A survivor from a massacre of Palestinian paramedics and rescue workers in Gaza has said he saw Israeli troops open fire on a succession of Red Crescent ambulances and rescue vehicles and then use a bulldozer to bury the wreckage in a pit.

Munther Abed, a 27-year-old Red Crescent volunteer, was in the back of the first ambulance to arrive on the scene of an airstrike in the Hashashin district of Rafah before dawn on 23 March, when it came under intense Israeli fire. His two Red Crescent colleagues sitting in the front were killed but he survived by throwing himself to the floor of the vehicle.

“The door opened, and there they were – Israeli special forces in military uniforms, armed with rifles, green lasers and night-vision goggles,” Abed told the Guardian. “They dragged me out of the ambulance, keeping me face down to avoid seeing what had happened to my colleagues.”

He was beaten, detained with his hands tied and made to lie on the ground, from where he was able to see some of what happened as other friends and colleagues arrived on the scene in ambulances and fire trucks, each one running into a hail of gunfire. In all, eight Red Crescent ambulance crew members and paramedics, six civil defence rescue workers and a UN employee were killed. Their bodies were found alongside their crushed vehicles last weekend in a sandy pit that Abed watched the troops dig. Other witnesses have told the Guardian that some of the dead had had their hands or feet tied.

A Red Crescent ambulance officer, Assad al-Nassara, remains unaccounted for, but Abed said he saw him alive and in Israeli detention in the vicinity of the killings. Nassara has not been seen since. So far, Abed is the only one to return alive and tell his story.

He was volunteering on 23 March at the ambulance station at the British field hospital in al-Mawasi, a coastal camp for displaced people, when the call came in shortly after 4am from the emergency services dispatcher in Hashashin, an area of barren sandy dunes on the northern outskirts of Rafah. (The name means The Assassins). Abed jumped in the back of an ambulance that left immediately. His friend, Mostafa Khufaga, was driving, with another ambulance officer, Ezzedine Shaath, beside him.

Under international pressure, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said on Thursday they were launching a formal investigation into the shootings. Until now, however, the IDF has denied any wrongdoing, claiming it had fired on vehicles “advancing suspiciously” without headlights or emergency signals. Abed said that account was blatantly false.

“The ambulance’s lights were clearly on, and the Red Crescent logo was visible as we headed to the scene,” he said. The IDF has described the area as a war zone, but Abed said Hashashin was “a civilian area where daily life had been going on as usual, not a designated combat zone”.

They had almost reached the site of the reported airstrike at 4.20am, when they came under fire.

“From the moment the shooting began, I immediately took cover on the floor of the ambulance. I didn’t hear anything from my colleagues, except for the sounds of their last moments, hearing them take their last breath,” he said. “Suddenly, everything went quiet, the ambulance came to a stop, and the lights went out. The driver’s side door opened, and I heard voices speaking in Hebrew. Fear and panic overtook me, and I began reciting some quotes from the Qur’an.

“I was completely stripped, left only in my underwear, and my hands were bound behind my back,” Abed recalled. “They threw me to the ground, and the interrogation began. I endured severe torture, including beatings, insults, threats of death, and suffocation when one soldier pressed a rifle against my neck. Another soldier held a dagger to my left shoulder. After a while, an officer arrived and ordered the soldiers to stop, calling them ‘crazy people’ who didn’t know how to communicate.”

An elderly man and his son who had been going fishing before sunrise were also detained and bound and made to lie on the ground beside Abed.

“During this time, I noticed a civil defence vehicle and another ambulance approaching. As they neared, both were met with intense gunfire from the Israeli forces that lasted for about five minutes. After the shooting stopped, I didn’t see anyone leave the vehicles,” he said.

“About five minutes later, two ambulances arrived from the direction of Rafah on the road leading to the Red Crescent ambulance centre. I could only see the red lights of the ambulances and hear the sound of gunfire. Another five minutes passed and a third ambulance arrived from the direction of Khan Younis, the same direction we had come from. It stopped near our vehicle and was shot at as well, just like the others.

“As the sun began to rise around 6am, the landscape around us became clearer,” Abed said. “Tanks, quadcopters and drones came. The area was completely surrounded, and a large Israeli bulldozer and excavator arrived. They began digging a massive hole and threw the ambulances and civil defence vehicle into it, burying them and covering the hole.

“As for my colleagues, I don’t know their fate. I only saw Asaad, but I’m certain that the others were killed immediately after being shot,” he said.

The bodies of Abed’s colleagues, Khufaga and Shaath, were dug up from the same pit last weekend, along with the remains of six other Red Crescent workers: Saleh Muamer, Mohammad Bahloul, Mohammed al-Heila, Ashraf Abu Labda, Raed al-Sharif and Rifatt Radwan – six Palestinian civil defence workers and an employee of the UN relief agency, Unrwa.

The IDF had claimed it had killed nine militants from Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad in the incident, but no other bodies have been recovered from the mass grave, and Abed was adamant there were no militants travelling with the ambulances.

Abed himself was held for several hours, sometimes in a hole dug in the ground, during which he was fully stripped, beaten again and interrogated about his past. He was later forced to help in the vetting and photographing of local people who were ordered to leave the area and go to al-Mawasi.

“Some of the women were carrying their children who had been killed. One mother carried her child, who had been shot in the chest and killed. Another mother carried her daughter, who had also been shot in the chest. Another girl carried their sister, who had been shot in the foot, and many elderly people were among them. No one stopped the women and children,” he said.

“Then I began directing the men, bringing five at a time to stand in front of the camera,” Abed said. “Some of them passed without incident, but others were taken, dressed in white, and placed in a large hole. I still don’t know what happened to them.”

Abed was released in the evening. He was given back his watch and underwear, but not his identity card, paramedic uniform or shoes. He was told to walk towards al-Mawasi, and was eventually able to flag down a passing Red Crescent vehicle.

