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Spanish police were investigating Thursday a series of letter bombs sent to targets including the prime minister and the US embassy, similar to one which went off at the Ukrainian embassy, hurting a staff member.

The interior ministry revealed that an envelope with “pyrotechnic material” had arrived at Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez’s official residence on November 24. It was destroyed in a controlled explosion.

Spain’s High court meanwhile announced it had broadened an initial investigation over the Ukraine embassy letter bomb to cover the all the other incidents.

Both announcements came a day after the security officer at Ukraine’s embassy in Madrid suffered a light injury to one hand while opening a letter bomb addressed to the Ukrainian ambassador, an incident that prompted Kyiv to boost security at its embassies worldwide.

That letter, like the others discovered, arrived by regular mail.

Later in the evening, a second “suspicious postal shipment” was intercepted at the headquarters of military equipment firm Instalaza in the northeastern city of Zaragoza, the interior ministry said.

Instalaza makes the grenade launchers that Spain donates to Ukraine.

Then on Thursday morning letter bombs arrived and at the defence ministry; and at an air base in Torrejon de Ardoz, just outside Madrid, from where weapons donated by Spain are sent to Ukraine.

“The characteristics of the envelopes, as well as their content, are similar in the five cases,” Spain’s Secretary of State of Security, Rafael Perez, told journalists.

“There are signs that indicate that the letters came from Spanish territory, but I insist we must be prudent…we are at the beginning of the investigation.”

A few hours after he spoke the interior ministry said another letter “with similar characteristics as the others” had been intercepted at the US embassy in Madrid.

– ‘Terrorist methods’ –

Ukraine’s ambassador to Spain, Serhii Pohoreltsev, appeared to blame Russia for the letter bomb at its embassy.

“We are well aware of the terrorist methods of the aggressor country,” he said during an interview late Wednesday with Spanish public television.

“Russia’s methods and attacks require us to be ready for any kind of incident, provocation or attack,” he added.

But in a statement Thursday, Russia’s embassy in Spain said: “Any threat or terrorist act, especially those that target a diplomatic mission, is to be totally condemned.”

The letter to the defence ministry was addressed to Defence Minister Margarita Robles. The one sent to the air base was meant for a European Union satellite centre located there.

That centre supports the bloc’s foreign and security policy by gathering information from satellite imagery, according to its website.

After scanning the envelope that arrived at the air base by X-ray, security officers determined it contained “a mechanism”, the ministry statement said. Police were still analysing the envelope.

Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba ordered the strengthening of security at all of their embassies, the country’s foreign ministry spokesperson said Wednesday after the letter bomb went off at the embassy in Madrid.

Spain’s interior minister said it had ordered increased security measures at all embassies and consulates in the country, as well as “other sites that require special protection”.

Security had already been boosted in February after the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

In addition to sending arms to help Ukraine, Spain is training Ukrainian troops as part of a European Union programme and providing humanitarian aid.

Netflix on Thursday unveiled a long-awaited trailer for a six-part docuseries in which Prince Harry and wife Meghan lift the lid on their lives in the royal family.

Omid Scobie, a close friend and biographer of the couple, tweeted that the series would be aired on December 8, adding it will share “the other side of their love story and the challenges they faced”.

The announcement coincides with Harry’s elder brother William’s first trip to the United States as Prince of Wales and another race row within the family back home.

William — the heir to the throne — has been forced to part ways with one of his godmothers after she used racially charged language to a black British woman at a palace reception on Tuesday.

Harry and Meghan, a mixed-race former television actress, cited racism in the royal household as one of the reasons for their acrimonious departure almost three years ago.

Royal insiders described William’s visit to Boston to present his annual climate change awards to innovators on Friday as his “Superbowl moment”.

But Scobie tweeted that “if tomorrow is Prince William’s Super Bowl, then here’s your Halftime Show” as he shared the trailer.

“With commentary from friends, family, and historians discussing the state of the British Commonwealth today (and the Royal Family’s relationship with the press), the Netflix series aims to ‘paint a picture of our world and how we treat each other’,” he added.

The family will be braced for more revelations from the docuseries and Harry’s autobiography “Spare”, which is due out in January.

