News Desk

A mother who killed her baby daughter by burning her with a hairdryer has been jailed for six years.

Courtney Gartshore, 28, used the appliance to subject three-month-old Dahlia-Rose to “significant and sustained heat” on her head and body.

Emergency services were called to the scene at a property in Peterhead, Aberdeenshire, in September 2023, but the child had died.

Gartshore was convicted of culpable homicide – the closest equivalent to manslaughter in Scots Law – following a trial at the High Court in Aberdeen in July.

Sentencing Gartshore at the High Court in Edinburgh, judge Simon Collins KC described the case as “uniquely disturbing and distressing”.

He said it was “tragic as well as terrible”.

Gartshore appeared via videolink at the 25-minute hearing, during which she sobbed and wiped away tears.

The judge said Gartshore would have to live for the rest of her life knowing she was responsible for her daughter’s death.

“This was a gross breach of the most basic duty as a parent,” he added.

Judge Collins said her likely cause of death was hyperthermia and heat stroke.

For every actor, musician, writer and artist who has become a wealthy and enduring celebrity, exponentially more of them have enjoyed a brief, shining moment, never to be heard of again. What separates those who last from those who fade away? Is it luck, talent, drive, destiny? All of the above?

It’s an intriguing question that may have no definitive answer, but one that director Kent Jones (2018’s acclaimed “Diane”) and Oscar-nominated screenwriter Samy Burch (“May December”) lovingly and lyrically consider in the often first-rate “Late Fame.” The film is based on an 1895 novella by Arthur Schnitzler (also author of the book that became “Eyes Wide Shut”), which went unpublished until 2014.

A quietly captivating Willem Dafoe plays Ed Saxberger, a New York post office veteran of 37 years in a seemingly satisfying if decidedly low-key existence. For him, it’s work, then maybe a game of pool with his blue-collar buddies at a local bar (though he’s six years sober) and a solo return to his Greenwich Village walk-up.

That is, until one night, he’s approached outside his apartment building by a somewhat affected but seemingly earnest young man who goes by his last name, Meyers (Edmund Donovan). With his elevated speech, tony air and throwback attire, he’s like someone from another era; you could see him as one of Jay Gatsby’s pals or a bon vivant who drops by on “Downton Abbey.”

Meyers proceeds to tell an astonished Ed that he’s a huge fan of his long-forgotten 1979 poetry collection entitled “Way Past Go,” the postal worker’s fleeting brush with literary success. “They just slap you across the face with their style and with their relevancy,” extols Meyers of the poems. “They’re timeless.”

Really, what writer, no matter how detached from their past, could resist that kind of sweet talk?

A meet-up with Meyers’ “artistic community,” a circle of so-called intellectuals known as the Enthusiasm Society, leads Ed to humbly dip a toe back into his vanished creative side. He’s not unaware that Meyers’ mostly 20-something male friends have — like many — romanticized the gritty abandon of lower Manhattan’s bygone literary scene and perhaps Ed’s tenuous place in it. They might be poseurs tossing around references to Ginsberg and Bukowski, but the welcome mat the group offers Ed is enticing and inspiring.

Still, a visit to Meyers’ sleek apartment, admittedly paid for by his parents, confirms for Ed the kind of youthful privilege at play here, so unlike the scrappier downtown bohemia of his own artistic heyday.

The wild card in the Society is Gloria (Greta Lee, dazzlingly good), an impish sprite who’s hard to pin down. Is she really a working stage actor? Ed gets swept up in her performative antics and elusive, larger-than-life allure. (She’s older than her fellow Society members but decades younger than Ed.) When they develop a teasing flirtation, it’s one of the less credible turns here, given how authentic Ed is — and how dubious she appears (though some truth on that front will later unfold).

This tilt toward Gloria causes the film to lose its way a bit, pulling focus from the more potentially vital mentor-disciple dynamic between Ed and the anxious, navel-gazing Meyers. Plus, Donovan is excellent here, so less of him is, well, less.

That said, there’s a bravura second-act scene that finds Gloria performing an impassioned version of the 1929 Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill torch song “Surabaya Johnny” for an appreciative cabaret audience, one that includes a rapt Ed. It verifies Gloria’s singing talent and proves a perfect match for her showy, cagey persona: the love child of Marlene Dietrich and Sally Bowles.

If the story has a through line, it concerns the planning and execution of an evening of live readings from the Society’s works, with a new poem from Ed as its centerpiece. A few of the obstacles layered in — Ed’s struggle to write and some show-night personality conflicts — feel a tad obligatory. But the event itself has its high points, including the piece Ed finally reads.

In addition, an awkward meeting between Ed and a smooth literary agent (Jake Lacy), along with a mini-subplot involving phone calls from Ed’s frustrated sister about their dying brother, come off slightly wedged in. Not much payoff there.

No matter. There’s wisdom and depth to the film’s themes of growing old, dashed dreams and the magic of rediscovery, plus a deliciously ironic final twist. Jones manages his superb cast with aplomb and cinematographer Wyatt Garfield evocatively captures lower Manhattan’s wintry, burnished glow.

Aug. 14 (UPI) — Reform U.K. leader Nigel Farage was re-elected to parliament on Friday, five weeks after he resigned his seat specifically in order to ask voters to back him amid a probe by parliamentary standards authorities into a $6.8 million gift he received before the 2024 general election.

With a turnout of 44.4%, Farage won the Clacton byelection with a 12,784 vote majority — winning about 1,000 votes more than when he won the seat the first time around in the July 2024 general election — but Thursday’s vote was boycotted by all main political parties who dismissed it as a political stunt by Farage to distract from the investigation.

As a result, the election was contested by an array of more than 35 parties including Reform rival Reclaim, independents and several novelty candidates including Count Binface, who came second with 9,455 votes, and three from the Monster Raving Loony Party that included Nick the Incredible Flying Brick, Howling Laud Hope and Baron von Thunderclap.

“The result in Clacton speaks for itself,” Farage wrote on X.

Farage didn’t attend the count or declaration of the result at Clacton Leisure Center early Friday with a party spokesman citing “a credible threat against him.”

Speaking at a victory party nearby Farage said the county police had advised him to stay away.

“I’m sad to say that after 33 years of being a candidate in active politics, I’ve been advised tonight by Essex Police that there is an organized campaign to disrupt and degrade the result. I’m damned if I’m going to stand on a stage having won a resounding victory, a ringing endorsement of all that I’ve tried to fight for and you’ve tried to fight for and be demeaned and humiliated by nobodies,” said Farage.

The BBC said Essex Police had told it the force had not warned any candidate not to attend.

Runner-up Count Binface, whose real name is Jonathan Harvey, told reporters he had sought and received assurances from Essex Police that there was no threat to the election events and it was 100% safe to proceed as normal.

“Let’s all meet for part 2 of the Clacton byelection, coming soon to a leisure centre near you,” said Harvey, referencing the possibility of doing it all again in a few months if the House of Commons votes to suspend Farage in the event he is found in breach of parliamentary rules.

