC's Hindi news bulletin on the radio - its future is in doubt because of spending cuts.
"This is our only source of objective information," Maoist spokesperson in south Chhattisgarh, Gudsa Usendi, told me.
Films
When there were no sing-songs, films would be played on a laptop late into the night.
One film that was repeatedly screened was Do Bigha Zameen or Two Acres of Land, made in 1953 about the plight of a small farmer in Nehru's India.
Another popular film was The Axis of War which includes a depiction of Mao's long march.
Interestingly, Bruce Lee's Enter the Dragon is a roaring hit among the young cadres.
The guerrillas often invited locals to join their late-night soirees when they stayed near villages.
Most villagers had never seen a film before the Maoists showed them one.
"Families finish dinner early and come here to watch the late-night show whenever there is one," said one villager.
At the end of the day, I would lie down with up to a dozen guerrillas in one of the cramped tents.
As I drifted off to sleep, I couldn't help thinking how the peace of the night - despite the snoring of sleeping rebels and the buzzing of countless mosquitoes - belied the dangers that surrounded us.
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Crescents, cul-de-sacs and indoor toilets were but a dream for the residents of London's slums in 1919. But thanks to chancellor Lloyd George's revolutionary scheme to make "homes fit for heroes", Becontree - the first and largest council estate in the UK - made those fantasies a reality. A century later, its residents reflect on living in a "working class haven". | By Sarah LeeBBC News
"Those who watched the construction of Becontree were immediately filled with hope of a new world," says Peter Fisher, who has lived on the estate for 92 years.
"These people watched with wonder and excitement as a new era - of luscious homes that had running water, indoor toilets and private gardens - was created.
"For them, the days of slumming it in the East End were over."
Peter's family was one of the first to move into Dagenham's newly built estate in east London, taking up residence in 19 Chitty's Lane. At the age of four, he recalls his mother telling him they were "going on an adventure to a new life, away from disease and plague."
"My parents, my four brothers and I moved from a two bedroom flat in Whitechapel to Chitty's Lane in 1926. It was a few doors down from number 26 - the first house built in Becontree.
"Our house was gigantic - it had a big kitchen, a well-kept garden that ran all the way around the back and the front. I was the king of the castle. As far as my mum was concerned, it was heaven - though she had difficulty making a house look a home with our somewhat meagre possessions.
"She loved having the simplest of things - like kitchen cupboards and a stove. She'd never let me open the fruit cupboard in case I got dirt on it."
Smells of grass, freshly grown flowers and the surrounding acres of fields were a stark contrast to the toxic smog in the city.
"It was just like being in the countryside - the air was so fresh, despite some construction work still taking place," says Peter. "You could even go pea and potato picking in the fields nearby. Becontree was simply a working class haven."
The 96-year-old still lives on the estate in Burnside Road - two streets away from his childhood home - and is one of the few who still remember what it was like in its early years.
He recalls how London County Council attempted to discourage heavy drinking by refusing to build no more than six pubs on the estate and how residents had to adhere to strict rules. Parents had to ensure their children were kept orderly, no washing could be hung from windows and front gardens had to be kept neat.
"My father, who worked in a biscuit factory in Bermondsey, used to complain there wasn't a pub on the corner [at home] where he could enjoy a few pints after his long commute. Some families moved out of the area for that very reason."
At the time Peter and his family moved in, Becontree was proclaimed the world's largest council estate, with 26,000 homes. The four square mile estate, which was finally completed in 1935, is still considered to be the largest in the UK, followed by the Wythenshawe estate in Manchester.
"Becontree was among the first of the London County Council's post-war schemes in 1919," says social housing author, John Boughton.
"It was certainly the largest in the UK when planned and developed in the interwar period. In terms of population, it's probably since been superseded by some large estates in the former Soviet Bloc but it must remain one of the largest in area today."
Barry Watson lives with his wife, Shirley, in one of the estate's desirable "suntrap houses" on Wykeham Avenue. She grew up 10 minutes away, on the same estate, in a two-bed home that belonged to her parents, who moved from Hackney when their house was bombed in the Blitz.
Around the same time, Barry moved in with his grandparents, who had moved from Poplar to Hunters Hall Road in Becontree in the 1940s.
"One abiding memory of my childhood was my grandmother's fear of the 'terrifying weasel-looking' rent collector," says Barry, 77. "He would report people if they didn't keep their hedges trimmed or if their curtains were not clean enough."
As revenge for confiscating a football, Barry and his friend once played a "cruel trick" on the rent collector.
"We put a piece of chewing gum which was hiding a drawing pin on the latch of his gate. On top of that piece of chewing gum was some cat poo - and I bet you can imagine what happened," he said mimicking someone sucking their thumb in pain.
"A month or so later, he fell off his bike in the street and not one person went over to help him. That's how universally hated he was."
'Homes for Heroes'
The Becontree estate was a groundbreaking scheme that re-housed some 100,000 people, many of whom had lived in London's slums.
The allure of a spacious home with running water, two to four bedrooms and a parlour was hugely appealing, despite conditions that windows were to be cleaned once a week, doorsteps must be scrubbed and children were banned from playing in communal gardens. If families failed to meet these standards, they faced being thrown out of their homes.
It was a novel idea and one that attracted attention from royalty to famous people who took up residence, including singer Sandie Shaw, England football manager Sir Alf Ramsey and footballer Bobby Moore.
"It was such an innovative scheme that King George V visited the estate in 1923, when he had tea with one of the early tenants," remembers Bill Jennings, who moved to the estate in 1954.
"Mahatma Ghandi once spent the night at Kingsley Hall [community centre], leaving a portrait of himself and a spinning wheel as gifts to the community."
But all was not rosy. Becontree was often referred to as "Corned Beef City" by historians and commentators because of the "staple diet" of its "poor residents".
Alexander McDonald, who lived on the estate from 1921 until he was 81, wrote in his memoirs that he had never heard it referred to by that name.
"I agree that there were some very poor people [living there] but there were many more men who had jobs to go to."
But he conceded that the estate was unfinished when he moved from Poplar to 5 Manor Square when he was five years old and how the property had no fences and no garden, as it was still "littered with builders' equipment".
"Some of Becontree was but a muddy lane with a ditch running its length and filled with water. We used to watch the water voles swimming about in them," he wrote.
Alexander's daughter Christina said while her father's memories of the estate were mostly happy ones, he had considered it a "dump" in the years before his death.
"Throughout my father's life he watched the estate decline steadily," she said. "The budgets for parks and gardens and general maintenance must have felt a serious squeeze and everything generally felt much less cared for.
"Front gardens have become driveways and flower beds are now a place to put rubbish bins. One has to wonder what the next hundred years will see."
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Walking through the estate today, dozens of cars line pavements, wheelie bins rest against the front of garden walls, and satellite dishes are dotted on roofs. Its near-identical streets, whose houses once all looked the same, now have a sense of ownership about them: one house is painted pink, another is coated in trails of wisteria.
"The estate has changed vastly throughout the years," says Peter. "People used to fight over who had the best kept garden, now they are merely extra space for cars or rubbish.
"But that's life. You can't change it. All I have is the lovely memories of my beautiful home and how Becontree became Becontree."
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It's a rare thing in cinema for a film to receive a round of applause even before its titles appear. But that's what has been happening at early screenings of Oscar-tipped musical La La Land. | By Tim MastersArts and entertainment correspondent
SPOILER ALERT - This article discusses the opening scene of La la Land.
The film stars Ryan Gosling as a jazz pianist and Emma Stone as an aspiring actress who are both chasing dreams of stardom in Los Angeles.
So why the amazing reaction to the opening scene when the pair have their first encounter?
It's all down to the jaw-dropping song and dance sequence that takes place in a traffic jam on a Los Angeles freeway.
"That was up there with the most challenging things I've done," the film's director Damien Chazelle tells the BBC.
'Everything came together'
The sequence involved more than 100 dancers in a complex routine that weaves in and out - and on top of - a long queue of stationary cars and trucks.
It was filmed on a "brutally hot" weekend on a closed road ramp in LA - while the city's real traffic continues to flow on a freeway in the background.
But after days of intensive rehearsals on boxes in car parks, the actual shoot didn't go entirely to plan.
"At times like that you're just lucky you have a great crew," Chazelle says.
"All these little things seemed to go wrong. As we were shooting, clouds came to cover the sun, a truck door wouldn't open - but everything came together at the end."
Co-producer Fred Berger admits it was a tough sequence.
"There were many weeks of preparation leading up to that and then it turned out to be one of the hottest weekends on record."
On screen, the scene looks like it was shot in a single take.
"It was shot over two days," Chazelle explains, "And the result is about three takes stitched together. It was fun - but it was a challenge."
La La Land is Chazelle's follow-up to his 2014 film Whiplash. The drama about a young jazz drummer won three Oscars, including best supporting actor for JK Simmons, as well as awards for its sound mixing and film editing.
Since premiering at the Venice Film Festival in August, La La Land is being talked up as a major contender at next year's Academy Awards.
It won the People's Choice award at the Toronto International Film Festival in September, which in the past has proved to be a decent predictor for Oscars success.
Chazelle wrote the script six years ago but was not able to persuade anyone to produce it until he made his name with Whiplash.
He says his aim with La La Land was to give a new twist to an old genre.
"I grew up loving those old Hollywood musicals, and what I wanted to do was to take that form of film-making we think of as old fashioned and see if it could be updated and revived for today."
The film goes on limited release in the US on 9 December (with a wider release on 16 December) and opens in UK cinemas on 13 January.
Follow us on Facebook, on Twitter @BBCNewsEnts, or on Instagram at bbcnewsents. If you have a story suggestion email [email protected].
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A homeless man was found dead in a busy city street, while another was injured when his tent was set on fire. | The incidents happened in Cardiff on 10 December, and are both being investigated by police as part of separate inquiries.
The dead man was found on St Mary Street at 19:30 GMT. His death is being treated as unexplained.
A man received minor injuries in the tent fire, which happened at about 13:30 GMT.
South Wales Police said: "The man has not yet been formally identified, but he is believed to be from the Llanrumney area and efforts are being made to contact next of kin."
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A UK couple have died while swimming on holiday in Portugal. | Kim Fletcher and Danny Johnson, both 33, from Stoke-on-Trent, are believed to have been swimming in Zambujeira do Mar when they got into difficulties.
A family friend said Mr Johnson tried to save his partner, but they were caught by a strong undercurrent.
The Foreign & Commonwealth Office said it was liaising with Portuguese authorities and supporting the families of the deceased.
Friend Ben Cook, who has known Mr Johnson since they were teenagers, said of the couple: "They've been together over 12 years and were completely devoted to each other.
"It's absolutely tragic. It's devastated everyone who knew them."
He said caves underneath rocks where the pair swam created a strong undercurrent which led to their deaths.
Ms Fletcher was a mother-of-two and yoga teacher. Mr Johnson was a steward at Stoke City FC, Mr Cook said.
A Foreign & Commonwealth Office spokesperson said: "Our staff are supporting the families of a British man and woman following their deaths in Zambujeira do Mar, Portugal and are in contact with the Portuguese authorities."
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Was this the most diverse London Fashion Week to date? | By Lucy ToddEntertainment reporter
Victoria Beckham chose 47-year-old Stella Tennant to open her debut show in London, model Winnie Harlow, who has vitiligo, opened for House of Holland and wheelchair user and former Paralympian Samanta Bullock closed at the Fashion's Finest show.
Last week, Kate Moss welcomed the increase in diversity in the fashion industry, saying it had changed for the better.
"There's so much more diversity now, I think it's right. There's so many different sizes and colours and heights. Why would you just be a one-size model and represent all of these people?"
Designer Steven Tai, who has worked at design houses including Viktor + Rolf, teamed up with photographer Rankin and charity Changing Faces to challenge the fashion industry's perception of beauty. At his show he had models with visible scars or disfigurements alongside conventional models.
Speaking after his show on Sunday, he said: "It enriches the setting and enriches the clothes as well. It gives the context of the collection a lot more depth.
"I just want an accurate reflection of the world that we live in. I think as much as fashion is about telling a story, it needs to be conscious of the social responsibilities as well and the effects that it could have on younger girls growing up.
"Familiarity breeds acceptance."
'Treated like a leper'
Brenda Finn was one of the models in the show and told the BBC the feedback after coming off stage was "amazing".
"They loved that the show looked so much more real. People are interested in how the clothes fit on a different body, and on women who look like me."
Finn, who has had alopecia since she was 14, said she was "treated like a leper" when she was younger, and had to be taken out of school because the bullying became so severe.
"To be seen as different was seen as negative," she says. "Ten years ago I never even thought we'd see someone like Winnie Harlow in a magazine, so we've made great strides.
"I hope that someone seeing this show thinks they are normal and can do what they want to do. It took me a long time - I wasted six years of my life before I got to where I wanted to be - so I hope it can help others."
Chloe Root, who was born with a port wine stain birthmark, which covers about half of her body and two thirds of her face, also modelled in Sunday's show. "I've never seen women who look like me in the mainstream media - it's disheartening to feel like I'd never look like that and never fit in.
"It's frustrating that it's such a mono-culture - not just for someone with an obvious difference, but also for someone who's walking down the street that isn't a size six.
"It creates a unity, that goes beyond fashion."
'No regulation'
Supermodel Eunice Olumide has added her voice to the discussion: "The fact that we're not able to represent reality in the industry is a problem," she says. "We're looking at life through a very parochial lens. When I started out, people in China and other markets wouldn't even look at you if you're dark-skinned.
"There are no requirements for diversity in the industry," continues the Scottish model. "How can you have an industry that's worth trillions that has no regulation? There's no minimum wage for models, no requirement to make clothes in different sizes. It's common to have hairdressers who have never worked with afro hair before.
"That reflects badly on you as the model because you don't look good, and won't get re-booked."
Fashion commentator and campaigner Caryn Franklin says she's "thrilled" more and more younger designers are taking the issue of representation seriously.
"Teatum Jones have led the way by using models like Kelly Knox and I know they have been hugely influential. This conversation gets louder every season," says the fashion expert.
"Repetition is key - when we see something over and over again we normalise it. That's why it's important to see a range of body shapes.
"Fashion has to wake up to the needs of the end user and show a broader range of people. We all want that. In fact, studies show when the audience can make a connection to the model wearing the clothes, the desire to actually want to make a purchase is increased by 300% - so it's a business no-brainer," she says.
But the obstacles to presenting a show at fashion week with various size models are not only due to "fear of putting their head above the parapet" on the part of the fashion houses, as Franklin puts it, but also one of logistics.
Designers make clothes in sample sizes - meaning that it's, literally, a straight-forward one-size fits all approach to dressing models. For plus-size or "curve" models, there is more work involved planning the show and getting the model in for repeat fittings to make sure the clothes look good on them.
'New York is killing it'
But some don't see that as an excuse.
"The UK is still really far behind," says Beth Willis, co-director at model agency Bridge.
"New York had their best year yet in terms of the number of bigger models and those of colour who were walking in campaigns. London is still using a token plus-sized model here and there."
Willis, who runs an agency for curve models, says none of her models were booked for London Fashion Week - which she says was "not a massive surprise". The plus-size fashion week in May, on the other hand, saw her models booked out: "That's great, but we shouldn't need a plus-size fashion week at all," she says.
She says she's "frustrated" by what she sees as PR stunts on the part of brands.
"Generally a lot of these clients will use a token model and get some good press, but that's it. The repeat bookings are what we need. Designers can't just do one-offs - we need to be changing the face of things regularly."
Brands like River Island, Asos and Figleaf have been lauded for their inclusive advertising campaigns and clothing lines directed at different sections of the population - including plus-size and maternity.
"Fashion week hasn't really been the place where strides are made on diversity," says Willis. "Some people within the industry think it cheapens the brand - and it's not seen as cool.
"Where it needs to come from is the students - so when they're learning pattern-cutting and doing their first shows they need to be thinking about clothes which suit different body shapes. Scaling up a design for a size six doesn't really work.
"It's got better over the past 30 years," Willis says, "but more needs to be done. In terms of the number of brands we work with, that's increased massively - but if you look at New York they are just killing it. You look at the likes of big name models like Ashley Graham, and that doesn't exist here yet. There's a massive difference in what they're doing compared to us."
Olumide says she's seen fellow models heading to New York agencies because they think they may be more likely to get work there: "In the UK we are much too safe, fashion houses will use people who they know and who they've used before.
"In the US they're interested in who'll sell. There's a migration of models to New York because there they are more likely to take a risk."
In February's fashion week, it was calculated 34.6% of shows represented models of colour in London - compared to New York's 37.3%. The British Fashion Council said in a statement: "Our numbers are above the national UK average representation of 15% but we'd like it to be closer to London's population average of 40%.
"The BFC's objective is for London to become the most diverse Fashion Week."
'LFW diversity has been terrible'
Tamara Cincik, who runs Fashion Roundtable, an organisation which promotes representation in the fashion industry, agrees with Willis and Olumide: "It's always New York that is leading the way. To be world-leading you have to make changes. And make changes within the organisation. It goes deeper than what's on the catwalk.
"Just because Edward Enninful's at Vogue they think that's it," she adds.
"But we're still at the point where you have PRs this London Fashion Week going up to women of colour and asking them why they're sat on the front row at a show.
"One editor of an Italian fashion magazine was sat on the second row while the rest of her team were sat on the front row - because she is of a different ethnicity. It's disgusting.
"Two other editors I know, who are women of colour, were asked whether they were seated in the right seats at two different shows. Both had front row tickets. It plays into a trope of the norm not being women of colour in positions of power and agency - which is what the front row signifies: think front bench in Westminster."
The former stylist says the fashion industry runs the risk of alienating many would-be customers by its lack of representation.
"I was discussing it with another fashion industry insider and she said she thought the diversity on the catwalk this week has been terrible. Burberry had some inclusion but other big brands had nothing.
"There is a changing demographic. You cannot just have white privilege on the front row, within the organisation and then in the casting, and expect that to resonate with consumers. I think it's got a long way to go."
And that doesn't even take into account the number of shows where disability is not considered - either on stage or off: "At plenty of shows you can't get a wheelchair in them," says Cincik.
"Organisations need to start thinking we can't show here if there is no disability access, however cool it is."
Fashion's Finest was, however, one of the LFW shows which represented disabled people by the inclusion of model Samanta Bullock - a wheelchair user.
The Brazilian model, a Paralympian and former wheelchair tennis champion, has been working on and off as a model for the past 30 years, and says it feels like "change is coming".
Previously, her work was mainly for fashion aimed at wheelchair users. Now she has done a number of high-end shows and campaigns aimed at the mainstream market and is optimistic about the future.
"If you don't show people in a wheelchair or disabled people in magazines, it's like we don't exist," she says. "A few years ago it was the same for black people, or gay people. It's the right thing to do to show all different types of people.
"It's like opening Pandora's box - people aren't going to go back to how it was before. Once you know what is right, you don't go back."
Follow us on Facebook, on Twitter @BBCNewsEnts, or on Instagram at bbcnewsents. If you have a story suggestion email [email protected].
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Leaving the "dirty stuff" in the ground is fast becoming the mantra of environmentalists, with the global campaign to move money out of fossil fuels gaining momentum. There is pressure to divest from oil and gas companies on the basis that they represent a "carbon bubble" of overvalued assets, but the industry says this stance is "simply naive". Here are some of the key questions. | By Helen BriggsBBC Environment Correspondent
Where does the idea of divestment come from?
Rewind 30 years to the 1980s, when divestment meant ditching shares in South Africa during the apartheid era. Academics argue that divestment increased public visibility of the injustices of South Africa's apartheid government and contributed to its decline. Since then, similar movements have targeted a host of issues, such as sweatshop labour, use of landmines, and tobacco advertising. The fossil fuel divestment campaign is based on encouraging people to move their money away from fossil fuels and invest in sustainable energy.
Who is leading the way in getting out of fossil fuels?
The campaign started in the US and has spread around the world. Hundreds of institutions controlling about £30bn of assets have now pledged not to invest in companies seen to fuel global warming. Among those in the UK who have signed up are universities and organisations such as Glasgow University and the British Medical Association. The Church of England, which has an investment portfolio of £9bn, has warned it could withdraw its investments from oil giants BP and Shell unless they do more to tackle climate change. There are also consumer campaigns, such as Move Your Money, which wants customers to put pressure on their banks to cut ties with "dirty energy".
What does the science say?
Scientific studies show that existing fossil fuel reserves are several times greater than can be burned if the world's governments are to fulfil their pledge to keep global warming below the limit of 2C regarded as the threshold of dangerous climate change.
What are the pros and cons?
Some charities, such as the Wellcome Trust, say it is better to work with the energy companies involved to become more environmentally friendly rather than sell out on them. Others, including some scientists, take the view that expensive technologies such as carbon capture and storage could be a solution to the problem of carbon emissions and will need financial investment from industry as well as government. Many oil companies accept that some reserves will have to remain in the ground to tackle global warming. The practical approach is to burn the fossil fuels that are most cost-efficient and least "dirty". But some environmentalists say fossil fuel companies will never play a leading role in any move towards a low-carbon economy.
What happens next?
One view is that the recent drop in oil prices presents a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for governments to get rid of fossil fuel subsidies and introduce a price on carbon. This generally goes against government thinking and concern over job losses in the oil and gas industry. With the divestment campaign gathering pace - and momentum building for the Paris climate talks in December - there is renewed hope among campaigners. But with environmental policies getting little attention in the UK election, and coal, oil and gas companies continuing to spend billions on exploration, NGOs are already upping their rhetoric in calling for renewed government efforts over climate change.
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Two holidaymakers were rescued by lifeboat after they became stranded at Lossiemouth's east beach on Wednesday. | The lifeboat crew from Buckie used an inflatable dinghy to pick up the couple, a man and a woman, after they called for help at about 21:00.
The footbridge leading to the beach has been taken out of use for safety reasons.
Some people wade across the water to avoid a long detour to the beach but risk becoming stranded.
Work on a replacement bridge is ongoing.
Moray Council previously said the sheer number of people crossing the footbridge had led to its condition deteriorating.
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Two gay men were publicly caned in the conservative Indonesian province of Aceh on Tuesday, the first to be punished under Islamic laws introduced two years ago that outlawed gay sex. As the BBC's Rebecca Henschke reports, the case has deeply worried Aceh's gay community. | Salman (not his real name) joined the crowd of hundreds to watch the public caning.
He flinched as the convicted men, dressed in white gowns, stood on a stage murmuring prayers while a team of men dressed in hoods took turns to lash their backs with sticks.
The two men closed their eyes in pain while the crowd cheered.
"It's horrible, it's terrifying, it could happen to me," Salman said.
"I think now I should be more careful about how I behave. My partner is not in Aceh at the moment but I worry about my future."
Salman is Acehnese and stays here so that he can look after his elderly mother - leaving is not an option for now.
"There are lots of people in the gay community who are smart and have lots to contribute to Aceh but now they are scared and they have to hide their sexuality. Many others are leaving."
We were treated like animals
Gay rights activist Hartoyo travelled up from Jakarta for the caning.
In 2007, he too was caught with his boyfriend in Aceh, when he was an aid worker helping to rebuild the province after the devastating 2005 tsunami.
"The police urinated on my head and beat the two of us up, we were treated like animals," he recalls.
"I was lucky that homosexuality wasn't officially a crime then," he says.
A day before the public caning, I went with Salman to the prison to meet one of the convicted men.
He was terrified, his hands and body shaking. He was nervous and said at first he didn't want help from the gay community:
"I have been deeply depressed in jail, I am trying desperately to be accepted here, I am trying to pull myself out of a dark hole."
What he wanted was to go home to his family and return to his old life, he says.
Before neighbourhood vigilantes broke down his rented room door, he was in his final years of a medical degree.
But returning to that life will be hard.
Read more on this:
Aceh's Sharia code empowers local vigilantes to publicly identify and detain anyone suspected of violating the rules.
And that includes breaking and entering someone's house to catch people in their most private moments.
Mobile phone footage of the raid that circulated online shows the men naked and visibly distressed. One of them appears to call for help on his phone.
"Raids like that are allowed under our laws," says Illiza Sa'aduddin Djamal, the mayor of the provincial capital, Banda Aceh. "They were in a rented room."
"The neighbours were suspicious; they knew what was going on. But they needed to get proof."
In February last year, she wrote on her Instagram account that she was going to "flush" LGBT people out of Aceh, below a picture of her pointing a pistol.
"I want to save our next generation," she told me. "Imagine what it would be like if the whole world started liking the same gender."
"We don't hate them as people, what we hate is what they do."
Veranda of Mecca
Aceh is believed to be one of the first places Islam entered Indonesia and is often referred to as the "veranda of Mecca".
Acehnese separatist rebels, known as GAM, fought a decades-long brutal separatist war to break away from Indonesia.
It wasn't until the devastating tsunami hit the province in 2004 that peace talks started in earnest.
And in a peace deal made with the national government in 2006, Aceh was granted the right to practise Sharia.
At the time, Acehnese political leaders promised the law would not affect religious minorities and would respect international human rights, but it has become an increasingly strict code.
And the Sharia police have been accused of human rights violations and abuse of power.
Last year a Christian woman became the first non-Muslim to be caned under the regulations. Her crime was selling alcohol.
And there was international outrage a few years ago when a vigilante gang raped a woman in the town on Langsa.
They had raided her home and found her with a married man. Accusing them of committing adultery, the men, one of whom was a 13-year-old boy, raped the woman, before marching the couple to the Sharia police.
I went to Aceh at the time and met with the head of the Sharia police in Langsa. He told me she was to blame, because she was wearing "super sexy clothes".
"I think any normal man would have been provoked."
He said then he would have liked to have seen both of them stoned to death.
"The man would be buried at the crossroads and whoever passes throws a stone until he dies. The women would be buried and stoned to death," he said.
'The shame hurts the most'
For now Aceh's Sharia doesn't allow stoning, but it is getting stricter.
Before the caning this week of the gay men, an organiser warned the crowd not to attack them. "They are also human," he said.
He also told all children to leave the area. "This is not something children should watch," he said. But a number of parents ignored that.
"This is a positive punishment that creates a better society for all and is our right under our autonomy law," H A Gani Isa, the head of the Ulama council of Aceh, told the crowd.
Our driver in Aceh, Brandi, says he has had quite a few friends who have been caned - for drinking and gambling.
"They say it is the shame that hurts the most, the cane not so much," he says
One of his friends has been caned three times.
"But it hasn't stopped him from drinking, and he even takes a selfie before the caning now," he laughs.
Acehnese leaders are quick to state that their right to enforce Sharia came after a bloody civil war.
But rights groups have strongly criticised the use of caning.
The New York-based group Human Rights Watch says it constitutes torture under international law.
'My family accept me'
Syeril, a transgender woman in Aceh, says LGBT people now need to be "very careful about how we dress and how we behave and what we say".
"We don't wear sexy clothes for example, we can't do that anymore," she says with a smile.
But she says her family are comfortable with her sexuality. They were senior members of GAM and are still politically powerful.
She says she was often beaten by Indonesian soldiers looking for her rebel brothers during the civil war, and survived the tsunami and says she is a true Acehnese.
"I am a little bit scared after what's happened to others. But I don't have a problem personally because my family and my village accept me.
"They have always been very good to me and whatever happens I will not leave them," she says.
No place to hide
Gay rights activist Hartoyo didn't end up watching the caning.
After he posted his plan to attend on social media, an online campaign began calling for him to be forced out of the province. Men in the crowd were asking where he was.
He now wants to reach out to the caned men and see if they want help to get out of Aceh and go to the capital, Jakarta.
"I want them to know they are not alone and there is a safer place."
But after this week's arrest of 141 men at a gay sauna in the capital, Jakarta, and similar arrests in the city of Surabaya, the space for Indonesia's LGBT community is dramatically shrinking.
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The government has been urged to speed up the publication of its guidance for a 'no deal' Brexit, after a survey of 800 businesses by the Institute of Directors found that fewer than a third of them have carried out any Brexit contingency planning. | By Chris MorrisReality Check correspondent, BBC News
Recently, the Brexit debate has been dominated by the potential implications of the UK leaving the EU without any kind of deal in place next March.
Some of the details have been pretty alarming, but the whole point about contingency planning is that it has to take account of the worst-case scenario.
So what could 'no deal' mean for two essentials of daily life - food and medicines?
Food
The UK produces roughly 60% of the food it consumes. Of the remaining 40%, about three-quarters is imported directly from the European Union, including a lot of fresh fruit and vegetables like citrus fruits, grapes and lettuces.
In other words, the food industry is highly dependent on just-in-time supply chains, and while the UK has more supermarkets per head than anywhere else in the world, those supermarkets keep very little in stock. It all comes in overnight, much of it through Dover.
That is why the idea of gridlock at UK borders - in the event of a 'no deal' Brexit - is such a worry.
Strike action which closed the port of Calais in 2015 led to queues of lorries on the M20 in Kent stretching back for 30 miles. The logistics industry, and Dover District Council, fear that the disruption caused by a 'no deal' Brexit could last for far longer.
"If there were to be no deal there would be many, many months of disruption to existing choices," said Ian Wright, of the Food and Drink Federation, "frankly until some kind of deal was reached."
So what has the government said?
Not a lot in public, and pressure on the government from supporters of Brexit to highlight 'no deal' planning (as a means of putting pressure on the European Union) has now been replaced by accusations that their opponents are selectively leaking scare stories.
The government is planning to publish, in two tranches in late August and early September, about 70 technical notices on how businesses and consumers should prepare for no deal. I understand that about 20 of them will impact directly on the food industry.
Brexit Secretary Dominic Raab was reluctant to give MPs many details when he appeared before the Exiting the EU Select Committee, insisting that he wanted to wait until he could "set it out in a responsible and full fashion".
But when Mr Raab was asked directly if the government was considering stockpiling food, he said: "It would be wrong to describe it as the government doing the stockpiling.
"Of course, the idea that we only get food imports into this country from one continent is not appropriate, but we will look at this issue in the round and make sure that there is adequate food supply."
The implication that it was businesses rather than the government that should be doing any stockpiling has not gone down well within the food industry.
"If they are expecting the industry to be stockpiling things, they will be in for a surprise," said one executive working for a major supermarket chain.
"It's nonsense. There is absolutely no capacity in the UK supply chain for extra food to just sit around."
For one thing, you cannot stockpile perishable food. That's obvious. And a huge amount of fresh produce arrives from the EU on a daily basis.
"The problem is the government doesn't appreciate what that means in practice," said Andrew Opie, of the British Retail Consortium (BRC).
"For example, in the run-up to last Christmas 130 lorry-loads of citrus fruit came through Dover from Spain every single day. That's the sort of volumes we're talking."
The BRC estimates that, on average, more than 50,000 tonnes of food passes through British ports every single day from the EU.
So border delays, caused by sudden customs and regulatory checks, could very quickly lead the distribution system to break down. For fresh produce that could mean shorter shelf lives, and rising costs in the system.
Industry sources say the government has suggested that it would keep regulatory checks at borders to a minimum in the event of no deal, in an effort to keep traffic moving. But that wouldn't help much if robust checks were being carried out on the EU side.
"If there were big border hold-ups, after three days there would be gaps on the shelves in fairly short order," said Chris Sturman, chief executive of the Food Storage and Distribution Federation (FSDF).
What about chilled or frozen food?
The trouble is there is very little spare storage capacity. According to the FSDF, there are 385 refrigerated warehouses around the country, but more than 90% of refrigerated warehousing is in constant use and margins are extremely tight.
Supermarkets are certainly making contingency plans. But rather than involving stockpiling food, which one executive described as a "non-starter", they revolve around how they might be able to source produce from other countries if European supply chains are seriously disrupted.
They have done that before. For example, bad weather in Spain last year meant lettuces were temporarily imported by air (and therefore more expensively) from Latin America, and supplies were rationed. The 2015 industrial action in Calais also promoted retailers to diversify their supply chains.
But these are short-term fixes and at the moment the whole industry is trying to plan for an outcome that is impossible to predict.
"We're not going to run out of food if there is no deal," said Ian Wright from the FDF. "There is a way to increase capacity, to grow more of particular vegetables, to cut out the waste that occurs at the moment.
"But the short-term disruption could be severe. The government needs to understand that."
A spokesperson for the Department for Exiting the European Union said the government was preparing for all eventualities but had no plans to stockpile food.
"The government has well-established ways of working with the food industry to prevent disruption - and we will be using these to support preparations for leaving the EU. Consumers will continue to have access to a range of different products."
Medicines
Another big issue is medicines. Every month the UK exports 45 million packs of medicines to the EU and EEA countries, and imports more than 37 million. Again, prolonged disruption at borders could threaten supplies of drugs and other vital healthcare products - both in the UK and elsewhere in Europe.
There is more scope with medicines than with food to increase stocks of things like tablets, but other imported drugs such as insulin often need to be refrigerated and may therefore pose bigger logistical challenges.
So what has the government said?
Health Secretary Matt Hancock told the House of Commons Health Select Committee recently that "we are working with industry to prepare for the potential need for stockpiling in the event of a 'no-deal' Brexit".
"This includes the chain of medical supplies," he said, "vaccines, medical devices, clinical consumables and blood products."
Industry sources confirm that they are in close contact with the government to make sure it understands their plans, and that it knows what the practical implications of leaving without a deal could be.
The UK-based pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca told the BBC on 17 July that "as a safety net" it was increasing its drugs stockpiles across Europe by about 20% in preparation for a no-deal Brexit.
AstraZeneca's chief executive, Pascal Soriot, has subsequently said the company is doing everything it can to be prepared, and to make sure patients do not run out of their medicines.
"We typically run about three months of inventory for our medicines," he said. "We are increasing this by one month so that we have additional inventory to protect against a disorderly Brexit, if you will."
The company is not increasing its global stock, but it is locating more of it in the UK and Europe to be available if necessary.
Two other big companies, France's Sanofi and Switzerland's Novartis, have also confirmed plans to increase stockpiles.
But I understand that the other big UK-based pharmaceutical company, GlaxoSmithKline, has decided for the moment not to increase the additional stocks of drugs that it holds in the UK.
GSK was not able to say why it has taken such a decision, citing commercial confidentiality.
The focus of its stocks is mostly on medicines that are not necessarily readily available from competitors or generic alternatives.
GSK is certainly preparing for Brexit though. It has already started the process of moving the EU-wide marketing authorisation for more than 1,000 drugs registered in the UK to other EU countries, mostly to Germany.
And GSK's annual report released in March 2018 reveals that the company is spending £70m in one-off costs connected to Brexit, with additional ongoing costs of up to £50m per year depending on what arrangements are made in the future.
But perhaps the biggest challenge in the health sector is faced by those who rely on products which are only of medical use for a few days or sometimes a few hours.
In particular, this means radio isotopes that are essential for things like cancer scans.
"A 'no deal' scenario will be difficult for the nuclear medicine community," said John Buscombe, of the British Nuclear Medicine Society. "We calculate that 60% of the radiopharmaceuticals we use come from the EU, affecting as many as 600,000 patients per year."
At the moment they arrive by road and rail across the Channel.
"If they arrive too late," Mr Buscombe said, "they may not be useable because they will have decayed too much.
"They could be flown in, but that will result in increased costs that the NHS will have to pay."
When asked about the supply of medical radio isotopes by the Health Select Committee, Mr Hancock said: "We are working with industry to ensure that exactly that sort of medicine, or rather diagnostic need, is taken care of… it is incredibly important for me, as Secretary of State, to ensure that people will have access to the medicines they need."
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Newsbeat has unveiled the upcoming stars of music, film and TV to look out for this year. Check out who made the top 10 list for the year ahead, what they'll be up to and where you can see the artist or programme.
| Ellie Goulding
Newsbeat's number one tip for super stardom in 2010 is singer-songwriter Ellie Goulding.
The 22-year-old's dance-infused songs have created a lot of buzz and she's also topped the BBC's Sound of 2010 poll, voted for by industry insiders and taste makers.
Goulding is also definitely in with the right crowd, counting artists like Marina And The Diamonds, Laura Marling and Mumford & Sons as friends.
"There's a lot of musical people in our group," she admits.
The singer's acoustic pop/electro mix should be all over the TV and radio this year, with her debut Lights due out in March.
If you want to get in on the action early she's also on tour in a few months, supporting US band Passion Pit.
Andrew Garfield
Twenty-six year-old actor Andrew Garfield is number two in our list.
Garfield was born in LA (his dad's American and his mum's English) but he moved to the UK when he was three.
In 2009 he appeared in The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, Heath Ledger's last film, and also in Channel 4's critically-acclaimed Red Riding series.
However, 2010 should see his profile rise to new heights when he appears in British sci-fi film, Never Let Me Go, which stars Keira Knightley.
He's also set to star alongside Justin Timberlake in a movie about the founders of Facebook, called Social Network.
Glee
Much-hyped new American TV show Glee is a comedy set in a US high school focusing on the Glee club - a group of kids who sing and dance.
Each week they perform covers of classic tracks which you can then download.
The cast have just been honoured with a People's Choice Award for favourite new TV comedy.
"I don't know if we can really wrap our heads round it. We're just enjoying the ride.
"We're still filming, we're still completing season one and that's really important to us right now."
There was a sneak preview of the show on E4 just before Christmas and it starts properly on 11 January.
The Vampire Diaries
It's already picked up a gong for favourite new TV drama at the People's Choice Awards in LA, and if the success of Twilight and True Blood are anything to go by, The Vampire Diaries is set to be a big hit over in the UK too.
The show is based on the very popular books and has been adapted for TV by Kevin Williamson - the man behind Scream and Dawson's Creek.
The cast say there's definitely room for the series in an already crowded Vampire-themed market.
"You have Twilight which is the large theatrical franchise and you have True Blood which is the more R-Rated HBO version. This show fits into this niche, where a 13-year-old girl can't watch True Blood with her mum but can watch Vampire Diaries.
"It caters to a much younger audience, however it also caters to an older, maybe more mature audience. It hits on a lot of facets, which makes it a well-rounded show."
Justin Bieber
US pop and R'n'B singer Justin Bieber has been a big hit Stateside and he's only 15.