He said he was still in pain from the beatings and described his state of mind as “shattered”.

Abed has volunteered for the Red Crescent since he was 18 and worked in the ambulances since the start of the war.

“We entered this field out of love, despite the dangers that surround it and the risk we face during missions,” he said. But the work was sliding rapidly from the dangerous to the lethal.

“We no longer find it surprising when someone is killed. Anyone can be targeted as we are dealing with an occupying force that disregards international laws and treaties,” Abed said. “Every mission we go on feels like it might be the last.”

Hungary will leave the international criminal court because it has become “political”, the country’s prime minister, Viktor Orbán, said as he welcomed his Israeli counterpart, Benjamin Netanhayu – the subject of an ICC arrest warrant – to Budapest for an official visit.

Standing beside Netanyahu at the start of the four-day visit, Orbàn said Hungary was convinced the “otherwise very important court” had “diminished into a political forum”.

Netanyahu hailed “a bold and principled” decision. “I thank you, Viktor … It’s important for all democracies,” the Israeli prime minister said. “It’s important to stand up to this corrupt organisation.” Netanyahu has been under an international arrest warrant since November over allegations of war crimes in Gaza.

He also said he believed Israel and Hungary, both of which are led by rightwing nationalist governments, were “fighting a similar battle for the future of our common civilisation, our Judeo-Christian civilisation”.

Orbán’s chief of staff, Gergely Gulyás, announced shortly after Netanyahu landed at Budapest airport that the government would “initiate the withdrawal procedure on Thursday in accordance with the constitutional and international legal framework”.

Leaving the court, to which all 27 EU members belong, would entail first passing a bill through parliament, dominated by Orbán’s Fidesz party, then formally notifying the UN secretary general’s office. Withdrawal comes into effect one year later.

Israel’s foreign minister, Gideon Saar, welcomed what he termed an “important decision”, adding that the “so-called international criminal court” had “lost its moral authority after trampling the fundamental principles of international law in its zest for harming Israel’s right to self-defence”.

The Dutch foreign minister, Caspar Veldkamp, however, told reporters on the sidelines of a Nato meeting in Brussels that as long as Hungary remained officially a member of the ICC, it should “fulfil all its obligations to the court”.

The ICC’s governing body voiced concern over Hungary’s decision, saying any departure “clouds our shared quest for justice and weakens our resolve to fight impunity”. It said the court was “at the centre of the global commitment to accountability” and the international community should “support it without reservation”.

Netanyahu was welcomed in Budapest in an official ceremony, standing alongside Orbán as a military band played and cavalry carrying swords and bayonets passed by. He is expected to tour Budapest’s Holocaust Museum and hold a number of political meetings before leaving on Sunday.

Orbán invited his Israeli counterpart to visit the day after The Hague-based ICC, the world’s only permanent global tribunal for war crimes and genocide, issued the warrant, described by Israel as politically motivated and fuelled by antisemitism.

Netanyahu’s government has repeatedly said the court lost its legitimacy by issuing a warrant against a democratically elected leader exercising his country’s right to self-defence after the October 2023 attack by Hamas-led fighters on southern Israel.

Liz Evenson, the international justice director at Human Rights Watch, said Hungary’s withdrawal would “demonstrate how far Orbán’s government is willing to go to diminish protection of human rights globally and respect for the rule of law for people including in Hungary”.

The country’s ICC obligations “remain intact”, Evenson said.

Budapest says the law was never transcribed into national law, so no ICC measure can be legally carried out within Hungary. Many legal experts, however, say that as a signatory and ratified state party, Hungary is nonetheless obliged to uphold the ICC’s Rome statute .

Orbán, in any case, has said he would not respect the ruling, which he has previously described as “brazen, cynical and completely unacceptable”.

Orbán has strongly supported Netanyahu for many years, embracing him as an ally who shares the same conservative, sovereignist and authoritarian views. Hungary has frequently blocked EU statements or sanctions against Israel.

The visit marks Netanyahu’s second trip abroad since ICC warrants were announced against him and his former defence chief Yoav Gallant, as well as for the Hamas leader Ibrahim al-Masri. In February, he travelled to the US, which – like Israel, Russia and China – is not a member of the ICC.

For the Israeli prime minister, the visit is a chance to show – at a time of mounting criticism of his leadership and a lengthening list of domestic scandals – that despite widespread international opposition to Israel’s conduct of the war he remains a leader on the world stage. For Orbán, it is another act of attention-grabbing defiance.

ICC judges said when they issued the warrant that there were reasonable grounds to believe Netanyahu and Gallant were criminally responsible for acts including murder, persecution and starvation as a weapon of war.

EU members are divided over whether to enforce the warrants, with some, such as Spain, the Netherlands and Finland, saying they would enforce them and others, including Germany and Poland, suggesting they could find a way for Netanyahu to visit without being arrested. France has said Netanyahu should be immune from the warrant since Israel is not an ICC member.

The court, whose 124 members also include the UK, Canada, Australia, Brazil, Japan and many African, Latin American and Asia-Pacific countries, aims to pursue people responsible for grave crimes when countries cannot or will not do so themselves.

It has opened more than 30 cases for alleged war crimes, crimes against humanity, genocide and offences against the administration of justice, but is hampered by a lack of recognition and enforcement. Only Burundi and the Philippines have so far left the ICC.

Hungary will leave the international criminal court because it has become “political”, the country’s prime minister, Viktor Orbán, said as he welcomed his Israeli counterpart, Benjamin Netanhayu – the subject of an ICC arrest warrant – to Budapest for an official visit.

Standing beside Netanyahu at the start of the four-day visit, Orbàn said Hungary was convinced the “otherwise very important court” had “diminished into a political forum”.

