break

NEW YORK — A last-ditch Trump administration effort to hunt for noncitizen voters ahead of November’s elections is requiring federal employees to misrepresent themselves on voter lookup tools in a way that likely violates state laws, according to a federal whistleblower’s statement released Monday.

The Department of Homeland Security probe known as the “Unlawful Voter Initiative” also asks employees to create federal law enforcement records about voters based on unreliable data, the account warns. That could potentially wrongly implicate U.S. citizens in official documentation that could spur further investigation.

The anonymous, nearly 30-page disclosure was published Monday by Democratic Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York and Democratic Sen. Alex Padilla of California, the ranking member of a Senate committee overseeing federal elections.

It features screenshots and transcripts of a DHS training for a group of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services staffers, who it says were forced in late August to drop their other work, complete a less than two-hour training session and begin running DHS-provided lists of individuals through state voter registration systems to find “unlawful voters.”

The whistleblower contends that agents have been asked to review 40 individuals per day, giving them about 12 minutes to determine whether each person is a legal voter and create federal records of anyone who is not.

Padilla and Schumer said Monday the initiative was an example of President Trump attempting to interfere in elections and the short timelines would impede officials from conducting proper investigations. They noted that the data DHS has on voters can be unreliable and differ from state records, making any federal findings based on that data potentially problematic.

“We just got more proof of Trump’s vile schemes to rig our elections,” Schumer told reporters in a news conference. “The lengths Trump will go to cheat, lie and steal in this upcoming election are simply beyond the pale.”

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The Trump administration has been targeting noncitizen voting to allege it could be a source of significant fraud during the midterm elections, even as research shows voting by people who are not citizens is extremely rare. Trump has been pushing for the U.S. Postal Service to send mail ballots only to voters verified as U.S. citizens, and his Justice Department has sued to force the release of detailed voter data in 30 states and the District of Columbia, though it has not yet succeeded in those cases.

The whistleblower report details an effort by the federal government to work around a lack of data from the states by directing Citizenship and Immigration Services employees to pose as individual voters to access their state voter records.

Some states, such as Virginia, explicitly limit their voter lookup tools to individuals who attest under penalty of law that they are looking up their own records. In other states, like California, personally identifiable information such as a driver’s license number or partial Social Security number is needed to look up individual voter records.

The whistleblower said that when officers raised concerns about liability for searching the tools against state guidance, agency leaders told them to proceed with the searches anyway.

Schumer and Padilla on Sunday sent a letter to DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin requesting more information about the initiative and demanding that it be stopped.

Asked about the whistleblower report, a DHS spokesperson said it is “laser focused on prosecuting and removing aliens who vote and preventing the dilution of the votes of U.S. citizens.”

“The department accessed publicly available data from states’ voter rolls and cross referenced them with known aliens in our systems,” the spokesperson said in an emailed statement. “It’s not rocket science; it’s an easy step to secure our elections.”

In response to complaints about the timing, limited training and quotas for agents, the spokesperson said that “far from being rushed or untrained, these investigative efforts are conducted diligently and professionally.”

The New York Times first reported on the DHS initiative in early September.

The whistleblower account released Monday was produced by the watchdog group Democracy Defenders Fund. The group, which said it represents the whistleblower as a client, said the person is anonymous because of “an extreme fear of retaliation but they feel an obligation to speak up about the misconduct and gross mismanagement they have witnessed.”

Swenson writes for the Associated Press.

Demonstrators burn tyres and block highways as protests over increased fuel prices grip Syrian cities.

Protests have erupted across several cities in Syria after the government increased fuel prices, with demonstrators blocking a main highway for several hours.

The government raised prices on Sunday by up to 40 percent on diesel and 28 percent on petrol, in what it said were temporary increases caused by a sharp rise in the global cost of securing fuel.

Syria’s government also cited an overhaul of the critical Baniyas refinery for higher prices, saying it will raise capacity from 80,000 to 130,000 barrels per day.

Protests were reported in Hama, Khan Sheikhoun and Maarat al-Numan. Footage published by Al Jazeera shows crowds gathering on the street and burning tyres. The price increases also prompted fierce debate on social media.

The country is currently producing about 102,000 barrels of oil per day, while it needs about 325,000 barrels per day for domestic consumption and is relying on imports to make up the difference, Syrian Energy Minister Mohammed al-Bashir said on Saturday.

The Ministry of Energy said it would continue to review prices as global market conditions change and would work over the long term to expand refining and storage capacity, according to the state-run Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA).

Syria’s fuel supplies are key to the country’s economic recovery as it seeks to rebuild after 14 years of war.

The ITV show returned to screens this week following a lengthy break due to the changes made by the broadcaster this year.

Loose Women has been replaced in another schedule shake-up.

On Monday, the Loose Women panel members were thrilled when they returned to the ITV show after a lengthy break, due to the show being cut to 30 weeks of the year.

Presenter Ruth Langsford told viewers they were happy to be back, adding that they had ‘missed’ the show. However, after three days back, Loose Women has had another schedule change.

At the end of Wednesday’s show, Kaye Adams explained they weren’t going to be on for the rest of the week. She commented: “That is it for today and this week, we are off tomorrow and Friday for the racing.”

Although she told viewers that when the show returns, they’ll be joined by some familiar faces. Kaye continued: “We are back to normal, whatever that is, next week with two guest panellists joining us.

“Dragons’ Den star Emma Grede and Corrie’s Maria, Samia Longchambon. They’ll be here on the panel, we’ll see you at 12:30 on Monday.”

The show is taking a two-day hiatus as ITV covers the racing live from Doncaster, when viewers will see Ed Chamberlin and Francesca Cumani present coverage.

Before September, Loose Women was last on-air back in July as the presenters confirmed their lengthy break at the time, as Kaye told their fans: “We’re done for the summer.”

It comes after the Managing Director of ITV’s Media and Entertainment Division, Kevin Lygo, confirmed the broadcaster will see major changes in 2026 to its daytime scheduling.

Lorraine Kelly’s programme was cut back to 30 minutes as opposed to a full hour, and was also reduced to airing for 30 weeks on a seasonal schedule, similar to Loose Women.

During the weeks Lorraine isn’t on, fans have seen Good Morning Britain extended for an extra 30 minutes.

Speaking about the changes at the time, Kevin commented: “Daytime is a really important part of what we do, and these scheduling and production changes will enable us to continue to deliver a schedule providing viewers with the news, debate and discussion they love from the presenters they know and trust as well generating savings which will allow us to reinvest across the programme budget in other genres.

“These changes also allow us to consolidate our news operations and expand our national, international and regional news output and to build upon our proud history of trusted journalism at a time when our viewers need accurate, unbiased news coverage more than ever.”

Loose Women is available to watch on ITVX.

Unseeded Michelsen came into the match in fine form, having not dropped a set at the tournament prior to facing Tiafoe, and grasped the momentum in the first set.

After the pair traded breaks of serve early in the match, Michelsen got the deciding break at 6-5 in a set where he fired 15 winners to Tiafoe’s four.

Michelsen continued to have the upper hand, with his backhand proving decisive on key points and, after taking the second set, he went up a break early in the third.

It was not until Michelsen was serving for the match at 5-4 that nerves began to hit. He served two double faults and Tiafoe broke to level, won the set and took the opening three games of the fourth set.

After holding Michelsen off, Tiafoe took the match to a deciding set where the pair traded multiple breaks of serve – invigorating the spectators on Arthur Ashe Stadium.

A fan favourite, Tiafoe thrived off the energy of the New York crowd as he then got the better of the tie-break to seal his fourth five-set victory at a major in 2026.

“He’s a great guy for consoling me in that moment,” said Michelsen of their post-match embrace.

“I was trying to keep it together, and I didn’t do a good job of that. He was saying a lot of nice personal things.

“I’ve got a lot of time to grow physically and mentally. I’m going to be here again. I know it.”

Tiafoe is hoping to reach the final at Flushing Meadows for the first time, following defeats by Alcaraz in 2022 and Taylor Fritz in 2024.

If there’s one thing Jed Wheeler and Marcus Ruiz Evans agree on, it’s that things in California need to change.

The state sends too much money to Washington, they say, and is both politically and culturally out of step with a country that lacks its openness and vitality.

“We can solve our own problems and don’t need to wait on a government 3,000 miles away,” said Wheeler, echoing Evans’ suggestion that Democratic-leaning California would be far better off going it alone as a separate country.

They sharply disagree, though, on the matter of how and precisely when California should seek a divorce from the other 49 states.

Evans is pushing a ballot measure that would put the question of secession before voters in 2018, believing the time has never been so ripe to form a breakaway nation. Wheeler is working to create a pro-secession political party, looking a dozen or more years down the road when its candidates hold office, and fears that a premature vote would undermine the effort.

In short, the effort to cleave California faces a crackup of its own.

At least four proposals are floating about to reshape the state in some fashion, including two that would split up California along different axes. All work at cross-purposes, and the result is varied degrees of hostility among proponents; none of the plans seems likely to reach fruition anytime soon, if ever.

That is something they have in common.

