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    Volodymyr Zelenskyy has courage. Pope Francis had it too. Why are there so many cowards? | Alexander Hurst

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    “Courage is seeking the truth and speaking it,” Jean Jaurès, the French philosopher and Socialist party leader, told a group of high school students in 1903. “It is not yielding to the law of the triumphant lie as it passes, and not echoing, with our soul, our mouth and our hands, mindless applause and fanatical jeering.”When the first world war reared its ugly, pointless head, Jaurès refused to give in to mindless fanaticism and attempted to coordinate a Franco-German general strike to stop the rush to war. In 1914, he paid for those efforts with his life when a 29-year-old French nationalist shot him twice in the back.Courage among ordinary people is not in short supply. The doctors and humanitarian workers who rush to war zones and refugee camps to care for those who need it. Rümeysa Öztürk, the PhD student who was arrested in the US for voicing an opinion against the relentless bombing of Gaza. Israeli conscientious objectors and an increasing number of other refuseniks. The protesters in Tbilisi, Belgrade and Istanbul who have repeatedly faced down their governments’ attempts at repression.Examples of political courage from those in power, though? These feel less numerous. Volodymyr Zelenskyy has displayed it endlessly. French judges did too, when they upheld the rule of law – which in normal times would simply be doing their duty, but in our times meant facing death threats. Pope Francis pushed reforms of the Catholic church to make it more compassionate and inclusive, and didn’t veer from them. He didn’t “change strategy” when attendance failed to pick up, because he didn’t have a strategy – he was simply doing what was right.View image in fullscreenOn the other hand, we’ve witnessed so many high-profile examples of political cowardice in recent months that I can only talk about them in broad categories. The US supreme court justices who, last summer, bent over backwards to create a monarchical presidency with impunity to break the law as it desires. The law firms that have offered up hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of pro bono work to an administration busy dismantling the rule of law.The CEOs and companies that have turned on the money tap and tripped over themselves to cancel inclusion initiatives to placate a president who is tanking their share prices. An almost comically conspicuous level of grift, alleged corruption and insider trading. Congressional Republicans who have sold out their country’s constitutional principles in order to avoid primaries – or perhaps, as the senator Lisa Murkowski put it, because “we are all afraid … because retaliation is real”.What is just? Who is acting with honour? With courage? When did we stop thinking it normal to consider such questions – and to demand those things from the people who lead us? To demand that they, well, lead?Left with basically no other choice, Harvard University finally made the decision to oppose the Trump administration’s outrageous demands. That is not to downplay the moral courage in the decision; other universities might have and did make different choices when they were in the same bind. As a result of Harvard’s stand, hundreds of college and university presidents have decided that sticking together is better than falling one by one.But perhaps in this moment, Harvard and other elite schools like it might take the opportunity to reflect on exactly what kind of virtues they have been instilling in their students. For years, nearly half of Harvard’s graduates have stepped straight from campus into roles at consulting firms and investment banks. It’s disheartening but perhaps not surprising, given that according to its newspaper, the Crimson, for the past four decades far more first-years have been concerned with “being well-off financially” than with “developing a meaningful life philosophy”.When the primary metric becomes “success” in amassing something – money, followers, territory, votes – society loses its moral centre. As Pankaj Mishra wrote in his 2017 book, Age of Anger, part of the crisis of the current moment is that commercial society has unleashed individuals who are unmoored from each other or from some greater social fabric.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionIt may sound quaint, almost conservative, to denounce a breakdown in society’s engagement with morality in public life. But I reject that. Without an ability to think and speak in real moral language, we end up in a place where there is no more shame in hypocrisy, no dishonour in rapacious greed; where if something is true or false matters less than how many people believe it. We end up in a place where the world’s wealthiest man has overseen a series of devastating aid cuts that will indirectly kill hundreds of thousands of children and sentence millions more to death from disease. There is an appropriate descriptive word for that: the word is evil.Much of the media – US media, most certainly – have a lot to answer for in the ways that they have oriented public conversation. Far too frequently, they have approached politics primarily as a horse race. What does this or that mean for a candidate’s electoral chances? How will it play out in the polls? Who is up, who is down? Who agrees, who disagrees, and what is each party saying about the other? What the media don’t like to do, because it’s far more difficult and far riskier, is to talk about whether the policies being proposed and the decisions being taken are morally commendable, just, honourable, courageous.A focus on speaking the truth, of the kind that Jaurès extolled, opens wide other doors. Among them, the ability to move from a political question – what do we want? – to a more courageous one: is this what we should want?

    Alexander Hurst is a Guardian Europe columnist

    Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. More

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      The Guardian view on Britain’s new aid vision: less cash, more spin. The cost will be counted in lives | Editorial

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      Last week, the government justified cutting the UK’s development budget from 0.5% to 0.3% of gross national income – the lowest level in more than 25 years – by claiming Britain’s role is now to “share expertise”, not hand out cash. With a straight face, the minister responsible, Jenny Chapman, told MPs on the international development committee that the age of the UK as “a global charity” was over. But this isn’t reinvention – it’s abdication, wrapped in spin. No wonder Sarah Champion, the Labour MP who is chair of the committee, called Lady Chapman’s remarks “naive” and “disrespectful”. Behind the slogans lies a brutal truth: lives will be lost, and Britain no longer cares. Dressing that up as the “new normal” doesn’t make it less callous.Kevin Watkins of the London School of Economics analysed the cuts and found no soft-landing options. He suggests charting a sensible course through this wreckage, noting that harm from the cuts is inevitable but not beyond mitigation. Dr Watkins’ proposals – prioritising multilateralism, funding the global vaccine alliance (Gavi) and replenishing international lending facilities – would prevent some needless deaths. Ministers should adopt such an approach. The decision to raid the aid budget to fund increased defence spending was a shameful attempt to cosy up to Washington. The cuts were announced just before Sir Keir Starmer’s White House meeting with Donald Trump, with no long-term strategy behind them. It’s a deplorable trend: globally, aid levels could fall by $40bn this year.The gutting of USAID, the world’s biggest spender on international development, by Elon Musk, was less fiscal policy than culture-war theatre. Foreign beneficiaries don’t vote, and liberal-leaning aid contractors lack clout, so dismantling USAID shrinks “globalism” while “owning the establishment”. But the real casualties lie elsewhere. Memorably, Bill Gates said the idea of Mr Musk, the world’s richest man, “killing the world’s poorest children is not a pretty one”. Countries that built health systems around USAID now face a reckoning. It wasn’t just cash – it sustained disease surveillance, logistics and delivery. Ironically, much of it never left American hands, absorbed by US private interests.In the UK, University of Portsmouth researchers say aid increasingly serves foreign policy, not development. It’s not just ineffective – it’s cynical. Aid should change lives, not wave flags. All this as poor nations’ debt crisis deepens. Without global reform, the Institute for Economic Justice warns, African nations face a cycle of distress blocking investment in basic needs. The UK recasts withdrawal as progress – holding up Ethiopia and Zimbabwe as model partners. But Georgetown University’s Ken Opalo makes a cutting point: in diplomacy, when the music stops, those who outsourced ambition get exposed. Aid dependency, he argues, has hollowed out local ownership. With little planning, many governments now face a choice: take over essential services or cling to a vanishing donor model.Politicians should choose their words carefully. The former Tory development secretary Andrew Mitchell rightly criticised Boris Johnson’s “giant cashpoint in the sky” remark for damaging public support for aid. Labour ministers are guilty, too. Britain has replaced moral leadership with metrics, and compassion with calculation. The policy’s defenders call it realism. But without vision, it’s just surrender – leaving the world’s poor to fend for themselves, forced to try to survive without the means to do so. More

