In the early hours of April 9, 2008, a 44-year-old Englishman and a 48-year-old Frenchman sat silently on the edge of the windowless 155th floor of the Burj tower – the tallest building in the world – watching dawn bleed over Dubai. From their eyrie half a mile up, they saw the desert turn from[…]

Mupagasi is Helen’s neighbour. He is also the man who butchered her husband and son during the Rwandan genocide. How have they learnt to live together? Helen Mukandori has no choice but to remember every damned thing. She remembers how, in the early hours of April 7, 1994 – the morning after the plane carrying[…]

Fifteen years on, have they any regrets about joining the cult that declared war on America? Livingstone Fagan, a squat 49-year-old with ash-tipped dreadlocks, answers the door. He is dressed in a grey sweatshirt, dark trousers, white socks and plastic sandals: penitentiary chic. In his spotless one-bedroom flat, high in a social-housing block on the[…]

“Fame is not a cultural achievement. It’s just a sign of our times. If your movie doesn’t make an enormous amount of money, is it a failure? I have different criteria on what constitutes a success.” A defiant Kevin Costner defends his Hollywood legacy. “Are you anxious to die?” It’s a little after 3pm on[…]

This young man was both victim and villain when he was stabbed to death in London’s West End in May. We mourned Steven Bigby for one whole evening. For those few hours, his death at the hands of another young black man outside a McDonald’s on Oxford Street on a bright May day seemed shocking.[…]

What’s the story behind Britain’s richest road? There’s a simple way to check if your house is a super-mansion or not: look for the boiler cupboard. If you find one, you fail. Of course, there are other tests. Do you have your own cinema, for instance, or could you hold a five-a-side football tournament in[…]