Germany’s conservative leader has unexpectedly fallen short of a majority in a parliament vote to become chancellor.

Friedrich Merz needed 316 votes in the 630-seat Bundestag but only secured 310, in a significant blow to the Christian Democrat leader, two and a half months after winning Germany’s federal elections.

His coalition with the centre left has enough seats in parliament but it appears 18 MPs who had been expected to back him dissented. Merz’s failure in the first vote is seen as unprecedented in modern German history.

The Bundestag will now have another 14 days to choose either Merz or another candidate as chancellor with more than half its members.

Under Germany’s constitution, there is no limit to how many votes can be held, but if no absolute majority is reached within that period then a candidate can be elected by a simple majority.

No further votes were expected immediately, and there was a prevailing mood of confusion.

Bundestag President Julia Klöckner was said to be planning a second vote on Wednesday, although Christian Democrat General Secretary Carsten Linnemann said he was hoping for a second round by the end of the day.

“Europe needs a strong Germany, that’s why we can’t wait for days,” he told German TV.

Merz’s defeat is seen by political commentators as a humiliation, possibly inflicted by a handful of disaffected members of the Social Democrat SPD, which signed a coalition deal with his conservatives on Monday.

The Bundestag president told MPs that nine of the 630 MPs were absent, three abstained and another ballot paper was declared invalid.

Not everyone in the SPD is happy with the deal, but party officials were adamant their party was fully committed to it.

“It was a secret vote so nobody knows,” senior Social Democrat MP Ralf Stegner told the BBC, “but I can tell you I don’t have the slightest impression that our parliamentary group wouldn’t have known our responsibility.”

The historic nature of Merz’s failure will be difficult for him to move on untarnished. No candidate has failed in this way since 1949.

The embarrassment of Tuesday’s vote undermines Merz’s hopes of being an antidote to the weakness and division of the last government, which collapsed late last year.

Far-right party Alternative for Germany which came second in the February election with 20.8% of the vote seized on his failure and called for fresh elections.

Joint leader Alice Weidel wrote on X that the vote showed “the weak foundation the small coalition has been built between the [conservatives] and SPD, which was rejected by voters”.

Merz’s choice for foreign minister, Christian Democrat colleague Johann Wadephul, told the BBC the vote was “an obstacle but not a catastrophe”.

“We will have a second attempt, of course, with again Friedrich Merz as the candidate from the coalition. And I’m sure he will be elected and he will be the next chancellor.”

Germany’s handover of government is carefully choreographed. On the eve of Monday’s vote, outgoing chancellor Olaf Scholz was treated to a traditional Grand Tattoo by an armed forces orchestra.

Merz, 69, was expected to win the vote and then visit President Frank-Walter Steinmeier to be sworn in, fulfilling a long-held ambition to become German chancellor.

His rival and former chancellor Angela Merkel had come to the Bundestag to watch the vote take place.

The caretaker ministers from Germany’s outgoing government were all planning to hand over to their successors on Tuesday afternoon.

Merz’s immediate decision now will be to decide with his coalition partners whether he should push for a second vote and take the risk of failing again.

His defeat threatens to cause splits within the coalition.

Political correspondents in the Bundestag said the failure to back Merz indicated that even if the coalition did come to power eventually, there was a potential issue lurking within its ranks.

AfD MP Bernd Baumann said the CDU had promised a string of policies similar to his own party’s, such as limiting migration, and then went into an alliance with the centre left: “That doesn’t work. That’s not how democracy works.”

“This isn’t good,” warned Green politician Katrin Göring-Eckardt. “Even though I don’t want this chancellor or support him, I can only warn everyone not to rejoice in chaos.”

Less than 24 hours earlier, the messaging had been very different, of Germany under a stable government putting six months of political paralysis to an end.

“It’s our historical duty to make this government a success,” Merz had said as he signed the coalition document.

Despite having a narrow majority of 12 seats, the agreement between the conservatives and centre left was seen as far more stable than the so-called traffic-light coalition of three parties which fell apart last November in a row over debt spending.

The SPD, which had been the biggest party in the old coalition slumped to its worst post-war election result in third place, but Merz had promised that Germany was back and that he would boost its voice on the world stage and revive a flagging economy.

After two years of recession, Europe’s largest economy grew in the first three months of 2025. However economists have warned of potential risks to German exports because of US-imposed tariffs.

Germany’s services sector contracted last month because of weaker demand and lower consumer spending.

Sir David Attenborough is launching what he says is one of the most important films of his career as he enters his hundredth year.

He believes his new, cinema-length film Ocean could play a decisive role in saving biodiversity and protecting the planet from climate change.

Sir David, who will be 99 on Thursday, says: “After almost 100 years on the planet, I now understand the most important place on Earth is not on land, but at sea.”

The ocean is the planet’s support system and humanity’s greatest ally against climate catastrophe, the film argues. It shows how the world’s oceans are at a crossroads.

A blue carpet will be rolled out at the film’s premiere tonight at the Royal Festival Hall.

A host of celebrities are expected to attend including Chris Martin and Coldplay, Benedict Cumberbatch, astronaut Tim Peake, Geri Halliwell-Horner and Simon LeBon.

Toby Nowlan, who produced Ocean, says this new production is not a typical Attenborough film. “This is not about seeing brand new natural history behaviours. It is the greatest message he’s ever told,” he says.

The film documents how the state of the world’s oceans and our understanding of how they function have changed in the course of Sir David’s lifetime.

Sir David remembers his first scuba dive on the Great Barrier Reef way back in 1957: “I was so taken aback by the spectacle before me I forgot – momentarily – to breathe.”

Since then, there has been a catastrophic decline in life in the world’s oceans. “We are almost out of time,” he warns.

Ocean contains some of the most graphic footage of the damage that bottom trawling – a common fishing practice around the world – can do to the seabed. It is a vivid example of how industrial fishing can drain the life from the world’s oceans, Sir David claims.

The new footage shows how the chain that the trawlers drag behind them scours the seafloor, forcing the creatures it disturbs into the net behind. They are often seeking a single species: more than three-quarters of what they catch may be discarded.

“It’s hard to imagine a more wasteful way to catch fish,” comments Sir David.

The process also releases vast amounts of carbon dioxide which contributes to the warming of our planet, yet bottom trawling is not just legal but is actively encouraged by many governments.

Sir David says the state of the ocean has almost made him lose hope for the future of life on the planet. What has kept him from despair is what he calls the “most remarkable discovery of all” – that the ocean can “recover faster than we had ever imagined”.

Sir David says the story of the world’s whales has been a source of huge optimism for him.

It is estimated that 2.9 million whales were killed by the whaling industry in the 20th Century alone. Scientists have said it is the largest cull of any animal in history when measured in terms of total biomass. It pushed almost all whale species to the edge of extinction.

Just one per cent of Blue Whales were left, recalls Sir David: “I remember thinking that was it. There was no coming back, we had lost the great whales.”

But in 1986 lawmakers bowed to public pressure and banned commercial whaling worldwide. The whale population has rapidly recovered since then.

One of the film’s directors, Keith Scholey, has worked with Sir David for 44 years. “When I first met David, I was in shorts,” he jokes. That was in 1981, two years after Sir David had resigned as the BBC’s director of programmes – one of the most senior jobs at the Corporation. “He’d done one career, and he was off on his next.”

Despite now nearing his 99th birthday Sir David is still remarkably energetic, says Scholey. “Every time you work with David, you learn something new,” he says. “It’s really good fun. But also, David keeps you on your mettle, because he is so on his mettle and so, you know, it’s always a very creative process.”

Sir David’s key message in the Ocean film is that all is not lost. Countries have promised to protect a third of the world’s oceans. He hopes his new film will spur leaders to take firm action on this promise at a UN conference next month.

He believes that could be transformational.

“The ocean can bounce back to life,” Sir David says. “If left alone it may not just recover but thrive beyond anything anyone alive has ever seen.”

A healthier ocean ecosystem would also be able to trap more carbon dioxide, helping protect the world from climate change, according to scientists.

“In front of us is a chance to protect our climate, our food, our home,” Sir David says.

As he celebrates his 99th birthday this week he is still fighting to protect the natural world he has worked his lifetime to show to us in all its glory.

Ocean will be in cinemas across the country from Thursday.

Sign up for our Future Earth newsletter to keep up with the latest climate and environment stories with the BBC’s Justin Rowlatt. Outside the UK? Sign up to our international newsletter here.

I ran from the White House briefing room, past the portico entrance of the West Wing to our camera position on the lawn, and flung on an ear piece connecting me to the studio.

A moment later the presenter asked me about the comments we had just heard live from US President Donald Trump.

I said we were seeing a fundamental shift in a United States’ policy position after decades of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

It was February this year, and Trump had just held talks with Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu – the first foreign leader since Trump’s inauguration to be invited to the White House. The US president vowed that his country would take control of the Gaza Strip, having earlier pledged the territory would also be “cleaned out” and emptied of its Palestinian population.

Trump was grabbing the world’s attention with a proposal that hardened his administration’s support for Israel and also upended international norms, flying in the face of international law. It marked an apex of the current Republican Party’s relationship with Israel – sometimes described as support “at all costs”.

The alliance between the two countries had been thrust into the international spotlight after the Hamas attacks on Israel on 7 October 2023 and Israel’s offensive in Gaza that followed.

During that war, the administration of President Joe Biden sent some $18bn (£13.5bn) worth of weapons to Israel, maintaining unprecedented levels of US backing. The period was marked by intensifying protests in the US, with many of those protesting being traditional Democrat leaning voters. The fallout became the focus of a bitter culture war centring on American attitudes towards Israel and the Palestinians. I covered demonstrations in which protesters repeatedly labelled Biden “Genocide Joe” – an accusation he always rejected.

At the time Donald Trump branded the protesters “radical-left lunatics” and the Trump administration is now targeting for deportation hundreds of foreign students who it accuses of antisemitism or support for Hamas, a move being vigorously challenged in the courts.

But as a Democrat who could otherwise have expected the vote of many of those upset over his support for Israel that support was politically costly for Biden in a way not experienced by previous presidents or, indeed, Trump.

One of Biden’s key decision makers over relations with Israel still wrestles with the decisions they took.

“My first reaction is just, I understand that this has evoked incredibly passionate feelings for Arab Americans, for non-Arab Americans, Jewish Americans,” says Jake Sullivan, Biden’s former national security adviser.

“There were two competing considerations: one was wanting to curb Israel’s excesses, both with respect to civilian casualties and the flow of humanitarian assistance. The other was […] wanting to make sure that we were not cutting Israel off from the capabilities it needed to confront its enemies on multiple different fronts.”

He added: “The United States stood behind Israel materially, morally, and in every other way in those days following October 7th.”

But opinion polls suggest support for Israel among the American public is dwindling.

A Gallup survey taken in March this year found only 46% of Americans expressed support for Israel (the lowest level in 25 years of Gallup’s annual tracking) while 33% now said they sympathised with the Palestinians – the highest ever reading of that measure. Other polls have found similar results.

Surveys – with all their limitations – suggest the swing is largely among Democrats and the young, although not exclusively. Between 2022 and 2025, the Pew Research Center found that the proportion of Republicans who said they had unfavourable views of Israel rose from 27% to 37% (younger Republicans, aged under 49, drove most of that change).

The US has long been Israel’s most powerful ally – ever since May 1948, when America was the first country to recognise the nascent State of Israel. But while US support for Israel is extremely likely to continue long-term, these swings in sentiment raise questions over the practical extent and policy limits of the US’s ironclad backing and whether the shifting sands of public opinion will eventually feed through to Washington, with real-world policy impacts.

To many, the close relationship between the US and Israel seems like a permanent, unshakeable part of the geopolitical infrastructure. But it wasn’t always guaranteed – and at the very beginning largely came down to one man.

In early 1948, US President Harry S Truman had to decide on his approach to Palestine. The country was in the grip of sectarian bloodshed between Jews and Arab Palestinians after three decades of colonial rule by Britain, which had announced its intention to pull out. Truman was deeply moved by the plight of Jewish survivors of the Holocaust stranded in displaced persons camps in Europe.

In New York City, a young Francine Klagsbrun, who would later become an academic and historian of Israeli prime minister Golda Meir, watched her parents praying for a Jewish homeland.

“I grew up in a very Jewish home and a very Zionist home also,” she explains. “So my older brother and I would go out and collect money to try to get England to open the doors. My brother would go on the subway trains, all the doors open on the train and he’d shout ‘open, open, open the doors to Palestine’,” she recalls.

Truman’s administration was deeply divided over whether to back a Jewish state. The CIA and the Department of State cautioned against recognising a Jewish state. They feared a bloody conflict with Arab countries that might draw in the US, risking Cold War escalation with the Soviets.

Two days before Britain was due to pull out of Palestine, an explosive row took place in the Oval Office. Truman’s domestic advisor Clark Clifford argued in favour of recognising a Jewish state. On the other side of the debate was Secretary of State George Marshall, a World War Two general whom Truman viewed as “the greatest living American”.

The man Truman admired so much was vigorously opposed to the president immediately recognising a Jewish state because of his fears about a regional war – and even went as far as telling Truman he would not vote for him in the coming presidential election if he backed recognition.

But despite the moment of extraordinary tension, Truman immediately recognised the State of Israel when it was declared two days later by David Ben-Gurion, the country’s first prime minister.

The historian Rashid Khalidi, a New York-born Palestinian whose family members were expelled from Jerusalem by the British in the 1930s, says the US and Israel were fused together in part by shared cultural connections. From 1948 onwards, he says, the Palestinians had a critical diplomatic disadvantage in the US, with their claim to national self-determination sidelined in an unequal contest.

“On the one side, you had the Zionist movement led by people whom are European and American by origin… The Arabs had nothing similar,” he says. “[The Arabs] weren’t familiar with the societies, the cultures, the political leaderships of the countries that decided the fate of Palestine. How could you speak to American public opinion if you had no idea what America is like?” says Khalidi.

Popular culture played its role too – notably the 1958 novel and subsequent blockbuster film Exodus by the author Leon Uris. It retold the story of Israel’s establishment to mass audiences of the 1960s, the movie version creating a heavily Americanised portrayal of pioneers in a new land.

Ehud Olmert, who at the time was a political activist but would later become Israeli prime minister, points to the war of 1967 as the moment when America’s support for Israel became the profound alliance that it is today.

That was the war in which Israel, after weeks of escalating fears of invasion by its neighbours, defeated the Arab countries in six days, effectively tripling the size of its territory, and launching its military occupation over (at that time) more than a million stateless Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.

“For the first time, the United States understood the importance and the significance of Israel as a major military and political power in the Middle East, and since then everything has changed in the basic relations within our two countries,” he says.

Over the years, Israel became the biggest recipient of US foreign military aid on Earth. Strong American diplomatic support, particularly at the United Nations, has been a key element of the alliance; while successive US presidents have also sought to broker peace between Israel and its Arab neighbours.

But in recent years it has been far from a straightforward relationship.

When I spoke to Jake Sullivan, I put to him the issue of Arab Americans in the state of Michigan who boycotted Biden and his successor candidate Kamala Harris over the extent of their support for Israel during the Gaza conflict, voting instead for Trump. He rejected the idea that Biden lost the state because of this support.

But that backing still prompted a marked backlash within a section of the American public.

A Pew Research Center survey taken in March this year found that 53% of Americans expressed an unfavourable opinion of Israel, an 11 point increase since the last time the survey was taken in 2022.

Currently, these shifts in public opinion haven’t yet prompted a major change in US foreign policy. Whilst some ordinary US voters are turning away from Israel, on Capitol Hill elected politicians from both parties are still mostly keen to talk up the importance of a strong alliance with Israel.

Some think that a sustained, long-term shift in public opinion might eventually lead to reduced real-world support for the country – with weaker diplomatic ties and reduced military aid. This issue is felt particularly sharply by some inside Israel. Several months before 7 October, the former Israeli general and head of the Military Intelligence Directorate, Tamir Hayman, warned of cracks forming between his country and the United States, in part because of what he described as the slow movement of American Jews away from Zionism.

Israel’s political shift in favour of the national-religious right has played a key part in this. From early 2023, Israel was gripped by an unprecedented wave of protests among Jewish Israelis against Netanyahu’s judicial reforms, with many arguing he was moving the country towards theocracy – a claim he always rejected. Some in the US who had always felt a deep sense of connection with Israel were watching with growing concern.

In March this year, the Institute for National Security Studies, a leading Tel Aviv-based think tank led by Hayman, published a paper arguing that US public opinion had entered the “danger zone”, as far as support for Israel was concerned. “The dangers of diminished US support, particularly as it reflects long-term and deeply rooted trends, cannot be overstated,” wrote the paper’s author, Theodore Sasson. “Israel needs the support of the global superpower for the foreseeable future,”.

That support at the policy level has only strengthened over the decades, but it is important to note that historic American opinion polling shows public opinion has ebbed and flowed before.

Today, Dennis Ross, who helped negotiate the Oslo accords with President Bill Clinton, says American opinion on Israel has become increasingly tied to sharp political divisions in the US.

“Trump is viewed very negatively by most Democrats – the latest polls show over 90 percent,” Ross says. “There’s potential for Trumpian support for Israel to feed a dynamic here that, at least among Democrats, increases criticism of Israel.”

But he expects that Washington’s support for Israel – in the form of military aid and diplomatic ties – will continue. And he thinks if Israeli voters eject their prime minister and replace him with a more centrist government, one that may reverse some of the disquiet in the US. A general election must be held in Israel before late October next year.