You may not have heard about Justin yet but you will in the next 12 months. His debut single is called One Time and it's already being played on Radio 1.
He was discovered singing on YouTube when he was 13 and a battle then ensued between Usher and Justin Timberlake to sign him - he went with Usher.
Probably his biggest gig to date was playing for President Barack Obama at the White House this Christmas.
Delphic
Expectation put on new bands can be great. But even greater can be the expectation put on them by themselves.
Manchester dance/indie hybrids Delphic were so consumed by making their debut album Acolyte, that when finally finished they bolted to Paris and didn't tell anyone.
"We completely freaked out," admitted guitarist Matt Cocksedge.
They needn't have worried though, with current stellar single Doubt a mere taster of the albums Underworld meets Bloc Party charms.
With the trio's claim that "the guitar is dead" they might just have to the future.
Hurts
The Manchester duo Hurts is made up of Theo Hutchcraft and Adam Anderson.
The new noir-pop neurotics are becoming as well known for their dapper dress sense as their music and unlike many acts tipped for success who play down the hype, these guys are going to milk it.
"I think we intend for next year just to continue living off the hype. We'll probably make an average record and live off the hype for as long as possible.
"We feel like we've duped everybody at the moment."
The boys have yet to play a single gig but a clutch of dates in Salford, London, Berlin and Koln are planned for February.
Everything Everything
Despite what it might look like today (i.e. snow covered) Manchester is a hot bed right now. Musically, at least.
Joining Lancashire cohorts Hurts and Delphic as the most touted outfits for the forthcoming year are experimental-pop foursome EE.
"There's a lot that's in our heads and in our fingers that's ready to go," said lead singer Jonathan speaking to us last year.
After the brilliance of recent single MY KZ, UR BF and the promise of an album before summer 2010 - we can't wait…
Saoirse Ronan
Fifteen-year-old Saoirse Ronan is being talked about as one of the brightest new acting talents of 2010.
She plays the main role in The Lovely Bones, the latest film from Lord of the Rings mastermind Peter Jackson, (who's described the actress as like a "young Cate Blanchett").
The movie's about a murdered teenager who watches over her grieving family and her killer from heaven. It also stars Susan Sarandon, Mark Wahlberg and Rachel Weisz.
Some critics think the film could be Oscar nominated but Saoirse says she's not paying too much attention to that at the moment.
"I'm trying not to think about it really," she admitted. "It's a little bit nerve wracking, quite a lot of anticipation from people... it would be a great honour."
However, the Irish actress is no stranger to award ceremonies. In 2007 she was nominated for an Oscar for her role in Atonement, where she starred alongside Keira Knightley.
You can catch Saoirse in the The Lovely Bones when it hits UK cinemas on 29 January.
Plan B
Look back three years and Ben Drew was the rough-cut voice of Britain's disenchanted streets.
He spat about inner-city poverty, teenage pregnancy and drug trafficking on his sarcastically titled debut Who Needs Action When You Got Words. Eminem with an acoustic guitar is how he got boxed.
Not strictly a brand new tip then, but 2010's Ben Drew is a reinvented man.
After starring alongside Sir Michael Caine in last year's Harry Brown he's now directing his own full length movie but it's in his music he's made his biggest strides.
"I've reinvented myself so if people are saying that I'm basically a newcomer," he says. “I’m doing a completely different style of music.
"My life has changed and I don't feel like I'm part of the same struggle I was in before."
Indeed, now suited, clean shaven and smartly dressed with a fresh pop sensibility (see single Stay Too Long) on soul-influenced, brassy second album The Deformation Of Strickland Banks he’s a changed man.
It seems like Plan B has reverted to Plan A, and it looks like it'll be a success.
Carey Mulligan
The final tip is for British actress Carey Mulligan who most recently starred in An Education. That film netted her two gongs - the Critics Choice Award and a British Independent Film Award for best actress.
The 24-year-old has also been nominated for a Golden Globe -which is usually a good indicator for the Oscars, but like Saoirse Ronan above, she told Newsbeat she's taking the whole thing in her stride.
She said: "It's too surreal to be exciting. It's too mad a concept. It's so huge that the Oscar thing seems like a whole other stratosphere that I can't really think about.
"It meant that more people went to see the film and that's what I wanted, so that's brilliant."
Carey is also starring as Michael Douglas' daughter in the upcoming Wall Street 2: Money Never Sleeps and is said to be dating Transformers star Shia LaBeouf, after the pair met on the set of Wall Street.
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A record number of tickets for the Cheltenham Literature Festival have been sold for this year's event. | Organisers say 126,000 tickets have been sold so far. A total of 119,000 were sold during the whole festival last year.
Famous names such as JK Rowling, Salman Rushdie, Michael Palin, Kofi Annan and Sir Roger Moore will appear at events in the town over the next 10 days.
Festival director Jane Furze said: "Ticket sales are absolutely amazing."
Other authors due to speak about their works include PD James, Ian Rankin, Sir Terry Pratchett and Ian McEwan.
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Donald Trump boarded Air Force One for the last time on Wednesday with a wave. As Frank Sinatra's My Way blared over the loudspeakers at Joint Base Andrews, the soon-to-be-ex-president took off for his new home in Florida. | By Anthony ZurcherNorth America reporter
Although he had just finished promising a small gathering of supporters that he would be back "in some form", the future for Trump - and the political movement he rode to victory in 2016 - is murky.
Just two months ago, he seemed poised to be a powerful force in American politics even after his November defeat. He was still beloved by Republicans, feared and respected by the party's politicians and viewed positively by nearly half of Americans, according to public opinion surveys.
Then Trump spent two months trafficking in unsubstantiated allegations of electoral fraud, feuded with party officials in battleground states, unsuccessfully campaigned for two Republican incumbent senators in Georgia's run-off elections and instigated a crowd of supporters that would turn into a mob that attacked the US Capitol.
He's been impeached (again) by a bipartisan vote in the House of Representatives and could, if convicted in the Senate, be permanently banned from running for public office.
Over his five-year career in politics, Trump has wriggled free from political predicaments that would sink most others. He has been declared dead more times than Freddy Krueger. Yet he always seemed unsinkable; a submarine in a world of rowing boats.
Until now.
Stripped of his presidential powers and silenced by social media, he faces daunting challenges, both legal and financial. Can he still plot a successful political comeback? Will a Mar-a-Lago exile be his Elba or St Helena? And who might the tens of millions of Americans who supported him turn to instead?
A solid Maga base
In the days following the US Capitol riot, Trump's overall public approval rating precipitously dropped to the mid-30s - some of the lowest of his entire presidency. At first blush, the numbers would indicate that his future political prospects have been mortally wounded.
A deeper dive, however, paints a less dire picture for the ex-president. While Democrats, independents and some moderate Republicans are against him, his Republican base appears to be intact.
"I don't think what we're seeing suggests he loses political relevance and resonance," says Clifford Young, president of US public affairs at the public opinion company Ipsos. "Anyone who says that is kidding themselves. He still has a significant base."
Many Trump supporters fully believe Trump's assertion that the election was stolen by Democrats, and Republicans, across multiple states. They've seen reports in fringe conservative media that the attack on the Capitol was instigated by antifa leftists and dismiss the preponderance of evidence that has led to the arrest of numerous right-wing militants and pro-Trump activists.
Gary Keiffer is a 67-year-old former Democrat from Beckley, West Virginia, who voted for Trump in 2016 and 2020. He says the ex-president was right to raise questions about the election, he suspects left-wing activists were behind the Capitol attack, he still fully supports the ex-president, and he hopes he'll run again in four years.
"He did so much for our country," Keiffer says. "I've never seen a president do as much as he has done and lose an election - and he didn't lose an election."
Trump may have a lot of problems, but the loyalty of his base - the folks who go to the rallies and buy Maga flags and signs - isn't one.
The party divides
Donald Trump ran for president as an outsider challenging the Republican establishment. His own party's leaders and rivals for the presidential nomination were as much a part of what he derisively referred to as "the swamp" as the Democrats.
With his victory, he became the Republican establishment - and all but the most recalcitrant never-Trumpers eventually bent to his will.
They bent, according to Liam Donovan, a Republican lobbyist and former Senate campaign strategist, because that's where the party membership took them. Trump appointed top party officials, like Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel. And at the state and local level, Republican Party officials are Trump true believers.
"The state party leaders are the activists, not the elite," says Donovan. "The rank and file are hardcore Republicans, and hardcore Republicans are hardcore Trump people. He has absolutely converted them."
When controversies came - the violence following a white nationalist march in Virginia, recordings of immigrant children crying because of the administration's family separation policy, the use of teargas and brute force on Black Lives Matter protesters near the White House, the impeachment over pressuring Ukraine's president for political help and any number of intemperate tweets - the standard response from Republican politicians was to hunker down and wait for the storm to pass.
In the final weeks of Trump's presidency, however, cracks have begun to show.
Before a pro-Trump mob stormed the US Capitol on 6 January, then-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell warned the president's efforts to undermine confidence in the 2020 presidential election results threatened to put American democracy into a "death spiral". After the violence, his aides indicated that he was "pleased" with efforts in the House of Representatives to impeach the president for inciting the insurrection - a vote that 10 Republicans, including a member of the Republican leadership, broke party ranks to support.
Earlier this week McConnell made his most direct comments on the riot, saying that the mob was "fed lies" and "provoked" by Trump and other powerful people.
McConnell's moves are the clearest sign that at least some Republicans are looking to put daylight between the party and Trump.
Others, however - such as the 138 House Republicans who voted to challenge the results of Pennsylvania's presidential vote after the Capitol Hill riot or the 197 who voted against Trump's impeachment - are sticking with the ex-president.
"President Trump is still the leader of the Republican Party and the America First movement," Republican Congressman Matt Gaetz of Florida, a loyal Trump supporter, tweeted on Thursday.
If anything, Donovan says, Republicans in the House better reflect the party's centre of gravity given that, unlike the Senate, they have to stand for election every two years. If McConnell and the Republican top leadership want to make a clean break with Trump, it could tear the party apart.
A corporate revolt
For decades, the Republican Party has operated as a fusion between social conservatives and business interests. The latter appreciated the party's advocacy of lower taxes and reduced regulation, and tolerated the former's support for abortion bans, religious freedom initiatives, gun rights and other hot-button cultural issues.
Trump's presidency, and his efforts to expand the Republican coalition to include working-class whites through anti-immigration and anti-trade policies, have put pressure on this alliance. In 2018, suburbanites - the kind of people who work at and run those pro-Republican businesses - trended toward the Democrats.
Then, after the Capitol Hill riot, the dam broke. A slew of big companies - including Walmart, JPMorganChase, AT&T, Comcast and Amazon - announced they were either suspending their political donations or withdrawing support specifically from Republican politicians who supported Trump's challenge to the presidential election results.
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Big business could, once the political waters calm, return to its normal giving patterns, says Donovan, or it could decide that their interests no longer clearly align with a Republican Party beholden to Trump.
"This has been a long time coming," Donovan says. "We're past the point where business is going to cast their lot exclusively with Republicans."
Corporate contributions make up only part of the Republican Party's funding, but the speed and severity of the move caught many conservatives off-guard. And the latest moves might instigate further efforts by the party leaders - the ones who pay attention to the dollars and where they come from - to reject Trump's policies and his style of politics.
The evangelical bargain
If the corporate wing of the Republican Party is contemplating a break with Trumpism, social conservatives may not be far behind. The strong evangelical backing for a man with two divorces, multiple affair allegations and intemperate personality always seemed counterintuitive, but religious conservatives stuck by the president in 2020 even when the moderate suburbanites peeled off.
Part of it can be explained by Trump's ability to fill more than 200 federal court vacancies, including three Supreme Court seats, over the course of his four years. His selection of one of their own, Mike Pence, as vice-president also helped. Policy wise, the Trump administration advanced a social agenda that was also popular with Christian conservatives. It fought against religious limitations in courts and adjusted regulations, such as contraceptive care mandates in federal healthcare law, in their favour.
With Trump out of power, however, some evangelicals may be rethinking their support of Trump and his political agenda.
"We worship with the magi, not MAGA," headlined a piece in Christianity Today by Anglican minister Tish Harrison Warren.
"The violence wrought by Trump supporters storming the Capitol is anti-epiphany," she writes. "It is dark and based in untruth. The symbols of faith - Jesus' name, cross, and message - have been co-opted to serve the cultish end of Trumpism."
She goes on to blame religious leaders in the US for allowing their desire for political power to cloud their moral compass - and said a reckoning within the religious community is near.
Deeana Lusk, a legal assistant from Derby, Kansas, says faith is important in her voting and Trump wasn't her first pick in the 2016 Republican primaries. Still, she voted for him in the general election that year and in 2020.
She says she won't give a lot of weight to Trump's endorsements and advocacy going forward, however, and if Trump decides to run again she'll definitely shop around for other possibilities.
"The truth of the matter is no one's perfect," she says. "However, there are thousands of candidates out there who would support religious freedom, and I think ultimately we are going to be looking for that candidate."
Life without Trump
There is, of course, the possibility that Trump - despite his protestations and promises - fades from the political scene. Talk of new political parties, new media empires and new presidential campaigns could subside.
Or, perhaps at least 17 Republicans in the Senate could join the 50 Democrats in convicting the ex-president of his insurrection impeachment charges and banning him from public office. Such an outcome is not outside the realm of possibility.
Even if he survives impeachment, Trump faces some very real legal challenges. New York prosecutors are investigating his payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels. Georgia is looking into his phone call pressuring Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to "find votes" in the November election. And federal prosecutors might review his words and actions prior to the attack on the Capitol.
He also will have his hands full keeping his business empire afloat, as it faces declining revenue due to the coronavirus pandemic and a tarnished brand. Trump's company owes hundreds of millions of dollars in loans due in the next few years and Deutsche Bank, his most reliable lender, recently dropped him as a client.
A political revival, in other words, could be a low priority in the days ahead. At that point, Trump the man, would become separated from Trumpism as a movement.
"I think it would relegate him again to the status of a celebrity and media elite with opinions on politics," says Lauren Wright, a political scientist at Princeton University.
She adds that it might be difficult for another Republican to pick up Trump's political mantle and carry it forward.
"I think what makes Trump distinct is not the policy message, it's the way it's packaged, and that comes from an entertainment skill set, and that comes from a showbusiness background," she says. "A traditional politician cannot perform in the same way."
For Trumpism to be a success, Republicans will have to find another celebrity - or go back to the traditional Republican values of earlier candidates like Mitt Romney and John McCain.
Donovan isn't so sure Republicans can - or even will want to - turn back the clock.
"What Trump proved is being a slave to whatever conservative orthodoxy says is not necessary or even necessarily advantageous," he says.
Trump ran against free trade, open immigration and an aggressive foreign policy, and was an ardent critic of cutting Social Security. Other Republican politicians might decide Trump has proven that heterodoxy isn't so risky.
"A lot of people are playing with different things Trump has done," he says, "but I don't think anyone has figured it out yet."
They may not have to figure it out, however. Even after all the events of recent days, Donald Trump may not be done yet.
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Millions of people are less physically active than they were before Covid-19. For those working from home, the morning walk to the bus stop has gone. Days on end can be spent hunched over a laptop without ever leaving the house. | By David BrownBBC News
For some, that's taking a painful toll.
A survey of people working remotely, by Opinium for the charity Versus Arthritis, found 81% of respondents were experiencing some back, neck or shoulder pain. Almost half (48%) said they were less physically active than before the lockdown. Another study by the Institute for Employment Studies found 35% reporting new back pain while working from home.
Physiotherapists and other back pain experts say those with serious or persistent problems should seek professional help, but there are things that many of us can do to help ourselves.
Don't just sit there
Pretty much all the experts agree that one of the best things you can do is get moving.
Don't sit in the same position for long periods.
"Make sure you take any opportunity you can to move your body," says Ashley James of the Chartered Society of Physiotherapists (CSP). "It doesn't need to be about exercise as such," he says. "It's about building movement into your day." He calls it taking "regular movement snacks".
That could be taking phone calls or joining online meetings standing up, just having a stretch or walking up and down the stairs when you don't really need to, he says. When you're moving, different muscle groups share the work of keeping your head, neck, back and the rest of your body supported, rather than continually overloading the same muscles.
Where lockdowns have restricted outside exercise to once a day, Mr James's advice is to use that daily opportunity for at least a good walk whenever you can.
Movement can help with breathing by opening up your chest, and reducing muscle atrophy. It increases blood flow and lubricates synovial joints - joints that allow free movement - like hips and shoulders.
Set an alarm
Creating a new routine to help keep you moving can be difficult, so experts suggest setting a timer on your phone or laptop to remind you to move. It's a good way to avoid getting stuck in the same position hour after hour, says neck specialist Chris Worsfold.
"We've evolved to move," he says. "We naturally want to move after about 20 or 30 minutes, so that's when you need to go and shake it about."
If you're sitting when it goes off, stand up. If you're standing, have a stretch or walk up and down the stairs.
"The key is to create a routine that works for you," says Leanne Antoine, who treats patients in Hertfordshire. "There's no point in creating a schedule that makes you feel like a failure when you don't keep to it."
So ask yourself honestly what you would be prepared to do, and stick to it. Be careful, but as long as it gets you out of the chair, stretching, walking or Zumba dancing in your living room, it doesn't matter, she says.
Sort out your workspace
"You don't need the perfect set up with a thousand pound chair, but if you're scrunched up on the sofa, it's not going to be good for your back," says Chris Martey.
Your workspace is worth some serious thought, but companies have a big interest in selling expensive equipment, so he says beware of unnecessary costs.
Leanne Antoine agrees: "Just make small tweaks that don't cost the earth."
That could be as simple as using a cushion to raise you up on your chair, or to support your lower back. An inexpensive adjustable office chair can help. A mount for your laptop will raise your screen to eye level so that you're not always looking down, particularly on long online video calls. An external keyboard is also useful.
"Talk to your employer," says Ms Antoine. Many will supply equipment to staff.
If you have to use a sofa, at least make sure your feet are firmly on the floor and you're sitting back with a cushion to support your lower back. Standing desks can be helpful, says Chris Martey. But you need to alternate between standing and sitting - and take regular screen breaks.
If you don't have a standing desk, some experts recommend standing with your laptop on an ironing board for short periods.
Get better sleep
We're in a "perfect storm" for back trouble - according to Ashley James, with Covid-19 restricting physical activity while simultaneously ramping up anxieties about health, job insecurity, children's education and more.
It's impossible to quantify but a lot of back pain is driven by anxiety, he says. In the jargon, back problems are "biopsychosocial". It doesn't help that we're now in winter - when many people experience a dip in mood.
People de-stress in all sorts of ways of course. Pilates and yoga are helpful for some.
One of the best ways is to work on getting better sleep, says Mr James. "Sleep hygiene" is the key.
That means cutting down on caffeine in the afternoon and evening, keeping to a consistent night time routine and trying to wake up at the same time every day.
The NHS advises against using electronic devices for an hour or so before you go to bed, as the light from the screen may make it more difficult for you to sleep. Light suppresses the secretion of melatonin, a hormone which helps to make you sleepy.
Many studies have suggested that blue light does this most powerfully, but some research suggests the warmer colours used in "night mode" on many devices may actually have a bigger impact.
Desk exercises
The CSP has designed some simple stretches which, if done regularly, can help ward off aches and pains. They're for people who are working remotely and find themselves sitting for long periods.
The chest stretch, the leg stretch, the sit stretch and the wall press, are designed to help different muscle groups. The CSP says there is no "perfect posture" and that the priority is to keep moving.
There's a positive message here, says Chris Martey. For millions of people suffering everyday aches and pains he says: "You can take control. You can self-manage. You don't have to be dependent."
Illustrations by Gerry Fletcher.
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Hospitals, clinics and pharmacies in Iran are running out of medicine as the government cuts health funding because of international sanctions, putting the lives of thousands of people at risk, reports the BBC's Mohsen Asgari. | At the well-known 13 Aban Pharmacy in central Tehran, Atefeh Allahyari is queuing.
Ms Allahyari left her house at 04:30 to make sure she would be first to get Paclitaxel, a chemotherapy drug used to treat cancer, for her younger brother. However, she does not hold out much hope.
"I have come here for the last four days, but the pharmacists say nothing has arrived yet," she says.
Khosrow, one of the pharmacists, says there is nothing they can do.
"We cannot import medicine," he explains. "My uncle has been in this job for many years but he cannot import anything because no banks accept Iran's money for fear of facing punishment by the West."
"They are not legally bound to refuse services to Iranians; but they err on the safe side for fear of getting into trouble."
Dwindling reserves
Although trade in medicine is exempt from international sanctions imposed by the UN Security Council and the unilateral sanctions announced by the US and EU, Iranian importers say Western banks have been declining to handle it.
The US and EU have placed restrictions on dealings with Iran's Central Bank - the only official channel for Iranians to transfer money abroad - and Swift, the body that handles global banking transactions, has cut Iran's banks out of its system.
The move has isolated Iran financially by making it almost impossible for money to flow in and out of the country. Foreign currency which Iran used to receive for its oil and gas exports has also dried up in the wake of an EU-wide embargo.
The government said in July that it had $150bn in foreign currency reserves to help cushion the blow of the sanctions. By October, the central bank's reserves were reported to have fallen to $110bn. Iran's currency, the rial, is also believed to have lost 80% of its value against the dollar since the start of the year.
A subsidised exchange rate was set up by the government to protect vital imports, but some reports say it has been open to abuse. The health ministry has also allegedly been denied access to cheap dollars to purchase medicine and equipment.
Officials have also sought to step up domestic production of medicine. However it has been limited by subsidy reforms which have increased the cost of fuel and electricity, as well as by shortages of increasingly-expensive raw materials.
On Wednesday, Britain's Times newspaper reported that Iran had stockpiles of medicine to last only another 100 days.
'Silent death'
Iranians suffering from diseases such as the blood disorders thalassemia and haemophilia, and various types of cancer, so far have been hardest hit.
For months they have had to worry about whether they could afford the spiralling cost of vital drugs, but now they are struggling to get hold of them.
Manouchehr Esmaili-Liousi, a 15-year-old boy suffering from haemophilia, died in July because his family did not have access to medicine.
He was from a nomadic tribe based in the mountains near the city of Dezful, in Iran's south-western province of Khuzestan.
"He lived far away from the city and because the family had not the medicine on the spot they had to take him to hospital. But it was too late," Ahmad Ghavidel, the director of the Iranian Haemophilia Society, told local media.
Mr Ghavidel blamed Manouchehr's death on the US and EU sanctions.
"This is against human rights. Even in wars, women and children and patients are protected by international treaties," he added. "But sanctions hitting medicine in Iran are causing a silent death and are a ploy to hurt the health of Iranian people."
Milad Rostami, a seven-year-old haemophilia sufferer from Kuhdasht, a town in Lorestan province, desperately need injections of a US-made medicine, but it is no longer available locally in sufficient quantities. Supplies have run out even in Tehran.
Milad has been receiving treatment at the Iran Haemophilia Centre.
"We came to Tehran by bus to find medicine for our son. He had to take medicine two to three times a day. But now he receives injections every three or four days and his bleeding is increasing," says Afsaneh Souri, his mother. "They say the medicine is scarce."
'Appalling atmosphere'
Fatemeh Hashemi Rafsanjani, the head of Iran's Charity Foundation for Special Diseases, has expressed serious concern about the fates of the six million patients, especially those suffering from haemophilia, multiple sclerosis and cancer.
In a letter to the UN secretary general, she wrote that restrictions on bank transfers had severely affected the import of medicines.
"I hereby implore you to exert all your endeavours to champion human rights in lifting the sanctions as they are political in nature and prove to the inexcusable detriment of the patients in Iran," she said.
In a statement, the US treasury said: "It has been the longstanding policy of the United States not to target Iranian imports of humanitarian items, such as food, medicine and medical devices.
"If there is in fact a shortage of some medicines in Iran, it is due to choices made by the Iranian government, not the US government."
Mismanagement
Critics of the government believe its mismanagement of the national finances, as well as the inefficacy of local bureaucracies and corruption, have exacerbated the problems.
Many importers say they have struggled to get access from state institutions to the dollars and euros they need to purchase medicines, most of which are made in the West.
Iranian Health Minister Marziyeh Vahid Dastjerdi recently complained her department's inability to get access to foreign currency she had been promised.
"Some $2.5bn has been allocated for [the import of] medicine," she said. "However, Iran's Central Bank has given only $600m to the ministry since the beginning of the Iranian year [in March 2012]."
Importers have also complained that customs duties on medicine have risen significantly, while some have been accused of withholding stocks to increase prices.
The Times reported that drugs for a course of chemotherapy which would cost $2,000 at the state-subsidised rate, now cost $6,000.
There are also reports of a black market in medicine developing, as well as claims that hospitals are turning to drugs which have been struck off by the health authorities but remain available and affordable.
Sanctions or mismanagement? For patients and their families it does not matter which one is to blame for the crisis which is slowly threatening a nation's health.
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Should governments step in to regulate work emails and so rescue harassed staff from the perils of digital burnout? The answer in France appears to be "Yes". President Francois Hollande's Socialist Party is about to vote through a measure that will give employees for the first time a "right to disconnect". | By Hugh SchofieldBBC News, Paris
Companies of more than 50 people will be obliged to draw up a charter of good conduct, setting out the hours - normally in the evening and at the weekend - when staff are not supposed to send or answer emails.
Much mockery was made in the foreign press when the proposal was first mooted, with images of hawk-eyed work inspectors snooping on the industrious.
But the French government says the problem of permanent connection is universal and growing - and that intervention is needed.
"All the studies show there is far more work-related stress today than there used to be, and that the stress is constant," Socialist MP Benoit Hamon tells me.
"Employees physically leave the office, but they do not leave their work. They remain attached by a kind of electronic leash - like a dog. The texts, the messages, the emails - they colonise the life of the individual to the point where he or she eventually breaks down."
The measure is part of a labour law - named after Labour Minister Maryam El Khomri - many of whose other provisions have sparked weeks of protests in France. The "disconnection" clause is about the only part on which there is consensus.
Few - in France or elsewhere - would disagree that work-home encroachment is a troubling by-product of the digital revolution.
"At home the workspace can be the kitchen or the bathroom or the bedroom. We shift from a work email to a personal WhatsApp to a Facebook picture to a professional text - all on the same tool," says Linh Le, a partner at Elia management consultants in Paris.
"You're at home but you're not at home, and that poses a real threat to relationships," she says.
Le says the businesses she advises are increasingly aware of the dangers to staff. The most extreme threat is so-called burnout which she describes as "physical, psychological and emotional distress caused by a total inability to rest".
But apart from wishing to spare their suffering, companies also need employees to be creative. And this is less likely, says Le, without regular downtime.
She applauds a US insurance company that has given workers sleep monitors and pays them a bonus if they get 20 consecutive nights of good sleep.
"It shows how good companies recognise the importance of not harassing workers at home.
"Here in France we speak of the two types of time, as defined by the Greeks: chronos and keiros. Chronos is regular, divisible time. Keiros is unconscious time… creative time.
"Keiros is essential for productive thinking, and good employers know they need to protect it."
But will the law work? Many have doubts.
At PriceMinister - an online marketplace run from central Paris - chief executive Olivier Mathiot has instituted "no-email Fridays", to encourage employees to resort less to digital messaging.
Sales manager Tiphanie Schmitt says this idea is fine - it helps to get people to talk - but she would resist any government interference in the way she does her job.
"I do sales. I like doing sales. It means I use email late into the evening, and at the weekend. I don't want my company preventing me from using my mail box just because of some law," she says.
Similar views can be heard expressed at the Bowler pub near the Champs-Elysees, a hang-out for financial and computer workers.
"I think [the right to disconnect] is wonderful for improving the human condition but totally inapplicable," says software writer Gregory.
"In my company we compete with Indian, Chinese, American developers. We need to talk to people around the world late into the night. Our competitors don't have the same restrictions.
"If we obeyed this law we would just be shooting ourselves in the foot."
Olivier Mathiot of PriceMinister says the issue should be addressed by education rather than legislation.
"In France we are champions at passing laws, but they are not always very helpful when what we need is greater flexibility in the workplace," he says.
And according to Linh Le at Elia Consulting, the law will be very quickly made irrelevant. "In a few years' time emails will have ceased to exist," she predicts. "We'll have moved on to something else."
Even cheerleaders such as the MP Benoit Hamon admit that the impact of the law will only go so far - as presently drafted there is no penalty for violating it. Companies are expected to comply voluntarily.
But almost everyone in France agrees that the subject of communications overload is one that needs to be on every employer's agenda.
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German vehicle-maker Daimler has an innovative approach to holiday email, which many people may wish their company would copy, writes William Kremer.
Should holiday email be deleted? (August 2014)
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The justifications put forward by the US, UK and France for the air strikes in Syria have focused on the need to maintain the international prohibition against the use of chemical weapons, to degrade President Assad's chemical weapons arsenal and to deter further chemical attacks against civilians in Syria. | By Marc WellerProfessor of International Law
Prime Minister Theresa May argued that the UK has always stood up for the defence of global rules and standards in the national interest of the UK and of the organised international community as a whole.
However, in its formal legal defence of the operation issued some time later, the UK government rather emphasises the need to protect the population of Syria from further harm.
Legally, the claim to enforce international law on chemical weapons by violent means would return the world to the era before the advent of the UN Charter. The Charter allows states to use force in self-defence and, arguably, for the protection of populations threatened by extermination at the hands of their own government. The use of force for broader purposes of maintaining international security is also possible. However, such action is subject to the requirement of a mandate from the UN Security Council.
This arrangement tries to balance the need of states to preserve their security in the face of an actual or imminent attack through self-defence when strictly necessary with the need to ensure that force cannot be used as a routine tool of international politics. Hence, international law since 1945 precludes military strikes in retaliation - to teach other states a lesson, as it were - or by way of reprisal. Reprisals are acts that are in principle unlawful, but they can be excused because they aim to force a state back into compliance with its international obligations.
Hence, in 1981 Israel was condemned by the UN Security Council when it attacked the Osirak nuclear reactor in Iraq. Israel had argued that it might contribute to the production of weapons of mass destruction in the future. A US attack against an alleged chemical weapons facility in Sudan in 1998 in response to US embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania was also criticised.
In this instance, the three states mounting the air strikes have taken it upon themselves to force Syria into compliance with its obligations under the Chemical Weapons Convention. Syria joined the Convention in 2013 as part of the diplomatic settlement that followed the failure of the UK, and the US, to go through with threatened air attacks after gruesome chemical attacks in Eastern Ghouta. The Convention prohibits the production, possession and use of chemical weapons. No fewer than 192 states have signed.
Syria was also subjected to additional duties contained in mandatory Security Council resolution 2118, reinforcing these obligations and providing for the destruction of its chemical weapons stockpile. In an impressive example of international co-operation, also involving Russia, this was largely achieved a year later, by September 2014.
Russian veto
However, since then, there have been some 40 recorded instances of alleged chemical weapons use in Syria. The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) has the ability to dispatch fact-finding missions to determine whether such weapons have actually been used.
A special joint mechanism was set up by the OPCW and the Security Council with a mandate to assign responsibility for such uses. However, after the mechanism pointed the finger at the Assad government last year, Russia vetoed its renewal.
An attempt to establish a new mechanism empowered to determine responsibility for the latest use of chemical weapons in Douma failed this week, again due to a Russian veto in the Security Council. Russia's own proposed investigatory mechanism, which was opposed by the Western states and others, would have lacked that power.
The three states intervening in Syria now argue that there was no prospect of obtaining a mandate from the Council to confront chemical weapons use by Syria. In striking Syria, they claim to have fulfilled an international public order function of defending the credibility of the prohibition of the use of chemical weapons in general terms, and enforcing Syria's obligations in particular.
This argument is somewhat reminiscent of the 2003 invasion of Iraq, supposedly to enforce Baghdad's disarmament obligations imposed by the Security Council in the absence of clear Security Council authorisation. Moreover, in April of last year, President Trump launched 59 cruise missiles against the Syrian air-base at Shayrat. It was claimed that the installation had been involved in a chemical attack in the town of Khan Sheikhun, again to restrain further chemical weapons use.
The blockage in the Security Council on Syria opens up some space for this kind of argument. The Chemical Weapons Convention provides for referral of grave instances such as the Douma attack to the Security Council for enforcement action. But the Council could not even agree on a mechanism to establish responsibility, not to speak of more decisive action to repress future uses of such weapons.
The claim of the three states involved to act instead of the Council, as the world's enforcement agent of a highly important international rule, is of course being resisted by some. Russia has already asserted that the attacks flagrantly violate the prohibition of the use of force. The UN secretary general has also emphasised the need to respect the primacy of the Security Council.
Humanitarian suffering
The arrogation of the functions of the Council by a group of states claiming to act in the common interest therefore reflects the reality of the present, little Cold War between Russia and the West. The breakdown of the consensus that facilitates the operation of collective security necessarily results in unilateral acts and, in consequence, further division.
In addition to the general interest in maintaining the obligation to refrain from chemical weapons use, Mrs May also referred to the protection of civilians from further chemical attacks to alleviate further humanitarian suffering. This, in fact, is a stronger and more persuasive legal argument in favour of the strikes.
In fact, the formal legal argument put forward by the UK government sometime after the prime minister addressed the nation does not rely on the claim to enforce the terms of the chemical weapons convention or of resolution 2118.
In 2013, when the use of force was expected after the Ghouta attack, the UK already expressly invoked the doctrine of humanitarian intervention. A good argument has been made that states can act in cases of overwhelming humanitarian necessity that cannot be addressed by any other means to protect populations in danger of imminent destruction.
The doctrine of forcible humanitarian action gained credence throughout the 1990s when it was applied to rescue the Kurds of northern Iraq and the Marsh Arabs in the south of Iraq from destruction by Saddam Hussein. It was later employed unopposed in cases including Liberia and Sierra Leone.
However, international division about its application emerged in the wake of the operation on behalf of the Kosovo Albanians of 1999.
Since then, the UN has embraced the concept that international action can be taken to rescue a population under immediate threat. However, the doctrine of responsibility to protect (R2P) was narrowed down to cover operations mandated by the Security Council. Still, a number of states claim a right to act when the Council cannot.
Innocent civilians at risk of destruction should not pay the price for a political blockage at UN headquarters in New York. Others, including Russia and China, oppose humanitarian intervention.
The application of this doctrine is not restricted to uses of chemical weapons against civilian populations. However, given the uncontrollable and indiscriminate effect of chemical weapons, their use against civilians offers perhaps the clearest trigger for the application of this doctrine.
In this instance, the UK points to the history of repeated uses of chemical weapons by the Syrian government, adding that it is "highly likely" that further such attacks would follow. Given the failure of previous attempts to rein in this practice, and the present blockage in the Security Council, it is argued that no means other than the use of force were available to secure the humanitarian objective of the operation.
Moreover, it is asserted the force used was strictly limited and specifically targeted at objects connected with the objective of degrading the capacity to launch future chemical attacks and deterring such attacks in the future. These arguments conform to the legal requirements for humanitarian intervention.
It could also be argued that the attacks aim to preserve the national security of the states involved in the attacks, by way of an extensive right to self-defence. Diluting the protection stemming from the prohibition of the use of chemical weapons in recent practice posed a threat to all states.
Of course, every state may defend itself, under some circumstances even before an armed attack aimed at it has landed on its territory. But the attack must be imminent, leaving no choice of means and the response must be proportionate to the attack.
In the run-up to the Iraq war of 2003, there was the famous 45-minute claim concerning Iraq's supposed weapons of mass destruction. Laying the ground for an argument of anticipatory self-defence against a strike that might come in the future, the UK argued that Iraqi weapons of mass destruction might reach UK military bases in Cyprus with minimum warning.
But there was no evidence that Baghdad was contemplating such an attack and the argument was abandoned. Similarly, there is no suggestion in this instance that Syria was preparing to launch an attack against the US, UK or France.
Marc Weller is Professor of International Law in the University of Cambridge and the editor of the Oxford University Press Handbook on the Use of Force in International Law.
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"Lost dispiriting places with the reek of missed opportunities" or "places of innovation, spirit and community"?
As the number of libraries in England falls , BBC News looks at some of the experiences of people who love or loathe visiting public libraries. | Sally Ball, Hanham
I am a mother of two young boys and regular visitor to Hanham library in South Gloucestershire. I have been personally involved in the campaign to stop the proposed library cuts in our area.
I am also a member of award winning Black Sheep Harmony, a female a cappella group from South Gloucestershire. We have produced a song against library cuts.
We have chosen the song's lyrics to show libraries as not only places from which to borrow books but, increasingly, hives of community activity, appealing to different areas of society.
Michael Johns-Perring, Edinburgh
I was one of those cool kids at school that volunteered in the library. When I was a sixth former, some of the teachers thought I was a member of staff - something that granted me staff room privileges.
I was even a fan of libraries before I was a fan of reading. Typically, as a boy, I wasn't much into books. Maybe it is the calming atmosphere of a library that has always appealed to me; after all, a library is also a public study.
I have also always liked order. I was fascinated by the Dewey Decimal system [of categorising books].
I still remember, with fondness, skipping a class in order to put the school library's National Geographic collection in chronological order. Ah, those halcyon days.
Sally Newton, Hemel Hempstead
I grew up in Hertfordshire and on Saturdays when I was little my Dad would either take me swimming or to the Hemel Hempstead library. Both pursuits were equally brilliant as far as I was concerned.
I could borrow up to six books a week, and I frequently did.
History, biology, fiction, mythology - anything I liked. I read far more books than I would have had a chance to purchase alone.
Dad still lives in the area and said the library we used to go to isn't even there any more. I am sad that the service libraries provide is being eroded.
Mark, Cheltenham
It pains me to have to say it, but public libraries have had their day. They have less life in them than the zombies in the Night of the Living Dead.
Decades of under-investment, poor leadership and fundamental professional disagreements about what libraries are for has wrecked libraries as much as the internet and Amazon.
Too many libraries are beyond redemption. They are lost dispiriting places with the reek of missed opportunities. They have also not been best served by some of their main public supporters. Having authors leading campaigns makes those campaigns look self-serving and they ignore the role modern libraries were supposed to fulfil.
