By Lawrence Hurley

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday ruled in favor of the FBI in a case concerning discrimination claims by three Muslim men from California who accused the agency of conducting illegal surveillance on them after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.

The court unanimously overturned a lower court’s 2019 ruling that said a federal law regulating government surveillance called the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) trumped the state secrets privilege – a legal defense based on national security interests – that the government asserted.

The ruling means the case returns to lower courts for further litigation, with the claims made by the plaintiffs not yet dismissed.

The Supreme Court faulted the San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals’ analysis, with Justice Samuel Alito writing that the FISA provision in question “does not displace the state secrets privilege.”

The lawsuit accused the FBI of infiltrating mainstream mosques in Southern California and targeting Muslim Americans for surveillance because of their religion. It accused the FBI of engaging in religious discrimination in violation of the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment by targeting Muslims, as well as violating the Fourth Amendment prohibition on unreasonable searches and seizures.

The plaintiffs are: Eritrean-born U.S. citizen Yassir Fazaga, an imam at the Orange County Islamic Foundation in Mission Viejo; native-born U.S. citizen Ali Uddin Malik, who attended the Islamic Center of Irvine; and Yasser Abdel Rahim, a U.S. permanent resident from Egypt who also attended the Islamic Center of Irvine. They are represented by the American Civil Liberties Union and others.

The lawsuit focused upon a 14-month period in 2006 and 2007 when the FBI paid an informant named Craig Monteilh to gather information on Muslims as part of a post-Sept. 11 counterterrorism investigation. Monteilh met with Muslims in southern California, adopted a Muslim name and said he wanted to convert to Islam, according to court papers. Monteilh also recorded conversations and conducted surveillance, according to court papers.

The arrangement unraveled when Monteilh started making statements about wanting to take violent action. Community members reported him to the local police and obtained a restraining order against him, according to court papers.

A federal judge in 2012 dismissed the claims against the FBI, determining that they were barred under the state secrets privilege. The judge did permit claims accusing some individual FBI agents of violating the surveillance law.

The 9th Circuit ruled that the religious claims should instead be analyzed under a section of the FISA law that lets judges review the legality of surveillance. The 9th Circuit also allowed the unlawful search claims, not at issue before the Supreme Court, to move forward.

(Reporting by Lawrence Hurley; Editing by Will Dunham)

By Nandita Bose

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – As the United States and Western allies grapple with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Biden administration is taking a unique approach to fighting a surge in Russian disinformation and propaganda.

Unlike its European allies, the White House is not directly pushing the giant U.S.-based tech and social media companies that control the flow of information to billions of people to take down disinformation or accounts that spread it, administration sources with direct knowledge of the matter say.

U.S. officials are instead focusing on calling out pro-Russian media outlets for spreading disinformation, rapidly sharing intelligence about Russia’s military moves and propaganda, and exposing what it calls Moscow’s plans to stage “false flag” attacks designed to provoke sentiment against Ukraine.

“We are proactively putting out information on the intelligence we have gathered, what we are seeing, debunking claims that are false, making sure our allies and partners have the right information,” one such source said. “The idea is to counter Russia’s narratives and make people understand that things being pushed to them is disinformation.”

That is an extension of a strategy of releasing to the public U.S. intelligence information about the Russian military build up near Ukraine before the invasion.

“Preempting what the Russians were doing and pointing things out and being bold in the way the administration revealed intelligence was very valuable,” said Brian Murphy, former head of the Department of Homeland Security’s intelligence branch, and now vice president for strategic operations at Logically, a firm that offers services to reduce the spread of disinformation.

A White House National Security Council (NSC) spokesperson said the administration is “extremely careful” with what it declassifies but “there is value to the public” in exposing disinformation operations.

Tech platforms like Alphabet’s YouTube, Twitter and Facebook have become virtual battlegrounds during the Russian invasion, as Kremlin-backed media publish information that often contradicts reporting from fact-based news outlets on the ground in Ukraine.

