BBC -UK and Canadian nationals will be able to travel to mainland China for up to 30 days without a visa from 17 February.

China’s foreign ministry said visa-free entry would be permitted for tourism, business or visits to family and friends, with the policy set to stay in effect initially until 31 December.

It follows Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer’s official visit to China last month, where he and Chinese President Xi Jinping agreed travel rules would be relaxed.

Sir Keir said the agreement would make it easier for businesses to expand to China, though critics say Downing Street’s push to reset relations with Beijing overlooks human rights and national security concerns.

Announcing the policy’s start date on Sunday, China’s foreign ministry said the scheme would “further facilitate people-to-people exchanges between China and other countries”.

The move brings rules for UK and Canada passport holders into line with 50 other countries, including France, Germany, Italy, Australia and Japan.

Hundreds of thousands of British people could potentially benefit from the change, with around 620,000 travelling to China in 2024, according to the Office for National Statistics.

During his official visit to China in January, Sir Keir said British businesses had been “crying out for ways to grow their footprints in China”.

Xi and Sir Keir also agreed to deepen trade relations in services, healthcare, green technology and finance – though no sweeping trade free trade agreement was announced.

The visit, which was the first by a British prime minister since Theresa May in 2018, was criticised by some opposition figures.

Shortly before heading to China, Sir Keir’s government approved plans for a major new Chinese embassy in central London, despite opponents claiming it could be used as a base for spying and pose security risks.

AYER, Mass.

Connor Murphy walked in circles around his dad, tracing the same path across the kitchen floor. Then he flopped down. Then he got up and walked in circles again.

His father watched the repetitive motion not as a symptom, but as an opening.

“Want me to pick you up?” Matthew Murphy asked, scooping up his 9-year-old, lifting him high, tickling him, spinning him until Connor’s face broke into a smile.

In the Murphy household, these spontaneous moments of connection are the rhythm of daily life. Everything revolves around Connor and his twin brother, Ronan. Both boys have profound autism.

“They’re going to need 24-7 care for the rest of their lives,” their father said. “Life will be a challenge for them, and we have to prepare them as best we can.”

The boys are at the center of a growing debate within the medical community. Autism rates have been rising for decades, but two trends have, in a strange twist, shifted focus away from those with the most severe needs.

The diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder, adopted in 2013, is now very broad, encompassing many people with low support needs. Meanwhile, better awareness has led to more children being diagnosed than ever—but most of those cases are relatively mild.

For families like the Murphys, the question is whether the system can see—and serve—those at the far end of the spectrum. The boys may never live independently.

They may never speak in full sentences. But in their kitchen, in the circles and the tickles and the spinning, there is love. And there is a plea: don’t forget about us.

By James Kisoo

ATLANTA

Lots of candidates pitch themselves as political outsiders. Derek Dooley goes a step further: he didn’t even vote.

The former football coach is running for the Republican nomination to challenge Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff in Georgia. But his own ballot history is sparse.

He sat out the 2016 election, when Donald Trump first won the presidency. He sat out 2020, when Trump lost to Joe Biden. In fact, Dooley says he didn’t vote for nearly two decades.

Now he’s asking Georgians to send him to Washington.

Dooley doesn’t see the contradiction as a liability. Instead, he argues that his distance from the process is exactly what qualifies him.

Washington, he insists, needs someone with a fresh outlook—someone not focused on “their own political career or their political ambitions.”

And about those missing votes? Dooley points out that millions of Americans stay home on Election Day. He wants to inspire more of them to participate.

“If you’re not vigilant in exercising that right, things can go pretty sideways in our country,” he told The Associated Press.

The pitch is unconventional: a man who ignored his civic duty for years, now asking to be entrusted with it. Whether Georgia voters see a convert or a contradiction may determine his political future.

By James Kisoo

KATHMANDU, Nepal

Across the Bagmati River, the smoke rises in lazy spirals from the forested slopes of Bankali. It mingles with incense and ash, carrying the pungent scent of a sacred tradition.

On Sunday, as tens of thousands of devotees lined up to pray at the Pashupatinath temple for the Shivaratri festival, another kind of worship unfolded on the hillside.

Hindu holy men, their bodies smeared in gray ash, sat in meditative circles, openly puffing on cannabis. They were joined by mostly young Nepali men—and some women—partaking in a substance usually banned across this South Asian nation.

But Shivaratri, the great night of the god Shiva, is the exception.

Shiva, one of Hinduism’s principal deities, has strong links to cannabis and has often been depicted smoking it. For one day each year, Nepal’s strict prohibition loosens, allowing devotees to honor their god with the herb they believe he loves.

At the temple complex itself, worshippers prayed and danced to religious songs, their devotion contained within the sacred walls.

Hindus constitute about 81% of Nepal’s population, and the Pashupatinath temple stands as one of their holiest sites. Devotees from neighboring India also made the pilgrimage to Kathmandu for the festival.

Across the river, the atmosphere was looser, smokier. Holy men with ash-smeared faces passed pipes. Young men laughed and coughed. The smoke curled upward, carrying prayers of a different kind—to a god who, tradition holds, is listening.

By James Kisoo