Russian President Vladimir Putin said he agreed with the idea of a ceasefire in Ukraine, but that “questions” remained about the nature of a truce as he set out a number of tough conditions.

The Russian president was responding to a plan for a 30-day ceasefire, which Ukraine agreed to earlier this week after talks with the US.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky described Putin’s response to the plan as “manipulative” and called for more sanctions on Russia.

Meanwhile, the US placed further sanctions on Russian oil, gas and banking sectors.

Speaking at a news conference in Moscow on Thursday, Putin said of the ceasefire proposal: “The idea is right – and we support it – but there are questions that we need to discuss.”

A ceasefire should lead to “an enduring peace and remove the root causes of this crisis”, Putin said.

“We need to negotiate with our American colleagues and partners,” he said. “Maybe I’ll have a call with Donald Trump.”

Putin added: “It will be good for the Ukrainian side to achieve a 30-day ceasefire.

“We are in favour of it, but there are nuances.”

One of the areas of contention is Russia’s Kursk region, Putin said, where Ukraine launched a military incursion last year and captured some territory.

He claimed Russia was fully back in control of Kursk, and said Ukrainian troops there “have been isolated”.

“They are trying to leave, but we are in control. Their equipment has been abandoned.”

“There are two options for Ukrainians in Kursk – surrender or die.”

Outlining some of his questions over how a ceasefire would work, Putin asked: “How will those 30 days be used? For Ukraine to mobilise? Rearm? Train people? Or none of that? Then a question – how will that be controlled?”

“Who will give the order to end the fighting? At what cost? Who decides who has broken any possible ceasefire, over 2,000km? All those questions need meticulous work from both sides. Who polices it?”

• Is Putin ready for a ceasefire or playing for time?

Putin “doesn’t say no directly”, Zelensky said in his nightly video address, but “in practice, he’s preparing a rejection”.

“Putin, of course, is afraid to tell President Trump directly that he wants to continue this war, wants to kill Ukrainians.”

The Russian leader had set so many pre-conditions “that nothing will work out at all”, Zelensky said.

After Putin’s remarks and Zelensky’s response, there is now a clear divide between both sides’ positions.

Ukraine wants a two-stage process: a quick ceasefire and then talks about a longer-term settlement.

Russia believes you cannot separate the two processes and all the issues should be decided in a single deal. Both sides seem content to argue their differences.

Ukraine believes it can put pressure on Russia, painting it as a reluctant peacemaker, playing for time. Russia, equally, believes it has a chance now to raise its fundamental concerns, about Nato expansion and Ukraine’s sovereignty.

But this presents a problem for Donald Trump. He has made it clear he wants a quick result, ending the fighting in days.

And right now, Putin does not appear to want to play ball.

Speaking at the White House following Putin’s remarks, Trump said he would “love” to meet the Russian leader and that he hoped Russia would “do the right thing” and agree to the proposed 30-day truce.

“We’d like to see a ceasefire from Russia,” he said.

Speaking earlier at a meeting in the Oval Office with Nato Secretary General Mark Rutte, Trump told reporters he had already discussed specifics with Ukraine.

“We’ve been discussing with Ukraine land and pieces of land that would be kept and lost, and all of the other elements of a final agreement,” Trump said.

“A lot of the details of a final agreement have actually been discussed.”

On the subject of Ukraine joining the Nato military alliance, Trump said “everybody knows what the answer to that is”.

The fresh sanctions on Russian oil and gas came as the Trump administration further restricted access to US payment systems, making it harder for other countries to buy Russian oil.

Meanwhile, Putin met US special envoy Steve Witkoff behind closed doors in Moscow.

Earlier in the day, Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov rejected the ceasefire proposal put forward by the US.

On Wednesday, the Kremlin released a video it said showed Putin visiting Russia’s Kursk region, symbolically dressed in military fatigues. Russia later said it recaptured the key town of Sudzha.

Russia launched a full-scale invasion in February 2022, and now controls about 20% of Ukrainian territory.

More than 95,000 people fighting for Russia’s military have died in the war.

Ukraine last updated its casualty figures in December 2024, when President Volodymyr Zelensky acknowledged 43,000 Ukrainian deaths among soldiers and officers. Western analysts believe this figure to be underestimated.

Russia is ready for a halt in fighting, says Vladimir Putin, but “there are nuances”. Those nuances that he laid out ahead of talks with US envoys at the Kremlin are so key to his thinking they could scupper any hope of a 30-day ceasefire.

They are demands that he has had throughout Russia’s full-scale invasion, and before. And for Ukraine and its Western partners, many of them are going to prove unacceptable or impossible to fulfil.

“We agree with the proposals to cease hostilities,” he started positively, only to add: “This cessation must be such that it would lead to long-term peace and eliminate the root causes of this crisis.”

Nobody would disagree with the need for long-term peace, but Putin’s idea of the root causes of the war revolve around Ukraine’s desire to exist as a sovereign state, beyond Russia’s orbit.

Ukraine wants to be part of Nato and the European Union – so much so, it is enshrined in the constitution.

President Trump has already cast doubt on Nato membership, but Putin has repeatedly dismissed the idea of Ukraine as a state at all.

And that underpins many of the nuances he sketched out.

He wants to stop Ukraine from reinforcing its army and replenishing its weapons supply – so there would be no more deliveries from the West. He wants to know who would ensure that was verified.

From the start of this war, Putin has demanded the “demilitarisation” of Ukraine, which is anathema to Kyiv and its allies.

In essence, Putin is looking for security guarantees in reverse.

• Why did Putin’s Russia invade Ukraine?
• Ukraine in maps: Tracking the war in Russia

Would Russia agree to halt rearming or mobilising its forces? That seems implausible and there was no hint of any concession on his part, as he addressed reporters in the Kremlin.

Putin has just come back in bullish mood from a visit seemingly close to the front line in Kursk, a Russian border region that has been partially occupied since last August by Ukraine.

Russia has the upper hand in Kursk. Putin clearly feels he is negotiating from a position of strength and doesn’t want to lose it.

“If we stop military actions for 30 days, what does that mean? Will everyone who is there leave the battle?”

Russia’s defence ministry announced on Thursday that its forces had now taken full control of the biggest city the Ukrainians had managed to seize, Sudzha. Putin says all the Ukrainians have left is a wedge, so why would Russia stop now?

“If a physical blockade occurs in the coming days, no-one will be able to leave at all. There will be only two options – to surrender or die.”

The same applied to the whole of the 1,000km (620-mile) front line, where he claimed the situation on the ground was changing rapidly, with Russian troops “advancing in practically all areas”.

That is not the case, as most of the front is at a stalemate, even if Russia has had some recent success in the east.

Putin believes a 30-day ceasefire would deprive Russia of its advantage and enable the Ukrainians to regroup and rearm.

“What are our guarantees that nothing like that will be allowed to happen,” he asked rhetorically.

As yet, no mechanism has been offered to ensure that the terms of any ceasefire would hold.

Although 15 Western countries have tentatively offered peacekeeping troops, they would only come in the event of a final peace deal, not a ceasefire.

Not that Russia would allow that arrangement anyway.

Given all these “nuances”, Putin appeared to be sceptical of how a ceasefire could benefit Russia, especially when his troops were on the front foot. His entire outlook was “based on how the situation on the ground develops”.

Putin was meeting Trump’s envoys on Moscow late on Thursday, notably Steve Witkoff.

Whatever happens in those talks, Putin knows that ultimately, his most important conversation will be with the president.

“I think we need to talk to our American colleagues… maybe have a phone call with President Trump and discuss this with him,” he said.

But Putin was setting out his stall ahead of those conversations, with a message that the road to a ceasefire was littered with conditions that would be almost impossible to meet.

Mehboob Hussain was riding the train home on Tuesday when the tracks under the front car exploded.

In the depths of central Pakistan’s Bolan Pass, a pocket of wilderness so remote that there is no internet or mobile network coverage, the nine-coach Jaffar Express ground to a halt. Then the bullets started flying.

“I was a passenger on the train that was attacked,” Mr Hussain told BBC Urdu.

He, along with some 440 others, had been travelling from Quetta to Peshawar through the heart of the restive Balochistan province when a group of armed militants struck – they bombed the tracks, fired on the train and then stormed the carriages.

The Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) quickly claimed responsibility for the siege, and threatened to kill many of those on board if Pakistani authorities did not release Baloch political prisoners within 48 hours.

The group, which many countries have designated a terrorist organisation, has waged a decades-long insurgency to gain independence for Balochistan, accusing Islamabad of exploiting the province’s rich mineral resources while also neglecting it.

BLA militants have a long history of attacking military camps, railway stations and trains in the region.

But this was the first time they had hijacked one.

The siege lasted over 30 hours. According to authorities, 300 passengers have now been freed, and 33 BLA militants, 21 civilian hostages and four military personnel were killed. But conflicting figures suggest many passengers remain unaccounted for.

Information relating to the attack and the subsequent rescue operation has been tightly controlled throughout.

But the BBC was able to speak to multiple eyewitnesseses who described the “doomsday scenes” on board the train as the attack unfolded.

As Ishaq Noor told BBC Urdu of those first few moments: “We held our breath throughout the firing, not knowing what would happen next.”

A railway police officer who was on board the train told BBC Urdu that, contrary to initial reports from Pakistani authorities, the train was “not in a tunnel but in an open area” when it was hit.

The BLA has also released an alleged video of the moment the train was struck by the blast. It shows an open section of track that runs along the base of a large rocky slope.

Atop that slope, according to the video, is a cluster of BLA fighters.

The officer described to the BBC how he initially “fought together with other police officers” to try and hold off the militants until “the ammunition ran out”.

“They [the BLA] were moving in front of us on the mountain and they were much more numerous than us, in the hundreds,” the officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity, recalled. He noted that he was accompanied by four railway police and two members of Pakistan’s paramilitary Frontier Corps (FC).

At least 100 of those on the train were members of the security forces, according to Pakistani officials.

“I told my companion to give me the G-3 rifle because it is a better weapon,” the officer explained. “When I got the rifle and the rounds, we also started firing back. I used to fire one shot at a time at them so that they could not come near us and the train… [But] in an hour-and-half, our rounds were over… We were helpless.”

When the gunfire from those on board the Jaffar Express ceased, the militants came down from the surrounding mountains and started taking passengers off the train, the officer said.

“They started checking cards and telling people to go this way, this way,” he said, explaining that the hostages were separated into groups alongside the train, according to their ethnicity.

The militants were speaking in the Balochi language, he added, and declared, “We have made demands to the government and if they are not met, we will not spare anyone; we will set the vehicle on fire”.

The officer claimed the militants were receiving orders: “They would get orders to kill, and they would pick up people from the group and kill them. They killed many people – both army personnel and civilians.”

Some passengers, however, were allowed to leave unharmed – including women, children, the elderly and those who lived in Balochistan, according to Mr Noor.

Among those released was Noor Muhammad. He said that when the initial volleys of gunfire stopped after an hour, armed men forced open the door to the train and entered, saying “get out or we will shoot you”.

Mr Muhammad said he was escorted off the train, and when he told the militants his wife was still in the back of the car, they brought her out too. Then they “told us to go straight and not look back”.

The couple walked through the wilderness, he said, and with “great difficulty” reached Panir Railway Station at about 1900, where they rested.

His wife recalled the moment the Pakistan military arrived to meet them.

“They told me, ‘ma’am, come inside with us, we will take you home safely,'” she said. The soldiers took the couple to the town of Machh, she added, “and then we reached Quetta to our children, who were waiting for us”.

Some passengers who managed to leave the train late on Tuesday evening said they walked for nearly four hours to reach the next railway station. They included Muhammad Ashraf, who had been riding the train to Lahore to visit his family.

“We reached the station with great difficulty,” he told BBC Urdu, “because we were tired and there were children and women with us.”

As night descended over the Jaffar Express, scores of BLA militants began to depart, according to the police official who did not wish to named.

“Many of them hugged each other and 70, 80 people left while 20, 25 stayed behind,” he said.

At about 10pm, he recalled, violence erupted again.

“Some people tried to run away, they [the BLA] saw them and opened fire, then everyone fell to the ground,” the official said.

Mr Mehboob similarly recalled gunfire throughout the night – and said that at one point, a person close to him, who had five daughters, was shot.

“When someone is killed in front of your eyes, you don’t know what to do,” he said.

Another passenger, Allahditta, said his cousin was killed in front of him by the BLA. He said his cousin was pleading to the militants to not kill him as he had young daughters but “his life was not spared”.

The BBC on Wednesday saw dozens of wooden coffins being loaded at Quetta railway station. A railway official said they were empty and being transported to collect casualties.

It was during the time of morning prayer on Wednesday that rescuers from the FC started firing on the BLA militants, Mr Allahditta said.

Amid the sudden chaos, he and others broke free.

“When the FC opened fire at the time of the Fajr call to prayer, we escaped from the militants,” Mr Allahdita said.

The police official similarly recalled the moment when the FC moved in, briefly diverting the BLA militants’ focus away from the hostages.

“When the FC arrived in the morning, the attention of these people turned to this direction,” the official said. “I told my companion, ‘Let’s try to run away.'”

Militants fired on the escapees as they fled, and the official said his companion was hit from behind.

“He told me to let go of him. I said no, I’ll carry you on my shoulder. Then another person also joined hands and we went down the hills and out of firing range.”

Mr Mehboob, Mr Allahdita, the police official and his companion all managed to escape the Jaffar Express alive as the FC attacked the militants.

Military and paramilitary troops and helicopters had surrounded the stranded train since Tuesday. On Wednesday, they killed the hostage-takers and cleared the site, according to a military spokesperson.

Authorities said there were 440 passengers on the train – and 300 of them have been freed. But it’s still unclear what happened to the remaining 140. Reuters and AFP quoted an unnamed security official who said some miliants had left, taking an unknown number of passengers with them.

The military says it is still working to find passengers who escaped and fled into the surrounding area, and insists that any others involved in the hijacking would be brought to justice.

Mr Noor, who is now distributing alms and charity in his hometown along with his wife, is just grateful to have escaped the situation with his life.

“Thank God,” Mr Noor said. “He saved us.”

Passengers on an American Airlines flight were evacuated onto the tarmac of a Colorado airport as a fire broke out on the plane, sending smoke billowing into the air.

No injuries were reported in the incident.

Footage of the evacuation showed passengers huddled on the wing of the Boeing airliner, some holding bags, with flames burning near the bottom of the plane.

The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said passengers used inflatable slides to reach the ground safely at the Denver International Airport. The agency said it would investigate the cause of the incident.

The flight took off from nearby Colorado Springs and was on the way to Dallas Fort Worth International Airport in Texas, the FAA said in a statement to the BBC.

The plane diverted to Denver around 17:15 pm local time (23:15 GMT) after the crew reported “engine vibrations,” the FAA said.

After the flight landed, it caught fire while taxiing on the tarmac at the airport.

American Airlines said the plane had 172 passengers on board, along with six crew members. All were evacuated safely, the company said.

It said the plane was a Boeing 737-800 and experienced an “engine-related issue”.

Smoke and flames were visible from various gates at the airport, according to airport spokesman Michael Konopasek. He said the fire was doused and it did not lead to delays for other flights.

Some of those inside the airport posted videos on social media showing the plane’s passengers walking toward the edge of the wing as large clouds of black smoke filled the air.

Grounds crew can be seen rushing to the wing while pushing ladders.

Video showed active flames under the plane’s right engine as an inflatable evacuation slide appeared at the aircraft’s rear door.

The incident comes after a recent string of high-profile accidents in North America have raised concerns about aviation safety.

A fatal crash in Washington DC left 67 people dead when an American Airlines regional jet collided mid-air with a US Army Black Hawk helicopter. The crash in the US capital city led to questions about air traffic controller shortages and their workloads.

US President Donald Trump’s administration has also terminated hundreds of FAA probationary workers as part of government cost-saving efforts.

The layoffs happened weeks after the fatal DC crash.

The laid off FAA employees included maintenance mechanics, environmental compliance workers and technical assistants.

Trump has pushed to reduce government spending with tech billionaire Elon Musk spearheading efforts as part of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).

When Kajol contracted tuberculosis in January, USAID kept her alive. Now she and her family are in danger again after the Trump administration ordered most US aid spending to end.

TB can be fatal if left untreated. The highly contagious bacterial disease, which usually infects the lungs, is not prevalent in rich countries, because treatment is relatively cheap. But in Bangladesh, it is a scourge.

That’s especially so in neighbourhoods such as Mohammadpur, a slum in the capital Dhaka where Kajol,17, lives.

“We are poor people,” she says. She is the sole breadwinner for herself, her mother and little brother. Her job in a garment factory keeps them all afloat.

So when she fell ill in January, it could have been catastrophic.

