Emma Watson banned from driving for 6 months
Watson, who shot to fame as Hermione Granger in the Harry Potter film franchise, was sentenced at High Wycombe Magistrates' Court on Wednesday (Jul 16), after she admitted speeding on Banbury Road, Oxford. Watson wasn't in attendance in the courtroom.
According to the newspaper, This Is Oxfordshire, Watson's representative said in court that Watson fully understood her position and accepted her punishment.
Before the speeding incident in Oxford, Watson already had nine points on her licence following previous offences.
Her Audi vehicle was previously impounded by the police in February last year after it blocked two cars in a town in England.
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CNA
2 days ago
- CNA
UK starts online checks to stop children accessing harmful content
LONDON: New UK age verification rules aimed at preventing children from accessing harmful online content came into effect on Friday (July 25), with campaigners calling the move a long-overdue breakthrough in regulating the internet. The rules, part of the 2023 Online Safety Act, require websites and apps to verify users' ages using tools such as facial imagery or credit cards. Britain's media regulator Ofcom will oversee enforcement. About 6,000 pornography websites have agreed to apply the measures, according to Ofcom chief executive Melanie Dawes, who said other platforms must also ensure children are protected from illegal content, including pornography, hate speech and graphic violence. 'We've done the work that no other regulator has done,' Dawes told BBC Radio. 'These systems can work. We've researched that.' Ofcom estimates that 500,000 children aged between eight and 14 viewed pornography online last month alone. STRICTER RESPONSIBILITIES FOR TECH FIRMS The new measures target content related not just to pornography but also suicide, self-harm, eating disorders, and other risks. Tech companies now have legal duties to safeguard minors and adults online or face sanctions. Firms that violate the rules could be fined up to £18 million (US$23 million) or 10 per cent of their global revenue, whichever is higher, according to the UK government. Senior executives could also face criminal charges for failing to comply with Ofcom's data requests. After a preparatory period for the industry and regulator, the rules now take full effect. Children will 'experience a different internet for the first time,' said Technology Secretary Peter Kyle. Speaking to Sky News, he said he had 'very high expectations' for the changes. In a separate interview on parenting website Mumsnet, Kyle apologised to young people who have already been exposed to harmful content. 'I want to apologise to any kid who's over 13 who has not had any of these protections,' he said. FURTHER PLANS UNDERWAY Rani Govender of child protection charity NSPCC called the changes 'a really important milestone,' saying it was right for tech companies to be held accountable. 'Children are frequently stumbling across this harmful and dangerous content,' she told BBC News. 'There will be loopholes, but it's still right that we're introducing much stronger rules to make sure that that can't continue to happen.' Prime Minister Keir Starmer's government is also weighing additional rules, including a proposed daily two-hour limit on social media for children under 16.
Straits Times
3 days ago
- Straits Times
UK fears new summer of unrest, year after Southport riots
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Cabinet minister Jonathan Reynolds on July 24 urged people not to speculate or exaggerate the situation, saying 'the government, all the key agencies, the police, they prepare for all situations'. 'I understand the frustrations people have,' he told Sky News. Top stories Swipe. Select. Stay informed. 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The issue of thousands of irregular migrants arriving in small boats across the Channel, coupled with the UK's worsening economy, has triggered rising anger among some Britons. Such sentiments have been amplified by inflammatory messaging on social networks, fuelled by far-right activists. Almost exactly a year ago on July 29, 2024, three young girls were stabbed to death in a frenzied attack in north-western Southport. The shocking killings stoked days of riots across the country after false reports that the killer – a UK-born teenager whose family came to the country from Rwanda after the 1994 genocide – was a migrant. Nearly 24,000 migrants have made the perilous journey across the Channel so far in 2025, the highest-ever tally at this point in a year. The issue has become politically perilous, putting pressure on Labour Prime Minister Keir Starmer's centre-left government, as the anti-immigrant, far-right Reform UK party rises in the polls. More unrest likely The Epping protests were stirred after a 38-year-old asylum seeker, who only arrived in Britain in late June 2025, was arrested and charged with three counts of sexual assault. Images from the protests have gone viral on social networks, mirroring what happened in July 2024. But Epping residents have maintained that the protests are being fuelled by people from outside the community. 'These violent scenes ... are not Epping, and they are not what we stand for,' the Conservative MP for Epping, Mr Neil Hudson, told parliament on July 21. While calm was restored to Epping, a middle-class suburban town with a population of 12,000, tensions remain palpable. 'This is the first time something like this has happened,' one local who lives close to the Bell Hotel told AFP, asking not to be named. 