At least 10 people have died in Missouri after tornadoes tore through central and southern parts of the US, authorities have confirmed.

Missouri’s governor has warned of further severe weather, including the risk of additional tornadoes on Saturday. The state’s emergency management service has reported widespread damage across multiple regions.

“The Patrol and local agencies are working tirelessly to assist those in need and assess the damage,” Missouri State Highway Patrol said in a statement on X.

The destructive storms have also struck Texas and Oklahoma, where they fuelled more than 100 wildfires and overturned several semi-trailer trucks, according to CBS News, the BBC’s US partner.

One of those fires, known as the 840 Road Fire, has already burned 27,500 acres and remains 0% contained, according to the Oklahoma Forestry Service. The agency has issued a “red flag” warning for the Panhandle, signaling extreme fire danger.

The state of Mississippi is now on high alert as well for a potential tornado outbreak, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa).

A US influencer who was filmed taking a wild baby wombat away from its distressed mother in Australia has said she is “truly sorry” and received thousands of death threats over the incident.

Sam Jones, who calls herself an “outdoor enthusiast and hunter”, was filmed picking up the joey on the side of a road, while laughing and running over to a car, while the mother chases after them.

It sparked a huge backlash, with Australian PM Anthony Albanese challenging her to “take a baby crocodile from its mother and see how you go there”.

In a lengthy statement on her Instagram page, Jones says she was trying to get the animals safely off the road.

She said, as can be seen in the video, that the mother runs off the road, but the baby does not, and Jones scoops it up. She says she ran across the road “not to rip the joey away from its mother, but from fear she might attack me”.

“The snap judgement I made in these moments was never from a place of harm or stealing a joey,” the statement said.

She said the video was “not staged, nor was it done for entertainment”, and in her excitement of the moment, “acted too quickly and failed to provide necessary context to viewers online”.

• US influencer draws backlash for stealing baby wombat from mum

In the second part of her statement, Jones launched a scathing attack on Australia’s animal culling laws, including wombats, kangaroos, horses, deer and pigs.

Australia has various culling laws and regulations that spark controversy and divide the nation.

Wombats, which are native to Australia, are a protected species, but permits can be obtained to cull them if deemed necessary.

• To conserve or cull? Life in Australia’s crocodile capital

An online petition supporting her deportation received more than 40,000 signatures. Home Affairs minister Tony Burke said his department was reviewing whether it could revoke Jones’s visa. However, the BBC understands that she left the country of her own accord.

Jones, who also goes by the name Samantha Strable, has more than 95,000 followers on Instagram.

Conservationists warned Jones’s “appalling” behaviour could have caused severe harm to the wombats.

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

“[She] then placed the vulnerable baby back onto a country road – potentially putting it at risk of becoming roadkill,” it noted in its statement, adding that it remained unclear if the joey had been reunited with its mother.

“I caught a baby wombat,” Jones said in the video, while the joey could be heard hissing and struggling in her grip.

The man filming can be heard laughing: “Look at the mother, it’s chasing after her!”

Her caption in the now-deleted post read: “My dream of holding a wombat has been realised! Baby and mom slowly waddled back off together into the bush.”

“The baby was carefully held for one minute in total and then released back to mom,” she wrote in the comments, responding to criticism.

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

Animal rights organisations have criticised Jones. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or Peta, described the video as “wildlife-exploiting content” and urged people to “stop treating wildlife as a prop”.

Talks to extend the Gaza ceasefire have failed to reach an agreement, a Palestinian official has told the BBC, as the US accused Hamas of making “entirely impractical” demands at meetings in Qatar.

Negotiators have been trying to find a way forward after the first phase of the temporary truce ended on 1 March.

The US proposed to extend the first phase until mid-April, including a further exchange of hostages held by Hamas and Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.

But the unnamed Palestinian official said Israel and Hamas disagreed over key aspects of the deal set out by US Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff at the indirect talks.

Israel is yet to comment, but Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said he would receive a report from Israel’s negotiating team later on Saturday.

The White House accused Hamas of making “entirely impractical” demands in its response to Witkoff’s proposal.

It would extend the ceasefire into April but delay the negotiation of a permanent end to the war.

A statement from Witkoff’s office and the US National Security Council on Friday said: “Hamas is making a very bad bet that time is on its side. It is not.”

“Hamas is well aware of the deadline, and should know that we will respond accordingly if that deadline passes.”

A Hamas statement seen by the BBC said negotiations had broken down.

Netanyahu’s office had earlier said Israel accepted the US proposal.

It said Hamas remained “firm in its refusal and has not budged a millimetre,” accusing the group of “manipulation and psychological warfare”.

• What we know about the Gaza ceasefire deal
• US envoy in Qatar for talks on extending fragile Gaza ceasefire
• Gaza ceasefire in peril as Israel and Hamas hit impasse

Israel and Hamas agreed to a ceasefire deal involving three stages in January, after 15 months of war.

In the first stage, Hamas returned 25 living Israeli hostages, the remains of eight others, and five living Thai hostages. Israel released about 1,800 Palestinian prisoners in exchange.

The deal says stage two will include the remaining living hostages in Gaza exchanged for more Palestinian prisoners.

But both sides currently disagree on the number of hostages due to be released next.

They also disagree on the withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza, which the original deal states should be happening by now.

Israel resists this point, while Hamas insists it should happen.

Earlier in March, Israel blocked aid shipments to Gaza and then cut electricity, saying it aimed to put pressure on Hamas.

It is believed that Hamas is still holding up to 24 living hostages in Gaza and the remains of 35 others.

As indirect talks continued on Friday, the group said in a statement it was ready to release the last living Israeli-American hostage it is known to be holding.

Edan Alexander, 21, was serving as an Israeli soldier close to Gaza when he was taken.

Under the terms of the original ceasefire agreement, it was expected that he would have been among the last hostages to be released.

The group also said it would hand over the remains of four other dual nationals captured during the 7 October 2023 attacks.

It did not give further details or make clear what it would demand in return.

Witkoff dismissed the offer, saying Hamas was trying to appear flexible in public while being impractical in private.

The attacks led by Hamas on 7 October 2023 killed more than 1,200 people in southern Israel, mostly civilians, with 251 taken hostage.

The assault triggered an Israeli military offensive that has since killed more than 48,520 people, most of them civilians, according to figures from the Hamas-run health ministry which are used by the UN and others.

Most of Gaza’s 2.1 million population has been displaced multiple times.

An estimated 70% of buildings have been damaged or destroyed, healthcare, water, and sanitation systems have collapsed and there are shortages of food, fuel, medicine and shelter.

A team of charity workers has been killed in Israeli strikes in northern Gaza, the UK-registered Al Khair Foundation has told the BBC.

The charity said eight workers – including volunteers and journalists documenting their activities – were killed when their vehicles were targeted on Saturday in what Hamas described as a “blatant violation” of the ceasefire agreement with Israel.

The Israeli military has said it had struck “two terrorists who were identified operating a drone that posed a threat to Israeli troops”, adding that it then targeted “additional terrorists” who arrived at the scene.

The charity rejects the allegation that members of its team were terrorists.

Qasim Rashid Ahmad, founder and chairman of the charity, told the BBC the team was in the area to set up tents and document it for the charity’s own promotion efforts.

He said that its two cameramen came back to the car and were hit, while other team members who rushed to the scene were then struck by an Israeli drone which had followed them when they went to the charity’s second car.

Several others were injured and rushed to the Indonesian Hospital in the northern Gaza Strip, the Hamas-run health ministry said.

A spokesman for the group, Hazem Qassem, said Israel had “committed a horrific massacre in the northern Gaza Strip by targeting a group of journalists and humanitarian workers”.

A ceasefire between Israel and Hamas has been in place since January, but its future is uncertain as the process has reached an impasse raising fears of a return to fighting.

The war began after Hamas attacked Israel on 7 October 2023, killing about 1,200 people and taking 251 back to Gaza as hostages.

Israel responded with a massive military offensive, which has killed more than 48,300 Palestinians, Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry says.

The elderly woman gazes wistfully into the distance, her hands curled over a basket of tobacco, surrounded by the hundreds of cigarettes she has spent hours rolling by hand.

The photograph is one of several snapped by student Rashmitha T in her village in Tamil Nadu, featuring her neighbours who make traditional Indian cigarettes called beedis.

“No-one knows about their work. Their untold stories need to be told,” Rashmitha told the BBC.

Her pictures were featured in a recent exhibition about India’s labourers titled The Unseen Perspective at the Egmore Museum in Chennai.

All the photographs were taken by 40 students from Tamil Nadu’s government-run schools, who documented the lives of their own parents or other adults.

From quarry workers to weavers, welders to tailors, the pictures highlight the diverse, backbreaking work undertaken by the estimated 400 million labourers in India.

Many beedi rollers, for instance, are vulnerable to lung damage and tuberculosis due to their dangerous work, said Rashmitha.

“Their homes reek of tobacco, you cannot stay there long,” she said, adding that her neighbours sit outside their homes for hours rolling beedis.

For every 1,000 cigarettes they roll, they only earn 250 rupees ($2.90; £2.20), she told the BBC.

In the state’s Erode district, Jayaraj S captured a photo of his mother Pazhaniammal at work as a brick maker. She is seen pouring a clay and sand mixture into moulds and shaping bricks by hand.

Jayaraj had to wake up at 2am to snap the picture, because his mother begins working in the middle of the night.

“She has to start early to avoid the afternoon sun,” he said.

It was only when he embarked on his photography project that he truly realised the hardships she has to endure, he added.

“My mother frequently complains of headaches, leg pain, hip pain and sometimes faints,” he said.

In the Madurai district, Gopika Lakshmi M captured her father Muthukrishnan selling goods from an old van.

Her father has to get a dialysis twice a week after he lost a kidney two years ago.

“He drives to nearby villages to sell goods despite being on dialysis,” Lakshmi says.

“We don’t have the luxury of resting at home.”

But despite his serious condition, her father “looked like a hero” as he carried on with his gruelling daily routine, said Gopika.

Taking pictures with a professional camera was not easy initially, but it got easier after months of training with experts, said the students.

“I learned how to shoot at night, adjust shutter speed and aperture,” said Keerthi, who lives in the Tenkasi district.

For her project, Keerthi chose to document the daily life of her mother, Muthulakshmi, who owns a small shop in front of their house.

“Dad is not well, so mum looks after both the shop and the house,” she said. “She wakes up at 4am and works until 11pm.”

Her photos depict her mother’s struggles as she travels long distances via public buses to source goods for her store.

“I wanted to show through photographs what a woman does to improve her children’s lives,” she said.

Mukesh K spent four days with his father, documenting his work at a quarry.

“My father stays here and comes home only once a week,” he said.

Mukesh’s father works from 3am till noon, and after a brief rest, works from 3pm to 7pm. He earns a meagre sum of about 500 rupees a day.

“There are no beds or mattresses in their room. My father sleeps on empty cardboard boxes in the quarry,” he said. “He suffered a sunstroke last year because he was working under the hot sun.”

The students, aged 13 to 17, are learning various art forms, including photography, as part of an initiative by the Tamil Nadu School education department.

“The idea is to make students socially responsible,” said Muthamizh Kalaivizhi, state lead of Holistic Development programme in Tamil Nadu’s government schools and founder of non-government organisation Neelam Foundation.

“They documented the working people around them. Understanding their lives is the beginning of social change,” he added.

On Friday, Chuck Schumer, the Democratic leader in the Senate, found himself in a particularly uncomfortable position.

President Donald Trump was singing his praises. And former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and other influential Democrats were expressing their dismay with him – or worse.

This was Schumer’s fate the day after he decided to back a Republican-crafted measure to avert a possible US government shutdown this weekend.

Later, he followed through on his promise, voting with nine other Democrats and all but one Republican to overcome the key procedural hurdle that – if Democrats had stuck together in opposition – would have prevented the funding bill from coming to a final vote.

The Senate bill, which passed that final vote shortly after, contained a number of provisions that angered liberals. These included cuts to non-military programmes, increased spending on border security, limits on how Congress can rescind Trump’s tariffs and draconian restrictions on Washington DC’s budget.

Schumer acknowledged all of this, but said he was backing the bill because a shutdown, which would allow the president to determine what government services and employees to suspend, would be worse.

“I believe it is the best way to minimise the harm that the Trump administration will do to the American people,” he said on Friday. “Allowing Donald Trump to take even much more power via government shutdown is a far worse option.”

