US stocks fell again on Thursday after a historic rally following Donald Trump’s shock retreat on Wednesday on the hefty tariffs he had just imposed on dozens of countries.

The falls came as the president blamed “transition problems” for the market reaction and the sell-off deepened after a White House clarification noted that total tariffs on China had been raised by 145% since Trump took office.

Speaking at the White House, Trump said: “We think we’re in very good shape. We think we’re doing very well. Again there will be a transition cost, transition problems, but in the end it’s going to be a beautiful thing.”

The sell-off comes as Democrats continue to react with anger over the sudden retreat that rattled markets, while Republicans praised Trump’s “art of the deal” in action, referencing Trump’s 1987 book.

By the end of Thursday, the Dow was down 2.5% after soaring on Wednesday afternoon. The Nasdaq Composite was down more than 4%, after posting its biggest gain in more than two decades on Wednesday, and the S&P 500 down 3.4%.

The market seems to be in a state of fatigue after a rollercoaster week. Stocks were even unresponsive to news on Thursday morning that the European Union announced it will suspend 25% retaliatory tariffs against US imports and new data showed inflation in the US cooled to 2.4% in March – both would typically be cause for optimism on Wall Street.

On CNN, former US treasury secretary Janet Yellen called Trump’s economic policies the “worst self-inflicted wound” an administration had ever imposed on a “well-functioning economy”.

Trump said in an abrupt announcement on Wednesday that he would be implementing a 90-day pause on his tariff plan, and that goods entering the US from most countries would now face a 10% blanket tariff until July, except for Chinese exports, which he said would face tariffs totaling 145% effective immediately – 125% in “reciprocal” tariffs plus 20% already imposed for China’s alleged role in the fentanyl crisis.

Republican lawmakers praised the decision to pause the tariffs, with the House speaker, Mike Johnson, stating on social media: “Behold the ‘Art of the Deal.’ President Trump has created leverage, brought MANY countries to the table, and will deliver for American workers, American manufacturers, and America’s future!”

Before the pause was announced, a small but growing number of Republican lawmakers and Trump supporters in the business world expressed concerns about the risks of the president’s tariff policy.

By Wednesday afternoon, many were praising Trump for the rollback as part of a purported strategy.

Bill Ackman, a billionaire hedge fund manager and Trump supporter who advocated for Trump to pause his trade war over the weekend, reacted to the announcement saying that “this was brilliantly executed by @realDonaldTrump. Textbook, Art of the Deal.”

The benefit of Trump’s approach, Ackman claimed, “is that we now understand who are our preferred trading partners, and who the problems are. China has shown themselves to be a bad actor. Our counterparties also have a taste of what life is like if they don’t take down their trade barriers. This is the perfect set-up for trade negotiations over the next 90 days.”

But some industry leaders criticized the administration’s back-and-forth and tariff decisions.

On Thursday, Amazon’s CEO, Andy Jassy, said the company was still waiting to see the impact of the tariffs but warned third-party sellers may “pass that cost on” to consumers.

“The effective tariff rate is actually HIGHER with the pause than it was as announced on April 2, due to the tariffs on China,” Diane Swonk, the chief economist of the professional services firm KPMG, wrote on social media. “There will be some diversion through connector countries. However, the effective tariff rate now peaks at 30.5% during the pause. That is worse than our worst case scenarios.”

While Republicans and White House officials praised Trump’s decisions, Democratic lawmakers such as Senator Chuck Schumer pushed back. Schumer told his supporters that “this chaos is all a game to Donald Trump”.

“He thinks he’s playing Red Light, Green Light with the economy,” Schumer said. “But it is very real for American families.”

Some Democrats have made accusations of possible market manipulation.

“These constant gyrations in policy provide dangerous opportunities for insider trading,” Senator Adam Schiff said. “Who in the administration knew about Trump’s latest tariff flip-flop ahead of time? Did anyone buy or sell stocks, and profit at the public’s expense? I’m writing to the White House – the public has a right to know.”

The New York representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez echoed similar concerns, urging any member of Congress who purchased stocks over the last two days to disclose that.

“I’ve been hearing some interesting chatter on the floor,” she said. “Disclosure deadline is May 15th. We’re about to learn a few things. It’s time to ban insider trading in Congress.”