Under such a new Israeli government, Ross argues, “there won’t be the same impulse towards creating de-facto annexation of the West Bank. There’ll be much more outreach to the Democratic Party and the Democratic Party officials.”

Those who see a fraying relationship are paying particularly close attention to the views of younger Americans – a group that has shown the most marked shift in opinion since 7 October. As the ‘TikTok generation’, many young Americans get their news about the war from social media and the high civilian death toll from Israel’s offensive in Gaza appears to have driven the declining support among young Democrats and liberals in America. Last year, 33 percent of Americans under 30 said their sympathies lie entirely or mostly with the Palestinian people, versus 14 percent who said the same about Israelis, according to a Pew Research poll published last month. Older Americans were more likely to sympathise with the Israelis.

Karin Von Hippel, chair of the Arden Defence and Security Practice and a former official in the US State Department, agrees there is a demographic divide among Americans on the topic of Israel – one that even extends to Congress.

“Younger Congress men and women are less knee jerk, reactively supporting Israel,” she says. “And I think younger Americans, including Jewish Americans, are less supportive of Israel than their parents were.”

But she is sceptical of the idea that this might lead to a serious change at the policy level. Despite changing opinions among the party’s base, she says, many of the most prominent Democrats who might run for President in 2028 are “classically supportive of Israel”. She names Gretchen Whitmer, the governor of Michigan, and Pete Buttigieg, the former Transportation Secretary, as examples. And what about Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the Instagram-famous congresswoman who is a long-standing supporter of Palestinian rights? Hippel responds bluntly: “I don’t think an Ocasio-Cortez type can win right now.”

In the weeks after February’s Trump-Netanyahu press conference at the White House, I asked Jake Sullivan where he thought the US-Israel relationship was going. He argued that both countries were dealing with internal threats to their democratic institutions that would define their character and their relationship.

“I think it’s almost less of a foreign policy question than it is a domestic policy question in these two countries – whither America and whither Israel?” he says. “The answer to those two questions will tell you where does the US-Israel relationship go five, ten, fifteen years from now.”

Three people are dead and at least seven more are missing after a small boat overturned off the coast near San Diego, California, officials said.

At least 16 people, including two children, were on board the panga-style fishing boat, the US Coast Guard said. Initially, as many as nine people were reported missing – but two were later found and detained.

An official told CBS News, the BBC’s US partner, that the incident was being treated as a suspected case of human smuggling. A number of Indian passports were found near where the boat washed up on a beach, news agency Reuters reported.

Four of those found have been taken to hospital. It is not known if anyone else entered the water.

It was unclear where the boat was coming from before it flipped about 35 miles (56km) north of the Mexico border, Coast Guard Petty Officer Chris Sappey told the Associated Press news agency.

He said similar vessels were commonly used by smugglers. “They were not tourists,” Mr Sappey said. “They are believed to be migrants.”

A panga boat is a small, open lightweight vessel typically powered by an outboard motor.

A coastguard cutter and a helicopter were searching for the missing, a spokesman told the BBC.

Nick Backouris, a lieutenant with the San Diego Sheriff’s office, said people from his office helped victims on the beach.

“A doctor hiking nearby called in and said, ‘I see people doing CPR on the beach, I’m running that way,'” Backouris told AP. “The deputies were assisting with life-saving measures.”

Jorge Sanchez, of the Encinitas Fire Department, said the immigration status of those caught was not known.

A senior Hamas official has said there is “no point” in further talks on a new Gaza ceasefire and hostage release deal, after Israel approved an expanded offensive that may include seizing all of the Palestinian territory indefinitely.

Bassem Naim told the BBC the armed group would not engage with new proposals while Israel continued its “starvation war”.

On Monday, the Israeli military said the aim of the “wide-scale” operation was the return of hostages held by Hamas and its “decisive defeat”.

Israeli officials said it would involve “capturing” Gaza, displacing the majority of its population, and taking control of aid after a two-month blockade the UN says has caused severe food shortages.

The officials also said the offensive would not begin until after US President Donald Trump’s visit to the region next week, giving Hamas what they called a “window of opportunity” to agree to a deal.

But Bassem Naim’s comments on Tuesday seemed to counter that.

UN Secretary General António Guterres warned that expanded Israeli ground operations and a prolonged military presence would “inevitably lead to countless more civilians killed and the further destruction of Gaza”.

UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron expressed deep concern at recent developments and agreed that “a renewed peace process was required”, Downing Street said.

In Washington, President Trump said the US would help supply food to people in Gaza, without going into details.

“People are starving and we’re going to help them get some food. A lot of people are making it very, very bad,” he said. “Hamas is making it impossible because they’re taking everything that’s brought in.”

Israel cut off all deliveries of aid and other supplies on 2 March and resumed its offensive two weeks later after the collapse of a two-month ceasefire, saying it was putting pressure on Hamas to release hostages.

It also accused Hamas of stealing and storing aid – an allegation the group has denied.

Aid agencies have warned that with no change in policy, mass starvation is imminent.

They have also condemned Israel’s proposal to deliver aid through private companies at military hubs, saying it would be a breach of basic humanitarian principles and that they would not co-operate.

The UN has said Israel is obliged under international law to ensure food and medical supplies for Gaza’s population. Israel has said it is complying with international law and there is no aid shortage.

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

At least 52,567 people have been killed in Gaza since then, including 2,459 since the Israeli offensive resumed, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry.

The only surviving guest of a deadly beef wellington lunch at the heart of a high-profile Australian court case has described being run down a hospital corridor to urgent care after medical staff realised he had eaten toxic mushrooms.

Ian Wilkinson told the courtroom on Tuesday that he and his wife Heather had been “very happy to be invited” to the lunch hosted by Erin Patterson.

But the meal left Heather and two other relatives dead, and Mr Wilkinson seriously ill.

Ms Patterson, who is on trial for the murder of three people and the attempted murder of another, has pleaded not guilty and her defence team says she “panicked” after unintentionally serving poison to family members she loved.

Three people died in hospital in the days after the meal: Ms Patterson’s former in-laws, Don and Gail Patterson, as well as Gail’s sister, Heather Wilkinson.

Mr Wilkinson, a local pastor, survived after spending seven weeks in hospital, including three weeks in intensive care at the Austin hospital in Melbourne. He gave the packed courtroom details about the lunch, describing how he and his wife took ill afterwards, and being told by medical staff that the situation was “serious”.

The jury has heard that there is no dispute that the lunch of beef wellington, mashed potatoes and green beans contained death cap mushrooms and caused the guests’ illnesses.

Whether Ms Patterson intended to kill or cause very serious injury is the main issue in the case, the judge has told the jury.

Mr Wilkinson told the court that Ms Patterson had plated “all of the food”.

“Each person had an individual serve, it was very much like a pasty,” he said. “It was a pastry case and when we cut into it, there was steak and mushrooms.”

He added that Gail and Heather picked up four grey plates with the food and set them on the table, while Ms Patterson ate from an “orangey tan” coloured plate.

“Erin picked up the odd plate and carried it to the table. She took it to her place at the table,” he said. He also said that his wife told him in hospital the next day that she had “noticed the difference in colours” of the plates.

After eating the lunch, Mr Wilkinson recalled being unwell through the night with vomiting and diarrhoea.

Ms Patterson’s ex-husband Simon Patterson, who last week told court he’d declined an invitation to the lunch, had visited them after discovering his parents had been ill the whole night as well. He had insisted on calling an ambulance as his own parents had done. But the wait for an ambulance was too long, so Simon drove them to a local hospital, and then to Leongatha hospital, Mr Wilkinson said.

Mr Wilkinson said that doctors had first treated them as food poisoning cases and “suspicion was falling on the meat”, adding that he could not recall mention of mushrooms at the time.

But the next morning, they were “abruptly woken up by a group of nurses who literally ran us down the corridor in our beds to the urgent care area,” he said. A doctor then told the couple that “he’d had communication … saying it was suspected mushroom poisoning”.

“He was very frank. He said it is a very serious situation. He said there was time critical treatment available.”

The pair were then taken by ambulance to Dandenong hospital.

Earlier in the day, Mr Wilkinson was shown a picture of the dining room table on an iPad and he marked where each of the five people at the lunch had been seated.

He said that both he and Heather “ate the entire meal”, while Don ate his meal along with half of the beef wellington that Gail did not finish.

“There was talk about husbands helping their wives out.”

He said Ms Patterson was “definitely” eating but couldn’t say “with certainty” how much she ate.

There was a cake for dessert as well as a fruit platter but Mr Wilkinson told the court that not much was eaten because everyone was full from the main course.

When asked about his relationship with Ms Patterson, Mr Wilkinson said: “I would say our relationship was friendly, amicable. It did not have much depth. We were more like acquaintances. We didn’t see a great deal of each other.”

“She just seemed like a normal person to me,” he added. “When we met things were friendly. We never had arguments or disputes. She just seemed like an ordinary person.”

“Heather would have seen Erin more than me, talked to her more than me but we did not consider that the relationship was close,” he said.

The invitation was made to Heather Wilkinson at church, a week or two earlier, Mr Wilkinson recalled.

“We were very happy to be invited. It seemed like maybe our relationship was going to improve,” he said.

“We were very happy to accept.”

The court was shown a copy of Mrs Wilkinson’s diary where she had written, “Erin for lunch” with a pencil.

Written in blue ink: “12:00” – which Mr Wilkinson said was the time they were to be picked up by Don and Gail Patterson. Another word “fruit” in the diary referred to the fruit platter they were taking to the lunch, he said.

Mr Wilkinson said that after the lunch, Erin Patterson announced that she had cancer – something the defence has already told the jury it accepted was a false claim.

“She said she was very concerned because she believed it was very serious, life-threatening,” he said. “She was anxious about telling the kids. She was asking our advice about that. ‘Should I tell the kids or not tell the kids about this threat to my life?’

“She was asking, ‘What do you think I should do?”

“In that moment, I thought this is the reason we’ve been invited to the lunch,” said Mr Wilkinson, adding that he “didn’t quite catch” what type of cancer she had said.

“I thought it was some sort of ovarian or cervical cancer – something like that.”

He said it was a “relatively short conversation” and felt like it lasted around 10 minutes. The discussion ended because the Patterson children and a friend were arriving back at the house.

“I realised we weren’t able to continue, and that we hadn’t prayed about it,” Mr Wilkinson said. “I suggested we pray and I asked a prayer asking for God’s blessing that Erin would get the treatment she needed, that the kids would be okay.”

Ms Patterson, wearing a light pink striped shirt sat emotionless as Mr Wilkinson began his evidence.

Last week when the trial opened, her lawyer said there was no intent to hurt anyone and the deaths were the result of a tragic accident – though many of the facts are not in dispute and it is accepted that she lied several times to police.

On Monday the jury heard from members of a true crime Facebook group that Ms Patterson was part of.

One of the witnesses, Christine Hunt, was asked about Erin Patterson’s relationship with her estranged husband Simon.

She told the court that the words “controlling” and “coercive” had been used by Ms Patterson.

Another member of the same group, Daniela Barkley, told the court that Erin Patterson had been “excited” about buying a dehydrator, and the jury was shown several images shared with the group, which showed mushrooms drying on the metal racks of the appliance.

In a text message shown to the court, Ms Patterson said “I’ve been hiding powdered mushrooms in everything” – including recipes such as brownies so her children couldn’t tell they were eating them.

The court also heard that in July 2023, she’d asked the group for advice on cooking a beef Wellington, the dish that was served to the four guests at that deadly lunch later the same month.

Monday night marked one of the world’s biggest nights of fashion, as stars served up their most iconic looks for the annual Met Gala in New York City.

The theme for this year’s event was “Superfine: Tailoring Black Style”, the first since 2003 to focus exclusively on menswear.

It was inspired by a newly unveiled exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s costume institute featuring the “black dandy”, which Vogue says “examines the importance of clothing and style to the formation of black identities in the Atlantic diaspora”.

A-list celebrities including Zendaya, Demi Moore and Diana Ross brought their own interpretation to the theme, stunning in tailored suits and dramatic gowns.

• Look back at our live coverage of the Met
• Rihanna reveals she is expecting third child

Here is a look at some of the highlights:

Actress Zendaya, known for her dazzling red carpet style, opted for a wide-brimmed hat and tailored Louis Vuitton cream suit at this year’s Met Gala.

But there was one slight pop of colour: her manicured red nails.

Puerto Rican rapper Bad Bunny wore a brown Prada suit, which he said he worked on with the Italian fashion house for a few months before the event.

He also stayed on theme by accessorising with embellished gloves, a brooch and a hat that paid homage to his Puerto Rican heritage.

“We did something special,” he said of his look. “I feel good, and I hope people think I’m looking good.”

US reality TV star Kim Kardashian wore an all-black ensemble by LA-based brand Chrome Hearts – a fitted leather top and skirt that she offset with diamond necklaces and two strings of pearls.

She is, of course, no stranger to the Met Gala – having made headlines with a dress worn by Marilyn Monroe in 2022, and a wet-look Thierry Mugler dress in 2019.

Black British designer Grace Wales Bonner dressed British Formula One star Sir Lewis Hamilton for the night. Sir Lewis was a co-chair of this year’s event.

The pair have worked together in the past with Wales Bonner dressing Hamilton for the 2023 British Fashion Awards.

Singer Chappell Roan brought a rare pop of colour to the Met’s blue carpet, in a patchwork hot pink ensemble sourced from eBay.

The singer worked with Wicked costume designer Paul Tazewell on her outfit, while make-up artist Pat McGrath was behind her disco-inspired look.

Demi Moore gave us another round of method dressing.

The American actress’s recent press tour for The Substance recalled the body horror themes of the film, while her awards campaign for the role of Elisabeth Sparkle saw her dressing for the glam statuettes.

Moore understood the assignment for the Met Gala, coming as a literal men’s tie in a sculptural black and white striped sequin gown from Thom Browne.

Rihanna, typically one of the most stylish attendees at the Gala, returned to the Met steps this year in Marc Jacobs, debuting her pregnancy with co-chair of the evening A$AP Rocky.

Legendary singer Diana Ross wore a show-stopping white ensemble, complete with feathers and a long train that required at least two assistants.

On the carpet, Ross said her son persuaded her to attend this year’s event. The last time she attended the Met Gala is 2003.

She added she had the names of her children and grandchildren embroidered on her dress train.

Actress Sydney Sweeney wore a custom Miu Miu gown – her third time wearing the designer at the Met Gala. This time, her dress was complete with beaded fringe shoulders and gold hardware detailing on the neck.

Speaking about her look, Sweeney said it paid homage to actress and painter Kim Novak. Sweeney is set to portray Novak in the upcoming film Scandalous.

A custom-made Chanel look was Dua Lipa’s choice this year.

The chiffon dress, sequin tweed jacket and organza cape – all adorned with pearls, feathers and crystals – took some 2,000 hours to make.

Sabrina Carpenter wore a burgundy Louis Vuitton bodysuit that featured all the tailoring of a regular suit.

The singer said she worked with recording artist Pharrell Williams – also the men’s creative director of Louis Vuitton – on the bottomless look.

“You’re quite short, so no pants for you,” Carpenter recalled Williams telling her.

Irish actor Barry Keoghan wore a custom-made Valentino fit, with florals embroidered on the cuffs and a silk red scarf wrapped around the waist.

New Zealand singer Lorde made a rare appearance at the Met Gala this year (she has not attended since 2021).

She wore a metallic silver floor-length skirt set, and a matching bandeau and blazer designed by Thom Browne.

Olympic gymnast and gold medalist Simone Biles brought a pop of colour to the Met Gala carpet with a striking blue minidress that featured a collared neckline, a long train and jewelled appliques.

The dress was designed by Harbison Studio.

Singer Coco Jones opted for a look designed by Indian brand Manish Malhotra.

She wore a tailored cream and white look that featured ornate embroidery and a dramatic long-sleeve coat. Jones also wore a large statement necklace and Jimmy Choo heels.

Actor and playwright Colman Domingo could have inspired this year’s Met Gala theme, as he’s been carrying the baton for well-dressed men on the red carpet for several years now.

He donned a royal blue Valentino cloak that paid homage to Andre Leon Talley, former editor-at-large on Vogue whom Anna Wintour called “a dandy among dandies.”

The cape later was removed to reveal a second look underneath: a tailored, patterned suit complete with a big fabric, polka-dotted flower brooch.

Actress and singer Teyana Taylor, who hosted Vogue’s live stream of the red carpet, arrived in custom Marc Jacobs on the arm of costume designer Ruth E. Carter. Ms Carter has worked with filmmaker Spike Lee and on the Black Panther movie franchise to create some modern pop cultural cues for the black dandy.

Taylor wore a burgundy cape embroidered with “Harlem Rose,” a nod to her 2018 song A Rose in Harlem.

Social media influencer Emma Chamberlain looked sharp and on theme with a backless tailored suit dress designed by French fashion house Courrèges.

She accessorised the look with a spiky beach blonde pixie cut and stylish eyeglasses.

Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo, known for her on-theme style, wore a Givenchy ensemble featuring a bedazzled bodice and an extra-long black train with matching leather boots and nails.

Recording artist Doja Cat wore a custom Marc Jacobs look that featured giant shoulder pads and a leopard-print bustier panel.

“I just wanted to feel like a little gangsta,” she said.