• Schumer backs Republican spending bill to avert shutdown
• Why government shutdowns seem to only happen in US
• US government shutdown averted as Senate passes spending bill

It didn’t take long after Schumer’s announcement for Democratic second guessing – and straight-up outrage – to ensue.

“Chuck Schumer is unwilling and unable to meet the moment,” the Democratic group Pass the Torch, which led calls for Joe Biden to end his re-election bid last summer, said in a statement.

Pelosi, who wields considerable influence among House Democrats despite having stepped down from her leadership position, decried what she said was a “false choice” between a shutdown and accepting the Republican measure.

“We must fight back in a better way,” she said, suggesting a short-term funding extension and new bipartisan negotiations. She called the Republican bill a “blank cheque that makes a devastating assault on the well-being of working families across America”.

In a Friday press conference, the current House Democratic leader, Hakeem Jeffries of New York, dodged questions about Schumer. When asked if he still had confidence in his Senate counterpart, he tersely replied: “Next question.”

Others in the party were less circumspect. Senator Raphael Warnock of Georgia told reporters that he expected “new leadership” in the Senate next year – or after the next presidential election in 2028.

A group of 60 House Democrats – who joined all but one in their party to vote against the Republican bill in that chamber – penned a letter to Schumer, saying that the legislation “potentially legitimises President Trump and the Republican party’s dismantling of government”.

“If Republicans in Congress want to pass this bill,” they wrote, “they should do so with their own votes.”

As if to add rub salt on Democratic wounds, Trump took to his Truth Social website on Friday morning to praise what he said was a “good and smart move” by Schumer – and to promise that more Republican legislation on taxes, spending and “so much more” was coming.

“This could lead to something big for USA,” he wrote, “a whole new direction and beginning!”

While many rank-and-file Democrats and liberal activists clamoured for Schumer and Senate Democrats to block the House measure even if it triggered a government shutdown, it is unclear whether such a move would have pressured Trump and Republicans to negotiate a less partisan government-funding bill.

In fact, there are many on the right, including Trump’s designated government slasher, Elon Musk, who were relishing an opportunity to use a shutdown to further hamstring the federal bureaucracy.

After days, or weeks, of shutdown pain that would disproportionately affect their supporters, the Democratic Party could have found itself in the same place it is now – with limited power and few good options.

“Neither House Democrats nor the people voting ‘no’ in the Senate nor the people getting mad on Twitter have an actual strategy for getting what the base wants out of this, which is some kind of act of Congress saying that Trump and Musk need to conduct the government differently,” writes Matthew Yglesias, a left-leaning commentator.

Democrats have the power to block Republican legislation, but they simply don’t have the votes to advance their own alternative either in the House or the Senate.

That doesn’t make the situation Schumer and the Democrats have found themselves in any easier to stomach, however. Republicans, by sticking together, have been able to exert their will in Congress, while Trump pushes the boundaries of presidential power.

Elections, as they say, have consequences. And 2024’s results have left Democrats deep in the wilderness.

The gates to the Izaguirre Ranch look much like any others you might find in the state of Jalisco. Two prancing horses on the front perhaps a nod to the surrounding cattle-grazing and sugarcane fields.

Yet what lies behind the black iron doors is allegedly evidence of some of Mexico’s worst drug cartel violence of recent times.

Following a tip-off about the possible location of a mass grave, an activist group of relatives of some of Mexico’s thousands of disappeared people went to the ranch, hoping to find some sign of their missing loved ones.

What they found was far worse: 200 pairs of shoes, hundreds of items of clothing, scores of suitcases and rucksacks, discarded after the owners themselves were apparently disposed of.

Even more chilling, several ovens and human bone fragments were found at the ranch.

The site was used, the activists claim, by the New Generation Jalisco Cartel (CJNG) for the forced recruitment and training of their foot-soldiers, and for torturing their victims and cremating their bodies.

“There were children’s toys in there,” says Luz Toscano, a member of the Buscadores Guerreros de Jalisco Collective.

“People were desperate,” she recalls.

“They’d see the shoes and say: ‘those look like the ones my missing relative was wearing when they disappeared’.”

Toscano believes the authorities must now go through all the personal effects piece by piece and make them available to the families for closer inspection.

• From Mexico cartel safe house to US streets: BBC tracks deadly fentanyl targeted by Trump tariffs
• Mexico cartels: Which are the biggest and most powerful?

For many, however, the worst part of the gruesome discovery is that local police raided the ranch, near the village of Teuchitlán, as recently as last September.

While at the time they made 10 arrests and released two hostages, they either didn’t find or didn’t reveal any evidence of the apparent magnitude of violence carried out there.

While the full picture is still to come over what action, if any, was taken by the municipal and state authorities after last year’s operation, critics and victims’ families openly accuse them of complicity with the cartels in Jalisco.

State Governor Pablo Lemus responded in a video message.

His administration was cooperating fully with the federal authorities, he said, and insisted that “no one in Jalisco is washing their hands” of the case.

For Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum, the events in Jalisco threaten to overshadow a strong start to her presidency.

Given the serious doubts about the actions of the local police and the state attorney general’s office, she has ordered federal investigators to take charge of the case.

She urged people not to jump to conclusions while the investigation is ongoing.

“It is important is to make the investigation before we come to any conclusions,” she said in her morning press briefing earlier this week.

“What did they find at the site? Before anything else, we must hear from the attorney general’s office, which is the agency responsible, and they will let the entire country know what they have found.”

Whether most Mexicans will believe the official version of events, however, is another question.

The place is now crawling with police officers, federal investigators and forensics teams in dust overalls.

Whatever they conclude, though, the media in Mexico is calling the Izaguirre Ranch an “extermination” site.

Meanwhile, more search teams of victims’ relatives have come to the state capital, Guadalajara, ahead of a protest march this weekend to urge the authorities to do more to find Mexico’s missing people.

Rosario Magaña was among them. She is the mother of Carlos Amador Magaña, who disappeared in June 2017. He was just 19 years old.

“I still feel desperate, as it’s been eight years and I’m still in the same situation,” she said – speaking of her endless search for her son who was kidnapped along with his best friend.

“It’s a very, very slow process when it comes to the state attorney general’s office and the investigation.”

“I still have faith and hope of finding him,” she stressed. “But I’m in a situation which doesn’t move forward, and it’s discouraging.”

As she left a church service for the unknown victims at the ranch in Teuchitlán, Rosario said the allegations of mistakes, oversight, collusion and negligence in the case only underlined the uphill struggle mothers like her have faced for years in obtaining answers to the most basic of questions about their children’s whereabouts.

“There are so many mass graves in Jalisco, so many cartel safehouses, the authorities know the CJNG’s modus operandi. So, what is the government doing?” she asks rhetorically.

The US is expelling South Africa’s ambassador to Washington, with Secretary of State Marco Rubio describing him as a “race-baiting politician”.

In a post on X, Rubio accused Ebrahim Rasool of hating the US and President Donald Trump, and said the ambassador was “no longer welcome in our great country”.

The office for South Africa’s president on Saturday called the decision “regrettable”, adding that the country remained committed to building a mutually beneficial relationship with the US.

The rare move by the US marks the latest development in rising tensions between the two countries.

While lower-ranking diplomats are sometimes expelled, it’s highly unusual in the US for it to happen to a more senior official.

In his post on Friday, Rubio linked to an article from the right-wing outlet Breitbart that quoted some of Rasool’s recent remarks made during an online lecture about the Trump administration.

At the event, Rasool said Trump was “mobilising a supremacism” and trying to “project white victimhood as a dog whistle” as the white population faced becoming a minority in the US.

“We see it in the domestic politics of the USA, the Maga movement as a response not simply to a supremacist instinct, but to very clear data that shows great demographic shifts in the USA in which the voting electorate in the USA is projected to become 48% white,” he said.

He suggested that South Africa was under attack because “we are the historical antidote to supremacism”.

In response, Rubio called Rasool “PERSONA NON GRATA”, referencing the Latin phrase for “unwelcome person”.

Ties between the US and South Africa have been deteriorating since Trump took office.

An executive order last month – which froze US assistance to South Africa – cited “unjust racial discrimination” against white Afrikaners, largely descended from Dutch settlers who first arrived in the 17th Century.

It references a new law, the Expropriation Act, that it claims targets Afrikaners by allowing the government to take away private land.

“As long as South Africa continues to support bad actors on the world stage and allows violent attacks on innocent disfavoured minority farmers, the United States will stop aid and assistance to the country,” a statement from the White House said at the time.

South Africa’s 2022 census noted that white people – including Afrikaners – made up 7.2% of the population. However, according to a 2018 land audit by the South African government, white farmers owned 72% of the country’s individually-held farmland.

South Africa’s government, which is made up of 10 parties led by the African National Congress (ANC), said earlier that the US president’s actions were based on “a campaign of misinformation and propaganda aimed at misrepresenting our great nation”.

It added no land had been seized without compensation and said this would only happen in exceptional circumstances, such as if land was needed for public use and all other avenues to acquire the land had been exhausted.

A fact sheet from the White House states the country “blatantly discriminates against ethnic minority descendants of settler groups”.

Rasool – who previously served as US ambassador from 2010 to 2015 – was himself forcibly removed from his home in Cape Town’s District Six as a child after it was declared a white area under the Apartheid government.

He would later describe the eviction as a significant moment in his upbringing which guided his future.

Rasool became Pretoria’s ambassador to the US again in 2024.

Unnamed sources in the South African government told online news site Daily Maverick at the time that he was thought to be well placed to deal with a Trump administration because of the experience and contacts he had acquired during his first stint as ambassador.

The captain of a cargo ship that collided with an oil tanker in the North Sea has appeared in court charged with gross negligence manslaughter over the death of a crew member.

The Portuguese-flagged Solong and US-registered tanker Stena Immaculate crashed off the East Yorkshire coast at about 10:00 GMT on Monday.

Filipino national Mark Angelo Pernia, 38, was named as the crew member of the Solong who was missing and presumed dead, the Crown Prosecution Service said.

Vladimir Motin, 59, of Primorsky in St Petersburg, Russia, captain of the Solong, did not enter a plea and was remanded in custody by Hull magistrates to appear before the Central Criminal Court in London on April 14.

Mr Motin stood in the glass-front dock at Hull Magistrates’ Court for the 35-minute hearing.

He spoke through a translator to confirm his name, age and address, and that he understood the charges.

The court heard how all 23 people on the tanker were rescued along with 13 of 14 crew members from the Solong but that Mr Pernia could not be located.

Humberside Police arrested Mr Motin on suspicion of gross negligence manslaughter on Monday evening, hours after the collision.

The force said he had been charged on Friday evening.

The Marine Accident Investigation Branch (MAIB) is trying to establish the cause of the crash.

It said initial inquiries found the Solong was travelling from Grangemouth to Rotterdam and had often sailed the same route.

“At 09:47 GMT it struck the Stena Immaculate that was at anchor off the entrance to the River Humber,” the MAIB said.

On Friday, Stena Bulk said salvage experts from SMIT Salvage had successfully boarded Stena Immaculate to conduct a thorough assessment. The vessel was carrying 220,000 barrels of aviation fuel.

The Stena Immaculate is still at anchor at the point where the collision happened, which is about 12 miles off the East Yorkshire coast, near Withernsea.

The MAIB said the salvage process was “necessarily methodical, comprehensive and ongoing” and would “require time to complete fully”.

Chief coastguard Paddy O’Callaghan said that aerial surveillance flights continued to monitor the vessels and confirmed “there continues to be no cause for concern from pollution” from either ship.

All 23 crew on board Stena Immaculate were Americans who are currently in Grimsby and are likely to be repatriated in due course, the BBC understands.

Hull and East Yorkshire on BBC Soundslatest episode of Look North here.

United Nations aid agencies have been sent questionnaires by the US asking them to state if they have “anti-American” beliefs or affiliations.

Among the 36 questions on the form, sent by the US Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and seen by the BBC, is one asking if they have any links to communism.

Some of the world’s biggest humanitarian organisations have received the questionnaire, including the UN Refugee Agency and the International Committee of the Red Cross.

The Trump administration has launched a cost-cutting drive across the US government, led by billionaire Elon Musk, and has closed down much of its foreign aid.

The UN groups fear the move by the OMB is a sign the US is planning to abandon humanitarian work – or even the UN itself – altogether.

