A “panic-stricken” elephant killed a Spanish woman while she was bathing the animal at an elephant centre in Thailand, local police said.

Blanca Ojanguren García, 22, was washing the elephant at the Koh Yao Elephant Care Centre last Friday when she was gored to death by the animal.

Experts told Spanish language newspaper Clarín that the elephant could have been stressed by having to interact with tourists outside its natural habitat.

García, who was a law and international relations student at Spain’s University of Navarra, was living in Taiwan as part of a student exchange programme.

She was visiting Thailand with her boyfriend, who witnessed the attack.

Spain’s foreign minister, Jose Manuel Albares, said the Spanish consulate in Bangkok was assisting García’s family.

BBC News has contacted the elephant care centre for comment.

Bathing elephants is a popular activity among tourists in Thailand, which is home to more than 4,000 wild elephants and has a similar number kept in captivity, according to the Department of National Parks.

The Koh Yao centre offers “elephant care” packages which let tourists make food for and feed the animals, as well as shower and walk with them. These packages cost between 1,900 baht ($55; £44) and 2,900 baht.

Animal activists have previously criticised elephant bathing activities, noting that they disrupt natural grooming behaviours and expose the animals to unnecessary stress and potential injury.

World Animal Protection, an international charity, has for years urged countries including Thailand to stop breeding elephants in captivity.

More than six in 10 elephants used for tourism in Asia are living in “severely inadequate” conditions, the charity said.

“These intelligent and socially intricate animals, with a capacity for complex thoughts and emotions, endure profound suffering in captivity, as their natural social structures cannot be replicated artificially,” the charity said.

US Vice-President Kamala Harris will on Monday preside over the official certification in Congress of the result of November’s presidential election – a contest that she lost to Donald Trump.

The date also marks the fourth anniversary of a riot at the US Capitol, when Trump’s supporters tried to thwart the certification of Democratic President Joe Biden’s election victory in 2020. Normally the occasion is a mere formality.

Heavy security is in place in Washington DC, and Biden has vowed there will be no repeat of the violence on 6 January 2021 – which led to several deaths.

As lawmakers meet in Washington DC, heavy snow forecast for the American capital could prove disruptive.

House Speaker Mike Johnson has vowed to go ahead with the certification at 13:00 EST (18:00 GMT) in spite of the weather, telling Fox News: “Whether we’re in a blizzard or not, we’re going to be in that chamber making sure this is done.”

As the current vice-president, Harris is required by the US Constitution to officially preside over the certification of the result, after Trump beat her in the nationwide poll on 5 November.

Trump won all seven of the country’s swing states, helping him to victory in the electoral college, the mechanism that decides who takes the presidency. It will be Harris’s job on Monday to read out the number of electoral college votes won by each candidate.

Trump’s second term will begin after he is inaugurated on 20 January. For the first time since 2017, the president’s party will also enjoy majorities in both chambers of Congress, albeit slender ones.

• How will Trump’s win be certified?
• Just how big was Trump’s victory?
• What next for Harris, after her bruising election defeat?
• Who has joined Trump’s top team?
• What happens to Trump’s legal cases?

Trump’s win marked a stunning political comeback from his electoral defeat in 2020, and a criminal conviction in 2024 – a first for a current or former US president.

Amid the dramatic recent presidential campaign, Trump also survived a bullet grazing his ear when a gunman opened fire at one of his rallies in Pennsylvania.

While away from the White House, he has faced a slew of legal cases against him – including over his attempts to overturn the 2020 result, which he continues to dispute.

Following his defeat that year, Trump and his allies made baseless allegations of widespread voter fraud – claiming the election had been stolen from them.

In a speech in Washington DC on certification day, 6 January 2021, Trump told a crowd to “fight like hell” but also asked them to “peacefully” make their voices heard.

He also attempted to pressurise his own vice-president, Mike Pence, to reject the election result – a call that Pence rejected.

• What Trump said in speech before riot

Rioters went on to smash through barricades and ransack the Capitol building before Trump ultimately intervened by telling them to go home. Several deaths were blamed on the violence.

Trump’s pledges after returning to office include pardoning people convicted of offences over the attack. He says many of them are “wrongfully imprisoned”, though has acknowledged that “a couple of them, probably they got out of control”.

Conversely, Biden has called on Americans never to forget what happened.

“We must remember the wisdom of the adage that any nation that forgets its past is doomed to repeat it,” Biden wrote in the Washington Post over the weekend.

For Trump’s Republican Party, the new Senate Majority Leader John Thune has signalled a desire to move on, telling the BBC’s US partner CBS News: “You can’t be looking in the rearview mirror.”

• 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 huge winter storm has brought snow, ice and and freezing temperatures to a broad swathe of the US, with more than 60 million Americans under weather alerts.

Much of the US is waking up to below freezing temperatures on Monday morning, with some of the coldest conditions expected in Kansas, while the Washington DC area is awaiting unusually heavy snowfall.

Forecasters say the extreme weather – named Storm Blair – is being caused by the polar vortex, an area of cold air that circulates around the Arctic.

As of early Monday morning, 1,400 US flights had been cancelled for the day and 800 delayed, according to FlightAware.com.

A state of emergency has been declared in of Kansas, Missouri, Kentucky, Virginia, West Virginia, Arkansas and parts of New Jersey.

And much of Canada is also under weather alerts, as the blizzard conditions have dumped about a foot of snow (30cm) in places.

Thirty US states, spanning from the middle of the country to the east coast – including major cities such as Washington DC and Philadelphia – are under weather alerts, the National Weather Service (NWS) said.

On Sunday – which was forecast to be the most intense day of the storm – people in affected states saw roads cut off. Schools were shut down on Monday in Virginia, Maryland, Indiana and Kentucky.

Hundreds of car accidents and stranded drivers were reported over the weekend in several midwestern states – including Kansas as well as Indiana, Kentucky and Virginia.

• Follow live updates on this story
• How to drive in snow and icy weather

Blizzard warnings have been issued in Kansas, Missouri and Nebraska.

Kansas City is seeing its heaviest snow in 32 years, with more than a foot (30 to 40cm) having come down so far, according to Matthew Cappucci, a senior meteorologist at the weather app MyRadar.

Parts of northern Missouri have already experienced 14in (36cm) of sleet and snow.

The storm began moving toward the US’s east coast on Sunday, with parts of Virginia, Maryland, Washington DC and Delaware due to take the brunt.

Washington DC is bracing for heavy snow and bitter cold on Monday, the same day the US Congress is set to meet and formally certify Republican Donald Trump’s election as president.

But Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson said the weather would not prevent lawmakers from carrying out their duties. But officials have announced that federal offices in the nation’s capital will be closed.

The NWS said the winter storm could bring “the heaviest snowfall in at least a decade”, while AccuWeather forecaster Dan DePodwin said: “This could lead to the coldest January for the US since 2011.”

He added that “temperatures that are well below historical average” could linger for a week. Temperatures 12-25F (7-14C) below normal are forecast.

Further north, Canadians are also feeling the effects of the polar vortex.

Much of Canada has been under extreme weather alerts, with freezing temperatures spanning the country.

Some areas are also seeing snow squalls – a sudden heavy snowfall accompanied by strong winds.

In the central province of Manitoba, the wind chill could see temperatures plummet to as low as -40C.

Meanwhile, as much as 15in (38cm) of snow was expected in parts of Ontario on Sunday.

Amtrak has also cancelled numerous rail services.

American, Delta, Southwest and United airlines are waiving change fees for passengers because of the potential flight disruptions.

Conditions on roads have deteriorated, with crashes involving lorries and cars, as well as a fire engine rolling over near Salina, Kansas.

“Whiteout conditions will make travel extremely hazardous, with impassable roads and a high risk of motorists becoming stranded,” the NWS warned.

Meanwhile, severe thunderstorms capable of producing tornadoes were set to move east from Arkansas and Louisiana into Mississippi and Alabama on Sunday evening, the NWS said.

Private meteorologist Ryan Maue said: “It’s going to be a mess, a potential disaster. This is something we haven’t seen in quite a while.”

How have you been affected by the storm? Share your experiences by following this link.

South Korea’s suspended president Yoon Suk Yeol remains defiant in his newly-fortified residence, as investigators seek to extend the arrest warrant over his short-lived martial law order.

The current warrant – which was due to expire at midnight local time (15:00 GMT) – was issued after Yoon ignored multiple summonses to appear for questioning on insurrection and abuse of power charges.

Anti-corruption investigators tried to carry out the arrest on Friday – only to call it off after a six-hour standoff with the presidential security service at Yoon’s residence.

Yoon’s security team have since installed barbed wire and barricaded the compound with buses.

Investigators told the BBC they had asked the police to execute the warrant, in the hope their efforts carry more weight.

But police refused, saying it was legally controversial and its execution should be left to anti-corruption investigators.

Public anger has spiralled in recent weeks, as thousands of protesters braved heavy snow over the weekend, both in support of and against Yoon.

South Korea has been in crisis for the past month, ever since Yoon tried to impose martial law citing a threat from the North and “anti-state forces”. The fallout continues as US Secretary of State Antony Blinken visits Seoul, seeking to stabilise ties ahead of a Donald Trump presidency.

Yoon’s lawyers have claimed that the warrant for his arrest was “illegal” as the anti-corruption investigators leading the criminal case against their client did not have the authority to oversee a case as serious as insurrection.

The presidential security service (PSS) has cited this as a reason for blocking Yoon’s arrest – along with the fact that Yoon remains a sitting president until the constitutional court rules on his impeachment.

“For the PSS, whose primary mission is the absolute safety of the president, to comply with the execution of an arrest warrant amidst ongoing legal disputes would be tantamount to abandoning its duty,” security service chief Park Jong-joon said on Sunday.

Mr Park denied accusations that his team was serving as a “private militia” for Yoon.

Yoon’s lawyers, who on Monday filed complaints against investigators over the arrest attempt, said Yoon has been “practically detained in his residence”.

They also filed an injunction against the warrant, which was rejected by the court, and then said they were considering appealing against the decision.

Meanwhile, acting president Choi Sang-mok has resisted the opposition’s calls to sack key security officials obstructing the arrest.

The BBC understands that opposition lawmakers had asked investigators to try arresting Yoon again, but “more firmly and with sufficient means”.

Investigators could also apply for a new detention warrant, which has to be approved by a judge. That would allow Yoon to be detained for up to 20 days, while an arrest warrant only allows him to be held for 48 hours.

But without a change to either the situation or their approach, it seems unlikely investigators or police will be able to make the arrest.

As seen last Friday, they may again be blocked by the presidential security service which formed a “human wall” to protect Yoon. He himself has vowed to “fight to the end”, dividing public opinion and spurring on his supporters, who have been demonstrating for days outside his home.

The tense standoff has also raised urgent questions about the robustness and effectiveness of South Korea’s political and legal institutions.

The situation also has consequences beyond domestic politics.

Up until last month, the Biden administration had sung Yoon’s praises, delighted by his willingness to work with Washington to tackle the security threats posed by North Korea and China. The US put a lot of effort into helping South Korea repair its strained relations with Japan, so the three countries could address these issues together.

Mr Blinken’s visit to Seoul, where he met the acting president as well South Korea’s foreign minister, therefore comes at a difficult time for these two allies.

Yoon did not tell the US about his plans to impose martial law, meaning Washington did not have the chance to dissuade him and was unprepared for the chaos that ensued.

Blinken will not want to be drawn on the current political situation. He will instead want to focus on preserving the trilateral co-operation between Seoul, Washington and Tokyo beyond President Biden’s tenure.

Speaking during a joint press conference on Monday, Blinken said the US had “full confidence” in South Korea’s institutions, and reaffirmed the US government’s “unwavering support for the Korean people as they work tirelessly to uphold those institutions”.

“Over the past four decades Korea has written one of the most powerful, inspiring democratic stories in the world,” Blinken said.

“Korea’s democracy has been tested in recent weeks – just as American democracy has faced challenges throughout our history. But you are responding by demonstrating your democratic resilience.”

But it’s hard to disentangle the domestic and geopolitical situations. South Korea could be months away from electing a new president, and that leader may well want to break with Yoon’s foreign policies.

Trump, who enters the White House in a fortnight, will also pursue his own agenda.

US President Joe Biden has announced a ban on new offshore oil and gas drilling along most of America’s coastline, weeks before Donald Trump takes office.

The ban covers the entire Atlantic coast and eastern Gulf of Mexico, as well as the Pacific coast off California, Oregon and Washington and a section of the Bering Sea off Alaska.

It is the latest in a string of last-minute climate policy actions by the Biden administration ahead of Donald Trump’s return to the White House.

Trump has vowed to revoke the ban “immediately” when he takes office, but he may find it difficult to reverse under US law.

During his campaign, Trump pledged to “unleash” domestic fossil fuel production in a bid to lower gas costs, despite the US already seeing record high extraction rates.

Announcing the new drilling ban, Biden said: “My decision reflects what coastal communities, businesses, and beachgoers have known for a long time: that drilling off these coasts could cause irreversible damage to places we hold dear and is unnecessary to meet our nation’s energy needs.

“It is not worth the risks.”

In a radio interview, Trump branded the ban “ridiculous”.

“I’ll unban it immediately,” he said. “I have the right to unban it immediately.”

Trump has previously said he will reverse Biden’s conservation and climate change policies.

For the new drilling ban, Biden is taking the action under the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act of 1953, which allows US presidents to withdraw areas from mineral leasing and drilling.

The law does not grant presidents the legal authority to overturn prior bans, according to a 2019 court ruling. It means a reversal would likely require an act of Congress, which is now controlled by Trump’s Republicans.

The law also does not allow presidents to revoke any areas already leased for offshore drilling.

Trump – despite being in favour of more oil and gas exploration and repeatedly deploying his tag line “Drill, baby, drill” during campaigning – has used the law himself to protect waters off the coast of Florida in 2020.

At the time, this was seen as an effort to garner votes from the state ahead of the 2020 US election, and the protection was due to expire in 2032. Biden’s decision will protect the same area with no expiry date.

The new offshore drilling ban covers more than 625 million acres (253 million hectares) of waters.

After it was reported last week that Biden would introduce the policy, Trump’s incoming press secretary Karoline Leavitt called it “a disgraceful decision”.

She said the move was “designed to exact political revenge on the American people who gave President Trump a mandate to increase drilling and lower gas prices”.

Environmental groups, however, welcomed the move.

Joseph Gordon, from conservation organisation Oceana, said: “This is an epic ocean victory.

“Our treasured coastal communities are now safeguarded for future generations.”

• ‘Visit Hull’ invitation to Trump after social post
• Trump’s eyeing Greenland – but other Arctic investment is frozen
• A year of extreme weather that challenged billions

An oil and gas industry trade group said Biden’s decision would harm American energy security and should be reversed by Congress.

Mike Sommers, president of the American Petroleum Institute, said: “We urge policymakers to use every tool at their disposal to reverse this politically motivated decision and restore a pro-American energy approach to federal leasing.”

In 2017, during his first term in office, Trump tried to reverse former President Barack Obama’s protection of 125 million acres (50.6 million hectares) of the Atlantic and Arctic Oceans.

Two years later, a US District Court ruled that the act did not allow a president to reverse decisions of previous administrations – meaning Trump could not revoke Obama’s protections.