“I feel like he brought that with the strong shape of the shoulders, and all of the exaggerated shapes,” Doja Cat said of Jacobs.

Actress Tracee Ellis Ross, the daughter of Diana Ross, was one of the few people who wore pink at this year’s Met Gala.

She donned a custom Marc Jacobs suit that was complete with a giant, hot pink bow at the back, a matching top hat and some unique bling.

In one of the more memorable looks of the evening, Andre 3000 showed up to the Met Gala carpet with a black and white piano strapped to his back and a trash bag as a purse.

The stylish OutKast rapper designed the look himself in collaboration with Burberry.

Oscar-winning actress Lupita Nyong’o wore a stunning powder blue Chanel suit, with a matching hat and transparent cape.

She accessorised the look with bedazzled, black rhinestone eyebrows.

Rapper Cardi B debuted a new hairstyle (and eye colour) in a green Burberry pantsuit, complete with matching nails and eye shadow.

Doechii took brand representation to new levels, stamping the famous Louis Vuitton logo on her face to go along with the motif of her suit.

The American rapper is often seen wearing looks from the French fashion house.

This outfit combined the designer’s two famous patterns – the LV monogram pattern on the waistcoat and jacket, as well as the damier checkerboard on the shorts.

When asked about her outfit on the carpet, Janelle Monáe responded simply – “free” – followed by an expletive.

“And when I’m in my suit, that is exactly how I feel,” she said.

She wore a Thom Brown suit, with whom she’s attended the Met Gala as a guest for the last several years. The look is styled by the Academy Award-winning costume designer for Wicked, Paul Tazewell.

Pop legend Madonna accessorised her cream-colored tuxedo with a cigar, creating an interplay between soft feminine materials and a distinct masculine energy.

It’s a dynamic that the superstar has played with throughout her career.

The Indian government has threatened to take legal action against Sotheby’s in Hong Kong unless they stop an upcoming auction of jewels linked to the Buddha’s remains and requested their return to India.

The auction, which is set to take place on Wednesday, includes gems which were found buried with Buddha’s bone fragments more than a hundred years ago.

India’s ministry of culture has said the sale “violates Indian and international laws as well as UN conventions”, and asked for the jewels should be treated as sacred. The sale has also been condemned by several Buddhists and art scholars globally.

The BBC has reached out to Sotheby’s for a comment.

The Indian ministry posted a letter it sent to Sotheby’s and Chris Peppé, the great-grandson of William Claxton Peppé, who excavated the relics in 1898, on Instagram.

The post stated that Sotheby’s has responded to the legal notice and assured that the matter is receiving its “full attention”.

The post said that Peppé “lacks authority” to sell the relics and accused the auction house of participating in “continued colonial exploitation” by facilitating the sale.

• Jewels linked to Buddha remains go to auction, sparking ethical debate

William Claxton Peppé was an English estate manager who excavated a stupa at Piprahwa, just south of Lumbini, the believed birthplace of Buddha. He uncovered relics inscribed and consecrated nearly 2,000 years ago.

The findings included nearly 1,800 gems, including rubies, topaz, sapphires and patterned gold sheets, stored inside a brick chamber. This site is now in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.

William Peppé handed the gems, relics and reliquaries to the colonial Indian government, from where the bone relics went to the Buddhist King of Siam (Rama V). Five relic urns, a stone chest and most other relics were sent to the Indian Museum in Kolkata – then the Imperial Museum of Calcutta.

Only a small “portion of duplicates”, which he was allowed to keep, remained in the Peppé family, Chris Peppé said. (Sotheby’s notes say Peppé was allowed to keep approximately one-fifth of the discovery.)

The Indian ministry has said that labelling the jewels as “duplicates” is misleading and that these relics make up the “inalienable religious and cultural heritage” of India.

The jewels “cannot be treated as specimens” but as the “sacred body and originally interred offerings to the sacred body” of the Buddha, the post said.

The ministry has also questioned the custodianship of the jewels.

It said that the sellers who call themselves the custodians of the gems do not have the right to “alienate or misappropriate the asset”, which it calls an “extraordinary heritage of humanity”.

The statement also mentioned a decade-old report which said that the relics were left forgotten in a shoebox, suggesting that custodianship also included “safe upkeep”.

The Indian ministry has demanded a public apology from Sotheby’s and Peppé. It has also asked them to fully disclose all records that trace the ownership of the relics that are still in their possession or transferred by them.

The ministry has said that the failure to comply with their demands would lead to legal proceedings in India and Hong Kong for “violation of cultural heritage law”.

It also threatened to launch a “public campaign” highlighting Sotheby’s role in perpetuating “colonial injustice”.

Earlier, Chris Peppé had told the BBC that the the family looked into donating the relics, but all options presented problems and an auction seemed the “fairest and most transparent way to transfer these relics to Buddhists”.

Chris Peppé has written that the jewels passed from his great-uncle to his cousin, and in 2013 came to him and two other cousins.

Over the past six years years, the gems have featured in major exhibitions, including one at The Met in 2023. The Peppé family has also launched a website to “share our research”.

But the Indian ministry in its statement said custodianship of the jewels has been “monetised via publicity and exhibition”.

Drone strikes have hit a major power station in the Sudanese city of Port Sudan causing a “complete power outage”, the country’s electricity provider said.

Explosions and huge fires have been reported near the city’s main international airport as a paramilitary force targeted the key city for the third consecutive day.

Flights have been cancelled after drones hit the international airport and a hotel near the current presidential palace, reports say.

“I see a huge cloud and fire going like all around the city… and I heard also now that they were like two more loud bangs. It looks quite apocalyptic,” a journalist, Cristina Karrer, told the BBC’s Newsday programme.

Thick black smoke could be seen at dawn on the skyline of the previously safe city where thousands of people fleeing the two-year civil war have sought refuge.

On Tuesday, Sudan’s electricity company said it was assessing the damage on its substation, which has disrupted supply of water, health and other services.

One drone targeted the civilian section of the Port Sudan airport and another one hit the main army base in the centre of the city, witnesses told AFP news agency.

• What is going on in Sudan? A simple guide
• BBC finds fear, loss and hope in Sudan’s ruined capital after army victory

A third drone struck “a fuel depot near the southern port” in the densely populated city centre, where UN officials, diplomats, aid agencies and the Sudan’s army have relocated from the capital Khartoum, AFP reported.

A major hotel located close to the residence of army chief Gen Abdel Fattah al-Burhan was also hit in the attack, the witness said.

Following the attacks, the UN has temporarily suspended aid flights to Port Sudan but regular aid operations continue, said Farhan Haq, the UN deputy spokesperson.

“None of our offices, premises or warehouses have been impacted, and we continue to carry out our regular operations,” Mr Haq added.

On Tuesday, Sudan’s government spokesman Khaled Al-Aiser said the military was guarding the affected fuel depots “to the fullest extent possible”, adding that the “will of the Sudanese people will remain unbreakable”.

The military has blamed the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) for the drone attacks which started on Sunday. The RSF is yet to comment on the attacks.

In a statement, the African Union warned that the attack on Port Sudan represented “a dangerous escalation” in the Sudanese civil war and “a direct threat to the lives of civilians, humanitarian access and regional stability”.

Prior to the attacks on Sunday, Port Sudan had avoided bombardment and was regarded as one of the safest places in the war-ravaged nation.

The paramilitary group has increasingly relied on drones to reclaim its lost territories, including Khartoum which was taken back by the army in March.

The two years of fighting between the army and the RSF has killed thousands, forced millions from their homes and created the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.

Both the army and RSF have been accused of war crimes.

• ‘Tortured and terrified’ – BBC witnesses the battle for Khartoum
• Five key moments in the battle for Khartoum
• Will recapture of presidential palace change course of Sudan war?

The pace at 64-year-old Thirunavkarsu’s spinning mill in southern India’s Tamil Nadu state has noticeably slowed down.

The viscose yarn – a popular material that goes into making woven garments – he produces, now sits in storage, as orders from local factories have dropped nearly 40% in the last month.

That’s because Chinese imports of the material have become cheaper by 15 rupees ($0.18; £0.13) per kilo and flooded Indian ports.

With Donald Trump imposing tariffs of up to 145% on Chinese goods going into the US, manufacturers in China have begun looking for alternative markets.

India’s textiles makers say they are bearing the brunt of the trade tensions as Chinese producers are dumping yarn in key production hubs.

While China is the leading producer of viscose yarn, India makes most of the viscose yarn the country needs locally with imports only bridging supply gaps.

Mill owners like Thirunavkarsu fear their yarn won’t survive the onslaught of such competition.

“We can’t match these rates. Our raw material is not as cheap,” he says.

Jagadesh Chandran, of the South India Spinners Association, told the BBC nearly 50 small spinning mills in the textile hubs of Pallipalayam, Karur and Tirupur in southern India are “slowing production”. Many say they’ll be forced to scale down further if the issue isn’t addressed.

China’s Ambassador to India, Xu Feihong, has sent assurances to India that his country will not dump products and in fact wants to buy more high-quality Indian products for Chinese consumers.

“We will not engage in market dumping or cut-throat competition, nor will we disrupt other countries’ industries and economic development,” he wrote in an opinion piece for the Indian Express newspaper.

But anxieties about dumping are spread across sectors in India, as China – Asia’s biggest economy – is the world’s largest exporter of practically all industrial goods, from textiles and metals, to chemicals and rare minerals.

While pharmaceuticals – and later phones, laptops, and semiconductor chips – were exempted from steep tariffs, large chunks of Chinese exports still run into Trump’s 145% tariff wall. It is these goods that are expected to chase other markets like India.

Their sudden inflow will prove “very disruptive” to emerging economies in Asia, according to Japanese broking house Nomura, whose research earlier revealed that China was flooding global markets with cheap goods even before Donald Trump took office earlier this year.

In 2024, investigations against unfair Chinese imports rose to a record high. Data from the World Trade Organization (WTO) shows nearly 200 complaints were filed against China at the forum – a record – including 37 from India.

India, in particular, with heavy dependencies on Chinese raw materials and intermediate goods, could be hit hard. Its trade deficit with China – the difference between what it imports and exports – has already ballooned to $100bn (£75bn). And imports in March jumped 25%, driven by electronics, batteries and solar cells.

In response, India’s trade ministry has set up a committee to track the influx of cheap Chinese goods, with its quasi-judicial arm probing imports across sectors, including viscose yarn.

India also recently imposed a 12% tax on some steel imports, locally known as a safeguard duty, to help halt an increase in cheap shipments primarily from China, which were pushing some Indian mills to scale down.

Despite such protections – and a loud marketing campaign by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government to boost manufacturing locally – India has found it hard to reduce its reliance on China, with imports rising even when border tensions between the two neighbours peaked after 2020.

That’s because the government has only had “limited success” with its plans to turn India into the world’s factory through things like the production linked subsidies, says Biswajit Dhar, a Delhi-based trade expert. And India continues to depend heavily on China for the intermediate goods that go into manufacturing finished products.

While western multi-national companies like Apple are increasingly looking towards India to diversify their assembly lines away from China, India is still dependent on Chinese components to make these phones. As a result, imports in sectors like electronics have risen significantly, pushing up its trade deficit.

India’s burgeoning deficit is a “worrying story”, says Ajay Srivastava, founder of the Global Trade Research Initiative (GTRI) think tank, all the more so because its exports to China have dropped to below 2014 levels despite a weaker currency, which should ideally help exporters.

“This isn’t just a trade imbalance. It’s a structural warning. Our industrial growth, including through PLI (production linked incentive) schemes, is fuelling imports, not building domestic depth,” Srivastava wrote in a social media post. In other words, the subsidies are not helping India export more.

“We can’t bridge this deficit without bridging our competitiveness gap.”

India needs to get its act together quickly to do that, given the opportunity US trade tensions with China have presented. But also because countries with a large rise in imports from China generally tend to see the sharpest slowdown in manufacturing growth, according to Nomura.

Akash Prakash of Amansa Capital agrees. A key reason why Indian private companies were not investing enough, was because they feared being “swamped by China”, he wrote in a column in the Business Standard newspaper. A recent study by the ratings agency Icra also corroborates this view.

With fears of Chinese dumping becoming more widespread and the likes of the European Union seeking firm guarantees from Beijing that its markets will not be flooded, pressure is mounting on China – which is now urgently looking to secure newer trading partners outside the US.

China wants to completely shift the narrative, says Mr Dhar, “It is trying to come clean amidst increased scrutiny”.

Despite the reassurances from Beijing, Delhi should use thawing relations with its larger neighbour to kickstart a proper dialogue on its firm stance about dumping, says Mr Dhar.

“This is an issue that India must flag, like most of the Western countries have.”

This must be the most secretive election in the world.

When 133 Catholic cardinals are shut into the Sistine Chapel on Wednesday to choose a successor to Pope Francis, each one will have sworn an oath on the gospels to keep the details under wraps for life.

The same goes for every person inside the Vatican during the conclave: from the two doctors on hand for any emergency, to the dining-room staff who feed the cardinals. All vow to observe “absolute and perpetual secrecy”.

Just to be sure, the chapel and the two guesthouses will be swept for microphones and bugs.

“There are electronic jammers to make sure that phone and wi-fi signals are not getting in or out,” said John Allen, the editor of Crux news site.

“The Vatican takes the idea of isolation extremely seriously.”

The famous lockdown is not only about keeping the voting process itself secret: stopping “nefarious forces” from attempting to hack it for information or to disrupt things.

The measures are also about ensuring the men in red total seclusion from the secular world and its influences as they prepare to vote.

Catholics will tell you the election is guided by God, not politics. But the hierarchy takes no chances.

On entering the conclave, everyone is obliged to surrender all electronic devices including phones, tablets and smart watches. The Vatican has its own police to enforce the rules.

“The logic is trust but verify,” John Allen said.

“There are no televisions, newspapers or radio at the guesthouse for the conclave – nothing,” said Monsignor Paolo de Nicolo, who was head of the Papal household for three decades.

“You can’t even open the windows because many rooms have windows to the exterior world.”

Everyone working behind the high Vatican walls for the conclave has been heavily vetted. Even so, they are barred from communicating with electors.

“The cardinals are completely incommunicado,” said Ines San Martin of the Pontifical Mission Societies in the US.

“There will just be walkie-talkies for some specific circumstances like, ‘we need a medic,’ or ‘Hey, the Pope has been elected, can someone let the bell-ringers in the Basilica know.'”

So what if someone breaks the rules?

“There is an oath, and those who do not observe it risk ex-communication,” Msgr De Nicolo says, meaning exclusion from the church. “No one dares to do this.”

It’s a different matter in the run-up to the conclave.

Officially, the cardinals are banned from commenting even now. But from the moment Pope Francis was buried, parts of the Italian press and many visitors turned cardinal-hunters, trying to suss out his most likely successor.

They have been scouring the tourist-filled restaurants and gelato joints around the Vatican, ready to speculate on any sightings and possible alliances.

“Wine and Rigatoni: the Cardinals’ Last Suppers”, was one headline in La Repubblica which described the “princes of the church” enjoying “good Roman lunches” before lockdown.

Reporters have then been grilling waiters on what they might have overheard.

“Nothing,” one of the servers at Roberto’s, a couple of streets back from St Peter’s, told me this week.

“They always go quiet whenever we get close.”

The other prime spot to catch a cardinal is beside the basilica itself, next to the curve of columns that embraces the main square. Each morning there’s a huddle of cameras and reporters on the lookout for the men in lace and scarlet robes.

There are now close to 250 cardinals in the city, called here from all over the world, although those aged 80 or over are not eligible to vote.

As they head into the Vatican for their daily congregations to discuss the election, each one is surrounded and bombarded with questions on progress.

They’ve given away little in response beyond the “need for unity” or assurances that the conclave will be short.

“The whole idea is for this to be a religious decision, not a political one,” Ines San Martin explains. “We say the Holy Spirit guides the conversation and the vote.”

But the Pope heads a huge, wealthy institution with significant moral authority and global sway on everything from conflict resolution to sexual politics.

So the man chosen – and his vision and priorities – matter far beyond the Vatican.

Certain Catholic monarchs had a veto on the election up until 1907. Today, voices from all quarters try to influence the debate – most obviously through the media.

At one point, Rome’s Il Messaggero chided a presumed front-runner, Italian Cardinal Parolin, for “a sort of self-candidacy”.

Then there was a video clip of Filipino Cardinal Tagle singing John Lennon’s Imagine, apparently released to dent his popularity. It went viral instead.

Meanwhile, a glossy book highlighting some potential contenders is doing the rounds, lauding conservatives like Cardinal Sarah of Guinea for condemning the “contemporary evils” of abortion and the “same-sex agenda”.

“There are groups in town who are trying to bang the drum on issues of interest to them,” John Allen says. “The cardinals are aware of this kind of thing, they read the papers. But they will do everything they can to block it out.”

“Are there lobbies going on? Yes, like in every election,” Ines San Martin agrees. “But it’s not as loud as I thought it would be.”

She argues that is partly because Pope Francis appointed so many new cardinals, including from new places.

“Fifty or sixty percent of them don’t even know one another. So even if you were an outside group, trying to have an agenda, it’s very hard even to pick your cardinals to begin with.”

By Wednesday morning, all the electors should be in place inside the Vatican – stripped of their phones and sealed off from the rest of the world.

From then on John Allen believes personal preference will dominate over politics, liberal or conservative factions or the “rattle and hum of public debate”.

