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  • Anthony Grey, Reuters Journalist Held Captive in Mao’s China, Dies at 87

    (Reuters) -In his first job interview with Reuters, Anthony Grey was asked why he wanted to cover international news. To be mixed up in important events, he said.

    His wish would come true – to a ruinous degree.

    Three years later, in 1967, Grey – by then the agency’s Beijing correspondent – became a pawn in a drawn-out feud between China and the United Kingdom. After the crown colony of Hong Kong arrested communist reporters, Chinese authorities retaliated by placing Grey under house arrest.

    The Briton’s ordeal would last some 26 months – and make him famous around the world.

    Finally set free in October 1969, he told the press: “I felt very, very low many times. But I didn’t despair.”

    Grey would go on to work for the BBC, write several popular novels and set up a charity to assist other state hostages.

    He held no bitterness towards his former captors. The trauma of solitary confinement nonetheless lingered his entire life.

    Grey, who had Parkinson’s disease, died on October 11 in Norwich, England, his daughters Lucy and Clarissa Grey told Reuters. He was 87 years old.

    Anthony Keith Grey was born on July 5, 1938, in Norwich, the second child of driver Alfred Grey and shopkeeper Agnes (née Bullent).

    Raised by Agnes after his parents’ divorce, Grey was estranged from his father for most of his life. An athletic pupil who excelled in English, he was once described by a friend’s mother as “restless”. He wore the epithet with pride.

    After leaving school at 16, he did national service with the air force in Glasgow. Concerns that he would eventually require glasses prevented him from becoming a pilot.

    Grey harboured another hope: to write fiction. But he sensed that he should first find out more about life. He chose journalism.

    In 1960 he joined Norwich’s Eastern Daily Press newspaper, where he overlapped with Frederick Forsyth, who died earlier this year. Both reporters later joined Reuters, before writing novels.

    The news agency first posted Grey to East Berlin, ahead of which he took German lessons in London with a teacher called Shirley McGuinn. She would eventually become his wife.

    From his base in Berlin, Grey travelled to Czechoslovakia, Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria and Poland. On several occasions he was followed, and questioned, by Soviet agents, he said. Among his accomplishments: breaking the news that a prisoner exchange was in the works to free Gerald Brooke, a British lecturer held captive in Russia, years before the exchange finally took place.

    ‘A CORRESPONDENT’S DREAM’

    One night in January 1967 a Reuters executive rang to ask whether he would go to Peking, as Beijing was then known.

    “It was a correspondent’s dream,” Grey recalled in his 1970 book “Hostage in Peking”. China’s capital city, then convulsed by the Cultural Revolution, was generating a torrent of headlines, but was host to just four Western reporters.

    “I made a conscious effort to restrain the enthusiasm of my reply. I was twenty-eight. I didn’t want to be thought over-eager and unreliable. Yes, I quite liked the idea.”

    Grey had no special knowledge of China. All he had was 18 months’ experience covering another communist part of the world: Eastern Europe.

    As he set off, he was advised to gauge the state of the country from his train seat by whether smoke rose from the factory chimneys and rice shoots from the paddy fields – “a measure of the ignorance existing among outsiders of conditions in China at that time”, he later remarked.

    One of his first reports debunked a Russian news bulletin claiming a famine in South China. A few weeks later, while he was covering May Day celebrations, Mao Zedong passed within a few feet of him. Caught up in the crowd’s commotion, Grey failed to film the chairman of the Chinese Communist Party.

    Grey’s relative freedom of movement ended abruptly on July 21, 1967. That day, a foreign ministry official told him that, in view of the “illegal persecution” and “fascist atrocities” in Hong Kong against Chinese correspondents, he would no longer be allowed to leave his house. He protested that his British employer was independent from the British state, to no avail.

    Of his house arrest, Grey wrote in his diary that evening: “The novelty of it prevented me feeling depressed; I feel a small sense of how unjust the measure.”

    There ensued four weeks of relative normality in Reuters’ staffed, two-storey residence on the edge of the Forbidden City. That all changed on August 18.

    That night, Red Guards burst into the house, daubed paint on him and dragged him into the yard, his arms wrenched behind his back and his head forced down – an agonising position known as jet-planing.

    The intruders killed his cat, Ming Ming, and shouted: “Hang Grey! Hang Grey!”

    Around midnight, they finally left. “I was aching all over and out of breath, and didn’t sit down for a long time,” Grey wrote in his diary.

    After that, the conditions of his detention became much starker. Guards confined Grey to one tiny room, its walls plastered with Maoist propaganda.

    A pen was his only solace. With it he secretly journaled, wrote short stories and compiled crossword puzzles. “I would occupy the emptiness of time by thinking of cliches and colloquial phrases and making up what I thought were smart or groan-provoking puns as clues,” he wrote in the foreword to his 1975 collection “Crosswords from Peking”.

    Among his favourite ones: “The law of graffiti?” Tantalisingly, he declined to give readers the four-word answer.

    ‘CAUGHT UP IN A BATTLE OF FACE’

    The British government insisted on quiet negotiations with China. But as that approach proved fruitless, Grey’s peers launched a far more public campaign to secure his release. The tall, slender reporter became a fixture on front pages.

    When his wait was finally over, a Chinese official told him that he owed his freedom to the release of the communist reporters.

    “I don’t think Peking cared desperately about the news workers in Hong Kong in themselves,” Grey later wrote. “I was simply caught up in a battle of face between two intransigent governments.”

    Readjusting to society proved a challenge, especially as Britain had changed so much during his captivity. Recreational drugs abounded, as did miniskirts, long-haired men and – with the musical “Hair” – on-stage nudity.

    His status too had changed. “The former newshound, accustomed to hunting safely in numbers with the press corps pack, had been separated out – had become the fox, the hunted one,” he wrote in his book “The Hostage Handbook” decades later.

    He went on to host a current affairs programme on BBC radio and write several thrillers. But the unexplained death in Cairo of journalist David Holden in 1977 – a chilling real-life incident of the sort Grey had lightly imagined in his novels – put him off the genre.

    After that he wrote sprawling historical fiction set in China, Vietnam and Japan. His best-selling work was “Saigon”.

