Biden pulls Yemen war support, welcomes refugees in US reset

National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan says the US is ending military support for the Saudi war in Yemen

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  • Over-56s are invited for Covid vaccine jabs as July target date on track

    Everyone aged 56 and over will be invited for jabs this week, NHS England has announced. Hundreds of thousands of letters for those aged between 56 and 59 began landing on doorsteps on Saturday. The latest round of invitations comes after eight in 10 people aged 65 to 69 took up the offer of inoculation. More than 18 million people in England - more than a third of the adult population - have already received a vaccine. Across the UK, more than a million people have received both doses of a Covid-19 vaccine, while almost 21.4 million people have had one dose. Dr Nikki Kanani, NHS England national medical director for primary care, said: "It is testament to our incredible staff that we can now move on to the next age group. The vaccines are both safe and effective, so if anybody who is eligible hasn't been vaccinated yet, I'd urge them to go online or call 119 and get themselves booked in."

  • Meghan, Duchess of Sussex saw red over blanket colour, claim palace aides

    The Duchess of Sussex “went mental” at her personal assistant for ordering blankets that were the wrong shade of red, it has been claimed. Meghan, 39, is said to have had “unattainably high demands” causing untold tensions with her Kensington Palace staff. When she hosted a shooting party at Sandringham for Prince Harry’s friends, shortly after their engagement, she allegedly told her PA, Melissa Touabti, to order red, personally embroidered blankets for each of the guests. A source told the Sunday Times: “When they arrived, they weren’t the right shade of red for Meghan and she went mental at Melissa.” Ms Toubati is said to have left “traumatised” by the Duchess’s alleged behaviour and left the Royal Household six months after the Sussexes’ wedding, amid claims she had been reduced to tears.

  • Austria suspends AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine batch after death

    Austrian authorities have suspended inoculations with a batch of AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccine as a precaution while investigating the death of one person and the illness of another after the shots, a health agency said on Sunday. "The Federal Office for Safety in Health Care (BASG) has received two reports in a temporal connection with a vaccination from the same batch of the AstraZeneca vaccine in the district clinic of Zwettl" in Lower Austria province, it said.

  • Exclusive: Nigel Farage quits politics - and this time he means it

    Brexit is done - and so is Nigel Farage. The former leader of the UK Independence Party and the Brexit Party, credited even by his sharpest critics as the most influential politician of the past two decades, has finally quit politics. And this time it is for good. In an interview with this weekend’s Chopper’s Politics podcast, which you can listen to on the audio player above, Mr Farage announces he is resigning as leader of the Reform Party and turning his back on politics after three decades of political street fighting. He says: “There is no going back - Brexit is done. That won’t be reversed. I know I’ve come back once or twice when people thought I’d gone, but this is it. It’s done. It’s over.” Mr Farage famously quit after the 2016 referendum, saying "I want my life back", but then reformed the Brexit Party two years later in 2018 to exploit disaffection with the way the Government was handling the Brexit negotiations. He adds: “Now's the moment for me to say I've knocked on my last door. I'm going to step down as the leader of Reform UK. I'll have no executive position at all. I'm quite happy to have an honorary one, but party politics, campaigning, being involved in elections, that is now over for me because I've achieved the one thing I set out to do: to achieve the independence of the UK.” The 56-year-old insists that he had no plans to retire, saying: “I'm not packing up. I'm not off to play golf four afternoons a week and have half a bitter afterwards. That's not happening.” Instead, he will be trying to influence the national debate on China’s influence in the UK and the battles over the so-called culture wars.

  • Scots don’t support independence after Sturgeon inquiry, poll suggests

    More than third of Scottish voters less likely to vote for cutting ties with rest of UK after events of recent days

  • Biden fires Trump official at EEOC who refused to resign

    General counsel wrote a letter to the White House ‘respectfully’ declining to resign before she was eventually removed from her post

  • Meghan, Duchess of Sussex 'called all the PR shots', say royal sources despite Oprah interview claims she was gagged

    The Duchess of Sussex “called all the shots” when it came to managing her own media, royal sources have said, casting doubt on her claim she could not be interviewed by Oprah Winfrey three years ago. Multiple royal sources have told The Telegraph the 39-year-old former actress “had full control” over her media interviews and had personally forged relationships not only with Ms Winfrey, but other powerful industry figures including Vogue editor Edward Enninful. In a teaser clip released from the Sussexes’s interview with the US chat show host, due to be aired in the US on Sunday, the Duchess said it felt “liberating” to be able to speak and accused the Royal family of effectively gagging her and taking away that choice. “It’s really liberating to be able to have the right and the privilege in some ways to be able to say yes, I’m ready to talk, to be able to make a choice on your own and be able to speak for yourself,” the Duchess said. In the clip, the Duchess and Ms Winfrey reference the fact that a royal aide was listening in to their first phone call in February 2018, although it is understood the pair had spoken privately before then. What time is Meghan and Harry's interview with Oprah, and how can I watch it in the UK?

  • NEWS OF THE WEEK: George Clooney and Julia Roberts team up for new romantic comedy

    George Clooney and Julia Roberts are teaming up for new romantic comedy 'Ticket To Paradise.'