A suspension of 10 or more parliamentary business days would automatically trigger a recall petition that requires the signatures of at least 10% of registered voters in the Clacton constituency to remove Farage and trigger another byelection.

Neither the sanction from the parliamentary standards commission, censure from his fellow MP’s or a recall would make him ineligible to try to win the seat back.

Farage is being investigated for allegedly failing to inform parliamentary authorities about a $6.8 million gift from Christopher Harborne, a British cypto billionaire based in Thailand.

Farage denies the allegations and says he has followed all the rules, arguing he was not required to declare the money because it was before he decided to run for parliament and it was a personal contribution to pay for his private security.

He is also under scrutiny, although not by the parliamentary standards commission, over his ties to convicted U.S. fraudster George Cottrell, with Reform acknowledging Farage accepted security, staff and accommodation from Cottrell in the run up to the 2024 election.

The developments come three weeks after London’s Met Police launched an investigation into payments to Reform U.K. allegedly from George Cottrell’s mother, Fiona Cottrell, that are alleged to have been routed via a company owned by the party’s deputy leader.

A period drama with a famous cast has been added to BBC iPlayer and fans are gripped

A “remarkable” period drama based on a best-selling book is available to stream now and fans have said it’s a “must watch”.

The Boys in the Boat, which stars Joel Edgerton and Callum Turner, is based on the popular 2013 book by Daniel James Brown and follows the University of Washington rowing team as they set their sights on competing in the Olympics.

Set during the Great Depression, it follows Joe Rantz (played by Callum), a struggling student who joins the rowing team simply to earn enough money to stay in college. He and a group of other young men face financial trouble and hardship but rise through the ranks with their rowing skills, with Joel as their coach Al. Their journey eventually takes them all the way to the 1936 Berlin Olympics.

Directed and co-produced by George Clooney, the movie made a splash when it was first unveiled in 2023 and it is winning over a new audience after it was added to the BBC iPlayer, where it is streaming now.

One fan wrote on Reddit that the movie was “remarkable”, while others called it “outstanding”.

Several noted how emotional it made them, with one posting on Letterboxd that it “had me crying” when they tuned in.

“I got goosebumps, my heart was racing, I cried,” said someone else, as another described it as “an emotional rollercoaster”.

Another person said that it left them “sobbing”, and someone else wrote online: “Made me laugh, it made me cry a little, it inspired me.”

One fan said they were “choked up several times” watching as Joe and the rest of the team strove to make their dream of Olympic glory come true.

Discussing a part of the film in Frontpage magazine, one person said: “I swear to deity, I started crying right then; I would go on to cry multiple times throughout the film.”

“I absolutely loved it (and had a tear in my eye),” said another.

The Boys in the Boat also stars Peter Guinness, Jack Mulhern, Thomas Elms and Luke Slattery. Actress Hadley Robinson stars as Joyce Simdars, Joe’s love interest, in the film.

The Boys in the Boat is available on BBC iPlayer.

Kyiv targets Baltic oil hub and warehouse near Moscow with drones, as regional alerts prompt security measures in Latvia and Finland.

Russia says its forces have struck a railway station at the Ukrainian Danube port of Izmail and two vessels near Mykolaiv, as Ukrainian drones hit targets inside Russia, including a Baltic oil export hub and a warehouse near Moscow.

The Russian Ministry of Defence said on Friday that the railway station in Izmail was being used to load, store, and transport military cargo and fuel for Ukraine’s armed forces, according to state news agency TASS.

The ministry added that Russian forces struck two tugboats off the coast of Mykolaiv that it claimed were escorting cargo vessels carrying weapons to Ukrainian ports.

The developments follow Russian attacks a day earlier that damaged port infrastructure and caused power cuts in Izmail, a vital export hub on the Danube River near the Romanian border.

Ukrainian drones target Ust-Luga and Tver

Meanwhile, Russian authorities said a Ukrainian drone attack triggered a fire at Ust-Luga, a major Baltic Sea oil export port in the Leningrad region.

Regional Governor Alexander Drozdenko said the fire had been brought under control and cleared with no casualties reported. He added that more than 50 drones had been shot down overnight in the region surrounding St Petersburg.

Ukraine has repeatedly targeted Russian refineries, ports, and energy infrastructure to raise the economic cost of Moscow’s war effort. More than a dozen major Russian refineries have been hit, contributing to domestic fuel shortages.

Further south, the governor of Russia’s Tver region said drone debris damaged a warehouse wall belonging to online retailer Wildberries northwest of Moscow. No injuries were reported. Wildberries facilities have been hit more than 20 times over the past month.

Due to the drone activity, Russia’s Federal Air Transport Agency, Rosaviatsia, temporarily restricted flights at all Moscow-area airports to ensure flight safety, according to TASS.

The overnight drone activity also prompted defensive measures elsewhere in the Baltic region.

Latvia’s armed forces said fighter jets shot down a drone that entered its airspace. Meanwhile, Finland temporarily restricted maritime movement in parts of the Baltic Sea as a precaution against potential drone incidents.

Oceania have offered support to Gianni Infantino, but New Zealand have gone against their own confederation in FIFA row.

New Zealand has become the latest nation to withdraw its support for FIFA President Gianni Infantino’s re-election bid over his aborted commercial rights stake sale plan, while Oceania’s confederation cautiously backed the ⁠governing body’s leadership.

Infantino has faced open revolt after three confederations – Europe’s UEFA, the Asian Football Confederation and CONCACAF (North and Central America and Caribbean) – called for a review of his leadership and attacked his conduct over the plan to bring private investment into FIFA competitions.

Infantino will seek re-election for a fourth term in ⁠charge of the global governing body at the FIFA Congress next year, with the African and South American confederations declaring their continued support.

New Zealand, the only Oceania Football Confederation (OFC) nation to qualify for this year’s World Cup, said on Friday it had withdrawn support for Infantino and that the review of the stake sale proposal should be independent due to a loss of confidence and trust in FIFA’s leadership.

“We’ve called for an independent review specifically because what we don’t ‌want to see is a sort of in-house quick washover of this,” New Zealand Football (NZF) Chief Executive Andrew Pragnell told the Reuters news agency.

“An independent review is something else that has been called for by other confederations that will help restore some of the trust.”

The OFC said in a statement that it welcomed FIFA’s decision to withdraw the proposal and that football in the Oceania region had grown under the current FIFA leadership.

“OFC recognises the progress achieved over the last decade in advancing football development in Oceania under FIFA’s leadership and encourages FIFA to use the review as an opportunity to identify and implement any changes that may be necessary,” it added.

What allies does Infantino have?

Swiss Infantino had proposed carving off ⁠the commercial rights to the World Cup and selling 20 percent to private investors to raise about $4.2bn before ⁠a U-turn following the furore.

The proposal came with a $20m grant for member associations for the next funding cycle, an amount that could have been doubled if they signed the deal.