Netanyahu hailed “a bold and principled” decision. “I thank you, Viktor … It’s important for all democracies,” the Israeli prime minister said. “It’s important to stand up to this corrupt organisation.” Netanyahu has been under an international arrest warrant since November over allegations of war crimes in Gaza.

He also said he believed Israel and Hungary, both of which are led by rightwing nationalist governments, were “fighting a similar battle for the future of our common civilisation, our Judeo-Christian civilisation”.

Orbán’s chief of staff, Gergely Gulyás, announced shortly after Netanyahu landed at Budapest airport that the government would “initiate the withdrawal procedure on Thursday in accordance with the constitutional and international legal framework”.

Leaving the court, to which all 27 EU members belong, would entail first passing a bill through parliament, dominated by Orbán’s Fidesz party, then formally notifying the UN secretary general’s office. Withdrawal comes into effect one year later.

Israel’s foreign minister, Gideon Saar, welcomed what he termed an “important decision”, adding that the “so-called international criminal court” had “lost its moral authority after trampling the fundamental principles of international law in its zest for harming Israel’s right to self-defence”.

The Dutch foreign minister, Caspar Veldkamp, however, told reporters on the sidelines of a Nato meeting in Brussels that as long as Hungary remained officially a member of the ICC, it should “fulfil all its obligations to the court”.

The ICC’s governing body voiced concern over Hungary’s decision, saying any departure “clouds our shared quest for justice and weakens our resolve to fight impunity”. It said the court was “at the centre of the global commitment to accountability” and the international community should “support it without reservation”.

Netanyahu was welcomed in Budapest in an official ceremony, standing alongside Orbán as a military band played and cavalry carrying swords and bayonets passed by. He is expected to tour Budapest’s Holocaust Museum and hold a number of political meetings before leaving on Sunday.

Orbán invited his Israeli counterpart to visit the day after The Hague-based ICC, the world’s only permanent global tribunal for war crimes and genocide, issued the warrant, described by Israel as politically motivated and fuelled by antisemitism.

Netanyahu’s government has repeatedly said the court lost its legitimacy by issuing a warrant against a democratically elected leader exercising his country’s right to self-defence after the October 2023 attack by Hamas-led fighters on southern Israel.

Liz Evenson, the international justice director at Human Rights Watch, said Hungary’s withdrawal would “demonstrate how far Orbán’s government is willing to go to diminish protection of human rights globally and respect for the rule of law for people including in Hungary”.

The country’s ICC obligations “remain intact”, Evenson said.

Budapest says the law was never transcribed into national law, so no ICC measure can be legally carried out within Hungary. Many legal experts, however, say that as a signatory and ratified state party, Hungary is nonetheless obliged to uphold the ICC’s Rome statute .

Orbán, in any case, has said he would not respect the ruling, which he has previously described as “brazen, cynical and completely unacceptable”.

Orbán has strongly supported Netanyahu for many years, embracing him as an ally who shares the same conservative, sovereignist and authoritarian views. Hungary has frequently blocked EU statements or sanctions against Israel.

The visit marks Netanyahu’s second trip abroad since ICC warrants were announced against him and his former defence chief Yoav Gallant, as well as for the Hamas leader Ibrahim al-Masri. In February, he travelled to the US, which – like Israel, Russia and China – is not a member of the ICC.

For the Israeli prime minister, the visit is a chance to show – at a time of mounting criticism of his leadership and a lengthening list of domestic scandals – that despite widespread international opposition to Israel’s conduct of the war he remains a leader on the world stage. For Orbán, it is another act of attention-grabbing defiance.

ICC judges said when they issued the warrant that there were reasonable grounds to believe Netanyahu and Gallant were criminally responsible for acts including murder, persecution and starvation as a weapon of war.

EU members are divided over whether to enforce the warrants, with some, such as Spain, the Netherlands and Finland, saying they would enforce them and others, including Germany and Poland, suggesting they could find a way for Netanyahu to visit without being arrested. France has said Netanyahu should be immune from the warrant since Israel is not an ICC member.

The court, whose 124 members also include the UK, Canada, Australia, Brazil, Japan and many African, Latin American and Asia-Pacific countries, aims to pursue people responsible for grave crimes when countries cannot or will not do so themselves.

It has opened more than 30 cases for alleged war crimes, crimes against humanity, genocide and offences against the administration of justice, but is hampered by a lack of recognition and enforcement. Only Burundi and the Philippines have so far left the ICC.

JD Vance said on Thursday that Elon Musk would remain a “friend and an adviser” to the vice-president and Donald Trump after he leaves his current role with the so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge).

In recent days, several news outlets, including Politico, reported that Trump had told members of his cabinet that the tech billionaire, who holds the position of “special government employee”, would soon be stepping back from his role in the administration, and would take on a supporting role and return to the private sector.

As a special government employee, Musk’s current service is capped at 130 days, which, if counted from the day of the inauguration, is set to expire sometime in late May.

But on Wednesday, Musk dismissed the report as “fake news” and the White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, criticized the Politico story, calling it “garbage”, and adding that Musk “will depart from public service as a special government employee when his incredible work at Doge is complete”.

And then, on Thursday morning, in an interview with Fox News, Vance stated: “Doge has got a lot of work to do, and yeah, that work is going to continue after Elon leaves, but fundamentally, Elon is going to remain a friend and an adviser of both me and the president.

“Elon came in and we said, ‘We need you to make government more efficient, we need you to shrink the incredible fat bureaucracy that thwarts the will of the American people but also costs way too much money,” Vance added. “We said, ‘That’s going to take about six months’ – and that’s what Elon signed up for, but of course, he’s going to continue to be an adviser and by the way, the work of Doge is not even close to done, the work of Elon is not even close to done.”

Despite Musk’s 130-day cap, Doge is expected to continue until 2026, as a result of Trump’s executive order.

