Latest news with #TheArk
Times
4 days ago
- Politics
- Times
Third Islamic centre in Glasgow linked to Iranian regime
Iran's 'malevolent' presence in Scotland must be investigated after a third Islamic centre was linked to the Tehran regime, senior politicians have claimed. The Ark, a Muslim media, charity and enterprise hub in Govanhill, Glasgow, was used as an electoral base by the Islamic Republic of Iran during its most recent presidential elections, it has emerged. The venue, which also houses the Muslim Council of Scotland — an umbrella organisation that advises the Scottish government — was twice used as an official polling station last summer. The revelation comes after The Sunday Times revealed last week that the Ahl al-Bait Society Scotland, which has received more than £400,000 in public funding, held a memorial vigil for Ebrahim Raisi, Iran's hardline president who ordered the execution of thousands of political dissidents. Previously we disclosed that the Al-Mahdi Islamic Centre, also based in Glasgow and the recipient of government grants worth more than £370,000, displayed the country's flag alongside images of Ayatollah Khomeini, who issued a death sentence on the British author Salman Rushdie. The Ark, run by a registered charity called Noah's Ark, insists that it seeks to be an 'ethical and independent organisation', and claims it is dedicated to 'inclusion' and nurturing 'positive change'. • Iran security risk to the UK now equal to that of Russia However, it agreed to collaborate with a regime that, according to Amnesty International, executed almost 1,000 people last year alone, including political prisoners and individuals arrested when they were children. Iran has also sentenced more than 6,000 citizens to death for being gay or lesbian since the 1979 revolution, which transformed the country into an authoritarian theocracy. 'It is deeply concerning to learn of yet another organisation in Scotland's largest city being linked to the Iranian regime which stands against our precious values of freedom and democracy, while being the world's largest state-sponsor of terrorism,' Russell Findlay, the Scottish Conservative leader, said. 'Going forward, not a single penny of taxpayers' money should find its way into these entities, and every effort should be made to expose and end their malevolent activities.' The Sunday Times has seen correspondence issued by the Iranian embassy in London which confirmed that The Ark served as its only Scottish polling station during the presidential election and run-off last June and July. It also shared images of individuals queueing up to vote in the venue's main hall which was decorated with Iranian flags. 'The process of collecting votes for compatriots has begun at the Glasgow branch,' the embassy stated on a Persian language social media channel. The Ark is based in Nicola Sturgeon's Glasgow Southside constituency. A spokeswoman for the former first minister said that she 'unequivocally condemns the continued repression, brutality, and systemic human rights abuses perpetrated by the regime in Tehran'. Andrew Bowie, a Conservative MP and shadow Scotland secretary, has also called for organisations linked to Tehran to be investigated, stating: 'I would expect a robust response from the UK government and security services, along with the authorities in Scotland.' Earlier this month, Westminster's intelligence and security committee warned that 'cultural and educational centres supported by Iran had been used to promote violent and extremist ideology'. A spokeswoman for the cross-party committee said: 'We encourage the intelligence community and wider government not to underestimate the potential espionage and interference threat that Iranian state-linked institutions pose. 'Whilst we are reassured that the Home Office is now investigating the threat posed by Iranian-aligned cultural groups, it is important that this is followed up with specific and timely action to ensure any threat from radicalisation, promotion of extremist material and intimidation of UK-based students and diaspora is addressed.' It is not clear if The Ark received payment from the Iranian state for the use of its premises or whether it granted access for free. The Muslim Council of Scotland insisted it was unaware that Iran had twice used the premises where it is based. 'The council is only a renter in a small, shared office space,' a spokesman said. 'We are not aware of the use of the rest of the building spaces, offices, meeting rooms or hall.' During the 2021 presidential election, Iran used the Al-Mahdi Islamic Centre, situated close to The Ark in the southside of Glasgow, as a polling station. Neither The Ark, Al-Mahdi, nor the Ahl al-Bait Society Scotland responded to requests for comment. The Home Office stressed it did not comment on individual organisations but said: 'We consider any organisation or activity that seeks to undermine our democratic society as unacceptable and work closely with a range of partners to ensure the safety and security of communities in the UK.' The Iranian embassy in London, which also operated polling stations in the city as well as Manchester, Newcastle, Birmingham and Cardiff, said: 'The suggestion that Iran engages in, or supports, acts of physical violence, espionage or cyber-aggression on British soil, or against British interests abroad, is wholly rejected. 'Such accusations are not only defamatory but also dangerous, fuelling unnecessary tensions and undermining diplomatic norms.'
