US Vice-President Kamala Harris defended her shifts on policy, President Joe Biden, and her time in the White House in her first interview since becoming the Democratic nominee.

Ms Harris argued that the Biden administration was able to reduce illegal border crossings in recent months and “recover the economy” after the pandemic.

She called the White House’s policies a “success”, specifically pointing to a decline in prescription drug costs and the unemployment rate: “That’s good work. There’s more to do.”

Ms Harris appeared in the pre-recorded CNN interview with her running mate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz. It was her first as a presidential candidate.

The vice-president was forced to defend the White House’s economic track record, as inflation and high cost-of-living prices continue to sting American pocketbooks. Polls have regularly suggested that voters would prefer Republican candidate Donald Trump’s handling of the economy.

But the most tense exchanges between Ms Harris and CNN interviewer Dana Bash centred on the assertion that the Democratic nominee’s policy positions had undergone “changes” during her time as vice-president and as a presidential candidate.

“I think the most important and most significant aspect of my policy perspective and decisions is my values have not changed,” she said when asked why her positions shifted in recent years.

Trump had already dismissed the vice-president’s first interview, which lasted 27 minutes, before its release because it was pre-taped and included Mr Walz.

He used a single-word in his review after it concluded.

“BORING!!!” the former president wrote on Truth Social.

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Ms Harris referred to her effort to address climate change and support of the Green New Deal, a Democratic proposal to reduce reliance on fossil fuels, as something that remains a steadfast value when pressured about her shifting policy positions.

“I have always believed, and I’ve worked on it, that the climate crisis is real, that it is an urgent matter,” she said.

The vice-president pointed to the Biden administration’s work on the Inflation Reduction Act, which funnelled hundreds of billions of dollars to renewable energy and electric vehicle tax credit and rebate programs.

“We have set goals for the United States of America, and by extension the globe, around when we should meet certain standards for reduction of greenhouse gas emissions.”

Ms Harris did not explain her reversal on banning fracking – a technique for recovering gas and oil from shale rock used by an industry that is particularly strong in the battleground state of Pennsylvania.

Ms Harris had said that “there is no question I’m in favour of banning fracking” during a CNN town hall in 2019. But she has backpedalled on that view since becoming vice-president – even casting the tie-breaking vote in the Senate on new fracking leases.

In the CNN interview on Thursday, she said: “As president, I will not ban fracking.”

Brian Fallon, a campaign spokesperson, said on social media that the Biden administration’s “clean energy investments have proven the ability to make progress on climate without those past stances”.

Ms Harris once held more progressive immigration views as a senator and in her campaign for president in 2020. She had previously advocated for the closure of immigration detention centres and the decriminalisation of illegal crossings.

But on the subject of “securing our border” Ms Harris said “my values have not changed” and referenced her time “prosecuting transnational, criminal organisations” as California attorney general.

Earlier this year, the vice-president supported a hardline bipartisan border security deal that would have included hundreds of millions of dollars for border wall construction.

Trump pressured Republicans in Congress to kill the deal, but Ms Harris has promised to “sign it into law” if elected. She committed to passing it again during the CNN interview.

To explain her moderated immigration view, the Democratic nominee told CNN that her travels across the country as vice-president had made her “believe it is important to build consensus, and it is important to find a common place of understanding of where we can actually solve problems”.

Along those lines, Ms Harris committed to include someone “who was a Republican” in her presidential cabinet. She said it would fulfill her promise to be a president “for all Americans”.

“I have spent my career inviting diversity of opinion. I think it’s important to have people at the table when some of the most important decisions are being made that have different views.”

Ms Harris also was asked about the war in Gaza, and re-iterated the White House’s position that both Israel and Hamas must “get a deal done” and that the Palestinians deserve to have their own country neighbouring Israel.

“This war must end, and we must get a deal that is about getting the hostages out,” she said.

She would not commit to an arms embargo on Israel, as some on her party’s left flank have demanded.

Mr Walz, who served for decades in the US National Guard, was asked to clarify a comment he in made in which he said he “carried” an assault rifle in “war”.

The campaign has clarified that Mr Walz was never in a war zone.

In the interview, the governor said he wore “his emotions on his sleeve” and was “speaking passionately” about the subject of gun crime in schools when he made the inaccurate statement.

That “passion” also extended to his incorrect assertion that his wife had received in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) treatments – which have become a political lightning rod in the US debate over abortion access – to conceive their children.

She received intrauterine insemination, not IVF, though doctors have said that the two fertilisation treatments are often referred to interchangeably.

Mr Walz said his record speaks for itself. He said he did not believe that Americans were “cutting hairs” between the two.

The Minnesota governor was also asked about his son, Gus, who went viral when he proudly proclaimed “That’s my dad” at the Democratic National Convention.

“It was just such a visceral, emotional moment that I’m grateful I got to experience it – and I’m so proud of him.”

Ms Harris described the moment that President Biden called her to share that he had decided to end his re-election bid in July.

She said her family was visiting her when she received the phone call. They had just eaten pancakes and bacon and were working on a puzzle.

“My first thought was not about me, to be honest with you, my first thought was about him,” Ms Harris said when asked whether she asked for his endorsement.

The vice-president also maintained that the president could have served again.

“He is so smart, and I have spent hours upon hours with him being in the Oval Office and in the situation room. He has the intelligence, the commitment and judgment and disposition that I think the American people rightly deserve in their president.”

She said Trump, by contrast, had none of those qualities.

Ms Harris has faced criticism from Republicans and some pundits for refusing to hold a press conference or an on-the-record, in-depth interview until now. Her critics argued that she was avoiding having her record challenged.

Her appearance on CNN marks her first substantive interview since Mr Biden exited race.

Ms Bash, the CNN journalist who conducted the interview of Ms Harris and Mr Walz, was one of the moderators of the 27 June debate between Mr Biden and Trump.

Mr Biden’s disastrous performance in that debate was widely seen as what sparked the effort for the president to withdraw from the race.

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The messages come through on the Israeli phone network – scraps of information from inside Jenin’s refugee camp.

“I don’t dare go on the roof, in case I’m shot,” one resident says, speaking anonymously.

Information inside the camp is scarce, he says, and the streets are empty, as residents stay inside.

“It’s mostly old people and children here,” he tells me. “The young people left before the army arrived – it’s bad luck for those who can’t get out.”

Jenin, the focus of news networks today, has been living through a news blackout.

The Palestinian phone network was down for much of the day – lines cut by the Israeli military operation here, the telecoms company said.

The resident I speak to says his family still has water and electricity, and that a small shop nearby was open and selling supplies, under the constant buzz of military drones.

As we talk, a few scattered gunshots reverberate over the rooftops from the direction of the camp.

• UN calls for de-escalation as Israeli West Bank raids continue

“Yes, I heard them too,” he says. “The sound of the drones has increased.”

As he is speaking, an armoured bulldozer rumbles towards one of the camp’s main entrances, the road deserted and baking in the afternoon sun.

For a few hours last night, explosions and gunfire erupted from the alleyways there, disrupting sleep.

But since then, this man says it had been largely quiet – with no sign of house-to-house searches in his neighbourhood, nor of fighters from the camp.

“It’s abnormally quiet,” he said.

The camp has been sealed off by the army since it arrived before dawn on Wednesday – part of a wide, coordinated operation across several centres of the occupied West Bank.

Jenin camp is a base for armed Palestinian fighters, but also unarmed civilians. There have been fierce gun battles here in recent months, as Israeli forces have raided, again and again, looking for them.

Army vehicles are also stationed around two of Jenin’s main hospitals.

Ambulances are stopped as they approach – approaching and reversing in response to terse instructions broadcast in Arabic from loudspeakers on the army Jeeps.

We watched paramedics get out to open the back doors of their ambulance, to show what – or who – was inside. Two female patients were also made to get out and present themselves to soldiers in the Jeeps.

Behind them, one of Jenin’s main commercial districts is shuttered and deserted. Cardboard boxes are scattered across the empty road; fruit sits abandoned on carts under thin cotton covers – the sickly-sweet smell of rotting mangoes fills the silent street.

One small grocery shop has been opening in the afternoon – an urban oasis for those who can reach it.

Thaeer Shana’at is stocking up on food to deliver to local families in the eastern neighbourhood, where Israeli forces were blocking access, he says.

“The whole of the eastern area – a population of about 20,000 – is sealed off,” he said.

“Only ambulances can deliver food. If we go there, we get fired at. There are many areas where we can’t deliver people any food or drink.”

He says his wife and baby are still in Jenin camp, as he couldn’t get them out before the army arrived.

“They are scared to open the door,” he says. “A sniper is directly stationed in front of the house.”

Munir Garwan, who used to work for the municipality, is also waiting to buy food.

He says he was a member of the West Bank’s main political party, Fatah, and had spent six years in an Israeli jail for shooting at the army, and belonging to a “hostile organisation”.

“The occupation [Israel] claims it is trying to stop terrorism. But when the young men get killed, new ones take their place. They are getting nowhere like that.”

“We are not fighting to make someone victorious over the other,” he said. “We are fighting for our rights.”

As night fell, loud explosions and gunfire were heard again from the direction of the camp.

Information has begun to flow again, as communication networks begin to return, circulating details of the ongoing incursion, and the identities of those injured and killed.

The news blackout in Jenin is ending, but the news is the last thing people here want to hear.

One of the F-16 fighter jets sent from Nato allies to Ukraine has been destroyed, a Ukrainian military source has told the BBC.

The aircraft went down amid a barrage of Russian missiles on Monday, killing pilot Oleksiy Mes, Ukraine’s military said. It marks the first loss of its kind since the planes were delivered earlier this month.

The cause of the crash was not a direct result of an enemy missile strike, the Ukrainian military claims.

It said the pilot destroyed three cruise missiles and one drone in Russia’s largest aerial attack to date.

• Ukraine receives first F-16 fighter jets

“Oleksiy saved Ukrainians from deadly Russian missiles,” the Ukrainian Air Force wrote in a statement on social media.

“Unfortunately, at the cost of his own life.”

The statement did not specify the type of plane involved, but a military source told the BBC the pilot was flying an F-16.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky officially confirmed on Tuesday the US-made F-16’s were being deployed to shoot down Russian drones and missiles.

This week, he asked allies to allow Ukraine to use long range missiles to hit targets further into Russia.

Dutch Chief of Defence Gen Onno Eichelsheim confirmed the Netherlands will provide Ukraine with 24 of the jets, in addition to more weapons.

There will be no restrictions on their usage apart from complying with humanitarian law, he told a conference in Washington on Wednesday – meaning Kyiv could launch deeper strikes into Russian territory.

Around 65 F-16s have been pledged by Nato countries since US President Joe Biden first authorised willing European allies to send them to Ukraine in August 2023.

Ukraine’s F-16s work alongside a limited number of Western-supplied surface-to-air missile systems such as Patriot and Nasams which are already on the ground.

They also help defend against Russian glide bombs – dumb munitions fitted with pop-out wing kits and guidance modules to deliver precision strike stand-off capabilities, similar to the JDAM munitions from the United States.

The destruction of the aircraft is blow to Zelensky, who said he will deliver a “victory plan” to US President Joe Biden next month.

He also revealed Ukraine had recently carried out the first successful test of a domestically-produced ballistic missile, but declined to share any more details.

Japan has issued its highest level alert to more than five million people after the country was hit by one of its strongest typhoons in decades.

At least four people have been killed and more than 90 injured after Typhoon Shanshan made landfall in the country’s south-west. Hundreds of thousands of people have been left without power.

The level five order issued in parts of the southern island of Kyushu told residents to take immediate life-saving action by moving to a safer location or seeking shelter higher in their homes. In other areas, people have been advised to leave.

After making landfall, the typhoon weakened to a severe tropical storm and is pummelling its way north-east, bringing torrential rain and severe disruption to transport services.

Shanshan landed in Kagoshima prefecture, in the southern island of Kyushu, at around 08:00 local time on Thursday (23:00 GMT Wednesday), the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) said.

It has left a trail of destruction in its wake, with many buildings damaged and windows shattered by flying debris, trees uprooted and cars overturned.

Late on Tuesday, three people from the same family – a couple in their 70s and a man in his 30s – were killed by a landslide in central Japan ahead of the typhoon’s arrival. Their home in Gamagori was swept away, while two other female relatives were rescued.

A fourth person was confirmed dead by police on Thursday. The 80-year-old man from Tokushima prefecture was trapped after the roof of a house collapsed about 17:30 local time (08:30 GMT), according to Japan’s national broadcaster NHK.

The fire brigade rescued the man around 50 minutes after the incident but he later died in hospital. The JMA recorded 110mm of rainfall in the area around the time of the incident.

The agency has issued its rare “special warning” for the most violent storms, warning of landslides, flooding and large-scale damage. High winds of up to 252 km/h (157mph) have been reported on Kyushu.

Most of the evacuation orders are in place for the southern island, but some were also issued for central Japan.

Videos online show large trees swaying, tiles blown off houses, and debris being thrown into the air as heavy rains lashed the island.