The key test is this: would anyone today be proposing to establish public libraries if they didn't exist?
The simple answer is "no".
Claire Warren, Nottingham
I am a qualified and chartered librarian. I find it utterly horrifying that councils have cut services to libraries so fiercely over the past few years, having to rely on volunteers and very little money.
Libraries are so much more than the stagnant, dull and lifeless places that they are sometimes perceived - they are a place of innovation, spirit and community.
I work in schools and see the instrumental impact of a lack of books around children through low literacy levels and children struggling to read.
Libraries need to be protected now, not struggling for survival.
Charlotte Thomas-Collins, Crediton
I went in to register my daughter and that was it. They register them at birth now.
The books were filthy and had bits missing, looked chewed and I didn't want them in the house.
The staff were very friendly, though.
Another problem we had is that kids get obsessed with a favourite book and would have a fit if you returned it. They're so cheap on Amazon anyway. Less risky.
Adam, London
I became a librarian to help people but left the profession because I was tired of making excuses for why we couldn't any more. Mistakenly, I thought my voice would be heard as a campaigner outside the service, but the local council seems only marginally less disdainful of public voices.
The service was being run down long before they started planning closures in the local authority I worked for.
It wasn't just in libraries but across the council, as every service councillors are elected and paid to run are viewed as burdens if they aren't generating income.
Sue Bentley, Northamptonshire
Libraries introduced me to the world of books at a young age.
They shaped my life, broadened my view of the world, and became the spur to a career - I am a successful writer of multi-million selling children's series Magic Kitten.
Literacy is so important in all areas of life. Research shows that children who are read to at an early age do better at school that those who are not. We need our libraries and must fight for them.
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A herd of red deer have been photographed heading into a Highlands loch during last week's heatwave. | The animals were pictured cooling off at Reraig Forest at Ardaneaskan, Lochcarron, in Wester Ross.
Last Thursday, Scotland had its hottest day of 2019 when 31.6C (88.9F) was recorded in Edinburgh.
Later Scotland had its hottest night ever, after temperatures fell to only 20.9C (69.62F) in Achnagart, north-west Scotland.
Images copyright of Reraig Forest.
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The controversial Indian Islamic preacher, Zakir Naik, has been accused by the government of causing disaffection along religious lines and inciting youth through speeches. The BBC's Zubair Ahmed went to Mumbai to find out more about him and the impact of his preaching. | Zakir Naik's Islamic International School, located in a crowded Mumbai suburb, could be easily missed due to the fact that it is partially hidden by trees and high walls.
Although both boys and girls studied there, the two sexes were not allowed to mix.
The classrooms on the first floor were for girls, all of whom were clad in black burka. The boys, wearing skull caps, occupied the ground floor.
The school, now shut, was modelled on the preacher's own hardline brand of Islam, but much like Mr Naik himself, this is mixed with "modernity". In this case, a Cambridge IGCSE curriculum.
Mr Naik has courted controversy by aggressively advocating fundamentalist Islam.
He has always refused to denounce al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden and also famously dismissed the 9/11 terror attack in New York as an "insider job". However, these speeches are delivered in fluent English. He is always attired in a suit and tie, matched with a Muslim skull cap.
And he has a massive following.
Bangladesh to ban Islamic TV channel
Indian preacher is banned from UK
He has travelled widely in Africa and the Middle East and addressed large gatherings, while his lectures have been attended by heads of governments and heads of states. He is also believed to have huge followings in the Gulf countries as well as Pakistan, Africa, Indonesia and Malaysia.
And his impact is considerable.
Many detained al-Qaeda activists have reportedly told authorities that he had been a huge influence on them. He has been living a self-exiled life in the Middle East after being blamed for "influencing" the Dhaka terror attackers on 1 July this year. His offices and schools have since been raided and sealed.
The Indian government is likely to ask him to return to the country to help with their investigations.
Mr Naik believes that spreading the word of Allah should be the mission of every Muslim.
Many in the community call him and his followers "Wahhabi", an ideology which advocates a return to the era of Prophet Muhammed.
Amir Rizvi, a designer and an Islam enthusiast, has closely followed Mr Naik's progress as a preacher.
"Zakir Naik has made himself into a brand. He is a package. His image is that of a man who is western-educated, with a medical background and wearing suit and tie. He has also cultivated the image of a man of Islam. He sports a beard and wears a skull cap"
Mr Naik's journey to becoming one of the world's most controversial preachers - he has a popular television channel called Peace TV, which is now banned in Bangladesh - has been an unusual one.
He was born in 1965 in Dongri, a predominantly Muslim locality in Mumbai, into a family of doctors.
Dongri was once a playground for smugglers, underworld dons and gangsters, and has been unable to shed its reputation of notoriety.
It has also been home to the city's most infamous underworld figures including Dawood Ibrahim.
His father, who died recently, was also a doctor and so is his older brother.
Mr Naik, who attended St Mary's High School also followed the family profession, choosing to study medicine at the Topiwala National Medical College in Mumbai.
He founded the Islamic Research Foundation in Dongri in 1991 soon after abandoning his medical practice.
'Spectacle'
Saleem Yusuf, a former employee of Mr Naik's foundation, left him because he says he was never happy with the "spectacle" Mr Naik used to create on stage over the conversion of non-Muslims (into Islam). He once asked about it but he says he never got a satisfactory reply.
Mr Yusuf says he often felt uncomfortable with Mr Naik's speeches in which he allegedly made fun of other religions.
But both Mr Yusuf and Mr Rizvi despite being self-declared opponents of Zakir Naik, say they believe banning him and his institutions is "unjustified and anti-democratic".
Mr Naik's followers believe he might be arrested if he returns to India. But he will look at his school with some satisfaction. He is influencing a whole new generation of Muslims who think and talk like him.
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The 1984 miners' strike was a bitter and divisive episode in modern British history. But with the film Pride, screenwriter Stephen Beresford has created a hit focusing on unexpected links between South Wales miners and a Lesbian and Gay group from London.
Released late last year, the film has been nominated for three Baftas, as well as a Golden Globe for best comedy.
Three of those who were part of the story in real life say they're delighted it's been discovered by a new generation. | By Vincent DowdArts correspondent, BBC World Service
Almost certainly Sian James is the only British politician to have been in demand at the Toronto Film Festival. But since the 1984 coal strike the Labour MP's life has been full of the unexpected.
"I was a 25 year-old wife fretting who had the whitest net curtains in the village," she says. "All I thought about was supporting my striking husband with virtually no cash coming in. I never dreamt that 20 years after that I'd become a Labour member of parliament.
"So who could possibly have thought another decade on I'd find myself briefing the Hollywood Foreign Press Association about the strike? They were fascinated. There were times in Toronto when it all seemed a bit surreal."
The publicists for Pride - directed by Matthew Warchus and written by Stephen Beresford - soon realised the real-life participants in the story were a big hit with the media. Two of the leading figures in the group Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners also went to Toronto and then the USA to beat the drum for the film.
Jonathan Blake, now 65, is a former actor played in the film by The Hour star Dominic West.
In 1984, he acknowledges, he was a slightly flamboyant presence in the Dulais Valley when a group of LGSM (Lesbian and Gays Support the Miners) members drove from London "in two Hackney Community Transport mini-buses and a clapped out old Volkswagen" to meet the families they'd offered to help financially.
"We got so lost that we arrived about one o'clock in the morning and it all felt a bit flat. I remember thinking we might have made a terrible mistake accepting the invitation to go and see how our money was being spent: how on earth would a mining community react to these strange people from London?
"The film is about 70% true and 30% invention - but Stephen Beresford is spot on showing how warm the welcome was from almost everyone. And oddly we felt the same warmth doing publicity at Toronto and in the States: it's obvious people like the story."
After Toronto, Blake went to talk about Pride in New York, Los Angeles and in San Francisco.
"In San Francisco we had a screening in the Castro, the main gay area. It was at a cinema in a shopping mall and at first I worried about the reception we'd get.
"Russell Tovey (who has a cameo role in the film) was in town making the HBO series Looking so he came over with some of the cast. We were kept as surprise guests until after the screening and people were delighted."
Mike Jackson has also been on the publicity trail in America. Thirty years ago he was instrumental in getting LGSM going.
"I was working as head gardener at Bedford College in Regents Park. In my spare time I was a volunteer at London Gay Switchboard and that's how I met Mark Ashton [played in the film by American actor Ben Schnetzer].
"Mark was very active in left-wing politics and massively energetic: he suggested we collect for the miners.
"At first where we sent the money was a bit like pinning a tail on the donkey. The important thing was to send the money direct to a support group because if you sent through the NUM it would have been lost as their funds had been frozen by the courts.
"Someone in LGSM came from South Wales so that's why we wrote to a miners' support group in the Dulais Valley - which in the movie Stephen changes to a telephone call. In retrospect it was a fortunate choice because the South Wales miners were organised and really efficient about getting big donors to spend time with them. And of course without that strange meeting of opposites there'd be no film today."
James says the fact their London visitors were gay wasn't a huge issue for most of the community. "I remember some giggling when the letter arrived but it didn't last. I pointed out that there was a lot of rubbish in the media about striking miners - so maybe everything you'd get in those days in newspapers about gays and lesbians was nonsense too.
"And during the strike you'd meet Swedish Euro-communists in the village and Maoists and all kinds of activists who wouldn't normally have come to places like Onllwyn. We were very used to strangers.
"I think it was rarer then for people - especially women - in a working village to engage with people from outside. For people like me it was an education to meet people who were different: the exact way they were different wasn't so important.
"Meeting all these people changed my life and without it I'm sure I'd never have spent the last 10 years as an MP."
Played by actress Jessica Gunning, James is seen in one of the film's highlights - a very 1980s dance which Blake launches into in the miners welfare hall.
"I can't claim my dancing was quite the big production number it became on screen," she recalls. "But that's the wonder of cinema: Stephen and Matthew made it true to the spirit of what happened."
Blake agrees that West's exotic moves to Shirley and Company's disco classic Shame, Shame, Shame might in reality have been a bit beyond him. "But it's a highlight with audiences. And you can see why people are already saying Pride would make a musical."
Jackson recalls that he and other LGSM members were in South Wales when the National Union of Mineworkers announced the strike was over and the miners would return to work.
"It was a national decision so they went back - but lots of people were unhappy at what happened. In that sense the miners lost and Stephen Beresford's too honest a writer to create a phoney upbeat ending.
"But Jonathan and Sian and I have spoken to people about the film in London and Toronto and in America. Audiences like the struggle and the sense of community at the heart of the story. They don't see what happened as a defeat."
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A man died after he walked on to the M1 and was hit by a car shortly after he crashed his own vehicle. | Police said a car went down the embankment between junctions 20 and 21, southbound, in Leicestershire, just before 01:15 BST on Sunday.
The man was taken to hospital afterwards and later died.
The M1 southbound was closed for several hours and re-opened at about 10:30 BST. Police have appealed for eyewitnesses and dashcam footage.
Follow BBC East Midlands on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram. Send your story ideas to [email protected].
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The US president-elect Donald Trump has German ancestry on his father's side - but his mother was Scottish. During the election campiagn BBC Newsnight's Stephen Smith went to the Isle of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides to find out more. | Lewis is a windblown, God-fearing outcrop notable for its Gaelic heritage, its peat, and its jealously guarded sense of propriety.
Trump's mother, Mary MacLeod, was born there in 1912, to Malcolm MacLeod, a fisherman, and his wife, also called Mary.
Young Mary left the island at the age of 18 for a holiday in New York, where she met a local builder by the name of Trump - and the rest, as they say, is histrionics.
While some journalists have been pursuing the juicy story of the property developer's German grandfather, who appears to have supplied hard liquor and showgirls to gold prospectors in the Wild West, I decided to concentrate on the more understated but deeply enigmatic narrative of his maternal line.
I was encouraged in this by Trump himself, who has spoken fondly of his Scottish roots, and even went so far as to make a characteristically hush-hush visit to Lewis in 2008, his airliner "Trump 1" scorching the heather around the catwalk-like runway.
He flew into the island for a grand total of three hours or so, as councillors were debating a controversial Trump golf resort, a solid 2-iron away on the mainland. (The course is in business, though he's cooled on it ever since he failed to block a nearby wind farm.)
At the time, he said: "I have been very busy - I am building jobs all over the world - and it's very, very tough to find the time to come back. But this just seemed an appropriate time, because I have the plane... I'm very glad I did, and I will be back again."
When our own twin-prop flight touched down in Lewis, I sucked in a lungful of rarefied northern air and began to grasp what the Trump family liked about the place.
It's perfumed by an intoxicating blend of kelp and nitrate-rich sod that would have the apothecaries at a cosmetics laboratory rending their white coats in despair.
At night, the sky's as clear as the small print on a Trump contract, and the stars seem close enough to touch.
Perhaps it's this transparency - a sense that what you see is what you get - that accounts for their gruff rectitude. I'm reliably informed that Donald Trump is the talk of the place, but they won't necessarily talk about him to an outsider, on the charitable basis that if you can't say something nice about someone…
There's that, and there's also a formidable tradition of Calvinism, which has earned Lewis the TripAdvisor-friendly tag of "the last bastion of Sabbath observance in the UK".
This is such an established part of Lewis's reputation that the hostile environment specialists who brief BBC teams before assignments issued us with hipflasks. In fact, I found the pubs of Stornoway open til the witching hour even on a school night.
Retired healthcare worker Kathy McArthur told me, "When I first came here years ago, the swings were still padlocked on a Sunday so the children couldn't play on them. But now you see people out in the town with their children on a Sunday whereas it used to be just people going to church. There have been a lot of changes."
That said, I heard one outlying settlement described as a "religious village".
One thing that Trump has in common with adherents of the old religion on Lewis is that he takes the pledge. He does not drink. He suffered the horror of watching his own brother die of alcoholism, which reinforced whatever strictures he absorbed at his mother's knee.
Mary MacLeod was raised in the little village of Tong, among low-rise garrison-style homes "finished in pukey pebble-dash", as one Lewis writer puts it.
Who was Donald Trump's mother?
Trump's cousins still live in Tong, not far from the capital Stornoway. I was very firmly informed that no-one would talk to us. After I made my apologies and left, I tried to put my finger on what the experience reminded me of.
Perhaps I caught the family on a bad day, and no doubt they are weary of the world's press beating a path to their door, but it struck me that it had been like visiting the scene of a mortifying calamity. I hesitate to say it, but there was a sense of shame as well as irritation.
In a Stornoway pub, I recounted the experience to Ian Stephen, a storyteller in the island's age-old fireside tradition, and author of an acclaimed Lewis novel, A Book of Death and Fish.
"Oh yeah, I can imagine it. You would like to picture Donald with that lovely hair being caught by an island breeze and him helping to carry around a big basket. And what do you get instead? These outbursts of his - and everybody goes like that..." Stephen cradled his head in his hands in mock horror.
"It's not fashionable, but in Lewis our main passion is a bloodsport… genealogy," he went on. "You know, 'Who are your people?' So we're very proud of the people who have an impact on the wider world."
"So you're proud of Donald Trump?" I asked.
Folk musician Gerry Blane said: "Personally I think Trump's behaviour is questionable. There's a lot of intolerance there and you would never see any of that on the island. People used to think of the island as being intolerant and it's not. There's a mix of religions here now and people are very open, very honest and very kind."
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A seafront landmark in Bexhill has re-opened following a £3.5m renovation. | Kent-based Neilcott Construction led the works on the Grade II listed Colonnade, which was built to mark the coronation of King George V in 1911.
Rother District Council said the works were part of a wider scheme to regenerate the seafront.
The project also involves the construction of a new rowing club boathouse and a terraced lawn area alongside the De La Warr Pavilion.
Related Internet Links
Made by the Sea
Rother District Council
Bexhill Rowing Club
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More than 120 Indonesians who say Australia wrongly jailed them as adults - when in fact they were children - have launched a bid for compensation.
The BBC's Indonesia editor Rebecca Henschke visited remote Rote Island to hear how they became caught up in human trafficking. | Siti Rudy's eyes fill with tears when she recalls the long months in 2009 when, with no news, she assumed her son Abdul was dead.
"I cried and cried because as the youngest he was the one who looked after me," she says, sitting on the cement floor of her home, a one-bedroom house in Oelaba village on Rote, the Indonesian island closest to Australia.
"After a long time he called me and told me he was in jail in Australia. That was a very hard thing to hear."
Abdul says he unwittingly became, in the eyes of the Australian authorities, a people smuggler, carrying asylum seekers into Australian waters.
He says he was offered around $100 (£77), a significant amount of money in this area, to work on a boat transporting rice. He didn't know or ask where it was going.
Australia intercepts any boats attempting to bring refugees or asylum seekers to its shores.
Under Australian policy at the time, any crew members of those boats found to be children should have been returned home - rather than face charges.
But Abdul was convicted as an adult and jailed for two-and-a-half years. His family and village officials say he was just 14 at the time.
"I was scared I would be beaten up," he says.
"I was so far from my family and held for a long time. That's what was frightening but I got used to it after a while," he says.
I have interviewed many men in Abdul's position over the years - they all go very quiet when they talk about their time in jail. Lawyers say several children were physically and sexually abused, and still suffer psychological trauma.
Lawyers in town
Siti's small house is a hive of activity. Giggling children crowd around the veranda as a group of Australian lawyers take down her story.
Among the visitors, Mark Barrow of Ken Cush Associates is building up a case to have Abdul's conviction overturned and to fight for some form of compensation.
More than 120 boys who were imprisoned between 2009 and 2011 have signed up for the class action, pursuing compensation through the Australian Human Rights Commission.
They are seeking money from the Australian Federal Police, Australia's Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions and the doctor who used a now-discredited X-ray method to determine their age.
A 2012 report by the Australian Human Rights Commission entitled An Age of Uncertainty found numerous breaches of the boys' rights.
"If this was an Australian child, you would expect the Indonesian police to ring up their parents and ask for the details, and quickly their child would be sent back to Australia. This didn't happen," says Mr Barrow.
"I think most people would fairly agree that if that happened to their children, then they would seek redress."
The whistleblower
Colin Singer was an independent prison visitor, a volunteer job he had held for around four years, when he came across the Indonesian boys behind bars.
"There was this tiny kid holding on to this barbed wired fence and I remember saying to him gently, 'what's your name?' And he was in tears, clearly traumatised."
Mr Singer started asking questions, but says appeals to resolve the matter with Australian and Indonesian authorities fell on deaf ears.
"I strongly believe that the Commonwealth of Australia knowingly and willingly imprisoned these children," he says.
"It's beyond belief that a single child could end up in adult prison - not for a day, not for a week, but for nearly three years - and we are not just taking about one child here."
As for Indonesia, he says: "The government didn't want to do anything. They didn't provide lawyers. They didn't provide any assistance whatsoever. I was appalled."
The lead claimant
The boy Mr Singer met behind bars that day was Ali Jasmin.
Documents, including an Indonesian birth certificate showing he was 13 at the time of his arrest, were obtained by the Indonesian government but never tendered in his defence.
"I kept arguing that I was a child, but I was sentenced to three years because they said I was an adult," he says.
"I was angry that the test they used was not my mum; it didn't give birth to me."
Ali Jasmin was released in 2012, after extensive media coverage of his case, and deported back to Indonesia.
Last year he became the first boy to have his conviction overturned in Western Australia's Court of Appeal, which found that a "miscarriage of justice" had occurred.
"My battle for justice was worth it," he says.
Mr Singer, he says, has become like family for him.
"What I am fighting for now is compensation for the time I spent in jail," Ali says. "After that I will give money to my parents. I want to make my family happy."
He has a two-year-old daughter and works as a fisherman. Having not been able to complete his high school education, jobs are scarce.
What Australia and Indonesia say
The 2012 Australian Human Rights Commission report found numerous breaches of the boys' rights, and flawed handling of their cases.
It stated that "federal police and the CDPP [Australia's Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions] placed reliance on wrist X-ray analysis as evidence that a person was over the age of 18 years - despite significant material being available to support the conclusion that they should not do so."
The CDPP and Australia's foreign affairs department turned down the BBC's requests for interviews.
The CDPP said via email: "You are aware there are still active legal proceedings and as such we decline the offer to be interviewed or provide any comment."
Dede Syamsuri was Indonesia's consular-general in Perth at the time. Now ambassador to Morocco, he says Indonesia was not in a position to help most of the boys.
"[This was] simply because we had nothing in our hand - we had no proof of how old the boys were," he says.
He says Indonesian authorities were able to help just two, or perhaps more, boys - including Ali Jasmin. In those instances, Indonesia helped the boys get documents from their families to prove they were children.
Once those documents were handed over to lawyers appointed by Australia, Dede Syamsuri says Indonesia left the matter with the Australian courts.
"Because those responsible were doctors using medical ways [to determine ages], I just had to agree with what they said. We had to accept what the doctor found," he says.
"Indonesia did firmly raise the issue of the underage boys with Canberra." But he adds: "It was very hard to discuss further the issue."
Anger over inaction
Ali Jasmin says he felt deeply let down by Indonesia.
"I am disappointed and angry because they should have been fighting for us," he says.
"They should have been our biggest defenders but they just weren't. The Indonesian consular [officials] asked us if we were underage and we told them clearly that we were, but nothing changed."
Dede Syamsuri says Indonesian officials regularly visited the boys in jail, bringing them religious books and food.
"Of course being in jail wasn't fun but I saw that they were happy," he says.
"They could do regular exercise because there was a basketball court, football pitch and they had a room just for watching TV. The facilities were very good and they enjoyed them. The jails are very different to ones we have in Indonesia."
He says he did receive reports that some boys were being sexually harassed, and he requested that the boys be moved to other jails.
Dede Syamsuri says he was surprised and pleased to hear from the BBC that Ali's conviction had been overturned.
Too sick to go home
For Erwin Prayoga, who shared a cell with Ali Jasmin, this legal battle comes too late. He died about two months after being released and sent home to Rote Island.
Erwin's family says he was 14 when he was arrested by Australia.
His younger brother, Baco Ali, breaks down when he tells me about the excruciating pain Erwin was in before his death.
"It's hard to remember how sick he was," Baco Ali says through tears.
"They had to push him in a wheelbarrow to the local health centre. I have been told by the lawyers that if you are not well then you shouldn't be sent home from Australia. I want to know why he was."
Lawyers have obtained his medical records in Australia and are asking the same question.
Erwin's family say any compensation they receive will be used to make him a proper grave.
Now it's marked simply with rocks and a wooden block at the back of their house, near the fishing boats where Baco Ali comes to pray often.
Lawyers say more avenues are available through the courts, if compensation is not achieved through the Australian Human Rights Commission.
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Facebook has banned the selling of administration rights for community groups. | By Zoe KleinmanTechnology reporter, BBC News
This follows BBC News uncovering several incidents of group owners being approached about selling their pages.
Last month, nearly all 25,000 members of a west London group left in protest after finding out it had been sold by the person running it.
One buyer told BBC News they bought groups to promote their own business. They also sell unofficial ad space.
Facebook says the practice falls under the "spam" section of its Community Standards rules although there is no specific line that says this.
"We do not allow people to sell site privileges on Facebook, which includes selling admin roles or space on a page or group to display a third-party ad.
"We disabled the account reported to us by the BBC in November and urge our community to report cases like this so we can investigate and take swift action," a Facebook representative said.
Community groups are traditionally set up by Facebook members in the local area, acting in a voluntary capacity.
Members typically use them to discuss local issues, buy and sell unwanted items, and share upcoming events.
Jon Morter runs a local community group in his home county of Essex. It has about 30,000 members. He also belongs to one that is for other group administrators.
"A few weeks ago, a member posted to say someone had approached and offered to buy their group," he said.
"Another member then pointed out that they had been approached as well. Lots of us all dived in and realised it was the same bunch of people.
"We investigated [and found] that there are at least five, possibly more, local sales or community groups that this lot now own. They also say, 'If you want to put your advert on the banner, we'll charge you.'"
BBC News contacted someone in the UK who buys local groups.
They said they did so in order to showcase their own business and allow it "exclusivity" but added that group members were also allowed to promote their own companies, free, in their posts.
Other businesses were also invited to buy promotion by sponsoring the group's cover photo - the large photo at the top of each page - but not many did, the buyer said.
Mr Morter said administrators should not make money out of groups.
"You do it for the love of where you live. I'm proud of my town," he said.
Mr Morter also runs various music group fan pages and says that back in 2014 he was offered $4,000 (£3,100) from a US company to hand over the rights to one of them.
"They said they were part of a marketing company and 'we'd like to put our own advertisements on there but we wouldn't stop you putting your content on there still'. They wanted to control it."
He did not sell the page.
He said that he had read Facebook's Community Standards and could not see anything about whether or not the practice of buying and selling group rights was permitted.
"It's very vague - that's being polite about it," he said.
"There's not really anywhere specific where it says that you cannot purchase admin rights."
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Police are appealing for information following a case of sheep worrying in the south of Scotland over the weekend.
| The incident happened some time between Friday and Sunday on farmlands at Clerkhill near Eskdalemuir.
Police Scotland said six sheep worth about £900 had been "worried and mauled to death".
The fields are near a haulage road in the area and police have asked anyone who uses the road to get in touch if they have seen anything suspicious.
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Irish voters from around the world returned to cast their ballots in Friday's referendum on whether or not to repeal the country's Eighth Amendment. That clause in the Irish constitution in effect outlaws abortion by giving equal rights to the unborn. | By Kelly-Leigh CooperBBC News
The #HomeToVote hashtag has trended on Twitter for most of the weekend, as men and women shared their journeys home.
From car shares, to offers of beds for the night, the movement was propelled by social media. A similar movement also took off ahead of the 2015 vote that legalised same-sex marriage.
People on both sides of the argument travelled back to vote, but the movement was spearheaded by the London-Irish Abortion Rights Campaign - a pro-choice group that tried to mobilise an estimated 40,000 eligible emigrants.
The Eighth Amendment came into being after a 1983 referendum, so no-one under the age of 54 has voted on this before. For many, the vote was touted as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to have their say on women's reproductive rights.
Thousands of Irish women travel every year for abortion procedures in Britain. For women who made the reverse trip to vote Yes to repeal the Eighth, the journey held a lot of symbolism.
"I think of it every time I've travelled to and from the UK; it's always on my mind," 21-year-old student Bláithín Carroll said before boarding her plane back.
Karen Fahy, 26, and Maria Mcentee, 24. travelled back from London to vote against the change.
They argue that young women opposed to abortion have been stigmatised for their views in the run-up to the referendum and believe many others like them have kept their opinions quiet.
"A lot of people don't want to get involved in the polarising debates online," Maria said. "But you can kind of infer who is voting no, because they'll be the people who don't have repeal stickers on their picture or post things about repeal."
The 24-year-old said she had always been "a bit indifferent" to the abortion issue until she saw a campaign video showing a procedure.
Currently living in the UK where abortion is legal (except in Northern Ireland), Karen said she had concerns about the proposal presenting abortion as "the first and only choice" for women with unplanned pregnancies.
"I don't want to see that coming to Ireland, and I think we can do a lot better," she said. "We should be investing and providing support for women in crisis pregnancies."
"In those very difficult situations when there's a very severe disability, we should provide more child benefit and support women in education."
Abortion is only currently allowed in Ireland when the woman's life is at risk, and not in cases of rape, incest or foetal-fatal abnormality (FFA).
Round trip from Japan
Clara Kumagi, a keen repealer, has taken time off work in Tokyo to travel back thousands of miles to cast her vote. She was already on her way back there by Friday afternoon.
"I want to live in a country where I feel safe, where I know that I have the autonomy to make decisions about my own body," the 29-year-old said.
"For me, the act of travelling was something that I felt was important to do. How many kilometres do Irish women travel every year? For me 10,000km felt like the least I could do."
Her student brother also travelled travelling back from Stockholm to vote. Irish men living as far away as Buenos Aires and Africa have posted online about their journeys home. Pro-repeal men have shared their support for the movement using the #MenForYes hashtag.
Mother-of-three Amy Fitzgerald, 38, took three flights to return to Ireland from Prince Edward Island in Canada.
"There's always people who will need an abortion," she said, reacting to accusations that the proposed new law could lead to abortion "on demand" as a back-up to contraception.
The government's proposed abortion bill would allow unrestricted terminations up to 12 weeks, with allowances made afterward on health grounds.
"No-one wants one until you actually need one. No little girl dreams of having one," Amy said.
Irish actress Lauryn Canny, 19, who travelled back from LA to vote, said that that concern over abortion access loomed over her teenage years.
She recalls being "constantly terrified" of the risks of having sex while growing up.
"I remember one of my friends said: Well if I got pregnant, I would just commit suicide. I couldn't tell my Mam," she says.
"I have two baby sisters now, and they're six and seven, and I just really hope that when they are growing up they feel safer and feel like they're growing up in a more compassionate Ireland that will care for them if they're in crisis."
Lauryn was able to afford flights after her grandmother organised a "whip-round" to raise money.
Student Sarah Gillespie, 21, travelled back from the US to vote - but for the other side.
She felt so strongly about the issue that she cut short her time studying abroad in Pennsylvania to return to Ireland to canvas for a No vote.
She describes herself as a feminist, but believes the rights of the unborn should be considered too.
Having previously voted for marriage equality, she wants people to recognise that the issues are different, and that No voters were not simply voting according to strict religious beliefs.
"I would never judge or get angry at a woman who went abroad, I just wish there was better support here," Sarah said.
She hoped that, whatever the result, people respected the outcome.
Unlike in other countries, most eligible voters outside Ireland had to physically travel back to cast their ballot.
Only those who have lived away for less than 18 months were legally entitled to take part in the referendum.
Because of that rule, Oxford University lecturer Jennifer Cassidy was ineligible to vote - but campaigned for repeal. Those ineligible used the #BeMyYes hashtag to encourage support for Yes.
"I understand it to an extent - Ireland has a huge global community and policing that would be difficult," she said.
"But it seems illogical and counter-intuitive to the Irish narrative, which is one of emigrating for a while and then coming home."
Oxford University was one of several UK institutions whose student unions offered to help subsidise travel.
Under the current system, people are not routinely removed from Ireland's electoral register, so polling cards were being sent to the family homes of emigrants who were no longer eligible.
It was feared that if the result was close, people may have complained about the #HomeToVote movement and whether everyone was actually legal to vote.
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South Wales firefighters say a large grass blaze in the Rhondda is out, but other small fires have continued to keep crews busy overnight. | A large area of scrubland above Porth Park burned for much of Saturday, but was out shortly after 21:00 BST.
South Wales Fire and Rescue Service also dealt with several others, including a deliberate grass fire at Tonyrefail Comprehensive School.
About 15 small grass fires were also reported overnight in the Swansea area.
However, Mid and West Wales Fire and Rescue Service said there were no major incidents.
No grass fires were reported overnight in north Wales.
Across Wales, nearly 200 fires have been tackled since March, with many started deliberately.
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Sea monsters are the stuff of legend - lurking not just in the depths of the oceans, but also the darker corners of our minds. What is it that draws us to these creatures, asks Mary Colwell. | "This inhuman place makes human monsters," wrote Stephen King in his novel The Shining. Many academics agree that monsters lurk in the deepest recesses, they prowl through our ancestral minds appearing in the half-light, under the bed - or at the bottom of the sea.
"They don't really exist, but they play a huge role in our mindscapes, in our dreams, stories, nightmares, myths and so on," says Matthias Classen, assistant professor of literature and media at Aarhus University in Denmark, who studies monsters in literature. "Monsters say something about human psychology, not the world."
One Norse legend talks of the Kraken, a deep sea creature that was the curse of fishermen. If sailors found a place with many fish, most likely it was the monster that was driving them to the surface. If it saw the ship it would pluck the hapless sailors from the boat and drag them to a watery grave.
This terrifying legend occupied the mind and pen of the poet Alfred Lord Tennyson too. In his short 1830 poem The Kraken he wrote: "Below the thunders of the upper deep, / Far far beneath in the abysmal sea, / His ancient, dreamless, uninvaded sleep / The Kraken sleepeth."
The deeper we travel into the ocean, the deeper we delve into our own psyche. And when we can go no further - there lurks the Kraken.
Most likely the Kraken is based on a real creature - the giant squid. The huge mollusc takes pride of place as the personification of the terrors of the deep sea. Sailors would have encountered it at the surface, dying, and probably thrashing about. It would have made a weird sight, "about the most alien thing you can imagine," says Edith Widder, CEO at the Ocean Research and Conservation Association.
"It has eight lashing arms and two slashing tentacles growing straight out of its head and it's got serrated suckers that can latch on to the slimiest of prey and it's got a parrot beak that can rip flesh. It's got an eye the size of your head, it's got a jet propulsion system and three hearts that pump blue blood."
Find out more
The giant squid continued to dominate stories of sea monsters with the famous 1870 novel, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, by Jules Verne. Verne's submarine fantasy is a classic story of puny man against a gigantic squid.
The monster needed no embellishment - this creature was scary enough, and Verne incorporated as much fact as possible into the story, says Emily Alder from Edinburgh Napier University. "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea and another contemporaneous book, Victor Hugo's Toilers of the Sea, both tried to represent the giant squid as they might have been actual zoological animals, much more taking the squid as a biological creature than a mythical creature." It was a given that the squid was vicious and would readily attack humans given the chance.
That myth wasn't busted until 2012, when Edith Widder and her colleagues were the first people to successfully film giant squid under water and see first-hand the true character of the monster of the deep. They realised previous attempts to film squid had failed because the bright lights and noisy thrusters on submersibles had frightened them away.
By quietening down the engines and using bioluminescence to attract it, they managed to see this most extraordinary animal in its natural habitat. It serenely glided into view, its body rippled with metallic colours of bronze and silver. Its huge, intelligent eye watched the submarine warily as it delicately picked at the bait with its beak. It was balletic and mesmeric. It could not have been further from the gnashing, human-destroying creature of myth and literature. In reality this is a gentle giant that is easily scared and pecks at its food.
Another giant squid lies peacefully in the Natural History Museum in London, in the Spirit Room, where it is preserved in a huge glass case. In 2004 it was caught in a fishing net off the Falkland Islands and died at the surface. The crew immediately froze its body and it was sent to be preserved in the museum by the Curator of Molluscs, Jon Ablett. It is called Archie, an affectionate short version of its Latin name Architeuthis dux. It is the longest preserved specimen of a giant squid in the world.
"It really has brought science to life for many people," says Ablett. "Sometimes I feel a bit overshadowed by Archie, most of my work is on slugs and snails but unfortunately most people don't want to talk about that!"
And so today we can watch Archie's graceful relative on film and stare Archie herself (she is a female) eye-to-eye in a museum. But have we finally slain the monster of the deep? Now we know there is nothing to be afraid of, can the Kraken finally be laid to rest? Probably not says Classen. "We humans are afraid of the strangest things. They don't need to be realistic. There's no indication that enlightenment and scientific progress has banished the monsters from the shadows of our imaginations. We will continue to be afraid of very strange things, including probably sea monsters."
Indeed we are. The Kraken made a fearsome appearance in the blockbuster series Pirates of the Caribbean. It forced Captain Jack Sparrow to face his demons in a terrifying face-to-face encounter. Pirates needed the monstrous Kraken, nothing else would do. Or, as the German film director Werner Herzog put it, "What would an ocean be without a monster lurking in the dark? It would be like sleep without dreams."
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We can't stop nature when it unleashes its fury in the form of volcanoes, earthquakes, storms and avalanches, but we can use technology to warn us of imminent danger - and save lives. | By Gabriella MulliganTechnology of Business reporter
As the sun sets over Lake Victoria, Africa's largest lake, tens of thousands of fishermen ready themselves to head out on the water for the night, fishing mostly for tilapia and Nile perch.
As they push off, they know they are risking their lives - some of them may never be seen again.
Lake Victoria - a lake so big it straddles Uganda, Tanzania and Kenya - is notorious for its deadly storms. At this time of year, strong winds, rain, lightning and huge waves are a regular occurrence.
Up to 5,000 fishermen lose their lives each year, says the International Red Cross.
"The storms usually start at midnight and last until around 6am," says Amone Ponsiano, officer in charge at the Marine Police, Nkose Island, Uganda.
"This is the exact time when the fishermen are very busy, collecting their nets. It's very dangerous and we have a lot of people disappearing."
Recently, one man's boat was smashed on the rocks as he tried to escape a violent storm, but Mr Ponsiano's team managed to fish him out of the water in the nick of time.
But a new early warning system developed by an international team of scientists and technologists could end up saving hundreds of lives.
Simply put, real-time satellite data from Nasa is applied to a statistical model and used to forecast the probability of an extreme thunderstorm. This probability is translated into a simple warning message delivered to fishermen via text message, Twitter or WhatsApp.
Prof Wim Thiery, lead researcher on the project - a joint venture between Brussels-based university Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Switzerland's ETH Zurich university, Nasa, and CodeForAfrica - says there is a "great potential" for new technologies, in particular machine learning, to improve the prediction of extreme weather.
As erratic weather becomes more common due to climate change, such tech will become increasingly important to make us "less vulnerable", he says.
"Just like with the traditional weather forecast, there will always be misses and false alarms," he admits. "We are dealing with a deterministic chaos system, so you can't predict everything.
"But we clearly see that with time, our ability to forecast extreme events improves, thanks to better weather models, better supercomputers, and innovative techniques."
Extreme weather isn't only a mortal peril in Africa.
In 2014, Stanford engineering student Ahmad Wani found himself marooned for a week awaiting rescue from extreme flooding in Kashmir, India. The floods claimed hundreds of lives.
Since the incident, he has focused his engineering skills on developing a machine learning platform aimed at predicting the impact of natural disasters. Better predictions would enable urban communities to prepare better, he believes.
Teaming up with two of his student colleagues, Mr Wani co-founded One Concern to tackle the issue.
"By 2030, 60% of the world's population will live in cities," he says, "with 1.4 billion facing the highest risk of exposure to a natural disaster.
"These are sobering statistics, but the good news is outcomes can be changed. By having the insights to better prepare for, respond to, recover from and mitigate against disasters, leaders can reduce the risk that their people face," argues Mr Wani.