Since 1849, when the state was remade in a rush of greed and ambition, there have been more than 200 efforts to split apart, pull away or otherwise reimagine the vast empire known as California. Not one has succeeded.

The latest, most conspicuous attempt, a proposed ballot initiative fueled by anti-Trump sentiments and titillated national media coverage (those wacky Californians!) seems destined to fall short of qualifying for the ballot, barring a sudden change in fortune.

Supporters of the measure, led by Evans, have until July 25 to collect nearly 600,000 valid signatures to place an independence measure before voters in November 2018. The group, which received the go-ahead to collect signatures at the end of January, has yet to reach a quarter of that number, according to the California secretary of state’s office.

The group has also not reported raising any campaign contributions, according to the secretary’s office, which oversees elections.

Evans, 40, a former government affairs consultant now working full-time on the “Calexit” campaign, insisted a robust signature-gathering process was underway, engaging thousands of volunteers in 82 chapters across the state. However, the precise number collected was unknown, he said, because of the loose structure of his pro-secession group, Yes California.

“Some are mailing them in. Some are holding them. Some are taking them directly to their county registrar of voters,” he said. Asked to assess the odds of making the ballot, Evans responded, “Good. I won’t say great.”

The effort, uphill from the start, has not been helped, he said, by reports linking the Calexit movement to Russia, which Evans called preposterous and unfair. The co-leader of Yes California is Louis Marinelli, a former San Diego-area Assembly candidate now teaching English in Russia, where, among promotional activities, he appeared last fall at a Kremlin-backed pro-secession conference in Moscow.

“It has definitely been damaging to us getting big donors and hurting our ability to bring on new members because of clouding the issue without accurately reporting all the facts,” Evans said, citing the organization’s 44,000 “likes” on Facebook as just one example.

Nor, he said, was it beneficial when Nigel Farage, a leading proponent of Britain’s exit from the European Union and prominent Trump supporter, recently flitted into California to talk up a vague plan to split the state down the middle, creating a coastal “West California” and interior “East California.”

“They’re trying to confuse people,” Evans huffed. “Classic Trump.”

It seems Evans and his pro-secession movement might have found an ally in Wheeler and others working to form a political party dedicated to achieving state independence. Many tenets of the left-leaning California National Party — the state needs to keep more of the money it sends to Washington and establish home-grown policies on issues such as immigration and healthcare — echo those propounded by Yes California.

The nascent party has taken no official position on the 2018 secession drive. But Wheeler, the party’s vice chairman, believes the initiative would lose, damaging the independence movement. Better, he said, to elect sympathetic lawmakers under the National Party banner who could then work to bring about California’s eventual departure.

“We’re trying to be very pragmatic and realistic where we are as a movement,” said Wheeler, 36, who works for a digital media company in San Francisco.

While “the idea of having a ballot initiative is seductive and appeals to a lot of people,” he said, “you can’t harvest the crop without the work of planting the seeds, then tilling the soil and all that stuff first.”

In California’s far north, a determined group of dissenters have done that labor for decades — so far to no avail.

Efforts have been underway since before World War II to break off more than a dozen rural counties and combine them with a chunk of southern Oregon to form Jefferson, the nation’s 51^st state.

The impetus is the same that drives backers of secession: the notion of a far-off government (in this case, Sacramento) ignoring local sentiments and a sense of being outnumbered and outvoted by a population whose social and political views are at odds with the prevailing (in this instance, conservative) culture. The proposed flag — a pair of Xs, or double cross — captures the animating sentiment.

“We really don’t have fair representation,” said Terry Rapoza, 67, a leader of the Jefferson movement in Shasta County, where he sells T-shirts and other souvenir clothing in Redding.

He cited recent passage of a 10-year, $52-billion road repair and transportation bill; the hike in gas taxes, he said, will have much less impact in urban California than in rural stretches, where people might drive 20 miles to the grocery store, or a dozen miles to pick up their mail.

But he has little use for secession, which strikes him as bizarre — would the new California nation have its own nuclear arsenal and U.N. representative, he wonders — and fruitless in ending the urban-rural divide he blames for persistently short-changing his part of the state.

There’s something wrong and even vaguely un-American, he suggested, about trying to break the country apart. “We want to add a star to the flag,” Rapoza said. “Not take one off.”

mark.barabak@latimes.com

@markzbarabak on Twitter

ALSO

The cost of California’s public pensions is rising fast. But efforts to fix the problem by ballot measure have fizzled

What Californians need to know about the state’s $52-billion transportation plan

California is sick of being a presidential campaign afterthought. Here’s one lawmaker’s fix

George Rainsford is returning to Casualty tonight as fan favourite Dr Ethan Hardy for the BBC medical drama’s 40th anniversary three years after his last apperance

A former Casualty actor has admitted he was “ready to have a break” after nine years working on the medical drama.

George Rainsford is putting his scrubs back on and resuming his role as Dr Ethan Hardy for the BBC show’s huge 40th anniversary, which airs tonight (Saturday, September 5).

The actor played the popular doctor for almost a decade before leaving the BBC medical drama in 2023. Fans will know George’s charatcer Ethan was diagnosed with Huntington’s disease and left the E.D. three years ago to spend more time with his son, Bodhi.

Speaking exclusively to Betway about his exit, George explained: “At the time, I definitely wanted that time away. I was ready to have a break. It’s a fantastic place to work.

“I loved how generous they were with all the storylines I had over the years, and I loved everybody there but it’s filmed in Cardiff, and I’m not based there, so I needed to spend a bit more time at home. When you’re an actor, sometimes you want to challenge yourself and see what else is out there.

“After nine years, that feeling had gotten a bit stronger. I was keen to go back and do theatre for a bit and see what other screen work was out there.

“I’m glad we were able to have the conversation with the producers that it wasn’t final because I really enjoyed going back and I do think there would be a storyline there but at the same time, I was ready for a little break”

Since leaving Casualty, Jimmy has appeared in seven episodes of popular BBC period drama Call the Midwife as Jimmy Wilson and more recently played the role of Miles is movie Bank of Dave 2: The Loan Ranger.

Ethan isn’t the only familar face returning to Casualty this week with Derek Thompson also reprising his iconic role as nurse Charlie Fairhead. Fans last saw him during his final appearance in March 2024, where he retired after 38 years in the NHS.

Although bosses haven’t shared too many details of Ethan and Charlie’s involvement in the 40th anniversary, they have said: “The gripping, anniversary event centres on a high-stakes major incident that throws Holby into chaos.

“Lives hang in the balance and the ED team are pushed to their limits in a tense and emotionally charged story that brings together some of the show’s most beloved characters.

“As the fallout continues, a major rescue operation unfolds, forcing impossible life-or-death decisions and testing the courage, resilience and leadership of those at the heart of the hospital.

“As Dylan Keogh (William Beck) battles personal tragedy while leading his team through their darkest hour, Stevie Nash (Elinor Lawless) and Flynn Byron (Olly Rix) find themselves fighting for survival in a race against time.”

Casualty’s 40th anniversary specials will air on Saturday, September 5 from 8pm on BBC One and iPlayer

Sometimes travel delivers a real shock. I’m moving along the boulevards in the Polish city of Łódź, enjoying the excellent cafes and warm sunshine, when I spot the vans. They are parked up on the verge, with racks of clothing and heavily laden tables behind. I can’t resist a Sunday morning market and walk towards a group of men huddled around a car that is covered in blankets. And then it happens. They turn – and I see they are weighing pistols in their hands. I recognise the lean profile of a German Luger, and then the bulkier Colt 45.

There is a second of doubt. I hesitate. They replace the weapons on the display and walk away laughing. I approach. On the car roof is a row of dusty soldiers’ helmets. “We were repairing a pavement in the centre of town,” says the seller cheerfully, handing me a badge to inspect. “Imagine! For 80 years, all this stuff was just under our feet.”

It’s a Wehrmacht shoulder badge from Kuban 1943, a last-ditch post-Stalingrad action on the Crimean peninsula. Who wore this, I wonder? A veteran of the Russian front who almost made it home? Nothing is clear, except that in Łódź, the past is never far away.

I arrive the previous night, a little disoriented, whizzing past unlit buildings, huge brick structures like Victorian factories. “Are we in the city yet?” I ask.

The taxi driver gives me a quizzical look. “Yes, this is Łódź.” I note the pronunciation, like “wudge”. I glimpse five-storey blocks, tree-lined streets, a tramline. “I could never live anywhere else,” he adds. A huge blue graffito is caught in the headlights, like a monstrous alien creature.

“Why?” I ask, but we are already pulling up outside an immense red-brick building, my hotel, and he never answers my question. The reception area is huge, with a strange scalloped ceiling in red brick that hints at a previous incarnation as a factory.

This is my first visit to Łódź, a city about 75 miles (120km) south-west of Warsaw. My interest has been piqued by a list of notable people associated with the place. It features an astonishing number of Oscar-winning or nominated film directors connected to the city: Andrzej Wajda (The Promised Land), Roman Polanski (The Pianist), Paweł Pawlikowski (Ida), Agnieszka Holland (Europa Europa), Krzysztof Kieślowski (Three Colours trilogy) and Zbigniew Rybczyński (Tango).