Instead, help arrived through Dipa Halder. For the last three years, she has been canvassing the residents of Mohammadpur about TB and getting people the treatment they so desperately need, free of cost.

The initiative is run by a local aid organisation, Nari Maitree. It was funded by the US Agency for International Aid (USAID) until February, when it received a letter from the US government saying the funds had been terminated.

That brought Kajol’s treatment, only partially completed, to an abrupt end.

“Now I have to go get the medicine myself,” she says. “I am struggling a lot.”

Cutting off medicines mid-treatment makes the chances of TB becoming drug-resistant much greater. It makes the disease much more difficult to combat and puts patients at greater risk of severe illness and death.

“The people here are quite vulnerable,” says Dipa, 21. “I can tell them to go to a particular doctor, which would help them save some money.

“Or I try to provide them with some financial assistance from our organisation so that they can continue their treatment.”

According to a US government performance report seen by the BBC, support by USAID in 2023 resulted directly in the identification and reporting of more than a quarter of a million new cases of TB in Bangladesh. In the same year, there were 296,487 new or relapse cases of TB which were cured or successfully completed as a result of USAID.

The agency was seen as integral to the country’s fight against tuberculosis.

“You ask people on the street, they will say yeah, it’s the US, they are the ones that are keeping it [tuberculosis] in control,” said a director of a USAID project in Bangladesh, who is not authorised to speak publicly and did not want to be named.

“Bangladesh was USAID’s largest programme in Asia,” says Asif Saleh, executive director of the non-profit BRAC organisation. “In terms of its impact, particularly in the healthcare sector, it has been massive.

“Particularly around vaccination, reducing child mortality and maternal mortality, USAID has played a massive role in this country.”

In 2024, Bangladesh received $500m in foreign assistance. This year, that amount has cratered to $71m. To put that number into context, in the three-year period from 2021-2023, USAID committed an average of $83m annually in Bangladesh for health initiatives alone, including combating TB.

Cuts to USAID have meant Nari Maitree can no longer offer its Stop TB Program, but it also means Dipa is out of work. She supports her elderly parents and her younger sister.

“I am completely shattered now that I lost my job. I am carrying the burden of the family. Being unemployed is a devastating situation,” she told the BBC.

In a document seen by the BBC, 113 programmes that were funded directly by the USAID office in Bangladesh have stopped. The list does not include the myriad programmes that are funded directly by US agencies in Washington.

“The NGO sector [In Bangladesh] employs 500,000 people at least,” says Mr Saleh. “It’s huge. Thousands and thousands of jobs are going to be eliminated.”

It’s not just the United States that is moving away from foreign aid. The UK has announced cuts to its foreign assistance programmes, as has Switzerland. It is likely that other countries may follow suit.

It’s a sobering reality for Bangladesh. The country’s government was overthrown last year and the economy is shaky, with inflation near 10% and a jobs crisis, particularly among young people.

Interim leader Muhammad Yunus says Bangladesh will come up with a new strategy on how to survive following the aid cuts – but doesn’t say how.

When pressed in a BBC interview on how the country will cover the shortfall from USAID, Yunus said: “It was a small part, not a big deal. It doesn’t mean Bangladesh will disappear from the map.”

Asif Saleh says the way the cuts have been implemented has been abrupt and chaotic. The impact on a country like Bangladesh is immeasurable.

Nowhere is that more clear than in Cox’s Bazar, a coastal city in south-eastern Bangladesh, home to the world’s largest refugee camp. More than one million Rohingya, a persecuted Muslim minority community that the United Nations calls victims of ethnic cleansing, fled violent purges in their home country, neighbouring Myanmar.

Unable to go back home and unable to work outside the refugee camp, the Rohingya depend on international aid for their survival.

The United States contributed almost half of all aid to Rohingya refugees.

“We have run out of soap,” says Rana Flowers, country representative for the UN children’s agency Unicef. “We are now having to truck water into the camps. It’s an absolutely critical time. There is an outbreak of cholera with over 580 cases, along with a scabies outbreak.”

Water sanitation projects in the camps used to be funded by USAID.

Since the order to stop work went into effect at the end of January, hospitals such as the International Red Cross hospital in Cox’s Bazar are reduced to providing emergency assistance only. Any hope the money would be reinstated was crushed this week, when the Trump administration cancelled more than 80% of all the programmes at USAID.

Patients like Hamida Begum, who was getting regular treatment for hypertension, are left with few options.

“I’m old and I don’t have anyone to help me,” she says. Her husband died last year, leaving her to care for her four children alone, including her 12-year-old daughter who cannot walk.

“I cannot go to another hospital far from home because of my daughter.”

At a nearby UN food distribution centre, Rehana Begum is standing beside two large sacks.

Inside, she says, are six litres of cooking oil and 13kg of rice, along with basics such as onions, garlic and dried chillies. These rations, given to her by the World Food Programme (WFP), need to last her and her family a month.

I ask how she will manage now that her rations will be cut in half beginning next month.

She looked shocked. Then she started to cry.

“How can we possibly survive with such a small amount?” asks Rehana, 47, who shares one room with her husband and five children. “Even now, it is difficult to manage.”

The WFP says it was forced to make the drastic cut because of “a critical funding shortfall for its emergency response operations”.

The rations now being allotted to the Rohingya community will only meet their basic daily dietary needs, igniting fears they will be left with just enough to live and not much more.

“This is an absolute disaster in the making,” says Rana Flowers of Unicef. “Desperate frustrated people within the camps will lead to security concerns. If that escalates to the degree it could, we won’t be able to go into the camps to help.”

Sam Jones, an American influencer who briefly snatched a baby wombat from its distressed mother and uploaded the footage to social media has left Australia.

Australia’s Home Affairs minister Tony Burke had earlier said his department was reviewing if it could revoke Ms Jones’s visa, but the BBC understands that she left the country of her own accord.

“There has never been a better time to be a baby wombat,” Burke said in a short statement on Friday celebrating Jones’s departure.

Anger erupted across Australia after Jones posted a video of her taking a baby wombat from the side of a road while laughing and running away from the distraught mother wombat.

The video also shows the baby wombat hissing in distress before Jones then returns it to the bush.

Jones, who also goes by the name Samantha Strable, has nearly 100,000 followers and describes herself as an “outdoor enthusiast and hunter” on her Instagram profile. She has since made her account private and deleted her post.

Her video was swiftly met with widespread condemnation, with Australia Prime Minister Anthony Albanese calling the incident an “outrage”.

Foreign minister Penny Wong called the video “dreadful”.

On Friday, opposition leader Peter Dutton said he thought it was “a cruel act” and that he was “glad” the influencer has now left.

An online petition demanding Jones be deported from Australia garnered more than 30,000 signatures.

However, as Jones had not been charged nor been deemed a threat to the country – the government may not have had any grounds to cancel her visa.

In since-deleted comments, Ms Jones said “the baby was carefully held for one minute in total and then released back to mom”.

“They wandered back off into the bush together completely unharmed,” she wrote. “I don’t ever capture wildlife that will be harmed by my doing so.”

But wildlife experts have deemed Jones’s act a “blatant disregard” for native wildlife.

The Wombat Protection Society said it was shocked to see the “mishandling of a wombat joey in an apparent snatch for ‘social media likes'”.

Suzanne Milthorpe, Head of Campaigns at World Animal Protection Australia, told BBC Newsday that posting such a video for “cheap content” was “unacceptable”.

“To that baby it must have seemed like a giant predator was picking it up and taking it away,” she said.

Wombats, which are native to Australia, are a legally protected species across the country. Baby wombats share a strong bond with their mothers, and any separation can be distressing and harmful, conservationists say.

The president of Poland, Andrzej Duda, has repeated his call for the US to base nuclear weapons on Polish soil.

In the presidential palace in Warsaw, he told me that it would make Poland stronger and safer, as it faces Russia.

Viewed from Poland, President Putin’s Russia is a clear and a present danger.

President Duda, who is also commander-in-chief of the rapidly expanding Polish armed forces, said today’s Russia is at least as aggressive as the former Soviet Union.

He condemned what he called Moscow’s imperial greed.

Positioning US nuclear weapons in Poland would be viewed by President Putin as a provocation.

But President Duda views the proposal as a defensive measure to strengthen deterrence.

He said it would be a response to President Putin’s 2023 decision to deploy Russian tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus, which has a border with Poland and Ukraine.

“It’s the same Russia that’s attacking Ukraine today, who is an aggressor, who is murdering civilians, who is bombing down civilian settlements,” he told me.

“And it’s moving its nuclear weapons from the depths of Russia to Belarus.”

“This defensive tactic is a vital response to Russia’s behaviour, relocating nuclear weapons in the NATO area. Poland is ready to host this nuclear weapon.”

President Duda also welcomed proposals made by France’s president, Emmanuel Macron, to extend the French nuclear weapons umbrella to other Nato states.

The US already rotates about 10,000 troops at a time through Poland.

When asked how the presence of nuclear weapons would make Poland safer, Mr Duda said it would deepen America’s commitment to Polish security.

“Every strategic kind of infrastructure, American and Nato infrastructure, which we have on our soil is strengthening the inclination of the US and the North Atlantic Alliance to defend this territory.”

Poland spends almost 5% of its national income on defence. That is more than any other member of Nato, including the United States.

Last week, Poland’s prime minister, Donald Tusk, made a speech in parliament warning that a “profound change in American geopolitics” was putting both Poland and Ukraine into an “objectively more difficult situation”.

Prime Minister Tusk called for further increases in Polish defence spending and proposed that Poland should consider reaching for “opportunities related to nuclear weapons.”

Mr Tusk is on the centre left, unlike President Duda who is on the right and considers himself a friend of Donald Trump.

Referring to President Putin’s refusal on Thursday to agree immediately to the 30-day ceasefire in Ukraine, Mr Duda said he was confident that the US president had a plan, as he put it, to “to encourage the Russian side to act reasonably”.

Mr Duda will not criticise Mr Trump nor accept that his actions and words have cast a doubt on the US commitment to Article 5, the mutual defence clause of the North Atlantic Treaty.

But he has much harsher words for Putin’s Russia than Donald Trump ever uses.

And he backs calls for the EU to seize Russian assets worth around 200 billion euros that have been frozen in European banks.

“I believe it is obvious that Russian assets collected and locked in banks in Western Europe should be used to support Ukraine, and it should be a double support,” he says.

“First of all, Ukraine should be supported in defending itself against the Russian aggression. And secondly, this should be used to support the rebuilding of Ukraine.”

“I cannot imagine that after the destruction of Ukraine, Russia can simply take this money away without paying war reparations and compensation.”

Millions of Indians are celebrating Holi, the festival of colours.

The spring festival symbolises the victory of good over evil and marks the end of winter.

People light a bonfire, smear or spray friends and family members with colour and water, and feast on traditional sweets prepared for the occasion.

It’s one of India’s biggest festivals, with millions returning to their hometowns to celebrate with loved ones.

The festival honours the divine love of Hindu deities Radha and Krishna, and boisterous celebrations are held in the northern Indian cities of Mathura and Vrindavan, believed to be their birthplace.

Historical texts suggest the festival has long been celebrated to mark good harvests and seek fertile land.

UN experts have accused Israel of increasingly using sexual and gender-based violence against Palestinians and carrying out “genocidal acts” through the systematic destruction of maternal and reproductive healthcare facilities.

A report commissioned by the UN Human Rights Council documents alleged violations, including rape, in Gaza and the occupied West Bank since Hamas’s 7 October 2023 attack on Israel triggered the Gaza war.

It also says the destruction of maternity wards in Gaza and embryos at a fertility clinic could indicate a strategy to prevent births among a particular group – one of the legal definitions of genocide.

Israel said it “categorically rejects the unfounded allegations”.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu responded angrily, calling the Human Rights Council “an antisemitic, rotten, terrorist-supporting and irrelevant body”.

Instead of focusing on war crimes committed by Hamas, he said, it was attacking Israel with “false accusations”.

The Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory was established by the UN Human Rights Council in 2021 to investigate all alleged violations of international humanitarian and human rights law.

The three-member commission said its new report was based on testimony from victims and witnesses of sexual and reproductive violence, some of whom spoke during two days of public hearings held in Geneva earlier this week, as well as verified photos and video footage, and information from civil society and women’s rights organisations.

The commission’s chair Navi Pillay, a South African former UN human rights chief, said the evidence collected “reveals a deplorable increase in sexual and gender-based violence” that she claimed was being employed by Israel against Palestinians “to terrorise them and perpetuate a system of oppression that undermines their right to self-determination”.

The report says specific forms of sexual and gender-based violence – such as forced public stripping and nudity, sexual harassment including threats of rape, as well as sexual assault – “comprise part of the Israeli Security Forces’ standard operating procedures toward Palestinians”.

Other forms of such violence, including rape and violence to the genitals, were “committed either under explicit orders or with implicit encouragement by Israel’s top civilian and military leadership”, it alleges.

The report does not provide examples of explicit orders from commanders or senior officials. But it does cite statements from Israeli ministers who defended soldiers who were accused of severely mistreating a Palestinian detainee at Sde Teiman military base last year.

Commission member Chris Sidoti, an Australian human rights lawyer, told the BBC: “Sexual violence is now so widespread that it can only be considered systematic. It’s got beyond the level of random acts by rogue individuals.”

Israel has rejected accusations of widespread ill-treatment and torture of Gaza detainees, and insisted it is fully committed to international legal standards.

The report says the commission also found that Israeli forces had systematically destroyed sexual and reproductive healthcare facilities across Gaza during the 17-month war there.

It concludes that women and girls have died from complications related to pregnancy and childbirth due to conditions imposed by the Israeli authorities which have denied access to reproductive health care, and says they amount to the crime against humanity of extermination.

The commission also alleges that Israeli authorities have “destroyed in part the reproductive capacity of Palestinians in Gaza as a group” through the “systematic destruction” of sexual and reproductive healthcare facilities, including maternity hospitals and maternity wards of hospitals and Gaza’s main in-vitro fertility clinic, Al-Basma IVF Centre in Gaza City.

This amounts to “two categories of genocidal acts in the Rome Statute and the Genocide Convention, including deliberately inflicting conditions of life calculated to bring about the physical destruction of Palestinians and imposing measures intended to prevent births”, it concludes.

According to the report, the embryology laboratory at Al-Basma was hit in early December 2023, reportedly destroying around 4,000 embryos as well as 1,000 sperm samples and unfertilised eggs.

It says the commission determined through visual analysis of pictures that the damage was caused by a large calibre projectile, most probably an Israeli tank shell, and that it was intentionally attacked by Israeli forces. However, the Israeli military told ABC News at the time that it was not aware of a strike on the clinic. The BBC has contacted the IDF for comment.

“The deliberate destruction of a health facility is one serious issue for international humanitarian law and human rights law. But it does appear from our analysis of the attack on this clinic, that it was knowingly and intentionally directed towards the destruction of reproductive services,” Mr Sidoti said. “The consequence of this is the prevention of births.”

In a statement, Israel’s mission to the UN in Geneva said the report was “a shameless attempt to incriminate the [Israel Defense Forces] and manufacture the illusion of ‘systemic’ use of [sexual and gender-based violence]”.

It criticised what it called the commission’s decision to use “information from second-hand single uncorroborated sources”, which it said was inconsistent with established UN standards and methodologies.

The statement also stressed that the IDF had “concrete directives, procedures, orders, and policies, which unequivocally prohibit such misconduct”, as well as mechanisms to investigate any incidents of alleged sexual violence.

Israel’s prime minister also rejected the report’s findings and called the Human Rights Council an “anti-Israel circus”.

“Instead of focusing on the crimes against humanity and the war crimes that were perpetrated by the Hamas terrorist organisation in the worst massacre carried out against the Jewish people since the Holocaust, the UN has again chosen to attack the State of Israel with false accusations, including baseless accusations of sexual violence,” Netanyahu said.

The International Court of Justice is hearing a case bought by South Africa that accuses Israeli forces of committing genocide against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. Israel has vehemently denied the allegation.

The Israeli military launched a campaign to destroy Hamas in response to an unprecedented cross-border attack on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 were taken hostage.

More than 48,520 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry.

Most of Gaza’s 2.1 million population has also been displaced multiple times. Almost 70% of buildings are estimated to be damaged or destroyed; the healthcare, water, sanitation and hygiene systems have collapsed; and there are shortages of food, fuel, medicine and shelter.

US President Donald Trump has threatened a 200% tariff on any alcohol coming to the US from the European Union (EU) in the latest twist of an escalating trade war.

The threat is a response to the EU’s plans for a 50% tax on imports of US-produced whiskey as part of its retaliation to Trump’s tariffs on all steel and aluminium imports to the US.

