World

“A Different World,” a multicamera comic collegiate soap opera spun off from “The Cosby Show,” has been updated and reborn as a single camera sequel a mere 39 years after the original series welcomed its freshman class and 33 after it packed them off into adulthood. It’s a different “A Different World,” times being what they are, but in many respects the same, set over a school year at the same fictional Hillman College, “the preeminent HBCU in the country.”

As before, we begin with the arrival of new students, sorting themselves out, meeting roommates, finding friends. Many members of the original cast have returned, including Jada Pinkett-Smith, Cree Summer, Charnele Brown, Jenifer Lewis, Dawnn Lewis, Glynn Turman and Joe Morton, as parents or teachers or counselors, three decades older though not necessarily wiser. In a way I can’t exactly articulate — and which has nothing to do with the earlier series, which I know hardly at all — the new “A Different World” made me happy, especially in the early episodes, before the characters are entangled in plot and everything is new, infused with sweetness and energy. (A climactic talent show is just as corny and unpersuasive as every other climactic talent show in television history.)

At the center of a large and sometimes confusing Gen Z cast is Deborah Wayne (Maleah Joi Moon), the daughter of Dwayne Wayne (Kadeem Hardison), who is now the provost, and Whitley Gilbert-Wayne (Jasmine Guy), who in the intervening years founded and sold a beauty empire, which is to say that Deborah, accent on the “bo,” is a rich girl — not at all mean and not especially spoiled, though she doesn’t know how to operate a washing machine. (It also means she is not afraid to raise a ruckus.) She thinks of herself as an artist, but her admission to NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts was rescinded after “a horrible misstep.” And at Hillman, she is required to keep a B average and not get into any trouble, both of which will prove difficult.

Shaquille Johnson (Cornell Young IV), a football star who arrives a week late to practice in a Lamborghini accompanied by his domineering father — it’s Ron Johnson (Darryl M. Bell) from the original cast — who thinks it’s a shame that his son is at tiny Hillman when he could be making a pot of money elsewhere. (Shaquille promised his late mother he’d go there.) “Not everything is about money,” he says. Shaquille also has a gone-wrong romantic past with Deborah, but they are glad to see one another again.

While the show features members of the original cast, the younger generation sorts itself into trios, including Kojo (Chibuikem Uche), left, Shaquille (Cornell Young IV) and Amir (Jordan Aaron Hall).

(Quantrell Colbert/Netflix)

Deborah wants to show her parents, who have been separated for six months but are rarely apart, that she can “enter my full studious season.” This will lead to her engaging a tutor, Ellington (Vincent Jamal Hooper), introduced for some light romantic tension vis a vis Shaquille. Athletic RA Candace (Renee Harrison), who likes Shaquille, provides a counterweight.

The younger generation sorts itself into two entwined trios. For a roommate Deborah draws Rashida (Alijah Kai), who’s from Compton and supposedly a champion gymnast, a characteristic that seems to exist simply to support a joke about Deborah’s “most improved” trophies for Choate women’s pickleball, since it’s never mentioned again. (Some storylines do just melt away.) She’s majoring in criminal justice “to get my cousins out of prison” and thinks Deborah is an unserious student. They’re joined by Hazel (Kennedi Reece), a nice Christian girl looking for a nice Christian guy.

On the boys’ team, alongside Shaquille, are Amir (Jordan Aaron Hall), a gay Harlemite whose deferred admission was because of a year in what they seemingly still call juvie and whose dream is to design clothing; and Ghanian Nigerian “by way of the U.K.” Kojo (Chibuikem Uche), an aspiring influencer bootlegging T-shirts of Shaquille; he, too, has marriage on his mind. They will learn as much in the dorms as they do in the classroom, but the classroom scenes are more on point than they often are in school-set shows.

Shaquille has a rival on the team, Andre (Joshua Suiter), whose wrist he fractures in a locker room fight — but this never really turns into anything. There aren’t any villains here, just young people making young people mistakes and older people making older people mistakes. No one is evil, but people do stupid things, which accords with my own memories of college.

Created by Felicia Pride, who has writing credits on “Queen Sugar,” “Bel-Air” and “Grey’s Anatomy,” it also includes plenty of scenes in which the young folks just have fun, dancing and singing. Big scenes are very well staged, which might have something to do with having choreographer Debbie Allen, director of the premiere episode (and 83 episodes of the original series), as an executive producer. (She also reprises her role as academic counselor Dr. Langhorne, whose motto is “Relax, relate, release,” as if anyone could.)

Over the course of 10 episodes, we’ll encounter many issues relevant to student life and beyond — dyslexia, ADHD (this was my introduction to the parking lot and pomodoro techniques), how lockdown “wreaked havoc” on a generation’s ability to read social cues, STDs, adultification bias, federal cuts to education (Hillman is in the red, and students are losing their grants). bell hooks is quoted on socializing men toward love instead of sex, and, indeed, the series is refreshingly modest on that account.

Welcoming the incoming freshmen, Deborah’s father says, “This is a watershed moment where this country that we built is trying to erase our Black history. Our gains, our culture. They wanna demoralize us. They wanna deport us, they wanna jail us, they wanna shoot us down in the street. But you, you all are their greatest threat. You future leaders who are about justice and community and each other. I know you will stand up. I know you will fight, build and change the world.” It’s a bit speechy — well, it’s in an actual speech — but it’s nice to have that laid out so cleanly in a Netflix sitcom in these difficult days.

And in the wake of a bomb threat, Deborah will declare to the world, “We are not going anywhere. We are studying, we are partying, and we are living our best young, gifted, Black, talented lives right here in our space.” Which sums it up nicely.

Brandon McNulty became the first American winner of the men’s road race world title in 33 years with a stunning victory in Montreal.

The 28-year-old put his hands on his head in disbelief as he crossed the line 13 seconds clear of the chasing pack, completing the gruelling 273.4km course in six hours and 17 minutes.

Australian Michael Matthews was second, with former winner Mathieu van der Poel, of the Netherlands, in third.

The last American winner of the race was Lance Armstrong in 1993.

“Until the last 800m I didn’t believe, I was so tired,” said McNulty.

“I’m at a loss for words. I knew something could happen but it would take a miracle and I guess today a miracle happened”.

He launched an attack going into the final 30km and was 50 seconds clear going into the last lap.

McNulty visibly began to tire on the final climb and his lead was cut to just 10 seconds, but the chasing pack were unable to reel him in.

Britain’s Tom Pidcock finished seventh, with Ireland’s Ben Healy 10th and Remco Evenepoel of Belgium in 12th place.

Scotland and Northern Ireland secured qualification for the Netball World Cup after a three-day event in East Kilbride.

The top two sides from the four-team tournament won their spots in the finals, which take place in Sydney, Australia, with Wales and Republic of Ireland failing to qualify.

Northern Ireland’s emphatic 73-50 win in the early match on Sunday meant they would qualify should Scotland win or draw, while Wales’ only path to qualification was through a victory over Scotland.

Heading into the final match of the tournament between the Scots and Welsh, the event hosts had their spot in the finals secured unless Wales won with an overwhelming points haul and Scotland ran out 55-48 victors.

The World Cup runs from 25 August-5 September 2027.

Great Britain’s Beth Potter claimed silver at the World Championship Triathlon Series behind Olympic champion Cassandre Beaugrand of France.

The final event of the series took place in Pontevedra, Spain, where Potter needed a win to overhaul Beaugrand in the overall standings.