But under the bonnet there is a vast array of talent in acting, production and technical excellence. The city’s film school is responsible, of course, but Łódź itself features as a setting, too, notably in David Lynch’s Inland Empire and Wajda’s masterpiece The Promised Land.

Łódź, I had decided, must be fascinating. Any visit starts with Piotrkowska Street, the longest shopping street in Europe at about 2½ miles. My guide, Anna, takes me through Plac Wolności (Freedom Square), where a dance festival is in progress, with hooded hip‑hoppers rubbing shoulders with troupes of line dancers and girls in colourfully embroidered traditional dress. This is a city where music and dance are never far away. We dodge down a side alley and emerge in a striking art installation – an entire street, Pasaż Róży (Rosa’s Passage), covered in mirrors by the artist Joanna Rajkowska. Back on the main pedestrianised route, the mix of ancient and modern continues: 19th‑century porticoed palaces adorned with colourful graffiti.

I ask Anna how Łódź fared in the second world war. “It was not too badly damaged,” she says. “Both the Germans and the Russians wanted the industry intact.”

There is no medieval heart, no ornate houses like in Wrocław or Kraków. What Łódź possesses is an impressive array of 19th-century factories, mostly textiles, built to show off their owners’ power, wealth and architectural aspirations. Now, this heritage has become a stunning example of urban regeneration.

We turn into OFF Piotrkowska, a complex of beautiful old textile mills reborn as a hive of small businesses. There are lots of vibrant restaurants and bars, but Anna wants to show me a shop that she likes: Pan Tu Nie Stał. “It was a saying in communist times: ‘You’re not in the queue.’ We said it to people trying to push in,” Anna says.

This is the spot to pick up a T-shirt featuring Soviet combine harvesters or some Czas Pokaże (Time Will Tell) socks. The shop says a lot about the Polish attitude to communist times: none of the maudlin ostalgie of East Germany; this nostalgia comes with healthy dashes of colour and humour.

It did all start, however, with a disaster. The old mills had survived two world wars, but died in the economic collapse after communism ended in 1989. “Everything closed down,” says Anna. “We call that time the transformacja. It was very hard.”

We stroll into the Manufaktura area, once the site of a vast textile business started by a local scrap metal dealer, Izrael Poznański, in 1872, and now another beautifully restored collection of red-brick buildings housing restaurants, bars, shops and the fascinating Museum of the Factory. Next door is the palace that Poznański built, a neo-baroque monstrosity of bulging wealth, now the city museum.

After the Congress of Vienna in 1815, Łódź became part of the Russian empire, a melting pot of German, Jewish, Polish and Russian influences. In the 1870s, Poznański was one of a group of men who saw the potential of steam power. They imported looms from England and were soon amassing unimaginable wealth, constructing a city of handsome red-brick factories, the core of which still remains.

The Museum of the Factory houses a collection of working looms that date back to the 1880s. Only four machines are ever turned on due to noise pollution laws – in the old days, one factory might have had hundreds. This was the city of the deaf, but the deafest of all were the bosses, oblivious to the terrible hardships of their workforce, from the founders through to their communist successors. When Wajda came to these mills in the early 1970s, planning The Promised Land, he needed to make only minor adjustments to start filming. The tired faces, the crashing looms, the heat and the dust – it was all very much like 1880.

Is that your favourite film, I ask Anna? She shakes her head. “Cold War by Pawlikowski,” she says. “I love that film.”

This 2018 masterpiece is the story of a tragic love affair conducted across the Iron Curtain in the years following the second world war. Based on the lives of Pawlikowski’s parents, it is dark and sensuous, full of great music and dance. Pawlikowski has used Łodż as a location.

We move on to the Museum of Cinematography, a tour de force that warrants some preparation (watch films by Polish directors). They have everything from early working equipment to props from the most recent Oscar triumphs. By the time I get to the end, I have only a few minutes to rush to the Central Museum of Textiles.

There I find a technician, Przemysław, about to start up a 1893 Greenwood loom. He’s a former policeman with a few tales to tell, but right now one question is bothering me. “Why did film-making succeed so brilliantly in this city of textiles?” I ask him.

He taps the cast iron loom and chuckles. “I’ll show you.”

With the flick of a switch, the loom begins to clank and turn. The noise is incredible. Przemysław is moving around, adjusting and calibrating, his face concentrated. I see the spools of thread begin to unwind, the shuttle dashing back and forth, the warp and weft rhythmically rising and falling. The different colours, each no more than a thin line, but magically coming together. And from the lip of the machine spills a beautiful multicoloured cloth.

Przemysław looks at me and raises a questioning eyebrow. “Like weaving a story, right?”

The trip was provided by the Polish Tourism Organisation, with Holiday Extras lending travel support in car parking, insurance, airport transfers and hotels

“Over the last five or six years, man-to-man pressure has become bigger,” Kane says.

“European football is physical and top teams are trying to win the ball back high, trusting their defenders and midfielders to defend man for man to win their battles.”

Given that change, the best teams have recruited physical athletes and brilliant dribblers who can beat their man when the game becomes a series of one-against-ones.

Kane, not known for his dribbling – and by his own admission “not the fastest”, has thrived on his own terms.

Against Dortmund, there was a specific moment Kane dropped deep, looking to arrive in space unmarked. Recognising the danger, two players converged on the Englishman.

Kane’s dribbling is cerebral. His speed of thought provides him solutions to problems others would attempt to solve with their feet alone.

After getting low and using his strength to shrug centre-back Waldemar Anton off him, Kane rose, slightly adjusting his body to the right. These micro-adjustments are a hallmark of his game and through them he is able to shift an entire team’s momentum.

Fooled by this feint, Daniel Svensson and Jobe Bellingham found themselves wrong-footed as Kane snapped the ball back the other way, opening up the entire pitch from within Bayern’s half.

Premier League breaks its own record as four of its 11 most expensive signings have arrived in this transfer window.

The English Premier League displayed its financial power once again by smashing the summer transfer window record for the amount spent by its clubs on new players.

It had only set the previous record last year.

The spree continued deep into the final hours of the window, which shut on Tuesday, with several big-money deals completed before the 11pm (22:00 GMT) deadline for signings by English clubs.

Approximately 38 percent of the Premier League deals were made between the clubs from within that competition, up from 30 percent last year’s summer transfer window.

Al Jazeera Sport takes a look at major takeaways from the 2026-27 transfer window:

How much did Premier League clubs spend for the 2026-27 season?

A total of 3.46 billion pounds ($4.67bn) was dished out by England’s top-flight clubs, with 475 million pounds ($640.1m) being spent on deadline day itself, up from 391 million pounds ($526.7m) on the same day last year.

During the last summer transfer window, the combined spending of the league’s 20 clubs breached the 3 billion pounds ($4.05bn) barrier for the first time, while this year’s figure dwarfed the 1.13 billion pounds ($1.52bn) spent five years ago.

What were the most expensive Premier League and La Liga signings?

Manchester City topped the list when they spent 125 million pounds ($168.7m) on signing Argentina midfielder Enzo Fernandez from Chelsea.

He’s the first player to be transferred twice for figures upwards of 100 million pounds ($134.7m), and his deal equalled the amount spent on Aleksander Isak when he moved from Newcastle United to Liverpool during the last summer transfer window.

Liverpool paid a close second 123 million pounds ($166m) to sign France forward Bradley Barcola from Paris Saint-Germain.

Chelsea followed with 117 million pounds ($158m) spent on bringing England international Morgan Rogers from Aston Villa to Stamford Bridge, while Manchester City dished out 116 million pounds ($156.6m) for midfielder Elliot Anderson from Nottingham Forest.

Which clubs spent the most money on summer transfers?

Manchester City’s signing of Fernandez capped the whopping 458 million pounds ($618.2m) spent as new manager Enzo Maresca assembled his first squad, which includes Moroccan midfielder Ayyoub Bouaddi for 86 million pounds ($116.2m).

It was a new Premier League record that surpassed the 415 million pounds (560.3m) paid by Liverpool last year.

Chelsea also spent heavily, shelling out 349 million pounds ($471.1m) to back new boss Xabi Alonso.

Tottenham splashed out 303 million pounds ($409m) as they rebuild after two successive seasons close to being relegated.

Promoted trio Ipswich, Coventry City and Hull City spent more than a combined 400 million pounds ($539.9m) to prepare themselves for life in the top flight.

Sunderland landed highly rated Belgian winger Malick Fofana, 21, from Olympique Lyonnais in a reported 30 million pounds ($40.5m) deal after beating Crystal Palace to his signature.

Tottenham Hotspur also broke their club transfer record to sign Sandro Tonali from Newcastle United in a deal that could reach 100 million pounds ($134.9m).

Why did Julian Alvarez, Folarin Balogun and Lamine Camara fail to join a new club?

Some deals failed to go through on deadline day.

British media reported that Everton’s move for Folarin Balogun collapsed after the US striker decided against proceeding with the transfer, while Senegal midfielder Lamine Camara remained at Monaco after his reported 47.1 million pounds ($63.5m) move to Chelsea fell through.

