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Your morning briefing: What you should know for Thursday, November 26

London hopes for Tier 2 restrictions when lockdown lifted

Sadiq Khan has said it would be the “sensible decision” for the the capital to be placed in Tier 2 restrictions when the national lockdown is lifted.

The London mayor, speaking last night ahead of the country’s regional restrictions being announced, warned that Tier 3 would be a "hammer blow" to businesses.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock will reveal in Parliament later today which tier each local authority in England will fall under.

Each area will be placed into one of three tiers when lockdown ends - but the system has been toughened from the previous regime.

Watch: How England's new three-tier COVID system will work

Boris Johnson faces growing backlash over cut to international aid

Boris Johnson is facing a growing Tory backlash over plans to cut the international aid budget as part of a sweeping Spending Review aimed at dealing with the economic impact of the coronavirus crisis.

A number of prominent Conservatives publicly expressed concern at the move - which formed part of the party's manifesto - as the Government's economic forecasts were questioned by some economists.

The overseas aid cut was announced by Chancellor Rishi Sunak as one of a number of measures intended to help cope with the economy contracting by an expected 11.3 per cent this year.

Former foreign secretary Jeremy Hunt and former prime minister David Cameron, were among those criticising the plans to cut overseas aid from 0.7 per cent to 0.5 per cent of gross national income (GNI).

Watch: Trump pardons former national security advisor Michael Flynn

Donald Trump has pardoned his first national security advisor Michael Flynn who pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about clandestine contacts with a Russian official.

Mr Trump announced the pardon in a tweet in which he said he was honoured to exonerate the retired general. Flynn had not been sentenced following his conviction.

Mr Trump is expected to offer a pardon to a string of key aides before he leaves office on January 20 following his election loss.

Freed British-Australian academic says she leaves Iran feeling ‘bittersweet’

British-Australian academic Dr Kylie Moore-Gilbert said she is departing Iran with "bittersweet feelings" after being released from an Iranian prison.

State media in Iran said the detained Melbourne University lecturer had been released in an apparent prisoner swap on Wednesday.

The Middle Eastern studies expert was picked up at Tehran Airport while trying to leave the country after attending a conference in 2018.

Dr Moore-Gilbert was convicted of spying and sentenced to 10 years behind bars, but has vehemently denied the charges.

She was held in Evin prison where British-Iranian dual national Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe was also imprisoned.

Man who sought fresh start after losing wife to cancer wins £1m in charity draw

A man who sought a fresh start after losing his wife to cancer has won a £1 million house after donating £10 in a charity draw.

Civil servant Ian Garrick, 56, from Mablethorpe, Lincolnshire, said he wanted to try his luck after spotting the competition in aid of Teenage Cancer Trust on Facebook, but said he "didn't think more of it" after entering.

The father-of-three said the mansion prize was the boost he needed to carry on and start afresh after losing his wife, Julie, to breast cancer nearly five years ago.

On this day…

1607: John Harvard, founder of Harvard University, was born in London.

1864: Charles Dodgson presented a little girl called Alice Liddell with a story she had inspired him to write. It was called Alice's Adventures Under Ground, which later became Alice's Adventures In Wonderland and was published under Dodgson's pen name Lewis Carroll.

1922: Howard Carter and the Earl of Carnarvon became the first men to see inside the tomb of the Pharaoh Tutankhamun near Luxor since it was sealed more than 3,000 years before.

1942: The film Casablanca, starring Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman, premiered at the Hollywood Theatre in New York.

1968: Rock group Cream - Eric Clapton, Jack Bruce and Ginger Baker - played their farewell concert at the Royal Albert Hall.

1983: Gold bars worth £25 million were stolen from the Brinks Mat security warehouse at Heathrow Airport.