The reports regarding Musk’s future involvement with the Trump administration come as earlier this week, a liberal judge in Wisconsin, Susan Crawford, defeated a Musk-backed conservative judge in the race for a seat on the state’s supreme court, framed by Democrats as a referendum on the popularity of Musk and Trump.

Musk invested millions in the race, in what what became the most expensive judicial contest in US history, and also spent time campaigning in the state.

In her acceptance speech, Crawford said: “I never could have imagined that I’d be taking on the richest man in the world for justice in Wisconsin, and we won!”

Russian authorities on Thursday banned the Elton John Aids Foundation (EJAF), which focuses on HIV/Aids prevention, citing its support for LGBTQ+ rights as a reason for the move.

Founded by the British singer and songwriter in 1992, the organisation funds HIV treatment programmes in countries including Russia. It also advocates for LGBTQ+ people, who have faced years of brutal persecution in Russia.

In its statement, Russia’s prosecutor general’s office designated the EJAF as an “undesirable organisation”, a label that bans the group from operating in Russia and exposes its staff and partners to potential criminal prosecution.

The prosecutor general’s office accused the foundation of promoting “non-traditional sexual relationships, western family models, and gender reassignment”.

The prosecutor’s office alleged that EJAF held “negative attitudes” toward countries that “uphold traditional spiritual and moral values”. It accused the foundation of taking part in a campaign to “discredit Russia” since its 2022 invasion of Ukraine.

“When a musician plays along with those trying to sow the seeds of democracy, it is propaganda. And when it’s Elton John calling the tune, then it’s more than just anti-Russian propaganda too,” the statement read.

“In our country, the British foundation works closely with non-profit organisations designated as foreign agents,” the Russian law enforcement agency added.

The ruling is the latest blow to human rights groups supporting Russians living with HIV and Aids. According to Rospotrebnadzor, the federal agency for public health and consumer rights, more than 1.2 million people in Russia have HIV, the highest per capita rate in Europe.

The country has faced chronic shortages of HIV medication since 2023, leaving many patients struggling to access tests and life-saving antiretroviral therapy.

Repression of Russia’s LGBTQ+ people has escalated since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Authorities recently labelled what they described as an “international LGBT public movement” as extremist – a designation that has already led to the arrest and jailing of LGBTQ+ individuals across the country.

John, who has a loyal fanbase in Russia, has long campaigned for LGBTQ+ rights there. In 2014, after a series of sold-out concerts in the country, he published an open letter condemning Russia’s “gay propaganda” law and offered to introduce Vladimir Putin to members of the LGBTQ+ community.

A year later, the Kremlin announced that the Russian president had personally called John and offered to meet – a move prompted by a prank after two comedians posing as Russian officials tricked the singer into a phone conversation that was later released online.

Prince Harry has launched a thinly veiled attack on the chair of the Sentebale charity he founded two decades ago for telling “blatant lies”, as an inquiry was launched into claims about the organisation’s governance.

In a statement issued in response to the Charity Commission’s decision to open a “compliance case”, the prince said he hoped a “robust inquiry” would “unveil the truth”.

Harry said he had found the recent developments “heartbreaking to witness, especially when such blatant lies hurt those who have invested decades in this shared goal”.

It was announced last week that Harry had quit the charity alongside his co-founder and fellow patron, Prince Seeiso of Lesotho, and its five trustees, after a row with the chair of the board, Sophie Chandauka.

Chandauka had launched a legal action at the high court to prevent her being ousted and complained to the Charity Commission about the behaviour of Sentebale’s trustees.

In subsequent media appearances, Chandauka accused Harry of “harassment and bullying at scale” for releasing news of his decision to resign “without informing me or my country directors, or my executive director”.

On Thursday, the Charity Commission said it had escalated its response after initial contact with complainants, adding that it was “in direct contact with parties who have raised concerns to gather evidence and assess the compliance of the charity and trustees past and present with their legal duties”.

It went on: “The regulator’s focus, in line with its statutory remit, will be to determine whether the charity’s current and former trustees, including its chair, have fulfilled their duties and responsibilities under charity law.

“The commission is not an adjudicator or mediator and is guided by the principle of ensuring trustees fulfil their primary duty to their charitable purpose and beneficiaries.”

In response, Harry said he was relieved that the inquiry had been launched into the charity, which he established in 2006 in memory of his mother, Diana, Princess of Wales.

He said: “From the inception of Sentebale nearly 20 years ago, Prince Seeiso and I have had a clear goal: to support the children and young people in southern Africa in memory of our mothers.

“What has transpired over the last week has been heartbreaking to witness, especially when such blatant lies hurt those who have invested decades in this shared goal. No one suffers more than the beneficiaries of Sentebale itself.

“On behalf of the former trustees and patrons, we share in the relief that the Charity Commission confirmed they will be conducting a robust inquiry.

“We fully expect it will unveil the truth that collectively forced us to resign. We remain hopeful this will allow for the charity to be put in the right hands immediately, for the sake of the communities we serve.”

Chandauka, a Zimbabwean corporate lawyer who has held roles at Meta and Morgan Stanley, and leads a biotechnology company in New York, said she had first raised “governance, administration and management matters” at Sentebale with the commission in February.

She said: “For completeness, I should mention that we initiated an internal governance review last year, the findings of which we will share with the Charity Commission.

“We hope that, together, these actions will give the general public, our colleagues, partners, supporters, donors and the communities we serve comfort that Sentebale and its new board of trustees are acting appropriately to demonstrate and ensure good governance and a healthy culture for Sentebale to thrive.”

She added: “In the meantime, our exceptional executive team and operational staff remain focused on the day-to-day operations of the charity, ensuring continuity in our work and mission delivery.

“We appreciate the patience, understanding and tremendous support we have received from our existing and prospective partners and supporters, and look forward to continuing to work together with you as we recalibrate for an ambitious future.”