The US president called for the immediate removal of the EU’s “nasty” tariff on US whiskey, calling the bloc “hostile and abusive” and “formed for the sole purpose of taking advantage of the United States”.

A European Commission spokesperson said that “calls are being prepared” between between the US and the EU to discuss the situation.

It confirmed that its trade commissioner, Maroš Šefčovič, had “reached out to his American counterparts” after Trump’s latest threat.

The stand-off marked another escalation of a trade war which has rattled financial markets and raised concerns over the impact on the economies and consumers in many countries around the world, including the US.

Europe sends more than €4.5bn ($4.89bn; £3.78bn) worth of wine each year to the US, which is its largest export market, according to the Comité Européen des Entreprises Vins, which represents the European wine industry.

Ignacio Sánchez Recarte, secretary-general of the group, said if Trump carried through on his threats, it would destroy the market, costing thousands of jobs.

“There is no alternative to sell all this wine,” he said, pleading with the two sides to “keep wine out of this fight”.

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The latest clash came after new US tariffs on steel and aluminium came into effect on Wednesday, hitting imports of the metals with a blanket duty of 25% and ending exemptions from the duties that the US had previously granted for shipments from some countries, including from the EU and Canada.

Canada and Europe – which are among America’s biggest trade partners – called the new taxes unjustified and struck back with their own tariffs on a range of US products. The EU’s measures are due to go into force 1 April.

The clash reprises a battle that played out during Trump’s first term, when he first announced tariffs on steel and aluminium.

The EU responded with its own tariffs, including a 25% tax on American whiskey.

In the aftermath, whiskey sales to the EU dropped 20%, falling from roughly $552m in 2018 to $440m in 2021, according to the Distilled Spirits Council of the US. Trump in turn

The tariffs were lifted after Trump left office, after the two sides reached an agreement that exempted a certain amount of European metals from the duties.

But Trump has indicated little appetite for deal-making so far, at least when it comes to steel and aluminium.

“If this Tariff is not removed immediately, the US will shortly place a 200% Tariff on all wines, champagnes & alcoholic products coming out of France and other EU represented countries,” he wrote on social media, using all capital letters for some of the message.

The targeting of wine and whiskey is symbolic – there are few consumer goods more iconic than French Bordeaux or Tennessee whiskey. From a value standpoint, drinks trade is worth less than some of the other items facing tariffs.

But Mary Taylor, a US-based importer of European wines, said the measures would be catastrophic for her business and industry, with an impact that would ripple out to restaurants, bars and distributors across the US.

“It just looks like a big, giant threat to our livelihoods,” she said.

Ms Taylor, who brings in 2 million bottles a year, weathered the 25% tariff Trump put on certain EU bottles during his first term by expanding her distribution in Europe, but she said, “200% is a whole different ball game”.

Shares in the US fell again on Thursday.

The S&P 500 dropped nearly 1.4%, taking it down roughly 10% from its most recent peak – a milestone known as a correction. The Dow slumped 1.3%, while the Nasdaq dropped almost 2%.

In Europe, London’s FTSE 100 was flat, while Germany’s Dax ended about 0.5% lower.

In Paris, the Cac 40 fell 0.6%, as shares of major spirit-makers were hit, with Pernod Ricard down 4% and Hennessy cognac maker LVMH falling 1.1%.

In interviews with US business media on Thursday, White House officials blamed the EU for escalating the dispute.

“Why are Europeans picking on Kentucky bourbon or Harley-Davidson motorcycles? It’s disrespectful,” Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told Bloomberg Television, describing the back-and-forth as “off the topic”.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent warned that a trade war was likely to inflict more economic pain on the EU than on the US, dismissing concerns that the clash could spiral.

“One or two items, with one trading bloc – I’m not sure why that’s a big deal for the markets,” he said.

In an interview with the BBC’s HardTalk, European central bank president Christine Lagarde, said that the EU had “no choice” but to retaliate.

“At the moment, everybody is positioning,” she said, adding that she expected the two sides to sit down and negotiate.

“Everybody will suffer” if the dispute were to develop into a full blown trade war, she warned.

So far, Trump has shown little tolerance for retaliation from countries over the tariffs he has introduced.

Earlier this week, he blasted Canada with the threat of a 50% tariff on its steel and aluminium after the Canadian province of Ontario responded to new tariffs with a surcharge on electricity exports to the US.

He rescinded that threat after Ontario agreed to suspend the charges.

Former Trump adviser Stephen Moore, now an economist with the Heritage Foundation, said he thought the EU would have to make a concession to defuse the situation, noting that Trump had consistently voiced concerns about rules on agricultural products.

“Absolutely this is going to end up with a deal,” he said. “It’s only a question if it ends up in a deal in a day, a week, a month or six months, but there will eventually be a negotiated settlement.”

Syria’s interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa has signed a constitutional declaration covering a five-year transitional period, three months after his Islamist group led the rebel offensive that overthrew Bashar al-Assad.

The document says Islam is the religion of the president, as the previous constitution did, and Islamic jurisprudence is “the main source of legislation”, rather than “a main source”, according to the drafting committee.

It also enshrines separation of powers and judicial independence, and guarantees women’s rights, freedom of expression and media freedom.

“We hope it will be a new history for Syria, where we replace oppression with justice,” Sharaa said.

UN special envoy Geir Pedersen said he welcomed the “moves towards restoring the rule of law” and noted that “this development potentially fills an important legal vacuum”.

But the Kurdish-led administration in north-eastern Syria criticised the constitutional declaration, saying it “contradicts the reality of Syria and its diversity”.

In January, rebel military commanders named Sharaa president for the transitional period, cancelled the Assad-era 2012 constitution, and dissolved the former regime’s parliament, army and security agencies.

Only 10 days ago, Sharaa announced the formation of the seven-member committee to draft the constitutional declaration, which he said would serve as “the legal framework regulating the transitional phase”.

A member of the committee, Abdul Hamid al-Awak, a constitutional law expert who teaches at a Turkish university, told a news conference on Thursday that the declaration aimed to “create a balance between a security society and rights and freedoms”.

He said it stipulated “absolute separation of powers”, pointing to Assad’s “encroachment” on other branches of government during his 24-year rule.

The president would have executive authority during the transitional period, he said, but would have only one “exceptional power” – the ability to declare a state of emergency.

A new People’s Assembly will have full responsibility for legislation. Two thirds of its members will be appointed by a committee selected by the president and one third chosen by the president himself.

A committee will also be formed to draft a new permanent constitution.

Sharaa has promised an inclusive government that will run the country until the new constitution is finalised and free and fair elections are held.

However, he faces significant challenges following a devastating civil war that erupted when Assad ordered a brutal crackdown on pro-democracy protests 14 years ago.

Last week, gunmen supporting Sharaa’s Sunni Islamist-led government were accused of carrying out revenge killings against members of Assad’s minority Alawite sect in the western coastal region following a deadly ambush on a security patrol by gunmen loyal to the former regime. One monitoring group has said almost 1,500 civilians were killed.

Sharaa has pledged to hold the perpetrators to account and ordered the formation of a committee aimed at preserving civil peace.

However, many Alawites and members of other religious and ethnic minorities are wary of his intentions because of his past as the leader of al-Qaeda’s former Syrian affiliate.

UN Secretary General António Guterres said on Thursday that nothing could justify the killing of civilians and warned that Syria’s “much-deserved brighter future hangs in the balance”.

“The caretaker authorities have repeatedly committed to building a new Syria based on inclusive and credible foundations for all Syrians. Now is the time for action,” he added.

Donatella Versace is to step down from her creative director role at fashion house Versace, after nearly 30 years.

She has held the position since 1997 and took over after the murder of her brother Gianni.

Versace has overseen hundreds of fashion campaigns for the Italian brand, also designing hotels and cars.

The 69-year-old will be replaced by Dario Vitale, who is a former design director for Miu Miu, and take on a new brand ambassador role.

It comes amid speculation that the Prada Group is interested in buying Versace from the Capri Holdings group, who paid €2bn (£1.67bn) for the fashion house in 2018.

In a statement issued on Thursday, Capri Holdings said Versace would now “dedicate herself to the support of Versace’s philanthropic and charitable endeavours and will remain an advocate for the brand globally”.

It added that the announcements were part of “a thoughtful succession plan” and credited Vitale as a “strong design leader” whose “talent and vision will be instrumental in Versace’s growth”.

The company statement also thanked Versace for everything she had done for the brand and for playing “an integral role in the company’s global success”.

Versace also posted her own statement on Instagram to her 12 million followers, saying it was “the greatest honour of my life to carry on my brother Gianni’s legacy”.

“Versace is in my DNA and always in my heart,” she said.

“Championing the next generation of designers has always been important to me. I am thrilled that Dario Vitale will be joining us, and excited to see Versace through new eyes.”

Donatella Versace has dressed some of the world’s biggest stars – including Madonna, Beyoncé and Lady Gaga.

She famously designed the green jungle dress for Jennifer Lopez in 2000 and Michelle Obama’s dress for her 2016 final state dinner.

Versace is also considered an embodiment of the fashion house she has built – always seen in brightly coloured prints that are synonymous with the brand and platinum blonde hair that ensures she always stands out.

Versace, which was first founded in Milan in 1978 by Donatella and her brothers Santo and Gianni, was sold to the Michael Kors group in 2018, which was then folded in to Capri Holdings in 2019.

The Italian atelier represented 20% of Capri’s 2024 €5.2bn (£4.3bn) revenue.

Freddy Mukuza’s final moments were witnessed by a friend, who stood helpless, 50m (160 ft) away.

When he heard that Freddy had been shot – by M23 rebels he was told – he and others rushed to the scene in Goma, in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.

“When we arrived, we found Freddy still breathing, and wanted to take him away, but the M23 did not allow us,” says the friend, who we are calling Justin.

“When we insisted, they fired bullets into the ground as if to say: ‘If you dare cross this perimeter, we will kill you as well.'”

So they had to keep their distance, as Freddy, 31, took his last breath. Only then did the M23 allow them to approach and take away his body.

Shortly before the killing, three pick-up trucks full of rebel fighters had come to Freddy’s neighbourhood – Kasika.

It was around 15:00 on Saturday 22 February – almost a month after the rebel group had captured Goma in a rapid advance through the east of the country.

Within an hour or so, between 17 and 22 people had been killed, mostly young men, according to our sources.

We have gathered detailed accounts from residents, who cannot be identified, for their own protection.

We asked the M23 for a response to the allegation that they carried out a mass killing in the neighbourhood. They did not reply.

Officials in Kasika have not released a death toll, and there is little or no prospect of an independent criminal investigation into what residents are calling a massacre.

But locals insist the M23 is the only armed group which can operate freely, and shoot to kill in broad daylight in Goma.

Since taking the city at the end of January, the rebels have been in complete control. During the 18 days we spent on the ground, their authority was absolute.

They have been accused in the past of carrying out atrocities in other areas.

The heavily armed rebels do not act alone. They are backed by neighbouring Rwanda, according to the UN and the US. Rwanda denies this, though it no longer denies having its own troops in DR Congo, saying they are there in self-defence.

It is believed the M23 targeted Kasika because of a former Congolese army base in the area.

The Katindo camp is now closed but some of the soldiers and their families remain in the district.

“Not all the soldiers were able to run away,” a local resident explains. “Some threw away their guns and stayed about the neighbourhood.”

But Freddy Mukuza was a civilian – a married father of two, struggling to get by. When hard times came, he earned a living by taking passengers on his motorbike.

He was also an activist and songwriter who rapped about the many problems in his homeland – a country rich in minerals whose people are amongst the poorest in the world.

DR Congo is known as a place of corruption and instability – and of conflict, stretching back 30 years. That is if the country and its suffering are remembered at all.

Sexual violence is endemic. The government is weak, at best.

There was plenty for Freddy to rap about.

One of his songs is called Au Secours (Help in French), the lyrics full of questions that have gone unanswered:

“Who will come to the aid of these people? Who will come to the aid of these raped women? Who will come to the aid of these unemployed men?… The people are in danger, they don’t have enough to eat. They [the authorities] buy jeeps.”

On the day of his death, Freddy was moving to a new rented home in Kasika. His brother-in-law was helping him put a tarpaulin over the roof.

His sister-in-law was there too, getting the house ready for Freddy’s family. When they heard the shooting, they were inside and rushed to shut the door, but they were seen by the M23.

The rebels shot and killed Freddy’s two in-laws, according to his friend Justin.

Since then, Justin has barely left home, not even to earn money. His family is surviving on vegetables and fruit. Tea is now a luxury they cannot afford.

He has stopped his children going to school, for fear they might be taken from their classrooms by the M23 and forcibly recruited.

“We believe it is more important that they stay alive,” he says.

His world has shrunk to his own four walls. There is the constant nagging fear that the rebels could return hunting for young men.

Just the sight of one of their pick-up trucks in the street sends locals running, he says.

These days it is rare to find a group of young people talking together, he tells us, and neighbours no long share gripes about the authorities as they did before the rebel takeover.

“Before, there was bad governance, but we were free,” he says. “There was embezzlement. There was mismanagement and we spoke out about that. We had the chance to go to court. Today, there is bad governance, but we live in terror and silence.”

Justin is speaking to us because he wants Freddy Mukuza to be remembered, and he wants the outside world to know about life and death under the M23.

Since the killings, Kasika has been shrouded in fear. Local journalists have not reported the story.

But a shaky video was posted on social media the next day, 23 February, which appears to show some of the victims: 10 bodies are visible – dumped in a tangled heap, in an unfinished building. It is unclear if any of the dead were soldiers.

None are in uniform and there is no sign of any weapons.

In the background there are screams and shouts. One woman repeats over and over: “There are 10 of them,” as she moves from body to body.

“They are going to finish us all,” she says. “They killed all these young people. Isn’t that Junior? I think it is him. He is a house builder.”

Without the video, news of the killings might not have spread beyond the neighbourhood.

But the footage had the power to shock, even by the violent standards of DR Congo.

Our sources say it is authentic. One confirmed that the location shown is in Kasika.

He visited the place after the bodies were moved. And he recognised one of those seen crying in the video, from around the neighbourhood.

Two of our sources say the youngest to die in Kasika was a boy aged 13-14. The teenager was inside his own home, hiding behind his sisters.

“The M23 said: ‘If this boy does not come with us, we will kill all of you,'” one man told us.

The boy was then led away to his death.

There was also a young woman among the victims. She had been selling milk on the overcrowded streets.

Also killed – another street vendor, in his twenties.

When the shooting started, he was sitting in his usual spot – on the pavement outside his own front door, selling airtime for mobile phones and home-made doughnuts.

He was overheard pleading with the rebels: “I’m not a soldier.

“I just sell airtime. Look, these are my things – my airtime and my basket of doughnuts.”

Then he ran. One of his friends takes up the story. We are calling him John.

“I was in the house, and I heard gunfire,” John tells us. “People were saying: ‘They are taking young people by force.’ I saw people running, including my friend, so I ran with them.

“When we reached the main road, there was shooting, and I heard gunfire behind me and somebody fell.”

That was the doughnut seller.

Despite his age, he was still in secondary school, in his final year. He was a keen student who had a late start because his family could not afford to educate him.

But John says: “Like all young people, he had a dream.” In his case, it was to be an engineer.

John says the rebels did not care who they killed.

“There was no inquiry before shooting,” he tells us. “They just shot at everyone who was present, and at people who ran away, in two different directions.”

When the M23 captured Goma, they announced they had no prisons. John says no further explanation was needed: “That meant whoever is presumed to be a government soldier, or a thief, or whoever makes a mistake, will be killed – immediately.”

Weeks on, few have dared to speak out. “No-one wants to be next,” John says.

Bereaved families have held small hasty burials – without the usual mourning at home.

“The rebels didn’t want any funerals,” says one resident, who we are calling Deborah. “They didn’t even want people to cry. We thought they were coming to bring peace, but instead they came to exterminate us. They took everyone they found on the street.”

As the men were being rounded up, she tried to step outside. The rebels ordered her back in, at gunpoint.

Denis Baeni was on his way home when the rebels arrived in Kasika. He dashed into a small shop to hide with a few others, our sources say.

The primary school teacher got his ID card out of a pocket. He may have thought that would save him, by proving he was a civilian.

A neighbour – with knowledge of the events – tells us what happened. We are calling her Rebecca.

“They heard a voice from outside asking: ‘Are there any soldiers?'” Rebecca says. “They said no but the M23 took them out of the shop.”

The men were told to walk a short distance to a half-built house where they were “assembled for execution”.

“There was so much gunfire,” she says. “It was so close. There were 21 people killed all at once from our neighbourhood. Many were just passing by.”

Rebecca insists they were all civilians. “Not one was a soldier,” she says.

Denis leaves behind two children, who he was raising alone.

Death is not the only danger here. Locals also face the risk of being recruited to fight – willingly or otherwise.

