I cannot see any justification for allowing any political funding from British citizens living abroad.

Iran's Fars: Most essential goods are reportedly imported into Israel from Azerbaijan and Greece, making the country heavily dependent on these two suppliers.

Cartoon put up by the Iranian embassy in SA after Trump said that he was going to be controlling traffic through the Straits of Hormuz.

Wondering what leverage in negotiations looks like? Australia's new FTA with the EU provides 16,830 tonnes of tariff free access for beef. Australia's FTA with the UK, completed with a desperate Johnson administration, provided 35,000 tonnes tariff free, rising to unlimited over 15 years.

“That was not supposed to happen.”

Aesop: I TOLD YOU

Horrifying.

In case you missed it ... Here's a shortened version of the opening sketch from the opening show of Saturday Night Live UK ... It's on Starmer and the Iran War! – and the guy playing Starmer (George Fouracres) really nails it! 😂 #SNLUK

www.middleeastmonitor.com/20260322-bbc... None of this is getting any attention. (I'm an ex-BBC producer, living partly on a BBC pension.)

And NATO SecGen Rutte would be well advised to check back with his team on his claim that current war will make a nuclear armed Iran less likely in the medium to long term. This war is one big global ad for getting nuclear weapons fast -- not just Iran will take that lesson.

This is indeed a terrific, perceptive read.

A Tory government looks extremely unlikely at this point. I would prefer a Labour government to a Nigel Front government, but Labour under the current leadership are doing their level best to make me prefer a Greens government to a Labour one

The government's "earned settlement" proposals "pull the rug from under those who have planned their lives and commitments and are contributing to our economy and to our society...I believe in a country where we keep our word and live up to our values” Absolutely right from Angela Rayner.

He was certainly afraid of Vietnam-style combat in Vietnam.

Note this means that we now have both the Omani intermediaries and the UK diplomatic observers saying the same thing: Iran was prepared to do a very reasonable deal, and Witkoff and Kushner were determined to insure that no deal came to pass, so Netanyahu could proceed to war.

Jonathan Powell who was at talks says Iran made serious offer before US and Israel attacked. www.theguardian.com/world/2026/m...

Joe Kent, the director of the National Counterterrorism Center, resigns over Iran war. x.com/joekent16jan...

May all your days be Slow News Days.

Stock market crashes don't destroy money, and here is why youtu.be/wzQGAX5FDFI?...

There it is (also leaking like a sieve now)

Not even the Nazis expressly announced they were committing war crimes. Indeed, at Nuremberg war crimes were denied. But here, openly, the US Secretary for Defense is explicitly admitting to committing war crimes.

Declaring that no quarter will be given unequivocally violates international humanitarian law. Indeed, ordering that no quarter will be given, threatening an adversary therewith or conducting hostilities on this basis is prohibited and constitutes a war crime.

Canada’s ally Israel is the one bombing civilians, civilian infrastructure and UNIFIL personnel, and Canada has done absolutely nothing even change its relationship with Israel, let alone cut ties or do anything remotely helpful

1/2 This is crucially important point. 1) "No quarter" is indeed specifically war-crime term 2) Under Geneva Conventions, after sinking an enemy ship, the attackers must "take all positive measures" to find and rescue any survivors. Text in next post No evidence US sub did so after attack, AFAIK

I just wrote something that said both UK and EU agree they should in theory have close ties but neither can get there and here is an example of why not from the EU to go alongside others from the UK. You can ask for anything in a trade deal, but you can also expect no at times.

Rereading Nye Bevan’s greatest Commons speech On Suez, 5 Dec 1956 The war where, as he put it, “the reasons change all the time” Just replace “the canal” with “straits of hormuz” — and weep www.theguardian.com/theguardian/...

this is an acknowledgement the US will have to fight to reopen the strait

let's all meet up in the year 2000

Reported findings that the US is responsible for the recent deadly school attack in Iran, and that it was based on outdated targeting data, highlight the need for reform and accountability within the US military to minimize civilian harm during conflict. New from HRW: https://bit.ly/4dqo6Aa

Further to this I remember my boss offering David Hockney a car; he said no, he’d take the tube. He’s pretty high in my list of candidates.

Just stumbling around trying to figure out how the world works.

Fully *one year later*, the Telegraph has been forced (by @ipso.co.uk) to admit that it was lying about foreign nationals claiming benefits.

How much would it cost to produce and publish a Choctaw-Gaeilge dictionary? I'm thinking of stuff I'd do if I won the Euromillions, and am wondering if this would cost more or less than an apartment in Paris.

This is a cracking piece from @irishlittimes.bsky.social . No byline that I could see on my tiny ‘phone.

Trump did this. U.S. at Fault in Strike on School in Iran, Preliminary Inquiry Says www.nytimes.com/2026/03/11/u...

Judgment: www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/u...

Compare the UK press coverage when he was charged and when he was finally found innocent. www.irishnews.com/news/norther...

This is a real video from the official White House account on a war that is currently killing people. I don’t know how the US is going to come back from this. The post was “JUSTICE THE AMERICAN WAY. 🇺🇸 🔥”

The Iranian warship that was bombed by the US was unarmed www.middleeasteye.net/news/iranian...

This is a good analogy. Very useful in carefully controlled settings for specific usages, but unfortunately being widely inserted into everything and used without training or PPE and poisoning a lot of things and people and we’re going to pay a tonne of money to remove it safely in the future

It's a peculiar thing. The BBC repeatedly gets into a mess, but meanwhile, Ros Atkins again and again does the kind of job that no one else does and which represents the best values of the Corporation - simply by laying out the facts clearly and calmly.

this the FT not The Onion

Remember: what Trump and his administration are doing is only possible because Congress and the Supreme Court have abdicated their proper constitutional functions of check and balance.

“Almost all the 165 people killed in the attack were girls aged between seven and 12, according to local officials. There were around 170 girls at the school in southern Iran’s Minab at the time.“ A double-tap strike on little girls at school.

Jellyfish and anemones sleep in much the same way as humans. www.science.org/content/arti...

Spot. On.

The State has paid a serving detective €270,000 in a settlement arising out of his three year suspension for giving a loan of a bicycle to an elderly farmer near his home. jrnl.ie/6973526t