But she finished fourth, with team-mates Georgia Taylor-Brown and Kate Waugh finishing second and third behind Beaugrand.

Beaugrand won comfortably, completing the 1.5km swim, 40km bike ride and 10km run in one hour 50 minutes 52 seconds, which was over a minute quicker than Taylor-Brown.

Potter, who won the World Series at Pontevedra in 2023, remained in contention at the end of the cycle, but Beaugrand stretched clear of the three Brits in the second lap of the run and held firm.

It concludes a dominant season for Beaugrand, who has won all five of the World Championship circuit races she entered.

Taylor-Brown won the Czech Republic leg of the series earlier this month, which was her first win on the tour since 2023.

A UK-based theme park has beaten competition from across the globe to be named the best in the world, and a brand-new ride that only opened this summer also scooped a major award

The Park World Excellence Awards has named its top theme park picks for 2026, and the coveted Best of the Best award has been given to a British theme park that has beaten competition from across the world.

The north west resort scooped the prestigious prize at the awards ceremony held on Wednesday (September 23). The awards, which focus on parks in Europe, the Middle East and Asia, included categories from the Best Roller Coaster to the Best Water Park, and competition was stiff, with nominations for huge theme parks including PortAventura, Futuroscope, and Land of Legends.

Pleasure Beach Resort in Blackpool took the top prize, which was described as being awarded to “theme parks, rides, or tourist attractions recognised for excelling as the best of all time within its respected industry.” The Best of the Best award is given to parks that offer “the absolute pinnacle, reflecting everything that is great about our industry”.

Formerly known as Blackpool Pleasure Beach, the iconic theme park has been celebrating its 130-year anniversary in 2026, making it one of Europe’s oldest, and it is fourth-generation family-owned. It’s the first UK theme park to win the award, with former recipients including Germany’s Europa Park and Siam Park in Tenerife.

The theme park also scooped Best Ride of the Year for Aviktas, the largest ride of its kind in the UK, which swings passengers 138ft in the air on a rotating pendulum. Aviktas opened in May 2026 and was an £8.27 million addition to the park. Meanwhile, Valhalla, a Viking-themed attraction, was the runner-up in the Best Water Ride category. It’s the fifth time the water-based ride has been nominated in this category.

The Pleasure Beach Resort is also home to the UK’s only Nickelodeon Land, which includes SpongeBob SquarePants and PAW Patrol-themed rides for all the family.

It’s Halloween event, Journey to Hell, is set to open on October 17, just in time for half term. Described as an “immersive scare experience”, it’ll include three new scare mazes and a selection of rides that stay open until 9pm.

Amanda Thompson, managing director of the Pleasure Beach Resort, said in a statement: “To be named Best of the Best is a massive achievement for our park. Our industry is full of so much talent, so to be recognised among the best speaks volumes on the dedication and hard work that has kept us moving forward for 130 years.

“Avitkas has been a hugely valuable addition to the park and I’ve been delighted by its reception so far. If they haven’t already I’d absolutely encourage people to visit Pleasure Beach and give our ride, now recognised as one of the world’s best a go!”

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In an otherwise empty compartment of a regional train on its way to a small town in Germany last month, a friendly passenger asked if I was headed to Halberstadt for “the note change.” He was an Australian law professor based in Hong Kong who was traveling with his Swiss mother for the irregular ritual every few years of a new note being sounded on a decommissioned old church’s diminutive modern pipe organ in what feels like the middle of nowhere.

He was hardly alone. The audience the next day in the packed late-Romanesque St. Burchardi “John Cage Organ” Church had come from seemingly everywhere, along with international media, to witness a barely distinguishable new note added to a sustained chord in Cage’s “Organ2/ASLSP.”

“ASLSP” stands for as “As Slow(ly) and Soft(ly) as Possible,” adapted from the opening line of the final paragraph in James Joyce’s “Finnegans Wake”: “Soft morning City! Lsp.” Cage had meant his organ piece to enjoy the indeterminacy of neither the performer nor the audience knowing how long the score, in eight parts, would last. In Halberstadt, they are stretching it out 639 years! The performance began in 2001 with the intent that each note change would be a great event.

Four years ago, Times columnist Nicolas Goldberg wrote an opinion piece about his fascination with what to him sounded like a profound project about the meaning of time. I tried to talk him out of what I believed to be a gimmicky violation of the being-in-the-moment spirit of Cage. But what mattered to Nick was the idea, not the intent, and he used me in his column as a foil. Still, Cage has been central to my practicing what some people (not me) call music criticism, and I contended wild horses couldn’t drag me to Halberstadt.

Nevertheless, early August’s “From 7 to 8,” as the note change was advertised, occurred almost exactly to the day, as when, 50 years earlier, I filed my first music review in the Los Angeles Herald Examiner. This was also to be my last summer and 121st season on staff of the Los Angeles Times. I step down as music critic Friday. (I still plan to contribute to The Times on an irregular basis.)

I happened to be visiting the Salzburg Festival in August and, in a spirit of endgame, hopped on a train to Halberstadt. On the seven-hour ride, my half-century Cage-suffused career passed through my mind.

I thought about how Cage had once told me that when he was a boy in Los Angeles, he loved Grieg with no need to know why. When he studied music, reason replaced love. It was only regaining the ability to hear music as music that he could compose.

Cage described this as an example of the celebrated Zen koan about reality: First there is a mountain, then there is no mountain, then there is.

When I accidentally stumbled into music criticism with an academic penchant for music analysis, my crutches for writing about music were technical and of little use in a newspaper. I had to find a way to simply listen. It gave me new ears, and I was hooked.

Cage solved my next problem by insisting that the way to discover new things is to overcome our dependence on our likes and dislikes, those supposed pillars of criticism. College taught me to investigate the “great” composers who mattered and disdain those of no value. Consequently, I had never paid attention to the likes of Rachmaninoff and Shostakovich but discovered that they moved listeners deeply. Again, for me, so-called criticism proved a pathway to opening the mind, and writing about discovery is an ancient pleasure. Cage put it this way: “It’s not what I don’t know that scares me, it’s what I do know.”

The great enticement to return to L.A. after spending nine years in New York (and periodically reporting on Cage from the East Coast and Europe for The Times) was the prospect of Walt Disney Concert Hall. Construction hadn’t yet begun and fundraising was iffy; the community was scared about what it didn’t know. I came armed with another Cage-ism: Every seat is the best seat in the house.

I tried to get the Music Center to make that the motto of the hall. After all, Cage was born at Good Samaritan Hospital about a mile from Disney. That didn’t fly. Still, thanks to Frank Gehry, every seat meant every view inside and out was the best. Every way of seeing also meant every way of hearing. Disney taught L.A. the joy of architecture in a way many of us had never known in this haphazardly built town. Once it was built, there was no choice but to embark on an ongoing love letter to L.A.

Such thoughts on the Cage train poorly suited arriving in the heart of the state of Saxony-Anhalt. One of the first things to catch my eye was a campaign billboard for a far-right Alternative for Germany candidate. A month later AfD would win a landslide victory, dividing Germany and alarming much of Europe.

The streets were mostly deserted. There wasn’t much open, giving the handsome and well-preserved Halberstadt a “Twilight Zone” aura.

In the St. Burchardi Church in Halberstadt, Germany, “The Cage Organ Project” is to be played for 639 years.