The US pulled out of the World Health Organization on the first day of US President Donald Trump’s second term.

And this week, Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced that the vast majority of the US Agency for International Development’s (USAID) programmes had been terminated.

Surveys indicate that most Americans believe the country overspends on foreign aid.

The US spends a lower percentage of its GDP on aid than European countries but, because of its huge economy, still supplies 40% of global humanitarian funding

Many of the UN aid agencies who were sent the form receive funding, not just from USAID, but directly from the US government.

One question asks: ”Can you confirm that your organisation does not work with entities associated with communist, socialist, or totalitarian parties, or any party that espouses anti-American beliefs?”

Another asks agencies to confirm they don’t receive any funding from China, Russia, Cuba or Iran – these countries may not be Washington’s best friends but, like all 193 UN member states, they fund the big humanitarian agencies.

Other questions ask aid agencies to ensure no project includes any elements of DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion) or anything related to climate change.

This could be awkward for agencies like Unicef, which supports equal access to education for girls, or the World Food Programme, which tries to prevent famine by supporting drought affected communities to transition to more climate resilient crops.

Professor Karl Blanchet, of Geneva University’s Centre for Humanitarian Studies, believes the aid agencies are being set up to fail: “The decision has already been made. It’s highly likely the US is going to stop its involvement in any UN system.

“It’s multilateralism versus America first – these are two ends of a spectrum.”

Aid agencies working on complex humanitarian operations are more blunt.

“It’s like being asked ‘have you stopped beating your child, yes or no?'” said one frustrated aid worker.

The UN aid agencies believe the questionnaire misunderstands their core principles of neutrality and impartiality – that people suffering because of war or natural disaster should be helped regardless of political beliefs, and that aid should not be used as a tool to strengthen one particular nation.

UN Human Rights has already chosen not to fill out the form.

“Given they were mostly yes/no questions with very limited room for elaboration, and that some of the questions were not applicable to the UN, we were not in a position to reply directly to the online questionnaires,” a spokesperson told the BBC.

“Instead, we provided replies by email with explanations to those questions where we could provide a response.”

Some of the questions also reflect the economic interests of President Trump’s administration.

There is a query about projects which might affect “efforts to strengthen US supply chains or secure rare earth minerals”.

The BBC has approached the OMB and the US missions at the United Nations in New York and Geneva for comment.

A senior Islamic State (IS) group leader in Iraq and Syria has been killed in an operation by members of the Iraqi national intelligence service along with US-led coalition forces, the Iraqi prime minister has said.

Abdallah Makki Muslih al-Rifai, also known as Abu Khadijah, “was considered one of the most dangerous terrorists in Iraq and the world”, according to Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani.

US President Donald Trump said “he was relentlessly hunted down by our intrepid warfighters”.

The US Central Command (Centcom) said it conducted a “precision airstrike” in Iraq’s western Al Anbar province, which killed “one of the most important” IS members on Thursday.

Rifai was the head of IS’s most senior decision-making body and was responsible for operations, logistics, and planning conducted by IS globally, the US Central Command said.

He also directed a large portion of finance for the group’s global organisation, Centcom added.

Posting on his Truth Social platform, President Trump said: “His miserable life was terminated, along with another member of ISIS, in coordination with the Iraqi Government and the Kurdish Regional Government. PEACE THROUGH STRENGTH!”

Rifai was found dead alongside one other IS operative, Centcom said.

“Both terrorists were wearing unexploded ‘suicide vests’ and had multiple weapons,” it added.

Centcom and Iraqi forces were able to identify him through a DNA match from DNA collected on a previous raid where he “narrowly escaped”, it added.

Gen Michael Erik Kurilla said Rifai “was one of the most important IS members in the entire global IS organisation.

“We will continue to kill terrorists and dismantle their organizations that threaten our homeland and US, allied and partner personnel in the region and beyond.”

• IS: A persistent danger, 10 years since its peak

IS once held 88,000sq km (34,000sq miles) of territory stretching from north-eastern Syria across northern Iraq and imposed its brutal rule on almost eight million people.

Iraq declared the defeat of IS in December 2017 and the group was driven from its last piece of territory in 2019.

However militants and sleeper cells continue to have a presence in various parts of the country and carry out sporadic attacks against Iraq’s army and police.

Germany’s conservative leader, Friedrich Merz, has clinched an enormous financial package to revamp defence and infrastructure, ahead of a crunch vote in parliament next Tuesday.

Merz, who aims to lead a government with the Social Democrats in the coming weeks, is in a rush to push through a big boost in spending on defence and creaking infrastructure.

After winning elections last month, he said it was his absolute priority to strengthen Europe because President Donald Trump appeared indifferent to its fate.

After 10 hours of talks with the Greens, he said the deal sent a clear message to his country’s allies: “Germany is back.”

He added: “Germany is making its major contribution to defending freedom and peace in Europe.”

Merz, who is expected to become Germany’s next chancellor, is bidding to get his debt and spending reforms through the outgoing parliament before the newly elected MPs are able to take their seats in the Bundestag on 25 March.

The far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party doubled its number of MPs in the election and could jeopardise Merz’s spending push if it fails to go through in time. The Left party also objects to the reforms.

Under Germany’s constitution, Merz needs a two-thirds majority to get the changes passed. With the support of the Greens and Social Democrats, he should succeed.

Urgent motions by both the AfD and the Left to challenge next week’s sessions of the outgoing parliament failed at the constitutional court on Friday, enabling the vote to go ahead.

The conservative Christian Democrat leader said the three-party plan agreed by his party, the Social Democrats and Greens involved:

• A big boost in spending on defence, civil protection and intelligence – with spending over 1% of GDP (economic output) exempt from debt restrictions
• A special €500bn (£420bn) infrastructure fund for additional investments over 10 years, including €100bn to cover climate-protection initiatives
• Germany’s 16 states will be allowed to borrow up to 0.35% of GDP above the debt limit.

The defence plans also allow spending on aid for states “attacked in violation of international law” to be exempt from the so-called debt-brake.

That would enable outgoing chancellor Olaf Scholz to release €3bn in aid to Ukraine as early as next week.

Germany’s last government collapsed late in 2024 because of disagreements over loosening debt restrictions brought in by Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government during the financial crisis in 2009.

It meant that the government could not borrow more than 0.35% of Germany’s gross economic output, while the country’s rail and bridge infrastructure creaked from years of underinvestment and ministers tried to boost military spending.

Social Democrat chairman Lars Klingbeil said Friday’s agreement sent a “historical signal” for Germany that would make the country stronger and “strengthen Germany’s role in Europe too”.

Although the Greens were in the old government, they will not be part of Merz’s coalition. However, the party was delighted that the €100bn secured for climate funding would go “in the right direction”.

Outgoing Greens Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock also hailed the defence package as not just making Germany safer but sending “a clear signal to Ukraine, Europe and the world”.

Germany was taking responsibility in turbulent times, she added.

AfD co-leader Alice Weidel was less impressed, and accused Merz of bending the constitution and loading future generations with a “gigantic burden”.

“This is nothing less than a financial coup,” she complained.

Netflix’s latest big-budget film The Electric State, starring Millie Bobby Brown and Chris Pratt, is one of the most expensive movies ever made, and had some of the most scathing reviews in recent memory. But that doesn’t mean it will flop.

Film critics haven’t minced their words when delivering their verdicts on The Electric State.

It is “a turgid eyesore” and “top-dollar tedium”, according to the Times. It’s “slick but dismally soulless”, declared the Hollywood Reporter, while the New York Times called it “obvious, garish and just plain dumb”.

Paste pointed out its eye-watering budget, billing it as “the most banal way you can spend $320m”. Warming to the theme, the magazine summed it up as “one hell of an artistically neutered, sanitized boondoggle”.

There have been some kinder reviews. Empire said it was “breezily watchable” and worth three stars, while the Telegraph awarded four stars to the “Spielbergian treat”.

But overall, its 15% Rotten Tomatoes score is a meagre return for any major film, especially one costing such a lot. The $320m (£247m) figure has been widely reported but neither confirmed nor denied by Netflix. It would make The Electric State the most expensive streaming film ever.

Critics’ opinions have become more irrelevant in the streaming age, though, and the bad reviews didn’t stop The Electric State from going straight to number one on Netflix’s chart after its release on Friday.

And it fits into Netflix making star-packed, entertaining and escapist movies that often get panned by reviewers – but are watched by hundreds of millions of subscribers.

“I would love to say that what I’ve written and what other critics have written will matter, but I just don’t think it will,” says Digital Spy movies editor Ian Sandwell.

Sandwell awarded the film two stars out of five, noting that the action and visual effects are “decent”, the robots are “impressive” and the finale is “epic”.

“My main problem was they’d created this really impressive, visually spectacular world and then just told quite a generic seen-it-all-before story inside it,” he says.

Bad reviews might have put people off paying to see the film if it had been released in cinemas, he says. “But on Netflix, I think it will still be absolutely massive. I don’t think bad reviews will matter at all.”

While a critic’s job is to a analyse a movie, “audiences probably do just want a big, spectacular blockbuster to watch at home, with two massive stars”, he adds.

The Electric State follows Brown, Pratt and a succession of zany robots in an alternative version of 1990s America, where there has been a war between humans and intelligent bots.

It also stars Ke Huy Quan, Stanley Tucci and the voices of Woody Harrelson and Brian Cox, and is directed by Anthony and Joe Russo – who have made four Marvel movies, including the wildly successful Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame.

The Electric State is based on the graphic novel by Simon Stålenhag, although some critics pointed out that Netflix had missed the book’s point about the perils of a consumerist society addicted to technology.

The film is “absolutely not” value for money in terms of quality, says City AM’s film editor Victoria Luxford.

And it remains to be seen whether the film makes financial sense for Netflix, she says.

The streaming giant’s most popular ever film, 2021’s Red Notice, has had 231 million views, according to Netflix’s measurements.

“The Electric State will be hoping for that kind of performance, just as a $320m theatrically released movie would be aiming to break box office records,” Luxford says.

“The higher the price, the higher the target for success, even with a business model as opaque as Netflix’s.”

Red Notice, an action-packed art crime caper starring Dwayne Johnson, Gal Gadot and Ryan Reynolds, has a lukewarm 39% critics’ score on Rotten Tomatoes – but a 92% audience rating.

Other recent Netflix hits have been lapped up by viewers more than reviewers.

Brooke Shields’ lightweight multi-generational rom-com Mother of the Bride has a 13% critics’ score, Jennifer Lopez’s AI action thriller Atlas is on 19%, Cameron Diaz and Jamie Foxx’s family spy escapade Back In Action has 29%, and Kevin Hart’s heist comedy Lift is on 30%.

They are enjoyable but forgettable – and easy to watch in the midst of potential distractions at home. The Hollywood Reporter described Atlas as “another Netflix movie made to half-watch while doing laundry” – summing up this new genre.

In December, N+1 magazine quoted several screenwriters as saying a common request from Netflix executives is for characters to announce what they’re doing “so that viewers who have this programme on in the background can follow along”.

“Electric State does feel like that,” Sandwell continues, “where there are just random big dumps of the characters explaining exactly what’s happened, sometimes something we’ve seen recently, just in case you’re not following along.

“But it does depend on the movie.”

Netflix does have serious and critically-acclaimed movies, too, of course, but they are often not such crowd-pleasers. Emilia Perez, which led this year’s Oscar nominations, has not troubled the Netflix global top 10 charts.

Another critic, Gav Squires, says many of Netflix’s films are “very average”, but don’t usually have such astronomical budgets as The Electric State.

“Netflix know what they’re doing,” he says. “They know that people are probably watching on a second screen, they’re not paying full attention. So when they’re putting stuff out that costs $30m that people aren’t really watching and is kind of average, I’m not too fussed about it.

“But when they’re spending $320m on a movie, I start getting really angry. $320m would have paid the budgets for the last, I think, 10 best picture Oscar winners.

“And it just feels like really, really bad value for money at that point.”

• Listen to Jennifer read this article

The boss of online clothing brand Snag has told the BBC it gets more than 100 complaints a day that the models in its adverts are “too fat”.

Chief executive Brigitte Read says models of her size 4-38 clothing are frequently the target of “hateful” posts about their weight.

The brand was cited in an online debate over whether adverts showing “unhealthily fat” models should be banned after a Next advert, in which a model appeared “unhealthily thin”, was banned.