Julian Alvarez’s dream of playing for Barcelona never materialised after Atletico held onto him despite strong interest from Barcelona and Arsenal.

Atletico chief executive Miguel Angel Gil Marin made his feelings quite clear about ⁠⁠Barcelona last week and ⁠⁠said Alvarez would never be sold to them.

“There has not been, and there will not be any negotiation with them [Barcelona] regarding Alvarez’s transfer,” Atletico’s board of directors said in the statement.

“Atletico de Madrid is open to standard transfer market negotiations when conducted in a professional, ethical and respectful manner,” the statement added.

ARIANA GRANDE broke down in tears on stage at what could be her final-ever concert.

The superstar, 33, sobbed as she opened up about her decision to step back from public life.

Halting her final gig at London’s O2 Arena, Ariana said: “I just wanted to say thank you so much.

“This has been such an extraordinary experience.

“Thank you for ten beautiful London shows and 41 incredible Eternal Sunshine shows.”

Breaking down in tears, Ariana continued: “This has been one of the most beautiful extraordinary experiences of my life and I just wanted to express my gratitude without sobbing. 

over & Out

Jonathan Bailey QUITS West End show weeks after co-star Ariana Grande’s exit

HEEL-ING TIME

Ariana Grande gives health update after painful injury that left fans worried

“Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

“It has been so special and I will cherish this experience always.

“I have loved every minute of this with you all and I just wanted to make sure I express how grateful I am.”

Signing off, she continued: “Thank you for being by my side all the way from Honeymoon Avenue to Hampsted.”

Ariana broke down in tears for a second time before performing Hate That I Made You Love Me. 

The singer struggled to get her words out as she thanked everyone who has worked on the tour from hair and make up to the security. 

For the final show of the tour Ariana added four songs from her new album Petal. 

The singer belted out Oh Well, Like I Do and the record’s lead single Hate That I Made You Love Me. 

Ari also performed Nowhere, Nobody for the first time.

During her performance of hit single Thank U, Next the star continued her recent trend of changing the words to reflect her rekindling things with dancer Ricky Alvarez. 

Rather than singing “wrote some songs about Ricky, now I listen and laugh” the superstar sang: “Wrote some songs about Ricky, I’m trying to make him my last.”

Ariana’s Wicked co-star Cynthia Erivo watched her final show from the sound decks. 

However, unlike on night two of the 10 London shows when she joined Ariana on stage, she opted to take a back seat and simply watch the show as a fan.

It was previously revealed that Ariana would be retreating from the public eye following the end of tonight’s run of 10 O2 Arena shows of the Eternal Sunshine Tour.

In a statement released last month, a rep for the 7 Rings singer said: “Ariana will be taking a step back from visibility after she completes the Eternal Sunshine Tour.

“She looks forward to finishing the tour and ending it on a high note, both healthily and happily, and then taking a much-deserved break from public-facing work and appearances, which have led to endless, ongoing public scrutiny.

“This tour has been a beautiful experience for her.

“She loves her fans and has loved every minute of this tour so much.”

Ariana herself later clarified that the decision had been months in the planning and was not in response to widespread concern for her health after visible weight loss over the past year.

The singer said: “It was not a reactive or impulsive thing. It is something that I have decided, a plan that I had quietly made a long time ago and it’s a decision that was made from a thoughtful and empowered place.

“And I want you to know that many things can be true at the same time.”

She added: “I heard that my fans were worried that negativity was ruining things for me, but I just have to say that could not be more the f*** opposite.

“This is not what that is. I just want to be very, very clear. Multiple things can be true at the same time.

“Boundaries need to be set.

“Human beings need a break sometimes. And also, this can be, and will continue to be, the greatest experience of my professional and creative life. So, I just wanted to make that quite plain.”

It comes a month after Ariana pulled out of making her West End debut in Sunday in the Park with George slated for next year at the Barbican.

Her co-star Jonathan Bailey has also since pulled out too, as exclusively revealed by The Sun earlier today.

State lawmakers have approved a series of modest changes intended to bolster California’s film and TV tax credit program.

Among the key revisions, independent filmmakers would be exempted from the $5 million state corporate tax credit cap that was approved earlier this year as part of Gov. Gavin Newsom’s state budget.

Film industry advocates lobbied hard for a carve-out, saying the cap would undercut gains made under the current film and TV tax credit program at a time when Hollywood has been reeling from job losses.

The exemption is a compromise. Film industry advocates were hoping all types of producers would be exempt from the corporate tax cap.

The bill includes other changes intended to help Hollywood, such as allowing companies to carry forward older tax credits for up to 15 years (the old limit was nine) and reducing the discount they are charged when they opt to seek a cash refund on unused credits.

Producers will also be able to collect their refund money more quickly — within two years instead of five.

California offers tax credits of up to 35% on qualified expenses, which can be applied to any tax liabilities the production companies have in the state. The program allocates $750 million annually in film and TV tax breaks.

The budget trailer bill was introduced to the Senate on Friday by Assemblyman Rick Chavez Zbur (D-Los Angeles), chair of the Assembly Democratic Caucus and Senator Ben Allen (D-Santa Monica).

The new cap, issued by Gov. Newsom, would have undermined the “competitiveness” of the current California Film and Television Jobs Program, said the Entertainment Union Coalition, an advocacy group that supports the bill. But with these new modifications, the group — which represents the Directors Guild, SAG-AFTRA, IATSE and more — said the program will be able to continue to “support the fragile recovery of our industry here in California.”

“Most importantly, we want to recognize the major role our members played in today’s success as advocates for their industry in California,” Rebecca Rhine, the coalition’s president, said in a statement. “They sent an unprecedented 450,000 letters to the California legislature, making clear the negative impact that SB 122 [the new cap] would have on their livelihoods, their families, and their communities.”

Over the program’s first full year in its expanded $750-million form, the California Film Commission says it delivered $6.6 billion in direct production spending and $4.3 billion in qualified expenditures, supporting nearly 35,000 cast and crew jobs across 6,630 filming days statewide.

The bill cleared the Assembly floor by a vote of 68-2, with the Senate approving its companion measure by a vote of 32 in favor, 8 against the same day. It now awaits Gov. Newsom’s signature.

“It’s a good day that we took steps to strengthen the program and while we have to do more next year, this was a crucial first step,” Zbur said in an interview.

Zbur said he believes everyone in the state’s film and TV tax credit program should have been exempted from the corporate tax credit cap and he plans to look at that within the context of next year’s budget.

“There were budget implications to doing that, so we really did all the things that are viable to do in this legislative session,” Zbur said.

Sammy and Jonathan were one of a number of couples whose romantic journeys were never shown on the Netflix show

Love Is Blind UK’s third season saw a record number of engagements – but only a handful were shown.

The Netflix reality dating show sees 30 singles sent on a string of blind dates in the show’s pods which are designed to prevent the contestants from ever seeing each other. The only way they can meet a potential partner face to face is if they accept a marriage proposal from them.

An unprecedented number of contestants became engaged during the latest season – 14 to be precise – though just six of those love stories were shown to viewers at home.

The show’s executive producer, Nazleen Karim, previously addressed why they cut some couples on the programme but kept following others. She explained: “When there are more engagements than we can physically follow, we have to make difficult editorial choices. We’re looking for a range of different relationship journeys and stories that together capture the full experience of the experiment.

“Not being selected isn’t a reflection of the strength of a relationship – many couples continue exploring their connection once they leave the pods.”

Now, one couple who were cut from the show revealed what happened to them afterwards, and the remarkable journey they have been on since.

Tech recruiter Jonathan, 32, and wellbeing coach and entrepreneur Sammy, 31, found a connection in the pods and became engaged, but their dates, nor that all-important proposal, were ever shown.

In a tell-all Instagram post, Sammy recounted that she asked a producer to give Jonathan her number after they were told they would not be continuing on the programme, and the pair continued to date in the real world.

Since leaving the show in August last year, they have jetted off on holiday together, met each other’s families, got a dog together named Poddy in homage to the show, and remain engaged to this day. Sammy also revealed the devastating news that the pair had suffered a silent miscarriage in June.

“We lost our baby to a silent miscarriage and honestly, we really struggled,” she shared. “Grieving whilst still living on opposite sides of the country was one of the hardest things we’ve had to face together.”

While she admitted the pair were still navigating the loss, Sammy revealed their love story still endured. She added: “We didn’t get picked to continue on Love Is Blind. At the time, that felt like the end of our story. Turns out, it was the beginning of the best bit.

“No cameras. No experiment. No guarantees. We just kept choosing each other, and now you’re finally in on the secret.”

Love Is Blind UK series three is now streaming on Netflix. A reunion special will air tomorrow night (August 30) at 9pm.

Manchester City‘s position has shifted following Wednesday’s signing of Ayyoub Bouaddi. They have generated 278.5m euros from sales so far, with the departures of players including Savio, Tijjani Reijnders, Rodri, James Trafford, Manuel Akanji and Nathan Ake.

Bouaddi’s arrival takes City’s spending to 273.7m euros, leaving them with a positive transfer balance of 4.8m euros.

