South Korea’s main parties are holding emergency meetings amid reports MPs could bring forward a vote to impeach President Yoon Suk Yeol over Tuesday night’s short-lived martial law declaration.

The main opposition Democratic Party says the vote, currently scheduled for Saturday, could take place as soon it can guarantee the numbers to pass the motion.

In the first clear sign his own party may now vote with the opposition, the leader of Yoon’s ruling party called for his swift suspension on Friday, saying he posed a “great danger” if he remained in power.

The opposition need the support of at least eight ruling party MPs to secure the 200 votes required for the impeachment motion to pass.

Han Doong-hoon, chief of the People Power Party (PPP), had earlier said his party would not support the opposition’s impeachment motion.

But on Friday he said said there was “credible evidence” that Yoon had ordered the arrest of key politicians on “anti-state charges” on Tuesday.

He expressed concern that “extreme actions”, such as the martial law declaration, could be repeated if Yoon remained in office.

“[These are] putting the Republic of Korea and its people at great risk.”

He added that his party had learnt about plans to jail arrested opposition politicians in a detention centre in Gwacheon, a city south of Seoul.

His comments are the first clear indication the president’s own party may now vote to help impeach him.

Earlier on Friday, supporters of the opposition assembled on the steps of parliament, armed with placards and demanding the president’s removal.

Yoon’s attempt to impose martial law shocked the country and unnerved South Korea’s allies and financial markets.

He cited threats from “anti-state forces” and North Korea. But it soon became clear that his move had been spurred not by external threats but by his own domestic political troubles.

The order was abruptly reversed hours later after 190 MPs managed to make it into the parliament and vote it down – some of them climbing fences and breaking barricades to get into the chamber.

Opposition lawmakers are concerned that there will be another attempt to impose martial law. Some of them earlier told BBC they have been staying close to the National Assembly grounds so they could get there quickly to vote down any such declaration.

Meanwhile, ruling party MP Cho Kyung-tae became the first ruling party MP to publicly voice support for Yoon’s impeachment.

“The choice between standing on the side of the people by suspending the president’s duties or becoming an ally of the forces that imposed martial law is a matter for politicians to judge,” Cho said on Friday.

“I hope that all the politicians of the People’s Power will stand on the side of the people,” he added.

The capital, Seoul, has seen more than two days of street protests demanding Yoon’s resignation, while police said he is being investigated for “insurrection”.

People have also been flooding PPP lawmakers with text messages, urging them to vote for Yoon’s impeachment, according to South Korean media reports.

One MP, Shin Sung-bum, received more than 4,000 such messages on Facebook, The Chosun Daily reported.

More than seven out of 10 South Koreans were in favour of the impeachment, a survey by local pollster Realmeter showed on Thursday.

Before his attempt to place the country under military rule, Yoon had been beset by low popularity ratings, corruption allegations and an opposition-led legislature that reduced him to a lame-duck leader.

French President Emmanuel Macron said he will name a new prime minister “in the coming days”, after Michel Barnier resigned following a no-confidence vote in parliament.

In a 10-minute address to the nation on Thursday, he rejected opposition pressure to stand down, vowing to stay in his post “fully, until the end of the mandate” in 2027.

He thanked Barnier for his dedication during his brief term as prime minister, and accused the French far right and hard left of collaborating in an “anti-republican front” to bring down the government.

French MPs voted overwhelmingly to remove Barnier on Wednesday, just three months after he was appointed by Macron.

The vote was the first time a French government had been voted down by parliament in more than 60 years, a move Macron labelled “unprecedented”.

In response, Marine Le Pen, leader of the far right National Rally (RN), posted to social media: “A little reminder to President Macron, who is supposed to be the guarantor of the Constitution: censure is not anti-republican, it is provided for in the Constitution of our Fifth Republic.”

The no-confidence vote that toppled Barnier’s leadership had been tabled by both the New Popular Front (NFP) left-wing alliance, and Le Pen’s RN.

They united to censure the government after the former Brexit negotiator used special powers to force through his budget without a vote.

A total of 331 MPs voted in support of the motion against Barnier, far more than the 288 required for it to pass.

Barnier resigned on Thursday, and the budget was automatically withdrawn. He will remain in office on a caretaker basis with his ministers until a new government is appointed. Macron’s role is unaffected.

Macron has been heavily criticised for deciding to call snap elections in July, creating a deadlock in parliament and an escalating political crisis.

He admitted the decision he took “was not understood”, saying: “Many have blamed me for it and I know, many continue to blame me. It’s a fact and it’s my responsibility.”

Addressing voters directly, he said some of his political opponents had chosen “chaos over responsibility” and that they were not thinking “about you, the voters”, suggesting their focus was on the next presidential elections.

Macron gave no indication of who the next prime minister would be, but said their immediate focus would be the budget for 2025.

Speculation has been swirling over who could be named, with potential candidates including Defence Minister Sébastien Lecornu, Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau, and centrist former presidential candidate François Bayrou.

But finding someone who would be supported by the majority of factions within the stalemate parliament could be difficult, as was the case when former PM Gabriel Attal was asked to stay on as caretaker for two months after July’s elections.

It is unclear if the next government will now be in place before Saturday, when world leaders including US President-elect Donald Trump are due to attend the opening ceremony of the rebuilt Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris.

The building was devastated by fire in April 2019, and its reconstruction little more than five years later has drawn worldwide praise.

Macron said the rebuilding of the ravaged cathedral, plus France’s successful hosting of the 2024 Olympics, were “proof that we can do great things”.

“We can do the impossible,” he said. “The world admires us for that.”

Police in New York have released two photos of an unmasked individual wanted for questioning over the killing of a healthcare chief executive.

UnitedHealthcare boss Brian Thompson, 50, was fatally shot in the back on Wednesday morning outside the Hilton hotel in Midtown Manhattan.

The attacker fled the scene without taking any of Thompson’s belongings. Police believe the victim was targeted in a pre-planned killing.

Investigators are also using facial recognition technology and bullet casings with cryptic messages written on them to track down the suspect. They have yet to reveal a motive in the shooting.

Here’s what we know about the suspect and the investigation.

The shooting took place at about 06:45 EST (11:45 GMT) in a busy part of Manhattan close to Times Square and Central Park. Thompson had been scheduled to speak at an investor conference later in the day.

According to police, the suspect – who was clad in a black face mask and light brown or cream-coloured jacket – appeared to be waiting for Thompson for five minutes outside the Hilton hotel where he was expected to speak.

Thompson, who arrived on foot, was shot in the back and leg, and was pronounced dead about half an hour later at a local hospital.

• Story in full: Police hunt gun-wielding killer of UnitedHealthcare CEO

New York Police Department (NYPD) Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny has revealed that the suspect’s weapon appeared to jam, but that he was able to quickly fix it and keep shooting.

CCTV footage appears to show the gunman had fitted a suppressor, also known as a silencer, to his pistol, BBC Verify has established.

New York City Mayor Eric Adams – a veteran of the NYPD – told MSNBC that the use of a silencer was unprecedented in his career.

“I have never seen a silencer before,” he said. “That was really something shocking to us all.”

Investigators reportedly believe the firearm is a BT Station Six 9, a weapon which is marketed as tracing its roots back to pistols used by Second World War-era Allied special operations forces.

Police have reportedly visited gun stores in Connecticut to try to determine where the weapon was purchased.

After the shooting, video shows the suspect fleeing the scene on foot. Officials initially said the suspect used an electric Citi Bike owned by Lyft.

But Lyft, which owns and operates Citi Bike, later said it had been told by the NYPD that one of its vehicles had not been used, according to the BBC’s US partner, CBS News.

So far, the investigation into Thompson’s killing has centred on a few clues that police are using to identify the suspect.

Officials released two images of an unmasked man on Thursday that the NYPD said was “wanted for questioning” in connection with the murder.

Law enforcement sources told CBS that the person is believed to have used a fake ID to check into a hostel in the area. The name used is fraudulent and is not believed to belong to an actual person.

Investigators believe the person of interest took a bus that originated in Atlanta, Georgia, to New York days before the shooting, CBS reports, citing a person briefed on the investigation. It’s unclear whether the person got on the bus at Atlanta or later during a stop.

It is unclear if he is the same person as the suspect.

Earlier, police revealed the suspect was photographed at a nearby Starbucks just minutes before the shooting.

While he is masked in the image, police sources told CBS that the mask is pulled down far enough so that his eyes and part of his nose can be seen.

With that, investigators are using facial recognition software to try to find a match.

Investigators have so far not identified a motive in the killing, although police did note that the assailant fled without taking any of Thompson’s belongings.

Additionally, police are testing three bullet casings and three live rounds found at the scene for DNA.

The words “deny,” “defend” and “depose” were discovered on the casings, two law enforcement sources told CBS.

Investigators believe this could be a reference to the “three D’s of insurance” – a known reference made by opponents of the industry.

The terms refer to tactics used by insurance companies to refuse payment claims by patients in America’s complicated and mostly privately run healthcare system.

The words resemble – but are not exactly the same as – the title of a book called Delay, Deny, Defend: Why Insurance Companies Don’t Pay Claims and What You Can Do About It.

The book, published in 2010, was written by Jay Feinman, a legal scholar at Rutgers University in New Jersey. It’s billed as an exposé of the insurance industry and a how-to guide for Americans on how to navigate the system.

Professor Feinman declined to comment when the BBC contacted him.

A mobile phone was discovered in an alley along the suspect’s escape route. Police say they are “working through” the phone.

A coffee cup believed to have been discarded by the suspect has also been dusted for fingerprints and sent to an NYPD crime lab in the hopes that it may help reveal his identity or establish a chain of events.

Investigators also said they executed a search warrant at a location in Manhattan’s Upper West Side, which he was seen entering earlier in the day.

The location is near the Frederick Douglas housing project, where police say surveillance video showed the suspect outside at approximately 05:00 the morning of the crime.

Police earlier said they would also search Thompson’s room at the nearby Marriott, which is down the street from where the incident took place.

Thompson joined UnitedHealth, the biggest private insurer in the US, from accountancy firm PricewaterhouseCoopers in 2004.

He rose through the ranks and became CEO in 2021, leading the company through some very profitable years.

• Who was Brian Thompson?

In an interview with MSNBC, Thompson’s wife said that there had “been some threats” against him earlier, although she was unable to provide details.

“I just know that he said there were some people that had been threatening him,” she said.

According to police in Thompson’s hometown of Maple Grove, Minnesota, there had previously been one suspicious incident at his home in 2018.

The incident was cleared with no criminal activity detected. No additional details were provided.

Worshippers have been forced to flee an Australian synagogue after it was set on fire in what the prime minister has condemned as an “act of hate”.

Firefighters were called to Melbourne’s Adass Israel synagogue just after 04:00 local time on Friday (17:00 GMT Thursday), finding the building fully ablaze when they arrived.

Community leaders have told local media that “a few people” were inside at the time for morning prayers, and they reported seeing firebombs thrown. One person was injured and the fire caused extensive damage.

Police say that they believe the fire was deliberately lit but are keeping an “open mind” on a motive.

In a statement, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said the incident in Ripponlea, in the city’s south-east, was “clearly aimed at creating fear in the community”.

“This violence and intimidation and destruction at a place of worship is an outrage,” he wrote.

“I have zero tolerance for antisemitism.”

He added that he had been briefed by the Australian Federal Police, who would provide support to authorities in the state of Victoria.

“The people involved must be caught and face the full force of the law.”

Victoria Police said the exact cause of the fire had not yet been determined and an arson chemist would visit the site.

However Det Insp Chris Murray said a witness had told them two people in masks appeared to have spread accelerant inside the building.

He appealed for anyone who may have witnessed the incident, or who may have CCTV or dashcam footage from the local area, to contact police.

Synagogue board member Benjamin Klein told The Age newspaper that people inside “heard banging on the door and the window, and some liquids came through which were lit”.

“The whole thing took off pretty quickly,” he said.

A man who was inside at the time, Yumi Friedman, added that a window had been smashed, sending “glass flying”.

Mr Friedman told reporters his hand was burned on a door knob when he tried to return to the synagogue to fight the blaze.

Det Insp Murray – who was confronted by an angry worshipper while updating the press – said police would be committing significant resources to the investigation and increasing patrols around the area.

“We’re going to do our best to make sure that they can return, as they should, to their local synagogues, doing what is absolutely Australian – that is to be able to worship without fear.”

Jewish community leaders have said they believe the attack is an escalation of a recent documented increase in antisemitism in Australia.

“None of the Jewish community is surprised. We’ve known this has been coming,” Executive Council of Australian Jewry president Daniel Aghion said.

For about two months each year, fisherman Faustino Mauloko da Cunha transforms his home along the South Pacific coast into a whale monitoring station.

From the morning, villagers and student volunteers gather at the house in Subaun, a village in the north of Timor-Leste. Armed with binoculars and telephoto cameras, they watch the cobalt waters for one of its great treasures – pygmy blue whales.

When there is a sighting, it’s all systems go.

Faustino’s son, Zacarias, dispatches a drone. Then the team’s leader, Australian marine ecologist Karen Edyvane, guides him to take the best photographs. When the drone returns, the team reviews the pictures, taking notes on a white board.

It’s a small and thrifty operation in Timor-Leste, which is part of an archipelago that lies between South East Asia and the South Pacific. But it has generated a wealth of information about pygmy blue whales – one of the largest animals on earth, whose vast habitats and elusive nature make them challenging to study.

These citizen researchers, all of them locals, have spotted nearly 3,000 pygmy blue whales over the past 10 years – Prof Edyvane considers that a “truly extraordinary” number.

Timor-Leste has one of the world’s highest concentrations of marine mammals.

During the migration season – October and November – hundreds of pygmy blue whales pass through the country’s waters as they make the epic journey spanning thousands of kilometres from the Banda Sea, which lies to the north of Timor-Leste, to southern Australia.

But the area has been under-researched, says Prof Edyvane, who started the citizen science monitoring programme in 2014.

During the last two whale seasons, she has based herself in Subaun, about 50km (31 miles) from the capital Dili, working with fishermen, students and dive tour operators to document the cetaceans.

They have documented “some of the lesser known, intimate reproductive behaviours of blue whales, some for the very first time,” says Prof Edyvane, who lectures at the Australian National University and Charles Darwin University.

In 2022, for instance, tourists with a local tour operator invovlved in the programme captured underwater footage of a mother nursing her calf, offering a glimpse into the species’ reproductive behaviours, which have remained largely unknown.

“It’s very, very exciting,” she adds.

The project started as a Facebook group, inviting local volunteers to spot and document the lives of pygmy blue whales.

Prof Edyvane trained them on surveying methods and hired professionals to teach them how to use telephoto cameras and drones so that they could conduct aerial and boat surveys.

“When locals living along the coast see the whales swimming by, they will post pictures on Facebook and WhatsApp. Updates come on a real-time basis and when someone shares something, everyone gets very excited,” Prof Edyvane says.

In 2016, the team worked with a dive tour operator to launch the first whale-watching tour.

It was only last year that they set up a “research station” outside the da Cunha’s village home – photos show a simple hut overlooking the bay. Outside are two tables, plastic chairs and white boards mounted on the hut’s walls.

During this year’s whale season, undergraduates from the National University of East Timor gathered at the research station to help with the sightings.

Even such a basic structure has made the task easier.

“We’re able to monitor all day and all night,” Prof Edyvane says. “We’ve also been able to get the most incredible footage. The whales come in so close sometimes we can actually hear their blows.”

Citizen researchers like these have become powerful eyes and ears on the ground for marine scientists, says wildlife scientist Vanessa Pirotta.

“The combination of people having access to tools like drones and social media means we have insights into things that are happening while we may be behind the desk writing grants to fund our work,” she said.

The increase in research activity in Subaun has also led to a rise in tourism.

The demand for whale-watching tours has increased, diving instructor Cassio Schumacher tells the BBC, adding that these tours are “booked up years in advance”.

Local non-profits have warned of the risks of unregulated whale tourism and the government has said it intends to use Prof Edyvane’s research to “fully protect and conserve” the marine life that pass through Timor-Leste’s waters.

Prof Edyvane believes that with regulation, whale tourism has the potential to create jobs and grow Timor-Leste’s economy.

The country is one of the poorest in the world, where average annual incomes in cities hover around $1,500, according to the International Monetary Fund. In Subaun, most villagers work as subsistence fishermen and farmers, earning just about $600 to $900 a year.

The da Cunha family has now started preparing meals from local produce and the day’s catch for the students and tourists – an additional source of income.

“We enjoyed having the guests around and will love to do it again,” Faustino, 51, tells the BBC on a WhatsApp video call. “We will make it a better experience [next season].”

His son, Zacarias, has also been contracted to provide drone services for the project. Prof Edyvane says she plans to train him to give talks about whales in English.

The 26-year-old says what he appreciates is that the visitors are learning to protect the area: “The university students learn fast and well to defend this area.”

As for the tourists, he says the locals are happy to teach them. “We remind tourists not to swim with the whales but instead watch them from a distance.”

In the 2016 Bollywood hit Pink, a scene introducing Amitabh Bachchan’s character shows the actor emerging from his home on a winter morning into Delhi’s smog-filled streets, wearing a mask.

The mask and Delhi’s smoggy air feature in other scenes of the film but are of little relevance to its plot.

Yet, it is one of the rare examples of mainstream Indian films taking notice of the deadly air that makes many parts of India dangerous to live in every year.

The toxic air pollution and recurrent winter smog in Indian capital Delhi and other parts of northern India frequently makes headlines, becoming a matter of public concern, political debate and legal censure. But unlike disasters such as the devastating floods in Uttarakhand in 2013, Kerala in 2018 and Mumbai city in 2005 – each of which have inspired films – air pollution is largely missing from Indian pop culture.