(Mark Swed/Los Angeles Times)

Dawn, though, attracted life. “The Cage Organ Project” proved marvelous, to use one of Cage’s favorite words. Whether they were 200-euro ticket holders who had journeyed long and far to be in the church for the note change or the hundreds on complimentary folding chairs outside on the lawn, unshaded in the hot sun watching on large video screens and listening with the assist of a fine amplification system, the aura was now calmness, grace and gratitude.

Nick had been right all along. Time became grounded. The note change is a marker, but the organ, in which air is electronically blown through the pipes day and night for all to hear, has become an endearing sound that connects you to your being. Here and now and hear and now are the same.

ASLSP, moreover, reflects the magical unhurriedness the world craves, be it the slowing down of AI or turning down the volume on social media and politicians’ bully pulpits. None of this may have been on Cage’s mind when “Organ2/ASLSP” had its premiere in Metz, France, in 1987, five years before Cage’s death. That performance lasted a half hour. But Cage is no longer with us, and “Organ2/ASLSP” now has a marvelous life of its own.

One of my most memorable interviews at The Times was with the Dalai Lama in 1999. He had never given one about music and appeared at first sorry he had agreed to. Every question about music got a negative response. The only need he expressed for it was as a fundraising tool for his Tibetan government in exile.

Noting my distress, he explained the problem with music is how easily we get attached to it, and at the heart of Buddhism is nonattachment. Then, breaking the tension with his trademark belly laugh, he admitted his problem was attachment to Buddhism.

At Halberstadt, I may have found my way of letting go. But I also leave The Times with the gratitude not only for the freedom it allowed me to champion causes but also to be part of a very long, quirky process that makes this newspaper unique.

Going back to 1925, there have only been four Times classical music critics in 101 years, and arriving here in 1996, I immediately discovered my roots in Isabel Morse Jones. A violinist who covered music from 1925 to 1947, she was a modernist with her finger on the pulse of the times and stood in refreshing contrast to the fussy East Coast male critics.

She was said to have provided an intellectual awakening of music on the West Coast. She put the Hollywood Bowl on the map. She championed new music and not just the stellar locals, Stravinsky and Schoenberg, but also the avant-garde and world music no one else gave the time of day. After leaving The Times, Jones founded the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara originally modeled after the Salzburg Festival.

She threw her lot in with the society page editor, who covered women’s clubs. Together they became a power duo who campaigned to build a home for the Los Angeles Philharmonic, which three decades later led to the Music Center. That society editor — who chronicled and illuminated the social, political and artistic issues in L.A. in the 1930s from the women’s perspective — was Crete Cage. John Cage’s mother was a must-read for all women in L.A.

We cannot hold on to Cage, but we can’t escape him either. Times look bad. L.A. feels in the dumps. It was like that, as well, when I arrived at The Times in 1996. The city was still recovering from the 1992 riots — the beating of Rodney King had caused a profound social reckoning — and the 1994 earthquake. There was a recession. The L.A. Phil, now the model arts institution in the country if not the world, was millions of dollars in the hole.

Today, catastrophe is wherever you look. The Olympics, the environment, the damn developers, self-driving cars, LAX. The news business isn’t so hot either.

But let history — and John Cage — remind us that opening our ears can be the conduit to opening our minds. We have a wealth of new artistic leadership on the way at the L.A. Phil, L.A. Opera, L.A. Chamber orchestra and Pacific Symphony; new management at the L.A. Master Chorale and the Wallis and Long Beach Opera. And new ideas all around us.

Just as Disney Hall spread joy when we needed it most, one of Gehry’s final masterpieces is taking shape, the Colburn Center on 2nd Street a block from Disney. I took a hard-hat tour after returning home from Halberstadt and experienced the same combination of awe and promise. When it opens next year, it will be a game changer.

And even here, Cage the connector can’t keep out. At the press opening of Peter Zumthor’s new LACMA building, I buttonholed the architect, telling him I see John Cage all over the place. He looked startled for a moment and then with an uncharacteristic grin replied that he considered that a welcome compliment. Chance, he said, is very important.

Across town, one of MOCA’s most successful exhibitions was its 1993 Cage celebration, “Rolywholyover A Circus.” Cage asked for natural light, so that paintings would always look different whenever you saw them. He wanted the surprise of artwork hung in an unpredictable fashion. He wanted to let the outdoors in and the indoors out.

It is no coincidence that this describes aspects of the new LACMA. “Rolywholyover” traveled to the Guggenheim in New York’s SoHo district the next year, and the young curator in charge was Michael Govan, LACMA’s visionary head behind the Zumthor galleries.

Along with the new LACMA building we have a new Metro D Line stop nearby. Now a direct connector between LACMA and the Colburn Center passes almost directly under Good Samaritan Hospital.

Let me make my last suggestion as “music critic.” How about naming the new D Line connection between LACMA and the Colburn Center the John Cage Express?

Not everything has to be as slow as possible.

YOU don’t have to go far to find one of the world’s best theme parks.

Pleasure Beach in Blackpool has just been crowned the ‘Best of the Best’ in the Park World Excellence Awards.

The ‘Best of the Best’ award is given to theme parks, rides, or tourist attractions that are the ‘best of all time’ within its part of the industry.

And this is the first time a UK theme park has won the award, with previous winners including Europa Park, Siam Park and Liseberg.

The park has around 30 attractions including huge rollercoasters and water rides.

And one of the rides is Aviktas, which opened in May 2026 and has also been named the ‘Best Ride of the Year’ at the awards.

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The £8.7million ride is the largest ride of its kind in the UK, swinging riders 42 metres into the air on a rotating pendulum.

Amanda Thompson OBE, CEO of Pleasure Beach Resort said: “To be named Best of the Best is a massive achievement for our park.

“Our industry is full of so much talent, so to be recognised among the best speaks volumes on the dedication and hard work that has kept us moving forward for 130 years.

“Aviktas has been a hugely valuable addition to the park and I’ve been delighted by its reception so far.

“If they haven’t already I’d absolutely encourage people to visit Pleasure Beach and give our ride, now recognised as one of the world’s best a go!”

If you fancy heading to the theme park this autumn, Pleasure Beach Resort will remain open for most of September and October.

In October, you could also head to the theme park’s Halloween event – Journey to Hell – where you head through an immersive scare experience with three new scare mazes.

Prime Minister Balendra Shah told the UN that world leaders must act on climate change.

Nepal’s Prime Minister Balendra Shah has appealed for action to combat the rising threat of climate change, calling the flood that devastated his country last month “a warning to the world”.

Shah made the comments during his address to the 81st Session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York on Thursday night. He told the gathering that the August disaster “was not just a local tragedy”, asking them the question, “Have you really heard that warning?”

Political leaders “have been negligent to translate those warnings in action at the speed and scale that the vulnerable people require,” he said.

At least 1,453 people died when a torrent of mud, rock and water struck northern Nepal and the China-Tibet border on August 26, triggered by a glacial collapse.

According to Nepal’s National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority, 5,500 people were still missing and 13,795 had been rescued.

Researchers from the World Weather Attribution (WWA) group said in a report released last week that the disaster was not caused by a single extreme weather event, but rather a “compound crisis” shaped by long-term warming, glacier retreat, permafrost thaw and geological instability.

Shah said climate change was hurting people not responsible for the crisis but who “are paying a colossal price for it”.

He said Nepal contributed less than one-tenth of 1 percent of the heat-trapping gases behind climate change. About 99 percent of the country’s electricity comes from hydropower, and many workers were trapped in tunnels by the flooding.