Further departures could quickly change the picture again. Tottenham have agreed a loan deal to sign Omar Marmoush, with an obligation to make the move permanent for £60m (58m euros) next summer. That fee would therefore count towards City’s 2027-28 transfer income rather than this season’s figures.

Nico Gonzalez is also expected to leave, while Jack Grealish could yet be another departure before the deadline. Grealish spent last season on loan at Everton, who remain interested, although the winger has viewed Enzo Maresca replacing Pep Guardiola as manager as a fresh start at City. His contract runs until June 2027.

A permanent sale of Gonzalez, and possibly Grealish, could still significantly increase City’s 2026-27 income.

Their ability to sell at such a level is particularly significant given the scale of their midfield rebuild. City have already signed Elliot Anderson from Nottingham Forest for 135m euros. They also remain interested in Chelsea midfielder Enzo Fernandez.

From the ancient ruins of Rome to the street food of Iceland or the canals of Amsterdam, here are five ways to spend a memorable mini break this autumn

Summer holiday season may be drawing to a close, but that doesn’t have to spell the end of travels until the same time next year. In fact, when temperatures have cooled, crowds have thinned and prices have dropped, autumn is often the perfect time of year to book a city break.

There are plenty of destinations to choose from across Europe, whether it’s history and culture holidaymakers are after, delicious food and drink, or breathtaking natural wonders. And for those squeezing in a quick weekend away this autumn while keeping their annual leave for the festive period, a well-planned trip can make all the difference.

That’s why our travel experts have taken a look at the top-rated tours across Europe on Viator to offer some inspiration to jet-setters already dreaming of their next getaway. Here are five of the most popular choices across the continent that are ideal for mini breaks and are a way to ensure no highlights of a destination are missed.

READ MORE:

Canal cruise in Amsterdam, the Netherlands

With its world-class museums and art galleries, delicious food and drink scene, and vibrant nightlife, Amsterdam is always a popular choice for a mini-break among British holidaymakers. And the number one top-rated tour on Viator offers visitors the chance to explore it in style.

The Amsterdam Classic Saloon Boat Cruise will see travellers board a 19th century wooden saloon boat to cruise along the city’s canals, journeying past iconic landmarks such as the Anne Frank House and the Rijksmuseum while hearing more about them from the onboard guide. Priced from £14.38 per person, this hour-long tour is ideal for those with a busy itinerary or only stopping in Amsterdam for a few hours – and there’s the option to upgrade to a drinks and cheese package too.

With an average rating of 4.8 out of five based on more than 30,000 reviews, fans of this tour have praised it as “a great way to see the city and learn about its history” with guides that were “knowledgeable and entertaining”. However, one person did remark that they “wish it was longer”, while someone else commented that their boat was “a bit crowded”.

Several airlines offer regular flights from UK airports to Amsterdam, including easyJet and KLM. Or for those who want to travel a little differently, the DFDS Amsterdam Mini Cruise is a popular choice that sets sail from Newcastle on a daily basis and is priced from £56 per person, offering the chance to spend the day in Amsterdam without having to worry about accommodation.

More canal cruises are available to book via Amsterdam Boat Trips, which offers both shared and private tours as well as food and drink themes from craft beer to Dutch pancakes.

Book a tour for your next holiday

Viator offers tours across Europe visiting everything from iconic landmarks to hidden gem spots.

City walking tour of Porto, Portugal

The coastal city of Porto, Portugal’s second-largest city, is a popular destination among sun-seekers, enjoying Mediterranean warmth well into the autumn – the average temperature here in October last year was 18°C, compared to the UK’s 10.4°C. A lesser-visited alternative to the Algarve or the capital of Lisbon, Porto is ideally suited to a long weekend away with its walkable historic centre.

The Unvanquished Tour in Porto City Centre comes in at number two on the Viator list of the top-rated tours of Europe, and takes visitors on a two-and-a-half hour walking tour of the city that delves into 2,000 years of history via famous landmarks and hidden gems. Learning all the secrets of Porto from a knowledgeable tour guide, this tour has no set price and simply asks participants to pay what they think it’s worth at the end.

Earning a stellar five-star rating based on more than 32,000 reviews, this tour has been dubbed “a wonderful introduction to Porto” with plenty of “interesting and informative” highlights to look forward to. Although more than 96% of participants have awarded it the full five stars, one reviewer did comment that they felt the tour had “not as much walking to various sites as I would have liked”.

Ryanair offers flights to Porto from £18.99 per person from multiple UK airports, including London Stansted, Manchester, Birmingham and Liverpool, with the likes of easyJet and British Airways offering direct flights too. More tours of Porto are available via the likes of GetYourGuide and Living Tours.

Exploring ancient ruins of Rome, Italy

On the travel bucket list of every ancient history lover in the world, Rome is a truly unique place to visit where there are iconic ancient ruins to be found at every turn alongside some of the most spectacular Renaissance and Baroque architecture. Such is the Italian capital’s reputation for being a must-visit that a short trip can feel overwhelming, so booking a walking tour is a top recommendation to make sure none of the landmarks are missed.

Although there are thousands to choose from, the Rome Colosseum, Roman Forum and Palatine Hill Guided Tour is the top-rated option on Viator. Priced from £29.64 per person, this tour combines three of the most iconic sights in Rome into one trip led by an expert guide, learning about life in Ancient Rome along the way.

With more than 25,000 reviews on Viator and an overall rating of 4.6 out of five stars, those impressed by this tour praised it as a “fantastic experience” with the “amazing” guides that were “very attentive” and knowledgeable about the sites. Despite this, one reviewer felt that their trip to the Colosseum “was a little rushed”, while another complained that it was “overcrowded” at the site.

Several airlines offer direct flights from the UK to Rome’s airports, including British Airways, easyJet and Ryanair. Meanwhile, if holidaymakers want to make their trip to Rome part of a luxury cruise holiday, Fred. Olsen is offering trips sailing from UK shores that include the opportunity to visit the Italian capital, such as the 18-night Culture & Coastline of Italy journey from Southampton next April which is priced from £2,599 per person.

Dublin to Galway via Cliffs of Moher, Ireland

UK holidaymakers don’t have to travel too far for spectacular sights – over in Ireland there are breathtaking natural wonders to see, and a top-rated tour gives travellers the chance to witness them all in a single day. Ideal for anyone planning a few days in Dublin, the Dublin to Cliffs of Moher, including Wild Atlantic Way and Galway is priced from £65.38 per person and ventures from the capital out to the rugged west coast.

Swapping out the walking for an air-conditioned vehicle, passengers on board will learn about Irish history and culture on this 13-hour tour that offers the opportunity to explore the clifftop paths of the Cliffs of Moher before continuing along part of the Wild Atlantic Way. The final stop before heading back to Dublin is Galway, where visitors can choose to embark on a guided walking tour or explore the vibrant harbour city at their own pace.

Racking up an average rating of 4.9 out of five stars based on more than 20,000 reviews, impressed participants said their tour guide went “above and beyond” and that the stops were “a perfect amount of time to enjoy and explore the beautiful places”. Although one person fed back that it was “hard to find a restaurant and enjoy the city in the time provided” in Galway, while someone else echoed that they “wish we had more time to explore Galway”.

It’s possible to travel to Dublin from the UK via flight or a combination of a car, coach or train and ferry, with Stena Line, P&O Ferries and DFDS among those operating crossings. When it comes to exploring Dublin itself, the hop-on, hop-off Do Dublin bus tours are one of the most popular options, with 24, 48 and 72-hour tickets available.

Authentic food tasting in Reykjavik, Iceland

And finally, Iceland rounds off the top-rated tours of Europe as a destination that is at its most spectacular when the weather turns colder. The aptly nicknamed ‘land of fire and ice’ is home to awe-inspiring dramatic landscapes, from giant glaciers and cascading waterfalls to active volcanoes and rugged mountains – and there’s yet more to discover its capital Reykjavik.

The Reykjavik Food Walk offers holidaymakers the opportunity to sample some of the city’s best eateries, sampling local favourites from Icelandic cheeses to Arctic char. Priced from £108.94 per person with food included, this three-hour small group tour also passes by many of Reykjavik’s landmarks from the Hallgrimskirkja church to the Harpa concert hall, offering a unique way to see the city.

Earning a five-star rating from more than 20,000 reviews, this tour has been described as ‘such a fun way to experience Icelandic dishes’ with an ‘amazing’ choice of restaurants and foods on offer.

Seasonal flights to Iceland are available from selected UK airports, operated by the likes of Jet2, easyJet and IcelandAir. There are a number of cruise options available from UK ports too, including from Ambassador Cruise Line with the Iceland’s Land of Ice & Fire holiday sailing from London Tilbury on September 10 from £1,399 per person and up to £200 onboard credit available in a last-minute deal.

Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco is not lazy, I’ll give him that.

During his unsuccessful run for governor this year, you may recall that the MAGA devotee found time to seize more than 650,000 ballots from the Proposition 50 redistricting race, claiming he suspected there were tens of thousands more votes cast than there should have been — a favorite (and false) complaint of election deniers.