Siddharth Singh, author of The Great Smog of India, a book on pollution, says that it is a “big failure” that air pollution is not a prevailing narrative in India’s literature and filmmaking.

Much of the writing on pollution in India remains in the realm of academia and scientific expertise, he points out.

“When you say PM2.5 or NOx or SO2 (all pollutants), what are these words? They mean nothing to [ordinary] people.”

In his 2016 book, The Great Derangement, author Amitav Ghosh, who has written extensively about climate change, observed that such stories were missing from contemporary fiction.

“People are weirdly normal about climate change,” he said in a 2022 interview.

The writer described being in India during a heatwave.

“What struck me was the fact that everything seemed to be normal and that was the most unsettling thing,” he said. “It is like we have already learnt to live with these changes.”

Ghosh described climate change as “a slow violence” which made it difficult to write about.

That certainly holds for pollution – it can have devastating health impacts over a long time, but does not lend itself to dramatic visuals.

The subject has, however, been explored in documentaries like Shaunak Sen’s All That Breathes, which was nominated for the Oscars in 2022.

In the film, Sen explored climate change, pollution and the interconnected nature of human-animal relationships in Delhi’s ecosystem through the story of two brothers who treated wounded black kites that fell from the city’s smoke-filled skies.

Sen says he was interested in exploring how “something as big as the Anthropocene” (a term used to describe the current moment in time when human beings are having a profound impact on the living and physical world) or climate change were connected to petty squabbles and everyday irritability.

A scene in the film shows the two brothers arguing. One of them then points to the sky and at themselves and says, “Yeh sab jo hamare beech mein ho raha hai, ye is sab ki galti hai (What’s happening between us is the fault of all of this).”

“[The effects of climate change] actually pervade through every aspect of our life,” Sen says. “And the job of representation, be it cinema or literature, is to give it that kind of robustness in its representation.”

• Living in Delhi smog is like watching a dystopian film again and again

Environmental films that are pedantic, prescriptive, or hold audiences by the collar to make them feel bad do more disservice than good, he says.

“For me, the best films are those which are Trojan horses which are able to sneak in ideas without the audience fully knowing that they’re engaging in that conversation.”

Filmmaker Nila Madhab Panda, whose work on climate change and environment spans more than 70 films, believes art can make a difference.

Panda, who began telling stories on climate change in 2005 with his documentary Climate’s First Orphan, turned to more mainstream cinema for the message to reach wider audiences.

The filmmaker was born and raised in the Kalahandi Balangir Koraput region of the eastern state of Odisha which was prone to droughts and floods and moved to Delhi in 1995.

“It’s amazing to me that I was living in an ecosystem where you see four seasons, you drink water from the river directly. Natural wealth is free to us – air, water, fire, everything. And I come to Delhi where you buy everything. I buy water, I buy air. Every room has an air filter.”

In 2019, Panda made a short film for an anthology in which he explored the theme of Delhi’s pollution through a courtroom drama about a couple getting a divorce because they couldn’t agree on whether to continue living in the capital.

“You can’t just make anything which is not entertaining and show [it],” Panda says.

• The families fleeing Delhi to escape deadly smog

Creators also deal with the challenge of humanising difficult stories.

Singh, whose 2018 book looked at India’s air pollution crisis, says he struggled to find the people behind the statistics while writing it.

“We always read these news headlines of a million or two million people dying because of pollution every single year. But where are these people? Where are their stories?”

While themes related to the environment have often found place in India’s vast canon of regional literature, a lot of contemporary English writers, including Ghosh, have also highlighted the topic – Delhi’s Bhalswa rubbish dump features in Nilanjana S Roy’s crime novel Black River. In Gigi Ganguly’s Biopeculiar and Janice Pariat’s Everything the Light Touches, the writers explore our relationship with the natural environment.

But there is still a long way to go.

Singh says one of the reasons for the relative shortage of such stories could be that the people creating them are “insulated” due to their privilege.

“They are not the people who are by the bank of the [polluted] Yamuna river, who see the poem in it or write about the stories along its banks.”

These days it’s memes and photos on social media that have been most effective in capturing the gravity of air pollution, he says.

“One meme that was popular a few days ago said something like, ‘Sheikh Hasina [exiled Bangladesh PM who is now in Delhi] spotted on her daily morning walk’. But the accompanying image was completely grey because the joke was not being able to see her because of air pollution!”

The writer hopes such creative outlets find enough momentum to eventually “trigger a response by those who can actually make a difference”.

“I think that’s what we lack at the moment,” he says.

A strong 7.0 magnitude earthquake has struck off the coast of northern California, according to the US Geological Survey.

A tsunami warning was initially issued along the coasts of both northern California and southern Oregon – an area that includes about 4.7 million people – but was later rescinded.

The earthquake’s epicentre hit closest to the town of Ferndale, California, a small city in Humboldt County about 260 miles (418km) north of San Francisco.

Local officials said no deaths or major widespread damage had been reported in the aftermath of the quake, which is one of only nine such 7 magnitude quakes to strike globally this year.

Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office told CBS News, the BBC’s US partner, there had been no catastrophic destruction to buildings or infrastructure, but some homes did report minor damage.

Several stores in the area reported items falling off shelves and power briefly went out for many residents, the sheriff’s office said.

More than 10,000 people were without power in Humboldt County after the earthquake struck, according to poweroutage.us.

While the earthquake did not cause widespread damage, one resident of Ferndale who spoke to the BBC in the minutes following the quake said the inside of the building she was in “looks like a bomb has gone off in every room”.

Olivia Cobian, the innkeeper at the Gingerbread Mansion Inn in Ferndale, said the inside of the inn now “looks like a warzone”.

“We have huge cast iron fireplaces that have been lifted up and moved over, everything’s fallen over, broken”.

Another who witnessed the quake was Todd Dunaway, who was eating lunch in his home in Fortuna, California when the earthquake hit.

“It literally felt like standing on a giant waterbed,” he told the BBC. “The noise of rattling windows, creaking walls, falling dishes and decorations added to the drama and scariness of it all as it is happening. Naturally – you can’t help wonder as it is happening ‘Is this the really big one?'”

Mr Dunaway said he and his wife – who was also in the house – were shaking nervously for 15 minutes afterwards waiting to see if there would be a bigger aftershock.

His large swimming pool was still sloshing ferociously for minutes after the shaking stopped and lost about 18 inches (45cm) of water.

His sporting goods store experienced some damage, with boxes of shoes falling from the shelves, but nothing major, he said.

Multiple aftershocks were reported after the initial earthquake, which struck around 10:44 local time (18:44 GMT).

Some areas, including the city of Berkeley in northern California, issued an evacuation order due to the threat of a possible tsunami.

“EVACUATE NOW,” an X post from the city warned. “People in the Tsunami Zone are in IMMEDIATE DANGER and MUST EVACUATE NOW. Stay east of 7th St. This is a lawful order to leave now.”

Kayla Aihara was staying at a hotel in Half Moon Bay, California and got the back-to-back alerts about the earthquake and potential tsunami.

Before the tsunami warning was cancelled, workers at the hotel had told her to vacate a gym and go to higher ground out of fear of the tsunami’s impacts.

Some vacated outside and she said multiple people crowded near the shoreline of the Pacific Coast hotel, watching the waves and waiting to see any hints of a tsunami.

California Governor Gavin Newsom was briefed on the earthquake and met with state emergency officials to help coordinate the response.

At an event along the US-Mexico border, the governor announced he’d signed a state of emergency declaration to help free resources to respond to the earthquake.

He said the earthquake is “another reminder of the state that we live in and the state of mind that we need to bring to our day-to-day reality here in the state of California”.

Tsunami signs line the roads of many coastal communities along the US West Coast. They mark any “tsunami hazard zone” and often point those in the area to evacuation routes leading them to higher ground.

Those who live in these tsunami zones are encouraged to familiarise themselves with their evacuation routes and have a kit ready for quick evacuation.

California’s emergency services website notes a tsunami can hit in as little as 5 to 10 minutes after a large earthquake and sometimes the first wave to hit is not the biggest. It notes if you see water draw out from the shoreline and go out to sea quickly, “escape immediately to higher ground or inland”.

The US West Coast is the confluence of a number of the Earth’s tectonic plates, and tremors are not uncommon. But a strong 7 magnitude quake isn’t typically seen in the region. Experts say there are between 10 and 15 earthquakes of this magnitude that hit globally each year.

There have been eight other earthquakes with a 7 magnitude globally this year, according to data from the US Geological Survey.

The agency says that typically there are about 20,000 earthquakes tracked around the globe each year – about 55 per day.

The area has been struck by a number of major earthquakes, including a 1994 quake that hit Northridge, in the Los Angeles area, killing dozens of people and injuring thousands more, as it wrought billions of dollars of damage to homes and infrastructure.

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Syrian rebels say they have taken full control of a second major city, after the military withdrew its troops from Hama in another setback for President Bashar al-Assad.

The leader of the Islamist militant group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), Abu Mohammed al-Jawlani, declared “victory” in Hama and vowed there would be “no revenge”.

Earlier, HTS fighters and their allies took over Hama central prison and released inmates amid fierce battles, while the military said it had redeployed troops outside the city.

Hama is home to one million people and is 110km (70 miles) south of Aleppo, which the rebels captured last week after launching a surprise offensive from their stronghold in the north-west.

The rebel commander told residents of Homs, which is the next city south on the highway from Aleppo to Damascus, that “your time has come”.

In the past, President Assad relied on Russia and Iran to crush his opponents.

But with both allies preoccupied with their own affairs, it is unclear how – or if – he will be able to stop an advance that could threaten his government’s survival.

More than half a million people have been killed since a civil war erupted in 2011 after Assad’s government cracked down violently on peaceful pro-democracy protests.

The rebels broke through the government’s defensive lines north of Hama following several days of heavy fighting.

The military had sent reinforcements to the city after the fall of Aleppo. But despite support from Russian air strikes and Iran-backed militia fighters, troops were unable to prevent Hama being overrun on Thursday.

Rebel commander Hassan Abdul Ghani said in the morning that its fighters were engaged in fierce battles in various districts.

In the early afternoon, he announced that hundreds of inmates from Hama’s central prison had been released.

Minutes later, the military announced the redeployment of troops outside Hama “to preserve civilian lives and prevent urban combat”.

Photos and videos posted online and verified by the BBC showed fighters in several north-eastern neighbourhoods. The freed inmates were also filmed celebrating outside the central prison with a rebel and a reporter for a pro-opposition news outlet.

Abdul Ghani subsequently declared: “We’re pleased to tell you that Hama has been completely liberated after our forces have finished combing operations.”

He also said the rebels had cleared Hama military airport, in the city’s western outskirts, as well as Jabal Zain al-Abadin, a strategically important hill just to the north-east that overlooks the Damascus-Aleppo highway.

In a video, Abu Mohammed al-Jawlani said his fighters had entered Hama to “cleanse the wound that has endured in Syria for 40 years”.

“I ask God almighty that it be a conquest with no revenge,” he added.

The HTS leader was referring to the killing of between 10,000 and 25,000 people in the city in 1982, when the late President Hafez al-Assad sent in tanks and artillery to crush an Islamist uprising.

Similar tactics have been employed across the country by his son, Bashar, over the past 13 years.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), a UK-based monitoring group, says more than 820 people – most of them combatants, but also including 111 civilians – have been killed across the country since the start of the rebel offensive eight days ago.

The UN has said the fighting is also “worsening an already horrific situation for civilians in the north of the county”.

An estimated 280,000 people have been displaced, most of them women and children, and some civilians are trapped in front-line areas unable to reach safer locations.

In Aleppo, home to two million people, some public services and critical facilities – including hospitals, bakeries, power stations, water, internet and telecommunications – are meanwhile disrupted or non-functional because of shortages of supplies and personnel.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged “all those with influence to do their part” to end the civil war.

“We are seeing the bitter fruits of a chronic collective failure of previous de-escalation arrangements to produce a genuine nationwide ceasefire or a serious political process,” he added. “These must change.”

President Assad has vowed to “crush” the rebels and accused Western powers of trying to redraw the map of the region, while his key allies Russia and Iran have offered their “unconditional support”.

Russian warplanes have intensified their strikes on rebel-held areas in recent days, Iran-backed militias have sent fighters to reinforce the government’s defensive lines, and Iran has said it is ready to send additional forces to Syria if asked.

Turkey, which supports the Syrian opposition but has denied reports that it is involved in the HTS-led offensive, has urged Assad to engage in a political process with the opposition to bring an end to Syria’s 13-year civil war.

Turkish-backed rebel factions have meanwhile capitalised on the government’s retreat in the north by launching a separate offensive on a pocket of territory near Aleppo that was controlled by a Kurdish-led militia alliance, the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). Turkey, which has a large restive Kurdish minority, considers the Kurds in Syria as a threat.

Before the start of the rebel offensive, the government had regained control of Syria’s main cities with the help of Russia, Iran and Iran-backed militias. However, large parts of the country remained out of its control.

The rebels’ last stronghold was in Aleppo and Idlib provinces, which border Turkey and where more than four million people were living, many of them displaced from government-held areas.

The enclave was dominated by HTS, which is designated as a terrorist organisation by the UN, US, Turkey and other countries because it was al-Qaeda’s affiliate in Syria until it formally broke ties in 2016.

A number of allied rebel factions and jihadist groups were also based there, along with Turkish-backed SNA factions and Turkish forces.

HTS and its allies said on 27 November that they had launched an offensive to “deter aggression”, accusing the government and allied Iran-backed militias of escalating attacks on civilians in the north-west.

But it came at a time when the government’s allies were preoccupied with other conflicts.

The Iran-backed Lebanese group Hezbollah, which was crucial in helping push back rebels in the early years of the war, has suffered recently from Israel’s offensive in Lebanon. Its new leader Naim Qassem said on Thursday that it would “be by Syria’s side in thwarting the goals of this aggression as much as we can”.

Israeli strikes have also eliminated Iranian military commanders in Syria and degraded supply lines to pro-government militias there.

Russia has also been also distracted by the war in Ukraine.

The northeastern Indian state of Assam has banned the consumption of beef in public places including restaurants and events.

This is an expansion to an earlier rule that restricted the sale of beef near certain religious places like temples, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said on Wednesday.

However, the meat can still be purchased from shops and eaten within homes or private establishments in the state.

The consumption of beef is a sensitive issue in India, as cows are revered by Hindus, who comprise 80% of the country’s population.

Several states ruled by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) – which is also in power in Assam – have cracked down heavily on cow slaughter in recent years.

About two-thirds of India’s 28 states, many of them governed by the BJP, have partially or fully banned cattle slaughter and beef consumption (though consumption of buffalo meat is legal in some of these places).

In many parts of India, cow vigilante groups have been accused of enforcing the ban through violence, often leading to deadly attacks on Muslim meat sellers and cattle traders and Dalits (formerly untouchables), for whom beef is a staple and cheap form of protein.

In Assam, the sale and purchase of beef was banned in 2021 in areas where Hindus, Jains and Sikhs – who don’t usually eat beef – live. That law also prohibited the sale of beef near temples.

Sarma said that the new ban on public consumption will be added to that existing law.

The decision comes days after India’s main opposition party Congress claimed that Sarma had used beef to win a by-election in Samaguri, a Muslim-majority constituency – a charge denied by the BJP.

Congress legislator Rakibul Hussain had said that by “offering beef” to voters, the chief minister had “betrayed” his own party’s Hindu nationalist values.

The statements sparked a political slugfest, with Sarma on Wednesday saying he was willing to impose a complete ban on beef in the state, if that’s what the Congress wanted.

Meanwhile, other political parties have criticised the ban, saying it interfered with people’s right to eat what they want.

“If they cannot ban beef in Goa or other northeastern states, why in Assam?” said Hafiz Rafiqul Islam, a member of the All India United Democratic Front.

The sale and consumption of beef is legal in some states, including Goa and Arunachal Pradesh, which are ruled by the BJP.

Calin Georgescu, the fringe nationalist politician leading the presidential race in Romania, has told the BBC that he would end all support for Ukraine if elected.

He is facing a second-round run-off in the elections on Sunday, where he will run against Elena Lasconi, a former TV presenter who is campaigning on a firmly pro-EU platform.

Georgescu, whose only election campaigning has been on social media, said he would make “the Romanian people” his priority.

But he denied that his surprise success so far was the result of a Russian-backed influence operation, saying he did not care about the “lies” of his country’s intelligence agencies as he was working with God and the people.

On Wednesday, in a highly unusual move, Romania’s outgoing president published declassified documents that detailed what was called a massive and “highly organised” campaign for Georgescu on TikTok co-ordinated by a “state actor”.

The papers included an intelligence assessment that Russia was carrying out hybrid attacks on Romania, which it sees as an “enemy state”.

The constitutional court is now being flooded with requests to look into the allegations of meddling with a view to possibly cancelling the election.

Prosecutors today announced they were opening a criminal investigation but there is no timeline on when that might conclude.

“They are afraid,” is how Georgescu brushed away evidence that hundreds of thousands of dollars were spent pushing campaign content for him, breaking both Romanian election law and TikTok’s own rules.

He denied that he was “Moscow’s man”, referring derisively to Romania’s “un-intelligence agencies”.

“They can’t accept that the Romanian people finally said, ‘we want our life back, our country, our dignity’,” he said, portraying himself as battling against an unyielding establishment.

In a sometimes tetchy interview in which he praised Donald Trump and the Hungarian populist leader Viktor Orban, Georgescu referred to Vladimir Putin as a “patriot and a leader”.

