Karen McDougal claims she had a sexual relationship with Trump in 2006 just after his wife Melania gave birth to their son, Barron
Hello, this is Anna getting you up to speed on everything you should be reading today.
Today's headlines
Past comes back to haunt Trump
Former Playboy model Karen McDougal has reached an agreement on Wednesday with publisher American Media Inc that will allow her to speak openly about an alleged affair with US President Donald Trump. McDougal sought to be released from a deal reached in 2016 with AMI that gave the company exclusive rights to her story in exchange for $150,000.
‘Oldest person’ dies
A man from Chile thought to be the world’s oldest person has died in hospital at the ripe old age of 121. Celino Villanueva Jaramillo passed away on Wednesday after falling out of bed a week previously, breaking three ribs, one of which pierced a lung.
Castro dynasty is out
The Cuban government has selected the country’s first vice-president, Miguel Díaz-Canel, as the only candidate to succeed President Raúl Castro. The appointment of Díaz-Canel will be the first time in six decades that someone outside the Castro family is head of the country’s government.
Trump’s hard-line
Donald Trump has said he will meet the North Korean dictator, Kim Jong-un, ‘in the coming weeks’ but warned that he was prepared to walk away if the talks were not ‘fruitful’. ‘As you know, I will be meeting with Kim Jong-un in the coming weeks to discuss the denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula,’ the US president told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida. ‘Hopefully that meeting will be a great success and we’re looking forward to it.’
What we like
Must-read
This Buzzfeed report investigates why the UK refused to investigate a company suspected of money laundering because it is ‘the biggest corporate donor to the Conservative Party’. According to Buzzfeed News, the British government refused to assist a French investigation into suspected money laundering and tax fraud by UK telecoms giant Lycamobile.
In-depth
The New York Times travel section published an incredibly-detailed account of the controversial Palio di Siena horse race in Italy, and it will transport you to the chaos of this ‘huge outdoor loony bin’. Dwight Garner says: ‘Jockeys openly bribe one another. Betrayal is common. Guile is prized.’ Read his enthralling account here.
Spotlight
Israel is 70. The New Yorker examines the current state of the embattled holy region and asks if the right are winning the cultural war. Interspersed with personal narratives and sensitive political insight, the piece manages to avoid the usual pitfalls of pro- or anti-Israel rhetoric.
Entertainment
Kanye West is writing a philosophy book in real time via Twitter, because of course he is. Yeezy made his grand return to the micro-blogging site in a style only he could. ‘No publisher or publicist will tell me what to put where or how many pages to write,’ Kanye wrote. ‘This is not a financial opportunity this is an innate need to be expressive.’ What followed was some pearls of wisdom - read some of his tweets below and let the knowledge wash over you.
Environment
Marine heat waves caused by global warming are killing off Australia's Great Barrier Reef, the world's largest coral reef system, according to a study published Wednesday in the journal Nature. 30% of corals at the Great Barrier Reef were killed after an extended marine heat wave in 2016 that caused massive coral bleaching and death.
Arts & Culture
Has the era of #MeToo changed how we view paintings of naked women by clothed men in art galleries? Writers Michael Slenske and Molly Langmuir for The Cut certainly think so. Slenske writes: ‘While feminist art critics have for decades pointed out the shortcomings of the “male gaze,” the post-#MeToo reckoning with the art world’s systemic sexism, its finger-on-the-scale preference for male genius, has given that critique a newly powerful force.’ Read this extensive, word porn-filled critique of gender dynamics within the art world.