Following a crisis meeting in Morocco last week, FIFA apologised to its 211 member associations for mistakes in the handling of the proposal and said its leadership had ⁠full support for Infantino.

Despite the opposition of the three confederations, which represent 136 of the 211 member associations who will vote in the FIFA presidential election in March, Infantino still has plenty of allies in the game.

Six ⁠heads of Arab national football associations, including Qatar and 2030 World Cup cohost Morocco, firmly ⁠backed him on Thursday, saying they appreciated his “sustained efforts to advance football globally”.

The Confederation of African Football’s executive committee also unanimously confirmed its support for Infantino, though, there is no guarantee of a bloc vote from all 54 members.

Pragnell said an independent review into the scrapped FIFA Forward Enterprise proposal needed to shed light on decision-making and oversight at FIFA.

It should ‌also identify who was involved in the plan for Thrive Capital, a firm with close familial links to US President Donald Trump, to play a leading role in the venture.

“I think the scope needs to be considered really carefully, but what’s most important is that all confederations should agree ‌on ‌the scope, and it needs to get under way with urgency,” Pragnell told Reuters.

AFC member Australia has also called for an independent review alongside the Asian bloc, without publicly expressing a position on Infantino’s leadership.

“Based on what we’ve seen, including [Australia’s] commitment to the AFC statement, we’re strongly aligned,” Pragnell said.

Wrestling with the realities of drug addiction is an endeavor rife with pitfalls for any filmmaker hoping to avoid easy judgment. To judge from the earliest, straight-on view in “Union County” of Will Poulter’s Cody — a weary-looking, tight-lipped young Ohio man absorbing the rules of a treatment program as explained by a courtroom judge — the sense is that we’re in for a ride-along hinged to honesty and the unfettered character work of a fine actor.

That empathy is welcome from first-time writer-director Adam Meeks, and he supports his approach with a gentle aura of verisimilitude, a mostly locked-down camera and, in the snippets of other testimonials, a suggestion that we’re in genuine spaces, not movie locations. Eventually, as the film tracks Cody’s progress through this rural stretch of central Ohio, it becomes clear we’re in a fictionalized story surrounded by real recovery participants and counselors, a backdrop of sincerity that allows a well-intentioned performance to breathe on its own.

That unaffected authenticity helps gird us for the quietly complicated tale “Union County” has to tell. Cody, who is living in his car when we meet him, isn’t alone as he starts this journey. Also in that courtroom that first day is his brother Jack (Noah Centineo), a more visibly restless and outgoing soul compared to Cody’s protective reticence. Jack, who is further along in the program and seems to bring Cody out of his shell, also helps him land a job at a lumber mill where he works. Tagging along to a campfire hang, Cody allows himself to talk to Anna (Elise Kibler) and we notice a potential spark.

But with that connection to Jack, initially forged as foster siblings but later as opioid buddies, comes risk. There’s a sister, too, played by Emily Meade, and her stone-faced appearance during a backslide in Cody’s recovery is a sign that with his past comes a lot he hasn’t faced yet. But as we learn more about Cody, Jack and the hard road ahead, “Union County” doesn’t pitch its treatment as a cure-all, nor engineer candidness into dramatic gold. Rather, Meeks merely asks us to clock the humanity in our every minute of observing Cody, to recognize what struggling looks like whether we “know” someone going through it or not.

Necessary to that approach, which brings to mind the watchful grace of last year’s stellar memory drama “Familiar Touch,” is the wonderful Poulter’s lived-in presence as someone trying to not even have a presence. Meeks knows when and where to give his lead character distance, respecting that opacity. In group sessions, where Cody typically doesn’t say much, the others speak for what Cody might be going through, Greek chorus-style. The effect is of watching someone float around the outside of a safe space. There’s tension in wondering if he’ll notice when it’s time to slip inside.

Social realist dramas aren’t new and they include award-winning landmarks by Ken Loach and Chloé Zhao. But they’re having a moment and “Union County” underscores why some work as well as they do. The right mix of true and imagined can give the simplest of humane narratives — in this case, the possibility of renewal in an epidemic of hurt — a fresher chance to touch us.

“The Wrong Girls” is the right comedy if you want to unplug your brain and laugh. The first punchline doesn’t even have words. It’s just two stoner roommates, Frankie (Kristen Stewart) and Molly (Alia Shawkat), ripping a mega-hit and coughing at each other. Finally, they speak in unison: “Jinx.”

Frankie, a Stanford dropout, engineered the living room’s impressive “bong-a-tron.” Molly, a wannabe chef, bakes brownies spiked with pot and blue cheese. (We’re assured they‘re delicious.) These screw-ups share everything: a taste in thrift store cat paintings, a chillaxed attitude toward overdue bills and a comfy inertia that’s kept them both stunted, frustrating Molly’s boyfriend Josh (a likable Zack Fox). In turn, possessive Frankie thinks Josh is a buzzkill.

Soon, the insular twosome will share a mind, too, thanks to a telepathic drug they ingest like idiots, not that they have any gray matter to spare. That’s not entirely fair. The friends aren’t dumb; they’ve just been baked for so long that acting dumb is a habit. (Don’t worry, writer-director Dylan Meyer won’t force them to sober up.)

The plot is confidently stupid. A criminal courier (LaKeith Stanfield) mistakes Frankie for her more successful doppelganger Francis (also played by Stewart), saddling her with a briefcase that a trio of dangerous Danes are determined to steal back. Thus, our heroes must peel themselves off from the couch and go on the run with their resentful felines Dio and GG bouncing along in backpacks.

Voiced by Seth Rogen and Kumail Nanjiani, the pets have opinions their owners don’t want to hear. “I’m pretty sure they’re the ones who gave us fleas,” GG sneers. I like those comics and live with two annoying Maine Coons. Nevertheless, these cats are too chatty.

Meyer is a screenwriter-turned-filmmaker who met Stewart on the set of the underseen 2015 comic thriller “American Ultra.” In the years since, she has also become Stewart’s wife. That’s important only because “Wrong Girls” has the pinpoint silliness of soulmates who spend a lot of time goofing around at home. Meyer wrote the script a decade ago about her friendship with producer Maggie McLean, but no doubt she knows better than anyone how much the smart and sensible-projecting Stewart delights in acting the fool.

The jokes are as flawlessly tailored to Stewart as Chanel couture, be they zany schemes, spacey freak-outs or the sly middle finger Stewart flashes with her 818-tattooed knuckles while her character suffers a jerk (Tony Hale). And they custom-fit Shawkat’s mellower Molly, who trots behind in Frankie’s wake of destruction. The sci-fi twist in the script turns their relationship into a send-up of co-dependence. Their insular bond can’t last forever — can it?

Meyer subverts a couple tropes, embraces others. Comedy capers like this usually deflate in the third act when their pleasures get punctured by unfunny gunfire. The movie sees that trap coming and dodges it by the skin of its teeth. Nimbly, it manages to be both a pacifist film and a subversive one with no faith in the system as it stands. Characters deliver jabs at “Jeff Bozos” and the Epstein class while slyly revealing you shouldn’t trust their takes, either. Frankie invents a new nonsensical insult, calling Molly’s boyfriend Josh “such a customer.” Sure, whatever that means!

