Councils spend heavily on grisly yet ineffective methods. Why won’t they consider a proven, low-cost and humane strategy?

By some estimates there are almost 3 million pigeons residing in London, which has the highest pigeon population in the country. Known as “rats with wings”, “flying ashtrays” and “gutter birds”, pigeons do not have popular sentiment on their side. And cities in the UK have an extensive history of attempted pigeon pest control – having tried everything short of an exorcism to remove them – to no avail.

London’s best-known victory in the war against pigeons was self-declared, after an operation in Trafalgar Square in the early 2000s. Ken Livingstone’s city government flew two Harris hawks around the area to “deter” pigeons – although the hawks went further than that, killing 121 pigeons in what ended up being a years-long bloodbath. The blitz cost the city £226,000. Wildlife activists deemed it an act of unimaginable cruelty. And it did little to permanently cut down pigeon populations. Last year in Manchester at least 81 pigeons were shot and killed by pest control services – employed by Northern Trains – in early morning offensives at Manchester Victoria station. The event is known to some as the Manchester Victoria pigeon massacre.

Sydney Lobe is a freelance writer based between Vancouver and London

The sprint sensation was pushed to new heights in the 200m final by an unlikely opponent at the Australian Athletics Championships

It didn’t look good for Gout Gout. He had started the 200m final at the Australian Athletics Championships relatively well, and was positioned just off the lead at the start of the straight.

But, there – who was that? The man wearing all black, two lanes on the inside. An athlete who appeared to match the global phenomenon step by step just when Gout was expected to pull away.

From farms in New Zealand to factories in Delhi, the effects of the oil crisis triggered by the Iran war are rippling across Asia

As other Asian economies race to conserve energy, China has huge reserves of oil and gas as well as alternative energy sources like wind and solar

• Middle East crisis – live updates

Xi Jinping has been preparing for a crisis like this for years. China must secure its energy supply “in its own hands”, its president was reported to have said during a visit to one of its vast oilfields in 2021.

The US-Israel war on Iran plunged the Middle East into a deep conflict, with the strait of Hormuz – one of the most important waterways in global trade – all but closed and key energy facilities across the region under attack.