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President has suggested steam catapults every year since 2017, saying digital systems are too ‘complicated’

After nearly a decade of loudly complaining about the fact that modern US aircraft carriers use electromagnetic systems to launch fighter jets instead of steam-powered catapults, Donald Trump has directed the Pentagon to redesign a new aircraft carrier to replace the modern system with the old-fashioned catapults he prefers.

Trump signed a national security memorandum on Thursday directing the defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, and the acting navy secretary, Hung Cao, to make the change he has had his heart set on since at least 2017, when he first described his idea to Time magazine.

Two explosions kill six personnel in Sevastopol; drone-hit Russian refinery shuts down as sanctions block repairs. What we know on day 1,634

Betting on what people say is becoming an increasingly popular category of prediction market sites. Now, federal officials have opened a probe examining whether those markets are a magnet for manipulators.

(Image credit: Erin Hooley/AP Photo/Erin Hooley)

Self-doubt doesn’t respond to evidence, writes advice columnist Eleanor Gordon-Smith. Rather than disputing it, perhaps you could engage in a different way

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A close friend of mine is suffering with crippling self-doubt and it’s starting to take a strain on our relationship. We’ve been friends for eight years. She is such a bright, bubbly and charismatic person who has an infectious ability to make people laugh and feel welcome; but she also has a really low opinion of herself and, as her friend, I am the one who always gets the brunt of her negative self-talk. After every social event she will message me to ask if I think she has annoyed someone, or that she spoke too much, or that she embarrassed herself. In private conversations she is constantly putting herself down, calling herself fat, apologising for nothing and generally claiming she’s not good enough.

I love her and constantly reassure her that her thoughts have no grounding but, after years of this, I am tired. I’m starting to enjoy our time together less and less, as I never know what mood she will be in or what she will say about herself. I would hate to hear anyone else speak about her in the way she does. I especially hate it when she says these things about herself.

Former 2GB and 2UE radio broadcaster is facing 22 indecent assault and sexual touching charges. Jones, 85, has pleaded not guilty

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A young driver for Alan Jones felt “violated” and “trapped” when the broadcaster allegedly touched him on the penis in the car and kissed him in a lift, but didn’t complain due to the “extraordinary” power dynamic between the pair, a Sydney court has been told.

Complainant C, now aged in his 40s, on Friday told Jones’s indecent assault trial that interactions between the pair escalated over time.

Cernavoda shutdown poses immediate problems for Moldova, which relies on Romanian power ​to cover its own electricity shortages

Romania has been forced to shut down the last working ⁠reactor at its only nuclear plant after drought caused the Danube river to fall to record lows – a rare move that will immediately affect power supplies in neighbouring Moldova.

Drought and record-low water levels have deepened fears of an energy crisis across Europe, which is facing a new summer heatwave.

Cernavoda shutdown poses immediate problems for Moldova, which relies on Romanian power ​to cover its own electricity shortages

Romania has been forced to shut down the last working ⁠reactor at its only nuclear plant after drought caused the Danube river to fall to record lows – a rare move that will immediately affect power supplies in neighbouring Moldova.

Drought and record-low water levels have deepened fears of an energy crisis across Europe, which is facing a new summer heatwave.

Shizuoka Crown melons are part of an important cultural gifting practice in Japan, where they are hand-patted by growers to achieve an even shape and texture

The melons at the centre of a national imbroglio involving the Australian prime minister have the sweetness of a watermelon, the snap of a honeydew and the perfume of a peach, according to fruit sellers.

Anthony Albanese maintains he has nothing to apologise for, after a joke he made regarding a gift he received from Japan’s prime minister.

Australia claim five wickets across the second day as Bangladesh reach 351 for 6 and build an ominous first-innings lead in Darwin

28th over: Bangladesh 108-1 (Tanzid 37, Mominul 42) Cummins adjusts his approach to around the wicket to Mominul but is fortunate a half-volley is driven straight to the alert Labuschagne in the covers. The first attempted lifter of the day gets up high enough to clip the batter’s bottom hand., but it was slow and loopy bounce, consistent with what we’ve seen all Test so far.

There is little sideways movement on offer for Australia, and the tennis ball bounce means the window of a good length is very short. AKA: a Scott Boland pitch.

More than 6 million customers in California will have Spectrum service.

Sophie Woods speaks about the challenges she overcame while completing the notorious Via Alpina across eight European countries

A couple of weeks into her record-breaking 2,000km run through Europe’s alps, Sophie Woods feared she might die. Woods and her photographer had just scaled a peak in Switzerland, when a severe thunderstorm engulfed them.

“The lightning was going off around us ... there was nowhere to shelter in place [and] all the rocks around us were conductive,” Woods tells the Guardian, from her home in Andorra, nearly two weeks after she became the fastest person ever to run the Via Alpina, a rollercoaster network of alpine trails through eight countries.