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      Michelle Obama 2.0 – the reinvention of the former first lady

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      Hello and welcome to The Long Wave. This week, I review Michelle Obama’s new podcast, IMO, which is surprising in the ways it breaks with the Michelle of the past.I came to sneer – and stayed to cheerView image in fullscreenFirst, a disclaimer: I had never fully bought into the Michelle Obama hype. I felt her now legendary line “When they go low, we go high” encapsulated a troubling and complacent form of respectability politics, in which Black people have to maintain coolness and grace under fire to be taken seriously. As the first lady, Michelle often seemed like a sanitising presence, wheeled out so that her national treasure status could serve as a smokescreen to obscure more honest and damning assessments of Barack Obama’s political record.Also, I am not a huge fan of the celebrity podcast genre, which is a vehicle for high-profile figures to chat to their friends in return for huge pay packets. So I was sceptical when Michelle’s podcast was launched in March. Yet when I listened to it, I was immediately charmed and hooked. In truth, I came to sneer and stayed to cheer. She is honest, reflective and vulnerable in ways that are profoundly resonant of a universal Black female experience, something that her icon status had rarely spoken to previously. The irony is that just as Michelle is finding her voice, her popularity appears to be falling – the podcast received poor ratings on launch, though it’s arguably the best thing she’s ever done.A great orator has the conversation of her lifeView image in fullscreenThe most arresting thing about IMO, despite the genuinely interesting high-profile Black guests such as Keke Palmer and the Wayans brothers, is Obama herself. She has always been one of the great orators in US politics – one of the superpowers that made her and Barack, another impressive public speaker, such a compelling couple on the world stage. In her podcast, Michelle uses this talent to reflect on her life and the challenges of ageing, losing her parents and the constant demands placed upon her.The fact that she co-hosts the show with her brother, Craig Robinson – a genial and down-to-earth foil for her confessions – gives the podcast such an intimate air that you feel like you’re in the presence of everyday people, not celebrities. I found myself listening not to hear any snippets of political gossip or insight into the Obamas’ lifestyle, but to receive some exceptionally articulated wisdom from an older Black woman who has seen a lot and gone through milestones we will all experience.She is also funny. Her account of how differently men and women socialise is familiar and hilarious. Michelle describes catching up with her female friends as a “multiday event”, something that leaves Barack perplexed as to why it takes two days for a basic meetup.There is pathos and uncertainty, too. In a recent episode, Michelle talks about the death of her mother, who lived in the White House during the Obamas’ tenure. Michelle says that, at 61, only now does she feel that she has finally become an adult, having had to reckon with her own mortality after the loss of her parents. The former first lady has revealed that she is in therapy, and that she is still trying to navigate this phase of her life.And, in a striking segment, she speaks with barely restrained annoyance about her reasons for not attending Trump’s inauguration, an absence that triggered divorce rumours that have been swirling for months. She says “it took everything in [her] power” to choose what was right for her in that moment. Yet that decision was met with “ridicule” because people couldn’t believe she was saying no to the inauguration for any other reason than she just did not want to be there – they had to “assume my marriage was falling apart”. Oof. It caught my breath.Beyond Black Girl Magicskip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionView image in fullscreenThis Michelle is worlds away from the Michelle of the 2010s. The publishing juggernaut and icon of Black social mobility, who rose to first lady from a bungalow in the south side of Chicago, was the product of a particular moment in feminist and racial discourse.The start of that decade brought the rise of Black Girl Magic, a cultural movement that focused on the exceptional achievements and power of Black women. It intersected with Black Joy, which moved away from defining the Black experience primarily through racism and struggle. Both unfolded against the backdrop of “lean in” feminism, which glorified hard graft, corporate success and having it all. The result was the marketing of women such as Michelle to promote popular narratives of inspiration and empowerment.That energy has since dissipated, losing steam culturally and overtaken by more urgent battles. The gains of the Black Lives Matter movement triggered a rightwing backlash against diversity and inclusion that is spearheaded by Trump. Now the Obamas seem like relics of a naively optimistic and complacent time.‘We got out of the White House alive – but what happened to me?’View image in fullscreenBut all that change and disappointment seems to have freed Michelle from the expectation that she should project graceful power and guru-like wisdom at all times. The podcast may not be the runaway hit it might have been 10 years ago, but that speaks to its authenticity and refreshing lack of a cynical big marketing campaign. Michelle is not trying to catch a moment – she even looks different. Gone is the silk-pressed hair, the minimalist jewellery and the pencil dresses. She now embraces boho braids, long colourful nails and bold gold jewellery. In an episode of IMO, she asks herself: “What happened that eight years that we were in the White House? We got out alive; I hope we made the country proud. But what happened to me?” There is so much urgency in her voice. And though her high-octane political experience may not be relatable to the average person, that question is one that I and many women of a certain age are asking as we emerge, blinking into the light, from the tunnel of navigating racism, establishing careers against the odds and having families. What happened to me?To receive the complete version of The Long Wave in your inbox every Wednesday, please subscribe here. More

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      Trump’s chief trade adviser says Britons will like chlorinated chicken and hormone-fed beef – US politics live

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      Peter Navarro, Trump’s chief trade adviser, just told reporters outside the White House that British consumers will like chicken and beef imported from the US despite the use of chlorine and hormones.“Let’s see what the market decides,” Navarro said when asked about longstanding concerns in the UK about the safety of chlorinated chicken and hormone-fed beef produced in the US.“Our position is and always has been”, he added, that sanitary standards are “simply a phony tool used to suppress what is very fine American agricultural product”.“So if more of that comes into the market and the British people don’t want to buy it, that’s one set of facts,” Navarro said. “We don’t believe that once they taste American beef and chicken that they would prefer not to have it.”One point of apparent disagreement between American and British officials seems to be whether the UK will have to drop its digital services tax, imposed on US tech companies like Amazon, Google and Meta.The tax, which is imposed by several European countries and is set at 2% by the UK on the revenues of search engines, social media services and online marketplaces, was described recently by the US treasury secretary Scott Bessent as an “unfair tax on one of America’s great industries”.While the 10 Downing Street statement on the new trade deal agreed on Thursday says, “The Digital Services Tax remains unchanged as part of today’s deal”, Donald Trump’s trade adviser Peter Navarro told reporters a short time ago, “we’re still in negotiations with that”.“That’s a very big deal to President Trump”, Navarro added. “The digital tax has spread like a bad virus around the world, but it started in Europe, and it basically targets American companies”.According to the UK prime minister’s office, instead of dropping that tax, “the two nations have agreed to work on a digital trade deal that will strip back paperwork for British firms trying to export to the US – opening the UK up to a huge market that will put rocket boosters on the UK economy.”In the House of Commons on Wednesday, the UK’s trade minister, Douglas Alexander, was asked if the digital services tax, and legal regulations to prevent “online harms”, are on the negotiating table. The tax, and those measures on online harms, he said, “remain undisturbed and unchanged by this agreement”.Peter Navarro, Trump’s chief trade adviser, just told reporters outside the White House that British consumers will like chicken and beef imported from the US despite the use of chlorine and hormones.“Let’s see what the market decides,” Navarro said when asked about longstanding concerns in the UK about the safety of chlorinated chicken and hormone-fed beef produced in the US.“Our position is and always has been”, he added, that sanitary standards are “simply a phony tool used to suppress what is very fine American agricultural product”.“So if more of that comes into the market and the British people don’t want to buy it, that’s one set of facts,” Navarro said. “We don’t believe that once they taste American beef and chicken that they would prefer not to have it.”Germany’s new chancellor, Friedrich Merz, and Donald Trump agreed on the need to quickly resolve trade disputes in a phone call on Thursday evening, Reuters reports that a German government spokesperson said.The two leaders also agreed on the need to closely cooperate with the aim of ending the war in Ukraine, the spokesperson said.“President Trump congratulated the Chancellor on taking office” earlier this week, the spokesperson said. “Chancellor Merz assured the American President that, 80 years after the end of the second world war, the United States remains an indispensable friend and partner of Germany.”On the day of his election earlier this week, Merz warned the US to “stay out” of his country’s politics after the far-right AfD received strong backing from allies of the US president, including Vice-President JD Vance and controversial tech billionaire Elon Musk.Merz condemned recent “absurd observations” from the US, without specifying particular statements, and said he “would like to encourage the American government … to largely stay out of” German domestic politics.

