At least the British gave us the perp-walk shots. But I fear that any Americans seeking real justice will have to wait, and wait, and wait

I can’t believe the cops didn’t max out the theatrics yesterday when taking Peter Mandelson to the police station to help with their inquiries. They didn’t even do that thing where they put their hand on top of the suspect’s head to ease him down into the back seat of the car. Absolutely no sense of occasion.

And you know, they really may as well have had one. Misconduct in a public office is such an archaic old law and so incredibly difficult to prove that it may well be that you have already seen the high-water mark of law-adjacent consequences for both Mandy and Andy. The perp walk is the punishment. No offence to the highly esteemed Metropolitan police and the various other forces who’ve found the rare grooming-gang scandal they can be arsed with, but it’s hard to get past the deep-rooted suspicion that they are just looking busy. But look, we got one iconic royal photo out of it and a clip of Mandelson over which you could wonder absentmindedly, “Is this honestly the first time he’s been arrested? I must be having a deja vu because it hasn’t happened before, yet it feels so weirdly familiar. For whatever reason.” Anyway, allow me to reiterate that both of the men mentioned in this paragraph deny any wrongdoing.

Marina Hyde is a Guardian columnist

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Forget fear of public speaking. A lot of people now shy away completely from speaking to anyone in public. But if we learn to do this it’s enriching, for ourselves and society

It started with two incidents on the same day. In a fairly empty train carriage, a stranger in her 70s approached me: “Do you mind if I sit here? Or did you want to be alone with your thoughts?” I weighed it up for a split second, conscious that I was, in effect, agreeing to a conversation: “No, of course I don’t mind. Sit down.”

She turned out to be an agreeable, kind woman who had had a difficult day. I didn’t have to say much: “I’m sorry to hear that.” “That’s tough for you.” She occasionally asked me questions about myself, which I dodged politely. I could tell she was only asking so the conversation would not be so one-sided. Some moments are for listening, not sharing. I sensed, without needing to know explicitly, that she was probably returning to an empty house and wanted to process the day out loud. I didn’t feel uncomfortable, as I knew I could duck out at any moment by saying I needed to get back to my phone messages. But instead we talked – or, rather, I listened – for most of the 50-minute journey. I registered that it was an unusual occurrence, this connection, but thought little more of it. A small part of me was glad this kind of thing still happens.

Underestimated for too long, Wylie is now wanted by galleries worldwide and her giant, wild, witty paintings – of Hollywood stars, soccer greats, black swans and flying bombs – fetch huge sums. We visit her relaxed studio in Kent

The Royal Academy is billing Rose Wylie as a “rebel artist” for her forthcoming show and at 91, she finds there’s still a lot to rebel against. An establishment that has long underrated women’s work, for one: astonishingly, hers is the first solo show by a British woman to occupy all the academy’s main galleries. Being pigeonholed is another: her giant canvases – with their bold colours, painted texts and wild juxtapositions (Nicole Kidman meets ancient Egypt at a Kent community centre) – have been compared to the work of Jean-Michel Basquiat and Philip Guston. But she does not identify with any one movement and dislikes art that is “up your arse”.

For more than 60 years now, Wylie has lived in her low-slung, 17th-century house in Sittingbourne, Kent, where she rebels against conventional domesticity. Jasmine grows in a tangle through the kitchen ceiling and bouquets of dead flowers crowd another room. A ceramic horse given to her by the actor James Norton, a collector, lies by the windowsill. Next to the sink, two plates of petrified cakes are fuzzy with cobwebs. “I bought that biscuit in Costa two years ago,” says Sara, who works at Wylie’s London gallery, pointing to one of them. She thinks there’s a Battenberg buried somewhere upstairs in the studio.

With the Russian military performing poorly, Ukraine is clarifying strategy and pushing back with modest success

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, now entering its fifth grim year, has already gone on longer than the entire fight on the eastern front in the second world war. The Soviets marched from the gates of Leningrad to Berlin in a little over 15 months in 1944-45; today the Russian rate of gain in Pokrovsk in Ukraine is 70 metres a day, in Kupiansk, 23 metres, according to the Centre for Strategic and International Studies.

The gains are trivial, given Ukraine’s size, amounting to 1,865 sq miles during 2025 (about 0.8% of the country) – so the idea touted by the Russians, sometimes accepted by a credulous White House, that Ukraine is suffering a slow-motion defeat, is not accurate. In reality, even allowing for the fact that hundreds of thousands of homes are without electricity, heating and water after Russian bombing, Ukraine is clarifying its strategy and pushing back with modest success.

Armed groups and a state-owned refinery’s oil leaks have displaced Barrancabermeja’s fishing community and poisoned a paradise once full of manatees and jaguars

Standing on her wooden canoe, a machete in her hand, Yuly Velásquez hacks away at reeds matted with blackened sludge. Close by, a burst oil pipe has released a slick of crude into the San Silvestre wetlands in Barrancabermeja, Colombia’s oil city, choking the water and its wildlife.

“The destruction is immense,” says Velásquez, president of Fedepesan, a sustainable fishing organisation. “For the fish, the animals and flora, it means immediate death.”

What is behind the growing anger over plan 2 student loans and what could reforms mean for graduates?

Pressure is building on the government to reform the student loans system, with politicians and campaigners piling in, and a minister conceding there are “problems” with the current set-up.

Yesterday the consumer champion Martin Lewis – who last month locked horns with Rachel Reeves – became engaged in a war of words with Kemi Badenoch, the Conservative leader, on live TV.

Former US ambassador issues statement via lawyers saying his priority is to cooperate with police and clear his name

Keir Starmer is taking part in a coalition of the willing video call to discuss Ukraine. There is a live feed of his public contribution here.

Kemi Badenoch is holding a press conference now. She is appearing with the relatives of children who she says have died as a result of social media – either because they took their own lives, or because it led to them being attacked. She says she wants to give them a platform to tell their stories.

Leader says Vladimir Putin has not achieved his goals and visit by Trump might make clear ‘who the aggressor is’

Volodymyr Zelenskyy has appealed to Donald Trump to visit Kyiv, in a video address on the fourth anniversary of Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion, and said Ukraine would not betray its people in any negotiations with Russia.

Zelenskyy said Putin had not achieved his original war goals or “broken the Ukrainian people”. “He has not won this war,” he said. “We have preserved Ukraine, and we will do everything to achieve peace. And to ensure justice.”

Campus clashes provide uneasy backdrop to third round of talks on nuclear programme in Geneva

Plainclothes police and security forces, many of them armed, have tried to flood Iran’s remaining open universities in an attempt to crush a fourth day of student protests against the supreme leader, Ali Khamenei.

Running battles were reported on some campuses, with videos showing fistfights between the Basji state-backed militia and students at the University of Science and Technology in Tehran. Pick-up trucks with machine-guns were photographed parked outside the University of Tehran, with demonstrations also in Mashhad.

Government ignores pleas for a grace period before new rules come into force on Wednesday

British citizens with a second nationality risk being blocked from entering the UK from Wednesday, the Home Office has confirmed.

The government has decided to ignore pleas from families, the3million campaign group, the Liberal Democrats and the former Conservative cabinet minister David Davis for a grace period to allow British dual nationals to adapt to the new rules they face.