Thatcher ‘threatened to nuke Argentina’

Margaret Thatcher forced François Mitterrand to give her the codes to disable Argentina’s deadly French-made missiles during the Falklands war by threatening to launch a nuclear warhead against Buenos Aires, according to a book.

Leonora Hornblow

Obituary: The tobacco heiress and novelist Leonora Hornblow, who has died at 85, was addicted to New York. Marriage took her from Manhattan to Hollywood, and her split-coast life that inspired her two seethingly noirish cult novels, Memory and Desire and The Love Seekers.

Pro-Franco history tops bestseller list

A revisionist history book praising the former Spanish dictator General Francisco Franco has shot to the top of the bestseller list in Spain on the 30th anniversary of his death.

Defiant Meyer takes on critics and refuses to resign from PCC job

Sir Christopher Meyer insisted yesterday he had no intention of resigning from his role as chairman of the Press Complaints Commission, despite coming under sustained attack from the foreign secretary, other politicians and former colleagues. By Tania Branigan.

Charles Smith

Obituary: Gypsy activist, poet, and film-maker, he once ran a successful antiques business.

From Russia with love

Mikhail Kalatozov's account of the Castro revolution, Soy Cuba, is more than Soviet agitprop. It's one of the great forgotten movies of the 1960s, says Richard Gott.

Writer Koontz accused of racism

Best-selling author Dean Koontz, raved a recent reviewer, is a master storyteller. His novels sell by the thousands. A recent speech he gave, however, is proving less popular, bringing accusations of racism.

Two sides to every story

The Israeli press's coverage of the Palestinian conflict is driven by a sense of national guilt, according to a new book by a Tel Aviv media professor. Daphna Baram reports.