Mandell Creighton (1843–1901) was a British historian and clergyman. He studied at the University of Oxford, then became a don in 1866. He was appointed the first occupant of the Dixie Chair of Ecclesiastical History at the University of Cambridge in 1884. The following year, he also was engaged as the founding editor of The English Historical Review, the first English-language academic journal in its field. In these posts, he helped to establish history as an independent academic discipline in England. Creighton was a parish priest of the Church of England who rose to be Bishop of London from 1897 and, but for his death, was thought likely to become Archbishop of Canterbury. His moderation and practicality drew praise from Queen Victoria. He was firm in asserting that public figures should be judged for their public acts, not private ones. He believed that the Church of England was uniquely shaped by its particular English circumstances, and he saw it as the soul of the nation. (Full article...)
... that the tomb (pictured) of Louis Adrian is surmounted by a sculpture of the helmet that he developed for the French Army?
... that the coconut octopus walks on two legs to look like a floating coconut?
... that a theme-park attraction based on Harry Potter'sDiagon Alley cost approximately US$400 million to build?
... that Matt Koart forced himself to eat 2000 calories in addition to his regular meals to increase his weight?
... that a cruise ship off the coast of Tahiti was the first floating Olympic Village?
... that Erna Meyer urged the Jewish immigrant readers of How to Cook in Palestine to try olives and eggplants, but doubted their ability to eat spicy food like the "native population"?
Defeat of the Villasur expedition depicted on buffalo hide
1720 – The Spanish Villasur expedition, intended to slow the progress of French influence on the Great Plains of North America, ended in failure when it was ambushed (depicted) by Pawnee and Otoe forces.
Arctocephalus forsteri, sometimes called the Australasian fur seal or the New Zealand fur seal, is a species of fur seal in the family Otariidae, the eared seals. It is found mainly around southern Australia and New Zealand, in coastal waters and on offshore islands. The male of this species has an average mass of around 126 kilograms (278 lb) and a length of 2 metres (6 ft 7 in), while females are typically between 30 and 50 kilograms (66 and 110 lb), with a length of up to 1.5 metres (4 ft 11 in). Arctocephalus forsteri has a deeper and longer dive than any other fur seal, with males being able to descend to 380 metres and stay underwater for 15 minutes. It has a diet which includes cephalopods, fish, and birds, and makes use of vocalisations and olfactory recognition for communication. The population of the species has been significantly reduced by human activity, and it is protected by legislation in both Australia and New Zealand. This female A. forsteri seal with a suckling pup was photographed at Admiral's Arch on Kangaroo Island, South Australia.
Lai is on trial for breaching national security and colluding with foreign forces
Hailed by some as a hero and scorned by others as a traitor, Hong Kong's pro-democracy media tycoon Jimmy Lai is in the final stage of his national security trial.
Closing arguments begin on Thursday for Lai, who is accused of colluding with foreign forces under a Beijing-imposed national security law.
The trial has drawn international attention, with UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer calling for Lai's release. The 77-year-old has British as well as Chinese citizenship - though China does not recognise dual nationality, and therefore considers Lai to be exclusively Chinese.
Lai has been detained since December 2020 and faces a maximum sentence of life imprisonment if he is convicted.
Critics say Lai's case shows how Hong Kong's legal system has been weaponised to silence political opposition.
Lai has been a persistent thorn in China's side. Unlike other tycoons who rose to the top in Hong Kong, Mr Lai became one of the fiercest critics of the Chinese state and a leading figure advocating democracy in the former British territory.
"I'm a born rebel," he told the BBC in an interview in 2020, hours before he was charged. "I have a very rebellious character."
He is the most prominent person charged under the controversial national security law which China introduced in 2020, in response to massive protests which erupted in Hong Kong the year before.
The legislation criminalises a wider range of dissenting acts which Beijing considers subversion and secession, among other things.
Beijing says the national security law is necessary to maintain stability in Hong Kong but critics say it has effectively outlawed dissent.