Major carmakers like Toyota and Nissan shut down their plants, citing the safety of employees as well as potential parts shortages caused by the storm.

Hundreds of flights to and from southern Japan have been cancelled, with some high-speed train services have also been suspended.

JMA expects the storm to move across Japan over the weekend before it reaches the capital Tokyo.

Special typhoon warnings, like the one issued for Shanshan, are declared in Japan in cases of extraordinarily powerful storms. The same warning was issued in September 2022 as Typhoon Nanmadol approached Kyushu – the first such warning declared for a region other than Okinawa.

Shanshan comes in the wake of Typhoon Ampil earlier this month, which caused only minor injuries and damage but still disrupted hundreds of flights and trains.

Before that, northern parts of Japan saw record rainfall when Tropical Storm Maria hit Honshu island.

Typhoons in the region have been forming closer to coastlines, intensifying more rapidly and lasting longer over land due to climate change, according to a study released last month.

Israel has agreed to a series of “humanitarian pauses” in Gaza to allow for the vaccination of children against polio, the World Health Organization (WHO) has said.

The campaign will aim to vaccinate around 640,000 children across the Gaza strip and will begin on Sunday, senior WHO official Rik Peeperkorn said.

It will be rolled out in three separate stages, across the central, southern and northern parts of the strip. During each stage, fighting will pause for three consecutive days between 06:00 and 15:00 local time.

The agreement comes days after UN officials said a 10-month-old baby had been partially paralysed after contracting Gaza’s first case of polio for 25 years.

Around 1.26m doses of the novel oral polio vaccine type 2 (nOPV2) are already in Gaza, with 400,000 additional doses set to arrive soon.

The campaign will be administered by “the Palestinian Ministry of Health, in collaboration with WHO, UNICEF, UNRWA”. Over 2,000 health and community outreach workers have been trained to administer the vaccine.

The WHO is aiming to achieve 90% vaccine coverage across the strip, which is needed to stop transmission of the virus within Gaza.

An agreement is in place for an additional fourth day of vaccination and humanitarian pause if needed to achieve that level of vaccination.

Poliovirus is highly infectious and is most often spread through sewage and contaminated water.

It can cause disfigurement and paralysis, and is potentially fatal. It mainly affects children under the age of five.

The WHO says immunisation rates in Gaza and the occupied West Bank were optimal before the conflict. Polio vaccine coverage was estimated at 99% in 2022, although it had declined to 89% last year, according to the latest data.

The Israeli military said in July it had begun vaccinating its soldiers against the disease.

Hamas official Basem Naim told the Reuters news agency: “We are ready to cooperate with international organisations to secure this campaign, serving and protecting more than 650,000 Palestinian children in the Gaza Strip.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the series of three-day pauses were “not a ceasefire”.

James Kariuki, UK deputy permanent representative to the UN, said he “strongly” welcomed the vaccination plan.

“We now need to see this in action and these pauses need to be long enough to deliver the 90% coverage required. When the campaign starts and thousands of vulnerable and unaccompanied children gather at vaccination sites, they must all be protected,” he added.

Prof Hagai Levine, a spokesman for the Hostages Families Forum – a group which is calling for more action to secure the release of Israeli hostages – urged health workers to ensure those still being held are included in the vaccination campaign.

Israel launched a military campaign in Gaza in response to an unprecedented attack on southern Israel on 7 October by Hamas, during which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 taken hostage.

More than 40,530 people have been killed in Gaza since 7 October, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry.

“My heart is filled with so much pain. Even today, I cry when I think about how that one encounter destroyed my life.”

The year was 1992. Sushma* said she was 18 when a man she knew took her to an abandoned warehouse under the pretext of watching video tapes. There, six to seven men tied her up, raped her and took photographs of the act.

The men belonged to rich, influential families in Ajmer, a city in the western Indian state of Rajasthan.

“After they raped me, one of them gave me 200 rupees [$2; £1] to buy lipstick. I didn’t take the money,” she said.

Last week, 32 years later, Sushma saw a court convict her rapists and sentence them to life imprisonment.

“I am 50 years old today and I finally feel like I got justice,” she said. “But it cannot bring back all that I have lost.”

She said she had endured years of slander and taunts from society because of what happened to her, and both her marriages ended in divorce when her husbands discovered her past.

Sushma is one of 16 victims – all schoolchildren or students – who were raped and blackmailed by a group of powerful men in different places in Ajmer city over several months in 1992. The case became a massive scandal and sparked huge protests.

Last week, the court handed out life sentences to six of the 18 accused: Nafis Chishty, Iqbal Bhat, Saleem Chishty, Sayed Jamir Hussain, Naseem – also known as Tarzan – and Suhail Ghani.

They have not confessed to the crime and their lawyers said they will appeal the verdict in a higher court.

So what happened to the remaining 12 accused?

Eight were sentenced to life in 1998, but four were acquitted by a higher court, and the others had their sentences reduced to 10 years.

Of the remaining four, one died by suicide. Another was sentenced to life in 2007 but was acquitted six years later. One was convicted in a related minor case but later acquitted, and one of the accused is still absconding.

“Can you even call this [the 20 August verdict] justice? A judgement is not justice,” said Santosh Gupta, a journalist who had written about the case and has appeared as a witness for the prosecution.

It is a thought echoed by Supreme Court lawyer Rebecca John, who called it yet another case of “justice delayed is justice denied”.

“This points to a problem that extends far beyond the legal system. Our patriarchal society is broken. What we need is a mindset change, but how long is that going to take?”

The accused men used their power and influence to deceive, threaten and lure their victims, said prosecution lawyer Virendra Singh Rathore.

They took compromising photographs and videos of their victims and used them to blackmail them into silence or bring in more victims, he added.

“In one instance, the accused invited a man they knew to a party and got him drunk. They took compromising photos of him and threatened to make them public if he didn’t bring his female friends to meet them,” he said. “That’s how they kept getting victims.”

The accused also had strong political and social connections. Some of them were associated with a famous dargah (Muslim religious shrine) in the city.

“They roamed around on bikes and cars in what was a small-town city at the time,” Mr Gupta said. “Some people were afraid of these men, some wanted to get closer to them and some wanted to be like them.”

He said that it was their power and connections that had helped keep the case under wraps for months. But there were people – like those working at the studio where the photos were developed and even some police officers – who were aware of what was going on.

One day, some of the photographs taken by the accused reached Mr Gupta. They had a chilling effect on him.

“Here were some of the city’s most powerful men committing heinous acts with innocent, young girls – and there was proof of it. But there was no major reaction from the police or the public,” he said.

He wrote a few reports about it but none managed to blow the case wide open.

Then one day, his paper “made a daring decision”, he said.

It published a photo that showed a young girl, naked to the waist, pressed between two men who were fondling her breasts. One of the men was smiling at the camera. Only the girl’s face was blurred.

The report sent shock waves through the city. The public was outraged and shut the city down in protest for days. Anger spread through Rajasthan like raging fire.

“Finally, there was some concrete action from the government. Police registered a case of rape and blackmail against the accused and it was handed over to the the state’s Criminal Investigation Department [CID],” Mr Rathore said.

Mr Rathore explained that the trial had dragged on for 32 years because of several factors, including the staggered arrests of the accused, alleged delaying tactics by the defence, an underfunded prosecution and systemic issues within the justice system.

When police filed the initial charges in 1992, six of the accused – who were only convicted last week – were left out because they were absconding.

Mr Rathore believes this was a mistake, as when the police finally filed charges against the six in 2002, they were still on the run. Two of them were arrested in 2003, another in 2005 and two more in 2012, while the last one was apprehended in 2018.

Every time one of the accused was arrested, the trial would begin afresh with the defence recalling victims and witnesses brought by the prosecution to give their testimonies.

“Under the law, the accused has the right to be present in court when witnesses are testifying and the defence has the right to cross-examine them,” explained Mr Rathore.

This put the victims in the horrifying position of having to relive their trauma over and over again.

Mr Rathore recalled how often the victims, who were now in their 40s and 50s, would scream at the judge, asking why there were being dragged to court, years after they had been raped.

As time passed, the police also found it challenging to track down witnesses.

“Many didn’t want to be associated with the case as their lives had moved on,” Mr Rathore said.

“Even now, one of the accused is absconding. If he is arrested, or if the other accused appeal against the verdict in a higher court, the victims and witnesses will be called to testify again.”

Sushma – who was one of three victims whose testimony played a key role in convicting the six accused – said that she had been talking to the media about her ordeal because she was telling the truth.

“I never changed my story. I was young and innocent when these people did this to me. It robbed me of everything. I have nothing to lose now,” she said.

The Māori king in New Zealand – Kiingi Tuheitia Pootatau Te Wherowhero VII – has died peacefully at age 69, surrounded by his wife and three children.

The Kiingitanga, or Māori king movement, announced the news on social media on Friday morning local time (Thursday evening GMT).

Spokesman Rahui Papa said the king had been in hospital recovering from heart surgery, just days after celebrating the 18th anniversary of his coronation.

“The death of Kiingi Tuheitia is a moment of great sadness for followers of Te Kiingitanga, Maaoridom and the entire nation,” the spokesman said. “A chief who has passed to the great beyond. Rest in love.”

The king was born Tūheitia Paki in 1955. He was crowned in 2006 following the death of his mother, Te Arikinui Dame Te Atairangikaahu.

Like his mother, King Tuheitia was seen as a great unifying figure – recently calling on Māori to stand together in the face of policies targeting them.

“Let’s keep pushing forward while we are currently facing a storm, there’s no need to worry. In this storm we are strong. Together. The wind in our sails is kotahitanga [unity], and with that we will reach our destination.”

King Tuheitia’s successor will be chosen by leaders within the Kiingitanga and may not be announced until the end of his funeral rites.

New Zealand media reported the king was expected to lie in state at Turangawaewae Marae, the seat of the Māori king, for five days, then would be taken to rest on Taupiri Mountain.

The Māori king position dates back to 1858, when Māori decided to create a unifying figure similar to that of a European monarch in order to try and prevent the widespread loss of land to New Zealand’s British colonisers and to preserve Māori culture. The role is largely ceremonial.

New Zealand’s Prime Minister Christopher Luxon paid tribute to the king on social media, saying: “His unwavering commitment to his people and his tireless efforts to uphold the values and traditions of the Kiingitanga have left an indelible mark on our nation.”

Former prime minister Dame Jacinda Ardern addressed King Tuheitia in her tribute, saying: “You have been an advocate for Māori, for fairness, justice and prosperity. You wanted children, young people, and those who have been left behind to have opportunities and hope”.

The Māori king attended King Charles III’s coronation in May 2023 and privately met the British monarch before the celebration.

The two also met during a visit by then-Prince Charles and his wife Camilla to New Zealand in 2015.

In a statement, King Charles said he and Queen Camilla were “profoundly saddened to learn of the death of Kiingi Tuheitia” and that he had had the “greatest pleasure” of knowing the king for decades.

“He was deeply committed to forging a strong future for Māori and Aotearoa New Zealand founded upon culture, traditions and healing, which he carried out with wisdom and compassion.”

“Kua hinga te tōtara i Te Waonui a Tāne. (A mighty Totora tree has fallen),” added King Charles in Māori, referring to a native New Zealand tree considered to be sacred and a symbol of strength.

In 2014, the king declined to meet Prince William and Princess Kate, the then-Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, on their tour to New Zealand because he said the 60 to 90 minutes allocated for the visit was not enough time to carry out the cultural customs befitting their status.

Workers who leave the head office to buy a cup of coffee are costing an Australian mining firm too much money, according to its boss.

Managing director of Mineral Resources Chris Ellison said during a financial results presentation on Wednesday he wants to “hold staff captive all day long”.

“I don’t want them leaving the building,” he said.

The head office in Perth has a restaurant, nine staff psychologists, a gym, and other facilities designed to encourage staff to stay in the office.

“We have a lot of different benefits that we have brought on,” said Mr Ellison, whose company has a strict “no work from home policy”.

“Why have I done that? Because when I get them first thing in the morning, I want to hold them captive all day long. I don’t want them leaving the building.

“I don’t want them walking down the road for a cup of coffee. We kind of figured out a few years ago how much that costs.”

He said the rest of the mining industry should “get on board” with his thinking on the benefits of working in the office rather than at home.

“The industry cannot afford it. We can’t have people working three days a week and picking up five days a week pay – or four days.”

The company culture at Mining Resources also extends to Mr Ellison’s views on parents, with the company building a day-care centre on site big enough for 105 children.

“Another reason for them to come in and enjoy work,” he said.

“Drop their little tykes off next door. We have doctors on board and nurses who are going to feed them, but mum and dad will be working in our office.”

Mr Ellison is not the only boss to enforce a no work from home policy.

Last week, the head of London-based smartphone maker Nothing sent an all-staff email to announce the end of hybrid working and a move to fully office-based work.

“I know this is a controversial decision that may not be a fit for everyone, and there are definitely companies out there that thrive in remote or hybrid setups,” he wrote in the email.