“The Wrong Girls” shares its own hive mind with David Wain’s also-good “Gail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass,” released earlier this summer. Both are star-studded, hyper-L.A. chase comedies that treat their central contrivances as nothing more than scaffolding for the scenes that actually count. Who cares what happens to the Danes’ precious briefcase? We just want to see Frankie and Molly melt down upon learning that their favorite all-you-can-eat lunch spot is closing due to uncertainty in the buffet sector (a eulogy for the real-life Souplantation, whose absence remains deeply felt).

Even within the tenuous reality of the movie, Frankie and Molly aren’t focused on saving their own necks, especially after their clairvoyant powers kick in and the friends realize they can communicate with closed mouths. As lab-coated figures played by Kate McKinnon and Geena Davis attempt to deliver exposition, the pals drown them out chit-chatting about drivel. The stars know it takes skill to act dumb. Christina Applegate described it best: About her portrayal of hair metal bimbo Kelly Bundy in “Married … with Children,” Applegate said, “In her own mind, she’s a genius.”

The film is just wonky enough to wonder if some beats got chopped out of it, like a go-nowhere running joke about how Hale’s front door won’t close or an aside about how Stewart’s Frankie once Jerry-rigged an escape parachute, which cinematographer Todd Banhazl seems to be reminding us of when he lingers on a shot of an awkward shindig’s helium décor. Banhazl does pull off one of the few inventive psychedelic sequences I’ve seen in a while. (To see another, go stream the giddy new campus comedy “Pizza Movie.”)

Or maybe “The Wrong Girls” is simply making an artistic statement about the joy of sloppiness. Here, to be chaotic and colorful is a badge of honor. Just compare the girls’ cluttered digs with their pursuers’ sterile white suits. In that same spirit of excess, there’s an extra scene in the end credits that goes over like a lead balloon. No one in my theater chuckled. But I respected it anyway for insisting on these jokers’ right to remain an unapologetic mess.

With one-way attack drones playing an ever larger role in American military operations, U.S. Central Command announced it is creating what it calls “the first multinational attack drone task force.” The move comes as combat between the U.S. and Iran has paused, but tensions in the region remain high, including ongoing attacks on shipping by the Iranian-aligned Houthi rebels of Yemen. The task force is also being launched amid growing concerns about the U.S. magazine depth of high-end standoff weapons — a class of weapon one-way-attack drones aim to take pressure off of.

Dubbed Task Force Falcon Strike (TFFS), the command said it will “employ one-way attack drones consisting of unmanned systems from above, on, and below the sea operated by military support staff from the United States and regional partners.”

The CENTCOM announcement offered no further information about which nations will participate, what systems will be used, and whether those joining Task Force Falcon Strike will bring their own equipment. The command declined to provide further details when we asked.

The war against Iran saw the command follow global trends in warfare by deploying air and sea drones in combat for the first time. Other militaries in the Middle East have or are working on acquiring similar capabilities. Israel largely wrote the book on one-way attack munitions, for instance.

The establishment of TFFS follows the creation in December of Task Force Scorpion Strike (TFSS). As we were one of the first to report, this was the U.S. military’s first dedicated one-way attack drone squadron and the first operational unit armed with Low-Cost Uncrewed Combat Attack System (LUCAS) kamikaze drones, a design reverse-engineered from the Iranian-designed Shahed-136, in the Middle East.

Initially, TFSS was created to send a warning to Iran, a U.S. official told us at the time. As we noted earlier in this story, after the launch of Epic Fury on Feb. 28, TFSS marked several operational firsts for America’s use of drones in war.

The first major milestone came on the opening day of the war, when LUCAS drones were used for the first time. The second came in June, when a Saronic Corsair uncrewed surface vessel (USV) rescued the crew of a U.S. Army AH-64 Apache that crashed in the Gulf of Oman after it was downed by Iran. That was the first known instance of a drone boat being used to recover personnel as part of a search and rescue mission.

The third large step forward for U.S. drone warfare came in July, when three Corsairs “hit the port at Bandar Abbas Naval Base” and “successfully struck a submarine and ship maintenance facility in Iran,” the command stated on X that day. It was the first U.S. use of a USV as an attack weapon.

You can see those attacks in the following video produced by CENTCOM.

As we have frequently reported, Ukraine has used USVs to devastating effect on the Russian Black Sea Fleet. The Magura line of drones, among others, has played a key role in this campaign.

Notably, the command also said the new task force will also use uncrewed underwater vehicles (UUVs) as attack weapons. If they have been used in combat by the U.S., that has not been publicly acknowledged. The command did announce in April that it was using UUVs to assist in demining the Strait of Hormuz.

In December, Ukraine’s state security service (SBU) said it carried out the first-ever UUV attack on a Russian vessel. The strike was on a Project 636 Varshavyanka class, or Improved Kilo class diesel-electric submarine, in the Black Sea naval stronghold of Novorossiysk.

That attack can be seen in the video below.

KATIE Price has announced a new live tour in a money-making move.

It comes as the former glamour model is said to have been consulting divorce lawyers over her tumultuous marriage to Lee Andrews

In a new Instagram post, Katie revealed she’s set to tour the country with the podcast she hosts with sister Sophie, The Katie Price Show.

The post read: “PRICEY IS BACK!

“Katie Price and her little sister Sophie bring their hit podcast “The Katie Price Show” to a theatre near you, live – with more chaos, more singing and even juicer stories!

“They may be opposites, but their sisterly banter and relationship are what makes the podcast a success.”

CHEST A MINUTE

Katie Price puts on display as Wayne Lineker makes joke about her boobs

RIGHT PRICE

Michelle Heaton recalls Katie Price told her to go to rehab amid booze battle

It was then confirmed that the sisters will be touring in February, with the tour kicking off on the 2nd in Stockport before ending in Harpenden on 25 February.

Tickets are on sale today (Friday 14 August) from 10am for the tour.

The tour announcement comes as Katie has spent the week partying in Ibiza with her son Harvey and Wayne Lineker.

She has been letting her hair down on the White Isle after a rocky time in her marriage with husband Lee.

The Dubai-based ‘businessman’ was exposed by The Sun as a conman last month, and currently remains in prison for a second time.

Sources revealed to The Sun that Katie was consulting divorce lawyers following her husband’s imprisonment, and took off her wedding ring.

Katie has now returned to wearing her ring, but is yet to speak out on Lee.

The Reform UK leader received 22,239 votes in the Clacton by-election, compared with 9,455 for Binface.

Reform UK leader Nigel Farage has regained his parliamentary seat, besting his main challenger Count Binface in a by-election he triggered by resigning his post last month.

