Press Review

PRESS REVIEW – Friday, October 9: US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth announces that the military execution of Fort Hood shooter Nidal Malik Hasan will be "livestreamed". But first: we look at reactions in Italy after the country's parliament passes a controversial electoral reform that critics say serves to benefit Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni. Plus, ".fart" and ".trump" are among the new domain name applications, as revealed by the US non-profit organisation ICANN.

The Italian parliament approved an electoral reform on Thursday that's dividing the press along political lines. The reform will introduce a prize for the majority-winning alliance, awarding it bonus seats in both houses of parliament if it wins at least 42 percent of the national vote. Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni says this will reduce the post-election bargaining that often results in shaky governments. The centre-right paper Il Giornale hails this reform, which it says restores more power to Italian citizens via a preferential voting system and declares Italy's "Third Republic". The conservative daily Il Tempo's editorial attacks the "nervous left". There are two ways to examine electoral law, it says: the first is suited to career politicians and aspiring candidates, and involves "obsessing over technicalities and dissecting every clause." The other way tries to take the long view, giving the system a strong push towards a bipolar structure, which is what the Meloni government has done, it says approvingly.

The Italian left has struggled to build a united alliance ahead of next year's elections, and the left-wing press are furious about the reform. Centre-left daily La Repubblica calls it the "law of power" and in its editorial deplores the "ultimate betrayal." It says through a "political makeover worthy of a magician, Meloni forced her own majority to approve an electoral law that only she and her inner circle wanted". La Stampa says Meloni has changed the rules while Il Fatto Quotidiano says Italian President Sergio Mattarella can veto this "latest piece of garbage" – but wonders if he will do so.

French paper La Croix has an interesting article about Saudi Arabia. It looks at how the kingdom has poured money into state-of-the-art weaponry, but its army is badly lacking skills. La Croix's correspondent in Saudi Arabia reminds us that Yemen's Houthi rebels have launched several brazen attacks against the kingdom in recent weeks, including strikes on Saudi airports. How is it possible that Saudi Arabia spends billions on military equipment but cannot thwart attacks from a tenacious but underequipped rebel group, the paper asks. According to La Croix, there are several reasons: internal struggles between Saudi's national guard and regular army, both of which are affiliated with different powerful families. The central command is also very hierarchical and paralyses any initiative on the ground.

We turn next to the US where Nidal Malik Hasan, an army psychiatrist found guilty of a mass shooting in Fort Hood, Texas in 2009, will be executed by firing squad. As the Washington Post tells us, if it goes ahead, it would be the first such military execution since April 1961, when an army sergeant was hanged for rape and murder. On Thursday, US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth said the execution will be public and livestreamed. Hegseth said he wants people to watch the execution, so they understand "there are serious consequences for these types of things". If this goes ahead, the US would be added to a notorious list of countries in the world that hold public executions. Last year, of the 17 public executions, six were in Afghanistan and 11 in Iran. 

We end with the biggest shakeup of internet addresses in more than a decade. ICANN is a US non-profit organisation that controls the application approvals for domain names. It has unveiled new trends in IP addresses. Applications for more than 1,600 new addresses have been made. ICANN last expanded web domains in 2012, the Times of London tells us. At the time, new domains like .app, .web, .babysitting and .pizza were approved. This time around, AI is a big drawcard. AI companies are seeking to grab domains like .superintelligence or .chatgpt, while Meta has applied for .wearables. There are many novelty ones too. Among some new domain name applications are ".fart", ".bro", ".maga" and ".trump" and ".god". A Belgian LGBT non-profit wants to own .meow, which it says will be for the community but also cat lovers!

You can catch our press review every morning on France 24 at 7:20am and 9:20am (Paris time), from Monday to Friday.

PRESS REVIEW – Thursday, October 8: Maricarmen, the evicted Spanish pensioner who became the face of Spain's housing crisis, dies in hospital. Also, France braces for "Act Four" of high school student protests against dilapidated schools and poor staff presence. Finally, actress Zendaya sparks a row over etiquette at Paris Fashion Week.

