Donald Trump’s 1 August tariffs deadline did what it was always intended to do. It kept the markets and the nations guessing amid last-minute uncertainty. It attempted to reassert the global heft of the United States economy to take on and master all comers. And it placed President Trump at the centre of the media story, where he always insists on being.

In the event, there were some last-minute agreements struck this week, few of them fair or rational in trade terms, most of them motivated by the desire to generate some commercial order. Some conflicts are still in the balance. There were 11th-hour court challenges too, disputing the president’s

Donald Trump’s 1 August tariffs deadline did what it was always intended to do. It kept the markets and the nations guessing amid last-minute uncertainty. It attempted to reassert the global heft of the United States economy to take on and master all comers. And it placed President Trump at the centre of the media story, where he always insists on being.

In the event, there were some last-minute agreements struck this week, few of them fair or rational in trade terms, most of them motivated by the desire to generate some commercial order. Some conflicts are still in the balance. There were 11th-hour court challenges too, disputing the president’s

The British public discovered only very belatedly that an enormous accidental data breach by an official three years ago put up to 100,000 Afghans at risk of torture and death. Some of them had worked with British forces in Afghanistan. The result was that thousands were secretly relocated to the UK. A superinjunction covered up the story for almost two years.

But the shocking security lapse is far from the only example of Afghans being failed since Kabul fell to the Taliban in 2021. Many more are now at risk because the countries to which they fled are pushing them out. The mirage of a more moderate Taliban was soon

The British public discovered only very belatedly that an enormous accidental data breach by an official three years ago put up to 100,000 Afghans at risk of torture and death. Some of them had worked with British forces in Afghanistan. The result was that thousands were secretly relocated to the UK. A superinjunction covered up the story for almost two years.

But the shocking security lapse is far from the only example of Afghans being failed since Kabul fell to the Taliban in 2021. Many more are now at risk because the countries to which they fled are pushing them out. The mirage of a more moderate Taliban was soon

Over the past six months, Donald Trump has been accused of rapidly dragging the largest democracy in the Americas towards authoritarianism. Now, the US president seems bent on undermining the region’s second largest democracy too.

Since early July, Trump has launched an extraordinary attack on Brazil’s institutions, slapping 50% tariffs on imports from the South American country and sanctions on a supreme court judge – partly in retribution for what he called the political persecution of his ally, Jair Bolsonaro, who is on trial for allegedly masterminding a failed coup.

“Rarely since the end of the cold war has the United States interfered so deeply with a Latin American country,” the

School is out, young audiences are available, and yet still, Hollywood animation is having a bad summer at the box office. In contrast to last year, when Inside Out 2 and Despicable Me 4 occupied two of the season’s top three (and combined for about $2.7bn worldwide), it seems entirely possible that not a single fully animated movie will crack the top 10. Adding insult to injury: the Disney-Pixar original Elio has been trounced by “live-action” remakes of Lilo & Stitch and How to Train Your Dragon, which faithfully reproduce old cartoons with bland new actors and CG visual effects. With younger audiences steered toward those movies and seemingly