The Brazilian supreme court has ordered that X be suspended in the country after the social media platform failed to meet a deadline to appoint a legal representative in the country.

Late on Friday afternoon, Justice Alexandre de Moraes – who has been engaged in a dispute with X’s owner, Elon Musk, since April – ordered the “immediate, complete and total suspension of X’s operations” in the country, “until all court orders … are complied with, fines are duly paid, and a new legal representative for the company is appointed in the country”.

He gave Brazil’s National Telecommunications Agency 24 hours to enforce the decision. Once notified, the agency must pass the order on to the more than 20,000 broadband internet providers in the country, each of which must block X.

In an interview with the TV channel Globonews, the agency’s president, Carlos Manuel Baigorri, said the order had already been passed on to internet providers.

“Since we’re talking about more than 20,000 companies, each will have its own implementation time, but … we expect that probably over the weekend all companies will be able to implement the block,” he said.

Justice Moraes also initially summoned Apple and Google to “implement technological barriers to prevent the use of the X app by users of the iOS and Android systems” and to block the use of virtual private network (VPN) applications.

However, later in the evening, the judge removed the part mentioning Apple and Google “until there is a statement from the parties [X and Musk] in the case, to avoid any potential unnecessary disruptions to third-party companies [Apple and Google]”.

The decision imposes a daily fine of R$50,000 (£6,800) on individuals and companies that attempt to continue using X via VPN.

The deadline given to X to appoint a new legal representative in the country expired at 8.07pm local time on Thursday (0.07am BST on Friday). An hour later, Elon Musk’s social network announced that it would not comply.

Musk responded on Friday by posting on X that Brazil was “shutting down the #1 source of truth” and that its “oppressive regime” was “so afraid of the people learning the truth that they will bankrupt anyone who tries”.

The dispute began in April, when Moraes ordered the suspension of dozens of accounts for allegedly spreading disinformation – a request Musk denounced as censorship.

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva said in a radio interview on Friday morning: “Just because the guy [Musk] has a lot of money, doesn’t mean they can disrespect you … who does he think he is?”

X, formerly known as Twitter, has been without a legal representative in Brazil since 17 August, when Musk announced that his company was shutting down its operations in the country “effective immediately” due to what it called “censorship orders” from Moraes. The service has remained available to users in the country.

Moraes’ April order to X to block some accounts stemmed from an investigation into “digital militias” who backed former president Jair Bolsonaro’s attempts to stay in power after his 2022 election defeat. After Musk refused to comply, the judge included him in his investigation.

On Wednesday, Moraes gave the company 24 hours to appoint a new legal representative in Brazil – a requirement for foreign companies operating in the country – “under penalty of immediate suspension of the social network’s activities”.

In the post announcing its non-compliance with the order, X said it “would not comply with his [Moraes’] illegal orders to censor his political opponents”.

Asked on Friday about Musk’s refusal to comply, Lula said: “Any and all citizens from anywhere in the world who have investments in Brazil are subject to the Brazilian constitution and Brazilian laws.”

The president said Musk “must respect the decision of the Brazilian supreme court … If not, this country will never be sovereign”.

It was also revealed on Thursday that on 18 August – a day after Musk announced the end of X’s operations in Brazil – Moraes blocked the local bank accounts for Musk’s satellite and internet provider Starlink. The aim was to enforce fines imposed on X – as of this Friday, R$18.3m (£2.5m) – for refusing to remove profiles accused of promoting anti-democratic acts and false news.

The two firms are part of Musk’s sprawling business empire, which includes the rocket company SpaceX and the electric car company Tesla. The billionaire owns X and 40% of SpaceX and is the chief executive of Tesla.

Legal experts have criticised the Starlink decision. They argue that it is a different company (albeit one owned by the same person) and should not be held responsible for matters pertaining to X.

In an email to its clients, Starlink criticised the decision and stated: “Although this illegal request may affect our ability to receive your monthly payment … we will continue to provide services to you free of charge, if necessary.”

Starlink, which is the dominant internet provider in the Amazon, remains operational for now.

On Friday, Starlink filed a request with the supreme court to have Moraes’ decision suspended and its bank accounts unfrozen, or, if this request was denied, that the freeze be limited to the total of the fines against X. There is no indication as to when the request will be reviewed.

Donald Trump has denied exploiting a controversial visit to soldiers’ graves at Arlington national cemetery for political ends by saying he does not need the publicity.

The US army publicly rebuked Trump campaign officials for turning a ceremony on Monday to mark the deaths of American soldiers in Afghanistan into a photo opportunity for the Republican presidential candidate. The army accused two campaign workers of pushing aside an official at the cemetery who told them that it was not permitted to take photographs at the graves of recently deceased soldiers.