The minute-long trailer, posted on Twitter, features intimate photographs of the couple, interspersed with a clip of Harry saying: “No one sees what’s going on behind closed doors” and images of Meghan wiping her eyes.

Scientists often study the grim impacts of losing wildlife to hunting, habitat destruction and climate change. But what happens when endangered animals are brought back from the brink?

Research has shown restoring so-called “keystone” species — those with an outsized impact on their environment — is vital for the health of ecosystems, and can come with unexpected benefits for humans.

Here are some notable examples from North America. 

– Wolves –

Few species evoke the American wild as much as wolves. 

Though revered by Indigenous communities, European colonists who arrived in the 1600s embarked on widespread extermination campaigns through hunting and trapping.

By the mid-20th century, fewer than a thousand gray wolves were left in the contiguous United States, down from at least a quarter million before colonization.

Extinction was averted in the 1970s when lawmakers passed the Endangered Species Act, helping revive the apex predator in parts of its former range.

Then, in the mid-1990s, the government took wolves from Canada and reintroduced them to Yellowstone National Park.

This generated a wealth of data that scientists are still working to understand.

The new arrivals kept elk numbers down, preventing them from over-browsing vegetation that provides material for birds to build nests and beavers to build dams — a phenomenon known as a trophic cascade.

The recovered vegetation helped stop soil erosion into rivers, changing their course by reducing meandering.

While building their dams, the beavers also create deep ponds that juvenile fish and frogs need to survive.

When they embark on hunts, wolves focus on weak and diseased prey, ensuring survival of the fittest.

A recent paper even found that wolves brought back in the midwestern state of Wisconsin kept deer away from roads, reducing collisions with cars.

Amaroq Weiss, a biologist and senior wolf advocate for the Center for Biological Diversity compared ecosystems to tapestries, “and when we take out some of the threads, we weaken that tapestry,” she told AFP.

It’s thought there are now more than 6,000 gray wolves in the contiguous United States. The main threat is legalized hunting in some states.

– Buffalo –

The story of the American buffalo — also known as bison — is inextricably linked to the dark history of the early United States.

From an estimated 30 million, their number plummeted to just hundreds by the late 19th century as the US government sought to wipe out plains tribe Indians whose way of life depended on the animal.

“It was an intentional genocide to remove the buffalo, to the remove the Indians and force them onto reservations,” Cody Considine of The Nature Conservancy (TNC) told AFP.

Buffalo, he explained, are an integral part of TNC’s efforts to re-establish prairies in the Nachusa Grasslands of Illinois.

The buffalo, who were introduced there in 2014 and now number around a hundred, favor eating grass over flowering plants and legumes, which in turn allows a variety of birds, insects and amphibians to flourish.

“Some of these species without that grazing simply just disappear off the landscape due to the high competition of the grasses,” added Considine.

As they forage, bisons’ hooves kick up and aerate the soil, further aiding in plant growth as well as seed dispersion. 

TNC currently manages some 6,500 buffalo, and is creating a pilot program with tribal partners that involves transferring excess animals to Indigenous communities, as part of broader efforts to revive America’s national mammal. 

Some 20,000 buffalo are now thought to roam in “conservation herds,” though none are truly free roaming, added Considine.

– Sea otters –

As the dominant predator of marine nearshore environments, sea otters play a hugely important role in their ecosystem.

Historically they spanned from Baja California up the West Coast up to Alaska, Russia and northern Japan, but hunting for fur in the 1700s and 1800s decimated their numbers, which were once up to 300,000. 

They were thought for a while to have been completely exterminated off California, but a small surviving population of around 50 helped them partially recover to some 3,000 today.

Jess Fujii, sea otter program manager at the Monterey Bay Aquarium, told AFP that research during the 1970s in the Aleutian Islands showed the otters maintained the balance of kelp forest by keeping a check on the sea urchins that graze on them.

In the last decade, more complex interactions have come to light. These include the downstream benefits of otters for eelgrass habitats in California estuaries. 

Here, the sea otters controlled the population of crabs, which meant there were more sea slugs who were able to graze algae, keeping the eelgrass healthy.

