Politics

One thousand days into Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, three facts seem to be evident. First, Russia is losing. It is using its soldiers like human ammunition, burning through its economic reserves and mortgaging its future to Beijing. Second, Ukraine is losing faster than Russia. Ukraine’s forces are beleaguered along a too-long front and increasingly reliant on what looks like press-ganging for recruits. The country’s energy infrastructure is 80 per cent damaged or destroyed. The third fact: Donald Trump’s election is throwing all the old assumptions about the war into doubt. It is a sign of the odd times in which we live… Chief of the Defence Staff Sir

Paris prosecutors last week recommended that Marine Le Pen be jailed and banned from public office for five years. The court also wants similar sentences for 24 members of the party who, along with Le Pen, are accused of misusing public funds. The prosecutor accuses Le Pen of using money intended for EU parliamentary aides to instead pay staff who worked for the party between 2009 and 2016. The defence’s argument is that it’s hard to differentiate between what constitutes EU work and party work as the two often overlap. The judges will study the evidence and a verdict is expected in early 2025. Le Pen was probably not surprised

After three horses died at Cheltenham on Sunday, the reaction was depressingly predictable. The cameras cut away and the horse racing industry pretended to be shocked and upset that more horses had died on its watch. Abuffalosoldier and Bangers And Cash – two of the horses who died at Cheltenham – appear to have suffered heart attacks. A third, Napper Tandy, took a fatal fall during the Greatwood Hurdle race. Napper Tandy took a fatal fall during the Greatwood Hurdle race The British Horseracing Authority (BHA) described the trio of deaths as ‘a tragedy’ and said the horses’ owners will be ‘heartbroken’. The Daily Mail reported that ‘the shocking nature of

Keir Starmer will today become the first prime minister in six years to meet with Xi Jinping. The Labour leader is due to meet with the Chinese president at the G20 summit in Brazil as Starmer’s government attempts a wider reset of UK/China relations. This is being pitched by Downing Street as a move to ‘stable and pragmatic engagement’ with Beijing following a cooling of relations in recent years. The last prime minister to meet with Xi was Theresa May in 2018 who hailed a ‘golden era of UK-China relations’. Since then, however, allegations of espionage, human rights abuses, the national security law in Hong Kong and the pandemic have

At the very moment most people seem to have forgotten of his existence, President Biden has slowly but purposefully shuffled across Vladimir Putin’s latest red line in Ukraine. After months of President Zelensky’s tireless pleas, the United States has finally given Kyiv a green light to use American missiles (ATACMS) for strikes deep inside Russia. Putin may well decide that it is safer to swallow his pride and pretend nothing has happened Reports indicate that Biden’s permission applies in the first instance only to the Russian and North Korean troops deployed in the Kursk region. It aims at helping Kyiv to hold on to the piece of the Russian territory that

Is Westminster ready for farmageddon? Tomorrow will see the greatest political demonstration for a rural cause since the passage of the Hunting Act in 2004. Thousands are expected to descend on Whitehall to protest Rachel Reeves’ changes to inheritance tax for farms. Those worth more than £1 million will face an effective inheritance tax (IHT) rate of 20 per cent from April 2026 – which rural groups fear will ‘kill’ the family farm. The National Farmers’ Union (NFU) is hosting a conference event at Church House in Parliament Square from 9 a.m. tomorrow morning. Up to 1,800 members – divided into three groups of 600 – will be able to