'The issue is not the hotel, but extremists applying a political ideology,' he added. Late on July 24, the hotel, cordoned off behind barriers, was again the centre of a protest involving dozens of people, with the police making one arrest. With another protest expected on July 27, the local council voted through a motion to demand the government no longer house asylum seekers at the hotel. The UK is 'likely to see more racist riots take place this summer', said Dr Aurelien Mondon, politics professor and expert on far-right and reactionary discourse at Bath University. Anti-immigrant protests have already erupted elsewhere, with demonstrations in the south-eastern town of Diss in Norfolk outside a similar hotel on July 21. In June, clashes flared for several days in the town of Ballymena in Northern Ireland after two teenagers with Romanian roots were arrested for the alleged attempted rape of a young girl. Civil disobedience 'It is well documented that many of the protests we are witnessing are not the result of grassroots, local movements,' Dr Mondon said. 'Social media plays a role and facilitates coordination amongst extreme-right groups,' but it is 'also crucial not to exaggerate' its power, he added. High-profile far-right activist Tommy Robinson, who was blamed for stoking the Southport unrest, announced he would be in Epping on July 27, before later seeming to scrap the plan. The firebrand anti-Islam campaigner has just been freed from jail after spreading fake news about a Syrian immigrant, but faces trial on a separate issue in 2026. 'I don't think anybody in London even understands just how close we are to civil disobedience on a vast scale,' said Reform leader Nigel Farage. 'Most of the people outside that hotel in Epping weren't far right or far left,' he said, they 'were just genuinely concerned families'. AFP
CNA
5 days ago
- CNA
UK launches first sanctions in new strategy to deter migrant crossings
LONDON: The UK imposed sanctions on Wednesday (Jul 23) on more than two dozen people, groups and suppliers from the Balkans, the Middle East and China accused of helping migrants cross the Channel. In what it called a "landmark" first use of new powers, the move came as the government faces political pressure to stem migrant arrivals on small boats from northern France, at record levels. The asset freezes and travel bans announced target individuals and entities "driving irregular migration to the UK", and include four "gangs" and "gangland bosses" operating in the Balkans, the Foreign Office said. They also hit a small boat supplier in China, so-called "hawala" money movers in the Middle East, and seven alleged people-smugglers linked to Iraq. Foreign Secretary David Lammy called it "a landmark moment in the government's work to tackle organised immigration crime" impacting the UK. "From Europe to Asia we are taking the fight to the people-smugglers who enable irregular migration, targeting them wherever they are in the world," he added. "My message to the gangs who callously risk vulnerable lives for profit is this: we know who you are, and we will work with our partners around the world to hold you to account." "TERRORISING REFUGEES" Prime Minister Keir Starmer took office a year ago promising to curb the journeys by "smashing the gangs" that facilitate the crossings, but he has struggled to deliver. Nearly 24,000 migrants have made the perilous journey across the Channel so far in 2025, the highest ever tally at this point in a year. The issue has become politically perilous in the UK, blamed for helping to fuel the rise of the far-right and violence at anti-migrant demonstrations. Protests have erupted sporadically outside hotels believed to house asylum-seekers, with a recent demonstration outside one in Epping, east of London, descending into clashes that injured eight police officers. Riots sparked by the stabbing to death of three young girls in northwestern Southport a year ago also saw suspected asylum-seeker hotels attacked and anti-migrant sentiment on display. As part of its strategy to curb new arrivals, the government is also cracking down on illegal working, which European neighbours cite as a "pull factor" for UK-bound migrants. It announced late Tuesday a new agreement with delivery firms Deliveroo, Just Eat and Uber Eats which includes sharing the locations of asylum hotels to help tackle illegal working. Meanwhile in another new tactic, artificial intelligence technology will be trialled to assess disputed ages of asylum-seekers who claim to be children, the interior ministry said Tuesday. "FAR-FETCHED" Wednesday's designations represent the UK's first use of its new "Global Irregular Migration Sanctions Regime". It claims the regime is a "world first", empowering the Foreign Office to target foreign financiers and companies as well as individuals allegedly involved in facilitating people-smuggling to the UK. In all, it sanctioned 20 individuals, four gangs - two Balkan groups and two of North African origin operating in the Balkans - and Chinese firm Weihai Yamar Outdoor Product Co. It has advertised its small boats online "explicitly for the purpose of people-smuggling", the Foreign Office said. Among those facing curbs was Bledar Lala, described as an Albanian controlling "the 'Belgium operations' of an organised criminal group" involved in the crossings. The UK also targeted Alen Basil, a former police translator it accused of now leading a large smuggling network in Serbia, "terrorising refugees, with the aid of corrupt policemen". London hit alleged "gangland boss" Mohammed Tetwani with sanctions, noting he was dubbed the "King of Horgos" over his brutal running of a migrant camp in the Serbian town Horgos. Author and researcher Tom Keatinge, of the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), said the sanctions were "a new front in the UK's efforts to control a business model that brings profit to the enablers" and misery to victims. "However, I would caution against overpromising," he told AFP. "Talk of freezing assets and using sanctions to 'smash the gangs' seems far-fetched and remains to be seen.