The UK’s advertising watchdog says it has banned ads using models who appear unhealthily underweight rather than overweight due to society’s aspiration towards thinness.

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) received 61 complaints about models’ weight in 2024, with the vast majority being about models who appeared to be too thin.

But it only had grounds to investigate eight complaints and none were about Snag.

Catherine Thom read the BBC report about the Next advert ban and got in touch to say she found it “hypocritical to ban adverts where models appear too thin for being socially irresponsible, however when models are clearly obese we’re saying it’s body positivity”.

The 36-year-old from Edinburgh was one of several people who contacted the BBC with this view, while a Reddit thread had more than 1,000 comments with many along the same theme.

Mrs Thom says she was “bombarded with images of obese girls in tights” after buying from Snag when she was pregnant.

“I see Snag tights plastering these morbidly obese people all over social media,” she says.

“How is that allowed when the photo of the Next model isn’t? There should be fairness, not politically correct body positivity. Adverts normalising an unhealthy weight, be it obese or severely underweight, are equally as harmful.”

But Snag founder Ms Read says: “Shaming fat people does not help them to lose weight and actually it really impacts mental health and therefore their physical health.”

She thinks the idea of banning adverts showing models with bigger bodies is a symptom of society’s “fat phobia”.

Of her 100 staff, 12 are dedicated “just to remove negative comments and big up those promoting body positivity”.

“Fat people exist, they’re equally as valid as thin people, they buy clothes and they need to see what they look like on people that look like them,” she says.

“You are not worth less the bigger you are. Models of all sizes, shapes, ethnicities and abilities are valid and should be represented.”

Sophie Scott is a 27-year-old salon owner from Lossiemouth in Scotland who has modelled for Snag, and received positive and negative comments about her size on social media.

“I get either ‘you’re so beautiful’ or ‘you need to lose weight’. When I started modelling I was a size 30. Having lost weight since then I’m still on the receiving end of hate comments because it will never be enough for some people.”

Sophie is used to online comments telling her she is “unhealthy”, but says, “fitness is not measured by the way you look. They are making assumptions, they don’t know me or my activity levels.

“People say ‘you’re glorifying obesity’ but I don’t think anyone is looking at me and saying ‘I want to look like that’. Perhaps some people are looking at me and saying ‘she has a similar body type to me’.

“When I get a message from someone saying ‘we are the same size and you’ve inspired me to wear what I want’, it takes away from every hate comment I get.

“If I’ve helped one person accept their body then the hate comments don’t really bother me.”

Fashion journalist Victoria Moss believes the “depressing” debate shows society is not used to seeing bigger bodies in advertising campaigns.

“You’d be pretty hard pushed to find genuine plus-size models on retailers’ websites because even a mid-size is a 10/12 and plus is 14/16 which is actually around the average size for a woman in the UK,” she says.

“The issue with adverts showing very small or very big models is the context and the provocation. We know people with eating disorders seek out images of very thin people as ‘thinspiration’. But if anyone sees a picture of a bigger person they’re not going to drive to buy 10 McDonald’s to try to get fatter.”

Jess Tye at the ASA told the BBC the watchdog gets about 35,000 complaints a year about all advertising, and in 2024 received 61 complaints about 52 adverts relating to the model’s weight.

She says an advert will be investigated if it could be seen to be encouraging people to aspire to an unhealthy body weight. Adverts simply promoting body confidence and using a model who is relevant to the product’s size range would not be investigated.

“It’s to do with the wider societal context. We know in the UK currently society tends to view thinness as aspirational and that’s not the case for being overweight.”

The BBC has heard evidence of atrocities committed by retreating fighters in a battle raging for control of Sudan’s capital city Khartoum.

The city has been held by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) since the start of the country’s brutal civil war nearly two years ago – but the army has retaken much of it and believes it is on track to seize the rest.

Regaining the capital would be a tremendous victory for the military and a turning-point in the war, although by itself would not end the conflict.

In recent weeks troops have mostly encircled Khartoum, coming up from the south after surging through central Sudan, and clearing city districts in the north and east, squeezing the remaining RSF fighters into the centre.

Vast areas of the reclaimed territory are completely destroyed.

Travelling with the army, we drove past block after block of damaged and ransacked buildings – some of them blackened by fire, many pockmarked with bullet holes.

The pavements in front of them were littered with vandalised vehicles, pieces of discarded furniture, the soiled remains of looted goods and other debris.

But even in places that look untouched, the terror is fresh.

In Haj Yusuf, a district of Khartoum east of the River Nile, residents described chaos and violence as fleeing RSF fighters turned on civilians.

“It was a shock, they came suddenly,” says Intisar Adam Suleiman.

Two of her sons, 18-year-old Muzamil and 21-year-old Mudather, were sitting by the house with a friend. The RSF soldiers ordered them inside, then shot them in the back as they entered the gate, says Ms Suleiman.

Muzamil escaped with a bullet wound in his leg but “our friend died instantly”, he told me.

“Then the men wanted to enter the house, and my mother tried to hold the door shut, pushing and pushing. They spotted a phone on the ground, grabbed it and left. I went and called the father of my friend so he could come and do first aid, but we couldn’t rescue him.”

Mudather died the next morning because the hospital’s blood bank had been decimated by a long power outage and he could not get the transfusion he needed.

Ms Suleiman says she knew the RSF soldiers and had engaged with them before to try and de-escalate violence.

One of them had told her: “We came for death, we are people of death.”

She says she told them: “If you came for death, this is not the place for death.”

Yet too much death is what Ms Suleiman has seen in this war.

So many people have died, she says: “I’ve become used to these traumas.”

A few blocks away, Asma Mubarak Abdel Karim tells me she and a group of women got caught up in the fighting as Sudanese forces closed in.

She says they were confronted by retreating RSF soldiers who accused them of siding with the military because they had been to a market in army-held territory.

“They shot on the ground around us, around our feet, terrifying us,” she says, explaining how they then pulled one woman into an empty house and raped her.

She says the RSF fighter held the woman at gunpoint and told her: “Come with us.”

He was beating her with his weapon, says Ms Karim.

“And then we heard shooting and the man ordering her to: ‘Take it off! Do this! Do that!’ Then the fighting around us intensified and we couldn’t hear any more – bullets were falling in the area, so we hid inside the house.”

She wipes away tears when asked what the best thing about the situation is for her now.

“Security,” she says softly, “the best thing is security. They tortured us so terribly.”

An RSF spokesman denied the reports, saying the group had controlled this area for two years “without any major crimes” and that “massive killings” had been reported in areas taken by the military.

The army and allied militias have been accused of carrying out widespread atrocities after recapturing territory, in particular the central Gezira state.

The UN and US say both sides have committed war crimes, but singled out the RSF for criticism of mass rape and accusations of genocide.

It is not only the RSF foot soldiers who are on the move.

Top officials have abandoned their homes in the nearby affluent suburb of Karfuri.

The RSF elite had embedded itself into Khartoum’s establishment before the paramilitary group and the army turned on each other in April 2023 in a battle for control.

Karfuri is now eerily empty and thoroughly looted.

Even the house of the RSF’s deputy commander, Abdel Rahim Hamdan Dagalo, and brother of the group’s leader, was not spared.

The big empty swimming pool in the yard is scattered with rubbish.

Sofas in the spacious rooms are overturned, the windows broken, gold jewellery boxes are bare, the door of a waist-high safe has been pulled off.

The army says it believes that most of the RSF senior leadership is now outside the city, and that those still fighting for the heart of Khartoum are the junior commanders and lower-ranking soldiers.

We were told the military was using drones to drop leaflets urging remaining fighters to leave rather than fight street by street.

The samples we were shown are written in Arabic but also French, apparently directed at foreign fighters from neighbouring Chad.

“Lay down your weapon, change into civilian clothes, and leave the area to save your life,” says one.

In Khartoum North, closer to the Nile, the RSF was pushed out several months ago, but the calm is regularly punctured by the sound of shelling as the army fires at the group’s positions across the river.

Many people here say they finally feel safe enough to sleep at night but are still taking stock of extensive damage.

Zeinab Osman al-Haj showed me the wreckage of her house, telling me the RSF fighters would come at night and break down the door if she didn’t open it.

“They filled their backpacks, and even my food supply, my sugar and my flour and my oil, the soap, they took it,” before eventually burning the house down, she says.

“This was not a war,” she says, pointing at the pile of ashes where her brother-in-law’s library once stood, the charred bedframes in the ruined bedrooms.

“This was chaos: there was theft and stealing and robbery, that’s it.”

A few streets down we meet Hussein Abbas.

He is nearly 70 years old, walking with a cane and dragging a battered suitcase down an empty street toward a skyline of burned and gutted buildings.

He tells us he has been displaced three times since leaving the capital seven days after the war began.

“The moment I got off here I almost cried,” he says, as tears begin rolling down his cheeks. “For two years, two years I haven’t seen this place. We suffered a lot, extreme suffering.”

Survivors like Mr Abbas are slowly returning to try and salvage their homes.

The army has the upper hand now in this terrible war, but there is much suffering still to come for Sudan’s people.

Cher Horowitz has brought her life of Beverly Hills high fashion, friendship and matchmaking to London’s West End, as classic 1990s teen film Clueless has been given a musical makeover.

Clueless has been brought to the stage by the film’s original writer and director Amy Heckerling – who says keeping the 90s theme was integral to the show.

Heckerling insists she has “no interest in being modern” – which will come as a relief to the audiences who grew up quoting “As if!” and aspiring to Cher’s plaid and Prada-filled wardrobe.

The story follows the life of the naïve and lovably spoiled teenager, who plays matchmaker with her friends before ultimately finding love herself.

An adaption of Jane Austen’s Emma, Clueless captured the teen spirit of the 90s and inspired countless school dramas like Mean Girls, Gossip Girl and Legally Blonde.

The stage version has songs in the form of an original score by singer-songwriter KT Tunstall.

Speaking to the BBC, Tunstall says the film was “omnipotent” in the 90s and influenced everything from the clothes people wore to the music people listened to.

The Scottish singer, best known for songs like Black Horse and the Cherry Tree and Suddenly I See, says working on the show was a “dream project”.

She says the original soundtrack was a big inspiration, and describes the music as “a mixtape of all your favourite 90s bangers”.

The process of creating the soundtrack for Clueless: The Musical was intense for Tunstall, who says it’s no easy feat to add music to an adaptation of a film that didn’t originally have it.

“You really have to think about whether a song fits the structure and flow of the story and whether it actually helps the audience understand the narrative better,” she says.

Heckerling says she actually wishes the film had been a musical because “there were natural moments in the script where characters could have sung”.

“Those types of films weren’t very common in the 90s but I’m glad we could add in music now,” she says.

Critics had mixed thoughts about the new songs – the Guardian called them “disappointingly flat-footed” in a two-star review and said the lyrics “too often serve as exposition rather than raising the emotional drama”.

Similarly, the Telegraph’s Dominic Cavendish wrote that the show has “numbers designed to sound in keeping with the period but which are so generic they don’t ring with real-world authenticity”.

But What’sOnStage praised Tunstall’s “infuriatingly catchy tunes” and Glenn Slater’s “nifty, witty lyrics”.

For Emma Flynn, who is making her West End debut as Cher, the music has another important function in the show – it allows characters to easily share their inner thoughts with the audience.

“In the film you hear these really funny inner monologues of Cher, but the great thing about this show is you can hear all of the character’s thoughts, which makes you feel more connected to them.”

Flynn has been praised by critics, with the Evening Standard noting her “powerfully-sung breakout performance” and describing it as channelling “both Alicia Silverstone in the original movie and Sabrina Carpenter today, while making the role entirely her own”.

Co-star Keelan McAuley, who plays nerdy Josh, tells the BBC he loves the play’s nostalgia factor.

“The flip phone was the most advanced technology they had in the 90s and there’s something so enchanting about a time where there was no access to social media,” he says.

The show stays almost entirely true to the 1995 film, with everyone sporting the latest 90s fashions, carrying a glitzy pager, and listening to angsty teen bangers on a Walkman.

While it may feel like a nostalgia fest, Heckerling admits she doesn’t “like to stick to real life”, and even her sunny film was far from the reality of what the 90s were like for most teenagers in LA, with race riots and other political problems.

The Independent’s three-star review says the show “sticks to the original movie like chewing gum to the underside of a school desk” at first, but changes tack by the second half.

