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More than 11,000 people have been forced to leave France's south-western Gironde region in the past few days. Dozens of fires are burning in Portugal and Spain where temperatures have surged above 40C. At least 281 deaths in both countries were linked to the heat and several towns in western Spain were evacuated. Portuguese villagers were also told to flee when flames crossed the border from Spain. The head of France's firefighters' federation has warned of the impact global warming is having on civil protection. "It's firefighters, civil security who deal with the effects on a daily basis - and these effects aren't in 2030, they're right now," said Grégory Allione. Heatwaves have become more frequent, more intense, and last long...

Temperatures are expected to soar well above average with highs close to 30C (86F) on Monday. Met Éireann has also issued a yellow warning for high temperatures in the Republic of Ireland. The RNLI warned visitors to the seaside to take "extreme care". "The message is really simple this weekend is to respect the water if you do visit the coastline," the charity's head of water safety, Gareth Morrison, said. "The number one piece of advice if you are heading Oofos Outlet  to the coast this weekend is to visit a lifeguarded beach. "If you're bringing children or yourself to the water, the safest place you can possibly do that this weekend and into next week is at a lifeguarded beach, and I cannot emphasise enough that one simple action c...

With the jailing on Friday of one man for burglary at the home of ex-footballer Ashley Cole - in which he and his partner were bound with cable ties - how are wealthy homeowners fighting back to defend their homes? "We're in high demand that's for sure," says John Moore, who heads up Westminster Security, a private security firm protecting homes in affluent areas like Holland Park. The area of Kensington, where white stucco-fronted villas sell for millions, has become a "real hotbed of criminal activity", said Mr Moore. "It is namely high-end burglaries, the criminal gangs are very professional and they're travelling from overseas, targeting properties and getting out of the country quickly. "Literally every other night there is an incident.....

Ivana Trump, Donald Trump's first wife, died of "blunt impact injuries" to the torso, the New York City medical examiner's office has said. It added that the death of the 73-year-old on Thursday was accidental. Reports in US media say she died after falling down stairs in her New York City apartment. Ivana Trump, who was born in what was then Czechoslovakia, married the former president in 1977. They divorced 15 years later in 1992. "She was a wonderful, beautiful, and amazing woman, who led a great and inspirational life," Mr Trump said. They had three children together - Donald Jr, Ivanka and Eric Trump. Donald and Ivana Trump were notable public figures in New York in the 1980s and 1990s, and their split was the subject o...

US health officials say they do not have enough monkeypox vaccines to cope with surging demand. The US has seen more than 1,800 cases so far, though that is thought to be an undercount as testing has also lagged. There has been growing concern about the rate at which monkeypox is spreading - especially in New York City, epicentre of the US outbreak. The disease, characterised by lesions on the skin, usually clears up on its own but can be extremely painful. Most confirmed cases have been among men who have sex with men, although anyone can be infected with the virus. "We don't yet have all the vaccine that we would like in this moment," US Centers for Disease Control director Rochelle Walensky told a news briefing on Friday. ...

You don’t have to like them. You can find their views repellent. You can promise never to vote for a single one of them. But you have to admit: the fact that six of the initial 11 candidates for the Conservative party leadership, four of the eight who made it on to the first ballot, are from an ethnic minority, and the fact that the next prime minister is all but certain to be a woman or a person of colour, or both, is a big deal. It is a significant moment in the politics of this country – even if it has induced conflicted and contradictory feelings in progressives. Consider what is actually happening here. Just before the election of 2010, the Tories could point to a grand total of one black and one Asian MP. Those two represented half the number of MPs from a visible ethnic minority ...