There were not.

Undaunted by reality, and likely law, Bianco announced he was going to have his deputies recount the votes, even though this kind of interference in the chain of custody of ballots never had occurred anywhere in the United States.

This unprecedented seizure of ballots — something election-denier-in-chief President Trump has been hinting at trying himself for years — quickly became a national news story, and a national concern.

With midterms looming and more than one MAGA sheriff out there, what would stop another conspiracy-minded, badge-wearing maverick from doing something similar this November, potentially throwing our national election into turmoil?

The specter of Bianco setting a precedent for like-minded conspiracists to follow prompted two significant lawsuits — one led by the election experts at the UCLA Voting Rights Project and the other from state Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta.

The state Supreme Court heard arguments in those cases Monday, and while we’ll have to wait for the official rulings, things did not seem to go well for the sheriff.

What surprised me most, or maybe just relieved me, was how thin Bianco’s arguments were to support his actions. In the end, his legal team came with little more than contortions and cartwheels, trying to twist Bianco’s overreach into existing law.

His lawyer, Bradley Hertz, attempted to argue that legislators, when crafting laws protecting ballots, meant different rules to apply to investigations of elections preceding formal prosecutions. If that sounds confusing, it’s because it is.

Hertz seemingly was trying to convince the court that Bianco legally could pull his shenanigans as long as he didn’t actually find criminal wrongdoing, which would trigger a different set of rules.

“That seems bizarre,” Justice Goodwin H. Liu said during a back-and-forth with Hertz.

Indeed.

But it was Justice Joshua Groban who hit at the national implications of what Bianco had done — and what it could mean for the midterms if this court ruled in his favor.

“It seems like under your broad view of the warrant power … the sheriff could could seize ballots even before election day, right?” Groban asked. “Even before they were counted.”

It’s terrible to have ballots seized after they’re counted. It’s devastating if they were to be taken before there was an official tally, because how would anyone trust that there hadn’t been tampering? Simply seizing uncounted ballots, no matter what happens next, would create such paranoia and uncertainty that the election results almost certainly would be called into question — something that could play into the favor of, say, a wannabe authoritarian who fears he’s likely to lose a fair vote count.

Even Hertz seemed to acknowledge such a scenario was bad.

“If search warrants were allowed during the election or preelection, that would obviously wreak havoc,” he said. “There would be, kind of, a cat out of the bag, so to speak. You can’t count ballots if they’re not in the possession of the registrar.”

But then Hertz tried to come up with logic that what Bianco was arguing wouldn’t mean that ballots could be seized anytime, anyhow, and that instead courts could find a way to allow seizing only after the official count. The court did not seem convinced that this was a good idea, or that that is what the law should or did allow.

If that case didn’t go well for Bianco, it was the second case brought by Bonta that really might end up being a hard loss.

For years, decades really, in California and across the country, there has been a group of sheriffs who have argued they are a law onto themselves because they are elected, not hired or appointed. Some of these sheriffs argue that they are literally above federal law.

In California, there has at times been momentum to rein in this line of thinking by creating clear boundaries in law, but the state Legislature always has backed down in the face of opposition from law enforcement.

One potential curb on sheriffs’ power comes from a single line in our state Constitution that seems to say the state attorney general has supervisory power over them. But the meaning and power of this particular clause has long been debated and seldom invoked.

Bonta, however, invoked it against Bianco, claiming the the sheriff had to back off the ballot-seizing because Bonta had authority to order him to stop. Bianco did stop, to his credit. But the standoff was heard by the court Monday and likely will force clarity on an issue that has long lacked it.

Here again, the justices seemed amenable to Bonta’s argument that sheriffs, at least to some extent, answer to him as the state’s chief law enforcement officer. But the justices seemed far more cautious on this issue, and even the state’s attorney conceded that “it’s actually pretty remarkable how little our Constitution says about county sheriffs.”

If Bianco loses on this issue, it would be huge. It would mean that Bianco not only overstepped his power by seizing the ballots, but that he also had forever lessened the power of California sheriffs by clarifying they do answer to the attorney general. I’m sure that will be very popular with other sheriffs.

We’ll see what the justices say, but at least it seems likely that this embarrassing chapter of California election history will end in favor of the law, and democracy.

Maybe Bianco really does believe his conspiracy theories. After all, “there are some people who believe they had breakfast with Elvis on Sunday,” pointed out Chad Dunn, who argued the case for the Voting Rights Project.

“We can’t satisfy them,” Dunn warned.

More importantly, we shouldn’t — even when they wear a badge. Our laws already have robust protections for elections, and rogue sheriffs aren’t one of them.

Ahmed Krim spent 30 years teaching English in Algeria’s middle schools. Now retired, the 60-year-old watched the language he loved remain firmly behind French as the country’s second language.

English was less valued than French, which might have been the language of Algeria’s coloniser, but continues to be present in every dialogue, six decades after independence.

On July 25 , Algeria’s Education Minister, Mohamed Seghir Saadaoui, announced that English will become the sole foreign language taught in the third year of primary school in the new academic year for 2026-2027.

French would be pushed back to the fourth year, ending its domination of foreign language classes in Algerian schools.

From next month, eight-year-olds across Algeria will become the first to learn English before French.

“It is a very good decision. But it requires thinking, planning and resources,” Krim told Al Jazeera.

It is among the first steps in President Abdelmadjid Tebboune’s linguistic overhaul for Algeria, which he first outlined in 2022 with English being introduced to primary schools.

Since then, medicine and science faculties have begun switching from French to English.

The French language has been erased from some utility bills and Air Algerie tickets. Road signs are beginning to feature English alongside Arabic, while government ministers’ websites will also have English as an option.

The shift from French to English as Algeria’s secondary language is both sweeping and structural.

It comes amid the most serious diplomatic crisis between the two countries since Algeria’s independence from France in 1962.

In July 2024, French President Emmanuel Macron publicly backed Morocco’s sovereignty claim over Western Sahara.

Algeria, which supports the Sahrawi Polisario Front and hosts over 170,000 Sahrawi refugees, viewed that as highly provocative.

That, and other issues, saw Algeria expel French diplomats, and vice versa.

Algeria’s replacement of French as the country’s second language accelerated after the diplomatic crisis grew.

A classroom without enough teachers

A rethink of the whole education system in Algeria may be needed.

“First and foremost, specialised training centres must be restored and candidates must not be forced into the teaching profession without wanting it – we need people who genuinely want to do this work,” Krim said.

He refers to dedicated institutes established after independence, where primary and middle school teachers, like himself, trained via a model that combined classroom instruction with direct school placements to meet the gap in Arabic instructors.

The centres operated until the late 1990s, when an economic crunch replaced them with the fewer and more selective Ecoles Normales Superieures.

Most teachers today are university graduates, but lack the practical, classroom-first grounding that the older model provided.

Krim said that school curricula must be designed and entrusted to “a qualified body that includes both linguistic and pedagogical expertise, free from all ideology”.

But journalist and analyst Noureddine Bessadi said the ideological dimension matters in Algeria, which overthrew colonialism following a bloody and bitter struggle against the French.

“Since independence in 1962, every shift in language policy has been fought as much on political as pedagogical grounds,” Bessadi told Al Jazeera.

After independence, Algeria’s Arabisation drive, when French was displaced from government and education, was “part of state building and enforcing Algeria’s identity, centring Arabic and Islam”, Bessadi added.

Tamazight, a non-Semitic language spoken by around a quarter of Algeria’s population, was marginalised until 1995, Bessadi said, shaped by an “ideological perception of unity that prioritised linguistic and cultural harmony”.

Critics argue that the transition from French to English is happening faster than the system can keep up with. For one, it is believed that there are not enough qualified English teachers to make the language reforms work.

But one source familiar with the matter told Al Jazeera that there are enough teachers to roll out this programme in primary schools and that any shortage could be filled through contractors.

In February, Algeria’s education ministry reportedly recruited about 15,000 English language teachers for primary schools.

Rafik Laceb, a lecturer in English at Mouloud Mammeri University in Tizi Ouzou, is cautiously optimistic about the primary school reform. But he considers the parallel push to teach university subjects in English to be rushed and poorly executed.

“Frankly, and beyond any chauvinism, I believe this decision is positive… I believe there is, today, sufficient supervision and evaluation work from the first experience,” Laceb said, in reference to the previous introduction of English in later primary school years.

The university experiment that began in 2023-2024 produced insufficient contact hours, a lack of genuine assessment of students’ English levels and no tracking of their progress.

Around 50 percent of teaching at Tizi Ouzou University’s English department is by younger contract staff, which brings other challenges.

“A young contract teacher must first master the basic principles of medicine before attempting to teach medical terminology in English,” he said.

Levelling the playing field

Currently, children only begin learning a foreign language in the third year of state primary schools, whereas multiple languages are taught at private schools from kindergarten.

Djamel Merah, whose daughter attended private schools before transferring to public secondary school, studied Arabic, French and English simultaneously from kindergarten level.

Merah welcomes the government’s language reforms at state primary schools, which will provide more children with the opportunity to learn English.