Analysing huge amounts of data and developing predictive models has helped them advise communities on how to improve their disaster response plans.
For example, one client had stored supplies for shelter, water, and first aid in a community-owned building they had planned to use as a shelter and relief staging point in the event of an earthquake.
But One Concern's simulations showed that this building stood a high chance of being significantly damaged, so was unsuitable for the role.
The emergency response plan needed rethinking; the building needed strengthening.
The company is currently working with Los Angeles and San Francisco on how to disaster-proof their cities, and aims to roll out its platform globally.
"We are on a mission to save lives and livelihoods and believe in the power of benevolent artificial intelligence to help do so," Mr Wani says.
Colorado-based Avalanche Lab believes that even simple tech can save lives.
About 150 people are killed by avalanches every year. But with two thirds of the world's population owning a mobile, half of which are smartphones, Avalanche Lab thinks a phone app could prove the most effective avalanche prevention and rescue tool in the winter survival kit.
The AvyLab "crowdmaps" avalanche data and makes it accessible to those out in the snow. Users record snow observations, pin notes on a map, and share the data with the community. Meteorological information is also provided via the app, with the aim of helping users make informed decisions about venturing out.
"A phone app for avalanche safety is not a 'magic bullet' for decreasing avalanche incidents," says AvyLab app creator Michael Murphy, "but rather a way for creating a more informed and connected general public, which will make a difference in decreasing avalanche fatalities."
More Technology of Business
Tech to warn of impending disaster is being applied around the world to save lives, limit infrastructure damage and aid emergency services.
In Mexico, for example, start-up Grillo is installing $50 (£37) seismic sensors along the coast to give early warning of impending earthquakes to residents via a smartphone app. Such warnings may only give residents an extra 90 seconds to prepare, but that's enough potentially to save lives, the founders believe.
Tech may not be able to control Mother Nature, but at least it is helping us prepare for an unpredictable world.
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"These pictures still cause me pain," says Letizia Battaglia, who during her career in Italy took some of the best-known photographs of the surge of Mafia violence in Sicily between the 1970s and 1990s. The BBC's Julian Miglierini talked to her about her work:
WARNING: Some of these photos contain graphic content including pictures of the victims' bodies | This is one of Battaglia's best-known pictures: it shows the scene soon after the murder of the then governor of Sicily Piersanti Mattarella by the Mafia. His body is being held by his brother, the current President of Italy, Sergio Mattarella.
"It's striking how a picture can change meaning over time: this photograph is not only about the murdered man anymore, but about his brother," says Battaglia. "For me it has become a symbol of hope. Today, the president of our country has the fight against Mafia inside him, forever."
"I always used a wide lens, which meant that for taking a good picture you need to be really up close," Battaglia says.
Sometimes too close. The man in this picture is Leoluca Bagarella - convicted of Mafia crimes and dozens of murders. Battaglia was there while he was being led away by police after being arrested in 1980.
"He was very angry and when he passed in front of me, he threw a strong kick at me. I actually fell backwards just after I took this picture."
Battaglia is also known for her work photographing scenes of daily life in Palermo.
"This is just a kid who was playing with a plastic gun at a poor neighbourhood in Palermo, Santa Chiara. He was pretending to be a killer.
"For the Day of the Dead, little boys would get guns from their relatives - but a gun is a horrible thing. When I worked in politics in Sicily, I wrote a manifesto calling for people to stop giving toy guns to little boys. It has to be said: basta (enough)."
In this photograph, a man lies dead after being killed in a Mafia homicide.
"I took several pictures at this location, but this sounded like the most 'silent' one, with the car with the Palermo licence plate, that typical Sicilian floor tiles, the blanket... you never get used to seeing children, women and men murdered, every day, everywhere. That was how it was like in Palermo. Like a civil war. I have my archives full of murdered people."
Battaglia focused also on the environments around the murder scenes - the relatives who came to see their dead loved ones, the crowds that would gather behind the police cordons. In this photograph, the son of one victim is being held by two Italian carabinieri as he tries to approach the scene.
Often, dozens of people would surround the bodies, Battaglia remembers. But there was also a certain "normality" to it all. "There were kids who would be watching this while having an ice cream."
This is a picture that Battaglia took of judge Cesare Terranova after he was murdered by the Mafia in an ambush in 1979. His chest is covered in blood - which turns from red to black in Battaglia's work.
"I've always taken pictures in black and white - I would have never accepted the red of blood; I didn't want to produce sensationalist photos, I wanted to honour this man.
"I'm moved by that little hand laying on the seat, near all the glass. These were people who did their job right, and that's why they were killed."
This photo was taken during the infamous "trial of the 114" in 1978, during which 114 Mafia members were put on trial.
While the men in the back rows covered their faces when they noticed Battaglia taking pictures - "Maybe they thought they would be able to go back to their underground, criminal lives" - the man in the front, Gaetano Fidanzati, looks defiantly at the photographer. "He was the powerful capo (boss) - he didn't need to cover his face."
This picture shows anti-Mafia Judge Giovanni Falcone attending the funeral of Palermo's police prefect Carlo Alberto dalla Chiesa, murdered in 1982.
Ten years later, Falcone himself, his wife and three of his bodyguards were killed in an attack with explosives that marked a turning point in public sentiment against the Mafia.
"I loved Giovanni Falcone", Battaglia says. "He was someone who wanted to save us." When she took these pictures, she says, "I would have never imagined that one day he would be killed himself. We still don't know who did it, and we're still calling for justice."
The rise of Mafia-related violence in the early 1990s galvanised opposition to the organised crime syndicate's stronghold on Sicilian society. There were several anti-Mafia demonstrations in Palermo, like the one this little girl is attending.
"I'm normally not very good at photographing the pain and the rage of the anti-Mafia movement", Battaglia says. "But this girl is a symbol of the future, of the desire to fight against the Mafia."
Battaglia, now 82, has just published an anthology of her work and the Maxxi museum in Rome is hosting a major exhibition from late November.
She still lives in Palermo and closely follows current affairs.
"The battle against the Mafia continues. Sometimes I say, 'We'll never make it'. And sometimes I think 'No, we should continue towards victory'. I will not see the victory myself - but I hope that this fight will continue to be fought by my grandchildren - and my great-grandchildren."
All photographs © Letizia Battaglia from the book Anthology, published by Drago.
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Local elections will be held in Essex on Thursday 6 May. | People across Essex can cast their ballot in the county council elections, with several district and borough councils and two unitary authorities.
Local authorities are funded by a variety of sources, including council tax, government grants and other income, like parking charges.
Below is how a representative £100 of your money is spent by these councils.
Essex County Council
It serves a population of almost 1.5 million people, but does not have responsibility for Thurrock or Southend.
It spends more than £2bn a year on things like education, road maintenance, social care and public libraries.
Full details of candidates for Essex County Council can be found on its website.
Southend-on-Sea Borough Council
One of Essex's two unitary authorities, it is responsible for education, social care and libraries like the county council, but also things like bin collections, parks, and local planning applications.
It serves a population of about 183,000 and spends more than £140m a year.
Full details of candidates for Southend-on-Sea Borough Council can be found on its website.
Thurrock Council
Another Essex unitary authority, it serves a population of more than 170,000 and spends more than £111m.
Full details of candidates for Thurrock Council can be found on its website.
Basildon Borough Council
People in several districts and boroughs will be voting in the county council elections but will also elect councillors to their local council, which is responsible for things like bin collections, parks, public housing and local planning applications.
Basildon borough, which includes Billericay and Wickford, has a population of around 189,000 and its council has a budget of almost £30m.
Full details of candidates for Basildon Borough Council can be found on its website.
Brentwood Borough Council
It serves a population of about 77,000 people with a budget of more than £9m.
Full details of candidates for Brentwood Borough Council can be found on its website.
Castle Point Borough Council
It has a budget of about £12m to serve a population of more than 90,000 people, providing services such as bin collections, leisure centres and housing.
Full details of candidates for Castle Point Borough Council can be found on its website.
Colchester Borough Council
It provides services such as car parking, museums and planning for almost 200,000 residents with a budget of about £95m.
Full details of candidates for Colchester Borough Council can be found on its website.
Epping Forest District Council
It has a budget of about £70m for services like licensing, planning, and bin collections for more than 130,000 residents.
Full details of candidates for Epping Forest District Council can be found on its website.
Harlow District Council
It serves 87,000 residents with a budget of about £16m for services such as parks, housing and parking.
Full details of candidates for Harlow District Council can be found on its website.
Rochford District Council
It provides services including recycling, leisure, and fly-tipping clear-up for about 86,000 people with a £30m budget.
Full details of candidates for Rochford District Council can be found on its website.
Across Essex, voters will also be polled on their choice for the next police, fire, and crime commissioner. Click here to see the candidates.
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Nearly 500 people have been arrested in a Metropolitan Police crackdown on thieves who target people's phones and other valuables. | Dawn raids targeted suspected thieves with 7,500 police officers out across all London boroughs in the operation.
Personal theft has risen 14.4% over the past year, according to latest Metropolitan Police figures.
The rise is largely down to a surge in mobile phone phone theft, Scotland Yard said.
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Labour minister Mervyn Silva was airlifted to Colombo after he met with an accident in Aralaganwila, Polonnaruwa district. | Chairman of Kelaniya Pradesheeya Sabha, Seevali Kelanithilake, has succumbed to injuries, hospital authorities said.
Minister Silva’s private secretary, Kadawatha Amal, and another injured were airlifted to Colombo together with the minister.
The controversial minister has sustained injuries in his leg, Dehiattakandiya hospital authorities said.
The minister was travelling to Dehiattakandiya from Colombo to organise ruling Sri Lanka Freedom Party’s (SLFP) May Day celebrations.
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There is a particular piece of hallowed turf which all politicians like to think they are standing on. It is a Goldilocks place where everything seems just right, where their views and the people's coincide, where harmony rules. | By Andrew BomfordBBC Radio 4's World at One
It is a place where elections are won, and as we enter the final straight to the 7 May election, all political leaders seem to be stampeding for the spot. They call it the centre-ground.
But according to new research, based on the British Social Attitudes survey, the centre ground is always moving.
How close are you to the political centre?
Answer the five official survey questions below - asked almost every year since 1986 - and see how your views compare to the rest of the population. You will find out how close you are to the current political centre or whether you are a closer match to the 'centre' in previous years.
The results don't imply you should vote for any particular party - instead they reflect where you stand on economic issues compared to the rest of the British population, as surveyed by NatCen Social Research.
Try the quiz
Users of the BBC news app tap here to take a quiz that will tell you how close you are to the political centre-ground.
Tony Blair was someone who found the centre ground - that political sweet spot - and pitched his party's tent firmly on it in 1997.
"It's a vision which is right in the centre-ground of British politics today," he told a crowd in Manchester back then. "And if it has one value at its core, it is the simple British value of fairness."
Fast forward to 2015, and his successor, Ed Miliband, claims he is occupying the same piece of priceless political real estate.
"We're a party firmly in the centre-ground of politics," he said in January. "And this is where I think the centre-ground is: people want a society where, yes, people who do well are properly rewarded, but also where there is fairness."
But wait, because David Cameron says he has already raised his flag there.
"The real common ground, the real centre-ground of British politics right now, is who has got the answers to making sure Britain competes and succeeds in the global race? That's the question which wasn't answered by Labour, which is being answered by us," he told the BBC last year.
And who is this, who is also staking his claim to the Elysian Fields of centre-ground politics?
"We are the only party able to build a stronger economy and a fairer society too. Liberal Democrats: take this message out to the country - our mission is anchoring Britain to the centre-ground," Nick Clegg told his party conference in 2013.
The centre-ground is starting to look awfully crowded. And surely they cannot all be standing on the very same spot?
This election season is different because we have insurgent parties of the right - UKIP, and the left - the Greens and SNP, who seem to be shaking up the old political order. But all successful politicians know that in our political system, elections are actually won in the centre-ground.
So the crucial question is this - where is the centre?
A new analysis by academics at Essex University, using more than a thousand pieces of polling and survey data, has tracked the political centre over the last 50 years.
They have done this by mapping public attitudes to a wide range of issues such as tax and spending, welfare, business, the monarchy, and abortion and placing them on a left-right scale.
Much of the data comes from the annual NatCen British Social Attitudes survey which has been tracking public attitudes for more than 30 years. Next week NatCen is publishing the results of the 2014 survey.
And here is the thing: the political centre - where, en masse, the views of the electorate generally coincide - is, as already mentioned, always moving.
No wonder politicians spend so much time looking for it.
It is currently moving leftwards politically, according to the research. It has been heading in this direction since the last general election in 2010.
And here is the other thing: it always moves in the opposite direction to the policy programme of the government.
In 1979, a milestone year in British politics, the data shows that the political centre was at the most right-wing point it has ever reached.
But as soon as Margaret Thatcher was elected, the centre started reacting against the direction of policy by moving to the left, and continued to do so until the mid 1990s.
Although the voters were moving leftwards, the Labour Party was seen as even further left, and it was not until 1997, when Tony Blair had abandoned the extremes of left-wing Labour policy and moved his party to the centre, that they won.
But no party can afford to rest there in the centre-ground, because it does not stay in the same place for long. In 1997 it started moving rightwards and continued to do so until 2010, when the Conservative-Lib Dem coalition won power.
"The electorate tends to move in the opposite direction to the policy trajectory of the incumbent government," Dr John Bartle told politics students at Essex University, as he presented his research.
"If Labour are in power and they increase public spending; that will shift the electorate to the right. If the Conservatives are in power and they reduce public spending and they reduce average tax levels; that will drive the electorate to the left."
One of the students spotted the quirkiness of the findings. "It seems very counter-intuitive," said Franklin Murray. "You'd expect that if parties promised certain policies and that's what they were voted in for, and then performed on them, that the electorate would be satisfied."
Instead it seems, oddly, that by delivering on their programmes, parties sow the seeds of their own destruction.
Some political scientists have described the centre-ground as like a thermostat. If things get too hot under Labour - too much government - the centre wants to cool things down and move to the right.
Equally, if things are too cold under the Conservatives - inequality rises for instance - then the centre moves left to a warmer policy of more welfare.
So when parties hit that sweet spot on the centre-ground, why do not they just stay there, and keep in tune with the electorate?
"Most voters are in the centre-ground. Most party members and most MPs are not," Dr Tom Quinn, one of John Bartle's colleagues at Essex University, told BBC Radio 4's World at One.
"When you see parties which track closely to the centre-ground like Blair's New Labour, it causes internal tensions. So there were always problems between Blair and the trade unions, and Blair and the Brown-ites. When David Cameron moved the Conservatives to the centre it caused problems with the Conservative right.
"So a party might do what it needs to do in order to win an election, but once it's in government some of its supporters might see it as time to start delivering on its core ideological promises. So there's always a temptation to start catering for those less centrist elements."
Britain has a particularly rich set of data to work from going back more than 50 years, but similar analysis has been done in other countries such as the US, Canada, Germany, France and Spain. In all these countries the same model seems to apply, according to the researchers.
Most of the time the political centre is moving in opposition to the government of the day, but sometimes a strong political leader can actually shift the political centre by successfully persuading the public that a new paradigm is needed.
Peter Kellner, the President of YouGov, is a veteran political commentator and pollster. He believes this is why 1979 was such an important year in political history because of the political chaos earlier under Labour and the subsequent actions of Margaret Thatcher.
"She might have suffered from being right wing, but what she managed to persuade people was that there was a new sensible centre-ground which happened to be to the right of where British politics had previously been," he said.
"In that sense Margaret Thatcher was more of a game changer than Tony Blair because she explicitly moved the centre - and the fact that her reforms were accepted by Tony Blair demonstrates that."
"Tony Blair though did not move the centre. He accepted the centre he bequeathed and took his party to that territory."
So what are the lessons for the 2015 election?
If the current centre-ground is moving leftwards, it ought to benefit Ed Miliband and Labour. But Ed is not ahead.
The last time the political centre was at this point on the left-right scale, in 2005, Labour won the election with a working majority. The polls suggest Labour will struggle to achieve this in May.
"The policy mood has moved left, but Labour needs to make sure it hasn't moved even further to the left. It can only take advantage if it stays in the centre," said John Bartle.
"But," he added, "Labour has another more serious problem. And that is perceptions of its competence. The Labour Party lost its reputation for economic competence in the period from 2008 to 2010."
And Peter Kellner believes that Ed Miliband's problems are also more personal.
"David Cameron is seen as further away to the right from the centre than Ed Miliband is to the left. And yet David Cameron is regarded as a far more capable leader."
He adds: "The left-right axis is only one of a number of judgements that people make. They're also making a judgement on the basis of competence and character, and Ed Miliband loses more on this than he gains by being closer to the centre."
Those behind the research also believe that it vindicates our democratic model. They say because the policy mood is almost always moderate, it punishes politicians who become too extreme.
"In this democracy you really do govern," said John Bartle. "You as an individual are irrelevant, but collectively the electorate does ensure that government overtime, broadly speaking, pursues the policy direction that the electorate wants."
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Chipmunk has released a free 20-track online mixtape. | Just For The Fun Of It, made available through his website, features remixes of Rihanna's Rude Boy, Drake's Forever and Beyonce's Sweet Dreams.
Writing on his Twitter the 19-year-old said the release was his "[favourite] features, freestyles and radio rips."
The download mixtape also features contributions from Tinchy Stryder, Wiley, N-Dubz and Sugababes' Jade Ewen.
Chipmunk released his debut album I Am Chipmunk last year.
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While thousands were fighting for their country in World War One, hundreds in south Wales were fighting a struggle of their own as conscription threatened to force them to join a cause they did not believe in. | By Chris WoodBBC News
In 1917, communities were split over whether locals should support the conflict.
Seven men who refused to take part died in jail, while Labour's first Welsh MP Keir Hardie was said to have been left a "a broken man" after he failed to stop the conflict.
Now, new documentaries tell the story of anti-war campaigners and the lengths some went to to avoid service.
The project by the Made in Tredegar film company took researchers to places such as the Gwent Archives, Ebbw Vale and Cyfarthfa Castle museum, Merthyr Tydfil.
But they found the story of conscientious objection in south Wales could be traced back to Newhouse, Scotland in 1856 - where James Keir Hardie was born.
From the age of 10, he was working underground in a local colliery to support his family.
"People often wonder why he took Wales to his heart but it could have been an incident where a pit shaft collapsed and he was trapped," said the project's Alan Terrell.
"Those above threw rocks down and smashed the cage before lowering buckets down to rescue the men.
"But Hardie had gone to sleep in a corner and it was only because his mother was at the top, frantic, they sent someone down to find him."
Mr Terrell said "this camaraderie stuck with him through his life" and while serving as an MP in London, he would ask that condolences were sent to Wales following pit disasters.
In 1894, he attacked the monarchy after Parliament refused to extend sympathies to the families of 251 people killed in a colliery explosion in Cilfynydd as part of a message to the King.
This contributed to him losing his seat, with the mayor of Merthyr Tydfil then asking Hardie to stand to represent the area.
He was duly elected Wales' first independent Labour party MP in 1900 and championed the working man - wearing their Sunday best of tweed jacket and deer stalker to Parliament, rather than the expected top hat and tails.
Mr Terrell said when war broke out in 1914, support in south Wales for the cause was "about 50-50".
"There were those loyal to king and country, but in areas such as Merthyr and Aberdare, where there was a strong labour presence, socialist background, people thought 'it's not our war'," he said.
"They thought we shouldn't be fighting, it became religion versus politics and it was a melting pot here."
At the heart of the opposition campaigning was Hardie, with some people calling "get the German out" when he spoke.
He had opposed conflict his entire life but died in 1915, aged 59, a year before conscription came in for men, aged 18 to 41.
"He was anti-war, the first objector without knowing it," added Mr Terrell.
"He was very passionate about not going to war - he recognised a lot of people would make a lot of money from it, selling arms, uniforms, horses.
"Hardie saw it as a profiteering exercise as well as a loss of men. He worked himself to death, died of pneumonia and was a broken man as he couldn't stop it."
While military conscription for coal workers did not come in until 1918, there were many other men eligible to fight.
Every week, the Police Gazette listed hundreds of men wanted for service, with about 900 conscientious objectors from Wales.
Of these, 25 went on the run to work for the Forestry Commission in the Brecon Beacons, Powys, under false names.
The Merthyr Pioneer reported about a pit boy called Aneurin Bevan, 20, who was excused from duty following a tribunal as he had nystagmus - an involuntary movement of the eyes - in June 1918.
Documents also detailed the case of Sidney and Henry Solomon, Orthodox Jews from Crumlin, Caerphilly county.
They made a vow to their dad on his death bed they would not take any part in the war - and were in jail long after it ended.
But it was not just the working classes who refused to fight - the research also found examples of middle class people excused from service.
"There was a Newport landlord, who owned £14,000 worth of property. He got off maybe because he owned so many businesses, half of the town would've fallen flat," Mr Terrell said.
"Another case was of a man who wound down his dad's undertaking business and became a special constable so he didn't have to go."
Swansea University's Dr Aled Eirug suggested it would have been difficult for many people to fight because of religious beliefs and the commandment "thou shalt not kill".
He said he would have found it "very difficult" to join up himself, but added: "My father was a conscientious objector in the Second World War and my grandfather was a conscientious objector in the First World War, so you could say that the family has form."
Falklands veteran Simon Weston said: "The thought of killing someone, even though I joined the Army and picked up a rifle and was prepared to, it fills me with horror now, and that's why we should not rush to judge people."
Mr Terrell described the period between July 1914 and November 1918 as "one of the darkest of human history" when "a country turned on its own population" for refusing to fight.
But he said the suffering was not totally in vein, with "mistakes rectified" when World War Two broke out in 1939.
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A priest accused of sexually abusing two boys told one of them he was "preparing" him for a girlfriend, a court has heard. | The Reverend Christopher Howarth, of Rocks Park Road in Uckfield, East Sussex, is accused of 20 offences against the boys, now aged 19 and 20.
Hove Trial Centre heard the former teacher paid money to the boys for his own sexual gratification.
He denies 19 of the charges which include six counts of sexual assault.
However, he has pleaded guilty to one count of causing or inciting a child to engage in sexual activity.
At the opening of his trial, the jury heard he is alleged to have told one of the boys: "I am simply preparing you for a girlfriend."
The offences, including seven counts of sexual activity with a child, are alleged to have taken place between 2004 and 2012.
The case continues.
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So, where are we with a raft of Scottish results in? Good day for the SNP, good day for Labour, poor day for the Tories, simply miserable for the Liberal Democrats.
| Brian TaylorPolitical editor, Scotland
The final political verdict on the day may rest with two key facts. Who has the most councillors (it's currently the SNP)? Who has the biggest share of the vote in local government? (It's currently Labour.)
Other council results tend to reinforce that picture - with the full verdict in Glasgow and Edinburgh still to emerge.
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A 17-year-old boy has appeared in court charged with the murder of a teenager who was stabbed to death in Halifax. | Jamie Brown, also 17, died after being attacked on East Park Road in the Ovenden area of the town on 27 October.
A 17-year-old appeared at Leeds Magistrates' Court earlier charged with his murder.
Five other youths arrested in connection with the stabbing remain on police bail.
The 17-year-old was remanded in custody and is due to appear at Bradford Crown Court on Tuesday.
More Yorkshire stories
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Yesterday afternoon I looked at my mobile phone and found that I had $121 (£79) in it. A couple of hours later though, I only had $79 (£51). But by this morning my phone told me I had $93 (£60) to spend. | Rory Cellan-JonesTechnology correspondent@BBCRoryCJon Twitter
Actually, what I had was 0.53 in Bitcoin, the virtual currency whose wild gyrations over the last 24 hours have raised questions about its long-term viability.
I got my Bitcoin a couple of weeks ago, because I was making a radio piece about the currency. My mission then was to work out how easy it was to get and then spend Bitcoins - and I eventually ended up with a rather expensive pizza, ordered via an American site and delivered by a London chain.
The whole cumbersome process of getting and spending the currency invented in 2009 by a mysterious Japanese (or possibly American) man called Satashi Nakamoto convinced me of one thing - that Bitcoin was not yet much use except as a means of speculation.
The only reason to get hold of Bitcoins right now is because you think they might be worth a lot more in a few hours or days. Now if you bought into the market back in January when you could get one Bitcoin for $15 (£10) you'd have been pretty smug yesterday when the price hit a new high of $260 (£170).
But if you were one of those who found out about Bitcoin from the mass of recent media and bought at yesterday's peak, then you've learned a valuable lesson - like tulips in the 17th Century and London houses in 1988, prices can go down as well as up.
There have been all sorts of explanations of what caused yesterday's crash - from a problem at the main exchange to a strange incident in which someone called Bitcoinbillionaire apparently started giving away large sums on the social news site Reddit.
A likelier reason is our old friends Greed and Fear combining to inflate and then depress prices as all those new arrivals crowded into the market.
All this talk of a Bitcoin bubble has annoyed the true believers - an interesting mixture of libertarians and cryptographic specialists charmed by the idea of a currency that embodies many of the open and virtually ungoverned principles of the internet itself.
They maintain that the key feature of Bitcoin is that the supply can never exceed a certain number - 21 million - and that it has recovered from previous crashes when its demise was predicted.
What is true is that we are seeing a fascinating experiment in what a currency of the future might look like. But unless and until Bitcoin can be used to buy a sandwich, or be accepted by your friends when you pay them back for a restaurant meal, then it is likely to remain just a playground for geeks and gamblers.
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A "frightening arsenal" of knives, stun guns and a hatchet was found at the home of a man being arrested over a baseball bat attack, police have said. | The weapons were discovered during a search of the 39-year-old's home in connection with the assault on Byrom Street, Manchester on 30 November.
Two knuckledusters, a "zombie knife", three hunting knives, three extendable batons, an air rifle were also found, Greater Manchester Police (GMP) said.
A 25-year-old woman was also arrested.
The pair were arrested after a man was hit with a baseball bat multiple times, fracturing his leg, at about 22:30 GMT on Saturday.
A GMP spokesman said a quantity of cocaine and heroin and three passports were also "recovered" from the address.
He said both the man and woman were held on suspicion of possession of class A drugs and possession of a prohibited firearm, with the man also being arrested on suspicion of serious assault.
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A British team is developing a car that will be capable of reaching 1,000mph (1,610km/h). Powered by a rocket bolted to a Eurofighter-Typhoon jet engine, the vehicle will mount an assault on the world land speed record. Bloodhound will be run on Hakskeen Pan in Northern Cape, South Africa, in 2016.
Wing Commander Andy Green, the current world land-speed record holder, is writing a diary for BBC News about his experiences working on the Bloodhound project and the team's efforts to inspire national interest in science and engineering.
| By Andy GreenWorld Land Speed Record Holder
Bloodhound's world debut date has just been announced: we're going to show the car off with a 200-plus mph run on 17 November this year.
While we regard 200mph as "slow-speed testing", it's still going to be quite a show.
We're aiming to get full reheat engaged on our ex-Eurofighter Typhoon jet engine, but I'll have to be quick on the throttle.
About two seconds after reheat lights up, we'll be doing 200mph and accelerating at close to 2g.
2g is the equivalent of 0-60mph in one-point-five seconds.
I don't care what car you have in the garage - this is faster.
Want to come and watch us run? Get your booking through the 1K Club today.
There's a slight disadvantage of finishing our test running in November, as we're going to miss the ideal weather window in South Africa.
Rather than press out to our Hakskeen Pan track in the heat of the summer and in the middle of the rainy season, we're taking the locals' advice and waiting until conditions improve.
We'll be doing our first batch of high-speed testing - and aiming to set a new supersonic FIA World Land Speed Record - in summer of 2016. Can't wait.
As we get closer to running Bloodhound SSC, we're testing more and more of the hardware. June was one of the more fun experiments, using a Jaguar F-Type to check Bloodhound's high-speed chutes.
Our prototype chute can, designed to nestle next to Bloodhound SSC's jet engine, was mounted sticking out of the rear windscreen of the Jaguar.
While the F-Type can't get to supersonic speeds, its 180-plus mph runs were more than enough for us to test Bloodhound's unique chute system. In fact, it's more difficult to deploy a chute at slower speeds, as there is less airflow to pull the chute out.
Even at these (relatively) low speeds, the chute came out with a fair bang, as you can see from the video of the test session.
We happened to be testing the chutes in the same week that Nasa conducted a high-speed test of its new Mars lander chute (which sadly failed to deploy).
I'm delighted that our chute support crew managed a 100% success rate during our many test runs. Confidence in our team just keeps increasing.
The car build continues steadily, if not quite as fast as seen in our latest build video, the 'hyperlapse' (yes, that's a real word, it just sounds made up) of "Building Bloodhound in 90 seconds".
The RAF technicians are still busy this month on the rear deltas, which (to my untrained eye) look mostly finished now.
It's great to see the back of the car coming together, catching up with the front.
The car is looking more complete every day - it's exciting to watch.
The RAF guys are also completing the final assembly of Bloodhound's fin.
This is one of the most important bits of the car, as it's critical to keeping the vehicle "pointy-end forwards" during each run.
Once it's finished, we've already got over 29,000 names to put on the fin, all wanting to go supersonic. Want to join them? Sign up here. We've got a special prize waiting for number 30,000.
The fin loads are being very carefully measured, just like every other bit of Bloodhound SSC.
In this case, there is a cluster (known as a "rosette") of strain gauges on the inside of the skin, to measure the loads.
For Bloodhound's fin, three strain gauges are glued on to the skin in different directions.
A load on the fin will either stretch (or compress) the skin, at the same time stretching (or compressing) the tiny filament wires inside the strain gauge.
This will very slightly change the thickness of the wires, which in turn very slightly changes their electrical resistance.
Measuring this change in electrical resistance will tell us how much load the skin is suffering.
This will be monitored on every run. If the strain gauges see an unusually big load, then the computer will immediately illuminate a big shouty red "STRUCTURE" caption in the cockpit.
If this ever happens, it's time for me to stop the car so that we can find out what's going on.
I'm not expecting this will ever happen, but it's nice to know the system is there to keep an eye on things.
The fin is stressed to 2.5 tonnes of working load, with a big safety factor on top.
For comparison, if we laid the car on its side, then the Fin could happily support 30 fully grown men standing on it, or 60 11-year olds. It's very strong.
Of course, it would normally be impossible to get 60 11-year olds standing still for long enough to test the fin like this, but don't underestimate the power of the Bloodhound Education Programme to enthral young people.
The programme continues to achieve amazing results, with some 100,000 students directly engaged over the past year, and many more following the project online.
As part of our Education Programme, we've launched a Model Rocket Challenge, to give students all over the world the chance to set their own Guinness world record. Last year, I spent a few days in Brazil, working with the British Embassy to tell Brazilian schools about the Bloodhound programme.
I've just heard that they are now planning to set up a Bloodhound schools rocket car competition across the whole of Brazil. I'm more convinced than ever that we're not going to be the first to set a new supersonic world record - a group of school children somewhere in the world is going to get there first!
We've also launched another competition, to design the "keys" for the car.
One of our REME technicians is going to make the keys and the REME needs creative assistance - yours.
Race cars don't have normal keys to start them (possibly because they don't trust the driver not to lose them). Instead, we will have two electrical isolating keys on the outside of the car, so that the engineers can shut the car off from the outside if they need to. Time to get designing - good luck!
We've just finished the final design tweaks to the new "Bloodhound Driving Experience".
We tested it with a huge group of visitors to the Bloodhound Technical Centre and the feedback was terrific.
Comments ranged from "Is it really that difficult?" to "I want one of these at home!". Fancy a go? Come and try it at one of our public events this summer.
Our other June release has been the latest animation of the rocket system and airbrakes.
This video shows you what would be happening elsewhere in the car, while you're busy wrestling with the controls of the Bloodhound Driving Experience. Enjoy!
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Indian cinema began 100 years ago with the first "Bollywood" film, although the term was only coined many years later. The vibrant song-and-dance routines have millions of fans but here are some lesser-known facts that may have escaped their knowledge. | It all began with a cross-dressing, wet sari scene
Dhundiraj Govind Phalke's black-and-white silent film Raja Harischandra was screened in Mumbai on 3 May, 1913.
It is a tale of a righteous Indian king who never told a lie. Many say this was the filmic seed that spawned a billion-dollar industry.
One of the most famous scenes is the bathtub sequence where the king comes to call on his wife Taramati.
She is in the tub with attendants and they are all drenched, their saris and blouses clinging to their bodies - but they are all in fact male actors dressed as women.
Phalke went on to make 95 full-length films, but he died in penury.
As Nasreen Rehman, a historian of South Asian cinema, points out, the Hindi language film industry of Mumbai was not known as Bollywood for many years.
"The term Bollywood is an invention of the late 20th Century, after Bombay cinema caught the imagination of the West."
A kiss lasted four minutes - in the 1930s
Devika Rani locked lips with her real life husband on screen in the 1933 film, Karma. It took four minutes.
Shubhra Gupta, film critic and columnist for the Indian Express newspaper, says: "Post-independence, the kiss vanished into a miasma of prudery and false modesty and a misguided notion of what was Indian culture and tradition and not."
In 1954 a group of Indian women presented a petition to then PM Jawaharlal Nehru asking him to curb the influence of cinema as an influence on "precocious sex habits".
But there have been changes over the last decade.
"The kiss has returned to claim its place in the movies - the two nodding flowers and canoodling swans are a thing of the hoary past."
Gupta adds that Bollywood has decades of repression to make up "but the modern industry recognises that sex and lust are part of human behaviour".
Most Indians don't watch it
Film director Karan Johar recently said: "Of the 1.2 billion population of India, movies should reach out to at least 300 million people. But currently, our reach is limited to 45 million. If we figure out how to cover this gap, it will be a game changer."
Nevertheless, the industry hasn't done badly at all. With more than 1,000 films a year, it is the world's most prolific industry.
The BBC's India business correspondent Shilpa Kannan points out that India is home to regional industries making films in more than 20 languages - but Mumbai's Hindi-speaking Bollywood is the biggest of all.
The most expensive Indian film is in Tamil - Endhiran (Robot) cost $35m (£23m) to make.
Indians buy 2.7 billion movie tickets annually, the highest in the world. But average ticket prices are among the lowest in the world so revenues are a fraction of Hollywood's.
For a country that is obsessed with films, there are still very few cinema screens. India has fewer than 13,000 screens compared with nearly 40,000 screens in the US.
Western actors become stars too
Thousands of Westerners arrive in Bollywood every year hoping to make it big. Many make it on to the set as extras. But this is not a new phenomenon.
Perhaps the first foreigner to attain cult status in Bollywood was Australian-born Nadia, also known as the "Fearless Nadia" or "the Hunterwali" (the woman with the whip).
She arrived in 1935-36 and became Bollywood's first stunt queen.
Film historian Jaiprakash Choksi says Nadia, who acted in about 35 films, was his "favourite heroine" in his childhood. "She would ride a horse wearing a mask, jump onto a moving train, whip 25-30 men single-handedly and beat them up with her bare hands if needed."
And an Italian actress by the name of Signorina Manelli played a vamp in the 1922 silent-era film Pati Bhakti - a film which advocated that women should be devoted to their husbands.
Over the years, there were others too. Indian-born American Tom Alter acted in about 60 films and made a career playing the "white man" who spoke in English-accented Hindi.
Then, of course, there was Helen, who floored generations of Indian film-goers with her sensuous dance moves. In her skimpy clothes, she found her way into the hearts of generations of Indian men with her belly dances and pelvic thrusts.
In recent years, perhaps no one has made it quite as big as the current reigning queen Katrina Kaif, who is half-British and speaks Hindi with a foreign accent.
There were Bollywood-Germany collaborations
In those early years, the West was crucial in providing equipment and technicians for films.
In the 1920s, filmmaker-actor Himanshu Rai formed a co-production deal with German firm Emalka and together they made several hugely successful films, says film historian Jaiprakash Choksi.
German director Franz Osten directed 14 films for Rai but once World War II began, India's British government deported German technicians - about a dozen of them - bringing to an end the lucrative collaborations.
Calcutta was really India's film-making hub until the 1930s, says historian Nasreen Rehman.
But, she adds, it was only after the Japanese threatened India's eastern borders during the war that many filmmakers moved to Bombay, as it was known then.
Swiss mountain love is no longer in
The mountains of Switzerland were discovered in the 1960s - in Bollywood that is.
And in the 1970s, legendary producer Yash Chopra popularised the notion when he decided to move from the slopes of Kashmir in search of new vistas and new big budget films high on romance and musical declarations of love in Alpine surroundings.
Film critic and columnist for the Indian Express, Shubhra Gupta, says "his brand of cinema caught fire. So did the Swiss slopes. So much so that no romance from Bollywood was complete without the lead pair tumbling down the icy tracks - she in sheer chiffon and he in completely snow-proof boots and jacket!"
But this is an image that does not belong to the Bollywood of today, which has moved decisively beyond Switzerland, she says.
Exotic locations are still in vogue but Bollywood has been spotted in Scotland, the US, Australia, New Zealand, Bangkok and South Africa.
Superheroes are box office
Bollywood is not alone in struggling to tell tales of pure romance anymore. Gupta says that the mass audience is largely male aged 15-25 and very heavily oriented towards films featuring super heroes and comic book avengers.
"Young love is finding it hard to find visibility. And mature love stories have practically vanished," she says.
One of the most popular recent examples of superhero films was the science-fiction Krrish series starring Hrithik Roshan.
But superheroes have an even older pedigree in Indian cinema, including Anil Kapoor's turn as Mr India in the 1987 cult film.
It's the man that rules
Like Hollywood, Bollywood is also ruled by its superstar heroes who are mostly men in their late 40s.
In the words of film critic Gupta: "They call the shots." These include the Three Khans who have dominated Bollywood films for the last two decades - Shahrukh Khan, Salman Khan and Aamir Khan.
"Your average viewer has no trouble seeing his favourite Khan or Kapoor cavorting with a much younger girl. For mainstream Bollywood, the heroine, even the biggest of them all, is dispensable, and interchangeable. The hero is not."
The film industry is not an isolated bubble, it is part of this patriarchy, says film director Zoya Akhtar.