“Nowadays men have to be home by 17:30,” says Rebecca. “By 18:00 it’s dark, and they can take you very easily.”

As families in Kasika are forced to stifle their grief, the M23 are continuing their sweep through eastern DR Congo.

After Goma, they took control the city of Bukavu in mid-February. They have threatened to go all the way to the capital, Kinshasa, 1,600km (almost 1,000 miles) away.

They claim they are revolutionaries battling a failed state, and defending the rights of minority Tutsis.

Human rights groups paint a very different picture.

They have accused the armed group of a catalogue of abuses since its foundation in 2012 – including systematic shelling of civilian areas, gang rape and “summary executions”. The allegations have been documented in a series of reports.

In a recent BBC interview, I asked rebel leader, Corneille Nangaa, for a response. He heads a coalition of political parties and militias – called the Congo River Alliance – which includes the M23.

“I didn’t see the reports,” he said. “I cannot respond for the report that I didn’t read”. He also said he was not worried by the allegations.

Pushed on why he had not read the reports, he said: “Give me one, I will be reading it.”

Nangaa, a former head of DR Congo’s electoral commission, alternates between combat fatigues and smart suits.

He is presented as the unarmed and unthreatening face of the rebels, but the Congolese government is offering a $5m (£4m) reward for information leading to his arrest.

The rebels are not alone in having a history of brutality. The same applies to the Congolese army, and to many of the other armed groups in eastern DR Congo.

But the M23 are now the only authority in parts of the east, and millions of Congolese are at their mercy.

As we spoke to one resident of Kasika, his wife called him, asking him to come quickly to take their eight-year-old son from school.

Panic was spreading because of reports the M23 were taking children from their classrooms.

He got his child home safely but fears for the future.

“We are all traumatised. They said they came to liberate us,” he said. “But now it’s like they are taking us hostage. “

When Kajol contracted tuberculosis in January, USAID kept her alive. Now she and her family are in danger again after the Trump administration ordered most US aid spending to end.

TB can be fatal if left untreated. The highly contagious bacterial disease, which usually infects the lungs, is not prevalent in rich countries, because treatment is relatively cheap. But in Bangladesh, it is a scourge.

That’s especially so in neighbourhoods such as Mohammadpur, a slum in the capital Dhaka where Kajol,17, lives.

“We are poor people,” she says. She is the sole breadwinner for herself, her mother and little brother. Her job in a garment factory keeps them all afloat.

So when she fell ill in January, it could have been catastrophic.

Instead, help arrived through Dipa Halder. For the last three years, she has been canvassing the residents of Mohammadpur about TB and getting people the treatment they so desperately need, free of cost.

The initiative is run by a local aid organisation, Nari Maitree. It was funded by the US Agency for International Aid (USAID) until February, when it received a letter from the US government saying the funds had been terminated.

That brought Kajol’s treatment, only partially completed, to an abrupt end.

“Now I have to go get the medicine myself,” she says. “I am struggling a lot.”

Cutting off medicines mid-treatment makes the chances of TB becoming drug-resistant much greater. It makes the disease much more difficult to combat and puts patients at greater risk of severe illness and death.

“The people here are quite vulnerable,” says Dipa, 21. “I can tell them to go to a particular doctor, which would help them save some money.

“Or I try to provide them with some financial assistance from our organisation so that they can continue their treatment.”

According to a US government performance report seen by the BBC, support by USAID in 2023 resulted directly in the identification and reporting of more than a quarter of a million new cases of TB in Bangladesh. In the same year, there were 296,487 new or relapse cases of TB which were cured or successfully completed as a result of USAID.

The agency was seen as integral to the country’s fight against tuberculosis.

“You ask people on the street, they will say yeah, it’s the US, they are the ones that are keeping it [tuberculosis] in control,” said a director of a USAID project in Bangladesh, who is not authorised to speak publicly and did not want to be named.

“Bangladesh was USAID’s largest programme in Asia,” says Asif Saleh, executive director of the non-profit BRAC organisation. “In terms of its impact, particularly in the healthcare sector, it has been massive.

“Particularly around vaccination, reducing child mortality and maternal mortality, USAID has played a massive role in this country.”

In 2024, Bangladesh received $500m in foreign assistance. This year, that amount has cratered to $71m. To put that number into context, in the three-year period from 2021-2023, USAID committed an average of $83m annually in Bangladesh for health initiatives alone, including combating TB.

Cuts to USAID have meant Nari Maitree can no longer offer its Stop TB Program, but it also means Dipa is out of work. She supports her elderly parents and her younger sister.

“I am completely shattered now that I lost my job. I am carrying the burden of the family. Being unemployed is a devastating situation,” she told the BBC.

In a document seen by the BBC, 113 programmes that were funded directly by the USAID office in Bangladesh have stopped. The list does not include the myriad programmes that are funded directly by US agencies in Washington.

“The NGO sector [In Bangladesh] employs 500,000 people at least,” says Mr Saleh. “It’s huge. Thousands and thousands of jobs are going to be eliminated.”

It’s not just the United States that is moving away from foreign aid. The UK has announced cuts to its foreign assistance programmes, as has Switzerland. It is likely that other countries may follow suit.

It’s a sobering reality for Bangladesh. The country’s government was overthrown last year and the economy is shaky, with inflation near 10% and a jobs crisis, particularly among young people.

Interim leader Muhammad Yunus says Bangladesh will come up with a new strategy on how to survive following the aid cuts – but doesn’t say how.

When pressed in a BBC interview on how the country will cover the shortfall from USAID, Yunus said: “It was a small part, not a big deal. It doesn’t mean Bangladesh will disappear from the map.”

Asif Saleh says the way the cuts have been implemented has been abrupt and chaotic. The impact on a country like Bangladesh is immeasurable.

Nowhere is that more clear than in Cox’s Bazar, a coastal city in south-eastern Bangladesh, home to the world’s largest refugee camp. More than one million Rohingya, a persecuted Muslim minority community that the United Nations calls victims of ethnic cleansing, fled violent purges in their home country, neighbouring Myanmar.

Unable to go back home and unable to work outside the refugee camp, the Rohingya depend on international aid for their survival.

The United States contributed almost half of all aid to Rohingya refugees.

“We have run out of soap,” says Rana Flowers, country representative for the UN children’s agency Unicef. “We are now having to truck water into the camps. It’s an absolutely critical time. There is an outbreak of cholera with over 580 cases, along with a scabies outbreak.”

Water sanitation projects in the camps used to be funded by USAID.

Since the order to stop work went into effect at the end of January, hospitals such as the International Red Cross hospital in Cox’s Bazar are reduced to providing emergency assistance only. Any hope the money would be reinstated was crushed this week, when the Trump administration cancelled more than 80% of all the programmes at USAID.

Patients like Hamida Begum, who was getting regular treatment for hypertension, are left with few options.

“I’m old and I don’t have anyone to help me,” she says. Her husband died last year, leaving her to care for her four children alone, including her 12-year-old daughter who cannot walk.

“I cannot go to another hospital far from home because of my daughter.”

At a nearby UN food distribution centre, Rehana Begum is standing beside two large sacks.

Inside, she says, are six litres of cooking oil and 13kg of rice, along with basics such as onions, garlic and dried chillies. These rations, given to her by the World Food Programme (WFP), need to last her and her family a month.

I ask how she will manage now that her rations will be cut in half beginning next month.

She looked shocked. Then she started to cry.

“How can we possibly survive with such a small amount?” asks Rehana, 47, who shares one room with her husband and five children. “Even now, it is difficult to manage.”

The WFP says it was forced to make the drastic cut because of “a critical funding shortfall for its emergency response operations”.

The rations now being allotted to the Rohingya community will only meet their basic daily dietary needs, igniting fears they will be left with just enough to live and not much more.

“This is an absolute disaster in the making,” says Rana Flowers of Unicef. “Desperate frustrated people within the camps will lead to security concerns. If that escalates to the degree it could, we won’t be able to go into the camps to help.”

Outside the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) detention centre, where former Philippines president Rodrigo Duterte has been taken, his supporters gathered on Wednesday night, waving national flags and shouting, “Bring him back!” as a vehicle thought to be carrying him was driven through the imposing iron gates at speed.

Shortly before he landed in the Netherlands, the 79-year-old unapologetically defended his bloody “war on drugs” for which the ICC says there are “reasonable grounds” to charge him with murder as a crime against humanity.

Small-time drug dealers, users and others were killed without trial on his watch as mayor and, later, as president.

The official toll stands at 6,000, though activists believe the real figure could run into the tens of thousands.

Duterte said he cracked down on drug dealers to rid the country of street crimes.

However, rights groups allege that the campaign was rife with police abuse, targeting young men from the urban poor.

Duterte is the first Asian former head of state to be indicted by the ICC – and the first suspect to be flown to The Hague in three years.

And his arrival comes at a pivotal moment for the International Criminal Court.

Rodrigo Duterte’s arrest and deportation on Monday was the result of an unprecedented chain of events.

His supporters allege that the ICC is being used as a political tool by the country’s current president Ferdinand Marcos who has publicly fallen out with the powerful Duterte family.

The ICC is a court of last resort designed to hold the most powerful to account when domestic courts are unable or unwilling to do so. But this case is a reminder of the extent to which it depends on state co-operation in order to fulfil its mandate – it effectively has no power to arrest people without the co-operation of the countries they are in, which is most often refused.

In the case of Duterte, chances that he would ever be prosecuted by the ICC seemed unthinkable even in 2022, when his daughter, Vice-President Sara Duterte, allied with Marcos to create the powerful “uniteam” that swept presidential elections.

Up until a few months ago, Marcos had dismissed the idea of co-operating with the ICC.

But the pace at which Duterte was served an arrest warrant and extradited shows that when political winds shift, those once considered untouchable can find themselves touching down in The Hague.

The whole process of his extradition – from his detention in Manila to his arrival in The Hague – has been documented on social media by his daughter Kitty and Duterte himself through his aide. His plane was the most tracked on flight radar.

“I am the one who led our law enforcement and military. I said that I will protect you and I will be responsible for all of this,” he said on a Facebook video, one of many that was shared over more than 24 hours during his journey from Manila to The Hague.

It provided rare insight into what is usually an opaque process, and the world was able to follow, sometimes in real time, every step of it right down to the meals Duterte was served on board his chartered jet.

Duterte’s arrest now sends a strong signal that even powerful individuals may be held accountable for their actions, potentially deterring future abuses.

His case has also reignited debate about the ICC’s role in relation to national sovereignty, a concern often raised by non-member states like the United States, Russia, and China.

The court depends on its 128 members to fund and be the operational arm of this judicial body.

So Duterte’s headline-making arrival, followed by his first night in custody at The Hague, offer the court a much-needed win.

After serving two high-profile arrest warrants – one for the Russian president Vladimir Putin, and another for Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu over the war in Gaza – which are unlikely to be enforced, the arrival of Duterte will be put forth as proof the court is capable of bringing those accused of the gravest atrocities to face justice.

It is a litmus test for the ICC’s ability to function effectively in an increasingly polarised climate.

ICC prosecutor Karim Khan was recently sanctioned by Donald Trump over the arrest warrant issued for Benjamin Netanyahu.

The detention of Duterte provides him with a powerful response.

“Many say international law is not strong,” Karim Khan acknowledged. “But international law is not as weak as some may think. When we come together, when we build partnerships, the rule of law can prevail.”

The former Philippines president will now mark his 80th birthday this month in the ICC’s detention facility, located in the dunes of The Hague.

The facility, once a Nazi prison complex, provides each detainee with a private cell, access to computers, a library, and sports facilities.

If he isn’t satisfied with the meals provided, Duterte has the option to prepare his own food using a shopping list in the detention center’s kitchen. He will also have access to medical care, lawyers, and visitors.

He is expected to make his initial court appearance in the coming days, where he will confirm his identity, choose the language he wishes to follow proceedings in, and acknowledge the charges against him.

Following this public appearance, a confirmation of charges hearing will follow, during which the judges will decide whether the prosecution has presented a sufficient amount of evidence to proceed to trial.

If the charges are confirmed, it could be many months before he eventually goes on trial, and years before a final judgment.

Disney’s live-action remake of Snow White is set to be released in UK cinemas next week, marking the latest efforts by the film studio to revive a beloved old classic.

But the film, which stars Rachel Zegler and Gal Gadot, has faced several issues throughout its production.

The movie is being released amid a debate about how the seven dwarfs are represented on screen, while Zegler has made headlines for critical comments about the original 1937 film.

The European premiere was held on Wednesday at a castle in Northern Spain, instead of a more traditional and high-profile location such as London’s Leicester Square.

The debate around the film began making headlines in January 2022, when Game of Thrones star Peter Dinklage, an actor with Dwarfism, described the decision to retell the story of “seven dwarfs living in a cave” as “backward”.

Disney has used computer-generated dwarfs in the remake and said it would “avoid reinforcing stereotypes from the original animated film”.

But this week, other actors with Dwarfism have said they would have liked the opportunity to play the roles.

Speaking to the Daily Mail, performer Choon Tan said the decision to use CGI was “absolutely absurd and discriminating in a sense”.

“There really is nothing wrong casting someone with dwarfism as a dwarf in any given opportunity,” he said.

“As long as we are treated equally and with respect, we’re usually more than happy to take on any acting roles that are suitable for us,” he added.

Another performer, Blake Johnston, told the newspaper that “we have plenty of dwarf actors out there who are dying for roles like this”.

He said he also said he believed Disney had “succumb to peer pressure on political correctness, which has now given top dwarf actors less work”.

Dinklage, who has a form of dwarfism called achondroplasia, criticised the film in 2022 during an interview with podcaster Marc Maron.

“I was a little taken aback by [the fact] they were very proud to cast a Latina actress as Snow White,” he said, referring to Colombian-American actress Zegler.

“You’re progressive in one way, but then you’re still making that backward story about seven dwarfs living in a cave together? Have I done nothing to advance the cause from my soapbox? I guess I’m not loud enough.”

The actor had previously spoken about the representation of dwarfism, saying it was “bad writing” to make it a “dominant character trait”.

In a statement released after Dinklage’s comments, Disney said they were “taking a different approach with these seven characters” and had made their decision to use CGI after “consulting with members of the dwarf community”.

The film’s European premiere took place on Wednesday at a remote castle in Spain, which was the inspiration behind the castle in the 1937 original animated film.

Zegler performed a rendition of original song Waiting On a Wish at the event on Wednesday evening in Segrovia, north-West of Madrid.

Most media outlets were not invited to the medieval castle, and Zegler instead performed to a relatively small crowd.

The Los Angeles premiere, meanwhile, will be reportedly smaller than usual for a film of this magnitude, with the stars only expected to pose for photographs and speak to Disney’s in-house crews.

News journalists have not been invited to attend the red carpet and therefore will not have the opportunity to interview the film’s cast and creatives.

However, the cast are taking part in a few select sit-down interviews with some outlets as part of a press junket which is taking place this week.

The debate about the seven dwarfs is not the only controversy which has surrounded the film, which has reportedly cost £217m to make.

Early in the film’s production, there was controversy around Disney’s decision to cast Zegler, a Latina actress, in the role of a character deemed to have skin “as white as snow”.

It was part of a drive by Disney to cast a more diverse range of actors to play updated versions of some classic characters.

Halle Bailey, a black actress, was cast in another recent Disney live-action movie, The Little Mermaid. Both actresses faced abuse online after their casting was announced.

Zegler also made headlines after she made critical comments about some elements of the previous animated film.

“The original cartoon came out in 1937, and very evidently so,” Zegler said in 2022. “There’s a big focus [in the original] on her love story with a guy who literally stalks her. Weird! So we didn’t do that this time.”

Zegler also called the original film “extremely dated when it comes to the ideas of women being in roles of power,” adding: “People are making these jokes about ours being the PC Snow White, where it’s like, yeah, it is – because it needed that.”

Elsewhere, fans have speculated that there may have been a behind-the-scenes rift between Zegler and Gadot, who plays the wicked stepmother, because the actresses have opposing views on the Israel-Palestine conflict.

Zegler has publicly taken a pro-Palestine stance, whilst Gadot is Israeli and served in the country’s army for two years.

However, others have said rumours of a rift are misguided, noting Gadot and Zegler have appeared publicly together on several occasions, including when they jointly presented an award at last week’s Oscars.

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs is the latest in a long line of classic animated Disney stories which have been remade as live-action films.

Other recent live-action remakes the studio has produced include Aladdin, Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid, The Lion King, Dumbo and The Jungle Book.

This week saw talks to end the three-year war in Ukraine enter a new phase, a mission to find ice on the Moon fall flat, and the UK unveil its latest attempt to take the crown at Eurovision.

But how much attention did you pay to what else has been going on in the world over the past seven days?

