England

LONDON (AP) — Millions of people in Britain stayed home or sought shade Monday during the country’s first-ever extreme heat warning, as hot, dry weather that has scorched mainland Europe for the past week moved north, disrupting travel, health care and schools.

The red heat alert covers a big chunk of England and is due to last through Tuesday, when temperatures may reach 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) for the first time, posing a risk of serious illness and even death among healthy people, according to the Met Office, the U.K.’s meteorological agency.

LONDON, July 17 (Xinhua) -- As Britain issued its first-ever "Red Extreme" heat warning, the highest-level alert, a leading climate scientist has said the country is ill-prepared for the record scorchers.

"The record high temperatures we're expecting and experiencing is not surprising. Climate change is leading to changes in extreme temperatures, changes in the number of heat waves around the world," Corinne Le Quere, professor of Climate Change Science at Britain's University of East Anglia, told Xinhua on Friday.

LONDON, July 17 (Xinhua) -- As political risk, volatility and social divisions increase in the United States, public trust hits a record low, which makes the country start to look less like a developed economy, a recent Financial Times opinion piece said.

LONDON (AP) — The candidates to become the next British prime minister burnished their right-wing credentials Sunday, as they looked to remain in the race to succeed Boris Johnson.

Many of the five remaining hopefuls highlighted issues linked to Brexit and immigration as they attempted to woo fellow Conservative lawmakers ahead of a third round of voting on Monday, when another contender will drop out.

LONDON, July 15 (Reuters) - The five remaining contenders to be Britain's next prime minister will go head to head in the first of three televised debates on Friday, hoping a good performance will boost their chances in a battle that so far has no clear frontrunner.

An initial field of 11 challengers has been whittled down following two days of votes by lawmakers from the ruling Conservative Party, but no individual has yet emerged as the obvious successor to Boris Johnson who announced he was stepping down following a series of scandals.

LONDON, July 14 (Reuters) - Former British finance minister Rishi Sunak won the most votes in the second round of voting to succeed Boris Johnson as leader of the Conservative Party and prime minister, as one candidate was eliminated.

Sunak came top with 101 votes, followed by junior trade minister and bookmakers' favourite Penny Mordaunt on 83 votes and Foreign Secretary Liz Truss on 64 votes. Attorney General Suella Braverman was eliminated with 27 votes.

Lawmaker Tom Tugendhat received 32 votes and Kemi Badenoch received 49 votes.

LONDON, July 14 (Reuters) - A self-portrait of Dutch post-Impressionist artist Vincent van Gogh has been uncovered hidden behind one of his paintings.

National Galleries of Scotland said on Thursday art conservators made the discovery, believed to be a first for a UK institution, during an x-ray examination of Van Gogh's 1885 artwork "Head of a Peasant Woman" for an upcoming exhibition.

LONDON (AP) — Conservative Party lawmakers in Britain on Thursday knocked one of the six remaining contenders out of the contest to replace Prime Minister Boris Johnson, as front-runner Rishi Sunak worked to stave off momentum from surprise challenger Penny Mordaunt.

Attorney General Suella Braverman secured the fewest votes from her colleagues, 27, and was eliminated from the race, leaving five contenders.

LONDON (AP) — The number of outbreaks of diseases that jumped from animals to humans in Africa has surged by more than 60% in the last decade, the World Health Organization said, a worrying sign the planet could face increased animal-borne diseases like monkeypox, Ebola and coronavirus in the future.

There has been a 63% rise in the number of animal diseases breaching the species barrier from 2012 to 2022, as compared to the decade before, the U.N. health agency said in a statement on Thursday.

LONDON, July 13 (Reuters) - Britain's House of Commons speaker Lindsay Hoyle ordered two lawmakers belonging to the Scottish party Alba to leave the debating chamber just before Prime Minister's Questions for refusing to comply with his instructions.

"Neale Hanvey, I am now naming you and Kenny MacAskill to leave this chamber," Hoyle said, requesting them to be escorted out and warning that it might lead to them being suspended from the house.