"It does fuel ideas about objectifying women. For example we have scenes in our films where the male hero woos a woman by stalking her. Indian cinema is the only defining popular culture in this country so we have to take more responsibility."
High-pitched singing
The basic form of the film song is derived from various regional song types, and hasn't changed much since the 1930s, says film historian Nasreen Rehman.
"You could compare it with the opera, but whereas opera is all song, Indian films have between five to nine songs on average," she says.
Both song and dance are used to enhance the mood for love, and drive the narrative, she adds.
"As song and dance became an essential part of the masala, it became difficult to find a combination of the 'right film face' and the 'right voice', and this led to the practice of using playback singers," says Rehman.
The high pitch of the female singing voice also makes the comparison with opera interesting.
Nur Jahan - who was trained in the classical tradition of dhrupad and Lata Mangeshkar were the touchstones for all other singers, says Rehman.
Nur Jahan moved to Pakistan and, Rehman says, sang some of her best songs in that country. Singers such as Runa Laila and Firdausi, also with high-pitched voices sang in both Pakistan and Bangladesh.
South Asian female classical singers sing on lower pitches than Nur Jahan and Mangeshkar, who sing on pitches closer to western opera singers.
Bad dancers use a tree as a prop
In decades gone, Bollywood stars danced around trees at moments when love was declared. The simple answer as to why this formula endured was that they were not good dancers.
"Dance materialises sexuality in these films," says Nasreen Rehman.
"Once the vamp was usually the accomplished dancer in films. Now all heroes and heroines dance," she adds.
In recent decades, Bollywood actors have proved they really can move.
"Up until the 1980s dancers would suddenly appear out of nowhere underneath a mountainous backdrop," says film director Johar.
"Nowadays they can still appear out of nowhere, but the choreography is much more sophisticated."
Bollywood dance extravaganzas have proved an inspiration to many Western film directors such as Baz Luhrmann.
Reporting by Samanthi Dissanayake, Jastinder Khera, Alastair Lawson and Geeta Pandey
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BBC Asian Network asked a panel of industry experts to compile a list of 100 songs from the World of Hindi cinema from the past seven decades. You can vote for the greatest Bollywood song from the list below.
Vote for the greatest Bollywood song
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Prime Minister Boris Johnson hailed Luton as the "way forward for the entire country" just a few weeks ago, as Covid-19 cases there fell and local restrictions were lifted. After infection rates surged, the council is now urging residents to voluntarily follow tighter restrictions. How are they reacting? | By Laurence CawleyBBC News
"The reason I think for the success of Luton is that local people pulled together to depress the virus," Mr Johnson told the House of Commons during Prime Minister's Questions at the end of September.
The town's 214,000 residents are now being asked to pull together once again after the rate of infection rose from 87 to 138 per 100,000 people in the past week.
At present the town remains in tier one of the government's new three-tier system. Council leaders want to keep it that way.
The council has urged everybody in Luton to voluntarily place themselves under tighter restrictions than demanded by the government.
This includes urging people not to meet with those from other households whether inside or outside the home.
Council leader Hazel Simmons said she knew the request would be a bitter pill to swallow for many, especially as it came just before school half term, but it was a "health crisis".
"Covid-19 cases are rising dramatically - so much so that the town now has the highest number in the whole of the Eastern region, she said.
"Admissions to the Luton and Dunstable Hospital are increasing and tragically we have experienced Covid-19 related deaths for the first time in a number of weeks.
"It is a stark reminder of the deadly nature of the virus and the danger we are all facing.
"There can be little doubt that while we are currently on the medium alert level, if our cases continue to grow we would expect to move up to the next tier unless we can act together to slow the disease's spread."
The move has been welcomed by Usman Ayub, who works at his family butchers, Luton Halal.
"The council takes a lot of flack from businesses and people in general, but it is good to see they are doing a lot of positive work for the community and I think the message is sinking in," he said.
"Luton is ethnically diverse and, as a British Asian, I think we tend to be set in our ways, especially our elders, when it comes to things like social distancing and wearing masks.
"Nobody wants to be told what to do but if we don't all work together it will only get worse.
"My own father is now wearing a mask and gloves which I could not have imagined him doing at the start of the outbreak. It just goes to show that the message is really getting through. That's important, especially as we head into the winter months."
Fellow Luton resident Gill Bottoms knows more than most about the impact of restrictions.
Mrs Bottoms, who has chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), has been shielding since the pandemic first rose its head in the UK back in March.
She has not been inside a shop and the only visits she has had have been from close family and a handful of friends, who have usually conversed with her from the end of her garden.
"It has never been more than six at a time - we have not been able to meet up as a family. It is very hard and not to have a hug has been terrible. I've told my grandchildren that when this is over they owe me thousands of hugs."
She said she supported the council's move urging people to go above and beyond the restrictions laid down under the town's current tier rating.
"I don't think everybody is following the rules," she said. "I've seen children in large groups out and about not wearing masks. You would think they would have a little bit more sense. It is not just about protecting yourself, it is about protecting and caring about the people around you."
Gerry Taylor, Luton's director of public health, said unless cases started coming down, it was "quite likely" the town would be put in tier two by central government.
"What we are seeing are cases rising across the whole of the town rather than in specific parts of Luton so we are at a real tipping point where we do need to work together and we really need community support to make sure we can halt the increase."
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A 19-year-old man has been arrested in connection with the death of a man whose body was found in a Glasgow flat. | The body of the 45-year-old was found in the building on Carrbridge Drive, Maryhill, at about 19:55 on Monday.
Forensic examiners were at the scene on Tuesday.
Police Scotland said a post-mortem would take place to establish the exact cause of the man's death and their inquiries were continuing.
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The ink is hardly dry on the UK's EU deal, but immediately the focus has switched to the substance of what David Cameron has achieved and - possibly an awkward question - how many of his colleagues will argue against him. | Laura KuenssbergPolitical editor@bbclaurakon Twitter
The focus will move to whether the prime minister can keep his party politely together during a period of public disagreement.
The ability to restrict benefits to migrants is an important victory for Mr Cameron - ammunition for his argument that he has achieved changes to help reduce the number of EU migrants coming to live and work in the UK.
The proposals are complicated and do not exactly match the promises he made in the Conservative Party manifesto.
But with it - and the other commitments - it becomes harder for his critics to make the case that the agreement is flimsy and will change nothing.
Critic to supporter
Mr Cameron is now set for a referendum campaign when he will turn from one of the EU's critics to an enthusiastic supporter of an institution that he will argue is changing for the better.
But he will face, repeatedly, a different question.
If the deal is so good - truly transformative - why do many of his senior colleagues not see its merits?
The loss of his close colleague and personal friend Michael Gove to the other side of the debate is a disappointment to Downing Street - even if it is not surprising.
Others will follow. Iain Duncan Smith, Chris Grayling, possibly as many as six cabinet ministers, and perhaps Boris Johnson - a politician able to cut through Westminster's machinations and speak directly to the public.
But this will be an intense and hard-fought battle between politicians of all stripes - a campaign that crosses party boundaries.
Ultimately, it will be a choice for all of us, the like of which British voters have not had for decades.
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So, is Northern Ireland better off inside or outside the European Union? | Mark DevenportPolitical editor, Northern Ireland@markdevenporton Twitter
The Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) leader Colum Eastwood, who visited Brussels this week, is in no doubt.
He described the prospect of the UK's withdrawal from Europe as "the biggest immediate threat to the economy of Northern Ireland and to the island as a whole".
He insisted a Brexit - the inelegant shorthand for Britain leaving Europe - "would undermine and destabilise the fabric of successive Anglo-Irish agreements".
It would "undermine and destabilise our north-south institutions", he added, and would "resurrect borders and resurrect barriers for business".
Bureaucracies
In Northern Ireland Questions in the House of Commons, the Democratic Unionist Party's (DUP) Sammy Wilson took the opposite view.
He maintained a vote to leave the EU would "help the Northern Ireland economy insofar as it would release £18bn every year for expenditure on public services".
He also said it would "enable us to enter a trade agreement with growing parts of the world and release us from the stifling bureaucracies of Europe".
Finance Minister Mervyn Storey, Mr Wilson's DUP colleague, attended an event this week to welcome the allocation of more than £400m in EU peace and cross-border funding for Northern Ireland.
Earlier this month, Emma Pengelly, another DUP minister, described the peace money and the European Task Force on Northern Ireland as "essential to making Northern Ireland work and building that better future we want to see".
Calculating
At the same time, DUP politicians tell you it is only right that Northern Ireland should get its share, pointing out that the UK puts £1.50 into the European pot for every £1 it gets back.
In the Commons, the SDLP, the Scottish National Party and the Labour Party appeared to be intent on exposing the difference between what they termed the "mixed messages" emanating from the Eurosceptic Northern Ireland Secretary Theresa Villiers and Ben Wallace, her Europhile junior minister.
When it came to calculating the amount Britain puts into Europe, Mr Wilson set the bar high at £18bn.
Both the DUP's deputy leader Nigel Dodds and First Minister Arlene Foster recently quoted far more conservative estimates of about £9bn.
That, coincidentally, is about the same amount as Northern Ireland's fiscal deficit with Westminster, according to the latest Stormont budget.
This BBC backgrounder opts for a UK EU contribution figure of £11.3bn.
Barrenness
Mr Dodds told the BBC's Question Time that Northern Ireland and the UK could survive quite well outside the EU.
Both he and Mrs Foster are sticking to the official DUP line that they will not make their minds up definitively until Prime Minister David Cameron has completed his negotiations for EU reform.
But given Mr Wilson's belief that Mr Cameron's renegotiation is doomed to fail, and the DUP MEP Diane Dodds' previous criticism of the prime minister's "barrenness of ambition", it appears almost certain that the DUP will end up campaigning for EU withdrawal, together with the Tradional Unionist Voice and the UK Independence Party.
The SDLP, Sinn Féin and the Alliance Party will be in the pro EU camp.
The Ulster Unionists are still in wait-and-see mode.
Clarity
If Mr Cameron does opt for a summer referendum, voters in Northern Ireland will barely have time to recover from May's assembly election before they are asked to go to the polls again.
The campaign will no doubt feature plenty of financial arguments, not just about the UK's membership fees but also regarding the impact of any withdrawal on future trade between the UK and the rest of the EU.
Mrs Foster told me she would like more clarity about Westminster's plans for Northern Ireland's financial subvention in the event of the UK leaving the EU and the consequent loss of peace and cross-border cash.
Whether she gets such clarity is doubtful, given that the prime minister may be reluctant to contemplate such a possibility.
Scaremongering
Away from the numbers game, with the Irish government watching on with concern and nationalists and unionists likely to be polarised, expect plenty of good old-fashioned traditional politics.
Sinn Féin MEP Martina Anderson has said a Brexit "could see the re-emergence of passport checkpoints and customs controls" along the Irish border that would hinder "free movement and disrupt the lives of nearly a million people living in the border region".
Mrs Foster said that is "scaremongering" and appears convinced that "practical solutions" will mean cross-border trade and the free movement of people would continue unaffected.
Just like the Scottish independence referendum, the EU campaign in Northern Ireland may ultimately be more about hearts and minds than it is about facts and figures.
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The Swiss border town of Kreuzlingen is a lovely, peaceful place. It lies between one of Europe's most beautiful stretches of water, Lake Constance, and the rolling hills of the canton of Thurgau, with the Alps rising majestically in the distance. | By Imogen FoulkesBBC News, Geneva
But recently, Kreuzlingen has become too peaceful, eerily quiet in fact. Its main street, optimistically redesigned and renamed the Kreuzlingen Boulevard just four years ago, is empty. There are plenty of shops, but some are closed, and those that are open have few customers.
It's a strange feeling for me to return here; I went to school just across the border in the German town of Konstanz, and almost every week my parents used to come to Kreuzlingen to shop. Petrol, beer, wine, most foods (and most importantly from my point of view, chocolate) were all cheaper on the Swiss side.
"That's right," says Silvia Cornel of Kreuzlingen's chamber of commerce. "We used to do well selling butter, pasta, petrol, but not any more."
Mighty Swiss franc
She admits that the economic downturn is a big issue for her town.
"We are talking about it almost every day. The retailers are really suffering from the current situation. Things are much more expensive, I must be honest. And yes, on our main street there are many shops [which have] closed."
The problem for Kreuzlingen's traders is the mighty Swiss franc. Throughout the eurozone crisis, it has been regarded as a safe haven, pushing its value ever higher.
For more than three years, from September 2011 to January 2015, the Swiss National Bank (SNB) pegged the currency at 1.20 Swiss francs to the euro, hoping to protect exports - and places like Kreuzlingen.
Many business leaders were disappointed, arguing that 1.30 Swiss francs to the euro was a more realistic level, but worse was to come. Last January, after spending billions buying euros, the national bank bailed out of its policy and the Swiss franc soared. For the past six months it has traded at virtually one to one with the euro.
The consequences for border towns like Kreuzlingen were immediate. While Swiss prices have been somewhat higher than those in Germany for some years, with the franc now so high many products cost twice as much or more in Switzerland.
So why shop in Kreuzlingen when 10 minutes' walk away the bustling German town of Konstanz awaits?
Cars with Swiss number plates line Konstanz's streets. In the very crowded shops the voices are Swiss not German.
"Lots of Swiss are here," one woman tells me. "Everything is substantially cheaper."
"There's a huge difference," says another lady. "I bought these," she adds, holding up a pair of shoes. "And then another pair for a friend, and a dressing gown as well."
A quick price comparison says it all: Nivea shower cream, 1 euro 25 in Konstanz, 2 francs 70 in Kreuzlingen. Twice the price. A pair of Birkenstock sandals, 39 euros in Konstanz, 60 francs in Kreuzlingen. Again, significantly higher. No wonder Kreuzlingen's shops are empty.
Double whammy
But if empty shops in its border towns were the only consequence of the strong Swiss currency, Switzerland's business leaders might not be too worried.
Unfortunately the high franc has been a double blow for Switzerland: Swiss consumers are spending across the border and Swiss exports, over half of which are sold in the eurozone, are being priced out of the market.
When the euro peg was abandoned, Swiss exports became 15-20% more expensive overnight, and already the effects are being felt.
Exports overall fell 2.6 % in the first half of this year, big companies such as Roche and Swatch are reporting reduced profits, and a survey carried out this month (by Deloitte) showed that half of all Swiss companies have made or will make job cuts this year.
Others have put their workforce on shorter hours and reduced salaries or are asking staff to work longer hours for the same pay.
At the same time, Switzerland's tourism sector, an important part of the economy, is finding it increasingly difficult to compete when alpine resorts in neighbouring Austria or France have much cheaper offers.
You could argue that it's high time for high-price, high-salary Switzerland to face reality and start cutting costs, but it's not as easy as that.
Cheese woes
The cost of living for Swiss workers is higher than for their eurozone counterparts: health insurance alone leaves a big hole in everyone's salary each month. And for the majority who don't live near the border, shopping in Swiss stores is the only option. So big salary cuts would not be easy to introduce.
Switzerland's dairy farmers are a good example. For years, as agricultural subsidies slowly eroded under international trade regulations, the milk price has fallen. Now, with the sharp rise of the Swiss franc, the market for Swiss cheese is shrinking.
"It's happening like this" explains Markus Hausammann, whose dairy farm lies just outside Kreuzlingen, "The cheese maker, who I sell my milk to, comes to me and says: 'the market is bad, I'm not selling my cheese'."
That means cheesemakers will buy less milk from the farmers, or offer an even lower price for it. And since the euro peg was abandoned, the situation has got worse.
"In May our foreign sales figures, especially for traditional cheeses, really slumped," says Mr Hausammann. "We had a 14% reduction over the same month last year."
Swiss solutions?
So what can Switzerland do? In Kreuzlingen, Silvia Cornel remains optimistic. Her own business, a small travel agency, is doing well. She offers personal attention, bespoke holidays and significantly she can sell her products in euros as well as in Swiss francs.
But she also believes Switzerland needs to capitalise on its long tradition of excellence and innovation.
"We have to come up with new solutions, new ideas, just creative thinking actually," she enthuses.
"I mean we've been through hard times in the past and we still made it. We have a high quality, we can do it, we have the knowledge, we have the innovative products here."
But Swiss cheese is the kind of high-quality, unique product that Switzerland should be able to count on even in hard times.
Swiss dairy farmers have restructured and repriced several times already to cope with the strong franc, and profits are still falling. So Markus Hausammann doesn't necessarily share Silvia's optimism. He worries for the future.
"Hard times are coming, really hard times," he predicts. "My son has just started agricultural college, and I really hope there is a future for him here on the farm. But what happens in the next 10 years in farming - well, it's written in the stars."
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A band from Merthyr Tydfil has signed a record deal with Virgin EMI Records despite only playing two gigs. | Pretty Vicious, who are all in their teens with one of them still in school, has been the subject of a record company bidding war this month.
Despite only releasing one song online they are already being touted as the next Oasis in the music press.
The band has recorded a session for BBC Wales, which will be broadcast on the Bethan Elfyn show on Saturday.
A spokeswoman from Virgin EMI Records confirmed they had signed the band this week.
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It was a night which changed the landscape of a small north Wales village forever. Now, 90 years on, the church bell that tolled on the night 16 residents lost their lives, will ring out again in their memory. | By Rosanna Pound-WoodsBBC News
On 2 November 1925, Dolgarrog was devastated when two dams burst, sending a torrent of water and boulders crashing down towards the village below.
The flood killed 10 adults and six children in the Conwy Valley community.
Many more watching a film in the village theatre survived. Had the building not been on higher ground, the death toll could have been far greater.
"It was a terrible, terrible disaster, which affected the whole community and changed the lives of the families here," said Dafydd Williams, chairman of Dolgarrog community council.
The flooding was triggered by a failure of the Eigiau Dam, owned by the Aluminium Corporation, which was breached following two weeks of heavy rain.
At about 20:45 GMT, the water from the reservoir flooded downstream, overtopping the Coedty dam. This then failed, releasing up to 70bn gallons (350bn litres) of water and debris into Dolgarrog.
Within 20 minutes, the water had flooded across the main road, swept away houses on Machno Terrace, the church, church house, sweet shop, butcher's and water mains.
The church bell is said to have rung out three times just minutes earlier.
Today, the only building left standing of the old village is the now-empty Porth Lwyd Hotel.
"The flow of water from the dams did not cease until mid-morning the following day," said Gwilym Wyn Roberts, whose mother survived the disaster.
He has since carried out extensive research into what happened that night.
"Cows were seen hanging from the trees and the aluminium works were submerged under 5ft (1.5m) of mud," he added.
Mr Roberts, who was born and brought up in the village, used to play as a child on the "massive numerous boulders", some of which weighed more than 200 tonnes.
"These massive stones had been carried down with the torrent," he said.
What caused the flood?
The jury at an inquest into the lives lost at Dolgarrog returned a verdict of "accidental death", after hearing technical evidence from Ralph Freeman.
He claimed the flood had been "caused by the bursting of the dam under the wall in consequence of the wall lacking a proper foundation" and that this foundation "had not been sufficiently deep".
Parliamentary records suggest "the damage was done in the construction originally".
The investigation led to improved construction requirements for dams in the UK, as part of the Reservoirs (Safety Provisions) Act in 1930.
The act introduced laws on the safety of reservoirs and was more recently updated as the Reservoirs Act 1975.
A memorial service is being held at St Mary's Church at 20:15 GMT, on Monday - exactly 90 years after the disaster took place.
Council chairman, Mr Williams said: "The church bell is one of the few remaining items that we have from the original church that was washed away in the disaster.
"It will be very moving when that bell is rung at the service in memory of each of the victims.
"We will be hearing something which those people once heard and which was rung on the night of the disaster."
Jamie Hack, from Wrexham, is a direct descendant of four of the victims claimed by the flood: Susannah Evans and three of her children, Ceridwen, Bessie and Gwen.
Unable to attend the memorial service in Dolgarrog, he and his family will be remembering the occasion with "special prayers at bedtime".
"I will also be relating the incident as a story to my children," he said.
Susannah Mewis, the granddaughter of Susannah Evans, will be travelling from Staffordshire to the service.
"We grew up knowing of the disaster and my father (now deceased) used to talk a lot about his life in north Wales," she said.
She has since researched the deaths of her grandmother and aunties.
'Enormity'
"I read about the ways in which their bodies were found and burst into tears," she said. "The enormity of what happened will surely stay with all descendants for ever."
Fred Brown was the last remaining survivor of the flood but passed away several years ago. He was 14 when the waters came crashing down, claiming the lives of his mother and younger sister.
Mr Brown previously told BBC Wales about that tragic night: "I heard that my mother had drowned, as well as my four-year-old sister.
"My father and my elder sister were washed down with the flood and they rescued themselves by crawling over coke wagons."
The village now faces the task of preserving the memories of that terrible night, with nobody left who directly experienced it.
To do this, they are maintaining a special memorial walk, which has been built in memory of those who lost their lives.
The £60,000 trail was opened in 2004, explaining the tragic story to walkers visiting the area. It follows the route the water took down towards the village, past the boulders brought down from the damaged dam.
There is also a small display in the village of photographs and newspaper clippings from the disaster, with plans to set up a permanent museum in the community centre.
"We also mark the big anniversaries", said Mr Williams, "we don't mark it every year, but the last one was the 75th anniversary and after this the next one will probably be the 100th."
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Thousands of hospital staff at an NHS trust have received their pay three days late after an error caused delays. | Salaries of about 8,500 workers at South Tees Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust were not paid on Friday due to "human error".
Chief executive Tricia Hart said she could only "personally apologise" to every member of staff.
The trust runs James Cook University Hospital in Middlesbrough and the Friarage in Northallerton.
The trust previously said it would honour any bank charges caused by the delay.
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A 48-year-old motorcyclist has died after a crash which involved a car and a van on the Isle of Man TT course. | The man died at the scene of the three-vehicle collision between Ballaugh Bridge and Quarry Bends at 19:25 BST on Thursday.
The A3 between Ballaugh Bridge and Sulby crossroads has reopened.
Det Insp Darren Richards thanked members of the public who stopped to assist the emergency services and asked any witnesses to contact police.
The man is the the third motorcyclist to be killed in as many weeks on the Isle of Man after two men were killed on the Mountain Road in separate incidents.
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More than 8 million people visited the Louvre in 2017. The vast majority of them would have rubbed shoulders with the same famous artworks that appeared this week in The Carters' (that's Beyoncé and her husband Jay-Z) music video for the launch track from their new album, Everything is Love. | Will GompertzArts editor@WillGompertzBBCon Twitter
I doubt many gyrated in leggings and a bra in front of Jacques-Louis David's monumental canvas The Consecration of the Emperor Napoleon (1806-7) as Beyoncé does in the video, but I imagine people will now.
Blame Napoleon for encouraging such behaviour.
When he was presented with the canvas having insisted on several alterations, like reducing the size of Notre-Dame cathedral to make him look bigger, the delighted Emperor said: "This is not a painting; one walks in this picture."
The Carters get up to all sorts in this personalised take on Night at the Museum, the title of which made use of asterisks when it was uploaded to YouTube last weekend given its bad language.
In one scene they appear dressed in white, like marble statues, standing regally at the top of the Winged Victory of Samothrace staircase as the magnificent winged goddess Nike rises from behind their heads while their loyal subjects lie down before them.
In another, they hang out with the ancient Great Sphinx of Tanis, which came from the Temple of Amun Tanis, once the pharaohs' seat of power in the dim and distant 21st and 22nd Dynasties. Jay-Z stands aside, while Beyoncé dances frenetically.
Like most museum visitors, they take regular breaks - chilling out on the Louvre's plush sofa-seats; Jay-Z man-spreading as Beyoncé uses his shoulder as a chair back. They appear to be having a great time.
Although, the longer the video goes on the more you realise there is something slightly odd about their visit. I'm pretty sure that just about every single one of the Louvre's 8 million-plus visitors takes the opportunity to have a good look at the masterpieces on show.
The Carters do not. At least, not until the dying seconds of their six-minute promo, when they face each other before slowly turning towards Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa.
This isn't an oversight; it is a point - maybe, the point - being made.
They are not in the Louvre to look reverentially at great works of European art; they are there to make their own great work of art. The museum and its contents are not the star of this show; they are there to play a part.
Pop's power-couple, along with director Ricky Saiz, have produced a series of vignettes, all of which play with the same dramatic device: inserting a contemporary black artistic voice into a white, Western, male-dominated, establishment narrative.
I don't know if they specifically chose The Consecration of the Emperor Napoleon to dance in front of because it was the colonising French general who repealed anti-slavery laws in 1802, but I imagine the fact hadn't escaped their notice.
There is no ambiguity with the elegantly-composed image they curate in front of David's painting Portrait of Madame Récamier (1800), which is heavily laden with symbolism.
Two black women are sitting on the floor wearing light brown tights and body-hugging beige vests. They are in profile, facing away from each other, and positioned at either side of David's painting of the famous 19th Century French socialite.
Linking the two women together is a flowing piece of white material, each end of which they wear on their heads like a turban.
Above them, Madame Récamier reclines on her antique sofa, dressed in a simple sleeveless white dress, her head turned towards the viewer. The design of the sofa is similar to that of a sleigh-bed, with rising wooden ends.
It is these bed ends that the women on the floor echo, the variance in the darkness of their skin matching the different tones of the wood in the painting.
The cloth that links them represents the dress worn by the painting's subject. The message is clear: It was on the backs of subjugated black people from the French colonies that Madame Récamie was able to enjoy her life of leisure and pleasure.
The Carters' Louvre takeover isn't just about protest; it is about power too.
We meet them in the museum's Salle des Etats gallery, which was originally built for Napoleon III to preside over major legislative sessions in the late 1850s.
Today it houses the Louvre's Venetian Renaissance paintings as well as the picture for which it is thought 80% of visitors come to see, the Mona Lisa. And that's where we find our besuited pop stars: Beyoncé dressed in pink, Jay-Z in mint green.
They look at us with deadpan expressions mimicking the Mona Lisa's, whose portrait hangs between them. We get what they are saying, we are not looking at one iconic face: we're looking at three.
The Carters are not just giving themselves the same status as Da Vinci's masterpiece; they are transforming the world's most famous painting from a single image into a triptych.
The song for which the promo has been made sets the tone. Its profane title, Apeshit, repeated in every chorus: "Have you ever seen a crowd goin' apeshit?"
"I can't believe we made it," they duet as they take ownership of Paris's temple of cultural icons, which until their residency, had barely a black face in it.
"We livin' lavish, lavish," Beyoncé sings draped in white silk. "I got expensive fabrics, I got expensive habits."
These are not words of apology for being overtly materialistic. She's boasting. Here she is, a successful black woman, talking about her opulent tastes while enjoying being the inheritor of Napoleon's. And in his back yard, too.
The video is a smart piece of work, albeit a little rushed at times. Not every shot works, not every idea lands.
But the overall point is powerfully put. The game is up for those institutions - be it Hollywood, Broadway or the Louvre - which have ignored black artists, refused them a voice, or a seat at the top table.
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In the early hours of 16 April 2010, a British woman was discovered "in a distressed state" outside a bar in Goa. A short time later, she was declared dead in hospital. Her family believe Denyse Sweeney was murdered. Six years later, her death is being re-examined in India, after the first investigation was found to be flawed. But will the truth ever be revealed? | By Jennifer HarbyBBC News
The years since Denyse's death have been a trauma "every single day" for her two sisters, Maureen and Marion.
The toll the years have taken seem the very antithesis of the life of Denyse - a fun-loving "hippie soul" who had skipped off to the Anjuna district Goa from her Derby home in 2009.
"She loved the people, she loved the culture, she just loved the place," said Maureen. "I think she would have moved out there eventually.
"She was free-spirited and that's why she ended up in Goa - because it's a bit of a hippie paradise."
Denyse started life in paradise as a volunteer with an animal sanctuary, quickly making friends and enjoying the bars and beaches of the Indian beauty spot.
"She had a bit of a crazy personality. We knew her as Dennis the Menace," said Maureen.
Word of Denyse's death came to the sisters via Facebook one weekend.
Denyse, 34, had two children in Derby who had to be told the news.
"The family almost collapsed in on itself," said Maureen.
"You could see the pain in my mother's face. Denyse was the youngest in our family - our baby sister.
"It completely devastated us."
But worse was to come for the family, as the Goan police concluded Denyse had died of a drugs overdose.
That conclusion sounded unconvincing to the family from the start.
"From the offset we thought something was wrong," said Marion.
"Denyse may have taken drugs in her younger years but to say she died of a drug overdose is unthinkable."
A toxicology report presented to an inquest held in Derby in 2012 revealed there were no drugs in her system.
A Home Office pathologist ruled the cause of death was probably a wound to the back of her head. At the time of her death, Denyse's body bore about 20 injuries.
So why were all these clues seemingly overlooked by the Goan police?
On the morning she died, Denyse had been at a bar called the Primrose Bar with a couple of friends.
For most of the evening, she had apparently been, "her usual self - jumping around and happy", according to a witness who was there that night, Sean Carpenter.
Sean had met Denyse a month before. He came across her in a bar with a moustache drawn on her face. When they got talking, she drew a moustache on his face as well and they became friends.
"She was good fun to be with and we got on well," he said.
On the night of 15 April, he and his friend Bob Stuttard ran into Denyse at another bar.
He remembers she was carrying a bag and wearing a cropped black vest top that showed off a Henna tattoo on her stomach.
The friends arrived at the Primrose Bar in the early hours. Sean said he and Bob went upstairs to play pool, leaving Denyse downstairs talking to the bar staff, whom she knew well.
"Bob and I stayed up there playing pool for quite a while - maybe an hour or so - before we came down the stairs to get some drinks," he said.
"It was at this time I realised I hadn't seen Denyse for a while and I decided to go and look for her."
Sean searched the main bar area before eventually finding Denyse in an outside toilet area at the back of the bar.
He said she was standing up, but was in a very distressed state.
"She had her arms outstretched in front of her body," he told the police.
"She made eye contact with me and tried to move towards me. She was speaking but it sounded like a foreign language and I didn't understand anything she was saying.
"She looked scared. Her face was full of fear. Her eyes were open wide. I didn't notice any blood or anything on her.
"When her eyes caught mine, she appeared to look relieved. Then she collapsed into my arms."
Only one other person was standing nearby, Sean said, and he remembers him distinctly.
"He was an Indian guy. I didn't know him and hadn't seen him before.
"He had a hat on, what I would call an Oasis-type hat, made of soft, floppy material.
"I think he had shorts on to his knees. He was quite thin, about 5ft 9 or 5ft 10."
The man disappeared, supposedly to get help. Sean said he stayed with Denyse but could feel her arms and legs starting to stiffen.
"By this time, it was daylight and the sun was up," he said.
"About an hour and a half later, the doctor turned up with a car and Denyse was carried out to the car. I was talking to her all the way to hospital. And I held her."
Sean, who now lives in Manchester, has never returned to Goa.
"It is a tropical paradise, but it does have a dirty underbelly to it," he said.
"I don't think I would feel safe there again after what I have seen."
He still does not know the identity of the man he saw with Denyse that night.
"The key to all this is that guy," he said. He must know what happened to her.
"There were several CCTV cameras in the bar, so they must have captured people's movements before and after Denyse was taken ill."
No CCTV from the bar has ever been made available to police in England.
Denyse is not the first Briton to have suffered a mysterious death in Goa.
According to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, between 2010 and 2014, 58 British nationals died in the region in what it calls "unknown" circumstances.
One of the most infamous cases was that of 15-year-old Scarlett Keeling, from Bideford, Devon. in 2008.
Goan police initially said her death was the result of an accidental drowning before two men went on trial for assaulting and killing her.
After the British inquest into Denyse's death returned an open verdict, Derbyshire Police set up Operation Ross to investigate the case but Det Ch Insp Paul Tatlow said they were given "little to no" information by the Indian authorities.
"The coroner in the UK had very limited papers," he said.
"We eventually got sent copies of original statements but they didn't give us a lot of information about the circumstances leading up to Denyse's death.
"The statements were not taken to the same standard as they would have been in Derbyshire.
"It appears the decision was made quite early on it was a drugs death.
"I think [the Goan police] have perhaps tied themselves to that."
Det Ch Insp Tatlow said Derbyshire Police had made requests to their Goan equivalents about "several" investigative strands but only received a partial response.
The Goan police have yet to respond to a BBC request for a comment.
"It's clear there's an injury to the back of Denyse's head," Det Ch Insp Tatlow said.
"A subsequent post-mortem review we conducted suggested that injury was enough to kill her. But there is not enough information in the statements we have got to suggest how she got that injury.
"It could have been a fall, it could have been malicious, but without filling in some of these gaps, it's very difficult to say.
"It's very frustrating. The reason we became involved was to see if we could help the family. Unfortunately, at this stage, we are not able to give them a definitive answer."
However, there may be some light on the horizon.
In January it emerged India's Central Bureau of Investigation had begun a fresh inquiry into Denyse's death and will also look at the handling of the original case.
Editor of the Goan Chronicle Savio Rodrigues, who has studied the case, said he believed the bureau would do a "better job" than the police.
"It's going to be an arduous task to prove anything but if they go back to the CCTV footage, they might be able to find out what's happened," he said.
Denyse's family remain convinced she was murdered.
"It's awful knowing that man could still be out there," said Marion.
"The difficulty is trying to prove anything years down the line when all the evidence has gone.
"But no British person is safe in Goa because there are people like him walking free."
For more on this subject, watch Inside Out on BBC One East Midlands at 19:30 on Monday 1 February and nationwide for 30 days thereafter on the iPlayer.
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South Africa leads this continent in many ways. Right now, it is poised to lead Africa into the next, most dangerous phase of the pandemic, as the country braces itself for a dramatic rise in infections that will almost certainly overwhelm its relatively well-resourced healthcare system. | By Andrew HardingAfrica correspondent, BBC News
Here are eight things it can teach the rest of Africa:
1) Keep the tea rooms clean
No, it is not a joke. Governments, and medical teams, still need to focus a lot more on hygiene.
Instead of wasting time and money - as many experts now see it - on acquiring expensive but relatively ineffective ventilators, the evidence from South African hospitals already grappling with the virus points to the need for vastly improved hygiene protocols.
Several major hospitals have already been forced to shut after becoming hot spots for the virus.
Doctors are warning that medical staff continue to congregate in tea rooms, removing their masks, passing mobile phones to each other, and undermining all the work they do on the wards.
"The most dangerous place in a clinic is undoubtedly the tea room. We're trying to get that message out," said Doctor Tom Boyles, an infectious disease specialist in Johannesburg.
2) Fast tests - or no tests
After a promising start, South Africa is now struggling, woefully, with its testing.
It has built up a huge backlog - "tens of thousands" according to several sources - at its laboratories, which is now undermining the validity of the entire testing process.
"How do we prioritise limited resources?" asked Prof Shabir Madhi, a prominent vaccine expert, who said South Africa's likely testing limit - because of financial and logistical constraints - would stay at about 20,000 per day.
An impressive number, perhaps, but of no real use, doctors insist, unless the results of those tests can reliably be produced within, ideally, 24 hours.
Much longer than that and an infected person will either have spread the virus to too many others to trace properly, or they will already be in hospital, or they will have passed the point of serious risk for infecting others.
"Currently the turnaround time for Covid tests is around 14 days in most places, so that basically means it's a complete waste of time," said Dr Boyles.
The same concerns apply to South Africa's much-hailed community screening and testing programme which, experts say, has outlived its usefulness, since the virus has now spread far beyond the capacity of the country's large team of community health workers to track with any effectiveness.
"The timeline renders it meaningless and compromises the care that should be occurring in hospitals," according to Prof Madhi, who said it was vital that the testing system be aimed, as efficiently as possible, at hospitals, medical staff and those at most risk.
But there are signs of a political battle delaying these changes, with officials reportedly resisting calls for older tests to be simply thrown away.
3) It is not old age, it is obesity
Much has been made of the fact that Africa has an unusually young population, and, indeed, that may yet help to mitigate the impact of the virus here.
But the evidence from several South African hospitals already suggests that alarmingly high levels of obesity - along with hypertension and diabetes - in younger Covid-19 patients are linked to many fatalities.
It is believed that as many South Africans suffer from hypertension and diabetes as from HIV - some seven million people. That is one in eight of the population. Some of them are undiagnosed.
Two-thirds of coronavirus deaths in South Africa so far are among people aged under 65, according to Prof Madhi.
"Obesity is a big issue, along with hypertension and diabetes," he said.
Although demographic differences make it hard to make direct comparisons between countries, over half of younger South Africans who are dying from Covid-19 have some other illness - roughly twice the rate seen in Europe.
4) Exposure isn't always exposure
A busy antenatal clinic in Johannesburg recently closed down following reports that one member of staff had been exposed to a coronavirus patient. Twelve nurses were sent home and told to self-isolate.
The move has been quietly condemned by many doctors who see it as evidence of a wider climate of unnecessary fear and over-caution among medical staff which is in danger of crippling the country's health system and undermining its fight against the virus.
"There needs to be clear guidance on what sort exposure is significant. We have not adequately demystified this virus," said Prof Madhi, who stressed that a person needed to spend 15 minutes or more in close proximity to a confirmed case to be considered at serious risk of infection.
Unions have been understandably robust in seeking to protect their members and to raise concerns where personal protection equipment (PPE) has been lacking.
But several medical workers told me that tougher discipline was needed to enforce hygiene protocols among staff - along with better education and training about managing risk.
"Fear is the predominant factor. Morale is definitely low," said one hospital doctor, on condition of anonymity.
"But you also find people who are looking to get quarantined, who are very happy to take a two-week paid holiday" in self-isolation.
5) The devil is in the detail
This week South Africa announced that religious groups could resume worship in gatherings of no more than 50 people.
The move was clearly a political concession by a government under pressure to ease lockdown restrictions and that understands that to retain public trust over the longer-term it must show signs of give and take.
But the decision carries significant risks. Religious gatherings - often attracting older people - are known globally to be hot spots for spreading the virus. By choosing to ignore that fact, the government may be undercutting its own messaging.
"It undermines any pretence that the regulations are rules are science-based," said political scientist and commentator Richard Calland.