It is expected that Trump – whose inauguration ceremony takes place on 20 January – will still seek to challenge Biden’s move. A final legal decision could be made by the Supreme Court, which currently has a majority of Republican judges.

Environmentalists and Democrats had been calling on Biden to introduce the ban because of concerns that any new drilling would threaten US ambitions to cut its greenhouse gas emissions and tackle climate change.

The International Energy Agency estimates that global oil and gas demand needs to fall by 5% annually to limit global temperature rise to 1.5C, which is seen as crucial to help avoid the most damaging impacts.

More Vietnamese attempted small-boat Channel crossings in the first half of 2024 than any other nationality. Yet they are coming from one of the world’s fastest-growing economies. Why, then, are so many risking their lives to reach Britain?

Phuong looked at the small inflatable boat and wondered whether she should step in. There were 70 people packed in, and it was sitting low in the water. She recalls the fear, exhaustion and desperation on their faces. There weren’t enough lifejackets to go around.

But Phuong was desperate. She says she had been stuck in France for two months, after travelling there from Vietnam via Hungary, sleeping in tents in a scrubby forest.

Already she had refused to travel on one boat because it seemed dangerously overcrowded, and previously had been turned back in the middle of the Channel three times by bad weather or engine failure.

Her sister, Hien, lives in London, and recalls that Phuong used to phone her from France in tears. “She was torn between fear and a drive to keep going.

“But she had borrowed so much – around £25,000 – to fund this trip. Turning back wasn’t an option.” So, she climbed on board.

Today Phuong lives in London with her sister, without any legal status. She was too nervous to speak to us directly, and Phuong is not her real name. She left it to her sister, who is now a UK citizen, to describe her experiences.

In the six months to June, Vietnamese made up the largest number of recorded small boat arrivals with 2,248 landing in the UK, ahead of people from countries with well-documented human rights problems, including Afghanistan and Iran.

The extraordinary efforts made by Vietnamese migrants to get to Britain is well documented, and in 2024 the BBC reported on how Vietnamese syndicates are running successful people-smuggling operations.

It is not without significant risks. Some Vietnamese migrants end up being trafficked into sex work or illegal marijuana farms. They make up more than one-tenth of those in the UK filing official claims that they are victims of modern slavery.

And yet Vietnam is a fast-growing economy, acclaimed as a “mini-China” for its manufacturing prowess. Per capita income is eight times higher than it was 20 years ago. Add to that the tropical beaches, scenery and affordability, which have made it a magnet for tourists.

So what is it that makes so many people desperate to leave?

Vietnam, a one-party Communist state, sits near the bottom of most human rights and freedom indexes. No political opposition is permitted. The few dissidents who raise their voices are harassed and jailed.

Yet most Vietnamese have learned to live with the ruling party, which leans for legitimacy on its record of delivering growth. Very few who go to Britain are fleeing repression.

Nor are the migrants generally fleeing poverty. The World Bank has singled Vietnam out for its almost unrivalled record of poverty reduction among its 100 million people.

Rather, they are trying to escape what some call “relative deprivation”.

Despite its impressive economic record, Vietnam started far behind most of its Asian neighbours, with growth only taking off well after the end of the Cold War in 1989. As a result, average wages, at around £230 a month, are much lower than in nearby countries like Thailand, and three-quarters of the 55-million-strong workforce are in informal jobs, with no security or social protection.

“There is a huge disparity between big cities like Hanoi and rural areas,” says Nguyen Khac Giang, a Vietnamese academic at the Institute of South East Asian Studies-Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore. “For a majority of workers with limited skills, there is a glass ceiling. Even if you work 14 hours a day you cannot save enough to build a house or start a family.”

This was what Phuong felt, despite coming from Haiphong, Vietnam’s third-largest city.

Her sister Hien had made it to Britain nine years earlier, smuggled inside a shipping container. It had cost her around £22,000 but she was able to pay that back in two years, working long hours in kitchens and nail salons. Hien married a Vietnamese man who already had British citizenship, and they had a daughter; all three are now UK citizens.

In Haiphong, jobs were scarce after the pandemic and at 38 years old, Phuong wanted what her sister had in London: the ability to save money and start a family.

“She could survive in Vietnam, but she wanted a home, a better life, with more security,” explains Hien.

Lan Anh Hoang, a professor in development studies at Melbourne University, has spent years studying migration patterns. “Twenty to thirty years ago, the urge to migrate overseas was not as strong, because everyone was poor,” she says. “People were happy with one buffalo, one motorbike and three meals a day.

“Suddenly a few people successfully migrated to countries like Germany or the UK, to work on cannabis farms or open nail salons. They started to send a lot of money home. Even though the economic conditions of those left behind have not changed, they feel poor relative to all these families with migrants working in Europe.”

This tradition of seeking better lives overseas goes back to the 1970s and 80s, when Vietnam was allied to the Soviet Union following the defeat of US forces in the south.

The state-led economy had hit rock bottom. Millions were destitute; some areas suffered food shortages. Tens of thousands left to work in eastern bloc countries like Poland, East Germany and Hungary.

This was also a time when 800,000 mainly ethnic Chinese boat people fled the communist party’s repressive actions, making perilous sea journeys across the South China Sea, eventually resettling in the USA, Australia or Europe.

The economic hardships of that time threatened the legitimacy of the communist party, and in 1986 it made an abrupt turn, abandoning the attempt to build a socialist system and throwing the doors open to global markets. The new theme of Vietnam’s national story was to catch up, and get rich, any way possible. For many Vietnamese, that meant going abroad.

“Money is God in Vietnam,” says Lan An Hoang. “The meaning of ‘the good life’ is primarily anchored in your ability to accumulate wealth. There is also a strong obligation to help your family, especially in central Vietnam.

“That is why the whole extended family pools resources to finance the migration of one young person because they believe they can send back large sums of money, and facilitate the migration of other people.”

Drive through the flat rice fields of Nghe An, one of Vietnam’s poorer provinces lying south of Hanoi, and where there were once smaller concrete houses, you will now find large, new houses with gilded gates. More are under construction, thanks, in part, to money earned in the West.

The new houses are prominent symbols of success for returnees who have done well overseas.

Vietnam is now enjoying substantial inflows of foreign investment, as it is considered an alternative to China for companies wanting to diversify their supply chains. This investment is even beginning to reach places like Nghe An, too.

Foxconn, a corporate giant that manufactures iPhones, is one of several foreign businesses building factories in Nghe An, offering thousands of new jobs.

But monthly salaries for unskilled workers only reach around £300, even with overtime. That is not enough to rival the enticing stories of the money to be made in the UK, as told by the people smugglers.

The business of organising the travel for those wishing to leave the province is now a very profitable one. Publicly, companies present themselves as either travel agents or brokers for officially approved overseas labour contracts, but in practice many also offer to smuggle people to the UK via other European countries. They usually paint a rosy picture of life in Britain, and say little about the risks and hardships they will face.

“Brokers” typically charge between £15,000 and £35,000 for the trip to the UK. Hungary is a popular route into the EU because it offers guest-worker visas to Vietnamese passport holders. The higher the price, the easier and faster the journey.

The communist authorities in Vietnam have been urged by the US, the UK and UN agencies to do more to control the smuggling business.

Remittances from abroad earn Vietnam around £13bn a year, and the government has a policy of promoting migration for work, although only through legal channels, mostly to richer Asian countries.

More than 130,000 Vietnamese workers left in 2024 under the official scheme. But the fees for these contracts can be high, and the wages are much lower than they can earn in Britain.

The huge risks of the illicit routes used to reach the UK were brought home in 2019, when 39 Vietnamese people were found dead in Essex, having suffocated while being transported inside a sealed container across the Channel.

Yet this has not noticeably reduced demand for the smugglers’ services. The increased scrutiny of container traffic has, however, pushed them to find alternative Channel crossings, which helps explain the sharp rise in Vietnamese people using small boats.

“The tragedy of the 39 deaths in 2019 is almost forgotten,” says the cousin of one of the victims, Le Van Ha. He left behind a wife, two young children and a large debt from the cost of the journey. His cousin, who does not want to be named, says attitudes in their community have not changed.

“People hardly care anymore. It’s a sad reality, but it is the truth.

“I see the trend of leaving continuing to grow, not diminish. For people here, the success stories still outweigh the risks.”

Three of the victims came from the agricultural province of Quang Binh. The headteacher of a secondary school in the region, who also asked not to be named, says that 80% of his students who graduate soon plan to go overseas.

“Most parents here come from low-income backgrounds,” he explains. “The idea of [encouraging their child to] broaden their knowledge and develop their skills is not the priority.

“For them, sending a child abroad is largely about earning money quickly, and getting it sent back home to improve the family’s living standards.”

In March the UK Home Office started a social media campaign to deter Vietnamese people from illegal migration. Some efforts were also made by the Vietnamese government to alert people to the risks of using people-smugglers. But until there are more appealing economic opportunities in those provinces, it is likely the campaigns will have little impact.

“They cannot run these campaigns just once,” argues Diep Vuong, co-founder of Pacific Links, an anti-trafficking organisation. “It’s a constant investment in education that’s needed.”

She has first-hand experience, leaving Vietnam to the US in 1980 as part of the exodus of Vietnamese boat people.

“In Vietnam, people believe they have to work hard, to do everything for their families. That is like a shackle which they cannot easily escape. But with enough good information put out over the years, they might start to change this attitude.”

But the campaigns are up against a powerful narrative. Those who go overseas and fail – and many do – are often ashamed, and keep quiet about what went wrong. Those who succeed come back to places like Nghe An and flaunt their new-found wealth. As for the tragedy of the 39 people who died in a shipping container, the prevailing view in Nghe An is still that they were just unlucky.

The Golden Globes were a night to celebrate film, TV, and… love.

Last year, Timotheé Chalamet sent the internet into a frenzy as he piled on the PDA with his girlfriend Kylie Jenner at the ceremony, and this year it was date night again as the pair cosied up throughout the evening.

There was even more love in the air as A Different Man star Sebastian Stan is now officially officially dating Annabelle Wallis. He shouted out that he loved her during his acceptance speech for best actor in a musical or comedy film.

And if that isn’t enough romance for you then Zendaya has stolen the show with rumours of a potential engagement. Here’s more on that and eight other highlights from the awards ceremony that you may have missed.

Zendaya brought her usual effortlessly sleek style to the red carpet but the internet seemed less interested in her burnt orange gown and more about what was on her finger.

The Challengers star was sporting a large diamond ring on the fourth finger of her left hand and some thought it might be a sign that she’s engaged.

The 28-year-old has been dating Spider-Man actor Tom Holland for the past four years.

Fans immediately started speculating about their possible engagement, but one pointed out on X: “They’re very protective about their relationship, so would she actually wear the ring on the red carpet?”

If you’re hosting the Golden Globes, naturally you’ve got to look the part. For Nikki Glaser that meant a whopping a 10 dresses across the three hour ceremony.

The comedian started off the night wearing a strapless metallic dress on the red carpet before switching to a halter neck silver sequined gown to kick the ceremony off.

• Host Nikki Glaser’s best jokes at the Golden Globes

The 40-year-old seemed to use every advert break across the show to switch into something different backstage and some of her other outfits included a sparkly purple dress, a high-slit red gown and a tight-fitting black plunge number.

Our personal favourite outfit? A Wicked-inspired bright pink sequined dress that she wore with a pope’s hat as she sang “you’re going to be pope-ular”.

If you even go to the bathroom at The Beverly Hilton, you’re likely to run into a celebrity.

Turn the corner, bam – Melissa McCarthy. Turn another – Jean Smart and the rest of the cast of Hacks.

The hotel in the heart of swanky Beverly Hills had a large security perimeter with barriers, armed guards and patrols, but once a person is inside – it’s like a playground for Hollywood’s A-list.

Some hunted for drinks, others were wrangled by publicists to interviews and photo shoots with eager journalists.

Roaming around the hotel, Selena Gomez, hot off her film Emilia Pérez winning four awards, was seen with her new fiancé Benny Blanco. He kissed her shoulder as he trailed behind her in an intimate moment.

Shōgun, a series set in 17th century Japan, was a big winner at the Globes, taking home four awards.

Star Hiroyuki Sanada won best male actor in a drama TV series and backstage told the BBC that he hopes the show and their wins could “could break the wall of language” and open “doors much wider” not only for Japanese actors and projects but those across the globe.

His co-star Tadanobu Asano won best male supporting actor in a TV series and clearly shocked, jumped out of his seat and, in Japanese custom, bowed repeatedly – first to those at his table then everyone in the audience and then to the cameras, which had panned to him.

“Wow!” he said when handed the award on stage. He acknowledged that he’s a new talent in the US and started off by introducing himself to the crowd.

“Maybe you don’t know me, so I’m an actor from Japan and my name is Tadanobu Asano,” he said as the crowd laughed.

“I’m very happy!” he shouted through excited laughter, concluding his acceptance speech.

Backstage, he said his message to other Japanese actors: “If I can do this, anyone can.”

Irish actor Colin Farrell picked up his third Golden Globe, for playing the Batman villain in the HBO series Penguin.

Accepting his speech he mentioned some of the other nominees in his category including fellow Irishman Andrew Scott.

He recalled their first movie together, Drinking Crude, and said: “[Andrew] who I did my first film with 25, 30 years ago. You can’t even find it on Betamax. It doesn’t exist. But we go back that far.”

He added to Scottish actor Richard Gadd, whose experience of stalking and sexual assault inspired the Netflix hit series Baby Reindeer, that “you broke my heart with your work this year”.

In his speech, Farrell also spoke about the three hours it took to be fitted with prosthetics to make him the bloated villain in Penguin.

“In the morning, I drank black coffee, listened to 80s music, and I became a canvas for that team’s brilliance.”

Farrell also said: “Thank you for employing me. And yeah, I guess it’s prosthetics from here on out.”

Backstage, Mr Farrell acknowledged his lengthy Hollywood career and said despite his win, “I certainly don’t consider myself at the top of any pile”.

He said after his nearly 30 years acting, he doesn’t feel a sense of pride, but rather, just feels “very grateful”.

We’ve all been holding space for Wicked this year and Michelle Yeoh and Jeff Goldblum were providing us with our Wizard of Oz fix in classic boomer style.

“People have been calling me Zaddy but I don’t know what that means,” Goldblum said while Yeoh added that she was just as confused by people telling her that she’s been “serving mother”.

Despite being clueless to the meaning of the Gen Z language and looking even more baffled as Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande tried to explain the meaning behind these words, they both said they love it.

“Let’s see who ate,” Goldblum said as he introduced the nominees for a category.

Backstage the cast of Wicked spoke to the BBC about whether there was a future for the Land of Oz in a TV series.

The film’s producer Marc Platt joked that the film “is already a show” – on Broadway. Beyond that, though, he said: “It’s hard to predict.”

Asked by the BBC about the film transcending into a culture phenomenon with countless memes and viral clips, Platt said it speaks to the “timeless” material the film is based on.

“When something becomes a cultural phenomenon, you can’t really predict that. It’s very exhilarating,” he said.

Sir Elton John joked about his sight loss as he presented the award for best original film score with Brandi Carlile, who he sang the track Never Too Late with.

The 77-year-old singer revealed in September that his vision has been affected in his right eye after contracting an infection in the summer.

In December he said he had been unable to watch his own musical, The Devil Wears Prada, due to the infection.