“[Director Rachel] Kavanaugh and Heckerling gain the confidence to part ways a bit from the movie’s script, and to let the story’s heart show,” Alice Saville wrote.

For Tunstall, what sets Clueless apart from traditional rom-coms and high school dramas is that there isn’t a typical villain and there’s no nastiness or bad intentions from the main characters.

Jane Austen famously thought her main character wouldn’t be a widely liked heroine, but Tunstall says she is often people’s favourite character because of her honesty and depth.

“People can relate to her on a deeper level, like how she is trying to process the death of her mother and help keep her family in order.

“Those themes are universal and that’s what makes this story so enduring.”

“Nerve-wrecking, terrifying and horrific.”

That is how one witness described her experience getting off an American Airlines flight that caught fire after it was forced to make an emergency landing in Colorado.

Some of the 172 passengers travelling on the flight bound for Dallas were seen standing on the plane’s wing after it touched down in Denver, with large plumes of smoke encircling around them.

Everyone on board, including six crew members, made it out of the plane alive, with 12 passengers treated at hospital for minor injuries, according to airport officials.

One of those passengers, Michele Woods, told CBS News, the BBC’s US partner, how everything about the flight seemed normal at take off.

It was not until they were cruising in the air that she noticed a loud noise reverberating from one of the plane’s engines.

The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) later confirmed the plane diverted to Denver at around 17:15 local time (23:15 GMT) after the crew reported “engine vibrations”.

But even when the plane landed, passengers soon realised they were still far from safety.

“Everything was fine but then there was smoke filling the cabin,” said Ms Woods, who was returning home after attending a trade show in Colorado.

Seated at the front of the plane, she explained how she was one of the few in a position where they were able to walk off the plane once it had touched down.

Other passengers, as now viral images of huddled people standing on the wing of a smoking plane show, did not have as straightforward an escape.

Ingrid Hibbit, who was travelling on flight 1006 with her husband and daughter, was one of the unfortunate few forced out onto the wing before she could reconnect with her family on the ground.

“[You could see] flames from the window and the windows [were] kind of melting,” Ms Hibbit told CBS. Dismounting from the plane proved to be a difficult task – not helped, she pointed out, by being dressed in Birkenstock sandals.

“I was like shaking, I was not stable,” she admitted.

Adding to her already fever-pitch anxieties was the fact neither she, nor any member of her family, were seated in the same section of the plane. They could communicate only through text messages.

“I was hoping everything was okay, but we really didn’t know for sure,” she said, adding that despite the ordeal lasting only 10 minutes, “it was a very long 10 minutes”.

“It was a really great feeling to see that everyone was okay.”

She and her family finally touched down at Dallas Fort Worth International Airport on Friday morning, along with several of the other passengers.

Relief, she said, had swept through the group, particularly after an “exhausting” episode that had overshadowed the start of their family holiday.

“If this would’ve happened in the air, I don’t think we would be telling this story at all, because who knows what that would’ve been like,” she said. “I’m grateful that everyone survived.”

Think of video games, and you’ll probably think of something competitive.

Some of the most popular titles in the world, such as Fortnite and Call of Duty, are focused on outgunning, outrunning or outclassing opponents.

But, as Josef Fares and his studio Hazelight have shown, that’s not the only thing gamers want.

His latest, Split Fiction, is a collaborative experience where two players work together to solve puzzles and beat obstacles.

The adventure game has received rave reviews, sold one million copies in 48 hours and is currently among the most-watched titles on streaming platform Twitch.

It’s not a one-off. His previous title, It Takes Two, featured similar “couch co-op” gameplay and sold 20 million copies and won a Game of the Year Award.

What draws players to these friendlier experiences?

A report from analytics company Midia Research found that couch co-op was especially popular among people aged 16 to 24.

It surveyed 9,000 gamers worldwide, and said roughly 40% of respondents in the age range reported it was their preferred way to play.

The report said “social play is a key part of gaming for younger consumers,” and suggested more developers could look to incorporate collaborative elements.

Co-operative games are also big with streamers – watching players bicker as they try to conquer a new title is a great source of viral moments.

Last year Chained Together, where players work together to escape the depths of hell, was a hit thanks to huge names like Kai Cenat and IShowSpeed getting in on the action.

Couple Melissa and Jonn-Mark, from Middlesbrough, have been uploading clips of themselves playing Split Fiction together to TikTok.

The game centres around fantasy author Zoe and sci-fi writer Mio, who become trapped in simulated versions of their own stories.

Melissa, a keen reader, says the plot appealed to her, but the chance to team up got her invested.

“A lot of the time when you play video games you are isolated from other people and it’s just nice to be together, spend that quality time together,” Melissa tells Newsbeat.

Jonn-Mark says popular online games are often very competitive, which can be stressful.

“I don’t want to have to come home tired and have to focus 100% to just be able to do ok at a game,” he says.

“Whereas this one, I can just sit back, relax and just enjoy the experience.”

What Hazelight does is unique, but other companies do implement co-op features into their titles.

Guildford-based Supermassive Games, which specialises in “interactive horror movies”, made couch co-op a standard mode in its titles after publishing its breakout hit Until Dawn.

They found players were going through the single-player title in groups, passing the pad between them as the narrative – which changes based on choices made in-game – progressed.

Competitive social play is also popular. Some of the best-selling games on Nintendo’s Switch system – Mario Kart 8 and the Mario Party series – are frequently played with mates around the TV.

In recent years, developers have tried to replicate the success of games like Fortnite – so-called “live service” titles that constantly update and retain players for months, if not years.

If you get it right, the potential financial rewards are huge, but cutting through in a saturated market is difficult.

And as the video games industry continues to deal with mass layoffs, studio closures and decreased spending on premium games, not many publishers want to take a risk.

Josef believes there may be too much focus on the bottom line.

“Publishers need to step up and really trust the developer,” he says.

“But also developers, I think, need to have a clear vision and stick with what they believe in.”

He does admit, though, that not everyone has his studio’s history, nor his personality.

“I am a – what do you say? – a different breed,” says Josef.

When he was directing his first game, Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, feedback from some early playtests was “super bad”.

“I’m like, they’re wrong, they’re wrong, because I know it’s great,” he says.

He’s spoken before about resisting pressure to put micro-transactions – in-game purchases – in his projects, and is uncompromising despite his studio’s close relationship with EA, one of the world’s biggest publishers.

“I don’t expect everybody to be like me, but that’s me with my extreme confidence,” he says.

“What we do, I love it.

“We’re sticking to the vision of what we believe in. Stick with the vision, go with it.

“And I think if you really love what you do people love it as well.”

Listen to Newsbeat live at 12:45 and 17:45 weekdays – or listen back here.

An eight-year-old child who was raped in Bangladesh died of her injuries on Thursday, setting off fierce protests around the country.

The girl was raped while visiting her elder sister’s house in the city of Magura some time between the night of 5 March and the following morning, according to a case filed by her mother.

The elder sister’s 18-year-old husband, along with his parents and brother, were arrested and placed on remand.

On Thursday night, after hearing news of the child’s death, an angry mob descended on the house where the incident is alleged to have taken place, setting it on fire.

The girl died at about 13:00 local time (07:00 GMT) on Thursday after suffering three cardiac arrests, according to a statement by the government’s Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) department.

“Although doctors managed to stabilize the condition twice, the heart failed to restart after the third episode,” the statement said.

She had spent six days in a critical condition at the Combined Military Hospital in the capital Dhaka, after being admitted on 8 March.

“I thought my daughter would survive,” her mother said following the girl’s death, according to local media. “If she had made it through, I would never have let her go anywhere alone again.”

The girl’s body was taken back to Magura in an army helicopter, which landed at the local stadium around 18:00 to fierce protests.

Aiyub Ali, officer-in-charge of Magura Sadar Police Station, said that authorities struggled to bring the situation under control, according to local news outlet The Daily Star.

Thousands of people gathered in the public square in Magura for the girl’s namaz-e-janaza, the Islamic funeral prayer, before she was laid to rest at 19:30.

An absentee funeral was also held for the girl at Dhaka University, in the nation’s capital, followed by a protest march and speeches by female students.

Many protesters demanded that the government expedite justice for rape victims and reform laws related to women and children’s safety.

Protesters also called for greater clarity around the legal definitions of what constitutes rape in Bangladesh, which they said were currently ambiguous.

The trial of the rape and murder case is expected to begin within the next seven days, according to legal advisor Asif Nazrul.

“DNA sample collection has been completed, we hope to get the report within the next five days,” Mr Nazrul told a press briefing at the Secretariat on Thursday – adding that statements had already been taken from 12 to 13 people.

“If we can start the trial within seven days, our judges will be able to ensure justice with the utmost speed,” he added.

The rape of minors is punishable by death in Bangladesh, as per a law that was passed in 2020.

The introduction of that law followed a series of high-profile sexual violence cases, including the brutal gang assault on a 37-year-old woman that was filmed and spread on social media.

Less than a week after the rape of the young girl in Magura, media reports emerged of at least three rapes of children of around the same age in different parts of Bangladesh.

In some cases the accused were neighbours of the victim, while others were close relatives.

According to statistics from the Law and Arbitration Center, 3,438 child rape cases have been filed in Bangladesh in the last eight years, and there have been many more rape victims.

At least 539 of them are under the age of six, and 933 are between the ages of seven and twelve.

Research has shown that in most cases, children are sexually abused or raped by people they know.

Mark Carney, an economist and political newcomer, has been sworn in as Canada’s new prime minister, and delivered remarks vowing to “never” become a part of the United States.

He took office on Friday just days after being elected leader of the governing Liberal Party and amid an ongoing trade war with US President Donald Trump.

“We know that by building together, we can give ourselves far more than anyone else can take away,” he said after the ceremony.

Carney replaces outgoing Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who was in office for nine years, after a landslide victory in last week’s Liberal leadership race.

“We will never, in any shape or form, be part of the US,” Carney told reporters in Ottawa on Friday, referring to Trump’s musings that Canada join the US as its “51st state”.

“We are very fundamentally a different country,” he said, later adding the notion is “crazy”.

He declined to answer questions about the timing of Canada’s next federal election – currently scheduled for October – but hinted he would move quickly to seek “as strong a mandate that is needed for the time”.

• Carney wins race to succeed Trudeau as PM
• A simple guide to Canada’s federal election

In his first order as prime minister, Carney moved to end a policy that had been frequent attacked against by political opponents.

He ended the consumer carbon pricing programme – a key environmental policy under Trudeau that had become deeply unpopular in recent years amid high inflation.

Conservatives have criticised the tax, saying it raised the price of goods and energy for Canadian families.

At an afternoon cabinet meeting, Carney said his government will still take steps to fight climate change. An industrial carbon tax on large emitters remains in place.

Canadians receive a rebate to offset the cost of carbon pricing and will get their final cheque in April.

Canadian politics in recent months have largely been overshadowed by the trade war Trump launched after taking office in January – and with a general election on the horizon, Carney is expected to pitch himself as the candidate best equipped to take on Trump.

He previously held roles as governor of the Bank of Canada, the country’s central bank, and of the Bank of England, and helped both countries weather major financial disruption.

He intends to travel to the UK and France as his first foreign trip as PM next week.

Carney said he also looks forward to speaking with Trump.

“We respect the United States. We respect President Trump,” he said.

“President Trump is has put some very important issues at the top of his agenda.”

Carney has promised to uphold Canada’s reciprocal tariffs on specific American goods for as long as Trump maintains 25% universal tariffs on Canadian goods not covered by the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA) trade deal.

Canada is dependent on trade with the US. Economists say it risks a recession if Trump’s tariffs are fully imposed.

Several of Carney’s new cabinet members served under Trudeau, and in particular he kept on those who have been working directly with the Trump administration in recent months.

They including Mélanie Joly, who remains in foreign affairs; David McGuinty, who remains in public safety; Jonathan Wilkinson, staying on as energy minister; Dominic Leblanc, who has moved from finance to trade; and François-Philippe Champagne, moved from industry to finance.

When the federal election comes, Carney’s main rival will be Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre.

Before the the threat of tariffs, Conservatives enjoyed a 20-point lead in some election polls. Now polls are indicating a much closer race.

Speaking after Carney on Friday, Poilievre argued that Liberals do not deserve a fourth term in office, arguing adding they have already had nine years to improve affordability and other issues in the country.