Quiz compiled by Ben Fell.

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

Mehboob Hussain was riding the train home on Tuesday when the tracks under the front car exploded.

In the depths of central Pakistan’s Bolan Pass, a pocket of wilderness so remote that there is no internet or mobile network coverage, the nine-coach Jaffar Express ground to a halt. Then the bullets started flying.

“I was a passenger on the train that was attacked,” Mr Hussain told BBC Urdu.

He, along with some 440 others, had been travelling from Quetta to Peshawar through the heart of the restive Balochistan province when a group of armed militants struck – they bombed the tracks, fired on the train and then stormed the carriages.

The Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) quickly claimed responsibility for the siege, and threatened to kill many of those on board if Pakistani authorities did not release Baloch political prisoners within 48 hours.

The group, which many countries have designated a terrorist organisation, has waged a decades-long insurgency to gain independence for Balochistan, accusing Islamabad of exploiting the province’s rich mineral resources while also neglecting it.

BLA militants have a long history of attacking military camps, railway stations and trains in the region.

But this was the first time they had hijacked one.

The siege lasted over 30 hours. According to authorities, 300 passengers have now been freed, and 33 BLA militants, 21 civilian hostages and four military personnel were killed. But conflicting figures suggest many passengers remain unaccounted for.

Information relating to the attack and the subsequent rescue operation has been tightly controlled throughout.

But the BBC was able to speak to multiple eyewitnesseses who described the “doomsday scenes” on board the train as the attack unfolded.

As Ishaq Noor told BBC Urdu of those first few moments: “We held our breath throughout the firing, not knowing what would happen next.”

A railway police officer who was on board the train told BBC Urdu that, contrary to initial reports from Pakistani authorities, the train was “not in a tunnel but in an open area” when it was hit.

The BLA has also released an alleged video of the moment the train was struck by the blast. It shows an open section of track that runs along the base of a large rocky slope.

Atop that slope, according to the video, is a cluster of BLA fighters.

The officer described to the BBC how he initially “fought together with other police officers” to try and hold off the militants until “the ammunition ran out”.

“They [the BLA] were moving in front of us on the mountain and they were much more numerous than us, in the hundreds,” the officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity, recalled. He noted that he was accompanied by four railway police and two members of Pakistan’s paramilitary Frontier Corps (FC).

At least 100 of those on the train were members of the security forces, according to Pakistani officials.

“I told my companion to give me the G-3 rifle because it is a better weapon,” the officer explained. “When I got the rifle and the rounds, we also started firing back. I used to fire one shot at a time at them so that they could not come near us and the train… [But] in an hour-and-half, our rounds were over… We were helpless.”

When the gunfire from those on board the Jaffar Express ceased, the militants came down from the surrounding mountains and started taking passengers off the train, the officer said.

“They started checking cards and telling people to go this way, this way,” he said, explaining that the hostages were separated into groups alongside the train, according to their ethnicity.

The militants were speaking in the Balochi language, he added, and declared, “We have made demands to the government and if they are not met, we will not spare anyone; we will set the vehicle on fire”.

The officer claimed the militants were receiving orders: “They would get orders to kill, and they would pick up people from the group and kill them. They killed many people – both army personnel and civilians.”

Some passengers, however, were allowed to leave unharmed – including women, children, the elderly and those who lived in Balochistan, according to Mr Noor.

Among those released was Noor Muhammad. He said that when the initial volleys of gunfire stopped after an hour, armed men forced open the door to the train and entered, saying “get out or we will shoot you”.

Mr Muhammad said he was escorted off the train, and when he told the militants his wife was still in the back of the car, they brought her out too. Then they “told us to go straight and not look back”.

The couple walked through the wilderness, he said, and with “great difficulty” reached Panir Railway Station at about 1900, where they rested.

His wife recalled the moment the Pakistan military arrived to meet them.

“They told me, ‘ma’am, come inside with us, we will take you home safely,'” she said. The soldiers took the couple to the town of Machh, she added, “and then we reached Quetta to our children, who were waiting for us”.

Some passengers who managed to leave the train late on Tuesday evening said they walked for nearly four hours to reach the next railway station. They included Muhammad Ashraf, who had been riding the train to Lahore to visit his family.

“We reached the station with great difficulty,” he told BBC Urdu, “because we were tired and there were children and women with us.”

As night descended over the Jaffar Express, scores of BLA militants began to depart, according to the police official who did not wish to named.

“Many of them hugged each other and 70, 80 people left while 20, 25 stayed behind,” he said.

At about 10pm, he recalled, violence erupted again.

“Some people tried to run away, they [the BLA] saw them and opened fire, then everyone fell to the ground,” the official said.

Mr Mehboob similarly recalled gunfire throughout the night – and said that at one point, a person close to him, who had five daughters, was shot.

“When someone is killed in front of your eyes, you don’t know what to do,” he said.

Another passenger, Allahditta, said his cousin was killed in front of him by the BLA. He said his cousin was pleading to the militants to not kill him as he had young daughters but “his life was not spared”.

The BBC on Wednesday saw dozens of wooden coffins being loaded at Quetta railway station. A railway official said they were empty and being transported to collect casualties.

It was during the time of morning prayer on Wednesday that rescuers from the FC started firing on the BLA militants, Mr Allahditta said.

Amid the sudden chaos, he and others broke free.

“When the FC opened fire at the time of the Fajr call to prayer, we escaped from the militants,” Mr Allahdita said.

The police official similarly recalled the moment when the FC moved in, briefly diverting the BLA militants’ focus away from the hostages.

“When the FC arrived in the morning, the attention of these people turned to this direction,” the official said. “I told my companion, ‘Let’s try to run away.'”

Militants fired on the escapees as they fled, and the official said his companion was hit from behind.

“He told me to let go of him. I said no, I’ll carry you on my shoulder. Then another person also joined hands and we went down the hills and out of firing range.”

Mr Mehboob, Mr Allahdita, the police official and his companion all managed to escape the Jaffar Express alive as the FC attacked the militants.

Military and paramilitary troops and helicopters had surrounded the stranded train since Tuesday. On Wednesday, they killed the hostage-takers and cleared the site, according to a military spokesperson.

Authorities said there were 440 passengers on the train – and 300 of them have been freed. But it’s still unclear what happened to the remaining 140. Reuters and AFP quoted an unnamed security official who said some miliants had left, taking an unknown number of passengers with them.

The military says it is still working to find passengers who escaped and fled into the surrounding area, and insists that any others involved in the hijacking would be brought to justice.

Mr Noor, who is now distributing alms and charity in his hometown along with his wife, is just grateful to have escaped the situation with his life.

“Thank God,” Mr Noor said. “He saved us.”

Donald Trump’s arrival to the White House is a “a major blow to global climate action”. So said Christiana Figueres, the former UN climate chief, after he was elected for a second term in November.

Since taking office Trump has withdrawn the US from what is considered the most important global climate pact, the Paris Climate Agreement. He has also reportedly prevented US scientists from participating in international climate research and removed national electric vehicle targets.

Plus he derided his predecessor’s attempts to develop new green technology a “green new scam”.

And yet despite his history on the issue of climate, Trump has been eager to make a deal with the Ukrainian president on critical minerals. He has also taken a strong interest in Greenland and Canada – both nations rich in critical minerals.

Critical mineral procurement has been a major focus for Trump since he took office. These minerals are crucial in industries including aerospace and defence, but intriguingly, they have another major use too – to manufacture green technology.

So, could Trump’s focus on obtaining these minerals have a knock-on effect and help unlock the US’s potential in the green technology sector?

Trump’s right-hand man understands more than most the importance of critical minerals in the green transition. Space X and Tesla – the companies Elon Musk leads – rely heavily on critical minerals like graphite (in electric vehicles), lithium (in batteries) and nickel (in rockets).

Dr Elizabeth Holley, associate professor of mining engineering at Colorado School of Mines, explains that each nation has its own list of critical minerals, but they are generally made up of rare earths and other metals like lithium.

She says demand is booming – in 2023, demand for lithium grew by 30%. This is being driven mostly by the rapid growth in the clean energy and electric vehicle sectors.

Within two decades they will make up almost 90% of the demand for lithium, 70% of the demand for cobalt, and 40% for rare earths, according to the International Energy Agency.

Such has been Musk’s concern with getting hold of some of these minerals that three years ago he tweeted: “Price of lithium has gone to insane levels! Tesla might actually have to get into the mining & refining directly at scale, unless costs improve.”

He went on to write that there is no shortage of the element but pace of extraction is slow.

The weakness of the US position in rare earths and critical minerals (such as cobalt and nickel) was addressed in a report published by a US Government Select Committee in December 2023. It said: “The United States must rethink its policy approach to critical mineral and rare earth element supply chains because of the risks posed by our current dependence on the People’s Republic of China.”

Failure to do so, it warned, could cause “defense production to grind to a halt and choke off manufacturing of other advanced technologies”.

China’s dominance in the market has come from its early recognition of the economic opportunities that green technology offers.

“China made a decision about 10 years ago about where the trend was going and has strategically pursued the development of not just renewables but also electric vehicles and now dominates the market,” says Bob Ward, policy director at The London School of Economics (LSE) Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment.

Daisy Jennings-Gray, head of prices at price reporting agency Benchmark Mineral Intelligence explains that they are critical minerals because they are geologically restricted. “You cannot guarantee you will have economically recoverable reserves in every country.”

Some minerals like lithium are abundant on Earth but often they are located in difficult to reach places, so the logistics of a mining project can be very expensive. In other cases, there is dependency on one country that produces a large share of global supply – like cobalt from the The Democratic Republic of Congo. This means that if there is a natural disaster or political unrest it has an impact on the price, says Ms Jennings-Gray.

China has managed to shore up supply by investing heavily in Africa and South America, but where it really has a stronghold on the market is in processing (or the separation of the mineral from other elements in the rock).

“China accounts for 60 percent of global rare earth production but processes nearly 90 percent – [it] is dominant on this stage,” says Gracelin Baskaran, director of the critical minerals security program at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C.

She says the country understands how important this is in economic trade – a few days after Trump introduced tariffs on China its government hit back by imposing export controls on more than 20 critical minerals including graphite and tungsten.

What is motivating Trump is a fear of being at a disadvantage, argues Christopher Knittel, professor of applied economics at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

“I think what is driving this is because China is the dominant player on the processing side,” he says. “It is that processing stage, which is the high margin stage of the business, so China is making a lot of money.”

As he puts it, it is a “happy coincidence” that this could end up supporting green technology.

The key question though is whether the US is too late to fully capitalise on the sector?

In the early days, the green transition was “framed as a burden” for countries, according to LSE’s Bob Ward.

The Biden administration was highly supportive of green technology industries through its introduction of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) in August 2022, which offers tax credits, loans and other incentives to technologies that reduce greenhouse gas emissions, from battery technologies for electric vehicles to solar panels.

By August 2024 it was estimated to have brought $493bn (£382bn) of investment to US green industry, according to the think tank Clean Investment Monitor.

And yet little work was done to support upstream processes like obtaining critical minerals, says Ms Gray from Benchmark Intelligence. Instead, the Biden administration focused heavily on downstream manufacturing – the process of getting products from the manufacturer to the end consumer.

But Trump’s recent moves to procure these critical minerals suggest a focus on the upstream process may now be happening.

“The IRA put a lot of legislation in places to limit trade and supply only from friendly nations.

“Trump is changing tact and looking at securing critical minerals agreements that owes something to the US,” explains Ms Gray.

There could be further moves from Trump coming down the line. Those working in the sector say whispers in the corridors of the White House suggest that he may be about to pass a “Critical Minerals Executive Order,” which could funnel further investment into this objective.

The exact details that may be included in the executive order remain unclear, but experts knowledgeable with the issue have said it may include measures to accelerate mining in the US, including fast tracking permits and investment to construct processing plants.

Although work may now be under way to secure these minerals, Prof Willy Shih of Harvard Business School thinks that the US administration lacks understanding of the technical complexity of establishing mineral supply chains, and emphasises the time commitment required. “If you want to build a new mine and processing facility it might take you 10 years.”

As a policy of his predecessor and one that is so obviously pro-climate action, Trump has been vocally opposed to maintaining the IRA. But its success in red states mean that many Republican senators have been trying to convince him to keep it in some form in his proposed “big, beautiful bill” – the plan to pile all of Trump’s main policy goals into one mega-bill – due to be revealed later this month.

Analysis by the Clean Investment Monitor shows in the last 18 months Republican-held states had received 77% of the investment.

MIT’s Dr Knittel says for states like Georgia, which has become part of what is now known as the “battery belt” following a boom in battery production following IRA support, these tax credits are crucial for these industries to survive.

He adds that failure to do so poses a real political threat for US representatives who are up for re-election in less than two years.

If Trump loses even just one seat to the Democrats in the 2026 mid-terms, then he loses the house majority – limiting his ability to pass key pieces of legislation.

Carl Fleming was an advisor to former President Biden’s Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Advisory Committee and is a partner at law firm McDermott, Will & Emery advising clients in the clean tech and energy space. He says that despite the uncertainty investors remain confident. “In the last month my practice has been busier than ever, and this is since quadrupling last year following the IRA.”

He also believes that there is a recognition of the need to maintain parts of the IRA – although this may be alongside expansion of some fossil fuels. “If you are really trying to be America first and energy secure you want to pull on all your levers. Keep solar and keep battery storage going and add more natural gas to release America’s energy prowess.”

But the uncertainty of the US position is little consolation for its absence on the international climate stage, says LSE’s Bob Ward. “When the Americans are on the ball it helps to move people in the right direction and that’s how we got the Paris Climate Agreement.”

For those in the climate space Trump is certainly not an environmentalist. What’s clear is he is not concerned with making his legacy an environmental one but an economic one – though he could achieve the former if he can be convinced it will boost the economy.

Belgian police have raided several locations in the country as part of an investigation into corruption within the European Parliament.

Prosecutors said the alleged corruption was “under the guise of commercial lobbying”, and that several people had been detained for questioning.

According to officials, an address in Portugal was also searched by local police, while in France, one person was arrested.

Belgian newspaper Le Soir said the investigation was linked to Chinese tech giant Huawei and its activities in Brussels since 2021. Huawei said it was taking the allegations “seriously” and would “urgently communicate with the investigation”.

The Belgian prosecutor’s office said: “Corruption was allegedly practised regularly and very discreetly from 2021 to the present day, under the guise of commercial lobbying and taking various forms, such as compensation for political positions or excessive gifts such as food and travel expenses, or regular invitations to football matches.”

In a statement to the BBC, a spokesperson for Huawei said it had “a zero-tolerance policy towards corruption or other wrongdoing, and we are committed to complying with all applicable laws and regulations at all times”.

Le Soir reported that several people suspected of being lobbyists working for Huawei were detained, over the alleged bribery of current or former members of the European Parliament (MEP) to promote the company’s trade policy.

Belgian police sealed two offices inside the European Parliament at the request of the judge in charge of the case.

A spokesperson for the the prosecutor’s office told the BBC no MEPs had been directly targeted by Thursday’s raids.

A total of 21 raids were conducted in Brussels, Flanders and Wallonia, the prosecutor’s office told the newspaper.

The investigation focuses on “active corruption within the European Parliament” as well as “forgery and use of forged documents”, all within the framework of a “criminal organisation”, the prosecutor’s office said, adding that it was also looking to uncover possible money laundering.

Arizona Congressman Raul Grijalva, a Democrat, has died from complications related to his cancer treatments, according to a statement from his office. He was 77.

Grijalva announced last April that we was battling cancer but did not specify which type.

He was first elected to the House in 2002 and served as the long-tenured member of Arizona’s congressional delegation.

Grijalva “fought a long and brave battle”, the statement read, saying he died on Thursday morning.

He spent over two decades in Congress, representing constituents in Tuscon, Yuma and Nogales.

Grijalva started his political career as a community organiser, often focusing on environmental issues.

After being elected to Congress, he served as the top Democrat on the House Committee on Natural Resources.

“Rep Grijalva’s kind and humble nature was known to many,” his office said.

“He was approachable by all because he believed people should be treated as equals. He loved to give gifts, blare music in his office, and get to know people for who they are.”

in Congress, Grijavla also focused on student loan forgiveness, immigrant issues and the expansion of childhood education.

“We are heartbroken in the face of this news but determined to carry on his legacy.”

His office will continue to help with constituent services while a special election is held to fill Grijalva’s seat, it said.

Germany’s foreign intelligence service believed there was a 80-90% chance that coronavirus accidentally leaked from a Chinese lab, German media say.

Two German newspapers say they have uncovered details of an assessment carried out by spy agency BND in 2020 but never published.

The intelligence service had indications that the Wuhan Institute of Virology had been carrying out experiments where viruses are modified to become more transmissible to humans for research, they say.