      The state department said a solution to be able to deliver food aid to Gaza was “steps away” and an announcement was coming shortly, although it fell short of detailing what the plan would entail, per Reuters. Gaza is on the brink of catastrophe after two months of a total blockade by Israel.

      Trump and British PM Keir Starmer announced some details of the framework for a future US-UK trade deal, most of which pertained to cars, steel and aluminum, and agriculture. The details have not been finalized, but what was announced today was that tariffs for UK cars imported into the US would be cut from 27.5% to 10% up to a maximum of 100,000 cars a year, while US tariffs of 25% on steel and aluminum would be dropped to zero. On agriculture, Starmer said there had been no compromise on food standards, while the deal would open exclusive access for UK beef farmers to the US. But it also includes £5bn worth of agricultural exports from the US to the UK, with ethanol and beef – of great concern to British farmers – the only products mentioned specifically. US agriculture secretary Brooke Rollins said the deal would “exponentially increase our beef exports” to the UK. While the White House fact sheet and later press release from the US commerce department alluded to “unprecedented access” to the UK market for other American agricultural products being on the table in the talks – which neither side talked about in their press conferences today – they appeared to actually be referring to areas where the US already exports to the UK, albeit in small amounts.

      Trump congratulated Pope Leo XIV on his election to head the Catholic Church on Thursday, writing on Truth Social that it “is such an honor to realize that he is the first American Pope”. Trump said he was looking forward to meeting Robert Francis Prevost, who is originally from Chicago. A quick glance at Prevost’s X account gives some indication to his possible views on the Trump administration’s immigration agenda. Whether this might put him on a similar path to the late Pope Francis, who had a difficult relationship with the US president as a vocal critic of his most aggressive policies, remains to be seen.

      Bill Gates announced plans to shutter the Gates Foundation in 2045 and also strongly criticized Elon Musk for slashing funding to the US Agency for International Development (USAID), accusing the Tesla CEO of “killing the world’s poorest children” in new interviews.

      Trump said he will nominate a new candidate to serve as Washington DC’s top federal prosecutor, after his first pick Ed Martin, who holds the job on an interim basis, failed to garner enough support to advance in the Senate. Republican senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina, who sits on the Senate judiciary committee, appeared to deal Martin’s nomination a fatal blow when he told reporters he could not support him because of Martin’s past comments which downplayed the January 6, 2021 US Capitol attack.

      The Trump administration asked the supreme court to intervene in its bid to revoke the temporary legal status granted by Joe Biden to hundreds of thousands of Venezuelan, Cuban, Haitian and Nicaraguan migrants living in the US.

      An Irish woman who was detained by US immigration authorities because of a criminal record dating back almost 20 years was released after 17 days in custody.
      Reuters reports that Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy was speaking to Donald Trump on Thursday evening (Ukrainian time), according to Zelenskyy’s spokesperson Serhiy Nikiforov.We’ll bring you more on this as we get it.The state department said a solution to be able to deliver food aid to Gaza was “steps away” and an announcement was coming shortly, although it fell short of detailing what the plan would entail, Reuters reports.Gaza is on the brink of catastrophe after two months of a total blockade by Israel, aid workers say, with many families down to one meal a day. Medical officials report rising cases of acute malnutrition, and community kitchens that served 1m meals a day are shutting down for lack of basic essentials. Aid agencies say they have distributed all remaining stocks of food. Dozens of bakeries that supplied vital free bread closed last month.I’ll bring you more on this as we get it.My colleague Peter Walker has this very helpful explainer from a UK perspective of the key points of the US-UK trade deal that was announced to be under discussion today.

      Tariffs for UK cars imported into the US will be cut from 27.5% to 10%, up to a maximum of 100,000 cars a year, close to total exports last year (after that the tariff will be 25%). This was, Starmer said, a “huge and important reduction” – even if it is capped, and still a tariff.