Farage received 22,239 votes in the Clacton by-election compared with 9,455 for serial joke candidate Binface, who wears a rubbish can on his head and calls himself an “intergalactic space warrior”. The United Kingdom’s main political parties boycotted the election, creating the embarrassing face-off for Farage who had sought to use the election to boost his standing after allegations of financial impropriety.

Farage did not attend the official vote count early Friday and cancelled a planned victory speech, the BBC reported.

In earlier remarks as votes rolled in, Farage claimed a “convincing, overwhelming win”.

“I called this by-election because I wanted the people of Clacton, the voters of this constituency to be my judge, not the mainstream media in Britain,” he said, adding that Clacton voters had “stuck two fingers up to the entire political establishment”.

Binface, whose campaign promises included putting a cap on croissant prices and moving the restroom hand dryer of a local pub, told Al Jazeera “there’s more than one way to win.”

Listing former British premiers he has challenged in previous elections, he said: “You guys are fixated on winning numerically, but … where’s Theresa May, where’s Rishi Sunak, where’s Boris Johnson?”

The 9,455 votes in Clacton for Binface, who has run in six elections since 2019, were his best-ever electoral result.

Voter turnout in Thursday’s election was 44 percent, lower than the 59 percent turnout recorded at the 2024 general election, but not unusual for a by-election.

Farage and Binface both topped a long list of joke candidates, independents and members of fringe political parties.

Candidates on stage at the Clacton Leisure Centre, where the count was held, were seen cheering for each other as the results were announced, with many receiving fewer than 100 votes.

Many view Farage, a right-wing populist who was a vocal campaigner for Brexit, as a prospective candidate for prime minister. He has pledged to crack down on migration, including using the British navy to intercept and return asylum seekers arriving by boat.

Farage quit his seat in parliament in July during an investigation into whether he failed to report a 5 million pound ($6.75m) gift from a crypto billionaire overseas, triggering the by-election he took part in.

“I have done nothing wrong. I have not broken the law in any way at all,” said Farage of the allegations at the time.

North Korea has intensified its criticism of Japan’s military expansion and its growing security cooperation with the United States and South Korea, portraying the developments as a threat to regional stability.

More than a dozen North Korean state media attacks since early July have focused on Japan’s defence buildup, including its acquisition of long range weapons, rising military spending and closer security ties with Washington and Seoul.

The campaign has also coincided with unusual silence from Pyongyang over its own recent missile launches, raising questions about what North Korea is trying to achieve with its latest messaging.

Why Is North Korea Targeting Japan?

North Korean statements have focused heavily on Japan’s acquisition of counter strike capabilities, its testing of U.S. made Tomahawk cruise missiles, increased defence spending and its annual defence white paper.

Kim Yo Jong, the influential sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, warned last week of “additional military options” in response to what she described as Japan’s transformation into a military power.

North Korea’s KCNA later described Japan’s 2026 defence white paper as a document aimed at justifying military expansion and preparing for what it called a “re invasion.”

Pyongyang has also criticised the annual U.S. South Korean Ulchi Freedom Shield military exercises, accusing Washington, Seoul and Tokyo of developing what it called a “nuclear alliance.”

The United States and South Korea maintain that the exercises are defensive.

How Has Japan Changed Its Defence Policy?

Japan announced in 2022 that it planned to double defence spending to 2% of gross domestic product in response to growing security concerns involving China, Russia and North Korea.

A major part of that expansion has involved acquiring long range missile capabilities, including U.S. made Tomahawk cruise missiles capable of striking targets more than 1,000 km away.

Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s government is expected to revise Japan’s national security strategy this year, potentially leading to further increases in defence spending and investment in drones and domestic weapons production.

For Pyongyang, these developments represent a significant change in Japan’s traditional defence posture and provide another basis for portraying the regional security environment as increasingly hostile.

Is North Korea’s Campaign Really About Japan?

Analysts say Japan is only one part of a broader strategic message.

Park Won-gon of Ewha Womans University said North Korea is attempting to frame Northeast Asia as a confrontation between two opposing camps.

The objective, he said, is to create a U.S. South Korea Japan versus North Korea China Russia framework.

Such a narrative could serve several purposes for Pyongyang. It can strengthen North Korea’s argument that its nuclear weapons are necessary for self defence, while also encouraging closer political and military support from China and Russia.

South Korea’s Unification Ministry has expressed a similar assessment, saying North Korea appears to view Japan’s changing security posture, South Korea’s plans for nuclear powered submarines and trilateral military cooperation as part of a broader shift in the regional balance of power.

Why Is North Korea Silent About Its Missile Tests?

One of the more unusual aspects of the latest campaign is that North Korean state media has remained silent about recent missile launches.

North Korea conducted ballistic missile tests last week and again this week, but state media has not reported them, despite the launches being condemned by South Korea, Japan and the United States.

That differs from Pyongyang’s usual practice of publicising missile tests shortly after they take place.

Analysts believe the launches may have involved improvements to existing missile systems rather than entirely new weapons, making them less valuable as domestic propaganda.

Shin Jong-woo of the Korea Defense and Security Forum suggested that some tests could involve upgraded short range ballistic missiles developed with Russian technical assistance and potentially intended for Russia.

Another possibility is that North Korea does not want to publicise launches that could be connected to prospective military exports.

What Role Does Russia Play?

North Korea’s expanding military relationship with Russia is increasingly important to understanding its weapons development.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has repeatedly accused Russia of using North Korean missiles in Ukraine and Pyongyang of supplying Moscow with missiles, ammunition and troops.

Analysts say cooperation with Russia may also be helping North Korea improve the performance and accuracy of its missile systems through battlefield experience and technical assistance.

Recent launches could therefore represent tests of upgraded variants before they are deployed by North Korea or potentially supplied to Russia.

Analysis: What Is Pyongyang Trying to Achieve?

North Korea’s intensified criticism of Japan appears to be part of a broader attempt to reshape the strategic narrative around the Korean Peninsula.

By portraying the United States, South Korea and Japan as an increasingly integrated military and nuclear bloc, Pyongyang can present its own weapons development as a defensive response rather than an independent escalation.

The strategy also fits North Korea’s growing alignment with China and Russia. As security cooperation between Washington, Seoul and Tokyo deepens, Pyongyang has an incentive to emphasise the emergence of rival blocs and strengthen its position within the opposing camp.

Japan’s military expansion therefore provides North Korea with a useful political target. The immediate issue may be Japanese defence policy, but the larger objective is regional positioning.

If Japan continues expanding its military capabilities while U.S. South Korean and Japanese security cooperation deepens, Pyongyang is likely to use those developments to justify further weapons development and closer cooperation with Beijing and Moscow. The result could be a reinforcing cycle in which each side’s security measures become evidence for the other side that greater military preparedness is necessary.

With information from Reuters.

Kate Garraway and Ranvir Singh returned to host ITV’s Good Morning Britain on Friday

Viewers of Good Morning Britain have been left feeling unimpressed.

Kate Garraway and Ranvir Singh returned to host the ITV programme on Friday (August 14), delivering the day’s biggest headlines from across the UK and around the world.