Maricarmen, the Spanish pensioner who became the face of the country's housing crisis, has died in hospital. El Pais, the Spanish daily, pays tribute to the 87-year-old woman whose eviction last month sparked nationwide protests. She had lived in an upmarket Madrid neighbourhood for more than 70 years before a company bought her rent-controlled apartment for a ridiculously low price, El Pais says. It then forced the wheelchair-bound woman out of her home. The eviction and her years-long legal battle had taken a toll on Maricarmen. In recent months, her physical condition had deteriorated. The elderly woman is now a symbol in Spain and other parts of the world, El Pais says. El Mundo and 20 Minutes also dedicate their editions to the protesters and vigils held for Maricarmen. Protesters marched to Spain's parliament where they mourned her death and vowed that "her fight will go on".

We turn from housing crisis protests in Spain to high school protests in France. Act Four of the movement is taking place this Thursday, as French high schoolers continue their demands for better facilities and more staff. Le Monde says the high school student movement is united and digging its heels in. Hundreds of thousands of students marched in cities across France on Tuesday. They're going to renew those efforts this Thursday, while parents and union members have also joined the demonstrations. 

The left-wing paper Libération's edition is written by historians, in what is the annual "Libé of Historians", with a striking front page photo of the protests. L'Humanité, the Communist paper, offers us an excellent play on words: "Les Flics en flag", which translates to "cops caught red-handed". The paper condemns illegal badges, a lack of officer identification and accuses French police of "illegal practices". Elsewhere, the Times of London compares the movement to May 1968, saying "the May 68 rebellion was fuelled by dreams of a better world while this movement is being driven by the discontent of a nation stuck in a cycle of economic decline and political deadlock." Le Soir, the Belgian daily, urges an end to the violence in Liège, where public property has been damaged in the past week as student protests flare up there as well. 

Next, scientists may have uncovered the secrets to the longevity of life – thanks to Jonathan the tortoise! Gizmodo reports that Jonathan, a Seychelles giant tortoise, is estimated to be around 194 years old. He has lived in Saint Helena since the late 1800s and he's the oldest known living land animal. Scientists took a swab to look at his genetics and found that one key to his long life might be in his mitochondria – known as the body's powerhouses of the cell. It appears that he keeps his mitochondria young. If we can do the same, we might have a fighting chance of living longer.

Finally, actress Zendaya sparks an intense row over etiquette at Paris Fashion Week, after she did not stand up to greet French First Lady Brigitte Macron.

You can catch our press review every morning on France 24 at 7:20am and 9:20am (Paris time), from Monday to Friday.

PRESS REVIEW – Wednesday, October 7: Papers mark the third anniversary of the October 7 attacks. But first: the high school protests that have swept across France make the front pages at home and abroad. Also, the Argentinian press waves off Lionel Messi after his last international match. Finally, a British adventurer completes a 28-year walk around the world.

The French front pages all look quite alike this Wednesday. Aujourd'hui en France describes 266,000 young people in the streets, according to the interior ministry, while L'Humanité reports that 450,000 protesters descended into the streets across France. Libération celebrates the high school "aura", saying thousands of young people marched for their rights without any major incidents.

Beyond France, Italy's Il Manifesto celebrates the movement and quotes the French national anthem on its front page. Il Fatto Quotidiano highlights clashes between some protesters and the police. In the UK, the Guardian says authorities face accusations of deliberate brutality. It also looks at the facts behind the discontent: social inequality, huge class sizes and dilapidated school buildings.

Papers are also commemorating the three-year anniversary of the October 7 attacks. Israel Hayom is full of questions, whilst Haaretz argues that the scale of the attacks shows the extent of the security failure. In France, L'Équipe looks at how affected communities are using sport to work through their trauma, from a commemorative cycling race in the Israeli village of Be'eri to more than 220 Palestinian football clubs returning to competition after three years.

Staying in the world of football, the Argentinian press is waving off its superstar, Lionel Messi. Clarín headlines with "Messi's emotional farewell: a goal, two assists and an unforgettable ovation" after his last international match, a 3-0 win over Benin. In the UK, the Guardian says he has "completed football", finishing his international career after 21 years with 126 goals and 70 assists for Argentina. The Telegraph says he is only bettered by one man, and it is not Cristiano Ronaldo: Pelé, who takes the top spot in its list of the best footballers of all time.