BBC News
02-07-2025
- General
- BBC News
Puppies dumped in graveyard 'lucky to survive hot weather'
A litter of four, day-old puppies found dumped in a shoebox in a graveyard are lucky to have survived the hot spell of weather, the RSPCA has four puppies, all males, were handed in to the RSPCA Solent Branch, Fareham, Hampshire, after they were found by a member of the public in the Portsmouth area on 24 charity said they were "very lucky" they were found as they need feeding every two hours and "due to the hot weather this could have had a very different outcome".Staff at the centre have set up a puppy rota to hand rear the litter. They will be placed into foster homes in the coming weeks before being put up for adoption once they reach eight weeks old. The charity said: "As always, our amazing team here at The Ark, immediately got to action in caring for these sweet boys. "All four puppies are bottle feeding well, gaining weight and just about to open their eyes."Although our dedicated staff are volunteering round-the-clock care every few hours, time away from their biological mum at this critical time will be having an impact on their development - both physically and psychologically."The staff are highly concerned for the welfare of mum who has been separated from her puppies. This must be a distressing time for her." The centre added it would be able to establish their breed "in the coming weeks when more of their characteristics come through".After taking in the litter the charity started a fundraising appeal to help cover food and care for the puppies and their further needs, including vaccinations, microchipping and Solent Branch, known as The Stubbington Ark, is an independent branch of the RSPCA, and a separately registered charity. You can follow BBC Hampshire & Isle of Wight on Facebook, X (Twitter), or Instagram.
RTÉ News
25-06-2025
- Entertainment
- RTÉ News
Watch: news2day Wednesday, 25 June 2025
Making a splash in Dún Laoghaire. The Ark celebrates 30 years. News from the Ireland WNT camp. Two bears have a bath. Stream the show on RTÉ Player or watch it now by pressing play on the image above. Florence takes to the water to paddle along with some new friends at a DLR Sportsability Water Camp. Barry goes to The Ark in Dublin as they celebrate their 30th birthday. RTÉ's Tony O'Donoghue is in Denver with a report from the Ireland WNT camp. And we see two bears who are cooling down with a bath!
Yahoo
16-05-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Saturn's Moon Titan Is Surprisingly Earth-Like, the Only Other Place with Weather Like Ours
We tend to think of the weather as mundane, the sort of boring things you talk about when you have nothing else to say, but in the scope of the solar system, it's one of the most interesting things going on. There are eight known planets, five known dwarf planets, and hundreds of known moons in our solar system, but only two of them have weather: Earth and Titan. Saturn's moon Titan is almost featureless when seen in visible light, thanks to a thick blanket of atmospheric fog. But when astronomers look at it in infrared light, they suddenly see lakes and rivers, dunes and valleys, and a complex liquid cycle. Recently, astronomers peered at Titan using the JWST and Keck observatories, revealing new insight into Titan's bizarrely Earth-like weather. While the crew of The Ark (streaming now on Peacock) made their way across light-years of space to visit Proxima centauri b, they might have had a better shot setting up closer to home. Titan isn't exactly habitable by human standards (it's way too cold and we couldn't breathe the air) but it's remarkably similar in many ways. It has an atmosphere made of mostly nitrogen, just like on Earth, with an atmospheric pressure about 1.5 times that of Earth. Inside that atmosphere you'll find running rivers, lakes, seas, and weather with clouds and rain. The surface temperatures on Titan are so cold (about -290 Fahrenheit) that water exists as solid stone and, possibly, liquid water oceans deep underground. Instead of water, Titan's surface liquid cycle centers on methane. It evaporates from methane lakes and seas, creates methane clouds in the atmosphere, and rains back down again. 'Titan is the only other place in our solar system that has weather like Earth, in the sense that it has clouds and rainfall onto a surface,' explained astronomer Conor Nixon of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, in a statement. Astronomers used the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) and Keck observatories during two observation windows, one in November 2022 and another in July 2023, to investigate the weather cycle on Titan. In those observations, they identified two bright areas of methane cloud cover in the mid and high northern latitudes. It's the first time astronomers have seen evidence of convection in the northern parts of Titan. That's where most of the moon's methane lakes and seas are, covering an area roughly equivalent to the North American Great Lakes. That's where Titan's weather cycle starts, as methane evaporates from the rivers and lakes on the surface, creating clouds. Keck and JWST investigated the layers of Titan's atmosphere to estimate the altitude of clouds and track their movement over time. In observations taken days apart, astronomers watched clouds rise to higher altitudes, where methane gets broken down by sunlight or energetic electrons from Saturn's magnetosphere. As methane breaks down, it creates methyl radicals like CH3 which combine to create other molecules like ethane. Finally, they condense and fall from the alien sky as rain, returning to the surface and completing the cycle. Titan may not be the most comfortable place in the universe, but it's about as close to home as any place we've found. Visit alien worlds on The Ark, .