Facebook owner Meta has blocked Russian state media outlets from users’ feeds in Europe, under pressure from EU officials. Twitter and other social media are being restricted in Russia, and the tech companies face further punitive measures there. Several tech giants are also restricting Russian state media from making profits from ads on their platforms, and Meta is demoting posts from Kremlin-related outlets.

The Biden administration has identified outlets that are publishing information it believes to be Russian propaganda through accounts with millions of followers, but has not pressured tech companies to block or remove them.

For example, conservative financial news website ZeroHedge, was named last month by U.S. intelligence as one such vehicle. The outlet is still tweeting information to over one million followers.

The account doesn’t violate Twitter’s rules of service, the tech company says – and the White House is not pushing for a ban, sources say. That would raise questions about American press freedom, free speech issues and could start a fight with the tech giants that the administration does not want.

The White House also views Russian disinformation differently, sources said, than for instance, the spread of vaccine misinformation, which was killing Americans and pushed Biden to fight social media companies, albeit briefly.

In this instance, the State Department, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the FBI are working with the NSC to stop Moscow from peddling false narratives about Ukraine, the sources said.

The State Department’s Global Engagement Center (GEC) has been sharing information with U.S. agencies and foreign governments about Russian disinformation on social media, news outlets, and Russian proxy websites, a State Department official told Reuters.

GEC has been in regular contact with social media companies, “who have updated the department on their actions to cease monetizing sanctioned Russian individuals on their platforms,” the official said.

While GEC does not request the removal or labeling of content it shares its analyses with the platforms to identify and counter Russian disinformation.

WORKING IN AMERICA, BUT NOT RUSSIA

So far, the approach has been effective in the United States and Europe, experts say, but not in Russia where the Kremlin has tight control over the media.

“Russian propaganda did not quite take off inside the United States in this instance…because of some of the work the Biden administration has been doing,” said Larissa Doroshenko, a researcher at Northeastern University.

But, she added, “it wasn’t as effective in Russia obviously because of how thick the propaganda from the Kremlin is.”

The situation highlights the asymmetric battle democratic governments face against autocracies in information wars. Beijing and the Kremlin regularly demand local news and social media companies censor information they consider critical of the government, or that runs contrary to the official point of view.

Last month, the United States alleged Russia has been preparing to fabricate a pretext for an invasion of Ukraine by creating a very graphic propaganda video that would depict a fake attack by Ukraine against Russia.

That video has not surfaced, because, U.S. officials believe, they pre-empted it.

The Kremlin and pro-Moscow news outlets have accused Kiev on television and social media of carrying out bombings and other non-existent attacks and warned of an alleged attempt by Ukrainian saboteurs to blow up a chemical storage facility in eastern Ukraine.

Russian reports accuse Ukraine of plotting a genocide against ethnic Russians and the United States of using proxy forces to plot a chemical attack – examples Biden called “outlandish and baseless claims” in a Feb. 22 speech.

The proactive U.S. moves represent an advance from 2016 when officials in the Obama administration, some of whom now work for Biden, and U.S. intelligence agencies failed to identify and stop Russia from launching a disinformation campaign and interfering with the U.S. elections.

Back then, Russian trolls used a large network of fake accounts to spread incendiary political content to millions of Americans, took advantage of existing divisions in American society and sowed doubt about the election process.

(Reporting by Nandita Bose in Washington; Additional reporting by Simon Lewis and Elizabeth Culliford, Editing by Heather Timmons and Alistair Bell)

Washington (AFP) – US basketball authorities said Saturday that an American star basketball player being held in Moscow on narcotics charges is two-time Olympic champion Brittney Griner.

The arrest came as tensions between Moscow and the West have soared over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. 

The Russian Federal Customs Service said in a statement that an inspection of hand luggage carried by a US citizen who arrived on a flight from New York in February “confirmed the presence of ‘vapes’ (and) a liquid with a specific smell”.

It said an expert had determined that the liquid was the narcotic cannabis oil (hash oil). 

The statement did not identify the jailed woman but said she was “a member of the US National Basketball Association, a two-time Olympic basketball champion in the US team”.