“But that’s not right for our type of business, and won’t help us fully realize our potential as a company.”

X, formerly known as Twitter, has said it expects to be blocked in Brazil after failing to meet a deadline to name a new legal representative for the company.

The social media network closed its office in the country earlier this month, saying its representative had been threatened with arrest if she did not comply with orders it described as “censorship”.

The months-long row began with Supreme Court Judge Alexandre de Moraes in April ordering the suspension of dozens of X accounts for allegedly spreading disinformation.

X owner Elon Musk has threatened to reactivate the accounts, and has described Justice Moraes as a “tyrant” and a “dictator”.

Justice Moraes gave X 24 hours to name a new legal representative or face suspension, with the deadline coming just after 20:00 local time (23:00 GMT) on Thursday.

A ban would be expected to take some 12 hours to come into force.

But in a post from one of its official accounts shortly after the deadline expired, X made clear that it had not complied with the order.

“Soon, we expect Judge Alexandre de Moraes will order X to be shut down in Brazil – simply because we would not comply with his illegal orders to censor his political opponents,” the post said.

“The fundamental issue at stake here is that Judge de Moraes demands we break Brazil’s own laws. We simply won’t do that.”

X said it would not comply “in secret with illegal orders”, adding that it would publish the judge’s demands in the coming days “in the interests of transparency”.

Justice Moraes had ordered that X accounts accused of spreading disinformation – many supporters of the former right-wing president Jair Bolsonaro – must be blocked while they are under investigation. He said the company’s legal representatives would be held liable if any accounts were reactivated.

Meanwhile, the bank accounts of Mr Musk’s satellite internet firm Starlink have been frozen in Brazil following an order by the country’s Supreme Court.

Starlink responded with a post on X which said the “order is based on an unfounded determination that Starlink should be responsible for the fines levied – unconstitutionally – against X.”

Mr Musk also said on X that “SpaceX and X are two completely different companies with different shareholders.”

Starlink is a subsidiary of Mr Musk’s rocket firm SpaceX.

Justice Moraes gained prominence after his decisions to restrict social media platforms in the country.

He is also investigating Mr Bolsonaro and his supporters for their roles in an alleged attempted coup on 8 January last year.

The former Strictly Come Dancing star Artem Chigvintsev has been arrested on suspicion of domestic violence in the US, according to jail records.

He was booked into Napa County jail in California on Thursday morning.

The 42-year-old Russian professional dancer joined series eight of Strictly in 2010, winning that year with celebrity partner Kara Tointon.

Since 2014 he has been appearing regularly on Dancing With The Stars, the US version of the show.

Online jail records say Mr Chigvintsev was arrested under section 273.5(a) of the California penal code – corporal injury to spouse.

The section covers traumatic injury to a current or former spouse, cohabitant or fellow parent in an act of domestic violence. The offence can be charged either as a misdemeanour or a felony, the latter allowing for a sentence of up to four years in jail.

It is not clear whether Mr Chigvintsev’s current wife is in any way involved.

In 2022 he married World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) star Nikki Bella, whom he met on Dancing With The Stars in 2017.

Ms Bella has since left wrestling and changed her name to Nikki Garcia.

The couple had recently celebrated their second wedding anniversary, and have a son together.

Festivities have begun for the wedding of Norwegian Princess Märtha Louise and her American partner, self-styled shaman Durek Verrett.

Hundreds of guests are arriving in the town of Alesund, in western Norway, for a “meet and greet” in a historic hotel.

On Friday, they will travel by sea to the scenic town of Geiranger, on the shores of a fjord designated a Unesco World Heritage Site. The wedding programme says that guests will enjoy a “light lunch on the boat while witnessing the majestic mountains and waterfalls”.

The couple will then tie the knot at a private event on Saturday.

Members of the Swedish royal family are said to be attending alongside various social media influencers and TV personalities, including US reality star and model Cynthia Bailey.

According to Norwegian media, guests have been asked not to use mobile phones or cameras during the celebrations and not to post anything on social media.

Princess Märtha Louise, 52, and Mr Verrett, 49, announced their engagement in 2022.

The princess – a former equestrian and the eldest of Norwegian King Harald’s two children – was previously married to the late writer and artist Ari Behn, with whom she had three daughters – Maud, Leah and Emma. The two divorced in 2017. Mr Behn, who had discussed suffering from depression, died on Christmas Day 2019.

Märtha Louise has long attracted controversy in Norway for decades for her involvement in alternative treatments. She lost her honorific “Her Royal Highness” title in 2002 so as to be allowed to start her own business. In 2007, she announced she was clairvoyant and, until 2018, ran a school which she said taught students to “create miracles” and talk to angels.

Last year, Märtha Louise told the BBC’s Katty Kay that there had been so much “turmoil” concerning her decision to take a different path than that of a “traditional royal”.

“There’s been a lot of criticism over the years, especially with me being spiritual – and in Norway, that’s taboo,” she said.

Meanwhile, Mr Verrett says on his site that he is a sixth generation shaman, “servant of god and energy activator” who “demystifies spirituality” through his “no-nonsense teachings”.

In an interview with Vanity Fair magazine, he claimed to have risen from the dead and said that when he was a child a relative had predicted he would one day marry the princess of Norway.

Princess Märtha Louise announced her relationship with Mr Verrett with an Instagram post in 2019. Perhaps hoping to pre-empt potential criticism, she wrote: “To those of you who feel the need to criticise: Hold your horses. It is not up to you to choose for me or to judge me. Shaman Durek is merely a man I love spending my time with and who fulfils me.”

However, many Norwegians have not yet fully accepted Mr Verrett. “They think he has said very strange things and there are many cultural differences,” said royal correspondent for Norway’s NRK TV Kristi Marie Skrede. ”Many people here are very critical of what Mr Verrett says and does in his role as a shaman.”

Despite the couple’s spiritual beliefs, this weekend’s wedding ceremony will follow a more traditional canon, with Parish Priest Margit Lovise Holte officiating according to the Norwegian Church’s wedding liturgy.

When the engagement was first announced, Norway’s state broadcaster NRK reported Mr Verrett would move to Norway and join the royal family without holding a title. He and Märtha Louise have now reportedly bought a house in Norway.

In 2022, the Norwegian palace announced Märtha Louise would “relinquish her patronage role” as she and Mr Verrett sought to “distinguish more clearly between their activities and the Royal House of Norway” and to “prevent misunderstandings regarding the Royal House”.

It added that King Harald had decided she would keep her title but that the princess would not use it in her commercial endeavours.

At the time, King Harald told Norwegian reporters that Mr Verrett was “a great guy” and that the two of them “laughed a lot, even in this difficult time. I think both we and he have gained a greater understanding of what this is about, and we’ve agreed to disagree.”

However, over the summer Märtha Louise came under fire after her name and royal title appeared on the label of a commemorative wedding gin created to mark her nuptials.

Ms Skrede said many Norwegians are “tired of this behaviour”, which some feel shows the princess “disrespects” her father. Beloved King Harald, 88, ascended to the throne in 1991 and is one of Europe’s longest-serving monarchs. In April, plans were announced to reduce his public engagements “out of consideration for his age”.

Locals are also upset that Norwegian media is excluded from covering the wedding as the couple has signed deals with Hello! magazine for exclusive coverage. “This means the public won’t know or see anything about it unless they buy the magazine,” Ms Skrede said.

On Wednesday, it was also revealed that the couple has been working with Netflix for a year on what the streaming giant called an “in-depth and moving documentary” on their relationship.

“We’re going more global and there’s nothing more powerful than the love that fuels us,” Mr Verrett wrote on Instagram.

Princess Märtha Louise is King Harald’s eldest child and fourth in line to the throne. Her younger brother, Crown Prince Haakon, will succeed his father as king.

The CIA says the suspects in the foiled plot to attack a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna wanted to kill “a huge number” of people at the event.

The intelligence provided by the agency to Austrian authorities allowed them to disrupt the plot and save “hundreds of lives” , CIA’s deputy director David Cohen said on Wednesday.

Mr Cohen highlighted that there were “tens of thousands of people at this concert, I am sure many Americans”. He added that the suspects’ plans were “advanced”.

Three male teenage suspects were arrested in connection with the foiled attacks, allegedly inspired by the Islamic State group.

Speaking at an annual intelligence summit outside Washington, DC, Mr Cohen said the day of the arrests was a “good day for Langley”, referring to the CIA headquarters. “And not just for Swifties in the office.”

“The Austrians were able to make those arrests because the agency and our partners in the intelligence community provided them information about what this ISIS-connected group was planning to do,” Mr Cohen said.

He did not disclose how his agency had learned about the plot.

Some 200,000 people had been expected to attend one of Swift’s three Vienna concerts, part of the European swing of her multi-continent Eras tour.

On 7 August, the day before the first show, concert organisers announced the shows would be scrapped after a warning about a “planned terrorist attack” from government officials.

• Taylor Swift says she felt ‘fear’ over Vienna attack threat
• Two held in Vienna over Taylor Swift concert threat
• Defiant Swifties take to streets after Vienna plot

Earlier that day, Austrian authorities arrested two of the suspects. The third was arrested two days later.

Authorities said the main suspect, a 19-year-old Austrian citizen, had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State and had focused on the Eras tour as a target.

He hoped to “kill as many people as possible”, authorities said.

Last week, for the first time, Swift commented publicly on the planned attack, writing on Instagram that having to cancel the Vienna shows was “devastating”.

“The reason for the cancellations filled me with a new sense of fear, and a tremendous amount of guilt because so many people had planned on coming to those shows,” she wrote. “But I was also so grateful to the authorities because thanks to them, we were grieving concerts and not lives.”

Swift performed eight concerts at Wembley this summer, overtaking a record for any solo singer, which was previously set by Michael Jackson in 1988.

Her next show as part of The Eras Tour is scheduled for 18 October in Miami, Florida.

“My heart is filled with so much pain. Even today, I cry when I think about how that one encounter destroyed my life.”

The year was 1992. Sushma* said she was 18 when a man she knew took her to an abandoned warehouse under the pretext of watching video tapes. There, six to seven men tied her up, raped her and took photographs of the act.

The men belonged to rich, influential families in Ajmer, a city in the western Indian state of Rajasthan.

“After they raped me, one of them gave me 200 rupees [$2; £1] to buy lipstick. I didn’t take the money,” she said.

Last week, 32 years later, Sushma saw a court convict her rapists and sentence them to life imprisonment.

“I am 50 years old today and I finally feel like I got justice,” she said. “But it cannot bring back all that I have lost.”

She said she had endured years of slander and taunts from society because of what happened to her, and both her marriages ended in divorce when her husbands discovered her past.

Sushma is one of 16 victims – all schoolchildren or students – who were raped and blackmailed by a group of powerful men in different places in Ajmer city over several months in 1992. The case became a massive scandal and sparked huge protests.

Last week, the court handed out life sentences to six of the 18 accused: Nafis Chishty, Iqbal Bhat, Saleem Chishty, Sayed Jamir Hussain, Naseem – also known as Tarzan – and Suhail Ghani.

They have not confessed to the crime and their lawyers said they will appeal the verdict in a higher court.

So what happened to the remaining 12 accused?

Eight were sentenced to life in 1998, but four were acquitted by a higher court, and the others had their sentences reduced to 10 years.

Of the remaining four, one died by suicide. Another was sentenced to life in 2007 but was acquitted six years later. One was convicted in a related minor case but later acquitted, and one of the accused is still absconding.

“Can you even call this [the 20 August verdict] justice? A judgement is not justice,” said Santosh Gupta, a journalist who had written about the case and has appeared as a witness for the prosecution.

It is a thought echoed by Supreme Court lawyer Rebecca John, who called it yet another case of “justice delayed is justice denied”.

“This points to a problem that extends far beyond the legal system. Our patriarchal society is broken. What we need is a mindset change, but how long is that going to take?”

The accused men used their power and influence to deceive, threaten and lure their victims, said prosecution lawyer Virendra Singh Rathore.

They took compromising photographs and videos of their victims and used them to blackmail them into silence or bring in more victims, he added.

“In one instance, the accused invited a man they knew to a party and got him drunk. They took compromising photos of him and threatened to make them public if he didn’t bring his female friends to meet them,” he said. “That’s how they kept getting victims.”

The accused also had strong political and social connections. Some of them were associated with a famous dargah (Muslim religious shrine) in the city.

“They roamed around on bikes and cars in what was a small-town city at the time,” Mr Gupta said. “Some people were afraid of these men, some wanted to get closer to them and some wanted to be like them.”

He said that it was their power and connections that had helped keep the case under wraps for months. But there were people – like those working at the studio where the photos were developed and even some police officers – who were aware of what was going on.

One day, some of the photographs taken by the accused reached Mr Gupta. They had a chilling effect on him.

“Here were some of the city’s most powerful men committing heinous acts with innocent, young girls – and there was proof of it. But there was no major reaction from the police or the public,” he said.

He wrote a few reports about it but none managed to blow the case wide open.

Then one day, his paper “made a daring decision”, he said.