He then added: “But I am not a fan.”

But when questioned about Russia’s war on Ukraine, he first asked, “Are you sure of that?”, appearing to deny the war’s very existence.

He then said Romania was interested only in pushing for peace on its border but refused to say that this should be on Kyiv’s terms.

When asked whether he agreed with standing by Ukraine, as the EU puts it, “for as long as it takes”, Georgescu said “No.” He said things would change.

“I agree just that I have to take care of my people. I don’t want to involve my people,” he replied, clarifying that Romania – an EU and Nato member – would provide no more military or political support for its neighbour.

“Zero. Everything stops. I have to take care just about my people. We have a lot of problems ourselves.”

It would be a dramatic change in position for Bucharest, and one that would be music to Russian ears.

The president in Romania has considerable power, including influence on areas such as foreign policy. He is also the commander-in-chief of the armed forces and appoints the prime minister.

Romania shares a long border with Ukraine and has been a staunch supporter of Kyiv since the full-scale invasion in 2022.

It’s provided a Patriot missile defence system as well as financial support. It’s also become a key export route for Ukrainian grain, as Russian bombardments have crippled the work of ports there.

Under a Georgescu presidency, Romania would join Hungary and Slovakia as Russia-sympathisers on the eastern flank of Nato.

It would also be a serious dent to EU solidarity on Ukraine, just as it faces the prospect of assuming more responsibility for aiding Kyiv with Donald Trump back in the White House.

Georgescu underlined that he would keep Romania inside the EU and Nato, but that everything from now on would be “negotiated” and focus on his country’s interests.

He refused to say that Vladimir Putin’s Russia was a security threat for the West.

His endorsement of conspiracy theories has also sparked concerns, including denying the Covid pandemic and doubting that anyone ever landed on the Moon.

Romania is home to a giant Nato military base, close to the Black Sea, as well as a US missile defence facility.

Georgescu now describes himself as a university teacher, but has previously worked in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and with the UN.

He clearly does have supporters – his clean-living, Romania-first message has popular appeal, especially outside Bucharest.

But in the capital many people are worried about the direction their country may be taking.

When asked if he understood why they were scared, Georgescu shook his head: “That’s just propaganda.”

On Thursday evening, several thousand protesters gathered in central Bucharest to call for Romania to remain closely allied with Europe – many holding the blue EU flag.

Others brought Romanian flags with a circular hole in the centre, a reminder of how after the 1989 revolution people cut out the communist symbols.

Talk of Russian influence – Moscow meddling in any form – is an emotional topic for many. Several chanted “Freedom!” and “Europe!”

One man told the BBC he and his friends had been with protesters on the streets of Bucharest 35 years ago, and couldn’t bear to think of Romania going back to the past.

Another woman, Anca, said she saw the “long arm of Russia” at work in Romania’s presidential election and had come to the rally to show she believes her country’s future has to be firmly in Europe.

One of the biggest questions on people’s minds in Seoul on Wednesday is: what was the president thinking?

In a late-night address that threw South Korea’s parliament into chaos and tested the country’s commitment to democracy, President Yoon Suk Yeol declared that he was imposing martial law.

Less than 24 hours later, his political future is on the brink, with protests on the streets and impeachment proceedings against him under way.

So, what happened?

• What is martial law and why was it declared?
• Woman who grabbed South Korean soldier’s gun speaks to BBC
• How two hours of martial law chaos unfolded

Martial law was last introduced in South Korea in 1979, sparked by the assassination of the then-military ruler in a coup. Today’s South Korea, however, is a far cry from that, and the repressive years that followed.

It is a stable, prosperous democracy – yet Yoon claimed he was introducing military rule to save the country from dark forces. He called the opposition-controlled National Assembly a “den of criminals” that was “attempting to paralyse” the government.

Hours later, he was forced to back down as furious protesters and lawmakers gathered outside the National Assembly – the MPs made it inside and voted down the order.

His shock declaration was, in fact, a bid to get the kind of grip on power that has eluded him since he won the presidency in 2022 by the slimmest margin in South Korea’s history.

And barely a month has passed since then without controversy.

In late 2022, he was criticised for his government’s response to the horrific crowd crush during Halloween, which killed 159 young people in Seoul.

Then there were calls to investigate his wife after she was caught accepting a Dior handbag as a gift – a scandal that is always hovering close to the headlines.

In April this year, his party was defeated in parliamentary elections, leaving him in a lame-duck position. This week alone he has been locked in a political battle with opposition lawmakers over the country’s budget.

Even before he told South Koreans he was suspending their rights, his approval rate was below 20%.

There are some clues in Yoon’s address as to what he was thinking.

What was immediately evident was that he was frustrated with the opposition-controlled parliament. In his Tuesday night address, he called the assembly where they exercise their mandate a “monster that destroys the liberal democratic system”.

The reference to a threat from North Korea and “anti-state forces” suggests he was also hoping to garner support from the kind of right-wing conservatives in South Korea who label liberal politicians “communists”.

But the president misread his country and its politics.

His declaration was a chilling reminder of a period many in South Korea have tried to forget. On television, newsreaders were seen shaking.

In 1980, when pro-democracy activists, many of them students, took to the streets of the city of Gwangju to protest at martial law, the army responded with violence and around 200 people were killed.

While martial law lasted three years – 1979 to 1981 – there had been military rule for decades before, and it continued until 1987. And in those years South Korea was rife with suspicion, when anti-government activists were dubbed Communist spies and arrested or killed.

Yet, during his election campaign Yoon praised authoritarian general Chun Doo-hwan and said he had managed government affairs well – except for his suppression of pro-democracy activists.

He was later forced to apologise and said he “certainly did not defend or praise Chun’s government”.

But it does provide some insight into the president’s view of what constitutes power.

There have been rumours in South Korean political circles for months that Yoon was considering imposing martial law. In September, opposition leaders and party members declared it was a possibility. Most dismissed it as too extreme an option.

But he may well have been driven by something more: the fear of prosecution.

Park Geun-hye, the country’s first female leader, was jailed after being found guilty of abuse of power and corruption. Her predecessor, Lee Myung-bak, was investigated over allegations he was involved in stock price manipulation. He was sentenced to 17 years in prison for corruption and bribery in 2020.

Another former president, Roh Moo-hyun, took his own life in 2009 while under investigation for allegedly receiving millions in bribes.

In South Korea, prosecutions have almost become a political tool – a threat for the opposition to wield. It may partly explain why President Yoon took such drastic action.

Whatever his motives, Yoon’s career will struggle to recover from this. He is also facing calls to resign, and some local media reported that members of his own People Power Party were discussing expelling him from the party.

South Korea is a stable democracy – but it is a noisy one. And it refused to accept another authoritarian diktat.

President Yoon will now face the judgement of a parliament and a people after they rejected the most serious challenge to the country’s democracy since the 1980s.

Nineteen-year-old Hwang was watching the protests in Georgia on Tuesday night’s news when the images on TV suddenly changed – the spotlight was on his country after South Korea’s President Yoon Suk Yeol announced martial law.

“I couldn’t believe what I was seeing,” said the student, who wished to be identified only by his surname.

By Wednesday afternoon, he was among the protesters standing before the National Assembly, still stunned about what had happened the night before.

“It’s important for me to be here to show that we are against what Yoon tried to do,” Hwang said.

In a little less than six hours, Yoon was forced to walk back his shock announcement after lawmakers scrambled to block it.

But those were chaotic hours, sparking protests, fear and uncertainty in the country that had elected him.

On Tuesday night, at 23:00 local time (14:00 GMT) President Yoon, seated in front of blue creaseless curtains, made an unexpected address to the nation.

He said he was imposing martial law to protect the country from “anti-state” forces that sympathised with North Korea. The embattled leader is in a deadlock over a budget bill, dogged by corruption scandals and investigations into his cabinet members.

What followed was a sleepless night for Seoul.

Shortly after Yoon’s announcement, police lined the white metal gates outside the National Assembly building in the heart of Seoul, the building that the country’s tourism authorities have framed as “the symbol of Korean democracy”.

The military then announced that all parliamentary activity was suspended under martial law. But neither that nor the heavy security presence stopped thousands from gathering in front of the assembly in concern and fury.

It is easy to forget that South Korea – now a vibrant democracy – had its last brush with authoritarianism in the not-too-distant past – it only emerged from military rule in 1987. Martial law was last imposed in 1979.

This was “a move I never expected to see in the 21st century in South Korea,” university student Juye Hong told BBC World Service’s OS programme from Seoul.

Soon after Yoon’s shock announcement, the opposition’s Democratic Party leader Lee Jae-myung, hosted a live stream urging people to assemble at the National Assembly and protest there.

He also asked his fellow lawmakers to make their way to the assembly to vote down the order.

Hundreds of South Koreans responded.

Tensions rose quickly as a sea of dark, puffy winter coats pushed up against lines of police in neon jackets, chanting “no to martial law”.

And as vehicles arrived with military units, crowds blocked them. One woman lay defiantly between the wheels of a vehicle.

In stark contrast, there was a façade of normalcy across the rest of Seoul. Still, confusion enveloped the city.

“The streets look normal, people here are certainly bewildered,” John Nilsson-Wright, an associate professor at the University of Cambridge, told BBC World Service from Seoul.

The policeman he spoke to was “as mystified as I am,” he added.

• The president’s gamble backfired: What was he thinking?
• What is martial law and why was it declared?
• Woman who grabbed South Korean soldier’s gun speaks to BBC
• How two hours of martial law chaos unfolded

It was a sleepless night for some. “At first I was excited at the thought of not going to school today,” 15-year-old Kwon Hoo told the BBC in Seoul on Wednesday. “But then overwhelmingly the sense of fear settled in, that kept me up all night.”

“No words can express how afraid I am that things might turn out like North Korea for our people,” a South Korean who did not want to be named told BBC OS.

Meanwhile, word was spreading that special forces had been deployed to the assembly building. Helicopters were heard overhead as they circled the skies before landing on the parliament’s roof.

Reporters jostled in the crowd outside the gates, clicking away with their cameras.

As concerns grew that the government might restrict the media, journalists in Seoul stayed in touch with one another, exchanging advice on how to stay safe.

Ahn Gwi-ryeong, the 35-year-old spokesperson for the opposition Democratic Party found herself facing down soldiers at gunpoint. A video of the moment, where she is tugging at the barrel of a soldier’s rifle, has since gone viral.

“I wasn’t thinking about anything intellectual or rational, I was just like, ‘We have to stop this, if we don’t stop this, there’s nothing else,’’ she told the BBC.

“To be honest, I was a bit scared at first when I first saw the martial law troops. I thought, ‘Is this something that can happen in 21st century Korea, especially in the National Assembly?”

“After such a storm last night, it was hard to get back to reality,” she added, recalling the previous night. “I felt like I was witnessing the regression of history.”

As Ahn was confronting the soldiers, the clock was ticking for opposition lawmakers, who rushed to get into the assembly to block the order. Once that happened, the president would have to withdraw it.

But first, MPs and their aides had to get inside. Some crawled through the legs of security forces, others shoved and screamed at armed soldiers; many frantically clambered over fences and walls.

Hong Kee-won from the Democratic Party told the BBC that he had to scale a 1.5m (4.9ft)-high fence to enter the building, with the police blocking him even after he had shown them identification that proved he was a lawmaker.

Hong said that protesters helped to hoist him over the wall. He had been asleep when Yoon made the announcement – when his wife woke him, he raced to parliament.

“Democracy is strong here,” Hong said. “The military needs to listen to us, to the constitution, and not to the president.”

Lawmakers who made it into the building huddled together, only slightly calmer than the people outside. Hastily, they barricaded the entrances with whatever they could find: cushioned benches, long tables, sofas.

Some tried to push back soldiers who had made their way into the assembly building.

By 01:00 local time, National Assembly Speaker Woo Won-sik submitted a resolution requesting martial law to be lifted.

With that, less than two hours after Yoon’s shock declaration, 190 lawmakers who gathered, including some from Yoon’s party, voted unanimously to block it.

After the vote, opposition leader Lee told reporters that this was “a decisive opportunity to break the vicious cycle and return to normal society”.

By 04:30, Yoon was back on TV, in front of the same blue curtains, saying he would withdraw martial law. But this would only be made official, he said, when he could assemble enough of his cabinet to lift the order.

The announcement was met with cheers outside the assembly. In the hours before dawn, more people emerged from the building, from behind the barricades they had haphazardly put together.

With holes in the doors and broken windows, the stately building already bears scars of the night when South Koreans saved their democracy.

Schools, local businesses and banks opened as usual on Wednesday morning – and flights continued to land uninterrupted in South Korea’s buzzing capital.

But public anger – and the political fallout – was not spent.

As the sun rose on Wednesday, thousands gathered to call for Yoon’s resignation. The president is also facing impeachment proceedings.

“We are a strong democracy…But Korean people want to be safe – President Yoon must resign or be impeached,” Yang Bu-nam, a Democratic Party politician, told the BBC.

South Korea’s president shocked the country on Tuesday night when, out of the blue, he declared martial law in the Asian democracy for the first time in nearly 50 years.

Yoon Suk Yeol’s drastic decision – announced in a late-night TV broadcast – mentioned “anti-state forces” and the threat from North Korea.

But it soon became clear that it had not been spurred by external threats but by his own desperate political troubles.

Still, it prompted thousands of people to gather at parliament in protest, while opposition lawmakers rushed there to push through an emergency vote to remove the measure.

Defeated, Yoon emerged a few hours later to accept the parliament’s vote and lift the martial law order.

Now, lawmakers will vote on whether to impeach him over what the country’s main opposition has called his “insurrectionary behaviour”.

• The president’s gamble backfired: What was he thinking?
• Woman who grabbed South Korean soldier’s gun speaks to BBC
• How two hours of martial law chaos unfolded

Yoon has acted like a president under siege, observers say.

In his address on Tuesday night, he recounted the political opposition’s attempts to undermine his government before saying he was declaring martial law to “crush anti-state forces that have been wreaking havoc”.

His decree temporarily put the military in charge – with helmeted troops and police deployed to the National Assembly parliament building where helicopters were seen landing on the roof.

Local media also showed scenes of masked, gun-toting troops entering the building while staffers tried to hold them off with fire extinguishers.

Around 23:00 local time on Tuesday (14:00 GMT), the military issued a decree banning protests and activity by parliament and political groups, and putting the media under government control.

But South Korean politicians immediately called Yoon’s declaration illegal and unconstitutional. The leader of his own party, the conservative People’s Power Party, also called Yoon’s act “the wrong move”.

Meanwhile, the leader of the country’s largest opposition party, Lee Jae-myung of the liberal Democratic Party, called on his MPs to converge on parliament to vote down the declaration.

He also called on ordinary South Koreans to show up at parliament in protest.

“Tanks, armoured personnel carriers and soldiers with guns and knives will rule the country… My fellow citizens, please come to the National Assembly.”

Thousands heeded the call, rushing to gather outside the now heavily guarded parliament. Protesters chanted: “No martial law!” and “strike down dictatorship”.

Local media broadcasting from the site showed some scuffles between protesters and police at the gates. But despite the military presence, tensions did not escalate into violence.

And lawmakers were also able to make their way around the barricades – even climbing fences to make it to the voting chamber.

Shortly after 01:00 on Wednesday, South Korea’s parliament, with 190 of its 300 members present, voted down the measure. President Yoon’s declaration of martial law was ruled invalid.

Martial law is temporary rule by military authorities in a time of emergency, when civil authorities are deemed unable to function.

The last time it was declared in South Korea was in 1979, when the country’s then long-term military dictator Park Chung-hee was assassinated during a coup.

It has never been invoked since the country became a parliamentary democracy in 1987.

But on Tuesday, Yoon pulled that trigger, saying in a national address he was trying to save South Korea from “anti-state forces”.

Yoon, who has taken a noticeably more hardline stance on North Korea than his predecessors, described the political opposition as North Korea sympathisers – without providing evidence.

Under martial law, extra powers are given to the military and there is often a suspension of civil rights for citizens and rule of law standards and protections.

Despite the military announcing restrictions on political activity and the media, protesters and politicians defied those orders. And there was no sign of the government seizing control of free media – Yonhap, the national broadcaster, and other outlets kept reporting as normal.

Yoon was voted into office in May 2022 as a hardline conservative, but has been a lame duck president since April when the opposition won a landslide in the country’s general election.

His government since then has not been able to pass the bills they wanted and have been reduced instead to vetoing bills passed by the liberal opposition.

He has also seen a fall in approval ratings – hovering around lows of 17% – as he has been mired in several corruption scandals this year, including one involving the First Lady accepting a Dior bag, and another around alleged stock manipulation.

Just last month he was forced to issue an apology on national TV, saying he was setting up an office overseeing the First Lady’s duties. But he rejected a wider investigation, which opposition parties had been calling for.

Then this week, the opposition proposed slashing a major government budget bill – which cannot be vetoed.

At the same time, the opposition also moved to impeach cabinet members and several top prosecutors- including the head of the government’s audit agency – for failing to investigate the First Lady.

The opposition Democratic Party has moved to impeach Yoon.

Parliament will have to vote by Saturday on whether to do this.

The impeachment process is relatively straightforward in South Korea. To succeed, it would require support from more than two-thirds of the 300-member National Assembly – at least 200 votes.

Once an impeachment is approved, a trial is held before the Constitutional Court – a nine-member council that oversees South Korea’s branches of government.

If six of the court’s members vote to sustain the impeachment, the president is removed from office.

If this happens, it wouldn’t be the first time that a South Korean president has been impeached. In 2016, then-President Park Geun-hye was impeached after being accused of helping a friend commit extortion.