They primarily focused on Nigel Farage winning the Clacton by-election with 22,239 votes after quitting as an MP and fighting to reclaim his seat. His main rival, parody candidate Count Binface, was backed by just over 9,000 voters.

This came after the Reform UK leader triggered the by-election in protest of the scrutiny of donations from his backers.

There was also early-morning drama as Farage announced he would not be attending the result declaration. He told activists he had been made aware of plans to “disrupt and degrade” the proceedings.

Kate and Ranvir discussed the result during the latest episode of GMB, alongside former Scottish trade union leader Christina McAnea and Reform MP Nadhim Zahawi.

But viewers were left feeling frustrated over the show dedicating much of its coverage to the politics, as well as the hosts and guests repeatedly talking over one another.

“ITV needs to shake up #GMB. The BBC is the place for political debate in the morning. We need a more light hearted alternative,” one person wrote on X (formerly Twitter).

Another added: “What the hell are you doing bringing Zahawi on? Are you kidding me? get him off!” while a third said: “Just a load of noise with 2 s**** presenters and 2 guests talking over each other on #GMB move on.”

Someone else commented: “Turned off within 20 seconds this morning,” with another fuming: “Doing my head in now.”

Other frustrated fans said “come on”, while a seventh said: “I turned off. Many people lost their homes in wildfires in Stourbridge last night but they are giving full on airtime to Nigel Farage.”

Meanwhile, other viewers praised Ranvir and Kate for their handling of the story as they spoke to Zahawi and interviewed his colleague Richard Tice.

Another headline that was focused on was the weather. Laura Tobin revealed that cooler weather is on the way for the UK after Brits endured another week of record breaking heat.

Kew Gardens provisionally recorded a top temperature of 38.1 degrees on Thursday (August 13), surpassing the previous high of 38 degrees on June 26, the Met Office said.

Good Morning Britain airs weekdays on ITV1 and ITVX at 6am

Taybeh, occupied West Bank – Underneath a painting of Jesus and his disciples, Sandra Basir brought out what she and her husband, Roland, now keep to protect their home: a couple of fire extinguishers.

They keep them because the last time Israeli settlers set fire to a neighbour’s car outside their house, no one else came. “Civil defence – when did they even show up? After everything was already over,” Roland says.

The couple’s nightly routine in their Palestinian Christian town is now similar to the majority-Muslim rural Palestinian communities besieged by settler attacks and nighttime military raids for years. Sandra checks the doors more than once before bed. They got a dog to stay outside to alert them of any trespassers. Sandra is, by her own description, always half-awake – listening for whoever might be coming for her four small children while they sleep.

Their seven-year-old son has stopped playing outside, Sandra says, and for months, the little boy told his father not to go to work – scared he might not return. “That’s what our life has become,” says Sandra, who was on the verge of tears throughout the conversation. “A child that age should just be playing.”

For more than 20 years, Roland built up a stone quarry and concrete-block factory on the edge of town, investing an estimated $5m in the business. After employing 40 local Palestinians, he has found his life’s work snatched by marauding settlers, both armed adults and some barely teenagers.

In the past three years – and with the situation deteriorating even more severely this past year – he and his workers were frequently chased off by settlers at gunpoint, with his quarry’s heavy-machinery equipment set on fire. The most brazen attack came in March, when Roland says some 30 to 40 settlers stormed the quarry site in a coordinated mass incursion. Videos and photos show them raising Israeli flags over the grounds and performing prayers on the land. Before leaving, they smashed his office, destroyed electrical panels, and pulled cameras from the walls.

Roland documented everything on video, filed complaints with the liaison office, the police, and every institution he could reach. All his efforts to mobilise help to protect his land, however, were for naught. The settlers were back the next day, with their attacks continuing ever since.

Meanwhile, Roland showed Al Jazeera donation pages online for the settlers that he says carried out the attacks. He also alleges that stone taken from his land was registered under a settler’s name and resold.

This past week, he finally stopped trying to continue operations, leaving his stone quarry business all but abandoned.

“They’ve taken the quarry, taken the factory, taken the land,” Roland says. “What’s left for them to take? My children? My house?”

A once-safe haven now in the crosshairs

A few years ago, nobody in Taybeh thought trouble like this was coming their way.

Madees Khoury, who runs the Taybeh Brewery her family founded in 1994, lived in Taybeh through the second Intifada, the Arab Spring, and every war on Gaza – but none of it ever really touched the quaint town filled with centuries-old churches, well-built homes, and street-corner statues of Mother Mary and Jesus. “Taybeh was always safe, untouched – never, never, never did I imagine it would come to this,” says Madees.

The town is traditionally identified with biblical Ephraim – the place Jesus is said to have withdrawn to before his final journey to Jerusalem – and is the last Palestinian town left in the West Bank whose population is entirely Christian, home now to roughly 1,200 people and to the ruins of the fifth-century Church of St George, one of the oldest Christian sites in the Holy Land.

Things began to change as Israeli settlers, after driving Bedouin and herding communities from areas to the east, increasingly turned their attention to the hills around Taybeh itself, commencing attacks within the town last year. Mayor Suleiman Khourieh estimates roughly seven settler outposts now surround the town – four or five, by his count, sitting directly on Taybeh’s municipal land.

The attacks that followed mirror those taking place across the rural West Bank, with Sandra – who says her mother’s arm was broken by a settler during last year’s olive harvest – and Roland showing Al Jazeera photographs and videos of the frequent settler incursions within the town’s central confines.

Repeatedly, settlers graze cattle, sheep and camels on private agricultural land. Last year, Christian leaders say fires were deliberately set near the church and its adjoining cemetery. A couple of months ago, armed settlers set large fires along the village’s farmlands and prevented firetrucks from reaching them, according to local residents who drove to the scene.

Residents of Taybeh now face routine restrictions on accessing their farmlands and resources, including the now depopulated Ein Samiya spring. The spring supplies all the water to Taybeh Brewery and other Palestinian communities in the area, but settlers have since taken control of it.

Madees Khoury remembers one morning, in February this year, when a group of settlers walked into the centre of town claiming to search for a horse that didn’t exist – while her cousin’s actual horse and its foal, kept in a small structure on her father and uncle’s land for years, stood a few metres away. When she and her family called Israel’s Civil Administration to have the settlers removed, she says the officials who arrived instead walked in alongside them, broke open the door, and helped carry the horses out. “Instead of removing them,” she says, “the officials who came walked alongside the settlers onto my father and uncle’s private property … took the horse and the foal, and walked out.”

The newest outpost, established just last week, sits on the western edge of town, in Area B of the West Bank – nominally under Palestinian civil administration, though security in these hills has long since fallen to whoever is willing to enforce it on the ground.

On his own land in Area B, Mayor Khourieh has watched a settler take over his vineyard and its well over the past month, following the establishment of a settler outpost nearby. Sitting in his office, Khourieh described the settlers cutting his locks, bringing sheep there to graze, at one point pitching a tent by the well and furnishing it with sofas, and even bathing in the water meant for his vines.