Eelgrass is considered a “nursery of the sea” for juvenile fish, and it also reduces erosion, which can factor in coastal floods.

“Kelp and eelgrass are often considered good ways to sequester carbon which can help mitigate the ongoing impacts of climate change,” stressed Fujii, a prime example of how destruction of nature can worsen planetary warming.

Scientists often study the grim impacts of losing wildlife to hunting, habitat destruction and climate change. But what happens when endangered animals are brought back from the brink?

Research has shown restoring so-called “keystone” species — those with an outsized impact on their environment — is vital for the health of ecosystems, and can come with unexpected benefits for humans.

Here are some notable examples from North America. 

– Wolves –

Few species evoke the American wild as much as wolves. 

Though revered by Indigenous communities, European colonists who arrived in the 1600s embarked on widespread extermination campaigns through hunting and trapping.

By the mid-20th century, fewer than a thousand gray wolves were left in the contiguous United States, down from at least a quarter million before colonization.

Extinction was averted in the 1970s when lawmakers passed the Endangered Species Act, helping revive the apex predator in parts of its former range.

Then, in the mid-1990s, the government took wolves from Canada and reintroduced them to Yellowstone National Park.

This generated a wealth of data that scientists are still working to understand.

The new arrivals kept elk numbers down, preventing them from over-browsing vegetation that provides material for birds to build nests and beavers to build dams — a phenomenon known as a trophic cascade.

The recovered vegetation helped stop soil erosion into rivers, changing their course by reducing meandering.

While building their dams, the beavers also create deep ponds that juvenile fish and frogs need to survive.

When they embark on hunts, wolves focus on weak and diseased prey, ensuring survival of the fittest.

A recent paper even found that wolves brought back in the midwestern state of Wisconsin kept deer away from roads, reducing collisions with cars.

Amaroq Weiss, a biologist and senior wolf advocate for the Center for Biological Diversity compared ecosystems to tapestries, “and when we take out some of the threads, we weaken that tapestry,” she told AFP.

It’s thought there are now more than 6,000 gray wolves in the contiguous United States. The main threat is legalized hunting in some states.

– Buffalo –

The story of the American buffalo — also known as bison — is inextricably linked to the dark history of the early United States.

From an estimated 30 million, their number plummeted to just hundreds by the late 19th century as the US government sought to wipe out plains tribe Indians whose way of life depended on the animal.

“It was an intentional genocide to remove the buffalo, to the remove the Indians and force them onto reservations,” Cody Considine of The Nature Conservancy (TNC) told AFP.

Buffalo, he explained, are an integral part of TNC’s efforts to re-establish prairies in the Nachusa Grasslands of Illinois.

The buffalo, who were introduced there in 2014 and now number around a hundred, favor eating grass over flowering plants and legumes, which in turn allows a variety of birds, insects and amphibians to flourish.

“Some of these species without that grazing simply just disappear off the landscape due to the high competition of the grasses,” added Considine.

As they forage, bisons’ hooves kick up and aerate the soil, further aiding in plant growth as well as seed dispersion. 

TNC currently manages some 6,500 buffalo, and is creating a pilot program with tribal partners that involves transferring excess animals to Indigenous communities, as part of broader efforts to revive America’s national mammal. 

Some 20,000 buffalo are now thought to roam in “conservation herds,” though none are truly free roaming, added Considine.

– Sea otters –

As the dominant predator of marine nearshore environments, sea otters play a hugely important role in their ecosystem.

Historically they spanned from Baja California up the West Coast up to Alaska, Russia and northern Japan, but hunting for fur in the 1700s and 1800s decimated their numbers, which were once up to 300,000. 

They were thought for a while to have been completely exterminated off California, but a small surviving population of around 50 helped them partially recover to some 3,000 today.

Jess Fujii, sea otter program manager at the Monterey Bay Aquarium, told AFP that research during the 1970s in the Aleutian Islands showed the otters maintained the balance of kelp forest by keeping a check on the sea urchins that graze on them.

In the last decade, more complex interactions have come to light. These include the downstream benefits of otters for eelgrass habitats in California estuaries. 

