Britain should ensure aid money is earmarked specifically for overseas food assistance to protect its security interests, the report, which was commissioned by the organisation United Against Hunger and Malnutrition, argues.

The UK’s overseas development budget (ODA) has been drastically reduced in the last six years, falling from 0.7 per cent to 0.3 per cent of GDP.

Defence spending is up but largely earmarked for the military – and is not designed to address the root causes of global instability. 

The drop in aid – which equates to roughly £6.5 billion in real terms – has hit food assistance programmes particularly hard. 

The UN’s World Food Programme (WFP), the largest provider of food relief globally, received £448 million of British aid money in 2024, a figure cut to £322 million last year. 

The organisation has had to drastically scale down operations, including giving emergency food packages to pregnant women and young children, in places like Somalia, Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), and Haiti. 

“[Britain] needs to protect and prioritise spending on proven nutrition interventions, including supplementary and emergency therapeutic foods such as [….], breastfeeding support and ready-to-use therapeutic food. 

“There isn’t really a choice between spending money and saving money. It’s between spending modestly before a crisis and paying far more for it afterwards,” Prof Gordon said. 

Protect yourself and your family by learning more about Global Health Security

All good things come to those who wait. And Liverpool have certainly had to be patient with Alexander Isak.

But this was Isak back to his scintillating best as last summer’s record buy stole centre stage from this year’s big money buy Bradley Barcola.

Isak scored twice within the space of four first half minutes to secure Liverpool ’s first win of the season as they were simply too good for newly-promoted Ipswich.

The hangover from a transfer window can easily derail a club’s season and there must have been worries for Liverpool.

For a start, Cody Gakpo nearly joined bitter rivals Manchester City in the final days of the window while new £106m signing Bradley Barcola was deemed not fit enough to start so was on the bench.

JOIN US ON FACEBOOK! Latest news, analysis and much more on Mirror Football’s Facebook page

But, actually, the uncertainty clearly gave Gakpo something to prove to Andoni Iraola. Let’s not forget Liverpool were willing to let Gakpo go but could not get their transfer targets in.

Liverpool, with Gakpo at the heart of everything, started with a real buzz and energy which threatened to overwhelm newly-promoted Ipswich. And the home fans were left very quiet within the first ten minutes.

It was last year’s big-money buy, Alexander Isak, who really shone and lit up Portman Road with his pace, movement and sublime finishing.

Liverpool paid £125m for Isak last summer, he only scored four goals in all competitions for the Reds in an injury-plagued first season and the spotlight has really been on him in the early weeks of this campaign.

Sky Sports pundit Gary Neville branded Isak and Florian Wirtz “the biggest disappointments” after their draw at Newcastle on the opening weekend. Frankly, it was also a reflection of their time at Anfield so far. Both of last summer’s big-money buys have been underwhelming.

But this was more like the Isak Liverpool thought they were signing. And Liverpool also looked more like an Iraola team. They were high energy, they pressed and were playing with high intensity.

It took them just six minutes to go ahead. It was Gakpo’s pass who released Isak and the Liverpool striker’s shot was so fierce that Ipswich keeper Kjell Scherpen could not keep it out.

Liverpool’s traveling fans began singing: “Isak again, ole, ole.” That seemed a bit rich has he has hardly been prolific. But he did score in the draw with Nottingham Forest last weekend and quickly had them singing again.

This time, Gakpo’s pass was really special. From the left, through the eye of a needle, Gakpo’s through ball released Isak who tied Ipswich defender Jacob Greaves up in knots before slotting past Scherpen.

Liverpool were in cruise control. Ipswich were in disarray. We should not forget that Ipswich spent £189m which was more than Spanish giants Barcelona. Yes, no-one expected anything other than another fight for survival. But there was little evidence of any fight.

They were being steamrollered in midfield, overwhelmed in defence and a bit powder puff up front. Ipswich captain Dara O’Shea remonstrated angrily with his teammates. In fairness, Julio Enciso gives them an edge.

But it took them a long time to get going and Liverpool could have been out of sight. Dominik Szoboszlai unleashed two long range efforts. Isak thought he had a hat trick only to have strayed offside.

Eventually, Liverpool fans got their wish and on came Barcola for his first run-out since playing for France against England in the third-place play-off at the World Cup. Barcola came on to a great reception and there were enough glimpses to leave the fans very excited.

Join our WhatsApp community and receive your daily dose of Mirror Football content. We also treat our community members to special offers, promotions, and adverts from us and our partners. If you don’t like our community, you can check out any time you like. If you’re curious, you can read our Privacy Notice.