Finally, there is one other homecoming to celebrate this morning. After 28 years walking around the world, British adventurer Karl Bushby has finally set foot on British soil, according to The Times. A Washington Post map traces his journey from the southern tip of Chile to Alaska, across the Bering Strait and Russia, and through Europe. He has walked 50,000 kilometres and has only around 400 to go until he reaches his mother's house in Hull.

You can catch our press review every morning on France 24 at 7:20am and 9:20am (Paris time), from Monday to Friday.

PRESS REVIEW – Tuesday, October 6: The death of a researcher in Siberia, reportedly from the plague, sparks concern despite Russian authorities' denial. But first: French high school protesters are promising "Act 3" of their protest movement against learning conditions. Also, Le Monde speaks to the editor of Russian independent outlet Novaya Gazeta ahead of the 20th anniversary of the murder of investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya. Finally, it appears that butter is back in fashion.

French high schoolers are promising "Act 3" of their protest movement and there is great concern in the press about how it is going to unfold. French left-wing daily Libération worries about the police crackdown on the high schoolers. It calls on police to "act with discretion". The Communist paper L'Humanité evokes the "rage of student protesters". In its editorial, the paper pays tribute to a generation who have grown up with social anxiety: they learned to read with soldiers patrolling their schools in 2015 (due to terror attacks), they hit puberty during the social distancing years of Covid-19 and they are finishing school amid two wars and rising inflation. The right-wing paper L'Opinion, however, is less sympathetic. It expresses concern about how violent the protests will become and says the student movement has "no instruction manual", calling it "a movement that has been, up to now, volatile, violent and unable to be controlled by the government."

The movement is garnering a lot of interest in Europe too. The British daily The Times says the French government is "bewildered" by the anger and fury of the high school students. The conservative daily quotes a Paris school principal as saying that in 20 years she has seen strikes, blockades and protests, but never as violent as what is happening now. Germany's Frankfurter Allgemeine explains the movement by France's economic woes, which were exacerbated by the 2024 dissolution of parliament and by the emergence of artificial intelligence while Le Soir, the Belgian daily, reports that the movement is starting to spread to Belgium as well. Students in Liège told the paper that they too want to fight against a "sick" educational system.

Meanwhile, authorities in Russia are playing down fears after a researcher in Siberia died of the plague. Time magazine reports that dozens of people have been quarantined and outbreak control measures are underway at the Irkutsk Research Anti-Plague Institute of Siberia. A 28-year-old lab worker known as Darya Shipilova died in unknown circumstances. A local report says she died after being exposed to the plague via a broken test tube, but those reports are no longer available online. Local authorities say there is no evidence to support this. But experts have been quick to play down fears of an outbreak. The Times of London explains that the pneumonic plague can be spread through close contact and is dangerous if untreated. However, it can be managed with antibiotics and outbreaks can be controlled if cases are caught early and isolated and treatments are respected.

We stay in Russia for our next story. Wednesday marks the 20th anniversary of the death of Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya, who was assassinated in Moscow on October 7, 2006. As Le Monde notes, Politkovskaya was killed for "understanding Putin before anyone else did". Her reporting from Chechnya foreshadowed the war in Ukraine. The paper interviews Dmitry Muratov, the founder of the independent Russian media outlet Novaya Gazeta, where Politkovskaya worked. He notes that her belongings are still in the office, including a yellowed copy of the Russian penal code opened to the last page she had consulted before her death. For Muratov, her death was clearly orchestrated by the Russian government.

Finally, it appears that butter is back in fashion, at least according to the Guardian. Here in France, butter was never out of fashion but elsewhere, butter is enjoying a renaissance right now: from butter sculptures, to a quest for a butter sommelier, to after-dinner "butter and crackers". This summer, a young entrepreneur opened Le Butter in Paris, a shop dedicated to 50 different varieties of butter. An Egyptian American artist has carved fragments of Michelangelo's David out of butter. Butter is back – butter late than never!

You can catch our press review every morning on France 24 at 7:20am and 9:20am (Paris time), from Monday to Friday.

PRESS REVIEW – Monday, October 5: More than 400 schools are closed across France, as the government fails to assuage the anger of protesting high school students. In other news: Boulder, Colorado takes on ExxonMobil and Suncor Energy, demanding billions for damage caused by wildfires. Finally, we take a look at some of nature's most whimsical offerings.