      Agriculture is the most potentially tricky area of the deal, not least due to concerns among UK voters – and farmers – about chlorinated chicken and hormone-fed beef. The result was hailed by Downing Street as “a win for both nations”. As ever, the devil could be in the detail. Government officials said there had been no compromise on food standards, while the deal would open exclusive access for UK beef farmers to the US. But, it also includes £5bn worth of agricultural exports from the US to the UK, with the US agriculture secretary, Brooke Rollins, saying the deal would “exponentially increase our beef exports” to the UK.
      Read Peter’s full piece here:Americans are celebrating after US cardinal Robert Francis Prevost, who will be known as Pope Leo XIV, was announced as the next pope.“Congratulations to Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost, who was just named Pope. It is such an honor to realize that he is the first American Pope. What excitement, and what a Great Honor for our Country. I look forward to meeting Pope Leo XIV. It will be a very meaningful moment!” Donald Trump wrote on Truth Social shortly after the pope, who was born in Chicago, appeared on the Vatican balcony in Rome, Italy on Thursday.Chicago mayor Brandon Johnson quipped on X about Prevost’s appointment:
      Everything dope, including the Pope, comes from Chicago! Congratulations to the first American Pope Leo XIV! We hope to welcome you back home soon.
      The US Embassy to the Holy See also lauded the new pope on X:
      With joy we extend our heartfelt congratulations to the first Pope from the United States of America, His Holiness Robert Francis Prevost, as Pope Leo XIV, elected as the 267th Supreme Pontiff of the Catholic Church.
      As Aaron Reichlin-Melnick of the American Immigration Council astutely notes on X, the new pope didn’t post on his X account at all in 2024, but in 2025 he has posted twice and reposted three times.Of his own posts, Robert Prevost – now Pope Leo XIV – posted an article criticizing vice-president JD Vance’s take on Jesus, and posted another article critiquing Vance’s statements on the administration’s deportation policies. Two of his reposts were to do with the health of the late Pope Francis, and his most recent repost was criticism of Donald Trump and El Salvador’s president Nayib Bukele’s laughter at Kilmar Ábrego García (who was mistakenly deported to El Salvador by the Trump administration and whose reeturn to the US the supreme court has ordered the administration to facilitate).Earlier, Trump said he looked forward to meeting with the new pope, who he had “realised” was the first American to hold the position. How Pope Leo’s personal views will influence their relationship going forward will be interesting to see. Indeed, Trump had a difficult relationship with the late Pope Francis, a vocal critic of many of his policies – particularly his crackdown on immigration which, as recently as February this year, Francis called a “major crisis”.Donald Trump said he will nominate a new candidate to serve as Washington DC’s top federal prosecutor, after his first pick Ed Martin, who holds the job on an interim basis, failed to garner enough support to advance in the Senate.“I was disappointed. A lot of people were disappointed, but that’s the way it works sometimes,” Trump said in the Oval Office earlier. “We have somebody else that we’ll be announcing over the next two days who’s going to be great.” A spokesperson for Martin’s office did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.A source close to the Senate judiciary committee earlier this week said the committee would not move forward with a vote before Martin’s interim term expires on 20 May.Republican senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina, who sits on the committee, appeared to deal Martin’s nomination a fatal blow when he told reporters he could not support him because of Martin’s past comments which downplayed the January 6, 2021 US Capitol attack.Senator Dick Durbin, the top Democrat on the panel, said he was “relieved” that the nomination was withdrawn and that “Martin’s record made it clear that he does not have the temperament or judgment” for the top US law enforcement job for the nation’s capital.Per Politico: “Martin has spent the last few years advocating for January 6 defendants and helping organize their legal defense. He has embraced conspiracy theories about the attack and the results of the 2020 election and he has spoken favorably about some of the most egregious perpetrators of the riot.“He also has also drawn scrutiny for his evasive answers to the judiciary committee about his relationship with January 6 defendant Timothy Hale-Cusanelli, who had been accused of openly anti-Semitic behavior, and omission of dozens of appearances on Russian state media in recent years.”It was unclear what is next for Martin. Trump said he would consider giving him another role in the administration, potentially in the department of justice.Donald Trump congratulated Pope Leo on his election to head the Catholic Church on Thursday, writing on Truth Social that it “is such an honor to realize that he is the first American Pope”.US cardinal Robert Prevost, who took the name Leo XIV, is originally from Chicago. Trump went on:
      What excitement, and what a Great Honor for our Country. I look forward to meeting Pope Leo XIV. It will be a very meaningful moment!
      For more from the Vatican, my colleague Jakub Krupa has been live-blogging the moment:Tom Bradshaw, president of the UK’s National Farmers’ Union, told the Guardian he is concerned the beef imported from the US will be produced to a lower standard than the UK product. He said:
      80% of our beef diet comes from grass so it’ll be interesting to see exactly what the standards for the imported beef is. We are unclear on that as the details are still being worked on.
      Many beef cattle are fed with soy, which can be bad for the environment as it comes from sensitive areas including the Amazon rainforest.Bradshaw said the “main focus” in their recent lobbying was on hormone-treated beef, but said “the large US beef lots were also a big concern for our members – we will be watching that very closely.”The US has vast factory farms for its beef, which outcompete those in the UK, farmers fear. Bradshaw added:
      What we need to look at is how the US beef is produced, what are the health and welfare standards and what is the diet. [British] beef is one of the most sustainable in the world.
      However, he said he was pleased the UK secured reciprocal access to the beef market, adding:
      We’ve had a very clear ask that we wanted reciprocal access back, and the red lines on animal health and welfare standards have thankfully been maintained. We cannot see agriculture used as a pawn to shoulder the burden of tariffs.
      US agriculture secretary Brooke Rollins said she hopes to expand today’s agreement to include “all meats” and that she will be visiting the UK next week to make this point, adding: “There is no industry that has been treated more unfairly than our agriculture industry.”Bradshaw replied “good luck with that,” adding:
      The [UK] government is trying to negotiate with the EU [which also has high food standards] at the same time so that sounds unfeasible.
      The US-UK trade deal includes £5bn worth of agricultural exports. The farming sector in the UK has been very concerned about farmers being undercut with cheap products from the US, which has lower environmental standards for its food than the UK. They say the large beef feedlots in the US outcompete the smaller farms in the UK.US agriculture secretary Brooke Rollins told reporters:
      This [trade deal] is going to exponentially increase our beef exports. American beef is the crown jewel of American agriculture for the world.
      UK ministers have been clear that chlorinated chicken and hormone-treated beef will not be included in any deal, but Rollins said she hopes to expand today’s agreement to include “all meats” and that she will be visiting the UK next week to make this point, adding:
      There is no industry that has been treated more unfairly than our agriculture industry.
      Donald Trump, however, mentioned that US agriculture could end up being produced to higher health and environmental standards under the leadership of his health chief Robert F Kennedy Jr, adding:
      Bobby Kennedy is probably heading towards your system.
      The UK Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs sources said imports of hormone-treated beef or chlorinated chicken will remain illegal, and that the deal will open up exclusive access for UK beef farmers to the US market. They said only a few countries such as Australia have this access. More

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      Flattery gets Starmer somewhere as The Donald stays awake to toot tariff deal | John Crace

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      Three days ago, Donald Trump promised an announcement that would be very possibly the greatest announcement in the whole history of announcements. Come Thursday morning, he said the US and the UK had reached a full and comprehensive trade deal.I guess a lot depends on what you mean by the words “greatest announcement” and “full and comprehensive”. As details of the deal began to emerge, it rather looked as if the UK had managed to negotiate a worse deal with the US than we had even two months ago. One that was hardly transformative. Just reversing some of the damage that had been done to the UK by the US starting a global trade war. Tariffs as a protection racket.Still, a deal is a deal. These days, Keir Starmer has learned you get what you can get. And it’s more than any other country has got so far. It remains to be seen if others come out of the White House with anything better. But Keir wasn’t the only one who needed a quick result. Trump did, too. He had a reputation to maintain as a deal-maker and Americans were beginning to get twitchy that none had been reached. It wasn’t clear if this was a victory for crack negotiating teams, or a sign that both the US and the UK had been a bit desperate. So both sides were keen to chalk the deal up as a win for themselves.Then there was the choreography to think of. A televised phone call between the president and the prime minister, before each gave separate press conferences. In both instances it was Agent Orange to go first. Presumably, because no one was sure he could stick to the script. When you do a deal with The Donald, there’s no guarantee he isn’t going to change his mind before the ink is dry. It would be no surprise if he were to announce new tariffs by the weekend.Cut to the Oval Office where, 45 minutes later than planned, Trump was on the phone to Starmer. Bizarrely, he started by talking about rare-earth minerals, which weren’t part of the deal. He seemed to have forgotten what had been agreed with whom. His minders set him back on track and there were warm words about one of America’s greatest and most cherished allies. You wondered why he had previously treated the UK with indifference if he cared so much.“This is an historic day,” said Starmer. All the more so because it had happened on VE Day. Keir could almost believe he was Winston Churchill addressing a jubilant nation after six years of war. At this point, it looked as if Agent Orange might drop off.Trump’s powers of concentration aren’t all they might be and he finds it difficult when he’s not the centre of attention. Keir did his best to stop the president from flatlining by showering him with flattery. The Donald had been the best. Everyone and everything would be nothing without him.At this, Trump began to perk up. The US and the UK had been working for years on a trade deal. People had said it couldn’t be done, he boasted. And yet he had done it in a matter of weeks. Truly, he was incredible. He didn’t seem to realise that he hadn’t negotiated a full trade agreement. Just a small side hustle encompassing a few sectors. There was a ripple of applause from the sycophants in the Oval Office when Trump managed to press the right switch to disconnect the call.The Donald then invited his commerce secretary, Howard Lutnik, to expand a little on the deal. Howie is reportedly a billionaire but he also delivers a pitch-perfect impersonation of a halfwit. It’s hard to imagine him in a room negotiating the sale of a secondhand car. “This was the president’s deal,” he cooed. “If it had been left to me, it would have taken at least three years. He did everything. He is the closer.” Imagine. Howie had just told the entire world he had been out of his depth in a puddle. Truly, the world is fucked if he is one of its masters.Next up was the British ambassador, Peter Mandelson. Bowing deeply. Full of reverence. Mandy was born for days like these. When all that is required is oleaginous smooth-talking masquerading as sincerity. Truly, The Donald was nothing short of a genius. He wasn’t fit to wipe the president’s shoes. Trump had achieved more than anyone else in the history of the world. Thank you, thank you. We have reached the end of the beginning, he sobbed. Everyone was getting in on the Churchill act this VE Day. Trump nodded. Mandy was right about him.Back in the UK, Starmer was just starting his own press conference at the Jaguar Land Rover factory. Britain was open for business, he said. No less than the whole future of the UK had been saved. Keir, alone, had altered the course of history. Some men are born great, some achieve greatness and some have greatness thrust upon them. Keir had managed all three. This was bigger than VE Day. Bring out the bunting. Drink the pubs dry. We were entering a new era of prosperity.This wasn’t just a victory for the UK. It was a victory for Starmer personally. Some people had said he should stand up to Agent Orange. Put the phone down. Don’t give in to bullies. But Keir had emerged triumphant. His brown-nosing had achieved the impossible. Which was, er … not quite as good as the deal we had not so long ago. It was time for the king to get out his silk pyjamas, line up the Diet Cokes and the Haribos and prepare for his sleepover with the president. If Keir had to suck it up, then so could Charles. More