But, on stage he told the audience: “There has been a lot of stories going around about my regressive eyesight, and I just want to reassure everyone it is not as bad as it seems.”

“I’m so pleased to be here with my co-host, Rihanna,” he joked.

Sir Elton cheered as it was announced that US musician Trent Reznor and English composer Atticus Ross won the award for the musical score for erotic tennis film challengers.

Fernanda Torres’s surprise win for best drama actress in the Brazilian political thriller I’m Still Here even surprised her.

She called the win over Hollywood heavyweights – including Angelina Jolie, Nicole Kidman and Kate Winslet – both “strange” and “weird”.

“I never thought I would win”, she said, because there were “so many great performances in English, so this tells so much about the difference in cinema nowadays.”

She was asked about the celebrations happening back in her home country of Brazil, with one reporter remarking that it was like she’d won the country the World Cup.

“It is something very patriotic that’s happening in Brazil with this film,” she said, noting the country was “very happy” thanks to the Golden Globes.

In her acceptance speech she noted that the only other Brazilian actor to be nominated at the Globes was her mother, Fernanda Montenegro.

Several winning actresses tackled the topic of age at the awards.

Demi Moore, 62, noted in her acceptance speech for best film actress in The Substance that she’d spent much of her career believing that while she was successful, she would never receive any major Hollywood accolades.

She said the award reflected the message of the film, a body horror about a woman who trades her body for a younger, more beautiful version of herself.

“I’ll just leave you with one thing that I think this movie is imparting is in those moments when we don’t think we’re smart enough or pretty enough or skinny enough or successful enough, or basically just not enough,” Moore said.

“I had a woman say to me, just know you will never be enough, but you can know the value of your worth if you just put down the measuring stick.

After winning her award, she told journalists backstage about how many women spend much of their lives as caretakers and don’t get to spend their energy outward. And now, at 62, she is and “it feels really damn good”.

Jodie Foster, who is the same age as Moore, won the award for best actress in a limited series and said the 60s are a “golden age” because there’s like “a hormone that happens when suddenly you go, ‘Oh, I don’t really care about all the stupid things anymore”.

She called this era the “most contented moment in my career.”

Nippon Steel and US Steel are suing the US government over blocking a takeover, claiming that President Joe Biden “ignored the rule of law to gain favor” with trade unions.

The two companies also alleged that Biden, who is entering the last weeks of his presidency, stopped Nippon Steel buying US Steel to pursue his own political agenda.

In rejecting the proposed deal on Friday, President Biden said a strong domestically-owned steel industry was essential for national security and resilient supply chains, including for the car and defence industries.

If the $14.9bn (£11.8bn) takeover went ahead, it would strengthen Nippon’s ability to compete with China, which produces 60% of the world’s steel.

The takeover has been in limbo since it was first announced in December 2023.

Biden’s decision to officially block the deal delivered on a political promise made during last year’s election – US Steel is based in swing state Pennsylvania – despite concerns it could chill foreign investment and roil relations with key ally Japan.

In its lawsuit against the government, Nippon Steel and US Steel asked the court to order a new official review of the purchase.

The companies alleged that Biden’s influence meant that the Committee on Foreign Investment in the US, which has the power to vet foreign takeovers of US firms, had failed to conduct “a good faith, national security-focused regulatory review process”.

Additionally, the companies are suing the president of the United Steelworkers trade union, David McCall, and the chief executive of rival steel firm Cleveland-Cliffs, Lourenco Goncalves, for “their illegal and coordinated actions aimed at preventing the transaction”.

Mr McCall, who had supported a $7.3bn takeover offer from Cleveland Cliffs in summer 2023, said the accusations were “baseless” and repeated his support of Biden’s decision.

“By blocking Nippon Steel’s attempt to acquire US Steel, the Biden administration protected vital US interests, safeguarded our national security and helped preserve a domestic steel industry that underpins our country’s critical supply chains,” he said.

Nippon Steel and US Steel said they have “engaged in good faith with all parties” to show how the deal “will enhance, not threaten, US national security” and how it would strengthen America’s domestic steel industry “against the threat from China”.

They also reiterated that Nippon was prepared to invest $2.7bn in Pittsburgh-based US Steel.

Earlier on Monday, Japan’s Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba expressed his concerns about the US decision to block the takeover and the impact it might have on trade relations between the two G7 countries.

“Unfortunately, it is true that we have heard concerns voiced by the Japanese industries over future investments between Japan and the US. We must view this issue as a grave matter,” Mr Ishiba said.

He added that while it was inappropriate for his government to comment on individual companies: “We must insist on an explanation as to why there are security concerns, otherwise there will be no progress in future discussions.”

The lawsuit could leave the fate of the deal in the hands of the next administration, but it is not clear that would improve its chances.

President-elect Donald Trump has also said he would block the deal. On Monday, he wrote on Truth Social: “Why would they want to sell US Steel now when tariffs will make it a much more profitable and valuable company?”

Trump has said he plans to enact sweeping tariffs, which make imports into the US more expensive.

He has said the measures, which he also deployed during his first term, will make it easier for US-based companies to compete with overseas rivals and spur a manufacturing boom, increasing demand for steel.

According to economic analyses, the tariffs on foreign steel that he unveiled in 2018 led to modest job gains at steel-makers but job losses at other manufacturing companies that were forced to contend with higher steel costs.

A senior Hamas official has shared with the BBC a list of 34 hostages that the Palestinian group says it is willing to release in the first stage of a potential ceasefire agreement with Israel.

It is unclear how many of those named remain alive. All but two were captured during Hamas’s attack on Israel on 7 October 2023.

The ages of those on the list range from just one year old to 86. It also includes children who Hamas previously said had been killed in an Israeli air strike.

A number of hostages who Hamas says are sick are also on the list.

The Israeli prime minister’s office denied reports that Hamas had provided Israel with a list of hostages.

“The list of hostages published in the media was not passed on to Israel by Hamas, but was originally passed from Israel to intermediaries as early as July 2024,” it said.

“To date, Israel has not received any confirmation or comment from Hamas regarding the status of the abductees on the list.”

British Israeli Emily Damari, who was shot and taken from kibbutz Kfar Azar on 7 October, is among the names on the list. The 28-year-old is one of five civilian women named alongside five female surveillance soldiers.

They include 19-year-old Liri Albag, who appeared in a video posted by Hamas at the weekend, in which she was seen urging her government to make a deal.

Also on the list are two brothers – Kfir Bibas, a one-year-old approaching his second birthday, and 5-year-old Ariel – who were taken hostage along with their parents. Hamas has previously said the children were killed in an Israeli air strike.

Two Israelis held in Gaza for around a decade are also among the 34 names. They are Hisham al-Sayed, a Bedouin Arab who was seized in 2015, and Ethiopian Israeli Avera Mengistu, who was reportedly suffering from mental health issues and was taken captive after crossing into Gaza a year earlier.

• The forgotten hostages held by Hamas for years

Families of hostages said in a statement that they were “deeply shaken and distressed” by the list.

“The time has come for a comprehensive agreement that will bring back all hostages – we know more than half are still alive and need immediate rehabilitation, while those who were murdered must be returned for proper burial. We have no more time to waste. A hostage ceasefire agreement must be sealed now!”

Hamas’s decision to release the names of hostages will be seen by some as an attempt to increase public pressure on the Israeli government.

Ceasefire negotiations resumed in Doha, Qatar, over the weekend, but the talks do not appear to have made significant progress yet.

A Hamas official told the Reuters news agency any agreement to return Israeli hostages would depend on a deal for Israel to withdraw from Gaza and a permanent ceasefire or end to the war.

“However, until now, the occupation continues to be obstinate over an agreement over the issues of the ceasefire and withdrawal, and has made no step forward,” the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Israel and Hamas have consistently accused each other of obstructing progress towards a ceasefire deal.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told reporters in Seoul on Monday that he was “confident that [a deal] will get its completion at some point, hopefully sooner rather than later”, though he conceded it might happen after Joe Biden leaves office on 20 January.

About 1,200 people were killed and 251 others taken hostage in the unprecedented attack, which triggered a massive Israeli military campaign in Gaza. A hundred and five of the hostages were freed in exchange for 240 Palestinian prisoners held by Israel in November 2023. Fifty other hostages have been released, rescued or their bodies recovered.

At least 45,805 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s offensive, Gaza’s health ministry says.

Reports from the Hamas-run Gaza health ministry say Israeli air strikes killed more than 100 people there at the weekend.

The Israeli military said on Sunday that its air force had attacked more than 100 “terrorist” sites across the Gaza Strip over the weekend, killing dozens of Hamas fighters.

Romi Gonen (24); Emily Damari (28); Arbel Yehoud (29); Doron Steinbrecher (31); Ariel Bibas (5); Kfir Bibas (1); Shiri Silberman Bibas (33); Liri Albag (19); Karina Ariev (20); Agam Berger (20); Daniel Gilboa (20); Naama Levy (20); Ohad Ben-Ami (55); Gad Moshe Moses (80); Keith Shmuel Siegel (65); Offer Kaldaron (53); Eliyahu Sharabi (52); Itzhak Elgaret (69); Shlomo Mansur (86); Ohad Yahalomi (50); Yousef Yousef Alziadna (54); Oded Lifshitz (84); Tsachi Idan (50); Hisham al-Sayed (36); Yarden Bibas (35); Sagi Dekel Chen (36); Iair Horn (46); Omer Wenkert (23); Alexandre Troufanov (28); Eliya Cohen (27); Or Levy (34); Avera Mengistu (38); Tal Shoham (39); Omer Shem Tov (21).

The prime minister has attacked politicians and activists “spreading lies and misinformation” over grooming gangs.

It comes after multi-billionaire Elon Musk accused Sir Keir Starmer of being “complicit in the rape of Britain” during his tenure as director of public prosecutions (DPP) for failing to tackle grooming gangs.

Alongside Musk’s comments, senior Conservatives and Reform UK MPs have also spent the week calling for a national inquiry into child sexual exploitation.

But Sir Keir accused opposition MPs of “jumping on a bandwagon” and “amplifying what the far-right is saying” to gain attention.

Sir Keir said Labour was addressing child sexual abuse after Conservatives inaction “for 14 long years”.

Online debate around grooming gangs had now “crossed a line”, resulting in threats against MPs, including Safeguarding Minister Jess Phillips, he said.

“We have seen this playbook many times – whipping up of intimidation and of threats of violence, hoping that the media will amplify it,” Sir Keir said.

“Those who are spreading lies and misinformation as far and as wide as possible are not interested in victims, they’re interested in themselves,” he added.

Debate around grooming gangs was reignited this week after it was reported that Phillips rejected Oldham Council’s request for a government-led inquiry into historical child sexual exploitation in the town, in favour of a locally-led investigation.

The decision was taken in October, but first reported by GB News on 1 January.

Describing child sexual exploitation as “utterly sickening”, Sir Keir defended his record in office as DPP, saying he tackled the issue “head on”.

“I changed the system because I could see some of the things that were going wrong,” he told reporters.

While DPP, Sir Keir introduced a special prosecutor for child abuse and sexual exploitation to oversee convictions; changed the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) guidance to encourage police to investigate suspects in complex sexual abuse cases and brought in court reforms aimed at making the process less traumatic for victims.

Sir Keir said he also reopened cases, brought the first prosecution of an “Asian grooming gang” in Rochdale and called for mandatory reporting of child sexual abuse.

“When I left office, we had the highest number of child sexual abuse cases being prosecuted on record,” Sir Keir said.

“The victims here suffered terrible abuse,” he said, “and then they weren’t listened to.”

Phillips had also “done a thousand times more” to protect victims of child sexual abuse than those attacking her can “even dreamt about”, he said.

Reporters were briefed Sir Keir planned a bold defence of his record and his government – and his comments were the most impassioned he has been in his time as prime minister.

Sir Keir did not name any of those he thought were spreading lies in the debate, but his comments followed a series of questions about interventions by Musk.

Over the past week, the tech-entrepreneur has attacked the Labour government over grooming gangs – using his platform on his social media site X to accuse Phillips of being a “rape genocide apologist”, and calling for her and Sir Keir to be jailed.

Musk’s push to oust the PM could spark diplomatic trouble for Labour.

Alongside being one of the richest men in the world, Musk is also a key adviser for US President-elect Donald Trump.

Musk responded to Sir Keir’s comments, calling him “utterly despicable”.

In a series of posts on social media, Musk continued to attack Labour figures and the prime minister by name.

He also condemned what he saw as Sir Keir’s description of demands for a national inquiry into grooming gangs as far-right activism – calling it “an insane thing to say”.

Musk has called for far-right activist Tommy Robinson to be released from jail.

Robinson, whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, is currently serving an 18-month prison sentence for contempt of court, after admitting he breached an injunction against repeating claims about a Syrian refugee schoolboy.

Sir Keir accused those “cheerleading” Robinson of not being interested in justice and said he would not tolerate discussion and debate on lies.

“Once we lose the anchor that truth matters, in the robust debate that we must have, then we’re on a very slippery slope,” he said.

The Conservatives attacked Sir Keir for “smearing people who are concerned about rape gangs as jumping on a ‘far-right’ bandwagon”.

Shadow home secretary Chris Philp called the prime minister’s comments “disgraceful”.

Philp said Sir Keir had shown “how out of touch he really is” by not understanding why people are demanding a national inquiry.

The Liberal Democrats urged the government to “summon the US ambassador” to address Musk’s comments, given his role in the next White House administration.

Lib Dem leader Sir Ed Davey said: “People have had enough of Elon Musk interfering with our country’s democracy when he clearly knows nothing about Britain.”

There have been numerous investigations into the systematic rape of young women by organised gangs, including in Rotherham, Cornwall, Derbyshire, Rochdale and Bristol.

Sir Keir admitted many of the victims had been “let down by perverse ideas about community relations or by the idea that institutions must be protected above all else and they have not been listened to and they have not been heard.”

A Rotherham inquiry uncovered the sexual abuse of 1,400 children over 16 years, mainly by British Pakistani men.

In Telford, up to 1,000 girls faced abuse over 40 years, with some cases overlooked due to “nervousness about race” as most suspects were men of south Asian heritage.

The Conservatives and Reform UK have been calling for a statutory inquiry into grooming gangs.

Last week Kemi Badenoch, the leader of the Conservatives, said: “Trials have taken place all over the country in recent years but no one in authority has joined the dots. 2025 must be the year that the victims start to get justice.”

But Sir Keir dismissed the calls, claiming Professor Alexis Jay’s Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) was “comprehensive”.

While he agreed that “no stone should be left unturned” to end child sexual abuse, Sir Keir insisted that “action” is now needed, not another review.

Austria’s president Alexander Van der Bellen has tasked the leader of the far-right Freedom Party, Herbert Kickl, with forming a coalition government.

If the talks are successful, Austria will, for the first time, have a government led by the Eurosceptic, Russia-friendly Freedom Party (FPO).

The FPO has been in power before, but only as a junior coalition partner.

The party came first in September’s elections, with roughly 29% of the vote, but was then sidelined.

President Van der Bellen infuriated the FPO by not tasking it with forming a government soon after the election.

At the time, the leaders of all of the other parties ruled out making an alliance with Kickl.

In October, Van der Bellen gave the conservative People’s Party (OVP), which came second in the election with 26%, the task of forming a coalition.