“Our glaciers are retreating, our mountain slopes are becoming unstable, our rivers are becoming less predictable, and every major disaster threatens to erase years of development,” Shah said.

Shah urged the international community to help bear the cost of helping Nepal adapt to climate change.

He proposed to create a ‘Himalaya Climate Resilience Mechanism’ which would include Nepal and neighbours India and China, and would allow them to share satellite data and expertise, monitor glacial lakes and strengthen joint early warning systems.

Nepal has asked the UN’s loss and damage fund for $20m in aid, the maximum allowed, but a tiny fraction of what it needs. A preliminary assessment by the government has placed the cost of the disaster at $5bn.

The fund, established in 2022 in the aftermath of catastrophic floods in Pakistan, has yet to make even its first disbursement, and observers see Nepal as a key test of its credibility.

Earlier this week, the United States pledged an additional $31m in new flood recovery support.

Daley Cross, manager of the England team, said of Lucy’s role: “She was just trying to do her best for him and trying to find a way to motivate him.

“His wife did drop in the conversation that he used to play at Manchester United as a schoolboy. So that got our ears twitched instantly.

“You could tell from him being on the pitch, even though he was so fresh into his journey, that he knew the football game and he would be such an incredible asset to us.

“You can be in a dark place, at the time of diagnosis, through your treatment or even post-transplant. So to have us exist to help and inspire people means that we are getting some incredible footballers.

“And that really is the power of it: to that transplant community or to the world, showing people that when you’ve had organ failure, your life isn’t over. There is a chance for you, and you can go and resume and live your life.”

As the recipient of a donor heart, Jackson has to manage his exercise workload more carefully than his team-mates, many of whom have had kidney transplants, the most common transplant in the UK.

His role in the side tends to involve 10-minute bursts, rather than playing for the duration of matches.

Great Britain’s impressive rider line-up for cycling’s Road World Championships means the team have rarely stood a better chance of glory.

For the men, there is also the helpful factor of Slovenian superstar Tadej Pogacar being absent, after he suffered crash injuries during the Vuelta a Espana in August.

But at the same time a new generation of British cycling talent is rising, and GB riders could take the coveted winner’s rainbow jersey in the men’s and women’s road races in Montreal this weekend.

While Pogacar crashed out of the Vuelta, the race showcased the continued emergence of 21-year-old British rider Matthew Brennan, who won five stages of the three-week endurance test for Visma Lease a Bike – a record for a Grand Tour debutant.

There are currently 49 British riders competing across the men’s and women’s world tours – more than ever before – and some of those will compete in this World Championship weekend.

The road race itself is much like a stage of the Tour de France, but in which riders compete in national squads, looking to out-think and out-muscle each other.

A lot of the British potential is thanks to the inspiration of British cycling’s golden period, which featured great success from the likes of Team Sky, Mark Cavendish and Lizzie Deignan across the past 15 years.

Deignan won the road race in 2015, while Cavendish triumphed in 2011.

In total, British riders have won the elite road races seven times, including Tom Simpson (1965), Beryl Burton (1960 & 1967), Mandy Jones (1982) and Nicole Cooke (2008).

Amid an unpredictable performance landscape for the women, Britain’s best young female riders have a chance to infiltrate the once-dominant Dutch contingent.

Tour de France Femmes winner Demi Vollering remains the sport’s best overall, but Briton Zoe Backstedt’s brilliant second place in Sunday’s Worlds time trial was her first shot at the elite level.

She will be involved in Saturday’s women’s road race, and Olympic mountain bike gold medallist and Tour de France stage winner Tom Pidcock will race for the men on Sunday.

“You need a lot of faith in your team to be present at the front,” Backstedt told BBC Sport. “You need to talk, hear, see and feel each other to know they are there, especially as there’s no team radio.

“Obviously it’s about knowing the big names to follow. If Demi or Kasia [Niewiadoma] go off the front, you know it’s a dangerous move and you need to be there.

“But we’ve got a super strong team, and if any one of us was with them, we all could stand have a chance.”

The women’s road race is 180.4km long, which includes eight laps of Montreal, and the men’s 273.2km race incorporates 12 circuits.

Goalkeepers: Eartha Cumings (Manchester City), Lee Gibson (Glasgow City), Sandy MacIver (Washington Spirit).

Defenders: Georgia Brown (Jacksonville), Jenna Clark (Liverpool), Nicola Docherty (Rangers), Sophie Howard (Como), Emma Lawton (Ipswich Town), Rachel McLauchlan (Newcastle United), Amy Muir (Glasgow City).

Midfielders: Chelsea Cornet (Birmingham City), Erin Cuthbert (Chelsea), Christy Grimshaw (AC Milan), Sam Kerr (Liverpool), Kirsty Maclean (Liverpool), Maria McAneny (Celtic), Miri Taylor (Aston Villa), Caroline Weir (Lyon).

Forwards: Lauren Davidson (Brann), Claire Emslie (Angel City), Freya Gregory (Newcastle United), Kirsty Hanson (Tottenham Hotspur), Kirsty Howat (Crystal Palace), Mia McAulay (Aston Villa), Kathleen McGovern (Newcastle United), Martha Thomas (Newcastle United).

Sept. 22, 2026 6:56 PM PT

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration plans to limit the number of refugees admitted to the country to 17,500 mostly white South Africans, the administration told Congress on Tuesday, as it continues to transform a program that at one point served as a pathway to safety for people fleeing war and strife from countries around the world.

In a notice to Congress obtained by the Associated Press, the administration said the white South Africans faced seizures of their land and other forms of persecution and would be likely to assimilate when they come to America. The South African government has repeatedly rejected the idea that the white South Africans, who are Afrikaners, are a persecuted minority in the home country.

The Trump administration has dramatically altered a refugee program that historically enjoyed strong bipartisan support as it welcomed tens of thousands of refugees from countries around the world to new lives in America, and instead the administration has transformed it into a vehicle to resettle white South Africans in America.

The administration told Congress in the announcement that it intended to spend about $500 million to resettle the new arrivals to the U.S.

Presidents set the cap on how many refugees the U.S. will approve through the program each year, and historically, they’ve allocated those numbers across various geographic regions while factoring in wars or conflicts that spark humanitarian needs around the globe.

Santana and Kim write for the Associated Press.

POP star Zara Larsson has made waves rocking a purple bikini on Instagram in a striking, nighttime photoshoot.

The Swedish singer, 28, can be seen posing on a beach, bathed in dark lighting with dramatic flash photography and an E.T vibe.

The blonde bombshell can be seen wearing a tiny metallic purple string bikini paired with her long blonde hair down with decorative glowing star stickers scattered across her skin.

The visual highlights several dynamic poses, including standing centered within a mesmerising circular swirl pattern carved into the sand, crouching low to the ground and striking side-profile silhouettes.

Injecting a touch of humour into the artistic drop, the post also features a playful product shot of a water bottle sitting upright in the middle of the sand ripples.

The post quickly drew hundreds of thousands of likes and a flood of enthusiastic comments from fans praising her look.

Fans commented: “God is a woman.”

A second playfully wrote: “She can just do that with the sand btw.”

A third added: “BODY WAS SCULPTED FROM THE GODS.”

Zara recently addressed the White House social media team’s use of her song Midnight Sun in a TikTok video featuring Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations captioned ‘Never ending deportations’.

In a response shared on TikTok, Larsson expressed her sadness and heavy heart regarding the situation.