    Grey would have a few more dalliances with journalism. In 1983, he wrote “The Prime Minister Was a Spy”, a book which alleged that Australia’s Harold Holt, who is widely believed to have drowned at sea in 1967, had in fact fled the country in a Chinese submarine.

    The stridently anti-communist Holt had spied on Beijing’s behalf for 38 years, Grey wrote.

    Holt biographer Tim Frame called the theory “a complete fabrication”. Relying on a former Australian naval officer who claimed to have Chinese informants, Grey himself wrote of his account: “I can’t guarantee that it is true.”

    A 1996 BBC radio documentary about unidentified flying objects led him to yet more unorthodox views. “At the end of my own investigation, I personally feel sure that extraterrestrial craft are visiting us,” he concluded in the broadcast.

    After that, Grey became a follower of Rael, a Frenchman who said that humanity had been created by alien scientists. His movement – Raelism – defines itself as an atheist religion. A French parliamentary inquiry called it a cult.

    Grey’s faith, which led him to write the foreword to Rael’s 2005 book “Intelligent Design”, became, for a time, all-consuming. It threatened to engulf his finances, reputation and mental health, the latter already largely hobbled by his experiences in Beijing.

    Four decades on from captivity, Grey, who fell in and out of depression, finally saw a psychiatrist. He was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder.

    In brighter moments, he would laugh with Lucy about how much he identified with Billy Joel’s lyrics: “Darling I don’t know why I go to extremes / Too high or too low there ain’t no in-betweens.”

    Grey had an open yet troubled mind. He could also be “wonderfully silly”, Clarissa said.

    Both daughters are journalists. They survive him, as do Lucy’s children Eddie and Oscar.

    Preaching forgiveness, Grey let go of any resentment towards the British and Chinese authorities, as well as towards his fellow journalists, who had pressed him for stories even at his lowest. He founded several charities, including Hostage Action Worldwide and Planet of Forgiveness.

    Sitting at home in England’s South Downs listening to John Williams’s “Cavatina” with a Chivas Regal in hand was his idea of bliss.

    He was married to Shirley for 22 years. Following their separation, and before her death from cancer in 1995, they remained close friends. He would visit her every week to tackle a crossword together.

    The answer to his own clue, “The law of graffiti?”, it turned out, was “Writing on the wall”.

    Conceived in detention half a century ago, all four walls of his cell covered in Maoist mantras, the pun brought a smile to his face.

    (Editing by Andrew HeavensArchival research by Rory Carruthers and Susan Ponsonby)

    Copyright 2025 Thomson Reuters.

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  • Prince Andrew Stripped of Royal Title by King Charles

    Andrew’s friendship with Jeffrey Epstein and new revelations about longstanding abuse allegations forced the king’s hand.

    Max Colchester

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  • Explainer-Nuclear Testing: Why Did It Stop, Why Test and Who Has Nuclear Weapons?

    (Reuters) -U.S. President Donald Trump ordered the U.S. military on Thursday to immediately resume testing nuclear weapons after a gap of 33 years, minutes before beginning a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

    How many nuclear weapons tests have there been, why were they stopped – and why would anyone start them again?

    The United States opened the nuclear era in July 1945 with the test of a 20-kiloton atomic bomb at Alamogordo, New Mexico, in July 1945, and then dropped atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945 to force Japan to surrender in World War Two.

    The Soviet Union shocked the West by detonating its first nuclear bomb just four years later, in August 1949.

    In the five decades between 1945 and the 1996 Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT), over 2,000 nuclear tests were carried out, 1,032 of them by the United States and 715 of them by the Soviet Union, according to the United Nations.

    Britain carried out 45 tests, France 210 and China 45.

    Since the CTBT, 10 nuclear tests have taken place. India conducted two in 1998, Pakistan also two in 1998, and North Korea conducted tests in 2006, 2009, 2013, 2016 (twice) and 2017, according to the United Nations.

    The United States last tested in 1992, China and France in 1996 and the Soviet Union in 1990. Russia, which inherited most of the Soviet nuclear arsenal, has never done so.

    Russia held nuclear drills last week and has tested a nuclear-powered cruise missile and a nuclear-powered torpedo but has not tested a nuclear warhead.

    WHY WAS NUCLEAR TESTING ENDED?

    Concern mounted about the impact of the tests – above ground, underground and underwater – on human health and the environment.

    The impact of the West’s testing in the Pacific and of Soviet testing in Kazakhstan and the Arctic was significant on both the environment and the people. Activists say millions of people in both the Pacific and Kazakhstan had their lands contaminated by nuclear testing – and have faced health issues for decades.

    By limiting the Cold War bonanza of nuclear testing, advocates said, tensions between Moscow and Washington could be reduced.

    The CTBT bans  nuclear explosions  by everyone, everywhere. It was signed by Russia in 1996 and ratified in 2000. The United States signed the treaty in 1996 but has not ratified it.

    In 2023, President Vladimir Putin formally revoked Russia’s ratification of the CTBT, bringing his country in line with the United States.

    WHY WOULD YOU TEST AGAIN?

    To gather information – or to send a signal.

    Tests provide evidence of what any new nuclear weapon will do – and whether older weapons still work.

    In 2020, the Washington Post reported that the administration of U.S. president Donald Trump had discussed whether or not to conduct a nuclear test.

    Apart from providing technical data, such a test would be seen in Russia and China as a deliberate assertion of U.S. strategic power.

    Putin has repeatedly warned that if the United States resumed nuclear testing, Russia would too. Putin says a global nuclear arms race is already underway.

    WHAT ARE BIG POWERS DOING WITH THEIR NUCLEAR WEAPONS?

    The exact number of warheads each country has are secret but Russia has a total of about 5,459 warheads while the United States has about 5,177, according to the Federation of American Scientists. Those number include deployed, stockpiled and retired warheads.

    The Washington D.C.-based Arms Control Association says the United States has a stockpile of 5,225 nuclear warheads and Russia has 5,580.

    Global nuclear warhead stockpiles peaked in 1986 at over 70,000 warheads, most in the Soviet Union and the United States, but have since been reduced to about 12,000, most still in Russia and the United States.

    China is the third largest nuclear power with 600 warheads, France has 290, the United Kingdom 225, India 180, Pakistan 170, Israel 90 and North Korea 50, according to the Federation of American Scientists.