The Democratic House whip, Katherine Clark, wrote: “Two hours before announcing his tariff pause, Trump told his paid Truth Social subscribers it was ‘a great time to buy’ on the stock market. Corruption is the name of their game.”

The Nevada representative Steven Horsford questioned the US trade representative, Jamieson Greer, asking the representative during a committee hearing whether the climbdown was market manipulation.

“How is this not market manipulation?” Horsford asked, to which Greer responded “No.”

“If it was always a plan, how is this not market manipulation?” Horsford asked again.

“Tariffs are a tool, they can be used in the appropriate way to protect US jobs and small businesses, but that’s not what this does,” Horsford said. “So if it’s not market manipulation, what is it? Who’s benefiting? What billionaire just got richer?”

Donald Trump is facing accusations of market manipulation after posting on social media that it was a “great time to buy” just hours before he made a dramatic U-turn on his trade war that led to big rises in stock markets around the world.

Shortly after US markets opened on Wednesday morning, Trump wrote on his social media platform Truth Social: “THIS IS A GREAT TIME TO BUY!!! DJT”.

Less than four hours later, he shocked investors by announcing a 90-day pause on additional trade tariffs on most countries except China, sending share indexes soaring.

In America the S&P 500 blue chip index closed up by more than 9%, while the technology-focused Nasdaq index shut more than 12% up. Stocks continued to rise in Asia and Europe on Thursday, with Japan’s Nikkei 225 index up by 9%, and London’s FTSE 100 index rising by as much as 4% in early trading.

Trump does not usually sign off his post with his initials. Those letters happen to be the same as the ticker for Trump Media & Technology Group, the business that controls Truth Social, whose stock shot up by 22% on Wednesday.

The timing of the US president’s posts and subsequent huge share jumps has sparked accusations of market manipulation. The Democratic senator Adam Schiff has called for an investigation, saying: “These constant gyrations in policy provide dangerous opportunities for insider trading.

“Who in the administration knew about Trump’s latest tariff flip-flop ahead of time? Did anyone buy or sell stocks, and profit at the public’s expense? I’m writing to the White House – the public has a right to know.”

The Democratic senator Chris Murphy also wrote on X that an “insider trading scandal is brewing … Trump’s 9:30am tweet makes it clear he was eager for his people to make money off the private info only he knew. So who knew ahead of time and how much money did they make?”

The New York Democratic representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez called for all members of Congress to disclose any stocks they had bought in the past 24 hours. “I’ve been hearing some interesting chatter on the floor,” she wrote on X. “Disclosure deadline is May 15th. We’re about to learn a few things. It’s time to ban insider trading in Congress.”

When asked by US reporters on Wednesday evening when exactly he arrived at his decision to pause the tariffs on most countries for 90 days, Trump said: “For a period of a time. I would say this morning. Over the last few days, I’ve been thinking about it.”

However White House officials have argued the shift was part of the strategy all along, with his press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, arguing it was his “art of the deal” at work.

Several investors have used volatility in the stock market in recent weeks as a buying opportunity. The US representative for Georgia, Republican and Trump ally Marjorie Taylor Greene, disclosed that she had made several purchases on 3 and 4 April – days when there were sharp market falls after Trump first detailed his “liberation day” tariffs on 2 April – including shares in Amazon.com and Apple. Shares in the technology companies rose by 12% and 15% respectively on Wednesday.

While Trump has paused many of the new country-specific tariffs, he has maintained pressure on China, the second biggest economy in the world. He increased the tariff on Chinese imports to 125% from the 104% level that started on Wednesday. Beijing could respond again after hitting US imports with 84% tariffs that began on Thursday.

Donald Trump’s climbdown on Wednesday from the most draconian aspects of his tariff regime has uncovered a damning picture of chaos at the heart of his presidency without necessarily alleviating their most painful effects.

The president’s landmark “liberation day” unveiling of tariffs in the White House Rose Garden on 2 April was supposed to be symbolic gateway to his promised “golden age of American greatness”; instead, it triggered a cascade of global market crashes that prompted warnings of a recession, or even a 1930s-style depression, while Trump brushed it all off as temporary “disruption”.

Time alone will tell how much damage has been inflicted on the credibility of Trump’s economic policy and indeed his entire administration by the ditching of nearly 80 years of US economic and free trading architecture, only to be followed by a sharp, if partial, U-turn.