She shared a message directed at the creators of the video and wrote: “I wish I could talk to you, and I wish I could help you remember that you and I, we aren’t that different at all.

“And we’re not that different from the people in the video, either.

“The biggest difference between us is that we were dealt a different hand in life.”

The singer continued: “I consider myself so lucky with the life that I’ve been dealt.

“The fact that I’m born in Sweden, I’ve had an education and I’ve had all these opportunities just sort of laid out in front of me.

“I can travel and get to do all these amazing things. That’s luck.

“There are people out there who are not that lucky, and they want to have a better life for their families or for themselves and their children.

“I just don’t understand how it could be the worst thing in the world to be an undocumented immigrant.”

Larsson continued: “This video is so dehumanizing. These people in the video are real people.

“It’s so crazy how everything is so meme-ified, especially ‘Midnight Sun,’ which is about feeling connected to nature, the universe and people, essentially.

“And this just creates this massive divide between people. I just don’t get it. It’s so f***ing uncool… You guys are such f***ing losers, like it’s crazy.”

WASHINGTON — President Trump on Monday headed into a week full of high-stake meetings with world leaders after spending a 72-hour period banning reporters from the White House, mulling whether it was time to “blow … up” Iran, and proposing to house military drones and snipers in his triumphal arch in the nation’s capital.

The weekend — which also included the announcement of a security deal over Greenland and the creation of a new “A.I. Force” — captured an American president operating unpredictably across multiple fronts even as each one drew friction. The actions now stand to color the backdrop of a week that will feature meetings with world leaders at the United Nations General Assembly in New York and a state visit by Chinese President Xi Jinping in Washington.

Each of those moves carries its own political weight ahead of the diplomatic talks, but also ahead of the midterm elections, where these topics are front and center in key races.

Trump’s handling of the Iran war, its subsequent shocks to the global economy, his push to fast-track the development of artificial intelligence and the Greenland agreement are likely to come up in meetings with world leaders. His deal with Denmark to bolster U.S. military presence in Greenland, a territory Trump has repeatedly tried to annex, is expected to be signed Tuesday in New York, though action is still needed by the Danish and Greenland governments before it can be enforced.

While all the details of the Greenland deal are not public yet, Trump has said it is a “dream come true for the United States of America.”

“This solution is a great one for the United States of America, Denmark, Greenland and all of our Allies,” Trump wrote on social media Friday. “We look forward to working with the wonderful people of Denmark and Greenland toward a magnificent future with respect to this large, and highly strategic, parcel of land. We will be very protective of it.”

In an interview Sunday, Trump also indicated that he was trying to make a decision on Iran as the war stretches into its eighth month. The president said he would “probably be open” to meeting with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian during the U.N. General Assembly.

“My question is, if and when do I blow the entire nation up?” Trump told Fox News. “They better behave.”

Of all the actions Trump took, the press dispute has become the most contentious and drawn an immediate legal response. Three major news outlets — CNN, MS NOW and Politico — sued the Trump administration Monday for banning their reporters from the White House grounds, and major television networks suspended their pool coverage of the president’s activities.

In a joint statement, the organizations said the White House has acted “without notice or process” and called the arbitrary decision a “blatant violation” of the 1st Amendment.

Trump, meanwhile, argued Monday that the banned news outlets are “corrupt” and a “threat to our national security.”

Vice President JD Vance defended the press ban.

“He’s not banning media outlets. What he’s doing is saying we’re not going to give you special access to the White House if you engage in what is effectively propaganda,” Vance said Monday, arguing that the three outlets push out “negative” coverage of Trump.

The tense showdown between Trump and the White House press corps led to audio problems during the president’s ribbon-cutting ceremony for a new helipad on the South Lawn. Without television cameras and microphones set up by the major TV networks, it was impossible to hear what Trump was saying through the White House’s official YouTube stream, signaling further technical difficulties in the week ahead.

Behind the public displays of control, news reports have painted a picture of a president increasingly frustrated by the lack of credit he feels he is owed. At a recent closed-door meeting, reported by the Wall Street Journal, Trump told advisors he was aggravated that his allies hadn’t lauded him enough for his efforts to take over the Kennedy Center or other accomplishments made during his second term.

Trump has tried to put his name on the building’s facade and run into resistance from Democrats, arts patrons and a federal judge who blocked the move last week. Trump was then photographed aboard Air Force One looking at a large printout appearing to show demolition plans for the center.

Over the weekend, Trump posted on social media a link to a news article that claimed he was seeking to fix “safety hazards” at the performance center. He then posted an image of him watching the Western Hemisphere with the words, “His Hemisphere,” and wrote that his proposed triumphal arch near the National Mall would be used as a military complex for drones and snipers.

Trump also announced that he would be creating the “A.I. force,” modeled after the Space Force he launched during his first term, to ensure the country does not “in any way hinder or stifle the growth of the industry.” The announcement came amid growing backlash to data centers and the fast-paced development of artificial intelligence, an issue that in recent weeks has prompted stark warnings about the technology’s power and its threats to humanity.

Tech executives, including Dario Amodei and Sam Altman, have even called for a slowdown on the technology’s advancement and last week, four leading AI companies — Anthropic, OpenAI, SpaceXAI and Google — faced a lawsuit claiming they made an illegal deal to slow the pace of their respective AI development.

Trump’s announcement over the weekend comes as lawmakers, including congressional Republicans in tight races, have called for new guardrails on the technology.

Despite technology becoming a political flashpoint during the midterms, Trump has dismissed concerns about AI as a hoax and asserted that those who oppose data centers are intent on being “backwards and poor.”

Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) is among the lawmakers who have called for action on regulating the technology, and he has warned that not doing so could come at a cost on Nov. 3.

“We really need to send a memo around explaining we’ve got midterm elections coming,” Kennedy told Politico. “I may send that out.”

The UN chief’s mandate ends on December 31 this year, with a successor yet to be named.

The state of the world seems to be getting worse due to a “dramatic geopolitical divide” that is leaving “the most vulnerable countries and populations in very dramatic situations” and that “paralyses the Security Council”, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has told Al Jazeera.

Speaking on Monday, the first day of the UN General Assembly (UNGA) in New York City, Guterres said that major military conflicts happening in the world at the moment, the Russia-Ukraine war and the US-Israel war on Iran, have created a crisis due to the continued violations of international law by “superpowers” that are key members of the UN Security Council (UNSC).

“That creates an environment of impunity, in which midsize powers believe that they can do whatever they want because nothing will happen to them,” Guterres told Al Jazeera, admitting that “wars are becoming multiplied, and more and more complex”.

The UN chief outlined the real-life impacts that these two wars are having on people on a humanitarian level, particularly around food accessibility, rising fuel prices, and global inflation.

“The combination of the war in Ukraine with the problems of exports of foods, fertilisers, and energy through the Black Sea, if you combine it with the difficulties in the Strait of Hormuz [in the Gulf], in the Bab al-Mandeb [in the Red Sea], and in the attacks [on] oil installations in several countries of the [Middle East] region, we are creating a situation that has a devastating impact on many economies around the world,” Guterres said.

He added that rising interest rates and fuel prices in developed countries could eventually be managed, whereas people in the developing world “are in a desperate situation” due to the increasing energy and food costs and the lack of fertilisers.

Dire need for reforms

Guterres, who previously served as prime minister of Portugal and UN high commissioner for refugees, has been the UN chief since January 1, 2017, though his mandate is coming to an end on December 31, 2026.