Over the years, Lai's son Sebastien has called for his release. In February, the younger Lai urged Starmer and US President Donald Trump to take urgent action, adding that his father's "body is breaking down".
Rags to riches
Lai was born in Guangzhou, a city in southern China, to a wealthy family that lost everything when the communists took power in 1949.
He was 12 years old when he fled his village in mainland China, arriving in Hong Kong as a stowaway on a fishing boat.
While working odd jobs and knitting in a small clothing shop he taught himself English. He went from a menial role to eventually founding a multi-million dollar empire including the international clothing brand Giordano.
The chain was a huge success. But when China sent in tanks to crush pro-democracy protests in Beijing's Tiananmen Square in 1989, Lai began a new journey as a vocal democracy activist as well as an entrepreneur.
He started writing columns criticising the massacre that followed the demonstrations in Beijing and established a publishing house that went on to become one of Hong Kong's most influential.
Reuters
Lai is among the most prominent people charged under Hong Kong's controversial national security law
As China responded by threatening to shut his stores on the mainland, leading him to sell the company, Lai launched a string of popular pro-democracy titles that included Next, a digital magazine, and the widely read Apple Daily newspaper.
In a local media landscape increasingly fearful of Beijing, Lai had been a persistent critic of Chinese authorities both through his publications and writing.
This has seen him become a hero for many in Hong Kong, who view him as a man of courage who took great risks to defend the freedoms of the city.
But on the mainland he is viewed as a "traitor" who threatens Chinese national security.
In recent years, masked attackers firebombed Lai's house and company headquarters. He was also the target of an assassination plot.
But none of the threats stopped him from airing his views robustly. He was a prominent part of the city's pro-democracy demonstrations and was arrested twice in 2021 on illegal assembly charges.
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Apple Daily was unafraid to be openly critical of the Chinese state
When China passed Hong Kong's new national security law in June 2020, Lai told the BBC it sounded the "death knell" for the territory.
The influential entrepreneur also warned that Hong Kong would become as corrupt as China. Without the rule of law, he said, its coveted status as a global financial hub would be "totally destroyed".
The media mogul is known for his frankness and acts of flamboyance.
In 2021, he urged Donald Trump to help the territory, saying he was "the only one who can save us" from China. His newspaper, Apple Daily, published a front-page letter that finished: "Mr President, please help us."
For Lai, such acts were necessary to defend the city which had taken him in and fuelled his success.
He once told news agency AFP: "I came here with nothing, the freedom of this place has given me everything... Maybe it's time I paid back for that freedom by fighting for it."
Lai has been slapped with various charges - including unauthorised assembly and fraud - since 2020.
He has been in custody since December of that year.
The prosecution of Lai has captured international attention, with rights groups and foreign governments urging his release.
Over the years, Sebastien Lai has travelled the world to denounce his father's arrest and condemn Hong Kong for punishing "characteristics that should be celebrated".
"My father is in jail for the truth on his lips, courage in his heart, and freedom in his soul," he had said.
Leonardo Baez and his wife were among the first employers prosecuted for taking on undocumented immigrants at their bakery in Los Fresnos, Texas. They face up to 10 years in prison.
Watch: BBC obtains rare video from inside besieged el-Fasher in Sudan
The women at the community kitchen in the besieged Sudanese city of el-Fasher are sitting in huddles of desperation.
"Our children are dying before our eyes," one of them tells the BBC.
"We don't know what to do. They are innocent. They have nothing to do with the army or [its paramilitary rival] the Rapid Support Forces. Our suffering is worse than what you can imagine."
Food is so scarce in el-Fasher that prices have soared to the point where money that used to cover a week's worth of meals can now buy only one. International aid organisations have condemned the "calculated use of starvation as a weapon of war".
The BBC has obtained rare footage of people still trapped in the city, sent to us by a local activist and filmed by a freelance cameraman.
The Sudanese army has been battling the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) for more than two years after their commanders jointly staged a coup, and then fell out.
El-Fasher, in the western Darfur region, is one of the most brutal frontlines in the conflict.