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      Donald Trump expected to announce framework of US-UK trade deal – UK politics live

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      Good morning. I’m Andrew Sparrow, picking up from Martin Belam.Here is a timetable for what we are expecting today. We will be mostly focused on the US-UK trade deal announcement, but there will be some other politics too.9am: Keir Starmer gives a speech at the London defence conference. He is not expected to take questions.9.30am: Steve Reed, the environment secretary, takes questions in the Commons.10.30am: Lucy Powell, the leader of the Commons, takes questions on next week’s Commons business.11.30am: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.Noon: Starmer and other political leaders join the king and queen in Westminster Abbey for the service to commemorate the 80th anniversary of VE Day.After 12pm: After the two minutes’ silence to commemorate the 80th anniversary of VE Day, the Bank of England announces its interest rate.After 12pm: John Swinney, Scotland’s first minister, takes questions from MSPs.3pm (UK time): Donald Trump is due to make his announcement in the White House about the US-UK trade deal. He posted this on his Truth Social account earlier.Afternoon: Starmer is expected to make a statement about the trade deal.There will be a ministerial statement in the Commons this afternoon on the US-UK trade deal, Lindsay Hoyle, the Speaker, told MPs at the start of business questions. But he said he did not know yet when this would be.Steve Reed, the environment secretary, has accused the opposition of trying to “weaponise” tragedy after his Tory opposite number claimed farmers are taking their lives because of Labour’s inheritance tax policy.The government announced in the budget last year that more valuable farms will lose their exemption from inheritance tax. Older farmer have complained that, having planned on the basis that they will be able to leave their farms to their children without an inheritance tax liability, they have had little time to make alternative arrangements before the tax change comes into force in April next year.Speaking during environment questions in the Commons, Victoria Atkins, the shadow environment secretary, said:
      Before Christmas, I warned the secretary of state that a farmer had taken their own life because they were so worried about the family farm tax. He responded with anger and later stopped the farming resilience fund, which helped farmers with mental ill health.
      This week, I have received the devastating news that several more farmers have taken their own lives because of the family farm tax. This is the secretary of state’s legacy, but he can change it, because it is not yet law.
      Will he set out these tragedies to the prime minister, demand that Labour policy is changed, or offer an appointed principal his resignation?
      In his reply, Reed said he was sorry that Atkins was seeking “to politicise personal tragedy in this way”. He went on:
      I think it’s immensely, immensely regrettable that she would seek to do that. None of us have been sure what happens in matters of personal tragedy. But I think it’s beneath her, actually, to try to weaponise it in a way that she has done this.
      This government takes the issues of mental health very, very seriously indeed. That is why we are setting up mental health hubs in every community so that we can support farmers and others who are suffering from mental health, which I would again remind her is a problem that escalated during her time in office the secretary of state for health, where she failed to address the problems people are facing.
      Keir Starmer used his speech to the London Defence Conference to announce a £563m contract for Rolls-Royce for the maintenance of Britain’s fleet of Typhoon fighter jets. “The work to maintain 130 Typhoon engines will take place at Rolls-Royce’s sites, supporting hundreds of jobs in Bristol and beyond,” No 10 said.He also said that British workers would gain from what he described as the “defence dividend” – the benefits to be had from the government’s decision to increase defence spending. Starmer said:
      Our task now is to seize the defence dividend – felt directly in the pockets of working people, rebuilding our industrial base and creating the jobs of the future.
      A national effort. A time for the state, business and society to join hands, in pursuit of the security of the nation and the prosperity of its people.
      An investment in peace, but also an investment in British pride and the British people to build a nation that, once again, lives up to the promises made to the generation who fought for our values, our freedom and our security.
      The phrase “defence dividend” is an allusion to the term “peace dividend” – which referred to the advantage Britain and other western countries gained at the end of the cold war when they could cut defence spending, meaning more government money was available for other priorities.What Starmer refers to as the “defence dividend” has been funded in part by huge cuts to aid spending. But Starmer has repeatedly sought to show that his policy will bring, not just defence gains, but employment gains too.Keir Starmer has said that acting in the national interest has been his priority in the talks on the UK-US trade deal expected to be announced later.Speaking to the London Defence Conference, Starmer:
      Talks with the US have been ongoing and you’ll hear more from me about that later today.
      But make no mistake, I will always act in our national interest, for workers, businesses and families, to deliver security and renewal for our country.
      The conventional wisdom at Westminster is that trade deals are a good thing, and that voters welcome them. But the US-UK deal could challenge this assumption because at least some of its features may look like protection racket payments handed over to an administration using tariffs as an instrument of extortion.In a post on social media, Robert Peston, ITV’s political editor, says British voters might not necessarily applaud what has been agreed.
      The UK’s soon-to-be announced tariff deal with the US matters hugely for two reasons.
      First, it is the first since Trump announced his coercive global tariffs on the whole world. So it will be a template for further such deals with bigger manufacturing nations and areas like Japan and the EU.
      Second, it can only be judged against the yardstick of how far the UK has been forced to grant the US better terms of trade in response to the American president’s gangsterish bullying.
      The prospect of the UK being seen as a net winner from a deal that would abuse the meaning of “free trade” is nil.
      The question, soon to be answered, is how far we have surrendered – on access to the UK for US farmers, on reducing the tax for the likes of Google and Amazon – to save the bacon of our motor and steel manufacturers.
      Politically in the UK for the prime minister I am not sure how it will play out. British voters don’t like Trump. They won’t want Starmer to have capitulated to him.
      The Green party is joining the Liberal Democrats (see 8.05am) in demanding that MPs get a vote on the proposed US-UK trade deal (as well as the UK-India one). The Green MP Ellie Chowns posted this on Bluesky.
      Reports that Labour may scrap the Digital Services Tax to secure a trade deal with Trump are deeply concerning. I’m urging the govt to guarantee MPs get a vote on any such deal. MPs must have a say in decisions that affect our digital economy and ability to tax corporate giants.
      In 2021 the Labour party published a policy paper saying it would give MPs a vote on trade deals. It said:
      We will reform the parliamentary scrutiny of trade agreements, so that MPs have a guaranteed right to debate the proposed negotiating objectives for future trade deals, and a guaranteed vote on the resulting agreements, with sufficient time set aside for detailed scrutiny both of the draft treaty texts, and of accompanying expert analysis on the full range of implications, including for workers’ rights.
      In the Commons, Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, has repeatedly pressed Keir Starmer to confirm that he will give MPs a vote on the proposed US-UK trade deal. But Starmer has refused to commit to this. When this last come up, he told Davey: “If [a deal] is secured, it will go through the known procedures for this house.”This was a reference to the CRAG (Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010) process – which does not guarantee MPs get to vote on treaties.Unlike Donald Trump, Keir Starmer does not have his own social media platform. He still uses X, and this morning he has been tweeting, not about the US-UK trade deal, but about the 80th anniversary of VE Day.
      Their victory will always be one of our finest hours.
      Today we come together to celebrate those who fought for our freedom.
      #VEDay80
      He has also posted a link to an article he has written for the Metro about the VE Day generation, and his own grandfather. Here is an extract.
      This is the thing about our greatest generation.
      Not only did they sacrifice so much, they often bore their burden in silence.
      I think of my own grandfather, who fought during the Second World War. We never did find out exactly what he saw. He simply didn’t want to talk about it.
      But this VE Day and every VE Day, we must talk about them. Because without their bravery, the freedom and joy of today’s celebrations may never have come to pass.