“It will be the same Liberal results,” he said.

Poilievre added that if he were to be elected prime minister, he would “face off against President Trump directly, respond with counter tariffs and take back control”.

When Canadians next go to the polls, the Liberals will face not only the Conservatives – who are the official opposition with 120 seats in the House of Commons – but also the Bloc Quebecois, who have 33 seats, and the New Democrats (NDP), who have 24.

Reacting to Carney’s swearing in, the leader of the NDP argued that his cabinet appointments show that there is no room for progressive Liberals under his leadership.

Jagmeet Singh said that he had failed to create separate cabinet portfolios for minister of women, youth, or people with disabilities, and described Carney as someone who has made billionaires “very rich at the cost of workers”.

Iran is using drones and intrusive digital technology to crush dissent, especially among women who refuse to obey the Islamic republic’s strict dress code, the United Nations has said.

Investigators say Iranian security officials are using a strategy of “state-sponsored vigilantism” to encourage people to use specialist phone apps to report women for alleged dress code violations in private vehicles such as taxis and ambulances.

Their new report also highlights the increasing use of drones and security cameras to monitor hijab compliance in Tehran and in southern Iran.

For women who defy the laws, or protest against them, the consequences are severe – arrest, beating, and even rape in custody.

• Iranian women ‘ready to pay the price’ for defying hijab rules
• A really simple guide to the protests in Iran
• Iran reportedly executed at least 901 people in 2024, UN says

The findings of the Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on the Islamic Republic of Iran come after it determined last year that the country’s theocracy was responsible for the “physical violence” that led to the death in custody of Mahsa Amini in 2022.

Witnesses said the 22-year-old Kurd was badly beaten by the morality police during her arrest, but authorities denied she was mistreated and blamed “sudden heart failure” for her death. Her killing sparked a massive wave of protests that continues today, despite threats of violent arrest and imprisonment.

“Two-and-a-half years after the protests began in September 2022, women and girls in Iran continue to face systematic discrimination, in law and in practice, that permeates all aspects of their lives, particularly with respect to the enforcement of the mandatory hijab,” the report said.

“The state is increasingly reliant on state-sponsored vigilantism in an apparent effort to enlist businesses and private individuals in hijab compliance, portraying it as a civic responsibility.”

At Tehran’s Amirkabir University, authorities installed facial recognition software at its entrance gate to also find women not wearing the hijab, the report said.

Surveillance cameras on Iran’s major roads are also being used to search for uncovered women.

Investigators also said they obtained the “Nazer” mobile phone app offered by Iranian police, which allows “vetted” members of the public and the police to report on uncovered women in vehicles, including ambulances, buses, metro cars and taxis.

“Users may add the location, date, time and the licence plate number of the vehicle in which the alleged mandatory hijab infraction occurred, which then ‘flags’ the vehicle online, alerting the police,” the report said.

According to the report, a text message is then sent to the registered owner of the vehicle, warning them they had been found in violation of the mandatory hijab laws. Vehicles could be impounded for ignoring the warnings, it added.

The UN investigators interviewed almost 300 victims and witnesses – they also looked in-depth at Iran’s judicial system, which they said lacks any real independence. Victims of torture and other violations were also persecuted while their families were “systematically intimidated”, according to their report.

They also found evidence of the extrajudicial executions of three child and three adult protesters, later dismissed by the state as suicides.

The report also established additional cases of sexual violence in custody, citing the case of one arrested woman who was beaten severely, subjected to two mock executions, raped and then gang-raped.

The report will be presented to the Human Rights Council on 18 March.

The US has averted a government shutdown after the Senate passed a Republican-led measure to keep the government funded for the next six months.

The stopgap funding bill passed in the Senate 54-46, as two Democrats joined all but one Republican senator in voting yes. President Donald Trump must now sign it into law before the Friday midnight deadline.

The key vote came earlier when some Senate Democrats, after fierce debate, allowed the measure to pass a procedural hurdle.

The Senate minority leader, Democrat Chuck Schumer, and nine others broke with their colleagues to vote to advance the bill to its final Friday evening vote.

Two Democrats – Senator Jeanne Shaheen and Independent Senator Angus King of Maine – voted in favour of its final passage. Schumer voted “no”.

On Thursday, he announced he would vote to allow the measure to move forward, saying although it wasn’t a bill he liked, he believed triggering a shutdown would be a worse result.

• Democrat Party infighting exposes struggle to unite against Trump

Representative Alexandria Ocasio Cortez called Schumer’s willingness to let the spending bill proceed a “huge slap in the face”, adding that there is a “wide sense of betrayal” among the party, according to the BBC’s US partner CBS News.

She said supporting the bill “codifies the chaos and the reckless cuts that Elon Musk has been pursuing”, and that Senate Democrats who voted yes would be empowering “the robbing of our federal government in order to finance tax cuts for billionaires”.

The Democrats had agonised over whether to support the measure, and eventually pushed for a 30-day continuing resolution that was unlikely to earn enough support to pass.

Senator Ted Cruz accused the Democrats of conducting “political theater” and praised the bill’s passage.

“The government is funded, let’s get back to work,” he said in a statement.

The passage is a victory for Trump and congressional Republicans.

On Friday morning, Trump offered rare bipartisan praise of Schumer’s decision to let the bill advance, writing that “a non pass would be a Country destroyer, approval will lead us to new heights”.

The legislation would keep much of the federal funding levels from the Biden Administration in place, with some key changes.

It increases military spending by $6bn (£4.6bn), for items like border security, veterans healthcare, and military spending. But would cut non-defence funding by about $13bn.

Local officials in Washington DC had feared the bill would result in a $1bn cut in federal funds for the city over the next six months. However, the Senate approved a separate bill that kept its current operating budget intact, the New York Times reported.

US immigration authorities have announced the arrest of a second activist who participated in pro-Palestinian protests last spring at Columbia University in New York City.

Leqaa Kordia, who is a Palestinian and from the West Bank, was arrested in New Jersey, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said in a statement on Friday.

The statement said another student, Ranjani Srinivasani, who has Indian citizenship, chose to “self-deport” by leaving the US earlier this week.

This follows the arrest of Columbia campus activist Mahmoud Khalil, who was detained on Saturday in New York before being flown to a jail in Louisiana.

The DHS statement says that Ms Kordia had overstayed her student visa, which had been terminated in 2022 “for lack of attendance”. It did not say whether she had been attending Columbia or another institution.

She had previously been arrested in April 2024 for taking part in protests at Columbia University, according to DHS.

Ms Srinivasan, a doctoral student in Urban Planning at Columbia University, had her visa revoked on 5 March.

“It is a privilege to be granted a visa to live and study in the United States of America,” said Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem in a statement.

“When you advocate for violence and terrorism that privilege should be revoked, and you should not be in this country.”

Ms Srinivasan’s lawyer Ramzi Kassem told the Wall Street Journal that the government’s statement was “full of the falsehoods we’ve come to expect of DHS”.

Mr Kassem told the paper the government “violated basic rights” by revoking a visa “simply for engaging in protected political speech”.

The BBC contacted a lawyer for Ms Srinivasan for comment on Friday evening.

Contact details for Mr Kodia’s lawyer were not Immediately available.

• Who is Mahmoud Khalil, Palestinian student activist facing US deportation?

US President Donald Trump has repeatedly alleged that pro-Palestinian activists, including Mr Khalil, support Hamas, a group designated a terrorist organisation by the US.

The president argues these protesters should be deported.

Mr Khalil, 30, is a Syrian-born Columbia graduate and US green card holder.

His case has raised questions about free speech on college campuses and the legal process that would allow for the deportation of a US permanent resident.

His lawyers say he was exercising free speech rights to demonstrate in support of Palestinians in Gaza and against US support for Israel.

Mr Khalil’s lawyers deny that he supports Hamas.

Additionally, on Thursday night DHS agents executed two search warrants in rooms on the Columbia campus.

Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche of the US justice department said the agents were searching for evidence that the university was “harboring and concealing illegal aliens on its campus”.

“That investigation is ongoing, and we are also looking at whether Columbia’s handling of earlier incidents violated civil rights laws and included terrorism crimes,” he said.

Columbia Interim President Katrina Armstrong said in a letter to the campus that she was “heartbroken” to inform them of the federal raid.

“No one was arrested or detained. No items were removed, and no further action was taken,” she said.

The Trump administration has also pulled $400m (£310m) of federal funding from Columbia University, saying it failed to fight antisemitism on campus.

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky has accused Vladimir Putin of trying to “sabotage” diplomatic efforts to secure an immediate ceasefire.

In a post on social media, he urged the US to put more pressure on the Russian president, saying only the “strength of America” could end the war.

The Ukrainian leader said Putin was “doing everything he can to sabotage diplomacy by setting extremely difficult and unacceptable conditions right from the start even before a ceasefire”.

At his press conference on Thursday, Putin said he accepted the idea of a ceasefire but qualified that with numerous questions about detail.

• Peace talks are in parallel universe, say Ukraine front-line troops
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He raised the Kursk border region, where Russian forces are retaking territory occupied by Ukraine six months ago. He accused Ukrainian forces of “heinous crimes against civilians” – something Kyiv denies – and asked whether they should walk free or surrender.

He asked about whether Ukraine would use a ceasefire to mobilise, retrain and resupply its troops, without suggesting his forces might do the same.

And Putin raised numerous questions about how a ceasefire could be monitored and policed along the frontline in the east. “Who will be able to determine who violated the potential ceasefire agreement over a distance of 2,000 km and where exactly?” he asked. “Who will be held responsible for violating the ceasefire?”

At a meeting with journalists on Friday, Zelensky addressed these issues directly, especially the questions about verification. He said Ukraine was more than able to verify a ceasefire in the air and the sea. But he said the surveillance and intelligence capabilities of American and European aircraft and satellites would be needed to monitor the front line.

Ukraine believes Putin’s conditions of detail can be addressed. Much harder to deal with are Putin’s objections of principle. He said any deal should “proceed from the assumption that this cessation should lead to long-term peace and eliminate the root causes of this crisis”. By that, he means his objections to the expansion of the Nato military alliance and the very existence of Ukraine as a sovereign independent state.

There is very little chance of that being addressed in any immediate interim ceasefire. Not for nothing did G7 foreign ministers meeting in Canada emphasise Ukraine’s territorial integrity “and its right to exist and its freedom, sovereignty and independence”.

This is why Zelensky said “Russia is the only party that wants the war to continue and diplomacy to break down”.

So what could happen now? Well the ball is in America’s court. President Trump could choose to step up pressure on Russia as Ukraine is demanding. He could impose more sanctions on Russia – and countries buying its cheap oil and gas. He could also give more military and intelligence support to Ukraine. Or alternatively Trump could offer Russia more concessions to get a deal over the line, a possibility that worries some here in Kyiv. Much of the contact between the US and Russia has been held in secret compared to the very public diplomatic pressure imposed on Ukraine.

That is why Zelensky is calling out Russia’s delaying tactics and urging the West to put more pressure on Putin. He may also be enjoying seeing Russia in the spotlight, having been the butt of American diplomatic efforts for more than a month since Trump and Putin had their first telephone call.

The bottom line is that Trump has driven a diplomatic bulldozer through many international issues since his inauguration, including the war in Ukraine.

But now he has come up against the walls of the Kremlin and they may be harder to get through.

Trump wants a fast end to the fighting. Putin wants a “painstaking” discussion about details and principles. Two incompatible imperatives held by two stubborn leaders used to getting their way. Who will blink first? The prospects of a ceasefire are by no means certain, for all the American expressions of “cautious optimism”.

Sean “Diddy” Combs has pleaded not guilty to an amended indictment that includes new allegations of forced labour.

The superseding indictment alleges the rap mogul forced employees to work long hours under threat of physical and reputational harm and forced at least one worker to engage in sex acts with him.

Mr Combs’s lawyers have denied that the rap mogul has ever forced anyone into sex acts and that the case revolves around consensual relationships with his girlfriends, the New York Times reports.

His lawyers have also “vehemently” denied all the accusations made against him in the federal case and dozens of civil lawsuits that have been filed against him in recent months.

“He looks forward to his day in court when it will become clear that he has never forced anyone to engage in sexual acts against their will,” his lawyer Marc Agnifilo has said.

Mr Combs, one of the most successful rappers in the US, is soon expected to stand trial in a federal sex trafficking and racketeering case.