“I really think the cardinals’ discussions among themselves right now is key,” Ines San Martin agrees. “A lot have been speaking up for the first time. You never know just how inspiring one of them might be.”

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Russia says Ukraine launched a drone attack on Moscow – days before the start of a ceasefire, ordered by Russian President Vladimir Putin to coincide with a World War Two parade.

Moscow’s four major airports shut for a few hours on Tuesday amid the barrage, authorities said. There were no casualties and Ukraine has not commented.

Moscow is due to hold a parade on 9 May to mark the victory of the Soviet Union and allies over Nazi Germany. This year is the 80th anniversary of the end of WW2 and will see world leaders, including China’s Xi Jinping, in Russia for the event.

Putin has called for a three-day ceasefire from 8 May – something Ukraine has not committed to. Kyiv wants a longer truce.

“Fire will be halted, but should the Kyiv regime fail to do the same and should it continue trying to strike our positions and facilities, then an appropriate response will be given immediately,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Tuesday.

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky has dismissed Russia’s ceasefire plans as a “theatrical play”. Instead, he has been pushing for a ceasefire of at least 30 days where there would be a halt to missile and drone strikes on civilian targets.

He has also reportedly said his country cannot guarantee the safety of anyone travelling to Moscow this week.

“Our position is very simple for all countries traveling to Russia on May 9: We cannot be held responsible for what happens on the territory of the Russian Federation,” Zelensky was quoted as saying over the weekend by Ukrainian news agency Interfax.

Ukraine’s foreign ministry went a step further, calling on “all foreign states to refrain from the participation of their military personnel in the parade in Moscow”.

In a statement on Tuesday, it said taking part in the event would be “regarded by Ukraine as an insult to the memory of the victory over Nazism [and] the memory of millions of Ukrainian front-line soldiers who liberated our country and all of Europe from Nazism eight decades ago”.

The Kremlin had previously announced a 30-hour truce with Ukraine over Easter, where both sides reported a decrease in fighting, but accused each other of hundreds of violations.

Russian authorities said the Ukraine attack was the second in as many nights.

Moscow’s mayor said at least 19 Ukrainian drones had been intercepted “from different directions”. Sergei Sobyanin added that debris had landed on one of Moscow’s key highways.

The governors of other Russian cities, including Penza and Voronezh, also said they had been targeted.

Meanwhile, Ukraine reported downing 54 drones launched overnight from Russia, and several strikes across the country – including in Kyiv.

Four people have died as a result of the most recent attacks – three in the Sumy region, close to the Russian border, and one in the Black Sea city of Odesa.

Kharkiv’s regional head, Oleh Syniehubov, said 11 people had been injured and the city’s central market had been destroyed in a fire. At least four others were injured in the southern city of Nikopol on Tuesday morning, the regional head reported.

Fighting also continues in Russia’s Kursk region more than a week after Moscow said it had pushed Ukrainian troops out. Ukraine had denied that report and said its forces were still active there.

A total of 200 combat engagements occurred between Ukrainian and Russian troops on Monday, Ukrainian military authorities said.

Ukraine pushed into the Russian border region in a surprise incursion last August, but has since gained little ground.

Two weeks ago, the photograph of a woman sitting motionless beside her husband’s body went viral across Indian social media.

It captured a moment of unspeakable grief – one that came to symbolise the 22 April militant attack in Indian-administered Kashmir in which 26 civilians were killed.

The woman in the photo was Himanshi Narwal, whose husband, a 26-year-old naval officer, was among the victims. The couple, who had been married for less than a week, were on their honeymoon when Vinay Narwal was shot dead.

But within days, Ms Narwal, who had been portrayed as the face of the tragedy, found herself at the centre of a hate campaign.

It started last week when she urged people not to target Muslims or Kashmiris as emotions ran high across the country.

Survivors of the attack have said that Hindu men were targeted, and that the victims were shot after the militants checked their religion. Indian security forces are still searching for the attackers.

Since the attack, there have been reports of Kashmiri vendors and students in other Indian cities facing harassment and threats, mainly from members of Hindu right-wing groups.

• ‘We are too scared to go back’: Kashmiris in India face violence after deadly attack

“People going against Muslims or Kashmiris – we don’t want this. We want peace and only peace,” Ms Narwal told reporters at a blood donation camp held by the family on what would have been her husband’s 27th birthday. “Of course, we want justice. The people who have wronged him should be punished,” she added.

It was her first public statement since a video of her bidding an emotional farewell over her husband’s coffin went viral. In it, the grief-stricken widow says with tears: “It is because of him that the world is still surviving. And we should all be proud of him in every way.”

Her appeal for peace sparked a swift backlash. Within hours, many of the internet users who had earlier mourned her loss were posting abusive comments.

Some accused her of dishonouring her husband’s memory as she refused to blame ordinary Kashmiris for the attack. Others made and shared unfounded claims about her friendships and relationships with Kashmiri men while studying at a university in Delhi. Yet more claimed that she had no right to speak about her husband’s death as they were only married for a few days.

As the online abuse continued, India’s National Commission for Women (NCW) wrote on X that the trolling was “extremely reprehensible and unfortunate”.

“Perhaps her reaction may not have gone down well with angry people. But any kind of agreement or disagreement should always be expressed with decency and within constitutional limits,” NCW Chairperson Vijaya Rahatkar wrote on X.

Journalist Namita Bhandare, who covers gender issues, told the BBC that it was “shocking” how much hatred Ms Narwal received for simply appealing for peace and calm.

She was viciously trolled because she “appealed for peace rather than succumbing to the narrative of revenge”, Ms Bhandare added.

Ms Narwal was not the only survivor of the attack to face online abuse.

Arathi R Menon, the daughter of a man from Kerala state who was killed in the shootings, was also trolled after she recounted her ordeal in front of the media.

Some people said that she spoke too calmly and didn’t display much emotion as she recounted her father’s death. Others found fault with her praising two Kashmiri men who she said helped her and took care of her “like a sister”.

“It is the same old story – women are always the easy targets,” says Ms Bhandare, adding that female victims of online abuse are also likely to be sexualised and threatened with violence.

“Being faceless online gives people the courage to say whatever they want,” she says. “And of course, there’s patriarchy at play, women are singled out, no matter who they are.”

Amid the abuse, Ms Narwal received support online as well.

“Your [Ms Narwal’s] statement in the face of that loss was an act of grace and unimaginable strength,” writer and activist Gurmehar Kaur wrote on X.

“My mother was your age when she lost my father in the [Kashmir] valley. I know this kind of loss.”

In 2017, Kaur, then a graduate student, became the target of a vicious social media campaign after she spoke against a Hindu right-wing student group after a clash at a college in Delhi. Many of the people who trolled her took issue with an earlier campaign by her where she said her father, a soldier who died in 1999, was killed by war, not Pakistan.

Journalist Rohini Singh welcomed the NCW’s statement supporting Ms Narwal, but asked why no action had been taken against the social media accounts “blatantly abusing and slandering her”.

Members of India’s opposition parties have also urged the government to act.

Priyanka Chaturvedi, an MP from the Shiv Sena (UBT) party, tagged federal Information and Broadcasting Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw in a post, asking him to “stand with the widow of an Indian officer” and take action against the trolling.

No Indian minister has commented on the trolling campaign yet, and no police complaint has been lodged.

Meanwhile, Ms Bhandare says that, like many online hate campaigns, this too may follow a familiar pattern: “It will run its course and then the people will move on to their next target.”

Nothing has convinced Sabine Zetteler of the value of using AI.

“I read a really great phrase recently that said something along the lines of ‘why would I bother to read something someone couldn’t be bothered to write’ and that is such a powerful statement and one that aligns absolutely with my views.”

Ms Zetteler runs her own London-based communications agency, with around 10 staff, some full-time some part-time.

“What’s the point of sending something we didn’t write, reading a newspaper written by bots, listening to a song created by AI, or me making a bit more money by sacking my administrator who has four kids?

“Where’s the joy, love or aspirational betterment even just for me as a founder in that? It means nothing to me,” she says.

Ms Zetteler is among those resisting the AI invasion, which really got going with the launch of ChatGPT at the end of 2022.

Since then the service, and its many rivals have become wildly popular. ChatGPT is racking up over five billion visits a month, according to software firm Semrush.

But training AI systems like ChatGPT requires huge amounts of energy and, once trained, keeping them running is also energy intensive.

While it’s difficult to quantify the electricity used by AI, a report by Goldman Sachs estimated that a ChatGPT query uses nearly 10 times as much electricity as a Google search query.

That makes some people uncomfortable.

For Florence Achery, owner of Yoga Retreats & More, the environmental impact is one reason why she vows to stay away from AI.

“My initial reaction was that AI is soulless and is a contradiction with my business, which is all about human connection,” says Achery, based in London.

“However, I found out that the environmental impact was awful with all the energy consumption required to run the data centres. I don’t think that people are aware of that.”

While Ms Zetteler admits she respects AI for all the social good it can achieve, she says she’s concerned about the wider impact on society.

“I’m happy that AI exists for blind people if they can have articles translated by AI and anything that is truly beneficial. But in general, I don’t think it will benefit us long-term.”

Is she worried it might have a knock-on effect on her business, especially if rival companies are using AI?

“Like everything, I could save money by sending our agency to Milan on EasyJet flights rather than the train.

“Already my profit margins look unsuccessful if that’s how you measure success, but how about if you measure success by how much you’re contributing to society and how well you sleep?”

Sierra Hansen, who lives in Seattle and works in public affairs, also refuses to use AI. For her, she’s concerned that the use of AI is harming our ability to problem solve.

“Our brain is the thing that helps organise what our days look like, not going to AI Copilot and asking it to tell it how to manage my schedule.

“Our job as a human is to apply critical thinking skills, and if you are feeding simple tasks into ChatGPT then you’re not solving on your own. It’s doing the thinking for you. If I want to listen to music, I don’t need AI to create the perfect punk rock album for me.”

But not everyone has the luxury of opting out of AI.

Jackie Adams (not her real name), who works in digital marketing, resisted AI initially on environmental grounds, and because she thought using it was lazy.

“I heard about the energy needed to power data centres and the amount of land they take up, and it didn’t sit right with me. I didn’t understand why we needed it,” she says.

However, about a year ago her three colleagues at the marketing firm she works for started adopting AI, for tasks such as copywriting and idea generation.

Six months ago Ms Adams had to follow them, after being told she had to cut her budget.

“Then it was out my control,” she says. She feels that continuing to resist would have hurt her career.

“I started playing with it a bit more after reading job descriptions asking for AI experience. I recently realised that if I don’t implement it into my ways of working, I’m going to get left behind.”

Now, she says, she doesn’t view tapping into AI as laziness anymore.

“It can elevate my work and make some things better,” adding that she uses it to refine copywriting work and for editing photos.

The moment to opt out of AI has already passed, says James Brusseau, a philosophy professor specialising in AI ethics at Pace University in New York.

“If you want to know why a decision is made, we will need humans. If we don’t care about that, then we will probably use AI,” he says.

“So, we will have human judges for criminal cases, and human doctors to make decisions about who should get the transplant. But, weather forecasting will be gone soon, and anesthesiology too,” says Prof Brusseau.

Ms Adam has accepted using AI at work, but she still feels despondent about AI’s growing influence.

“Even when you do a Google search it includes an AI overview, while some emails have a topline summary, So now it almost feels like we have no control. How do I turn all that off? It’s snowballing.”

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As 133 cardinals meet in Rome to decide the next pope, questions about the legacy of the last one will loom large over their discussions.

For the Catholic Church, no aspect of Pope Francis’ record is more sensitive or contentious than his handling of the sexual abuse of children by members of the clergy.

While he’s widely acknowledged to have gone further than his predecessors in acknowledging victims and reforming the Church’s own internal procedures, many survivors do not think he went far enough.

Alexa MacPherson’s abuse by a Catholic priest began around the age of three and continued for six years.

“When I was nine-and-a-half, my father caught him trying to rape me on the living room couch,” she told me when we met on the Boston waterfront.

“For me, it was pretty much an everyday occurrence.”

On discovering the abuse, her father called the police.

A court hearing for a criminal complaint against the priest, Peter Kanchong, accused of assault and battery of a minor, was set for 24 August 1984.

But unbeknownst to the family, something extraordinary was taking place behind the scenes.

The Church – an institution that wielded enormous power in a deeply Catholic city – believed that the court was on its side.

“The court is attempting to handle the matter in such a way as to help Father Peter and to avoid scandal to the Church,” the then-Archbishop of Boston, Bernard Law, wrote in a letter that would remain hidden for years.

Reflecting on the events of more than four decades ago, Ms MacPherson recognises that her abuse took place long before Francis became pope.

But over that same period, through a series of global scandals which are still unfolding, the issue of the systemic sexual exploitation of children has become the modern Church’s biggest challenge.

It is a challenge she believes Pope Francis failed to rise to, as she made clear when I asked her how she had reacted to the news of his death.

“I actually don’t feel like I had much of a reaction,” she replied.

“And I don’t want to take away from the good that he did do, but there’s just so much more that the Church and the Vatican and the people in charge can do.”

The 1984 letter from Archbishop Bernard Law was addressed to a bishop in Thailand.

Mentioning the accusation of “child molestation” it was written two months after the Boston court hearing, which had indeed concluded without scandal for the Church.

Peter Kanchong – who was originally from Thailand – had been spared from formal criminal charges and given a year’s probation on the condition that he stayed away from the MacPherson family and underwent a course of psychological therapy.

The Archbishop’s letter, however, noted that even the Church’s own psychological evaluation had determined that the accused priest was “not motivated and unresponsive to therapy” and should therefore be “forced to face the consequences of his actions” under both civil and Church law.

But instead of acting on that advice, he implored the Thai bishop to immediately recall Peter Kanchong to his diocese in Thailand, mentioning for a second time the risk of “grave scandal” if he were to remain in the US.

Although press reports from the time suggest the Church authorities in Thailand did agree to take him back, Peter Kanchong ignored the recall, finding work in the Boston area at a facility for adults with learning disabilities.

In 2002, more than 18 years after Ms MacPherson’s father first called the police, the archbishop’s letter was made public.

In a landmark ruling, it was one of thousands of pages of documents that a Boston court ordered the Catholic Church to release.

A local newspaper, The Boston Globe, had, for the first time, begun to seriously challenge the institution’s power in the city, by placing the stories of victims on its front pages.

Soon, hundreds had come forward and their lawyers were fighting in court to prise open decades of internal records relating to the sexual abuse of children.

The Church had tried to argue that the First Amendment protection for freedom of religion entitled it to keep those files secret.

The order to unseal them led to a watershed moment.

Contacted at the time, Peter Kanchong denied the allegations.

“Do you have evidence? Do you have witnesses?” he told the Boston Globe, who found him still living in the area.

Ms MacPherson, however, was one of more than 500 victims who won an $85m civil case for the abuse they’d suffered at the hands of dozens of priests.

The internal files showed that, time and again, Archbishop Law had dealt with his knowledge of abuse in the same way he’d attempted to deal with Peter Kanchong – by simply moving priests on to new parishes.

After the settlement, and by then a Cardinal, Bernard Law resigned from his position in Boston and moved to Rome.

For the survivors, the sense of Church impunity was further compounded when he was given the honour of a seven-year post as Archpriest of the Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore, the same building where Pope Francis has now been buried.

Many Church insiders credit Francis with going further than his predecessors to address the issue of abuse.

In 2019, he summoned more than a hundred bishops to Rome for a conference on the crisis.

In the abuse of children, he told them, “We see the hand of evil.”

The conference led to a revision of the Church law on “pontifical secrecy” allowing co-operation with the civil courts when required in cases of abuse.

The change, however, doesn’t compel the disclosure of all information relating to child abuse, only its disclosure in specific cases when formally requested by a legitimate authority.

Similarly, a new law requiring that allegations be referred up the internal Church hierarchy stops short of mandating referral to the police.

Ms MacPherson’s lawyer, Mitchell Garabedian, a man portrayed in the Hollywood blockbuster Spotlight about the Boston abuse scandal, told me there are plenty of ways the Church continues to exercise secrecy.

“We have to litigate in court to get documents, nothing really has changed,” he said.

His 2002 legal victory may have been a defining moment, followed by an avalanche of such cases in dozens of countries, but he has no doubt that knowledge of wrongdoing remains hidden in churches around the world.

“While he did some things, it’s not enough,” Ms MacPherson told me when I asked for her assessment of Pope Francis’ record on this issue.

She wants the Church to reveal everything it knows.

“One of the biggest things is turning over predatory priests and the people who covered it up and holding them accountable in a regular court of law and not shielding them and hiding them any longer.”

Watching the endless news of the Pope’s funeral and the preparations for the appointment of his successor has been painful for her.

“It’s the abuse being celebrated, in a way,” she told me, “Because the cover-ups are still there, they’re shielded behind the Vatican walls and their canon laws.”

It is news coverage she’s found hard to escape because of her mother’s continuing faith in the Catholic Church.

“It’s all I’ve heard on the news, and she is obsessed with watching this, and so I just get slammed and inundated with it.”

Now 85-years-old, Peter Kanchong meanwhile has never been convicted of an offence.

Nor has he been stripped of his priesthood, although he has been prevented from holding any formal position in the Boston Diocese.

The Church’s own published list of accused clergy marks his case as “not yet resolved” with no final determination of guilt or innocence, noting simply that he is “AWOL” – absent without leave.

“I’ve been trying for years to have him defrocked and that is because he can only be defrocked either where he was ordained, which was in Thailand, or by the Vatican,” Ms MacPherson said.

