As a teenager, the actor landed her first ever job in the blockbuster film series. The experience was fun – but also led to horrendous online abuse. Now she’s back, playing a tough and surprising matriarch in the Regency smash hit

Some actors might have been a little put out to audition for the role of the beautiful young romantic lead, and instead be cast as her mother, but not Katie Leung. “Absolutely not,” she says with a laugh. “I look young for my age – as most people in the west think Asians do – but I felt really seen to finally get to play the role of a mother.” She is a mother, she points out, and anyway, the role of Lady Araminta Gun, the steely aristo who is about to rock the new series of Netflix’s Regency behemoth Bridgerton, is so delicious, who could be insulted?

Araminta, widowed, has seen off two husbands, and now she’s trying to marry off her two teenage daughters, ideally to a Bridgerton, while keeping her stepdaughter, Sophie, in her place – as a Cinderella-style servant for the family. “The showrunners reassured me that it wasn’t going to be the archetypal evil stepmother role,” says Leung. “They wanted to find the humanity in Araminta. They wanted to ensure I knew her background, her struggles, why she makes these decisions, and why she’s so formidable.”

Reform leader warns of the terrors of London alongside his mayoral candidate and swaps Commons for radio slot

Curious. Nigel Farage devoted decades to trying to get elected as an MP. His victory in Clacton in 2024 followed seven unsuccessful attempts in other constituencies. And now he is finally an MP, he seems reluctant to spend any time in the Commons chamber. The one place where we, the public, now pay him to be.

It’s as if the reality of his new position is a disappointment. A reality check. His entire career had been a narcissistic celebration of self and it feels as though he had expected the rules of engagement to be changed to accommodate his need for constant attention. He had come to parliament to make himself heard, not to sit and wait his turn as the leader of a party with just five MPs.

The White House has said using the US military is always an option, but few analysts believe it a likely one

• Europe live – latest updates

The Trump administration has said repeatedly that the US needs to gain control of Greenland, a mineral-rich, largely self-governing part of Denmark with foreign and security policy run from Copenhagen.

The White House has said using the US military is “always an option”, but few analysts believe an armed operation is likely and France’s foreign minister has said the US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, has ruled out the possibility of an invasion.

Arson attack that left parts of German capital in darkness for days stirs outrage over infrastructure insecurity

• Europe live – latest updates

When Silke Peters bought a crank radio and a camping stove just after the start of Russia’s full invasion of Ukraine, her husband thought she was “a little crazy”. “He put me down, only half-jokingly, as a prepper,” she said, referring to the kind of person who stockpiles in case of catastrophe.

For almost four years, the items gathered dust in the cellar of the Peters’ two-room flat in Zehlendorf, a well-to-do district of Berlin. But in recent days the windup radio – with its inbuilt torch and charge point – has come into its own during Germany’s longest power cut since the second world war.

The Voice of Hind Rajab has stunned audiences with its use of the real-life audio of a girl’s call for help after her family’s car was attacked by an Israeli tank in Gaza. Its director explains why she had to tell Hind’s tragic story

When Kaouther Ben Hania heard Hind Rajab’s voice for the first time, she was in Los Angeles airport scrolling through social media. The five-year-old’s cry for help cut through the clamour around her. This was in February 2024 and Hind had already been dead for at least a week, left to bleed out among the corpses of six of her relatives after their car was targeted by an Israeli tank, leaving it with 335 bullet holes, according to the Forensic Architecture research group.

More than 20,000 Palestinian children were killed in two years of Israeli bombardment of Gaza, according to UN estimates. Another 82 have been killed since 10 October when a ceasefire was declared and then routinely breached. The pictures of the dead have often been published online, including those of Hind, showing her dressed in pink with a floral tiara, or smiling in an oversized academic cap and gown, but her voice also remains to haunt the world after her death.

Crews Hill near Enfield in north London could become a victim of Labour’s ambitious housebuilding goal

• UK construction hit by worst run since global financial crisis

On the fringes of north London is an area of garden centres, green spaces and winding country lanes that feel a world away from the capital’s urban sprawl. Tucked just inside the M25, Crews Hill near Enfield has been home to a cluster of horticultural businesses for decades, leading to it being nicknamed the “golden mile”.

Many of these small, family-run businesses – selling plants, fencing and paving – fear they will be closed down and forced to move if the government selects Crews Hill and nearby Chase Park as one of its next generation of new towns.

US takes over two tankers, one Russian-flagged in the North Atlantic and the other Venezuela-linked in the Caribbean; Trump says Caracas will be ‘purchasing only American Made Products’

• Explainer: why so much interest in a rusty tanker in the Atlantic?

Meanwhile, in the UK, Nigel Farage has offered his take on Trump’s plans to control Greenland, saying it would be “outrageous” for the US to seize it from Denmark.

Farage says he agrees with Starmer that the fate of Greenland must be decided by Greenland and Denmark, not the US – but sided with Trump on “some genuine security concerns” that require further presence there.

“What I will say is this. There are some genuine security concerns around Greenland and that becomes ever more relevant with a retraction of the ice caps as we head towards the North Pole. There is a strong feeling in British intelligence circles, and many in Nato, that there needs to be a significant Nato base located directly on the north of Greenland.

At the moment, it would appear that is something Greenland is not particularly keen to do.

Exclusive: Chancellor says Reform leader wants to keep children in poverty based on skin colour after U-turn

Rachel Reeves has said she was angered by Nigel Farage’s suggestion that only British-born families should have the two-child benefit cap lifted, saying the Reform UK leader would keep children in poverty based on their skin colour.

The chancellor, who will introduce legislation to lift the cap on Thursday, said it had been a burden for her not to be able to do so sooner, but it had been vital to do it at a moment of market stability.

Mayor says ICE claims incident was self-defense are not true, and tells agency to ‘get the fuck out of Minneapolis’

• Minnesota Democrats voice outrage after fatal ICE shooting: ‘Leave our state immediately’

Federal agents shot and killed a woman during a large-scale immigration enforcement operation in Minneapolis on Wednesday.

Ilhan Omar, the Democratic Minnesota representative, said the victim was “a legal observer” of action by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), which had sent a surge of agents into the city in recent days tied in part to allegations of fraud involving Somali residents.

President’s order suspends support for UNFCCC climate framework, UN population agency and other entities

The Trump administration will withdraw from dozens of international organizations, including the UN’s population agency and the UN treaty that establishes international climate negotiations, as the US further retreats from global cooperation.

Donald Trump on Wednesday signed an executive order suspending US support for 66 organizations, agencies and commissions following his instructions for his administration to review participation in and funding for all international organizations, including those affiliated with the UN, according to a White House statement on social media.