In 2004 another president, Roh Moo-hyun, was impeached and suspended for two months. The Constitutional Court later restored him to office.

Yoon’s rash action stunned the country – which views itself as a thriving, modern democracy that has come far since its dictatorship days.

Many see this week’s events as the biggest challenge to that democratic society in decades.

Experts contend it may be more damaging to South Korea’s reputation as a democracy than even the 6 January riots in the US.

“Yoon’s declaration of martial law appeared to be both legal overreach and a political miscalculation, unnecessarily risking South Korea’s economy and security,” one expert, Leif-Eric Easley at Ewha University in Seoul said.

“He sounded like a politician under siege, making a desperate move against mounting scandals, institutional obstruction and calls for impeachment, all of which are now likely to intensify.”

South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol’s future is hanging in the balance after a chaotic night during which he dramatically declared martial law and then withdrew it just as suddenly, plunging the country into turmoil.

Yoon, who won the top job by a whisker in 2022, was already deeply unpopular and under growing pressure since losing parliamentary elections in April, regarded as a vote of confidence on his time in office.

He’s been plagued by personal problems too. Last month he apologised in a televised address to the nation for a string of controversies surrounding his wife that included allegedly accepting a luxury Dior handbag and stock manipulation.

Now he’s facing demands that he resign and lawmakers have said they will move to impeach him.

• The president’s gamble backfired: What was he thinking?
• What is martial law and why was it declared?
• Woman who grabbed South Korean soldier’s gun speaks to BBC
• How two hours of martial law chaos unfolded

Tuesday night’s short-lived attempt to impose martial law took everyone by surprise.

It sent lawmakers scrambling to the National Assembly in Seoul to vote against the order. Outside, police had assembled as thousands of protesters gathered in fury.

The same crowd erupted in cheers when Yoon backtracked within hours and declared he would withdraw the martial law order.

That he would play such a high-stakes game, and then back off so easily, came as a surprise to South Koreans and the rest of the world.

Yoon was a relative newcomer to politics when he won the presidency. He had risen to national prominence for prosecuting the corruption case against disgraced former President Park Geun-hye in 2016.

In 2022, the political novice narrowly beat his liberal opponent Lee Jae-myung by less than 1% of the vote – the closest result the country has seen since direct elections started to be held in 1987.

At a time when South Korean society was grappling with widening divisions over gender issues, Yoon appealed to young male voters by running on an anti-feminism platform.

People had “high hopes” for Yoon when he was elected, said Don S Lee, associate professor of public administration at Sungkyunkwan University. “Those who voted for Yoon believed that a new government under Yoon will pursue such values as principle, transparency and efficiency.”

Yoon has also championed a hawkish stance on North Korea. The communist state was cited by Yoon on Tuesday night when he tried to impose martial law.

He said he needed to protect against North Korean forces and “eliminate anti-state elements”, even though it was apparent from the outset that his announcement was less about the threat from the North and more about his domestic woes.

Yoon is known for gaffes, which haven’t helped his ratings. During his 2022 campaign he had to walk back a comment that authoritarian president Chun Doo-hwan, who declared martial law and was responsible for massacring protestors in 1980, had been “good at politics”.

Later that year he was forced to deny insulting the US Congress in remarks made after meeting US President Joe Biden in New York.

He was caught on a hot mic and seen on camera seemingly calling US lawmakers a Korean word that can be translated as “idiots” or something much stronger. The footage quickly went viral in South Korea.

Yoon has had some success in foreign policy, notably improving ties in his country’s historically fraught relationship with Japan.

Yoon’s presidency has been mired in scandal. Much of it centred around his wife Kim Keon Hee, who was accused of corruption and influence peddling – most notably allegedly accepting a Dior bag from a pastor.

In November, Yoon apologised on behalf of his wife while rejecting calls for an investigation into her activities.

But his presidential popularity remained wobbly. In early November, his approval ratings tumbled to 17%, a record low since he took office.

In April, the opposition Democratic Party won the parliamentary election by a landslide, dealing a crushing defeat for Yoon and his People Power Party.

Yoon was relegated to a lame duck president and reduced to vetoing bills passed by the opposition, a tactic that he used with “unprecedented frequency”, said Celeste Arrington, director of The George Washington University Institute for Korean Studies.

This week, the opposition slashed the budget the government and ruling party had put forward – and the budget bill cannot be vetoed.

Around the same time, the opposition was moving to impeach cabinet members, mainly the head of the government audit agency, for failing to investigate the first lady.

With political challenges pushing his back against the wall, Yoon went for the nuclear option – a move that few, if any, could have predicted.

“Many observers worried in recent weeks about a political crisis because of the confrontation between the president and the opposition-controlled National Assembly,” said Dr Arrington, “though few predicted such an extreme move as declaring martial law.”

President Yoon’s declaration of martial law was a “legal overreach and a political miscalculation”, according to Leif-Eric Easley, professor of international studies at Ewha Womans University in Seoul.

“With extremely low public support and without strong backing within his own party and administration, the president should have known how difficult it would be to implement his late-night decree,” Dr Easley told the BBC.

“He sounded like a politician under siege, making a desperate move against mounting scandals, institutional obstruction, and calls for impeachment, all of which are now likely to intensify.”

Yoon has drawn ire from politicians on both sides, as hastily-gathered lawmakers – including some from Yoon’s party – voted to lift martial law on Tuesday night. The opposition Democratic Party is trying to impeach Yoon, and even Yoon’s own party leadership has demanded the president’s withdrawal from the party. Yoon’s senior aides offered to resign en masse on Wednesday, Yonhap news agency reported.

Opposition leader Lee is projecting optimism, telling reporters that Yoon’s “illegal declaration of martial law” is a “decisive opportunity to break the vicious cycle and return to normal society”.

The repercussions of Tuesday night are set to ripple beyond South Korea’s borders. Yoon’s announcement has rattled South Korea’s allies. Officials in the US, a key ally, said they were caught off guard by Yoon’s announcement, and are urging South Korea to resolve the crisis “in accordance with the rule of law”. Japan says that it is monitoring the situation in South Korea with “exceptional and serious concerns”.

Meanwhile, North Korea, which has ratcheted up tensions with the South in recent months, may “attempt to exploit divisions in Seoul,” said Dr Easley.

Anger is still sweeping South Korea. On Wednesday protesters streamed onto the streets condemning Yoon. One of the country’s largest labour unions with over one million members is calling on workers to go on strike until he resigns.

It is unclear what Yoon plans to do. He has yet to make a public appearance since the fiasco.

“He was increasingly unpopular for the way he has dealt with the problems that have been raised with his own conduct and the conduct of the first lady,” former South Korean foreign minister Kang Kyung-wha told the BBC Newsday programme. “The ball is in the president’s court to find a way out of this corner that he has put himself in.”

But no matter how Yoon chooses to play it, his botched martial law declaration may already be shaping up to be the last straw that breaks his shaky presidency.

A chaotic night in South Korea produced scenes most thought were consigned to the nation’s history.

One in particular has caught the attention of many: a woman confronting soldiers who were sent to block lawmakers from entering the National Assembly.

Footage of Ahn Gwi-ryeong, 35, a spokesperson for the opposition Democratic Party, grabbing the weapon of a soldier during the commotion has been shared widely online.

“I didn’t think… I just knew we had to stop this,” she told the BBC Korean Service.

Ahn made her way to the assembly building as soldiers descended on it, shortly after the president declared martial law across South Korea.

Like many in South Korea’s younger generation, the word “martial law” was foreign to her. It was last declared in 1979.

When Ahn first heard the news, she admitted “a sense of panic took over”.

• Fear, fury and triumph: Six hours that shook South Korea
• The president’s gamble backfired: What was he thinking?
• What is martial law and why was it declared?
• How two hours of martial law chaos unfolded

When martial law is declared, political activities like rallies and demonstrations are banned, strikes and labour actions are prohibited, and media and publishing activities are controlled by the authorities. Violators can be arrested or detained without a warrant.

Shortly after the declaration of martial law, opposition leader Lee Jae-myung called on lawmakers to gather in the National Assembly and hold a vote to annul the declaration.

Arriving at the assembly building just past 23:00 local time, Ahn recalled turning off office lights to avoid detection as helicopters circled overhead.

By the time she reached the main building, soldiers were engaged in a stand-off with officials, aides and citizens.

She said: “When I saw the armed soldiers… I felt like I was witnessing the regression of history.”

Ahn and her colleagues were desperate to prevent the troops from entering the main building, where the vote would be held.

They locked the revolving doors from the inside and piled furniture and other heavy objects in front of the doors.

When the military began advancing, Ahn stepped forward.

“Honestly, I was scared at first,” she said, adding: “But seeing such confrontation, I thought, ‘I can’t stay silent’.”

The assembly passed the resolution calling for the lifting of martial law at around 01:00. All 190 members who were present voted to repeal it.

At 04:26, President Yoon announced he was reversing his decision.

After the chaos subsided, Ahn slept for a short time inside the assembly building.

She continued: “I was actually a little scared to go outside the assembly in the morning because there didn’t seem to be any taxis running, and after such a storm last night, it was hard to get back to reality.”

During her conversation with the BBC, Ahn was wearing the same black turtleneck and leather jacket she had been wearing in the footage from the night before.

At times, she was overcome with emotion.

“It’s heartbreaking and frustrating that this is happening in 21st century Korea,” she said.

Antibiotics are hailed as medical saviours.

But they are increasingly facing a crafty adversary: bacteria that mutate and adapt and outwit the very drugs designed to defeat them and cure the infections they cause.

These antibiotic-resistant “superbugs” directly caused 1.14 million deaths worldwide in 2021, according to The Lancet, a medical journal. Antibiotics – which are considered to be the first line of defence against severe infections – did not work on most of these cases.

India is among the countries hardest hit by “antimicrobial resistance”. In 2019 alone, antibiotic-resistant infections caused around 300,000 deaths. They alone are responsible for the deaths of nearly 60,000 newborns each year.

But some hope is on the horizon. A number of promising locally-developed new drugs show potential to combat antibiotic-resistant pathogens. They also offer a game-changing solution to preserve last-resort treatments.

Enmetazobactam, developed by Chennai-based Orchid Pharma, is the first antimicrobial invented in India to be approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). This injectable drug treats severe conditions like urinary tract infections (UTIs), pneumonia and bloodstream infections by targeting bacteria’s defence mechanisms rather than the bacteria itself.

Bacteria often produce enzymes, like beta-lactamase, to destroy antibiotics. Enmetazobactam binds tightly to those enzymes, neutralising them and allowing the antibiotic to kill the bacteria effectively.

To put it simply, the drug immobilises the bacteria’s “weapon” without triggering resistance easily. This also preserves the effectiveness of other antibiotics, including carbapenems, which are the reliable “last line of defence” drugs.

Trials across 19 countries – the drug has been approved by global regulators – with more than 1,000 patients have shown its effectiveness. “The drug has shown remarkable potency against these bacteria that have evolved over the years. It is administered via intravenous [IV] infusion in hospitals, specifically for critically ill patients, and is not available over the counter,” Dr Maneesh Paul, the lead co-inventor of the drug, told the BBC.

Mumbai-based Wockhardt is testing a new antibiotic, called Zaynich, for severe drug-resistant infections. Developed over 25 years, the drug is currently in Phase-3 trials and expected to launch next year.

Dr Habib Khorakiwala, founder chairman of Wockhardt, has described Zaynich as a “ground-breaking, one-of-its-kind new antibiotic designed to combat all major superbugs”. It was administered on compassionate grounds to 30 critically ill patients in India who were unresponsive to any other antibiotics. Remarkably, all survived. “This would make India proud,” Dr Khorakiwala said.

Also in Phase-3 testing is Wockhardt’s Nafithromycin, trademarked as MIQNAF, a three-day oral treatment for community-acquired bacterial pneumonia with a 97% success rate. Existing treatments to the disease have resistance as high as 60%. Its trials are set to conclude next year and once it’s approved, the company says it could be launched commercially by late next year.

A 30-member Bengaluru-based biopharma firm Bugworks Research has partnered with Geneva-based non-profit Global Antibiotic Research and Development Partnership, or GARDP, to develop a new class of antibiotics for treating serious drug-resistant infections. Currently in early Phase-1 trials, the drug is five-to-eight years from market readiness.

“Antibiotics are becoming less effective, but big money is in drugs for cancer, diabetes and other conditions, not antibiotics,” Anand Anandkumar, CEO of Bugworks, told the BBC. “There’s little innovation because antibiotics are kept as a last-resort option. Big pharma isn’t focusing on antibiotic resistance. We’ve been funded by different organisations, but less than 10% of our funding comes from India.”

But that needs to change. A 2023 drug resistance surveillance report by Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), which analysed nearly 100,000 bacterial cultures from 21 specialised care hospitals around India, highlighted worrying trends in antibiotic resistance.

E.coli (Escherichia coli), commonly found in the intestines of humans and animals after consumption of contaminated food, was the most frequently isolated pathogen.

This was followed by Klebsiella pneumoniae, which can cause pneumonia and also infect the blood, cuts in the skin and the lining of the brain to cause meningitis. Coming close was the rise of the multidrug-resistant pathogen called Acinetobacter baumannii, which attacks the lungs of patients on life support in critical care units.

The survey found antibiotic effectiveness against E.coli had consistently sharply declined while Klebsiella pneumoniae showed an alarming rise in drug resistance. Doctors found that some of the main antibiotics were less than 15% effective in treating infections caused by these pathogens. Most worrying was the rising resistance to carbapenems, a critical last-resort antibiotic.

“It’s like playing whack-a-mole with bacteria. They evolve at an incredibly fast pace, and we’re always playing catch-up. You get rid of one, another pops up. We need more innovation and to learn from past mistakes,” Dr Manica Balasegaram, executive director of GARDP, told the BBC.

Not surprisingly, GARDP is focussing on India. It’s collaborating with Hyderabad-based Aurigene Pharmaceutical Services to produce zoliflodacin, a novel oral antibiotic for gonorrhea, a sexually transmitted disease which is showing increasing resistance to antibiotics. GARDP has also partnered with Japan’s pharma company Shionogi to distribute cefiderocol – a breakthrough FDA-approved antibiotic for tough infections like UTIs and hospital-acquired pneumonia – in 135 countries, with plans for production in India.

But this is only one part of the story. Doctors say drug prescription practices in India urgently need reform. The widespread use of broad-spectrum antibiotics – they target many bacteria types but can kill good bacteria, cause side-effects and increase antibiotic resistance – fuels drug resistance by encouraging the emergence of drug resistant bacterial mutants.

Instead, say doctors, narrow-spectrum antibiotics should be prioritised. But hospitals often lack antibiograms – microbiology-based antibiotic guidelines – forcing doctors to prescribe “broadly and blindly”.

“I am definitely excited that we will have these new drugs. But what is also important is that we should create mechanisms that they should not be misused the way we have previously done with [what were once also] blockbuster drugs. Improper and irresponsible use will compromise the longevity of these new drugs,” warns Dr Kamini Walia, a scientist at ICMR.

The rapid mutation of bacteria, which can evolve in a matter of hours, underscores the urgency of a holistic approach. This includes reducing infections through better water, sanitation and hygiene, improving vaccine uptake, strengthening hospital infection control policies, educating physicians and deterring self-medication by patients. “Combating antimicrobial resistance is a complex, multi-faceted challenge tied to healthcare equity and systemic accountability,” says Dr Walia.

The message is clear: without urgent action, we risk a future where even relatively minor infections could become untreatable.

Canada is being accused of throwing Mexico under the bus amid a tariff threat ahead of President-elect Donald Trump’s second term in the White House.

Last week, Trump threatened he would impose a blanket 25% tariff on both countries when he takes office in January unless they secured their shared borders with the US.

Canadian officials were quick to distance their country’s border issues from those of Mexico, arguing that drug smuggling and unlawful crossings at the southern border were much higher, and that Mexico was serving as a “back door” in North America for Chinese investment.

Those remarks have not gone unnoticed in Mexico.

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum told the Associated Press this week that “Mexico must be respected, especially by its trading partners”.

She added that Canada had its own social problems with fentanyl use, adding the country “could only wish they had the cultural riches Mexico has”.

• ‘It’s going to be hard’: US firms race to get ahead of Trump tariffs

Sheinbaum’s remarks came after Canada’s US ambassador, Kirsten Hillman, told the news agency that during a recent dinner at Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s Florida residence, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau told the president-elect that the northern border was “vastly different than the Mexican border”.

Doug Ford, leader of Ontario, Canada’s most populous province, said last week that lumping Canada and Mexico together on border security – given the differences between the two boundaries – was “the most insulting thing” he has heard from the US, a long-time close ally of Canada.

Canadian officials have also tried to position the US and Canada as a united front against China, while saying they share concerns that China was using Mexico as a backdoor to flood the North American market with cheap imports.

In October, Canada imposed a 100% tariff on imports of Chinese-made electric vehicles (EV) after similar announcements by the US and European Union.

The country also plans to impose a 25% duty on Chinese steel and aluminium.

Mexico has not levied a similarly steep tariff.

At the moment, all three countries are under a North American trade agreement that was renegotiated during Trump’s first term. It is up for renegotiation again in 2026.

But tensions with China prompted Ford to repeatedly call for separate bilateral trade deals between Canada, the US and Mexico – a proposal that has been backed by Danielle Smith, leader of Canada’s oil-rich province of Alberta.

“They’ve had an opportunity to fix these concerns for years and they just don’t want to,” Ford said in late November.

Trudeau has said that while Canada preferred Mexico remain a united North American trade partner, “we may have to look at other options” if the country doesn’t address China trade.