The customs service said the detained woman faces a potential jail term of five to 10 years.  

US basketball authorities made clear that the woman was all-star Griner.

USA Basketball, the sport’s governing body in the US, said on Twitter that it was “aware of and closely monitoring the legal situation facing Brittney Griner in Russia.” 

It added: “Brittney has always handled herself with the utmost professionalism during her long tenure with USA Basketball and her safety and well-being are our primary concerns.”

Griner, who is 31, is a seven-time all-star center for the Phoenix Mercury of the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA). 

The team issued a statement echoing the language of USA Basketball and adding, “We love and support Brittney, and at this time our main concern is her safety, physical and mental health, and her safe return home.”

At 6-feet-9 (2.06 meters), she is the only woman in US college history to score 2,000 points and block 500 shots.

Many WNBA athletes spend the American off-season playing in European leagues, including the Russian and Ukrainian leagues.

LONDON (Reuters) – Russia’s Foreign Ministry protested to the U.S. ambassador in Moscow on Saturday over remarks by U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham advocating that President Vladimir Putin be assassinated.

It said in a statement that failure to unambiguously condemn the remarks and take concrete measures “will have a further devastating effect on Russian-American relations”, already in tatters following Western sanctions against Russia over its invasion of Ukraine.

U.S. Ambassador John Sullivan was summoned to the ministry to be told that Graham’s comment would be treated as a serious crime in Russia.

“This is a public, terrorist appeal that is completely unacceptable,” the ministry said.

Graham, a Republican from South Carolina, called on Twitter for someone in Russia to “take this guy out” – referring to Putin.

White House spokesperson Jen Psaki told reporters on Friday: “We are not advocating for killing the leader of a foreign country or regime change. That is not the policy of the United States.”

(Reporting by Reuters; Editing by Kevin Liffey)

LONDON (Reuters) – President Vladimir Putin said on Saturday that Western sanctions on Russia were akin to a declaration of war and warned that any attempt to impose a no-fly zone in Ukraine would lead to catastrophic consequences for the world.

Putin reiterated that his aims were to defend Russian- speaking communities through the “demilitarisation and de-Nazification” of the country so that Russia’s former Soviet neighbour became neutral and no longer threatened Russia.

Ukraine and Western countries have dismissed this as a baseless pretext for the invasion he launched on Feb. 24 and have imposed a sweeping range of sanctions aimed at isolating Moscow.

“These sanctions that are being imposed are akin to a declaration of war but thank God it has not come to that,” Putin said, speaking to a group of flight attendants at an Aeroflot training centre near Moscow.

He said any attempt by another power to impose a no-fly zone in Ukraine would be considered by Russia to be a step into the military conflict. Such a step he said would have catastrophic consequences for Europe and the world.

The NATO military alliance has rejected Kyiv’s request for a no-fly zone, on the grounds it would escalate the war beyond Ukraine into a far wider conflict, potentially pitting the United States against Russia.

‘GOING TO PLAN’

Asked about reports that Russian conscripts had been used in Ukraine, Putin said none had been involved and said the military operation was going to plan.

“There is not one conscript and we don’t plan for there to be,” Putin said. “Our army will fulfil all the tasks. I don’t doubt that at all. Everything is going to plan.”

That description was at odds with assessments from U.S. and British officials. British military intelligence said on Thursday that Russia’s advance on the Ukrainian capital had made little progress and encountered staunch resistance.

Putin dismissed concerns that some sort of martial law or emergency situation could be declared in Russia. He said such a measure was imposed only when there was significant internal or external threat.

“We don’t plan to introduce any kind of special regime on Russian territory – there is currently no need,” Putin said.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that the West was behaving like a bandit by cutting economic relations over the conflict in Ukraine but that Russia was far too big to be isolated as the world was much larger than just the United States and Europe.

(Reporting by Reuters; Editing by Frances Kerry)

By Elizabeth Culliford

(Reuters) -Russia is blocking Meta Platforms Inc’s Facebook, the country’s communications regulator said on Friday, in response to what it said were restrictions on access to Russian media on the platform.