One option for the government might have been to bar anyone over 65 from attending a religious service. Instead it has told religious leaders to implement strict social-distancing and hygiene policies in their churches and mosques.
Will they comply?
All non-authoritarian governments eventually have to rely on the public's willingness to obey, not just the broad spirit of any regulations, but - as the tea room troubles indicate - the granular detail of clean prayer mats, no-contact services and no more than one person for every 2.5 sq m (about 26 sq ft) of church hall.
6) Winning the peace
South Africa's official opposition, the Democratic Alliance (DA), has been struggling to make itself heard during the lockdown.
A crisis of this magnitude inevitably pushes opposition parties to the sidelines and, one could argue, they would do well to stay there.
Coronavirus in Africa:
When the DA has sought to attract attention to itself, it has shown signs of flip-flopping on policy.
"They should be playing a much longer game, looking to win the peace, not the war," said Mr Calland, citing the example of Clement Atlee, who swept to power in the UK, defeating Winston Churchill in the immediate aftermath of World War Two.
The much smaller, populist Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) has already indicated how it plans to win political capital from the crisis, by opposing any easing of the lockdown (its racialised antipathy to foreign investment and to big business freeing it from serious concern about the economic impact).
It will presumably seek to blame President Cyril Ramaphosa for the inevitable rise in infections and deaths.
Mr Ramaphosa's own enemies within the governing African National Congress (ANC) - currently silenced - may well make common cause with the EFF on that issue.
The blame game will be a brutal one across the continent. Will the power of incumbency - such an important factor in African politics and beyond - prove to be a strength or a weakness with Covid-19?
7) Bring the public with you
When South Africa banned the sale of alcohol during the lockdown, many people accepted it as a harsh, but perhaps necessary step to limit domestic abuse, prevent violence, and thus keep hospital beds free for coronavirus patients.
But over time, frustration - with the ban, and with the brutal and haphazard enforcement of it - has grown and the clampdown is now set to be partly lifted. So far so good.
But in tandem with the alcohol ban, South Africa put a stop to all cigarettes sales too. And that will remain in force indefinitely.
The government insists its decision is based on scientific evidence, but few people seem to believe that is what is really guiding ministers. Instead many suspect that officials are using the lockdown as cover to introduce their own pet projects.
The ban is playing into the hands of powerful criminal syndicates controlling contraband cigarettes, and is costing the government a fortune in lost tax revenues.
But perhaps more importantly, it is undermining the credibility of the lockdown regulations themselves - making compliance, as the country moves to ease some restrictions on movement, less likely.
8) Keeping it simple
For weeks, it seemed, everyone was talking about finding and building ventilators. But the experience of frontline doctors in Cape Town has already shown that simpler, cheaper and less-intrusive devices can play a far more important role.
Countries need to plan according to their limited resources.
"The investment in ventilators was a huge waste," said Prof Madhi, who, like colleagues in Cape Town, stressed the importance of high-flow nasal oxygen machines that work more efficiently than more traditional oxygen masks.
He said he had been "raising the alarm" about the need to improve South Africa's supply of oxygen "for about six weeks".
Hospitals in Cape Town are also following the international example of "proning" - lying patients face down in order to improve oxygen supply to their lungs.
The principal of looking for simpler solutions applies to staffing too, with many doctors urging the health authorities to focus on bringing final-year medical students, and perhaps retired staff, into an overstretched system, rather than importing expensive foreign doctors from places like Cuba.
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Kenya's High Court has ruled against campaigners seeking to overturn a law banning gay sex. But there is much to be proud of in the fight for equality despite this setback, writes Kevin Mwachiro. | Thirteen years ago, I would never have thought that Kenya could get to this point - that our LGBTQ community would go to court and fight for our rights. We have come a long way.
This generation is a much braver group of individuals trying to ensure other Kenyans learn to love, live and accept themselves for who they are. Our community is also trying to help other Kenyans understand our lives.
Thirteen years ago, I told myself that I would not live a life that panders to societal approval. I was not going to put myself in a sham, straight relationship or marriage so as to keep my relatives happy.
I wanted to be happy for myself, the way I am.
More on this story:
What has it been like to be gay in Kenya?
Some of my friends say that I'm brave to be publicly out. It took me a long time to understand what they meant, because I was just being myself, there was no bravery. I am lucky that I live in a part of town where people really don't bother you about your life.
'Stares and whispers'
I've worked with organisations that respect sexual orientation. I have not experienced any form of violence or overt discrimination.
I have not been denied access to a home, work or services because of my orientation. Maybe a few stares and whispers here and there, but that's as far it has gone. I am lucky.
But there many individuals from the community who have experienced physical and verbal violence and various forms of discrimination.
I recognise that there is the potential for violence. That threat is real to me too. But as members of the community, we've learnt to create or manoeuvre into and around spaces that let us be ourselves.
Here our love is proud yet guarded. Almost free, but cautious.
I was a teenager when I started grappling with my own same-sex feelings and I thought I was alone. There was no one I could turn to in order to help me understand what I felt. It was a lonely place.
Today, there are communities of gay, lesbian, trans men and women, and non-binary individuals across the country who support, encourage and love one another.
It was in 2016 that campaigners filed a case in Kenya's High Court calling for the decriminalisation of gay sex. Back then, it felt like a dream when I sat inside the court listening to both sides argue Petition 150 and Petition 234, now popularly known as Repeal 162. The movement was challenging a law that had long passed its time.
'The gay genie is out the bottle'
The Kenyan gay genie was out of the bottle and out of the closet.
On Friday, just as in February earlier this year when we learnt the ruling would be delayed, we packed the courtrooms. We jostled with journalists for space, hugged one another, and shared smiles of encouragement.
We had done this. We wanted a ruling. We wanted to win so badly, and we had a great constitution to back us. But we also knew that we could lose.
Seated in a stairwell, other friends and I listened to the ruling being read out. Thank God for technology!
Then the blow came, as the arguments were dismissed. The pain of the loss stung. I didn't think it could hurt that bad, but it did.
People started streaming out of the court room, glassy-eyed with rainbow flags draped over their drooping shoulders. It was time to lick our wounds.
But there was still fight within us. Maybe not today, but the fact we took on a system that is slow and scared to change is a victory in itself.
Thirteen years ago, I never would have thought I'd be in the corridors of justice advocating for LGBTQ rights. Not many within the movement would. But we have been.
There will still be plenty of social and religious stigma to face, and there will still be the potential for violence. There will still be various forms of discrimination against LGBTQ individuals. But there will also be a movement championing the rights of our community, and demanding a more inclusive Kenya.
I know the sting will lessen over the next few days. I feel a lot of pride towards fellow activists who showed up and stood up for themselves and our community.
To my 16-year-old self who thought he was all alone in his feelings: I want to tell him that the battle for self and for same love, is far from over.
Just look at how far we've come in 13 years.
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Model agents told her she'd never make it, hairdressers refused to touch her hair and Kodak didn't even make film that could cope with her skin tone, but somehow 40 years ago Beverly Johnson became the first black woman on the cover of American Vogue. | By Claire BowesBBC World Service
"You mean there's never been a woman of colour on the cover of Vogue magazine? Are you kidding me? We're in the 1970s."
When Beverly Johnson found out that she'd made the August 1974 cover of the fashion bible she was ecstatic - but also outraged to discover she was breaking a racial taboo for the first time.
At 21, she'd only been modelling for a couple of years and didn't know that her goal - to be on Vogue's front cover - would put her in the history books.
When the picture hit the newsstands - with Johnson, her hair swept back, wearing an unseasonably warm angora cardigan and Bulgari diamond loop earrings - she started getting calls from newspapers and magazines from all over the world.
"That's when I knew it was a big deal, when people told me it was a big deal," she says.
"I was interviewed by people from Africa and from Europe. They were saying, 'It's about time that America woke up!' It was just life-changing."
Johnson grew up in an all-white neighbourhood in Buffalo, upstate New York, largely unaware of the racial tensions elsewhere.
Her mother, an African American from Louisiana, and her father, a Native American, never spoke about race.
"We just learned that all people were good and alike and didn't really know about those kind of biases that exist in the world," she says.
Her first experience of racism came as a young girl when she and a friend rode their bicycles through a different neighbourhood on the border with Canada.
"They started calling us the N-word and throwing bottles at us. We were just stunned," she remembers.
That was the early 1960s. A decade of protests by African Americans had led to the passing of the Civil Rights Act in 1964 outlawing discrimination on grounds of race, colour, religion, sex, or national origin.
Johnson's family worried that Martin Luther King was "stirring up trouble", but Johnson - who entered her teens in 1965 - remembers being mesmerised when she saw him on television herself.
She planned to become a lawyer and went to Northeastern University in Boston to study political science. While there, her friends persuaded her to take up modelling to pay for her studies.
She began to get freelance photo-shoots for Glamour, a magazine bought mainly by young white women, but she still found it difficult to get an agent.
"Everyone turned me down. The Eileen Ford model agency said I was too heavy. Then three days later, they called me back and said, 'Oh you lost so much weight!' but I hadn't lost a pound."
Johnson says this was her first lesson in how the modelling business works - "A lot of BS."
Eileen Ford took her on after realising that she was getting lots of assignments for Glamour magazine, but warned her: "You're never going to be on the cover of Vogue. You're doing all this other work for Glamour and you should count your lucky stars."
This did not put her off - she just dumped Eileen Ford.
Another first
"To be on the cover of Vogue magazine is where every model wants to be. That's our touchdown, that's our Super Bowl. So I went to another agency," she says.
Meanwhile the editor of Glamour, Ruth Whitney, put her on the cover numerous times. The magazine regularly sent out questionnaires to its readers for feedback and the response to Johnson was unprecedented.
"They asked, 'Would you like to look like this model?' and 'Would you like to be her friend?' And with the other black models they tried to use in the magazine the readers were outraged - and with me they said they would like to actually be me."
Ruth Whitney was amazed. "What do you do to get this reaction?" she asked.
But while Johnson was capturing the readers' hearts, professionals in her industry still needed some persuasion.
"A lot of photographers just didn't see your beauty. Many didn't know how to light you. Kodak had to add darker colours to their spectrum so that the colour came out true," Johnson says.
"The hairdressers were just confused, they had probably never touched a black woman's hair."
Black models were getting work in the 1970s but would generally appear in magazines aimed at an African-American readership, such as Ebony or Essence.
But Johnson saw no reason why beauty should remain segregated.
Then in August 1974 Vogue photographer Francesco Scavullo, photographed Johnson. She didn't know it at the time but it was a cover shoot. In those days, as a model, you didn't know you were going to be on the cover until the magazine went on sale.
"Back then in New York the covers would be the banner all around the newsstand… I saw it and I just stopped in my tracks… Then I made a collect call to my mother on a payphone and told her, and I remember us just screaming and crying."
A year later the editor of American Vogue, Grace Mirabella, was quoted in the New York Times magazine saying, "We don't think about it as a milestone, but we're very proud to have had her there."
Johnson says she can understand why Vogue didn't acknowledge the significance of the picture.
"It was almost an embarrassment to them in 1974 because Europe really took a stand against them saying 'It's about time you did that,'" she says.
But she thinks the magazine still hasn't grasped the magnitude of what it did to change perceptions about race.
"I don't think they understand the impact they had on a nation of women, that they could finally look at someone and say, 'She's me and she's in the magazine and she's beautiful and we're finally accepted in mainstream America.'"
This point is regularly driven home to her even now, 40 years later.
"Every day some woman comes up to me and says how I changed their life… how important it was to see themselves in me."
Johnson admits that at 21, she also had a lot to learn.
"I went on a journey of self-discovery of who I am, what this whole thing about being African-American is… slavery, Martin Luther King, Malcolm X.
"Because I really didn't know… and I just started to get this sense of pride and responsibility."
What happened next
Johnson had a successful modelling career for many years. Most recently she appeared in a reality television show, Beverly's Full House.
The eight-part series documented Beverly's home life as she invited her daughter, son-in-law and baby granddaughter to live with her in Palm Springs.
Beverly Johnson spoke to Witness on the BBC World Service
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A series of events is being staged to mark the 40th anniversary of the publishing sensation that was Masquerade, a picture book that promised hidden treasure to the person who could solve the clues hidden within its pages. | By Mark ShieldsBBC News
It's a familiar tale: treasure-hunters racing to decipher clues from a mysterious book that will lead them to buried gold.
But this particular hunt, and its waiting treasure, was no work of fiction - even if the creation that inspired it was.
In 1979, artist Kit Williams published Masquerade - a storybook decorated with paintings whose intricacies held clues that would lead the successful sleuth to an 18-carat golden hare.
A phenomenon at the time, the book sold more than a million copies and sparked a worldwide hunt for the gold.
Forty years on, Masquerade retains an army of fans who have handed down their passion for the book, and their memories of the frenzy that gripped the country.
Readers were addicted, with treasure-hunters driven as much by being the first to solve the riddle as the value of the jewel-encrusted hare.
Countless lawns were dug up, and fed-up landowners put up signs warning off fortune-seekers. The book was even cited in divorce proceedings.
But when the golden hare was finally unearthed, three years later in a park in Bedfordshire, the story was far from over.
The scandal behind its discovery shocked fans around the world, and turned Williams into a recluse.
Ironically, it was a story that could have come out of a work of fiction.
The hunt begins
Masquerade follows the journey of Jack Hare, who loses a jewel he has been entrusted to deliver from the moon to the sun.
And the real-life treasure was fit for a fairy-tale, having been hand-beaten by Williams himself. It was valued at £5,000 - although it would eventually prove to be worth much more - and inset with ruby, mother-of-pearl and moonstones.
This golden hare caught the imagination of millions, yet for nearly three years its hiding place was known to only two men.
Setting off one night in August 1979, Williams was accompanied by a single witness chosen by his publisher Tom Maschler - the television host Bamber Gascoigne.
At a precise spot on the common, Williams and his famous witness buried the hare, which was sealed in wax and placed in a ceramic case to evade metal detectors.
Upon it was the engraving: "I am the keeper of the jewel of the Masquerade, which lies waiting safe inside me for you... or eternity."
Having witnessed the burial, Gascoigne was to provide the final flourish, emptying over the hare a fresh cowpat from a Tupperware box.
The perceptive reader would be led to this location - selected by Williams years before while on a picnic with his then-girlfriend - by unearthing the complex clues in the paintings.
But the paintings' detail allowed for almost as many interpretations and theories as there were fans.
The book was an instant success, as readers from across the world raced to solve the mystery.
An airline even sold transatlantic Masquerade tickets, which came with a free spade on arrival.
"The first edition sold out within two days or something like that," Williams recalled in a BBC Four documentary, The Man Behind the Masquerade.
"They were reprinting so fast. It became a sensation in a way, that it moved so fast."
Williams, until then a little-known artist, was thrust into the spotlight.
He embarked on a publicity tour of the United States, appeared on talk shows in the UK, and was inundated with requests from fans desperate for help.
Soon, more than 200 letters were arriving at his house daily and Williams had to read every one.
"I was unprepared," he said. "It really got out of hand really quickly."
Among the guesses posted through the artist's letterbox were more unsettling submissions, among them severed rubber hands.
Rallying round, Williams' neighbours in his Gloucestershire village began to deny any knowledge of him to inquisitive fans.
The solution
Among the golden hares and red herrings, only one theory led to the correct solution - and the golden prize.
To complete it, the puzzler had to draw a line from the eye of each of the animals in the 15 paintings through hand or paw to a letter in the border.
This revealed a word or phrase which, put together, formed the crucial clue.
It read: "Catherine's / Long finger / Over / Shadows / Earth / Buried / Yellow / Amulet / Midday / Points / The / Hour / In / Light of equinox / Look you."
When arranged in verse, the acrostic of the first letters spelled out "Close by Ampthill".
It gave Masqueraders their final, essential pointer towards the Bedfordshire town, near which Williams had lived years before.
The burial spot was where Williams knew the shadow of Catherine of Aragon's cross fell on the spring and autumn equinox - meaning it would point to the right place on the right day.
It took nearly three years for the code to be cracked, by physics teachers Mike Barker and John Rousseau - but the treasure was ultimately to elude them.
Discovery
By early 1982, Barker and Rousseau had arrived at what Gascoigne later called "the most perfect solution" to the puzzle.
They had made their breakthrough with the help of an additional clue published in the Sunday Times in 1981.
That hinted to them that fingers and toes might hold the key to the puzzle.
Remembering the introduction to the book - "To solve the hidden riddle, you must use your eyes" - they realised that a straight line drawn from each animal's eye, through its paw, pointed to a letter in the border. Put together, these letters spelled out a word.
It was the book's eighth painting, which revealed the word "Amulet", that convinced Barker and Rousseau they had done it.
From there, they reached "Close by Ampthill", found the park and identified the monument.
In January 1982, Barker visited the park to dig for their treasure but, without the precise instruments to calculate its resting place, was to return empty-handed.
But as the two men resolved to wait for March's equinox to point them to their prize, the golden hare squirmed from their grasp.
Scandal
They were beaten to the find by a reclusive puzzler called Ken Thomas, who shunned the publicity that came with solving a mystery that had captivated the world.
He was filmed with Williams as he freed the hare from the wax case, but later insisted on covering his face with a scarf and would only be interviewed from behind a screen. He refused to exhibit his treasure.
Unable to share in the joy of his discovery, Masquerade fans grew suspicious of Thomas and, later, Williams, with some even suggesting he had conspired to cheat them.
After years of searching for hidden clues, they saw another in an anagram of Kit Williams: "I will mask it".
The artist, however, shared their doubts over Thomas, realising he had not solved the full puzzle but uncovered the gold's location by other means.
It was not until 1988 that a newspaper finally uncovered the link between Thomas - revealed to be a pseudonym - and Williams' ex-girlfriend, who had remembered their visit to Ampthill years before.
When Thomas's company Haresoft collapsed he was forced to sell the hare at auction to raise money.
That led reporter Frank Branston to look into the company, the director of which was named Dugald Thompson - not Ken Thomas.
Thompson had previously been in business with a man named John Guard who was, at the time of the discovery, living with Williams' ex-girlfriend.
Williams, speaking later to the Sunday Times, said he felt "conned" and knew from the start that Thomas had not truly solved the puzzle.
The hare, having fetched £31,900 at auction, passed into private ownership and disappeared from public view for more than 20 years.
Williams, the man whose imagination had spawned the phenomenon, did the same.
He had grown disillusioned at his artistic reputation being reduced to that of a puzzle-maker, and having seen his creation corrupted.
"At the beginning he was quite grateful to me for having fostered this creature," his publisher Tom Maschler told BBC Four.
"But later he was quite resentful at times because I had destroyed his peaceful life. And he's right - I did."
Williams never stopped painting but put on only private shows to which select buyers were invited.
It was not until 2009, as his most famous work neared its 30th anniversary, that he returned to public life with an exhibition of some of his 300 intervening works.
Reunification
After retreating from the limelight for many years, Williams agreed to take part in a Radio 4 programme to mark Masquerade's milestone.
The broadcast was heard by the owner of the golden hare, by this time resident in the Middle East, who offered to display it at Williams' exhibition.
The artist's reunification with his creation was filmed by the BBC in The Man Behind the Masquerade.
Williams confessed he was overwhelmed to see his youthful creation again, and remained proud of what he called "an apprentice piece".
"I made it because I was almost no-one, going nowhere," he said.
"I made it thinking 'this is something rather special', and it turned out that way."
Legacy
Its mystery has been solved and its treasure found, but the fascination of Masquerade lives on.
For its fans, Ampthill has become a place of pilgrimage, and there remains a keen interest in the book in the town.
Masquerade40, a series of events launched on the equinox, will run through the year to mark the anniversary, and includes walks and craft events at the burial spot.
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A painting by local artist Karen Mangold, Close by Katherine's Cross, will be unveiled and Mark Jeoffroy has written the short story Jack's Parade, a continuation of the book.
Stephen Hartley, of Masquerade40, said Williams' book had been woven into the town's history.
"It lives on, and has become part of local folklore. The Ampthill library has its weather vane as a hare, and there is public art incorporating hares," he said.
"Younger people in the town know about the hare, but I think it has sidestepped them to a certain extent.
"Masquerade40 will bring it to a new generation."
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Donald Trump is not the first president to be called unhinged. But many of his predecessors are thought to have endured mental health conditions ranging from social anxiety to bipolar disorder and even psychopathy. | By Jude SheerinBBC News, Washington
In the summer of 1776, the American Revolutionary War was going so badly for the rebels that George Washington apparently attempted suicide by redcoat.
As his militiamen fled in panic at Kip's Bay, Manhattan, the 44-year-old supreme commander lapsed into a catatonic state, according to biographer Ron Chernow.
Washington just sat on horseback staring into space as dozens of British soldiers charged at him across a cornfield.
The future first US president's aides grabbed the reins of his mount and with some difficulty managed to spirit him to safety.
One of his generals, Nathanael Greene, later said the Virginian was "so vexed at the infamous conduct of his troops that he sought death rather than life".
Washington's suspected emotional breakdown illustrates how even the greatest of crisis leaders can snap under pressure.
Fast forward nearly two-and-a-half centuries, and the mental state of his political descendant is under somewhat less forgiving examination.
Presidential psychiatry has been all the rage ever since Donald Trump entered the White House.
There's even a publishing subgenre devoted to putting the 45th president on the shrink's couch.
Such titles include The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump: 27 Psychiatrists and Mental Health Experts Assess a President, Rocket Man: Nuclear Madness and the Mind of Donald Trump, A Clear and Present Danger: Narcissism in the Era of Donald Trump, and Twilight of American Sanity: A Psychiatrist Analyzes the Age of Trump.
Mr Trump - who maintains he is "a very stable genius" - is by no means the first US leader to find himself written off as a lunatic.
John Adams, the second president, was described by arch-rival Jefferson as "sometimes absolutely mad".
The Philadelphia Aurora, a mouthpiece of Jefferson's party, assailed Adams as "a man divested of his senses".
Theodore Roosevelt, the contemporary Journal of Abnormal Psychology theorised, would "go down in history as one of the most illustrious psychological examples of the distortion of conscious mental processes".
While Roosevelt campaigned in 1912 to return to the presidency, prominent US historian Henry Adams said: "His mind has gone to pieces… his neurosis may end in a nervous collapse, or acute mania."
After Woodrow Wilson had a stroke, his critics claimed the White House had become an insane asylum, pointing out the bars installed on some first-floor windows of the executive mansion.
But as John Milton Cooper recounts in his Wilson biography, those bars had in fact been fitted during Teddy Roosevelt's presidency to keep his young sons from breaking windows with their baseballs.
And yet, according to a psychiatric analysis of the first 37 commanders-in-chief, Adams, Roosevelt and Wilson did have actual mental health issues.
The 2006 study estimated that 49% of presidents suffered from a malady of the mind at some stage in their life (a figure said by the researchers to be in line with national rates).
Twenty-seven per cent of them were found to have been affected while in office.
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One in four of them met the diagnostic criteria for depression, including Woodrow Wilson and James Madison, said the team from Duke University Medical Center in North Carolina.
They also concluded that Teddy Roosevelt and John Adams had bipolar disorder, while Thomas Jefferson and Ulysses Grant struggled with social anxiety.
Professor Jonathan Davidson, who led the study, said: "The pressures of such a job can trigger issues in someone that have been latent.
"Being president is extremely stressful and nobody has unlimited capacity to take it forever and ever."
Woodrow Wilson suffered his stroke in 1919 during a doomed fight to get the Treaty of Versailles passed.
It left him incapacitated and stricken by depression and paranoia until the end of his presidency in 1921.
First Lady Edith Wilson practically ran the White House, leaving opponents fulminating about "government by petticoat".
By the time Wilson left office, one reporter said, he was a timid and "shattered remnant of the man" he had once been.
Paralysis of bereavement
Two other presidencies are thought to have been destroyed outright by clinical depression.
According to Prof Davidson, a major depressive disorder rendered both Calvin Coolidge and Franklin Pierce ineffectual as leaders after their sons died.
Pierce suffered a horrific tragedy just before his 1853 inauguration. The 14th president, his wife, Jane, and their son, Benjamin, were on a train when it derailed near Andover, Massachusetts.
The carriage was tossed down an embankment and Benny was nearly decapitated. He died instantly.
The 11-year-old had been the only surviving of three sons born to the Pierces.
The Democratic president wrote to Jefferson Davis, his secretary of war: "How I shall be able to summon my manhood and gather up my energies for all the duties before me, it is hard for me to see."
Prof Davidson says Pierce's inner torment led him to abdicate any real executive role as the nation drifted towards civil war.
He was the only president ever elected in his own right to suffer the indignity of being dumped by his party at the next election.
Pierce's sorrow, together with the stress of presiding over a country about to tear itself apart, is thought to have exacerbated his longstanding abuse of alcohol.
He died from ailments related to liver failure, according to biographer Michael F Holt.
Coolidge took office as an upbeat, hardworking and energetic leader.
But in the summer of 1924 his 16-year-old son, Calvin Jr, went to play on the White House tennis court, wearing trainers without socks.
The boy got a blister on his toe, which became infected, and he died of blood poisoning.
According to Amity Shales' biography, Coolidge blamed himself for the teenager's death.
He ordered gravestones for himself, his wife and surviving son, John, as well as Calvin Jr.
"Whenever I look out of the window," the president would say, "I always see my boy playing tennis on that court there."
His behaviour became increasingly erratic. He would explode with rage at guests, aides and family.
During one White House dinner, he became fixated on a portrait of President John Quincy Adams, remarking that his head looked too shiny.
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Coolidge ordered a servant to rub a rag in the fireplace ashes, climb a step ladder and dab it on the painting to darken Adams' head.
(John Quincy Adams also suffered from depression and used to mope around the White House, playing billiards and irritating his British-born wife, according to a biography by Harlow Giles Unger.)
Coolidge all but withdrew from political life. Most concerning was his ignorance about economic alarm bells a year before the 1929 Wall Street Crash.
As legislation was considered to rein in rampant stock speculation, he told reporters: "I don't know what it is or what its provisions are or what the discussion has been."
In his autobiography, the 30th president wrote: "When he [my son] went, the power and glory of the presidency went with him.
"I do not know why such a price was exacted for occupying the White House."
Other presidents were able to bounce back from the personal Gethsemane of bereavement.
Theodore Roosevelt battled severe depression early in his political career after the death of his young wife and mother on Valentine's Day, 1884.
He rode off for a couple of years to the Badlands of Dakota territory, where he built a ranch, hunted buffalo, arrested thieves and knocked out a gunslinger in a saloon.
"Black care rarely sits behind a rider whose pace is fast enough," he said.
Abraham Lincoln was prone throughout his life to melancholy, according to biographer David Herbert Donald.
In 1841 in Springfield, Illinois, while serving as a state legislator, Abe broke off his engagement to Mary Todd (they eventually wed) and plunged into deep depression.
A friend put him on suicide watch, removing razors and knives from his room.
It was rumoured in the state capital that he had gone crazy.
Given his morose disposition, aides must have feared how he would cope during the American Civil War with the death of his 11-year-old son, Willie, probably from typhoid fever, at the White House in February 1862.
Later that year, after another humiliating defeat, this time at the Second Battle of Bull Run, Lincoln told his cabinet he felt almost ready to hang himself, according to Donald's book.
But despite his grief, the 16th president managed to hold himself together and the union, too.
It was only after Willie's death that Lincoln finally fired his vacillating military commander, George McLellan.
He replaced him with a depressive, shy, probable alcoholic who was squeamish at the sight of blood: Ulysses Grant would lead the Union Army to victory.
'Psychopathic' presidents
Despite the enduring stigma of mental illness, some experts believe it may help certain leaders - up to a point.
A 2012 study by psychologists from Emory University in Georgia found several presidents exhibited psychopathic traits, including Bill Clinton.
The two determined to be most psychopathic were Lyndon Baines Johnson and Andrew Jackson, Mr Trump's hero.
Psychopathic attributes were identified by the Emory team as superficial charm, egocentricity, dishonesty, callousness, risk-taking, poor impulse control and fearlessness.
The research covered every president except the current one and Barack Obama.
Professor Scott Lilienfeld, who led the study, says: "I suspect that in the long run these traits are going to catch up with people.
"So yes, they might allow people to rise to positions of leadership.
"I'm less confident they're going to result in better overall leadership, especially in the long term."
LBJ, for example, had an ego the size of his home state of Texas.
He brazenly stole his 1948 Senate election, then even more shamelessly joked about it, according to Robert Caro's multi-volume biography.
Johnson thought nothing of casually putting his hand up another woman's skirt while his wife, Lady Bird, was sitting right next to him.
He liked to humiliate underlings by summoning them to take dictation while he urinated in a washbasin or defecated in a toilet.
However, LBJ may have caused his own political Alamo with widely suspected lies to the American people about a fake naval skirmish in the Gulf of Tonkin in 1964.
Johnson used the incident to dramatically escalate the US war in Vietnam.
But amid the hecatomb of the Tet Offensive four years later, LBJ announced he would not run for a second term.
Andrew Jackson - who signed the ethnic-cleansing Indian Removal Act - is remembered today more for his cruelty than for the enviable accomplishment of being the only president ever to fully pay off the national debt.
And Bill Clinton's reputation, of course, was left in tatters by his sexual impulsivity.
Some presidents have handled the strains of the Oval Office less well than others.
Even as vice-president, Richard Nixon was taking prescription drugs for anxiety and depression, along with sleeping pills washed down by alcohol.
John A Farrell's biography details how the unstable Watergate leader drank excessively throughout his turbulent tenure.
White House tapes record him slurring his words amid the tinkle of ice cubes.
Henry Kissinger, his top diplomat, once said Nixon couldn't take a call from the British prime minister during a Middle East crisis because he was "loaded".
His psychotherapist, Dr Arnold Hutschnecker, was the only mental health professional ever known to have treated a president at the White House.
He said Nixon had "a good portion of neurotic symptoms".
And so, is Donald Trump mentally ill?
Prof Davidson's armchair diagnosis is no. He cites debate among psychiatrists internationally as to whether narcissism - a trait so often attributed to the current president - is even a bona fide personality disorder.
But Nassir Ghaemi - author of A First-Rate Madness: Uncovering the Links Between Leadership and Mental Illness - believes President Trump has "classic manic symptoms".
The professor of psychiatry at Tufts University School of Medicine in Boston says: "He doesn't sleep much at all. He has a very high physical energy level.
"He's very impulsive with spending, sexually impulsive, he can't concentrate.
"His traits were most beneficial for him during the presidential campaign, where he was extremely creative.
"He was able to pick up on things that normal, mentally healthy, stable persons, like Hillary Clinton, for instance, did not."
The Trump presidency, we are so often told, has shattered historic norms.
But the strange and troubled lives of previous commanders-in-chief seem to raise the question, what is normal?
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A railway worker who died when he was hit by a train in Lincolnshire has been named by police.
| Scott Dobson, 26, from Stainforth, in Doncaster, was killed on Tuesday when he was working on a track at Sykes Lane, about half a mile from Saxilby station at about 13:55 GMT.
A spokeswoman from Network Rail said the man was a contractor.
British Transport Police said the Rail Accident Investigation Branch are carrying out an inquiry.
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In the tense days nearly a year ago when smoke rose around the stricken Fukushima Daiichi power station as if from a battlefield, when hydrogen explosions tore the reactor buildings apart and workers fought for their lives and Japan's future, it seemed as though we might be watching the death throes of the nuclear dream. | By Richard BlackEnvironment correspondent, BBC News
In the wake of what is officially classified as one of the two worst nuclear accidents in history, ranking at Category Seven on the International Event Scale (INES), the "electricity too cheap to meter" vision of the 1950s appeared to be turning into a technology too costly to contemplate in terms of the human and financial balance-sheets.
Within weeks, Germany announced it would close all its nuclear reactors, and Switzerland followed suit. Even China, busiest of the new builders, delayed approval for new power stations.
And around the world, opinion poll after opinion poll showed nuclear power losing its lustre.
"Fukushima impacted significantly, firstly on public opinion, and secondly by creating the need to analyse what happened from a technical point of view, to learn lessons and apply them," says Luis Echavarri, director-general of the ONuclear Energy Agency (NEA) of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).
"I see a clear impact on plans for the future in the sense that there is a certain delay in taking decisions on new power plants - I think that's going to last for three to four years."
Fissioned view
The vast majority of the reactors operating before Fukushima are still operating; even Germany stopped short of shutting them all down.
The glaring exception is in Japan itself, where only two out of 54 reactors are currently in operation. Some are shut for good; with others, local authorities have yet to decide whether to permit a restart.
But outside Japan, how does the future look a year on? Will Fukushima mark a full stop or just a comma in the nuclear story?
As always with this issue, the same set of facts produces very different interpretations.
John Ritch, director-general of the industry-backed World Nuclear Association (WNA), believes it has created a small pause - nothing more.
"Fukushima was a setback in terms of public perception and increased timidity on the part of policymakers," he says.
"But we're quite confident that the underlying facts remain the same; and that's what's caused dozens of governments to review their policies for the 21st Century and decide to make nuclear energy a central part."
Central to those "underlying facts" is the need for rapid decarbonisation of global energy to avert dangerous climate change.
Germany, he asserts, will come to rue its decision to pursue that goal through renewables alone.
Tom Burke, founding director of the sustainable development thinktank E3G and a long-time opponent of the nuclear industry, has a very different take.
"What I think will be even more significant [than German-style closures] in the long term is the economic impact," he says.
"The economics of nuclear have always been bad; and because countries such as Japan and Germany in particular are going to drive even harder into renewables, costs are going to come down even faster than they have, making nuclear even less cost-effective."
He also cites blockages in the supply chain, skills shortages and escalating concerns over Iran's possible military intentions as factors set to take nuclear out of the equation.
Asian century
One thing is clear: even before Fukushima, the real centre of nuclear power was shifting from its traditional heavy users such as France and the US to Asia.
South Korea has emerged as a major user of nuclear electricity and an exporter of technology; but China is the really big player.
Of about 60 reactors under construction around the world, 26 are in China, with many more set to follow.
There are observers who quietly applaud China for its apparent capacity to build reactors on time and on budget, while European projects at Flamanville in France and Olkiluoto in Finland flounder in a miasma of escalating costs and stretched deadlines.
Tom Burke is not among them. He points to the low building standards that contributed to the heavy death toll from the 2008 Sichuan earthquake and the recent health scare over melamine in milk products as evidence that China struggles with quality control - a key issue in building reliable nuclear reactors.
"How China is possibly going to create quality control mechanisms of a standard that exceed the Finns or the French is beyond me," he says.
"So what you're basically doing if you're in a country such as the UK is you're putting your future carbon policy in the hands of Chinese quality control inspectors, because if China drops another Category Seven incident, nobody's going to be able to run reactors."
Clunkers, not cash
The UK and many other countries are - at least on paper - pushing ahead with plans to build new reactors as part of a package aimed at curbing global warming and increasing their energy security.
However, a new trend has emerged in the last six months or so, with France - the biggest nuclear nation in Europe - announcing plans to extend the lives of existing reactors rather than build a big fleet of new ones.
In the US, licences for two new reactors were granted in February, the first since 1978 - underwritten by a vast $8bn (£5.1bn) in loan guarantees from the public purse. But the new build number is dwarfed by the 60-odd old ones that have been granted 20-year stays of execution.
This is bound to have an impact on other countries' programmes. If fewer reactors are being built, there is much less experience from which to learn; less learning makes it harder to build them quickly and cheaply.
With France, for example, constraining its building programme, will that increase costs for the UK?
You can also argue that on safety grounds, this is the wrong strategy: if new designs are safer than old ones, as their publicity would have us believe they are, would not the safest thing be to replace old with new - a kind of nuclear "cash for clunkers"?
Here, the industry gives conflicting messages. During the WNA's news briefing for reporters prior to the Fukushima anniversary, one official listed the increasing safety features of new reactor designs, while another described them as partly "marketing spin".
For John Ritch, the supposedly enhanced safety features of the so-called Generation 3+ reactors coming on to the market, such as the Westinghouse AP-1000 or Areva's EPR, are not really relevant to Fukushima.
"What Fukushima really represented was a failure of imagination," he says.
"You didn't need to tear the station down and build it again with AP-1000s - what you needed to do was spend a few million dollars on sea defences.
"If you live in Japan, you have to anticipate a tsunami, and they didn't do a good job of thinking through the threat - a major requirement is to have backup cooling and they didn't do that; they failed to capture it for years and years."
WNA says that regulators and operators have learned the lessons of Fukushima by putting their reactor fleets through safety reviews and "stress tests".
The processes ask whether there are risks that have not been imagined possible that now have to be considered - both natural risks, like floods, or of human agency.
It asks whether an electricity supply can be maintained in the event of a complex sequence of failures, and whether staff are sufficiently trained to deal with an event of Fukushima-like magnitude.
US stress tests have thrown up issues that are being addressed by spending about $100m across the country - roughly $1m for each reactor.
On the new vs old argument, Mr Ritch uses a car analogy: new cars might be safer than old, but still your old one might be safe enough, and economics might dictate that you do not change it.
Whether the analogy works for people living around the controversial Fessenheim station on the Franco-German border, built on a geological fault line, or near the Vermont Yankee station in the eastern US where maintenance standards were low enough to allow a cooling tower to collapse in 2007, I am not so sure.
Nevertheless, the new designs are beginning to be built, in China as well as France and Finland, and maybe the UK. WNA believes other developing countries are set to join the nuclear club, with Vietnam likely to open its first reactor by 2018 and Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia not far behind.
All have experienced tsunamis in recent years, and how the public would react to the laying of the foundations is unknown.
Long future
The Fukushima accident can be traced back to a number of very different factors, depending on how you do your analysis.
Among them is the type of reactor used, a boiling water reactor. Steam pressure generated by excess heat and a reliance on pumps for cooling were among the facets of the design that created the sequence of events we saw.
So has Fukushima accelerated development of the so-called Generation 4 designs, some radically different from anything on the market now and potentially much safer?
The OECD's NEA funds part of the Generation 4 initiative, but Luis Echavarri does not see deployment any time soon.
