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Highlights

Simple Minds’ Jim Kerr: ‘Hang around long enough and you’re a classic’

After cult electro-pop status and Eighties smashes like ‘Don’t You (Forget About Me)’ and Live Aid, the band’s career took a nosedive in the Noughties. But as their biographer Graeme Thomson finds, they’re suddenly being rediscovered by a new generation

<p>‘I don’t think we’ve ever known how to go half measures on anything, and we certainly don’t want to be half-arsed just because we’re nearly 50 years in’ </p>

<p>Crowds admire the world’s tallest building, Burj Khalifa, in Dubai </p>

Cities in the sky: what tall building syndrome says about us today

<p>Leonard Bernstein was one of the 20th century’s most gifted composers and conductors</p>

Leonard Bernstein was ‘a gifted man who drove himself to extremes’

<p>Iain De Caestecker as Arthur and Nathaniel Martello-White as Merlin in ITV’s gory drama </p>

The Winter King brings King Arthur for our times: dark, gloomy violent

Voices

<p>The former deputy Commons leader was suspended for six weeks </p>

Bad to the Bone: is this the sleaziest parliament of all time?

<p>Volodymr Zelensky meets EU leaders in Brussels </p>

The tiny EU country that has become Putin’s trojan horse

<p>Sunak welcomes Joe Biden to Downing Street in July </p>

Rishi Sunak is in denial – proof Brexit has failed mounts by the day

The Longer Read

<p>Putin delivers a speech as he attends a ceremony for newly-built nuclear submarines at the Sevmash shipyard earlier this month </p>

How to read Putin’s poker face as he bets large on victory in 2024

<p>A royal welcome: Sarah, Duchess of York enjoys the warmth of schoolchildren in Burnley </p>

Royal Family News

Sarah Ferguson on overeating, cancer and her royal rehabilitation

<p>The aftermath of violent storm on Tuvalu, the likes of which are increasing with climate change </p>

Why Cop28 barely scratches the surface on the cost of climate change

Politics Explained

<p>Ireland’s deputy prime minister Micheal Martin (left) and Northern Ireland secretary Chris Heaton-Harris at Farmleigh House, Dublin, during the British-Irish Intergovernmental Conference earlier this year </p>

Politics Explained

What has caused the argument between No 10 and Ireland?

<p>Shoppers on Oxford Street in London as Wednesday’s inflation figures were announced </p>

Politics Explained

Why the hard work on inflation is still to come

<p>Baroness Mone’s interview has reignited the row over PPE procurement</p>

Politics Explained

Could Baroness Mone lose her title and be removed from House of Lords?

<p>Richard Holden is sending out the message that his party needs talented people</p>

Politics Explained

Would you be mad to stand as a Tory next election? Not necessarily...

Most Commented

Rudy Giuliani files for bankruptcy: Live

123 comments

Doctors fear NHS will buckle in flu season as frontline staff avoid vaccine

115 comments

BA stops passenger flying after claiming ‘UK passports expire after nine years’

108 comments

How a sniper’s bullets utterly shattered the sanctuary in Gaza’s only Catholic church

326 comments

Editorials

<p>The ‘Triples’, named after their divisional designations, were trained and funded by the UK </p>

The Independent View

The UK must repay its debt to Afghan heroes – before it is too late

<p>Zarach was founded by a teacher, Bex Wilson, who witnessed at first hand the deleterious effects that lack of rest can inflict upon young, developing minds and bodies</p>

The Independent View

This Christmas, help The Independent give a bed to a child in need

<p>‘HMS Diamond’ is on her way to the Red Sea as part of a coaliton to protect commercial shipping </p>

The Independent View

A breakthrough is needed for humanitarian as well as economic reasons

Culture

<p>The actor comes from a family of thespians: his father Edward played the lead role in ‘The Day of the Jackal’</p>

Freddie Fox on cousin Laurence: ‘His views both shock and appal me’

<p>Mark Gatiss on John Gielgud: ‘He was very funny, very mischievous and very kind’ </p>

How Mark Gatiss summoned the ghost of John Gielgud

<p>Stepping onto the storied stage of Brixton Academy is many bands’ first taste of tangible big-gig success</p>