His successor, who is yet to be named, will take charge of an organisation that is grappling with multiple crises and is, in Guterres’s opinion, in dire need of reforms to stay relevant and important on the global stage. He notably cited the UNSC, saying it “still essentially represents the world of World War II”.

Candidates in the running to replace Guterres include the International Atomic Energy Agency’s Rafael Grossi, former Senegalese President Macky Sall and Ecuadorian diplomat Maria Fernanda Espinosa.

To be recommended by the UNSC, a candidate for UN secretary-general needs at least nine of the council’s 15 members to vote in favour and must avoid a veto from any of the five permanent members – China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States – before a final vote in the UNGA.

Great Britain became World Team Cup champions for the fifth time as Alfie Hewett and Gordon Reid joined forces to secure a 2-1 victory over Japan in Florida.

Japan were the defending champions of the competition, which is the wheelchair tennis equivalent to the Davis Cup and Billie Jean King Cup.

However, Hewett and Reid ensured Britain got their hands back on the trophy with a 6-1 6-2 win in the deciding doubles match against Tokito Oda and Daisuke Arai.

“We’re really happy to get the title back,” said Reid, who was also part of the World Team Cup-winning squad alongside Hewett in 2015, 2019, 2023 and 2024.

Hewett added: “It’s the first time it’s come down to the deciding doubles for us, so I’m just really happy that we got over the line.

“It’s always a privilege to play for your country and there’s been a great atmosphere and team spirit again this week between all the lads.”

Reid got Britain off to a winning start on Saturday with a commanding 6-2 6-2 victory over world number 21 Arai, who he has now beaten in all five encounters between the pair.

The start of the second singles match was then delayed because of extreme heat in Orlando, with Hewett and Oda returning to court six hours later when temperatures had cooled.

Just a week after beating the world number one in the singles final of the US Open, Hewett was unable to repeat his feat as he fell to a narrow 6-4 7-5 loss.

“I’m a bit disappointed that it wasn’t a 100% day after my loss in the singles, but it was a really high-level match and just came down to a few points in both sets that could have gone either way,” he said.

However, Hewett bounced back in the doubles alongside Reid as Britain, who also had 21-year-old Ben Bartram in the team and were captained by Martyn Whait, backed up their wins against South Korea and the Netherlands earlier this week.

TOMORROW night in Philadelphia, Ed Sheeran is expected to return to the stage for the first time since the biggest crisis of his career began.

Venues and promoters removed rapper Macklemore as the opening act on his US tour for voicing pro-Palestinian views on stage — prompting a legion of musicians, many of whom were British megastar Ed’s friends, to publicly turn against him over the past week.

This evening at Lincoln Financial Field, Ed will perform to 60,000 fans alone, with just his guitar and his trusted loop pedal, after Irish singer Aaron Rowe and Danish group Lukas Graham pulled out as support acts.

Irish folk group Beoga have performed with Ed on every night of the Loop World Tour — but they have also withdrawn, along with Billie ­Eilish’s brother Finneas, who was due to open six of Ed’s south ­American dates later this year.

“The world feels like a very lonely place for Ed right now,” an insider tells me.

“He couldn’t have done more to change the situation. He genuinely tried everything. This pile-on has been awful.”

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I’m told dad-of-two Ed, 35, is ­planning on pushing ahead with the concert this evening before taking a view on the remaining ten dates across the US before his shows in South America.

My insider explained: “He wants the tour to continue for fans.

“They will have spent a lot of money on travel and hotels and will want to see him perform.

“The plan is to see how it goes tonight and then Ed and his team can take a view on whether they will carry on or not.”

Last night local action groups Philly Palestine Coalition and Shut Down D&Z confirmed they would be demonstrating at the train station closest to the venue.

Police said they would be increasing patrols in the area and were dispatching extra officers to the area around Lincoln Financial Field before the concert starts at 8pm.

Jasmine Reilly, a spokesman for the Philadelphia Police Department, said last night: “Our officers are talking to Ed’s team to make sure all appropriate measures are taken.”

A second source told me: “A nightmare scenario is if unrest begins inside before or during the show. It’s a possibility because of the heightened emotions with everything that is going on right now.

“Naturally Ed and his team’s concerns are for the safety of the people inside and outside the venue.”

Tonight’s gig will take place 15 days after Macklemore lit the touchpaper under Bad Habits hitmaker Ed.

The rapper — real name Benjamin Haggerty — played his pro-Palestinian protest song Hind’s Hall in New Jersey before telling the crowd: “A big part of the reason why I wanted to do this tour in the first place is so I could stand up in ­stadiums like this and say two words that are very near and dear to my heart: Free Palestine.”

The next day he stood on stage again at the MetLife Stadium and declared: “To all of my Jewish brothers and sisters: criticism of Israel, criticism of apartheid, being against genocide in no way is a criticism of you.”

Two days later, the Israeli-American Council published a ­petition calling for Macklemore to be removed from Ed’s shows.

On September 8, Jewish singer Pink ramped up emotions when she shared a statement on Instagram with her 11.7million followers.

She blasted Macklemore for going on stage “in front of a stadium full of music-loving families, with violent images from a war on the screens, dedicated a song to the movement of his choice, and then took the mic to tell all of the Jews in the stadium that it wasn’t about them.”

Three days later Macklemore was removed from Ed’s tour. US promoters Messina Touring Group said that it had been notified by venues on Ed’s US tour that they “will not allow a concert to take place with Macklemore on the line-up.”

In a statement calling Ed a “brother”, the rapper said: “Nothing I’m writing here is out of spite or because I want to tear down his character.

“But as I told Ed multiple times on the phone, our friendship can’t change my responsibility to tell the truth about what happened.”

Macklemore explained that Ed had told him billionaire Robert Kraft, the owner of the New England Patriots American football team and their Gillette Stadium in Massachusetts, would not allow him to play the two dates there on September 25 and 26.

Macklemore added: “Ed was in a f***ed-up position.

“His typical apolitical stance was being challenged in a way it never had been before.

“He told me that the words ‘Free Palestine’ and the image of the Palestinian flag were hurtful to a lot of people he spoke with. I told him that if those words were more ­offensive than tens of thousands of Palestinian children being killed by Israel, then there was a fundamental disconnect between where those ­people stood and where I stood.

“But he couldn’t get past his public-facing, ‘I don’t take sides.’ ”

The next day Ed addressed the ­situation in a statement to his 47million Instagram followers and revealed the lengths he had gone to in a bid to get everyone back on board.

He said he had spoken to “activists on both sides” as well as the owners of stadiums to find unity and that he was “appalled” by the conflict.

Ed added: “I am not complicit. I have my personal views on this devastating conflict. Just because I choose not to speak publicly, it doesn’t mean I don’t have them, and it doesn’t mean I don’t care.

“Macklemore coming off the tour was the promoter’s decision, it was not mine.

“I would never let down the fans who had made plans, nor would I abandon the touring crew and the other support acts and musicians who rely on me for work.”

Explaining his decision to remain apolitical, he said: “There is a ­reason I do not use my professional platform for politics.

“My audience includes young people, often children, of all backgrounds.

“Those who come to my shows do not expect a political forum. I respect Macklemore’s strength of purpose to stand up and shout for what he believes in.

“However there is room for multiple approaches to the same end: peace.”

He concluded: “I have spent this week trying to build bridges, to find a solution, and unfortunately I was unable to do so.

