Susanne Hallergard

Director at DBAfrica #dbaafrica, sports can change lives, grass-roots advocate. Love travel, good wine, bridge, political discourse and food.

[DBA Africa @dbaafrica]

When will ANYONE take age grade cheating seriously?

Currently at Dala 7s & KRU provisionally disqualify DBA as we refused to play without birth certificates of the opposition being produced.

Because WE call it out, WE get penalised? Make it make sense.

We won’t stay silent.

[Damian Low @DamianLow3]

Now that it's a question of when rather than if Keir Starmer steps down, it seems his legacy will divide opinion for years.

One part of it that will become clearer with time is that he inherited one of the most politically and economically damaged versions of modern Britain any prime minister has faced.

1. Starmer took office after years of Brexit paralysis, leadership chaos, economic instability, collapsing trust in politics and public services pushed close to breaking point.

2. The political challenge was not simply winning power. It was restoring a basic sense that government itself could still function competently after years where politics often felt erratic and performative.

3. And whatever people think of Labour now, Britain does feel politically calmer than it did during the final years of Conservative rule. The problem for Starmer is that stabilisation rarely feels emotionally satisfying to voters living through stagnation.

4. If your mortgage is high, your rent is unaffordable and public services still feel stretched, “things are less chaotic” is not enough. That is where much of the frustration around him comes from. Many people expected not just stability, but visible national renewal such as cheaper living costs, faster growth, functioning infrastructure and a stronger sense the country was moving forward again.

5. Some of that impatience is fair. this government has on occasion looked too cautious, too managerial and too reluctant to tell a bigger story about where Britain is heading. But there has also been something unusual about the scale of hostility directed at Starmer personally. At times it has felt less connected to what he has actually done and more to what he represents culturally.

6. He is not a culture war politician. He does not perform outrage naturally. He rarely behaves like politics is entertainment. In a media environment built around emotional intensity, that can ironically make him look weaker than more chaotic figures.

7. The real irony is that many of the same people who said they wanted seriousness and stability after the Johnson and Truss years often seemed strangely underwhelmed once they got it. That may ultimately become Starmer’s political problem and his historical legacy at the same time. He arrived at a moment when Britain desperately needed stabilisation, but in an era where politics increasingly rewards spectacle over restraint.

8. History tends to judge leaders differently once the noise dies down. And there is a reasonable chance Starmer will eventually be viewed less as a failed transformational figure and more as someone who helped stop a period of national political deterioration from becoming something worse.

That may not inspire chants or mythology. But after the volatility Britain went through, it may turn out to have mattered more than people currently realise.

[Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Володимир Зеленський @ZelenskyyUa]

I thank His Majesty King Charles III @RoyalFamily, the United Kingdom, and all valiant American hearts for this clarion call for unity in support of Ukraine across the Atlantic. This is exactly what is needed to bring dignified and lasting peace to Ukraine and all of Europe. The people of Ukraine deeply appreciate all the support provided by the United Kingdom and the United States. Thank you.

[Acyn @Acyn]

Standing ovation for this line from King Charles: The U.S. Supreme court historical society has calculated that Magna Carta is cited in at least 160 supreme court cases since 1789, not least as the foundation of the principle that executive power is subject to checks and balances.

[James Lucas @JamesLucasIT]

There is a keyhole in Rome that lets you see three countries at once...

It sits in a green door at the top of the Aventine Hill. Press one eye to the lock, and the dome of St Peter's Basilica appears at the end of a long corridor of laurel hedges, framed perfectly inside a circle of metal barely an inch wide.

The dome is a kilometer and a half away, but through the keyhole it looks impossibly close. As if you could reach through and touch it.

The door belongs to the Sovereign Military Order of Malta, the only order from the Crusades that still exercises sovereignty today. The villa behind the door has extraterritorial status and it's treated as separate from the surrounding Italian territory.

This is why one keyhole holds three sovereign jurisdictions. The garden in front of you is the territory of the Order of Malta — not a country in the conventional sense, but a sovereign subject of international law, with its own passports, ambassadors, and a permanent observer seat at the United Nations. The land between the garden and the dome is Italy. The dome itself stands inside the Vatican. Three sovereignties in one glance...

None of this was an accident.

In 1765, the Venetian architect Giovanni Battista Piranesi was commissioned to redesign the priory. He laid out the gardens, planted the laurels, and aligned everything toward the distant dome of Michelangelo's masterpiece. He was building a telescope made of trees.

When he died in 1778, he was buried inside the church behind the door, a few steps from the keyhole that became his most famous design...

[Illia Ponomarenko 🇺🇦 @IAPonomarenko]

You know, the conquest and enslavement of Ukraine -- with its natural and human resources, its geographic position in Europe, its brains, its access to the sea, and its extraordinarily rich breadbasket -- was in the 18th century one of the key factors that enabled tsarist Moscow to proclaim itself the Russian Empire.

Through control over Ukraine, it achieved unprecedented power and remained, in its various forms, a scourge of Europe right up to very 1991.

Today, looking at these photographs (and this is the Russian oil port of Tuapse burning again tonight) I find myself understanding clearly that the Russian Empire in many ways began with Ukraine, and it is Ukraine that will bury it.