The president’s sudden and unheralded retreat from a signature policy that he has advocated for more than four decades has placated Wall Street and international bond markets, which rallied at the news of his 90-day pause on tariffs that rose to above 50% on the goods from some countries deemed to have been “ripping off” the US in their trade practices.

But left untouched was a 10% across-the-board duty levied on all foreign imports – not to mention a further tariff hike on all goods from China – meaning that higher consumer prices are on the way for Americans, no matter how relieved the masters of the universe on Wall Street and other international trading centers are feeling.

“Most Americans care less about the spin and more about the fact that his 10% across-the-board tariff will still cost families an average of $2,600 more annually,” Matt McDermott, a Democratic pollster, posted on Bluesky.

The market mayhem unleashed by Trump’s “liberation day” tariff rollout is reminiscent of the reaction to the attempt by the British prime minister, Liz Truss, to stage a radical reordering of UK economic policy in 2022.

The constitutional niceties of the America’s political system will no doubt save the president from the fate of the hapless Truss, who was memorably outlasted by a head of lettuce and driven from Downing Street within 50 days of taking office as international markets rejected her policies as non-credible.

No such mechanism exists for removing a US president whose policies trigger market turmoil at home and abroad.

Perhaps buoyed up by that knowledge, Trump’s closest aides and acolytes tried to present his political backflip as a sign of strategic genius that had always been part of a brilliant plan.

“This was his strategy all along. President Trump created maximum negotiating leverage for himself,” said Scott Bessent, the US treasury secretary, who had been locked in urgent discussions with the president onboard Air Force One on Sunday about the effect of last week’s “liberation day” tariffs, according to the New York Times.

“Many of you in the media clearly missed The Art of the Deal. You clearly failed to see what President Trump is doing here,” explained the White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, who a day before had said that Trump was not considering a delay to putting the tariffs into effect.

Yet the depiction of a carefully plotted strategy going perfectly to plan was undermined by Trump himself, who gave a strikingly blunt explanation for his volte-face.

“Well, I thought that people were jumping a little bit out of line,” he said. “They were getting a little bit yippy, a little bit afraid.”

It seemed a graphic portrayal of a loss of nerve – all the more so given that Trump had told Republicans that “I know what the hell I’m doing” and urged his followers to ignore the plunging markets and “BE COOL” on a post on his Truth Social network just hours earlier. “Everything is going to work out well,” he insisted.

That remains to be seen.

So too does the strength of Trump’s determination to plough ahead with a tariff policy which, even in its diluted iteration following Wednesday’s announcement, threatens to lumber Americans with higher living costs – an outcome at odds with the president’s campaign promise to reduce prices “on day one”.

Writing in the Washington Post, Aaron Blake noted that Wednesday’s decision was Trump’s second tariff climbdown since taking office without gaining anything in return, having previously backed away from duties on Mexico and Canada with only minor concessions.

Rather than being strategic, as Bessent, Leavitt and others claimed, he wrote, there was “reason to believe that this is indeed another example of Trump caving. And a big one at that.”

Trump has marketed his leadership on a message of strength, which has communicated itself to congressional Republicans, who – with a few notable exceptions – have fallen publicly into line with his tariff policies, whatever their qualms.

But having seen the president apparently buckle to market pressure, the question now arises over whether more of them will find the courage to push back. It is a question that could acquire added urgency as next year’s midterms loom into view, presenting an opportunity for voters to punish the GOP at the ballot box if inflation surges.

A helicopter crashed on Thursday afternoon into the Hudson River in New York, city authorities said, with news outlets reporting that there appeared to be multiple casualties.

The fire department said it received a report of a helicopter in the huge tidal waterway that runs up the west side of Manhattan at 3.17pm ET.

Videos posted on social media showed the aircraft mostly submerged, upside down in the water, and rescue vehicles crowding on to the streets on shore as an attempt to save those on board got under way.

The fire department of New York (FDNY) said it had units on scene performing rescue operations. Multiple rescue boats were seen on video circling the aircraft.

The rescue craft were near a site close to the Manhattan waterfront, near the end of a long maintenance pier for one of the ventilation towers for the Holland tunnel, a busy under-river road tunnel connecting the city with New Jersey.

Authorities have not yet confirmed a death toll, but law enforcement sources told ABC News that at a pilot, two adults and three children were on board. The family members were reportedly tourists from Spain, according to ABC. The Associated Press, meanwhile, reported that six people had died, according to sources.