    Russia, the United States and China are all undertaking major modernisations of their nuclear arsenals.

    (Reporting by Guy Faulconbridge; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)

    Copyright 2025 Thomson Reuters.

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  • UK and Vietnam Agree Deal on Illegal Migration

    LONDON (Reuters) -Britain said on Wednesday it had agreed a deal with Vietnam on illegal migration, in what London described as the strongest Hanoi had ever agreed with another country.

    The agreement will cut red tape and make it faster and easier to return those with no right to be in the United Kingdom, Britain said.

    “The number of illegal arrivals from Vietnam has already been cut by half, but more can be done,” British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said in a statement.

    “Today’s agreement shows that through international cooperation – not shouting from the sidelines – we can deliver for the UK and for working people.”

    (Reporting by Sam Tabahriti)

    Copyright 2025 Thomson Reuters.

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  • Factbox-Corporate Concerns Mount Ahead of Trump and Xi Talks in South Korea

    (Reuters) -Global companies have a long list of concerns around the U.S.-China trade war. They will closely monitor President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping’s expected meeting in South Korea on Thursday, hoping that the world’s two biggest economies begin to resolve their differences.

    Below are the biggest issues for global companies.

    The U.S. semiconductor industry will closely watch the talks for indications of a deal over whether U.S. firms can sell powerful artificial intelligence chips to China. While Nvidia is the market leader, Advanced Micro Devices and Intel are trying to gain market share, and a raft of other chip companies from Broadcom to Marvell Technology that help develop AI chips will feel the impact.  Also critical will be discussions over critical minerals and materials, which affect chip manufacturers such as Intel and GlobalFoundries. Those materials have become a flashpoint in the tussle between the U.S. and China over Chinese access to the tools needed to build out its own semiconductor manufacturing industry. Those tools come from U.S. firms such as Applied Materials, Lam Research and KLA. 

    China is an important manufacturer of both finished pharmaceutical products and key ingredients of drugs used in the U.S. 

    In 2024, China was the eighth-largest exporter of pharmaceutical products to the U.S., accounting for more than 3.5% of those products imported for the year, according to U.S. trade data.

    More importantly, China is the largest manufacturer globally of the key building blocks used to make pharmaceutical ingredients. According to a report published earlier this month by U.S. Pharmacopeia, China is the sole supplier of over 40% of the key starting materials for U.S.-approved pharmaceutical ingredients.

    The top Chinese drug companies include Shanghai Fosun Pharmaceutical, WuXi AppTec, CSPC Pharmaceutical Group and Sinopharm Group.

    U.S. energy companies, particularly LNG exporters including Venture Global LNG and Cheniere Energy, will be paying close attention to see if the Trump-Xi meeting can restart frozen energy flows after China levied a 15% tariff on American LNG in February. 

    China had been a major buyer before that, purchasing nearly 6% of U.S. exports of the fuel in 2024. Since the tariffs were imposed, Chinese companies have not signed any new long-term supply deals with U.S. LNG producers, and the country has been diverting U.S. cargoes to the European market in a move that has tempered global prices. 

    The U.S., meanwhile, has not exported any oil to China since February, when a 10% tariff was also imposed on crude. Exports to China totaled only about 4% of American shipments abroad – about 150,000 barrels per day – in 2024, down 42% from the previous year.

    Top exporters of U.S. crude to China have previously included Occidental Petroleum; Unipec, the trading arm of China’s Sinopec; and Atlantic Trading & Marketing, an arm of French oil major TotalEnergies, according to shipping flows data from Kpler.   

    A wide range of global companies will be watching to see if the Trump administration intends to follow through on a plan to curb an array of software-powered exports to China. If implemented, it would make good on Trump’s threat earlier this month to bar “critical software” exports to China by restricting global shipments of items that contain U.S. software or were produced using U.S. software.  It could disrupt global trade, given that many items are made with U.S. software, like jet engines from General Electric, or cars from companies like Toyota that use software in safety features. Chips worldwide are also produced with U.S. chip-design software from Cadence Design Systems and Synopsys.

    Carmakers have much riding on the geopolitical dynamics between Trump and China, including a slate of still-unresolved tariffs between the two countries. Most pressing, though, is the threat of a shortage of chips from Chinese-owned firm Nexperia. China has banned exports of Nexperia’s finished products amid a dispute with the Dutch government. The inexpensive chips are used widely in car electronics, and automotive lobbying groups that represent Volkswagen, General Motors and Ford have warned of likely factory disruptions if the dispute is not quickly settled. China’s stepped-up export controls on rare-earth metals as well as battery materials and equipment also have raised fears among automakers and suppliers of production snags.  

    Agribusinesses including Archer-Daniels-Midland, Bunge Global and privately held Cargill will be watching for any lifting of tariffs that have halted Chinese purchases of U.S. soybeans and other farm goods and driven crop prices to multiyear lows. Soybeans are the largest U.S. farm export by value, with $12.6 billion in shipments to top buyer China in 2024, according to U.S. government data.  Farm equipment makers such as Deere, AGCO and CNH Industrial will also be eying any easing of duties that have hammered farmer income and chilled sales of tractors and combine harvesters.

    Boeing faces rising pressure as Xi-Trump talks spotlight aerospace trade. Beijing’s push for domestic jets and retaliatory tariffs risk eroding Chinese demand for Boeing aircraft. With China historically a top market for Boeing, escalating trade tensions could threaten the company’s long-term growth. If Trump-Xi talks go well, Boeing could increase its access to China’s aviation market, but if they falter, the company risks deeper isolation. Meanwhile, Trump’s threat to restrict Boeing aircraft parts exports to China could disrupt the nascent jet production of state-owned Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China, which relies on U.S.-made engines and avionics.       

    (Reporting by Karl Plume in Chicago, Stephen Nellis in San Francisco, Mike Erman in New York, Mike Colias in Detroit, Chris Sanders in Washington, Nathan Crooks in Houston and Joe Brock in Los Angeles; Editing by Matthew Lewis)

    Copyright 2025 Thomson Reuters.

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  • Japan Woos Trump With a Royal Welcome

    TOKYO—The British aren’t the only ones who can sprinkle a little royal stardust when President Trump comes to town.

    As Trump pays a visit to Tokyo this week, his Japanese hosts are counting on some face time with the emperor to set a positive tone—even if the reception fell short on pomp.