Trump was pictured giving a thumbs up with family members amid the graves of 13 US servicemen and women killed in a suicide bombing as the US hurriedly withdraw from Afghanistan in 2021.

Trump told a rally in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, that he only posed at the invitation of the families – even though they did not have the authority to approve what amounted to campaign photos.

“I don’t need publicity. I get a lot of publicity. I would like to get a lot less publicity … I would hire a public relations agent to get less publicity,” he said.

“Joe Biden killed those young people because he was incompetent. And then they tell me that I used their graves for public relations services, and I didn’t.”

Hours before the rally, Trump sent supporters a fundraising email promising “an EARTH-SHATTERING announcement that blows this race wide open”.

“It’ll strike FEAR into the hearts of our DEEP STATE ENEMIES. It’ll force the Fake News Media to kick their propaganda machine into OVERDRIVE. It’ll send Comrade Kamala begging for massive checks from the liberal billionaire class,” he promised.

No such message was immediately discernible as the former president hit many of his stock themes, from immigration and crime to questioning whether Kamala Harris would be able to “stand up to China and North Korea” as president.

Trump called for the death penalty for drug dealers and promised to “end the era of inflation and misery”, to “keep men out of women’s sports” and to “restore peace through strength”, while veering off into observations about the “war on Christmas”.

Once again the former president attacked foreign governments for allegedly emptying their prisons and shipping criminals to the US illegally. But he added a new twist by saying that if he was in charge of the same countries he would be more effective than the governments he was criticising at pursuing such a policy.

“If I was running one of those countries, I’d be doing better than them at getting them (imprisoned criminals) out,” he said.

Trump yet again failed to offer evidence for his oft-repeated claim. But he did make reference to the release of video of Venezuelan gangs operating in Aurora, Colorado, including shootouts. Trump has previously alleged that the Venezuelan government is one of those sending known criminals across the Mexican border.

Speaking for more than 90 minutes, Trump defended himself from accusations that he rambles nonsensically at his rallies by claiming that he is weaving together complex thoughts.

“You know, I do the weave. You know what the weave is? I’ll talk about, like, nine different things that they all come back brilliantly together. And it’s like friends of mine that are like English professors, they say ‘It’s the most brilliant thing I’ve ever seen’,” he said.

“But the fake news, you know what they say, ‘He rambled’. It’s not rambling.”

At the end of the rally, Trump appealed for supporters to get out and vote in order to produce a win so large that it cannot be stolen, as he alleges happened in 2020.

“Get the hell out to vote,” he said. “We want a landslide that is too big to rig.”

Volodymyr Zelenskiy has fired the head of Ukraine’s air force a day after it emerged that a recently delivered F-16 jet had crashed earlier this week, killing the pilot.

“I have decided to replace the commander of the air forces … I am eternally grateful to all our military pilots,” Zelenskiy said in his evening video address on Friday, without giving a reason for the dismissal of Mykola Oleshchuk.

But Zelenskiy spoke of the need to “protect” the lives of those defending the country, suggesting the dismissal is probably related to the F-16 crash in which Lt Col Oleksiy Mes died.

The arrival of the F-16s, donated by a number of European nations, was delayed due to the lengthy training programme required for pilots and ground staff to be able to operate the aircraft.

Mariana Bezugla, a member of a parliamentary defence committee, had earlier claimed the plane was shot down by friendly fire. Reuters cited a US official stating the plane did not appear to have been hit by Russian fire, and the crash may have been caused by mechanical failure or pilot error.

The crash was more unwelcome news in a week when Russia has continued to make rapid advances in eastern Ukraine toward the key city of Pokrovsk, sparking public criticism of the Ukrainian military leadership and Zelenskiy even as the bold incursion into the Russian Kursk region continues.

For months, Russian forces have been attempting to seize Pokrovsk, a strategically important mining town with a prewar population of about 60,000, but their advance has gained considerable momentum in recent weeks.

Deep State, a Ukrainian group close to Ukraine’s defence ministry that tracks frontline activities, reported that Russian forces on Friday were less than 10km (6 miles) from the outskirts of Pokrovsk, where local officials have ordered a mass evacuation.

Russian pro-war military bloggers also reported on Friday that forces had entered the city of Selydove, south of Pokrovsk.

As Vladimir Putin’s troops advanced, Russia also shelled a residential building and a children’s playground in Kharkiv, killing at least five people, including a child, and leaving 40 people injured, according to the city’s mayor.

Videos circulating on social media showed flames pouring out of the high-rise building, which officials said was hit by a glide bomb. Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second largest city, has been shelled relentlessly since the start of Russia’s invasion.