Over the years, there have been multiple crashes in the skies over Manhattan, which are routinely filled with both planes and helicopters, including private recreational aircrafts and commercial and tourist flights.

Prior incidents include a collision in 2009 when a tour helicopter and a small private airplane collided over the Hudson River that killed nine people. In 2018, a sightseeing helicopter offering “open door” flights went down into the East River, killing five people. New York City banned open-door helicopter flights following the crash.

More details soon …

A Danish couple who fled their “forest resort” in Sweden for Guatemala and left behind a large tax debt and 158 barrels of human waste have hit back at criticism and claimed that their handling of the compost toilets was “very normal”.

Flemming Hansen and Mette Helbæk, both chefs, abandoned their purportedly eco-friendly retreat, Stedsans, in Halland, southern Sweden, last year. They owed large sums to Swedish and Danish tax authorities. They have since set up a business in Guatemala.

The story behind their disappearance and the abandoned human waste was revealed this week after an investigation by the newspapers Politiken and Dagens Nyheter. It also found that the couple had allowed wastewater to run into the forest and alleged that animals had died as a result of being left outside and that others were abandoned.

Hansen and Helbæk’s actions were described by local authorities as “environmental crime”. However, on Thursday, the couple claimed they were acting lawfully.

Commenting on the barrels left behind from their compost toilets, they said in a post on social media: “For people in rural Sweden it’s a very normal thing.”

They added: “It’s also a very important part of the permaculture principles that you deal with your own shit.”

The property’s new owner is aware of the barrels and they can be used for compost, they said. “Half of them are ready to use this spring, the other half is ready in 1 year, following the guidelines of Swedish law.”

But Daniel Helsing, the head of building and environment at the local authority, Hylte council, said the couple did not follow the necessary requirements for composting waste.

“There are a number of requirements that you have to follow and they have not,” he said. “Normal practice, if you do not have a water closet solution, is that you have a collecting service for your barrels that the local authorities in basically every county in Sweden provide. That would be the most common solution to handling toilet waste if you are not using water closets.”

It is possible to compost toilet waste but it has to be done according to local authority instructions, he said. “You would have to report that you are going to compost toilet waste and that gives us as the local authority a chance to set out rules and guidelines for how to do it.”

The Swedish Tourist Association said it was unfamiliar with the methods used at Stedsans. A spokesperson said: “I have never heard anything like that.”

Hansen and Helbæk accused the journalists behind the investigation of lying and of causing “our life’s biggest (literal!) shitstorm”.

They added: “The article claims that we have been damaging the local environment with our procedures at our permaculture resort and that we have left animals to die. All these claims and several others are false.”

Accusing the local authorities of being cowards, Hansen and Helbæk said that Hylte council was aware of their toilets. They had, the couple said, shown the toilets and procedures to authority representatives “several times”. “Either the municipality lies, or they have not done the work we have paid them to do, which is to make sure that all rules are followed.”

Hylte council said they had not been paid to deal with waste and that they were assessing whether it would be reported to police.

Hansen and Helbæk said their company had gone bankrupt and that they had tax debt in Denmark that had “multiplied tenfold” because of interest and fees over a decade. To prevent the debt from growing, they said, they would have to pay Danish tax authorities – which they accused of being “cold-hearted” and “narcissistic” – more than 50,000 DKK a month (£5,800), which they suggest they are unable to.

Hansen previously said they owed the Swedish tax agency “over 7m” SEK (more than £550,000).

Among the reasons they fled to Guatemala, they said, was “to give our family a second chance”. Describing it as their birthright, they added: “If you see us as villains for making this choice, we are sorry.”

Protective helmets were donned and sledgehammers wielded as Elon Musk critics vented their frustration at the Tesla boss and billionaire by smashing up a disused Tesla bound for the scrap heap.

The public art project was organised by the social media campaign group Everyone Hates Elon. A 2014 Tesla Model S was provided by an anonymous donor “to create a debate about wealth inequality”, a spokesperson for the group said.

The participants gathered at Hardess studios in south London on Thursday to take it in turns to swing at the car with sledgehammers and baseball bats. The destroyed electric vehicle, which retails for about £14,000, will be auctioned in the next few weeks, with all proceeds going to food bank charities.

