Event: US

Live Blog Update| War on Iran 26 August 2026 00:07 BST British ⁠Finance ⁠Minister John Healey said on Tuesday that the UK supports US efforts to secure a diplomatic ‌solution on Iran and welcomed steps to increase pressure after the US announced expanded sanctions ⁠on Iran on Monday. Healey also called ⁠on Iran ⁠to ⁠cease its “de-stabilising activity” across the region, including ‌in the Strait of ‌Hormuz. Britain's newly appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer John Healey in central London on 21 July 2026 (Stefan Rousseau/AFP)

Artist Suse Lowenstein, whose son, Alex, was killed in the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, looks at photos of the some of the victims at her studio in Montauk, N.Y., Wednesday, Aug. 19, 2026. | Photo Credit: AP A U.S. federal judge postponed on Monday (August 25, 2026) the trial of a Libyan man accused of making the bomb that destroyed a Pan Am flight over Scotland in 1988, killing 270 people, citing new evidence.Jury selection for the trial of Abu Agila Mohammad Masud, who allegedly worked as an intelligence operative for the government of Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi between 1973 and 2011, had been due to start on Wednesday (August 26, 2026).Judge Dabney Friedrich cited "newly discovered evidence" and "evidence located in other countries" as the reason for postponing the trial.No new trial date was set but a court hearing was scheduled for September 1 to discuss the status of the case.Masud, who has been in U.S. custody since 2022, has pleaded not guilty to charges related to the "destruction of an aircraft resulting in death." If convicted, he could face life in prison.Pan Am Flight 103, bound for New York, was blown up 38 minutes after it took off from London, sending the main fuselage plunging to the ground in the Scottish town of Lockerbie and spreading debris over a vast area.The bombing — which is the deadliest-ever terror attack in Britain — killed all 259 people on board, including 190 Americans, and 11 people on the ground.Only one person has so far been convicted for the bombing.Two alleged Libyan intelligence operatives — Abdelbaset al-Megrahi and Al Amin Khalifa Fhimah — were charged with the bombing and tried by a Scottish court in the Netherlands.Al-Megrahi was convicted in 2001 and spent seven years in…

Image source, ReutersImage caption, Pan Am Flight 103 was brought down on 21 December 1988ByScotland home affairs correspondentThe trial of a Libyan man over the Lockerbie bombing has been postponed for a third time, after new evidence on the 37-year-old case came to light three days ago.Jury selection was due to get under way in Washington DC on Wednesday but the BBC understands a new start date has been set for January next year.Lawyers acting for Abu Agila Mas'ud Kheir Al-Marimi said "newly discovered evidence" previously unknown to the defence and prosecutors from the US government emerged on Friday 21 August.Al-Marimi has denied building the bomb that destroyed Pan Am Flight 103 on 21 December 1988, killing 270 people.His lawyers told the court: "Constitutional and ethical obligations require the defence to investigate this development."They said they met Al-Marimi on Sunday and he agreed that they should ask for the postponement.Image source, ReutersImage caption, Abu Agila Mas'ud Kheir Al-Marimi has been in custody since December 2022The trial judge, Dabney Friedrich, has agreed that the start date should be set aside, underlining the potential importance of the new evidence.She would have been extremely reluctant to allow an 11th hour postponement after months of preparation and marathon pre-trial legal battles.For the relatives of those who died and Al-Marimi himself, this latest delay means a verdict might not come until next spring.It is yet another stunning development in a saga that has witnessed countless twists and turns over nearly four decades.Figure caption, Kara Weipz: We have to live in this anxiety until we actually get to trialPan Am 103 was flying from Heathrow to New York when the bomb exploded in its forward hold, breaking the plane apart at 31,000 feet.All 259 passengers and crew on board were killed. Another 11 people died in…

The equalities minister is playing a dangerous game in ginning up false grievances. Racism and sexism have become ‘normalised’ in Britain, asserted equalities minister Bridget Phillipson last week. Speaking on the Guardian’s Politics Weekly podcast, to substantiate these claims, she cited the ‘cesspit’ of social media and supposedly ‘racist’ statements made by the Conservatives’ Nick Timothy and Reform UK’s Robert Jenrick. Where once such speech would be censured as unacceptable, she claimed, there are now no consequences. While you might be inclined to yawn at this ham-fisted attempt to resurrect the heady days of #MeToo and Black Lives Matter, Phillipson’s desire to fan the charred embers of the Great Awokening deserves a more serious rebuke. As I noted on LBC, her claims are both illiterate and irresponsible. First, the illiteracy. Successive waves of the British Social Attitudes (BSA) survey and other longer-running studies show that Britain has never been less racist or sexist. For instance, when asked who should do the washing and ironing, 75 per cent of Brits in 1984 said the woman should, falling to only 16 per cent by 2023. Present British attitudes would be unrecognisable to earlier generations or many other societies. So too on race. In 1983, a 54 per cent majority said they would be displeased if a close relative married a black or Asian person. In 2023, fully 89 per cent said they would be happy for their child to marry someone from a different ethnic group. Also in that year, 93 per cent disagreed that ‘to be truly British you have to be white’. Racial attitudes are not perfect, but statements about a country’s characteristics are implicitly relative rather than based on a cosmic yardstick. We don’t say that Switzerland is poor because it could be richer, or that Usain Bolt is…

US President Donald Trump was among hundreds of people who gathered to see the IndyCar race through the streets of Washington DC on Sunday.But some spectators were left disappointed, telling the BBC they couldn't actually see any cars go by.Full story here.Video by Mabel Pickering