China repeated its denial saying the cause “should be determined by scientists” – and pointed to a World Health Organization investigation which found the lab-leak theory was “extremely unlikely”.

There is no consensus on the cause of the Covid pandemic.

The lab leak hypothesis has been hotly contested by scientists, including many who say there is no definitive evidence to back it up.

But the once controversial theory has been gaining ground among some intelligence agencies – and the BND is the latest to entertain the theory. In January, the US CIA said the coronavirus was “more likely” to have leaked from a lab than to have come from animals.

According to Die Zeit and Sueddeutscher Zeitung, the BND met in Berlin in 2020 to look into the origin of coronavirus in an operation called Project Saaremaa.

It assessed the lab theory as “likely”, although it did not have definitive proof.

The BND also found indications that several violations of safety regulations had occurred at the lab.

The assessment was commissioned by the office of Angela Merkel, Germany’s chancellor at the time, but was never publicly known of until now.

According to the papers, the findings were shared with the CIA in autumn of last year.

In January this year, the CIA said that a “research-related origin” of the pandemic was more likely than a natural origin “based on the available body of reporting” – although it cautioned it had “low confidence” in this determination.

Both the BND and outgoing chancellor Olaf Scholz declined to comment.

China’s foreign ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning said in response: “We believe that tracing the origin of Covid-19 is a scientific issue that should be determined by scientists with a scientific approach.

“The conclusion that a laboratory leak is extremely unlikely was reached by the China-WHO joint expert team after on-site visits to relevant labs in Wuhan and in-depth discussions with researchers.

“This authoritative scientific conclusion has been widely recognised by the international community and the scientific community.

“China firmly opposes any form of political manipulation on the issue of Covid-19 origin tracing.”

The WHO investigation in early 2021 saw a team of scientists fly to Wuhan on a mission to look into the source of the pandemic.

After spending 12 days there, which included a visit to the laboratory, the team concluded the lab-leak theory was “extremely unlikely”.

But many have since questioned their findings, with one prominent group of scientists criticising the WHO report for not taking the lab-leak theory seriously enough – it was dismissed in a few pages of a several-hundred-page report.

Supporters of the natural origin hypothesis – which was backed in the WHO report – say Covid-19 emerged in bats and then jumped to humans, most likely through another animal, or “intermediary host”.

This hypothesis was widely accepted at the start of the pandemic, but as time has worn on, scientists have not found a virus in either bats or another animal that matches the genetic make-up of Covid-19, leading some to doubt the theory.

Immigration officials have removed all migrants being held at Guantanamo Bay and returned them to the US, just weeks after sending the first batch to the US military base in Cuba.

According to US media reports, all the remaining migrants detained there were transported to another immigration facility in Louisiana.

In February, a separate group of migrants were abruptly moved from the facility after only a few weeks.

Shortly after taking office in January, President Donald Trump ordered that an existing facility used to hold migrants in Guantanamo Bay be expanded to hold some 30,000 people.

But so far, only a few hundred appear to have been sent there.

In response to a query from the BBC, a defence official confirmed that as of 13 March, there were no undocumented migrants being held at any facility in Guantanamo.

It is unclear why the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has brought the latest group of migrants held at Guantanamo back to the US. It declined the BBC’s request for comment.

The move, however, comes just days before a federal judge is due to hear a legal challenge on the legality of the federal government’s move to send migrants to Guantanamo, in a lawsuit filed by a coalition of human rights groups, including the American Civil Liberties Union.

US media report that 40 migrants were flown from Guantanamo to Alexandria in Louisiana on Tuesday and Wednesday, where Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) has a processing facility.

A facility used to hold migrants at Guantanamo, called the Guantanamo Migrant Operations Center, has been used by both Republican and Democratic administrations for decades – a practice long-criticised by some human rights groups.

Another facility, a high-security military prison once used to house detainees suspected of terrorism offences, is also located at Guantanamo.

The Washington Post reports that as of 10 March, 23 migrants were still being held in the military detention facility, while 17 others were detained in the Migrant Operations Center, citing a Pentagon official.

Last week, a defence official told the BBC the US military had last received a request from DHS to transport undocumented migrants to Guantanamo Bay on 1 March, adding that it stood ready to assist if additional flights are requested.

The expansion of the existing migrant centre at Guantanamo is part of a wider effort to dramatically overhaul the US immigration system, which has included promises of mass deportations.

At a signing ceremony early in his term, Trump said that the facility would largely be used to hold undocumented migrants deemed to be dangerous criminals or national security risks.

“Some of them are so bad we don’t even trust the countries to hold them, because we don’t want them coming back,” he said of migrants. “So we’re going to send them to Guantanamo… it’s a tough place to get out.”

The administration’s “border tsar”, Tom Homan, defended the use of the facility as recently as last week and said that plans for its expansion were still under way.

On 4 March, for example, he said the facility was “the perfect place for the worst of the worst” and that plans for its expansion were still in place.

Court documents filed late last week show that about 300 migrants from 27 countries have gone through the facility.

Two separate lawsuits have been filed challenging migrant detention in such facilities.

In one case, a coalition of legal aid organisations is seeking a court order allowing detainees at the facility access to attorneys, including in-person visits.

A second lawsuit directly challenges the legality of transferring migrants detained in the US to Guantanamo.

India’s largest telecoms company Reliance Jio and its rival Bharti Airtel have signed separate deals with Elon Musk’s SpaceX to bring the Starlink internet service to the country.

The move has caught most analysts by surprise, as Musk has publicly clashed with both companies recently.

It comes as Indian and US officials discuss a trade deal. US President Donald Trump has threatened to impose retaliatory tariffs on 2 April.

The agreements, touted to expand satellite internet coverage across India, are still conditional upon SpaceX obtaining the Indian government’s approval to begin operations.

Starlink had 4.6 million subscribers across the world, as of 2024.

SpaceX has been aiming to launch services in India since 2021, but regulatory hurdles have delayed its arrival.

Both Jio and Airtel say they will leverage their mobile network along with Starlink to deliver broadband services to communities and businesses across the country, including in rural and remote regions.

Jio will offer Starlink equipment in its retail outlets and online stores along with providing installation support for the devices, while Airtel says it is exploring the same.

Airtel also says the tie-up, along with an existing deal with Starlink rival Eutelsat OneWeb, would help to expand its connectivity.

Many had not anticipated Starlink’s simultaneous deals with Jio Platforms and Airtel.

Up until the announcement, Jio was seen as Starlink’s biggest competitor in India’s satellite broadband market.

Billionaires Mukesh Ambani and Sunil Bharti Mittal, who own Jio and Airtel respectively, had jointly opposed Musk’s demand to administratively allocate satellite spectrum.

Mr Musk had argued that spectrum should be allotted as this would align with international standards.

Ambani and Mittal had wanted it to be auctioned instead in a competitive bidding process.

Last October, in a major win for Musk, the Indian government announced that spectrum would be allocated administratively.

The tie-ups come off the back of that policy and Musk’s meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Washington last month, during which they discussed cooperation in areas of space technology and mobility.

Musk’s influence on the US government is “sky-high” and “probably a good reason why Delhi took a contrarian position with respect to Jio’s ask for spectrum auction rather than allocation, which is rare”, says Prasanto K Roy, a technology analyst.

India is the world’s second largest internet market but more than 670 million of its 1.4 billion people have no access to the internet, according to a 2024 report by GSMA, a trade body representing mobile network operators worldwide.

Satellite broadband provides internet access anywhere within the satellite’s coverage.

This makes it a reliable option for remote or rural areas where traditional services like DSL – a connection that uses telephone lines to transmit data – or cable are unavailable. It also helps to bridge the hard-to-reach digital divide.

“Starlink is a clear winner here,” says Tarun Pathak, an analyst at Counterpoint Research. If approved, the tie-ups give Musk access to 70% of India’s mobile users.

Musk has been “eyeing a presence [in India] because its size will also give him economies of scale” given how expensive satellite internet is, he says.

These partnerships are also a quick way for Starlink to comply with India’s data localisation laws, he adds.

For consumers, how the services are priced will be key, given mobile data in India is among the cheapest globally.

Satellite broadband plans cost around $150 a month, whereas mobile data is 150 rupees ($2; £1.33).

But a partnership with both Airtel and Jio could help bring prices down to around 3,000 rupees, says Roy.

“Also, pricing may be better from Musk’s point of view and not rock-bottom, with Jio and Airtel offering the same services,” he says.

For Airtel and Jio, the partnership with Musk is a clear result of the telecoms policy not favouring them, analysts say.

“Jio was hoping that it would raise the entry barriers for others by pressing for the auction route. But since that hasn’t happened, they must have felt it is better to change tack and do a tie-up,” says Roy.

Pathak says the Indian government, on the other hand, possibly felt it would be better to “co-operate” rather than “compete” with Musk with Trump’s tariffs looming and a trade deal under discussion.

A United Nations judge has been convicted of forcing a young woman to work as a slave.

Prosecutors said Lydia Mugambe “took advantage of her status” over her victim by preventing her from holding down steady employment while forcing her to work as her maid and provide childcare for free.

The 49-year-old, who is also a High Court judge in Uganda, was found guilty of conspiring to facilitate the commission of a breach of UK immigration law, facilitating travel with a view to exploitation, forcing someone to work, and conspiracy to intimidate a witness..

She will be sentenced at Oxford Crown Court on May 2.

In footage released by Thames Valley Police, Mugambe appeared shocked when an officer said he was arresting her under the Modern Slavery Act.

She then had a conversation with the officer, in which she said: “I am a judge in my country, I even have immunity. I am not a criminal.”

Asked to reaffirm that she had immunity, Mugambe told the officer: “Yes, I have a diplomatic passport.”

The conversation ended with the defendant saying: “I came here as a student, I don’t need anyone to work for me.

“I didn’t come with her, she asked me because she has worked at my home before, she asked me.”

Gasps were heard from the public gallery as the verdicts were given, and the court was cleared as the defendant appeared unwell.

Caroline Haughey KC, prosecuting, told jurors during the trial: “Lydia Mugambe has exploited and abused [her alleged victim], taking advantage of her lack of understanding of her rights to properly paid employment and deceiving her as to the purpose of her coming to the UK.”

She alleged Mugambe, who was studying for a law PhD at the University of Oxford, had conspired with Ugandan deputy high commissioner John Leonard Mugerwa to arrange for the young woman to come to the UK.

Prosecutors said the pair participated in a “very dishonest” trade-off, in which Mr Mugerwa arranged for the Ugandan High Commission to sponsor the woman’s entrance into the UK.

In exchange Mugambe would attempt to speak to a judge who was in charge of legal action Mr Mugerwa was named in, jurors heard.

She was also found guilty of conspiring to intimidate the woman to withdraw her support for the prosecution, and to have the charges against her dropped.

Mugambe’s trial heard she had the intention of “obtaining someone to make her life easier and at the least possible cost to herself”.

She denied forcing the young Ugandan woman to do household chores and said she “always” treated her with love, care and patience.

The young woman Mugambe tricked into coming to the UK, who cannot be named for legal reasons, told the court previously she felt “lonely” and “stuck” after her working hours were limited.

According to her UN profile page, Mugambe was appointed to the body’s judicial roster in May 2023, three months after police were called to her address in Oxfordshire.

Thames Valley Police commander for Oxfordshire, Ch Supt Ben Clark, said: “Lydia Mugambe is an extremely qualified lawyer, a Ugandan High Court judge and a UN Criminal Tribunal judge.

“After the offences had been reported to the police, Mugambe tried to evade justice by repeatedly claiming she had diplomatic immunity due to her status.

“Any immunity Mugambe may have enjoyed as a UN judge has been waivered by the Office of the United Nations Secretary General.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin said he agreed with the idea of a ceasefire in Ukraine, but that “questions” remained about the nature of a truce as he set out a number of tough conditions.

The Russian president was responding to a plan for a 30-day ceasefire, which Ukraine agreed to earlier this week after talks with the US.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky described Putin’s response to the plan as “manipulative” and called for more sanctions on Russia.

Meanwhile, the US placed further sanctions on Russian oil, gas and banking sectors.

Speaking at a news conference in Moscow on Thursday, Putin said of the ceasefire proposal: “The idea is right – and we support it – but there are questions that we need to discuss.”

A ceasefire should lead to “an enduring peace and remove the root causes of this crisis”, Putin said.

“We need to negotiate with our American colleagues and partners,” he said. “Maybe I’ll have a call with Donald Trump.”

Putin added: “It will be good for the Ukrainian side to achieve a 30-day ceasefire.

“We are in favour of it, but there are nuances.”

One of the areas of contention is Russia’s Kursk region, Putin said, where Ukraine launched a military incursion last year and captured some territory.

He claimed Russia was fully back in control of Kursk, and said Ukrainian troops there “have been isolated”.

“They are trying to leave, but we are in control. Their equipment has been abandoned.”

“There are two options for Ukrainians in Kursk – surrender or die.”

Outlining some of his questions over how a ceasefire would work, Putin asked: “How will those 30 days be used? For Ukraine to mobilise? Rearm? Train people? Or none of that? Then a question – how will that be controlled?”

“Who will give the order to end the fighting? At what cost? Who decides who has broken any possible ceasefire, over 2,000km? All those questions need meticulous work from both sides. Who polices it?”

• Is Putin ready for a ceasefire or playing for time?

Putin “doesn’t say no directly”, Zelensky said in his nightly video address, but “in practice, he’s preparing a rejection”.

“Putin, of course, is afraid to tell President Trump directly that he wants to continue this war, wants to kill Ukrainians.”

The Russian leader had set so many pre-conditions “that nothing will work out at all”, Zelensky said.

After Putin’s remarks and Zelensky’s response, there is now a clear divide between both sides’ positions.

Ukraine wants a two-stage process: a quick ceasefire and then talks about a longer-term settlement.

Russia believes you cannot separate the two processes and all the issues should be decided in a single deal. Both sides seem content to argue their differences.

Ukraine believes it can put pressure on Russia, painting it as a reluctant peacemaker, playing for time. Russia, equally, believes it has a chance now to raise its fundamental concerns, about Nato expansion and Ukraine’s sovereignty.

But this presents a problem for Donald Trump. He has made it clear he wants a quick result, ending the fighting in days.

And right now, Putin does not appear to want to play ball.

Speaking at the White House following Putin’s remarks, Trump said he would “love” to meet the Russian leader and that he hoped Russia would “do the right thing” and agree to the proposed 30-day truce.

“We’d like to see a ceasefire from Russia,” he said.

Speaking earlier at a meeting in the Oval Office with Nato Secretary General Mark Rutte, Trump told reporters he had already discussed specifics with Ukraine.

“We’ve been discussing with Ukraine land and pieces of land that would be kept and lost, and all of the other elements of a final agreement,” Trump said.

“A lot of the details of a final agreement have actually been discussed.”

On the subject of Ukraine joining the Nato military alliance, Trump said “everybody knows what the answer to that is”.

The fresh sanctions on Russian oil and gas came as the Trump administration further restricted access to US payment systems, making it harder for other countries to buy Russian oil.

Meanwhile, Putin met US special envoy Steve Witkoff behind closed doors in Moscow.

Earlier in the day, Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov rejected the ceasefire proposal put forward by the US.

On Wednesday, the Kremlin released a video it said showed Putin visiting Russia’s Kursk region, symbolically dressed in military fatigues. Russia later said it recaptured the key town of Sudzha.

Russia launched a full-scale invasion in February 2022, and now controls about 20% of Ukrainian territory.

More than 95,000 people fighting for Russia’s military have died in the war.

Ukraine last updated its casualty figures in December 2024, when President Volodymyr Zelensky acknowledged 43,000 Ukrainian deaths among soldiers and officers. Western analysts believe this figure to be underestimated.

Passengers on an American Airlines flight were evacuated onto the tarmac of a Colorado airport as a fire broke out on the plane, sending smoke billowing into the air.

No injuries were reported in the incident.

Footage of the evacuation showed passengers huddled on the wing of the Boeing airliner, some holding bags, with flames burning near the bottom of the plane.

The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said passengers used inflatable slides to reach the ground safely at the Denver International Airport. The agency said it would investigate the cause of the incident.

The flight took off from nearby Colorado Springs and was on the way to Dallas Fort Worth International Airport in Texas, the FAA said in a statement to the BBC.

The plane diverted to Denver around 17:15 pm local time (23:15 GMT) after the crew reported “engine vibrations,” the FAA said.

After the flight landed, it caught fire while taxiing on the tarmac at the airport.

American Airlines said the plane had 172 passengers on board, along with six crew members. All were evacuated safely, the company said.

It said the plane was a Boeing 737-800 and experienced an “engine-related issue”.