“It addresses a question about the gap in opportunities between children who get multilingual education from the start and those in public schools who don’t get the same chance,” he said.

Shakespeare’s rising shelf space

There also appears to be a more organic response among the public that precedes the government’s promotion of the English language.

Krimo Taleb, a bookseller at the Libre Pensee bookshop in Tizi Ouzou, has seen a growth in English-language book sales, particularly among female readers.

“In my opinion, it has nothing to do with government decisions. The majority of young readers today speak three languages fluently,” he said.

His own daughter, a middle school student, reads fluently in Arabic, English and French.

Colleen Hoover, Ana Huang and J. K. Rowling are some of the best-selling authors at his shop.

“Previously, our bookshops provided for English literature students the works of Shakespeare,” Taleb says. “Today, there is a diverse range of English-language titles aimed at the general public.”

However, French remains Algeria’s most influential foreign language. According to the International Organisation of La Francophonie (OIF), Algeria has approximately 15 million French speakers, nearly a third of its population.

There is not a single newspaper published in English and written English by Algerians remains in its infancy.

But there are signs that former colonies are turning their backs on France’s linguistic legacy, particularly in Africa, where Paris’s military and political presence made a resurgence in recent decades.

In March 2025, Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso withdrew from the OIF, accusing it of being a political instrument of Paris.

“Mali made its national languages official in 2023, demoting French to a working language. Burkina Faso followed the same year and Niger in 2025,” Bessadi added. “Even Senegal, which has not removed French as an official language, has begun encouraging local languages at its expense.”

For Krim, Algeria’s linguistic ambitions are not far-fetched, but for it to work, the country needs the “necessary resources… and transparency”.

Islamabad, Pakistan — Pakistan’s Chief of Army Staff and Chief of Defence Forces, Field Marshal Asim Munir, is traveling to Tehran on Monday for talks with senior Iranian officials, Iran’s Foreign Ministry announced on Sunday.

It will be Munir’s third visit to Iran this year as Islamabad continues its push to mediate an end to the United States and Israel’s war on Iran.

Pakistani officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed to Al Jazeera that the trip would take place but declined to elaborate on its agenda.

The Pakistani military’s media wing, the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), as well as the Foreign Ministry and Information Ministry, did not respond to Al Jazeera’s requests for comment on the visit, which was unusually announced by Tehran rather than Islamabad.

Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei said the trip would build on Pakistan’s efforts to “help strengthen peace and security in the region”.

Munir will hold talks with senior Iranian officials during his stay, Baghaei told reporters in Tehran.

The visit follows two phone calls between Munir and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi within four days, on Wednesday and Saturday.

The two officials discussed “regional developments” and ways to strengthen “peace, stability and security” in West Asia, according to Iranian state media.

A third trip this year

Munir’s first visit to Tehran this year came in April, days after the Islamabad Talks, the first direct US-Iran negotiations in more than four decades, ended without a breakthrough.

He returned in May, arriving hours after US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said there had been “slight progress” in talks between Washington and Tehran.

His latest visit comes as the diplomatic track underpinning the Islamabad MoU has all but stalled, while Washington prepares a new round of sanctions.

The discussions are also expected to touch on this month’s announcement of the Mecca Joint Defence Agreement between Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Turkiye, which Munir attended in Mecca.

Yemen’s Houthi fighters, whose attacks on shipping lanes have repeatedly threatened to widen the conflict, are also likely to feature in his conversations with Iranian officials. The Houthis are widely believed to receive support from Tehran.

The issue carries particular weight for Islamabad.

Three Pakistani sailors were killed and several others wounded when Houthi forces struck a Tanzania-flagged commercial vessel in the Bab al-Mandeb Strait on August 11.

Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar called the attack a violation of international law and “strongly condemned” it at the time.

Munir is expected to meet Iran’s newly appointed senior military leadership during the visit, according to Reza Afzal Samir, an Iranian journalist tracking the talks.

“He is well positioned to meet Iran’s newer senior military leadership, the new IRGC chief, the new Chief of General Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces, and the new Secretary of the Supreme National Security Council,” Samir told Al Jazeera, referring to Munir’s expected meetings with Major-General Ahmad Vahidi, Major-General Ali Abdollahi and Mohsen Rezaei respectively.

The officials were all appointed earlier this month.

A lapsed deal

The visit comes at a fraught moment for Pakistan’s mediation effort, which it has led after the war began six months ago.

The 60-day window set out in the Islamabad Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), signed by Pakistan, Iran and the US on June 17, lapsed in mid-August without either side agreeing to extend it.

Iran has kept the Strait of Hormuz shut, insisting that Washington first lift its naval blockade, end oil sanctions, unfreeze Iranian assets abroad and halt military threats. Tehran says the US has not met those conditions.

Munir’s trip also coincides with a fresh round of US economic pressure.

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is due to detail on Monday what American officials have called the “toughest sanctions in history” against Iran, a package he has said is intended, alongside the continuing naval blockade, to “collapse” the government in Tehran.

Iran’s Foreign Ministry has called the plan “economic warfare”.

The trip also follows a month of regional realignment. Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Turkiye signed the Mecca Joint Defence Agreement on August 7, a mutual defence pact under which an attack on one signatory would be treated as an attack on all three.

Pakistan’s Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi travelled to Tehran earlier this month to revive the stalled mediation push but returned without any concrete results.

Tensions elsewhere in the region have sharpened too.

The United Arab Emirates suspended trade and financial transactions with Iran last week after saying it had come under fire from two ballistic missiles launched from Iranian territory, a claim Baghaei denied.

But Munir’s visit, analysts say, signals that key regional mediators have not given up on efforts to revive talks, either direct or indirect, between Iran and the US, even as they try to balance their own relations with Tehran and Washington.

Oman’s Foreign Minister Badr bin Hamad Albusaidi, who, like Munir, has held recent telephone conversations with Araghchi, is scheduled to visit Tehran on Tuesday, Iran’s state-owned IRNA news agency has reported.

What leverage does Islamabad have?

Analysts remain divided on what Munir’s visit can realistically achieve, given Pakistan’s limited ability to enforce any understanding it helps broker.

“Both sides see Pakistan as a country that has helped facilitate dialogue without any personal stake in the outcome, nothing to gain for itself,” said Qamar Cheema, a political analyst and head of the Islamabad-based Sanober Institute. “That gives it a certain clarity, and the ability to offer an off-ramp to everyone involved.”

Javad Heiran-Nia, director of the Persian Gulf Studies Group in Tehran, said Pakistan’s persistence was driven partly by self-interest.

“Pakistan is concerned about escalating tensions and the outbreak of another all-out war between Iran and the United States, which would further destabilise the region,” he told Al Jazeera, pointing to Islamabad’s reliance on energy imports from the Gulf and the risk of disruption to remittances from Pakistani workers there if instability spreads.

Zahid Mehmood, a retired two-star general and Pakistani defence strategist, went further, describing Munir as still carrying Washington’s own offer to Tehran.

“Pakistan is still carrying, in effect, Washington’s off-ramp to Tehran,” he told Al Jazeera. “The country remains the most trusted conduit available.”

Not every analyst sees Pakistan’s role as this central.

Andreas Krieg, an associate professor of defence studies at King’s College London, said Qatar, not Pakistan, remained the primary channel.

“Qatar is leading the political mediation and remains the essential communication bridge between Washington and Tehran,” he told Al Jazeera.

Munir’s contribution, he said, was narrower, a “military-to-military channel into an Iranian system in which the IRGC and wider security establishment have become increasingly important to decisions about war and peace”.

What Munir can deliver, and what he can’t

Iranian journalist Samir said Pakistan had a significant role in Iran’s calculus because of what it could do.

“Why should Iran listen to Pakistan? Because Pakistan still retains the leverage to actually do something and create a real opening for peace, rather than remaining silent and doing nothing,” he said.

Samir also predicted the Munir visit could be followed quickly by movement on Hormuz negotiations. “I think the timeline for a final agreement between Iran and Oman on the Strait of Hormuz is also drawing near,” he said. “If [Munir] succeeds in bringing Iran back to the table, I anticipate a new announcement from Oman and Iran on the strait shortly after.”

Krieg was more cautious about what Munir’s visit could deliver. The most meaningful outcome, he said, would be “confirmation that Iran’s security establishment would abide by a specific Hormuz deconfliction arrangement and restrain escalation through Yemen or Iraq if Qatar can secure reciprocal American movement”.

Without that, according to Krieg, “the communication bridge remains open, but the two sides continue moving towards another coercive cycle”.

Mehmood, the retired Pakistani general, was less equivocal.

“Pakistan is really the only exit card available to either side for their off-ramp,” he told Al Jazeera.

A fresh wave of US tariffs on a wide array of Canadian goods has come into effect as of midnight on Saturday after a last minute break down in trade talks.

Announcing the suspension of negotiations shortly before the Friday night deadline, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said he would impose reciprocal tariffs on US goods “dollar for dollar”.

Carney said “last-minute changes in the US proposed terms were unfair, uneconomic, and called into question the reliability of any deal”.