Chandauka, who had sought to restructure the charity by moving its leadership to Africa and focusing fundraising in the US, has complained of “poor governance, weak executive management, abuse of power, bullying, harassment, misogyny, misogynoir [misogyny directed towards black women]” at Sentebale, which is based outside Maseru, the capital of Lesotho, in southern Africa.

The regulatory compliance case could lead to a range of outcomes including an official warning or the opening of a statutory inquiry, which would give the commission additional powers of investigation.

The deaths of a British couple who were found in their renovated rural home in Aveyron, south-west France, are being treated as a murder followed by a suicide.

The bodies of Andrew Searle, 62, a retired fraud investigator, and Dawn Kerr, 56, a project manager, were discovered on 6 February at their home in the village of Les Pesquiès, south of Villefranche-de-Rouergue.

Kerr was found lying dead in front of her house partly undressed and with a significant head injury, and Searle was found hanged inside.

The prosecutor in charge of the case said a police investigation had ruled out any third party involvement in their deaths. They told the BBC that there was no evidence that another person was involved.

Postmortem examinations confirmed Searle died from hanging and Kerr suffered “multiple blows to the head with a blunt and sharp-edged object”.

The couple married in 2023 and had two children each from previous relationships. They had lived in Aveyron for five years.

Kerr was the mother of the Scottish actor and musician Callum Kerr, who played PC George Kiss in the Channel 4 soap opera Hollyoaks, and appeared in Netflix’s Virgin River.

A statement on Kerr’s Instagram confirmed he and his sister were grieving the loss of their mother, and that their step-brother and step-sister were mourning the loss of their father. The post also asked for the family’s privacy to be respected.

According to his LinkedIn profile, Andrew Searle retired in 2015 after a career in financial crime prevention.

After quitting as a consultant in financial crime assurance at Barclays in Glasgow, Searle posted that he was “enjoying life in rural France – renovating!”. He previously worked for 21 years at Standard Life, in Edinburgh, where he was responsible for the bank’s anti-crime initiative.

Kerr’s Facebook profile said she grew up in the Scottish borders and went to school in the port town of Eyemouth. Before moving to France she had lived with Searle in Musselburgh, east of Edinburgh.

A statement issued by French prosecutors in February said: “The two deceased persons, a man and a woman, were the owners of the house in which their bodies were discovered. They were British expatriates, retired, and had been living in Aveyron for five years.

“The first victim, Ms Kerr, has a significant head injury. A box containing jewellery was found near to her, but no item or weapon which could have caused the injuries were located.

“Mr Searle, who was found hanged … did not show any visible defensive injuries.”

The deaths of a British couple who were found in their renovated rural home in Aveyron, south-west France, are being treated as a murder followed by a suicide.

The bodies of Andrew Searle, 62, a retired fraud investigator, and Dawn Kerr, 56, a project manager, were discovered on 6 February at their home in the village of Les Pesquiès, south of Villefranche-de-Rouergue.

Kerr was found lying dead in front of her house partly undressed and with a significant head injury, and Searle was found hanged inside.

The prosecutor in charge of the case said a police investigation had ruled out any third party involvement in their deaths. They told the BBC that there was no evidence that another person was involved.

Postmortem examinations confirmed Searle died from hanging and Kerr suffered “multiple blows to the head with a blunt and sharp-edged object”.

The couple married in 2023 and had two children each from previous relationships. They had lived in Aveyron for five years.

Kerr was the mother of the Scottish actor and musician Callum Kerr, who played PC George Kiss in the Channel 4 soap opera Hollyoaks, and appeared in Netflix’s Virgin River.

A statement on Kerr’s Instagram confirmed he and his sister were grieving the loss of their mother, and that their step-brother and step-sister were mourning the loss of their father. The post also asked for the family’s privacy to be respected.

According to his LinkedIn profile, Andrew Searle retired in 2015 after a career in financial crime prevention.

After quitting as a consultant in financial crime assurance at Barclays in Glasgow, Searle posted that he was “enjoying life in rural France – renovating!”. He previously worked for 21 years at Standard Life, in Edinburgh, where he was responsible for the bank’s anti-crime initiative.

Kerr’s Facebook profile said she grew up in the Scottish borders and went to school in the port town of Eyemouth. Before moving to France she had lived with Searle in Musselburgh, east of Edinburgh.

A statement issued by French prosecutors in February said: “The two deceased persons, a man and a woman, were the owners of the house in which their bodies were discovered. They were British expatriates, retired, and had been living in Aveyron for five years.

“The first victim, Ms Kerr, has a significant head injury. A box containing jewellery was found near to her, but no item or weapon which could have caused the injuries were located.

“Mr Searle, who was found hanged … did not show any visible defensive injuries.”

The Danish prime minister, Mette Frederiksen, has put on a show of unity with Greenlandic leaders in her first visit to the Arctic island since Donald Trump’s renewed threats to acquire the territory, saying that when Greenland is in a “difficult situation” so too are Denmark and Europe.

The Danish PM boarded an inspection ship on Thursday with Greenland’s new prime minister, Jens-Frederik Nielsen, after which they were due to hold a joint press conference expected to focus on unity and Arctic security.

Greenland’s outgoing prime minister, Múte B Egede, was also onboard. The three leaders were pictured looking out to sea and perched on a helicopter while onboard the ocean-patrol vessel HDMS Vædderen.

In contrast to last week’s visit by the US vice-president, JD Vance – which, after a diplomatic outcry, was limited to the US military base Pituffik and did not involve Greenlandic or Danish representatives – Frederiksen was greeted at the airport by Egede and went straight to the capital, Nuuk, where she met Nielsen.

On Wednesday, Frederiksen said: “When Greenland is in a difficult situation, the kingdom of Denmark and Europe are also in a difficult situation.