It published a photo that showed a young girl, naked to the waist, pressed between two men who were fondling her breasts. One of the men was smiling at the camera. Only the girl’s face was blurred.

The report sent shock waves through the city. The public was outraged and shut the city down in protest for days. Anger spread through Rajasthan like raging fire.

“Finally, there was some concrete action from the government. Police registered a case of rape and blackmail against the accused and it was handed over to the the state’s Criminal Investigation Department [CID],” Mr Rathore said.

Mr Rathore explained that the trial had dragged on for 32 years because of several factors, including the staggered arrests of the accused, alleged delaying tactics by the defence, an underfunded prosecution and systemic issues within the justice system.

When police filed the initial charges in 1992, six of the accused – who were only convicted last week – were left out because they were absconding.

Mr Rathore believes this was a mistake, as when the police finally filed charges against the six in 2002, they were still on the run. Two of them were arrested in 2003, another in 2005 and two more in 2012, while the last one was apprehended in 2018.

Every time one of the accused was arrested, the trial would begin afresh with the defence recalling victims and witnesses brought by the prosecution to give their testimonies.

“Under the law, the accused has the right to be present in court when witnesses are testifying and the defence has the right to cross-examine them,” explained Mr Rathore.

This put the victims in the horrifying position of having to relive their trauma over and over again.

Mr Rathore recalled how often the victims, who were now in their 40s and 50s, would scream at the judge, asking why there were being dragged to court, years after they had been raped.

As time passed, the police also found it challenging to track down witnesses.

“Many didn’t want to be associated with the case as their lives had moved on,” Mr Rathore said.

“Even now, one of the accused is absconding. If he is arrested, or if the other accused appeal against the verdict in a higher court, the victims and witnesses will be called to testify again.”

Sushma – who was one of three victims whose testimony played a key role in convicting the six accused – said that she had been talking to the media about her ordeal because she was telling the truth.

“I never changed my story. I was young and innocent when these people did this to me. It robbed me of everything. I have nothing to lose now,” she said.

One of the worst droughts in living memory is sweeping across southern Africa, leaving close to 70 million people without enough food and water.

In Mudzi district in northern Zimbabwe, a community and their livestock are gathered on a bone-dry riverbed. The Vombozi normally flows throughout the year but right now, it is just beige sand as far as the eye can see.

Armed with shovels and buckets, the men are digging into the river floor, desperately trying to extract the last drops of water from it.

Rivers and dams have dried up in other parts of the district and as a result more and more people are descending on this specific riverbed in Kurima village, putting pressure on the water source.

Along the riverbed are several holes, large enough to fit a single bucket.

Children are bathing, women are doing laundry and giving their bellowing cattle drinks of water.

Gracious Phiri, a mother of five, stands among these women. The 43-year-old tells the BBC she now has to walk further than usual, spending three hours every day travelling to fetch water.

Ms Phiri lowers her bucket into the half-metre (19in) wide hole and draws brown-coloured water. She worries about her family getting sick.

“As you can see, the cattle are drinking from the same pit as us. Their urine is right there… it is not very healthy,” she says.

“I have never seen anything like this.”

Food is also in short supply in Zimbabwe where 7.7 million people face hunger. In Mudzi the number of families who have access to a sufficient amount of affordable, nutritious food has dropped by more than half compared to previous years, the local health authority says.

Children have been particularly impacted – since June hospital admissions for youngsters with moderate to severe malnutrition have doubled.

A village feeding programme is trying to tackle the problem. Once a week women in the community gather, bringing whatever produce they have in order to contribute to a porridge for under fives.

Ground baobab fruit, peanut butter, milk and leafy green vegetables are stirred into the porridge to add extra nutrients.

But the list of ingredients shrinks every week – cow-peas and beans recently became unavailable because of the poor harvests.

The government, with the support of partners like the UN children’s agency, Unicef, devised the village feeding scheme and it used to run at least three times a week.

“But because of the El Niño drought we are now only giving it once a week,” explains Kudzai Madamombe, Mudzi district’s medical officer.

“Because the rains didn’t come, we suffered a 100% loss in terms of all the crop,” he adds, saying the programme might be forced to stop altogether in the next month as food stocks dwindle.

Clinics providing Zimbabweans in Mudzi with vital healthcare have also been affected – boreholes that supply a quarter of clinics in the district with water have run dry, Mr Madamombe says.

And the major dam in the district has only a month’s supply of water left.

As a result vegetable irrigation schemes, including one which supported 200 local farmers, have been suspended.

The misery is everywhere. Tambudzai Mahachi, 36, says she planted acres of maize, cow-peas and peanuts on her plot.

For all her hard work, she got nothing at all, not even a plate of food. Even her hardy baobab tree produced hardly any fruit.

In a good year Ms Mahachi says she would normally supply markets in the capital, Harare, but she is now among the millions of Zimbabweans relying on handouts.

While the village feeding scheme provides food one day of the week, her children need to eat every day.

Seated in a thatched hut, she boils wheat so she can provide her two children with breakfast. The wheat was supplied by a charitable neighbour.

“We have gone from eating what we want and when we want to limiting meals,” Ms Mahachi says.

“The older girl understands that we sometimes can only have porridge. But at times I can see that my youngest is hungry.”

The rains failed in most of southern Africa this year, on a continent where most of the agriculture relies on rainfall, rather than irrigation, for water.

The drought has prompted about a third of the countries in southern African to declare a state of disaster. A massive 68 million people across the region need food aid.

The Southern African Development Community (Sadc) – a grouping of countries in the region – appealed for $5.5bn (£4bn) in aid to combat the effects of drought in May. So far, only a tiny fraction has been received.

“If you go anywhere in southern Africa, family granaries are empty, and maize, which is the region’s most consumed in terms of carbohydrates, is now priced out of many people’s hands,” Tomson Phiri, southern African spokesperson for the UN World Food Programme (WFP), tells the BBC.

“The situation is only going to get worse.”

The WFP has only received one fifth of the $400m its needs for emergency assistance, he says, adding that southern Africa is experiencing its largest deficit in maize in 15 years.

And the hunger and water crisis is yet to peak – October, the hottest and driest month of the year, is still a long way off.

If rain falls in November or December, which is when the rainy season typically starts, farmers will have to wait until March to harvest maize.

It is something Ms Mahachi is acutely aware of as she cracks open some wild fruit to stave off her hunger pangs, unsure about what lies ahead in the coming months for her young family.

• What is El Niño and how does it change the weather?
• Zimbabwe’s cholera crisis fuelled by chronic water shortages
• Ice becomes a hot commodity as temperatures soar in Mali
• How a Kenyan farmer became a champion of climate change denial

There’s something missing from Gary Oldman’s trophy cabinet.

One of the most decorated actors of his generation, he won a best actor Oscar, Bafta and Golden Globe for playing Sir Winston Churchill in Darkest Hour, plus two Baftas for Nil by Mouth, which he wrote and directed.

Next month he could pick up his first Emmy award, for his role as Jackson Lamb in Slow Horses, a man who spends a lot more time insulting his MI5 colleagues than he does on his personal hygiene.

However, unlike those acting knights of the realm, such as Sir Anthony Hopkins, Sir Daniel Day Lewis and Sir Kenneth Branagh, he says that he has been completely overlooked by the honours system.

“I don’t know why. You should ask them. No nod from the royals, but there we are” he told the BBC.

In recent years, Oscar wins in major categories have tended to be quickly followed up with royal recognition.

Mark Rylance was knighted the year after he won best supporting actor for Bridge of Spies, while Olivia Colman, Colin Firth and Eddie Redmayne were all honoured in the months following their triumphs.

In fact, Oldman is the only British winner of best actor or best actress this century not to be the recipient of some kind of honour, but he strongly refutes any suggestion that he has turned one down, by repeating “no” four times in succession.

“Maybe it’s in my future,” he adds wistfully.

Oldman has not exactly been short of plaudits during a career lasting more than 40 years, in which he has played Sid Vicious, Lee Harvey Oswald, Dracula, Gotham City’s police commissioner Jim Gordon and even made a cameo as President Truman in Oppenheimer.

But for the first time in his career, he is part of what is becoming a long-running TV show. Apple TV+’s Slow Horses is about to start its fourth series and is a real genuine word of mouth hit.

Speaking down the line from Palm Springs, where he now lives, Gary Oldman shares how he describes the show to people who have yet to see it: “The sort of slightly shady, dirty side of espionage. It’s your PG Tips, Tescos version of it I guess.”

Slow Horses focuses on the agents who have been discarded or are in trouble with the British Secret Service, and have been left to rot at Slough House, an establishment run by Oldman’s Jackson Lamb, a character so shabby and dishevelled, that the actor has given a lot of thought to how he smells.

“He’s a whisky drinker, so obviously, that’s sort of coming out of the pores.

“It’s that stale booze and cigarettes and some B.O., a bit of underarm thrown in.”

Lamb’s trademark move is breaking wind. A lot of discussion goes into how many farts he should have each series, and what they should sound like. Season five does get off to a windy start.

“These are the conversations and email exchanges that you have with the director,” Oldman laughs.

“You know: ‘This one is on a leather chair, so it should be more robust’. We have these ridiculous conversations about the frequency.”

With chat like this, surely the knighthood is now secured.

Slow Horses is often described as the “anti-Bond” and Gary Oldman could have had an 007 past of his own. He turned down the chance to be a Bond baddie in the pre-Daniel Craig era.

“I was asked quite a few years ago,” he confirms, although claims to have forgotten which film it was.

“The Bond villain didn’t ring with me,” he says without a hint of regret.

His Slow Horses co-star Jack Lowden, agent River Cartwright in the series, is one of the names which gets mentioned during discussions on who could be the next James Bond, and Oldman has an idea.

“I’d like to see a sort of prequel with him (Bond) in the Navy or something and becoming 007.”

It is clear he has given this a lot of prior thought.

“Jack’s probably a little young at the minute, but he could be a young Bond coming up through the ranks.”

One hugely successful British film series in which Oldman did star was Harry Potter, playing Sirius Black, and there is something he would like to clear up.

“I know fans got terribly upset saying: ‘Oh he couldn’t be bothered’ and ‘he didn’t read the books’. That’s not true.”

The point which Oldman wants to clarify, is that when he started filming his role, JK Rowling was still finishing off the books, and everything was “shrouded in such secrecy that you could only read the current book and you could never know what the next chapter and the next episode would be.

“If I had been able to read the books, I may have seen that arc and I would have known where Sirius Black was heading.

“I would have maybe approached the character a little differently, but there were no more books.”

“So I have hopefully put that to bed,” he says with a flourish of which Sirius Black himself would have been proud.

It should be pointed out that Slow Horses is based on a series of books by Mick Herron and Oldman has read all eight.

Starring in a long-running TV series may be a new experience for Oldman, but it is not for another member of his family.

His big sister, Laila Morse made her acting debut at the age of 51, in the only film Oldman has ever directed, Nil by Mouth.

Since then, for almost a quarter of a century, Morse has, on and off, played Big Mo in EastEnders, returning to Albert Square once again this May.

Oldman is adamant that his sister has no problems with him now treading on her small screen turf: “She took a break and is back. I don’t see the show,” he admits, before adding with a laugh: “But then Mo doesn’t really look at my stuff either. I don’t think she’s running out to see Oppenheimer.”

Sadly, the idea of Oldman making a cameo on EastEnders holds no appeal to him.

“I don’t think that’ll be on the cards,” he flat bats, before continuing:

“But, we’re happy. She’s got the Square, and I’ve got Slough House, so we’re quite happy where we are.”

And with that there is just time for Gary Oldman to say that series five of Slow Horses has already been filmed and as for the future, he is “in it for the long run” if they want him.

Slow Horses seems set to bring him more honours, just perhaps not of the royal variety.

A selection of the week’s best photos from across the African continent and beyond:

• Why South Africans are flocking to a Chinese hospital ship
• World’s police in tech arms race with Nigerian mafia
• ‘I found out on social media that my son had died’

A blogger who attracted a following on Instagram and TikTok by documenting daily life in Gaza has been killed in a strike.

Mohammad ‘Medo’ Halimy, 20, was hit by shrapnel from a nearby blast caused by an Israeli missile in Khan Younis on Monday, according to two youth organisations he had previously worked with.

The Tamer Institute for Community Education told the BBC that Halimy was in an area near the beach where displaced people have sheltered when he was fatally struck.

The IDF told the BBC it could not confirm a strike took place in Khan Younis on Monday, but said it was continuing to “counter threats while persisting to mitigate harm to civilians” in Gaza.

Halimy built up a social media audience after his family were forced to flee their home when Israel began its military operation in Gaza in the wake of the 7 October attacks.

More than 250,000 people followed him on Instagram and TikTok after he began posting videos detailing his life as one of Gaza’s displaced citizens in Rafah and Khan Younis.

Halimy’s videos ranged from simple cooking recipes he had created with limited supplies and appliances, to walkthrough videos of how he made his content. In an interview last year, he said every clip he posted to social media cost him about $3 – a large sum in Gaza.