The regulator, Roskomnadzor, said there had been 26 cases of discrimination against Russian media by Facebook since October 2020, including restrictions in recent days on state-backed channels like RT and the RIA news agency.

The move is a major escalation in an ongoing confrontation between big tech companies and Russia, which has in recent years issued a slew of fines and hobbled services through slowdowns. The tensions have ramped up amid Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which Moscow calls a “special operation.”

Meta’s head of global affairs Nick Clegg said the company would continue to do everything it could to restore its services.

“Soon millions of ordinary Russian will find themselves cut off from reliable information, deprived of their everyday ways of connecting with family and friends and silenced from speaking out,” he said, in a statement posted on Twitter.

Last week, Moscow said it was partially limiting access to Facebook, a move the company said came after it refused a government request to stop the independent fact-checking of several Russian state media outlets. On Saturday, Twitter also said its service was being restricted for some Russian users.

Major tech companies have faced pressure to respond to the Feb. 24 invasion, which has led to economic sanctions against Moscow by governments around the world. Russian state-run media has emerged as a key flashpoint between Moscow and social media platforms during the conflict.

Meta this week said it had restricted access to RT and Sputnik across the European Union and was globally demoting content from Russian state-controlled outlets’ Facebook pages and Instagram accounts, as well as posts containing links to those outlets on Facebook.

Russia has made several moves to crack down on foreign news media in recent days. It cut access to several news organizations’ websites, including the BBC, Voice of America and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty for spreading what it says is false information about its actions in Ukraine.

Meta had about 7.5 million users on Facebook in Russia as of last year and 122.2 million users across its other services, including Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger, according to estimates from Insider Intelligence. The leading Russia-based social network VK had 63 million users, the researcher estimated.

Popular VPN apps have been downloaded more than 1.3 million times in Russia since its invasion of Ukraine began, according to data from researcher AppFigures, which described the figure as a major surge.

Roskomnadzor said in its statement that Meta had restricted access to the accounts of state-backed news outlets in recent days, listing RT, Sputnik, the RIA news agency, the defense ministry’s Zvezda TV and websites gazeta.ru and lenta.ru.

It said such restrictions violated the key principles of freedom of information and Russian internet users’ unimpeded access to Russian media.

(Reporting by Reuters; Editing by Kirsten Donovan and Jonathan Oatis)

By Patricia Zengerle

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol issued a subpoena on Thursday to Kimberly Guilfoyle, a U.S. television personality who is engaged to be married to Donald Trump Jr, the eldest son of the former president.

Guilfoyle, who worked on Trump’s 2020 presidential campaign, abruptly ended an interview with the Select Committee on Feb. 25, criticizing House of Representatives members who were present.

Her attorney issued a statement afterward saying Guilfoyle had agreed to meet only with attorneys for the Democratic-led House committee, not with members of Congress.

As a result, the committee said it would issue a subpoena to compel Guilfoyle’s cooperation. The panel asked Guilfoyle to appear for a deposition on March 15.

“Guilfoyle met with (former President) Donald Trump inside the White House, spoke at the rally that took place before the riot on January 6th, and apparently played a key role organizing and raising funds for that event,” Representative Bennie Thompson, committee chairman, said in a statement.

In a statement, Guilfoyle’s attorney Joe Tacopina accused the committee of “an attempt to smear” Trump, his family and supporters. “She had done nothing wrong,” he said.

The Select Committee is trying to establish the actions of Trump and associates before and during the assault on the Capitol by thousands of his supporters. The mobs attacked police, vandalized the building, and sent members of Congress and then-Vice President Mike Pence running for their lives as they gathered to certify Democrat Joe Biden’s presidential election victory over Trump, a Republican.

The Select Committee has so far interviewed more than 560 witnesses and issued more than 80 subpoenas as it probes the causes of the attack and the role played by Trump, who continues to push false claims that his election defeat by Biden was the result of fraud.

Earlier on Thursday, the panel interviewed Judd Deere, a former White House spokesman who is now a Republican congressional aide.