      Good morning. I’m Andrew Sparrow, picking up from Martin Belam.Here is a timetable for what we are expecting today. We will be mostly focused on the US-UK trade deal announcement, but there will be some other politics too.9am: Keir Starmer gives a speech at the London defence conference. He is not expected to take questions.9.30am: Steve Reed, the environment secretary, takes questions in the Commons.10.30am: Lucy Powell, the leader of the Commons, takes questions on next week’s Commons business.11.30am: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.Noon: Starmer and other political leaders join the king and queen in Westminster Abbey for the service to commemorate the 80th anniversary of VE Day.After 12pm: After the two minutes’ silence to commemorate the 80th anniversary of VE Day, the Bank of England announces its interest rate.After 12pm: John Swinney, Scotland’s first minister, takes questions from MSPs.3pm (UK time): Donald Trump is due to make his announcement in the White House about the US-UK trade deal. He posted this on his Truth Social account earlier.Afternoon: Starmer is expected to make a statement about the trade deal.Defence secretary John Healey has just appeared on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme, where he did not have much to add to his earlier comments about the prospect of a UK-US trade deal, repeating that negotiations had been “hard” and that ministers had refrained from offering a running commentary in order to give negotiators space.He was asked whether ministerial silence on some of the more controversial things Donald Trump’s administration had said or done since coming to office was part of the UK trying to secure a trade deal, and also asked why it did not appear to be “a full deal, as opposed to something responding to tariffs, as it seems to be.”Healey essentially side-stepped those questions, saying “the single purpose of the government is to get a good economic deal. And this discussion reminds us that the US is an indispensable ally for our economic security and our national security.”The Liberal Democrats treasury spokesperson Daisy Cooper has reiterated the party’s position that any trade deal with the US should be put to parliament for approval before being ratified, saying Labour “should not be afraid” of a vote if they are confident a deal is in the country’s best interests.Cooper, the MP for St Albans, said in a statement:
      Parliament must be given a vote on this US trade deal so it can be properly scrutinised.
      A good trade deal with the US could bring huge benefits, but Liberal Democrats are deeply concerned that it may include measures that threaten our NHS, undermine our farmers or give tax cuts to US tech billionaires.
      If the government is confident the agreement it has negotiated with Trump is in Britain’s national interest, it should not be afraid to bring it before MPs.
      Shadow defence secretary James Cartlidge has appeared on Times Radio this morning, and the Conservative MP for South Suffolk said “the devil is in the detail” over prospects for a US-UK trade deal.He told listeners the Conservatives “obviously” would support a deal “in principle”. He continued:
      If it’s correct, and you know, whilst we haven’t been named publicly, it does sound like something’s happening, nevertheless, it would be wholly speculative [to comment].
      As you appreciate and know full well, with any deal like that, the devil is in the detail. What is the nitty gritty? What does it mean for individual sectors and so on.
      So obviously, yes, we wanted to see a trade deal with the US. It’s a big benefit of our position with an independent trade policy since we left the EU but as I say, the devil will be in the details. So should there be an agreement, we would then need to study that in depth.
      Asked by presenter Kate McCann if there was anything the Tories would not want to see in any deal, he said:
      I think if we don’t know at all what’s in it, or even if it’ll definitely happen, I think to try and sort of pre-judge what might or might not be in is not something I’m going to get into respectfully. I totally understand why you’re asking that. I think it’s an incredibly important issue, particularly with the wider challenge of tariffs and so on. I’m a big free trader. Our party wants us to see the UK growing by striking trade deals. But I just think you’ve got to wait and see, because who knows, quite frankly.
      In 2021, then prime minister Boris Johnson said his Conservative government was “going as fast as we can” to secure a post-Brexit trade deal with the US, but the successive administrations of Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak failed to secure one.The defence secretary has said he is confident that UK negotiators will secure “a good deal with the US”, describing the country as “an indispensable ally for our economic security.”John Healey declined to comment on the timing of any update from Keir Starmer, which No 10 said would happen today. Asked whether it was correct that Donald Trump was going to make an announcement at 3pm UK time, and whether Starmer would speak at the same time, Healey said “I don’t account for the movements in Downing Street.”Appearing on Sky News the defence secretary reiterated his lines from an earlier Times Radio interview, saying:
      We’ve been conducting hard negotiations with the US ever since Keir Starmer went to the White House in February, trying to secure any good economic deal for Britain.
      And during that time, I have to say, ministers like me have stepped back and refrained from commenting on those discussions in order to give the negotiators the space to secure the best possible deal for Britain. So any live discussions or timelines really aren’t for me.
      He was pressed on Sky News on whether a US trade deal would have repercussions for the NHS, farm workers and steelworkers in the UK. He said:
      I’m not going to comment on potential content of any economic deal or timelines. What I will say is that for steelworkers like those in sconthorpe, they’ve seen now a UK Government, a Labour government, willing to step in to secure the future of their industry.
      And as defence secretary, you know, I’m going to make sure that the increased defence spending that we will use to secure our defence for the future also brings a premium – a dividend, if you like – and is measured in more British jobs, more British apprentices, more successful British firms right across the country.
      Keir Starmer will give an update on the prospects for a UK-US trade deal later today, it has been announced.PA Media reports a Number 10 spokesperson said:
      The prime minister will always act in Britain’s national interest – for workers, for business, for families. The US is an indispensable ally for both our economic and national security. Talks on a deal between our countries have been continuing at pace and the prime minister will update later today.
      Defence secretary John Healey is appearing on Sky News at the moment, speaking from Westminster ahead of VE Day commemorations later today.He has already appeared earlier on Times Radio, where he was coy about commenting on the prospects for a UK-US trade deal. PA Media report he told listeners of that station:
      It’s certainly true that the US is an indispensable ally for the UK, both on economic and national security grounds. It’s also true that since the prime minister visited the White House in February we have been in detailed talks about an economic deal.
      But I have to say, throughout that period, ministers like me have been keen to give the negotiations the space to get the best possible deal for the UK. So, we just haven’t been giving a running commentary on developments or timelines, so I’m not going to start now.
      In the morning Politico newsletter, Andrew McDonald makes the following point worth bearing in mind. He writes:
      This was never meant to be a comprehensive free trade agreement (FTA) with the US, of the sort that previous Tory governments tried and failed to win. Instead, this had been pitched by UK officials as a narrow economic pact to avoid tariffs and work together on AI and critical tech. How narrow or otherwise, we should know soon.
      Here is our earlier report from my colleague Hugo Lowell in Washington …Labour’s defence secretary John Healey and the Conservative shadow defence secretary James Cartlidge are on the media round this morning. They are likely to be questioned about the prospects for a US-UK trade deal announcement, as well as the conflict this week in Kashmir. I’ll bring you the key lines that emerge.In its report suggesting that a trade deal between the US and UK would be the subject of Donald Trump’s promised announcement, the New York Times quotes Timothy C Brightbill, an international trade attorney at Wiley Rein, who suggested any announcement would consist of “an agreement to start the negotiations, identifying a framework of issues to be discussed in the coming months.“We suspect that tariff rates, non-tariff barriers and digital trade are all on the list –and there are difficult issues to address on all of these,” he added.The UK government is likely to have in its sights a reduction in the 25% tariff on automobile sales that the Trump administration imposed. That has led to some British manufacturers pausing shipments across the Atlantic.A team of senior British trade negotiators is in Washington in the hopes of seucuring the trade deal. Last night, government sources said the recent announcement by the US president, Donald Trump, of film industry tariffs had proved a significant setback.One person briefed on the talks said: “We have a senior team on the ground now, and it may be that they are able to agree something this week. But the reality is the Trump administration keeps shifting the goalposts, as you saw with this week’s announcement on film tariffs.”Another said Trump’s threat of 100% tariffs on films “produced in foreign lands”, which could have a major impact on Britain’s film industry, had “gone down very badly in Downing Street”.UK officials say they are targeting tariff relief on a narrow range of sectors in order to get a deal agreed before they begin formal negotiations with the EU over a separate European agreement. A draft deal handed to the US a week ago would have reduced tariffs on British exports of steel, aluminium and cars, in return for a lower rate of the digital services tax, which is paid by a handful of large US technology companies.Officials from the trade department hoped to reach an agreement on two outstanding issues, pharmaceuticals and films. Trump has said he will impose tariffs on both industries, mainstays of the British economy, but has not yet given details.Keir Starmer has ruled out reducing food production standards to enable more trade of US agricultural products, as officials prioritise signing a separate agreement with the EU, which is likely to align British standards with European ones.Donald Trump is expected to announce the framework of a trade agreement with the UK after teasing a major announcement with a “big and highly respected, country.”The specifics of any agreement were not immediately clear and there was no comment from the White House or the British embassy in Washington on whether an actual deal had been reached or if the framework would need further negotiation. Any agreement would mark the first such deal for the administration since it imposed sweeping tariffs against trade partners last month.In a post on Truth Social previewing the announcement, Trump was vague and did not disclose the country or the terms.“Big news conference tomorrow morning at 10:00am, the Oval Office, concerning a MAJOR TRADE DEAL WITH REPRESENTATIVES OF A BIG, AND HIGHLY RESPECTED, COUNTRY. THE FIRST OF MANY!!!” Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social. More