Marta Leardi-Anderson, the executive director of the Cross-Border Institute at the University of Windsor – an Ontario city connected by a bridge to Detroit, Michigan – said Ford’s comments are likely a reflection of Ontario’s deep reliance on its US trade relationship.

The province is at the heart of the highly integrated auto industry in Canada, and trade between Ontario and the US totalled more than C$493bn ($350bn) in 2023.

“That’s a huge amount of economic energy from just one region of the country,” Ms Leardi-Anderson said.

She added that Trump’s views on tariffs and border security have forced Mexico and Canada – also long-time allies – to dissect the shortcomings in their relationship in ways they have not done before.

These comments were seen as a betrayal by Mexico’s lead trade negotiator, Gutierrez Romano, who told Canadian newspaper the Globe and Mail last week that “it is not rational to be divided against the United States”.

Ford’s comments and Trudeau’s perceived silence about them were also seen as offensive by some of the Mexican public, says Oliver Santín Peña, a professor at the National Autonomous University of Mexico.

“Ultimately, it is not a good time in the bilateral relationship [between Canada and Mexico],” Mr Peña told the BBC, noting the nations have enjoyed a steady relationship for 85 years.

He said Sheinbaum’s response signals that she will stand up for Mexico when needed, but she is likely not seeking to open a two-front trade war with Trump and Trudeau.

“She would not fall for provocations,” Mr Peña said, but also wants to communicate “that her country should be respected”.

Sheinbaum, who took office in October, is still establishing herself in the role and the country’s first woman president and has taken the position that Mexico is to be respected as a full and equal partner, particularly by its North American neighbours.

“I always will defend Mexico and Mexicans’ rights, including those based in the United States,” she told the BBC on the campaign trail when asked her about the possibility of working with a second Trump administration.

While both the northern and southern US borders have reported unlawful crossings and drug seizures, the numbers at the border with Canada are considerably lower than those at the Mexico border, according to official data.

US border agents have seized 43lbs (19.5kg) of fentanyl at the northern border between October 2023 and this September, compared to more than 21,000lbs at the southern border.

Over the same period, there were just under 200,000 migrant encounters at the northern border, and more than two million at the southern border.

Canada has promised to beef up border security since Trump’s surprise tariff threat.

Meanwhile, Sheinbaum has shared her country’s immigration strategy with Trump while emphasising her view of “respecting human rights”.

“We reiterate that Mexico’s position is not to close borders but to build bridges between governments and between peoples,” she has said.

Crossings at the US-Mexico border dropped sharply this summer after reaching record highs earlier under the Biden administration, in part due to efforts by Mexico to implement measures like setting up new checkpoints and increasing patrols.

Since Trump and Sheinbaum spoke on the phone following the tariff threats, Mexico has also made what it says is a record seizure of fentanyl – some 1,500 tablets with an estimated value of around $400m.

Mexico, China and Canada together account for more than a third of the goods and services both imported and exported by the US, supporting tens of millions of American jobs.

About 75% of Canada’s exports go to the US, and Canadian imports to the US are valued at $430bn, according to the United Nations Comtrade database on international trade.

Mexico is the top trading partner of the US with imports valued at $480bn.

For about two months each year, fisherman Faustino Mauloko da Cunha transforms his home along the South Pacific coast into a whale monitoring station.

From the morning, villagers and student volunteers gather at the house in Subaun, a village in the north of Timor-Leste. Armed with binoculars and telephoto cameras, they watch the cobalt waters for one of its great treasures – pygmy blue whales.

When there is a sighting, it’s all systems go.

Faustino’s son, Zacarias, dispatches a drone. Then the team’s leader, Australian marine ecologist Karen Edyvane, guides him to take the best photographs. When the drone returns, the team reviews the pictures, taking notes on a white board.

It’s a small and thrifty operation in Timor-Leste, which is part of an archipelago that lies between South East Asia and the South Pacific. But it has generated a wealth of information about pygmy blue whales – one of the largest animals on earth, whose vast habitats and elusive nature make them challenging to study.

These citizen researchers, all of them locals, have spotted nearly 3,000 pygmy blue whales over the past 10 years – Prof Edyvane considers that a “truly extraordinary” number.

Timor-Leste has one of the world’s highest concentrations of marine mammals.

During the migration season – October and November – hundreds of pygmy blue whales pass through the country’s waters as they make the epic journey spanning thousands of kilometres from the Banda Sea, which lies to the north of Timor-Leste, to southern Australia.

But the area has been under-researched, says Prof Edyvane, who started the citizen science monitoring programme in 2014.

During the last two whale seasons, she has based herself in Subaun, about 50km (31 miles) from the capital Dili, working with fishermen, students and dive tour operators to document the cetaceans.

They have documented “some of the lesser known, intimate reproductive behaviours of blue whales, some for the very first time,” says Prof Edyvane, who lectures at the Australian National University and Charles Darwin University.

In 2022, for instance, tourists with a local tour operator invovlved in the programme captured underwater footage of a mother nursing her calf, offering a glimpse into the species’ reproductive behaviours, which have remained largely unknown.

“It’s very, very exciting,” she adds.

The project started as a Facebook group, inviting local volunteers to spot and document the lives of pygmy blue whales.

Prof Edyvane trained them on surveying methods and hired professionals to teach them how to use telephoto cameras and drones so that they could conduct aerial and boat surveys.

“When locals living along the coast see the whales swimming by, they will post pictures on Facebook and WhatsApp. Updates come on a real-time basis and when someone shares something, everyone gets very excited,” Prof Edyvane says.

In 2016, the team worked with a dive tour operator to launch the first whale-watching tour.

It was only last year that they set up a “research station” outside the da Cunha’s village home – photos show a simple hut overlooking the bay. Outside are two tables, plastic chairs and white boards mounted on the hut’s walls.

During this year’s whale season, undergraduates from the National University of East Timor gathered at the research station to help with the sightings.

Even such a basic structure has made the task easier.

“We’re able to monitor all day and all night,” Prof Edyvane says. “We’ve also been able to get the most incredible footage. The whales come in so close sometimes we can actually hear their blows.”

Citizen researchers like these have become powerful eyes and ears on the ground for marine scientists, says wildlife scientist Vanessa Pirotta.

“The combination of people having access to tools like drones and social media means we have insights into things that are happening while we may be behind the desk writing grants to fund our work,” she said.

The increase in research activity in Subaun has also led to a rise in tourism.

The demand for whale-watching tours has increased, diving instructor Cassio Schumacher tells the BBC, adding that these tours are “booked up years in advance”.

Local non-profits have warned of the risks of unregulated whale tourism and the government has said it intends to use Prof Edyvane’s research to “fully protect and conserve” the marine life that pass through Timor-Leste’s waters.

Prof Edyvane believes that with regulation, whale tourism has the potential to create jobs and grow Timor-Leste’s economy.

The country is one of the poorest in the world, where average annual incomes in cities hover around $1,500, according to the International Monetary Fund. In Subaun, most villagers work as subsistence fishermen and farmers, earning just about $600 to $900 a year.

The da Cunha family has now started preparing meals from local produce and the day’s catch for the students and tourists – an additional source of income.

“We enjoyed having the guests around and will love to do it again,” Faustino, 51, tells the BBC on a WhatsApp video call. “We will make it a better experience [next season].”

His son, Zacarias, has also been contracted to provide drone services for the project. Prof Edyvane says she plans to train him to give talks about whales in English.

The 26-year-old says what he appreciates is that the visitors are learning to protect the area: “The university students learn fast and well to defend this area.”

As for the tourists, he says the locals are happy to teach them. “We remind tourists not to swim with the whales but instead watch them from a distance.”

Unable to get a job as an accountant since graduating five years ago, Ghanaian Nathaniel Qainoo has been forced to swap his calculator for a spanner.

The 29-year-old was busy repairing a taxi under the shade of a mango tree when the BBC met him at his home in the small town of Kasoa, about 30km (18 miles) from the capital Accra.

He often spoke of “the hardship” – a phrase that has become common in Ghana since the nation plunged into a deep economic crisis in 2022.

This was the year when the government defaulted on its debt repayments, international rating agencies downgraded Ghana’s creditworthiness to “junk status”, and inflation skyrocketed to 54%. To add to the woes of Ghanaians, their currency, the cedi, has lost 70% of its value in the past eight years.

This forced Ghana to secure a $3bn (£2.4bn) bailout from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The economic recovery efforts have been costly, resulting in significant losses for pensioners and investors who held government bonds.

All this has made Mr Qainoo so despondent that he does not intend to vote in Saturday’s presidential and parliamentary elections, though the electoral commission is confident that voter turnout will be high.

“I don’t know how this country is going to be saved from this crisis,” Mr Qainoo told the BBC.

His mind is on emigrating to North America or Europe.

“I would like to leave the country, go outside, live better, work harder,” Mr Qainoo added.

He is not alone. Many young people – who make up almost 40% of the population, according to the 2021 census – want to quit Ghana.

They see few job prospects in a country with an unemployment rate of 14%.

So it is not surprising that the economy has dominated the election campaign.

The two main presidential front-runners are:

• Former President John Mahama, who is hoping to barrel his way back to power like Donald Trump, and

• Mahamudu Bawumia, who feels the time has come for him to step into the president’s shoes after eight years as vice-president.

The two are vying to succeed President Nana Akufo-Addo. He is stepping down at the end of his two terms, with Ghanaians hoping for a smooth transfer of power to ensure that Ghana retains its reputation as stable democracy.

Contesting the election under the banner of the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP), Bawumia’s major handicap is incumbency.

Holding a masters in economics from the UK’s prestigious Oxford University, he heads the government’s economic management team, and the collapsing economy has tarnished his reputation as an “economic whizzkid”.

He was mocked in 2023 as “our Maguire” – a reference to Manchester United footballer Harry Maguire, who had been performing badly on the pitch at the time.

On the campaign trail, Bawumia preferred to call himself “the driver’s mate” – a phrase used in Ghana to describe a commercial vehicle driver’s assistant, as he sought to distance himself from decisions taken under Akufo-Addo’s watch.

“We may be tired of hearing it, but there is no avoiding the fact that the Covid-19 pandemic and the Russia-Ukraine war resulted in the greatest economic depression in the world since the 1990s with most countries recording negative GDP growth,” he said.

Bawumia has criss-crossed the country in a blue-coloured bus, with his image emblazoned on it alongside his campaign slogan: “It is possible” – a reference to the fact that he can win, and stimulate economic growth.

No party in Ghana has ever won more than two consecutive terms since the country restored democracy in 1992, a tradition the NPP says it is determined to break by ensuring that it wins a parliamentary majority and Bawumia the presidency.

The centrepiece of his campaign is a promise to create a “digital economy”, with skills training for one million young people in a bid to put a dent in the unemployment rate.

“Dr Bawumia’s government plans to invest in a digital economy hub and provide venture capital funding for tech start-ups,” his campaign website says.

“This will include creating innovation hubs, providing regulatory incentives, and supporting tech entrepreneurs with mentorship and business development resources,” it adds.

Ghanaian political analyst Clement Sefa Nyarko told the BBC that Bawumia’s promise to create a “digital economy” was his biggest electoral drawcard.

“Bawumia has transitioned from being a so-called economic wizzkid to a digitalisation champion and I think that’s one of the big things he is riding on,” Dr Nyarko said.

“In fact, if you see his posters in town, he has this symbol of digitalisation, suggesting that he is the man to take Ghana forward,” he added.

As for Mahama, his campaign has focused on a promise to “reset” the economy, with the essence of his message being, as Dr Nyarko put it: “Give me a chance. At least the economy didn’t crash under my watch despite the difficulties.”

But his critics have doubts, pointing out that Ghana plunged into an electricity crisis when he was in office from 2014 to 2017 so they do not see how a man who could not keep the lights on can reset the economy.

This – along with the fact that his government was dogged by corruption allegations, which he dismissed as politically motivated – led to him failing to win a second term in 2017.

The power cuts were so bad that Mahama joked at the time that he was known as “Mr Dumsor” – dum means off and sor means on in the local Twi language.

In this campaign, Mahama – the flagbearer of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) – has promised to make Ghana a “24-hour economy” through the creation of night-time jobs in both the public and private sectors.

“All the major and most prosperous economies in the world operate various degrees of 24-hour economies.

“They include the United States, where nearly 30% of the labour force work at night; the United Kingdom (19%); Germany (12%) and France (7%). In Africa, Kenya is contemplating a 24-hour economy,” a document outlining his economic strategy says.

In order to ease the cost-of-living crisis, both candidates have also promised to scrap some taxes, including the much-criticised electronic levy on mobile transactions and the levy on the carbon emissions produced by petrol or diesel-powered vehicles.

Economist Prof Godfred Bokpin told the BBC it was unclear how the two candidates would fulfil their promise as it would create a “fiscal gap”, at a time when Ghana was under an IMF-backed economic recovery programme that required the government to increase its revenue and slash expenditure.

“They will face a challenge in terms of navigating within the IMF-supported programme,” he added.

Political analyst Asa Asante told the BBC that he expected a close race between Mahama and Bawunia.

“Politics is nothing but a contest of ideas and a referendum of your work. People are going to see which one will really work the magic and of course what are their records,” he added.

The political odds appear to be in Mahama’s favour, with an opinion poll released on Monday by Global InfoAnalytics giving him 52% of the vote to Bawumia’s 41.3%.

But with the poll having a margin of error of 1.9%, some analysts say Mahama could fall short of crossing the 50% mark, forcing a run-off.

Bawumia’s campaign team has dismissed the poll as skewed, saying they are confident of propelling him to the presidency on Saturday – and making history by giving Ghana its first Muslim president.

• CHARTS: What’s on the minds of Ghanaian voters
• EXPLAINER: What’s at stake in Ghana’s elections?
• PROFILE: Who is John Mahama?
• PROFILE: Who is Mahamudu Bawumia?

In the 2016 Bollywood hit Pink, a scene introducing Amitabh Bachchan’s character shows the actor emerging from his home on a winter morning into Delhi’s smog-filled streets, wearing a mask.

The mask and Delhi’s smoggy air feature in other scenes of the film but are of little relevance to its plot.

Yet, it is one of the rare examples of mainstream Indian films taking notice of the deadly air that makes many parts of India dangerous to live in every year.

The toxic air pollution and recurrent winter smog in Indian capital Delhi and other parts of northern India frequently makes headlines, becoming a matter of public concern, political debate and legal censure. But unlike disasters such as the devastating floods in Uttarakhand in 2013, Kerala in 2018 and Mumbai city in 2005 – each of which have inspired films – air pollution is largely missing from Indian pop culture.

Siddharth Singh, author of The Great Smog of India, a book on pollution, says that it is a “big failure” that air pollution is not a prevailing narrative in India’s literature and filmmaking.

Much of the writing on pollution in India remains in the realm of academia and scientific expertise, he points out.

“When you say PM2.5 or NOx or SO2 (all pollutants), what are these words? They mean nothing to [ordinary] people.”

In his 2016 book, The Great Derangement, author Amitav Ghosh, who has written extensively about climate change, observed that such stories were missing from contemporary fiction.

“People are weirdly normal about climate change,” he said in a 2022 interview.

The writer described being in India during a heatwave.

“What struck me was the fact that everything seemed to be normal and that was the most unsettling thing,” he said. “It is like we have already learnt to live with these changes.”

Ghosh described climate change as “a slow violence” which made it difficult to write about.

That certainly holds for pollution – it can have devastating health impacts over a long time, but does not lend itself to dramatic visuals.

The subject has, however, been explored in documentaries like Shaunak Sen’s All That Breathes, which was nominated for the Oscars in 2022.

In the film, Sen explored climate change, pollution and the interconnected nature of human-animal relationships in Delhi’s ecosystem through the story of two brothers who treated wounded black kites that fell from the city’s smoke-filled skies.

Sen says he was interested in exploring how “something as big as the Anthropocene” (a term used to describe the current moment in time when human beings are having a profound impact on the living and physical world) or climate change were connected to petty squabbles and everyday irritability.

A scene in the film shows the two brothers arguing. One of them then points to the sky and at themselves and says, “Yeh sab jo hamare beech mein ho raha hai, ye is sab ki galti hai (What’s happening between us is the fault of all of this).”

“[The effects of climate change] actually pervade through every aspect of our life,” Sen says. “And the job of representation, be it cinema or literature, is to give it that kind of robustness in its representation.”

• Living in Delhi smog is like watching a dystopian film again and again

Environmental films that are pedantic, prescriptive, or hold audiences by the collar to make them feel bad do more disservice than good, he says.

“For me, the best films are those which are Trojan horses which are able to sneak in ideas without the audience fully knowing that they’re engaging in that conversation.”

Filmmaker Nila Madhab Panda, whose work on climate change and environment spans more than 70 films, believes art can make a difference.

Panda, who began telling stories on climate change in 2005 with his documentary Climate’s First Orphan, turned to more mainstream cinema for the message to reach wider audiences.

The filmmaker was born and raised in the Kalahandi Balangir Koraput region of the eastern state of Odisha which was prone to droughts and floods and moved to Delhi in 1995.

“It’s amazing to me that I was living in an ecosystem where you see four seasons, you drink water from the river directly. Natural wealth is free to us – air, water, fire, everything. And I come to Delhi where you buy everything. I buy water, I buy air. Every room has an air filter.”

In 2019, Panda made a short film for an anthology in which he explored the theme of Delhi’s pollution through a courtroom drama about a couple getting a divorce because they couldn’t agree on whether to continue living in the capital.

“You can’t just make anything which is not entertaining and show [it],” Panda says.

• The families fleeing Delhi to escape deadly smog

Creators also deal with the challenge of humanising difficult stories.