Trade negotiators had been engaged in intense talks since July, after President Donald Trump threatened to impose a 50% levy on nearly $20bn (C$28bn) of Canadian imports by 19 August.

Trump had temporarily paused those tariffs earlier in the week, saying the two sides were close to signing a trade deal that was “very good” for both countries.

But minutes before a deadline for a deal, Carney said that while “important progress” had been made in the talks it was “not enough to meet our objectives for Canadians”.

“As a result, this evening, I have decided to suspend trade negotiations with the U.S. and have directed negotiators to return to Ottawa,” he said.

“Last-minute changes in the US proposed terms were unfair, uneconomic, and called into question the reliability of any deal.”

After Carney’s announcement US trade representative Jamieson Greer said in a statement: “Tonight, Canada declined to finalize the trade deal under the terms agreed earlier this week.

“Despite the US offer to Canada to receive the best treatment of any major exporter to our market, new demands and walk backs of other commitments by Canada have upended the careful balance reached in the past days,” the statement on X said.

The breakdown in talks marks a significant shift in tone from earlier in the week, when both US and Canadian officials sounded optimistic that a trade deal beneficial for both countries was within reach.

Negotiators were reportedly discussing a deal that would reduce US tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminium from 50% to 25%, and on Canadian autos from 25% to 15%.

In exchange, Carney had asked Canadian provinces to restore US alcohol to store shelves.

Tensions between the two major trading partners have been simmering since Trump returned to office in January last year and unleashed a wide-ranging global programme of tariffs, upending decades of free trade between Canada and the US.

Now that talks have broken down, Canada will be hit with new 50% US tariffs imposed by Trump using a Depression-era law called the Tariff Act of 1930.

They will be applied on a range of goods, including wine, dairy, cement, clothing and hockey equipment.

They are in addition to existing tariffs the US had already imposed on Canadian steel and aluminium, autos and lumber.

Doug Ford, the traditionally outspoken premier of Canada’s largest province Ontario, said “the prime minister has my full support for a strong response—tariff for tariff, dollar for dollar,” following Carney’s announcement.

Canada has been engaged in on-again, off-again trade negotiations with the US for over a year in pursuit of a deal that would see the US drop or reduce tariffs on these key sectors.

The US, meanwhile, has been asking for a number of concessions from Canada, including removing its remaining retaliatory tariffs on American autos and adjusting its dairy quotas to allow greater access for US cheese producers.

It has also asked for the ban on US alcohol sales, imposed last year by most Canadian provinces in retaliation to Trump’s tariffs, be removed.

Businesses and stakeholders on both sides of the border had pushed for a deal to be reached, arguing that the new US tariffs on Canada will be harmful to both countries.

The US Chamber of Commerce said earlier in the week in a statement that “higher tariffs would damage both economies, drive up costs for US families, further disrupt critical supply chains, and risk the 13 million American jobs that depend on trade under the US-Mexico-Canada Trade Agreement”.

A recent poll by Canadian firm Abacus Data suggested that around 36% of Canadian would support retaliating to US tariffs, while another 30% would want the Carney government to continue negotiating.

Retaliation risks upsetting the Trump administration, with trade representative Jamieson Greer saying the US is “not going to tolerate” counter-tariffs.

“We’ll take action,” he told reporters last week.

They were two killings that rocked the rap world.

In 1996, Tupac Shakur was gunned down off the Las Vegas Strip. Then, less than a year later, Christopher Wallace, aka Biggie Smalls or the Notorious B.I.G., was killed in a drive-by shooting in front of the Petersen Automotive Museum on Wilshire Boulevard.

The two killings have long been tied together in popular culture.

Now, a detective says the investigation into Wallace’s death helped lead police to the suspect on trial in Las Vegas in Shakur’s slaying.

Duane “Keffe D” Davis, a onetime Compton gang member, is accused of orchestrating the Sept. 7, 1996, killing of Shakur. Prosecutors say the killing was rooted in a war between Southside Crips-Burris Street, led by Davis, and Mob Piru, a gang long associated with Death Row Records. Shakur was closely affiliated with the record company.

Authorities say Davis was in the car with his nephew, who grabbed the murder weapon and fired the fatal bullet.

On Wednesday, former LAPD Homicide Det. Daryn Dupree said Davis set out his role in Shakur’s killing in detail in 2008 to a joint LAPD federal task force that was formed to investigate Wallace’s murder.

To force Davis’ cooperation, Dupree said investigators gathered evidence that Davis, now 63, had sold a large quantity of PCP through his home, exposing him to a potential life sentence and leaving his family open to charges.

The task force questioned Davis about a car he owned that was similar to the one used in Wallace’s L.A. killing. Davis was given a proffer agreement, according to Dupree, meaning he agreed to provide information in exchange for possible benefit.

Davis said he knew about the Smalls shooting and then indicated, “we did the other one,” Dupree testified. That statement, he said, shifted investigators’ focus to the Shakur killing.

“We were talking about Christopher Wallace,” Dupree said. “We didn’t ask him any questions about Tupac. He offered that on his own.”

In a second interview, Dupree testified Davis stated that his nephew Orlando Anderson had been jumped, spurring Davis and cohorts on a hunt for revenge against Shakur.

The attack on Anderson occurred at a Mike Tyson fight earlier on the night of Sept. 7 in Las Vegas, according to Clark County prosecutors. Earlier in the trial, video was shown of Shakur’s entourage attacking Anderson, allegedly in retaliation over a chain that Anderson had previously stolen.

“They went looking for Tupac, Suge and anybody who was involved basically in the beatdown of Mr. Anderson,” Dupree said. Death Row Records boss Marion “Suge” Knight was in the car with Shakur the night he was killed.

When they found Shakur, the former detective testified, Davis “had the gun at first, but they came up on the passenger side,” where Knight was seated, “so he could not shoot across the driver. So he handed a gun to Dre in the back seat.” Deandre “Big Dre” Smith was among those in the white Cadillac in addition to Davis and Anderson.

“Davis said Deandre Smith was afraid to shoot,” Dupree testified, so “Anderson grabbed the gun and shot across Mr. Smith into Mr. Knight’s car.”

Davis told the task force they used a .40-caliber handgun, according to testimony.

Prosecutors said they would begin playing all five hours of the interviews to jurors on Thursday.

Dupree said Davis was signed up as a confidential informant in March 2009. He said Las Vegas police were not aware of the secret conversations at the time.

Dupree testified that Davis told investigators that former rapper and music mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs had been involved in targeting Shakur and Knight through East Coast drug dealer Eric “Von Zip” Martin.

He testified that Davis pledged to rekindle his relationship with Martin to gather evidence. But Martin had cancer, and that was not possible, Dupree said. Martin died in 2012.

Combs was never connected to the Shakur case and has denied ever being involved. Others have questioned Davis’ credibility on this and other points.

The Times in 2008 published a story suggesting a Combs link to Shakur’s killing. But it later retracted the story, saying it was based on documents that appeared to have been forged.

Prosecutors in Davis’ trial say the motive was straight revenge for the beating of Anderson, and that Martin allegedly gave Davis a gun. But they have made no allegations against Combs, who has long denied any role or connection to Shakur’s killing.

Michael Sanft, Davis’ defense attorney, told jurors in opening statements there would be no evidence linking his client to the shooting. Sanft noted that previous investigations did not take his client’s statements seriously because they were not credible. The defense attorney, in an unusual move, repeatedly undermined his own client’s credibility, saying Davis’ memoir, “Compton Street Legend,” where he talks about the Shakur killing, was a work of fiction for money and his client wasn’t in Las Vegas.

Under cross-examination, Dupree said Davis faced a life sentence in the PCP case and that his wife and family were in jeopardy because of it, so he needed to help authorities.

He said that LAPD Det. Greg Kading, the task force leader, left the department after investigating the Shakur and Smalls cases and published a book in 2011 that revealed Davis’ interview.

Dupree said the task force was trying to determine if money was really offered to kill Shakur. He said they were trying to build a racketeering case. “This is trying to solidify that Death Row Records was built on narcotics and Bad Boy Records.”

Dupree said he personally did not doubt Davis when he talked about Anderson killing Shakur.

“I knew he loved his nephew.”

For all the notoriety of the rapper killings, neither has yet led to convictions.

Wallace was leaving a music industry party at the Petersen Automotive Museum on March 9, 1997, sitting in the front passenger seat of a Chevrolet Suburban, when his killer pulled up alongside in a dark Chevy Impala.

As the SUV idled at a stoplight, the gunman opened fire, hitting the 24-year-old four times. He was rushed to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead shortly after 1 a.m.

From the beginning, police said they struggled to get leads and cooperation.

As The Times reported back in 1997, “although more than 1,000 people were said to be at the party, police said they had few eyewitnesses and even fewer solid leads … Detectives said they are investigating whether Wallace’s death is linked to bicoastal tensions within the rap world, but had nothing solid to go on.”

Despite many theories and a long LAPD investigation, the case remains unsolved.

There have been numerous books, documentaries and civil litigation that make allegations, but police said they could never build a case.

In 2017, an LAPD detective told The Times: “The shooter is most likely dead. You cannot ask him who paid him.”