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  • Southeastern Minnesota swatting incidents tied to terrorist organization


    Investigators say they have linked two swatting incidents in southeastern Minnesota to a terrorist organization that targets children through extortion and violence.

    Swatting is when someone makes a false report, intending to trigger a large-scale response.

    On Tuesday and Thursday, the Red Wing Police Department says officers were called to two separate emergency calls reporting multiple shooting victims at a residence on the 1300 block of East Avenue.

    Red Wing’s Investigation Unit says evidence suggests those involved in the incidents are connected to an “extremist group” that is recognized by the U.S. Department of Justice and the FBI as a terrorist organization. Authorities did not name the organization.

    Investigators worked with law enforcement in the United Kingdom and arrested a suspect overseas in connection with the fake emergency reports.

    The investigation into the incident remains open, police say.

    WCCO Staff

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  • UK Labour Party Elects Deputy Leader Who Urges More Focus on Left-Wing Values

    By Alistair Smout and David Milliken

    LONDON (Reuters) -Britain’s governing Labour Party on Saturday said Lucy Powell had won a vote of members to become the party’s deputy leader, a victory for a candidate whom Prime Minister Keir Starmer sacked as a government minister last month.

    Powell defeated education minister Bridget Phillipson by a 54-46 margin on a low 17% turnout, and called on Starmer to stop courting voters tempted by right-wing immigration policies and instead focus on bolstering left-wing support.

    “We won’t win by trying to out-Reform Reform, but by building a broad progressive consensus,” Powell said in her victory speech, saying the party needed to focus on its traditional values around reducing inequality.

    Labour lost a seat in the Welsh parliament on Friday to the left-leaning Welsh nationalist Plaid Cymru party, and was pushed into third place by former Brexit campaigner Nigel Farage’s Reform UK party, which is focused on cutting immigration.

    The election of a new deputy Labour leader followed the resignation of Angela Rayner in September after she breached ministerial rules by mistakenly failing to pay the correct tax when buying a house. 

    Powell lost her job in Starmer’s government in a ministerial reshuffle after Rayner’s resignation. She has suggested she might have been sacked from her job overseeing the government’s legislative agenda for letting Starmer know that things such as planned welfare cuts were unpopular with the party.    

    Speaking on Saturday, Powell said the party’s leadership needed to change its culture to re-engage with members and lawmakers and drop a “command and control” approach.

    Unlike Rayner, Powell will not serve as deputy prime minister as Starmer appointed justice minister David Lammy to that role after Rayner’s resignation.

    Powell has promised to be “a strong independent voice”, after the party’s tough first year in government during which its popularity has decreased.

    Responding to Powell’s victory speech, Starmer welcomed her election as “a proud defender of Labour values” and said Friday’s defeat in Wales highlighted the urgency of delivering visible improvements to voters.

    (Reporting by Alistair Smout and David Milliken; editing by Barbara Lewis)

    Copyright 2025 Thomson Reuters.

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  • Putin Envoy Kirill Dmitriev Confirms He Is in the US for a Long-Planned Meeting

    MOSCOW (Reuters -Kirill Dmitriev, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s special envoy for investment and economic cooperation, on Friday confirmed that he was in the United States for a long-planned meeting, proof he said that U.S.-Russia dialogue continued.

    “This meeting of mine had been planned quite a while ago, and the American side did not cancel it, despite a number of recent unfriendly steps. We will continue the dialogue,” Dmitriev told Reuters.

    U.S. President Donald Trump hit Russia’s two biggest oil companies with sanctions this week to press the Kremlin leader to end Moscow’s war in Ukraine.

    Trump spoke to Putin last week and said he planned to meet Putin soon, but Trump later cancelled that summit saying it could take place another time.

    “The Russia–U.S. dialogue will continue, but it is certainly only possible if Russia’s interests are taken into account and treated with respect,” Dmitriev said.

    He declined to say who he was meeting and predicted that the U.S. oil sanctions would backfire.

    “They will only lead to gasoline costing more at American gas stations,” said Dmitriev.

    Citing sources with knowledge of the visit, CNN reported earlier on Friday that Dmitriev was expected to meet Trump administration officials “to continue discussions about the U.S.-Russia relationship”.

    Axios reported that Dmitriev would meet Trump special envoy Steve Witkoff in Miami on Saturday. The state TASS news agency quoted Dmitriev as saying he would also meet other people he did not name.

    Dmitriev, who has developed a good working relationship with Witkoff, declined to say whether arrangements for a new Trump-Putin meeting would be on the agenda of his talks.

    (Reporting by Gleb BryanskiEditing by Andrew Osborn)

    Copyright 2025 Thomson Reuters.

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  • Putin Says Russia Will Never Bow to U.S. Pressure

    MOSCOW (Reuters) -President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday that Russia would never bow to pressure from the United States or any other country, and cautioned that the response to any strikes deep into Russia would be very serious and overwhelming.

    U.S. sanctions are an “unfriendly” act and “will have certain consequences, but they will not significantly affect our economic well-being,” Putin said. Russia’s energy sector feels confident, he said.

    “This is, of course, an attempt to put pressure on Russia,” Putin said. “But no self-respecting country and no self-respecting people ever decides anything under pressure.”

    Putin said breaking the balance in the global energy markets could lead to a hike in prices that would be uncomfortable for countries such as the United States, especially given the internal political calendar in the United States.

    Asked about a Wall Street Journal report that the Trump administration has lifted a key restriction on Ukraine’s use of some long-range missiles provided by Western allies, and remarks by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy about domestic missiles with a range of 3,000 km (1,900 miles), Putin said: “This is an attempt at escalation.”

    “But if such weapons are used to attack Russian territory, the response will be very serious, if not overwhelming. Let them think about it,” Putin said.

    (Reporting by Reuters; editing by Guy Faulconbridge)

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  • Opinion | Britain’s Do-It-Yourself Version of Chinese Sabotage

    A ‘spying’ case that may have been a mistake all along sows more distrust than Beijing ever could.

    Joseph C. Sternberg

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  • World Food Prize Winners Call for Doubling of Aid to Combat Hunger

    DES MOINES, Iowa (Reuters) -International food aid must double to meet the needs of about 2 billion people worldwide who struggle to get enough to eat, winners of an annual prize recognizing contributions to reducing global hunger said on Wednesday.