“We’re giving Londoners a chance to stand up to far-right hatred and billionaires and express how they feel about the current state of the world,” said the group. “Therapy is expensive, but this is free.”

Talia Denisenko, a 32-year-old writer, wore a Ukrainian flag as she took a hammer to the car’s bonnet as Britney Spears’s Hit Me Baby One More Time blared from a speaker. “My family is Ukrainian and Elon Musk wants to keep us occupied,” she said. “Things feel very disempowering at the moment. This is a little bit of therapy.”

Alice Rogers, a 24-year-old University of Cambridge researcher from Illinois, said: “Musk is acting in ways which violates our constitution. I’m very concerned by what I’m seeing – he’s gutting agencies and cutting USAID. This felt really cathartic. I’m not normally a smasher, but that felt really good.”

Everyone Hates Elon, which garnered attention this year for distributing stickers with the slogan “Don’t buy a Swasticar”, said it had made clear that the stunt, called London vs Musk, should not be replicated outside the event.

“This is a private event with a used Tesla that was destined for the scrapyard – it’s a supervised, controlled art piece and there are proper safety measures in place,” said a spokesperson. “We urge people not to damage other Teslas or any other cars.”

The battery of the scrap car had been removed and recycled.

“I’m just aghast at what I see going on in America at the moment,” said Lee Woods, a 45-year-old university lecturer who had travelled two hours from Hampshire for the event. “I think Musk is using his obscene wealth to promote the far right.”

Musk, the world’s richest person, leads the Trump administration’s “department of government efficiency” (Doge), which the president tasked with drastically reducing US government jobs and cutting national debt.

Tesla’s shares dropped 13% in the first three months of 2025 – an indication of buyer backlash as a result of Musk’s rightwing politics. Protests calling for a boycott of the electric vehicle company have been taking place on both sides of the Atlantic in recent months, including a global day of action where hundreds of Tesla branches were targeted by protesters from the US group Tesla Takedown.

“My opinion [on Musk] has changed hugely,” said Giles Pearson, 32, who dealt the first blow on Thursday. “Since buying Twitter he’s become seriously rightwing and alienated a lot of people by doing so. I would never normally do something like this … but I’ve always wanted to smash a car.”

Tesla was approached for comment.

Protective helmets were donned and sledgehammers wielded as Elon Musk critics vented their frustration at the Tesla boss and billionaire by smashing up a disused Tesla bound for the scrap heap.

The public art project was organised by the social media campaign group Everyone Hates Elon. A 2014 Tesla Model S was provided by an anonymous donor “to create a debate about wealth inequality”, a spokesperson for the group said.

The participants gathered at Hardess studios in south London on Thursday to take it in turns to swing at the car with sledgehammers and baseball bats. The destroyed electric vehicle, which retails for about £14,000, will be auctioned in the next few weeks, with all proceeds going to food bank charities.

“We’re giving Londoners a chance to stand up to far-right hatred and billionaires and express how they feel about the current state of the world,” said the group. “Therapy is expensive, but this is free.”

Talia Denisenko, a 32-year-old writer, wore a Ukrainian flag as she took a hammer to the car’s bonnet as Britney Spears’s Hit Me Baby One More Time blared from a speaker. “My family is Ukrainian and Elon Musk wants to keep us occupied,” she said. “Things feel very disempowering at the moment. This is a little bit of therapy.”

Alice Rogers, a 24-year-old University of Cambridge researcher from Illinois, said: “Musk is acting in ways which violates our constitution. I’m very concerned by what I’m seeing – he’s gutting agencies and cutting USAID. This felt really cathartic. I’m not normally a smasher, but that felt really good.”

Everyone Hates Elon, which garnered attention this year for distributing stickers with the slogan “Don’t buy a Swasticar”, said it had made clear that the stunt, called London vs Musk, should not be replicated outside the event.

“This is a private event with a used Tesla that was destined for the scrapyard – it’s a supervised, controlled art piece and there are proper safety measures in place,” said a spokesperson. “We urge people not to damage other Teslas or any other cars.”

The battery of the scrap car had been removed and recycled.

“I’m just aghast at what I see going on in America at the moment,” said Lee Woods, a 45-year-old university lecturer who had travelled two hours from Hampshire for the event. “I think Musk is using his obscene wealth to promote the far right.”