He posted his final video on Monday, hours before he was killed, in which he showed the tent he was living in and detailed what he had done that day.

Both Palestinian organisations which confirmed his death to the BBC said the fatal strike happened in a nearby street and Halimy was injured by flying debris. He died the following day.

Spark, a Gaza-based charity with which Halimy had worked in the summer of 2023, confirmed his death to the BBC and praised his “ability to add beauty and splendour to a place wherever it is” in a post online.

“Muhammad, your kind spirit will remain with us, and we believe you deserve a better world,” it added.

“May God have mercy on you, my beloved,” his sister Rahaf wrote in a post on Instagram announcing his death. “May God accept you as a martyr.”

Earlier this year, Halimy told NBC News he hoped his content would help “to show the world what our life really looks like”.

“I’m showing that us Palestinians are very resilient,” he told the US broadcaster.

“We’re going to survive and live no matter what happens, in whatever circumstances. We can’t be defeated. We’re very strong people, and we’re going to live no matter what.”

Israel launched a military campaign in Gaza in response to an unprecedented attack on southern Israel on 7 October by Hamas, during which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 taken hostage.

More than 40,530 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry, which does not distinguish civilian and combatant deaths. The UN human rights office says most of those killed were women and children.

US, Egyptian and Qatari mediators are trying to broker a ceasefire deal that would see Hamas release the 104 hostages still being held, including 34 who are presumed dead, in exchange for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails.

Indirect talks have continued in Cairo in recent days, but so far there has been no sign of a breakthrough over key sticking points. They include Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s demand that Israel keep troops along Gaza’s border with Egypt, which Hamas and Egypt have rejected.

Afghanistan’s Taliban government has banned mixed martial arts (MMA), saying it is incompatibile with Islamic law.

An official from the Taliban’s sports authority, speaking to local broadcaster TOLOnews on Tuesday, said that MMA was too violent and posed a risk of death.

The order was passed down by Afghanistan’s morality police in the Taliban’s Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice.

It comes after an investigation into the sport’s compliance with Islamic law, or Sharia.

“It was found that the sport is problematic with respect to Sharia and it has many aspects which are contradictory to the teachings of Islam,” the Taliban’s General Directorate on Physical Education and Sport said in a statement sent to the AFP news agency.

“That’s why this decision has been made.”

MMA is a popular sport among young people in Afghanistan, and garnered a passionate local fan base in the two decades leading up to the Taliban’s return to power in 2021.

The Mixed Martial Arts Federation was founded in 2008, while the Afghanistan Fighting Championship (AFC) and Truly Grand Fighting Championship (TGFC) held dozens of fights.

Although it does not seem to have been specifically named in official decrees, MMA has been under severe pressure ever since the Taliban took over.

Competitions were effectively outlawed in 2021 when the Taliban introduced legislation prohibiting “face-punching”.

Some fighters also complained of threats and harassment from Taliban officials, according to interviews published in MMA publications.

Yet the authorities did appear to soften their stance on some occasions.

In 2022, leading fighter Ahmad Wali Hotak was able to hold a press conference in the capital Kabul to announce an upcoming fight, which he won in Russia.

On his return to Afghanistan, he was met by government figures who posed for photographs.

Most competitors, however, had long left the country before this latest announcement.

MMA has not yet been recognised by the International Olympic Committee, primarily due to safety concerns.

Four of the 11 Afghan who competed in sports at the Paris Games, on either the national or the Refugee Olympic teams, were originally martial arts athletes.

An incident which saw two women lock a crying toddler in an aeroplane toilet has sparked an online debate in China on how to manage children in public spaces.

The incident went viral on the Chinese internet after one of the two women, Gou Tingting, posted a video of herself carrying the girl inside the cubicle.

In her post, she presented herself as trying to help others on board, but was swiftly met with backlash.

The airline later said that the girl’s grandmother had given the two women permission to “educate her”.

The incident took place on 24 August onboard a Juneyao Airlines flight from the southwestern city of Guiyang to Shanghai.

The toddler, who was travelling with her grandmother, had started crying during the flight.

The airline said in a statement two days after the incident that the girl’s grandmother had agreed to let two women take the girl to the toilet.

A video posted by Ms Gou on Chinese social media reportedly showed the other woman telling the girl she could leave the cubicle only if she stopped crying.

Local media reports say she was a one-year-old, though the airline has not given that detail.

Shortly after she posted the video, backlash was swift, with many criticising Ms Gou for lacking empathy and “bullying” the child.

Responding to the criticism, Ms Gou said she “prefers to take action rather than be a bystander”.

“I just wanted to calm the child down and let everyone rest,” she wrote on Douyin, China’s equivalent of TikTok.

She also explained that some passengers had “moved to the back of the plane to escape the noise” while others stuffed tissue papers into their ears.

Ms Gou’s account has since been set to private.

“Children cannot control their emotions when they are one or two years old. What’s wrong with crying? Didn’t you cry when you were young too?” one user wrote on Weibo.

Another was concerned about the psychological impact on the girl, saying: “We should be thinking about how public spaces can better accept and accommodate young children.”

But there were some who defended the women, saying their actions were justified as the girl’s grandmother had given her consent.

“To be honest, some children cannot do without some education,” a Weibo user wrote.

There has been growing debate over how to manage what China calls “bear children” – spoilt young kids who kick up a fuss in public spaces such as by screaming or damaging public property.

The use of the word “bear” in this instance suggests some people in China think some children can act in a feral way.

Some public trains have started operating separate compartments for children.

There are mixed views on this elsewhere in the world. South Korea, for example, has designated hundreds of children-free zones in restaurants, museums and theatres.

Lawmakers have called on the government to get rid of these zones, citing the need to recreate a society which are more accepting of children – especially as the country is wrestling with a low birth rate.

Global airlines, including Turkish-Dutch carrier Corendon Airlines and Singapore-based Scoot, offer the option for passengers to pay more to be seated in a child-free zone.

Passengers on a round-the-world cruise have been left stranded in Belfast for three months after their voyage was beset by delays.

Villa Vie Residences’ Odyssey arrived at Queen’s Island in the Northern Ireland capital to be outfitted before it was scheduled to leave on 30 May for the first leg of a three-year cruise.

But the ship has still not left yet thanks to problems with its rudders and gearbox.

Florida resident Holly Hennessey is among those on board to have “hunkered down” and made the city their unexpected home.

Travelling with her cat, Captain, has meant the self-proclaimed “cruise addict” has been unable to leave Belfast while waiting for the ship to be ready.

Passengers are allowed to spend time on the ship during the day, but must disembark in the evenings.

“We can spend all day aboard the ship, and they provide shuttle buses to get on and off,” Ms Hennessey said.

“We can have all of our meals and they even have movies and trivia entertainment, almost like cruising except we’re at the dock.”

Despite enjoying the sights, the damp weather has been a shock for the US native.

“I’ve never had so much use for my umbrella in my life, and I carry my raincoat everywhere I go.”

Passengers on the cruise were given the option of buying their cabin outright rather than paying a daily rate for their room like a traditional hotel.

It allows them to remain onboard beyond the Villa Vie Residences’ Odyssey’s initial three-year tour.

“I want to stay just as long as I am able,” she said. “I have always wanted to live on a ship, and it will be a dream come true for me.”

Villa Vie Residences’ website states that the cost of buying a cabin can range from $99,999 to $899,000.

Ms Hennessey’s cabin has space for a double bed, small living area with room for the cat and a balcony.

“Villa Vie is a community and a real community has pets,” she said.

The company says they are trying to do everything they can to “relieve the anxiety” of passengers by planning trips and other cruises or putting them up in hotels.

Angela and Stephen Theriac lived in Nicaragua and have made the most of their wait.

Since May they have travelled by train around Spain, taken weekend trips to England, and visited Greenland.

“We are travellers, and we want to make the most of the place we are in,” said Ms Theriac.

“We keep teasing we will apply for residency here in Belfast.”

Her husband Stephen says they have settled in with the locals.

“We have eaten in every restaurant and had a Guinness in every pub,” he said.

“It is just all part of our adventure.”

Dr David Austin, from Georgia in the United States, says he has “stopped counting down” the days until the ship launches.

“The payoff of seeing the world in this fashion is too great to feel too disappointed with each delay announcement,” he said.

“I was committed, having sold my house right before my arrival, and I’ve stayed committed to this adventure with every delay.”

CEO Mike Petterson said that he expects the ship to launch by the end of next week.

“We’re not focused on the next days or weeks, we are focused on the rest of our lives and what this company will do for the residents and the industry,” he said.

Mr Petterson explained that Villa Vie Residences’ Odyssey is the first “affordable” residential cruise ship.

“When you’re the first at doing something, you will run into hiccups, but we’re definitely getting there, and although we are late, we will launch,” he added.

Swedish pop superstars Abba have complained after their hits like The Winner Takes it All were played at one of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign rallies.

The group’s songs and videos, also including Money, Money, Money and Dancing Queen, were also played at the event in Minnesota in July, according to Swedish newspaper Svenska Dagbladet.

In a statement to the Reuters news agency, the band’s record label Universal Music said: “Together with the members of Abba, we have discovered that videos have been released where Abba’s music has been used at Trump events, and we have therefore requested that such use be immediately removed and taken down.”

The label said no permission or licence had been granted to Mr Trump’s campaign.

Abba are the latest in a long list of artists or their estates who have objected to Mr Trump using their music to promote his presidential campaign.

This week, Foo Fighters took to social media to say they hadn’t granted permission for My Hero to be used at a Trump rally. The Trump campaign said they had permission to use the song, according to The Independent.

A spokesperson for the band told the publication that any royalties received from the Trump campaign using the song would be donated to Kamala Harris’s campaign.

Last month, Celine Dion‘s team condemned the “unauthorised” use of a clip of My Heart Will Go On, and the family of late soul singer Isaac Hayes ordered Mr Trump to stop playing Hold On, I’m Coming and demanded $3m (£2.4m) in licensing fees.

In March, the estate of Sinéad O’Connor demanded he stop playing Nothing Compares 2 U, saying she would have been “disgusted, hurt, and insulted”.

Previously, Adele, REM and the Rolling Stones are among the big names who have demanded he doesn’t use their songs.

However, musicians have only had limited success in stopping politicians from using their music.

In the US, campaigns are required to obtain a Political Entities Licence from music rights body BMI, which gives them access to more than 20 million tracks for use in their rallies.

Artists and publishers can ask for their music to be withdrawn from the list, but it seems that organisers rarely check the database to ensure they have clearance.

Allegations. Resignations. Police complaints.

These words have been dominating headlines and shaking up a bustling film industry in the southern Indian state of Kerala since last week.

The state has been witnessing a flurry of sexual abuse allegations against some top male stars since a landmark report that looked into problems faced by women in the industry was released last week.

The industry, which makes around 150-200 Malayalam-language films a year, is a vital, vibrant business that has made some of the most critically acclaimed and progressive cinema emerging from India.

But the 290-page report by a three-member panel – called the Hema committee – detailed the problems faced by women in Malayalam cinema, including poor working conditions and rampant sexual harassment. Parts of the report have been redacted to hide the identities of the survivors as well as those accused of harassment.

• The Hema committee report slams Kerala’s film industry

Since its release, a number of women – some of whom have now given up acting – have publicly spoken about facing sexual assault and harassment in the industry.

More than a dozen police complaints have been filed against some male stars, two of whom have also filed counter-complaints.

The shake-up has been so huge that the entire top governing body of the state’s biggest film group – the Association of Malayalam Movie Artists (AMMA) – was dissolved after its president, superstar Mohanlal, resigned on “moral grounds” after some members faced accusations.

“This is just the tip of the iceberg. Only a few have spoken up till now. More serious issues may emerge,’’ actor Mala Parvathy told BBC Hindi.

The reactions to the first-of-its-kind report are being closely watched by people in India’s many film industries, including Bollywood. During the #MeToo movement, several women had made sexual harassment allegations against actors and filmmakers in different states but few of these have been investigated.

• Indian actress breaks silence on sexual assault

The government set up the Hema committee, headed by a former judge of the Kerala High Court, in 2017 in the aftermath of the shocking sexual assault on a leading actress. One of Kerala’s biggest actors, Dileep, was named by police as an accused and charged with criminal conspiracy. He has denied the charges, but was arrested and held in custody for three months before being released on bail. The case is still being heard in court.

After the release of the report, the first public allegation came from Bengali actress Sreelekha Mitra, who accused well-known director Ranjith of sexually harassing her a few years ago. He has denied this but resigned as chairman of the state’s prestigious motion picture academy. Mitra has filed a police complaint.

Many of the other complaints echo some of the revelations made by unnamed women in the Hema committee report that they were repeatedly asked to “compromise” and “adjust” in exchange for opportunities.

Minu Muneer told BBC Hindi as well as several other news channels that an actor had hugged and kissed her without her consent while they were shooting a film. She has also detailed instances of sexual misconduct by others in the industry, including prominent actor and lawmaker Mukesh.