“Regardless of what discussions we may have down the road about our commonwealth, it is clear that with the pressure from the Americans on Greenland in relation to sovereignty, borders and the future, we must stand together.”

In a clear signal to Trump, who has repeatedly said he wants to gain control of the autonomous territory, which is part of the kingdom of Denmark, and has not ruled out military or economic force to do so, she said: “The USA will not take over Greenland. Greenland belongs to the Greenlanders and the USA will not take over Greenland. And that is, of course, also the message that we will say collectively over the next few days.”

On social media she posted a picture of herself alongside the incoming and outgoing leaders, with the message: “Cooperation. Equality. Security.”

Frederiksen’s visit had initially been criticised by members of the governing coalition because the new government has not yet been officially approved. However, before her arrival, Nielsen said: “Denmark is our closest partner and it is natural we meet as soon as possible.”

The last time Frederiksen was in Greenland was in March 2024 on a joint visit with the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen.

As a former Danish colony, Greenland remains in the kingdom of Denmark, which continues to control the territory’s foreign and security policies.

Greenland’s long-running independence movement has been gaining momentum in recent months – momentum the Trump administration appears to be hoping to capitalise on – particularly after revelations over alleged mistreatment of Greenlanders by the Danish state.

But the threat of US intervention appears to have slowed down appetite in Greenland for a rapid move towards independence.

A general election last month resulted in the most US- and Trump-friendly party leaving coalition talks, after which the four other parties, led by Nielsen’s Democrats, signed a coalition agreement hours before Vance touched down in Greenland last Friday.

Page one of the agreement stated: “Greenland belongs to us.”

Frederiksen’s visit takes place amid reports from the US that the White House is preparing an estimate of what it would cost the government to control Greenland as a territory.

According to the Washington Post, the White House budget office is assessing the cost of running Greenland and working out an estimate of how much revenue could be earned from its natural resources.

Among the options on the table is to offer Greenland a higher figure in subsidies, approximately £500m a year, than Denmark currently does.

Speaking to US troops in Pituffik, Vance said the US had to gain control of Greenland to stop the threat of China and Russia, and claimed that Denmark had “not done a good job by the people of Greenland”.

In Washington, Trump claimed the US needed Greenland for “world peace”.

He said: “We need Greenland. Very importantly, for international security, we have to have Greenland.”

There have been calls in Italy for a “cultural rebellion” amid outrage and protests over the murders of two female students found within 48 hours of each other, bringing the number of femicides in the country since the start of the year to 11.

Sara Campanella, a 22-year-old biomedical student, was stabbed at a bus stop in the Sicilian city of Messina on Monday afternoon and died while being taken to hospital.

Stefano Argentino, a fellow student at the University of Messina, was later arrested in the town of Noto. His lawyer, Raffaele Leone, told the Italian press that Argentino, 27, had confessed to the murder.

The Messina prosecutor, Antonio D’Amato, claimed Argentino had “insistently and repeatedly” harassed Campanella since she started her university course two years ago.

In a separate killing, the body of 22-year-old Ilaria Sula, a statistics student at Sapienza University of Rome, was found in a suitcase in a forested area outside the Italian capital early on Wednesday morning. She had been missing since 23 March and was allegedly stabbed to death. Her former boyfriend, Mark Samson, 23, is being questioned by police on suspicion of her murder and of hiding a body.

The murders sparked protests in Messina, Rome and other Italian cities, including Bologna, on Wednesday night. Further events are planned on Thursday.

Antonella Polimeni, the rector of Sapienza University, said Sula’s death was an “atrocious and brutal femicide that leaves us speechless and heartbroken”. She added: “We must no longer stand by and watch femicide incidents.”

A minute of silence was held for Campanella at the University of Messina. Giovanna Spatari, the university’s rector, said students were “dismayed by this umpteenth episode of femicide”.

The killings have also renewed political debate on violence against women in Italy, where there were 113 femicides in 2024, of which 99 were committed by relatives, partners or ex-partners.

Mara Carfagna, party secretary for the centre-right Noi Moderati, called for a “cultural rebellion”. “From a regulatory point of view, Italy is more advanced than other countries, but culturally we haven’t managed to evolve at the same speed,” she told La Stampa newspaper. “For this we need a rebellion shared by everyone.”

In March, Giorgia Meloni’s government approved a draft law which for the first time introduced a legal definition of femicide in criminal law, punishing it with life in prison while increasing sentences for crimes including stalking, sexual violence and “revenge porn”.

The law followed the strong public reaction to the killing of Giulia Cecchettin, a 22-year-old student who was murdered by her former boyfriend, Filippo Turetta, in November 2023. Turetta was sentenced to life in prison in December.

A group of MPs with the opposition Democratic party has argued that an “incisive action of prevention” is now needed to stop this “continuous slaughter of women”, starting with education in schools.

In the aftermath of the disastrous debate against Donald Trump that ultimately ended his political career, Joe Biden skipped a White House meeting with the congressional Progressive caucus in favor of a Camp David photoshoot with the fashion photographer Annie Leibovitz, a new book says.

“You need to cancel that,” Ron Klain, Biden’s former chief of staff and debate prep leader, told the president, as he advocated securing the endorsement of the group of powerful progressive politicians perhaps key to his remaining the Democratic nominee.

“You need to stay in Washington. You need to have an aggressive plan to fight and to rally the troops.”

As described by Klain to Chris Whipple, the author of an explosive new book on the 2024 campaign, Biden “seemed to relent. ‘OK,’ he said.”

“But the president’s resolve didn’t last,” the book continued. “That weekend, Biden and his family were at Camp David having their pictures taken” by Leibovitz.

The president did speak to the progressives by Zoom, Whipple writes, only to scold them over their stance on Israel and claim to have stronger progressive bona fides than they did.

