The ‘Council of Andrews’ started as a bit of fun – but has led to friendships, financial help and even fiances…

It’s a rough time to be called Andrew. In recent years, notorious figures such as Andrew Tate and the former prince have dominated the headlines, giving us a bad name. Even the CEO caught up in that Coldplay scandal was an Andy. It’s been a bad run. As an Andrew myself, I wanted to unearth some better representatives, so I recently set out on a mission: to find some fellow Andrews doing good in the world.

That’s how I stumbled upon thousands of Andrews at once.

As government reorganisation ties part of the forest to Southampton, local people are angry

Della Keable could not hold back the tears as she explained how her family had lived in the forest for centuries, making a living among the trees, loving the tight-knit feel of the place. “I’m sorry,” she said as the emotion got too much. “But the forest is part of our souls.”

Keable is among thousands of people protesting against the UK government’s decision to split up the administration of the New Forest as part of local government reorganisation.

The king has the chance to offer some tough love. Perhaps he could start with a speech to Congress about the Trump administration’s reckless trajectory

It will be a definitive moment for King Charles III and the British monarchy. And for better or worse, it could help salvage UK-US relations after Donald Trump insulted Keir Starmer. In the public high point of his state visit, the king will mount the rostrum in the US House of Representatives on 28 April to address a joint session of Congress. Of all the British monarchs in the 250 years since US independence, only his late mother, Elizabeth II, was afforded this rare honour – and her accomplished 1991 performance brought the house down. This time could be more tricky.

Times have changed, as has the land of the free, and the biggest change is Trump. He will not be present on Capitol Hill when the king speaks, but his dark shadow lurks everywhere. Trump will undoubtedly portray Charles’s attendance at a separate White House state banquet as a royal endorsement of his person and policies. And it is precisely this galling prospect of a presidential propaganda coup that has led most people in Britain to oppose the visit. Starmer, in contrast, hopes it will set the badly soiled “special relationship” back on track.

Simon Tisdall is a Guardian foreign affairs commentator

It’s a high-wire act and the risk of an embarrassing failure can weigh heavily – but that’s no reason to avoid writing about sex, argues Black Bag author Luke Kennard

Are straight male writers scared of writing about sex? If you read modern fiction it’s hard to conclude otherwise. Maybe we’re worried that the very presence of a sex scene in our book would feel somehow exploitative or gratuitous. Or maybe we feel our gender has simply said enough on the subject so we should shut up.

Women writing about straight relationships don’t seem as nervous. In fact, sex is often a central element of narrative, and of nuanced portrayals of masculinity; from the slow-burn tenderness and awkwardness of intimacy in Sally Rooney’s work, to the surreal celebrations of and lamentations for the erotic in Diane Williams’s extraordinary short stories.

The daily news can’t adequately convey the administration’s sabotaging of our government, economy, alliances and environment

The United States is being murdered, and it’s an inside job. Every department, every branch, every bureau and function of the federal government is being fatally corrupted or altogether dismantled or disabled. All this is common knowledge, but because it dribbles out in news stories about this specific incident or department, the reports never adequately describe an administration sabotaging the functioning of the federal government and also trashing the global economy, international alliances and relationships, and the national and global environment in ways that will have downstream consequences for decades and perhaps, especially when it comes to climate, centuries.

Across the branches of government, the services that are supposed to protect us – nuclear stockpile monitoring, cybersecurity, counter-terrorism – are being undermined, understaffed or trashed. A different kind of protection that consists of public health, vaccination programs, food safety, clean air and water, social services, civil rights and the rule of law is also under attack. The federal government that serves us is being starved while the federal government that serves the Trump agenda and the oligarchy is glutting itself on taxpayer money, including the grotesque sums dumped on the Department of Homeland Security and the US military now being warped into Pete Hegseth’s twisted vision of a ruthless mercenary force. Hegseth has reportedly stood in the way of promotions for more than a dozen Black and female officers.

Rebecca Solnit is a Guardian US columnist. Her newest book is The Beginning Comes After the End: Notes on a World of Change

New technologies of reproduction are plundering the art world – and getting away with it

In 2026, its easy to see why generative AI is bad. The internet has nicknamed its excretions “slop”. The CEOs of AI companies prance about on stage like supervillains, bragging that their products will eliminate vast swathes of work. Generative AI requires sacrificing the world’s water to feed its hideous data centres. Around the globe, chatbots induce schizophrenic delusions and urge teens to kill themselves – all while turning users brains to mush.

Who could have predicted this? Artists, that’s who.

Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf says ‘if you fight, we will fight’, reports state media, as US president also threatens to bomb Iran’s water treatment facilities

• JD Vance and US delegation leave Pakistan after failing to reach deal with Iran

• Planeloads of negotiators and too little time: US and Iran’s 21 hours of talks

A post about an hour ago on the Israel Defense Forces Telegram channel claimed that overnight, the IDF “identified a rocket launcher positioned and ready to launch toward the State of Israel in the area of Jouaiyya in southern Lebanon”.

Shortly after the identification, the launcher was struck and dismantled in a rapid closure cycle, thwarting the launch before it could be carried out.

The two sides turned up to test one another’s resolve. It was probably unrealistic to expect a dispute that has taken up years of discussion to be settled in one marathon session

• Middle East crisis – live updates

It was as if the two delegations in the Iran-US peace talks in Islamabad hoped that the sheer number of negotiators flown into Pakistan could overcome the handicap of having only a finite number of hours in which to settle a 20-year dispute over Iran’s nuclear ambitions, now overlaid by complex new issues such as future control of the strait of Hormuz and US compensation for its attack on Iran.

Iran sent two planeloads of negotiators. They included many members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), present to ensure that no gains made in the field were relinquished at the diplomatic table. Diplomats fanned out across political, legal, security, economic and military files. One Iranian-drafted technical explanation on nuclear facility safety ran to more than 100 pages.

Demand at online marketplaces could settle at a new, higher normal, with the crisis leaving consumers ‘scarred’

Car buyers’ interest in electric cars has surged across Europe since the start of the war in Iran, as the rising cost of petrol highlights the cheaper power available from a plug.

Online marketplaces in the UK, Germany, France and Spain reported huge increases in inquiries about electric vehicles since the start of the conflict in February.

Long-serving prime minister beaten by opposition after early results showed clear lead

Europe correspondent

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