Mukesh has denied the allegations against him and accused Muneer of trying to blackmail him.

“I welcome any investigation into allegations made against me and others in the film industry,” he wrote in a Facebook post.

Two actresses have accused a director of knocking on the doors of their hotel rooms in the middle of the night. He has not responded to the allegation.

One actress has accused well-known actor Siddique of raping her in 2016 and filed a police complaint against him. Siddique, who resigned as AMMA general secretary after the accusation, has denied this and accused the complainant of trying to “tarnish his reputation”.

While the Kerala government had been praised for being the first to set up such a committee, the report’s release has also put it on the back foot.

The report, which was submitted in 2019, was released only last week after nearly five years of delay and multiple legal challenges by members of the film industry. The government then said that while it would investigate all complaints filed before the police, it would not take up any cases on its own. But as pressure mounted, it has set up a special team to investigate complaints.

The Kerala High Court has also asked the government to submit the entire report – including the 54 redacted pages – to it.

Within the Malayalam film industry, reactions to the report have been mixed. Superstars such as Mohanlal and Mammotty have been criticised for not making a public comment yet.

Some actors have welcomed the release of the report and called for the government to launch a proper investigation into the allegations. A prominent film employees’ federation has asked the government to disclose the names of those accused in the report.

Others have lamented that the report is being used to brand all men in the industry as abusers.

But many have also argued that the report and the subsequent shake-up are positive, much-needed changes in an industry often celebrated for making progressive films.

“I am not ok with people saying, ‘Malayalam industry is so rotten inside’. No, we are good inside, which is why we are fixing it,” actress Parvathy Thiruvothu, a founding member of the Women in Cinema Collective, an organisation formed in the aftermath of the 2017 assault, told a news channel.

It was the industries “you don’t hear anything about” that people should be “worried about”, she added.

A postcard which was delivered 121 years after it was posted has reunited long-lost family members who recognised their relatives.

The card, written by a boy called Ewart to his sister Lydia, was delivered this month to Swansea Building Society’s Cradock Street branch, despite having been sent in 1903.

After seeing the story, two families came forward and discovered they were related.

Ewart’s grandson said: “It’s like a family reunion, where the only connection you have is a common ancestor dating back to over a 100 years ago.”

Nick Davies, 65, from West Sussex, is Ewart’s grandson and said meeting new family members following the card was “extraordinary”.

Mr Davies said Ewart would have been 13, “just a schoolboy spending the summer holidays at his grandfather’s house in Fishguard.”

He said: “It seems that his eldest sister Lydia collected postcards, and this postcard that miraculously appeared last week was one that he had sent back home to Swansea.”

Ewart wrote: “I could not, it was impossible to get the pair of these, I am so sorry, but I hope you are enjoying yourself at home.”

Mr Davies said he believed his grandfather was talking about a pair of postcards.

Ewart added he had about 10 shillings “in pocket money, not counting the train fare, so I am doing alright”.

Ewart and Lydia were brother and sister and were two of six children living at 11 Cradock Street in 1903.

Their parents were John F Davies, who ran a tailor’s from the address, and Maria Davies.

Lydia’s great nieces, Helen Roberts, 58, and Margaret Spooner, 61, from Swansea, recognised her in the card.

Their grandfather David Stanley Davies was Lydia and Ewart’s brother.

Lydia’s great-granddaughter, Faith Reynolds, 47, from Devon, had been unaware her relative had siblings.

All four distant relatives met for the first time at West Glamorgan Archives in Swansea on Wednesday.

Ms Roberts said she has been building her family tree for six years and said: “It is emotional because I didn’t know these family members existed.”

“They have knowledge and photographs of previous generations, it’s just putting it all together.”

She said she hoped Lydia, Ewart and Stanley, were looking down saying: “That’s nice”.

Ms Spooner believed the postcard ended up back at 11 Cradock Street after falling from a bible sent to auction after a house clearance.

She said: “We have a theory that maybe the postcard fell out of that, and someone that bought the bible found the postcard and decided to put it back into the postal system.”

Ms Reynolds said: “We were contacted by someone about the story and they said they thought the postcard belonged to our family, and we thought, ‘Really?'”

Ms Reynolds said: “We didn’t realise that my grandmother Mora wasn’t actually an only child, we found out she also had a brother.”

“Then when we looked at Lydia, we saw that she had lots of siblings.

“So it’s very exciting to meet the relatives and I can’t wait to see what more we can discover about our family.”

It was decided to keep the card at the archives.

Henry Darby, from Swansea Building Society said: “After speaking with the family and the archive service, we thought it was only fair for it to be housed here for it to be enjoyed as what’s probably now Swansea’s most famous postcard.”

Archivist Andrew Dulley, said: “History isn’t something that just sits in the box and stays there – history is all around us.”

One of the F-16 fighter jets sent from Nato allies to Ukraine has been destroyed, a Ukrainian military source has told the BBC.

The aircraft went down amid a barrage of Russian missiles on Monday, killing pilot Oleksiy Mes, Ukraine’s military said. It marks the first loss of its kind since the planes were delivered earlier this month.

The cause of the crash was not a direct result of an enemy missile strike, the Ukrainian military claims.

It said the pilot destroyed three cruise missiles and one drone in Russia’s largest aerial attack to date.

• Ukraine receives first F-16 fighter jets

“Oleksiy saved Ukrainians from deadly Russian missiles,” the Ukrainian Air Force wrote in a statement on social media.

“Unfortunately, at the cost of his own life.”

The statement did not specify the type of plane involved, but a military source told the BBC the pilot was flying an F-16.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky officially confirmed on Tuesday the US-made F-16’s were being deployed to shoot down Russian drones and missiles.

This week, he asked allies to allow Ukraine to use long range missiles to hit targets further into Russia.

Dutch Chief of Defence Gen Onno Eichelsheim confirmed the Netherlands will provide Ukraine with 24 of the jets, in addition to more weapons.

There will be no restrictions on their usage apart from complying with humanitarian law, he told a conference in Washington on Wednesday – meaning Kyiv could launch deeper strikes into Russian territory.

Around 65 F-16s have been pledged by Nato countries since US President Joe Biden first authorised willing European allies to send them to Ukraine in August 2023.

Ukraine’s F-16s work alongside a limited number of Western-supplied surface-to-air missile systems such as Patriot and Nasams which are already on the ground.

They also help defend against Russian glide bombs – dumb munitions fitted with pop-out wing kits and guidance modules to deliver precision strike stand-off capabilities, similar to the JDAM munitions from the United States.

The destruction of the aircraft is blow to Zelensky, who said he will deliver a “victory plan” to US President Joe Biden next month.

He also revealed Ukraine had recently carried out the first successful test of a domestically-produced ballistic missile, but declined to share any more details.

US Vice-President Kamala Harris defended her shifts on policy, President Joe Biden, and her time in the White House in her first interview since becoming the Democratic nominee.

Ms Harris argued that the Biden administration was able to reduce illegal border crossings in recent months and “recover the economy” after the pandemic.

She called the White House’s policies a “success”, specifically pointing to a decline in prescription drug costs and the unemployment rate: “That’s good work. There’s more to do.”

Ms Harris appeared in the pre-recorded CNN interview with her running mate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz. It was her first as a presidential candidate.

The vice-president was forced to defend the White House’s economic track record, as inflation and high cost-of-living prices continue to sting American pocketbooks. Polls have regularly suggested that voters would prefer Republican candidate Donald Trump’s handling of the economy.

But the most tense exchanges between Ms Harris and CNN interviewer Dana Bash centred on the assertion that the Democratic nominee’s policy positions had undergone “changes” during her time as vice-president and as a presidential candidate.

“I think the most important and most significant aspect of my policy perspective and decisions is my values have not changed,” she said when asked why her positions shifted in recent years.

Trump had already dismissed the vice-president’s first interview, which lasted 27 minutes, before its release because it was pre-taped and included Mr Walz.

He used a single-word in his review after it concluded.

“BORING!!!” the former president wrote on Truth Social.

• Why is Harris bringing Walz to her first major interview?
• Where Kamala Harris stands on 10 key issues

Ms Harris referred to her effort to address climate change and support of the Green New Deal, a Democratic proposal to reduce reliance on fossil fuels, as something that remains a steadfast value when pressured about her shifting policy positions.

“I have always believed, and I’ve worked on it, that the climate crisis is real, that it is an urgent matter,” she said.

The vice-president pointed to the Biden administration’s work on the Inflation Reduction Act, which funnelled hundreds of billions of dollars to renewable energy and electric vehicle tax credit and rebate programs.

“We have set goals for the United States of America, and by extension the globe, around when we should meet certain standards for reduction of greenhouse gas emissions.”

Ms Harris did not explain her reversal on banning fracking – a technique for recovering gas and oil from shale rock used by an industry that is particularly strong in the battleground state of Pennsylvania.

Ms Harris had said that “there is no question I’m in favour of banning fracking” during a CNN town hall in 2019. But she has backpedalled on that view since becoming vice-president – even casting the tie-breaking vote in the Senate on new fracking leases.

In the CNN interview on Thursday, she said: “As president, I will not ban fracking.”

Brian Fallon, a campaign spokesperson, said on social media that the Biden administration’s “clean energy investments have proven the ability to make progress on climate without those past stances”.

Ms Harris once held more progressive immigration views as a senator and in her campaign for president in 2020. She had previously advocated for the closure of immigration detention centres and the decriminalisation of illegal crossings.

But on the subject of “securing our border” Ms Harris said “my values have not changed” and referenced her time “prosecuting transnational, criminal organisations” as California attorney general.

Earlier this year, the vice-president supported a hardline bipartisan border security deal that would have included hundreds of millions of dollars for border wall construction.

Trump pressured Republicans in Congress to kill the deal, but Ms Harris has promised to “sign it into law” if elected. She committed to passing it again during the CNN interview.

To explain her moderated immigration view, the Democratic nominee told CNN that her travels across the country as vice-president had made her “believe it is important to build consensus, and it is important to find a common place of understanding of where we can actually solve problems”.

Along those lines, Ms Harris committed to include someone “who was a Republican” in her presidential cabinet. She said it would fulfill her promise to be a president “for all Americans”.

“I have spent my career inviting diversity of opinion. I think it’s important to have people at the table when some of the most important decisions are being made that have different views.”

Ms Harris also was asked about the war in Gaza, and re-iterated the White House’s position that both Israel and Hamas must “get a deal done” and that the Palestinians deserve to have their own country neighbouring Israel.

“This war must end, and we must get a deal that is about getting the hostages out,” she said.

She would not commit to an arms embargo on Israel, as some on her party’s left flank have demanded.

Mr Walz, who served for decades in the US National Guard, was asked to clarify a comment he in made in which he said he “carried” an assault rifle in “war”.

The campaign has clarified that Mr Walz was never in a war zone.

In the interview, the governor said he wore “his emotions on his sleeve” and was “speaking passionately” about the subject of gun crime in schools when he made the inaccurate statement.

That “passion” also extended to his incorrect assertion that his wife had received in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) treatments – which have become a political lightning rod in the US debate over abortion access – to conceive their children.

She received intrauterine insemination, not IVF, though doctors have said that the two fertilisation treatments are often referred to interchangeably.

Mr Walz said his record speaks for itself. He said he did not believe that Americans were “cutting hairs” between the two.

The Minnesota governor was also asked about his son, Gus, who went viral when he proudly proclaimed “That’s my dad” at the Democratic National Convention.

“It was just such a visceral, emotional moment that I’m grateful I got to experience it – and I’m so proud of him.”

Ms Harris described the moment that President Biden called her to share that he had decided to end his re-election bid in July.

She said her family was visiting her when she received the phone call. They had just eaten pancakes and bacon and were working on a puzzle.

“My first thought was not about me, to be honest with you, my first thought was about him,” Ms Harris said when asked whether she asked for his endorsement.

The vice-president also maintained that the president could have served again.

“He is so smart, and I have spent hours upon hours with him being in the Oval Office and in the situation room. He has the intelligence, the commitment and judgment and disposition that I think the American people rightly deserve in their president.”

She said Trump, by contrast, had none of those qualities.

Ms Harris has faced criticism from Republicans and some pundits for refusing to hold a press conference or an on-the-record, in-depth interview until now. Her critics argued that she was avoiding having her record challenged.

Her appearance on CNN marks her first substantive interview since Mr Biden exited race.

Ms Bash, the CNN journalist who conducted the interview of Ms Harris and Mr Walz, was one of the moderators of the 27 June debate between Mr Biden and Trump.

Mr Biden’s disastrous performance in that debate was widely seen as what sparked the effort for the president to withdraw from the race.

• SIMPLE GUIDE: Everything you need to know about the vote
• ANALYSIS: Three ways Trump will try to end Harris honeymoon
• EXPLAINER: Where the election could be won and lost
• KAMALA HARRIS: The many identities of the first female vice-president

Workers who leave the head office to buy a cup of coffee are costing an Australian mining firm too much money, according to its boss.

Managing director of Mineral Resources Chris Ellison said during a financial results presentation on Wednesday he wants to “hold staff captive all day long”.