Whipple’s book, Uncharted: How Trump Beat Biden, Harris, and the Odds in the Wildest Campaign in History, will be published next week. The Guardian obtained a copy.

Klain was White House chief of staff from 2021 to 2023. He became chief legal officer for Airbnb but returned to Biden’s side last June to prepare him to debate Trump.

Concern over the octogenarian president’s fitness for the job was a feature of Biden’s White House term. As reported by the Guardian, Klain told Whipple debate preparations left him alarmed by Biden’s physical and mental decline.

But Klain told Whipple: “This was about something other than his age. It was a struggle over power in our party.” According to Klain, Democratic donors were “tired” of Biden because of his ties to labor, and wanted a more business-oriented leader.

Such calls grew deafening after the debate, in which Biden performed with painful, halting confusion. According to Whipple, Klain called Biden the next day, 28 June, and said: “Look, we’re hemorrhaging badly. We need to get the progressive caucus to the White House this weekend. And you need to agree with them on an agenda for a second term, and they will endorse you. So you can walk out there with one hundred members of Congress saying, ‘You should stay in the race.’

“Biden wasn’t convinced: ‘Well, I’m supposed to go to Camp David this weekend for a photo shoot with my family.’”

Klain offered his “blunt” advice and Biden seemed to back down, Whipple writes. But the president left Washington anyway, for a stay with family members who were widely reported to be urging him not to drop out of the race.

“Klain was angry,” Whipple reports. “He called [Jeff] Zients, his successor as White House chief of staff. The president needed to rally the progressives ASAP, Klain told him. But Zients didn’t share his alarm. ‘Look, we’ve got a plan,’ he told Klain. ‘We’ve got a schedule. We’re going to stick to the schedule.’”

Zients and his team had been trying to rally support for Biden from Democrats in Congress but Klain “felt more drastic action was needed”. A Zoom call was set up with the progressives. It proved a “fiasco”, with Biden giving members of Congress led by Pramila Jayapal of Washington state “a scolding”, saying: “All you guys want to talk about is Gaza … What would you have me do?” and “I was a progressive before some of you guys were even in Congress.”

Jayapal called Klain. Klain called Zients. Zients passed blame to another Biden aide, Steve Ricchetti, “the progressives’ least favorite White House official”. Klain told Zients: “Jeff, this is life or death for this presidency this weekend.” Zients pushed back. Klain was convinced Biden’s aides did not have “a strategy to save his presidency”.

The battle to force Biden out continued. On 21 July, the president bowed to pressure and quit. Klain told Zients: “Jeff, that’s too bad. I think that’s a mistake. I think this was an avoidable tragedy.”

Biden’s vice-president, Kamala Harris, fought off attempts to deny her the nomination, then fought a 100-day campaign that ended in defeat by Trump.

Despite his first-hand experience of Biden’s struggles, and his failure to corral the president into doing simple political legwork instead of attending a glitzy photoshoot, Klain still thought Biden could have won a second term.

In August, he told CNN the president was “clearly up to the job. He’s doing it every day. He’s doing it successfully.”

He also said Biden had “done well” in debate preparation.

The World Bank is embarking on a multimillion-dollar programme in response to alleged human rights abuses against Tanzanian herders during a flagship tourism project it funded for seven years.

Allegations made by pastoralist communities living in and around Ruaha national park include violent evictions, sexual assaults, killings, forced disappearances and large-scale cattle seizures from herders committed by rangers working for the Tanzanian national park authority (Tanapa).

The pastoralists say most of the incidents took place after the bank approved $150m (£116m) for the Resilient Natural Resource Management for Tourism and Growth (Regrow) project September in 2017, aimed at developing tourism in four protected areas in southern Tanzania in a bid to take pressure off heavily touristed northern areas such as Ngorongoro and the Serengeti.

In 2023, two individuals wrote to the bank accusing some Tanapa employees of “extreme cruelty” during cattle seizures and having engaged in “extrajudicial killings” and the “disappearance” of community members.

The Oakland Institute, a US-based thinktank that is advising the communities, and which alerted the World Bank to abuses in April 2023, says Ruaha doubled in size from 1m to more than 2m hectares (2.5m to 5m acres) during the project’s lifetime – a claim the bank denies. It says the expansion took place a decade earlier. Oakland claims 84,000 people from at least 28 villages were affected by the expansion plan.

This week, the bank published a 70-page report following its own investigation, which found “critical failures in the planning and supervision of this project and that these have resulted in serious harm”. The report, published on 2 April, notes that “the project should have recognised that enhancing Tanapa’s capacity to manage the park could potentially increase the likelihood of conflict with communities trying to access the park.”

Anna Bjerde, World Bank managing director of operations, said, “We regret that the Regrow project preparation and supervision did not sufficiently account for project risks, resulting in inadequate mitigation measures to address adverse impacts. This oversight led to the bank overlooking critical information during implementation.”

The report includes recommendations aimed at redressing harms done and details a $2.8m project that will support alternative livelihoods for communities inside and around the park. It will also help fund a Tanzanian NGO that provides legal advice to victims of crime who want to pursue justice through the courts.

A second, much bigger project, understood to be worth $110, will fund alternative livelihoods across the entire country, including Ruaha.

The total investment, thought to be the largest amount the bank has ever allocated to addressing breaches of its policies, is a reflection of the serious nature of the allegations.

The bank had already suspended Regrow funding in April 2024 after its own investigation found the Tanzanian government had violated the bank’s resettlement policy and failed to create a system to report violent incidents or claim redress. The project was cancelled altogether in November 2024. A spokesperson said the bank “remains deeply concerned about the serious nature of the reports of incidents of violence and continues to focus on the wellbeing of affected communities”.

By the time the project was suspended the bank had already disbursed $125m of the $150m allocated to Regrow.