(Reporting by Patricia Zengerle; Editing by Rami Ayyub, David Gregorio and Leslie Adler)

Jonathan Groff and Ben Aldridge have joined the cast of M. Night Shyamalan’s new film ‘Knock at the Cabin’.

The pair have boarded the cast and will feature alongside Dave Bautista, Rupert Grint and Nikki Amuka-Bird.

Shyamalan will write, direct and produce the thriller for Universal Pictures although plot details are being kept under lock and key.

The flick is set for release in February 2023 and is the latest movie from the acclaimed filmmaker – whose previous credits include ‘The Sixth Sense’, ‘After Earth’ and ‘Old’.

Groff recently starred in ‘The Matrix Resurrections’ as the villainous Agent Smith and praised co-star Keanu Reeves for his work ethic on set.

The 36-year-old star said: “All of the rumours are true about Keanu’s level of work ethic. He was there training and getting ready before all of us got there.

“My first day in the training tent, Keanu was in his jiu-jitsu outfit doing kicks and punches. I mean, he really sets the bar for all of us in the training.”

The ‘Mindhunter’ star continued: “It was so exciting to be doing such extraordinary fight choreography with the greatest action star of our time and someone that’s so devoted to their craft.

“I really tried to take in every single moment of getting to be with Keanu and I learned so much from working with him. It’s an experience I’ll hold in my heart for the rest of my life.

“There’s so much trust that’s involved in these fight scenes because you’re really hitting each other, but you’re not hurting each other. So it’s great abandon matched with great precision.”

Dua Lipa thinks being bullied online has made her a better artist.

The ‘Levitating’ singer was widely ridiculed for a quirky dance move back in 2018 but she’s now “reclaimed” the choreography because she has a “different perspective” on the situation and can recognise how the trolling she received motivated her to “work harder”.

Speaking on ‘The Tonight show Starring Jimmy Fallon’, she said: “The reason we’re talking about it is because I brought it back. I’m doing it on my tour.

“I’m reclaiming it because there was a moment where it caused me a lot of grief. Like I was being bullied online. It wasn’t very nice, but now I can look at it from a different perspective.

“I look back on it with such fondness because it helped me grow into the artist I wanted to become. It made me work harder. I went in, I did more rehearsal. I just wanted to become a real performer and I think that was the thing I needed.”

The 26-year-old star also reflected on collaborating with Sir Elton John on ‘Cold Heart’.

She said: “I’m so lucky to have so many pinch-me moments in my life.”

The ‘One Kiss’ hitmaker has previously admitted online trolling left her with “anxiety” and questioning whether she was “good enough” to be a star.

She said: “I experienced a s*** tonne at the end of my first record, and it was definitely something that gave me anxiety and made me upset and made me feel like I wasn’t good enough and made me feel like, maybe I’m not meant to be here and on the stage.

“Even after the Grammys, some people were like, ‘Well, she doesn’t deserve it.’

“There were so many things, especially when you start out, like a video of me dancing and they’re like, ‘Ah well, she has no stage presence’ – but they’d never been to one of my shows, they’d never seen me perform.”

By Patricia Zengerle

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration has delivered White House visitor logs from former President Donald Trump’s administration to the congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, the committee said on Friday.

NARA also turned over records from former Vice President Mike Pence, meeting a March 3 deadline.

“Yesterday, the Select Committee received additional production of records from the National Archives,” a House of Representatives Select Committee aide said. “This included records that the former President attempted to keep hidden behind claims of privilege.”

Trump had tried to block the release of the visitor logs, but President Joe Biden rejected his claim that they were subject to executive privilege, “in light of the urgency” of the committee’s work and Congress’ “compelling need.”

Several courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court, have also ruled against the Republican ex-president’s efforts to block the release of various records to the committee.

So far, more than 725 people have been charged with playing a role in the attack on the Capitol by mobs of Trump supporters, which left five people dead and more than 100 police officers injured. Another four police officers involved in defending the Capitol later committed suicide.