    The World Food Prize was started in 1986 by Nobel Peace Prize winner Norman Borlaug, a U.S. agronomist whose work with high-yield crops in the 1960s has been credited with saving 1 billion lives.

    A group of 28 prize winners, including Brazilian microbiologist Mariangela Hungria who received the award this year, issued the call on Wednesday during the Norman Borlaug Dialogue, an annual conference in Des Moines, Iowa.

    The U.N. World Food Program recently reported global food aid was cut by 40% in 2025. The United States, previously a top donor, slashed aid under President Donald Trump, and other governments such as the United Kingdom and France also reduced assistance.

    WFP cut aid in Democratic Republic of Congo by 75% and halved a hot meal program in Haiti due to lack of funds, WFP Assistant Executive Director Valerie Guarnieri said during the conference.

    “Donors are slashing their donations, for a variety of reasons,” she said. “There will be lives that will be lost, and global instability will increase.”

    David Beckmann, the 2010 prize winner and former president of nongovernmental organization Bread for the World, said famine was a problem in Sudan, Yemen, Gaza and Haiti, among other places.

    “When the need for help increased, the money was not there,” he said.

    Chef Jose Andres, founder of the nonprofit World Central Kitchen, has not won the World Food Prize, but he joined the appeal.

    “Immigration is increasing and will keep increasing. The main reason people leave their countries is hunger,” he told reporters.

    The World Food Prize honors work in fields like nutrition, environmental conservation, policy advocacy, rural development and plant and soil science.

    (Reporting by Marcelo Teixeira; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)

    Copyright 2025 Thomson Reuters.

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  • U.K. Inflation Unexpectedly Holds Steady

    The U.K.’s annual rate of inflation in September unexpectedly held at the pace of the previous month, raising the chance that Bank of England policymakers could cut interest rates later this year, despite price rises remaining at a level still well above the central bank’s target.

    Consumer prices were up 3.8% compared with the same month of last year, the Office for National Statistics said Wednesday, almost double the central bank’s 2% target and the same rate as August. Economists polled by The Wall Street Journal expected a higher rate of 4.0%.

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  • Analysis-Turkey Pressing for Western Fighter Jets to Claw Back Regional Edge

    By Ece Toksabay and Jonathan Spicer

    ANKARA (Reuters) -Anxious to bolster its air power, Turkey has proposed to European partners and the U.S. ways it could swiftly obtain advanced fighter jets as it seeks to make up ground on regional rivals such as Israel, sources familiar with the talks say.  

    NATO-member Turkey, which has the alliance’s second-largest military, aims to leverage its best relations with the West in years to add to its ageing fleet 40 Eurofighter Typhoons, for which it inked a preliminary agreement in July, and later also U.S.-made F-35 jets, despite Washington sanctions that currently block any deal. 

    Strikes by Israel – the Middle East’s most advanced military with hundreds of U.S.-supplied F-15, F-16 and F-35 fighters – on Turkey’s neighbours Iran and Syria, as well as on Lebanon and Qatar, unnerved Ankara in the last year. They laid bare key vulnerabilities, prompting its push for rapid air power reinforcement to counter any potential threats and not be left exposed, officials say.

    Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan has sharply criticised Israel’s attacks on Gaza and elsewhere in the Middle East and once warm relations between the two countries have sunk to new lows. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has warned that Turkey’s bases, rebel allies and support for the army in Syria posed a threat to Israel.  

    Greece, a largely symbolic but sensitive threat for Turkey, is expected to receive a batch of advanced F-35s in the next three years. In years past, jets from the two NATO states engaged in scattered dogfights over the Aegean, and Greece has previously expressed concerns about Turkish military build-up.

    TURKEY WOULD BUY SECOND-HAND PLANES TO GET THEM FAST

    For the Typhoons, Turkey is nearing a deal with Britain and other European countries in which it would promptly receive 12 of them, albeit used, from previous buyers Qatar and Oman to meet its immediate needs, according to a person familiar with the matter. 

    Eurofighter consortium members Britain, Germany, Italy and Spain would approve the second-hand sale proposal, in which they would provide Turkey with 28 new jets in coming years pending a final purchase agreement, the person said. 

    Erdogan is expected to discuss the proposal on visits to Qatar and Oman on Wednesday and Thursday, with jet numbers, pricing, and timelines the main issues. 

    Erdogan is then expected to host British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz later this month, when agreements could be sealed, sources say. 

    A UK government spokesperson told Reuters that a memorandum of understanding that Britain and Turkey signed in July paves the way “for a multibillion-pound order of up to 40 aircraft,” adding: “We look forward to agreeing the final contracting details soon.”

    German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul, who was in Ankara last week, said Berlin supported the jets purchase and later told broadcaster NTV that a deal could follow within the year.

    Turkey’s defence ministry said no final agreement had been reached and that talks with Britain were moving in a positive direction, adding other consortium members backed the procurement. Qatar and Oman did not immediately comment. 

    TURKEY, US HAVE POLITICAL WILL TO RESOLVE ISSUES

    Acquiring the advanced F-35s has proven trickier for Ankara, which has been barred from buying them since 2020 when Washington slapped it with CAATSA sanctions over its purchase of Russian S-400 air defences. 

    Erdogan failed to make headway on the issue at a White House meeting with President Donald Trump last month. But Turkey still aims to capitalise on the two leaders’ good personal ties, and Erdogan’s help convincing Palestinian militant group Hamas to sign Trump’s Gaza ceasefire agreement, to eventually reach a deal. 

    Separate sources have said that Ankara considered proposing a plan that could have included a U.S. presidential “waiver” to overcome the CAATSA sanctions and pave the way for an eventual resolution of the S-400 issue and F-35 purchase. 

    Turkey’s possession of the S-400s remains the main obstacle to purchasing F-35s, but Ankara and Washington have publicly stated a desire to overcome this, saying the allies have the political will to do so. 

    The potential temporary waiver, if given, could help Ankara increase defence cooperation with Washington and possibly build sympathy in a U.S. Congress that has been sceptical of Turkey in the past, the sources said.