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — A long-lost Italian portrait looted from a prominent Jewish art dealer during World War II was set to be returned to his heir after an Argentine court on Friday approved a deal under which the daughter of a fugitive Nazi official agreed to give up her claim rather than face trial.

The agreement paves the way for the long-sought return of “ Portrait of a Lady ” to Marei von Saher, the sole surviving heir of Dutch-Jewish art dealer Jacques Goudstikker, whose celebrated collection was sold under duress to Nazi officials after Adolf Hitler’s Germany invaded the Netherlands in 1940.

Patricia Kadgien, the daughter of the late high-ranking Nazi official Friedrich Kadgien, and her husband, Juan Carlos Cortegoso, were charged with aggravated cover-up last year after authorities said they hid the 18th-century painting despite knowing it was being sought by Argentine and international investigators.

Under the agreement, a copy of which was obtained by The Associated Press, the couple agreed to give up any claim to the work and consent to its return to von Saher in exchange for avoiding a criminal trial and spending two years under court supervision. During that time, they must make payments to a hospital in Argentina’s coastal city of Mar del Plata, where they live, and keep authorities informed of their whereabouts.

The deal ends a generations-long search for the missing portrait and a yearlong legal saga that began in August 2025. Dutch reporters investigating Friedrich Kadgien, a fugitive Nazi financial official who fled to Argentina after World War II, spotted “Portrait of a Lady” hanging above a green velvet couch in an online real estate listing for his daughter’s rustic home in Mar del Plata.

The listing disappeared within hours of the Rotterdam-based newspaper Algemeen Dagblad publishing its findings. Police raided the home several times but failed to find the painting. More than a week later, Kadgien’s lawyer turned it over to authorities.

For decades, the portrait had been identified as a work by the Italian Baroque painter Giuseppe Vittore Ghislandi. It appeared under that attribution in Goudstikker’s collection records and was exhibited as a Ghislandi in Amsterdam before the war. But a court-ordered examination by Argentina’s National Academy of Fine Arts reached a different conclusion, attributing the work to the Italian artist Giacomo Antonio Melchiorre Ceruti.

Experts authenticated the painting as part of Goudstikker’s collection and estimated its value at about 250,000 euros ($290,000).

24 Hours in Police Custody fans have been left furious by Channel 4’s scheduling of the true crime series, with many taking to social media to demand the broadcaster never split episodes again

Devotees of 24 Hours in Police Custody have expressed their annoyance at Channel 4 following the broadcaster’s latest announcement regarding the popular true crime programme.

Loyal viewers have endured a wait spanning several months for fresh episodes to broadcast, being served numerous repeats instead. Nevertheless, last weekend, audiences were at last given new material with a two-episode special.

The opening instalment of 24 Hours in Police Custody: The Ambush was shown on Sunday, 30 August, documenting the investigation into a 17-year-old lad left in a coma following a severe attack. Officers were depicted piecing together the circumstances that preceded his catastrophic injuries, relying substantially on CCTV footage to assist them in constructing their case.

The concluding instalment, still to be broadcast, will pick up from where the opening episode finished. Yet, numerous viewers were left baffled about when they’d be able to watch the second part of the special, with many presuming it would be screened the following night.

Advertisement

Due to the extent of bewilderment among audiences, Channel 4 has subsequently released a playful scheduling update, clarifying that the concluding half would be transmitted on Sunday, September 6 at 9pm on Channel 4 alongside screenshots of puzzled fan messages, reports Glasgow Live.

The post read: “POV you’re the Social Media Manager reading the comments on the new 24 Hours in Police Custody.” However, rather than being satisfied, numerous fans seized upon the update to voice their frustration at the week-long gap – and to insist Channel 4 reconsider its strategy going forward.

One viewer fumed: “Please listen to the feedback and NEVER again make us wait a week for part two!”

“Why make us wait a week?” questioned another devotee of the programme. They continued: “Deeply unfair and frustrating. You can only tease us so far, social media manager take note.”

Meanwhile, a third enthusiast, posting on X, observed: “I absolutely LOVE #24HoursInPoliceCustody, but the programming really does test my patience. We get about 3 new cases every 117 years while #Channel4 get u excited putting out episodes, only to find they are repeats.

“Then they FINALLY give us a new one that’s apparently an absolute belter and part 2 isn’t tomorrow. IT’S NEXT SUNDAY? ! A WHOLE WEEK? ! It’s called 24 Hours in Police Custody, not 168 Hours Waiting for Part Two.”