The new allegations detailed in the amended indictment come under the racketeering charge.

Separately, Mr Combs faces dozens of lawsuits accusing him of rape and assault. His lawyers have dismissed the lawsuits as “clear attempts to garner publicity.”

• BBC Sounds: Get the latest updates on the Diddy allegations in the weekly podcast, Diddy On Trial

Mr Combs was led into a wood-panelled courtroom on Friday in New York’s southern district federal court wearing a greenish-tan prison jumpsuit, with overgrown grey hair and a beard.

He chose to stand as he entered his not guilty plea. Asked by a judge if he had seen and read the indictment, he responded, “Yes, I have sir”.

Behind him, in the public benches, his son Christian, his daughter Chance, his mother Janice Combs – wearing large sunglasses, and friend Marvet Britto (a publicist) came to support him, along with two other men who described themselves as part of the family’s “support system”.

Mr Combs was smiling in court, waving and blowing kisses to his family and hugging his lawyers.

As well as the new allegations, there was also much discussion in court between the prosecution and defence’s lawyers over a video published by CNN last year appearing to show CCTV footage of Mr Combs kicking his former girlfriend, Cassandra Ventura, on a hotel hallway floor in 2016.

Mr Combs’s lawyers repeated their claims that the video was “deceptive” and that a visual expert had found that parts of the video were taken out of order, the actions sped up, and timestamps covered up.

Prosecutors on the other hand described it as “critical” and “direct evidence” of their case that they will submit as an exhibit in the trial. The judge urged them to reach a compromise.

CNN and a lawyer for Ms Ventura have denied what Mr Combs’ lawyers said about the video.

After the video was released in 2024, Mr Combs apologised for his behaviour, saying: “I take full responsibility for my actions in that video. I was disgusted then when I did it. I’m disgusted now.”

On Friday, the judge said jury selection was expected to start on 5 May, and opening statements on 12 May.

Elon Musk’s electric carmaker Tesla has warned it and other US exporters could be harmed by countries retaliating to Donald Trump’s trade tariffs.

Mr Musk is a close ally of the US president and is leading efforts to reduce the size of the federal government.

But in an unsigned letter addressed to the US trade representative, Tesla said while it “supports” fair trade it was concerned US exporters were “exposed to disproportionate impacts” if other countries retaliated to tariffs.

The letter was dated the same day that Trump hosted an event at the White House where he promised to buy a Tesla in a show of support for Mr Musk.

It is unclear who at Tesla wrote the letter as it is unsigned, or if Mr Musk was aware of it.

Tesla’s share price has dropped 40% since the start of the year. Mr Musk is the carmaker’s chief executive and while some have argued his alignment with the Trump administration is hurting its brand, market analysts say the share fall is more about worries over Tesla meeting production targets and a drop in sales over the past year.

In the letter, Tesla said it was making changes to its supply chains to find as many local suppliers for its cars and batteries so it was less reliant on foreign markets.

“None the less,” it warned, “even with aggressive localisation of the supply chain, certain parts and components are difficult or impossible to source within the US.”

The US president has imposed an additional 20% tariff on all imports from China, prompting Beijing to respond with retaliatory levies including on cars. China is Tesla’s second biggest market after the US.

“For example, past trade actions by the United States have resulted in immediate reactions by the targeted countries, including increased tariffs on EVs imported into those countries,” the letter reads.

The EU and Canada have both threatened sweeping retaliations for tariffs on steel and aluminium imports into the US, which went into effect earlier this week.

Demonstrators have targeted Tesla showrooms in recent weeks in protest against Mr Musk’s cost-cutting role in Trump’s administration, where he is head of the Department of Government Efficiency (Doge).

Earlier this week, Trump hosted an event at the White House where he said people protesting against Tesla should be labelled domestic terrorists, while sitting in the driver’s seat of a brand new red Tesla that he said he planned to buy.

Trump said demonstrators were “harming a great American company”, and anyone using violence against the electric carmaker would “go through hell”.

US President Donald Trump has praised talks held with Russian President Vladimir Putin on the US-proposed ceasefire deal in Ukraine as “good and productive”.

This comes after Putin and US envoy Steve Witkoff met in Moscow on Thursday evening, after which the Kremlin said it shared the US’s “cautious optimism” over a peace process.

Trump said in a Truth Social post that the talks provided “a very good chance that this horrible, bloody war can finally come to an end”.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, however, accused Putin of trying to drag out talks to continue the war, while Sir Keir Starmer said the Russian president could not be allowed to “play games” with ceasefire proposals.

• Follow live: Trump says US had ‘good and productive’ talks with Putin over Ukraine war

Earlier this week, Ukraine accepted the US-proposed ceasefire deal, which Russia is yet to agree to.

On Thursday, Putin had said the idea of a ceasefire was “right and we support it… but there are nuances” and he set out a number of tough conditions for peace, a response branded “manipulative” by Zelensky.

Ukraine’s leader continued his criticism on Friday in a series of posts on X, writing: “Putin cannot exit this war because that would leave him with nothing.

“That is why he is now doing everything he can to sabotage diplomacy by setting extremely difficult and unacceptable conditions right from the start even before a ceasefire.”

He said Putin would “drag” everyone into “endless discussions… wasting days, weeks, and months on meaningless talks while his guns continue to kill people”.

“Every condition Putin puts forward is just an attempt to block any diplomacy. This is how Russia works. And we warned about this.”

UK PM Sir Keir said the Kremlin’s “complete disregard” for Trump’s ceasefire proposal demonstrated Putin was “not serious about peace”.

“If Russia finally comes to the table, then we must be ready to monitor a ceasefire to ensure it is a serious and enduring peace,” he said.

“If they don’t, then we need to strain every sinew to ramp up economic pressure on Russia to secure an end to this war.”

On Saturday, Sir Keir will host a video call with as many as 25 leaders to develop the peacekeeping mission proposed during a summit in London earlier this month.

The “coalition of the willing” – as he called it – will work to deter future Russian aggression, should the US-proposed ceasefire come into effect.

In his social media posts on Friday, Zelensky “strongly” urged “everyone who can influence Russia, especially the United States, to take strong steps that can help”, because Putin would not stop the war on his own.

“Putin is lying about the real situation on the battlefield… the casualties” and “the true state of his economy”, he said, explaining that Putin was “doing everything possible to ensure that diplomacy fails”.

But the White House believes the two sides have “never been this close to peace”.

Talking to reporters, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt maintained that the talks between Putin and Witkoff in Moscow on Thursday were “productive”.

She added Trump has been “putting pressure on Putin and the Russians to do the right thing”.

Trump’s social media post also “strongly requested” Putin should spare the lives of Ukrainian troops, whom he described as surrounded by Russian forces, adding it would be a “horrible massacre” not seen since World War Two.

His comments came after Putin said on Thursday that Ukrainian troops in Kursk had been “isolated” and were trying to leave, as Russia ramps up efforts to reclaim the region invaded by Ukraine last year.

But on Friday, Ukraine’s armed forces general staff denied the encirclement of its troops, calling it “false and fabricated”.

In a statement, it said operations were continuing, with Ukrainian troops having withdrawn and “successfully regrouped” to better defensive positions.

“There is no threat of encirclement of our units,” it said.

In response to Trump’s request, Putin said Ukrainian soldiers in Kursk would be treated with “dignity in line with the norms of international law and the laws of the Russian Federation” if they gave up arms and surrendered.

Meanwhile, G7 members have been meeting in Quebec, where host Canadian Foreign Minister Mélanie Joly said all the members agreed with the US proposal of a ceasefire that is supported by Ukrainians.

“And we are now studying and looking at Russian reactions, so ultimately the ball is now in Russia’s court when it comes to Ukraine.”

UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy, who was also at the meeting, said the members were united in calling for a ceasefire with “no conditions”.

Following the meeting, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the US would not make foreign policy decisions based on what leaders said on social media or at a news conference, and stressed the “only way to end this war is through a process of negotiations”.

A US influencer who was filmed taking a wild baby wombat away from its distressed mother in Australia has said she is “truly sorry” and received thousands of death threats over the incident.

Sam Jones, who calls herself an “outdoor enthusiast and hunter”, was filmed picking up the joey on the side of a road, while laughing and running over to a car, while the mother chases after them.

It sparked a huge backlash, with Australian PM Anthony Albanese challenging her to “take a baby crocodile from its mother and see how you go there”.

In a lengthy statement on her Instagram page, Jones says she was trying to get the animals safely off the road.

She said, as can be seen in the video, that the mother runs off the road, but the baby does not, and Jones scoops it up. She says she ran across the road “not to rip the joey away from its mother, but from fear she might attack me”.

“The snap judgement I made in these moments was never from a place of harm or stealing a joey,” the statement said.

She said the video was “not staged, nor was it done for entertainment”, and in her excitement of the moment, “acted too quickly and failed to provide necessary context to viewers online”.

• US influencer draws backlash for stealing baby wombat from mum

In the second part of her statement, Jones launched a scathing attack on Australia’s animal culling laws, including wombats, kangaroos, horses, deer and pigs.

Australia has various culling laws and regulations that spark controversy and divide the nation.

Wombats, which are native to Australia, are a protected species, but permits can be obtained to cull them if deemed necessary.

• To conserve or cull? Life in Australia’s crocodile capital

An online petition supporting her deportation received more than 40,000 signatures. Home Affairs minister Tony Burke said his department was reviewing whether it could revoke Jones’s visa. However, the BBC understands that she left the country of her own accord.

Jones, who also goes by the name Samantha Strable, has more than 95,000 followers on Instagram.

Conservationists warned Jones’s “appalling” behaviour could have caused severe harm to the wombats.

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

“[She] then placed the vulnerable baby back onto a country road – potentially putting it at risk of becoming roadkill,” it noted in its statement, adding that it remained unclear if the joey had been reunited with its mother.

“I caught a baby wombat,” Jones said in the video, while the joey could be heard hissing and struggling in her grip.

The man filming can be heard laughing: “Look at the mother, it’s chasing after her!”

Her caption in the now-deleted post read: “My dream of holding a wombat has been realised! Baby and mom slowly waddled back off together into the bush.”

“The baby was carefully held for one minute in total and then released back to mom,” she wrote in the comments, responding to criticism.

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

Animal rights organisations have criticised Jones. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or Peta, described the video as “wildlife-exploiting content” and urged people to “stop treating wildlife as a prop”.

Sam Jones, a US 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 whether 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 Australian 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, 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.

A new TikTok account claiming to be Jones after her original account was allegedly banned, published a post on Thursday saying that “the hate is currently too much for me to handle” and that there had been “hundreds” of death threats.

“Imagine someone just goes up to your child and curses at them? Let’s have some respect,” the post said.

Most, however, have remained critical of Jones’s act.

“Maybe imagine if someone picked up your child and laughed while you screamed for them to give them back,” read a comment under the post, a reference to Jones’s snatching of the wombat from its mother.

“Nerve-wrecking, terrifying and horrific.”

That is how one witness described her experience getting off an American Airlines flight that caught fire after it was forced to make an emergency landing in Colorado.

Some of the 172 passengers travelling on the flight bound for Dallas were seen standing on the plane’s wing after it touched down in Denver, with large plumes of smoke encircling around them.

Everyone on board, including six crew members, made it out of the plane alive, with 12 passengers treated at hospital for minor injuries, according to airport officials.

One of those passengers, Michele Woods, told CBS News, the BBC’s US partner, how everything about the flight seemed normal at take off.

It was not until they were cruising in the air that she noticed a loud noise reverberating from one of the plane’s engines.

The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) later confirmed the plane diverted to Denver at around 17:15 local time (23:15 GMT) after the crew reported “engine vibrations”.

But even when the plane landed, passengers soon realised they were still far from safety.

“Everything was fine but then there was smoke filling the cabin,” said Ms Woods, who was returning home after attending a trade show in Colorado.

Seated at the front of the plane, she explained how she was one of the few in a position where they were able to walk off the plane once it had touched down.

Other passengers, as now viral images of huddled people standing on the wing of a smoking plane show, did not have as straightforward an escape.

Ingrid Hibbit, who was travelling on flight 1006 with her husband and daughter, was one of the unfortunate few forced out onto the wing before she could reconnect with her family on the ground.

“[You could see] flames from the window and the windows [were] kind of melting,” Ms Hibbit told CBS. Dismounting from the plane proved to be a difficult task – not helped, she pointed out, by being dressed in Birkenstock sandals.