Located at the intersection of several key roads, Pokrovsk facilitates the supply of Ukrainian forces across a broad frontline and its loss could open the way for further Russian advances in the Donetsk region.

“The situation is very bad, and it deteriorated quickly,” said a commander whose troops are stationed near Pokrovsk, speaking on the condition of anonymity, as he was not authorised to speak publicly on the matter. “Time will tell if we should have sent troops to Kursk instead of defending the east. But for now, we are suffering.”

Kyiv’s surprise incursion into Russia’s Kursk region earlier this month provided a welcome boost to morale at home and raised hopes that the gutsy attack might prompt Moscow to redeploy its troops away from the eastern front.

But more than three weeks into the operation, Ukraine’s military has admitted that Russia has not yet committed its forces in eastern Ukraine to recapture its own territory, while Kyiv’s progress in the Kursk region has significantly slowed down.

Ukraine’s top general, Oleksandr Syrskyi, said last week that Moscow had redeployed 30,000 troops to recapture its territories in the Kursk region, with some troops shifted from the occupied south of Ukraine.

Crucially, he also said that Russia was simultaneously increasing its efforts in the Pokrovsk sectors.

Ukraine continues to hold a chunk of Russian territory and in Sumy, the Ukrainian city closest to the operation, signs of the incursion are everywhere, with an increased military presence in the city and frequent sightings of military hardware heading towards Russia.

On Friday, Russian strikes on Sumy killed two women and wounded eight other people, regional officials said, claiming that guided air bombs had been used to strike a factory. There are regular strikes on areas close to the border. Regional authorities urged residents of these areas to evacuate as soon as possible. Already, more than 20,000 people have left the border areas.

A popular Ukrainian commentator and officer in the army’s reserves, who goes by the online handle Tatarigami, said the breach in the frontline in the Donetsk region was “worsened” by the Kursk offensive, which he said “diverted experienced and motivated brigades, stripping stabilisation reserves and allowing Russian forces to advance rapidly.”

He also accused the Ukrainian military leadership of underplaying the gravity of the situation. “Unfortunately, the high command is still receiving reports about the ‘controlled situation’, which is far from being controlled … Lies, lies, lies,” he tweeted.

Zelenskiy this week rejected charges that the redeployment of experienced troops to Kursk had weakened Ukraine’s position in Pokrovsk. During a press conference on Tuesday, he described the situation in Pokrovsk as “extremely difficult” but argued that the incursion had actually slowed Russian advances toward the city.

However, open-source data, along with military analysts close to the Ukrainian military and pro-Russian bloggers, paints a different picture, showing a deteriorating frontline since 6 August, when Ukrainian forces first entered Kursk.

Even before Ukraine decided to send troops to Kursk, the country had been on the back foot in the east for months, grappling with delayed western aid while its forces remained outnumbered and exhausted.

Some Ukrainian soldiers have stated that the Kursk incursion was not to blame for the collapse on the frontlines. Instead, they attribute the difficulties to troop exhaustion. Some soldiers have been engaged in combat since the start of the invasion more than two years ago.

“At the moment, it looks like our front in Donbas has collapsed,” Roman Ponomarenko, a brigade officer at the revered Azov Brigade, wrote on Telegram.

“The defence of the Ukrainian armed forces is disorganised, the troops are tired, weakened, and many units are demoralised … and it’s not because of the Ukrainian armed forces’ operation in Kursk.”

Ukraine has since managed to partially replenish its forces through strict new government conscription laws that have lowered the draft age from 27 to 25. However, the newly mobilised troops are apparently being sent to the frontlines with limited training.

“The replenishment received is mostly untrained and does not help; instead, it complicates the combat operations of the units,” Ponomarenko wrote.

In an interview last week with Associated Press, a battalion commander in Ukraine’s 47th Brigade said some of the newly mobilised soldiers “don’t want to shoot”: “They see the enemy in the firing position in trenches but don’t open fire … that is why our men are dying.”

• A Russian bomb attack on Ukraine’s north-eastern city of Kharkiv hit a residential building and a playground, killing seven people and injuring at least 77 more, local authorities said. Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said a 14-year-old girl was among the dead. The death toll from the attack climbed to seven when a woman’s body was recovered from the rubble. About 20 of the injured were in severe condition, said the regional governor, Oleh Syniehubov. Ukrainian authorities said the attack involved five aerial guided “glide bombs” launched from planes in Russia’s Belgorod region. Zelenskiy has renewed a call on western allies to allow Ukraine to use long-range western weapons to attack Russian military airbases. “A strike … would not have happened if our defence forces had the ability to destroy Russian military aircraft where they are based,” Zelenskiy said. “There is no rational reason to restrict Ukraine’s defences.”

