World

Jeremy Bowen’s half-hour long interview with Bashar al-Assad is being heavily trailed by the BBC this morning.  And while it has little that is new it does provide an interesting insight into the Syrian President’s current situation. The main story from it is Assad’s confirmation that there is some line of communication between the Syrian regime and the Americans. Bowen put to Assad that there are American planes over Syria all the time engaged in the fight against Isis and that there must be some contact between them. While confirming that they do not speak directly, Assad did confirm that Iraq and other countries act as intermediaries.  But it was the

After the late Bob Hoskins was left out of a tribute montage at the Baftas, many people took to Twitter to vent their anger. The comedian David Baddiel went so far as to suggest the academy were showing bias against working class actors as a result of the omission. Now Hoskins’ daughter Rosa has spoken out, saying that her father would not have cared about the snub. The actress says that he ‘knew his worth’ so would not require validation from the academy. Thanks to everyone who’s expressed dismay that Dad wasn’t mentioned in the #Bafta obituaries. But he wouldn’t have cared. #bobhoskins — HauteHoskins (@HauteHoskins) February 9, 2015 #bobhoskins needed no external validation, he knew

Tony Abbott is not dead yet. He has survived a spill motion this morning by the narrowest of margins (61 – 39). Had the vote got into the forties it would have been extremely difficult for Mr Abbott not to hold a leadership ballot, in which case Malcolm Turnbull would have challenged and almost certainly won. Mr Abbott is a renowned political fighter, but due to poor recent polls and a series of unusual events, dissatisfaction with him clearly runs high. How much time he has bought himself remains to be seen, but he is clearly a wounded beast. It is likely that Mr Abbott will find himself under pressure

Speaking this weekend, Francois Hollande said, ‘If we don’t find a lasting peace agreement, we know perfectly well what the scenario will be. It has a name, it’s called war.’ The day before, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the former head of Nato, said that Russia was likely to intervene in the Baltic states to test NATO’s shaky commitment to collective defence. ‘This is not about Ukraine. Putin wants to restore Russia to its former position as a great power.’ As telling as anything leaders are saying are the films Russian reporters have been broadcasting – I must warn you that there are age controls on these links for reasons that will become

We all need stories ‘to help us make sense of the complexity of reality’, intones the sensible sounding voice of Adam Curtis at the start of his new documentary about Afghanistan, Bitter Lake. But stories told by ‘those in power’ are ‘increasingly unconvincing and hollow’. What a relief then that Curtis has raided the archives of BBC News on our behalf for footage of the west’s 13 year engagement in Afghanistan to construct his own more than two hour long story. His conclusion: the crisis in Afghanistan is all the fault of the witless Americans! The problem all began on a US warship parked in the Suez Canal in 1945

Seventy years on from the liberation of Auschwitz, Roman Kent, who was 12 when he was sent there, wept as he implored the world not to allow anything like that to happen again. ‘How can one erase the sight of human skeletons – just skin and bones, but still alive?’ he said. ‘How can I ever forget the smell of burning flesh?’ Paul-Emile Seidman was working as a doctor in Bichat hospital in Paris when the survivors of the concentration camps began to arrive. In a few days our beds were occupied by skeletons…They all seem to be of the same age, whether they are twenty or sixty. Their heads

Q: When is a meatball not a meatball? A: When it’s vegan. Nothing is sacred to the killjoys over at Peta, not even the honest Ikea meatball. Just about the only tolerable aspect of an afternoon spent at the Swedish furniture giant – the meatball –has come under attack from the left, with the introduction of a vegan version. Teaming up with the animal rights lobby, ‘the company has announced that the tasty vegan treats will be available in its store restaurants beginning in April.’ Mr Steerpike is not sure what these non-meat balls will be named, but given Ikea’s form in the area, it will probably be a totally

Over Christmas I finally got around to reading Eichmann Before Jerusalem by Bettina Stangneth.  I cannot recommend this book – newly translated from the German – highly enough.  It challenges and indeed changes nearly all received wisdom about the leading figure behind the genocide of European Jews during World War II. The title of course refers to Hannah Arendt’s omnipresent and over-praised account of Adolf Eichmann’s 1961 trial, Eichmann in Jerusalem: a report on the banality of evil.  I would say that Stangneth’s book not merely surpasses but actually buries Arendt’s account.  Not least in showing how Arendt was fooled by Eichmann’s role-play in the dock in Jerusalem.  For whereas

The next set of exit polls are now out from Greece and they, again, show Syriza pulling off a spectacular victory. Their lead might even be just enough to see them win an overall majority; the poll estimates that they will win between 148 and 154 seats in the 300 seat parliament. If Syriza do win outright, they will have no justification to voters for watering down their demands to the rest of the Eurozone. They will have a clear mandate to push for the debt restructuring that they want. But Berlin is not going to be in any mood to grant concessions. Angela Merkel is already deeply unhappy about

Private Eye will have a field day when it comes to the tributes being paid to King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia – it’ll be like beheading fish in a barrel (for adultery). Among the tributes paid to the people’s medieval theocrat was one by David Cameron, who said: ‘I am deeply saddened to hear of the death of the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, His Majesty King Abdullah bin Abd Al Aziz Al Saud. ‘He will be remembered for his long years of service to the Kingdom, for his commitment to peace and for strengthening understanding between faiths. ‘I sincerely hope that the long and deep ties between our

The Swiss National Bank usually ticks away as quietly as one of its nation’s more expensive timepieces, but when the cuckoo does occasionally burst out of the clock, all hell breaks loose. After a policy was introduced in September 2011 to depress the Swiss franc against the euro (as traumatised investors continued to pour money into safe-haven Switzerland), governor Philipp Hildebrand resigned when it came to light that his wife Kashya had sold a huge bundle of francs ahead of her husband’s market intervention, then bought them back at a handsome profit. Now, weeks after Hildebrand’s successor Thomas Jordan called the informal fixing of the franc at €1.20 ‘absolutely central’

Warning to publishers. Don’t commission a first-time author without giving him a deadline. The Chilcot Inquiry, a long-pondered probe into the origins of the Iraq war, is maturing gracefully and expensively like a lovely old port. Seven years and counting. Let’s hope it tastes good when it comes out. At PMQs, David Cameron replied to questions about Chilcot with his ‘not-me-guv’ routine. Here are the things he isn’t responsible for. Ordering the Inquiry. Fixing the Inquiry timetable. Accelerating its publication. Receiving the Inquiry. Deciding what do with the Inquiry once it’s completed. Inquiring into delays surrounding the Inquiry. When, or if, the report appears it will damage the reputations of

The ministers covering women and equalities do have a view on the disappearance of topless Page 3 models, but the Prime Minister apparently doesn’t. Today Nicky Morgan called the decision of The Sun to put something over at least a portion of the breasts of the women in its paper ‘a long overdue decision and marks a small but significant step towards improving media portrayal of women and girls. I very much hope it remains permanent’. Her Lib Dem colleague Jo Swinson said she was delighted that the old fashioned sexism of Page 3 could soon be a thing of the past’ and called on the newspaper’s editors ‘to consider whether