“I was like shaking, I was not stable,” she admitted.

Adding to her already fever-pitch anxieties was the fact neither she, nor any member of her family, were seated in the same section of the plane. They could communicate only through text messages.

“I was hoping everything was okay, but we really didn’t know for sure,” she said, adding that despite the ordeal lasting only 10 minutes, “it was a very long 10 minutes”.

“It was a really great feeling to see that everyone was okay.”

She and her family finally touched down at Dallas Fort Worth International Airport on Friday morning, along with several of the other passengers.

Relief, she said, had swept through the group, particularly after an “exhausting” episode that had overshadowed the start of their family holiday.

“If this would’ve happened in the air, I don’t think we would be telling this story at all, because who knows what that would’ve been like,” she said. “I’m grateful that everyone survived.”

Iran is using drones and intrusive digital technology to crush dissent, especially among women who refuse to obey the Islamic republic’s strict dress code, the United Nations has said.

Investigators say Iranian security officials are using a strategy of “state-sponsored vigilantism” to encourage people to use specialist phone apps to report women for alleged dress code violations in private vehicles such as taxis and ambulances.

Their new report also highlights the increasing use of drones and security cameras to monitor hijab compliance in Tehran and in southern Iran.

For women who defy the laws, or protest against them, the consequences are severe – arrest, beating, and even rape in custody.

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The findings of the Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on the Islamic Republic of Iran come after it determined last year that the country’s theocracy was responsible for the “physical violence” that led to the death in custody of Mahsa Amini in 2022.

Witnesses said the 22-year-old Kurd was badly beaten by the morality police during her arrest, but authorities denied she was mistreated and blamed “sudden heart failure” for her death. Her killing sparked a massive wave of protests that continues today, despite threats of violent arrest and imprisonment.

“Two-and-a-half years after the protests began in September 2022, women and girls in Iran continue to face systematic discrimination, in law and in practice, that permeates all aspects of their lives, particularly with respect to the enforcement of the mandatory hijab,” the report said.

“The state is increasingly reliant on state-sponsored vigilantism in an apparent effort to enlist businesses and private individuals in hijab compliance, portraying it as a civic responsibility.”

At Tehran’s Amirkabir University, authorities installed facial recognition software at its entrance gate to also find women not wearing the hijab, the report said.

Surveillance cameras on Iran’s major roads are also being used to search for uncovered women.

Investigators also said they obtained the “Nazer” mobile phone app offered by Iranian police, which allows “vetted” members of the public and the police to report on uncovered women in vehicles, including ambulances, buses, metro cars and taxis.

“Users may add the location, date, time and the licence plate number of the vehicle in which the alleged mandatory hijab infraction occurred, which then ‘flags’ the vehicle online, alerting the police,” the report said.

According to the report, a text message is then sent to the registered owner of the vehicle, warning them they had been found in violation of the mandatory hijab laws. Vehicles could be impounded for ignoring the warnings, it added.

The UN investigators interviewed almost 300 victims and witnesses – they also looked in-depth at Iran’s judicial system, which they said lacks any real independence. Victims of torture and other violations were also persecuted while their families were “systematically intimidated”, according to their report.

They also found evidence of the extrajudicial executions of three child and three adult protesters, later dismissed by the state as suicides.

The report also established additional cases of sexual violence in custody, citing the case of one arrested woman who was beaten severely, subjected to two mock executions, raped and then gang-raped.

The report will be presented to the Human Rights Council on 18 March.

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.

Mark Carney, an economist and political newcomer, has been sworn in as Canada’s new prime minister, and delivered remarks vowing to “never” become a part of the United States.

He took office on Friday just days after being elected leader of the governing Liberal Party and amid an ongoing trade war with US President Donald Trump.

“We know that by building together, we can give ourselves far more than anyone else can take away,” he said after the ceremony.

Carney replaces outgoing Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who was in office for nine years, after a landslide victory in last week’s Liberal leadership race.

“We will never, in any shape or form, be part of the US,” Carney told reporters in Ottawa on Friday, referring to Trump’s musings that Canada join the US as its “51st state”.

“We are very fundamentally a different country,” he said, later adding the notion is “crazy”.

He declined to answer questions about the timing of Canada’s next federal election – currently scheduled for October – but hinted he would move quickly to seek “as strong a mandate that is needed for the time”.

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In his first order as prime minister, Carney moved to end a policy that had been frequent attacked against by political opponents.

He ended the consumer carbon pricing programme – a key environmental policy under Trudeau that had become deeply unpopular in recent years amid high inflation.

Conservatives have criticised the tax, saying it raised the price of goods and energy for Canadian families.

At an afternoon cabinet meeting, Carney said his government will still take steps to fight climate change. An industrial carbon tax on large emitters remains in place.

Canadians receive a rebate to offset the cost of carbon pricing and will get their final cheque in April.

Canadian politics in recent months have largely been overshadowed by the trade war Trump launched after taking office in January – and with a general election on the horizon, Carney is expected to pitch himself as the candidate best equipped to take on Trump.

He previously held roles as governor of the Bank of Canada, the country’s central bank, and of the Bank of England, and helped both countries weather major financial disruption.

He intends to travel to the UK and France as his first foreign trip as PM next week.

Carney said he also looks forward to speaking with Trump.

“We respect the United States. We respect President Trump,” he said.

“President Trump is has put some very important issues at the top of his agenda.”

Carney has promised to uphold Canada’s reciprocal tariffs on specific American goods for as long as Trump maintains 25% universal tariffs on Canadian goods not covered by the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA) trade deal.

Canada is dependent on trade with the US. Economists say it risks a recession if Trump’s tariffs are fully imposed.

Several of Carney’s new cabinet members served under Trudeau, and in particular he kept on those who have been working directly with the Trump administration in recent months.

They including Mélanie Joly, who remains in foreign affairs; David McGuinty, who remains in public safety; Jonathan Wilkinson, staying on as energy minister; Dominic Leblanc, who has moved from finance to trade; and François-Philippe Champagne, moved from industry to finance.

When the federal election comes, Carney’s main rival will be Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre.

Before the the threat of tariffs, Conservatives enjoyed a 20-point lead in some election polls. Now polls are indicating a much closer race.

Speaking after Carney on Friday, Poilievre argued that Liberals do not deserve a fourth term in office, arguing adding they have already had nine years to improve affordability and other issues in the country.

“It will be the same Liberal results,” he said.

Poilievre added that if he were to be elected prime minister, he would “face off against President Trump directly, respond with counter tariffs and take back control”.

When Canadians next go to the polls, the Liberals will face not only the Conservatives – who are the official opposition with 120 seats in the House of Commons – but also the Bloc Quebecois, who have 33 seats, and the New Democrats (NDP), who have 24.

Reacting to Carney’s swearing in, the leader of the NDP argued that his cabinet appointments show that there is no room for progressive Liberals under his leadership.

Jagmeet Singh said that he had failed to create separate cabinet portfolios for minister of women, youth, or people with disabilities, and described Carney as someone who has made billionaires “very rich at the cost of workers”.

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky has accused Vladimir Putin of trying to “sabotage” diplomatic efforts to secure an immediate ceasefire.

In a post on social media, he urged the US to put more pressure on the Russian president, saying only the “strength of America” could end the war.

The Ukrainian leader said Putin was “doing everything he can to sabotage diplomacy by setting extremely difficult and unacceptable conditions right from the start even before a ceasefire”.

At his press conference on Thursday, Putin said he accepted the idea of a ceasefire but qualified that with numerous questions about detail.

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He raised the Kursk border region, where Russian forces are retaking territory occupied by Ukraine six months ago. He accused Ukrainian forces of “heinous crimes against civilians” – something Kyiv denies – and asked whether they should walk free or surrender.

He asked about whether Ukraine would use a ceasefire to mobilise, retrain and resupply its troops, without suggesting his forces might do the same.

And Putin raised numerous questions about how a ceasefire could be monitored and policed along the frontline in the east. “Who will be able to determine who violated the potential ceasefire agreement over a distance of 2,000 km and where exactly?” he asked. “Who will be held responsible for violating the ceasefire?”

At a meeting with journalists on Friday, Zelensky addressed these issues directly, especially the questions about verification. He said Ukraine was more than able to verify a ceasefire in the air and the sea. But he said the surveillance and intelligence capabilities of American and European aircraft and satellites would be needed to monitor the front line.

Ukraine believes Putin’s conditions of detail can be addressed. Much harder to deal with are Putin’s objections of principle. He said any deal should “proceed from the assumption that this cessation should lead to long-term peace and eliminate the root causes of this crisis”. By that, he means his objections to the expansion of the Nato military alliance and the very existence of Ukraine as a sovereign independent state.

There is very little chance of that being addressed in any immediate interim ceasefire. Not for nothing did G7 foreign ministers meeting in Canada emphasise Ukraine’s territorial integrity “and its right to exist and its freedom, sovereignty and independence”.

This is why Zelensky said “Russia is the only party that wants the war to continue and diplomacy to break down”.

So what could happen now? Well the ball is in America’s court. President Trump could choose to step up pressure on Russia as Ukraine is demanding. He could impose more sanctions on Russia – and countries buying its cheap oil and gas. He could also give more military and intelligence support to Ukraine. Or alternatively Trump could offer Russia more concessions to get a deal over the line, a possibility that worries some here in Kyiv. Much of the contact between the US and Russia has been held in secret compared to the very public diplomatic pressure imposed on Ukraine.

That is why Zelensky is calling out Russia’s delaying tactics and urging the West to put more pressure on Putin. He may also be enjoying seeing Russia in the spotlight, having been the butt of American diplomatic efforts for more than a month since Trump and Putin had their first telephone call.

The bottom line is that Trump has driven a diplomatic bulldozer through many international issues since his inauguration, including the war in Ukraine.

But now he has come up against the walls of the Kremlin and they may be harder to get through.

Trump wants a fast end to the fighting. Putin wants a “painstaking” discussion about details and principles. Two incompatible imperatives held by two stubborn leaders used to getting their way. Who will blink first? The prospects of a ceasefire are by no means certain, for all the American expressions of “cautious optimism”.

Greenland’s leading political parties have issued a joint statement to condemn Donald Trump’s “unacceptable behaviour”, after the US president seemed to escalate his campaign to take over the island.

The show of unity saw all leaders of parties in the Inatsisartut – the parliament – release a joint message saying they “cannot accept the repeated statements about annexation and control of Greenland”.

It follows a meeting between Trump and Nato’s secretary general Mark Rutte on Thursday, where the president seemed to double down on his annexation plan.

Greenland’s joint statement was orchestrated by outgoing Prime Minister Mute B Egede, whose party was defeated in an election on Tuesday.

“Our country will never be the USA and we Greenlanders will never be Americans,” Egede wrote on Facebook. “Don’t keep treating us with disrespect. Enough is enough.”

Greenland – the world’s biggest island, between the Arctic and Atlantic Oceans – has been controlled by Denmark, nearly 3,000km (1,860 miles) away, for about 300 years.

Greenland governs its own domestic affairs, but decisions on foreign and defence policy are made in Copenhagen.

The US has long had a security interest in the island. It has had a military base there since World War Two, and Trump is probably also keen on the rare earth minerals that could be mined.

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Greenland was already on the defensive about Trump’s annexing talk, but his comments to Rutte at the White House sent further shockwaves when he implied that Nato’s help might be needed to seize the island.

“You know, Mark, we need that for international security… we have a lot of our favourite players cruising around the coast, and we have to be careful,” Trump said.

“We’ll be talking to you,” he added.

When asked about the prospect of annexation, Trump said: “I think that will happen.”

Rutte has been criticised in both Greenland and Denmark for not reprimanding Trump. Instead, he said he would “leave that [issue] outside… I do not want to drag Nato into that”.

He then pivoted to praise – something several world leaders have used when dealing with Donald Trump – saying he was “totally right” that security in the Arctic must be maintained.

The joint statement from Greenland’s politicians emphasised that they are united in their pushback against Trump’s plan.

“Greenland continues the work for Greenland,” the statement said.

“We all stand behind this effort and strongly distance ourselves from attempts to create discord.”

Their decision to speak out came three days after elections in which the centre-right opposition – the Democratic Party – won a surprise victory.

Its leader, Jens-Frederik Nielsen, who is likely to be Greenland’s new prime minister, is now negotiating with other parties to form a coalition.