The former leader of the OVP, Chancellor Karl Nehammer, had called Kickl a conspiracy theorist and a threat to security.

But Nehammer’s attempts to form a three-party and then a two-party centrist coalition collapsed this weekend.

He then resigned and the new leader of the conservatives, Christian Stocker, said his party would be willing to hold talks with Kickl.

President Van der Bellen has now tasked Kickl with forming a government.

The step is a dramatic reversal for the president, a former leader of the Green Party, who has long been critical of the FPO and has expressed reservations about Kickl as Chancellor.

On Monday, Van der Bellen said he had not taken “this step lightly”. He said he would “continue to ensure that the principles and rules of our constitution are correctly observed and adhered to”.

In recent months, Van der Bellen has repeatedly said he will remain vigilant to ensure “cornerstones of democracy” including human rights, independent media and Austria’s membership of the European Union are respected.

The Freedom Party and the OVP overlap on a number of issues and both take a tough line on migration.

However they have clashed on the EU and the Freedom Party’s opposition to aid for Ukraine in its war against Russia.

There is no timeframe for the coalition talks, which would usually take two or three months, but could be quicker.

If the talks fail, a snap election is likely. Polls suggest that support for the Freedom Party has grown since September.

US lawmakers will gather on Monday for a joint session of Congress to certify Donald Trump’s presidential election win – a procedure that happens every four years after the vote and two weeks before the president’s inauguration.

Last time, the routine went awry when a group of Trump’s supporters rioted at the Capitol to try to stop the formal vote-counting and overturn his defeat in the 2020 election.

This year’s certification will bring Trump a step closer to returning to the White House, after the Republican won the 2024 contest against Democratic Vice-President Kamala Harris.

Because of her role as leader of the Senate, Harris will oversee the certification.

Federal law states that Congress must gather on 6 January to certify the election results.

Members open sealed certificates from America’s 50 states, each of which contains a record of that state’s electoral votes.

The results are read out loud and an official count is tallied.

The president of the Senate – currently Harris – presides over the joint session of Congress. She will formally declare the winner of the presidential election.

• What is the US electoral college, and how does it work?

Routine turned to violence on 6 January 2021: the last time a joint session of Congress was held to certify election results.

After Trump made unfounded assertions that the 2020 election was stolen from him, hundreds of rioters smashed through barricades to try to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s win.

Trump urged Mike Pence, who was then vice-president, to have “courage” and allow states to “correct their votes”.

After the mob filled – and then emptied – the halls of the US Capitol building, members of Congress returned and certified the election, and Pence rejected Trump’s request. Several deaths were blamed on the day’s violence.

In the years since, Trump and many of his supporters have maintained his baseless claims about the 2020 election. He has vowed to pardon some of those convicted of offences over the riot when he returns to the presidency.

While there is some lingering anxiety in Washington DC, this year’s certification is expected to go off without a hitch, and Harris has not disputed the results.

This will not be the first time that a defeated election candidate has had to oversee the certification process.

In 2021, Pence oversaw the certification of the Biden-Harris victory, and in 2001, then-Vice-President Al Gore oversaw the certification of President George W Bush.

• Harris to certify Trump’s US election win

Short answer: yes. But it does not happen very often.

Members of Congress are allowed to object after a state’s certificate is read out. But in order for the presiding officer to hear the objection, it needs to be in writing and signed by one-fifth of the members of the House (the lower chamber) and one-fifth of the Senate (the upper chamber). Previously, an objection only needed to be raised by one member from each chamber.

The new policy came about in 2022, in an attempt to make objections more difficult. If an objection does meet the new requirements, the joint session would be suspended for the House and Senate to consider the objection separately. Both chambers would have to reach a majority vote for the objection to be sustained.

Challenges to electoral votes in Arizona and Pennsylvania were rejected by both the House and the Senate in 2021.

Once the certification is complete, there is only one step left in the process before Trump is officially president again: the inauguration.

On 20 January, the Trump family, former presidents and members of the public will gather on the west front of the Capitol for the official swearing in of the 47th president.

More Vietnamese attempted small-boat Channel crossings in the first half of 2024 than any other nationality. Yet they are coming from one of the world’s fastest-growing economies. Why, then, are so many risking their lives to reach Britain?

Phuong looked at the small inflatable boat and wondered whether she should step in. There were 70 people packed in, and it was sitting low in the water. She recalls the fear, exhaustion and desperation on their faces. There weren’t enough lifejackets to go around.

But Phuong was desperate. She says she had been stuck in France for two months, after travelling there from Vietnam via Hungary, sleeping in tents in a scrubby forest.

Already she had refused to travel on one boat because it seemed dangerously overcrowded, and previously had been turned back in the middle of the Channel three times by bad weather or engine failure.

Her sister, Hien, lives in London, and recalls that Phuong used to phone her from France in tears. “She was torn between fear and a drive to keep going.

“But she had borrowed so much – around £25,000 – to fund this trip. Turning back wasn’t an option.” So, she climbed on board.

Today Phuong lives in London with her sister, without any legal status. She was too nervous to speak to us directly, and Phuong is not her real name. She left it to her sister, who is now a UK citizen, to describe her experiences.

In the six months to June, Vietnamese made up the largest number of recorded small boat arrivals with 2,248 landing in the UK, ahead of people from countries with well-documented human rights problems, including Afghanistan and Iran.

The extraordinary efforts made by Vietnamese migrants to get to Britain is well documented, and in 2024 the BBC reported on how Vietnamese syndicates are running successful people-smuggling operations.

It is not without significant risks. Some Vietnamese migrants end up being trafficked into sex work or illegal marijuana farms. They make up more than one-tenth of those in the UK filing official claims that they are victims of modern slavery.

And yet Vietnam is a fast-growing economy, acclaimed as a “mini-China” for its manufacturing prowess. Per capita income is eight times higher than it was 20 years ago. Add to that the tropical beaches, scenery and affordability, which have made it a magnet for tourists.

So what is it that makes so many people desperate to leave?

Vietnam, a one-party Communist state, sits near the bottom of most human rights and freedom indexes. No political opposition is permitted. The few dissidents who raise their voices are harassed and jailed.

Yet most Vietnamese have learned to live with the ruling party, which leans for legitimacy on its record of delivering growth. Very few who go to Britain are fleeing repression.

Nor are the migrants generally fleeing poverty. The World Bank has singled Vietnam out for its almost unrivalled record of poverty reduction among its 100 million people.

Rather, they are trying to escape what some call “relative deprivation”.

Despite its impressive economic record, Vietnam started far behind most of its Asian neighbours, with growth only taking off well after the end of the Cold War in 1989. As a result, average wages, at around £230 a month, are much lower than in nearby countries like Thailand, and three-quarters of the 55-million-strong workforce are in informal jobs, with no security or social protection.

“There is a huge disparity between big cities like Hanoi and rural areas,” says Nguyen Khac Giang, a Vietnamese academic at the Institute of South East Asian Studies-Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore. “For a majority of workers with limited skills, there is a glass ceiling. Even if you work 14 hours a day you cannot save enough to build a house or start a family.”

This was what Phuong felt, despite coming from Haiphong, Vietnam’s third-largest city.

Her sister Hien had made it to Britain nine years earlier, smuggled inside a shipping container. It had cost her around £22,000 but she was able to pay that back in two years, working long hours in kitchens and nail salons. Hien married a Vietnamese man who already had British citizenship, and they had a daughter; all three are now UK citizens.

In Haiphong, jobs were scarce after the pandemic and at 38 years old, Phuong wanted what her sister had in London: the ability to save money and start a family.

“She could survive in Vietnam, but she wanted a home, a better life, with more security,” explains Hien.

Lan Anh Hoang, a professor in development studies at Melbourne University, has spent years studying migration patterns. “Twenty to thirty years ago, the urge to migrate overseas was not as strong, because everyone was poor,” she says. “People were happy with one buffalo, one motorbike and three meals a day.

“Suddenly a few people successfully migrated to countries like Germany or the UK, to work on cannabis farms or open nail salons. They started to send a lot of money home. Even though the economic conditions of those left behind have not changed, they feel poor relative to all these families with migrants working in Europe.”

This tradition of seeking better lives overseas goes back to the 1970s and 80s, when Vietnam was allied to the Soviet Union following the defeat of US forces in the south.

The state-led economy had hit rock bottom. Millions were destitute; some areas suffered food shortages. Tens of thousands left to work in eastern bloc countries like Poland, East Germany and Hungary.

This was also a time when 800,000 mainly ethnic Chinese boat people fled the communist party’s repressive actions, making perilous sea journeys across the South China Sea, eventually resettling in the USA, Australia or Europe.

The economic hardships of that time threatened the legitimacy of the communist party, and in 1986 it made an abrupt turn, abandoning the attempt to build a socialist system and throwing the doors open to global markets. The new theme of Vietnam’s national story was to catch up, and get rich, any way possible. For many Vietnamese, that meant going abroad.

“Money is God in Vietnam,” says Lan An Hoang. “The meaning of ‘the good life’ is primarily anchored in your ability to accumulate wealth. There is also a strong obligation to help your family, especially in central Vietnam.

“That is why the whole extended family pools resources to finance the migration of one young person because they believe they can send back large sums of money, and facilitate the migration of other people.”

Drive through the flat rice fields of Nghe An, one of Vietnam’s poorer provinces lying south of Hanoi, and where there were once smaller concrete houses, you will now find large, new houses with gilded gates. More are under construction, thanks, in part, to money earned in the West.

The new houses are prominent symbols of success for returnees who have done well overseas.

Vietnam is now enjoying substantial inflows of foreign investment, as it is considered an alternative to China for companies wanting to diversify their supply chains. This investment is even beginning to reach places like Nghe An, too.

Foxconn, a corporate giant that manufactures iPhones, is one of several foreign businesses building factories in Nghe An, offering thousands of new jobs.

But monthly salaries for unskilled workers only reach around £300, even with overtime. That is not enough to rival the enticing stories of the money to be made in the UK, as told by the people smugglers.

The business of organising the travel for those wishing to leave the province is now a very profitable one. Publicly, companies present themselves as either travel agents or brokers for officially approved overseas labour contracts, but in practice many also offer to smuggle people to the UK via other European countries. They usually paint a rosy picture of life in Britain, and say little about the risks and hardships they will face.

“Brokers” typically charge between £15,000 and £35,000 for the trip to the UK. Hungary is a popular route into the EU because it offers guest-worker visas to Vietnamese passport holders. The higher the price, the easier and faster the journey.

The communist authorities in Vietnam have been urged by the US, the UK and UN agencies to do more to control the smuggling business.

Remittances from abroad earn Vietnam around £13bn a year, and the government has a policy of promoting migration for work, although only through legal channels, mostly to richer Asian countries.

More than 130,000 Vietnamese workers left in 2024 under the official scheme. But the fees for these contracts can be high, and the wages are much lower than they can earn in Britain.

The huge risks of the illicit routes used to reach the UK were brought home in 2019, when 39 Vietnamese people were found dead in Essex, having suffocated while being transported inside a sealed container across the Channel.

Yet this has not noticeably reduced demand for the smugglers’ services. The increased scrutiny of container traffic has, however, pushed them to find alternative Channel crossings, which helps explain the sharp rise in Vietnamese people using small boats.

“The tragedy of the 39 deaths in 2019 is almost forgotten,” says the cousin of one of the victims, Le Van Ha. He left behind a wife, two young children and a large debt from the cost of the journey. His cousin, who does not want to be named, says attitudes in their community have not changed.

“People hardly care anymore. It’s a sad reality, but it is the truth.

“I see the trend of leaving continuing to grow, not diminish. For people here, the success stories still outweigh the risks.”

Three of the victims came from the agricultural province of Quang Binh. The headteacher of a secondary school in the region, who also asked not to be named, says that 80% of his students who graduate soon plan to go overseas.

“Most parents here come from low-income backgrounds,” he explains. “The idea of [encouraging their child to] broaden their knowledge and develop their skills is not the priority.

“For them, sending a child abroad is largely about earning money quickly, and getting it sent back home to improve the family’s living standards.”

In March the UK Home Office started a social media campaign to deter Vietnamese people from illegal migration. Some efforts were also made by the Vietnamese government to alert people to the risks of using people-smugglers. But until there are more appealing economic opportunities in those provinces, it is likely the campaigns will have little impact.

“They cannot run these campaigns just once,” argues Diep Vuong, co-founder of Pacific Links, an anti-trafficking organisation. “It’s a constant investment in education that’s needed.”

She has first-hand experience, leaving Vietnam to the US in 1980 as part of the exodus of Vietnamese boat people.

“In Vietnam, people believe they have to work hard, to do everything for their families. That is like a shackle which they cannot easily escape. But with enough good information put out over the years, they might start to change this attitude.”

But the campaigns are up against a powerful narrative. Those who go overseas and fail – and many do – are often ashamed, and keep quiet about what went wrong. Those who succeed come back to places like Nghe An and flaunt their new-found wealth. As for the tragedy of the 39 people who died in a shipping container, the prevailing view in Nghe An is still that they were just unlucky.

The Arctic recently made headlines after Donald Trump repeated his desire to buy Greenland. Trump cited national security interests, but for many the territory’s vast mineral wealth is the main attraction. Yet economic development elsewhere in the vast polar region has ground to a halt.

Working conditions in the Arctic Ocean are extremely challenging at this time of the year for Norwegian fisherman Sondre Alnes-Bonesmo.

The sun last rose at the end of October, and it is not due to appear in the sky again until the middle of February.

In addition to the endless dark, temperatures can plummet below minus 40C, and storms can bring vast waves.

Mr Alnes-Bonesmo, 30, works two six-hour shifts a day, during five-week tours on a ship called Granit. One of the largest factory trawlers fishing in Arctic waters north of Norway, and off the coast of Greenland, it doesn’t stop for winter.

Unsurprisingly, he prefers the endless daylight of summer. “I do like it when the weather is nice, as we’re not sent crashing into the walls and such, the way we are during storms, when the waves can be fairly big,” he grins in understatement.

Mr Alnes-Bonesmo is a participant in the so-called Arctic “cold rush”.

A play on words with gold rush, it began in earnest around 2008 when a series of reports identified vast mineral and hydrocarbon reserves across the Arctic region. Reserves that, together with large fishing stocks, could continue to become more accessible as climate change reduces ice levels.

This reduction in ice has also increasingly opened up Arctic sea routes, north of the Canadian mainland and Russia.

So much so that, in the decade from 2013 to 2023, the total recorded annual distances sailed by ships in the Arctic Sea more than doubled from 6.1 million to 12.9 million miles.

The hope in the longer term is that cargo ships can travel from Asia to Europe and the east coast of the US, through Arctic waters above Canada and Russia.

But the question Mr Alnes-Bonesmo now asks himself is this – did he arrive too late?

Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 much of the planned economic development of the Arctic region ground to a halt as relations between Russia and the West deteriorated.

“Russia had great plans in the Arctic,” says Morten Mejlaender-Larsen, Arctic operation and technology director from Norwegian firm DNV. His company sets rules and standards for the maritime sector.

“They began constructing regional rescue centres complete with ships and helicopters to facilitate both destination shipping for gas, oil and coal projects in Siberia, as well as for shipping along the Northeast Passage [north of Russia].

“[But] since the invasion of Ukraine, international shipping in the Northeast passage has all but stopped, apart from a few Chinese ships,” observes Mr Mejlaender-Larsen.