"How to get out of the crisis?" reads the front page of Le Parisien this Monday, as high school students are set to continue to blockading schools across France. The editorial suggests that the government may find itself waiting out the crisis, and hoping that rain forecast for Thursday will send protesters indoors. Le Monde has printed an op-ed by a protester saying these are not the actions of "out-of-control teenagers", but the result of an anger that has been too long contained. He references chronic shortages of teachers and decrepit school infrastructure as some of the reasons. Le Figaro headlines on a completely different anger: that of children who are not sympathetic with the protesters, but whose classmates are blockading or forcing their schools to close. Meanwhile, La Croix focuses on the dilemma of parents, torn between supporting their children's demands for improvements, and fears of their children being either hurt or involved if protests degenerate. 

Over in the US, the Supreme Court is set to examine the case of Boulder, Colorado, as it seeks billions in damages from oil majors ExxonMobil and Suncor Energy for damage caused by wildfires. The Washington Post explains how this is one of about 60 disputes in which city, county and state authorities are demanding damages of major historic polluters. The Atlantic explains how cases like these could pose an existential threat to the oil industry, but will be a test for so-called "attribution science", whereby scientists have sought to confirm which events are specifically attributable to greenhouse gas emissions, and which companies bear what proportion of that overall responsibility. 

Finally, a giraffe's outlandish hairdo, a friendly azure damselfly, and a mafia of walruses are among the finalists in Nikkon's Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards this year, as featured in the Guardian. 

PRESS REVIEW – Friday, October 2: We look at reactions in the French papers after high school blockades turned violent across France. We also look ahead to Brazil's two-round presidential election, which begins this weekend. The electoral campaign culminated with the cancellation of a presidential debate after both President Lula and his rival Flavio Bolsonaro pulled out. Finally, this year's Comedy Wildlife Awards finalists do not disappoint.

There's lots of focus on this week's high school protests in France that turned violent on Thursday. Le Parisien evokes the anger of pupils and talks of a "situation that escalated", with more than 2,000 arrests. 

Many of the papers point their finger at the far-left France Unbowed party, whose members have publicly supported the high schoolers. Le Figaro, the right-wing daily, calls them "the proxies" of the protesters and says that behind the demonstrators lurks the "shadow of the France Unbowed party". La Croix is more tempered in its coverage, reminding us that the violence of the protests is still marginal. Libération, the left-wing paper, is one of the few dailies that actually looks at what high schoolers are demanding: more funding for schools, better school facilities and adequate numbers of teachers and personnel. It offers some examples of how bad the situation is for some schools: one maths teacher was absent for three months and in one school, only one toilet was available for 1,200 pupils. Communist paper L'Humanité denounces the police action against protesters on Thursday. Its headline reads "Take your police away first" – a play on words of the word "bac", which also means high-school leaving diploma.

L'Humanité is also focusing on Brazil on its front page. Brazilians head to the voting booths this Sunday for the first round of presidential elections and the election is garnering a lot of attention in the papers there. The election pits incumbent President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva against Flavio Bolsonaro, the son of former president Jair Bolsonaro. Jornal do Brasil is focusing on polls that predict Lula will win the first round, but it could be neck and neck for the run-off on October 25. The paper also reports that international observers have arrived in Brazil to observe the correct undertaking of the electoral process.

It has been a bitter electoral campaign, culminating on Thursday with the cancellation of the final presidential debate, set to be hosted by O Globo, after both Lula and Bolsonaro refused to attend. In its editorial, Brazilian daily O Globo explains why it cancelled the debate. The Superior Electoral court authorities refused to leave an empty chair for absent candidates to allow the other candidates to direct questions at them in absentia. As O Globo explains, this is a deep-seated tradition in campaign debates and part of the democratic process. The other grievance was the inclusion of certain candidate from Lula's party who did not meet the requirements necessary to participate in the debates. O Globo says that faced with political interference and violations of the constitution and press freedom, it had no option but to cancel the presidential debate. A columnist for another daily, Folha da Sao Paolo, says the Supreme Electoral Court's meddling with the debate "with such brazenness would have been unthinkable not long ago, something associated with banana republics. Not anymore."