Here, the sea otters controlled the population of crabs, which meant there were more sea slugs who were able to graze algae, keeping the eelgrass healthy.

Eelgrass is considered a “nursery of the sea” for juvenile fish, and it also reduces erosion, which can factor in coastal floods.

“Kelp and eelgrass are often considered good ways to sequester carbon which can help mitigate the ongoing impacts of climate change,” stressed Fujii, a prime example of how destruction of nature can worsen planetary warming.

The timing could not have been worse for Britain’s royal family, not long after one racial reckoning involving Prince Harry and ahead of a new publicity blitz from the maverick “spare heir”.

Harry’s elder brother Prince William — the heir to the throne — has been forced to part ways with one of his godmothers after she used racially charged language to a black British woman at a palace reception on Tuesday.

King Charles III moved rapidly to evict Lady Susan Hussey from the royal household after the hurtful exchange was revealed on Twitter by Ngozi Fulani — while William and his wife Kate were flying to Boston.

When Hussey started to quiz her about her origins, the UK-born Fulani said she tried to give the 83-year-old courtier the benefit of the doubt.

“But it soon dawned on me very quickly that this was nothing to do with her capacity to understand,” the charity campaigner, who works with survivors of domestic abuse, told BBC radio on Thursday.

Hussey repeatedly asked Fulani where she was “really” from, refusing to accept her explanation that she was British.

“But this is her trying to make me really denounce my British citizenship,” Fulani said, as many other Britons of colour shared similarly demeaning experiences on social and traditional media.

It is the most serious controversy yet since Charles succeeded his mother in September. Hussey was not just any courtier — she was at Queen Elizabeth II’s side for six decades.

But she was unceremoniously dumped as Charles and William moved rapidly to draw a line under the row, earning plaudits from some black commentators.

– ‘Shocking’ –

Labour MP Diane Abbott, the first black woman to sit in the House of Commons when she was elected in the 1980s, said it was “really shocking” that a black Briton’s identity could be interrogated in this way.

But she told Times Radio that Buckingham Palace had made “progress” on race issues in the past 10 years.

Back then, “they would have said she (Fulani) was oversensitive and just dismissed it”, said Abbott.

The palace appears to have taken lessons on board particularly since last year, when Harry and his mixed-race wife Meghan accused an unidentified royal of racism with regard to their unborn baby.

Then, William retorted: “We are very much not a racist family.” But the family said the matter would be dealt with “privately”.

The royal household has also begun publishing data on the ethnic breakdown of its staff, admitting it has more to do to ensure due representation. 

Yet from their new lives in California, the duke and duchess of Sussex have been portraying themselves as modernising outsiders who tried to take on a reactionary establishment.

Ironies abound as the feuding brothers both find themselves on the US East Coast — with no plans to meet. 

William is set to award an environmental prize in Boston inspired by former president John F. Kennedy’s “Moonshot” ambition in the 1960s.

Next week, Harry and Meghan are due to attend an awards gala in New York held by the human rights foundation of Kennedy’s brother Robert. 

– Meghan vindicated? –

His daughter Kerry Kennedy says the couple will be recognised for taking a “heroic stand” against “structural racism” within the British monarchy.

But for their critics, Harry and Meghan are cashing in after quitting royal duties. A new Netflix documentary is imminent, and the prince’s autobiography “Spare” is due out in January.

UK public opinion had been turning against them, at least until the row over Hussey erupted. 

When Meghan entered the family, the lady-in-waiting was assigned to educate her in royal protocol, a role that Hussey also served for William and Harry’s mother Diana. 

Meghan rejected the offer, according to one biographer.

“The stifled horse laugh you can hear emanating from California is the noise of a duchess trying not to guffaw ‘I told you so’,” commentator Trevor Phillips — a former head of the Commission for Racial Equality — wrote in The Times.

There is further irony in the row erupting in the week that saw new data from the 2021 census confirm that Britain is more racially diverse — and less Christian — than ever before.

Charles himself has a lifelong commitment to multi-culturalism and religious diversity while the government is led by the country’s first prime minister of colour, Rishi Sunak.

Phillips added: “A mindset that colour codes British identity is not just distasteful and anachronistic, it is unambiguously racist.”