What happened
The European Union is pushing for legal protections in negotiations with the UK that would require compensation if either side abandons a future post-Brexit agreement. Reports say draft language linked to a proposed deal on agricultural trade would force the withdrawing party to pay for restoring border checks and related infrastructure. The demand reflects lingering mistrust following Britain’s departure from the bloc and the substantial costs EU states incurred setting up new controls after 2020. Talks form part of a broader “reset” being pursued by Keir Starmer, aimed at easing trade friction and rebuilding cooperation.

Who said what
EU diplomats have reportedly dubbed the proposed provision the “Farage clause”, viewing it as insurance against a future UK government cancelling the deal. Academic Anand Menon said the EU was negotiating from a position of strength and would “extract every last concession”.

With Reform significantly ahead of both Labour and the Conservatives in the polls, Brussels is “increasingly alive to the risk of its planned deals with Starmer unravelling”, said the Financial Times.

What next?
Both Reform UK and the Conservatives have already pledged to scrap any such deal if they win power.

What happened
Peter Mandelson has said he will not personally apologise to the victims of Jeffrey Epstein, despite acknowledging that his association with the disgraced financier was a serious error. In his first broadcast interview since being removed as the UK’s ambassador to Washington, the Labour peer addressed the emergence of emails describing Epstein as a close friend, correspondence he later called embarrassing. Mandelson said he had been marginal to Epstein’s life and had no awareness of his crimes, arguing that responsibility lay with broader institutional failures rather than with him individually.

Who said what
Speaking on “Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg”, Mandelson said: “I want to apologise to those women for a system that refused to hear their voices.” Asked why he would not apologise for the friendship itself, he said: “If I had known of course I would apologise… but I was not culpable.”

What next?
The BBC “drew criticism” from senior Labour figures, said The Telegraph, who branded the Mandelson interview a “slap in the face” for Epstein’s victims. Ayesha Hazarika, a former Labour adviser, accused the broadcaster of “aiding his swift rehabilitation”. Critics have called for further consequences for Mandelson.

Polar bears are leaping through their evolution in real time as rising temperatures threaten their habitat. A population of the majestic white carnivores found in an uncharacteristically temperate climate showed genetic differences from their colder-weather counterparts. And those differences could be key to the survival of the species, as well as show how other animals and humans could evolve in the future.

The isolated colony of polar bears found in southeast Greenland “inhabits a warmer climate zone, akin to the predicted future environments of polar bears with vastly reduced sea ice habitats,” said a study published in the journal Mobile DNA. The subpopulation is particularly interesting as it may have had a “200-year start on developing advantageous genetic changes for survival in this shifting landscape,” said Popular Mechanics.

This difference can be attributed to “jumping genes,” or transposons, which are “mobile pieces of a gene that can move around to influence how other genes work,” said Popular Mechanics.

Jumping genes are like “puzzle pieces that can rearrange themselves, sometimes helping animals adapt to new environments,” said Alice Godden, a co-author of the study. 

In this case, Godden said in The Conversation, her team found “active jumping genes in parts of the genome that are involved in areas tied to fat processing,” which is “important when food is scarce.” The polar bear genome comprises about 38.1% jumping genes, compared to 45% in humans. Scientists believe this is the “first documented case of rising temperatures driving genetic change in a mammal,” said NBC News.