As speculation mounts that Kim Jong-un and Trump could meet this month, analysts say Pyongyang will continue to see nuclear weapons as a matter of survival

North Korea’s launch last week of a missile from a naval destroyer elicited an uncharacteristically prosaic analysis from the country’s leader, Kim Jong-un. The launch was proof, he said, that arming ships with nuclear weapons was “making satisfactory progress”.

But the test, and Kim’s mildly upbeat appraisal, were designed to reverberate well beyond the deck of the 5,000-tonne destroyer-class vessel the Choe Hyon – the biggest warship in the North Korean fleet.

Lady Gaga and David Gest are among those who get ferocious dressings-down in this brutally candid memoir

Liza Minnelli’s father, the film director Vincente Minnelli, used to joke that his daughter’s career in show business was preordained. She was certainly familiar with the dark side of the industry from a young age through her mother Judy Garland, who was on the MGM payroll aged 13, before shooting to fame as Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz. Garland was famously depressive and addicted to prescription drugs and alcohol. When her daughter was six, she shut herself in the bathroom and made the first of many suicide attempts. Minnelli soon learned to monitor her mother and hide her pill bottles when she saw darkness descending. By 13, she was “my mother’s caretaker – a nurse, a doctor, pharmacologist and psychiatrist rolled into one … Just as the MGM studio system robbed Mama of her childhood, she robbed me of mine.”

In her memoir, Minnelli – who turns 80 this month – recounts how she broke free from her dysfunctional family at 16 and moved to New York to make it as a singer and actor. Little surprise, given her parentage, that her ascent was swift. “I was the original nepo baby,” she observes, gleefully. But if show business was in her DNA, so was addiction. In her 20s she became hooked on Valium, diet pills, cocaine and alcohol. Later, as her career faltered and her private life imploded, her sister Lorna staged an intervention and got her into the first of many rehab programmes.

Kemi may be all in favour, but at least economic realpolitik is forcing her to take a slightly different tack

There have been any number of opportunities for people to decide they wanted no part of America’s war with Iran. The first was after the US had launched its first wave of strikes. To be fair, this was the moment Keir Starmer and most of the UK reckoned enough was enough and that our involvement would be limited to defensive strikes only.

You couldn’t really fault the logic. Did the UK really want to be part of a war that was illegal in most versions of international law and for which the Americans had no clear vision of how it might end? Other than Donald Trump gets bored and lets everyone else clear up his mess. Like a baby. Nor was the UK’s track record of wars in the 21st century any source of pride. Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya had all been in chaos. Iran was shaping up the same way. So Starmer decided to sit this one out. Applying the doctor’s principle of “first, do no harm”.

Blaze follows devastating fires such as those at Glasgow School of Art, with traditionally constructed buildings at risk

• Major rail disruptions after large fire near Glasgow Central station

It was a spectacle of weary familiarity for many Glaswegians: a crowd gathering to watch a conflagration in progress, streets clogged with emergency vehicles, the city skyline blurred out with smoke.

For many who saw the fire next to Glasgow Central railway station, which broke out on Sunday afternoon, the acrid smell of smoke dampened by the Monday morning drizzle recalled the blazes at Glasgow School of Art’s Mackintosh building, which remains a burnt-out shell after two devastating fires in 2014 and 2018.

Interpol’s DNA unit is helping bring closure to families of murder victims, whose names may be unknown for decades

In the shadow of Antwerp’s main arena, close to the city’s docklands, runs the Groot Schijn River. It was here that the body of Rita Roberts was discovered in June 1992, floating against the grate of a water treatment plant.

She appeared to have been murdered, but Belgian police were unable to identify her. A tattoo of a black rose with green leaves and initials on her left arm was their only clue.

Kowtowing to US foreign policy in Iraq and Afghanistan had disastrous consequences. Why are leaders making the same mistake all over again?

Here is the sort of analysis you’re being served up by our esteemed commentariat. Keir Starmer’s positioning on the Iran war, we are told, reveals a prime minister with no political compass. True, but talk about burying the lede. The story here is not Starmer’s lack of political acumen. British involvement in the Iran war is not a policy question on which reasonable people might disagree, like raising a tax here or spending a bit more money there. This is a grave crime.

Yet all the pressure on Starmer seems to arrive from one direction. He “should have backed America from the very beginning”, declares Tony Blair, apparently eager for a successor to emulate his own record of dragging Britain into US-led catastrophes widely condemned as illegal. Donald Trump’s sidekick Nigel Farage, Tory leader Kemi Badenoch and the rightwing press make much the same complaint.

Owen Jones is a Guardian columnist

Trump calls Operation Epic Fury ‘one of the most complex and stunning operations ever conducted’ and touts ‘very good’ call with Putin about Iran

• Tell us: how have you been affected by the latest events in the Middle East?

Donald Trump has said a decision on when to end the war with Iran will be a “mutual” one he’ll make together with Benjamin Netanyahu, the Times of Israel has reported.

It said Trump also claimed in a brief telephone interview on Sunday that Iran would have destroyed Israel if he and Netanyahu had not been around. The US president said:

Iran was going to destroy Israel and everything else around it … We’ve worked together. We’ve destroyed a country that wanted to destroy Israel.

I think it’s mutual … a little bit. We’ve been talking. I’ll make a decision at the right time, but everything’s going to be taken into account.

Chancellor says she is ready to help households with rising costs but stops short of setting out specific steps

• Middle East crisis – live updates

Britain is likely to be hit by rising inflation because of the US war with Iran, the chancellor has said, as she suggested a “rapid de-escalation” would be the best protection against a jump in energy prices.

Rachel Reeves stopped short of setting out any new relief for people who could be hit by rising prices, rebuffing calls to ditch a planned 5p rise in fuel duty in September.

The price of Brent crude oil rocketed to as high as $119.50 on Sunday, a jump of 29%.

The Bank of England is now expected to keep interest rates on hold through 2026, with a small possibility of a rise in 2027.

The prospect of a prolonged conflict and higher inflation also pushed global markets lower.

The AA said drivers could “consider cutting out some non-essential journeys and changing their driving style to conserve fuel”.

After oil prices surged on Monday the US president sought – and failed – to offer a clear vision for when the largest US intervention in the Middle East in years will end

• Middle East crisis live

At one of the most consequential moments of his two terms in office, wartime president Donald Trump on Monday delivered a vague and contradictory forecast for how long the United States will continue to fight in Iran and what the ultimate goal of the US military campaign there will be.

With oil hovering above $100 a barrel for much of Monday and Middle Eastern allies fearing a further tumble into regional conflict, Trump appeared in Doral, Florida with the mission of calming global markets and reassuring skittish allies that he has a clear vision for how to end the largest US intervention in the Middle East since the Iraq war.

• Bus carrying Iran footballers leaves Gold Coast hotel

• Advocates working to inform players of their rights

Australia’s responsibilities for the welfare of the Iran women’s football team are not over, as advocates expect more players to seek asylum amid a frantic but “delicate” effort to inform the entire squad of their rights.

Five of the players, led by captain Zahra Ghanbari, were formally granted protection in Australia by home affairs minister Tony Burke early on Tuesday morning. The group has already been given an offer to train with A-League Women club Brisbane Roar.