Safety comes first – but Brixton Academy must reopen for London’s sake

Travel

<p>Texans take their Dickens seriously at Galveston’s annual festival celebrating the author</p>

Why Texans are the best at celebrating Charles Dickens at Christmas

<p>Midjourney can be used to create wanderlust-worthy travel pictures</p>

How AI is set to radically transform the way we holiday

John RentoulThe Independent’s chief political commentator

<p>Snippy or in control? Sunak appearing before the Commons Liaison Committee</p>

Rishi Sunak is the one Tory who still thinks he can win

<p>The one and only Criterion Theatre in London’s West End... if there were others, we would have to rename them the Criteria Theatres </p>

Mea Culpa: American influence on a great British institution

<p>Starmer will win in such difficult circumstances that it may feel like losing </p>

My crystal ball predicts one piece of bad news for Labour next year

Andrew GricePolitical columnist who keeps his ear to the ground inside Westminster

<p>A very uncivil service: Derek Fowlds, Paul Eddington and Nigel Hawthorne in the Eighties BBC Whitehall farce, ‘Yes Minister’</p>

Time for a change in dysfunctional Whitehall? Yes, minister…

<p>Rishi after Rwanda: Home Office officials are now deperately searching for other third countries to send asylum seekers</p>

Can Rishi move his Rwanda deal into the ‘Goldilocks zone’?

<p>In trying to placate his party’s two warring factions, the danger for Rishi Sunak is that he fails to satisfy either</p>

Sunak’s Rwanda plan has split his party… and reignited the Brexit wars

Chris Blackhurst

<p>Alison Rose left her job as Natwest CEO amid the furore over Nigel Farage having one of his bank accounts closed </p>

Business Comment

Everyone lost in the Coutts bank scandal... except Nigel Farage

<p>The London Stock Exchange’s Alternative Investment Market has come under fire for its performance</p>

Business Comment

London Stock Exchange’s AIM is a zombie market not fit for purpose

<p>Sellafield plant in Cumbria was formerly known as Windscale</p>

Business Comment

I pray the Sellafield nuclear leak fears are being taken seriously

News analysis

<p>Pulsar Fusion began constructing its nuclear fusion rocket in 2023</p>

How nuclear fusion rockets are about to launch a space revolution

<p>Zelensky with the head of the IMF in Washington on Monday </p>

Zelensky in Washington as time runs out to push Congress for more aid

<p>West Africa is suffering from a major hunger crisis </p>

Food insecurity bites in countries hit by extreme weather

<p>A failure to account for demand in developing countries is often a major oversight in models looking at peak emissions </p>

The greenhouse gas breakthrough that should give us hope

Sport

<p>From Belmarsh to Mont Blanc: John McAvoy used his time inside to get in the shape of his life</p>

This ex-con uses ultra running to stop kids following in his footsteps

<p>Jon Rahm, left, has announced he is joining the LIV Tour on a contract reckoned to be worth $450m (£358m), while Rory McIlroy, right, remains with the PGA Tour</p>

Show me the money: Jon Rahm and the battle for the future of golf

Mary DejevskyExpert on foreign affairs, Russian politics and diplomatic relations between the Kremlin and the west

<p> Amnesty International has designated Navalny a prisoner of conscience and called on the Russian authorities to ‘disclose his fate and whereabouts immediately’</p>

The mysterious prison disappearance of Putin’s most powerful opponent

<p>Volodymyr Zelensky’s cheery defiance has all but disappeared </p>

If they’re saying Zelensky’s an autocrat, we should all be worried

<p>He had something to say about the war that followed Russia’s invasion of Ukraine</p>

Why we will never see Henry Kissinger’s America again

America

<p>Joe Biden speaks in Belfast on 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement</p>

Biden says Brexit deal can bring ‘significant’ US investment to NI

<p>Such leaks remind countries like Russia – as well as US allies – of the sheer scale and reach of Washington’s operations</p>

The diplomatic damage done by the Pentagon leak won’t last long

<p>Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley wrote a tweet attacking ‘weak and woke’ ideology the day she declared her candidacy</p>

Republicans are running on ‘wokeism’ – but don’t know what it is