Fiona Gomersall

On the fifth anniversary of the start of the conflict, 27 parliamentarians call on the UK government to redouble its efforts to bring about peaceOn the fifth anniversary of the start of the conflict in South Sudan, we are writing to urge Jeremy Hunt, the foreign secretary, to redouble his efforts to bring about peace. In the grim competition for the world’s most devastating crisis, South Sudan is up there with the worst. It’s estimated that almost 400,000 people have died over the last five years, that over 4 million South Sudanese have fled their homes and that half of the country’s population are facing severe hunger. An adolescent girl in South Sudan today is three times more likely to die in childbirth than to complete primary school. Five years on, all parties to the conflict have signed a peace agreement. However, South Sudan’s short history tells us that peace is a process, not a moment, and that elite-level power-sharing deals easily fail. The South Sudanese people themselves are the only guarantors of peace in their country. The UK government’s focus must therefore be on promoting the local-level peacebuilding initiatives that address the root causes of the conflict. That means working closely with the churches, traditional leaders, women’s and youth groups, and refugee communities, to empower them to influence the implementation of this agreement. It also means pressing the transitional government to guarantee unhindered humanitarian access so NGOs can reach the 7.6 million South Sudanese who urgently need support to rebuild their lives.

Mary Gameson

As an 18-year-old with hormones raging,

Eric Finlayson

Cliff Richard name change | Noddy Holder | Cambridge interview | Talking to children | York art gallery | Waitrose In answer to Ray Chenery (

Years of failing wages can’t be salvaged by a small pay growth – 3.3% of naff all is naff all At the risk of adding to the Christmas repeats: what about the workers? It’s a traditional question, but a good and necessary one. The official figures seem to reveal a fairly positive picture. There are high levels of employment, while unemployment remains low in spite of economic uncertainty. Earlier this week the Office for National Statistics said that pay was now growing at an

Yes, we’ve moved on since the really bad old days – but as a new ruling on sexist ads show, damaging stereotypes still aboundTwentysomethings are getting fed up with what they see as an overload of political correctness, which is bad news. One young woman in my family heard a piece on Newsbeat this morning about the

'Vague, ill-defined, ambiguous, muddy, opaque' are the most popular synonyms for 'nebulous.' Do those words, as someone once said, remind you of anybody?

Even for aficionados of the comedy of embarrassment, this week has been a hard watchFor all the drama of her

We’re all celebrating this new independent venture. The trouble is, the online possibilities have spoiled customers like usA new bookshop has opened in my neighbourhood and you would think it was the second coming, the excitement it has caused. A bookshop! Opening! (Obviously, a third of the space is given over to a cafe where the cakes are roughly $2 a bite. But still.) Reports on the death of the bricks‑and‑mortar bookstore have been going on for some time, peaking last year in the US when the chain Book World closed 45 stores and

Poorly-managed diets can leave some open to fractures and nutrient deficiencies with potentially severe consequences

With so much opposition on her own benches, the most likely way to get a deal through the Commons is to secure a cross-party majority

Scotland started treating knife crime as a public health issue – and violence plummeted. The rest of the UK must follow suit

My friends in the UK listen in awe as I tell them about the turquoise waters, the incredibly fresh mango shakes, and they can hardly believe it when I mention the hundreds of thousands of us who walk amongst them on a daily basis

Austerity is partly to blame, but racism and Islamophobia are still holding us back For the last decade,

Questions of style and usage in this week's Independent

Where is justice? The inquiry is yet to make a single recommendation and delay only adds to the traumaWhen the six-month anniversary of the fire at Grenfell Tower took place at St Paul’s, one year ago today, it followed two days of procedural hearings at the Grenfell Tower inquiry. Whether or not the inquiry could deliver justice was unclear. Trust was low. Many survivors were still in hotels. It was bitterly cold. The community came together, publicly, and that evening carried green LED tealights and home-made votives along the route of the Silent Walk. When Theresa May announced the terms of reference of the Grenfell Tower inquiry, she promised a swift inquiry that would make urgent recommendations to ensure lessons were learned in the interests of public safety. The prime minister promised families would be at the heart of the process. A chairman was appointed, quickly. When families requested a panel, this was denied (three days before Christmas), because May said there was enough expertise at the inquiry. Families were told that appointing a panel would delay any interim findings and that these findings were urgent. Public safety was at stake.

In recent years it seems that an idea has gained traction in left-wing circles – and especially in universities – that nobody should risk making you feel too uncomfortable or challenge your notions of identity and social justice without treading exceptionally carefully

The chaotic theatre of British politics doesn’t change facts. There are three possible approaches – and time is running outOnce again a Brussels summit and British politics cross paths like celestial bodies on intersecting orbits. For just a few moments a cold hard ball of EU reality eclipses the gaseous inferno that is Westminster. Theresa May has not secured any meaningful change to her withdrawal agreement.

The left would presumably want to enact change, not just gain power for the sake of it, and O'Rourke has shown that for all his gloss and engaging rhetoric he simply doesn't seem to stand for much

I was forced to apologise after a daring newsagent heist when I was 14 – and the lesson has stayed with me ever since

A post-Brexit economic crisis could also roll back workplace rights, including parental leave, equal treatment and rights for part-time workers, into which group so many women fall

Christopher Reeve’s 1978 blockbuster got my head in a spin – and was the catalyst for today’s monolithic Marvel filmsThe nuns got me into hot supermen in tight red pants. All Catholic schools in Britain of the early 1980s were fitted out with their own set of 1940s nuns. It was a less austere one who mentioned that Superman: The Movie was on television that Christmas. You’d think King of Kings would be a more Catholically apt recommendation? Maybe Sister Anne-Marie saw religious parallels in the man from Krypton’s story. Superman

The veteran broadcaster’s departure after 25 years should prompt the lumbering BBC show to ramp up its format Imagine the joy of turning to David “Brexit will be a walk in the park” Davis, live on TV, and saying: “Some people might think you ARE the joke about Brexit.” Last night David Dimbleby

Like the St Ives Santa who ripped off his beard and ranted at his young visitors, let’s celebrate our feral sides this festive seasonChristmas traditions are weird. We all drink

In December 1918, Ireland delivered a resounding cry for independence, before being unjustly partitioned. A century later, the British are seeing their political goals thwarted by a border of their own design

Politicians seem to have forgotten that our lives are on hold, and our livelihoods in jeopardy, thanks to their incompetence“The nation has a breakdown”. This was a headline on Radio 4’s PM this week. It was said in that usual Radio 4 tone of jocular irony. All rather fascinating and quite amusing. No, it isn’t. We all respond to stress in different ways. Since Monday afternoon, when I should have been trying to earn some money, I have been gripped by a migraine and the latest episode in the slow-motion national car crash, the one that was meant to

A people’s vote will be painful and dangerous. But Labour should be ready – and avoid the mistakes of the 2016 campaign The traditional critique of the Labour left went something like this: it was made up of purists, more committed to principle and protest than power, unwilling to reach beyond its core vote to listen to the concerns of the swing voters it must attract in order to govern.

Millions of people face slaughter or starvation – the UK must stop sending billions in arms exports to Saudi ArabiaCount the number of times you see or hear the phrase “peace on Earth” in the next week or so. It’s one of the great Christmas themes – or great Christmas cliches, if you want to be cynical. But in the year when we remember