He adds that Norway has also halted oil and gas exploration in the region. “It’s completely stopped,” he says.

“We don’t expect to see any further developments in the Barents Sea north of Bear Island.” This small Norwegian island is some 400km (250 miles) north of Norway’s mainland.

Norway’s scaled back ambitions in the Arctic have pleased environmentalists who have consistently warned about the impact of drilling for hydrocarbons on both wildlife and the fragile environment of the polar region.

Last month Greenpeace welcomed the decision of the Norwegian government to stop the first round of licensing for deep sea mining in Arctic waters between Norway’s Svalbard and Jan Mayen islands.

Commentators say that while poor relations with Russia is a key reason why Norway is wary of ploughing money into Arctic projects, its interest in the polar region had already cooled.

Helene Tofte, director of international cooperation and climate at the Norwegian Shipowners Association, says that in hindsight the outlook for shipping in the Arctic had been “exaggerated”.

She points out that despite the impact of climate change, the Arctic remains a difficult place in which to operate. “Conditions in the Arctic can be extremely challenging, even when the absence of sea ice allows passage,” she says.

“Large parts of the route are far from emergency response capacities, such as search and rescue, and environmental clean-up resources.

“Increased shipping in this area would require substantial investments in ships, emergency preparedness, infrastructure, and weather forecasting systems, for a route that is unpredictable and has a short operational season. At present, we have no indication that our members view this as commercially interesting.”

Mr Mejlaender-Larsen points to a “belief that thanks to global warming there’ll be summers up there. That’ll never happen. If it’s minus 40C and it gets 3C warmer, it’s still not warm.”

Moreover, Prof Arild Moe, from Norwegian research group Fridtjof Nansen Institute, says the entire cold rush of the Arctic was based on exaggerated assumptions. “The exuberance was excessive,” says the expert on oil and gas exploration in the region.

“What the reports from 2008 referred to weren’t actual reserves, but potential and highly uncertain resources, which would be risky, expensive, and difficult to locate and exploit.”

Regarding Trump’s renewed interest in Greenland, an autonomous Danish territory, authorities in Greenland and Denmark were again quick to reply that it was not for sale.

Prof Moe says that Trump’s “crude and undiplomatic statement” shows that the US under Trump eyes both security and economic interests in the island, including its “rich mineral resources”.

The Danish government also responded by announcing a huge increase in defence spending for Greenland.

Elsewhere in the Arctic, Trump is expected to allow increased oil and gas exploration in Alaska, specifically in the resource rich Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

This 19 million acre expanse is the US’s largest wildlife refuge, and back in 2020 Trump authorised drilling in one section of it.

Meanwhile, Canada is continuing to build a deep-water port at Grays Bay, on the north coast of Nunavut, its most northern territory. Grays Bay is approximately in the centre of the so-called Northwest Passage, the Arctic sea route north of the Canadian mainland.

Back on the Granit fishing ship, Mr Alnes-Bonesmo says that, while he has earned good money, fishing quotas continue to go down to try to preserve stocks in Norwegian Arctic waters.

Nevertheless, he is philosophical. “After a few years at sea I’ve grown more scared of the Arctic Ocean, but I’ve also come to respect and value it for all its power and beauty.”

Known to the world as The Vivienne, James Lee Williams was one of the biggest breakout stars of British drag, and it all started with an impression of Donald Trump in 2019 on the first season of RuPaul’s Drag Race UK.

Like many of the drag queens on the show, The Vivienne was unapologetically unique and hilariously straight-talking, but she also had something more: pizzazz.

Described by judge Michelle Visage as “the best Snatch Game character in the history of the show”, it was The Vivienne’s President Trump impression – complete with pouted lips, orange makeup and a floppy blonde wig – in the Snatch Game that won her the show.

That win consolidated The Vivienne’s influence in the drag community and her career in the world of TV and musical theatre flourished.

• RuPaul’s Drag Race UK star The Vivienne dies aged 32

Giving one of the most memorable performances in the Snatch Game is no easy feat, but The Vivienne’s highlights from the show go far beyond her Trump impression as she was responsible for some of the show’s most iconic moments.

Having adopted the drag name The Vivienne because of a love for wearing Vivienne Westwood clothing, her weekly outfits on the catwalk were second to none.

On the show, she described her drag style as being “like a Scouse wife who has come into money, she moved to LA and blew it all and then she’s had to move back to Liverpool”.

Without a contour line out of place and a perfected walk in stilettos, she wooed the judges with her bold, glitzy and saucy looks.

Her ‘Queen Elizabeth walking around Balmoral’ outfit, which saw her wear a gold poncho and grey knitted skirt with fluffy ducks attached to it, was one of her most memorable.

Combine that with her doing the floss dance in the outfit and she had viewers, fellow contestants and even RuPaul crying with laughter.

In the final she was described by judge Graham Norton as having “it all”. Fellow judge Alan Carr added that she had “trademark wit” and delivered a “comedy masterclass” with her impressions of Trump, Margret Thatcher and Kim Woodburn.

The Vivienne went on to be a contestant in the seventh season of RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars in 2022.

In January 2023, The Vivienne became the first drag queen to appear on Dancing on Ice and was partnered with American skater Colin Grafton.

She finished in third place behind gymnast Nile Wilson and Joey Essex.

The pair skated to songs by gay icons such as Dolly Parton and Cher and particularly excelled in the movies and musical weeks, whether performing to Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious or Don’t Cry for Me Argentina.

• The best Donald Trump impression you’ll probably ever see
• Man sentenced for homophobic attack on The Vivienne

Her jaw-dropping ability to skate perfectly from day one meant not only did she never appear in the bottom two, but she also never appeared lower than third on the leader board.

But it was the week five performance that struck a chord with many as James chose not to perform in drag for the first time, confessing that it made him emotional dancing to Beyonce’s Halo “without my armour”.

James was widely praised for their decision, with one person on X saying that “‘The Vivienne skating as James and not in drag in itself is inspiring”.

Williams starred in a number of theatre shows, most recently in a role that seemed to be the perfect fit – the misunderstood yet strong and compassionate Wicked Witch of the West in the revival of The Wizard of Oz musical.

Starring alongside Aston Merrygold in the UK and Ireland tour, the performer reprised the role in the West End at the Gillian Lynne Theatre last year.

“I don’t have many words to say as this is one huge dream,” they wrote on Instagram. “Dream big kids.”

The Vivienne channelled her Wicked Witch of the West role off-stage in November when she sent heads spinning in her emerald green sequined gown at the European premiere of the Wicked film.

Most recently, she was performing as the Childcatcher on the tour of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and performed just a week ago in Blackpool.

While The Wizard of Oz was The Vivienne’s first theatre role, she was no stranger to TV and was able to successfully build a career in television after RuPaul’s Drag Race, appearing in a range of programmes including Hunted, Emmerdale and the Great British Sewing Bee.

Over Christmas, The Vivienne appeared on a celebrity special of BBC’s Blankety Blank.

In 2020, the Vivienne starred in a six-part series The Vivienne Takes on Hollywood on BBC Three.

The show saw the drag queen document her travels to Los Angeles in order to make a music video and was complete with her classic Northern humour and zingy one-liners.

Not all drag race contestants and winners have been able to build such a successful brand around themselves despite their humour and flawless looks, which is testament to how The Vivienne’s personality shone through in all her work.

One of the UK’s most promising new guitar bands, English Teacher, have kicked off the countdown of the top five on the BBC’s annual list of music’s rising stars.

The Leeds quartet have been voted in fifth place in BBC Radio 1’s Sound of 2025 poll – with a panel of 180 music industry experts choosing them as one of the acts with “the best chance of mainstream success” in the next 12 months.

They got well on their way last year. In September, the band beat pop stars like Charli XCX and CMAT to win the Mercury Prize for their debut album, This Could Be Texas.

The record deals in sharp portraits of life in sleepy northern towns, where the background hum of racism, loneliness and deprivation is thrown into sharp relief by sublime scenery and lifelong friendships.

Their music, meanwhile, is constantly surprising – full of shifting time signatures, needle-point guitar riffs and soaring melodies that are simultaneously odd and captivating.

“We never really set out with an aim to create something specific,” says guitarist Lewis Whiting. “But, that’s the fun part, right? Trying to make something new and interesting.”

They say the acclaim they’ve received so far still doesn’t feel real. “Where we come from, this just doesn’t happen,” says frontwoman Lily Fontaine.

“I keep telling people that I feel like I’m living in a simulation.”

“It does feel dream-like,” adds Whiting.

“Best year of my life, craziest year of my life.”

Over the last 12 months, the group have played more than 100 gigs in 16 countries, rising steadily up festival bills as they go, and surviving on “willpower, laughter and Red Bull”.

Along the way, they told journalists their origin story more times than they care to count. Eventually, they got tired of the “boring” reality (they met studying music at Leeds Conservatoire) and started inventing less prosaic stories.

“We said we were distant relatives who met at a wedding 20 years ago in Leeds,” laughs Fontaine.

“They put us at the odd table. We were sort of like the outcasts,” adds Whiting, continuing the story.

“But we really clicked,” says Fontaine. “We started talking about Shakira and how we wanted to be like her, then they played Hips Don’t Lie at the disco and we said, ‘We should start a band’.”

English Teacher, it should be noted, sound nothing like Shakira. They started out as a dream-pop outfit called Frank and, after the addition of Whiting on guitar, began to lean into a more angular, post-punk sound.

Key references include Radiohead, Sonic Youth and Pavement. “But, famously, we don’t agree on our favourite bands,” says Whiting.

One of their first releases was a demo of The World’s Biggest Paving Slab, which they put out independently in 2020.

Like many of their songs, it draws inspiration from Fontaine’s hometown of Colne in Lancashire, where the titular paving stone resides outside the town hall.

The lyrics reference a host of local heroes – from Life On Mars actor John Simm to novelist Charlotte Bronte – juxtaposing the colour and vigour of the town’s history against the social problems it faces in the current day.

It’s an itch she continues to scratch throughout the band’s catalogue, addressing social deprivation and political mismanagement (““) alongside themes of identity, self-doubt and emotional turbulence.

Incredibly, she only started writing relatively recently. As a teenager, she’d been in a wedding band with her friend, playing Amy Winehouse and Adele covers. She didn’t consider composing until she applied for university.

“I wrote my first song for the audition,” she recalls. “It was awful, but it worked. I got a place to study singing and performance, but I very quickly switched to composition, because I was suddenly spending all my time writing songs.”

During that period, English Teacher’s members – completed by drummer Douglas Frost and bassist Nicholas Eden – circled each other on Leeds’ live music scene, playing with various other bands before settling on their current line-up.

Their breakthrough came with 2021’s R&B, their official debut single, where Fontaine addresses the challenge of being a woman of colour fronting an indie band: (““).

It’s a perception she struggled with herself as a teenager, frustrated that she wasn’t capable of “the kind of the vocal runs that the black singers I looked up to were able to do”.

As a frontwoman, she developed her own style – a droll mixture of sprechgesang and her fluttering, airy upper register. But she still encountered prejudice.

“There’d be times where I told people that I made music, and they’d give a certain expression when I said that it was guitar music or it was indie music,” she says.

“There were a lot of small comments after gigs. People would come up and say, ‘Oh, that’s not what I was expecting at all’,” adds Whiting.

Fontaine is careful not to make too big an issue of it. “I think I’ve got a lot of privilege, because I’m quite a light skinned woman of colour,” she says.

“I think if I was dark skinned it would be even harder – but it did affect me, not seeing people who looked like me in bands.

“I think it made me start a band later in life. Maybe I would have started when I was a teenager, and not when I was leaving university.”

English Teacher’s early songs gained an audience during the first wave of the Covid pandemic – which meant they didn’t get to play a gig together until the lockdown ended.

Their first show was as part of an all-day mini festival in May 2021, where the audience still had to be seated and socially distanced.

“Those first gigs were kind of jarring,” Whiting recalls. “It was quite strange because everything up ’til then felt very online, which doesn’t feel as tangible. And then when you go and play a gig, it’s like, ‘Yeah, this is actually going somewhere.'”

“We were so nervous, too,” says Fontaine. “I feel like it was only late into 2023 that we really found our confidence.”

By that point, they were deep into recording their debut album with Italian producer Marta Salogni (Bjork, Depeche Mode, MIA) – including new, more polished versions of R&B and The World’s Biggest Paving Slab.

The band say they put “immense pressure” on themselves to perfect the record, fixating on its push-pull dynamics, adding extra layers of context, and experimenting with new instruments.

“It was an intense time in our personal lives, trying to get it finished and out. We gave a lot to it,” says Whiting.

“Recording your first album is just a huge opportunity,” continues Fontaine. “I think we were very aware of that.”

The hard work paid off.

Record Collector Magazine called This Could Be Texas “one of the most confident and charismatic debuts in years”. The Mercury Prize judges said the band’s “winning lyrical mix of surrealism and social observation… displays a fresh approach to the traditional guitar band format”.

The quartet are endearingly amazed that anyone paid attention at all.

“I wasn’t sure that it would connect with people, because the lyrics are quite specific to the area I grew up in,” says Fontaine.

Instead, it was the bigger themes – of leaving home and finding your place in a world that’s “going up in flames” – that helped them find an ever-growing audience.

On The World’s Biggest Paving Slab, Fontaine mockingly describes herself as “the world’s smallest celebrity” – a lyric that’s rapidly becoming obsolete.

“I’m not the smallest, but certainly not the biggest,” she laughs.

“In the alphabet of celebrity, I’m probably on the X-list.”

With his leopard-like spots, Navarro – a male lynx – calls out during mating season as he walks towards a camera trap.

Just short of 100cm (39 inches) in length and 45cm in height, the Iberian lynx is a rare sight. But there are now more than 2,000 in the wild across Spain and Portugal, so you’re much more likely to see them than you were 20 years ago.

“The Iberian lynx was very, very close to extinction,” says Rodrigo Serra, who runs the reproduction programme across Spain and Portugal.

At the lowest point there were fewer than 100 lynxes left in two populations that didn’t interact, and only 25 of them were females of reproductive age.

“The only feline species that was threatened at this level was the sabre tooth tiger thousands of years ago.”

The decline of the lynx population was partly down to more and more land being used for agriculture, a rise in fatalities on the roads, and a struggle for food.

Wild rabbits are essential prey for the lynx and two pandemics led to a 95% fall in their number.

By 2005, Portugal had no lynxes left, but it was also the year that Spain saw the first litter born in captivity.

It took another three years before Portugal decided on a national conservation action plan to save the species. A National Breeding Centre for Iberian lynxes was built in Silves in the Algarve.

Here they are monitored 24 hours a day. The aim is twofold – to prepare them for life in the wild and to pair them for reproduction.

Serra speaks in a whisper, because even from a distance of 200m you can cause stress to the animals in the 16 pens where most of the animals are kept.

Sometimes, though, stress is exactly what the lynxes need.

“When we notice a litter is becoming a bit more confident, we go in and chase them and make noise so they are scared again and climb the fences,” says Serra. “We’re training them not to get close to people in the wild.”

That’s partly for their own protection, but also so they stay away from people and their animals. “A lynx should be a lynx, not be treated like a house cat.”

So the lynxes never associate food with people, they are fed through a tunnel system at the centre.