The Jan. 6 committee has been investigating the events surrounding the attack – and the former president’s role in it – for more than seven months. It has made more than 80 subpoenas public, including many issued to top Trump aides and allies, and interviewed more than 560 witnesses.

It has also gathered records from social media and other telecommunications firms.

(Reporting by Patricia Zengerle; Editing by Mark Porter)

By Jennifer Rigby

(Reuters) – Almost a third of people report at least one ongoing symptom between 6 and 12 months after their coronavirus infection, a survey of 152,000 people in Denmark has found.

The study includes one of the largest groups yet of people who were not hospitalised with COVID, and followed them for longer than other major studies, the researchers from Denmark’s State Serum Institute (SSI) said.

The questionnaire-based study suggested that the most commonly reported long-term symptoms were changes in sense of smell and taste, as well as fatigue.

Conducted between September 2020 and April 2021, well before the recent Omicron variant surge, the survey compared the responses of 61,002 people who had tested positive for the coronavirus six, nine or 12 months before with those of 91,878 people who had tested negative.

In total, 29.6% of the respondents who had tested positive reported at least one ongoing physical symptom 6 to 12 months after infection, compared to 13% in the control group.

Just over half (53.1%) of those with positive tests said they had experienced either mental or physical exhaustion, sleep problems or cognitive problems within the 6 to 12 months after infection. That compared to 11.5% in the control group.

New diagnoses of anxiety and depression were also more common among those with a history of SARS-CoV-2 infection, the study showed.

The study was published as a pre-print and has not yet been peer reviewed.

Study author Anders Peter Hviid, an epidemiology professor at SSI, said the results are another sign that the long tail of COVID-19 should be considered by policy makers.

“It’s something you should take into account when you are weighing up the risks and benefits of… the interventions you are making, and vaccinations,” he said in a phone interview, stressing that more studies are needed.

Estimates on the prevalence of what is known as long COVID vary. The World Health Organization (WHO) calls the syndrome Post-COVID-19 condition and defines it as ongoing symptoms – including fatigue or shortness of breath, among others – three months after the initial infection that last at least two months.

The WHO estimates that between 10% and 20% of people are affected by that point and says more work is needed on the longer-term prognosis.

David Strain, lecturer at the University of Exeter Medical School in the UK who was not involved in the study, called the report “really concerning.”

“If Omicron is causing long Covid at the same rate as these earlier variants, we could be looking at a major crisis over the next 12 months given the number of people who have been exposed to this virus,” he said.

(Reporting by Jennifer Rigby in London; Editing by Nancy Lapid and Bill Berkrot)

An exhibition about Michael Clark, who is described as “the David Bowie of dance”, opens this weekend at the V&A Dundee, Scotland’s museum of design.

“Michael Clark: Cosmic Dancer” spans the dancer and choreographer’s career to date and explores his collaborations across the visual arts, music, fashion and film.

Born in Aberdeen in 1962, Clark began traditional Scottish dancing at the age of four and in 1975 left home to study at the Royal Ballet School in London.

He formed his own dance company in 1984 when he was only 22. As a young choreographer he brought together his classical ballet training with London’s punk, fashion and club culture to establish himself as one of the most innovative artists working in contemporary dance.

Film, photography, costume and archive material from throughout his career are presented in a series of different rooms in the exhibition, showing Clark as a pioneer who can transcend different disciplines.

Leonie Bell, director of V&A Dundee, said: “Michael Clark is a huge talent who brings new ideas, tradition, energy and amazing skill to dance. So much of his work feels as alive, thoughtful and relevant as it did in the years it was created.

“Michael Clark remains hugely relevant today, challenging convention and reflecting the energy of the world around him, with ideas around gender and sexuality explored in breathtakingly beautiful performances.

“For me, Michael Clark is the David Bowie of dance, an inventor who with grace and energy has found new ways for us all to enjoy and be inspired by dance.”

Clark’s collaborators have ranged from Leigh Bowery and The Fall to non-professional dancers, while his diverse musical influences include Bowie, Jarvis Cocker, Patti Smith, T.Rex and composers Erik Satie and Igor Stravinsky.