“I don’t want them leaving the building,” he said.

The head office in Perth has a restaurant, nine staff psychologists, a gym, and other facilities designed to encourage staff to stay in the office.

“We have a lot of different benefits that we have brought on,” said Mr Ellison, whose company has a strict “no work from home policy”.

“Why have I done that? Because when I get them first thing in the morning, I want to hold them captive all day long. I don’t want them leaving the building.

“I don’t want them walking down the road for a cup of coffee. We kind of figured out a few years ago how much that costs.”

He said the rest of the mining industry should “get on board” with his thinking on the benefits of working in the office rather than at home.

“The industry cannot afford it. We can’t have people working three days a week and picking up five days a week pay – or four days.”

The company culture at Mining Resources also extends to Mr Ellison’s views on parents, with the company building a day-care centre on site big enough for 105 children.

“Another reason for them to come in and enjoy work,” he said.

“Drop their little tykes off next door. We have doctors on board and nurses who are going to feed them, but mum and dad will be working in our office.”

Mr Ellison is not the only boss to enforce a no work from home policy.

Last week, the head of London-based smartphone maker Nothing sent an all-staff email to announce the end of hybrid working and a move to fully office-based work.

“I know this is a controversial decision that may not be a fit for everyone, and there are definitely companies out there that thrive in remote or hybrid setups,” he wrote in the email.

“But that’s not right for our type of business, and won’t help us fully realize our potential as a company.”

“My heart is filled with so much pain. Even today, I cry when I think about how that one encounter destroyed my life.”

The year was 1992. Sushma* said she was 18 when a man she knew took her to an abandoned warehouse under the pretext of watching video tapes. There, six to seven men tied her up, raped her and took photographs of the act.

The men belonged to rich, influential families in Ajmer, a city in the western Indian state of Rajasthan.

“After they raped me, one of them gave me 200 rupees [$2; £1] to buy lipstick. I didn’t take the money,” she said.

Last week, 32 years later, Sushma saw a court convict her rapists and sentence them to life imprisonment.

“I am 50 years old today and I finally feel like I got justice,” she said. “But it cannot bring back all that I have lost.”

She said she had endured years of slander and taunts from society because of what happened to her, and both her marriages ended in divorce when her husbands discovered her past.

Sushma is one of 16 victims – all schoolchildren or students – who were raped and blackmailed by a group of powerful men in different places in Ajmer city over several months in 1992. The case became a massive scandal and sparked huge protests.

Last week, the court handed out life sentences to six of the 18 accused: Nafis Chishty, Iqbal Bhat, Saleem Chishty, Sayed Jamir Hussain, Naseem – also known as Tarzan – and Suhail Ghani.

They have not confessed to the crime and their lawyers said they will appeal the verdict in a higher court.

So what happened to the remaining 12 accused?

Eight were sentenced to life in 1998, but four were acquitted by a higher court, and the others had their sentences reduced to 10 years.

Of the remaining four, one died by suicide. Another was sentenced to life in 2007 but was acquitted six years later. One was convicted in a related minor case but later acquitted, and one of the accused is still absconding.

“Can you even call this [the 20 August verdict] justice? A judgement is not justice,” said Santosh Gupta, a journalist who had written about the case and has appeared as a witness for the prosecution.

It is a thought echoed by Supreme Court lawyer Rebecca John, who called it yet another case of “justice delayed is justice denied”.

“This points to a problem that extends far beyond the legal system. Our patriarchal society is broken. What we need is a mindset change, but how long is that going to take?”

The accused men used their power and influence to deceive, threaten and lure their victims, said prosecution lawyer Virendra Singh Rathore.

They took compromising photographs and videos of their victims and used them to blackmail them into silence or bring in more victims, he added.

“In one instance, the accused invited a man they knew to a party and got him drunk. They took compromising photos of him and threatened to make them public if he didn’t bring his female friends to meet them,” he said. “That’s how they kept getting victims.”

The accused also had strong political and social connections. Some of them were associated with a famous dargah (Muslim religious shrine) in the city.

“They roamed around on bikes and cars in what was a small-town city at the time,” Mr Gupta said. “Some people were afraid of these men, some wanted to get closer to them and some wanted to be like them.”

He said that it was their power and connections that had helped keep the case under wraps for months. But there were people – like those working at the studio where the photos were developed and even some police officers – who were aware of what was going on.

One day, some of the photographs taken by the accused reached Mr Gupta. They had a chilling effect on him.

“Here were some of the city’s most powerful men committing heinous acts with innocent, young girls – and there was proof of it. But there was no major reaction from the police or the public,” he said.

He wrote a few reports about it but none managed to blow the case wide open.

Then one day, his paper “made a daring decision”, he said.

It published a photo that showed a young girl, naked to the waist, pressed between two men who were fondling her breasts. One of the men was smiling at the camera. Only the girl’s face was blurred.

The report sent shock waves through the city. The public was outraged and shut the city down in protest for days. Anger spread through Rajasthan like raging fire.

“Finally, there was some concrete action from the government. Police registered a case of rape and blackmail against the accused and it was handed over to the the state’s Criminal Investigation Department [CID],” Mr Rathore said.

Mr Rathore explained that the trial had dragged on for 32 years because of several factors, including the staggered arrests of the accused, alleged delaying tactics by the defence, an underfunded prosecution and systemic issues within the justice system.

When police filed the initial charges in 1992, six of the accused – who were only convicted last week – were left out because they were absconding.

Mr Rathore believes this was a mistake, as when the police finally filed charges against the six in 2002, they were still on the run. Two of them were arrested in 2003, another in 2005 and two more in 2012, while the last one was apprehended in 2018.

Every time one of the accused was arrested, the trial would begin afresh with the defence recalling victims and witnesses brought by the prosecution to give their testimonies.

“Under the law, the accused has the right to be present in court when witnesses are testifying and the defence has the right to cross-examine them,” explained Mr Rathore.

This put the victims in the horrifying position of having to relive their trauma over and over again.

Mr Rathore recalled how often the victims, who were now in their 40s and 50s, would scream at the judge, asking why there were being dragged to court, years after they had been raped.

As time passed, the police also found it challenging to track down witnesses.

“Many didn’t want to be associated with the case as their lives had moved on,” Mr Rathore said.

“Even now, one of the accused is absconding. If he is arrested, or if the other accused appeal against the verdict in a higher court, the victims and witnesses will be called to testify again.”

Sushma – who was one of three victims whose testimony played a key role in convicting the six accused – said that she had been talking to the media about her ordeal because she was telling the truth.

“I never changed my story. I was young and innocent when these people did this to me. It robbed me of everything. I have nothing to lose now,” she said.

The messages come through on the Israeli phone network – scraps of information from inside Jenin’s refugee camp.

“I don’t dare go on the roof, in case I’m shot,” one resident says, speaking anonymously.

Information inside the camp is scarce, he says, and the streets are empty, as residents stay inside.

“It’s mostly old people and children here,” he tells me. “The young people left before the army arrived – it’s bad luck for those who can’t get out.”

Jenin, the focus of news networks today, has been living through a news blackout.

The Palestinian phone network was down for much of the day – lines cut by the Israeli military operation here, the telecoms company said.

The resident I speak to says his family still has water and electricity, and that a small shop nearby was open and selling supplies, under the constant buzz of military drones.

As we talk, a few scattered gunshots reverberate over the rooftops from the direction of the camp.

• UN calls for de-escalation as Israeli West Bank raids continue

“Yes, I heard them too,” he says. “The sound of the drones has increased.”

As he is speaking, an armoured bulldozer rumbles towards one of the camp’s main entrances, the road deserted and baking in the afternoon sun.

For a few hours last night, explosions and gunfire erupted from the alleyways there, disrupting sleep.

But since then, this man says it had been largely quiet – with no sign of house-to-house searches in his neighbourhood, nor of fighters from the camp.

“It’s abnormally quiet,” he said.

The camp has been sealed off by the army since it arrived before dawn on Wednesday – part of a wide, coordinated operation across several centres of the occupied West Bank.

Jenin camp is a base for armed Palestinian fighters, but also unarmed civilians. There have been fierce gun battles here in recent months, as Israeli forces have raided, again and again, looking for them.

Army vehicles are also stationed around two of Jenin’s main hospitals.

Ambulances are stopped as they approach – approaching and reversing in response to terse instructions broadcast in Arabic from loudspeakers on the army Jeeps.

We watched paramedics get out to open the back doors of their ambulance, to show what – or who – was inside. Two female patients were also made to get out and present themselves to soldiers in the Jeeps.

Behind them, one of Jenin’s main commercial districts is shuttered and deserted. Cardboard boxes are scattered across the empty road; fruit sits abandoned on carts under thin cotton covers – the sickly-sweet smell of rotting mangoes fills the silent street.

One small grocery shop has been opening in the afternoon – an urban oasis for those who can reach it.

Thaeer Shana’at is stocking up on food to deliver to local families in the eastern neighbourhood, where Israeli forces were blocking access, he says.

“The whole of the eastern area – a population of about 20,000 – is sealed off,” he said.

“Only ambulances can deliver food. If we go there, we get fired at. There are many areas where we can’t deliver people any food or drink.”

He says his wife and baby are still in Jenin camp, as he couldn’t get them out before the army arrived.

“They are scared to open the door,” he says. “A sniper is directly stationed in front of the house.”

Munir Garwan, who used to work for the municipality, is also waiting to buy food.

He says he was a member of the West Bank’s main political party, Fatah, and had spent six years in an Israeli jail for shooting at the army, and belonging to a “hostile organisation”.

“The occupation [Israel] claims it is trying to stop terrorism. But when the young men get killed, new ones take their place. They are getting nowhere like that.”

“We are not fighting to make someone victorious over the other,” he said. “We are fighting for our rights.”

As night fell, loud explosions and gunfire were heard again from the direction of the camp.

Information has begun to flow again, as communication networks begin to return, circulating details of the ongoing incursion, and the identities of those injured and killed.

The news blackout in Jenin is ending, but the news is the last thing people here want to hear.

The Māori king in New Zealand – Kiingi Tuheitia Pootatau Te Wherowhero VII – has died peacefully at age 69, surrounded by his wife and three children.

The Kiingitanga, or Māori king movement, announced the news on social media on Friday morning local time (Thursday evening GMT).

Spokesman Rahui Papa said the king had been in hospital recovering from heart surgery, just days after celebrating the 18th anniversary of his coronation.

“The death of Kiingi Tuheitia is a moment of great sadness for followers of Te Kiingitanga, Maaoridom and the entire nation,” the spokesman said. “A chief who has passed to the great beyond. Rest in love.”

The king was born Tūheitia Paki in 1955. He was crowned in 2006 following the death of his mother, Te Arikinui Dame Te Atairangikaahu.

Like his mother, King Tuheitia was seen as a great unifying figure – recently calling on Māori to stand together in the face of policies targeting them.

“Let’s keep pushing forward while we are currently facing a storm, there’s no need to worry. In this storm we are strong. Together. The wind in our sails is kotahitanga [unity], and with that we will reach our destination.”

King Tuheitia’s successor will be chosen by leaders within the Kiingitanga and may not be announced until the end of his funeral rites.

New Zealand media reported the king was expected to lie in state at Turangawaewae Marae, the seat of the Māori king, for five days, then would be taken to rest on Taupiri Mountain.

The Māori king position dates back to 1858, when Māori decided to create a unifying figure similar to that of a European monarch in order to try and prevent the widespread loss of land to New Zealand’s British colonisers and to preserve Māori culture. The role is largely ceremonial.

New Zealand’s Prime Minister Christopher Luxon paid tribute to the king on social media, saying: “His unwavering commitment to his people and his tireless efforts to uphold the values and traditions of the Kiingitanga have left an indelible mark on our nation.”

Former prime minister Dame Jacinda Ardern addressed King Tuheitia in her tribute, saying: “You have been an advocate for Māori, for fairness, justice and prosperity. You wanted children, young people, and those who have been left behind to have opportunities and hope”.

The Māori king attended King Charles III’s coronation in May 2023 and privately met the British monarch before the celebration.

The two also met during a visit by then-Prince Charles and his wife Camilla to New Zealand in 2015.

In a statement, King Charles said he and Queen Camilla were “profoundly saddened to learn of the death of Kiingi Tuheitia” and that he had had the “greatest pleasure” of knowing the king for decades.

“He was deeply committed to forging a strong future for Māori and Aotearoa New Zealand founded upon culture, traditions and healing, which he carried out with wisdom and compassion.”

“Kua hinga te tōtara i Te Waonui a Tāne. (A mighty Totora tree has fallen),” added King Charles in Māori, referring to a native New Zealand tree considered to be sacred and a symbol of strength.

In 2014, the king declined to meet Prince William and Princess Kate, the then-Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, on their tour to New Zealand because he said the 60 to 90 minutes allocated for the visit was not enough time to carry out the cultural customs befitting their status.

Western technology and finance are helping Ukraine carry out hundreds of long-range strikes inside Russia.