The Oakland Institute estimates that economic damages for farmers and pastoralists affected by livelihood restrictions, run into tens of millions of dollars.

Anuradha Mittal, executive director of the Oakland Institute, said the “scathing” investigation “confirmed the bank’s grave wrongdoing which devastated the lives of communities. Pastoralists and farms who refused to be silenced amid widespread government repression, are now vindicated.”

She added that the bank’s response was “beyond shameful”.

“Suggesting that tens of thousands of people forced out of their land can survive with ‘alternative livelihoods’ such as clean cooking and microfinance is a slap in the face of the victims.”

Inspection panel chair Ibrahim Pam said critical lessons from the Regrow case will be applied to all conservation projects that require resettlement and restrict access to parks, especially those implemented by a law enforcement agency.

Regrow was given the go ahead in 2017. The Oakland Institute described its cancellation by the government in 2024 as a landmark victory, but said communities “remain under siege – still facing evictions, crippling livelihood restrictions and human rights abuses”.

In one village near the southern border of Ruaha, the brother of a young man who was killed three years ago while herding cattle in an area adjacent to the park, said: “It feels like it was yesterday. He had a wife, a family. Now the wife has to look after the child by herself.” He did not want to give his name for fear of reprisal.

Another community member whose husband was allegedly killed by Tanapa staff said: “I feel bad whenever I remember what happened to my husband. We used to talk often. We were friends. I was pregnant with his child when he died. He never saw his daughter. Now I just live in fear of these [Tanapa-employed] people.”

The Oakland Institute said the affected communities reject the bank’s recommendations, and have delivered a list of demands that includes “reverting park boundaries to the 1998 borders they accepted, reparations for livelihood restrictions, the resumption of suspended basic services, and justice for victims of ranger abuse and violence.

“Villagers are determined to continue the struggle for their rights to land and life until the bank finally takes responsibility and remedies the harms it caused.”

The bank has said it has no authority to pay compensation directly.

Wildlife-based tourism is a major component of Tanzania’s economy, contributing more than one quarter of the country’s foreign exchange earnings in 2019. The bank has said any future community resettlement will be the government’s decision.

Tate Modern has announced its most significant single donation in more than 50 years, a monumental triptych by the American abstract expressionist Joan Mitchell that she named after her German shepherd dog, Iva.

The huge 6-metre work, painted by Mitchell in 1973, was given to Britain’s national art collection by the billionaire Miami real estate magnate Jorge M Pérez and his wife, Darlene.

The artwork was hung in their bedroom, they told reporters on Thursday, until they were persuaded after a two-year “conversation” with the Tate director, Maria Balshaw, to donate the work to the central London institution. “She’s a good saleswoman,” joked Pérez.

Balshaw said the Mitchell triptych was the single most significant gift to the institution since Mark Rothko donated nine large murals in 1969. Its value has not been revealed, although a smaller work by Mitchell sold for $29m in 2023. Pérez described it as “priceless”.

The work will hang next to the museum’s Rothko room, where five of his murals are displayed. Pérez said the two artists’ paintings “form an incredible partnership. They just talk to each other.”

Like the art of many female artists of the period, Mitchell’s work had been underestimated in her lifetime, Balshaw said, and the museum had “missed the boat” by not acquiring more of her works – it previously owned only some prints and a smaller, late painting – when they were more affordable.

“By the time we realised the importance of the work, they were too expensive for a UK public institution to buy,” she said.

“This [gift] has changed the British national collection permanently,” she said. “It’s such a significant rebalancing – it’s not just filling a gap, it is taking us into a new representation of work of that period.”

An acquisition of this scale would not be possible without “an act of truly extraordinary generosity” by philanthropist donors, Balshaw acknowledged. About 30% of Tate’s funding comes from government grants, but it is still struggling with a post-pandemic financial squeeze and recently announced job cuts in an effort to tackle its funding deficit.

She had been in discussions with the philanthropist couple – who have also given donations worth more than $100m to Miami’s Pérez Art Museum, now named in their honour – since they visited an installation by the Ghanaian sculptor El Anatsui in Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall in 2023, she said.

“I can tell you that the conversation about gifting this important work focused on the millions of people that will see this work here in London,” said Balshaw. “You have given the British public and all our visitors from around the world a truly extraordinary thing, and I am deeply grateful.”

Having extended their bedroom to accommodate the work, parting with it had been “a very difficult decision in many ways”, said Pérez. He added: “We’ve always collected with the intent that art should be exposed to the most people that they can possibly be exposed to.

“Because I think art changes people’s lives. It’s changed our life for the better. It helps us understand the world better in different ways. It makes us part of the creative process that the artists go through, once you deeply get into them. So having the public feel the same thing that we feel is very important.”

When asked for his interpretation of the work’s connection to the painter’s German shepherd, Pérez said: “Actually, I think it’s got much more connection to landscape than to a dog. These are just her expressions of a mood, a landscape.”

The real-estate magnate was born in Argentina to Cuban-exile parents, before moving to Miami and making his fortune developing apartment blocks. Although previously a friend of Donald Trump before he ran for the US presidency, he is a longtime Democratic party supporter and fundraiser, and has been an outspoken critic of Trump’s policies, saying in December that his proposals for mass deportations risked leading to a “police state”.

A previous request by the president to help him build his Mexico border wall was similarly rebuffed, with Pérez calling it “idiotic”.

As well as the painting, the couple have also made a “multimillion-pound” donation to endow a curatorial post at Tate dedicated to African art, and have promised to make further donations of works in their collection by African and Latin American artists.

Pérez hopes the couple’s gifts will inspire other wealthy individuals to make donations. “The public sector is swamped with ever growing needs, and it all can’t be solved by the government,” he said. “People who have been very fortunate, like Darlene and I have been, have an obligation to give back to that community that is giving you so much. So we really hope that gifts like this get other people to think about giving.”