• Russia said Ukraine fired cluster munitions on the city of Belgorod and its suburbs, killing at least five people and wounding 37 civilians, including at least six children. “One woman and four men died of their wounds on the spot before an ambulance arrived,” regional governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said. He posted a video showing a house on fire. The state-run Tass media agency posted pictures of a road in Belgorod strewn with debris and twisted metal. There was no independent confirmation or comment from Ukraine, which maintains that it does not target civilians in Russia.

• Zelenskiy has fired the head of Ukraine’s air force a day after it emerged that a recently delivered F-16 jet crashed during the week, killing the pilot. “I have decided to replace the commander of the air forces … I am eternally grateful to all our military pilots,” Zelenskiy said in an evening video address, without giving a reason for the dismissal of Mykola Oleshchuk. Zelenskiy spoke of the need to “protect” the lives of those defending the country. Mariana Bezugla, a member of a parliamentary defence committee, had earlier claimed the plane was shot down by friendly fire. Reuters cited a US official stating the plane did not appear to have been hit by Russian fire, and the crash may have been caused by mechanical failure or pilot error.

• Ukraine has called on Mongolia to arrest Vladimir Putin when he visits on Tuesday. The Russian president is due to travel to Mongolia, a member of the international criminal court (ICC). The ICC has a warrant out for Putin’s arrest over the illegal deportation of Ukrainian children.

• Russia’s military said its forces had captured three villages in eastern Ukraine, where it is advancing even as Kyiv mounts its own assault on Russian territory. In a briefing published on its Telegram page, Russia’s defence ministry said its forces had seized settlements in the Donetsk, Luhansk and Kharkiv regions.

• Ukraine’s top commander said Kyiv’s forces had advanced about a mile in Russia’s western Kursk region in the previous 24 hours. Oleksandr Syrskyi said Ukrainian forces took control of two square miles more of Russian territory.

• A group of Russian armed volunteers was being set up in Kursk to “ensure security”, officials said. Kursk’s governor, Alexy Smirnov, said on Telegram that the new detachments would be tasked with “not only ensuring security, but also participating in life support in resettled areas in order to support the remaining people in this difficult time”.

• Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said corruption investigations into Russian defence officials involved “serious charges” that would lead to court trials, Reuters reports. A military court in Moscow has placed Pavel Popov, a former deputy defence minister, in detention on suspicion of fraud in the latest of a string of corruption probes of officials tied to former defence minister Sergei Shoigu.

By travelling to the centre of the Earth via seismic waves scientists have discovered a ring-like structure within the swirling pool of molten metal known as the outer core.

Research published in the journal Science Advances has identified a doughnut-shaped region within the outer core, parallel to the equator.

A study co-author and Australian National University geophysicist, Prof Hrvoje Tkalčić, said because scientists could not reach the core with current technology, the team had analysed the forms of seismic waves generated by large earthquakes as they travelled through it.

They found the waves slowed down as they passed through a section near the ceiling, before the mantle. “By understanding the geometry of the paths of the waves and how they traverse the outer core’s volume, we reconstructed their travel times through the Earth,” Tkalčić said.

“We realised that seismic waves slow down in the zone that mathematically is called a torus.”

To most people this looked like a doughnut, he said.

Understanding the outer core was important, he said, as it was critical to the survival of life at the surface. It was responsible for the magnetic field, which protected Earth from the constant bombardment of charged particles from the sun.

Currents moving within the molten iron and nickel acted like a “giant dynamo” that generated and sustained the Earth’s magnetic field.

Tkalčić said scientists did not yet know why the Earth had this active dynamo when many other planets did not: “It’s fair to say that we understand the surfaces of other planets in more detail than our own planet’s interior.”

Earth’s interior – a solid centre containing the inner core, encapsulated by a liquid outer core and then the mantle – was just as immense, he said.

Overall the core was slightly larger than Mars. “We can think of it as a planet within our own planet,” Tkalčić said.

He added: “We don’t know the exact thickness of the doughnut, but we inferred that it reaches a few hundred kilometres beneath the core-mantle boundary.” The structure’s buoyancy suggested the presence of lighter chemical elements such as silicon, sulphur, oxygen, hydrogen or carbon.

“What makes this field really fascinating is that pretty much everything we do know is an inference based on the data that we have on the surface,” he said.

A co-author, Dr Xiaolong Ma, said the discovery of a new structure within the outer core lifted a veil on the dynamics of Earth’s magnetic field yet there were “still mysteries about the Earth’s outer core that are yet to be solved”.

A couple living in a southern California nudist community who were reported missing earlier this week are presumed dead, police said on Friday, and a next-door neighbor had been arrested.