That is despite Nato allies still refusing to give Ukraine permission to use Western-supplied munitions to do so – mostly because of fears of escalation.

Ukraine has been stepping up its long-range strikes inside Russia over the past few months, launching scores of drones simultaneously at strategic targets several times a week.

The targets include air force bases, oil and ammunition depots and command centres.

Ukrainian firms are now producing hundreds of armed one-way attack drones a month, at a fraction of the cost it takes to produce a similar drone in the West.

One company told the BBC it was already creating a disproportionate impact on Russia’s war economy at a relatively small expense.

The BBC has been briefed by a number of those involved in these missions. They include one of Ukraine’s largest one-way attack drone manufacturers, as well as a big data company which has helped develop software for Ukraine to carry out these strikes.

Francisco Serra-Martins says the strategy is already creating huge dilemmas for Moscow. He believes that with extra investment, it will turn the tide of the war in Ukraine’s favour.

Eighteen months ago, the company he co-founded, Terminal Autonomy, didn’t even exist. It is now producing more than a hundred AQ400 Scythe long-range drones a month, with a range of 750km (465 miles). The company also makes hundreds of shorter range AQ100 Bayonet drones a month, which can fly a few hundred kilometres.

The drones are made of wood and are being assembled in former furniture factories in Ukraine.

Mr Serra-Martins, a former Australian Army Royal Engineer, set up the company with his Ukrainian co-founder, backed by US finance. It is one of at least three companies now producing drones in Ukraine at scale.

He describes his drones as “basically flying furniture – we assemble it like Ikea”.

It takes about an hour to build the fuselage and half that time to put the brains inside it – the electronics, motor and explosives.

The company’s Bayonet drone costs a few thousand dollars. In contrast, a Russian air defence missile used to shoot it down can cost more than $1m.

It is not only cheap drones making the difference.

Palantir, a large US data analysis company, was one of the first Western tech companies to aid Ukraine’s war effort. It started by providing software to improve the speed and accuracy of its artillery strikes. Now it has given Ukraine new tools to plan its long-range drone strikes.

British engineers from Palantir, working with Ukrainian counterparts, have designed a programme to generate and map the best ways to reach a target. Palantir makes clear it is not involved in the missions, but has helped train more than 1,000 Ukrainians how to use its software.

The BBC has been shown how it works in principle. Using streams of data, it can map Russia’s air defences, radar and electronic jammers. The end product looks similar to a topographical chart.

The tighter the contours, the heavier the air defences. The locations have already been identified by Ukraine using commercial satellite imagery and signals intelligence.

Louis Mosley of Palantir says the programme is helping Ukraine to skirt around Russia’s electronic warfare and air defence systems to reach their target.

“Understanding and visualising what that looks like across the entire battle space is really critical to optimising these missions,” he says.

The execution of the long-range drone strikes is being co-ordinated by Ukraine’s intelligence agencies, who work in secrecy. But the BBC has been told by other sources about some of the detail.

Scores of drones can be fired for any one mission – as many as 60 at one target.

The attacks are mostly carried out at night. Most will be shot down. As few as 10% may reach the target. Some drones are even shot down along the way by friendly fire – Ukraine’s own air defences.

Ukraine has had to work out ways to counter Russian electronic jamming. Terminal Autonomy’s Scythe drone uses visual positioning – navigating its course and examining the terrain by Artificial Intelligence. There is no pilot involved.

Palantir software will have already mapped the best routes. Mr Serra-Martins says flying a lot of drones is key to overwhelming and exhausting Russia’s air defences. So too is making the drones cheaper than the missiles trying to shoot them down, or the targets they are trying to hit.

Prof Justin Bronk of the Royal United Services Institute says Ukraine’s long-range drone attacks are creating dilemmas for Moscow. Although Russia has a lot of air defences, it still cannot protect everything.

Prof Bronk says Ukraine’s long-range strikes are showing ordinary Russians that “the state can’t defend them fully and that Russia is vulnerable”.

Ukrainian drones have been spotted more than 1,000km (620 miles) inside Russia. They have been shot down over Moscow.

But the focus has been on military sites. The map below highlights just a handful of the dozen targets hit over the past few months. They include five Russian airbases.

Prof Justin Bronk says targeting Russian airbases has so far been the only effective way Ukraine has to respond to Russia’s glide bombs.

It has forced Russia to move aircraft to bases further away and reduce the frequency of their attacks. Satellite imagery shows how Ukrainian drones have successfully damaged hangars at its Marinovka airbase.

Ukraine clearly believes it could do even more with the help of Western-made long-range weapons. But so far, allies have rejected Kyiv’s pleas.

There is still a lingering fear, especially in Washington and Berlin, that it could drag the West further into the conflict. But that hasn’t stopped Western companies and finance from helping Ukraine.

Ukraine is still largely having to rely on its home-grown efforts, convinced that bringing the war to Russia is a key to winning this war.

Francisco Serra-Martins also believes Western manufacturers are still “woefully unprepared” to fight high-intensity warfare – producing far fewer long-range weapons at a much higher cost. He says what Ukraine really needs now “is a lot of good enough systems”.

The BBC has talked to one Ukrainian company which is already developing a new cruise missile, at least 10 times cheaper than a British-made Storm Shadow missile.

Despite the West’s misgivings, Ukraine is planning to step up its attacks on Russia. Mr Serra-Martins says: “What you’re seeing now is like nothing compared to what you’ll see by the end of the year.”

The CIA says the suspects in the foiled plot to attack a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna wanted to kill “a huge number” of people at the event.

The intelligence provided by the agency to Austrian authorities allowed them to disrupt the plot and save “hundreds of lives” , CIA’s deputy director David Cohen said on Wednesday.

Mr Cohen highlighted that there were “tens of thousands of people at this concert, I am sure many Americans”. He added that the suspects’ plans were “advanced”.

Three male teenage suspects were arrested in connection with the foiled attacks, allegedly inspired by the Islamic State group.

Speaking at an annual intelligence summit outside Washington, DC, Mr Cohen said the day of the arrests was a “good day for Langley”, referring to the CIA headquarters. “And not just for Swifties in the office.”

“The Austrians were able to make those arrests because the agency and our partners in the intelligence community provided them information about what this ISIS-connected group was planning to do,” Mr Cohen said.

He did not disclose how his agency had learned about the plot.

Some 200,000 people had been expected to attend one of Swift’s three Vienna concerts, part of the European swing of her multi-continent Eras tour.

On 7 August, the day before the first show, concert organisers announced the shows would be scrapped after a warning about a “planned terrorist attack” from government officials.

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Earlier that day, Austrian authorities arrested two of the suspects. The third was arrested two days later.

Authorities said the main suspect, a 19-year-old Austrian citizen, had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State and had focused on the Eras tour as a target.

He hoped to “kill as many people as possible”, authorities said.

Last week, for the first time, Swift commented publicly on the planned attack, writing on Instagram that having to cancel the Vienna shows was “devastating”.

“The reason for the cancellations filled me with a new sense of fear, and a tremendous amount of guilt because so many people had planned on coming to those shows,” she wrote. “But I was also so grateful to the authorities because thanks to them, we were grieving concerts and not lives.”

Swift performed eight concerts at Wembley this summer, overtaking a record for any solo singer, which was previously set by Michael Jackson in 1988.

Her next show as part of The Eras Tour is scheduled for 18 October in Miami, Florida.

A hiker was rescued from a mountain in the US state of Colorado after being apparently left behind the previous day by his colleagues during an office retreat.

The unnamed man got lost and found himself without phone signal after being left by colleagues who went ahead without him, the Chaffee County Search and Rescue team said.

He endured stormy weather and multiple falls before being found in a “large search effort” the next morning. He was stabilised and taken to hospital, but there has been no further update on his condition.

The officials suggested the incident “might cause some awkward encounters at the office in the coming days and weeks”.

The drama unfolded on Friday as a 15-strong group from the company – which has also not been named – ventured along a trail up Mt Shavano, which is 14,000ft (4,300m) high.

In their statement, officials said the hiker was left to reach the summit on his own at about 11:30 local time (17:30 GMT).

Evan Brady, the public information officer for Chaffee County Search and Rescue South, told the New York Times the man had stopped for a break while his co-workers continued on the route.

“He’s lucky to be alive,” Mr Brady said.

The man became disoriented on the descent, “finding belongings left in the boulder field to mark the descent by the previous group having been picked up as they hiked down”.

Concerned, he sent a pin drop to colleagues, who are said to have told him that he was on the wrong route, and suggested that climb back up to regain the trail.

Shortly after sending them a second message, a strong storm passed through the area, bringing “high winds and freezing rain” and leaving him without a signal.

Chaffee County Search and Rescue received an alert at 21:00 that evening, dispatching two teams and a drone pilot who were thwarted by the bad weather.

A helicopter was also sent, but despite tracing the man’s last known movements, the rescuers could not find him. He was wearing dark clothing.

Extra help was summoned from multiple agencies in neighbouring areas on Saturday morning, resulting in what the officials called a “large search effort”.

Eventually, the missing man recovered enough phone signal to make an emergency call, and he was located in a gully.

He reported that he had fallen at least 20 times and was left unable to get up.

His rescue ultimately involved technical rope lowers and “phenomenal cooperation and teamwork”, the officials added.

Mr Brady also told the New York Times that the suggestion the hiker had been abandoned by colleagues was overblown.

The man’s health remains unknown after being taken for hospital care. The BBC has contacted Chaffee County Search and Rescue for further comment.

In their statement, they warned people never to hike alone, and to pack bright clothing and essential supplies.

“This hiker was phenomenally lucky to have regained cell service when he did, and to still have enough consciousness and wherewithal to call 911,” they said.

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has said that in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) treatments will be paid for by insurance companies or the government if he returns to the White House.

“I was always for IVF. Right from the beginning, as soon as we heard about it,” he told NBC News on Thursday.

The new campaign pledge comes after his Democratic rival, Vice-President Kamala Harris, and other members of her party have alleged that Republican-led abortion restrictions in some states could further threaten access to fertility treatments.

Trump’s announcement could put him at odds with some conservative anti-abortion activists who want to ban IVF for discarding unused human embryos.

But he committed to the new position on Thursday in the interview with NBC.

“Under the Trump administration, we are going to be paying for that treatment,” Trump told the news outlet. “Or we’re going to be mandating that the insurance company pay.”

IVF treatments can be very expensive – often around $20,000 (£15,000) per round – and are rarely covered by insurance in the US. Trump did not explain how this new policy would work or be put into effect.

The Harris-Walz campaign was quick to respond to the former president’s new policy position, blaming him for the US Supreme Court’s decision to overturn the landmark 1973 abortion case – Roe v Wade – which eliminated the national right to abortion.

State governments can now decide Americans’ access to abortion, and at least 14 have banned or put severe restrictions on the procedure.

“Because Trump overturned Roe v. Wade, IVF is already under attack and women’s freedoms have been ripped away in states across the country,” said Harris campaign spokeswoman Sarafina Chitika in response to Trump’s comments on Thursday.

Trump has previously bragged about appointing three of the six conservatives on the Supreme Court who backed overturning the abortion access law.

“I was able to kill Roe v Wade,” the former president posted online in May 2023.

But Trump has attempted to distance himself from his record on abortion, as Harris capitalises on voter concerns about how Republicans could affect reproductive rights.

In his interview, Trump – a Florida resident – also said he planned to vote against a Florida state ballot measure that would prohibit abortion after six weeks, with some exceptions.

“I think the six-week [ban] is too short. There has to be more time,” he said. “I am going to be voting that we need more than six weeks.”

IVF became a new political lightning rod in America’s debate over abortion access in February.

That’s when the Republican-controlled Alabama Supreme Court ruled that frozen embryos created through IVF are considered children under state law.

At the time, Trump called on Alabama lawmakers to “quickly find an immediate solution to preserve the availability of IVF in Alabama”. They passed a law protecting IVF in March.

The ruling was a political headache for Republicans, forcing several leaders to put out statements objecting to the Alabama ruling that had the possibility of damaging their prospects in an election year.

Forty-two percent of Americans have either used IVF treatments or known someone who did, according to a Pew Survey last year. That percentage rises with increased earnings – 45% among middle-income Americans and 59% for those with high-incomes.

Those individuals are more likely to be white Americans who vote Republican, and many are ones whom Trump hopes to bring back into the political fold after losing their support in 2020.

Trump told supporter about his new position at a rally in Michigan on Thursday.

“Your government will pay for, or your insurance company will be mandated to pay for, all costs associated with IVF treatment,” he said.

But Democrats continued to reject that a Trump administration would adopt such a policy on Thursday night.

“Americans have seen with their own eyes how Donald Trump overturned Roe v Wade and paved the way for extreme Maga Republicans to restrict IVF and pass cruel abortion bans across the country, hurting women and families,” Democratic National Committee Spokesperson Aida Ross said in a statement.

“When voters head to the ballot box this November, they will vote for the Harris-Walz ticket to protect our freedoms – not Trump and Vance’s all-out assault on our basic rights.”