Finally, this year's Comedy Wildlife Awards finalists have been announced and they do not disappoint! We look at some of those in the running for Nikon's Comedy Wildlife Awards, which will be announced in December. They include an orangutan flipping the bird, a pair of elephant seals necking each other and a macaque learning the hard way that you shouldn't ram into a tree at full speed!

You can catch our press review every morning on France 24 at 7:20am and 9:20am (Paris time), from Monday to Friday.

PRESS REVIEW – Thursday, October 1: A FlyDubai flight was diverted to Saudi Arabia after the pilot was stabbed by his co-pilot in what the Israeli media are calling a terror attack. The co-pilot was detained by off-duty pilots on board and passengers before making a safe landing in Saudi Arabia. Also in the news, Cornell University's college campus culture is back under scrutiny after a shocking sexual assault claim. Plus, a man learns that Singapore does not take AI slop lightly.

The terrifying events on a FlyDubai plane that was heading to Tel Aviv are dominating the press. The captain was stabbed by his co-pilot, who was then restrained by passengers and off-duty pilots on board. The plane was diverted to Saudi Arabia, where it safely landed, but not before a terrifying nosedive. According to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the co-pilot who stabbed the captain was an Omani national who aimed to crash the plane.

One India and the Daily Telegraph evoke this would-be attack as "Israel's 9/11", although the co-pilot's motivations for the stabbing are yet to be revealed. The Jerusalem Post reports on the "heroic actions of Israelis" who stormed the cockpit to thwart the attacker. The paper reports that luckily, four flyDubai pilots were on board on standby due to regional rerouting that could delay flight times and require extra pilots. The centre-left paper Haaretz notes that Israel was "moments away from one of its worst terror attacks". The incident also comes at a crucial time in Israel and could serve Netanyahu well ahead of legislative elections next month. The French-language Lebanese daily L'Orient-Le Jour notes that the "hypothesis of terror" has entered the electoral campaign in Israel. 

In the US, the botched execution of a death row prisoner is shedding light on the shortcomings of the justice system. As The New York Times reports, Christa Pike has been on death row for 30 years for the brutal murder of a classmate when she was 18. She was due to be executed this week but got an eleventh-hour reprieve. She was then given two lethal injections but somehow survived and is now being treated in hospital. An opinion writer for MS NOW argues that Pike's guilt was never in question, but her childhood sexual abuse, mental illness and PTSD could have been a factor in her committing murder. The author says: "Her case is a reminder that lives of capital defendants are often shaped by brutality and violence" and makes a case for clemency. 

Meanwhile, the fallout from the alleged 2024 sexual assault of a student at Cornell University continues to make headlines. In a six-page statement, the victim known as Jane Doe alleges she was subjected to hours-long sexual attacks by seven members of a fraternity club. The case is back in the spotlight now after the woman sued the university for failing to properly handle her sexual assault complaint. It has also sparked soul-searching and a review of college campus culture. The Washington Post analyses three chilling words reportedly revealed from a group chat during the assault: "Shop still open?" The paper says the "very presence of a group text regarding this alleged assault is both gob smacking and banal", as it conveys that whatever was happening that room, "several people thought to document it in real time and make it a bonding experience". 

Finally, a man has learned the hard way that Singapore is not a country that takes AI slop lightly. According to Gizmodo and the Straits Times, a man in Singapore thought it would be a great laugh to share an AI-generated image of a crocodile in a reservoir at a popular public park. Unfortunately, the park's staff took the image very seriously, shutting down the park and spending two days looking for the non-existent crocodile. It was then reported to police and the man in question, Myanmar national Ye Lin, has been charged and faces possible prison time for sharing a false image. He's also been charged with obstruction of justice for deleting the image and the AI programme he used to create it. So learn your lesson: AI slop is no laughing matter in Singapore! 

You can catch our press review every morning on France 24 at 7:20am and 9:20am (Paris time), from Monday to Friday.

PRESS REVIEW – Wednesday, September 30: The Cornell University gang rape investigation reopens. But first: students and prisoners protest in Iran "in a rare show of dissent". Journalist Evan Gershkovich speaks about his 16 months in a Russian prison. Bonus: what can we do to be less lonely? Finally, Fat Bear Week has chosen its winner.