Musk, the world’s richest person, leads the Trump administration’s “department of government efficiency” (Doge), which the president tasked with drastically reducing US government jobs and cutting national debt.

Tesla’s shares dropped 13% in the first three months of 2025 – an indication of buyer backlash as a result of Musk’s rightwing politics. Protests calling for a boycott of the electric vehicle company have been taking place on both sides of the Atlantic in recent months, including a global day of action where hundreds of Tesla branches were targeted by protesters from the US group Tesla Takedown.

“My opinion [on Musk] has changed hugely,” said Giles Pearson, 32, who dealt the first blow on Thursday. “Since buying Twitter he’s become seriously rightwing and alienated a lot of people by doing so. I would never normally do something like this … but I’ve always wanted to smash a car.”

Tesla was approached for comment.

A British adventurer has apologised after her claims to be the first woman to traverse Canada’s largest island solo were dismissed by members of the Inuit population who criticised her dangerous “privilege and ignorance”.

Camilla Hempleman-Adams, 32, covered 150 miles (240km) on foot and by ski while pulling a sledge across Baffin Island, Nunavut, in temperatures as low as -40C and winds of 47mph during the two-week expedition last month.

The trek took Hempleman-Adams, the daughter of the adventurer Sir David Hempleman-Adams, from Qikiqtarjuaq to Pangnirtung, through Auyuittuq national park.

But her claims have been described as incorrect, with local people saying they had travelled the same route for generations.

Gayle Uyagaqi Kabloona, an Inuit artist based in Ottawa, said on Instagram: “There is no way in hell a British colonizer is coming to Inuit Nunaat in 2025 and claiming any firsts.

“My gramma walked 100’s of km yearly, often pregnant, to Spring fishing and winter caribou hunting grounds because that was life. Every inch of this continent has indigenous history and stories like this. Help me call out this ignorant and racist behaviour.”

Kabloona said the matter had affected the community because many people who lived traditional nomadic lifestyles had died, raising concerns that cultural practices would gradually be lost to time.

“The article hit people really hard in a very sensitive spot because of our history and the difficulties we face every day in combatting western colonialism,” she told the BBC.

“This woman is coming here from such a place of privilege and ignorance that it seems dangerous. It was almost like she was bringing back news of a new continent to Europe and saying: ‘There’s nobody here!’ We were and still are.”

She added: “It’s such a clear example of how colonialism benefits from dispossessing Indigenous people of their land and writing us out of history.”

Hempleman-Adams wrote on her expedition website before departure: “Parks Canada has confirmed there are no historical records of a female solo attempt from Qikiqtarjuaq to Pangnirtung.”

Kabloona said this was because crossing the terrain was considered “a normal way of life for them”.

Hempleman-Adams, a producer living in London and the youngest British woman to ski to the north pole aged 15, said: “It was never my intention to misrepresent any historical achievements or cause distress to local communities.

“Before undertaking the expedition, I researched and verified the accuracy of my claim with Parks Canada and local outfitters in both towns who confirmed that there was no known female solo winter crossing from Qikiqtarjuaq to Pangnirtung.

“However, if this information is incorrect, I apologise unreservedly for making an incorrect claim and for causing offence.”

She added she was “truly saddened” that coverage of her trek “may have caused concern or upset … I remain committed to learning from this experience and engaging with the community with the utmost respect.”

The top US commander in the Pacific has warned senators that the military support that China and North Korea are giving Russia in its war on Ukraine is a security risk in his region as Moscow provides critical military assistance to both in return.

Adm Samuel Paparo, head of US Indo-Pacific Command, told the Senate armed services committee that China has provided 70% of the machine tools and 90% of the legacy chips to Russia to help Moscow “rebuild its war machine”.

In exchange, he said, China is potentially getting help in technologies to make its submarines move more quietly, along with other assistance.

Senators pressed Paparo and Gen Xavier Brunson, commander of US Forces Korea, on China’s advances in the region, including threats to Taiwan. They also questioned both on the US military presence in South Korea, and whether it should be shielded from personnel cuts.

Both said the current US forces there and across the Indo-Pacific region are critical for both diplomacy in the region and US national security, as ties between Russia and China grow. The US has 28,500 military personnel in South Korea.

Paparo said North Korea is sending “thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of artillery shells” and thousands of short-range missiles to Russia. The expectation, he said, is that Pyongyang will receive air-defense and surface-to-air missile support.

