White House envoy Steve Witkoff has arrived in Moscow for further talks with Vladimir Putin about a Ukraine peace deal. Donald Trump responded to Russia’s Wednesday night strikes on Kyiv by writing on social media: “Not necessary, and very bad timing. Vladimir, STOP!” Yvette Cooper is considering a “one in, one out” youth mobility scheme with the EU, says The Times, which would allow thousands of young Britons to work and study across the continent. Government sources says the proposal has allayed the Home Secretary’s fear that an uncapped cross-border deal would push up net migration figures. Medieval experts are embroiled in a fierce dispute over the number of male genitalia in the Bayeux tapestry. Six years ago, Oxford professor George Garnett totted up 93 (mostly equine) penises across the stitched account of the Norman conquest. But Christopher Monk says he has now found an additional, “anatomically fulsome” appendage dangling beneath the tunic of a running man. Decide for yourself below.

Is Yemen becoming another “forever war”?

It hasn’t gained much attention with everything else going on, says WJ Hennigan in The New York Times, but America is increasingly getting bogged down in yet another “forever war” in the Middle East. This time the goal is to stop Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels from disrupting Red Sea shipping. The costs of the operation are already “exorbitant”, with $250m worth of munitions dropped on Houthi targets in the first month alone. Despite its enormous firepower – there are now two aircraft carriers “parked” off Yemen’s coast – the US still hasn’t established air dominance. The Houthis have shot down six $30m reaper drones, and the Americans are having to launch $2m anti-missile interceptors to take out drones that cost a few thousand dollars apiece. By next month, the overall tally is expected to reach a whopping $2bn.

And for what? The only way to restore regular maritime activity in the Red Sea is to drive the Houthis from power. Saudi Arabia, Israel and the US have spent more than a decade trying to do this, taking turns “pummelling” the terror group with airstrikes, all to no effect. Yemeni forces are now reportedly planning a ground invasion of Houthi-controlled areas, but any US effort to support them would surely spiral into the sort of “wide, prolonged conflict” that Donald Trump has repeatedly promised to avoid. Like every other US president in the global war on terrorism, Trump has fallen for the belief that America’s overwhelming military superiority will usher in a “swift and decisive conclusion”. At some point he’ll almost certainly be confronted with the same “no-win decision” that bedevilled his predecessors: “retreat or escalate”.