Radio Free Europe reports that "in a rare show of dissent amid crackdown, Iranian university students stage protest". They are rallying against the country's hijab law, calling for the release of some of their classmates who have been imprisoned and speaking out about the poor living conditions on campus. The paper says that protests in Iran have been rare after the mass crackdown in January, when thousands of people were killed according to human rights groups. Iran Wire reports that inmates from 66 prisons across Iran are also protesting. The campaign is called "No to executions Tuesdays" and consists of weekly hunger strikes protesting the death penalty and demanding its abolition. 

Next, The New York Times interviews Evan Gershkovich, the Wall Street Journal reporter who was imprisoned in Russia for 16 months. He was released after a US-Russian prisoner swap in 2024. The article is called "The Russian prison Gershkovich carried home". In the interview, he describes the tiny cell he lived in. He could take around six steps in there. He spent his waking hours in anger, panic attacks or crying. He is feeling better now and the nightmares have faded. Gershkovich has published a memoir entitled "This Cursed Beautiful Land" about his experience, but also that of the broader Russian population.

Also: the Cornell University rape investigation has been reopened in response to a lawsuit filed by a woman who says she was raped there in 2024. The New York Times says that her lawsuit brought renewed pressure to reopen the investigation – she is suing seven men, the university, her sorority and the fraternity. The NYT reminds readers that she says she was raped repeatedly over nearly seven hours at the Chi Phi fraternity house. The lawsuit details a series of sexual assaults and how she was pressured into taking drugs.

There have been many text messages tied to the lawsuit. CBS News says it has obtained a video of the fraternity's Snapchat group. At 1:42 am – during the rape – one fraternity guy texted "shop still open?" – like "is the woman still available?" And the answer was "Yeah". The Cut focuses on the journalists who broke the story – student journalists from The Cornell Daily Sun – they've been covering every beat and new development. For the past two weeks, they have been "relentlessly" chasing follow-ups and responses from the university's administration. Earlier, The Cornell Daily Sun published a blistering editorial entitled "Cornell won't, we will" – printing the names of the accused men and blaming the university for its lack of transparency. The Cut says that "throughout it all, the team has approached this case with care and moral clarity". 

Bonus: The Atlantic looks at "one reason people are spending so much time alone". The article's central argument is that "inconvenience is the cost of community": we should sometimes do things that we don't want to do – or find irritating – if we want to maintain our relationships.  

Finally, The Washington Post looks at Fat Bear Week's winner: a chunky bear named Backpack. 

You can catch our press review every morning on France 24 at 7:20am and 9:20am (Paris time), from Monday to Friday.

PRESS REVIEW – Tuesday, September 29: Jordan Bardella, the head of the far-right National Rally party, is accused of anti-Semitic comments dating back to 2013. But first: French high schoolers call for a nationwide strike to protest against teacher absences and dilapidated schools. The Washington Post looks at how AI data centres are transforming the US landscape. Plus, where are all the hunks? The Miss England pageant is struggling to recruit candidates!

We start with calls for a nationwide high school blockade in France this Tuesday. It comes as the public sector also goes on strike. According to Le Monde, the movement began last week at a school in the Paris region where several teachers were absent. The underlying grievances of students are varied: a failure to replace absent teachers, the decrepit state of some schools, lack of funding, overcrowded classes and demands to loosen the smartphone ban in schools. On Monday, a police officer reportedly fired a round from a grenade launcher at point-blank range and injured a student. Just over six months before presidential elections, the blockade has become ripe fodder for politicians, the Huffington Post notes. Far-left leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon defended the high schools, saying the blockades were "harmless". He also accused Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu's government of "repression". French Education Minister Edouard Geffray in turn condemned the violent instrumentalisation of young French people by "outside groups", saying it was irresponsible to incite high schoolers to participate in the blockade.

In other news in France, the investigative website Mediapart has published revelations of alleged anti-Semitic comments made by Jordan Bardella, the French far-right leader. He is the man tipped to become prime minister if Marine Le Pen wins the presidential election next year. He has also been at the forefront of the far-right National Rally party's image rebranding. Mediapart accuses him of making anti-Semitic comments a decade ago, at the beginning of his political career when he was a young far-right activist. The website accuses him of "obsessional anti-Semitism". Bardella has angrily denied the comments, saying he was a minor in 2013 when the alleged comments were made. Mediapart notes, however, that in previous interviews, Bardella has said he joined the party in 2012, which lines up with the timeline. The left-wing press has reacted swiftly. L'Humanité, the Communist paper, says these revelations are indeed proof that behind the far-right National Rally party's rebranding, "the ideology has not changed". It opts for a photo-morph image of Bardella and party founder Jean-Marie Le Pen, who was himself often accused of rampant anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial.