Then, when the time comes, they are released into the wild.

Genetics determines where they end up, to diminish the risks of inbreeding or disease. Even if a lynx was born in Portugal it might be taken to Spain.

Pedro Sarmento is responsible for reintroducing the lynx in Portugal and has studied the Iberian lynx for 30 years.

“As a biologist there are two things that strike me when I’m handling a lynx. It’s an animal with a fairly small head for its body and extraordinarily wide paws. That gives them an impulse and ability to jump which are rare.”

The breeding programme and the return of the lynx have been hailed as great successes, but as their numbers climb there may be problems too.

As lynxes are often released on private land in Portugal, the organisers of the reproduction programme have to reach an agreement with the owners first.

Where the animals go after that is up to them, and although there have been some attacks on chicken coops, Sarmento says there have not been many.

“This can lead to uneasiness within locals. We’ve been strengthening the coops so lynxes can’t access them, and in some cases we keep monitoring the lynxes and scare them off if needed.”

He recounts the story of Lítio, one of the first lynxes released in Portugal.

For six months Lítio stayed in the same area but then the team lost track of him.

He eventually made his way to Doñana, a national park in southern Spain where he had come from originally.

As Lítio was sick, he was treated and then returned to the reproduction team in the Algarve.

Within days of his release from the centre he began heading back to Doñana, swimming across the Guadiana river to reach Spain.

For a time he disappeared, but eventually he was brought back to the Algarve.

When he was released for a third time, Lítio did not venture back to Spain but instead he walked 3km (two miles), found a female and never moved again.

“He is the oldest lynx we have here, and he’s fathered plenty of cubs ever since,” says Sarmento.

Three decades after Spain decided to save the lynx, the species is no longer endangered, and Sarmento hopes it’ll reach a favourable conservation status by 2035.

For that to happen, the numbers need to reach 5,000-6,000 in the wild.

“I saw the species disappearing. It’s surreal that we’re in a place where we can see lynxes in nature or through camera trapping almost daily,” says Sarmento.

The reproduction team are not being complacent and there are risks involved in their work. Last year 80% of lynx deaths took place on the roads.

For now, though, they feel confident the Iberian lynx has been saved.

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North Korea has fired what appears to be an intermediate-range ballistic missile towards the sea to its east, South Korea’s military said, in what is Pyongyang’s first missile launch in two months.

The missile flew 1,100km before falling into the sea, the military said, adding that it “strongly condemns” this “clear act of provocation”.

The launch comes as US Secretary of State Antony Blinken visits Seoul for talks with some of South Korea’s key leaders.

Earlier on Monday, Blinken met with acting president Choi Sang-mok, where he described the alliance between Washington and Seoul as a “cornerstone of peace and stability on the Korean peninsula”.

South Korea’s military says it has strengthened surveillance for the North’s future missile launches and is “closely sharing information” on today’s launch with the US and Japan.

Today’s launch also comes amid political chaos in South Korea, which has embroiled the country for weeks after suspended President Yoon Suk Yeol’s short-lived martial law attempt in December.

Yoon, who was stripped of his presidential powers after lawmakers voted to impeach him, now faces arrest. The constitutional court is also deliberating whether he should be removed from office.

Pyongyang previously mocked Yoon’s shock martial law declaration as an “insane act” and accused Yoon of “brazenly brandishing blades and guns of fascist dictatorship at his own people”.

The international community considers North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un a dictator. Kim’s family has ruled the hermit nation for decades by developing and promoting a cult of personality.

The last time Pyongyang fired missiles was in November, a day before the US presidential election, when it launched at least seven short-range ballistic missiles off its east coast.

Earlier that week, the US had flown a long-range bomber during trilateral military drills with South Korea and Japan in a show of power, drawing condemnation from Kim’s sister Kim Yo Jong.

Four young Kenyan men who went missing just before the Christmas holidays have been found alive, family members and rights groups say.

Kenya has been gripped by a wave of disappearances, with the state-funded rights group saying that over 80 people have been abducted in the last six months.

The abductions generally target government critics and are widely believed to be the work of security agents, although the government has not admitted responsibility.

They began in June last year during nationwide anti-tax protests, but they increased in December, when AI-generated photos of the president in a coffin were widely shared.

The youth-led protests forced President William Ruto to withdraw a series of planned tax rises and shook his government, leaving his authority badly undermined.

Those released on Monday include 24-year-old student Billy Mwangi in Embu, in the central Mount Kenya region.

Local MP Gitonga Mukunji told journalists that Mr Mwangi “was whipped and beaten while in a dark room. He is traumatised”.

His father said he was not able to discuss what he had gone through and had been taken to hospital.

“He came home around eight in the morning. He walked by himself – his mother and I saw him. We thank everyone who has prayed and supported him,” he told the Daily Nation news site.

Last week, Mr Mwangi’s father broke down in court as he pleaded for his son to be released.

A relative of 22-year-old Peter Muteti, who was seized in the capital on 21 December, told the BBC on Monday that he had been reunited with the family but was disoriented and unable to speak about the ordeal.

Amnesty International Kenya welcomed the releases and urged “the State to free all abductees and hold those responsible accountable”.

• Kenya protesters traumatised by abductions – lawyer
• Ruto’s humbling shows power of African youth

Two weeks ago the police denied responsibility for the abductions carried out by men in plain clothes across the country, some of which were captured on CCTV.

On Monday the police released an update acknowledging the freeing of the abducted men, saying they were in already contact with one who had presented himself at a police station.

The police said investigations into all cases of missing people were underway.

Rights groups and other Kenyans have linked the abductions to a shadowy intelligence and counter-terrorism unit of the security forces.

Amid the public uproar, President Ruto said last month: “We are going to stop the abductions so that our youth can live peacefully and have discipline”, while urging parents to take care of their children.

Until now, no-one had been freed since he spoke on 27 December, with activists planning protests on Monday to push the government to act.

Two other youths – Ronny Kiplangat and Bernard Kavuli – have also been released, their families told local media.

Mr Kavuli, a content creator, was seized on the outskirts of the city in December, while Mr Kiplangat is the brother of satirical cartoonist Kibet Bull, who also went missing last month.

Kibet Bull is known for his silhouette cartoon memes critical of the president. Two others were seized after posting AI-generated images of the president in a coffin.

Police said that Mr Kavuli had been assisting them with their investigations after he had presented himself to a police station at Moi’s Bridge in western Kenya.

A statement said that they would reach out to the three others “and their families and give them all the necessary support as we seek further information to assist ongoing investigations”.

The Law Society of Kenya has filed a legal case against the state, demanding the immediate and unconditional release of seven individuals abducted last month, including those who have now been released.

The situation continues to stoke fear across the country, with parents worried about the safety of their children and activists vowing to maintain pressure until all missing persons are accounted for.

• How a Ugandan opposition leader disappeared in Kenya and ended up in military court
• How Kenya’s evangelical president has fallen out with churches
• ‘I can’t sleep’: What an athlete’s murder tells us about women’s safety in Kenya
• ‘We live in fear’ – forced expulsions taint Kenya’s safe haven image

A “panic-stricken” elephant killed a Spanish woman while she was bathing the animal at an elephant centre in Thailand, local police said.

Blanca Ojanguren García, 22, was washing the elephant at the Koh Yao Elephant Care Centre last Friday when she was gored to death by the animal.

Experts told Spanish language newspaper Clarín that the elephant could have been stressed by having to interact with tourists outside its natural habitat.

García, who was a law and international relations student at Spain’s University of Navarra, was living in Taiwan as part of a student exchange programme.

She was visiting Thailand with her boyfriend, who witnessed the attack.

Spain’s foreign minister, Jose Manuel Albares, said the Spanish consulate in Bangkok was assisting García’s family.

BBC News has contacted the elephant care centre for comment.

Bathing elephants is a popular activity among tourists in Thailand, which is home to more than 4,000 wild elephants and has a similar number kept in captivity, according to the Department of National Parks.

The Koh Yao centre offers “elephant care” packages which let tourists make food for and feed the animals, as well as shower and walk with them. These packages cost between 1,900 baht ($55; £44) and 2,900 baht.

Animal activists have previously criticised elephant bathing activities, noting that they disrupt natural grooming behaviours and expose the animals to unnecessary stress and potential injury.

World Animal Protection, an international charity, has for years urged countries including Thailand to stop breeding elephants in captivity.

More than six in 10 elephants used for tourism in Asia are living in “severely inadequate” conditions, the charity said.

“These intelligent and socially intricate animals, with a capacity for complex thoughts and emotions, endure profound suffering in captivity, as their natural social structures cannot be replicated artificially,” the charity said.

Mozambique’s opposition leader Venâncio Mondlane, who has been calling for protests for weeks from exile, has said he will return to the country on Thursday.

Mondlane said he would arrive ahead of the swearing-in of a new president next week.

Daniel Chapo of the ruling Frelimo party is due to be sworn next Wednesday after a court confirmed his election victory.

But Mondlane, the runner-up, rejected the outcome, sparking violent protests that have left dozens dead since October.

Mondlane left Mozambique the same month saying he feared for his life, after two of his aides were shot dead.

In a Facebook live address on Sunday, he sent out a defiant message to the authorities saying he “will be in Maputo. They don’t need to chase me any more”.

• Children shot dead after joining pot-banging protests in Mozambique

He said he would arrive at 08:05 local time (06:05 GMT) on Thursday at the international airport in Maputo, calling for people to welcome him there.

“If they are killing my brothers… then I will be there. You can do what you want. If you want to murder, murder. If you want to arrest, arrest too. I will be there,” he said.

Mondlane maintains that he won the election and has called for more protests until there is “electoral truth”.

His supporters have frequently staged violent protests across the country to demand an end to the 49-year-rule of the Frelimo party.

He has previously said he would install himself as president on 15 January – on the presidential inauguration day – despite the court upholding his rival’s victory.

The electoral commission initially declared Chapo the winner of the election with 71% of the vote, compared to Mondlane’s 20%.

The final official results from the constitutional court two weeks ago gave Chapo 65% and Mondlane 24%.

International election observers have previously said that the vote was flawed, pointing to doctored numbers and other irregularities during the counting process.

Security forces have sought to end the nationwide protests in a violent crackdown that has tested the country’s stability.

More than 270 people have been killed, including protesters, children and members of the security forces, according to rights groups.

The unrest has also affected the economy, with more than 12,000 people losing their jobs and over 500 companies being vandalised.

Neighbouring countries have also been affected by the political unrest, with thousands of Mozambicans fleeing across the border.

Outgoing President Filipe Nyusi has in the past called for dialogue to resolve the dispute. On 27 December, Chapo called for “non-violence” and “unity”.

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A “panic-stricken” elephant killed a Spanish woman while she was bathing the animal at an elephant centre in Thailand, local police said.

Blanca Ojanguren García, 22, was washing the elephant at the Koh Yao Elephant Care Centre last Friday when she was gored to death by the animal.

Experts told Spanish language newspaper Clarín that the elephant could have been stressed by having to interact with tourists outside its natural habitat.

García, who was a law and international relations student at Spain’s University of Navarra, was living in Taiwan as part of a student exchange programme.

She was visiting Thailand with her boyfriend, who witnessed the attack.

Spain’s foreign minister, Jose Manuel Albares, said the Spanish consulate in Bangkok was assisting García’s family.

BBC News has contacted the elephant care centre for comment.

Bathing elephants is a popular activity among tourists in Thailand, which is home to more than 4,000 wild elephants and has a similar number kept in captivity, according to the Department of National Parks.

The Koh Yao centre offers “elephant care” packages which let tourists make food for and feed the animals, as well as shower and walk with them. These packages cost between 1,900 baht ($55; £44) and 2,900 baht.

Animal activists have previously criticised elephant bathing activities, noting that they disrupt natural grooming behaviours and expose the animals to unnecessary stress and potential injury.

World Animal Protection, an international charity, has for years urged countries including Thailand to stop breeding elephants in captivity.

More than six in 10 elephants used for tourism in Asia are living in “severely inadequate” conditions, the charity said.

“These intelligent and socially intricate animals, with a capacity for complex thoughts and emotions, endure profound suffering in captivity, as their natural social structures cannot be replicated artificially,” the charity said.

US President Joe Biden has announced a ban on new offshore oil and gas drilling along most of America’s coastline, weeks before Donald Trump takes office.

The ban covers the entire Atlantic coast and eastern Gulf of Mexico, as well as the Pacific coast off California, Oregon and Washington and a section of the Bering Sea off Alaska.

It is the latest in a string of last-minute climate policy actions by the Biden administration ahead of Donald Trump’s return to the White House.

Trump has vowed to revoke the ban “immediately” when he takes office, but he may find it difficult to reverse under US law.

During his campaign, Trump pledged to “unleash” domestic fossil fuel production in a bid to lower gas costs, despite the US already seeing record high extraction rates.

Announcing the new drilling ban, Biden said: “My decision reflects what coastal communities, businesses, and beachgoers have known for a long time: that drilling off these coasts could cause irreversible damage to places we hold dear and is unnecessary to meet our nation’s energy needs.

“It is not worth the risks.”

In a radio interview, Trump branded the ban “ridiculous”.

“I’ll unban it immediately,” he said. “I have the right to unban it immediately.”

Trump has previously said he will reverse Biden’s conservation and climate change policies.

For the new drilling ban, Biden is taking the action under the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act of 1953, which allows US presidents to withdraw areas from mineral leasing and drilling.

The law does not grant presidents the legal authority to overturn prior bans, according to a 2019 court ruling. It means a reversal would likely require an act of Congress, which is now controlled by Trump’s Republicans.

The law also does not allow presidents to revoke any areas already leased for offshore drilling.

Trump – despite being in favour of more oil and gas exploration and repeatedly deploying his tag line “Drill, baby, drill” during campaigning – has used the law himself to protect waters off the coast of Florida in 2020.

At the time, this was seen as an effort to garner votes from the state ahead of the 2020 US election, and the protection was due to expire in 2032. Biden’s decision will protect the same area with no expiry date.

The new offshore drilling ban covers more than 625 million acres (253 million hectares) of waters.

After it was reported last week that Biden would introduce the policy, Trump’s incoming press secretary Karoline Leavitt called it “a disgraceful decision”.

She said the move was “designed to exact political revenge on the American people who gave President Trump a mandate to increase drilling and lower gas prices”.

Environmental groups, however, welcomed the move.

Joseph Gordon, from conservation organisation Oceana, said: “This is an epic ocean victory.

“Our treasured coastal communities are now safeguarded for future generations.”

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An oil and gas industry trade group said Biden’s decision would harm American energy security and should be reversed by Congress.

Mike Sommers, president of the American Petroleum Institute, said: “We urge policymakers to use every tool at their disposal to reverse this politically motivated decision and restore a pro-American energy approach to federal leasing.”

In 2017, during his first term in office, Trump tried to reverse former President Barack Obama’s protection of 125 million acres (50.6 million hectares) of the Atlantic and Arctic Oceans.

Two years later, a US District Court ruled that the act did not allow a president to reverse decisions of previous administrations – meaning Trump could not revoke Obama’s protections.

It is expected that Trump – whose inauguration ceremony takes place on 20 January – will still seek to challenge Biden’s move. A final legal decision could be made by the Supreme Court, which currently has a majority of Republican judges.