Smoke and flames were visible from various gates at the airport, according to airport spokesman Michael Konopasek. He said the fire was doused and it did not lead to delays for other flights.

Some of those inside the airport posted videos on social media showing the plane’s passengers walking toward the edge of the wing as large clouds of black smoke filled the air.

Grounds crew can be seen rushing to the wing while pushing ladders.

Video showed active flames under the plane’s right engine as an inflatable evacuation slide appeared at the aircraft’s rear door.

The incident comes after a recent string of high-profile accidents in North America have raised concerns about aviation safety.

A fatal crash in Washington DC left 67 people dead when an American Airlines regional jet collided mid-air with a US Army Black Hawk helicopter. The crash in the US capital city led to questions about air traffic controller shortages and their workloads.

US President Donald Trump’s administration has also terminated hundreds of FAA probationary workers as part of government cost-saving efforts.

The layoffs happened weeks after the fatal DC crash.

The laid off FAA employees included maintenance mechanics, environmental compliance workers and technical assistants.

Trump has pushed to reduce government spending with tech billionaire Elon Musk spearheading efforts as part of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).

Sam Jones, an American influencer who briefly snatched a baby wombat from its distressed mother and uploaded the footage to social media has left Australia.

Australia’s Home Affairs minister Tony Burke had earlier said his department was reviewing if it could revoke Ms Jones’s visa, but the BBC understands that she left the country of her own accord.

“There has never been a better time to be a baby wombat,” Burke said in a short statement on Friday celebrating Jones’s departure.

Anger erupted across Australia after Jones posted a video of her taking a baby wombat from the side of a road while laughing and running away from the distraught mother wombat.

The video also shows the baby wombat hissing in distress before Jones then returns it to the bush.

Jones, who also goes by the name Samantha Strable, has nearly 100,000 followers and describes herself as an “outdoor enthusiast and hunter” on her Instagram profile. She has since made her account private and deleted her post.

Her video was swiftly met with widespread condemnation, with Australia Prime Minister Anthony Albanese calling the incident an “outrage”.

Foreign minister Penny Wong called the video “dreadful”.

On Friday, opposition leader Peter Dutton said he thought it was “a cruel act” and that he was “glad” the influencer has now left.

An online petition demanding Jones be deported from Australia garnered more than 30,000 signatures.

However, as Jones had not been charged nor been deemed a threat to the country – the government may not have had any grounds to cancel her visa.

In since-deleted comments, Ms Jones said “the baby was carefully held for one minute in total and then released back to mom”.

“They wandered back off into the bush together completely unharmed,” she wrote. “I don’t ever capture wildlife that will be harmed by my doing so.”

But wildlife experts have deemed Jones’s act a “blatant disregard” for native wildlife.

The Wombat Protection Society said it was shocked to see the “mishandling of a wombat joey in an apparent snatch for ‘social media likes'”.

Suzanne Milthorpe, Head of Campaigns at World Animal Protection Australia, told BBC Newsday that posting such a video for “cheap content” was “unacceptable”.

“To that baby it must have seemed like a giant predator was picking it up and taking it away,” she said.

Wombats, which are native to Australia, are a legally protected species across the country. Baby wombats share a strong bond with their mothers, and any separation can be distressing and harmful, conservationists say.

US President Donald Trump has pledged to impose more tariffs after his latest move to introduce import taxes on steel and aluminium entering the US prompted retaliation from the European Union (EU) and Canada.

Trump said that “of course” he would respond to the countermeasures, repeating his warning to reveal “reciprocal” tariffs next month on countries around the world.

“Whatever they charge us with, we’re charging them,” he said.

The threat marked a further escalation of a trade war which has rattled financial markets amid concerns over the impact on the economies and consumers in many countries around the world, including the US.

On Wednesday, Trump moved forward with a plan to widen US tariffs on steel and aluminium, imposing a blanket duty of 25% and ending exemptions that the US had previously granted for shipments from some countries.

That followed an order earlier this month that raised levies on Chinese imports into the US to at least 20%.

Trump has also threatened tariffs – which are taxes applied to goods as they enter a country – on a range of more specific items, including copper, lumber and cars.

Leaders in Canada and Europe called the new metals taxes unjustified and struck back with their own tariffs on a range of US products.

Other countries that are key US suppliers of metals, including the UK, Australia, Mexico and Brazil, held off on any immediate retaliation.

“Like everybody else, I’m disappointed to see global tariffs in relation to steel and aluminium but we will take a pragmatic approach,” said UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer.

“We are…negotiating a deal which covers and includes tariffs if we succeed. But we will keep all options on the table.”

Canada said from Thursday it would start charging a 25% tax on nearly C$30bn ($20bn; £16bn) worth of US products, including steel, computers and sports equipment.

Prime Minister-designate Mark Carney said he was ready to negotiate a renewed trade deal with Trump, as long as there was “respect for Canadian sovereignty”.

The EU said it would raise its levies on up to €26bn ($28bn; £22bn) worth of US goods, including boats, bourbon and motorbikes, from 1 April.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the response was intended to be “strong but proportionate” and added that the EU stood “ready to engage in a meaningful dialogue”.

“Tariffs are taxes. They are bad for business and worse for consumers,” she said, warning the economic disruption put jobs at stake and would send prices higher.

“Nobody needs that – on both sides, neither in the European Union nor in the United States.”

Trump had said he wants to boost US steel and aluminium production in the longer run, but critics say in the immediate term the taxes on imports of the metals will raise prices for US consumers and dent economic growth.

Major packaged food makers including Quaker Oats and Folgers coffee asked Trump for targeted exemptions from tariffs on imports such as cocoa and fruit, according to a letter seen by Reuters.

PepsiCo, Conagra and J M Smucker, also requested the president exempt ingredients not available from US sources in the letter, which was sent by the trade group the Consumer Brands Association.

Coffee, oats, cocoa, spices, tropical fruit and tin mill steel, used for some food and household goods, are among the imports listed as unavailable domestically, Reuters reported.

The import taxes are also expected to reduce demand for steel and aluminium that is not made in the US – a blow to makers of the metals elsewhere.

The EU estimated that the latest US tariffs affect about 5% of its total exports to the US, while the US is the destination for roughly 90% of Canada’s steel and aluminium exports.

Shares in the US were mixed on Wednesday, after two days of sharp decline. The Dow closed down 0.2%, while the S&P 500 ended nearly 0.5% higher and the Nasdaq jumped 1.2%.

In an appearance at the White House with the Irish prime minister, Taoiseach Micheál Martin, Trump said he did not plan to back down from his trade fight, saying he was “not happy” with EU trade policies.

He cited concerns about legal penalties it has imposed on Apple and rules he claimed put US farm products and cars at a disadvantage.

“They’re doing what they should be doing perhaps for the European Union but it does create ill will,” he said.

Repeating his threat to hit European cars with tariffs, he added later: “We’re going to win that financial battle.”

The president of Poland, Andrzej Duda, has repeated his call for the US to base nuclear weapons on Polish soil.

In the presidential palace in Warsaw, he told me that it would make Poland stronger and safer, as it faces Russia.

Viewed from Poland, President Putin’s Russia is a clear and a present danger.

President Duda, who is also commander-in-chief of the rapidly expanding Polish armed forces, said today’s Russia is at least as aggressive as the former Soviet Union.

He condemned what he called Moscow’s imperial greed.

Positioning US nuclear weapons in Poland would be viewed by President Putin as a provocation.

But President Duda views the proposal as a defensive measure to strengthen deterrence.

He said it would be a response to President Putin’s 2023 decision to deploy Russian tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus, which has a border with Poland and Ukraine.

“It’s the same Russia that’s attacking Ukraine today, who is an aggressor, who is murdering civilians, who is bombing down civilian settlements,” he told me.

“And it’s moving its nuclear weapons from the depths of Russia to Belarus.”

“This defensive tactic is a vital response to Russia’s behaviour, relocating nuclear weapons in the NATO area. Poland is ready to host this nuclear weapon.”

President Duda also welcomed proposals made by France’s president, Emmanuel Macron, to extend the French nuclear weapons umbrella to other Nato states.

The US already rotates about 10,000 troops at a time through Poland.

When asked how the presence of nuclear weapons would make Poland safer, Mr Duda said it would deepen America’s commitment to Polish security.

“Every strategic kind of infrastructure, American and Nato infrastructure, which we have on our soil is strengthening the inclination of the US and the North Atlantic Alliance to defend this territory.”

Poland spends almost 5% of its national income on defence. That is more than any other member of Nato, including the United States.

Last week, Poland’s prime minister, Donald Tusk, made a speech in parliament warning that a “profound change in American geopolitics” was putting both Poland and Ukraine into an “objectively more difficult situation”.

Prime Minister Tusk called for further increases in Polish defence spending and proposed that Poland should consider reaching for “opportunities related to nuclear weapons.”

Mr Tusk is on the centre left, unlike President Duda who is on the right and considers himself a friend of Donald Trump.

Referring to President Putin’s refusal on Thursday to agree immediately to the 30-day ceasefire in Ukraine, Mr Duda said he was confident that the US president had a plan, as he put it, to “to encourage the Russian side to act reasonably”.

Mr Duda will not criticise Mr Trump nor accept that his actions and words have cast a doubt on the US commitment to Article 5, the mutual defence clause of the North Atlantic Treaty.

But he has much harsher words for Putin’s Russia than Donald Trump ever uses.

And he backs calls for the EU to seize Russian assets worth around 200 billion euros that have been frozen in European banks.

“I believe it is obvious that Russian assets collected and locked in banks in Western Europe should be used to support Ukraine, and it should be a double support,” he says.

“First of all, Ukraine should be supported in defending itself against the Russian aggression. And secondly, this should be used to support the rebuilding of Ukraine.”

“I cannot imagine that after the destruction of Ukraine, Russia can simply take this money away without paying war reparations and compensation.”

Donald Trump’s arrival to the White House is a “a major blow to global climate action”. So said Christiana Figueres, the former UN climate chief, after he was elected for a second term in November.

Since taking office Trump has withdrawn the US from what is considered the most important global climate pact, the Paris Climate Agreement. He has also reportedly prevented US scientists from participating in international climate research and removed national electric vehicle targets.

Plus he derided his predecessor’s attempts to develop new green technology a “green new scam”.

And yet despite his history on the issue of climate, Trump has been eager to make a deal with the Ukrainian president on critical minerals. He has also taken a strong interest in Greenland and Canada – both nations rich in critical minerals.

Critical mineral procurement has been a major focus for Trump since he took office. These minerals are crucial in industries including aerospace and defence, but intriguingly, they have another major use too – to manufacture green technology.

So, could Trump’s focus on obtaining these minerals have a knock-on effect and help unlock the US’s potential in the green technology sector?

Trump’s right-hand man understands more than most the importance of critical minerals in the green transition. Space X and Tesla – the companies Elon Musk leads – rely heavily on critical minerals like graphite (in electric vehicles), lithium (in batteries) and nickel (in rockets).

Dr Elizabeth Holley, associate professor of mining engineering at Colorado School of Mines, explains that each nation has its own list of critical minerals, but they are generally made up of rare earths and other metals like lithium.

She says demand is booming – in 2023, demand for lithium grew by 30%. This is being driven mostly by the rapid growth in the clean energy and electric vehicle sectors.

Within two decades they will make up almost 90% of the demand for lithium, 70% of the demand for cobalt, and 40% for rare earths, according to the International Energy Agency.

Such has been Musk’s concern with getting hold of some of these minerals that three years ago he tweeted: “Price of lithium has gone to insane levels! Tesla might actually have to get into the mining & refining directly at scale, unless costs improve.”

He went on to write that there is no shortage of the element but pace of extraction is slow.

The weakness of the US position in rare earths and critical minerals (such as cobalt and nickel) was addressed in a report published by a US Government Select Committee in December 2023. It said: “The United States must rethink its policy approach to critical mineral and rare earth element supply chains because of the risks posed by our current dependence on the People’s Republic of China.”

Failure to do so, it warned, could cause “defense production to grind to a halt and choke off manufacturing of other advanced technologies”.

China’s dominance in the market has come from its early recognition of the economic opportunities that green technology offers.

“China made a decision about 10 years ago about where the trend was going and has strategically pursued the development of not just renewables but also electric vehicles and now dominates the market,” says Bob Ward, policy director at The London School of Economics (LSE) Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment.

Daisy Jennings-Gray, head of prices at price reporting agency Benchmark Mineral Intelligence explains that they are critical minerals because they are geologically restricted. “You cannot guarantee you will have economically recoverable reserves in every country.”

Some minerals like lithium are abundant on Earth but often they are located in difficult to reach places, so the logistics of a mining project can be very expensive. In other cases, there is dependency on one country that produces a large share of global supply – like cobalt from the The Democratic Republic of Congo. This means that if there is a natural disaster or political unrest it has an impact on the price, says Ms Jennings-Gray.

China has managed to shore up supply by investing heavily in Africa and South America, but where it really has a stronghold on the market is in processing (or the separation of the mineral from other elements in the rock).

“China accounts for 60 percent of global rare earth production but processes nearly 90 percent – [it] is dominant on this stage,” says Gracelin Baskaran, director of the critical minerals security program at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C.

She says the country understands how important this is in economic trade – a few days after Trump introduced tariffs on China its government hit back by imposing export controls on more than 20 critical minerals including graphite and tungsten.

What is motivating Trump is a fear of being at a disadvantage, argues Christopher Knittel, professor of applied economics at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

“I think what is driving this is because China is the dominant player on the processing side,” he says. “It is that processing stage, which is the high margin stage of the business, so China is making a lot of money.”

As he puts it, it is a “happy coincidence” that this could end up supporting green technology.

The key question though is whether the US is too late to fully capitalise on the sector?

In the early days, the green transition was “framed as a burden” for countries, according to LSE’s Bob Ward.

The Biden administration was highly supportive of green technology industries through its introduction of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) in August 2022, which offers tax credits, loans and other incentives to technologies that reduce greenhouse gas emissions, from battery technologies for electric vehicles to solar panels.

By August 2024 it was estimated to have brought $493bn (£382bn) of investment to US green industry, according to the think tank Clean Investment Monitor.

And yet little work was done to support upstream processes like obtaining critical minerals, says Ms Gray from Benchmark Intelligence. Instead, the Biden administration focused heavily on downstream manufacturing – the process of getting products from the manufacturer to the end consumer.

But Trump’s recent moves to procure these critical minerals suggest a focus on the upstream process may now be happening.

“The IRA put a lot of legislation in places to limit trade and supply only from friendly nations.

“Trump is changing tact and looking at securing critical minerals agreements that owes something to the US,” explains Ms Gray.

There could be further moves from Trump coming down the line. Those working in the sector say whispers in the corridors of the White House suggest that he may be about to pass a “Critical Minerals Executive Order,” which could funnel further investment into this objective.

The exact details that may be included in the executive order remain unclear, but experts knowledgeable with the issue have said it may include measures to accelerate mining in the US, including fast tracking permits and investment to construct processing plants.

Although work may now be under way to secure these minerals, Prof Willy Shih of Harvard Business School thinks that the US administration lacks understanding of the technical complexity of establishing mineral supply chains, and emphasises the time commitment required. “If you want to build a new mine and processing facility it might take you 10 years.”

As a policy of his predecessor and one that is so obviously pro-climate action, Trump has been vocally opposed to maintaining the IRA. But its success in red states mean that many Republican senators have been trying to convince him to keep it in some form in his proposed “big, beautiful bill” – the plan to pile all of Trump’s main policy goals into one mega-bill – due to be revealed later this month.

Analysis by the Clean Investment Monitor shows in the last 18 months Republican-held states had received 77% of the investment.

MIT’s Dr Knittel says for states like Georgia, which has become part of what is now known as the “battery belt” following a boom in battery production following IRA support, these tax credits are crucial for these industries to survive.

He adds that failure to do so poses a real political threat for US representatives who are up for re-election in less than two years.

If Trump loses even just one seat to the Democrats in the 2026 mid-terms, then he loses the house majority – limiting his ability to pass key pieces of legislation.

Carl Fleming was an advisor to former President Biden’s Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Advisory Committee and is a partner at law firm McDermott, Will & Emery advising clients in the clean tech and energy space. He says that despite the uncertainty investors remain confident. “In the last month my practice has been busier than ever, and this is since quadrupling last year following the IRA.”

He also believes that there is a recognition of the need to maintain parts of the IRA – although this may be alongside expansion of some fossil fuels. “If you are really trying to be America first and energy secure you want to pull on all your levers. Keep solar and keep battery storage going and add more natural gas to release America’s energy prowess.”

But the uncertainty of the US position is little consolation for its absence on the international climate stage, says LSE’s Bob Ward. “When the Americans are on the ball it helps to move people in the right direction and that’s how we got the Paris Climate Agreement.”