The Washington Post turns its attention to artificial intelligence and specifically how data centers are changing landscapes. In an interactive article, the paper looks at how AI data centres are transforming American landscapes – farmlands and desert are now teeming with the structures. What was once a warehouse surrounding by farmland today houses the US's largest operating data centre, Elon Musk's Colossus 2. This transformation is taking place across the US. 

Finally, call it the hunk shortage! The nationwide search to find the Mister who will represent England at the Mister World pageant has so far proven fruitless – just seven candidates signed up. Ahead of the October 7 final, organisers are getting desperate. They sent Miss England to a beach in the hopes of drawing some candidates – and are even asking Miss England semi-finalists to nominate their boyfriends or brothers! Where have all the hunks gone, the Guardian wonders!

You can catch our press review every morning on France 24 at 7:20am and 9:20am (Paris time), from Monday to Friday.

PRESS REVIEW – Monday, September 28: Papers discuss the Orange Order parade standoff in Northern Ireland. Also, who are the suspects in the RAF base terror plot? Finally, we look at some of the latest data on relationships.

Amid a standoff in Northern Ireland over a Protestant parade, the headline of The Irish News reads "We don't want this. We just want to live in peace". It's a quote by a mother of a Catholic child who died during the Drumcree parading dispute 30 years ago. The height of that dispute came in the 1990s, when several Catholic children died in a petrol bomb attack on their home by the Ulster Volunteer Force. The mother says she feels "traumatised" and as if history is repeating itself.

The BBC explains that the "Orange Order march row goes to the heart of the ongoing divisions in Northern Ireland". The article says that chamber disputes between unionists and nationalists happen almost every week. But ground-level arguments like this one are rare. The Orange Order is a Protestant, pro-British organisation and the area where it wants to march is mostly Catholic and has pro-Irish nationalists. The article reminds us that in the 1990s, the dispute spread to other places and "almost derailed the peace process". But while it was never resolved, it slowly faded. 

But The Guardian writes that the "Drumcree stand-off shows Northern Ireland's troubled past still threatens its peace". The paper says the conflict reminds us "how easily history can undermine the present – if imperfect – peace and stability". The Guardian says that today's Northern Ireland is very different from that of three decades ago: there is no longer a unionist majority and First Minister Michelle O'Neill is from Sinn Féin, a party focused on achieving a united Ireland. 

Next, an analysis piece in The Times says that the "RAF bases have long been targets of terror attacks". Counterterrorism police haven't ruled out the possibility that Islamists are behind Sunday's foiled plot. But British bases have also been on alert since this summer, when Iran said that anyone assisting the United States air strikes in the Middle East was a "legitimate target". This means that Iran is a suspect. The Times concludes that "any involvement of Tehran would prove a major escalation". 

Finally, we look at articles discussing some new relationship data. The Guardian explains that marriages that end in divorce today last longer than at any point since records began. One hypothesis says that couples may be delaying the legal end until they can afford what comes next. There are other hypotheses, like delaying divorce because of Covid-19 or also overall external uncertainty, like the environment, politics, etc. The Guardian also reminds us that women are mostly the ones who ask for divorce. 

But what about couples who are doing well? It turns out that regular churchgoers – married men and women – have more sex than secular couples, The Atlantic reports. Mostly Christians were interviewed, but there were some Muslim and Jewish people too. Those surveyed live in the United States and attend religious services at least twice a month. So according to this study, it seems like religious couples have avoided the "sex recession". Could this be just wives feeling obliged to sleep with their husbands? According to the data, they actually describe their sex life as "excellent" or "very good". 

However, we should take all this data with a pinch of salt as the survey in question was conducted by the Institute for Family Studies, a conservative think tank that aims to strengthen marriage and promote traditional family structures. Also, we don't know if gay couples were even surveyed.

You can catch our press review every morning on France 24 at 7:20am and 9:20am (Paris time), from Monday to Friday.