Yahoo
25-04-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Celebrate Hubble's 35th Birthday with Four New Images from the Orbiting Telescope
For centuries, one of the biggest challenges in astronomy has been our planet's atmosphere. While it helps distribute heat from the Sun and provides the pressure and oxygen we need to survive, it gets in the way of starlight. Fluctuations in the air distort the light coming from space and mess with ground-based observations. It's the reason the stars appear to twinkle in the night sky. They send their light our way in a more or less steady stream of photons, but it gets wiggled a little at the finish line, as it travels through the atmosphere on the way to our eyes. Ground-based telescopes use a variety of systems including deformable mirrors and artificial laser-based reference stars to correct for atmospheric distortion in real time. They're also often built at high altitudes, at the tops of mountains, to get above as much of the atmosphere as possible. The SOFIA Observatory (short for Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy) went as far as strapping a telescope to a modified Boeing 747 and flying at altitudes up to 45,000 feet during observations. But if you want truly clear images, you have to make like the crew of The Ark (streaming now on Peacock) and get off the Earth. That's why the Hubble Space Telescope, the world's most beloved orbiting telescope, has been the gold standard for decades. Today, Hubble celebrates its 35th birthday. The 24,000-pound Hubble Space Telescope launched into orbit 35 years ago, on April 24, 1990, aboard the Space Shuttle Discovery. When the first data came back from above the atmosphere, scientists on the ground quickly realized something was wrong. Instead of the crisp, clear images astronomers were expecting, everything came back blurry. Hubble's primary mirror had a small but important flaw. The edges had been ground too flat by a fraction the width of a human hair. It was enough that the mirror couldn't focus light correctly. Fortunately, NASA had already been working on an upgraded camera to be installed by astronauts at a later date. Before the updated camera went into orbit, it was modified with corrective optics to balance the flaw in the mirror and return the crisp images astronomers were looking for. An array of smaller mirrors also helped to focus light from the mirror as it was sent to the telescope's other instruments. Astronauts carried out a total of five service missions to Hubble, upgrading or repairing instruments, between 1993 and 2009. While other orbiting telescopes have been launched in recent years, Hubble remains the most recognizable and longstanding orbital observatory in history. 'Hubble opened a new window to the universe when it launched 35 years ago. Its stunning imagery inspired people across the globe, and the data behind those images revealed surprises about everything from early galaxies to planets in our own solar system,' said Shawn Domagal-Goldman, acting director of the Astrophysics Division at NASA Headquarters in Washington, in a statement. Hubble was designed to last 15 years and provide cutting edge views of the cosmos. Thirty-five years later it's still trucking along, though it's feeling its age. Parts have broken down and the telescope is now limping along on a single gyro, instead of its original three. That hasn't stopped it from continuing to send back stunning new images of everything from our closest planetary neighbors to distant galaxies. To celebrate Hubble's 35th anniversary in orbit, NASA released a set of four new images highlighting the breathtaking capabilities of the world's favorite telescope. The above mosaic includes a closeup of Mars (top left) as it was in late December 2024; icy clouds can be seen hovering at the poles, at a distance of 61 million miles. At upper right, outflows of radiation and stellar winds from a dense white dwarf create the sprawling beauty of the nebula NGC 2899. A star forming region in the Rosette Nebula can be seen swirling hydrogen gas and dust in the lower left; and the spiral galaxy NGC 5355 can be seen at lower right, patches of star formation punctuating its landscape and a bright bar of stars, gas, and dust spans its center. Hubble's three-and-a-half-decade lifetime has allowed astronomers to observe cosmic objects over extended periods to see how they change and evolve over time. In addition to peering at the very edges of the observable universe, Hubble has investigated things like seasonal changes of solar system planets, expanding supernovae, pulsars, and more. The telescope has made more than 1.7 million observations of roughly 55,000 targets, resulting in thousands of scientific publications. More than that, it changed the way we visualize and think about the universe, and our place within it. See the distant cosmos up close in The Ark, .