“I know who I am, both as a person and as an artist, and those who know my heart know my values too.”

Despite his attempts to make amends, Ed was left flattened the following day as the artists on his tour started to pull out.

In a statement, Irish group Beoga said: “To play in venues that silence anyone advocating for Free Palestine is simply not an option for us.”

Pro-Israeli billionaire Kraft then came out fighting in Ed’s corner.

Shortly after Macklemore announced he was donating his $1million fee for the tour to humanitarian organisations providing aid to Palestinians, Kraft said Ed had been in touch before asking to match a donation he had made.

Kraft said: “I have dedicated much of my life to building bridges between all people.

“I believe deeply that all lives are worth protecting.

“Earlier today, before Macklemore challenged me to match his donation, Ed called me and asked me to commit $2million to match his donation to aid in the region to fight this humanitarian crisis.

“Ed now plans to reach out to other venue owners and our goal is to continue to work together to build bridges.”

Kraft also pointedly recalled Macklemore’s stunt in 2014, where he performed on stage in a costume which featured anti-Semitic tropes.

Macklemore apologised and said he did not mean to offend anyone but conceded the outfit could have looked like a “Jewish caricature”.

In the days prior to tonight’s show, high-profile stars have waded into the row, including British singer Paloma Faith, Hacks actress Hannah Einbinder and Formula 1 champ Lewis Hamilton.

The controversy also spilled over into politics, with US senator ­Bernie Sanders blasting Kraft.

The Democrat wrote: “In the United States of America, billionaire stadium owners should not be able to silence artists because they speak out on political issues.

“Today it is the genocide in Gaza. What’s next? If they can silence one artist, they can silence anyone.”

Since his statement, Ed has not spoken and is, insiders tell me, “staying focused” on the hours ahead of the concert.

A source said: “Ed has never faced anything like this before.

“It’s been devastating. He is trying to do the right thing by everyone. Sadly that isn’t always possible.

“As he said in his statement he has his own views on the conflict.

“Just because he has not been public in speaking about them, it doesn’t mean he doesn’t care or hasn’t actively been helping in whatever way he can.”

EVER dreamt of getting a World Record? Well, you soon can have a chance at securing one in a huge new UK attraction dedicated entirely Guinness World Records.

Guinness World Records London, which is the first permanent entertainment venue from Guinness World Records, will open at The O2 in Greenwich, this winter.

Spanning across 2,322sqm, Guinness World Records London will be home to 45 different official Record Challenges, in five arenas.

Challenges include Loudest Scream, Fastest Typist, Fastest Basketball and Fastest Buzzwire.

Visitors testing out the different challenges could even walk away a Guinness World Record holder themselves.

There will be a number of interactive exhibits as well.

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While no specific opening date has been revealed yet, on the attraction’s website it states “late 2026” as the expected opening.

The website adds that there will also be “themed food and drink”, as well as a shop with “record-breaking souvenirs”.

Ahead of the attraction opening to the public, Guinness World Record London are looking for the UK’s most competitive family.

The winning family will be the first to look at the new attraction and try out the different challenges.

Will Munford, Adjudicator at Guinness World Records, said: “Guinness World Records London will give every guest the unique chance to take on our line-up of brilliantly fun and exciting record attempts, and potentially walk away a world record breaker themselves.

“We know how competitive families can get, so we want to find out who is the most competitive of them all and get them along to our new attraction to see if they have what it takes to become our first record breakers!”

WANT to know what true happiness feels like? You’ll need to ditch crowded European beaches for mud-covered, chill out sessions and freezing cold lakes.

Earlier this year, Finland was named the happiest country in the world for the ninth year running.

According to the World Population Review, Finland scored 7.74 out of 10 overall in the most recent index – compared to the world average which is 5.57.

The happiness score factors are calculated across six categories including social support, life expectancy and freedom to make choices.

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The report also mentions that top-ranked countries tend to have a combination of a higher income average, longer life expectancy and great freedom.

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So on a recent trip to Finland, I really put those stats to the test exploring different parts of Finnish life and culture to find out just why they are so cheerful.

Saunas

If the Finns are known for one thing, it is their saunas.

With a staggering 3.2million saunas compared to 5.2million people, there is nearly a sauna per 1.6 people.

And until experiencing the sauna culture in the country for myself, I didn’t get the hype.

But being in a sauna is the ultimate relaxation.

And they aren’t all the same kind – you get saunas of different temperatures, wood-fired saunas, smoke saunas and so on.

My favourite was the peat sauna, where I covered myself in mud and let it harden before scrubbing it off in the shower.

It is meant to do wonders for your skin and I did feel very refreshed and clean afterwards.

Saunas are also proven to be good for your health, with benefits for your heart, circulation and stress levels – promoting relaxation, better well-being and a decent night’s sleep.

Free foraging

In Finland, there are Everyman’s Rights – a traditional legal principle that allows everyone to freely explore nature without the landowner’s permission or having to pay a fee.

Whether it be swimming, walking, cycling or even riding a horse, you are allowed to do it all – even on privately owned land.

As part of the rights, you are allowed to pick wild berries, mushrooms and flowers as long as they are not protected species.

And Finland is abundant with tasty berries such as blueberries and lingonberries and mushrooms, such as chanterelles and porcini.

I love UK forests and it is always fun to see different mushrooms, but having such a variety that are safe to eat is something a little more special.

Forests & lakes

Seventy per cent of Finland is covered in forest and 10 per cent of the land area is lakes.

With that in mind, there are a lot of lush green places to walk and open calm waters to swim in.

In total, Finland has around 188,000 lakes with the largest being Lake Saimaa, which is where I visited.

Despite the water being a chilly 17C, thanks to the Everyman’s Rights you can dip in and out as much as you like.

The refreshing dips truly are invigorating and very relaxing if paired with a session in a sauna.

Most of the lakes are surrounded by dense forest with towering trees that look like they have been ripped out of a fairytale.

You can spend even longer enjoying it as you are allowed to pitch a tent for a night or two freely.

Kota culture

Across the parks, forests and at the edge of lakes you will find these cosy-looking indoor-outdoor cabins.

These are actually nicknamed ‘kota’ or ‘Grillikota’ and are shelters invented by the indigenous Sami people of Lapland around 4,000 years ago.

Over the years, the huts have been modernised relevant to today’s uses and now they are usually hexagonal or octagonal wooden cabins along hiking trails used to grill sausages and make food while enjoying outdoor adventures.

Public huts, such as those I found on one of the many islands on Lake Saimaa, are unlocked and free to use and are usually managed by the Finnish Forest Administration.

There only tends to be one rule and that is that the space must always be made for the newest, most exhausted hiker who arrives.

Firewood is also provided for free at public kotas and you must leave no trace.

Less people

Finland is about 1.4 times bigger than the UK, yet the country’s population (5.2million) is just over half the population of the UK’s capital, London (9.1million).

While initially I felt a little uncomfortable when walking around Imatra and seeing no people, it means that everywhere is so peaceful and constantly clean.

The entire time I was in Finland I didn’t see a single piece of rubbish – but with an incentive of around 20 cents per bottle you recycle, it’s easy to see why.

TORONTO — Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney is heading to Europe in the middle of a trade war with President Trump, seeking a deeper relationship with the European Union that could give Canadians greater freedom to work and study there.

Canada will seek an arrangement that would allow Canadians to live and work in Europe without visas as part of a strategic partnership, according to a senior Canadian official familiar with the discussions.