The long-running documentary programme has built up a dedicated fanbase since its debut in 2014, offering a raw look at law enforcement throughout the UK and the work officers undertake to achieve criminal prosecutions.

24 Hours in Police Custody: The Ambush returns to Channel 4 on Sunday, September 6 at 9pm.

Although Clancy does not deny killing her three children, she pleaded not guilty to three counts of first-degree murder

The trial of Lindsay Clancy, a mother accused of strangling her three children before throwing herself from a second-floor window, has been declared a mistrial after jurors were unable to reach a unanimous verdict.

Thirty-six-year-old Clancy was charged over the deaths of her children, Cora, aged five, Dawson, three, and eight-month-old Callan, who were found dead at the family’s home in Duxbury, Massachusetts, in January 2023.

The former labour and delivery nurse, who was paralysed after her fall and appeared in court in a wheelchair throughout the trial, allegedly sent her husband, Patrick Clancy, on a series of errands before the children were killed. He later returned home to discover their bodies in the basement, The Mirror reports.

Jurors deliberated for more than 38 hours but repeatedly told the court they could not agree on a verdict. After a third deadlock warning, the judge formally declared a mistrial.

“At this point, I’m going to declare that the jury is deadlocked, and I’m going to declare a mistrial,” Judge William Sullivan told the jury, before discharging them.

The sticking point of the trial focused on the mother’s mental state at the time of the killings. Clancy’s defence team argued that the former nurse was suffering from postpartum psychosis, making her not criminally responsible for her children’s deaths. Prosecutors dispute this point, alleging that she had deliberately killed the three youngsters.

Although Clancy does not deny killing her three children, she pleaded not guilty to three counts of first-degree murder. The indecisive jury heard evidence from more than 80 witnesses during the trial, observing roughly 300 exhibits. Clancy’s attorneys, while defending her, had never rejected her role in the killings, instead putting forth a defence of insanity; they argued that Clancy had hallucinations and delusions after giving birth to her youngest child.

Treatment for mental health issues, and Clancy’s decision to check herself into a psychiatric hospital just days before the deaths, were highlighted by the defence.

Countering this, prosecutors contended Clancy made a calculated decision to kill her children intentionally, alleging that she sent her husband out on errands so that he would not be home and she could carry out the killings.

Patrick, who has since remarried, told the court about Lindsay’s declining mental health following the birth of their youngest son, with the “big spiral” starting around a month before the killings.

“She started to lose a lot of weight, and she became very depressed, and she was having a really hard time,” he said. It was also revealed that Clancy had previously sought help from doctors and had been taking various medications.

Patrick added that he could recall her admitting to having suicidal thoughts. The jury had previously told Judge William Sullivan it was struggling to reach a unanimous decision before returning without a verdict for a third time.

Judge Sullivan said: “I’m going to declare a mistrial at this point,” before Clancy’s defence asked for the declaration to be temporarily stayed while it sought emergency relief from a higher court.

Ensure our latest stories always appear at the top of your Google Search by making us a Preferred Source. Click here to activate or add us as your Preferred Source in your Google search settings.

Just over a decade ago, at the height of Russia’s bombing campagn in Syria in 2015, an old friend who had spent much of his career teaching in the Middle East sent me two photographs of the city of Homs, which had taken a particularly heavy bombardment at the hands of Vladimir Putin’s warplanes.

One of the pictures, which had been taken some years previously, was of a cafe on the centre of this city of 1.3 million. It was packed with smiling, well-dressed young men and women and hinted at a vibrant cafe culture in Syria’s third-largest city. The other was an aerial photograph downloaded from contemporaneous news reports which my friend confirmed was the street on which that cafe had sat. It was now nothing but rubble.

This week our Insights team has published this moving account by three peace and conflict researchers who have travelled through some of Syria’s shattered cities, to observe at first hand how people have been trying to rebuild their lives since the fall of the Assad regime in December 2024. They spoke with many people returning to these cities having fled the violence. They observed food stalls, cafes, repair shops and other small and medium enterprises that had sprung up amid the rubble as people began to rebuild their lives, homes and livelihoods.

The researchers, from the UK’s Durham University and the Bonn International Centre for Conflict Studies, attended the wedding of a friend and recount hearing the joyous zalghouta – the traditional high-pitched ululation so characteristic of celebrations across the Arab world.

As they write here: “hope and hardship coexist. So do recovery and destruction”. Or as someone told them when they visited Damascus: “We sit on the ashes, and everything remains extremely fragile.”

