“A spy has to be an actor, but an actor that doesn’t need a public or a stage, and doesn’t require the approval of others,” says Elena Vavilova, as she sips a cappuccino in a Moscow cafe. Vavilova acted the part of a Canadian woman named Tracy Foley,

For 90 minutes, while their team plays, people of the war-torn Indian region of Kashmir forget curfews and protests and enjoy normality

She is the dancehall queen who has made an impact – not least when jumping on her fans. Now she is bringing her X-rated show to Notting Hill carnival

The latest findings may appear disgusting at first glance (or sniff). But it’s ‘advertistics’ such as this that are the real problem

My children are adults, and the house is buzzing with life. Even thinking of them leaving fills me with a sense of loss

Audre Lorde proposed a series of calming activities as a way to survive adversity. Now it’s just another form of ‘me time’

Guardian readers from Greenland share their reactions to Donald Trump’s idea to buy the country

Greenland didn’t just bubble into Trump’s mind randomly – it’s very much on Russia’s radar for its unknown supply of oil, gas and rare metals

The world’s fifth highest-earning comedian talks about going from serving Robert De Niro drinks to co-starring with him on screen

‘Crisis pregnancy centers’ seek to discourage women from getting abortions by ‘deceiving them about services they do or do not offer’

The rap star thinks racial justice will come from corporations and billionaires. That’s self-serving and wrong

The actor was a 60s icon but was also among the first in that era to tackle a bitterly divided America

On 19 August 1989, Hungarians and Austrians gathered in friendship at the border, paving the way to unification

She put her film career on hold and let husband Will Smith become a megastar. Now Jada Pinkett Smith’s candid chat show is opening up truthful conversations around kitchen tables everywhere

Malorie Blackman laments the lack of BAME children’s characters. I know – it’s a real battle to get writers of colour published

Once an obscure idea confined to the darker corners of the internet, the anti-Islam ideology is now visible in the everyday politics of the west. How did this happen? By Andrew Brown

As Tokyo marks the end of war in Pacific, conscripts’ families search for information on where their forebears fell

Basement used by resistance as control centre transformed ahead of anniversary of Nazis surrender

Several events have had to be pulled this summer, causing disappointment all round. But disgruntled punters wanting their money back are far from the only problem for organisers

In 1619, a ship with 20 captives landed at Virginia, ushering in the era of slavery in what would become the United States

Adversarial Fashion garments are covered in license plates, aimed at bamboozling a device’s databases

Amid depressing news these days such as abortion bans, mass shootings and rampant Hollywood sexual assault cases, it can be easy to overlook an event so uplifting that it almost sounds like science fiction. Just a few days ago the gymnast Simone Bile

The historian on how he confronted his own racism and the lessons he learned along the way, the far right’s abuse of free speech, and why the rise of the Squad gives him hope

Most people watch X-rated internet content, so it’s pure hypocrisy to judge those who have worked in the industry

In the brave new world of proliferating surveillance technology, human ingenuity is rising to the challenge

These very intimate details of our lives are always requested as if nothing is at stake. It’s laziness masquerading as curiosity

‘Clinic escorts’ create a buffer between protesters and women arriving at the clinic as its role becomes ever more important

The industry adage is that if it looks too good to be true it’s probably wrong. But the data reveals what’s really going on

Woody Harrelson is the latest person to share his embarrassing story of meeting the reality TV star before he became president

Ebola can no longer be called an incurable disease, scientists have said, after two of four drugs being trialled in the major outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo were found to have significantly reduced the death rate. ZMapp, used during