For those in the climate space Trump is certainly not an environmentalist. What’s clear is he is not concerned with making his legacy an environmental one but an economic one – though he could achieve the former if he can be convinced it will boost the economy.

Outside the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) detention centre, where former Philippines president Rodrigo Duterte has been taken, his supporters gathered on Wednesday night, waving national flags and shouting, “Bring him back!” as a vehicle thought to be carrying him was driven through the imposing iron gates at speed.

Shortly before he landed in the Netherlands, the 79-year-old unapologetically defended his bloody “war on drugs” for which the ICC says there are “reasonable grounds” to charge him with murder as a crime against humanity.

Small-time drug dealers, users and others were killed without trial on his watch as mayor and, later, as president.

The official toll stands at 6,000, though activists believe the real figure could run into the tens of thousands.

Duterte said he cracked down on drug dealers to rid the country of street crimes.

However, rights groups allege that the campaign was rife with police abuse, targeting young men from the urban poor.

Duterte is the first Asian former head of state to be indicted by the ICC – and the first suspect to be flown to The Hague in three years.

And his arrival comes at a pivotal moment for the International Criminal Court.

Rodrigo Duterte’s arrest and deportation on Monday was the result of an unprecedented chain of events.

His supporters allege that the ICC is being used as a political tool by the country’s current president Ferdinand Marcos who has publicly fallen out with the powerful Duterte family.

The ICC is a court of last resort designed to hold the most powerful to account when domestic courts are unable or unwilling to do so. But this case is a reminder of the extent to which it depends on state co-operation in order to fulfil its mandate – it effectively has no power to arrest people without the co-operation of the countries they are in, which is most often refused.

In the case of Duterte, chances that he would ever be prosecuted by the ICC seemed unthinkable even in 2022, when his daughter, Vice-President Sara Duterte, allied with Marcos to create the powerful “uniteam” that swept presidential elections.

Up until a few months ago, Marcos had dismissed the idea of co-operating with the ICC.

But the pace at which Duterte was served an arrest warrant and extradited shows that when political winds shift, those once considered untouchable can find themselves touching down in The Hague.

The whole process of his extradition – from his detention in Manila to his arrival in The Hague – has been documented on social media by his daughter Kitty and Duterte himself through his aide. His plane was the most tracked on flight radar.

“I am the one who led our law enforcement and military. I said that I will protect you and I will be responsible for all of this,” he said on a Facebook video, one of many that was shared over more than 24 hours during his journey from Manila to The Hague.

It provided rare insight into what is usually an opaque process, and the world was able to follow, sometimes in real time, every step of it right down to the meals Duterte was served on board his chartered jet.

Duterte’s arrest now sends a strong signal that even powerful individuals may be held accountable for their actions, potentially deterring future abuses.

His case has also reignited debate about the ICC’s role in relation to national sovereignty, a concern often raised by non-member states like the United States, Russia, and China.

The court depends on its 128 members to fund and be the operational arm of this judicial body.

So Duterte’s headline-making arrival, followed by his first night in custody at The Hague, offer the court a much-needed win.

After serving two high-profile arrest warrants – one for the Russian president Vladimir Putin, and another for Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu over the war in Gaza – which are unlikely to be enforced, the arrival of Duterte will be put forth as proof the court is capable of bringing those accused of the gravest atrocities to face justice.

It is a litmus test for the ICC’s ability to function effectively in an increasingly polarised climate.

ICC prosecutor Karim Khan was recently sanctioned by Donald Trump over the arrest warrant issued for Benjamin Netanyahu.

The detention of Duterte provides him with a powerful response.

“Many say international law is not strong,” Karim Khan acknowledged. “But international law is not as weak as some may think. When we come together, when we build partnerships, the rule of law can prevail.”

The former Philippines president will now mark his 80th birthday this month in the ICC’s detention facility, located in the dunes of The Hague.

The facility, once a Nazi prison complex, provides each detainee with a private cell, access to computers, a library, and sports facilities.

If he isn’t satisfied with the meals provided, Duterte has the option to prepare his own food using a shopping list in the detention center’s kitchen. He will also have access to medical care, lawyers, and visitors.

He is expected to make his initial court appearance in the coming days, where he will confirm his identity, choose the language he wishes to follow proceedings in, and acknowledge the charges against him.

Following this public appearance, a confirmation of charges hearing will follow, during which the judges will decide whether the prosecution has presented a sufficient amount of evidence to proceed to trial.

If the charges are confirmed, it could be many months before he eventually goes on trial, and years before a final judgment.

Russia is ready for a halt in fighting, says Vladimir Putin, but “there are nuances”. Those nuances that he laid out ahead of talks with US envoys at the Kremlin are so key to his thinking they could scupper any hope of a 30-day ceasefire.

They are demands that he has had throughout Russia’s full-scale invasion, and before. And for Ukraine and its Western partners, many of them are going to prove unacceptable or impossible to fulfil.

“We agree with the proposals to cease hostilities,” he started positively, only to add: “This cessation must be such that it would lead to long-term peace and eliminate the root causes of this crisis.”

Nobody would disagree with the need for long-term peace, but Putin’s idea of the root causes of the war revolve around Ukraine’s desire to exist as a sovereign state, beyond Russia’s orbit.

Ukraine wants to be part of Nato and the European Union – so much so, it is enshrined in the constitution.

President Trump has already cast doubt on Nato membership, but Putin has repeatedly dismissed the idea of Ukraine as a state at all.

And that underpins many of the nuances he sketched out.

He wants to stop Ukraine from reinforcing its army and replenishing its weapons supply – so there would be no more deliveries from the West. He wants to know who would ensure that was verified.

From the start of this war, Putin has demanded the “demilitarisation” of Ukraine, which is anathema to Kyiv and its allies.

In essence, Putin is looking for security guarantees in reverse.

• Why did Putin’s Russia invade Ukraine?
• Ukraine in maps: Tracking the war in Russia

Would Russia agree to halt rearming or mobilising its forces? That seems implausible and there was no hint of any concession on his part, as he addressed reporters in the Kremlin.

Putin has just come back in bullish mood from a visit seemingly close to the front line in Kursk, a Russian border region that has been partially occupied since last August by Ukraine.

Russia has the upper hand in Kursk. Putin clearly feels he is negotiating from a position of strength and doesn’t want to lose it.

“If we stop military actions for 30 days, what does that mean? Will everyone who is there leave the battle?”

Russia’s defence ministry announced on Thursday that its forces had now taken full control of the biggest city the Ukrainians had managed to seize, Sudzha. Putin says all the Ukrainians have left is a wedge, so why would Russia stop now?

“If a physical blockade occurs in the coming days, no-one will be able to leave at all. There will be only two options – to surrender or die.”

The same applied to the whole of the 1,000km (620-mile) front line, where he claimed the situation on the ground was changing rapidly, with Russian troops “advancing in practically all areas”.

That is not the case, as most of the front is at a stalemate, even if Russia has had some recent success in the east.

Putin believes a 30-day ceasefire would deprive Russia of its advantage and enable the Ukrainians to regroup and rearm.

“What are our guarantees that nothing like that will be allowed to happen,” he asked rhetorically.

As yet, no mechanism has been offered to ensure that the terms of any ceasefire would hold.

Although 15 Western countries have tentatively offered peacekeeping troops, they would only come in the event of a final peace deal, not a ceasefire.

Not that Russia would allow that arrangement anyway.

Given all these “nuances”, Putin appeared to be sceptical of how a ceasefire could benefit Russia, especially when his troops were on the front foot. His entire outlook was “based on how the situation on the ground develops”.

Putin was meeting Trump’s envoys on Moscow late on Thursday, notably Steve Witkoff.

Whatever happens in those talks, Putin knows that ultimately, his most important conversation will be with the president.

“I think we need to talk to our American colleagues… maybe have a phone call with President Trump and discuss this with him,” he said.

But Putin was setting out his stall ahead of those conversations, with a message that the road to a ceasefire was littered with conditions that would be almost impossible to meet.

US President Donald Trump has threatened a 200% tariff on any alcohol coming to the US from the European Union (EU) in the latest twist of an escalating trade war.

The threat is a response to the EU’s plans for a 50% tax on imports of US-produced whiskey as part of its retaliation to Trump’s tariffs on all steel and aluminium imports to the US.

The US president called for the immediate removal of the EU’s “nasty” tariff on US whiskey, calling the bloc “hostile and abusive” and “formed for the sole purpose of taking advantage of the United States”.

A European Commission spokesperson said that “calls are being prepared” between between the US and the EU to discuss the situation.

It confirmed that its trade commissioner, Maroš Šefčovič, had “reached out to his American counterparts” after Trump’s latest threat.

The stand-off marked another escalation of a trade war which has rattled financial markets and raised concerns over the impact on the economies and consumers in many countries around the world, including the US.

Europe sends more than €4.5bn ($4.89bn; £3.78bn) worth of wine each year to the US, which is its largest export market, according to the Comité Européen des Entreprises Vins, which represents the European wine industry.

Ignacio Sánchez Recarte, secretary-general of the group, said if Trump carried through on his threats, it would destroy the market, costing thousands of jobs.

“There is no alternative to sell all this wine,” he said, pleading with the two sides to “keep wine out of this fight”.

• What are tariffs and why is Trump using them?
• Six things that could get more expensive for Americans under Trump tariffs
• Is the US really heading into a recession?

The latest clash came after new US tariffs on steel and aluminium came into effect on Wednesday, hitting imports of the metals with a blanket duty of 25% and ending exemptions from the duties that the US had previously granted for shipments from some countries, including from the EU and Canada.

Canada and Europe – which are among America’s biggest trade partners – called the new taxes unjustified and struck back with their own tariffs on a range of US products. The EU’s measures are due to go into force 1 April.

The clash reprises a battle that played out during Trump’s first term, when he first announced tariffs on steel and aluminium.

The EU responded with its own tariffs, including a 25% tax on American whiskey.

In the aftermath, whiskey sales to the EU dropped 20%, falling from roughly $552m in 2018 to $440m in 2021, according to the Distilled Spirits Council of the US. Trump in turn

The tariffs were lifted after Trump left office, after the two sides reached an agreement that exempted a certain amount of European metals from the duties.

But Trump has indicated little appetite for deal-making so far, at least when it comes to steel and aluminium.

“If this Tariff is not removed immediately, the US will shortly place a 200% Tariff on all wines, champagnes & alcoholic products coming out of France and other EU represented countries,” he wrote on social media, using all capital letters for some of the message.

The targeting of wine and whiskey is symbolic – there are few consumer goods more iconic than French Bordeaux or Tennessee whiskey. From a value standpoint, drinks trade is worth less than some of the other items facing tariffs.

But Mary Taylor, a US-based importer of European wines, said the measures would be catastrophic for her business and industry, with an impact that would ripple out to restaurants, bars and distributors across the US.

“It just looks like a big, giant threat to our livelihoods,” she said.

Ms Taylor, who brings in 2 million bottles a year, weathered the 25% tariff Trump put on certain EU bottles during his first term by expanding her distribution in Europe, but she said, “200% is a whole different ball game”.

Shares in the US fell again on Thursday.

The S&P 500 dropped nearly 1.4%, taking it down roughly 10% from its most recent peak – a milestone known as a correction. The Dow slumped 1.3%, while the Nasdaq dropped almost 2%.

In Europe, London’s FTSE 100 was flat, while Germany’s Dax ended about 0.5% lower.

In Paris, the Cac 40 fell 0.6%, as shares of major spirit-makers were hit, with Pernod Ricard down 4% and Hennessy cognac maker LVMH falling 1.1%.

In interviews with US business media on Thursday, White House officials blamed the EU for escalating the dispute.

“Why are Europeans picking on Kentucky bourbon or Harley-Davidson motorcycles? It’s disrespectful,” Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told Bloomberg Television, describing the back-and-forth as “off the topic”.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent warned that a trade war was likely to inflict more economic pain on the EU than on the US, dismissing concerns that the clash could spiral.

“One or two items, with one trading bloc – I’m not sure why that’s a big deal for the markets,” he said.

In an interview with the BBC’s HardTalk, European central bank president Christine Lagarde, said that the EU had “no choice” but to retaliate.

“At the moment, everybody is positioning,” she said, adding that she expected the two sides to sit down and negotiate.

“Everybody will suffer” if the dispute were to develop into a full blown trade war, she warned.

So far, Trump has shown little tolerance for retaliation from countries over the tariffs he has introduced.

Earlier this week, he blasted Canada with the threat of a 50% tariff on its steel and aluminium after the Canadian province of Ontario responded to new tariffs with a surcharge on electricity exports to the US.

He rescinded that threat after Ontario agreed to suspend the charges.

Former Trump adviser Stephen Moore, now an economist with the Heritage Foundation, said he thought the EU would have to make a concession to defuse the situation, noting that Trump had consistently voiced concerns about rules on agricultural products.

“Absolutely this is going to end up with a deal,” he said. “It’s only a question if it ends up in a deal in a day, a week, a month or six months, but there will eventually be a negotiated settlement.”

A plane carrying former Philippines president Rodrigo Duterte has arrived in the Netherlands where he is to face charges of crimes against humanity at the International Criminal Court (ICC) over his deadly “war on drugs”.

Duterte was arrested at Manila airport on Tuesday and within hours was on a chartered jet which flew via Dubai to The Hague, where the ICC sits.

The 79-year-old could become the first Asian former head of state to go on trial at the ICC.

Duterte, who contested his extradition, led the Philippines from 2016 to 2022 and presided over a violent “war on drugs” that saw thousands of small-time drug dealers, users and others killed without trial.

The Gulfstream G550 landed in Dubai for a stopover early on Wednesday and its expected departure was delayed for several hours while Duterte received medical checks, Reuters news agency reports.

Once the plane had landed in Rotterdam, the ICC confirmed that Duterte was in its custody to face charges “of murder as a crime against humanity”.

“A hearing will be scheduled in due course for Mr Duterte’s initial appearance before the Court.”

Meanwhile the former leaders’ supporters gathered outside The Hague Penitentiary Institution protesting his arrest. Many of them waved the Philippine flag, while others mimicked Duterte’s signature fist-pumping gesture.

“We stand with Duterte,” read a banner held up by supporters.

Duterte’s main political rival, current President Ferdinand Marcos Jr, was instrumental in handing him over. Minutes after Duterte left Philippines airspace, Marcos gave a televised address saying the country was fulfilling its legal obligation.

“This is what the international community expects of us,” Marcos said.

The Duterte and Marcos families are the Philippines’ most powerful political dynasties. They joined forces to sweep the country’s last national election in 2022, but have fallen out in recent months as they pursued separate agendas.

Duterte being handed to the ICC is the latest twist in a political feud that has unfolded spectacularly in the public view.

The Duterte and Marcos families formed a formidable alliance in the 2022 elections. Against the elder Duterte’s wishes, his daughter Sara ran as Marcos Jr’s vice-president instead of seeking her father’s post.

Marcos initially refused to co-operate with the ICC investigation, but as his relationship with the Duterte family deteriorated, he changed his stance.

Vice-President Duterte said her father’s arrest amounted to “kidnapping”, claiming it violated Philippine sovereignty. She left Manila for the Netherlands on Wednesday, according to her office.

Rodrigo Duterte previously insisted that the ICC has no jurisdiction over the Philippines, since he pulled the country out of the tribunal in 2019, three years after it took note of the drug war’s rising death toll.

But according to the Rome Statute that is the basis for the ICC, the court maintains jurisdiction over alleged crimes committed before a nation leaves the tribunal.

The ICC investigation covers 2011-2019, which includes the period when Duterte was mayor of Davao, a sprawling metropolis in the country’s south, where his family has held power for decades.

Complaints filed against Duterte at the ICC allege that he kept a “death squad” of bounty hunters to go after drug suspects in Davao, and later replicated this model on a national scale when he was elected president.

Human Rights Watch called Duterte’s arrest a “critical step for accountability in the Philippines”.

Duterte built a reputation for Davao as one of the Philippines’ safest cities, and cultivated the image of a tough-talking, anti-establishment man of the masses to pull off a dark horse win in the 2016 presidential elections.

Polls show he is the most popular Philippines president since the restoration of democracy in 1986.

His supporters have threatened to hold large rallies to protest against his arrest. They had asked the Supreme Court to issue a restraining order against the ICC warrant – but the court did not act before the former president was flown out on Tuesday.

On social media, where the Dutertes maintain a strong following, the reaction was mixed.

Many praised the ICC for delivering justice for those who died in the drug war, while others defended Duterte’s legacy, with some calling for widespread rallies.

“Justice served,” read a top-liked comment on TikTok.

“Philippines was safe during Duterte’s time,” another TikTok user wrote, saying the former leader built bridges, roads and other infrastructure. “He was the best president.”