She points out that the Church has gone to the trouble of changing the name of the parish where she was abused – in order, she believes, to try to start afresh after what took place there.

The BBC asked the Boston Diocese for its views on Pope Francis’ legacy as well as for a response to claims that the Catholic Church maintains a culture of secrecy over its own internal records.

We received no reply to those questions.

We also asked whether the current archbishop could do anything to help victims seeking to remove a priest from the priesthood.

We were referred to the Vatican.

As the Catholic Church now sets about the business of electing a new pope, Ms MacPherson holds little hope for more comprehensive reform.

“You say you want to move forward. You say you want to bring people back into the fold,” she said.

“But you cannot possibly do any of that until you truly acknowledge those sins, and you hold those people accountable.”

US President Donald Trump has doubled down on his proposal to reopen and expand Alcatraz, the once-notorious prison island in the icy waters of San Francisco Bay.

Alcatraz – popularly known as “the Rock” – has not been used as a prison for decades. It is now a historic landmark visited by millions of tourists each year.

The US president says he believes the prison could be used once again to house dangerous inmates, and to serve as a symbol of law and order in the US.

But experts say that refurbishing the dilapidated remains of the once-formidable prison is “not realistic at all”. Here’s what we know about the plan.

Located on an island about 1.25 miles (2km) offshore from San Francisco, Alcatraz originally was built as a naval defence fort, but was rebuilt in the early 20th century as a military prison.

In 1934, it was formally converted into a federal prison – Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary – housing notorious inmates including gangster Al Capone, Mickey Cohen and George “Machine Gun” Kelly, among others.

The prison was among one of the most notorious in the US at the time, and was considered inescapable because of the strong currents and frigid temperatures of San Francisco Bay.

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The facility also was made famous by the 1979 American biographical prison movie, Escape from Alcatraz, which recounted a 1962 prisoner escape, starring Clint Eastwood as ringleader Frank Morris.

It was also the site of the 1996 film The Rock, starring Sean Connery and Nicolas Cage, about a former SAS captain and FBI chemist who rescue hostages from Alcatraz Island.

According to the Federal Bureau of Prisons, BOP, it was nearly three times more costly to operate than other federal institutions and was ultimately closed by Attorney General Robert Kennedy in 1963.

The island and prison are now a museum operated by the National Park Service. More than 1.4m people visit each year.

“Alcatraz is a place where the past meets the present,” Christine Lehnertz, president and CEO of the Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy, said in a statement sent to the BBC.

“It challenges us to listen, to learn, and to carry forward the stories that still shape our world today,” she added.

Donald Trump is not the first president to mull re-opening the facility as a detention centre.

In 1981, Alcatraz was one of 14 sites considered by the Reagan administration to hold up to 20,000 refugees who had fled from Cuba to Florida in the famous “Mariel Boatlift”.

The site eventually was rejected due to its value as a historical tourist site and its complete lack of adequate facilities.

In a Truth Social post on 4 May, Trump first said he had directed his government to re-open and expand the island prison, saying that “for too long America has been plagued by vicious, violent, and repeat criminal offenders”.

Speaking to reporters at the White House the following day, Trump said that, in his view, Alcatraz “represents something very strong, very powerful” – law and order.

“We need law and order in this country,” he said. “So we’re going to look at it. Some of the people up here are going to be working very hard on that.”

While he said he finds the idea “interesting”, Trump also acknowledged that the prison is currently a “big hulk” that is “rusting and rotting”.

“It sort of represents something that is both horrible and beautiful and strong and miserable,” he said.

Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, also told reporters that Alcatraz could be “an option” for “significant public safety threats and national security threats”.

“It should be on the table,” he added.

Soon after Trump’s comments made news around the world, justice department spokesman Chad Gilmartin said in a statement that BOP “is working towards rebuilding and opening Alcatraz to serve as a symbol of law and order”.

But prison experts and historians have expressed serious doubts whether the plan is feasible.

“To be frank, at first I thought it was a joke,” Hugh Hurwitz, who served as acting director of the BOP between May 2018 and August 2019, told the BBC. “It’s not realistic to think you can repair it. You’d have to tear it up and start over.”

Mr Hurwitz pointed to a number of issues with the facility, including buildings that are “literally falling apart”, and cells in which “a six-foot person can’t stand up”.

“There’s no security upgrades. No cameras. No fencing,” he added. “You can’t run a prison.”

“I have two words: water and sewage,” said Jolene Babyak, an author and Alcatraz historian who lived there as a child during her father’s two stints as prison administrator.

“In its heyday, all the sewage for 500 or more people was just dumped in the bay,” she said. “Nowadays it has to be boated off. It’s just not realistic at all. But it captures everyone’s imagination.”

When the facility closed in 1963, the BOP said it was nearly three times more expensive to operate Alcatraz than any other federal prison – the per-capita cost being $10 and $13 per inmate, compared to between $3 and $5 at other facilities. This was in part because it required food and supplies to be dropped off by boat.

In today’s federal prisons, the per capita cost for inmates is between $120 and $164 – meaning that costs could rise to over $500 per person in a facility like Alcatraz.

Alcatraz could hold only about 340 prisoners at its peak.

“It was mind bogglingly expensive to keep a convict there,” said John Martini, a historian who spent several years on Alcatraz as a ranger with the National Park Service. “Things have not changed. But the place has gone downhill.”

“It’s basically a shell. Even the concrete has major problems. The Park Service has put millions into structurally stabilising it,” he added. “They would need water, electricity, heat, and sanitation. None of those functions.”

“This [Trump’s comments] are just another twist in the odd history of Alcatraz,” Mr Martini added.

The takeover of Deliveroo by its US counterpart DoorDash is an illuminating example of the differing fortunes and attractions of US and UK stock markets.

DoorDash’s offer for Deliveroo values the business at £2.9bn and will create a company with operations in more than 40 countries.

While both are similar companies, their fortunes have dramatically diverged over the past few years.

Both started out as food delivery services offering customers convenient and speedy access to their favourite restaurants and offering restaurants the ability to more fully utilise the capacity of their kitchens.

Both extended their offerings to include other convenience shopping items – like nappies, flowers and pet food.

Both raised money by selling shares to the public in an initial public offering (IPO) around the same time – Deliveroo on the London stock market, DoorDash on the New York Stock Exchange.

But when Deliveroo listed its shares in London, DoorDash was worth five times as much as its UK counterpart. Four years later DoorDash was worth 35 times as much.

This is not a perfect comparison as DoorDash has issued more shares to raise money to expand over time which would boost its total value – its market capitalisation. But the appetite for shares in the US company meant that it could successfully raise that money on US markets.

Let’s look at another measure – the price of each share.

An investor who bought a share of DoorDash has seen its value rise 84%.

An investor who bought a share of Deliveroo has seen its value fall 56%.

What this means is that DoorDash is now in a position to use its greater financial heft to take over its UK rival – just as Deliveroo is finally turning a profit.

One of Deliveroo’s first backers, Danny Rimer of Index Ventures, told the BBC in 2023 that if he had his time again he would have voted for a US listing, and people close to the company agree that the current takeover bid was partly enabled by DoorDash’s access to US capital markets.

This is just one example which helps explain a wider problem. Companies are increasingly shunning the London stock market in favour of a US listing.

There are many reasons.

Higher valuation. The 500 largest publicly traded US companies (S&P 500) are worth, on average, 28 times the profit they make in a year. The 100 largest publicly traded UK companies (the FTSE 100) sell for 12 times their yearly earnings. Less than half.

How can there be such a huge disparity?

Partly because the US is home to most of the world’s most successful and profitable companies – the so-called Magnificent Seven (Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta, Microsoft, Nvidia and Tesla)

Take those out and shares trade at 20 times earnings – still a massive premium to the UK.

One of the other reasons UK valuations lag is old-fashioned lack of demand.

UK investors’ appetite for UK stocks has shrivelled.

Over the last 30 years, the share of the UK market owned by UK financial institutions has shrunk from 50% to less than 5%. This is partly because financial regulation has encouraged pension funds to buy less risky investments like government bonds.

But it’s also partly because the managers of those pension funds think they will get better returns investing in US markets – and they have been dead right.

In just the last five years, the total return including dividends on investing in US shares has been 116% while the same number for the UK is 45%.

But there are changes afoot.

The government’s so-called “Edinburgh Reforms”, designed to make listing in the UK more attractive, included reducing the proportion of a company available for sale to the public and retaining more voting power for founders who wanted to keep control of the company even as they sold stakes to others.

There have also been positive comments on the attractiveness of the UK from financial giants like Larry Fink of BlackRock and Jamie Dimon of JP Morgan.

They both noted the UK looks undervalued and the UK market has outperformed the US so far this year.

The secret that UK stocks are cheap has been out there for some time. That is precisely why private buyers from the US and elsewhere have swooped on UK-listed companies meaning they disappear from the UK stock market.

Even some of the biggest ones left are considered candidates for a move. Shell boss Wael Sawan told the BBC that while he had “no immediate” plans to move, he and his company “got a very warm welcome” when they held their big reception for investors in New York. Shell trades at a 35% discount to its US-listed peers and many of its shareholders aren’t happy about it.

What the DoorDash swoop on Deliveroo seems to highlight once again is that companies listed in the US can summon greater financial firepower with which to expand or acquire their rivals.

Deliveroo will join the likes of Arm Holdings, Morrisons, CRH Holdings, Ultra, Meggitt and many others as companies who used to be listed on the London Stock Exchange.

Does it matter? Pension funds, or individual investors, can buy shares whether they are listed in the UK, US or one of the European exchanges.

But a UK listing generates significant ancillary business for a UK financial services industry that still makes up more than 10% of the UK’s entire economy and contributes more than 10% of all taxes paid here.

Accountants, lawyers, financial PR firms and others feed off the fees that UK listings generate.

Trading on the London Stock Exchange is dwarfed by the trading of currencies, bonds and complex contracts but it has always been a centre of gravity for financial activity and one which many argue has lost its power to attract.

A wild beaver has been filmed on a river in Wales in what has been described as a “hugely significant” sighting.

Beavers disappeared from Britain about 400 years ago after being hunted to extinction, but in the past two decades they have been making a comeback.

Naturalist and presenter Iolo Williams, who encountered the wild beaver on the River Dyfi near Machynlleth, said the clear and prolonged sighting was one of the “very, very best” things he had ever witnessed.

There are four managed enclosures that house beavers in Wales, and an unknown number living in the wild.

“I’ve seen some incredible wildlife in Wales, some amazing things, but this ranks up there, not just with the best, but as the very, very best,” said Williams, who captured the moment as part of his BBC series Iolo’s River Valleys.

“The last people to see wild beaver in Wales would have been the Welsh princes, who would have hunted them.

“So they’ve been absent for hundreds of years. So it’s hugely significant.”

In Wales, it is an offence to release beavers into open rivers without a licence, and Natural Resources Wales (NRW) said no licences of this type had been issued.

In England, where the government recently approved beavers’ reintroduction to the wild, it is thought that there are about 500 of them – some in the wild and others in enclosures.

In Scotland, which began reintroducing beavers to the wild several years ago, it is thought that there are now more than 1,500.

“We had information that a beaver had been seen on this section of the River Dyfi, and we were told to get to this particular site at 18:00 and the beaver will be there,” said Williams.

“We had gone out a few days before, and it poured with rain and we’d seen nothing.

“And I must admit, I was thinking, we’re not going to get it.

“But then when we went on the first dry day, 18:00, and the beaver was there.”

Williams said the beaver “didn’t pay us any attention at all”.

“It was very chill,” he added.

“We were on the opposite bank, and we thought we better be quiet, don’t move around. And the beaver just saw us and it just carried on feeding and swam.”

Local people have reported seeing the beaver, and others, on the same stretch of the River Dyfi multiple times in recent years.

But exactly where they have come from remains a mystery, after a nearby beaver enclosure ruled out any escapes.

Alicia Leow-Dyke, from Wildlife Trust Wales, said there was evidence of the semi-aquatic animals breeding along the waterway.

“On this occasion we know it’s one family. It could be two families – one family split into two,” she said.

“There has been evidence of breeding on the river. Youngsters have been spotted on the river over the years.

“Beavers only breed once a year and their litters are pretty small – two to three within a litter. So a beaver family could be anything from two adults, to five or eight if you include the young.”

Last year the Welsh government said it was considering introducing legislation to protect beavers, as wildlife charities called for them to be released into Wales’ rivers.

Dr Robert Needham, from the Beaver Trust, said their reintroduction could bring substantial benefits, describing them as “ecosystem engineer[s]”.

“What this means is that the sort of habitat modification that beavers can do through damming, building lodges, digging canals – this can create habitats for other species, and they can increase biodiversity,” said Dr Needham.

“They can help restore our wetland habitats, which are massively lost throughout Europe, let alone Great Britain.

“They can help alleviate flooding with the dams that they create, particularly in headwater streams, they hold that water back, releasing it slowly. So we see a reduction in peak flow events, during storm events. But this can also be really beneficial to villages and society during summer periods, during drought conditions.”

But not everyone believes that reintroducing beavers to the wild is a good thing.

Critics say their dams can flood and waterlog fields while the animals themselves can feed on certain agricultural crops and damage trees.

“Fundamentally, there are issues. There are cases where river banks will fall in and the impact of flooding, particularly on good farmland as well,” said Aled Jones, president of NFU Cymru.

“The management [of beavers] is crucial. We can’t allow an indiscriminate approach where farming businesses are severely impacted.

“So we have to have control measures because this is their livelihoods. And we have to remember this is where farmers make their living, and anything negatively impacting that, if they’re losing their crops because of flooding, who pays?”

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The Peruvian government has imposed a night-time curfew in Pataz province, where 13 kidnapped mine workers were killed last week.

President Dina Boluarte also ordered that mining activities be suspended for a month while extra police and soldiers are deployed to the region.

The incident has shone a spotlight on the activities of criminal gangs in Pataz.

La Poderosa, the Peruvian company which owns the gold mine at which the men worked, said they had been kidnapped by “illegal miners colluding with criminals” on 26 April. Their bodies were found on Sunday.

President Boluarte said that the armed forces would take “full control of La Poderosa mining area”.

La Poderosa said in a statement that in total, 39 people with links to the company had been killed by criminal gangs in Pataz, a mining region more than 800km (500 miles) north of the capital, Lima.

It added that the state of emergency which has been in effect in the province since February 2024 had had little effect.

“The spiral of uncontrolled violence in Pataz is occurring despite the declaration of a state of emergency and the presence of a large police contingent which, unfortunately, has not been able to halt the deterioration of security conditions in the area,” said the statement from 2 May.

The 13 men whose bodies were found on Sunday were employed by a subcontractor, R&R, which worked at La Poderosa’s mine.

They had been sent to confront a group which had attacked and occupied the mine but were ambushed and seized as they were trying to regain control of it.

Videos shared by their captors showed them tied up and naked, lying in a mine shaft.

The footage, and the fact that their captors shared it with the relatives in an attempt to get them to pay ransom money, caused outrage in Peru.

The discovery of their bodies on Sunday and forensic evidence suggesting they were shot point blank more than a week before they were found, has caused further shock.

A prosecutor from the region, Luis Guillermo Bringas, told local media that the area was being rocked by “a war for mining pits” between illegal miners and criminals on the one hand and legal miners on the other.

Deliveroo, the food delivery app, has agreed to be taken over by US giant DoorDash in a deal valuing the business at £2.9bn.

The combined company will have a presence in more than 40 countries serving about 50 million customers per month.

The tie-up is also expected to provide fierce competition to rivals Just Eat and Uber Eats in the UK.

However, the deal is the latest example of a UK-listed company being taken over by a US firm, fuelling further concerns over UK investment.

DoorDash is offering 180p per Deliveroo share, which marks a 44% increase on the UK company’s share price from the point when takeover talks were made public last month.

However, it is well below the 390p share price that Deliveroo first floated at when it launched on the London Stock Exchange in April 2021.

“The combination with Deliveroo will strengthen DoorDash’s position as a leading global platform in local commerce,” the two firms said.

Will Shu, chief executive and co-founder of Deliveroo, said he was “very proud of everything we have achieved as a standalone business”.

However, he said the deal with DoorDash, which is based in San Francisco, was “transformative”.

“The enlarged group will have the scale to invest in product, technology and the overall consumer value proposition.”

The takeover is to be put forward to shareholders for final approval. Mr Shu, is set to receive about £172.4m for his 6.4% stake.

Deliveroo, which was co-founded by Mr Shu in 2013, operates in nine countries with more 130,000 delivery riders. It provides a food delivery service by linking restaurants with customers through an app. It also supplies groceries.

It made sales of about £2bn in 2024, while DoorDash, which was set up in the same year, made some £8bn last year through its operations in more than 30 countries.

The companies both started out as food delivery services, offering customers convenient and quick access to a range of restaurants and takeaways, but DoorDash has grown into a much bigger business.

DoorDash has seen its value soar after listing in the US, compared to Deliveroo, which has been listed in the UK.

The takeover raises further questions for the London Stock Exchange, which has lost another big name to a US company.

As well as takeovers, UK-listed firms worth hundreds of billions of pounds have been quitting the London Stock Exchange for the US over the past few years, prompting concerns over how attractive the UK is for investment.

These include Cambridge-based microchip giant Arm Holdings, which now sells its shares in New York, Paddy Power’s owner Flutter and equipment hire giant Ashtead.