“It’s a transactional symbiosis where each state fulfills the other state’s weakness to mutual benefit of each state,” Paparo said.

Brunson said North Korea has shown the ability to send munitions and troops to Russia while advancing development of its own military capabilities, including hypersonic weapons. Pyongyang, he said, “boasts a Russian-equipped, augmented, modernized military force of over 1.3 million personnel”.

North Korea’s efforts to develop advanced nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles “pose a direct threat to our homeland and our allies”, Paparo added.

North Korea also has sent thousands of soldiers to fight with the Russians against Ukraine. And the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said on Wednesday that Russia is actively recruiting Chinese citizens to fight alongside its forces in the Ukraine war. He said more than 150 such mercenaries are already active in the battle with Beijing’s knowledge.

China has called the accusation “irresponsible”.

Andrew Tate told a woman he was “debating whether to rape you or not” before he strangled and forced himself upon her, according to one of four women suing the self-proclaimed misogynistic influencer.

He is also accused of whispering “good girl” as he raped a woman he employed at his webcam business whom he had separately threatened with a gun, and strangling another so often that she developed spots from burst capillaries around her eyes.

A fourth woman, whom he allegedly first met at Yates nightclub in Luton, claims Tate continued to have sexual intercourse with her after strangling her to the point that she lost consciousness.

“She heard the defendant saying things like ‘I own you’ and ‘I’m going to kill you,’” according to her claim.

Tate denies the allegations, which include rape, coercive control and assault and battery, describing them as a “pack of lies” and “gross fabrications”. He claims his relationships with the women were consensual and that there was no violence or coercive control involved.

His lawyers further claim that the allegations for personal injury are barred as they relate to a period between 2013 and 2015 and are subject to a three-year limitation period.

It is claimed that emails, texts and other potential evidence in his defence will have been lost.

The claims by the four women have been filed at the high court where a preliminary hearing is scheduled for 15 April. Three of the women involved had reported Tate to Hertfordshire police in 2019 but the Crown Prosecution Service decided not to bring criminal charges.

According to the claims, two of the women worked for Tate’s webcam business in 2015 and the other two were in relationships with him in 2013 and 2014.

One of the women who allegedly had a relationship with Tate in 2013 said she told him she did not want to rush into full sexual intercourse but that he raped her at his flat after a training session before a kickboxing fight.

He is alleged to have told her: “I’m just debating whether to rape you or not.”

According to the claim, she “did not believe what she was hearing and asked him if he was joking”. Tate’s “face turned angry, and he proceeded to put one hand around her neck and, with the other, tried to remove her underwear”, it is claimed.

The claim goes on: “The … claimant was saying ‘no Andrew, you said you wouldn’t’ and “no, no, no”. His grip was tight but at that point it was not so tight that she could not speak.

“His response was to tell the … claimant to ‘shut the fuck up’. When she was quiet, he told her she was a ‘good girl’, and the … claimant thought if she was quiet he would partially release the stranglehold on her neck.”

Tate is alleged to have then raped the woman and to have repeatedly asked her: “Who do you belong to?”

In Tate’s filed defence, he claims the sexual intercourse was consensual and that the woman went on to visit him “on a number of occasions thereafter”. The defence adds: “They had sex several times. This is not the behaviour of someone in fear.”

All four women claim to have developed long-term mental health problems as a result of their alleged experiences.

Tate is under criminal investigation in three countries, including in Romania where he and his brother, Tristan, are accused of human trafficking, trafficking of minors and money laundering. He also faces allegations of rape.

Bedfordshire police are seeking to arrest the Tate brothers in relation to allegations of rape and trafficking dating back to between 2012 and 2015. The two men, who deny all accusations against them, are believed to currently be in Dubai.

A Pakistan-born Canadian citizen wanted for his alleged role in the deadly 2008 Mumbai siege has landed in New Delhi after his extradition from the United States.

Tahawwur Hussain Rana, 64, arrived at a military airbase outside the Indian capital under heavily armed guard late on Thursday, and will be held in detention to face trial.

India accuses Rana of being a member of the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) group, designated by the United Nations as a terrorist organisation, and of helping to plot the attacks.

The National Investigation Agency said it “secured the successful extradition of … Mumbai terror attack mastermind Tahawwur Rana from the US”.