According to the mayor, the army eventually removed the settlers’ tent, but the settlers still come back daily to water their flock from Khourieh’s own well. “We still don’t know whether I’m even allowed to go to my own vineyard or not,” says the town mayor inside his office.

Israeli officials have, at least on paper, acknowledged the problem. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said earlier this year that outposts established in Area B should be evacuated. But despite reported pressure from career military officials to remove the outposts over security concerns, enforcement has frequently been blocked amid opposition from officials in Netanyahu’s far-right government. By Peace Now’s latest count, of the approximately 390 illegal outposts and farms across the West Bank, at least 21 sit in Area B.

Al Jazeera has reached out to the Israeli authorities for comment on the attacks on Taybeh, and the accusations that their response has not been sufficient, but has yet to receive a response.

Hollow protections from the state

Following attacks in the area – including the invasion of a then-empty home of a Taybeh family on August 5 – on August 9, the Israeli army declared Taybeh, along with the neighbouring village of Rammun, a closed military zone.

The order itself has confused almost everyone tasked with living under it. It bars entry to Israelis and foreigners without a specific connection to the village, and the army has offered little clarity on the terms and enforcement. “It’s unclear,” Madees Khoury says. “The whole thing was strange.”

What almost no one in Taybeh believes is that the order will actually keep settlers out. Especially in the past year, such closed military zone orders have been issued in cases where settlers are attacking local Palestinians – only for those orders to be enforced selectively to remove activists attempting to offer protective presence to local Palestinians, while doing little to remove the violent settlers themselves.

Instead, the removal of visitors adds to the town’s growing isolation.

“The decision hasn’t amounted to anything practical,” the mayor says, “because the settler is still exactly where he was.” Father Bashar Fawadleh, priest of Taybeh’s Christ the Redeemer Church, put it more bluntly: “We don’t feel that they’re actually forbidding the settlers from coming to Taybeh.”

According to Roland, the day the military zone closure was announced, settlers broke into his office at the stone quarry and smashed cabinets, equipment, and anything they could reach inside. The following morning, he tried to go back to what remains of his quarry, but settlers confronted him again. He called the police; two and a half hours later, he says, they arrived, but the settlers had already left.

‘The cross we have to carry’

Emigration of Palestinian Christians has been an issue in Taybeh and elsewhere for years, as the Palestinian Christian population has shrunk to about 40,000 in the West Bank, or just more than 1 percent of the entire population. But under the pressures of severe restrictions on land access by Israeli authorities and settlers, movement restrictions, and the threat of unchecked settler attacks, in Taybeh, the quiet of emptiness is being replaced by a quiet borne of fear.

Madees Khoury says people avoid the roads now because no one wants to risk a checkpoint that might swallow four hours of their day, or a stretch of road where a settler’s car might slow down alongside theirs.

Tourism is gone; a well-known hiking trail that begins at the brewery sees almost no visitors any more. Among a wider economic depression and skyrocketing export costs imposed by Israeli authorities, Taybeh Brewery’s revenues are down 80 percent compared with before October 2023, according to Madees Khoury.

Fifteen families have already left Taybeh in the past two years, according to Father Bashar, along with dozens of individuals who left parents behind and moved on alone, mostly to the United States and Europe.

And yet almost no one who spoke to Al Jazeera described leaving as a real option for themselves. “Where is there to go?” asks Roland Basir, reiterating a common refrain heard across the West Bank these days.

“This land is ours,” says Father Bashar. “We cannot leave it easily … we want to resist by staying rooted in this land, to be part of this land, for dignity, for security, for peace, and for justice.”

Mayor Khourieh, whose own vineyard now sits behind a settler’s fence, put it in starker terms. “We are Palestinian Christians,” he says. “We have been in this town since the Lord Christ walked in it. This is our town. We will not leave it. Even if we die, we’ll be buried in it, because it’s holy ground.”

These days, Father Bashar frames the threats to this bastion of the wider Palestinian Christian community in the context of the suffering that Jesus endured. “For me, our cause, our problems, are the cross we have to carry on our shoulders,” he says.

He pauses before offering the line he says he carries into every house he visits after a new attack: “In the midst of this cross, in the hardest time, still we have hope. Inside our hearts, we have to put hope instead of the fear.”

Pyongyang has accused the US of pushing the world ‘to the brink of nuclear war’.

North Korea has denounced major United States-South Korea military drills set to start next week as a provocation that heightens tensions on the Korean Peninsula.

The US-Japan-South Korea military cooperation is turning into a nuclear alliance, and North Korea will respond to a new level of threat with a new level of deterrent, a spokesperson for North Korea’s Foreign Ministry said on Friday, according to Pyongyang’s Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

Pyongyang routinely denounces military drills in the south as a provocation that heightens tensions.

The drills – named “Ulchi Freedom Shield” – are due to start on August 17 and will last until August 27. They will incorporate exercises to counter drones, GPS disruption, and cyberattacks as the US and its allies adapt to North Korea’s evolving capabilities.

“The US announced that the forthcoming exercises are quite different from the ones of the past five years and intended to master the ability of fighting a war on the basis of the new aspects of modern warfare,” the North Korean Foreign Ministry spokesperson said in the statement.

“It is our consistent principle of ensuring security to respond to a new level of a threat with a new level of a deterrent,” the statement, published by KCNA, added.

Lessons learned in Russia-Ukraine

North Korea sent an estimated 12,000-15,000 soldiers to fight for Russia in its war against Ukraine, and the country is now thought to be preparing the deployment of another 10,000.

Thousands died, but the deal provided North Korea with valuable battlefield experience, as well as payment in arms, energy and direct financial support, according to reports.

Colonel Ryan Donald, spokesperson for the US and South Korean Combined Forces Command, said this week that North Korea’s deployment to the European war had changed the threat his soldiers may face on the Korean Peninsula.

“They’ve taken those lessons they learned there and brought them back to North Korea,” he told reporters. “Our training accounts for that threat.”

Pyongyang’s Foreign Ministry statement said the US-South Korea drills are being staged “at a time when military and political situation is becoming more serious with each passing day in Europe, the Middle East and other parts of the world”.

North Korea also said on Friday that it would further strengthen its nuclear deterrence, accusing the US of lowering its threshold for nuclear weapons usage and pushing the world “to the brink of nuclear war”.

On Wednesday, North Korea fired a ballistic missile towards the sea off the Korean Peninsula’s east coast, just six days after firing another missile.

The Ulchi Freedom Shield drills will include 18,000 South Korean soldiers and counterparts from the 28,500-strong US contingent in the country.

Denise Welch has announced that she is leaving Loose Women, sparking a flood of support from fans. The 68-year-old has been a staple of the ITV panel for decades, but confirmed that she would be stepping down in a video shared on Instagram earlier today.

Sharing the reason for her departure – which came days after Nadia Sawalha spoke about her own exit – she told followers that she wanted to focus on her acting career, describing it as her ‘first love and the thing she’s best at.”