One of Deliveroo’s first backers, Danny Rimer of Index Ventures, previously told the BBC that if he had his time again he would have voted for a US listing.

News of a potential agreement between the firms emerged just over a week ago, and sent Deliveroo’s share price up sharply.

Matt Britzman, senior equity analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown, said DoorDash was aiming to “squeeze out” rivals such as Just Eat and “rattle Uber” in the UK.

“The deal, expected to close later this year, could turn the UK market into a fierce two-horse race with DoorDash and Uber at the top,” he added.

“With no competing bid in sight, this looks like a bold, calculated move to outpace global rivals and gain ground fast.”

Air traffic controllers at Newark Liberty International Airport briefly lost communications with planes under their control, “unable to see, hear, or talk to them” last week, officials say.

The 28 April incident led to multiple employees going on trauma leave, contributing to hundreds of delayed flights. More than 150 flights were cancelled on Monday alone, according to tracking website FlightAware.

The airport, one of New York’s busiest hubs, has been grappling with staff shortages for more than a week.

US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said on Monday that contact with air traffic was lost for “30 seconds”, but it did not mean that the planes were going to crash.

“The primary communication line went down, the backup line didn’t fire, and so for 30 seconds we lost contact with air traffic,” Duffy told Fox News

“Now were planes going to crash? No. They have communication devices. … But it’s a sign that we have a frail system in place, and it has to be fixed.”

The Federal Aviation Administration also acknowledged in a statement that “our antiquated air traffic control system is affecting our work force”.

Confirming the controllers were on leave following the incident, the FAA said it could “not quickly replace them”.

“We continue to train controllers who will eventually be assigned to this busy airspace,” the statement said.

Air traffic control operations at the airport have come under sustained criticism recently.

Last week, United Airlines announced it was cancelling 35 flights per day from its Newark schedule because the airport “cannot handle the number of planes that are scheduled to operate there”.

“In the past few days, on more than one occasion, technology that FAA air traffic controllers rely on to manage the airplanes coming in and out of Newark airport failed – resulting in dozens of diverted flights, hundreds of delayed and cancelled flights,” United CEO Scott Kirby said.

He also said the issues were “compounded” because over 20% of FAA controllers “walked off the job”.

The National Air Traffic Controllers Association said the employees took leave under provisions for workers who experience a traumatic event at work.

The union would not say how many controllers had taken leave, or how long they lost contact with planes.

The incident comes as the US Department of Transportation last week unveiled a package designed to boost the numbers of FAA air traffic controllers. The department said it was on track to hire at least 2,000 controllers this year.

In February, the Trump administration began firing hundreds of FAA employees, weeks after a fatal mid-air plane collision in Washington DC.

Transport secretary Duffy said he planned to unveil a plan on Thursday to seek billions of dollars from Congress to reform infrastructure and staffing.

“We’re going to build a brand new air traffic control system, from new telecom to new radars to new infrastructure,” he told Fox News.

The home of Ukrainian Eurovision contestant Khrystyna Starykova has been destroyed by Russian shelling in the city of Myrnograd.

The 19-year-old is currently in Switzerland rehearsing for her performance with the band Ziferblat, but posted photos of her damaged apartment block in the Sviltly neighbourhood.

“Home. And I dreamed so much of returning home,” she captioned the post, which showed the building shrouded in smoke, with its windows blown out and several balconies collapsed.

“Fortunately, all my relatives and friends are alive and well,” she said, and vowed to perform at Eurovision next week “for the sake of our country”.

“[I want] to show what a strong people we are.”

In an interview with Ukrainian broadcaster Suspilne, Starykova said she had almost anticipated the destruction of her home.

“Four months ago, my grandmother lost her home – it was just such a big hole,” she said. “Then my aunt lost the roof over her head.

“I understood that maybe I could be the next one and, unfortunately, it happened. It’s very terrible news. I had really hoped to go back.”

In a new Instagram post on Tuesday morning, she shared further footage of the bomb-damaged streets of Myrnograd.

“I always went home from vocal lessons this way,” she wrote in the caption. “It was my favourite way home.”

Ziferblat will represent Ukraine at the Eurovision Song Contest with Bird of Pray, a song telling the story of Ukrainians who have been separated from their loved ones by the war with Russia.

“It’s about our problems we go through, the tragedy for the last three years,” singer Valentyn Leshchynskyi told Eurovision fansite Wiwibloggs.

“To be honest, the last eleven years.”

Starykova is a backing vocalist for the band, affectionately known as “bird girl” as she handles the song’s high notes.

She previously competed in the Ukrainian version of the TV talent show The Voice, reaching the grand final, where she performed a cover of Duncan Lawrence’s Eurovision winner, Arcade.

Born in Donetsk, she spent her childhood in Myrnograd, living through fierce battles between Russian-supported separatists and Ukrainian government forces in the region.

“When it all started, I was just in shock,” she later told local news outlet The Eastern Variant, recalling the heavy shelling that hit Myrnograd in 2015.

“The whole sky lit up and we started running to hide in the corridor,” she said. “That was the first time I felt it all.”

The family later moved to Kyiv, where Starykova studied at the renowned Glière Music College – but she always intended to move back to her hometown.

In a TV interview, she said it was important to go ahead with her Eurovision performance as a display of resilience.

“Despite what happened to me, I want to portray our song in a good way,” she said.

“And just to convey our main message, that everything will be fine.

“Despite our troubles, we will survive. I’m holding on for us.”

Sir Salman Rushdie is set to make his first in-person appearance in the UK since a stabbing left him blind in one eye.

The acclaimed British-Indian novelist said he is delighted to be returning “after too long”, and is expected to take part in an exclusive session at the Hay Festival talking about his recent books Knife and Victory City.

An attack in 2022 happened after Sir Salman spent years in hiding because of threats to his life after his novel The Satanic Verses was published in 1988.

He will join figures in Hay-On- Wye, Powys, including Donald Trump’s niece, Michael Sheen, Gavin and Stacey’s Ruth Jones, and presenter Stacey Dooley.

Sir Salman is the author of 22 works of fiction and non-fiction and won the Booker Prize for Midnight’s Children.

He was also shortlisted for The Satanic Verses and Quichotte.

The 77-year-old previously spent several years in hiding after the 1988 publication of The Satanic Verses – a fictional story inspired by the life of the Muslim Prophet Muhammad – triggered threats against his life.

It was banned in India, Pakistan and South Africa and prompted then Iranian leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini to issue a decree calling for Sir Salman’s death in 1989.

More than 35 years after the release of Sir Salman’s novel, he was attacked multiple times on a New York lecture stage in August 2022.

He was left with severe injuries including damage to his liver, vision loss in one eye and a paralysed hand caused by nerve damage to his arm.

The attacker, Hadi Matar, 27, was convicted of attempted murder and assault and faces a sentence of more than 30 years in prison.

Speaking two years after the attack in 2024, Sir Salman said his eye was left hanging down his face “like a soft-boiled egg”, and that losing it upsets him “every day”.

“I remember thinking I was dying,” he said.

“Fortunately, I was wrong.”

Sir Salman said he used his new book, Knife, as a way of fighting back against what happened.

About 150,000 people visit Hay-on-Wye for the arts and literature event each spring and this year marks the 38th spring edition of the festival.

With more than 600 events from 22 May to 1 June, Sir Stephen Fry, Hay Festival president, described the event as a “carnival of ideas”.

Hay Festival global chief executive Julie Finch, said organisers are honoured to welcome Sir Salman back in person.

She said: “In a very special event, we’ll explore his recent work and the power of storytelling to change the world.

“We know how much this appearance will mean.”

Romanian Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu has resigned and his Social Democrat party is to leave the government after a right-wing nationalist candidate won the first round of the presidential election.

George Simion, a eurosceptic who has promised to put Romania first, won 40.9% of Sunday’s vote and is expected to win a run-off vote on 18 May.

He will face liberal Bucharest Mayor Nicușor Dan, who narrowly defeated the Social Democrat (PSD) candidate.

Sunday’s result plunged Romania – an EU state on Nato’s eastern flank – into further political turmoil. Ciolacu told colleagues that as their coalition had failed to meet its objective and “has no legitimacy”, they should pull out of the government.

Ciolacu, 57, only came to power in a pro-EU coalition after elections in 2024, although George Simion’s far-right party along with two other groupings had attracted a third of the vote.

The parties in that coalition had been holding emergency meetings on Monday to decide on their next steps.

Simion’s victory on Sunday was largely driven by popular frustration at the annulment of presidential elections late last year. His likely success on 18 May is awaited nervously in European capitals, as well as in Kyiv.

He has said he wants an EU of strong, sovereign nations and his party has opposed supply weapons to Ukraine.

Ciolacu submitted his resignation to interim president Ilie Bolojan on Monday evening.

Bolojan appointed Ciolacu’s liberal coalition partner Catalin Predoiu as caretaker prime minister on Tuesday to lead the government until a new cabinet could be formed.

Bolojan himself took on the role of interim president last February because of the scandal surrounding the annulment of the presidential vote.

“Romania faces up to 45 days of political instability following Marcel Ciolacu’s resignation,” warned Elena Calistru of independent Romanian monitoring group Funky Citizens.

“This creates a dangerous power vacuum precisely when Romania needs steady leadership most.”

Ciolacu’s party was part of a three-party coalition and the prime minister told his colleagues they had come together with the aim of having a joint presidential candidate and a parliamentary majority.

“One of these two objectives has failed,” he explained. “I’ve seen the vote from yesterday, and that tells us the current coalition no longer has legitimacy in this form.”

“In any case, the new president would have replaced me – that’s what I’ve seen and heard from the media. A new coalition will form to govern.”

Meanwhile, the Social Democrat mayor of of Buzau, to the north-east of Bucharest, was highly critical of his party leaders: “We’ve embarrassed ourselves, and that’s partly because of poor decisions taken over time by the leadership.”

George Simion, 38, has cast himself as an admirer of US President Donald Trump. He became presidential frontrunner earlier this year when far-right pro-Russian candidate Calin Georgescu was barred from running

Georgescu had won last November’s first round, which was annulled by the courts after allegations of Russian interference on social media and campaign fraud.

Simion cast his vote on Sunday alongside Georgescu, having told voters the election was “about every Romanian who has been lied to, ignored, humiliated, and still has the strength to believe and defend our identity and rights”.

He has called for restoring Romania’s old borders and has been banned from entering Moldova and Ukraine.

Political analyst Radu Albu-Comanescu told Romania public radio that Sunday’s result was “a radical manifestation of hostility towards the current political establishment”.

Simion did particularly well with Romania’s diaspora voters, polling more than 73% in Spain and almost 65% in the UK among a broadly blue-collar electorate.

Public resentment at Romanian financial support for Ukrainian refugees has been a central plank in Simion’s campaign, though he denies he is pro-Russian.

“Russia is the biggest danger towards Romania, Poland and the Baltic states, the problem is this war is not going anywhere,” he told the BBC.

Elena Calistru said Romania was witnessing a remarkable political reset as both Simion and Nicușor Dan had positioned themselves as anti-establishment candidates with wildly different solutions.

“The outcome will reveal whether anti-establishment sentiment necessarily translates to anti-European positioning, or if Romania can channel its desire for change into constructive democratic renewal,” she told the BBC.

Germany’s conservative leader has unexpectedly fallen short of a majority in a parliament vote to become chancellor.

Friedrich Merz needed 316 votes in the 630-seat Bundestag but only secured 310, in a significant blow to the Christian Democrat leader, two and a half months after winning Germany’s federal elections.

His coalition with the centre left has enough seats in parliament but it appears 18 MPs who had been expected to back him dissented. Merz’s failure in the first vote is seen as unprecedented in modern German history.

The Bundestag will now have another 14 days to choose either Merz or another candidate as chancellor with more than half its members.

Under Germany’s constitution, there is no limit to how many votes can be held, but if no absolute majority is reached within that period then a candidate can be elected by a simple majority.

No further votes were expected immediately, and there was a prevailing mood of confusion.

Bundestag President Julia Klöckner was said to be planning a second vote on Wednesday, although Christian Democrat General Secretary Carsten Linnemann said he was hoping for a second round by the end of the day.

“Europe needs a strong Germany, that’s why we can’t wait for days,” he told German TV.

Merz’s defeat is seen by political commentators as a humiliation, possibly inflicted by a handful of disaffected members of the Social Democrat SPD, which signed a coalition deal with his conservatives on Monday.

The Bundestag president told MPs that nine of the 630 MPs were absent, three abstained and another ballot paper was declared invalid.

Not everyone in the SPD is happy with the deal, but party officials were adamant their party was fully committed to it.

“It was a secret vote so nobody knows,” senior Social Democrat MP Ralf Stegner told the BBC, “but I can tell you I don’t have the slightest impression that our parliamentary group wouldn’t have known our responsibility.”

The historic nature of Merz’s failure will be difficult for him to move on untarnished. No candidate has failed in this way since 1949.

The embarrassment of Tuesday’s vote undermines Merz’s hopes of being an antidote to the weakness and division of the last government, which collapsed late last year.

Far-right party Alternative for Germany which came second in the February election with 20.8% of the vote seized on his failure and called for fresh elections.

Joint leader Alice Weidel wrote on X that the vote showed “the weak foundation the small coalition has been built between the [conservatives] and SPD, which was rejected by voters”.

Merz’s choice for foreign minister, Christian Democrat colleague Johann Wadephul, told the BBC the vote was “an obstacle but not a catastrophe”.

“We will have a second attempt, of course, with again Friedrich Merz as the candidate from the coalition. And I’m sure he will be elected and he will be the next chancellor.”

Germany’s handover of government is carefully choreographed. On the eve of Monday’s vote, outgoing chancellor Olaf Scholz was treated to a traditional Grand Tattoo by an armed forces orchestra.

Merz, 69, was expected to win the vote and then visit President Frank-Walter Steinmeier to be sworn in, fulfilling a long-held ambition to become German chancellor.

His rival and former chancellor Angela Merkel had come to the Bundestag to watch the vote take place.

The caretaker ministers from Germany’s outgoing government were all planning to hand over to their successors on Tuesday afternoon.

Merz’s immediate decision now will be to decide with his coalition partners whether he should push for a second vote and take the risk of failing again.

His defeat threatens to cause splits within the coalition.

Political correspondents in the Bundestag said the failure to back Merz indicated that even if the coalition did come to power eventually, there was a potential issue lurking within its ranks.

AfD MP Bernd Baumann said the CDU had promised a string of policies similar to his own party’s, such as limiting migration, and then went into an alliance with the centre left: “That doesn’t work. That’s not how democracy works.”

“This isn’t good,” warned Green politician Katrin Göring-Eckardt. “Even though I don’t want this chancellor or support him, I can only warn everyone not to rejoice in chaos.”

Less than 24 hours earlier, the messaging had been very different, of Germany under a stable government putting six months of political paralysis to an end.

“It’s our historical duty to make this government a success,” Merz had said as he signed the coalition document.

Despite having a narrow majority of 12 seats, the agreement between the conservatives and centre left was seen as far more stable than the so-called traffic-light coalition of three parties which fell apart last November in a row over debt spending.

The SPD, which had been the biggest party in the old coalition slumped to its worst post-war election result in third place, but Merz had promised that Germany was back and that he would boost its voice on the world stage and revive a flagging economy.

After two years of recession, Europe’s largest economy grew in the first three months of 2025. However economists have warned of potential risks to German exports because of US-imposed tariffs.

Germany’s services sector contracted last month because of weaker demand and lower consumer spending.

Monday night marked one of the world’s biggest nights of fashion, as stars served up their most iconic looks for the annual Met Gala in New York City.

The theme for this year’s event was “Superfine: Tailoring Black Style”, the first since 2003 to focus exclusively on menswear.

It was inspired by a newly unveiled exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s costume institute featuring the “black dandy”, which Vogue says “examines the importance of clothing and style to the formation of black identities in the Atlantic diaspora”.

A-list celebrities including Zendaya, Demi Moore and Diana Ross brought their own interpretation to the theme, stunning in tailored suits and dramatic gowns.

• Look back at our live coverage of the Met
• Rihanna reveals she is expecting third child

Here is a look at some of the highlights:

Actress Zendaya, known for her dazzling red carpet style, opted for a wide-brimmed hat and tailored Louis Vuitton cream suit at this year’s Met Gala.

But there was one slight pop of colour: her manicured red nails.

Puerto Rican rapper Bad Bunny wore a brown Prada suit, which he said he worked on with the Italian fashion house for a few months before the event.

He also stayed on theme by accessorising with embellished gloves, a brooch and a hat that paid homage to his Puerto Rican heritage.

“We did something special,” he said of his look. “I feel good, and I hope people think I’m looking good.”

US reality TV star Kim Kardashian wore an all-black ensemble by LA-based brand Chrome Hearts – a fitted leather top and skirt that she offset with diamond necklaces and two strings of pearls.

She is, of course, no stranger to the Met Gala – having made headlines with a dress worn by Marilyn Monroe in 2022, and a wet-look Thierry Mugler dress in 2019.

Black British designer Grace Wales Bonner dressed British Formula One star Sir Lewis Hamilton for the night. Sir Lewis was a co-chair of this year’s event.

The pair have worked together in the past with Wales Bonner dressing Hamilton for the 2023 British Fashion Awards.

Singer Chappell Roan brought a rare pop of colour to the Met’s blue carpet, in a patchwork hot pink ensemble sourced from eBay.