This may be the only meal these children get for a day
The hunger crisis is compounded by a surge of cholera sweeping through the squalid camps of those displaced by the fighting, which escalated this week into one of the most intense RSF attacks on the city yet.
The paramilitaries tightened their 14-month blockade after losing control of the capital Khartoum earlier this year, and stepped up their battle for el-Fasher, the last foothold of the armed forces in Darfur.
In the north and centre of the country where the army has wrestled back territory from the RSF, food and medical aid have begun to make a dent in civilian suffering.
But the situation is desperate in the conflict zones of western and southern Sudan.
At the Matbakh-al-Khair communal kitchen in el-Fasher late last month, volunteers turned ambaz into a porridge. This is the residue of peanuts after the oil has been extracted, normally fed to animals.
Sometimes it is possible to find sorghum or millet but on the day of filming, the kitchen manager says: "There is no flour or bread."
"Now we've reached the point of eating ambaz. May God relieve us of this calamity, there's nothing left in the market to buy," he adds.
The UN has amplified its appeal for a humanitarian pause to allow food convoys into the city, with its Sudan envoy Sheldon Yett once more demanding this week that the warring sides observe their obligations under international law.
The army has given clearance for the trucks to proceed but the UN is still waiting for official word from the paramilitary group.
RSF advisers have said they believed the truce would be used to facilitate the delivery of food and ammunition to the army's "besieged militias" inside el-Fasher.
They have also claimed the paramilitary group and its allies were setting up "safe routes" for civilians to leave the city.
Local responders in el-Fasher can receive some emergency cash via a digital banking system, but it does not go very far.
"The prices in the markets have exploded," says Mathilde Vu, advocacy manager for the Norwegian Refugee Council.
"Today, $5,000 [£3,680] covers one meal for 1,500 people in a single day. Three months ago, the same amount could feed them for an entire week."
Doctors say people are dying of malnutrition. It is impossible to know how many - one report quoting a regional health official put the number at more than 60 last week.
Hospitals cannot cope. Few are still operating. They have been damaged by shelling and are short of medical supplies to help both the starving, and those injured in the continual bombardment.
"We have many malnourished children admitted in hospital but unfortunately there is no single sachet of [therapeutic food]," says Dr Ibrahim Abdullah Khater, a paediatrician at the Al Saudi Hospital, noting that the five severely malnourished children currently in the ward also have medical complications.
"They are just waiting for their death," he says.
When hunger crises hit, those who usually die first are the most vulnerable, the least healthy or those suffering from pre-existing conditions.
"The situation, it is so miserable, it is so catastrophic," the doctor tells us in a voice message.
"The children of el-Fasher are dying on a daily basis due to lack of food, lack of medicine. Unfortunately, the international community is just watching."
They said that "anecdotal reports of recent food hoarding for military use add to the suffering of civilians".
"There is no safe passage out of the city, with roads blocked and those attempting to flee facing attacks, taxation at checkpoints, community-based discrimination and death," the organisations said.
Hundreds of thousands of people did flee in recent months, many from the Zamzam displaced persons camp at the edge of el-Fasher, seized by the RSF in April.
Life is safer in the crowded camps, but they are stalked by disease - most deadly of all: cholera.
It is caused by polluted water and has killed hundreds in Sudan, triggered by the destruction of water infrastructure and lack of food and medical care, and made worse by flooding due to the rainy season.
Makeshift centres have been built to treat patients who have cholera
Unlike el-Fasher, in Tawila aid workers at least have access, but their supplies are limited, says John Joseph Ocheibi, the on-site project coordinator for a group called The Alliance for International Medical Action.
"We have shortages in terms of [washing facilities], in terms of medical supplies, to be able to deal with this situation," he tells the BBC. "We are mobilizing resources to see how best we can be able to respond."
Sylvain Penicaud of Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) estimates there are only three litres of water per person per day in the camps, which, he says, is "way below the basic need, and forces people to get water from contaminated sources".
Zubaida Ismail Ishaq is lying in the tent clinic. She is seven months pregnant, gaunt and exhausted. Her story is a tale of trauma told by many.