    “Both sides know that resolving CAATSA needs to be done. Whether it is a presidential waiver or a congressional decision, that is up to the United States,” Harun Armagan, vice chair of foreign affairs for Erdogan’s ruling AK Party, told Reuters.

    “It looks awkward with all of the other diplomacy and cooperation happening at the same time.” 

    Turkey’s foreign ministry did not respond to questions about floating a waiver to U.S. counterparts or discussions on resolving the S-400 issue. The White House did not immediately comment on whether Ankara raised a waiver option.

    A State Department spokesperson said Trump recognizes Turkey’s strategic importance and that “his administration is seeking creative solutions to all of these pending issues,” but did not elaborate further.

    Asked about Turkey’s separate agreement to buy 40 F-16s, an earlier generation fighter jet, a U.S. source said that talks have been dogged by Turkish concerns about the price and desire to buy the more advanced F-35s instead. 

    TURKEY HAS DEVELOPED ITS OWN STEALTH FIGHTER

    Frustrated by past hot-cold ties with the West and some arms embargoes, Turkey has developed its own KAAN stealth fighter. Yet officials acknowledge it will take years before it replaces the F-16s that form the backbone of its air force.

    Jet upgrades are part of a broader effort to strengthen layered air defences that also includes Turkey’s domestic “Steel Dome” project and an expansion of long-range missile coverage. 

    Yanki Bagcioglu, an opposition CHP lawmaker and former Turkish Air Force brigadier general, said Turkey must accelerate plans for KAAN, Eurofighter and F-16 jets. 

    “At present, our air-defence system is not at the desired level,” he said, blaming “project-management failures.”

    (Reporting by Ece Toksabay in Ankara and Jonathan Spicer in Istanbul; Additional reporting by Humeyra Pamuk in Washington; Editing by Alexandra Hudson)

    Copyright 2025 Thomson Reuters.

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  • Opinion | China’s Big London Spy Platform

    Did Britain’s Labour government torpedo a spying case to appease Beijing? Prime Minister Keir Starmer finds himself on the defensive as the opposition claims his government prioritized economic ties with China over national security. One test will be whether his government approves a proposed Chinese mega-embassy in London despite the espionage risks.

    The political brawl erupted last month after a much-publicized espionage case collapsed on a legal technicality. Prosecutors claimed British teacher and consultant Christopher Berry and parliamentary researcher Christopher Cash passed sensitive details to Beijing in violation of the 1911 Official Secrets Act.

    A 2024 High Court ruling expanded the definition of “enemy” to include any country that poses a national-security threat to the U.K. But the Crown Prosecution Service says the Labour government failed to provide such an assessment about China despite repeated requests, and as a result “the case could not proceed.” Messrs. Cash and Berry denied wrongdoing and the charges were dropped.

    Mr. Starmer has blamed the previous government for failing to issue such a designation against China. Under political pressure, he released statements by deputy national security adviser Matthew Collins outlining the evidence in the espionage case, including that British MPs critical of Beijing were among the targets.

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  • Virginia Giuffre Memoir Goes on Sale, Heaping Fresh Scrutiny on Prince Andrew

    LONDON (Reuters) -A posthumous memoir by Virginia Giuffre, who accused Britain’s Prince Andrew of sexually abusing her as a teenager, went on sale in London on Tuesday, days after the disgraced prince gave up his Duke of York title.

    Much of the contents of the book were reported before its release, triggering renewed scrutiny on Andrew – King Charles’ brother – whose conduct and connections with the late U.S. sex offender Jeffrey Epstein have long been criticised.

    Andrew, 65, has always denied Giuffre’s account.

    He quit all royal duties in 2019 and then was stripped of his military links and royal patronages in 2022 during legal action by Giuffre in the United States.

    That year, he settled a lawsuit brought by Giuffre, who died by suicide in April, which accused him of sexually abusing her when she was a teenager. 

    Giuffre’s book “Nobody’s Girl” contains fresh allegations against Andrew. She wrote that she feared she might “die a sex slave” under Epstein’s control and describes three alleged sexual encounters with Andrew in London, New York and on the late financier’s private island.

    The memoir also alleges Andrew correctly guessed Giuffre’s age – 17 – when they first met.

    In Friday’s statement Andrew said he would voluntarily give up his titles while repeating that he vigorously denied accusations against him.

    The Scottish National Party has called for further action and is seeking a parliamentary debate demanding the government introduce a law to formally strip Andrew of his titles.

    The government has said it believes the prince took the right course of action giving up his titles.

    (Reporting by William James; Editing by Andrew Cawthorne)

    Copyright 2025 Thomson Reuters.

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  • China Criticises UK for Delaying Ruling on New Embassy

    LONDON (Reuters) -China accused Britain on Monday of lacking “credibility and ethics” after the UK government postponed a decision on whether to approve Beijing’s plan to build a new embassy in London.

    China’s plans to build its biggest embassy in Europe near the Tower of London have stalled for the past three years because of opposition from local residents, lawmakers and Hong Kong pro-democracy campaigners in Britain.

    Last week, Britain again delayed a decision on whether to approve the plan, days after ministers faced pressure over the collapse of a trial of two men accused of spying for Beijing.

    The Chinese embassy in London on Monday expressed “strong concern and opposition” to the latest postponement, which pushes a final decision on the project back to December 10.

    “The UK has shown a total lack of the spirit of contract, credibility and ethics,” the embassy said in a statement. “It has repeatedly put off the approval …citing various excuses and linked the project with other issues, constantly complicating and politicising the matter.”

    The British government cited delays in receiving input from different government departments as the reason for the move.

    Some British media have reported that the government had given assurances to China over the approval of the embassy, but Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s spokesperson said: “No such assurance could have been given, as this decision is subject to a quasi-judicial process, independent from the rest of government.”

    (Reporting by Sam Tabahriti and Alistair Smout; Writing by Catarina Demony; Editing by Ros Russell)

    Copyright 2025 Thomson Reuters.

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  • US Supreme Court Won’t Revive Mumps Vaccine Antitrust Case Against Merck

    WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The U.S. Supreme Court declined on Monday to hear a bid by a group of physicians and healthcare providers to revive their antitrust lawsuit accusing drugmaker Merck of misleading federal regulators to maintain a decades-long monopoly over the mumps vaccine market.