An immersive film and sound installation has been created for the exhibition by Sophie Fiennes and Susan Stenger, which mixes heavy metal music with Clark’s radical choreography, while Sarah Lucas has conceived two installations for the show, including a parodying sculpture of Clark’s body sitting on a toilet.

Meanwhile a room dedicated to “The Fall” and Clark’s landmark performance “I Am Curious, Orange” (1988) features stage props of a huge burger and baked bean cans.

The exhibition has been curated by Florence Ostende of London’s Barbican Centre. “I am delighted this exhibition will bring Michael Clark’s visionary creativity back to his home country of Scotland,” she said.

“Clark is fascinating as a pioneer who brought together different disciplines to completely change contemporary dance and the British cultural landscape, from embracing and celebrating queer culture in the 1980s through to redefining gender representation and stereotypes within the heteronormative tradition of ballet history.

“This exhibition, one of the largest surveys ever dedicated to a living choreographer, presents a comprehensive story of Clark’s career.” The exhibition runs from Saturday until September 4.

By Kanishka Singh

(Reuters) – Incidents of anti-Semitic propaganda in the United States rose by 27% in 2021, the Anti-Defamation League, a New York-based advocacy group, said in a report on Thursday.

It said the 352 incidents were up from 277 in 2020.

The advocacy group’s tracking of incidents of anti-Semitic and white supremacist propaganda included fliers, stickers, banners, posters and stenciled graffiti.

White supremacist propaganda, including racist and anti-LGBTQ messages, dropped to 4,851 cases in 2021 from 5,125 cases in 2020 while still remaining at high levels, the report said.

White supremacist propaganda in the United States nearly doubled in 2020 to a record level, it said last year.

Last month, the Department of Homeland Security said the United States faced heightened threats from extremist groups domestic and foreign, underscored by January’s hostage standoff in a Texas synagogue and bomb threats at many historically Black colleges and universities.

U.S. Justice Department officials have pointed to an increase in domestic threats stemming from white supremacists and anti-government militias.

In January, the Justice Department announced the formation of a new domestic terrorism unit, underscoring the threat extremists within the country pose on a par with that posed by militant groups abroad such as Islamic State.

(Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Bengaluru; Editing by Howard Goller)

Sir Ian McKellen wishes he told his dad he was gay.

The ‘Lord of the Rings’ star – who came out publicly in a BBC radio interview in 1988 – never shared with his father Dennis the truth about his sexuality.

During the BBC Two programme ‘Amol Rajan Interviews’ on Thursday evening (03.03.2022), Amol asked if the the 82-year-old actor had “the conversation you needed to have with your father Dennis before he died,” to which, Ian replied: “No, I didn’t talk about being gay.”

However, the ‘Stonewall’ co-founder was “glad” that his father was able to see him perform in ‘A Scent of Flowers’, his West End debut, just weeks before he passed away in a tragic accident in 1964.

Ian said: He’d been to see me in my first show in the West End, I’m always glad of that. And three weeks later in a car crash he’d died.”

The Academy Award winner finds it “inconceivable” that his father would have taken any issue with him being gay.

He said: “The idea that he couldn’t have coped with the fact that his son was gay is inconceivable to me, even though I’m not aware that we had any gay friends or that he’d ever thought about it or that it had any impact on his life. Therefore it might have come as some sort of surprise to him, but there would have been no moral judgement.”

When Amol wondered if Dennis would have accepted him, he replied, “Yes”

The BBC Media Editor then added: “He would have loved you for who you are.”

Ian said: “As my sister did,” speaking of his older sister, Jean – five years his senior – who died in 2003, and wished he had told her “years” before he did about being gay.

He said: “When I came out to my sister, she said, “Oh I wish you’d told me years ago because I always wanted to talk to you about it.”

Last year, Ian shared that he felt coming out improved his acting, saying it made “everything better”.

He said: “It changes your life utterly. I discovered myself and everything was better. My relationships with my family, with friends, with strangers and my work got better as I wasn’t hiding anymore.”