The singer worked with Wicked costume designer Paul Tazewell on her outfit, while make-up artist Pat McGrath was behind her disco-inspired look.

Demi Moore gave us another round of method dressing.

The American actress’s recent press tour for The Substance recalled the body horror themes of the film, while her awards campaign for the role of Elisabeth Sparkle saw her dressing for the glam statuettes.

Moore understood the assignment for the Met Gala, coming as a literal men’s tie in a sculptural black and white striped sequin gown from Thom Browne.

Rihanna, typically one of the most stylish attendees at the Gala, returned to the Met steps this year in Marc Jacobs, debuting her pregnancy with co-chair of the evening A$AP Rocky.

Legendary singer Diana Ross wore a show-stopping white ensemble, complete with feathers and a long train that required at least two assistants.

On the carpet, Ross said her son persuaded her to attend this year’s event. The last time she attended the Met Gala is 2003.

She added she had the names of her children and grandchildren embroidered on her dress train.

Actress Sydney Sweeney wore a custom Miu Miu gown – her third time wearing the designer at the Met Gala. This time, her dress was complete with beaded fringe shoulders and gold hardware detailing on the neck.

Speaking about her look, Sweeney said it paid homage to actress and painter Kim Novak. Sweeney is set to portray Novak in the upcoming film Scandalous.

A custom-made Chanel look was Dua Lipa’s choice this year.

The chiffon dress, sequin tweed jacket and organza cape – all adorned with pearls, feathers and crystals – took some 2,000 hours to make.

Sabrina Carpenter wore a burgundy Louis Vuitton bodysuit that featured all the tailoring of a regular suit.

The singer said she worked with recording artist Pharrell Williams – also the men’s creative director of Louis Vuitton – on the bottomless look.

“You’re quite short, so no pants for you,” Carpenter recalled Williams telling her.

Irish actor Barry Keoghan wore a custom-made Valentino fit, with florals embroidered on the cuffs and a silk red scarf wrapped around the waist.

New Zealand singer Lorde made a rare appearance at the Met Gala this year (she has not attended since 2021).

She wore a metallic silver floor-length skirt set, and a matching bandeau and blazer designed by Thom Browne.

Olympic gymnast and gold medalist Simone Biles brought a pop of colour to the Met Gala carpet with a striking blue minidress that featured a collared neckline, a long train and jewelled appliques.

The dress was designed by Harbison Studio.

Singer Coco Jones opted for a look designed by Indian brand Manish Malhotra.

She wore a tailored cream and white look that featured ornate embroidery and a dramatic long-sleeve coat. Jones also wore a large statement necklace and Jimmy Choo heels.

Actor and playwright Colman Domingo could have inspired this year’s Met Gala theme, as he’s been carrying the baton for well-dressed men on the red carpet for several years now.

He donned a royal blue Valentino cloak that paid homage to Andre Leon Talley, former editor-at-large on Vogue whom Anna Wintour called “a dandy among dandies.”

The cape later was removed to reveal a second look underneath: a tailored, patterned suit complete with a big fabric, polka-dotted flower brooch.

Actress and singer Teyana Taylor, who hosted Vogue’s live stream of the red carpet, arrived in custom Marc Jacobs on the arm of costume designer Ruth E. Carter. Ms Carter has worked with filmmaker Spike Lee and on the Black Panther movie franchise to create some modern pop cultural cues for the black dandy.

Taylor wore a burgundy cape embroidered with “Harlem Rose,” a nod to her 2018 song A Rose in Harlem.

Social media influencer Emma Chamberlain looked sharp and on theme with a backless tailored suit dress designed by French fashion house Courrèges.

She accessorised the look with a spiky beach blonde pixie cut and stylish eyeglasses.

Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo, known for her on-theme style, wore a Givenchy ensemble featuring a bedazzled bodice and an extra-long black train with matching leather boots and nails.

Recording artist Doja Cat wore a custom Marc Jacobs look that featured giant shoulder pads and a leopard-print bustier panel.

“I just wanted to feel like a little gangsta,” she said.

“I feel like he brought that with the strong shape of the shoulders, and all of the exaggerated shapes,” Doja Cat said of Jacobs.

Actress Tracee Ellis Ross, the daughter of Diana Ross, was one of the few people who wore pink at this year’s Met Gala.

She donned a custom Marc Jacobs suit that was complete with a giant, hot pink bow at the back, a matching top hat and some unique bling.

In one of the more memorable looks of the evening, Andre 3000 showed up to the Met Gala carpet with a black and white piano strapped to his back and a trash bag as a purse.

The stylish OutKast rapper designed the look himself in collaboration with Burberry.

Oscar-winning actress Lupita Nyong’o wore a stunning powder blue Chanel suit, with a matching hat and transparent cape.

She accessorised the look with bedazzled, black rhinestone eyebrows.

Rapper Cardi B debuted a new hairstyle (and eye colour) in a green Burberry pantsuit, complete with matching nails and eye shadow.

Doechii took brand representation to new levels, stamping the famous Louis Vuitton logo on her face to go along with the motif of her suit.

The American rapper is often seen wearing looks from the French fashion house.

This outfit combined the designer’s two famous patterns – the LV monogram pattern on the waistcoat and jacket, as well as the damier checkerboard on the shorts.

When asked about her outfit on the carpet, Janelle Monáe responded simply – “free” – followed by an expletive.

“And when I’m in my suit, that is exactly how I feel,” she said.

She wore a Thom Brown suit, with whom she’s attended the Met Gala as a guest for the last several years. The look is styled by the Academy Award-winning costume designer for Wicked, Paul Tazewell.

Pop legend Madonna accessorised her cream-colored tuxedo with a cigar, creating an interplay between soft feminine materials and a distinct masculine energy.

It’s a dynamic that the superstar has played with throughout her career.

Sir David Attenborough is launching what he says is one of the most important films of his career as he enters his hundredth year.

He believes his new, cinema-length film Ocean could play a decisive role in saving biodiversity and protecting the planet from climate change.

Sir David, who will be 99 on Thursday, says: “After almost 100 years on the planet, I now understand the most important place on Earth is not on land, but at sea.”

The ocean is the planet’s support system and humanity’s greatest ally against climate catastrophe, the film argues. It shows how the world’s oceans are at a crossroads.

A blue carpet will be rolled out at the film’s premiere tonight at the Royal Festival Hall.

A host of celebrities are expected to attend including Chris Martin and Coldplay, Benedict Cumberbatch, astronaut Tim Peake, Geri Halliwell-Horner and Simon LeBon.

Toby Nowlan, who produced Ocean, says this new production is not a typical Attenborough film. “This is not about seeing brand new natural history behaviours. It is the greatest message he’s ever told,” he says.

The film documents how the state of the world’s oceans and our understanding of how they function have changed in the course of Sir David’s lifetime.

Sir David remembers his first scuba dive on the Great Barrier Reef way back in 1957: “I was so taken aback by the spectacle before me I forgot – momentarily – to breathe.”

Since then, there has been a catastrophic decline in life in the world’s oceans. “We are almost out of time,” he warns.

Ocean contains some of the most graphic footage of the damage that bottom trawling – a common fishing practice around the world – can do to the seabed. It is a vivid example of how industrial fishing can drain the life from the world’s oceans, Sir David claims.

The new footage shows how the chain that the trawlers drag behind them scours the seafloor, forcing the creatures it disturbs into the net behind. They are often seeking a single species: more than three-quarters of what they catch may be discarded.

“It’s hard to imagine a more wasteful way to catch fish,” comments Sir David.

The process also releases vast amounts of carbon dioxide which contributes to the warming of our planet, yet bottom trawling is not just legal but is actively encouraged by many governments.

Sir David says the state of the ocean has almost made him lose hope for the future of life on the planet. What has kept him from despair is what he calls the “most remarkable discovery of all” – that the ocean can “recover faster than we had ever imagined”.

Sir David says the story of the world’s whales has been a source of huge optimism for him.

It is estimated that 2.9 million whales were killed by the whaling industry in the 20th Century alone. Scientists have said it is the largest cull of any animal in history when measured in terms of total biomass. It pushed almost all whale species to the edge of extinction.

Just one per cent of Blue Whales were left, recalls Sir David: “I remember thinking that was it. There was no coming back, we had lost the great whales.”

But in 1986 lawmakers bowed to public pressure and banned commercial whaling worldwide. The whale population has rapidly recovered since then.

One of the film’s directors, Keith Scholey, has worked with Sir David for 44 years. “When I first met David, I was in shorts,” he jokes. That was in 1981, two years after Sir David had resigned as the BBC’s director of programmes – one of the most senior jobs at the Corporation. “He’d done one career, and he was off on his next.”

Despite now nearing his 99th birthday Sir David is still remarkably energetic, says Scholey. “Every time you work with David, you learn something new,” he says. “It’s really good fun. But also, David keeps you on your mettle, because he is so on his mettle and so, you know, it’s always a very creative process.”

Sir David’s key message in the Ocean film is that all is not lost. Countries have promised to protect a third of the world’s oceans. He hopes his new film will spur leaders to take firm action on this promise at a UN conference next month.

He believes that could be transformational.

“The ocean can bounce back to life,” Sir David says. “If left alone it may not just recover but thrive beyond anything anyone alive has ever seen.”

A healthier ocean ecosystem would also be able to trap more carbon dioxide, helping protect the world from climate change, according to scientists.

“In front of us is a chance to protect our climate, our food, our home,” Sir David says.

As he celebrates his 99th birthday this week he is still fighting to protect the natural world he has worked his lifetime to show to us in all its glory.

Ocean will be in cinemas across the country from Thursday.

Sign up for our Future Earth newsletter to keep up with the latest climate and environment stories with the BBC’s Justin Rowlatt. Outside the UK? Sign up to our international newsletter here.

I ran from the White House briefing room, past the portico entrance of the West Wing to our camera position on the lawn, and flung on an ear piece connecting me to the studio.

A moment later the presenter asked me about the comments we had just heard live from US President Donald Trump.

I said we were seeing a fundamental shift in a United States’ policy position after decades of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

It was February this year, and Trump had just held talks with Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu – the first foreign leader since Trump’s inauguration to be invited to the White House. The US president vowed that his country would take control of the Gaza Strip, having earlier pledged the territory would also be “cleaned out” and emptied of its Palestinian population.

Trump was grabbing the world’s attention with a proposal that hardened his administration’s support for Israel and also upended international norms, flying in the face of international law. It marked an apex of the current Republican Party’s relationship with Israel – sometimes described as support “at all costs”.

The alliance between the two countries had been thrust into the international spotlight after the Hamas attacks on Israel on 7 October 2023 and Israel’s offensive in Gaza that followed.

During that war, the administration of President Joe Biden sent some $18bn (£13.5bn) worth of weapons to Israel, maintaining unprecedented levels of US backing. The period was marked by intensifying protests in the US, with many of those protesting being traditional Democrat leaning voters. The fallout became the focus of a bitter culture war centring on American attitudes towards Israel and the Palestinians. I covered demonstrations in which protesters repeatedly labelled Biden “Genocide Joe” – an accusation he always rejected.

At the time Donald Trump branded the protesters “radical-left lunatics” and the Trump administration is now targeting for deportation hundreds of foreign students who it accuses of antisemitism or support for Hamas, a move being vigorously challenged in the courts.

But as a Democrat who could otherwise have expected the vote of many of those upset over his support for Israel that support was politically costly for Biden in a way not experienced by previous presidents or, indeed, Trump.

One of Biden’s key decision makers over relations with Israel still wrestles with the decisions they took.

“My first reaction is just, I understand that this has evoked incredibly passionate feelings for Arab Americans, for non-Arab Americans, Jewish Americans,” says Jake Sullivan, Biden’s former national security adviser.

“There were two competing considerations: one was wanting to curb Israel’s excesses, both with respect to civilian casualties and the flow of humanitarian assistance. The other was […] wanting to make sure that we were not cutting Israel off from the capabilities it needed to confront its enemies on multiple different fronts.”

He added: “The United States stood behind Israel materially, morally, and in every other way in those days following October 7th.”

But opinion polls suggest support for Israel among the American public is dwindling.

A Gallup survey taken in March this year found only 46% of Americans expressed support for Israel (the lowest level in 25 years of Gallup’s annual tracking) while 33% now said they sympathised with the Palestinians – the highest ever reading of that measure. Other polls have found similar results.

Surveys – with all their limitations – suggest the swing is largely among Democrats and the young, although not exclusively. Between 2022 and 2025, the Pew Research Center found that the proportion of Republicans who said they had unfavourable views of Israel rose from 27% to 37% (younger Republicans, aged under 49, drove most of that change).

The US has long been Israel’s most powerful ally – ever since May 1948, when America was the first country to recognise the nascent State of Israel. But while US support for Israel is extremely likely to continue long-term, these swings in sentiment raise questions over the practical extent and policy limits of the US’s ironclad backing and whether the shifting sands of public opinion will eventually feed through to Washington, with real-world policy impacts.

To many, the close relationship between the US and Israel seems like a permanent, unshakeable part of the geopolitical infrastructure. But it wasn’t always guaranteed – and at the very beginning largely came down to one man.

In early 1948, US President Harry S Truman had to decide on his approach to Palestine. The country was in the grip of sectarian bloodshed between Jews and Arab Palestinians after three decades of colonial rule by Britain, which had announced its intention to pull out. Truman was deeply moved by the plight of Jewish survivors of the Holocaust stranded in displaced persons camps in Europe.

In New York City, a young Francine Klagsbrun, who would later become an academic and historian of Israeli prime minister Golda Meir, watched her parents praying for a Jewish homeland.

“I grew up in a very Jewish home and a very Zionist home also,” she explains. “So my older brother and I would go out and collect money to try to get England to open the doors. My brother would go on the subway trains, all the doors open on the train and he’d shout ‘open, open, open the doors to Palestine’,” she recalls.

Truman’s administration was deeply divided over whether to back a Jewish state. The CIA and the Department of State cautioned against recognising a Jewish state. They feared a bloody conflict with Arab countries that might draw in the US, risking Cold War escalation with the Soviets.

Two days before Britain was due to pull out of Palestine, an explosive row took place in the Oval Office. Truman’s domestic advisor Clark Clifford argued in favour of recognising a Jewish state. On the other side of the debate was Secretary of State George Marshall, a World War Two general whom Truman viewed as “the greatest living American”.

The man Truman admired so much was vigorously opposed to the president immediately recognising a Jewish state because of his fears about a regional war – and even went as far as telling Truman he would not vote for him in the coming presidential election if he backed recognition.

But despite the moment of extraordinary tension, Truman immediately recognised the State of Israel when it was declared two days later by David Ben-Gurion, the country’s first prime minister.

The historian Rashid Khalidi, a New York-born Palestinian whose family members were expelled from Jerusalem by the British in the 1930s, says the US and Israel were fused together in part by shared cultural connections. From 1948 onwards, he says, the Palestinians had a critical diplomatic disadvantage in the US, with their claim to national self-determination sidelined in an unequal contest.

“On the one side, you had the Zionist movement led by people whom are European and American by origin… The Arabs had nothing similar,” he says. “[The Arabs] weren’t familiar with the societies, the cultures, the political leaderships of the countries that decided the fate of Palestine. How could you speak to American public opinion if you had no idea what America is like?” says Khalidi.

Popular culture played its role too – notably the 1958 novel and subsequent blockbuster film Exodus by the author Leon Uris. It retold the story of Israel’s establishment to mass audiences of the 1960s, the movie version creating a heavily Americanised portrayal of pioneers in a new land.

Ehud Olmert, who at the time was a political activist but would later become Israeli prime minister, points to the war of 1967 as the moment when America’s support for Israel became the profound alliance that it is today.

That was the war in which Israel, after weeks of escalating fears of invasion by its neighbours, defeated the Arab countries in six days, effectively tripling the size of its territory, and launching its military occupation over (at that time) more than a million stateless Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.

“For the first time, the United States understood the importance and the significance of Israel as a major military and political power in the Middle East, and since then everything has changed in the basic relations within our two countries,” he says.

Over the years, Israel became the biggest recipient of US foreign military aid on Earth. Strong American diplomatic support, particularly at the United Nations, has been a key element of the alliance; while successive US presidents have also sought to broker peace between Israel and its Arab neighbours.

But in recent years it has been far from a straightforward relationship.

When I spoke to Jake Sullivan, I put to him the issue of Arab Americans in the state of Michigan who boycotted Biden and his successor candidate Kamala Harris over the extent of their support for Israel during the Gaza conflict, voting instead for Trump. He rejected the idea that Biden lost the state because of this support.

But that backing still prompted a marked backlash within a section of the American public.

A Pew Research Center survey taken in March this year found that 53% of Americans expressed an unfavourable opinion of Israel, an 11 point increase since the last time the survey was taken in 2022.

Currently, these shifts in public opinion haven’t yet prompted a major change in US foreign policy. Whilst some ordinary US voters are turning away from Israel, on Capitol Hill elected politicians from both parties are still mostly keen to talk up the importance of a strong alliance with Israel.

Some think that a sustained, long-term shift in public opinion might eventually lead to reduced real-world support for the country – with weaker diplomatic ties and reduced military aid. This issue is felt particularly sharply by some inside Israel. Several months before 7 October, the former Israeli general and head of the Military Intelligence Directorate, Tamir Hayman, warned of cracks forming between his country and the United States, in part because of what he described as the slow movement of American Jews away from Zionism.