The official said Ottawa is not seeking to replicate the arrangements Norway or Switzerland have with the EU and did not propose “associate membership,” a term used in a recent report. Canada instead wants a partnership tailored to its priorities, with investment at its core.

Roughly 70% of Canadian exports go to the United States. Europe is central to Carney’s effort to reduce that dependence.

Carney has ruled out EU membership, saying Canada instead wants “a unique security and economic alliance” with the bloc. He said formal discussions will begin next month.

Economics is only part of the push, Carney said Tuesday. “The core of this, yes, there is an economic component, but it is about greater sovereignty,” he said.

Canadian government officials have consulted provinces and labor groups but have not settled on what form the relationship should take. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the talks publicly.

Carney’s Trump challenge returns to Europe

Carney will attend European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen’s State of the Union address Wednesday as a guest of honor before addressing the European Parliament on Thursday.

Carney cautioned against expecting a major announcement in Europe, saying the “real deepening discussions” will begin at the Canada-EU summit in Montreal in late October.

The trip puts him back on the European stage as relations with Washington reel from tariffs, threats and personal attacks since trade talks collapsed.

Carney said Tuesday that economic integration, once viewed largely as an asset, is increasingly “being used as a weapon by certain countries,” making it more important for Canada to deepen ties with trusted partners. He is also carrying to Europe a message that has won praise there but that European governments have been reluctant to follow in dealing with the United States: Middle powers should resist economic coercion and be willing to walk away from a bad deal.

Carney’s Davos speech on middle powers in January drew a personal rebuke from Trump, and another forceful defense could raise the temperature again.

Canada has retaliated against U.S. tariffs and rejected terms Carney says would weaken its sovereignty. Europe, by contrast, shelved retaliation and accepted a deal leaving most EU exports to the U.S. facing tariffs of up to 15%.

That choice is striking given the EU’s economic weight as the world’s largest trading bloc.

At Davos in January, Carney urged middle powers to band together rather than bow to great powers. When countries negotiate alone with a hegemon, he said, “we negotiate from weakness. We accept what is offered.”

“This is not sovereignty,” Carney said. “It is the performance of sovereignty while accepting subordination.”

In a European Parliament debate in March, French lawmaker Chloe Ridel said Carney had “said out loud what many Europeans think quietly,” while German lawmaker Tobias Cremer urged Europe to “show the same courage as the Canadians have done in this moment of rupture.”

Tobias Gehrke of the European Council on Foreign Relations said Europe accepted economic pain in hopes of preserving U.S. support for NATO and Ukraine, but gained neither firm security commitments nor stable ties with Washington.

“European governments will be watching closely to see whether retaliation creates leverage or simply produces more escalation and an increasing bill,” Gehrke said.

Building a hedge against Washington

Canadian Finance Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne rejected the idea that Canada’s push toward Europe is simply an effort to gain leverage over Washington, saying Ottawa intends to keep working with the United States even as it builds stronger partnerships elsewhere.

“It’s always about us,” Champagne told the Associated Press. “We will still do things with the United States.”

But Champagne also said the geopolitical landscape has fundamentally shifted. “The world has changed and America has changed,” he said. “And I think the world has taken notice.”

Carney’s trip follows his global investment summit in Toronto, part of a broader push to attract international capital and reduce dependence on the United States.

Canada and the EU already cooperate on trade, defense, energy, technology and critical minerals. Bilateral trade reached about $147 billion in 2025, making the EU Canada’s second-largest trading partner.

Europe moves closer to Canada too

Underscoring the push for closer ties, the European Parliament said Monday that it will open an office in Ottawa, its 10th outside the EU, with a regional mandate extending to the Arctic.

“At a time when the world is becoming more unpredictable, like-minded partners need to work even more closely together,” European Parliament President Roberta Metsola said.

Canada this year became the first non-European country to join the EU’s $173-billion SAFE defense program, giving Canadian companies access to joint procurement.

Ian Lesser of the German Marshall Fund in Brussels said Trump’s tariffs and policies toward the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and his stated intention to acquire Greenland for the U.S. have accelerated efforts by Canada and Europe to diversify their economic and security ties.

“The sheer unpredictability emanating from Washington has given history a shove,” Lesser said. He said many in Brussels still prefer to accommodate Washington or “wait and see” whether November’s midterm elections produce a Congress able to constrain Trump.

Carney will also travel to Britain to meet Prime Minister Andy Burnham for the first time. Both men are supporters of Everton soccer club and are expected to meet at the team’s League Cup match against Wolverhampton on Wednesday.

Gillies writes for the Associated Press. AP reporter Sam McNeil in Brussels contributed to this report.

SEVERAL UK eateries have been named among the best in the world – from a mash bar to a £100 gothic feast.

Tripadvisor has revealed its 2026 Travellers‘ Choice Awards: Best of the Best Restaurants and 12 of the top spots in the world are in the UK.

All the spots featured were decided on by millions of reviews for the past year.

Here is a rundown of the top places to head for a bite in the UK:

Coming out eighth in the world in the Casual Dining category was Casa Brazilian Rodizio in York.

The family-run Brazilian steakhouse – also named the top spot in the UK in the category for a second year in a row – is more of a dining experience than your usual sit-down-and-eat restaurant.

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Diners have to flip a card on their table to green if they want the chef, who is doing loops of the room, to carve spit-roasted meats at the table.

For a breather, visitors must turn the card to red.

Dinner costs £36.95 per person and is available every evening from 4pm and includes premium cuts such as flank steak and chilli beef.

Next up, longtime Travellers’ Choice favourite Makars Gourmet Mash Bar, Edinburgh was named twelfth in the world on the same list.

Diners are meant to pick a meat or plant-based alternative, with one of nine mash options including Scottish cheese and black pudding.

When it came to the Hidden Gems list, Hampstead-based spot Bonoo Indian Tapas which serves Indian small plates was named 13th in the world.

Prices range between £20 and £40 per person.

A few UK destinations were named on the best Date Nights spots in the world, as well.

London Steakhouse Co., which was opened by chef Marco Pierre White in 2008 and typically ranges from £40 to £100 per person, secured fourth place.

Another steak spot – The Herd Steak Restaurant in Bath – was then named in eleventh place.

And finally, modern family-run British bistro 1863 Restaurant in the picturesque village of Pooley Bridge in the Lake District came in at 19th.

Up in Glasgow, Indian spot Green Gates Merchant City made the world list for the first time, ranking sixth in Vegan & Vegetarian restaurants category.

When it comes to immersive food and drink experiences, the Royal Historic Pubs Walking Guided Tour in London, costing from £32 per person, was named tenth in the world on the World Wine & Beer Experiences list.

The tour usually includes heading to different historic pubs and learning about their history and famous visitors including former Prime Minister Winston Churchill, King Charles II and pop icon Ed Sheeran.

Dishoom was first on the Viral Right Now list, with London hotspots Mad Hatter’s Tea at Sanderson’s following in third and Borough Market Food Tour London named twelfth.

If you don’t mind splashing the cash, in Edinburgh, Scotland, The Witchery was named fourth in the World in the Fine Dining category.

The Witchery also claimed the top spot in Europe and the UK, for Fine Dining.

The well-known restaurant is a Gothic-style luxury restaurant which originally opened back in 1979 and can be found inside a historic building dating back to the 16th century.

Inside, diners can expect candlelight and oak panels with meals usually costing over £100 per person.