Singh, whose 2018 book looked at India’s air pollution crisis, says he struggled to find the people behind the statistics while writing it.

“We always read these news headlines of a million or two million people dying because of pollution every single year. But where are these people? Where are their stories?”

While themes related to the environment have often found place in India’s vast canon of regional literature, a lot of contemporary English writers, including Ghosh, have also highlighted the topic – Delhi’s Bhalswa rubbish dump features in Nilanjana S Roy’s crime novel Black River. In Gigi Ganguly’s Biopeculiar and Janice Pariat’s Everything the Light Touches, the writers explore our relationship with the natural environment.

But there is still a long way to go.

Singh says one of the reasons for the relative shortage of such stories could be that the people creating them are “insulated” due to their privilege.

“They are not the people who are by the bank of the [polluted] Yamuna river, who see the poem in it or write about the stories along its banks.”

These days it’s memes and photos on social media that have been most effective in capturing the gravity of air pollution, he says.

“One meme that was popular a few days ago said something like, ‘Sheikh Hasina [exiled Bangladesh PM who is now in Delhi] spotted on her daily morning walk’. But the accompanying image was completely grey because the joke was not being able to see her because of air pollution!”

The writer hopes such creative outlets find enough momentum to eventually “trigger a response by those who can actually make a difference”.

“I think that’s what we lack at the moment,” he says.

Prince Harry said his life in the US is what his mother Princess Diana would have “wanted” for him.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex relocated to Montecito, California four years ago, after announcing they would step back as senior royals and work to become financially independent.

Speaking to Andrew Sorkin at The New York Times Dealbook Summit on Wednesday, the prince was asked if he planned to remain in America for good. “I do,” he said, “I very much enjoy living here and bringing my kids up here”.

He added his family were able to access a degree of privacy and freedom they “undoubtedly wouldn’t be able to do in the UK” due to concerns around security.

Harry has pursued legal action over changes to his police protection for when he is in the UK. His security was downgraded when he stopped being a working royal.

In the interview he spoke of the impact of life in the spotlight on his mental health and on his mother, Princess Diana who was killed in a 1997 car crash in Paris while being chased by photographers.

“I think again, when you are kind of trapped within this bubble, it kind of feels like there’s no way out,” Harry said.

He continued: “What happened to my mum and the fact that I was a kid and felt helpless, there comes the inner turmoil. I felt helpless.

“One of my biggest weaknesses is feeling helpless.”

He said what worried him most was “that would happen to me, or to my wife, or to my kids”.

For now, Harry said his focus was on “being the best husband and the best dad that I can be”.

Asked about the press attention he and his wife receive, he made a joke that they had apparently moved house and divorced “10-12 times”.

“It’s just like what? It’s hard to keep up with but that’s why you sort of ignore of it,” he said.

The Duchess of Sussex meanwhile made an appearance at a fundraising gala in Beverly Hills, California, on Wednesday night.

How closely have you been paying attention to what’s been going on in the world over the past seven days?

Fancy some more? Try last week’s quiz, or have a go at something from the archives.

A man has broken the British record for running 2,684 miles (4,320km) across Australia.

Jack Pitcher, 28, from Bracknell, Berkshire, set off from Perth on 6 October and ended his adventure at Sydney’s Bondi Beach early on Thursday.

He completed the challenge in 61 days, beating the previous record set last year by Nikki Love, from Nottingham, by 16 days.

Mr Pitcher had started the challenge with 21-year-old Joshua Smith, from Reading, but Mr Smith was forced to stop running and completed some of the route by bike before flying home.

“I’m over the moon,” Mr Pitcher said.

“To have a round number of 60 days would have been nice but I’m incredibly proud of what I’ve done.”

He was aiming to finish on Wednesday but was forced to pause a final 93.2-mile (150km) run because he was hallucinating following an earlier 74.6-mile (120km) run.

He had taken a 45-minute break between the two.

“I went through the night and I got to Sydney and started to hallucinate,” he told BBC Radio Berkshire.

“I was very dizzy on the road, it was not safe.

“I wasn’t even enjoying it. I really needed to sleep so I thought I’d get a load of calories in me and got my head down for four to five hours, and then pushed on.”

Mr Pitcher, who has previously suffered with depression, said he hoped the run would inspire others who are struggling with mental health issues.

“When I get home I’m just going to see what comes my way,” he said.

“I’m very keen to get into motivational speaking and working in mental health.

“I’m just going to see what opportunities come my way after this run.

“If something comes my way, great. But I’m certainly going to have a rest and eat as many calories as I can.”

Mr Pitcher and Mr Smith set out to raise money for SSAFA, the Armed Forces charity, and ARC Wokingham, a volunteer-run counselling service.

In 2022, Australian ultra-marathon runner Nedd Brockmann managed the feat in just 46 days and 12 hours.

US space agency Nasa has announced a further delay to its plans to send astronauts back to the Moon.

The agency’s chief, Bill Nelson, said the second mission in the Artemis programme was now due for launch in April 2026.

The plan had been to send astronauts around the Moon but not land in September 2025. The date had already slipped once before, from November of this year.

That will mean that a Moon landing will not take place until at least 2027, a year later than originally planned.

The delay is needed to fix an issue with the capsule’s heat shield, which returned from the previous test flight excessively charred and eroded, with cracks and some fragments broken off.

Mr Nelson told a news conference that “the safety of our astronauts is our North Star”.

“We do not fly until we are ready. We need to do the next test flight, and we need to do it right. And that’s how the Artemis programme proceeds.”

Mr Nelson said that engineers had got to the root of the problem and believed that it could be fixed by changing the trajectory of the capsule’s re-entry – but it would take time to carry out a thorough assessment.

Nasa is in a race with the Chinese space agency, which has its own plans to send astronauts to the Moon. Mr Nelson said he was confident that the Artemis programme would reach the lunar surface first, but he called on Nasa’s commercial and international partners to “double down to meet and improve this schedule”.

“We plan to launch Artemis 3 in mid-2027. That will be well ahead of the Chinese government’s announced intention that they have already publicly stated is 2030.”

The added delay, however, will increase the pressure on government-run Nasa – whose rocket system for sending astronauts to the Moon, the Space Launch System (SLS), has been criticised as being expensive and slow to develop.

This is in stark contrast to Elon Musk’s private sector firm, SpaceX, which is surging ahead in its efforts to build its own, eventually much cheaper and reusable Starship rocket.

The nomination of Jared Iaacman by President-elect Donald Trump to take over from Mr Nelson as Nasa’s head has added to growing concerns that big changes are in store for Nasa’s Moon programme.

Mr Isaacman is a billionaire and close collaborator with Mr Musk, who has paid for two private sector missions which have taken him to space. His entrepreneurial approach might prove a shock to Nasa’s system, according to Dr Simeon Barber, a space scientist at the Open University.

“SLS is an old-school rocket. It is not reusable like Starship, hence very expensive, and it has taken a long time to get it operational. And slow and expensive is a precarious position to be in when the incoming president, we expect, is looking to save costs.

“Isaacman is going to bring a new pair of eyes over how Nasa operates. And it’s hard to predict what this combination of Isaacman, Musk and Trump might mean for Nasa as we know it.”

A Boeing plea deal intended to resolve a case related to two fatal crashes of its planes has been rejected by a US judge.

The plane maker agreed with the US government in July to plead guilty to one count of criminal fraud, face independent monitoring, and pay a $243m (£191m) fine.

However, Judge Reed O’Connor struck down the agreement on Thursday, saying it undermined the court and that diversity requirements for hiring the monitor were “contradictory”.

Family members of the 346 people killed in the crashes welcomed the ruling, describing the plea deal as a “get-out-of-jail-free card for Boeing”.

The Department of Justice said it was reviewing the decision. Boeing did not immediately comment.

In his decision, Judge O’Connor said the government’s previous years of overseeing the firm had “failed”.

“At this point, the public interest requires the Court to step in,” he wrote.

He said the proposed agreement did not require Boeing to comply with the monitor’s recommendations and gave the company a say in selecting a candidate.

Those issues had also been raised by some families of those killed on the flights, who had criticised it as a “sweetheart” arrangement that did not properly hold the firm to account for the deaths.

Judge O’Connor also focused on the deal’s requirements that race be considered when hiring the monitor, which he said would undermine confidence in the pick.

He said he was concerned with the “shifting and contradictory explanations of how the plea agreement’s diversity-and-inclusion provision will… operate”.

“In a case of this magnitude, it is in the utmost interest of justice that the public is confident this monitor selection is done based solely on competency,” he wrote.

“The parties’ DEI efforts only serve to undermine this confidence in the government and Boeing’s ethics and anti-fraud efforts.”

Ike and Susan Riffel of California, who lost their two sons, Melvin and Bennett, said the judge had done “the right thing” in rejecting the proposed agreement.

“This deal didn’t hold anyone accountable for the deaths of 346 people and did nothing to protect the flying public,” they said in a statement supplied by their lawyer.

They said they hoped the ruling would pave the way for “real justice”.

Boeing and the Department of Justice have 30 days to develop a new plan in response to the ruling.

The plane maker has been struggling to emerge from the shadow cast by two, near-identical crashes of its 737 Max planes in 2018 and 2019.

The aerospace giant was plunged back into crisis in January when a door panel on a new Boeing plane operated by Alaska Airlines blew off soon after take-off.

The incident reignited questions about what Boeing had done to improve its safety and quality record since the accidents, which were tied to the company’s flight control system.

The door panel malfunction happened shortly before the end of a three-year period of increased monitoring and reporting.

Boeing had agreed to the monitoring as part of a 2021 plea deal to resolve a charge it had deceived regulators over the flight control system.

In May, the Department of Justice said Boeing had violated the terms of that agreement, opening up the possibility of prosecution.

Instead, the two sides struck another deal, angering families who had hoped to see the company brought to trial.

In the ruling, Judge O’Connor wrote it was “not clear what all” Boeing had done to breach the 2021 agreement.

Nonetheless, he wrote, “taken as true that Boeing breached the [deal], it is fair to say that the government’s attempt to ensure compliance has failed”.

Erin Appelbaum, partner at Kreindler & Kreindler, which represents some families of those killed on the 2019 Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302, called Thursday’s ruling an “excellent decision and a significant victory” for the victims’ families.

“We anticipate a significant renegotiation of the plea deal that incorporates terms truly commensurate with the gravity of Boeing’s crimes,” she said.

“It’s time for the [Department of Justice] to end its lenient treatment of Boeing and demand real accountability.”

Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has travelled to Malta for a European security summit, marking his first visit to an EU state since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

His Ukrainian counterpart Andriy Sybiga, who is also attending the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) meeting, walked out of the hall ahead of Lavrov’s remarks, according to the country’s foreign ministry.

Lavrov’s attendance has proven controversial, with Poland’s foreign minister refusing to meet him and Sybiga branding the diplomat a “war criminal”.

The Russian foreign minister accused the West of fuelling a new Cold War “with a much greater risk of a transition to a hot one”.

Sybiga said Russia’s involvement in the OSCE was contrary to the organisation’s aims, describing it as the “biggest threat to our common security”.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken also attended. He accused Russia of escalating the war in Ukraine and spreading a “tsunami of misinformation”.

“Let’s not fool ourselves and let’s not allow [Lavrov] or anyone else to fool us,” he said.

“This is not about and has never been about Russia’s security. This is about Mr Putin’s imperial project to erase Ukraine from the map.”

Blinken and Lavrov, who have had limited interaction since the war in Ukraine began, are not scheduled to meet at the summit.

Kyiv boycotted last year’s OSCE meeting in North Macedonia, which is not an EU member, due to Lavrov’s attendance and has previously called for Russia’s expulsion from the group.

Several diplomats and officials were seen leaving the hall ahead of Lavrov’s remarks.

Moscow has grown increasingly critical of the OSCE, which was set up to ease east-west tensions during the Cold War and aims to prevent conflict and manage crises in Europe.

The forum of 57 states meets to discuss security issues on the continent and carries out practical security work, including sending observers to conflicts and elections globally.

Last year, Lavrov claimed the OSCE was “being turned into an appendage of Nato and the European Union”, while Russia has hampered the group’s ability to function in recent years by vetoing several major decisions.

Moscow voted to suspend its involvement in its parliamentary assembly earlier this year, calling it anti-Russian and discriminatory.

Ahead of this week’s summit, Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Lavrov would use the occasion to criticise the OSCE’s “institutional crisis”.

She said the OSCE had been “Ukrainised” and accused Western states of “using this platform for their own interests”.

Zakharova also wrote on Telegram that Malta had annulled her visa to accompany Lavrov to the meeting.

The Maltese foreign affairs office said that three OSCE member countries had objected to extending the visa to Zakharova, who is facing a travel ban.

While Lavrov is subject to EU sanctions, he is not under a travel ban.

Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy are on Capitol Hill to discuss their newly-announced advisory team that the two billionaires say will cut regulations, spending, and headcounts within the federal government.

“The taxpayers deserve better,” House Speaker Mike Johnson said on Thursday ahead of a meeting with Musk and Ramaswamy. “They deserve a more responsive government, a more efficient government.”

The Department of Government Efficiency, or “Doge” – seemingly a winking reference to Musk’s cryptocurrency of choice, dogecoin – was first announced by Donald Trump last month.

“It will become, potentially, ‘The Manhattan Project’ of our time,” the president-elect wrote on his social media platform, referring to a top-secret World War Two programme to develop nuclear weapons. “Republican politicians have dreamed about the objectives of ‘DOGE’ for a very long time.”

But despite Trump’s enthusiasm, much remains unclear about Doge and how it will function. As Musk and Ramaswamy meet with lawmakers, here’s a look at what we know about their nascent agency.

Though Doge has the clear support of Trump, and has the word “department” in its name, it is not an official government department – the type of body that has to be established through an act of Congress and typically employs thousands of staff.

Instead, it seems Doge will operate as an advisory body, run by two of Trump’s closest allies and with a direct line to the White House.

In an opinion piece published in the Wall Street Journal last month, Musk and Ramaswamy said they would “serve as outside volunteers, not federal officials or employees”.

The pair will assist the Trump transition team in recruiting the Doge team, they said, who will provide guidance to the White House on spending cuts, and compile a list of regulations they believe are outside agencies’ legal authority.

“DOGE will present this list of regulations to President Trump, who can, by executive action, immediately pause the enforcement of those regulations and initiate the process for review and rescission,” they wrote.

To some supporters of this new body, Doge’s outsider status – as well as its somewhat vague mandate – will serve as a benefit.

“They’re a little more untethered to the bureaucracy itself and to the systems that slow processes down around here,” Republican Senator Kevin Cramer of North Dakota told the BBC on Thursday. “I think the lack of parameters is part of what will make them effective.”

• Who has joined Trump’s top team?
• Trump’s legal cases – what now?
• Just how big was Trump’s victory?

The specifics do not seem nailed down, but the overall picture is clear – Doge’s leaders want major government reform, by way of major cuts.

The federal bureaucracy “represents an existential threat to our republic,” Musk and Ramaswamy wrote in the Journal. “Unlike government commissions or advisory committees, we won’t just write reports or cut ribbons. We’ll cut costs.”

Musk, the world’s richest person, has said he can find more than $2tn in savings – around a third of annual federal government spending.

And the two have said they will slash federal regulations, oversee mass layoffs and shut down some agencies entirely.

“I think we should be spending the public’s money wisely,” Musk said on Thursday, on his way to a closed-door meeting with incoming Senate Majority Leader John Thune, a South Dakota Republican.

Ramaswamy, a financier who ran for the Republican presidential nomination earlier this year, vowed during his campaign to shutter the Education Department, the FBI, and the IRS – promises he has repeated in recent weeks.

Speaking at a gala held at Mar-a-Lago last month, Ramasamy thanked Trump “for making sure that Elon Musk and I are in a position to start the mass deportations of millions of unelected federal bureaucrats out of the DC bureaucracy”.

“And I don’t know if you’ve got to know Elon yet, but he doesn’t bring a chisel, he brings a chainsaw, and we’re going to be taking it to that bureaucracy,” Ramaswamy said. “It’s going to be a lot of fun.”

Musk has solicited employees on X, formerly Twitter, the social media platform he owns.

Doge-hopefuls have been asked to send their resumes directly to the newly-created Doge account on X. Applicants should expect 80+ hour workweeks, according to a post from Doge, devoted to “unglamorous cost cutting”. And, according to Musk, all that work at Doge will not be rewarded with a salary.

“This will be tedious work, make lots of enemies & compensation is zero,” he wrote on X.

Only the “top 1% of applicants” will be reviewed by Musk and Ramaswamy, the Doge account said, though it did not specify how applicants will be ranked.

Even before it’s really up and running, Doge’s expiration has been set – 4 July, 2026.

“A smaller Government, with more efficiency and less bureaucracy, will be the perfect gift to America on the 250th Anniversary of the Declaration of Independence,” Trump said when announcing the new body.

Some Trump allies hope Doge will mirror the Grace Commission, a private-sector commission established by President Ronald Reagan in 1982 to reform the federal bureaucracy and control spending.

During its two-year tenure, the Grace Commission submitted more than 2,500 recommendations to the White House and Congress. Most were never implemented, however.

Musk and Ramaswamy’s bold promises have incited some incredulity among experts, who say the size and scope of their mandate borders on the impossible.

Elaine Kamark, a senior fellow in governance studies at the Brookings Institution, told the BBC that efforts to streamline government spending “can be done”.

Kamark pointed to her work managing the Clinton Administration’s National Performance Review, an effort to reduce government spending in the 1990s which saved over a billion dollars and cut 250,000 people from the federal work force.

But so far, Musk and Ramaswamy’s project, “is not a serious effort”, she said.