"My view is that Generation 4 reactors need to be based on recovering credibility with public opinion first, so Gen 3 and 3+ have to be successful first," he says.
"Gen 4 do have the objective of being safer, but there are other criteria too: more economic, less waste, reduced proliferation risk - that's the combination that will make them attractive, but they need 20-30 years to be in the marketplace.
"And if they are to be in the marketplace in 20-30 years' time, then we first need to recover the credibility damaged by Fukushima."
The implication is clear: if the credibility damaged by Fukushima is not recovered, neither will the nuclear industry.
Some of the key things likely to determine whether credibility is restored include building new reactors on time and to budget, effectively cleaning up the Fukushima site and ideally allowing many of the displaced to return home, and developing robust long-term storage for waste.
And above all - no more accidents.
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While the film Selma may be about the 1965 voting rights marches in Alabama led by Dr Martin Luther King Jr, its portrayal of then-President Lyndon Baines Johnson as an obstacle to the civil rights movement has spawned controversy. | By Echo ChambersOpinion and analysis from around the world
A presidential legacy, it seems, is a very touchy subject - at least, for former aides and interested historians.
Some have said the film negatively casts the president, who died 41 years ago, as reluctantly standing by while activists marched and Congress passed the landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965.
"What's wrong with Hollywood?" laments Joseph A Califano Jr, who served as Johnson's top aide for domestic affairs.
Drawing particular fire are factual inaccuracies such as a scene where Johnson asks the director of the FBI at the time, J Edgar Hoover, to discredit King. The president also is shown green lighting a decision to send King a tape recording of the civil rights leader engaging in an extramarital affair.
Later, the movie implies that MLK missed the first Selma march because he was busy trying to repair his marriage after his wife had listened to the tape.
While the FBI did monitor King at the time - and did send a threatening letter to his house that hints at an audiotape - the film takes artistic license with both the timeline and LBJ's involvement.
"In fact, Selma was LBJ's idea, he considered the Voting Rights Act his greatest legislative achievement, he viewed King as an essential partner in getting it enacted - and he didn't use the FBI to disparage him," Califano writes in an opinion piece for The Washington Post.
He says the movie is so far off the mark that it should be "ruled out this Christmas and during the ensuring awards season".
Mark K Updegrove, an author, historian and the director of the LBJ Presidential Library, agrees.
Writing for Politico, Updegrove says films based on true events often massage the truth in order to create a better narrative, but historians should step in when that narrative doesn't represent the spirit of what actually happened.
When it comes to Selma, he thinks the filmmakers misrepresented the relationship between King and LBJ.
"In truth, the partnership between LBJ and MLK on civil rights is one of the most productive and consequential in American history," he writes.
Updegrove cites a 1965 taped phone conversation between the pair, where Johnson encourages King to publicise the worst example of voter suppression as a way to prompt a national discussion and boost legislation being considered by Congress.
"If you just take that one illustration and get it on radio, get it on television, get in the pulpits, get it in the meetings, get it every place you can; pretty soon, the fellow that didn't do anything but drive a tractor will say: 'That's not right, that's not fair.' And then, that'll help us in what we're going to shove through in the end," Johnson says.
But Breitbart's Roger Stone and Phillip Nelson charge that Updegrove is sanitising the relationship between the two men.
Instead, Stone and Nelson say, Johnson was a life-long segregationist who worked against the civil rights movement for years. It was only when the president found himself in the Oval Office that he saw the benefit of supporting the civil rights agenda.
"Johnson's embrace of civil rights is apparently not based on a moral principle; even when LBJ does the right thing, he does it for self-interest, as part of his plan to create a grand legacy for himself," they write.
Outside of the actual historical debate, Vox's Matthew Yglesias writes that the criticism of Johnson's portrayal goes beyond the scrutiny that biopics like Selma normally receive. Instead, he says, it seems that the criticism comes from the fact that the film doesn't make LBJ, a white man, the hero of the Voting Rights Act.
He disagrees with the idea that Johnson is negatively portrayed in the film. Instead, he says, King and his associates are the key actors, while the president is on the sideline.
"The idea that a film should be ruled out for having the temerity to focus on black people's agency in securing their own liberation is completely absurd," he writes. "We've had too few such films in American history, and everyone could stand to watch some more."
But while most critics see Johnson as the victim in Selma's version of the story, Josh Zeitz writes for Politico that Selma is equally damaging to King. Even Yglesias misses the mark, he says.
"The controversy over Selma should not be reduced to a debate about whether black activists exercised political agency," he writes. "Of course they did. The deeper problem is that the movie doesn't always get its portrayal of black activists right."
Zeitz says that the film is "oddly patronising" in the way it deals with black student activists. Often, he says, they are seen as well-meaning hotheads often working against the movement. Instead, the reality is that King co-operated with student groups because they were unconventional, not in spite of that.
While it's often easier to understand historical events as a struggle between good and evil, the truth tends to be more complex.
(By Kierran Petersen)
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The government is cracking down on misinformation about the coronavirus pandemic. | A rapid response unit within the Cabinet Office is working with social media firms to remove fake news and harmful content.
Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden said action was needed "to stem the spread of falsehoods and rumours, which could cost lives".
The specialist unit is dealing with as many as 10 incidents each day.
It will try to tackle a range of issues online, such as fake "experts" issuing false medical information and criminals running phishing scams.
Last Tuesday, for example, hours after the government started sending texts urging people to stay at home, several fake versions of the message began circulating on social media.
One of them told people they had been fined for breaking the rules.
Mr Dowden added: "We need people to follow expert medical advice and stay at home, protect the NHS and save lives.
"It is vital that this message hits home and that misinformation and disinformation which undermines it is knocked down quickly."
The government is also re-launching a campaign called "Don't Feed the Beast", urging the public to think carefully about what they share online.
It comes as the former chairman of the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport select committee called for knowingly sharing misinformation about Covid-19 to be made an offence.
Conservative MP Damian Collins said: "The information contagion around Covid-19 is so dangerous, because there is so much that people don't know and so much happening all the time, that it is very easy for false rumours to take hold and spread."
Mr Collins is also launching an online service where members of the public can post screenshots of coronavirus-related information they have been sent.
Social media companies have also announced measures to try to fight the spread of misinformation about the virus.
Twitter has said it will remove content that promotes unverified claims.
Last week, Facebook, Google, Microsoft and Reddit also said they would work with governments on the issue and to help those in self-isolation.
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The "heartbroken family" of a man who police said was murdered in a bungalow fire on Teesside, have described him as "well-loved and popular". | Francis Betteridge, 62, was found inside the property in Stephens Road, South Bank, near Middlesbrough, at about 19:55 GMT on Friday.
Anthony Hart, 38, from Stockton, is due to appear at Teesside Crown Court on Thursday charged with murder and fraud.
Mr Betteridge's family said his death had left them "shocked and saddened".
In a statement they said: "Frankie was a well-loved and popular member of the South Bank community and will be missed by us all.
"We are deeply shocked and saddened by what has happened."
Follow BBC North East & Cumbria on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Send your story ideas to [email protected].
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A year ago, the Chinese government locked down the city of Wuhan. For weeks beforehand officials had maintained that the outbreak was under control - just a few dozen cases linked to a live animal market. But in fact the virus had been spreading throughout the city and around China. | By Jane McMullenBBC News
This is the story of five critical days early in the outbreak.
By 30 December, several people had been admitted to hospitals in the central city of Wuhan, having fallen ill with high fever and pneumonia. The first known case was a man in his 70s who had fallen ill on 1 December. Many of those were connected to a sprawling live animal market, Huanan Seafood Market, and doctors had begun to suspect this wasn't regular pneumonia.
Samples from infected lungs had been sent to genetic sequencing companies to identify the cause of the disease, and preliminary results had indicated a novel coronavirus similar to Sars. The local health authorities and the country's Center for Disease Control (CDC) had already been notified, but nothing had been said to the public.
Although no-one knew it at the time, between 2,300 and 4,000 people were by now likely infected, according to a recent model by MOBS Lab at Northeastern University in Boston. The outbreak was also thought to be doubling in size every few days. Epidemiologists say that at this early part of an outbreak, each day and even each hour is critical.
30 December 2019: Virus alert
At around 16:00 on 30 December, the head of the Emergency Department at Wuhan Central Hospital was handed the results of a test carried out by sequencing lab Capital Bio Medicals in Beijing.
She went into a cold sweat as she read the report, according to an interview given later to Chinese state media.
At the top were the alarming words: "SARS CORONAVIRUS". She circled them in bright red, and passed it on to colleagues over the Chinese messaging site WeChat.
Within an hour and a half, the grainy image with its large red circle reached a doctor in the hospital's ophthalmology department, Li Wenliang. He shared it with his hundreds-strong university class group, adding the warning, "Don't circulate the message outside this group. Get your family and loved ones to take precautions."
When Sars spread through southern China in late 2002 and 2003, Beijing covered up the outbreak, insisting that everything was under control. This allowed the virus to spread around the world. Beijing's response invoked international criticism and - worryingly for a regime deeply concerned about stability - anger and protests within China. Between 2002 and 2004, Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (Sars) went on to infect more than 8,000 people and kill almost 800 worldwide.
Over the coming hours, screen shots of Li's message spread widely online. Across China, millions of people began talking about Sars online.
It would turn out that the sequencers made a mistake - this was not Sars, but a new coronavirus very similar to it. But this was a critical moment. News of a possible outbreak had escaped.
The Wuhan Health Commission was already aware that there was something going on in the city's hospitals. That day, officials from the National Health Commission in Beijing arrived, and lung samples were sent to at least five state labs in Wuhan and Beijing to sequence the virus in parallel.
Now, as messages suggesting the possible return of Sars began flying over Chinese social media, the Wuhan Health Commission sent two orders out to hospitals. It instructed them to report all cases direct to the Health Commission, and told them not to make anything public without authorisation.
Within 12 minutes, these orders were leaked online.
It might have taken a couple more days for the online chatter to make the leap from Chinese-speaking social media to the wider world if it wasn't for the efforts of veteran epidemiologist Marjorie Pollack.
The deputy editor of ProMed-mail, an organisation which sends out alerts on disease outbreaks worldwide, received an email from a contact in Taiwan, asking if she knew anything about the chatter online.
Back in February 2003, ProMed had been the first to break the news of Sars. Now, Pollack had deja vu. "My reaction was: 'We're in trouble,'" she told the BBC.
Three hours later, she had finished writing an emergency post, requesting more information on the new outbreak. It was sent out to ProMed's approximately 80,000 subscribers at one minute to midnight.
31 December: Offers of help
As word began to spread, Professor George F Gao, director general of China's Center for Disease Control [CDC], was receiving offers of help from contacts around the world.
China revamped its infectious disease infrastructure after Sars - and in 2019, Gao had promised that China's vast online surveillance system would be able to prevent another outbreak like it.
But two scientists who contacted Gao say the CDC head did not seem alarmed.
"I sent a really long text to George Gao, offering to send a team out and do anything to support them," Dr Peter Daszak, the president of New York-based infectious diseases research group EcoHealth Alliance, told the BBC. But he says that all he received in reply was a short message wishing him Happy New Year.
Epidemiologist Ian Lipkin of Columbia University in New York was also trying to reach Gao. Just as he was having dinner to ring in the New Year, Gao returned his call. The details Lipkin reveals about their conversation offer new insights into what leading Chinese officials were prepared to say at this critical point.
"He had identified the virus. It was a new coronavirus. And it was not highly transmissible. This didn't really resonate with me because I'd heard that many, many people had been infected," Lipkin told the BBC. "I don't think he was duplicitous, I think he was just wrong."
Lipkin says he thinks Gao should have released the sequences they had already obtained. My view is that you get it out. This is too important to hesitate."
Gao, who refused the BBC's requests for an interview, has told state media that the sequences were released as soon as possible, and that he never said publicly that there was no human-to-human transmission.
That day, the Wuhan Health Commission issued a press release stating that 27 cases of viral pneumonia had been identified, but that there was no clear evidence of human to human transmission.
It would be a further 12 days before China shared the genetic sequences with the international community.
The Chinese government refused multiple interview requests by the BBC. Instead, it gave us detailed statements on China's response, which state that in the fight against Covid-19 China "has always acted with openness, transparency and responsibility, and … in a timely manner."
BBC This World's 54 Days: China and the pandemic can be seen on BBC Two at 21:00 GMT on Tuesday 26 January, or 23:30 on Monday 1 February (except BBC Two Northern Ireland). Or watch on BBC iPlayer.
Part two - 54 Days: America and the Pandemic - will be on BBC Two on Tuesday 2 February at 21:00.
A BBC/PBS Frontline co-production.
1 January 2020: International frustration
International law stipulates that new infectious disease outbreaks of global concern be reported to the World Health Organization within 24 hours. But on 1 January the WHO still had not had official notification of the outbreak. The previous day, officials there had spotted the ProMed post and reports online, so they contacted China's National Health Commission.
"It was reportable," says Professor Lawrence Gostin, Director of the WHO Collaborating Center on national and global health law at Georgetown University in Washington DC, and a member of the International Health Regulations roster of experts. "The failure to report clearly was a violation of the International Health Regulations."
Dr Maria Van Kerkhove, a WHO epidemiologist who would become the agency's Covid-19 technical lead, joined the first of many emergency conference calls in the middle of the night on 1 January.
"We had the assumptions initially that it may be a new coronavirus. For us it wasn't a matter of if human to human transmission was happening, it was what is the extent of it and where is that happening."
It was two days before China responded to the WHO. But what they revealed was vague - that there were now 44 cases of viral pneumonia of unknown cause.
China says that it communicated regularly and fully with the WHO from 3 January. But recordings of internal WHO meetings obtained by the Associated Press (AP) news agency some of which were shared with PBS Frontline and the BBC, paint a different picture, revealing the frustration that senior WHO officials felt by the following week.
"'There's been no evidence of human to human transmission' is not good enough. We need to see the data," Mike Ryan WHO's health emergencies programme director is heard saying.
The WHO was legally required to state the information it had been provided by China. Although they suspected human to human transmission, the WHO were not able to confirm this for a further three weeks.
"Those concerns are not something they ever aired publicly. Instead, they basically deferred to China," says AP's Dake Kang. "Ultimately, the impression that the rest of the world got was just what the Chinese authorities wanted. Which is that everything was under control. Which of course it wasn't."
2 January: Silencing the doctors
The number of people infected by the virus was doubling in size every few days, and more and more people were turning up at Wuhan's hospitals.
But now - instead of allowing doctors to share their concerns publicly - state media began a campaign that effectively silenced them.
On 2 January, China Central Television ran a story about the doctors who spread the news about an outbreak four days earlier. The doctors, referred to only as "rumour mongers" and "internet users", were brought in for questioning by the Wuhan Public Security Bureau and 'dealt with' 'in accordance with the law'.
One of the doctors was Li Wenliang, the eye doctor whose warning had gone viral. He signed a confession. In February, the doctor died of Covid-19.
The Chinese government says that this is not evidence that it was trying to suppress news of the outbreak, and that doctors like Li were being urged not to spread unconfirmed information.
But the impact of this public dressing down was critical. For though it was becoming apparent to doctors that there was, in fact, human-to-human transmission, they were prevented from going public.
A health worker from Li's hospital, Wuhan Central, told us that over the next few days "there were so many people who had a fever. It was out of control. We started to panic. [But] The hospital told us that we were not allowed to speak to anyone."
The Chinese government told us that "it takes a rigorous scientific process to determine if a new virus can be transmitted from person to person".
The authorities would continue to maintain for a further 18 days that there was no human-to-human transmission.
3 January: Secret memo
Labs across the country were racing to map the complete genetic sequence of the virus. Among them was a renowned virologist in Shanghai, Professor Zhang Yongzhen who began sequencing on 3 January.
After having worked for two days straight, he obtained a complete sequence. His results revealed a virus that was similar to Sars, and therefore likely transmissible.
On 5 January, Zhang's office wrote to the National Health Commission advising taking precautionary measures in public places.
"On that very day, he was working to try and get information released as soon as possible, so the rest of the world could see what it was and so we could get diagnostics going", says Zhang's research partner, Professor Edward Holmes an evolutionary virologist at the University of Sydney.
But Zhang could not make his findings public. On January 3, the National Health Commission had sent a secret memorandum to labs banning unauthorised scientists from working on the virus and disclosing the information to the public.
"What the notice effectively did," says AP's Dake Kang, "is it silenced individual scientists and laboratories from revealing information about this virus and potentially allowing word of it to leak out to the outside world and alarm people."
None of the labs went public with the genetic sequence of the virus. China continued to maintain it was viral pneumonia with no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission.
It would be six days before it announced that the new virus was a coronavirus, and even then, it did not share any genetic sequences to allow other countries to develop tests and begin tracing the spread of the virus.
Three days later, on 11 January, Zhang decided it was time to put his neck on the line. As he boarded a plane between Beijing and Shanghai, he authorised Holmes to release the sequence.
The decision came at a personal cost - his lab was closed the next day for "rectification" - but his action broke the deadlock. The next day state scientists released the sequences they had obtained. The international scientific community swung into action, and a toolkit for a diagnostic test was publicly available by 13 January.
Despite the evidence from scientists and doctors, China would not confirm there was human-to-human transmission until 20 January.
At the beginning of any emerging disease outbreak, says health law expert Lawrence Gostin, it's always chaotic. "It was always going to be very difficult to control this virus, from day one. But by the time we knew [the international community] it was transmissible human to human, I think the cat was already out the bag, it already spread.
"That was the shot we had, and we lost it."
As Wang Linfa, a bat virologist at Duke-Nus Medical School in Singapore, says: "January 20th is the dividing line, before that the Chinese could have done much better. After that, the rest of the world should be really on high alert and do much better."
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On 12 October Princess Eugenie and Jack Brooksbank will be tying the knot in Windsor. Their marriage will mark the second royal wedding of the year following Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's ceremony back in May. | By Tom EdgingtonBBC Reality Check
So how much is it expected to cost and who pays?
Providing security is likely to be one of the bigger expenses. That bill will be borne by the police - and, by extension, the taxpayer.
Security inside Windsor Castle will be handled by diplomatic protection officers - a branch of London's Metropolitan Police Service. Security in the town of Windsor itself will be met by the local force, Thames Valley Police.
It hasn't said how much it thinks that will cost. However, it has published some details about the sort of security measures it will provide - such as putting up anti-vehicle barriers, carrying out searches, using sniffer dogs and providing "a higher presence of armed and non-armed officers" in and around Windsor.
Princess Eugenie's wedding comes five months after Prince Harry and Meghan also married at Windsor Castle.
Not long after the Duke and Duchess of Sussex's big day, Thames Valley's police and crime commissioner, Anthony Stansfeld, told the BBC that the estimated cost of policing their wedding was "between £2m and £4m".
We also know that £6.35m was spent by the Metropolitan Police Service on security for the wedding of Prince William and Catherine Middleton back in 2011 - that's based on a Freedom of Information request released to the Press Association.
We asked Mr Stansfeld's office to provide a similar estimate for Princess Eugenie's ceremony - but we were told this wouldn't be possible "until it has concluded".
Eugenie's wedding is expected to attract a smaller crowd and there will also be a considerably shorter carriage ride.
The BBC understands that logically, the cost to Thames Valley Police should be lower than that of Prince Harry's wedding - but until all the numbers are crunched they can't say for certain.
Some newspapers suggest the security bill could be about £2m - but this is only an estimate and not an official figure.
Special grants
Initially, Thames Valley Police has to absorb the costs.
After the wedding the police will be allowed to make an application to the Home Office for a "special grant" to recoup some of the money.
Special grants - funded by the taxpayer - are available to all police forces in England and Wales to help with the cost of policing unexpected and exceptional events.
The cost of the event must be more than 1% of a force's annual budget to qualify.
In the case of Thames Valley this would be about £3.7m - based on last year's annual budget of £372m.
The force has not yet claimed for Prince Harry's wedding, but deputy police and crime commissioner Matthew Barber says that Thames Valley Police will be doing so "in due course".
The complexity of the operation, as well as the number of organisations involved, means that costs are still to be finalised, he said.
Cost to the council
Other organisations, such as the local council, will also be involved, and that will lead to additional public cost.
A budget report on the Windsor and Maidenhead Borough Council website shows that the local authority spent £1.2m on Prince Harry's wedding in May.
This cost includes £495,000 on stewarding, £108,000 on providing toilets, and £75,744 on setting up a temporary car park.
The council also received income of £73,332 - the majority coming from parking and media fees.
In addition, the local economy is likely to have received a boost from the influx of people visiting the town - but the precise impact is hard to quantify.
The report reveals that central government (again, by extension, the UK taxpayer) reimbursed most of the bill, meaning the final cost to the council was £92,891.
Windsor and Maidenhead says it's too early to work out how much it needs to spend this time, but it is hopeful that it will receive another government reimbursement.
Why do the royals get security paid for?
Princess Eugenie is ninth in line to the throne - a "minor royal" in the eyes of some critics.
Republic, which campaigns for an elected head of state, has set up a petition urging the government "to commit no public money" towards the royal wedding.
So far it's received about 40,000 signatures.
Republic's vice-chairwoman, Dani Beckett, argues that as Princess Eugenie is not a working royal - ie she doesn't carry out public duties as a member of the royal family - the wedding should be treated as a private event, and all elements (including security) should be paid for by the couple themselves.
"No-one has forced her to have a carriage and a high-profile ceremony. There are other ways she could have chosen to have had a less lavish wedding," says Ms Beckett.
Buckingham Palace says the cost of supplying security "is a matter for the police".
So why are the police providing security - at public expense - for Princess Eugenie's wedding?
Decisions are made on a case-by-case basis, regardless of how major or minor the royal is, according to Dai Davies, a former head of royal protection.
"In truth you have to look at the threat assessment and someone has to make a judgement," he says. "Will the couple in question attract attention and is there a potential risk to the public?"
If the answer is yes, the police - according to Mr Davies - are obliged to provide security, no matter how major or minor the royal person is perceived to be.
Other costs
The private aspects of the wedding - such as flowers, entertainment and the dress - will be paid for by the royal family itself.
But how distant a relative do you need to be to expect the Queen to pay for your wedding?
"The Queen herself draws the line on which weddings the Royal Family chooses to pay for," says Dickie Arbiter, a former royal press secretary.
So in theory the Queen can fund any wedding she chooses to, no matter how far down in line of succession.
But in reality Mr Arbiter says she restricts it to her children and grandchildren.
Every year the royal family gets a chunk of money from the annual Sovereign Grant worth £82m this year, paid directly by the Treasury.
Some members of the royal family also benefit from additional income.
For example, Prince Charles gets money from the Duchy of Cornwall estate, a portfolio of land, property and financial investments.
But it's not clear from which "pots" the Palace will choose to fund Princess Eugenie's wedding.
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A new poll from Ipsos MORI for STV has suggested that 58% now say that they would vote Yes in another independence referendum. Just 42% state that they would vote No, and thereby back staying in the Union. What conclusions can we draw? | By Sir John CurticeProfessor of Politics at Strathclyde University
No previous poll has put ever support for independence so high.
More importantly this is the ninth poll in a row since June to put Yes ahead. On average, these polls have put Yes on 54%, No on 46%.
It is the first time in Scottish polling history that support for independence has consistently outstripped backing for staying in the Union.
However, we should be careful about drawing the conclusion from today's poll that support for independence has now risen further.
A poll from Savanta ComRes released over the weekend, the interviewing for which took place at the same time as today's headline grabbing poll from Ipsos MORI, put support for independence at 53%, one point down on the company's previous poll in August.
We will need further evidence before we will know whether the higher level of support for Yes in today's poll represents no more than the kind of random variation that we might expect in the polls given that Yes are well ahead, or whether it signals a further significant shift in favour of independence.
In any event, today's poll provides valuable further clues as to why Yes are now ahead.
First, it confirms that over the course of the last year Nicola Sturgeon's popularity has soared back to the very high level she enjoyed in her early weeks and months as first minister.
As many as 72% say they are satisfied with the way she is doing her job as first minister.
Crucially, her popularity extends deeply into the ranks of those who voted in 2014 to stay in the Union, over half (55%) of whom are satisfied.
In contrast, only 33% of No voters are satisfied with the job that Boris Johnson is doing. It looks highly likely that this contrast has persuaded some former No voters to change sides.
Second, younger voters are firmly in favour of independence. No less than 79% of those aged 16-24 - most of whom were too young to vote in 2014 - say that they would vote Yes.
No is still well ahead among the over 65s, but the foundations of support for the Union are seemingly gradually being eroded by demographic turnover.
Gender gap disappears
Third, the gender gap, which in 2014 resulted in women being markedly less likely to support independence then men, has seemingly disappeared.
Today's poll, in which 60% of women back Yes compared with 57% of men, is in line with other recent polls, nearly all of which have revealed little or no gap.
Fourth, the poll suggests that some of those who voted No in 2014 are now attracted by the prospect that an independent Scotland would be able to head in a different direction from England.
As many as 38% of former No voters find this argument for independence convincing, while 28% are persuaded in particular by the fact that Scotland is being required to leave the EU even though it voted to Remain.
However, only 15% of former No voters think the claim that Scotland's economy would be stronger outside the UK is convincing, while even among those who say they would now vote Yes as many as 30% believe that leaving the UK would be a major risk for Scotland's economy.
There is evidently still plenty left to argue over in the debate about Scotland's constitutional future.
John Curtice is Professor of Politics, Strathclyde University and Senior Fellow, ScotCen Social Research and 'The UK in a Changing Europe'.
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In recent years, thousands of African migrants have crossed illegally into Israel along its border with Egypt, which stretches for 250km (155 miles). The Israeli government has now started building a huge barrier, costing more than $370m (£230m) to try to stem the flow. The BBC's Wyre Davies reports from the border. | We came across them by the roadside, no more than a couple of kilometres inside Israeli territory.
Sixty-five people, including five children, who had just made the perilous journey across the Sinai desert and Israel's southern border with Egypt.
The Sinai is tens of thousands of square kilometres of nothing but sand and emptiness - it must be one of the most inhospitable places on earth.
But such obstacles had not stopped the desperate people I spoke to. They had risked everything - leaving behind homes and families in Sudan, Eritrea and other troubled African nations.
Perilous journey
Even though they had been caught by an Israeli border patrol and were not really sure what to expect next, they said they now felt relatively safe.
That's because many migrants are fleeing persecution and poverty in their own countries, and even travelling across Egypt and the Sinai is fraught with danger.
Human rights groups accuse Egyptian border guards of shooting indiscriminately at them. Although officials insist they only fire at those who ignore repeated orders to stop, since July 2007, at least 85 people have been shot and killed trying to cross into Israel.
Many are also abused by the networks of trafficking gangs, who charge huge fees to transport them across the desert.
Abdum, who said he had made the long journey from Eritrea, knew that after he was "processed" the Israelis would probably allow him to remain, albeit temporarily, and he might even be able to find work.
"We came to Israel just to protect ourselves, to claim asylum," he said as he and his fellow travellers waited patiently under an awning outside an Israeli military base. "Coming here is a dream for me. I love Israel and I want to stay here."
While some migrants say they are political refugees, many, like the dozens of men we later came across in the town of Eilat, are clearly looking for employment.
It is thought that as many as 700 African migrants are crossing into Israel from Egypt every week.
Unprotected border
Long tracks across the desert indicate the well-worn routes taken by thousands of migrants across what is, in many areas, a completely unprotected border.
Earlier this year, Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced plans to build a barrier. Work finally started last month.
However, many in the local tourism sector say that is the wrong approach.
They need cheap foreign labour and say more, albeit legal, migration should be encouraged.
Increasingly, low-paid jobs that used to be done by Palestinian workers - who are now unable to enter Israel - are being filled by African migrants.
They wait tables, clean rooms and keep the beachfront clean.
"In the hotel industry in Eilat we need about 1,500 employees in those jobs. There are no Israelis who want to do the jobs even though we offer them wonderful conditions," says David Bloom, a senior manager for the Isrotel chain in Eilat.
Even when the wall is completed, it will not extend to less accessible areas along the length of the border.
Despite the many dangers along the route, desperate migrants are unlikely to be deterred by Israel's latest attempt to keep them out.
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Volunteers at a West Sussex steam railway are to pay their respects to one of its founding members by taking his coffin down the line. | Bernard Holden, who was one of the leading figures in the Bluebell Railway, died on 4 October aged 104.
His coffin will be carried on a special train from Sheffield Park to Kingscote on Tuesday before a family funeral.
Bluebell Railway Chairman Roy Watts said: "We are giving him one final trip before we say farewell."
He added: "We call him the founding father of the Bluebell Railway.
"Without him we wouldn't have the railway that we have today."
Mr Holden, who chaired the first meeting of the Bluebell Railway Society in 1958, was made an MBE for services to the organisation.
The funeral will be at St Margaret's Church in Ditchling, East Sussex, before a private burial.
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A man has been arrested on suspicion of murder after a woman was found with fatal stab wounds in a house in Greater Manchester. | The victim, believed to be in her 40s, was found dead at a property on Manchester Road, Leigh, on Sunday.
A 37-year-old woman has also been arrested on suspicion of assisting an offender.
Police said the woman's death was being treated as an isolated incident, with no threat to the wider community.
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The Duke of Sussex grew up in the media spotlight - from a young royal dealing with his mother's death, through his partying teenage years, to his career in the military. | Since then Harry has followed in his mother's footsteps, doing charity work across the globe. He has got married and become a father.
Now he and the Duchess of Sussex will begin a new chapter: giving up their royal duties, HRH titles and public funding, and - it is expected - spending most of their time in Canada.
Harry has tried to balance his public and private lives. At times, the publicity that comes with being sixth in line to the throne has helped him to bolster support for his charitable endeavours. But there have also been times when that attention has become too much, and he has fought fiercely for his family's privacy.
Young life
Born at St Mary's Hospital, Paddington, on 15 September 1984, the prince was christened Henry Charles Albert David by the Archbishop of Canterbury in December of that year in St George's Chapel, Windsor.
But it was officially announced from the start of his life that he would be known as Harry.
The prince's childhood was cut short when his mother died in 1997.
Princess Diana was killed in a crash in Paris, aged 36, as the car she was in sped through a tunnel followed by paparazzi photographers.
Her death shook royal fans the world over, but it was 12-year-old Harry and 15-year-old William whose lives changed forever.
The funeral, which featured the image of the boys walking behind their mother's hearse to attend the service at Westminster Abbey, remains one of the most-watched programmes on the BBC.
"I can safely say that losing my mum at the age of 12, and therefore shutting down all of my emotions for the last 20 years, has had a quite serious effect on not only my personal life but my work as well," the prince said in an interview with the Daily Telegraph in 2017.
He added: "I have probably been very close to a complete breakdown on numerous occasions when all sorts of grief and all sorts of lies and misconceptions and everything are coming to you from every angle."
The prince followed the educational path of his older brother William, at Wetherby School in Notting Hill, before entering Eton in 1998.
After leaving Eton with two A-levels in 2003, Harry took a gap year.
He worked on a sheep farm in Australia and with Aids orphans in Lesotho, paving the way for the charity he later set up there.
Life in the spotlight
Attention from the press has been a constant in Harry's life.
The front page of a 2002 edition of the (now defunct) News of the World roared: "Harry's drugs shame", and claimed Prince Charles sent his son to visit a rehab clinic as punishment for smoking cannabis.
St James's Palace confirmed the then 17-year-old had "experimented with the drug on several occasions" but said the use was not "regular".
Then in October 2004, there was a scuffle with a photographer outside a club.
A royal spokesman said at the time the 20-year-old prince was hit in the face by a camera "when photographers crowded around him".
When Harry pushed the camera away, "it's understood that a photographer's lip was cut", the spokesman added.
The following year, an image of the prince dressed as a Nazi at a fancy dress party sparked outrage.
Clarence House later said the prince had apologised for any "offence or embarrassment" caused and had realised "it was a poor choice of costume".
And in 2009, video footage emerged of Harry using offensive language to describe an Asian member of his Army platoon.
St James's Palace said the prince was "extremely sorry for any offence his words might cause" but said he had "used the term without any malice and as a nickname about a highly popular member of his platoon".
Harry enjoyed lighter-hearted press coverage during the London 2012 Olympic Games, in his role as an Olympic ambassador.
In the same year he spent a lot of time in front of the cameras for the Queen's Jubilee. As part of those celebrations Harry completed his first royal solo tour overseas with visits to Belize, the Bahamas, Brazil and Jamaica.
However, that August, photos emerged of the prince and a young woman naked in a Las Vegas hotel room.
The two photos, published on US gossip website TMZ and later in the Sun newspaper, were taken on a private break with friends, with the site reporting the prince was in a group playing "strip billiards".
He later said he had "probably let myself down" but added: "I was in a private area and there should have been a certain amount of privacy that one should expect."
There is, however, a saving grace to the scrapes Harry has found himself in.
As the younger brother to the expected future king, Harry has relatively little responsibility.
Like the Queen's sister, Princess Margaret, and Prince Charles's younger siblings, Harry is a "spare to the heir" - and a world away from the throne.
So Harry's indiscretions have done little to dent public opinion of him.
And he has perhaps had a freer existence because of it; security worries would have made active service in Afghanistan impossible for his older brother, for example.
Army and charity
Harry spent 10 years in the armed forces, becoming the first royal in more than 25 years to serve in a war zone.
He was left disappointed in 2007 when Army chiefs decided not to send him to Iraq because of "unacceptable risks", but later spent 10 weeks serving in Afghanistan in 2008.
Harry returned to the country as an Apache helicopter pilot from September 2012 to January 2013, before qualifying as an Apache commander in July 2013.
He later described how he had shot at Taliban insurgents, and said that being in Afghanistan was "as normal as it's going to get" for him.
When he announced he would be leaving the Army in 2015, the prince said his time in the military would "stay with me for the rest of my life".
This is reflected in his charity work, which mostly concentrates on mental health and helping service veterans.
Harry's most notable charity work so far is his founding and chairing of the Invictus Games in 2014.
The Paralympic-style international competition for injured ex-service personnel has been held in London, Orlando, Toronto and Sydney.
He has also supported the charity Walking With the Wounded, for injured veterans.
The prince's other charity work includes supporting conservation projects in Africa and jointly founding Sentebale, a charity to help orphans in Lesotho.
He has continued his mother's work helping children affected by HIV and Aids, and supporting the Halo Trust's work in clearing landmines.
Diana captured global attention when she walked through a live minefield in central Angola in 1997.
She died in Paris later that year, before seeing the full impact of her visit - such as the signing of an international treaty to outlaw the weapons - but Harry highlighted her achievements when he retraced her steps in September 2019.
Tackling stigma
In recent years, Harry has had counselling to help him deal with his mother's death.
He was best man at his brother William's wedding in April 2011, and has since spoken of how hard it was not to have Diana there.
In a candid interview with the Daily Telegraph, he described shutting down all of his emotions for nearly 20 years and refusing to thinking about his mother.
This, he said, had a "quite serious effect" on his personal life and his work, and brought him close to a breakdown "on numerous occasions".
He also said he would probably regret "for the rest of his life" how brief his last phone call with his mother was, and spoke of her "fun" parenting.
She was a "total kid through and through", he said.
Harry, William and the Duchess of Cambridge joined forces to focus their campaigning efforts on mental health.
They founded Heads Together, which aims to tackle stigma and fundraise for new support services.
'Beautiful surprise'
As one of the world's most high-profile bachelors, Harry's love life has drawn much interest over the years.
In late 2016, he confirmed a new relationship with US actor, Meghan Markle, while issuing a statement accusing journalists of harassing her.
He described "nightly legal battles to keep defamatory stories out of papers", attempts by reporters and photographers to get into her home and the "bombardment" of nearly every friend and loved one in her life.
The pair had met on a blind date, organised by a mutual friend. Then after just two dates, they went on holiday together to Botswana.
In September 2017, the year before their wedding, Meghan told Vanity Fair magazine she and Harry were "two people who are really happy and in love".
And in an interview that November, when their engagement was announced, Harry admitted he had never heard of Meghan before his friend introduced them, and was "beautifully surprised".
He designed the engagement ring for Meghan, including two diamonds from his mother's jewellery collection.
The couple married in May 2018 at a ceremony at St George's Chapel in Windsor, and consequently became known as the Duke and Duchess of Sussex.
On a 16-day tour of Australia that October, the duke and duchess announced they were expecting their first child, adding that they were happy to share the "personal joy" of their news.
Baby Archie, described by Harry as "our own little bundle of joy", was born on 6 May 2019.
The next chapter
The duke's past year has been a rollercoaster ride of highs and lows.
In March, he and his wife split their household office from that of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.
In April, the launch of the Sussexes' Instagram account amassed more than one million followers in record-breaking time (five hours and 45 minutes).
The joy of becoming parents was followed days later by news Harry had accepted damages and an apology from a paparazzi agency which had used a helicopter to take photographs of his home in the Cotswolds.
In June, the Sussexes announced they would split from the charity they shared with the Cambridges - fuelling speculation of a rift between brothers Harry and William.
A 10-day tour of Africa at the end of September 2019 started well.
Harry raised awareness for causes close to his heart, and the couple introduced Archie to anti-apartheid campaigner Archbishop Desmond Tutu.
But during the tour, the Duchess of Sussex launched legal action against the Mail on Sunday over a claim that it unlawfully published one of her private letters.
In a lengthy statement Harry said "positive" coverage of the tour of Africa had exposed the "double standards" of the "press pack that has vilified [the duchess] almost daily for the past nine months".
And in an ITV documentary, filmed during the tour and broadcast the following month, the duchess admitted she was struggling to adjust to royal life while the duke said his mental health was a matter of "constant management".
Harry's charity work will no doubt continue. Buckingham Palace said he and Meghan will keep their "private patronages and associations".
But much of the rest of his future - including where exactly he will live with his wife and son - is, for the moment, unclear.
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Fidel Castro ruled Cuba as a one party state for almost half a century. | As communist regimes collapsed across the world, Castro kept the red flag flying right on the doorstep of his greatest enemy, the United States.
A divisive figure, his supporters praised him as a champion of socialism, the soldier-politician who had given Cuba back to the people.