  • Vaccine shortage to shut down some centres next week and delay second-dose jabs

    Exclusive: Appointments to be cancelled and new slots unavailable in east Midlands, ahead of significant supply boost in following week

  • ‘I’m so confused’: People baffled as Kevin McCarthy reads Green Eggs and Ham in protest at pulling of Seuss books

    ‘Democrats are passing Covid relief And Republicans are reading Dr Seuss’ says one reply

  • Wales stabbing: Girl, 16, dies after several wounded in suspected knife attack

    Two men arrested and being treated in hospital

  • Struggling EU urges US to agree to export of Covid vaccines

    The EU is to appeal to the US to allow the export of millions of doses of AstraZeneca’s Covid-19 vaccine to Europe to make up for its shortfall of supplies, it has emerged. In a bid to boost its stuttering inoculation drive the European Commission plans to raise the matter in transatlantic discussions designed to boost collaboration in the fight against Covid-19. The EU will also ask Washington to ensure the free flow of shipments of vital ingredients needed for its own production of the vaccine. It comes after Italy blocked a shipment of AstraZeneca jabs to Australia, leading to further fears of vaccine hoarding as the EU tries to catch up with both the UK and the USA’s vaccine roll out. The European Commission said in a statement: “We trust that we can work together with the US to ensure that vaccines produced or bottled in the US for the fulfilment of vaccine producers’ contractual obligations with the EU will be fully honoured.” The European bid to obtain supplies of the AstraZeneca jab produced in the US comes as the company struggles to meet its delivery targets for the EU following production problems. AstraZeneca has also said it intends to source half of its planned supply to the EU from elsewhere in the world, but it declined to comment on the EU effort to access its US production. The EU’s attempt to source more supplies follows months of problems with its vaccine roll out, which at one stage saw the jab restricted to under-65s by several European countries such as Germany, which reversed the policy this month. President Joe Biden and Ursula von der Leyen, European Commission president, discussed increasing cooperation in the face of the pandemic on Friday. After the two leaders’ call the commission said that the two had a “strong interest” in working together to improve supply chains across the globe. Thierry Breton, EU internal market commissioner, has now been tasked to work with Jeffrey Zients, US co-ordinator of the Covid-19 response, on vaccine supply chain issues.

  • ‘Keep Meghan Markle’s name out of your damn mouth’: Kamala Harris’ niece defends the Duchess ahead of interview

    She accused critics of the Duchess of being racist

  • Hope for summer holidays but Britons should prepare for hard winter, Dr Susan Hopkins says

    ‘Population immunity’ to flu and other viruses may have been impacted by Covid health measures, government adviser says

  • Tony Blackburn misses Sunday radio show after death of sister Jackie from Covid

    Broadcaster shared a tribute to his sister on social media

  • Biden news - live: President to mark ‘Bloody Sunday’ with voting order as Trump tells GOP to stop using name

    Follow the latest in US politics

  • Covid roadmap out of lockdown: Everything you can and can’t do from March 8

    Last month Boris Johnson made his long-awaited speech to Parliament and announced a number of key dates for reopening Britain. The Government has always said that reopening schools would be the priority when lockdown is eased, with Monday previously set as the target date. According to a statement from the National Education Union, a full return would mean 10 million pupils and staff travelling to and from school each day.

  • Prince Harry and Meghan's Oprah interview: Five thorny issues that could make for uncomfortable viewing

    The Royal family will assume the brace position as it awaits a stream of damaging revelations by the Duke and Duchess of Sussex in their Oprah Winfrey interview. The slickly produced, dramatic teasers quashed any lingering hopes that the couple might stick to more mundane and diplomatic subject matters. Instead, they will tell “their truth”, lifting the lid on life behind palace walls in a manner no member of the family has done for decades. The couple intend the interview to draw a line under their grievances and mark the end of that chapter of their lives, allowing them to finally look to the future. But in reality, the issues that they raise, the allegations they make, are expected to be explosive, with potentially serious and long-term implications for the monarchy.

  • Italy has largest EU AstraZeneca stock but lowest vaccination rate

    No European Union country has a bigger stock of AstraZeneca (AZ) vaccines or has used a smaller percentage of its stock than Italy. Rome, with European Commission permission, stopped a shipment of 250,000 of the Oxford University jabs leaving the EU for Australia. The ban was a rebuke to the British-Swedish pharmaceutical firm, which Brussels accuses of breaking its contractual obligations, which AZ denies. In January it cut supplies to the EU in the first quarter to 40 million doses from the 90 million in the deal, and said it would cut deliveries by another 50 per cent in the second quarter. The EU has lagged far behind the UK, US and Israel in rollout, which it blames on supply shortfalls. Italian prime minister Mario Draghi aims to use AZ to speed up vaccinations as his country gears to face a third wave. He is expected to lift age restrictions and follow Britain's lead in having a longer gap between first and second jabs to increase the number having at least one shot. But a new YouGov survey of 1,029 Italians found that almost a quarter (23 per cent) would refuse the AZ jab and demand an alternative.

  • Air France flight made emergency landing in Bulgaria over disruptive passenger

    The passenger, an Indian citizen, began to act up soon after take-off, quarrelling with other passengers, assaulting a flight attendant and pummelling the cockpit's door, said Ivailo Angelov, an official at the National Investigation Agency. His aggressive behaviour prompted the flight's commander to seek an emergency landing in Sofia.