    The justices turned away an appeal by the plaintiffs of a lower court’s decision to throw out the lawsuit on the basis that the drugmaker was protected under a legal doctrine that immunizes companies from antitrust claims based on actions aimed at swaying government decision-making.

    A collection of family doctors and physicians’ groups from New Jersey and New York filed the lawsuit in 2012 in federal court in Philadelphia, seeking monetary damages.

    The claims remaining in the long-running litigation involve allegations that the plaintiffs were overcharged for New Jersey-based Merck’s mumps vaccines as a result of the company’s monopolization of the mumps vaccine market in violation of federal antitrust law and New Jersey and New York state laws.

    The plaintiffs said that submissions by Merck to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration contained misrepresentations that effectively boxed out competitors such as GlaxoSmithKline and delayed market entry of a rival vaccine for more than a decade.

    Merck made the only mumps vaccine in the United States from 1967 until 2022. It is sold as part of a combined vaccine against mumps, measles and rubella, known as MMR-II.

    The FDA in the 1990s raised concerns that the mumps vaccine lost potency toward the end of its 24-month shelf life, according to the lawsuit. The lawsuit accused Merck of misleading the FDA in the 2000s about the potency and efficacy of the mumps vaccine. Merck boosted the vaccine’s initial potency and submitted a supplemental application to the FDA to continue selling it without revising its efficacy claims.

    The so-called Noerr-Pennington doctrine at issue in the case was established under a pair of Supreme Court decisions in the 1960s.

    Merck has denied any wrongdoing and has argued that its communications with the FDA were legitimate regulatory submissions protected by Noerr-Pennington immunity.

    The Philadelphia-based 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals found that Noerr-Pennington immunity is broad, though not absolute. Actions intended to influence government decision-making are not immune from liability if they are deemed a “sham,” it said. But it decided that even if Merck’s petitions to the FDA contained falsehoods, they were not “sham” petitions because they succeeded in obtaining the agency’s approval.

    In their request to the Supreme Court to hear their appeal, the plaintiffs urged the justices to resolve what they said was a split among federal appeals courts over whether alleged intentional deception can fall outside Noerr-Pennington’s protections.

    Merck countered that the alleged misrepresentations did not materially affect any statement on the vaccine label. The company also said the FDA had taken no action to revise the label despite being made aware of the allegations years earlier.

    (Reporting by Mike Scarcella; Editing by Will Dunham)

    Copyright 2025 Thomson Reuters.

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  • Ultraconservative Sanae Takaichi on Track to Become Japan’s First Female Prime Minister

    TOKYO (AP) — Japan’s governing party leader, Sanae Takaichi, is on track to become the country’s first female prime minister, after finding a badly needed replacement for a crucial partner that left her Liberal Democratic Party’s coalition.

    Takaichi, 64, would replace Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba in Tuesday’s parliamentary vote. If she’s successful, it would end Japan’s three-month political vacuum and wrangling since the coalition’s loss in the July parliamentary election.

    The moderate centrist Komeito party split from the LDP after a 26-year-long coalition. The move by Komeito came days after Takaichi’s election as president of her party, and it forced her into a desperate search for a replacement to secure votes so that she can become prime minister.

    The Buddhist-backed Komeito left after raising concerns about her ultraconservative politics and the LDP’s lax response to slush fund scandals that led to their consecutive election defeats and loss of majority in both houses.

    While the leaders of the country’s top three opposition parties failed to unite for a change of government, Takaichi went for a quick fix by teaming up with the most conservative of them: The Osaka-based Ishin no Kai, or Japan Innovation Party. But the long-term stability of their cooperation is an unknown.

    The two parties are set to sign a coalition agreement on Monday.

    An eventual Takaichi premiership would be on a cliff edge. The fragile new coalition, still a minority, would need cooperation from other opposition groups to pass any legislation. It would be a risk that could lead to an unstable, short-lived leadership.

    Big diplomatic tests come within days — talks with U.S. President Donald Trump and regional summits. At home, she needs to quickly tackle rising prices and compile economic boosting measures to address the frustrated public.

    An admirer of former U.K. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, Takaichi’s breaking of the glass ceiling makes history in a country whose gender equality ranks poorly internationally.

    But many women aren’t celebrating, and some see her impending premiership as a setback.

    “The prospect of a first female prime minister doesn’t make me happy,” sociologist Chizuko Ueno posted on X. Ueno explained that Takaichi’s leadership would elevate Japan’s gender equality ranking, but “that doesn’t mean Japanese politics becomes kinder to women.”

    Takaichi, an ultraconservative star of her male-dominated party, is among those who have stonewalled measures for women’s advancement. Takaichi supports the imperial family’s male-only succession, opposes same-sex marriage and a revision to the civil law allowing separate last names for married couples, so women don’t get pressured into abandoning theirs.

    The prospect for a dual system for last names is fading under Takaichi, Ueno says.

    “Ms. Takaichi’s policies are extremely hawkish and I doubt she would consider policies to recognize diversity,” said Chiyako Sato, a political commentator and senior writer for the Mainichi newspaper.


    Rising prices and population decline

    If she’s successful in the parliamentary vote, Takaichi would immediately launch her Cabinet on Tuesday and make a policy speech later in the week.

    A protege of assassinated former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Takaichi is expected to emulate his economic and security policies. With a potentially weak grip on power, it’s unknown how much Takaichi would be able to achieve.

    She would have only a few days to prepare for diplomatic tests — major regional summits and talks with Trump in between. She has to reassure that there will be stable ties with China and South Korea, which are concerned about her revisionist views on wartime history and past visits to the Yasukuni Shrine.

    The shrine honors Japan’s 2.5 million war dead, including convicted war criminals. Victims of Japanese aggression, especially China and the Koreas, see visits to the shrine as a lack of remorse about Japan’s wartime past.

    Takaichi supports a stronger military, currently undergoing a five-year buildup with the annual defense budget being doubled to 2% of gross domestic product by 2027. Trump is expected to demand that Japan increase its military spending to NATO targets of 5% of GDP, and purchase more U.S. weapons.

    Takaichi has to follow up on Japan’s pledge of $550 billion to Trump’s administration as part of a U.S. tariff deal.