The notion of cutting one-third of the government’s spending – like Musk has pledged – is “ridiculous”, she said. Roughly two-thirds of the total budget is mandatory, and includes popular programmes like Social Security and Medicare.

“You cannot touch people’s social security payments or their veterans retirement payments or people’s medicare reimbursements without getting statutory changes… they don’t have the power to enact any of those,” she said.

But some parts of Doge have attracted somewhat unlikely praise.

Bernie Sanders, an independent Senator from Vermont who caucuses with Democrats, said this week Musk “is right” about proposed cuts to the defence budget. The Pentagon has “lost track of billions”, Sanders wrote on X, saying the department had failed its seventh audit in a row.

Other Democrats have offered similar glimmers of support. Representative Ro Khanna of California said he also supported cuts to Pentagon spending. And this week, Democratic Representative Jared Moskowitz of Florida became the first in his party to join the House Doge caucus, a Congressional caucus that is tasked with reducing government spending, but does not report directly to the Doge advisory board.

“Reducing ineffective government spending should not be a partisan issue,” he said in a statement.

• How these new recruits will be vetted
• What Trump can and can’t do on day one
• How undocumented migrants feel about deportations
• Can RFK Jr make America healthy again?
• What Trump’s Ukraine envoy has said about war

A nun is among 24 people arrested in northern Italy in connection with a mafia investigation, Italian police have said.

The nun, named in Italian press as Sister Anna Donelli, was arrested for allegedly acting as a go-between for the ‘Ndrangheta mafia and its jailed gang members.

Police also arrested two politicians and seized more than €1.8m (£1.5m) worth of assets in raids across several towns in the Lombardy and Veneto regions, as well as Calabria in the south.

The arrests are a result of a four-year investigation into the ‘Ndrangheta, which is one of Europe’s most influential and dangerous criminal organisations.

Statements released by the coalition of law enforcement agencies behind the sting detail allegations that the nun leveraged her position as a volunteer at the prison.

The Brescia Carabinieri said she was an unsuspecting figure, whose religious role allowed her “free access to the penitentiary facilities”.

Police statements did not identify the politicians or any others targeted in the investigation.

The operation is continuing, with hundreds of police officers conducting searches across northern Italy.

They are aided by sniffer dog units searching for weapons and drugs, as well as “cash dogs” which are trained to search for cash, police said.

Investigators allege the group primarily used scrap metal trade businesses as a front to launder money, totalling approximately €12m in laundered cash, prosecutors said.

Originating in the impoverished region of Calabria, the ‘Ndrangheta is considered one of the world’s most dangerous criminal organisations.

In November last year, more than 200 people were sentenced to a total of more than 2,200 years in jail in one of Italy’s biggest mafia trials for generations.

Police in New York have released two photos of an unmasked individual wanted for questioning over the killing of a healthcare chief executive.

UnitedHealthcare boss Brian Thompson, 50, was fatally shot in the back on Wednesday morning outside the Hilton hotel in Midtown Manhattan.

The attacker fled the scene without taking any of Thompson’s belongings. Police believe the victim was targeted in a pre-planned killing.

Investigators are also using facial recognition technology and bullet casings with cryptic messages written on them to track down the suspect. They have yet to reveal a motive in the shooting.

Here’s what we know about the suspect and the investigation.

The shooting took place at about 06:45 EST (11:45 GMT) in a busy part of Manhattan close to Times Square and Central Park. Thompson had been scheduled to speak at an investor conference later in the day.

According to police, the suspect – who was clad in a black face mask and light brown or cream-coloured jacket – appeared to be waiting for Thompson for five minutes outside the Hilton hotel where he was expected to speak.

Thompson, who arrived on foot, was shot in the back and leg, and was pronounced dead about half an hour later at a local hospital.

• Story in full: Police hunt gun-wielding killer of UnitedHealthcare CEO

New York Police Department (NYPD) Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny has revealed that the suspect’s weapon appeared to jam, but that he was able to quickly fix it and keep shooting.

CCTV footage appears to show the gunman had fitted a suppressor, also known as a silencer, to his pistol, BBC Verify has established.

New York City Mayor Eric Adams – a veteran of the NYPD – told MSNBC that the use of a silencer was unprecedented in his career.

“I have never seen a silencer before,” he said. “That was really something shocking to us all.”

Investigators reportedly believe the firearm is a BT Station Six 9, a weapon which is marketed as tracing its roots back to pistols used by Second World War-era Allied special operations forces.

Police have reportedly visited gun stores in Connecticut to try to determine where the weapon was purchased.

After the shooting, video shows the suspect fleeing the scene on foot. Officials initially said the suspect used an electric Citi Bike owned by Lyft.

But Lyft, which owns and operates Citi Bike, later said it had been told by the NYPD that one of its vehicles had not been used, according to the BBC’s US partner, CBS News.

So far, the investigation into Thompson’s killing has centred on a few clues that police are using to identify the suspect.

Officials released two images of an unmasked man on Thursday that the NYPD said was “wanted for questioning” in connection with the murder.

Law enforcement sources told CBS that the person is believed to have used a fake ID to check into a hostel in the area. The name used is fraudulent and is not believed to belong to an actual person.

Investigators believe the person of interest took a bus that originated in Atlanta, Georgia, to New York days before the shooting, CBS reports, citing a person briefed on the investigation. It’s unclear whether the person got on the bus at Atlanta or later during a stop.

It is unclear if he is the same person as the suspect.

Earlier, police revealed the suspect was photographed at a nearby Starbucks just minutes before the shooting.

While he is masked in the image, police sources told CBS that the mask is pulled down far enough so that his eyes and part of his nose can be seen.

With that, investigators are using facial recognition software to try to find a match.

Investigators have so far not identified a motive in the killing, although police did note that the assailant fled without taking any of Thompson’s belongings.

Additionally, police are testing three bullet casings and three live rounds found at the scene for DNA.

The words “deny,” “defend” and “depose” were discovered on the casings, two law enforcement sources told CBS.

Investigators believe this could be a reference to the “three D’s of insurance” – a known reference made by opponents of the industry.

The terms refer to tactics used by insurance companies to refuse payment claims by patients in America’s complicated and mostly privately run healthcare system.

The words resemble – but are not exactly the same as – the title of a book called Delay, Deny, Defend: Why Insurance Companies Don’t Pay Claims and What You Can Do About It.

The book, published in 2010, was written by Jay Feinman, a legal scholar at Rutgers University in New Jersey. It’s billed as an exposé of the insurance industry and a how-to guide for Americans on how to navigate the system.

Professor Feinman declined to comment when the BBC contacted him.

A mobile phone was discovered in an alley along the suspect’s escape route. Police say they are “working through” the phone.

A coffee cup believed to have been discarded by the suspect has also been dusted for fingerprints and sent to an NYPD crime lab in the hopes that it may help reveal his identity or establish a chain of events.

Investigators also said they executed a search warrant at a location in Manhattan’s Upper West Side, which he was seen entering earlier in the day.

The location is near the Frederick Douglas housing project, where police say surveillance video showed the suspect outside at approximately 05:00 the morning of the crime.

Police earlier said they would also search Thompson’s room at the nearby Marriott, which is down the street from where the incident took place.

Thompson joined UnitedHealth, the biggest private insurer in the US, from accountancy firm PricewaterhouseCoopers in 2004.

He rose through the ranks and became CEO in 2021, leading the company through some very profitable years.

• Who was Brian Thompson?

In an interview with MSNBC, Thompson’s wife said that there had “been some threats” against him earlier, although she was unable to provide details.

“I just know that he said there were some people that had been threatening him,” she said.

According to police in Thompson’s hometown of Maple Grove, Minnesota, there had previously been one suspicious incident at his home in 2018.

The incident was cleared with no criminal activity detected. No additional details were provided.

South Korea’s main parties are holding emergency meetings amid reports MPs could bring forward a vote to impeach President Yoon Suk Yeol over Tuesday night’s short-lived martial law declaration.

The main opposition Democratic Party says the vote, currently scheduled for Saturday, could take place as soon it can guarantee the numbers to pass the motion.

In the first clear sign his own party may now vote with the opposition, the leader of Yoon’s ruling party called for his swift suspension on Friday, saying he posed a “great danger” if he remained in power.

The opposition need the support of at least eight ruling party MPs to secure the 200 votes required for the impeachment motion to pass.

Han Doong-hoon, chief of the People Power Party (PPP), had earlier said his party would not support the opposition’s impeachment motion.

But on Friday he said said there was “credible evidence” that Yoon had ordered the arrest of key politicians on “anti-state charges” on Tuesday.

He expressed concern that “extreme actions”, such as the martial law declaration, could be repeated if Yoon remained in office.

“[These are] putting the Republic of Korea and its people at great risk.”

He added that his party had learnt about plans to jail arrested opposition politicians in a detention centre in Gwacheon, a city south of Seoul.

His comments are the first clear indication the president’s own party may now vote to help impeach him.

Earlier on Friday, supporters of the opposition assembled on the steps of parliament, armed with placards and demanding the president’s removal.

Yoon’s attempt to impose martial law shocked the country and unnerved South Korea’s allies and financial markets.

He cited threats from “anti-state forces” and North Korea. But it soon became clear that his move had been spurred not by external threats but by his own domestic political troubles.

The order was abruptly reversed hours later after 190 MPs managed to make it into the parliament and vote it down – some of them climbing fences and breaking barricades to get into the chamber.

Opposition lawmakers are concerned that there will be another attempt to impose martial law. Some of them earlier told BBC they have been staying close to the National Assembly grounds so they could get there quickly to vote down any such declaration.

Meanwhile, ruling party MP Cho Kyung-tae became the first ruling party MP to publicly voice support for Yoon’s impeachment.

“The choice between standing on the side of the people by suspending the president’s duties or becoming an ally of the forces that imposed martial law is a matter for politicians to judge,” Cho said on Friday.

“I hope that all the politicians of the People’s Power will stand on the side of the people,” he added.

The capital, Seoul, has seen more than two days of street protests demanding Yoon’s resignation, while police said he is being investigated for “insurrection”.

People have also been flooding PPP lawmakers with text messages, urging them to vote for Yoon’s impeachment, according to South Korean media reports.

One MP, Shin Sung-bum, received more than 4,000 such messages on Facebook, The Chosun Daily reported.

More than seven out of 10 South Koreans were in favour of the impeachment, a survey by local pollster Realmeter showed on Thursday.

Before his attempt to place the country under military rule, Yoon had been beset by low popularity ratings, corruption allegations and an opposition-led legislature that reduced him to a lame-duck leader.

A strong 7.0 magnitude earthquake has struck off the coast of northern California, according to the US Geological Survey.

A tsunami warning was initially issued along the coasts of both northern California and southern Oregon – an area that includes about 4.7 million people – but was later rescinded.

The earthquake’s epicentre hit closest to the town of Ferndale, California, a small city in Humboldt County about 260 miles (418km) north of San Francisco.

Local officials said no deaths or major widespread damage had been reported in the aftermath of the quake, which is one of only nine such 7 magnitude quakes to strike globally this year.

Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office told CBS News, the BBC’s US partner, there had been no catastrophic destruction to buildings or infrastructure, but some homes did report minor damage.

Several stores in the area reported items falling off shelves and power briefly went out for many residents, the sheriff’s office said.

More than 10,000 people were without power in Humboldt County after the earthquake struck, according to poweroutage.us.

While the earthquake did not cause widespread damage, one resident of Ferndale who spoke to the BBC in the minutes following the quake said the inside of the building she was in “looks like a bomb has gone off in every room”.

Olivia Cobian, the innkeeper at the Gingerbread Mansion Inn in Ferndale, said the inside of the inn now “looks like a warzone”.

“We have huge cast iron fireplaces that have been lifted up and moved over, everything’s fallen over, broken”.

Another who witnessed the quake was Todd Dunaway, who was eating lunch in his home in Fortuna, California when the earthquake hit.

“It literally felt like standing on a giant waterbed,” he told the BBC. “The noise of rattling windows, creaking walls, falling dishes and decorations added to the drama and scariness of it all as it is happening. Naturally – you can’t help wonder as it is happening ‘Is this the really big one?'”

Mr Dunaway said he and his wife – who was also in the house – were shaking nervously for 15 minutes afterwards waiting to see if there would be a bigger aftershock.

His large swimming pool was still sloshing ferociously for minutes after the shaking stopped and lost about 18 inches (45cm) of water.

His sporting goods store experienced some damage, with boxes of shoes falling from the shelves, but nothing major, he said.

Multiple aftershocks were reported after the initial earthquake, which struck around 10:44 local time (18:44 GMT).

Some areas, including the city of Berkeley in northern California, issued an evacuation order due to the threat of a possible tsunami.

“EVACUATE NOW,” an X post from the city warned. “People in the Tsunami Zone are in IMMEDIATE DANGER and MUST EVACUATE NOW. Stay east of 7th St. This is a lawful order to leave now.”

Kayla Aihara was staying at a hotel in Half Moon Bay, California and got the back-to-back alerts about the earthquake and potential tsunami.

Before the tsunami warning was cancelled, workers at the hotel had told her to vacate a gym and go to higher ground out of fear of the tsunami’s impacts.

Some vacated outside and she said multiple people crowded near the shoreline of the Pacific Coast hotel, watching the waves and waiting to see any hints of a tsunami.

California Governor Gavin Newsom was briefed on the earthquake and met with state emergency officials to help coordinate the response.

At an event along the US-Mexico border, the governor announced he’d signed a state of emergency declaration to help free resources to respond to the earthquake.

He said the earthquake is “another reminder of the state that we live in and the state of mind that we need to bring to our day-to-day reality here in the state of California”.

Tsunami signs line the roads of many coastal communities along the US West Coast. They mark any “tsunami hazard zone” and often point those in the area to evacuation routes leading them to higher ground.

Those who live in these tsunami zones are encouraged to familiarise themselves with their evacuation routes and have a kit ready for quick evacuation.

California’s emergency services website notes a tsunami can hit in as little as 5 to 10 minutes after a large earthquake and sometimes the first wave to hit is not the biggest. It notes if you see water draw out from the shoreline and go out to sea quickly, “escape immediately to higher ground or inland”.

The US West Coast is the confluence of a number of the Earth’s tectonic plates, and tremors are not uncommon. But a strong 7 magnitude quake isn’t typically seen in the region. Experts say there are between 10 and 15 earthquakes of this magnitude that hit globally each year.

There have been eight other earthquakes with a 7 magnitude globally this year, according to data from the US Geological Survey.

The agency says that typically there are about 20,000 earthquakes tracked around the globe each year – about 55 per day.

The area has been struck by a number of major earthquakes, including a 1994 quake that hit Northridge, in the Los Angeles area, killing dozens of people and injuring thousands more, as it wrought billions of dollars of damage to homes and infrastructure.

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Worshippers have been forced to flee an Australian synagogue after it was set on fire in what the prime minister has condemned as an “act of hate”.

Firefighters were called to Melbourne’s Adass Israel synagogue just after 04:00 local time on Friday (17:00 GMT Thursday), finding the building fully ablaze when they arrived.

Community leaders have told local media that “a few people” were inside at the time for morning prayers, and they reported seeing firebombs thrown. One person was injured and the fire caused extensive damage.

Police say that they believe the fire was deliberately lit but are keeping an “open mind” on a motive.

In a statement, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said the incident in Ripponlea, in the city’s south-east, was “clearly aimed at creating fear in the community”.

“This violence and intimidation and destruction at a place of worship is an outrage,” he wrote.

“I have zero tolerance for antisemitism.”

He added that he had been briefed by the Australian Federal Police, who would provide support to authorities in the state of Victoria.

“The people involved must be caught and face the full force of the law.”

Victoria Police said the exact cause of the fire had not yet been determined and an arson chemist would visit the site.

However Det Insp Chris Murray said a witness had told them two people in masks appeared to have spread accelerant inside the building.

He appealed for anyone who may have witnessed the incident, or who may have CCTV or dashcam footage from the local area, to contact police.

Synagogue board member Benjamin Klein told The Age newspaper that people inside “heard banging on the door and the window, and some liquids came through which were lit”.

“The whole thing took off pretty quickly,” he said.

A man who was inside at the time, Yumi Friedman, added that a window had been smashed, sending “glass flying”.

Mr Friedman told reporters his hand was burned on a door knob when he tried to return to the synagogue to fight the blaze.

Det Insp Murray – who was confronted by an angry worshipper while updating the press – said police would be committing significant resources to the investigation and increasing patrols around the area.

“We’re going to do our best to make sure that they can return, as they should, to their local synagogues, doing what is absolutely Australian – that is to be able to worship without fear.”

Jewish community leaders have said they believe the attack is an escalation of a recent documented increase in antisemitism in Australia.

“None of the Jewish community is surprised. We’ve known this has been coming,” Executive Council of Australian Jewry president Daniel Aghion said.

Republicans will hold a narrow majority in the US House of Representatives next year, after Democrats won the final uncalled race in California on Tuesday.

A slender win for Democratic candidate Adam Gray in California’s 13th congressional district leaves his party on 215 seats in the lower chamber of Congress, compared with the Republicans’ 220.

The trifecta of House, Senate and presidency – last achieved at the start of Donald Trump’s first term in 2017 – will give the president-elect significant power to enact his agenda on the economy, immigration and other key issues.

But with a narrow House majority Republicans could still struggle to secure enough votes for some actions.

A majority is achieved in the 435-seat chamber when a party wins 218 seats – which the Republicans surpassed.

The final congressional race to be called in the country was in California’s Central Valley – nearly a month after America went to the polls on 5 November. It is not unusual for some contests to take days or weeks to be called.