She tells us she used to trade when she had a little money, before fleeing el-Fasher.
Her husband was captured by armed men on the road to Tawila. Her daughter has a head injury.
Zubaida and her mother came down with cholera shortly after arriving in the camp.
"We drink water without boiling it," she says. "We have no-one to get us water. Since coming here, I have nothing left."
Back in el-Fasher we hear appeals for help from the women clustered at the soup kitchen - any kind of help.
"We're exhausted. We want this siege lifted," says Faiza Abkar Mohammed. "Even if they airdrop food, airdrop anything - we're completely exhausted."
Most recently she attended both Wimbledon tennis finals, as patron of the All England Lawn Tennis Club, and Colchester Hospital's Wellbeing Garden - both in July.
Alongside the video, which was posted to the princess' official Instagram account on Wednesday, she wrote: "It has never been more important to appreciate the value of one another, and of Mother Nature. Here's to Summer."
The scenery featured was shot at locations in Sheffield, Bradford, North Wales and Anglesey and the south coast.
As part of her narration, Catherine describes summer as the "season for abundance", saying that "as the flowers bloom and the fruits ripen, we too are reminded of our own potential for growth".
A group of dancers from The Royal Ballet School, who performed in a Westminster Abbey carol service hosted by the princess last year, are also featured.
The video concludes with Catherine encouraging us to "embrace the joy to be found in even the most fleeting of moments and shared experiences".
Unlike the first video in the series, published earlier this year, the Prince of Wales does not feature.
In that one, there were shots of the pair walking their dogs in Norfolk. Catherine also alluded to her cancer battle, saying nature had been her family's "sanctuary" for the past year.
Solomon Peña, who lost a bid for a seat in the New Mexico Legislature in 2022, was found guilty in March of orchestrating the attacks against state Democrats.
Peru's president has signed a controversial new law pardoning soldiers, police and civilian militias on trial for atrocities during the country's two-decade armed conflict against Maoist rebels.
Dina Boluarte enacted the measure that was passed by Congress in July, despite an order from the Inter-American Court of Human Rights to suspend it pending a review of its impact on victims.
The law will benefit hundreds of members of the armed forces, police and self-defence committees accused of crimes committed between 1980 and 2000.
It will also mandate the release of those over 70 serving sentences for such offences.
During the conflict, the Shining Path and Tupac Amaru rebel groups waged insurgencies in which an estimated 70,000 people were killed and more than 20,000 disappeared, according to Peru's Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC).
Boluarte, elected in 2022 as the the country's first female president, said the Peruvian government was paying tribute to the forces who - she said - fought against terrorism and in defence of democracy.
Human rights organisations have condemned the law. Juanita Goebertus, Americas director at Human Rights Watch, called it "a betrayal of Peruvian victims" that "undermines decades of efforts to ensure accountability for atrocities".
United Nations experts and Amnesty International had urged Boluarte to veto the bill, saying that it violated Peru's duty to investigate and prosecute grave abuses including extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances, torture and sexual violence.
UN experts said the amnesty could halt or overturn more than 600 pending trials and 156 convictions.
The TRC found that state agents, notably the armed forces, were responsible for 83% of documented sexual violence cases.
Last year, Peru adopted a statute of limitations for crimes against humanity committed before 2002, effectively shutting down hundreds of investigations into alleged crimes committed during the fighting.
The initiative benefited late president Alberto Fujimori, who was jailed for atrocities - including the massacre of civilians by the army - but released from prison in 2023 on humanitarian grounds. He died in September 2024.
Meanwhile, former president Martin Vizcarra was ordered on Wednesday to be held in preventative detention for five months over allegations he received $640,000 in bribes while governor of Moquegua between 2011 and 2014.
He is the fifth former president to be jailed in corruption investigations.
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《勝利青年》（Victorious Youth）是一尊青銅古希臘雕塑，製作於西元前300年至100年之間，現藏於J·保羅·蓋蒂博物館的蓋蒂別墅。1964年的這一天，它於義大利亞得里亞海沿岸法諾附近的海域被發現。.jpg)
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