But he faced accusations of brutally suppressing opposition and pursuing policies that crippled the Cuban economy.
Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz was born on 13 August 1926, the illegitimate son of a wealthy farmer, Angel María Bautista Castro y Argiz, who had emigrated to Cuba from Spain.
His mother, Lina Ruz González was a farm servant who became his father's mistress, and later, after Fidel's birth, his wife.
Castro attended Catholic schools in Santiago before going on to the Jesuit-run El Colegio de Belen in Havana.
However, he failed to excel academically, preferring to spend his time in sporting activities.
It was while studying law at Havana University in the mid-1940s that he became a political activist, honing his skills as a passionate public speaker.
Marxism
His targets included the Cuban government, led by the president Ramon Grau, which was mired in accusations of corruption.
Violent protests became the order of the day and Castro found himself targeted by the police.
He also became part of a plot to overthrow Rafael Trujillo, the right-wing leader of the Dominican Republic but the attempt was thwarted after US intervention.
In 1948 Castro married Mirta Diaz-Balart, the daughter of a wealthy Cuban politician. Far from encouraging him to join the country's elite, he turned increasingly to Marxism.
He believed Cuba's economic problems were a result of unbridled capitalism that could only be solved by a people's revolution.
After graduating Castro set up a legal practice but it failed to prosper and he was continually in debt. He remained a political activist, taking part in a series of often violent demonstrations.
In 1952 Fulgencio Batista launched a military coup which overthrew the government of the Cuban president, Carlos Prío.
Attack
Batista's policy of closer ties with the United States and the suppression of socialist organisations ran counter to Castro's fundamental political beliefs.
After legal challenges had failed Castro formed an organisation called The Movement, which worked underground in a bid to overthrow the Batista regime.
Cuba had become a haven for the playboy rich, and was run largely by organised crime syndicates. Prostitution, gambling and drug trafficking were endemic.
In July 1953 Castro planned an attack on the Moncada army barracks near Santiago in order to seize weapons for use in an armed uprising.
The attack failed and many revolutionaries were killed or captured. Castro was one of a number of prisoners who went on trial in September 1953.
Castro used his court appearance to expose atrocities committed by the army which further raised his profile, particularly among members of the foreign press who were allowed to attend the hearing.
Guerrilla warfare
He was sentenced to 15 years in prison. In the event he was released in a general amnesty in May 1955 having served just 19 months in relatively comfortable conditions.
During his short time in prison he divorced his wife and immersed himself in Marxist texts.
As Batista continued to crack down on his opponents, Castro fled to Mexico to avoid being arrested. There he met a young revolutionary named Ernesto "Che" Guevara.
In November 1956 Castro returned to Cuba with 81 armed companions on board a leaking cabin cruiser designed to carry just 12 people.
The party took refuge in the Sierra Maestra mountains. From this base Castro launched a two-year guerrilla campaign against the regime in Havana.
On 2 January, 1959, the rebel army entered the Cuban capital and Batista fled.
Hundreds of Batista's former supporters were executed after trials that many foreign observers deemed as less than fair.
Ideology
Castro responded by insisting that "revolutionary justice is not based on legal precepts, but on moral conviction".
The new Cuban government promised to give the land back to the people and to defend the rights of the poor.
But the government quickly imposed a one-party system. Hundreds of people were sent to jail and labour camps as political prisoners. Thousands of mainly middle class Cubans fled into exile.
Castro insisted his ideology was, first and foremost, Cuban.
"There is not communism or Marxism, but representative democracy and social justice in a well-planned economy," he said at the time.
In 1960, Fidel Castro nationalised all US-owned businesses on the island. In response, Washington put Cuba under a trade embargo that was to last into the 21st century.
Invaders
Castro claimed he was driven into the arms of the Soviet Union and its leader, Nikita Khrushchev, although some commentators say he entered the USSR's embrace willingly.
Whatever the motive, tropical Cuba became a Cold War battleground.
In April 1961, the US attempted to topple the Castro government by recruiting a private army of Cuban exiles to invade the island.
At the Bay of Pigs, Cuban troops repulsed the invaders, killing many and capturing 1,000. Fidel Castro had bloodied the nose of a superpower and it would never forgive him.
A year later, American reconnaissance planes discovered Soviet missiles on their way to sites in Cuba. The world was suddenly staring into the abyss of all-out nuclear war.
"A series of offensive missile sites is now in preparation on that imprisoned island. The purpose of these bases can be none other than to provide a nuclear strike capability against the Western hemisphere," warned President John F Kennedy.
Bizarre
The superpowers stood eyeball to eyeball, but it was President Khrushchev who blinked first, pulling his missiles out of Cuba in return for a secret withdrawal of US weapons from Turkey.
Fidel Castro, though, had become America's enemy number one. The CIA tried to assassinate him, most infamously with Operation Mongoose. Getting him to smoke a cigar packed with explosives was one idea.
Others were even more bizarre, including one to make his beard fall out and make him into a figure to be ridiculed.
The Soviet Union poured money into Cuba. It bought the bulk of the island's sugar harvest and in return its ships crammed into Havana harbour, bringing in desperately needed goods to beat the US trade embargo.
Despite his reliance on the Soviets' help, Castro put Cuba at the head of the newly-emerging Non-Aligned Movement.
Shortages
However, he also took sides, especially in Africa, sending his troops to support Marxist guerrillas in Angola and Mozambique.
By the mid-1980s, however, global geopolitics were shifting. It was the era of Mikhail Gorbachev, glasnost and perestroika, and it proved catastrophic for Castro's revolution.
Moscow effectively pulled the plug on the Cuban economy by refusing to take its sugar any more.
Still under the US embargo and with its Soviet lifeline cut off, chronic shortages and empty shelves in Cuba were inevitable. Tempers grew shorter as the food queues grew longer.
The country Fidel Castro called the most advanced in the world had, in fact, returned to the age of ox-drawn carts.
By the mid-1990s, many Cubans had had enough. If earlier waves of exiles had been as much about politics as economics, thousands were now taking to the sea in a waterborne exodus to Florida and the dream of a better life. Many drowned but it was a crushing vote of no-confidence in Castro.
Caribbean communism
Yet Cuba registered some impressive domestic achievements. Good medical care was freely available for all, and Cuba's infant mortality rates compared favourably with the most sophisticated societies on earth.
In later years, Castro seemed to have mellowed. 1998 saw a ground-breaking visit by Pope John Paul II, something which would have been unthinkable even five years earlier.
The then Pope condemned Cuba for its human rights abuses, embarrassing Castro in front of the world's media.
Fidel Castro had created his own unique brand of Caribbean communism which, in his last years, he was forced to adapt, slowly introducing a few free-market reforms to save his revolution.
On 31 July 2006, just days before his 80th birthday, Castro handed over power temporarily to Raul after undergoing emergency intestinal surgery.
His health continued to deteriorate. Early in 2008, Castro announced that he would not accept the positions of president and commander-in chief at the next meeting of the National Assembly.
In a letter published in an official communist newspaper, he was quoted as saying: "It would betray my conscience to take up a responsibility that requires mobility and total devotion, that I am not in a physical condition to offer."
He largely withdrew from public life, writing articles published in the state media under the title Reflections of Comrade Fidel.
He re-emerged in July 2010, he made his first public appearance since falling ill, greeting workers and giving a television interview in which he discussed US tensions with Iran and North Korea.
The following month Castro gave his first speech to the National Assembly in four years, urging the US not to take military action against Iran or North Korea and warning of a nuclear holocaust if tensions increased.
When asked whether Castro may be re-entering government, culture minister Abel Prieto told the BBC: "I think that he has always been in Cuba's political life but he is not in the government. He has been very careful about that. His big battle is international affairs."
President Obama's announcement in December 2014 of the beginning of an end to US trade and other sanctions saw the beginning of a thaw in what had been half a century of hostile relations between the two countries.
Castro welcomed the move stating it was it was "a positive move for establishing peace in the region", but that he mistrusted the US government.
While many Cubans undoubtedly detested Castro, others genuinely loved him. They saw him as a David who could stand up to the Goliath of America, who successfully spat in the "Yanqui" eye.
For them Castro was Cuba and Cuba was Castro.
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On Sunday morning, three police officers were shot dead in Baton Rouge. This attack came just 10 days after five police officers were killed in Dallas. Both events were revenge attacks for the killing of young black men by police. | The bloodshed has shocked the US, leading President Barack Obama to call for calm. But how many police officers are killed in the US in a normal year? And how many people are killed by police?
Police killed
"There's a widespread perception in the American public, and particularly within law enforcement, that officers are more threatened, more endangered, more often assaulted, and more often killed than they have been historically," says Seth Stoughton, a law professor at the University of Southern Carolina and former policeman.
"I think it's a very strong perception. People truly believe it. But factually, looking at the numbers, it's not accurate," he says.
FBI data on police officers "feloniously killed" - killed as a result of a criminal act - indicates that the numbers have been falling, he says.
Looking at the 10 years from 2006 to 2015 the annual average number of police deaths was 49.6, Stoughton says, which he notes is "down significantly from the high".
"The high was the 10-year period prior to 1980, when we had an average of 115 - actually 114.8 officers feloniously killed… in the line of duty every year."
At the same time the number of police officers has increased dramatically in the US.
At the same time the number of police officers has increased in the US. There are a quarter of a million more police officers working today than there were three decades ago.
So when you consider the number of officers killed per 100,000, there has been a dramatic decrease. The annual per capita number of officers killed has dropped from 24 per 100,000 in the 10 years to 1980 to 7.3 per 100,000 in the 10 years to 2013 (the last year for which there is good data).
This chimes with a bigger trend, which is a steady reduction in crime, including homicides.
Killed by police
Official data on the number of people killed by the police turns out to be remarkably unreliable.
"We can't have an informed discussion, because we don't have data," FBI Director James Comey said in the House of Representatives in October.
"People have data about who went to a movie last weekend, or how many books were sold, or how many cases of the flu walked into an emergency room. And I cannot tell you how many people were shot by police in the United States last month, last year, or anything about the demographics. And that's a very bad place to be."
He had previously said it was "unacceptable" that the leading sources of this information were newspapers, the Washington Post and the Guardian.
Find out more
Although the FBI does gather some data on fatal shootings, police forces are not obliged to provide it, and only some of them do. This led the Washington Post to start tracking civilian deaths itself after the shooting of Michael Brown by police in Ferguson in August 2014, by monitoring reports in the media.
"We looked at the FBI database, since that was the official government accounting for things. And saw that over the past decade, the average number of shootings that they counted was about 400. By the end of last year, we had almost 1,000 fatal shootings that we had captured," says Kimberly Kindy, an investigative reporter at the newspaper.
"What we didn't know though, of course, as we went into this year and did it a second year was - was last year a normal year? Is 990 people being killed by police in a single year about what you would expect year in and year out?"
So far, 2016 appears to be roughly on track with 2015, Kindy says.
"In fact there's been an increase, a 6% increase in fatal shootings when we compare the first six months of last year to the first six months of this year… So that's about three people are dying a day, who are being fatally shot by officers."
The Guardian has recorded even more deaths in 2015 and 2016, including deaths as a result of tasering, collisions with police vehicles and altercations in police custody.
The Washington Post journalists also collect information about the race of those shot by police. According to Kindy, about half are white, and about half are from minorities, but adjusting for the size of the populations, Kindy says, "minorities are definitely being shot at a higher rate than whites".
This is particularly noticeable in the case of the black population.
"Blacks are being shot at a rate that's 2.5 times higher than whites," Kindy says.
The big question is whether that is evidence that the police are discriminating against African Americans. There's an obvious argument that it is: African Americans are just 13% of the US population, and yet 26% of the people killed by the police.
But there's another way to look at these numbers. Nearly 50% of convicted murderers in the US are African Americans. Why that number is so high is a difficult question to answer. So is the question why African Americans are also far more likely than whites to be murder victims.
The point is that if African Americans are more likely to be involved in violent crime - both as perpetrators and victims - then the higher rate of police shootings may not be surprising.
The truth is that the raw statistics can't tell us whether the police are treating African Americans differently from white people. To understand that, we'd need to look at more details about what happened in each incident. There's a big difference between a case where someone was shooting at the police, and a case where someone was passive and unarmed.
One person who has tried to do that is an economist from Harvard University called Roland Fryer, the first ever African American to win the prestigious John Bates Clark medal in economics. This month Fryer released a preliminary study examining records from 10 cities and counties, with the best data coming from Houston - it's not yet peer-reviewed, but it has received a lot of attention in the press.
Fryer's research suggests that African Americans and Hispanics are substantially more likely to experience force in their interactions with the police - such as having a gun pointed at them, being handcuffed without arrest, or being pepper-sprayed or hit with a baton. This racial difference is reduced, but doesn't completely disappear, when Fryer adds all sorts of statistical controls such as whether the incident was indoors or outdoors, in a high-crime area, took place at night, and so on.
However, Fryer doesn't find any racial difference in the cases where police offers actually shoot someone.
The debate over this continues, both on the streets and in academia.
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On 17 October 2019 Boris Johnson was in ebullient form. | By John CampbellBBC News NI Economics & Business Editor
He had just sealed the Brexit withdrawal deal with the EU.
At a Brussels press conference, the prime minister hailed the agreement as marking the beginning of a "very exciting" time for the UK.
"I want to stress that this is a great deal for our country, for the UK," he said.
"And what it means is that we in the UK can come out of the EU as one United Kingdom - England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, together.
"And it means we can decide our future together, we can take back control, as the phrase goes, of our money, our borders, our laws, together."
Prescient study
Meanwhile civil servants were doing the work of turning the deal into domestic UK law - what would become the European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Bill.
Just four days after Mr Johnson's Brussels triumph, the Department for Exiting the EU (DExEU) had produced an analysis of the Withdrawal Agreement Bill.
It is that piece of work which shows that the problems with the Irish Sea border were foreseen virtually from the moment the deal was signed.
The DExEU civil servants produced a prescient study that almost precisely describes the issues which have come into sharp focus over the past week.
The Northern Ireland part of the deal - the Protocol - keeps Northern Ireland in the EU's single market for goods and EU customs rules are enforced at its ports.
That is to prevent a hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland but at the expense of a new trade border within the UK.
The DExEU report was clear about what this meant: "Goods moving from Great Britain to Northern Ireland will be required to complete both import declarations and Entry Summary Declarations because the UK will be applying the EU's custom code in Northern Ireland.
"This will result in additional administrative costs to businesses.
"Businesses that do not currently trade outside the EU will incur familiarisation costs as they have not had to engage with customs processes."
'Disproportionate effects'
It went on to explain that the heaviest burden would fall on small businesses.
"The proposals will have an effect on all UK businesses that move goods between Great Britain and Northern Ireland, irrespective of the business's size.
"Economic theory suggests that a 'one size fits all' approach for business trade requirements is likely to have a disproportionate effect on small and micro businesses (SMBs) in particular.
"There would be both fixed and variable costs for firms as a consequence of the Protocol, consequently these costs are likely to be a larger proportion of SMBs' operating costs and therefore disproportionately affect them."
It is the trade in food and plant products from Great Britain to Northern Ireland that has faced the greatest disruption since 1 January.
The DExEU report devotes a lengthy section to that issue and again spelled out the implications.
"There will be additional documentation required on all agri-food goods moving from Great Britain to Northern Ireland to ensure that they comply with the necessary regulations," it stated.
"These could include Export Health Certificates for products of animal origin, fish and live animals; and phytosanitary certificates for plants.
"This would result in an additional administrative cost to businesses moving goods between Great Britain and Northern Ireland."
'Symbolically separated'
DExEU was not the only government department with a clear view of what was coming.
During the 2019 UK general election campaign the Labour Party released a leaked Treasury presentation.
The language in the document was even blunter.
It said: "The Withdrawal Agreement has the potential to separate Northern Ireland in practice from whole swathes of the UK's internal market."
It also correctly anticipated the way in which the Protocol would be perceived by many unionists: "Northern Ireland symbolically separated from the union/economic union undermined."
Northern Ireland is of little interest to most voters or journalists in Great Britain so the issue sank without trace during the election campaign.
After winning that election, the government did act to mitigate the looming impacts of the Protocol.
Some potential requirements for new processes on Northern Ireland-Great Britain trade were negotiated away in further talks with the EU.
About £500m is being spent on a Trader Support Service to help with customs and a Movement Assistance Service to help with the certification costs of agri-food goods.
There are "grace periods", meaning some of the new processes are being phased in.
But the fundamental character of the Protocol has not changed since those DExEU officials explained it all more than 15 months ago.
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Reservoirs in Guernsey are full despite lower than average rainfall in March, according to the island's water company.
| March's rainfall was about 69% below the seasonal average for the month over the past 10 years.
However, the total for the previous year was 2.5% above average.
Guernsey Water said, with 4,400 megalitres in storage it puts the island in a good position ahead of the summer.
During the month of March, the company supplied 396 megalitres of water - about 2% more than the March average.
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South West Trains has suspended an employee after a message appearing to support Brexit was put up on the side of a train. | The words "Vote Out" appeared on a digital sign on a train travelling from London to Woking on Monday.
South West Trains said the company had "no position" on the issue of the upcoming EU referendum.
It said any referendum message would have been put on without the company's knowledge or authorisation.
An internal investigation is to be carried out into the matter, the company said.
The in-out referendum on the UK's membership of the European Union takes place on 23 June.
Related Internet Links
South West Trains
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After years of tiny gains at the cost of appalling casualties, Cambrai, fought 100 years ago, was heralded as the longed-for victory on the Western Front. But did a battle that left both sides almost where they started really change the course of the war? | By Greig WatsonBBC News
L/Cpl Alfred Brisco recalled in the aftermath of the fighting that his battle, inside the tank "Hotspur", came to a sudden and violent end: "There was a terrific roar and Hotspur shuddered from stem to stern.
"I saw our left caterpillar track fly in the air. Our left nose was blown off. If that last shell had landed two feet closer the officer and I would most certainly have both been killed."
Other crews nearby were not so lucky.
"A tank close to our right received a direct hit and burst into flames. I only saw one man roll out of a side door," Brisco said.
"The tank on our left also had a direct hit. I did not see anyone get out of that."
It was a terrible end to what had actually been a day of great progress for the British, who advanced further in six hours than in three months at Passchendaele.
After months of planning, the largest tank force so far assembled in the war - nearly 480 machines in all - had on 20 November smashed a seven-mile wide, four-mile deep hole in the Germans' toughest defences near the French town of Cambrai, just 25 miles from the Belgian border.
"It was a stunning success," said Bryn Hammond, head of collections at the Imperial War Museum. "For the first time since the war had begun, the church bells were allowed to ring."
Tanks, first used only 14 months before, were still distrusted by many.
They had struggled in the mud of Passchendaele and were hellish places in which to serve.
Lt Kenneth Wootton, of the Tank Corps, wrote in his account of the war: "The noise inside was absolutely deafening; the eight-cylinder engine was going at full speed, both six-pounder guns were firing as rapidly as possible and I was emptying drum after drum from the machine-gun.
"Any order I gave to the driver, who was close beside me, had to be shouted in his ear.... everything else had to be done by signs."
But this battle was different.
Dr Hammond said: "The key was surprise.
"There had been no week-long artillery bombardment; everything had been brought up in secrecy.
"And it was an integrated battle plan: tanks, infantry, artillery and aircraft all had a specific role to play."
Supporting the tanks were 1,000 artillery pieces, 110,000 infantry and 300 aircraft.
Belts of wire 50ft thick, which would have taken weeks to cut through in a traditional attack, were crushed by the tanks.
Accusing as I do without exception all the great Allied offensives of 1915, 1916, and 1917 as needless and wrongly conceived operations of infinite cost, I am bound to reply to the question, 'What else could have been done?' And I answer it, pointing to the Battle of Cambrai: 'This could have been done.'
Winston Churchill
Men and armour poured through the gaps. German defenders were overwhelmed. Soldiers described the advance as "a picnic" and "a cakewalk".
Commanders were left giddy by the success.
In his memoirs, Maj Richard Foot, of the Royal Field Artillery, said: "That first day was a day to be remembered. We really had the sense of victory for the first time."
But there was still savage fighting, as another officer, Maj William Watson, recalled finding in nearby trenches.
"The trench-boards were slippery with blood and 15 to 20 corpses, all Germans and all bayoneted, lay strewn about the road like drunken men.
"A Highland sergeant... who was in charge of the place, came out to greet us puffing a long cigar."
But the punch of the first hours, which had taken months of planning and resources, could not be maintained.
Tanks broke down, men became exhausted.
Deborah - The lost tank of Flesquieres
A six-year "obsession" led one man to uncover one of the most striking and poignant reminders of the Battle of Cambrai.
A tank named Deborah had made it through the village of Flesquieres but was one of nearly 40 that were destroyed as the tide of the battle turned.
Cambrai resident Philippe Gorczynski said: "An old woman told me about a tank being buried in the village after the war, and I just had to find it.
"I looked everywhere, I went 'hunting' in the woods and 'fishing' in the lakes - my wife said she had to share me with another woman!
"I looked at hundreds of aerial photographs and these, along with ground-penetrating scans, showed us where to go.
"The day we found Deborah was like finding the Grail. Here was an emblem of the battle, a tribute to all the men who served."
Historian John Taylor researched the crew and found the commander Frank Heap, 20, from Blackpool, had survived and won the Military Cross.
But George Foot, 20, from north London, William Galway, 25, from Belfast, Joseph Cheverton, 20, from Cambridge, and father-of-three Fred Tipping, 36, from Nottingham, all died in the flaming wreck.
Mr Taylor said: "It is important to remember these were men from typical towns, who fought in terrible circumstances but achieved remarkable things."
Deborah is now the centrepiece of a museum that will open to mark the 100th anniversary of the battle.
Dr Hammond said that after the Germans - who had no tanks of their own - had got over the "initial shock", they fought back bravely, "almost hand to hand".
"Bundled grenades were thrown under tracks, rifles fired through vision slits, even guns physically held down so they would fire into the ground - it got that close."
Another week of fighting hardly moved the front lines but cost thousands more men.
The British army, exhausted by Passchendaele, simply did not have enough soldiers, guns and tanks to exploit the gap in the defences.
Then on 30 November the Germans, backed by flamethrowers, counterattacked.
By 7 December, the armies held roughly the same amount of ground they had started with.
The British army had suffered more than 44,000 casualties, with nearly 180 tanks destroyed. The Germans had lost a similar number of men.
Had it all been for nothing?
Dr Hammond said: "The attack did not realise its potential due to lack of support, but these were the tactics which shattered German defences on the Western Front in 1918.
"It was a landmark in warfare. It establishes the principle of surprise attack, using each weapon in the role for which it is best suited, still used in the Gulf War.
"The era where the deadly combination of machine-guns, barbed wire, artillery and trenches defined the character of the battlefield was over."
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The BBC's M Ilyas Khan is one of the few journalists in recent months who has been able to travel to the remote north-western Pakistani tribal district of Kurram, where members of the Turi tribe are waging a war of attrition with the Taliban. | A couple of miles east of Alizai town in the Kurram tribal district, north-western Pakistan, boundary walls of two large compounds are rising fast.
Elders of the region's largest tribe, the Turi, say they are building homes for eight families from western parts of Kurram who have volunteered to resettle here.
"Apart from a house, each family will get four acres of land for agricultural use," says Haji Hashim Ali, a Turi elder and in charge of the community project.
"We hope to attract more than 200 families to this colony in a year's time," he says.
Community volunteers
The idea is to boost Turi presence in an area that belongs to the tribe but where the population has thinned out.
That has allowed others to step in and bring Taliban militants with them, Mr Ali explains.
The Turi tribe, which belongs to the Shia sect of Islam, has traditionally abhorred the Taliban - who adhere to a hardline Sunni form of the faith and many of whom consider Shias to be non-Muslims.
Two years ago, the Turis fought a major battle with the Taliban in the surroundings of Alizai.
They are now consolidating their hold on the region.
To the south of Alizai, across the Kurram river, the tribe is building a 14km (8.6 miles) road to link Alizai with the Turi stronghold of Parachinar in the west.
The Shurko road detours the Sunni-dominated town of Sadda, which is located on the region's main road that links Parachinar with Alizai and the rest of Pakistan.
In Parachinar, the district centre, and all along the Shurko road, community volunteers man checkpoints and also guard the region's airport.
There are no military checkpoints anywhere in the Turi lands from Parachinar to Alizai - and no Taliban.
To a casual observer, this comes as a surprise because Kurram is the most important strategic site from where to launch guerrilla attacks inside Afghanistan.
Its western tip is only 90km (56 miles) from the Afghan capital, Kabul.
Local people say that Taliban started pouring into the area in 2006 and set up base at a mosque in Parachinar.
"When we came to know of their presence, we took up the matter with the authorities, but they refused to expel them, saying the decisions were taken at a much higher level," says Ali Akbar Turi, another local elder.
Bombed
Fighting between the locals and the Taliban erupted in April 2007, and dozens of people were killed over the next year.
Devoid of local support, the Taliban were forced to retreat to their bases in Sadda and Alizai in eastern Kurram, but from there they enforced a blockade of Kurram's only road link to Pakistan.
"Our traders lost millions of dollars worth of merchandise when our trucks were bombed and burned down, and dozens of our people were beheaded," recalls Haji Hashim Ali.
In August 2008, local elders decided that if the army wasn't prepared to deal with the Taliban, it was time to raise a tribal force and storm the militant bases themselves.
Najib Hussain, a Kurram resident, fought on a front that finally led to the fall of Bugzai, a village that housed the Taliban's main base in the region, just across the river from Alizai.
"We had about 100 to 150 fighters. We would rotate them in four hourly shifts," he says.
"Fighting was intense. During the first 27 days I only came down twice from my position on the hill to take a bath. On the 27th day, I was hit and had to be carried away to the hospital."
It took the tribal force 46 days of fighting - and the loss of around 400 fighters - to inflict a final defeat on Taliban.
Nearly two years after the war, this entire area remains free of Taliban.
'Trapped'
But further east, the Taliban continue to block their exit route.
People can only leave Kurram in convoys, and only when the government provides security. Even then, they are regularly attacked.
In the last attack in July, suspected Taliban gunmen killed 18 people travelling in a passenger van from Parachinar to Peshawar, the regional capital.
Syed Abid Jan, 75, was one of four survivors.
"We started in the convoy but our van fell behind," he says.
"In Charkhel area, some 20km (12.4 miles) east of Alizai, about 10 gunmen fired at the van, causing it to overturn. Then they came closer and fired at the passengers trapped inside from all sides."
Mr Jan was hit in the back.
"When they went away, I looked around. My grandson was dead. He had fallen on me. I had fallen on my wife. She was also dead."
After three years of road blockades, the intensity of war has left a mark on the people of Kurram.
Trading and development work have come to a halt, much of the infrastructure of health, education and agriculture has been destroyed, and there is of course the emotional toll.
"A friend of mine told me to beware of going mad. I think that warning has kept me from going mad entirely," says Aqeel Hussain, the owner of a petrol station in Alizai.
"But sometimes I think I'm half mad. My blood pressure shoots up sometimes. It never used to happen before."
After the fall of Bugzai, the Taliban twice offered to guarantee the safety of the road from Kurram to Peshawar in return for access for their militants through Kurram into Afghanistan.
But this is an offer which the people of Kurram say they are determined never to accept.
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Caleb Femi, the first young people's laureate, says students must think creatively to secure a better future. He says that with the cancellation of this summer's major exams because of coronavirus, relying on the existing education system may no longer be the best option for future progress. | The British education system has covered itself in a veil for centuries. The veil is the promise that at the end of the road of education, there is security and even prosperity.
We are told to trim the fat of our potential. Students turned up every morning for 39 weeks a year. They studied and they learned for tests and they sat those tests.
They shrank their imagination and the autonomy of the learning process because there was that promise that you leave with a qualification, an emblem that said you were a capable member of society. This was the veil.
But Covid-19 was the storm that tore that veil apart for most students in the UK.
When the lockdown was imposed, schools had to close and students taking A-levels and GCSEs, as well as some from Years 9 and 10 in the middle of exam prep, were told that they wouldn't be able to take their tests.
Imagine that, after years of classroom exercises, homework, coursework, mock tests, parents' evenings and sacrificing so much because of that promise of a qualification, of security.
Instead your worth, the value of your qualification, your supposed future prospects are going to be based on a calculation of what is called your predicted grade.
Take note that statistically, black students are under-predicted and generally exceed their predicted grade in their real exams.
So what many students learn during this lockdown period is that society is an uncertain landscape. Job sectors are volatile, and then they begin to question themselves. They question the tools that they have to be able to survive in the wild that is adulthood.
You don't have to be David Attenborough to know that the absolute that is security does not exist in nature. The ones who survive, the ones who thrive, are the ones who have the tools and the skills to adapt.
So, as a student you then question yourself - do I have the tools that are required to survive in this society? These tools are problem solving, creativity innovation, the autonomy to envisage a new possibility and a new future.
Also, the mental dexterity to make careers for yourself and make society a more efficient place, a more equal place for everyone. Tools that you need to have to survive in such an uncertain landscape don't match up.
Going forward, it means that it's ultimately a job for you, the individual, alongside the community, to think in ways that put you in the driving seat of your own learning.
New approaches need to be made where students are encouraged to think creatively, to exercise their imagination, to problem-solve in unique, innovative, exciting ways. That is what a post-lockdown relationship should look like.
BBC Radio 4, Radio 5 Live and World Service have come together for a unique collaboration: BBC Rethink. It asks how society and our lives can change for the better after the Covid-19 crisis.
You can hear the BBC Rethink episodes on BBC Sounds.
Read the other essays:
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Repairs to the Cairngorms' funicular would not begin until May next year at the earliest, its owner Highlands and Islands Enterprise (HIE) has said. | The UK's highest railway has been out of action for almost a year due to structural problems.
Last month, HIE said fixing the funicular would be a cheaper option than having the structure removed.
Built at a cost of £26m, it connects a base station with a restaurant 1,097m (3,599ft) up Cairn Gorm mountain.
HIE said specialist structural engineers have been carrying out a further detail examination of issues affecting the beams of the railway, near Aviemore, this week.
Repairs are required to almost half of the railway's piers, almost 300 bearings need to be replaced and joints and connections on beams need to be reinforced.
The Scottish government will have to approve the repairs once the final cost is known.
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A woman has died in hospital after being injured in a fight outside a seaside bar. | The 52-year-old woman, from Nottinghamshire, was involved in an incident at Buzz Bar in Sea Lane, Ingoldmells.
Lincolnshire Police were called to the scene at about 23:25 BST.
Police have begun a murder inquiry and appealed for witnesses. They have asked for dashcam footage recorded in the area around the bar.
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Purdue Pharma, the drug-maker owned by the billionaire Sackler family, has reached a $270m settlement in a lawsuit which claimed its opioids contributed to the deaths of thousands of people. | As part of the deal, the US firm will fund a new centre to study addiction.
Purdue is one of several firms named in the claim which alleged they used deceptive practices to sell opioids.
The deal is the first Purdue has struck amid some 2,000 other lawsuits linked to its painkiller OxyContin.
The lawsuit filed by Oklahoma claimed that in order to persuade doctors to prescribe their painkillers, Purdue, and other companies such as Johnson & Johnson and Teva Pharmaceutical, allegedly decided to "falsely downplay the risk of opioid addiction" and "overstate" the benefits of their drugs to treat a wide range of conditions.
The companies deny the claims.
On average, 130 Americans die from an opioid overdose every day, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
In 2017, of the 70,200 people who died from overdose, 68% involved a prescription or illegal opioid.
Purdue said that the settlement with Oklahoma "resolves all of the state's claims against" against the company.
The family, who were not named in this lawsuit, said: "The agreement reached today will provide assistance to individuals nationwide who desperately need these services - rather than squandering resources on protracted litigation."
'Profound compassion'
The Sackler family, who are worth $13bn, according to Forbes magazine, also said: "We have profound compassion for those affected by addiction."
Under the settlement, Purdue will pay $102.5m towards the creation of a National Centre for Addiction Studies and Treatment at Oklahoma State University.
The Sacklers themselves said that they will contribute $75m over five years to the centre.
The dynasty has increasingly been under the spotlight because of the wave of legal action the company and individual family members are facing.
They are prolific philanthropists, having contributed millions of dollars to the arts.
However, a number of major galleries recently announced that they would not accept donations from the family, including the Tate in the UK and the Guggenheim in New York.
'Reckless criminals'
A lawsuit filed by Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey recently released a number of potentially damning documents, including some that present former Purdue boss Richard Sackler as someone who does not view OxyContin as contributing to opioid addiction but instead blames the individuals themselves.
He wrote in an email: "We have to hammer on the abusers in every way possible. They are the culprits and the problem. They are reckless criminals."
Commenting on the settlement, Purdue's chief executive Craig Landau said: "Purdue has a long history of working to address the problem of prescription opioid abuse and diversion.
"We see this agreement with Oklahoma as an extension of our commitment to help drive solutions to the opioid addiction crisis."
Alexandra Lahav, a professor at the University of Connecticut School of Law, told Reuters it was likely that Purdue was in talks to settle other lawsuits.
"This may be the start of the dominoes falling for Purdue," she said.
But the Sackler family said that the agreement with Oklahoma "is not a financial model for future settlement discussions".
Purdue Pharma, Johnson & Johnson and Teva Pharmaceutical had attempted to delay a trial over the claims made by Oklahoma state which is seeking $20bn in damages.
However, on Monday the Oklahoma Supreme Court refused and the trial against the other defendants will go ahead on 28 May.
Oklahoma Attorney General Mike Hunter, said: "The addiction crisis facing our state and nation is a clear and present danger."
He said one of the goals of the state's legal action was to ensure "a dramatic abatement of the sale of pharmaceutical opioids".
He added that as part of the settlement with Purdue, Oklahoma has put an injunction in place to stop the company marketing analgesic opioids within the state.
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He stood only about 4ft (1.2m) tall, yet what Benjamin Lay lacked in stature he made up for in moral courage and radical thinking. He was a militant vegetarian, a feminist, an abolitionist and opposed to the death penalty - a combination of values that put him centuries ahead of his contemporaries. | By Nic RigbyBBC News
For the hunchbacked Quaker was not a product of the 1960s counter-culture but of the Essex textile industry of the early 18th Century. The BBC charts the achievements of an extraordinary man, from his early life in eastern England, to the sugar plantations of Barbados and the British territory that would become the USA.
In September 1738, six years after arriving in America, Lay went to the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting of Quakers with a hollowed-out book inside of which was a tied-off animal bladder containing red berry juice.
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Lay told the gathering, which included wealthy Quaker slave-owners: "Thus shall God shed the blood of those persons who enslave their fellow creatures."
He then plunged a sword into the book and the "blood" splattered on the heads and bodies of the horrified slave-keepers.
As his biographer, University of Pittsburgh historian Marcus Rediker, says: "He did not care whether people liked it or not.
"He wanted to draw people in; he was saying: 'Are you for me or against me? Are you for slavery or against it?'
"He lost the battle with the elders of the church but won it with the next generation."
Lay's journey to become perhaps the most visionary radical in pre-Revolutionary America - he was one of the first people to boycott slave-produced products, in the same way campaigners today shun products made in sweat shops - began near Colchester in England.
Born in 1682 in Copford, he trained as a glove-maker in Colchester which had a major local textile industry and was a hotbed of radical thought.
"He was a third-generation Quaker from an area with a strong history of religious radicalism," said Dr Rediker.
He later became a sailor, and his experiences were to shape his views on slavery.
"Lay first learned about slavery through hearing stories from his sailor friends, some of whom may have been slaves themselves," the historian said.
"There was also a radical seafaring tradition, a sailor's ethic of solidarity, which connects in Lay to the radical tradition."
After returning home to the Colchester area, Lay found himself in trouble with the Quaker community because he felt the need to speak out against those who fell short of his high moral standards.
"He was a troublemaker at every moment of his life," said Dr Rediker.
"He had a powerful sense of his convictions and would speak truth unto power."
From Colchester he went to Barbados with his wife Sarah Smith, also a Quaker and a dwarf, to open a general store, but his experience "was a nightmare".
"It was the leading slave society of the world," said his biographer. "He saw slaves starved to death, he saw them beaten to death and tortured to death, and he was horrified,"
The Quaker spoke out against the plantation owners and, angered, they told him to leave.
Lay's odyssey next took him to Philadelphia, where he befriended the polymath Benjamin Franklin, a future Founding Father of the USA, who would publish Lay's book, All Slave-Keepers That Keep the Innocent in Bondage, Apostates.
While in America, he continued to defy conventional wisdom.
Lay crafted his own cottage in a cave, lining the entrance with stone creating a roof with "sprigs of evergreen", said Dr Rediker.
His home was apparently quite spacious, with room for a large library. Lay also planted an apple tree and cultivated potatoes, squash, radishes and melons.
Lay's favourite meal was "turnips boiled, and afterwards roasted", while his drink of choice was "pure water".
The committed vegetarian made his own clothes from flax to avoid the exploitation of animals - he would not even use the wool of sheep.
His moral certainty meant he could not allow the slavers in his midst to go unchallenged, and he would often attend Quaker meetings to denounce slavers.
Dr Rediker said they "flew into rages" when Lay spoke out against slavery.
"They ridiculed him, they heckled him... many dismissed him as mentally deficient and somehow deranged as he opposed the 'common sense' of the era," he said.
He was during his long life disowned by the Abington Quakers in Pennsylvania, as well as groups in Colchester and London.
In November 2017, almost 300 years after his denunciation, the North London Quakers recognised the wrong they had done in their treatment of Lay, accepting the group had "not walked the path we would later understand to be the just one".
"It has righted an historical injustice," London Quaker and writer Tim Gee said.
In 1758, the year before Lay died aged 77, the Philadelphia Quakers ruled they must no longer take part in the slave trade.
"Lay understood from this that it was the beginning of the end," Dr Rediker said.
The Quakers would go on to be at the forefront of the campaign against slavery, which would ultimately be abolished in the US in 1865.
For Mr Gee, Lay's lasting legacy is that he had "a vision for a better world".
"He could see basic injustices in society which were seen as normal and dragged the injustices into the light."
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