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      UK officials land in Washington as talks over trade agreement continue

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      A team of senior British trade negotiators has landed in Washington as talks over a deal between the two countries gather pace.Officials from the business and trade department are in the US for much of this week, attempting to get an agreement signed before the planned UK-EU summit on 19 May.Downing Street did not deny reports the deal could be signed as early as this week, although government sources said the recent announcement by the US president, Donald Trump, of film industry tariffs had proved a significant setback.One person briefed on the talks said: “We have a senior team on the ground now, and it may be that they are able to agree something this week. But the reality is the Trump administration keeps shifting the goalposts, as you saw with this week’s announcement on film tariffs.”Another said Trump’s threat of 100% tariffs on films “produced in foreign lands”, which could have a major impact on Britain’s film industry, had “gone down very badly in Downing Street”.UK officials say they are targeting tariff relief on a narrow range of sectors in order to get a deal agreed before they begin formal negotiations with the EU over a separate European agreement. A draft deal handed to the US a week ago would have reduced tariffs on British exports of steel, aluminium and cars, in return for a lower rate of the digital services tax, which is paid by a handful of large US technology companies.The Guardian revealed last week the Trump administration had made negotiating a trade deal with the UK a lower-order priority, behind a series of Asian countries. UK officials said they have been able to continue talks with their US counterparts despite that, describing the Trump administration’s approach as “chaotic”.Officials from the trade department arrived in Washington this week hoping to reach an agreement on two outstanding issues, pharmaceuticals and films.Trump has said he will impose tariffs on both industries, mainstays of the British economy, but has not yet given details.This week, the US president said the US film industry was dying a “very fast death” because of the incentives other countries were offering to draw American film-makers, and promised to impose a 100% tariff on foreign-made films. Britain offers producers generous reliefs on corporation tax to locate their projects there, which help support an industry now worth about £2bn, with major US films such as Barbie having recently been shot in Britain.Trump also said that he planned to unveil tariffs on imports of pharmaceutical products “in the next two weeks”. The UK exported £6.5bn worth of such goods to the US last year.Keir Starmer, the prime minister, has ruled out reducing food production standards to enable more trade of US agricultural products, as officials prioritise signing a separate agreement with the EU, which is likely to align British standards with European ones.Officials are racing to sign the US agreement before the planned UK-EU summit, at which both sides will set out their formal negotiating positions. Leaked documents revealed on Wednesday the two remain far apart on their demands for a youth mobility scheme, with Britain demanding that visas issued under the scheme should be limited in number and duration, and should exclude dependents.EU ambassadors met in Brussels on Wednesday to discuss the progress of the deal. One diplomat said: “Negotiations are going well, the mood is still good but it is a bit early to see bold moves from one side or another.”This week Starmer also signed an agreement with India after giving way on a demand from Delhi for workers transferring to the UK within their companies to avoid paying national insurance while in the country.The concession has caused some unease in the Home Office, with Yvette Cooper, the home secretary, not having been told about it in advance.It was also criticised by Kemi Badenoch, who accused the prime minister of bringing in a “two-tier” tax system. The Tory leader denied reports, however, that she had agreed to the same concession when she was business secretary.The prime minister defended the deal on Wednesday, telling MPs at PMQs it was a “huge win” for the UK. Other senior Tories have also praised the deal, including Steve Baker, Oliver Dowden and Jacob Rees-Mogg, the latter of whom said it was “exactly what Brexit promised”.British officials say they have been surprised at the willingness of the Labour government to sign agreements which have been on the table for years but previously rejected by the Conservative government.With economists having recently downgraded the UK’s growth outlook, Starmer is understood to have decided to sign deals such as that with India, even though they do not include a number of British demands, such as increased access for services.One source said the approach was to clinch a less ambitious agreement and use that to build a fuller economic partnership in the coming years. More

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      UK launches Yemen airstrikes, joining intense US campaign against Houthi rebels

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      British fighter jets joined their US counterparts in airstrikes against Yemen’s Houthi rebels overnight, the first military action authorised by the Labour government and the first UK participation in an aggressive American bombing campaign against the group.RAF Typhoons, refuelled by Voyager air tankers, targeted a cluster of buildings 15 miles south of the capital, Sana’a, which the UK said were used by the Houthis to manufacture drones that had targeted shipping in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden.The British defence secretary, John Healey, said the attack was launched in response to “a persistent threat from the Houthis to freedom of navigation”. The Iran-backed group has attacked merchant shipping and western warships, leading to a sharp drop in trade flows.“A 55% drop in shipping through the Red Sea has already cost billions, fuelling regional instability and risking economic security for families in the UK,” Healey added in a social media post shortly after midnight.Further updates were expected from the UK later on Wednesday.Britain had joined with the US to conduct five rounds of airstrikes against the Houthis between January and May 2024, part of a campaign authorised by the Biden administration, but has not been involved in a fresh and more intense US effort until now.Since the launch on 15 March of Operation Rough Rider under the Trump administration, 800 targets have been struck resulting in the deaths of “hundreds of Houthi fighters and numerous Houthi leaders”, according to the US military’s Central Command.There have also been reports of higher civilian casualties. This week, the Houthis said 68 people were killed when a detention centre holding African migrants was struck in Saada, north-west Yemen, while 80 civilians were reported to have died in an attack on the port of Ras Isa on 18 April.Annie Shiel, the US director at the Center for Civilians in Conflict (Civic), said the “US strikes continue to raise significant questions about the precautions taken to prevent civilian harm, as required by both international law and US policy”, and noted that there appeared to have been a shift in policy under Donald Trump.Overnight on Tuesday, the UK said it had taken steps to minimise the risk of civilian casualties. The Houthi buildings were targeted with Paveway IV missiles once, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) said, “very careful planning had been completed to allow the targets to be prosecuted with minimal risk to civilians or non-military infrastructure”.The MoD also emphasised that “as a further precaution, the strike was conducted after dark, when the likelihood of any civilians being in the area was reduced yet further”, though no damage assessment was offered.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThere was little immediate comment from the US, though the defence secretary, Pete Hegseth, has emphasised that the American military must emphasise “lethality, lethality, lethality” and has cut programmes intended to minimise civilian harm.News agencies said the Houthis reported several strikes around Sana’a, which the group has held since 2014, but there were few other details immediately available. Other strikes hit the area around Saada.The Houthis are targeting shipping in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden in support of Hamas and the Palestinians in Gaza, subject of a renewed offensive by Israel. Though the US boasts considerably more firepower than the group, a $60m (£45m) US navy F-18 Super Hornet jet was lost at sea on Tuesday.US officials said initial reports from the scene indicated the USS Harry S Truman aircraft carrier, on to which the F-18 was being towed, made a hard turn to evade Houthi fire. That contributed to the fighter jet falling overboard and sinking.The start of Operation Rough Rider caused controversy in the US over Hegseth’s use of the unclassified Signal messaging app to post sensitive details about the attacks, including a group containing a journalist. More