On Friday, police used a tank-like vehicle with a battering ram to smash into a home where they believed the bodies of Stephanie Menard, 73, and her husband, Daniel, 79, would be be found, said Carl Baker, spokesperson for the Redlands police department.

“We are confident that they are deceased and that they are still here on the property,” Baker said. He did not release any information about a possible motive.

Later on Friday, officials said searchers had found human remains in bags in a concrete bunker underneath the home. The remains were not immediately identified.

Michael Royce Sparks, 62, was booked into jail on suspicion of homicide on Thursday night after being found under the house at Olive Dell Ranch, which is described as a residential RV park and family-friendly nudist resort on its website. The rustic community is in hill country about 60 miles (97km) east of Los Angeles.

Baker did not know whether Sparks has a lawyer who can speak on his behalf. Online jail records showed he was ineligible for bail and was scheduled for a Tuesday court appearance.

A dog trained to find cadavers indicated the presence of at least one body somewhere under the house on Friday morning, but officers were waiting to enter until a structural assessment determined whether the home was safe, Baker said at a news conference.

“We’re not going to send people in if there’s a danger of the structure collapsing on them,” Baker said, noting that the assessment might take hours to complete.

A friend reported the couple missing on Sunday and said they were last seen at their home Saturday morning. Their pet dog, a shih-tzu named Cuddles, was also missing.

The couple’s unlocked car was found later on Sunday, not far from their residence, and both their phones, along with Stephanie Menard’s purse, were still inside their home. Daniel Menard was described as a diabetic with dementia.

Tammie Wilkerson, a friend of the couple, told KABC-TV that the Menards were kind people involved in the community.

“They’re very sweet people,” Wilkerson said. “There’s not a mean bone in their body at all, which makes this very confusing.”

The arrest followed rapid developments that began when police were at the park on Thursday to continue the investigation, search the area and knock on doors.

“We received information from a source that a person who was involved in their disappearance was here on the property,” Baker said. “At that point, we locked down the property.”

Police went to the suspect’s home but attempts to contact him were unsuccessful and the tactical vehicle was brought in, Baker said. News video showed that the home was substantially torn open, leaving debris strewn about.

The suspect was arrested about 9.30pm after voluntarily surrendering, Baker said.

A couple living in a southern California nudist community who were reported missing earlier this week are presumed dead, police said on Friday, and a next-door neighbor had been arrested.

On Friday, police used a tank-like vehicle with a battering ram to smash into a home where they believed the bodies of Stephanie Menard, 73, and her husband, Daniel, 79, would be be found, said Carl Baker, spokesperson for the Redlands police department.

“We are confident that they are deceased and that they are still here on the property,” Baker said. He did not release any information about a possible motive.

Later on Friday, officials said searchers had found human remains in bags in a concrete bunker underneath the home. The remains were not immediately identified.

Michael Royce Sparks, 62, was booked into jail on suspicion of homicide on Thursday night after being found under the house at Olive Dell Ranch, which is described as a residential RV park and family-friendly nudist resort on its website. The rustic community is in hill country about 60 miles (97km) east of Los Angeles.

Baker did not know whether Sparks has a lawyer who can speak on his behalf. Online jail records showed he was ineligible for bail and was scheduled for a Tuesday court appearance.

A dog trained to find cadavers indicated the presence of at least one body somewhere under the house on Friday morning, but officers were waiting to enter until a structural assessment determined whether the home was safe, Baker said at a news conference.

“We’re not going to send people in if there’s a danger of the structure collapsing on them,” Baker said, noting that the assessment might take hours to complete.

A friend reported the couple missing on Sunday and said they were last seen at their home Saturday morning. Their pet dog, a shih-tzu named Cuddles, was also missing.

The couple’s unlocked car was found later on Sunday, not far from their residence, and both their phones, along with Stephanie Menard’s purse, were still inside their home. Daniel Menard was described as a diabetic with dementia.

Tammie Wilkerson, a friend of the couple, told KABC-TV that the Menards were kind people involved in the community.

“They’re very sweet people,” Wilkerson said. “There’s not a mean bone in their body at all, which makes this very confusing.”

The arrest followed rapid developments that began when police were at the park on Thursday to continue the investigation, search the area and knock on doors.

“We received information from a source that a person who was involved in their disappearance was here on the property,” Baker said. “At that point, we locked down the property.”

Police went to the suspect’s home but attempts to contact him were unsuccessful and the tactical vehicle was brought in, Baker said. News video showed that the home was substantially torn open, leaving debris strewn about.

The suspect was arrested about 9.30pm after voluntarily surrendering, Baker said.

Kosovo authorities on Friday closed five parallel institutions working with the ethnic Serb minority, a move that was immediately criticised by the US and could further raise tensions with neighbouring Serbia.