À lire aussi :
Journeying through Syria’s shattered cities as they move from war to peace

Iran’s shifting power structure

Something else that remains extremely fragile is the ceasefire in Iran – if indeed it still exists in any meaningful sense. Both sides have carried out strikes this week. The US has hit what it referred to as military targets, including rocket-propelled mine launchers in the Strait of Hormuz (although it also reportedly hit a wedding party, killing several civilians and wounding many others). Iran struck at US military assets in the Gulf.

Tehran is now threatening to launch cyberattacks against energy and water facilities in the US.

Donald Trump, has said he has no plans to talk with Iran, claiming that the US has almost total control of the Strait of Hormuz and that the Iranian economy is close to collapse. He reiterated his call from the beginning of the conflict for the Iranian people to rise against the Islamic Republic.

While there’s no sense that the regime is in any real jeopardy at present, the war has prompted some important power shifts in Iran. Andreas Krieg, a Middle East specialist at King’s College London, explains who’s who in the struggle to control Iran and what that might mean for the future of negotiations with the US.

À lire aussi :
War has shifted how power works in Iran

Putin’s paranoia about Britain

One of the policy approaches taken by Keir Starmer as prime minister which his successor Andy Burnham is clearly keen to continue is the UK’s stance as a key ally of Ukraine. Burnham’s first, and so far only, overseas visit since moving into Downing Street has been to Ukraine, where he told President Volodymyr Zelensky that “Britain is 100% behind you”.

Predictably, this drew a harsh response from the Kremlin, several of whose leading lights issued threats that the deeper the UK’s involvement in the war “the higher price it will pay”.

Historian Peter Whitewood of York St John University believes the messaging coming out of Putin’s proxies recently echo a familiar theme. Russia has repeatedly accused the UK of being something of a ringleader in ganging up on Russia.

Whitewood points to a series of episodes in the 1920s, when Britain threw its weight behind Poland in its struggle to remain independent from the Soviets. Then, the Kremlin’s line was – as it is now – that Britain was “always striving to push others instead of itself into military actions against us”. As one Soviet diplomat observed, the Kremlin was inclined to see “the malevolent hand of the British government everywhere”.

Given this was Stalin’s personal belief, there wasn’t much mileage in suggesting it was misguided and it wasn’t until the rise of Nazi Germany that Britain was knocked off its podium as the Soviet Union’s main bogeyman.

À lire aussi :
Moscow has a long history of paranoia about Britain’s support for Russia’s enemies

The tragic fate of a Nepalese village

Thousands of people are still missing after the devastating floods that swept through Nepal last week, while the death toll from the disaster continues to mount. One settlement particularly hard hit was the village of Khalte, close to the Trishuli River in northern Nepal.

This village of around 5,750 people included 257 families who had been displaced in the disaster of 2015, when Nepal was rocked by a 7.8-magnitude earthquake. Heaven Crawley, a researcher from Coventry University, spent time working with families there in September 2019 as part of a research project looking at how renewable energy could improve people’s lives.

As she writes here, the local people were well aware of how precarious their village was as it was critically vulnerable to flooding from the Trishuli, which repeatedly flowed into Khalte, particularly during monsoon season. The urgency of finding somewhere safer was further brought home in 2025, when a glacial lake outburst sent floodwaters flowing into Nepal from Tibet.

Now Khalte no longer exists. It was completely swept away in the flooding of August 26. Scores of people are missing. Crawley believes that this terrible tragedy must be taken seriously as a lesson about the urgency of heeding these climate warnings.

À lire aussi :
Nepal floods: Khalte residents knew the river could take their camp – and then it did

Inside North Korea’s ‘shadow fleet’

Shadow fleets are the outlaws of the ocean. They are used by countries such as Russia, Iran and North Korea to evade sanctions and are among the reasons why some of the world’s conflicts seem so intractable.

In the latest episode of The Conversation Weekly, Justin Hastings, a professor of international relations at the University of Sydney, describes the tactics that North Korea uses to disguise the identities of its shadow ships – and why it has got away with it for so long.

There’s a superb multimedia piece to go with it, with vivid graphics illustrating the way in which shadow fleets go about hiding their identities.

Nicola Peltz Beckham made her film festival debut tonight – attending an event at the 83rd Venice Film Festival.

Introduced simply as ‘Nicola Beckham‘ the actress smiled and giggled with delight when making an entrance – an hour late – behind the renowned diva Faye Dunaway.

Sources indicate that the delay was because Ms Dunaway was not ready to appear.