In a video posted on Instagram she said: “I’m leaving Loose Women after the best part of 25 years, off and on. I did leave for about seven years and went back in 2018. This show has been part of mine, and my family’s life, for nearly a quarter of a century.

“I have the most wonderful, wonderful memories and it’s just that acting has always been my first love and, I think, the thing I’m best at.

“At the moment, I’m having the most wonderful opportunities coming my way and I’m grabbing them by the you-know-whats and running with it for this new chapter of my life.

“And so I just wanted to say that in person to thank all of the people who have shared my stories with me. I’ve shared my life with you – the good, the bad and the ugly. I’m very marmite but I cherish all the comments, good or bad, that I’ve had over the years.”

She added: “I just hope you wish me well for this new exciting chapter in my life. I’ll miss everybody but I will remain friends with the whole gang because, despite what you might read, we are a happy band of campers. Lots of love, thanks for sticking with me.”

Denise’s husband, Lincoln Townley, was among the first to share his support for her departure in the comments below. He proudly penned: “Grab those you know what’s darling you’re an incredibly strong talented sensational woman, the best is yet to come!”

Carol Vorderman commented: “Dens …… well that’s an era closing … you’ve been the beating heart of LW and I loved my 3 years with you there. You’re looking soooooooo well and happy and excited so here’s to your next chapter my lovely friend.”

“Nooooooo! Gutted to be honest! Going to really miss sharing the panel with you,” Katie Piper replied, as GK Barry added: “Denise I’m gonna be so sad not to be on the panel with you anymore you always brought so much joy to my day. Can’t wait to see you on our screens [sic].”

Denise made her debut as an official Loose Women panelist in 2005 alongside Kaye Adams, Coleen Nolan and a string of other notable faces. She took a step back from the series in 2013, before eventually returning in 2018.

In that time, she has shared the screen with Ruth Langsford, Christine Lampard, Andrea McLean, Oti Mabuse, Gloria Hunniford and many others.

She came to came in the early 80s before landing a coveted role in Byker Grove as Polly Bell in 1990. Shortly after, she made the move over to Weatherfield, playing Rovers Return landlady Natalie Barnes in Coronation Street.

Following her exit from the soap in 2000, she appeared in Down to Earth, Waterloo Road, Hollyoaks, Emmerdale and EastEnders. Aside from acting, she also won Celebrity Big Brother in 2012 and competed in Dancing on Ice.

Although Denise remained coy about her upcoming acting opportunities, an insider explained that she was taking ‘a massive leap of faith’.

Describing her decision as ‘the end of an era’, they told the Sun: “She is taking a massive leap of faith and going to focus solely on her acting which, really, has always been her first great love.

“Over the past 18 months she has also won herself a whole new fan base with Gen Z, and the LGBTQIA+ community especially.”

“This has seen her being offered high-fashion photoshoots, and given new social media opportunities,” they added. “Now is the time to pursue her dreams, although she will be devastated to wave goodbye to her Loose friends and colleagues. She will be sorely missed.”

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A salvage operation is under way to stabilise the stricken tanker behind a major oil spill off Oman, the risk management company coordinating the effort has said.

The announcement by Ambrey on Thursday came a day after Oman’s environmental authority confirmed that oil from the Caroline Bezengi had reached beaches along the sultanate’s central coast.

The tanker, a suspected member of Russia’s shadow fleet used to transport sanctioned Russian oil, has been leaking crude into waters near the Hallaniyat archipelago since June, when the ship’s crew reported an unidentified explosion.

Ambrey said it was working with Omani authorities and that its services had been engaged as part of a “significant international response” that included salvage vessels, aircraft and specialist personnel.

Apart from Oman and an unnamed “leading international oil spill response company”, Ambrey did not elaborate on which other countries or firms were involved in the effort to salvage the vessel, which has flown the flags of states including Cameroon, Palau and Liberia.

The International Maritime Organization (IMO) – the United Nations maritime agency – said on Thursday that it was “closely monitoring” the situation and would “continue to support ongoing efforts”, without providing further details.

The International Oil Pollution Compensation Funds, a pair of intergovernmental organisations established to provide compensation for oil pollution, said it would not be involved in the cleanup operation after determining that the incident likely resulted from an act of war.

Ambrey, based in Hereford in the United Kingdom, said it expected salvage vessels to reach the Caroline Bezengi soon and that specialist personnel had already boarded the vessel to begin stabilising its cargo.

Ed Wollaston, director of global response at Ambrey, said the “extremely challenging situation” had been complicated by adverse weather from the annual Khareef monsoon.

“However, we have deployed the leading experts in each aspect of the response and have mobilised the appropriate supporting equipment, aircraft and vessels,” Wollaston said in a statement.

“We are working around the clock to mitigate the environmental impact of the situation.”

The oil spill has expanded dramatically in size over the past week, according to analyses of satellite imagery, raising fears for coastlines and ecosystems in the region, including a marine reserve established last year off the Hallaniyat archipelago.

Environmental NGO Greenpeace said on Thursday that, based on satellite imagery, the spill had grown from 45 square kilometres (17sq miles) in late July to about 1,300sq kilometres (502sq miles) as of Wednesday.

Omani authorities as recently as Monday estimated the size of the spill at approximately 400sq kilometres (154sq miles).

Hanen Keskes, Greenpeace’s head of campaigns for the MENA region, said the circumstances of the spill made it “especially challenging” to respond to.

“Given the scale of this – a damaged tanker in a remote location, during monsoon season, with no clear owner or verified insurer to compel a rapid response – this is a case where international assistance should be mobilised urgently,” Keskes told Al Jazeera.

“Capabilities like specialised salvage equipment and expertise can exceed what any one country has on hand, and every day of delay allows more oil to disperse.”

Najmedin Meshkati, an expert in oil spills and a professor of civil and environmental engineering at the University of Southern California, said that authorities should have moved faster to contain the spill.

“That two-month interval was the response window, and it closed. In spill response, source control on day three is worth many multiples of source control on day 60,” Meshkati told Al Jazeera.

Meshkati acknowledged, however, that Omani authorities had been dealt a difficult situation.

“It was handed an orphaned wreck with no responsive owner, no verifiable insurer, no functioning flag state, and a compensation regime containing a war exclusion that may void it entirely,” Meshkati said.

“No mid-sized maritime administration on earth is resourced for that. But that is precisely the argument for escalating harder and earlier.”

Damilola S Olawuyi, a professor of energy and environmental law at Hamad Bin Khalifa University in Qatar, said the spill highlighted the need for stronger international mechanisms to hold polluters accountable.

“The obligation of the entity responsible for pollution to pay for the cost of cleanup and remediation, ie, the polluter pays principle, has for long been a bedrock of international law,” Olawuyi told Al Jazeera.

“However, in an era of increasing geopolitical realignments, identifying the responsible polluter has become complex, therefore complicating effective risk reduction, response and remediation measures,” he said.