There have been penalties for those who looked the other way when Epstein was convicted of child sex offences and decided to maintain relationships with the financier — but not for the British ambassador to Washington, reveals SOLOMON HUGHES

“WATCH Newsnight tonight.” This was the response from BBC Newsnight’s Policy Editor Lewis Goodall to someone tweeting on August 12, “Who should I follow to understand the contemporary situation in Afghanistan? Feel like the media in the UK not covering it enough/from all angles.”
How well has Newsnight been reporting on Afghanistan? In an attempt to gain some insight into this question, I made a list of the people the BBC news programme directly interviewed about Afghanistan in August, when Western military forces were compelled to hastily withdraw and a crisis ensued in and around Kabul airport.
This amounted to 118 people interviewed either from the studio or as part of a video report (this figure includes multiple appearances on different days by the same person). I didn’t include pooled news clips of speeches and interviews — those shared with other outlets — which were largely of US-British government and military figures.

At the very moment Britain faces poverty, housing and climate crises requiring radical solutions, the liberal press promotes ideologically narrow books while marginalising authors who offer the most accurate understanding of change, writes IAN SINCLAIR

New releases from Allo Darlin’, Loyle Carner and Mike Polizze

New releases from Toby Hay, Bruce Springsteen, Bonnie Dobson & The Hanging Stars

As the cover-ups collapse, IAN SINCLAIR looks at the shocking testimony from British forces who would ‘go in and shoot everyone sleeping there’ during night raids — illegal, systematic murder spawned by an illegal invasion