Elbert Krasniqi, Kosovo’s minister of local administration, confirmed the closure of five so-called parallel institutions in the north – where most of the ethnic Serb minority lives – writing online that they “violate the Republic of Kosovo’s constitution and laws”.

The US embassy in Kosovo reiterated on Friday in a statement Washington’s “concern and disappointment with continuing uncoordinated actions … that continue to have a direct and negative effect on members of the ethnic Serb community and other minority communities in Kosovo.”

Serbia continues to assist the Serb minority since Kosovo’s 2008 proclamation of independence, which Belgrade does not recognise.

Kosovo was a Serbian province before a Nato bombing campaign in 1999 ended a war between Serbian government forces and ethnic Albanian separatists in Kosovo. Their war left about 13,000 people dead, mainly ethnic Albanians.

The Kosovo-Serbia relationship remains tense and the 13-year-long normalisation talks facilitated by the EU have failed to make progress. A shootout in September 2023 between masked Serb gunmen and Kosovo police left four people dead.

The EU and the US have pressed both sides to implement agreements that were reached in February and March 2023 between the Serbian president, Aleksandar Vucic, and the Kosovo prime minister, Albin Kurti, who leads the ethnic Albanian dominated government.

This month, Pristina said it would open the bridge on the Ibar River which divides Mitrovica into a Serb-dominated north and ethnic Albanian south. The bridge has been closed to passenger vehicle traffic for more than a decade, with minority ethnic Serbs erecting barricades since 2011 because they say “ethnic cleansing” would be carried out against them if ethnic Albanians could freely travel over the bridge into their part of the city.

Kurti has also been at odds with western powers over Kosovo’s unilateral closure of six branches of a Serbia-licensed bank in northern Kosovo this year.

Unrest in northern Mitrovica has increased since last year, when the Nato-led international peacekeepers force in Kosovo, known as KFor, stepped up its numbers and equipment along the Kosovo-Serbia border, including at the bridge in Mitrovica.

Kosovo will hold parliamentary elections on 9 February, a vote that is expected to be a test for Kurti, whose governing party won in a landslide in 2021.

With Associated Press

A summit of Pacific leaders has ended in drama after China’s regional envoy demanded the scrapping of language about Taiwan, with the communique later republished without the offending paragraph.

The Pacific Islands Forum (Pif) summit in Tonga this week brought together Australia, New Zealand and 16 Pacific island countries or territories, only three of which still have diplomatic relations with Taiwan.

China is not a member of the regional grouping, but – like the US and numerous other major countries – attends some of the Pif events as a “dialogue partner”.

For more than 30 years, Taiwan has been afforded the lesser status of “development partner”, a situation that irks Beijing, which claims the self-governed democracy as its territory.

Solomon Islands, which has fostered increasingly warm ties with Beijing since switching diplomatic recognition from Taiwan in 2019, had raised concerns in the lead-up to this week’s summit about Taiwan’s status.

But the final communique published on the Pif website on Friday rebuffed any push for change and stood by existing arrangements.

“Leaders reaffirmed the 1992 Leaders decision on relations with Taiwan/Republic of China,” it said.

China’s special envoy for the Pacific, Qian Bo, called for changes to the communique.

Nikkei Asia reported that it saw a “visibly angry” Qian confront the Pif secretary general, Baron Waqa, immediately after the closing news conference and that he called the statement “unacceptable”.

Qian later told reporters in Tonga’s capital, Nuku’alofa, that it was “a surprising mistake made by someone” and it “must be corrected”.

He reiterated Beijing’s position that China should be seen as the representative “on behalf of the whole China, including Taiwan and the mainland”, Nikkei Asia reported.

The Guardian has seen and verified a copy of the final communique that appeared on the Pif website earlier on Friday. It included a line reaffirming the decades-long arrangements regarding Taiwan.

But as of Friday evening local time, this communique was no longer easily accessible on the website.

The communique was republished on the Pif website on Saturday morning local time, but with paragraph 66 about Taiwan no longer included.

A paragraph about Solomon Islands being the host of next year’s Pif was moved up to become the new paragraph 66.

The Guardian has sought comment from the Pif secretariat.

Taiwan’s deputy foreign minister, Tien Chung-kwang, also travelled to Nuku’alofa this week. Tien held talks with Taiwan’s three remaining Pacific allies, Palau, Tuvalu and the Marshall Islands.

China’s foreign ministry said on Friday: “Any attempt by the Taiwan authorities to brush up their sense of presence by rubbing shoulders with the forum can only be self-deceptive.”

The Australian prime minister, Anthony Albanese, had previously played down the prospect of any attempt to change Taiwan’s status within Pif structures.

