“It’s like something out of Sherlock Holmes.” Will the mystery of what happened to little Emile Soleil ever be solved? My dispatch from Le Vernet in the French Alps
thetimes.co.uk/article/the-en…

Time to give up my morning baguette, though I fear I may have left it too late. Glad to see, though, that researchers at Montpellier University have the time and resources to tackle such important subjects
theguardian.com/science/2024/m…

Navalny's spokeswoman has put out a public appeal for a hall where they can hold a farewell for him this week. Quite extraordinary. It will be a brave venue within Russia that will agree, but we shall see

Intriguing claim by Alexei Navalny's camp that Putin ordered his killing to sabotage a plan to swap him with Vadim Krasikov, an FSB agent jailed in Germany for murdering a former Chechen commander, and others. If true, explains the 'why now?' question
youtube.com/watch?v=jqevNx…

Looks like a major victory for Navalny's supporters. The question is now when and where he will be buried - and how Russian authorities will prevent it from turning into a massive opposition protest

As Russian authorities continue to hold on to Alexei Navalny's body, his widow Yuliya has accused Putin of 'satanism' and blamed the Russian leader directly for the “murder” of her husband thetimes.co.uk/article/alexei…

Alexey Navalny’s mother has been shown her son's body, but it is not handed over to her. Instead, she is blackmailed. On the Kremlin's orders, the investigators set conditions as to where, when and how Alexey is to be buried. They want to do it secretly youtube.com/watch?v=w2iysa…

Good luck to Anatomy of Fall at the #BAFTAs tonight. Its real star, of course, is Messi, who plays Snoop - and can drop dead at a click of a finger. I met him for Sunday Times News together with Laura Martin Contini, his brilliant trainer thetimes.co.uk/article/meet-m…

In memory of Alexei Navalny Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office

And now this....

From behind a closed door he could hear the unmistakable “sharp snap” of the falling blade. The sound would haunt him for the rest of his life.
(£)thetimes.co.uk/article/nw18gu…
Excellent piece by Peter Conradi on Robert Badinter, played major role ending death penalty in France.

It is very amusing as a journalist to find you have yourself become a news event merely by turning up somewhere. 😀 Merci Céline Guiral

charentelibre.fr/charente/nersa…

Home Alone: How did a nine-year-old French child survive for two years in his flat after his mother abandoned him - and why did neither his school nor social services notice? I went to the estate near Angoulême where he lived to meet his neighbours
thetimes.co.uk/article/of-cou…

Macron's reshuffle has begun with the departure of Elisabeth Borne, his prime minister. French media are speculating she will be replaced by Gabriel Attal, the health minister, who at just 34 will be the youngest PM France has ever had. But nothing confirmed yet

Praise for THE BRITTANY MURDERS by anne penketh!

📖 OUT NOW for £0.99 | $0.99: geni.us/brittany-murde…

Peter Conradi Christine Hamill

An interesting day watching Rishi Sunak address Giorgia Meloni's #Atreju2023 right wing ideas fest in Rome. Shame Sunak didn't have time to check out the splendid human nativity scene just outside the hall where he spoke, complete with plastic Baby Jesus doll and two live donkeys

This week's News Review cover is a troubling and insightful and troubling dispatch from Kyiv, on President Zelensky's winter of discontent.

By Samantha de Bendern and Peter Conradi

thetimes.co.uk/article/as-zel…