And that will be the ultimate act of historical justice for all the centuries of enslavement, Holodomors, savage bloodshed, and isolation from the civilized world.

[🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿InsideLucysHead🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿© @InsideLucysHead]

Oxford University researchers have discovered the densest element yet known to science...

The new element, Governmentium (symbol=Gv), has one neutron, 25 assistant neutrons, 88 deputy neutrons and 198 assistant deputy neutrons, giving it an atomic mass of 312.

These 312 particles are held together by forces called morons, which are surrounded by vast quantities of lepton-like particles called pillocks.

Since Governmentium has no electrons, it is inert.

However, it can be detected because it impedes every reaction with which it comes into contact.

A tiny amount of Governmentium can cause a reaction that would normally take less than a second, to take from 4 days to 4 years to complete.

Governmentium has a normal half-life of 2 to 6 years.

It does not decay, but instead undergoes a reorganisation in which a portion of the assistant neutrons and deputy neutrons exchange places.

In fact, Governmentium's mass will actually increase over time, since each reorganisation will cause more morons to become neutrons, forming isodopes.

This characteristic of moron promotion leads some scientists to believe that Governmentium is formed whenever morons reach a critical concentration.

This hypothetical quantity is referred to as a critical morass.

When catalysed with money, Governmentium becomes Administratium (symbol=Ad), an element that radiates just as much energy as Governmentium, since it has half as many pillocks but twice as many morons.

[JP Lindsley | Journalist @JPLindsley]

There is one word that reveals the vast difference between Ukraine and Russia:

[maksym eristavi. @maksymeristavi]

a hard night of russian culture in my homecity Zaporizhzhia. russians used missiles and drones to hunt as many civilians sleeping in their homes as possible. you'd be surprised how many people abroad have no idea about these crimes happening daily in Ukraine - please share

[Gina Miller @thatginamiller]

On #InternationalWomensDay, my heart is with women in war zones – nursing babies in basements, terrified about being raped, carrying trauma no one should endure.

They are not numbers. They are sisters, daughters, mothers – women whose bodies are used as battlefields and whose voices are silenced.

If “Rights. Justice. Action. For ALL Women and Girls” is to mean anything, it must include them. We owe them protection, accountability and a world that refuses to look away

#IWD2026 #WomenInWar #EndSexualViolenceInConflict
@MoneyShe_

[J.K. Rowling @jk_rowling]

Yes.

[Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Володимир Зеленський @ZelenskyyUa]

Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Montenegro, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain, United Kingdom, United States — thank you for your support. Light will prevail.

[Kate from Kharkiv @BohuslavskaKate]

The Brandenburg Gate today 💙💛

[Susanne Hallergard @Eva67S]

@UK_Needs_Reform Utterly disgusting by Ratcliffe. Not true at all.

[Illia Ponomarenko 🇺🇦 @IAPonomarenko]

I’m genuinely shaken to my core by how the Trump administration is ABSOLUTELY FINE with the fact that, right in the middle of yet another round of “peace talks,” literally while delegations are sitting across from each other discussing “compromise,” Russia is launching devastating missile strikes on heating and electricity in Ukrainian cities, leaving millions of people in a humanitarian catastrophe in the middle of a freezing winter.

And there isn’t the slightest objection, condemnation, or demand to stop. Nothing. Nobody appears bothered by these mass war crimes unfolding live.

Nothing, except regular Trump outbreaks in claiming that “Zelensky doesn’t want peace.”

And it’s easy to see why: they think that every Ukrainian apartment block demolished by a Russian missile in the middle of the night, along with the people inside it, helps them “pressure Zelensky into a deal.”

It’s astonishing. Down to the darkest depths of moral collapse. I genuinely can't wrap my head around how things could end up this way in this regard.

[Carl Bildt @carlbildt]

Very important and very well put remarks by 🇨🇦 PM Mark Carney. It’s time to take down the sign and speak up.

[Joël.Arts.Paints This is our Canada 🇨🇦 @JoelVinette]

Canada stands in solidarity with Greenland & Denmark. 🇨🇦🇬🇱🇩🇰 PM @MarkJCarney quote: "The future of Greenland is a decision exclusively for the people of Greenland and Denmark..." Carney also announced the establishing of a new consulate in Nuuk, Greenland. Retweets appreciated.

[Kate from Kharkiv @BohuslavskaKate]

President of Moldova Maia Sandu stated that if there were a referendum on unification with Romania, she would vote yes because:

"It is getting more and more difficult for a small country like Moldova to survive as a democracy, as a sovereign country, and of course to resist Russia."

Larger countries might interpret this as a sign of weakness, yet to me it reflects her awareness of just how far russia is prepared to go to restore its empire.

[Omid Djalili @omid9]

Despite internet shut off by the regime, a few videos received tonight. Here is the very start of the protests Tehran & Mashhad 8pm. Despite threats of being annihilated by the IRGC, absolutely no let up from the people of Iran #IranianRevolution2026

[Kirstie Allsopp @KirstieMAllsopp]

The number of men losing the plot because I refuse to condemn London as an unsafe place to live and get about in is extraordinary. I have no idea why they so passionately want to malign our capital city but it is deeply disturbing.