When asked about the matter on Thursday morning, prior to the leaders’ retreat, Albanese said: “Well, that hasn’t been discussed at all. We support all the existing arrangements.”

Additional reporting by Reuters

An aid agency whose convoy was hit by an Israeli airstrike on Thursday has said that the four men killed were local community members who had asked to serve as an escort for the convoy.

The four men were the only casualties from the strike, which hit the lead vehicle in which they were travelling. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) described them as “armed assailants” who had hijacked the convoy.

The incident has highlighted the dangers being faced daily by humanitarian workers trying to deliver life-saving assistance in Gaza, under the threat of looting and assault by armed gangs and desperate civilians, while risking coming under fire from Israeli forces on the ground or drones patrolling the skies.

The convoy was organised by a US-based NGO, Anera, which has been serving refugees and victims of violence in the region for more than 50 years. It had partnered with a Dubai-based logistics company, Move One, to organise the convoy bringing medical supplies and fuel to an Emirati-run hospital in the southernmost city of Rafah.

The convoy was on the way to the hospital when the lead vehicle was hit by an apparent drone strike.

Its route had been coordinated in advance with the IDF, under a deconfliction process intended to prevent aid vehicles from being bombed. But, according to an Anera statement on Friday, shortly after the convoy had crossed into Gaza, four men from the local community who had worked with Move One before “stepped forward and requested to take command of the leading vehicle, citing concern that the route was unsafe and at risk of being looted”.

In an earlier statement, Anera had described the Palestinian men as Move One employees, but on Friday it characterised them as “four community members with experience in previous missions and engagement in community security with Move One”.

“The four community members were neither vetted nor coordinated in advance, and Israeli authorities allege that the lead car was carrying numerous weapons,” the new statement said, without addressing the allegation that the men were armed.

“Anera and Move One are in close communication and are working together to determine all the facts,” it said, adding: “The Israeli airstrike was carried out without any prior warning or communication.”

Anera’s president and chief executive, Sean Carroll, said: “According to all the information we have, this is a case of partners on the ground endeavouring to deliver aid successfully. This should not come at the cost of people’s lives.”

An IDF statement on Thursday confirmed that the route had been agreed, but claimed that “during the convoy’s movement, a number of armed assailants seized control of the vehicle in the front of the convoy [a Jeep] and began to lead it”.

It added: “After the takeover and further verification that a precise strike on the armed assailants’ vehicle can be carried out, a strike was conducted.

“No damage was caused to the other vehicles in the convoy and it reached its destination as planned. The strike on the armed assailants removed the threat of them seizing control over the humanitarian convoy.”

The IDF claimed that it had contacted Anera after the incident and that the aid organisation had “verified that all of the convoy’s organisation members and humanitarian aid were safe and reached their destination as planned”.

Anera confirmed that the convoy did reach the hospital, but said only one person travelling in the convoy had been an Anera employee.

The airstrike came hours after Israeli soldiers opened fire on a World Food Programme (WFP) vehicle clearly marked with UN insignia and travelling in a convoy of two.

The WFP said the vehicle was hit by at least 10 bullets as it approached an IDF checkpoint at Wadi Gaza. The vehicle was armoured with reinforced glass and no one inside was injured, but the agency temporarily suspended the movement of its staff around Gaza.

At a UN security council meeting on the humanitarian situation in Gaza, the US deputy ambassador, Robert Wood, expressed alarm at the shooting of a WFP vehicle and said Israel has told Washington that an initial review suggested the shooting was “a result of a communication error” between military units.

On 23 July, the UN children welfare and protection agency, Unicef, said two of its vehicles were hit with live ammunition while waiting at an army-designated holding area in Gaza.

On 1 April, the IDF killed seven aid workers in a drone attack on a convoy run by the World Central Kitchen charity.

The IDF later admitted to “grave errors” by its officers, firing two of them, and conceded that it had been informed of the planned convoy in advance but said the information had not been passed down to operational units.

One of two doctors charged in connection with Matthew Perry’s death made his first appearance in a federal court in Los Angeles on Friday after reaching a deal to plead guilty and cooperate with prosecutors.

Dr Mark Chavez, 54, of San Diego, reached a plea agreement with prosecutors earlier this month to plead guilty to conspiring to distribute the surgical anesthetic ketamine. He is the third person to plead guilty in the aftermath of the Friends star’s fatal overdose last year.

Chavez agreed to cooperate with prosecutors as they pursue others, including the doctor Chavez worked with to sell ketamine to Perry. Also working with the US attorney’s office are Perry’s assistant, who admitted to helping him obtain and inject ketamine, and an acquaintance of the actor who admitted to acting as a drug messenger and middleman.