Environmentalists and Democrats had been calling on Biden to introduce the ban because of concerns that any new drilling would threaten US ambitions to cut its greenhouse gas emissions and tackle climate change.

The International Energy Agency estimates that global oil and gas demand needs to fall by 5% annually to limit global temperature rise to 1.5C, which is seen as crucial to help avoid the most damaging impacts.

A huge winter storm has brought snow, ice and and freezing temperatures to a broad swathe of the US, with more than 60 million Americans under weather alerts.

Much of the US is waking up to below freezing temperatures on Monday morning, with some of the coldest conditions expected in Kansas, while the Washington DC area is awaiting unusually heavy snowfall.

Forecasters say the extreme weather – named Storm Blair – is being caused by the polar vortex, an area of cold air that circulates around the Arctic.

As of early Monday morning, 1,400 US flights had been cancelled for the day and 800 delayed, according to FlightAware.com.

A state of emergency has been declared in of Kansas, Missouri, Kentucky, Virginia, West Virginia, Arkansas and parts of New Jersey.

And much of Canada is also under weather alerts, as the blizzard conditions have dumped about a foot of snow (30cm) in places.

Thirty US states, spanning from the middle of the country to the east coast – including major cities such as Washington DC and Philadelphia – are under weather alerts, the National Weather Service (NWS) said.

On Sunday – which was forecast to be the most intense day of the storm – people in affected states saw roads cut off. Schools were shut down on Monday in Virginia, Maryland, Indiana and Kentucky.

Hundreds of car accidents and stranded drivers were reported over the weekend in several midwestern states – including Kansas as well as Indiana, Kentucky and Virginia.

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Blizzard warnings have been issued in Kansas, Missouri and Nebraska.

Kansas City is seeing its heaviest snow in 32 years, with more than a foot (30 to 40cm) having come down so far, according to Matthew Cappucci, a senior meteorologist at the weather app MyRadar.

Parts of northern Missouri have already experienced 14in (36cm) of sleet and snow.

The storm began moving toward the US’s east coast on Sunday, with parts of Virginia, Maryland, Washington DC and Delaware due to take the brunt.

Washington DC is bracing for heavy snow and bitter cold on Monday, the same day the US Congress is set to meet and formally certify Republican Donald Trump’s election as president.

But Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson said the weather would not prevent lawmakers from carrying out their duties. But officials have announced that federal offices in the nation’s capital will be closed.

The NWS said the winter storm could bring “the heaviest snowfall in at least a decade”, while AccuWeather forecaster Dan DePodwin said: “This could lead to the coldest January for the US since 2011.”

He added that “temperatures that are well below historical average” could linger for a week. Temperatures 12-25F (7-14C) below normal are forecast.

Further north, Canadians are also feeling the effects of the polar vortex.

Much of Canada has been under extreme weather alerts, with freezing temperatures spanning the country.

Some areas are also seeing snow squalls – a sudden heavy snowfall accompanied by strong winds.

In the central province of Manitoba, the wind chill could see temperatures plummet to as low as -40C.

Meanwhile, as much as 15in (38cm) of snow was expected in parts of Ontario on Sunday.

Amtrak has also cancelled numerous rail services.

American, Delta, Southwest and United airlines are waiving change fees for passengers because of the potential flight disruptions.

Conditions on roads have deteriorated, with crashes involving lorries and cars, as well as a fire engine rolling over near Salina, Kansas.

“Whiteout conditions will make travel extremely hazardous, with impassable roads and a high risk of motorists becoming stranded,” the NWS warned.

Meanwhile, severe thunderstorms capable of producing tornadoes were set to move east from Arkansas and Louisiana into Mississippi and Alabama on Sunday evening, the NWS said.

Private meteorologist Ryan Maue said: “It’s going to be a mess, a potential disaster. This is something we haven’t seen in quite a while.”

How have you been affected by the storm? Share your experiences by following this link.

More Vietnamese attempted small-boat Channel crossings in the first half of 2024 than any other nationality. Yet they are coming from one of the world’s fastest-growing economies. Why, then, are so many risking their lives to reach Britain?

Phuong looked at the small inflatable boat and wondered whether she should step in. There were 70 people packed in, and it was sitting low in the water. She recalls the fear, exhaustion and desperation on their faces. There weren’t enough lifejackets to go around.

But Phuong was desperate. She says she had been stuck in France for two months, after travelling there from Vietnam via Hungary, sleeping in tents in a scrubby forest.

Already she had refused to travel on one boat because it seemed dangerously overcrowded, and previously had been turned back in the middle of the Channel three times by bad weather or engine failure.

Her sister, Hien, lives in London, and recalls that Phuong used to phone her from France in tears. “She was torn between fear and a drive to keep going.

“But she had borrowed so much – around £25,000 – to fund this trip. Turning back wasn’t an option.” So, she climbed on board.

Today Phuong lives in London with her sister, without any legal status. She was too nervous to speak to us directly, and Phuong is not her real name. She left it to her sister, who is now a UK citizen, to describe her experiences.

In the six months to June, Vietnamese made up the largest number of recorded small boat arrivals with 2,248 landing in the UK, ahead of people from countries with well-documented human rights problems, including Afghanistan and Iran.

The extraordinary efforts made by Vietnamese migrants to get to Britain is well documented, and in 2024 the BBC reported on how Vietnamese syndicates are running successful people-smuggling operations.

It is not without significant risks. Some Vietnamese migrants end up being trafficked into sex work or illegal marijuana farms. They make up more than one-tenth of those in the UK filing official claims that they are victims of modern slavery.

And yet Vietnam is a fast-growing economy, acclaimed as a “mini-China” for its manufacturing prowess. Per capita income is eight times higher than it was 20 years ago. Add to that the tropical beaches, scenery and affordability, which have made it a magnet for tourists.

So what is it that makes so many people desperate to leave?

Vietnam, a one-party Communist state, sits near the bottom of most human rights and freedom indexes. No political opposition is permitted. The few dissidents who raise their voices are harassed and jailed.

Yet most Vietnamese have learned to live with the ruling party, which leans for legitimacy on its record of delivering growth. Very few who go to Britain are fleeing repression.

Nor are the migrants generally fleeing poverty. The World Bank has singled Vietnam out for its almost unrivalled record of poverty reduction among its 100 million people.

Rather, they are trying to escape what some call “relative deprivation”.

Despite its impressive economic record, Vietnam started far behind most of its Asian neighbours, with growth only taking off well after the end of the Cold War in 1989. As a result, average wages, at around £230 a month, are much lower than in nearby countries like Thailand, and three-quarters of the 55-million-strong workforce are in informal jobs, with no security or social protection.

“There is a huge disparity between big cities like Hanoi and rural areas,” says Nguyen Khac Giang, a Vietnamese academic at the Institute of South East Asian Studies-Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore. “For a majority of workers with limited skills, there is a glass ceiling. Even if you work 14 hours a day you cannot save enough to build a house or start a family.”

This was what Phuong felt, despite coming from Haiphong, Vietnam’s third-largest city.

Her sister Hien had made it to Britain nine years earlier, smuggled inside a shipping container. It had cost her around £22,000 but she was able to pay that back in two years, working long hours in kitchens and nail salons. Hien married a Vietnamese man who already had British citizenship, and they had a daughter; all three are now UK citizens.

In Haiphong, jobs were scarce after the pandemic and at 38 years old, Phuong wanted what her sister had in London: the ability to save money and start a family.

“She could survive in Vietnam, but she wanted a home, a better life, with more security,” explains Hien.

Lan Anh Hoang, a professor in development studies at Melbourne University, has spent years studying migration patterns. “Twenty to thirty years ago, the urge to migrate overseas was not as strong, because everyone was poor,” she says. “People were happy with one buffalo, one motorbike and three meals a day.

“Suddenly a few people successfully migrated to countries like Germany or the UK, to work on cannabis farms or open nail salons. They started to send a lot of money home. Even though the economic conditions of those left behind have not changed, they feel poor relative to all these families with migrants working in Europe.”

This tradition of seeking better lives overseas goes back to the 1970s and 80s, when Vietnam was allied to the Soviet Union following the defeat of US forces in the south.

The state-led economy had hit rock bottom. Millions were destitute; some areas suffered food shortages. Tens of thousands left to work in eastern bloc countries like Poland, East Germany and Hungary.

This was also a time when 800,000 mainly ethnic Chinese boat people fled the communist party’s repressive actions, making perilous sea journeys across the South China Sea, eventually resettling in the USA, Australia or Europe.

The economic hardships of that time threatened the legitimacy of the communist party, and in 1986 it made an abrupt turn, abandoning the attempt to build a socialist system and throwing the doors open to global markets. The new theme of Vietnam’s national story was to catch up, and get rich, any way possible. For many Vietnamese, that meant going abroad.

“Money is God in Vietnam,” says Lan An Hoang. “The meaning of ‘the good life’ is primarily anchored in your ability to accumulate wealth. There is also a strong obligation to help your family, especially in central Vietnam.

“That is why the whole extended family pools resources to finance the migration of one young person because they believe they can send back large sums of money, and facilitate the migration of other people.”

Drive through the flat rice fields of Nghe An, one of Vietnam’s poorer provinces lying south of Hanoi, and where there were once smaller concrete houses, you will now find large, new houses with gilded gates. More are under construction, thanks, in part, to money earned in the West.

The new houses are prominent symbols of success for returnees who have done well overseas.

Vietnam is now enjoying substantial inflows of foreign investment, as it is considered an alternative to China for companies wanting to diversify their supply chains. This investment is even beginning to reach places like Nghe An, too.

Foxconn, a corporate giant that manufactures iPhones, is one of several foreign businesses building factories in Nghe An, offering thousands of new jobs.

But monthly salaries for unskilled workers only reach around £300, even with overtime. That is not enough to rival the enticing stories of the money to be made in the UK, as told by the people smugglers.

The business of organising the travel for those wishing to leave the province is now a very profitable one. Publicly, companies present themselves as either travel agents or brokers for officially approved overseas labour contracts, but in practice many also offer to smuggle people to the UK via other European countries. They usually paint a rosy picture of life in Britain, and say little about the risks and hardships they will face.

“Brokers” typically charge between £15,000 and £35,000 for the trip to the UK. Hungary is a popular route into the EU because it offers guest-worker visas to Vietnamese passport holders. The higher the price, the easier and faster the journey.

The communist authorities in Vietnam have been urged by the US, the UK and UN agencies to do more to control the smuggling business.

Remittances from abroad earn Vietnam around £13bn a year, and the government has a policy of promoting migration for work, although only through legal channels, mostly to richer Asian countries.

More than 130,000 Vietnamese workers left in 2024 under the official scheme. But the fees for these contracts can be high, and the wages are much lower than they can earn in Britain.

The huge risks of the illicit routes used to reach the UK were brought home in 2019, when 39 Vietnamese people were found dead in Essex, having suffocated while being transported inside a sealed container across the Channel.

Yet this has not noticeably reduced demand for the smugglers’ services. The increased scrutiny of container traffic has, however, pushed them to find alternative Channel crossings, which helps explain the sharp rise in Vietnamese people using small boats.

“The tragedy of the 39 deaths in 2019 is almost forgotten,” says the cousin of one of the victims, Le Van Ha. He left behind a wife, two young children and a large debt from the cost of the journey. His cousin, who does not want to be named, says attitudes in their community have not changed.

“People hardly care anymore. It’s a sad reality, but it is the truth.

“I see the trend of leaving continuing to grow, not diminish. For people here, the success stories still outweigh the risks.”

Three of the victims came from the agricultural province of Quang Binh. The headteacher of a secondary school in the region, who also asked not to be named, says that 80% of his students who graduate soon plan to go overseas.

“Most parents here come from low-income backgrounds,” he explains. “The idea of [encouraging their child to] broaden their knowledge and develop their skills is not the priority.

“For them, sending a child abroad is largely about earning money quickly, and getting it sent back home to improve the family’s living standards.”

In March the UK Home Office started a social media campaign to deter Vietnamese people from illegal migration. Some efforts were also made by the Vietnamese government to alert people to the risks of using people-smugglers. But until there are more appealing economic opportunities in those provinces, it is likely the campaigns will have little impact.

“They cannot run these campaigns just once,” argues Diep Vuong, co-founder of Pacific Links, an anti-trafficking organisation. “It’s a constant investment in education that’s needed.”

She has first-hand experience, leaving Vietnam to the US in 1980 as part of the exodus of Vietnamese boat people.

“In Vietnam, people believe they have to work hard, to do everything for their families. That is like a shackle which they cannot easily escape. But with enough good information put out over the years, they might start to change this attitude.”

But the campaigns are up against a powerful narrative. Those who go overseas and fail – and many do – are often ashamed, and keep quiet about what went wrong. Those who succeed come back to places like Nghe An and flaunt their new-found wealth. As for the tragedy of the 39 people who died in a shipping container, the prevailing view in Nghe An is still that they were just unlucky.

The Golden Globes were a night to celebrate film, TV, and… love.

Last year, Timotheé Chalamet sent the internet into a frenzy as he piled on the PDA with his girlfriend Kylie Jenner at the ceremony, and this year it was date night again as the pair cosied up throughout the evening.

There was even more love in the air as A Different Man star Sebastian Stan is now officially officially dating Annabelle Wallis. He shouted out that he loved her during his acceptance speech for best actor in a musical or comedy film.

And if that isn’t enough romance for you then Zendaya has stolen the show with rumours of a potential engagement. Here’s more on that and eight other highlights from the awards ceremony that you may have missed.

Zendaya brought her usual effortlessly sleek style to the red carpet but the internet seemed less interested in her burnt orange gown and more about what was on her finger.

The Challengers star was sporting a large diamond ring on the fourth finger of her left hand and some thought it might be a sign that she’s engaged.

The 28-year-old has been dating Spider-Man actor Tom Holland for the past four years.

Fans immediately started speculating about their possible engagement, but one pointed out on X: “They’re very protective about their relationship, so would she actually wear the ring on the red carpet?”

If you’re hosting the Golden Globes, naturally you’ve got to look the part. For Nikki Glaser that meant a whopping a 10 dresses across the three hour ceremony.

The comedian started off the night wearing a strapless metallic dress on the red carpet before switching to a halter neck silver sequined gown to kick the ceremony off.

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The 40-year-old seemed to use every advert break across the show to switch into something different backstage and some of her other outfits included a sparkly purple dress, a high-slit red gown and a tight-fitting black plunge number.

Our personal favourite outfit? A Wicked-inspired bright pink sequined dress that she wore with a pope’s hat as she sang “you’re going to be pope-ular”.

If you even go to the bathroom at The Beverly Hilton, you’re likely to run into a celebrity.

Turn the corner, bam – Melissa McCarthy. Turn another – Jean Smart and the rest of the cast of Hacks.

The hotel in the heart of swanky Beverly Hills had a large security perimeter with barriers, armed guards and patrols, but once a person is inside – it’s like a playground for Hollywood’s A-list.

Some hunted for drinks, others were wrangled by publicists to interviews and photo shoots with eager journalists.

Roaming around the hotel, Selena Gomez, hot off her film Emilia Pérez winning four awards, was seen with her new fiancé Benny Blanco. He kissed her shoulder as he trailed behind her in an intimate moment.

Shōgun, a series set in 17th century Japan, was a big winner at the Globes, taking home four awards.