The race ended in victory for Gray over the Republican incumbent John Duarte, by a margin of fewer than 200 votes, according to the BBC’s US partner CBS News.

Gray said it showed the area was “ready for independent and accountable leadership that always puts the Valley’s people ahead of partisan politics”.

In the presidential contest, Trump beat Kamala Harris in all seven closely watched swing states – handing him a decisive advantage as he mounted a comeback unmatched by any previously defeated president in modern times.

• Republicans win House in major boost for Trump
• US election results in full
• How big was Trump’s win exactly?
• Who has joined Trump’s top team?

Trump has vowed swift action in his first 100 days in office, including the start of mass deportations of unlawful migrants in the US.

And with the next mid-term elections set for 2026, the president-elect is expected to enjoy at least two years of limited congressional oversight.

The election results also leave Democrats with less leverage to challenge policies they disagree with, though narrow margins mean Republicans in the Senate could still struggle to secure enough votes for some actions.

The House majority could be further eaten away with Trump’s selection of a number of Republican lawmakers for key jobs in his incoming administration- notable Elise Stefanik and Michael Waltz.

There is already one vacancy after the resignation of Trump ally Matt Gaetz from the House.

Gaetz left Congress after being lined up to be the next attorney general – only to withdraw after days of debate over whether a committee should release a report on sexual misconduct allegations against him. He denied wrongdoing.

• How Trump’s new recruits will be vetted
• What he can and can’t do on day one
• How undocumented migrants feel about deportations
• Can RFK Jr make America healthy again?
• The rise and fall of Matt Gaetz, in eight wild days

North America correspondent Anthony Zurcher makes sense of US politics in his twice weekly US Election Unspun newsletter. Readers in the UK can sign up here. Those outside the UK can sign up here.

The regular British army could be wiped out in as little as six months if forced to fight a war on the scale of the Ukraine conflict, a defence minister has warned.

Alistair Carns said a rate of casualties similar to that prompted by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine would lead to the army being “expended” within six to 12 months.

He said it illustrated the importance of having reserves in order to be able to fight in a “war of scale”.

Official figures show the army had 109,245 personnel on 1 October, including 25,814 volunteer reservists.

Carns, a former Royal Marines colonel who is also a reservist, said Russia was suffering losses of around 1,500 soldiers, killed or wounded, a day.

“In a war of scale – not a limited intervention, but one similar to Ukraine – our army for example on the current casualty rates would be expended, as part of a broader multinational coalition, in six months to a year,” he added.

In a speech on reserves at the Royal United Services Institute defence think tank in London, Carns, the minister for veterans and people, said: “That doesn’t mean to say we need a bigger army, but it does mean we must be able to generate depth and mass rapidly in the event of a crisis.

“The reserves are critical, absolutely central, to that process.

“Without them we cannot generate mass, we cannot meet the plethora of defence tasks and challenges that we require, and we cannot seamlessly integrate the very best experts into the heart of our armed forces.”

Speaking separately at the same think tank, the head of the armed forces said it was important to note there was only a “remote” chance that Russia would launch a “significant direct attack or invasion” on the UK, or other Nato member.

Admiral Sir Tony Radakin added that Russia “knows the response would be overwhelming, whether conventional or nuclear”.

But he added that it showed the need for nuclear deterrence to be “kept strong and strengthened,” warning that the world was entering a “third nuclear age” following the Cold War and subsequent period of disarmament.

This new age would be defined by the “almost total absence of the security architectures that went before,” and more countries having nuclear weapons.

He added that China’s increasing nuclear weapons stockpile meant the United States could face a “two-peer challenge” from Beijing and Moscow, with both countries possessing significant arsenals.

Army reservists serve in their spare time, getting paid to train outside their main jobs.

Carns said the reality of wars such as the one being fought in Ukraine was that they were “attritional in nature”.

He also said the UK needed to “catch up with Nato allies” by placing a greater emphasis on its reserves.

A Ministry of Defence spokesperson said the UK’s armed forces were “amongst the best in the world and offer a 24/7 defence of the UK, operating alongside our allies and partners to prepare for any event”.

“The Strategic Defence Review will look at the threats we face and the capabilities we need so that our Armed Forces are better ready to fight, more integrated and more innovative,” they added.

“Our Reserves are an essential and extremely valued element of the Armed Forces and the contributions they make to our resilience and our ability to call on additional personnel when required are vital.”

Earlier, the prime minister’s official spokesman said the Budget had “invested billions of pounds into defence”.

Last month, Deputy Chief of the Defence Staff Lieutenant General Sir Rob Magowan told MPs on the Defence Select Committee: “If the British Army was asked to fight tonight, it would fight tonight.

“I don’t think anybody in this room should be under any illusion that if the Russians invaded eastern Europe tonight, then we would meet them in that fight.”

Earlier on Wednesday, Foreign Secretary David Lammy urged Nato’s European members to step up their defence spending ahead of Donald Trump’s return to the White House.

The US president-elect has accused European countries of relying on American taxpayers for their security.

At a meeting of Nato’s foreign ministers in Brussels, Lammy said “the time to act is now” – although the UK government has yet to set out its own plans for increasing its spending on defence to 2.5% of national output.

He highlighted Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and its involvement in conflicts around the world, including the Middle East.

“In the United Kingdom, we are at 2.3%, heading to 2.5% as soon as we can get there, and we urge all allies across the Nato family to get serious about defence spending.

“All of our populations require us to understand the tremendous security challenges that we are facing at this time,” he added.

French President Emmanuel Macron said he will name a new prime minister “in the coming days”, after Michel Barnier resigned following a no-confidence vote in parliament.

In a 10-minute address to the nation on Thursday, he rejected opposition pressure to stand down, vowing to stay in his post “fully, until the end of the mandate” in 2027.

He thanked Barnier for his dedication during his brief term as prime minister, and accused the French far right and hard left of collaborating in an “anti-republican front” to bring down the government.

French MPs voted overwhelmingly to remove Barnier on Wednesday, just three months after he was appointed by Macron.

The vote was the first time a French government had been voted down by parliament in more than 60 years, a move Macron labelled “unprecedented”.

In response, Marine Le Pen, leader of the far right National Rally (RN), posted to social media: “A little reminder to President Macron, who is supposed to be the guarantor of the Constitution: censure is not anti-republican, it is provided for in the Constitution of our Fifth Republic.”

The no-confidence vote that toppled Barnier’s leadership had been tabled by both the New Popular Front (NFP) left-wing alliance, and Le Pen’s RN.

They united to censure the government after the former Brexit negotiator used special powers to force through his budget without a vote.

A total of 331 MPs voted in support of the motion against Barnier, far more than the 288 required for it to pass.

Barnier resigned on Thursday, and the budget was automatically withdrawn. He will remain in office on a caretaker basis with his ministers until a new government is appointed. Macron’s role is unaffected.

Macron has been heavily criticised for deciding to call snap elections in July, creating a deadlock in parliament and an escalating political crisis.

He admitted the decision he took “was not understood”, saying: “Many have blamed me for it and I know, many continue to blame me. It’s a fact and it’s my responsibility.”

Addressing voters directly, he said some of his political opponents had chosen “chaos over responsibility” and that they were not thinking “about you, the voters”, suggesting their focus was on the next presidential elections.

Macron gave no indication of who the next prime minister would be, but said their immediate focus would be the budget for 2025.

Speculation has been swirling over who could be named, with potential candidates including Defence Minister Sébastien Lecornu, Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau, and centrist former presidential candidate François Bayrou.

But finding someone who would be supported by the majority of factions within the stalemate parliament could be difficult, as was the case when former PM Gabriel Attal was asked to stay on as caretaker for two months after July’s elections.

It is unclear if the next government will now be in place before Saturday, when world leaders including US President-elect Donald Trump are due to attend the opening ceremony of the rebuilt Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris.

The building was devastated by fire in April 2019, and its reconstruction little more than five years later has drawn worldwide praise.

Macron said the rebuilding of the ravaged cathedral, plus France’s successful hosting of the 2024 Olympics, were “proof that we can do great things”.

“We can do the impossible,” he said. “The world admires us for that.”

A chaotic night in South Korea produced scenes most thought were consigned to the nation’s history.

One in particular has caught the attention of many: a woman confronting soldiers who were sent to block lawmakers from entering the National Assembly.

Footage of Ahn Gwi-ryeong, 35, a spokesperson for the opposition Democratic Party, grabbing the weapon of a soldier during the commotion has been shared widely online.

“I didn’t think… I just knew we had to stop this,” she told the BBC Korean Service.

Ahn made her way to the assembly building as soldiers descended on it, shortly after the president declared martial law across South Korea.

Like many in South Korea’s younger generation, the word “martial law” was foreign to her. It was last declared in 1979.

When Ahn first heard the news, she admitted “a sense of panic took over”.

• Fear, fury and triumph: Six hours that shook South Korea
• The president’s gamble backfired: What was he thinking?
• What is martial law and why was it declared?
• How two hours of martial law chaos unfolded

When martial law is declared, political activities like rallies and demonstrations are banned, strikes and labour actions are prohibited, and media and publishing activities are controlled by the authorities. Violators can be arrested or detained without a warrant.

Shortly after the declaration of martial law, opposition leader Lee Jae-myung called on lawmakers to gather in the National Assembly and hold a vote to annul the declaration.

Arriving at the assembly building just past 23:00 local time, Ahn recalled turning off office lights to avoid detection as helicopters circled overhead.

By the time she reached the main building, soldiers were engaged in a stand-off with officials, aides and citizens.

She said: “When I saw the armed soldiers… I felt like I was witnessing the regression of history.”

Ahn and her colleagues were desperate to prevent the troops from entering the main building, where the vote would be held.

They locked the revolving doors from the inside and piled furniture and other heavy objects in front of the doors.

When the military began advancing, Ahn stepped forward.

“Honestly, I was scared at first,” she said, adding: “But seeing such confrontation, I thought, ‘I can’t stay silent’.”

The assembly passed the resolution calling for the lifting of martial law at around 01:00. All 190 members who were present voted to repeal it.

At 04:26, President Yoon announced he was reversing his decision.

After the chaos subsided, Ahn slept for a short time inside the assembly building.

She continued: “I was actually a little scared to go outside the assembly in the morning because there didn’t seem to be any taxis running, and after such a storm last night, it was hard to get back to reality.”

During her conversation with the BBC, Ahn was wearing the same black turtleneck and leather jacket she had been wearing in the footage from the night before.

At times, she was overcome with emotion.

“It’s heartbreaking and frustrating that this is happening in 21st century Korea,” she said.

Syrian rebels say they have taken full control of a second major city, after the military withdrew its troops from Hama in another setback for President Bashar al-Assad.

The leader of the Islamist militant group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), Abu Mohammed al-Jawlani, declared “victory” in Hama and vowed there would be “no revenge”.

Earlier, HTS fighters and their allies took over Hama central prison and released inmates amid fierce battles, while the military said it had redeployed troops outside the city.

Hama is home to one million people and is 110km (70 miles) south of Aleppo, which the rebels captured last week after launching a surprise offensive from their stronghold in the north-west.

The rebel commander told residents of Homs, which is the next city south on the highway from Aleppo to Damascus, that “your time has come”.

In the past, President Assad relied on Russia and Iran to crush his opponents.

But with both allies preoccupied with their own affairs, it is unclear how – or if – he will be able to stop an advance that could threaten his government’s survival.

More than half a million people have been killed since a civil war erupted in 2011 after Assad’s government cracked down violently on peaceful pro-democracy protests.

The rebels broke through the government’s defensive lines north of Hama following several days of heavy fighting.

The military had sent reinforcements to the city after the fall of Aleppo. But despite support from Russian air strikes and Iran-backed militia fighters, troops were unable to prevent Hama being overrun on Thursday.

Rebel commander Hassan Abdul Ghani said in the morning that its fighters were engaged in fierce battles in various districts.

In the early afternoon, he announced that hundreds of inmates from Hama’s central prison had been released.

Minutes later, the military announced the redeployment of troops outside Hama “to preserve civilian lives and prevent urban combat”.

Photos and videos posted online and verified by the BBC showed fighters in several north-eastern neighbourhoods. The freed inmates were also filmed celebrating outside the central prison with a rebel and a reporter for a pro-opposition news outlet.

Abdul Ghani subsequently declared: “We’re pleased to tell you that Hama has been completely liberated after our forces have finished combing operations.”

He also said the rebels had cleared Hama military airport, in the city’s western outskirts, as well as Jabal Zain al-Abadin, a strategically important hill just to the north-east that overlooks the Damascus-Aleppo highway.

In a video, Abu Mohammed al-Jawlani said his fighters had entered Hama to “cleanse the wound that has endured in Syria for 40 years”.

“I ask God almighty that it be a conquest with no revenge,” he added.

The HTS leader was referring to the killing of between 10,000 and 25,000 people in the city in 1982, when the late President Hafez al-Assad sent in tanks and artillery to crush an Islamist uprising.

Similar tactics have been employed across the country by his son, Bashar, over the past 13 years.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), a UK-based monitoring group, says more than 820 people – most of them combatants, but also including 111 civilians – have been killed across the country since the start of the rebel offensive eight days ago.

The UN has said the fighting is also “worsening an already horrific situation for civilians in the north of the county”.

An estimated 280,000 people have been displaced, most of them women and children, and some civilians are trapped in front-line areas unable to reach safer locations.

In Aleppo, home to two million people, some public services and critical facilities – including hospitals, bakeries, power stations, water, internet and telecommunications – are meanwhile disrupted or non-functional because of shortages of supplies and personnel.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged “all those with influence to do their part” to end the civil war.

“We are seeing the bitter fruits of a chronic collective failure of previous de-escalation arrangements to produce a genuine nationwide ceasefire or a serious political process,” he added. “These must change.”

President Assad has vowed to “crush” the rebels and accused Western powers of trying to redraw the map of the region, while his key allies Russia and Iran have offered their “unconditional support”.

Russian warplanes have intensified their strikes on rebel-held areas in recent days, Iran-backed militias have sent fighters to reinforce the government’s defensive lines, and Iran has said it is ready to send additional forces to Syria if asked.

Turkey, which supports the Syrian opposition but has denied reports that it is involved in the HTS-led offensive, has urged Assad to engage in a political process with the opposition to bring an end to Syria’s 13-year civil war.

Turkish-backed rebel factions have meanwhile capitalised on the government’s retreat in the north by launching a separate offensive on a pocket of territory near Aleppo that was controlled by a Kurdish-led militia alliance, the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). Turkey, which has a large restive Kurdish minority, considers the Kurds in Syria as a threat.

Before the start of the rebel offensive, the government had regained control of Syria’s main cities with the help of Russia, Iran and Iran-backed militias. However, large parts of the country remained out of its control.

The rebels’ last stronghold was in Aleppo and Idlib provinces, which border Turkey and where more than four million people were living, many of them displaced from government-held areas.

The enclave was dominated by HTS, which is designated as a terrorist organisation by the UN, US, Turkey and other countries because it was al-Qaeda’s affiliate in Syria until it formally broke ties in 2016.

A number of allied rebel factions and jihadist groups were also based there, along with Turkish-backed SNA factions and Turkish forces.

HTS and its allies said on 27 November that they had launched an offensive to “deter aggression”, accusing the government and allied Iran-backed militias of escalating attacks on civilians in the north-west.

But it came at a time when the government’s allies were preoccupied with other conflicts.

The Iran-backed Lebanese group Hezbollah, which was crucial in helping push back rebels in the early years of the war, has suffered recently from Israel’s offensive in Lebanon. Its new leader Naim Qassem said on Thursday that it would “be by Syria’s side in thwarting the goals of this aggression as much as we can”.

Israeli strikes have also eliminated Iranian military commanders in Syria and degraded supply lines to pro-government militias there.

Russia has also been also distracted by the war in Ukraine.

The northeastern Indian state of Assam has banned the consumption of beef in public places including restaurants and events.

This is an expansion to an earlier rule that restricted the sale of beef near certain religious places like temples, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said on Wednesday.

However, the meat can still be purchased from shops and eaten within homes or private establishments in the state.

The consumption of beef is a sensitive issue in India, as cows are revered by Hindus, who comprise 80% of the country’s population.

Several states ruled by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) – which is also in power in Assam – have cracked down heavily on cow slaughter in recent years.

About two-thirds of India’s 28 states, many of them governed by the BJP, have partially or fully banned cattle slaughter and beef consumption (though consumption of buffalo meat is legal in some of these places).

In many parts of India, cow vigilante groups have been accused of enforcing the ban through violence, often leading to deadly attacks on Muslim meat sellers and cattle traders and Dalits (formerly untouchables), for whom beef is a staple and cheap form of protein.

In Assam, the sale and purchase of beef was banned in 2021 in areas where Hindus, Jains and Sikhs – who don’t usually eat beef – live. That law also prohibited the sale of beef near temples.

Sarma said that the new ban on public consumption will be added to that existing law.

The decision comes days after India’s main opposition party Congress claimed that Sarma had used beef to win a by-election in Samaguri, a Muslim-majority constituency – a charge denied by the BJP.

Congress legislator Rakibul Hussain had said that by “offering beef” to voters, the chief minister had “betrayed” his own party’s Hindu nationalist values.

The statements sparked a political slugfest, with Sarma on Wednesday saying he was willing to impose a complete ban on beef in the state, if that’s what the Congress wanted.

Meanwhile, other political parties have criticised the ban, saying it interfered with people’s right to eat what they want.

“If they cannot ban beef in Goa or other northeastern states, why in Assam?” said Hafiz Rafiqul Islam, a member of the All India United Democratic Front.

The sale and consumption of beef is legal in some states, including Goa and Arunachal Pradesh, which are ruled by the BJP.