Ms Dunaway stars in Peltz Beckham’s upcoming film, Prima, about a ballerina, and both women are to be given a Kineo award tomorrow. 

Nicola will be named a ‘Rising Star’ and Dunaway is to accept a lifetime achievement award.

The actress, wearing white trousers and a camisole, said: ‘Thank you so much for having me here, this is such an honour. I’m so happy to be sitting here next to the one and only Faye Dunaway, the icon!’

Ms Dunaway, who was walking with the aid of a cane, responded: ‘I am very happy to be here with this lady who I can see is going to have a very big career.

Introduced simply as ‘Nicola Beckham’ the actress smiled and giggled with delight when making an entrance – an hour late – behind the renowned diva Faye Dunaway

‘I think she’s so talented and we are going to see so much of her.’

Moments later, the pair left the stage, at the Italian pavilion in the Excelsior hotel, followed by a small barking dog. It wasn’t clear if the dog belongs to either, or neither, of them.

Nicola started in acting in Deck The Halls with Danny DeVito, in 2006, and posted a throwback snap on her Instagram earlier this week. 

She was also in The Last Airbender and Transformers: The Age Of Extinction. 

More recently she has been writing and producing films through her label, Bunny Films, which is named after her late grandmother and bankrolled partly by her billionaire father, Nelson.

Her last movie was Lola, which did not gain wide distribution and took under $1,000 at the box office.

She has been married since April 2022 to Brooklyn Beckham, the son of David and Victoria, and is at the centre of a family feud which has seen her husband cut off his family in search of ‘peace’, having explained on Instagram in January that they had tried to split him up from his wife.

The Kineo Awards, celebrating their 25th anniversary, note that ‘in recent years, the American actress, screenwriter and producer has attracted growing international attention through increasingly multifaceted roles, both in front of and behind the camera’.

The actress, wearing white trousers and a camisole, said: ‘Thank you so much for having me here, this is such an honour’

Ms Dunaway stars in Peltz Beckham’s upcoming film, Prima, about a ballerina, and both women are to be given a Kineo award tomorrow

Advertisement

Nicola appeared in high spirits at the event 

Nicola and Brooklyn were glued to one another’s side after jetting into the Italian city on Thursday evening

Nicola has been working on her indie drama Prima since January but the film does not yet have an official release date 

Nicola is seen in Transformers: Age Of Extinction in 2014

Advertisement

The ceremony, set to take place at Venice’s Casa Cinema Giovani was conceived by Kinéo Cultural Association president Rosetta Sannelli and launched in 2002. 

It takes place during the Venice Film Festival, which welcomes A-listers annually, but has no direct ties to the international gathering.

Nicola has been working on her indie drama Prima since January but the film does not yet have an official release date. 

The movie also stars Dunaway, Jack Huston, Mira Sorvino and Betty Gabriel. Luca and Alessandro Morelli, known professionally as the Morelli Brothers, directed the film as their feature debut. 

Nicola stars as Margo, a dedicated prima ballerina facing life-altering decisions as modern changes disrupt her ballet company. 

The actress and her family attended a private Los Angeles screening in May for the movie, hosted by East West Bank CEO Dominic Ng. Afterwards she thanked supporters and said their backing of independent film meant ‘more than I can express’.

Nicola and Brooklyn were glued to one another’s side after jetting into the Italian city on Thursday evening. 

The couple sipped on glasses of red wine and enjoyed a PDA, with Brooklyn nuzzling into Nicola’s neck during a romantic moment on their night out. 

The actress wore low-slung jeans, a black vest top and designer sunglasses, while Brooklyn wore a crisp white T-shirt and khaki shorts.  

A man captured images of the cars going up in flames

Two cars went up in flames in a Cambridgeshire town. Firefighters were called to a car fire in Onyx Court, Wisbech just before 3.30pm on Thursday (September 3).

Daniel Green captured pictures of the cars when they went up in flames. A fire spokesperson said: “At 3.29pm on Thursday a crew from Wisbech was called to a fire on Onyx Court in Wisbech.

“Firefighters arrived to find a fire involving two cars well alight. Wearing breathing apparatus they extinguished the fire using hose reels and returned to their station by 4.50pm.”

The cause of the fire was determined to be accidental.

Do you want more of the latest Cambridgeshire news as it comes in from across the county? Sign up to our dedicated newsletter to make sure you never miss a big story from Cambridge or anywhere else in the county. You can also sign up to our dedicated Traffic and Crime newsletters for the latest updates on the topics you are most interested in.