Star Hiroyuki Sanada won best male actor in a drama TV series and backstage told the BBC that he hopes the show and their wins could “could break the wall of language” and open “doors much wider” not only for Japanese actors and projects but those across the globe.

His co-star Tadanobu Asano won best male supporting actor in a TV series and clearly shocked, jumped out of his seat and, in Japanese custom, bowed repeatedly – first to those at his table then everyone in the audience and then to the cameras, which had panned to him.

“Wow!” he said when handed the award on stage. He acknowledged that he’s a new talent in the US and started off by introducing himself to the crowd.

“Maybe you don’t know me, so I’m an actor from Japan and my name is Tadanobu Asano,” he said as the crowd laughed.

“I’m very happy!” he shouted through excited laughter, concluding his acceptance speech.

Backstage, he said his message to other Japanese actors: “If I can do this, anyone can.”

Irish actor Colin Farrell picked up his third Golden Globe, for playing the Batman villain in the HBO series Penguin.

Accepting his speech he mentioned some of the other nominees in his category including fellow Irishman Andrew Scott.

He recalled their first movie together, Drinking Crude, and said: “[Andrew] who I did my first film with 25, 30 years ago. You can’t even find it on Betamax. It doesn’t exist. But we go back that far.”

He added to Scottish actor Richard Gadd, whose experience of stalking and sexual assault inspired the Netflix hit series Baby Reindeer, that “you broke my heart with your work this year”.

In his speech, Farrell also spoke about the three hours it took to be fitted with prosthetics to make him the bloated villain in Penguin.

“In the morning, I drank black coffee, listened to 80s music, and I became a canvas for that team’s brilliance.”

Farrell also said: “Thank you for employing me. And yeah, I guess it’s prosthetics from here on out.”

Backstage, Mr Farrell acknowledged his lengthy Hollywood career and said despite his win, “I certainly don’t consider myself at the top of any pile”.

He said after his nearly 30 years acting, he doesn’t feel a sense of pride, but rather, just feels “very grateful”.

We’ve all been holding space for Wicked this year and Michelle Yeoh and Jeff Goldblum were providing us with our Wizard of Oz fix in classic boomer style.

“People have been calling me Zaddy but I don’t know what that means,” Goldblum said while Yeoh added that she was just as confused by people telling her that she’s been “serving mother”.

Despite being clueless to the meaning of the Gen Z language and looking even more baffled as Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande tried to explain the meaning behind these words, they both said they love it.

“Let’s see who ate,” Goldblum said as he introduced the nominees for a category.

Backstage the cast of Wicked spoke to the BBC about whether there was a future for the Land of Oz in a TV series.

The film’s producer Marc Platt joked that the film “is already a show” – on Broadway. Beyond that, though, he said: “It’s hard to predict.”

Asked by the BBC about the film transcending into a culture phenomenon with countless memes and viral clips, Platt said it speaks to the “timeless” material the film is based on.

“When something becomes a cultural phenomenon, you can’t really predict that. It’s very exhilarating,” he said.

Sir Elton John joked about his sight loss as he presented the award for best original film score with Brandi Carlile, who he sang the track Never Too Late with.

The 77-year-old singer revealed in September that his vision has been affected in his right eye after contracting an infection in the summer.

In December he said he had been unable to watch his own musical, The Devil Wears Prada, due to the infection.

But, on stage he told the audience: “There has been a lot of stories going around about my regressive eyesight, and I just want to reassure everyone it is not as bad as it seems.”

“I’m so pleased to be here with my co-host, Rihanna,” he joked.

Sir Elton cheered as it was announced that US musician Trent Reznor and English composer Atticus Ross won the award for the musical score for erotic tennis film challengers.

Fernanda Torres’s surprise win for best drama actress in the Brazilian political thriller I’m Still Here even surprised her.

She called the win over Hollywood heavyweights – including Angelina Jolie, Nicole Kidman and Kate Winslet – both “strange” and “weird”.

“I never thought I would win”, she said, because there were “so many great performances in English, so this tells so much about the difference in cinema nowadays.”

She was asked about the celebrations happening back in her home country of Brazil, with one reporter remarking that it was like she’d won the country the World Cup.

“It is something very patriotic that’s happening in Brazil with this film,” she said, noting the country was “very happy” thanks to the Golden Globes.

In her acceptance speech she noted that the only other Brazilian actor to be nominated at the Globes was her mother, Fernanda Montenegro.

Several winning actresses tackled the topic of age at the awards.

Demi Moore, 62, noted in her acceptance speech for best film actress in The Substance that she’d spent much of her career believing that while she was successful, she would never receive any major Hollywood accolades.

She said the award reflected the message of the film, a body horror about a woman who trades her body for a younger, more beautiful version of herself.

“I’ll just leave you with one thing that I think this movie is imparting is in those moments when we don’t think we’re smart enough or pretty enough or skinny enough or successful enough, or basically just not enough,” Moore said.

“I had a woman say to me, just know you will never be enough, but you can know the value of your worth if you just put down the measuring stick.

After winning her award, she told journalists backstage about how many women spend much of their lives as caretakers and don’t get to spend their energy outward. And now, at 62, she is and “it feels really damn good”.

Jodie Foster, who is the same age as Moore, won the award for best actress in a limited series and said the 60s are a “golden age” because there’s like “a hormone that happens when suddenly you go, ‘Oh, I don’t really care about all the stupid things anymore”.

She called this era the “most contented moment in my career.”

The body of an Indian journalist who had reported on alleged corruption in the country has been found in a septic tank in Chhattisgarh state.

Mukesh Chandrakar, 32, went missing on New Year’s Day and his family registered a complaint with the police.

His body was found on Friday in the compound of a road construction contractor in the Bijapur town area after officers tracked his mobile phone.

Three people have been arrested in connection with his death, reportedly including two of his relatives. A media watchdog has demanded a thorough investigation.

Police in the Bijapur district did not find anything during an initial visit to the compound on 2 January.

“However, after further inspection on 3 January, we discovered Mukesh’s body in the newly floored septic tank near the badminton court,” a senior police officer said, referring to the fact concrete slabs had been placed on top of the tank.

Police said his body showed severe injuries consistent with a blunt-force attack.

Mr Chandrakar, a freelance journalist, had reported widely on alleged corruption in public construction projects.

He also ran a popular YouTube channel, Bastar Junction.

Following his death, the Press Council of India called for a report “on the facts of the case” from the state’s government.

The chief minister of the state described Mr Chandrakar’s death as “heartbreaking”.

In a post on X, he said a special investigation team had been formed to investigate the case.

It has been reported in Indian media that one of those under arrest over the journalist’s death is his cousin.

One of the main suspects – compound owner Suresh Chandrakar, also a relative – is on the run.

Local journalists have held a protest demanding strict action against the alleged perpetrators.

Attacks on journalists reporting on corruption or environmental degradation are not uncommon in India.

In May 2022, Subhash Kumar Mahto, a freelance journalist known for his reporting on people involved in illegal sand mining, was fatally shot in the head by four unidentified men outside his home in Bihar.

Media watchdog Reporters Without Borders has said that an average of three or four journalists are killed in connection with their work in India every year, making it one of the world’s most dangerous countries for the media.

Fierce fighting is under way for a second day in Russia’s Kursk region after Ukraine launched a counter-attack on Sunday.

Moscow said it had met the attack with artillery and air power, and on Monday stated that Russian troops thwarted a breakthrough attempt by Ukraine.

The BBC was not immediately able to verify the Russian claims. Ukraine has not yet officially commented on its operations in Kursk.

However, on Sunday the head of Ukraine’s presidential office, Andriy Yermak, said there “was good news from Kursk Region” and that Russia was “getting what it deserves”.

Ukrainian forces entered the region of Kursk in August, seizing a chunk of territory. Russian forces have pushed them back in some areas without managing to eject them entirely.

According to the Russian defence ministry, a Ukrainian assault detachment consisting of two tanks, one military engineering vehicle and 12 armoured fighting vehicles (AFVs) attacked near the village of Berdin around 09:00 (06:00 GMT) on Sunday.

Russian forces hit back, it said, destroying both tanks, the military engineering vehicle and seven armoured fighting vehicles. Fighting continued, it added.

Aerial video of a column of armour moving through snow-covered countryside in daylight and coming under fire, with vehicles taking hits, was published by Russian state news agency Ria.

Ukraine’s top counter-disinformation official Andriy Kovalenko said in a Telegram post: “The Russians in Kursk are experiencing great anxiety because they were attacked from several directions and it came as a surprise to them.”

Oner Russian blogger, Yury Podolyaka, suggested the operation might have been diversionary, while another, Alexander Kots, did not rule out that the main attack could be launched somewhere else.

Kyiv’s forces are reportedly suffering from manpower shortages and have been losing ground in the east of Ukraine in recent months, as Russian troops advance.

In November, Ukraine reported its troops had engaged in combat with North Korean troops in the Kursk region.

The reported appearance of North Korean soldiers was in response to a surprise attack launched across the border by Ukrainian troops in August, advancing up to 18 miles (30km) into Russian land.

Moscow evacuated almost 200,000 people from areas along the border and President Vladimir Putin condemned the Ukrainian offensive as a “major provocation”.

After a fortnight, Ukraine’s top commander claimed to control more than 1,200 sq km of Russian territory and 93 villages.

Some of that territory has been regained by Russia.

At the weekend, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that security guarantees leading to an end to the war would only be effective if the US under Donald Trump provided them.

During a podcast interview with Lex Fridman, Zelensky praised the incoming US president’s influence and suggested Trump had the leverage to at least halt Russia’s continued invasion.

Trump pledged during his election campaign to end the war quickly, without giving details.

Zelensky said “Trump and I will come to an agreement and… offer strong security guarantees, together with Europe, and then we can talk to the Russians”.

But on Monday, French President Emmanuel Macron said that Ukraine needed to have a “realistic” position on territorial issues and warned there would be no “quick and easy” solution to the conflict.

US Vice-President Kamala Harris will on Monday preside over the official certification in Congress of the result of November’s presidential election – a contest that she lost to Donald Trump.

The date also marks the fourth anniversary of a riot at the US Capitol, when Trump’s supporters tried to thwart the certification of Democratic President Joe Biden’s election victory in 2020. Normally the occasion is a mere formality.

Heavy security is in place in Washington DC, and Biden has vowed there will be no repeat of the violence on 6 January 2021 – which led to several deaths.

As lawmakers meet in Washington DC, heavy snow forecast for the American capital could prove disruptive.

House Speaker Mike Johnson has vowed to go ahead with the certification at 13:00 EST (18:00 GMT) in spite of the weather, telling Fox News: “Whether we’re in a blizzard or not, we’re going to be in that chamber making sure this is done.”

As the current vice-president, Harris is required by the US Constitution to officially preside over the certification of the result, after Trump beat her in the nationwide poll on 5 November.

Trump won all seven of the country’s swing states, helping him to victory in the electoral college, the mechanism that decides who takes the presidency. It will be Harris’s job on Monday to read out the number of electoral college votes won by each candidate.

Trump’s second term will begin after he is inaugurated on 20 January. For the first time since 2017, the president’s party will also enjoy majorities in both chambers of Congress, albeit slender ones.

• How will Trump’s win be certified?
• Just how big was Trump’s victory?
• What next for Harris, after her bruising election defeat?
• Who has joined Trump’s top team?
• What happens to Trump’s legal cases?

Trump’s win marked a stunning political comeback from his electoral defeat in 2020, and a criminal conviction in 2024 – a first for a current or former US president.

Amid the dramatic recent presidential campaign, Trump also survived a bullet grazing his ear when a gunman opened fire at one of his rallies in Pennsylvania.

While away from the White House, he has faced a slew of legal cases against him – including over his attempts to overturn the 2020 result, which he continues to dispute.

Following his defeat that year, Trump and his allies made baseless allegations of widespread voter fraud – claiming the election had been stolen from them.

In a speech in Washington DC on certification day, 6 January 2021, Trump told a crowd to “fight like hell” but also asked them to “peacefully” make their voices heard.

He also attempted to pressurise his own vice-president, Mike Pence, to reject the election result – a call that Pence rejected.

• What Trump said in speech before riot

Rioters went on to smash through barricades and ransack the Capitol building before Trump ultimately intervened by telling them to go home. Several deaths were blamed on the violence.

Trump’s pledges after returning to office include pardoning people convicted of offences over the attack. He says many of them are “wrongfully imprisoned”, though has acknowledged that “a couple of them, probably they got out of control”.

Conversely, Biden has called on Americans never to forget what happened.

“We must remember the wisdom of the adage that any nation that forgets its past is doomed to repeat it,” Biden wrote in the Washington Post over the weekend.

For Trump’s Republican Party, the new Senate Majority Leader John Thune has signalled a desire to move on, telling the BBC’s US partner CBS News: “You can’t be looking in the rearview mirror.”

• 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

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau could announce his resignation within days, according to media reports.

He is considering stepping down as leader of the governing Liberal Party, which could also bring to an end his nine years as prime minister.

Last month Trudeau’s finance minister quit, citing policy disagreements such as how to deal with Donald Trump’s threat to levy US tariffs on Canadian goods.

He is expected to hold a news conference at 10:45 local time (15:45 GMT) on Monday.

Trudeau’s popularity has also plummeted among voters, with polls suggesting his party is on course for a general election defeat this year.

The Globe and Mail reports that he could announce his intention to quit before his party’s national caucus meets on Wednesday, to avoid the perception that his own MPs forced him out.

Their sources said it was unclear whether Trudeau would leave immediately or stay on as prime minister until a new leader was selected.

And they stressed he had yet to make a final decision on his future.

Whoever takes over will have to lead the party through an election campaign while also navigating a possible trade war with the US.

The election must take place before October, but a change in leadership of the Liberal Party could increase calls for a snap vote in the coming months.

• Faced with turmoil, a defiant Trudeau hangs on – for now
• Four paths Trudeau can take as political crisis deepens

Trudeau’s departure would bring to an end a defining era in Canadian politics.

He unexpectedly swept his party to power in 2015, winning a campaign that began with them in third place.

The fresh-faced young leader, aged 43 back then, promised a new kind of politics centred on an open immigration policy, increased taxes on the wealthy and battling climate change.

But his first term was dogged by scandals. In more recent years, he had been battling sinking popularity as frustration grew with the cost of living and his own style of governing.

Dozens of Liberal MPs in Quebec, Ontario and Atlantic Canadian provinces have called for him to step down, while polls suggest two-thirds of voters disapprove of him.

Just 26% of respondents in a September Ipsos survey said Trudeau was their top pick for prime minister, putting him 19 points behind Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre.

History is also not on Trudeau’s side, with only two prime ministers ever serving four consecutive terms.

Poilievre rose to the top of his party in 2022 on a promise to reduce taxes, tackle inflation and protect individual liberties.

The 45-year-old also rallied support behind the Freedom Convoy truckers protesting about Covid mandates – a blockade that brought Canadian cities including Ottawa to a standstill.

Canada’s next prime minister will have to address the threat of tariffs from incoming US President Donald Trump.

He has vowed to impose a 25% tariff on Canadian goods if the country does not secure its shared border to the flow of irregular migrants and illegal drugs.

The “grave challenge” this posed was referred to in the resignation letter of Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland, who quit hours before she was due to deliver her annual budget.

She said Trudeau had informed her he no longer wanted her to be his government’s top economic adviser.