    Her policies focus on short-term measures such as rising prices, salary increase and subsidies, as well as restrictions against a growing foreign population amid a rise of xenophobia. Takaichi hasn’t shown a vision for Japan to address bigger issues like demographic challenges.

    Takaichi’s mission is to regain conservative votes by pushing the party further to the right.

    The LDP’s new coalition with the right-wing JIP may fit Takaichi’s views, but experts say that she would have to avoid pushing them and prioritize stability.

    She needs to balance relations between China and the United States under Trump, while at home she also needs balance to gain support from the opposition camp to achieve anything.

    “She needs to be realistic,” says Sato, the commentator.

    On Friday, Takaichi sent a religious ornament instead of going to the Yasukuni Shrine, apparently to avoid a diplomatic dispute with Beijing and Seoul.

    To consolidate opposition cooperation and lift her coalition closer to a majority, she has reached out to smaller opposition groups, including the far-right Sanseito.

    “There is no room for Takaichi to show her true colors. All she can do is cooperate per policy,” said Masato Kamikubo, a Ritsumeikan University political science professor. “It’s a pathetic situation.”

    Takaichi’s election as LDP leader as she seeks the premiership is about power politics by the 85-year-old conservative former Prime Minister Taro Aso, the party’s most powerful kingmaker.

    In her first move as LDP president, Takaichi appointed Aso as the party’s vice president and gave more top jobs to his allies and others who supported her, including Abe allies linked to the funds scandal. Takaichi is expected to appoint them to her Cabinet.

    Political observers expect that a Takaichi government wouldn’t last long. An early election may have to be called later this year, in hopes of regaining a majority in the lower house, though that would be tough.

    Experts also raise concerns about how Takaichi, a fiscal expansionist, can coordinate economic policies with Ishin’s fiscal conservative views.

    “The era of LDP domination is over and we are entering the era of multiparty politics. The question is how to form a coalition,” Sato said, noting a similar trend in Europe. “We need to find a Japanese way of forming a coalition and a stable government.”

    About a dozen opposition parties span the spectrum from the Japanese Communist Party on the left to Sanseito and several others on the extreme right.

    “What’s going on here right now is what’s going on in all our democracies for a lot of complicated reasons,” said Gerald Curtis, a Columbia University professor and expert on Japanese politics, citing the mainstream political parties losing popularity, and voters acting on the basis of anger and resentment.

    Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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  • Emma Corrin, Maika Monroe Wrap Up Star-Spangled London Film Festival With ‘100 Nights of Hero’

    The 2025 BFI London Film Festival has closed in style thanks to Julia Jackman’s superstar 100 Nights of Hero cast.

    The Canadian filmmaker was joined by Emma Corrin, Maika Monroe, Amir El-Masry, Richard E. Grant and Felicity Jones at the city’s Royal Festival Hall on Sunday night to wrap up an almighty run of premieres for the LFF. Key cast members Nicholas Galitzine and Charli xcx were not in attendance.

    Jackman’s sophomore feature, based on the graphic novel of the same name by Isabel Greenberg, is a visually stunning fantasy set in a fairytale kingdom. Cherry (Monroe) is happily married to Jerome (El-Masry) and living a seemingly idyllic life. But the couple have yet to conceive an heir, so when Jerome absconds and his dashing friend Manfred (Galitzine) arrives with dastardly intentions, Hero (Corrin), Cherry’s wily and loyal maid, is forced to concoct a plan to distract Manfred by telling captivating stories about rebellious women.

    “I’ve been dreaming of making this film for a long time,” Jackman said on stage. “And I actually, to be honest, didn’t know whether I’d get the chance. So to be here with you guys is incredible. Thank you so much for coming.”

    Corrin, star of The Crown, Nosferatu and Deadpool & Wolverine, added about crafting the character of Hero with Jackman: “So much of it was in Julia’s incredible adaptation. … Hero’s all-knowing wisdom — she [has] confidence and knows who she is and there’s a real relief to playing someone like that. We chatted a lot about that, and [about] getting the comedy right.”

    Monroe — best known for last year’s horror hit Longlegs — said Jackman’s script was “so incredible unique and so beautiful.” She said: “Even just reading the script, I could imagine this fantastical world. I fell in love with Cherry. … [There] was just this feeling of, like, needing to do this role.”

    The Hollywood Reporter‘s review out of Venice Critics Week — where 100 Nights of Hero earned its world premiere in August — described the feature as “eccentric, fey and surprisingly dark.” Leslie Felperin wrote that “viewers may start to expect anything could happen — like pop superstar Charli xcx showing up in a supporting role as an unlucky bride with barely any lines but a sumptuous assortment of jewel-toned gowns.”

    It marks the end to another BFI London Film Festival after 11 days of star-studded screenings that had A-listers, including the likes of George Clooney, Adam Sandler, Daniel Craig, Julia Roberts, Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone, Jacob Elordi, Josh O’Connor, Oscar Isaac, Paul Mescal, Jessie Buckley and Daniel Day-Lewis, flocking to London’s Southbank.

    The fest kicked off Oct. 8 with the European premiere of Rian Johnson’s Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery and hosted the casts of Jay Kelly, Hamnet, Frankenstein, Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere, After The Hunt, Die My Love, Bugonia, Ballad of a Small Player, Sentimental Value and Is This Thing On?, among others.

    The fest has also hosted some of the industry’s most celebrated directors and actors for Screen Talks sessions at BFI Southbank, including Yorgos Lanthimos, Daniel Day-Lewis, Richard Linklater, Jon M. Chu, Chloé Zhao and Lynne Ramsay.

    “It’s not enough for a film to just have an incredible cast — the film has to really stand on its own two feet,” London Film Fest director Kristy Matheson told THR at the opening-night gala. “We’re really trying to find a program that’s got a lot of different textures in it, that really feels like it reflects the city that we are in. We want a really great geographical spread.

    “We want different types of stories, because here in London,” she continued, “the cinema audiences are amazing. They’re seeing great films every day of the week here. They really do know their cinema, so we have a standard that we need to meet.”

    A total of 247 titles — comprised of features, shorts, series and immersive works — from 79 countries premiered at this year’s festival, with official wins for Martel’s Landmarks (Nuestra Tierra), David Bingong’s The Travelers (Les Voyageurs), as well as One Woman One Bra by Vincho Nchogu and Coyotes, directed by Said Zagha.

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