Illustration: Guardian Design/ReutersIn 2013, the far-right politician Marian Kotleba won a shock victory in regional elections. Four years later, he was voted out in a landslide. But now he’s running for president. By Shaun Walker
More from this series: The new populism
by Shaun WalkerIn December 2013, Marian Kotleba, a former secondary school teacher who had become Slovakia’s most notorious political extremist, arrived to begin work at his new office – the governor’s mansion in Banská Bystrica, the country’s sixth-largest city. Read More...
Pop and rockObituaryStevie Wright obituarySinger with the Australian band the Easybeats, best known for their worldwide 1966 hit Friday on My MindFor Australian music fans in the 1960s, the Easybeats were the Beatles and the Stones rolled into one. The group’s vocalist, Stevie Wright, who has died aged 68 after suffering from pneumonia, was one of the most uninhibited and exciting performers of the era, and singers including Mick Jagger, Paul McCartney, Bon Scott of AC/DC and Michael Hutchence of INXS have acknowledged their debt to him. Read More...
An eradication expert tackling Japanese knotweed in Cornwall. Photograph: Tim Cuff/AlamyOnce hailed as a ‘handsome’ import, this most rampant of plants has come to be seen as a sinister, ruinous enemy. Can it be stopped?
by Samanth SubramanianWhen Paul Ryb found himself a new home, in 2014, no one told him about the danger lurking in the garden. The flat, in the north London neighbourhood of Highgate, occupied the ground floor of a two-storey, brown-brick building. Read More...