The extradition took “years of sustained and concerted efforts to bring the key conspirator behind the 2008 mayhem to justice”.

Donald Trump announced in February that Washington would extradite Rana, whom he called “one of the very evil people in the world”.

Rana was flown to India after the US supreme court this month rejected his bid to remain in the United States, where he was serving a sentence related to another LeT-linked attack.

New Delhi blamed the LeT group – as well as intelligence officials from New Delhi’s arch-enemy, Pakistan – for the 2008 Mumbai attacks wherein 10 Islamist gunmen carried out a multiday slaughter in the country’s financial capital, killing 166 people and injuring hundreds more.

India accuses Rana of helping his long-term friend, David Coleman Headley, who was sentenced by a US court in 2013 to 35 years in prison after pleading guilty to aiding LeT militants, including by scouting target locations in Mumbai.

Rana, who denies the charges, is accused of playing a smaller role than Headley, but India maintains he is one of the key plotters.

Rana “is accused of conspiring with David Coleman Headley, and operatives of designated [Pakistan-based] terrorist organisations LeT and Harkat-ul-Jihadi Islami … to carry out the devastating terror attacks,” the NIA said in the statement.

Rana, a former military medic who served in Pakistan’s army, emigrated to Canada in 1997, before moving to the United States and setting up businesses in Chicago, including a law firm and a slaughterhouse.

He was arrested by US police in 2009.

A US court in 2013 acquitted Rana of conspiracy to provide material support to the Mumbai attacks. But the same court convicted him of backing LeT to provide material support to a plot to commit murder in Denmark.

Rana was sentenced to 14 years for his involvement in a conspiracy to attack the offices of the Jyllands-Posten newspaper, which had published cartoons depicting the prophet Muhammad.

In February, Devendra Fadnavis, chief minister of Maharashtra state, which includes the megacity Mumbai, said that “finally, the long wait is over and justice will be done”.

An ancient jawbone dredged from the Taiwanese seabed has revealed new insights into the appearance and sweeping geographic range of an enigmatic human species called the Denisovans.

The fossil was discovered by fishers trawling the Penghu Channel off Taiwan and is thought to be the most complete fossil that has been genetically identified as Denisovan. The male individual, who lived at least 10,000 years ago, had a strong jaw and very large, powerful molars.

“From a tooth or a small bone fragment, there’s the mystery of their appearance,” said Prof Enrico Cappellini, of the University of Copenhagen, a co-senior author on the paper. A Denisovan jaw discovered in Tibet had begun to fill in this picture, and the latest discovery adds to the evidence of a prominent jaw with huge teeth.

“Now we have a richer image,” Cappellini said. “Of course it would be good to have a skull and the rest of the skeleton, but it’s a step forward.”

The fossil has been dated to one of two glacial periods when the channel is known to have been above sea level, either between 10,000 and 70,000 years ago or between 130,000 and 190,000 years ago.

The scientists were not able to obtain DNA from the sample but managed to extract proteins, which could be sequenced and used to place the fossil confidently on the Denisovan branch of the evolutionary tree.

The discovery reveals an impressive geographic range for the ancient species, which lived at the same time as – and interbred with – modern humans and Neanderthals.

The first Denisovan fossils, identified through analysis of ancient DNA, came from a cave in Siberia and comprised just a finger fragment and a few teeth. Since then, further discoveries show Denisovans also weathered the incredibly harsh conditions of the high-altitude Tibetan plateau, where temperatures can plunge to -30C. By contrast, in south-east Asia they would have lived alongside water buffaloes in a balmy climate.

“These are climate and environmental conditions that are quite different,” Cappellini said. “The cold environment in Siberia, high altitude in Tibet. We cannot infer anything of their cognitive abilities … but they had an ability to adapt to environments that are quite diverse.”

Prof Chris Stringer, a leader in human origins research at the Natural History Museum in London, who was not involved in the latest research, said the latest discovery also strengthened the case that Denisovans belong to a group called Homo longi, or dragon man, a complete skull of which was unearthed in Harbin in north-east China.

“It’s now apparent that the Denisovans must have had a wider environmental range than the Neanderthals, from cold, open environments in northern Asia to subtropical woodlands in south-east Asia,” he said. “A question for the future will be whether we end up calling Homo longi Denisovan or we end up calling Denisovans Homo longi.”

The findings are published in the journal Science.