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      Emboldened by Trump, the ‘liberal’ UK is giving free rein to its colonial impulses | Kenneth Mohammed

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      As Donald Trump rains chaos down upon the US – dismantling the rule of law trading in rage-fuelled nationalism and bullying the rest of the world – his ideology is now being eagerly imitated not just by the expected rogues of global politics, but by supposed bastions of democracy.These democracies now wear only a mask of civility over that old colonial impulses: control, divide, exploit.Most disturbing is the UK’s quiet complicity, sneaking its own brand of institutional cruelty. Like seasoned illusionists, they use chaos abroad to obscure injustice at home, to legitimise morally indefensible immigration policies.It is as though the UK and the US exchanged a sly nod across the Atlantic, and said: “Let’s see just how far we can go.”The US is now overseeing the deportation of thousands. Not illegal migrants. Legal. Some have lived in the country for decades, built families, contributed to society, paid taxes. As detention centre doors slams, dreams are extinguished in real time.Caribbean nation’s citizenship-by-investment (CBI) programmes, including Antigua & Barbuda, Dominica, Saint Kitts & Nevis, and Saint Lucia, are now under investigation by the US due to perceived security concerns, potentially facing travel restrictions. So, too, Africans are facing bans and visa cancellations.Not to be outdone, the UK has begun tightening visa restrictions on African and Caribbean nations under the thinnest of pretexts. To us, the message is clear: if you are the wrong colour and hail from a former colony, you’re not welcome. Of course, you’re more than welcome if you are Ukrainian or bringing money or minerals.View image in fullscreenA report on the roots of the Windrush scandal posted on the UK government’s website summarises, “major immigration legislation in 1962, 1968 and 1971 was designed to reduce the proportion of people living in the United Kingdom who did not have white skin.” Sixty years later, the UK still engages this socio-political ideology.Take the absurd treatment of Trinidad and Tobago. British authorities last month slapped exorbitant visa fees on Trinidadians, similar to Jamaica and Dominica. The justification? A spike in asylum claims – from an average of 49 a year between 2015 and 2019 to 439 in 2023.In the year ending June 2024, the UK’s net immigration was 728,000, a 20% decrease from 2023’s peak of 906,000. Yet 439 Trinidadians cause a “crisis”? This is political theatre staged for a frothing few with empire nostalgia and immigrant paranoia.But the Trinbagonian government cannot be let off the hook. For over a decade, gang violence triggered by smuggled guns from the US, the drug trade from South America and the influx of gang members from Venezuela has worsened under an impuissant minister of security and a government in paralysis.This new UK immigration policy for Trinidad and Tobago isn’t policy, its punishment. It’s the empire rearing its head again – this time in the guise of “immigration control”. If the UK was truly concerned, it could have picked up the phone and spoken to the high commissioner to the UK or even the Prime Minister to find a proportionate solution – as fellow Commonwealth members. But what does the Commonwealth mean any more? A glorified nostalgia club presided over by a monarch few in the Caribbean have ever seen.The Commonwealth is a relic. An expensive, hollow monument to a colonial past Britain refuses to apologise for and the Caribbean refuses to walk away from. Common means subservience, and wealth flows only one way. For example, the judicial committee of the privy council remains the highest court for many Caribbean nations – a colonial backdoor that ensures British influence remains after the union jack has been lowered.View image in fullscreenWhy does the Caribbean still genuflect before a throne that sees it as a holiday destination at best and an aid burden at worst? Why do African nations tolerate the condescension of aid when their stolen minerals fuel the west’s riches? As Bob Marley demanded, we must “emancipate ourselves from mental slavery”?The truth is: the west cannot function without us. It feeds off our resources, our oil and minerals, our intellect. Yet it treats us like pests at the door: unworthy of entry, let alone equality.Why are we still playing this rigged game? Why are we still begging for visas, pleading for asylum, when our presence build these nations in the first place?It’s time we stopped asking for permission, withdrew our labour, our brilliance, ourselves – and left them to stew in their nostalgia, mistaking walls for strength and xenophobia for sovereignty. We’ll build something better.Trump’s sledgehammer approach to diplomacy has torched relationships with Canada, Panama, Greenland, South Africa and the broader African continent. The Caribbean is not spared, least of all that US favourite: Cuba.This time, he unleashed his bulldog secretary of state, Marco Rubio,on Cuba’s quiet but powerful diplomatic engine: its doctors. For decades, Cuban medical professionals have travelled the world, from rural outposts in Africa to hurricane-ravaged villages in Haiti, treating the sick and delivering babies, with the soft diplomacy the US abandoned around the time it thought regime change was a sustainable foreign policy model.Cuban doctors have long symbolised international solidarity, emerging from a nation routinely vilified – because nothing terrifies Washington more than socialism in brown skin. But rather than acknowledge this medical diplomacy for what it is – a humanitarian gift – Rubio has instead accused Caribbean nations of exploiting these doctors, underpaying them and “trafficking” them. The audacity is breathtaking.Rubio threatened to revoke US visas from government officials and their immediate family members in any Caribbean country that accepts Cuban medical workers. Because America now exports moral lectures it no longer even pretends to live by.But this time, the Caribbean didn’t flinch. Leaders across the region responded with collective eye-rolling and a resounding: “Come take your visa.”These are independent nations, not subsidiaries of the US. Caribbean leaders made it clear: Cuban doctors are paid on a par with local medical professionals, they are not coerced, and are free to leave at any time. They are crucial to the region’s healthcare systems.Rubio’s daring to speak on behalf of doctors who have done more good across the global south than the aid-slashing US state department has in decades, is an insult not just to the Caribbean but to common sense.What we are witnessing here is a petulance from a fading empire that has replaced its moral compass with paranoia, and outsourced its diplomacy to the whisperings of an erratic billionaire, delusional oligarchs and baby-faced thinktanks addicted to colonial cosplayAmerica’s diplomacy had died, been cremated and scattered over Mar-a-Lago.So while Washington plays imperial hardball with nations trying to provide healthcare to their citizens, the rest of us are left wondering, again, why we allow ourselves to be bullied by a country that cannot keep its own citizens out of medical bankruptcy.At some point, the Caribbean – and the wider global south – must draw a red line. Not just rhetorically, but structurally. We need new alliances, new trading currencies, new friends, new models of cooperation rooted not in colonial debt but mutual respect.Because it is increasingly clear that the US is not interested in partnerships – it wants puppets. Preferably black or brown-skinned, desperate and pliable. More