Author: NCIJ NETWNCIJ NETWORK

UK Reform leader Nigel Farage will face an investigation that had been briefly paused following his resignation from Parliament after winning a by-election on Thursday with no major party candidates participating.As of Friday, the UK Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards website showed that Farage was currently under investigation for “failure to register an interest” related to the Reform leader receiving millions of dollars’ worth of donations and gifts from two figures tied to the crypto industry. The investigation was halted in July after Farage resigned as a member of Parliament, but resumed following his reelection as Clacton’s MP. The commission will probe…

Rain may bring disease-carrying mosquitoes. But the lack of it could have been a factor that led to the first urban yellow fever outbreak in Brazil in decades. In 2015, an El Niño powered an abnormally strong drought in central South America, and monkeys and mosquitoes on the hunt for water may have brought the virus into Brazilian cities, researchers report August 14 in Science Advances. Computer simulations hint that infected nonhuman primates moving into urban areas from dry forests and bite-happy mosquitoes perhaps trying to avoid dehydration may have helped drive yellow fever’s spread. During the outbreak, which began in late 2016, more…

Three 2026 studies reveal that the Amazon can regrow quickly, but deforestation and warming could trigger a system-wide tipping point in the next 15 years.Research also shows that repeated wildfires are replacing fire-resistant specialist trees with generalist species, halving biodiversity at forest edges despite a closing canopy.According to research, extreme conditions have increased tree mortality due to hydraulic failure, which is key to understanding the forest’s shrinking carbon sinks.Ending deforestation is necessary and achievable, but must be combined with global actions to curb climate change, say experts.See All Key Ideas For decades, scientists have been trying to answer…

In a short story called Career Move, published in the New Yorker in 1992, Martin Amis imagined a world in which screenwriters wrote for little magazines and earned a pittance while poets were global superstars. Amis’s story, a wonderfully ironic inversion of the time-honoured norm, was surprisingly prescient: the film and TV industries have been struggling, with screenwriters facing contracting outlets for their creations, whereas poets are now big business.The Bookseller reported recently that poetry sales were at a historic high. Part of the increase can be attributed to Christopher Nolan’s film The Odyssey, which has made Homer hot: editions…

This Facebook post from the Labour Party supposedly compares the number of prison places added under the current government with those added between 2010 and 2024. But the comparison is misleading, because the figures quoted are not like-for-like.What are the figures?The Labour Party did not respond to our queries about these figures, but the Ministry of Justice has confirmed what they’re based on. The “only 500”/“under 500” figure refers to the net increase in operational prison capacity during the Conservatives’ 14 years in office—this was 482 places measured to April 2024, and 455 measured to July 2024. (The Conservatives were…

The consortium, named ​1892 Holdings, is led by former QPR chairman Amit Bhatia and also includes the Mittal Family Trusts, EE Capital and the K5 Sports ‌fund, where Bezos ​is the lead investor.Published On 14 Aug 202614 Aug 2026A ‌‌consortium which includes Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has reached a ⁠⁠definitive agreement ⁠⁠to buy a minority stake in Liverpool FC, the Premier League club’s owners, Fenway Sports Group has announced.The consortium, named 1892 Holdings, is led by former Queens Park Rangers chairman Amit Bhatia and also includes the Mittal Family Trusts, EE Capital and the K5 Sports ‌‌fund, where Bezos is…

Nigel Farage didn’t attend the count of the byelection he forced upon Clacton. Instead, Reform UK’s leader celebrated his win with supporters at a “Farage Fest”, filmed by a friendly TV channel. For a politician who claims to speak for the people, it was telling that at his triumph he preferred an audience of believers.Mr Farage won because his toughest opponent on the campaign trail was a comedian in a jumpsuit with a bin on his head. That Count Binface nevertheless won 27% of the vote captured the absurdity of a contest the main parties had boycotted as a Faragist…

British diplomats in six locations around the world, including Buenos Aires and Santiago in South America, will no longer get hardship payments for working in dangerous cities.Bonuses and respite breaks are granted to those working in cities considered risky, like Beirut in Lebanon, or with high crime, such as Pretoria in South Africa, or high air pollution in cities including New Delhi and Beijing.The UK government has removed Santiago, in Chile, Panama City in Panama, Pyongyang in North Korea, Bamako in Mali, and Sarajevo in Bosnia and Herzegovina, in addition to the two south American cities, according to the latest…

Artie Beaty/ZDNETFollow ZDNET: Add us as a preferred source on Google.ZDNET’s key takeawaysGoogle Meet can now take notes for in-person meetings.The feature works on both the app and desktop versions.It’s only open to Google AI Pro or Ultra subscribers for now.Several years ago, Google Meet introduced a feature that takes notes during your virtual meetings. As of this week, Google’s meeting software can now sit in and take notes on your in-person offline meetings, too. Designed to let you focus on the meeting instead of taking down what was said, Meet’s new feature is rolling out this week to both the…

Israel’s biggest bank, Bank Leumi, will become the first lender in the country to offer customers Bitcoin trading, according to a Friday announcement.  The lender will work with Galaxy Digital to provide the service, which will become available to customers early next year, the announcement said.   Bank Leumi first announced plans to debut crypto trading in 2022 but shelved the initiative. The latest project will use GalaxyOne Institutional, Galaxy’s institutional platform for banks, asset managers and other institutions for trading and other services, to debut the service.  JUST IN: 🇮🇱 Israel’s largest bank is entering Bitcoin.Bank Leumi will allow customers…