The three are helping prosecutors as they go after their main targets: Dr Salvador Plasencia, who is charged with illegally selling ketamine to Perry in the month before his death, and Jasveen Sangha, a woman who authorities say is a dealer who sold the actor the lethal dose of ketamine. Both have pleaded not guilty and are awaiting trial.

At a hearing on Friday, Chavez stood in court with his lawyer and told a judge he understood his rights. The presiding judge, Jean P Rosenbluth, told him he could remain free on bond with several restrictions, including turning over his passport and not working as a doctor. He has agreed to turn over his medical license.

“He’s incredibly remorseful,” Chavez’s lawyer Matthew Binninger said outside court with the doctor standing at his side. “He’s trying to do everything in his power to right the wrong that happened here. He didn’t accept responsibility today but only because it wasn’t on the calendar.”

Binninger added: “He’s doing everything in his power to cooperate and help with this situation.”

The lawyer said Perry was “universally beloved, and it’s a shame what happened”.

Chavez admitted in his plea agreement that he obtained ketamine from his former clinic and from a wholesale distributor where he submitted a fraudulent prescription.

After a guilty plea, he could receive up to 10 years in prison when he is sentenced.

Perry was found dead by his assistant on 28 October. The medical examiner ruled ketamine was the primary cause of death. The actor had been using the drug through his regular doctor in a legal but off-label treatment for depression that has become increasingly common.

Perry found Plasencia about a month before his death when seeking more ketamine than his doctor would give him. Plasencia in turn asked Chavez to obtain the drug for him.

“I wonder how much this moron will pay,” Plasencia texted Chavez. The two met up the same day in Costa Mesa, halfway between Los Angeles and San Diego, and exchanged at least four vials of ketamine.

After selling the drugs to Perry for $4,500, Plasencia asked Chavez if he could keep supplying them so they could become Perry’s “go-to”.

“The doctors preyed on Perry’s history of addiction in the final months of his life last year to provide him with ketamine in amounts they knew were dangerous,” US attorney Martin Estrada said in announcing the charges on 15 August.

Plasencia is charged with seven counts of distribution of ketamine and two charges related to allegations he falsified records after Perry’s death. He and Sangha are scheduled to return to court next week. They have separate trial dates set for October, but prosecutors are seeking a single trial that would probably be delayed to next year.

Oasis have issued a warning to people against reselling tickets for their reunion tour – or buying those resold tickets – on the secondary market at vastly inflated prices.

The band said tickets “sold in breach of the terms and conditions will be cancelled by the promoters”.

A limited number of people were able to secure the coveted tickets through a presale ballot on Friday evening.

But, shortly after going on sale, floor standing tickets were available from about £807 to £3,615 on the StubHub website, while seats in some lower level sections were on offer at £6,347.

Viagogo, another resale website, also advertised tickets for more than £2,000.

Officially issued tickets range in price from £73 to £151, with the most expensive official package for the Wembley concerts retailing at £506.25.

Oasis wrote on X: “We have noticed people attempting to sell tickets on the secondary market since the start of the pre-sale.

“Please note, tickets can ONLY be resold, at face value, via @Ticketmaster and @Twickets. Tickets sold in breach of the terms and conditions will be cancelled by the promoters.”

Lisa Webb, a consumer law expert at Which?, said: “Oasis fans are understandably eager to snap up tickets to the reunion tour, but we’d strongly advise against buying any of the resale tickets currently popping up online at inflated prices.

“Not only is there a chance that some of these listings could be scam attempts, but even legitimate tickets could be cancelled, rendering them invalid, if they are sold outside of the official resale platforms or at above face value.”

Tickets for the band’s 15 UK shows in London, Manchester, Edinburgh and Cardiff will go on sale at 9am on Saturday, while the sale for their two Dublin gigs starts at 8am.

Prices to watch a gig at London’s Wembley Stadium begin at £74.25, while the most expensive ticket is £506.25, which includes a pre-show party, exhibition and seated package.

The cheapest seats are at Cardiff’s Principality Stadium shows, which will set people back £73, and Edinburgh’s Murrayfield Stadium at £74, according to Manchester-based promoter SJM Concerts, which runs the website Gigs and Tours.

Standing tickets at Wembley will cost fans £151.25, and the same tickets in Cardiff and Edinburgh are slightly cheaper at £150 and £151.

In the band’s home city of Manchester, tickets start from £148.50, with only standing available alongside a number of hospitality and luxury packages.

Before the announcement for the UK shows, Irish promoter MCD said on its website that the price of both of the two Croke Park gigs in Dublin would start at €86.50 (£73) without booking fees.

StubHub and Viagogo were contacted for comment.