Israel’s political shift in favour of the national-religious right has played a key part in this. From early 2023, Israel was gripped by an unprecedented wave of protests among Jewish Israelis against Netanyahu’s judicial reforms, with many arguing he was moving the country towards theocracy – a claim he always rejected. Some in the US who had always felt a deep sense of connection with Israel were watching with growing concern.

In March this year, the Institute for National Security Studies, a leading Tel Aviv-based think tank led by Hayman, published a paper arguing that US public opinion had entered the “danger zone”, as far as support for Israel was concerned. “The dangers of diminished US support, particularly as it reflects long-term and deeply rooted trends, cannot be overstated,” wrote the paper’s author, Theodore Sasson. “Israel needs the support of the global superpower for the foreseeable future,”.

That support at the policy level has only strengthened over the decades, but it is important to note that historic American opinion polling shows public opinion has ebbed and flowed before.

Today, Dennis Ross, who helped negotiate the Oslo accords with President Bill Clinton, says American opinion on Israel has become increasingly tied to sharp political divisions in the US.

“Trump is viewed very negatively by most Democrats – the latest polls show over 90 percent,” Ross says. “There’s potential for Trumpian support for Israel to feed a dynamic here that, at least among Democrats, increases criticism of Israel.”

But he expects that Washington’s support for Israel – in the form of military aid and diplomatic ties – will continue. And he thinks if Israeli voters eject their prime minister and replace him with a more centrist government, one that may reverse some of the disquiet in the US. A general election must be held in Israel before late October next year.

Under such a new Israeli government, Ross argues, “there won’t be the same impulse towards creating de-facto annexation of the West Bank. There’ll be much more outreach to the Democratic Party and the Democratic Party officials.”

Those who see a fraying relationship are paying particularly close attention to the views of younger Americans – a group that has shown the most marked shift in opinion since 7 October. As the ‘TikTok generation’, many young Americans get their news about the war from social media and the high civilian death toll from Israel’s offensive in Gaza appears to have driven the declining support among young Democrats and liberals in America. Last year, 33 percent of Americans under 30 said their sympathies lie entirely or mostly with the Palestinian people, versus 14 percent who said the same about Israelis, according to a Pew Research poll published last month. Older Americans were more likely to sympathise with the Israelis.

Karin Von Hippel, chair of the Arden Defence and Security Practice and a former official in the US State Department, agrees there is a demographic divide among Americans on the topic of Israel – one that even extends to Congress.

“Younger Congress men and women are less knee jerk, reactively supporting Israel,” she says. “And I think younger Americans, including Jewish Americans, are less supportive of Israel than their parents were.”

But she is sceptical of the idea that this might lead to a serious change at the policy level. Despite changing opinions among the party’s base, she says, many of the most prominent Democrats who might run for President in 2028 are “classically supportive of Israel”. She names Gretchen Whitmer, the governor of Michigan, and Pete Buttigieg, the former Transportation Secretary, as examples. And what about Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the Instagram-famous congresswoman who is a long-standing supporter of Palestinian rights? Hippel responds bluntly: “I don’t think an Ocasio-Cortez type can win right now.”

In the weeks after February’s Trump-Netanyahu press conference at the White House, I asked Jake Sullivan where he thought the US-Israel relationship was going. He argued that both countries were dealing with internal threats to their democratic institutions that would define their character and their relationship.

“I think it’s almost less of a foreign policy question than it is a domestic policy question in these two countries – whither America and whither Israel?” he says. “The answer to those two questions will tell you where does the US-Israel relationship go five, ten, fifteen years from now.”

Visa applications from nationalities thought most likely to overstay and claim asylum in the UK could be restricted under a new government crackdown.

Under Home Office plans, first reported in the Times, people from countries such as Pakistan, Nigeria and Sri Lanka may find it more difficult to come to the UK to work and study.

Ministers believe there is a particular problem with those who come to the UK legally on work or study visas and then lodge a claim for asylum – which if granted, would allow them to stay in the country permanently.

A Home Office spokesperson said: “Our upcoming Immigration White Paper will set out a comprehensive plan to restore order to our broken immigration system.”

It is not clear which nationalities are most likely to overstay their visas as the Home Office has not published statistics on exit checks since 2020, due to a review into the accuracy of the figures.

Many exits from the UK can go unrecorded, meaning those without a departure record were not necessarily still in the country.

Prof Jonathan Portes, a senior fellow at the academic think tank UK in a Changing Europe, said the impact that restricting visas would have on the number of asylum applications was “likely to be quite small”.

“I think the impact here is not designed primarily to be about numbers overall, it’s designed to be about reducing asylum claims which are perceived to be abusive,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.

“When you have someone who comes here ostensibly as a student and then switches quickly to the asylum route… that is an abuse of the system – the government is trying to reduce that.”

Latest Home Office figures show that more than 108,000 people claimed asylum in the UK last year – the highest level since records began in 1979.

In total, 10,542 Pakistani nationals claimed asylum – the most of any nationality. Some 2,862 Sri Lankan nationals and 2,841 Nigerian nationals claimed asylum in the same period.

Latest figures for 2023/24 also show there were 732,285 international students in the UK, with most coming from India (107,480) and China (98,400).

The number of UK work and study visas dropped in 2024, compared to the year before.

Since becoming prime minister last year, Sir Keir Starmer has promised to reduce both illegal and legal migration – but has previously declined to offer a net migration target, saying an “arbitrary cap” has had no impact in the past.

Labour’s plans to reduce migration include making it a criminal offence to endanger the lives of others at sea, to target small boat crossings, and cutting demand for overseas hires by developing training plans for sectors that are currently reliant on migrant workers.

Sir Keir has criticised the previous Conservative government, saying it failed to deliver lower net migration numbers “by design, not accident”.

Net migration – the number of people coming to the UK, minus the number leaving – hit a record 906,000 in the year to June 2023, and then fell to 728,000 in the year to June 2024.

New rules introduced by former Prime Minister Rishi Sunak in a bid to reduce migration levels appear to have contributed to the fall.

The previous Conservative government increased the minimum salary for skilled overseas workers wanting to come to the UK from £26,200 to £38,700 and banned care workers from bringing family dependants to the UK.

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Labour was already under pressure to make changes to the immigration system – but that pressure may have grown after Reform UK’s successes in last week’s local elections.

Reform won 677 of around 1,600 seats contested on Thursday across a clutch of mainly Tory-held councils last contested in 2021.

In its general election manifesto, Reform said it would implement a freeze on non-essential immigration. Those with certain skills – for example in healthcare – would still be allowed to come to the UK.

Reacting to the results last week, Sir Keir said he shared the “sharp edge of fury” felt by voters leaning away from the major parties, arguing that it would spur him on to “go further and faster” in delivering Labour’s promised changes to immigration and public services.

Enver Solomon, chief executive of the Refugee Council, said that “some people on work or study visas may find their lives at risk because the political situation in their home country has changed”, adding that it was right they were “protected from harm and given a fair hearing in the asylum system”.

Plans to tackle overstaying were already being worked on before the local elections.

Full details of government’s plans are due to be published in a new immigration white paper later in May.

A Home Office spokesperson said: “To tackle abuse by foreign nationals who arrive on work and study visas and go on to claim asylum, we are building intelligence on the profile of these individuals to identify them earlier and faster.

“We keep the visa system under constant review and will where we detect trends, which may undermine our immigration rules, we will not hesitate to take action.

“Under our plan for change, our upcoming Immigration White Paper will set out a comprehensive plan to restore order to our broken immigration system.”

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A woman missing for nearly 63 years has been found alive and well after the case into her disappearance was reviewed, police in the US state of Wisconsin said.

Audrey Backeberg was 20 years old when she disappeared from her home in the small city of Reedsburg on 7 July 1962.

In a statement, Sauk County Sheriff Chip Meister said Ms Backeberg’s disappearance “was by her own choice and not the result of any criminal activity or foul play”.

The sheriff said she was living outside Wisconsin, but did not provide any further details.

According to Wisconsin Missing Persons Advocacy, a non-profit group, Ms Backeberg was married and had two children when she went missing.

The group said that days before she went missing, Ms Backeberg, now 82, had filed a criminal complaint against her husband, whom she had married at the age of 15, alleging he had beaten her and threatened to kill her.

On the day she disappeared, she left home to pick up her pay cheque from the woollen mill where she worked.

The couple’s 14-year-old babysitter told police she and Ms Backeberg then hitchhiked to Madison, Wisconsin’s state capital, and from there caught a bus to Indianapolis, Indiana, about 300 miles (480km) away.

The babysitter then became nervous and wanted to return home, but Ms Backeberg refused and was last seen walking away from the bus stop.

The Sauk County Sheriff’s Office said investigators pursued numerous leads in the case but it had gone cold before a comprehensive review of old case files was carried out earlier this year.

The detective who solved the case, Isaac Hanson, told local news station WISN that an online ancestry account belonging to Ms Backeberg’s sister was crucial in helping locate the missing woman.

Det Hanson said he contacted local sheriffs where Ms Backeberg now lives, and spoke to her on the phone for 45 minutes.

“I think she just was removed and, you know, moved on from things and kind of did her own thing and led her life,” he told WISN. “She sounded happy. Confident in her decision. No regrets.”

Two weeks ago, the photograph of a woman sitting motionless beside her husband’s body went viral across Indian social media.

It captured a moment of unspeakable grief – one that came to symbolise the 22 April militant attack in Indian-administered Kashmir in which 26 civilians were killed.

The woman in the photo was Himanshi Narwal, whose husband, a 26-year-old naval officer, was among the victims. The couple, who had been married for less than a week, were on their honeymoon when Vinay Narwal was shot dead.

But within days, Ms Narwal, who had been portrayed as the face of the tragedy, found herself at the centre of a hate campaign.

It started last week when she urged people not to target Muslims or Kashmiris as emotions ran high across the country.

Survivors of the attack have said that Hindu men were targeted, and that the victims were shot after the militants checked their religion. Indian security forces are still searching for the attackers.

Since the attack, there have been reports of Kashmiri vendors and students in other Indian cities facing harassment and threats, mainly from members of Hindu right-wing groups.

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“People going against Muslims or Kashmiris – we don’t want this. We want peace and only peace,” Ms Narwal told reporters at a blood donation camp held by the family on what would have been her husband’s 27th birthday. “Of course, we want justice. The people who have wronged him should be punished,” she added.

It was her first public statement since a video of her bidding an emotional farewell over her husband’s coffin went viral. In it, the grief-stricken widow says with tears: “It is because of him that the world is still surviving. And we should all be proud of him in every way.”

Her appeal for peace sparked a swift backlash. Within hours, many of the internet users who had earlier mourned her loss were posting abusive comments.

Some accused her of dishonouring her husband’s memory as she refused to blame ordinary Kashmiris for the attack. Others made and shared unfounded claims about her friendships and relationships with Kashmiri men while studying at a university in Delhi. Yet more claimed that she had no right to speak about her husband’s death as they were only married for a few days.

As the online abuse continued, India’s National Commission for Women (NCW) wrote on X that the trolling was “extremely reprehensible and unfortunate”.

“Perhaps her reaction may not have gone down well with angry people. But any kind of agreement or disagreement should always be expressed with decency and within constitutional limits,” NCW Chairperson Vijaya Rahatkar wrote on X.

Journalist Namita Bhandare, who covers gender issues, told the BBC that it was “shocking” how much hatred Ms Narwal received for simply appealing for peace and calm.

She was viciously trolled because she “appealed for peace rather than succumbing to the narrative of revenge”, Ms Bhandare added.

Ms Narwal was not the only survivor of the attack to face online abuse.

Arathi R Menon, the daughter of a man from Kerala state who was killed in the shootings, was also trolled after she recounted her ordeal in front of the media.

Some people said that she spoke too calmly and didn’t display much emotion as she recounted her father’s death. Others found fault with her praising two Kashmiri men who she said helped her and took care of her “like a sister”.

“It is the same old story – women are always the easy targets,” says Ms Bhandare, adding that female victims of online abuse are also likely to be sexualised and threatened with violence.

“Being faceless online gives people the courage to say whatever they want,” she says. “And of course, there’s patriarchy at play, women are singled out, no matter who they are.”

Amid the abuse, Ms Narwal received support online as well.

“Your [Ms Narwal’s] statement in the face of that loss was an act of grace and unimaginable strength,” writer and activist Gurmehar Kaur wrote on X.

“My mother was your age when she lost my father in the [Kashmir] valley. I know this kind of loss.”

In 2017, Kaur, then a graduate student, became the target of a vicious social media campaign after she spoke against a Hindu right-wing student group after a clash at a college in Delhi. Many of the people who trolled her took issue with an earlier campaign by her where she said her father, a soldier who died in 1999, was killed by war, not Pakistan.

Journalist Rohini Singh welcomed the NCW’s statement supporting Ms Narwal, but asked why no action had been taken against the social media accounts “blatantly abusing and slandering her”.

Members of India’s opposition parties have also urged the government to act.

Priyanka Chaturvedi, an MP from the Shiv Sena (UBT) party, tagged federal Information and Broadcasting Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw in a post, asking him to “stand with the widow of an Indian officer” and take action against the trolling.

No Indian minister has commented on the trolling campaign yet, and no police complaint has been lodged.

Meanwhile, Ms Bhandare says that, like many online hate campaigns, this too may follow a familiar pattern: “It will run its course and then the people will move on to their next target.”

The only surviving guest of a deadly beef wellington lunch at the heart of a high-profile Australian court case has described being run down a hospital corridor to urgent care after medical staff realised he had eaten toxic mushrooms.

Ian Wilkinson told the courtroom on Tuesday that he and his wife Heather had been “very happy to be invited” to the lunch hosted by Erin Patterson.

But the meal left Heather and two other relatives dead, and Mr Wilkinson seriously ill.

Ms Patterson, who is on trial for the murder of three people and the attempted murder of another, has pleaded not guilty and her defence team says she “panicked” after unintentionally serving poison to family members she loved.

Three people died in hospital in the days after the meal: Ms Patterson’s former in-laws, Don and Gail Patterson, as well as Gail’s sister, Heather Wilkinson.

Mr Wilkinson, a local pastor, survived after spending seven weeks in hospital, including three weeks in intensive care at the Austin hospital in Melbourne. He gave the packed courtroom details about the lunch, describing how he and his wife took ill afterwards, and being told by medical staff that the situation was “serious”.

The jury has heard that there is no dispute that the lunch of beef wellington, mashed potatoes and green beans contained death cap mushrooms and caused the guests’ illnesses.

Whether Ms Patterson intended to kill or cause very serious injury is the main issue in the case, the judge has told the jury.

Mr Wilkinson told the court that Ms Patterson had plated “all of the food”.

“Each person had an individual serve, it was very much like a pasty,” he said. “It was a pastry case and when we cut into it, there was steak and mushrooms.”

He added that Gail and Heather picked up four grey plates with the food and set them on the table, while Ms Patterson ate from an “orangey tan” coloured plate.

“Erin picked up the odd plate and carried it to the table. She took it to her place at the table,” he said. He also said that his wife told him in hospital the next day that she had “noticed the difference in colours” of the plates.

After eating the lunch, Mr Wilkinson recalled being unwell through the night with vomiting and diarrhoea.

Ms Patterson’s ex-husband Simon Patterson, who last week told court he’d declined an invitation to the lunch, had visited them after discovering his parents had been ill the whole night as well. He had insisted on calling an ambulance as his own parents had done. But the wait for an ambulance was too long, so Simon drove them to a local hospital, and then to Leongatha hospital, Mr Wilkinson said.

Mr Wilkinson said that doctors had first treated them as food poisoning cases and “suspicion was falling on the meat”, adding that he could not recall mention of mushrooms at the time.

But the next morning, they were “abruptly woken up by a group of nurses who literally ran us down the corridor in our beds to the urgent care area,” he said. A doctor then told the couple that “he’d had communication … saying it was suspected mushroom poisoning”.

“He was very frank. He said it is a very serious situation. He said there was time critical treatment available.”

The pair were then taken by ambulance to Dandenong hospital.

Earlier in the day, Mr Wilkinson was shown a picture of the dining room table on an iPad and he marked where each of the five people at the lunch had been seated.

He said that both he and Heather “ate the entire meal”, while Don ate his meal along with half of the beef wellington that Gail did not finish.

“There was talk about husbands helping their wives out.”

He said Ms Patterson was “definitely” eating but couldn’t say “with certainty” how much she ate.

There was a cake for dessert as well as a fruit platter but Mr Wilkinson told the court that not much was eaten because everyone was full from the main course.

When asked about his relationship with Ms Patterson, Mr Wilkinson said: “I would say our relationship was friendly, amicable. It did not have much depth. We were more like acquaintances. We didn’t see a great deal of each other.”

“She just seemed like a normal person to me,” he added. “When we met things were friendly. We never had arguments or disputes. She just seemed like an ordinary person.”

“Heather would have seen Erin more than me, talked to her more than me but we did not consider that the relationship was close,” he said.

The invitation was made to Heather Wilkinson at church, a week or two earlier, Mr Wilkinson recalled.

“We were very happy to be invited. It seemed like maybe our relationship was going to improve,” he said.

“We were very happy to accept.”

The court was shown a copy of Mrs Wilkinson’s diary where she had written, “Erin for lunch” with a pencil.

Written in blue ink: “12:00” – which Mr Wilkinson said was the time they were to be picked up by Don and Gail Patterson. Another word “fruit” in the diary referred to the fruit platter they were taking to the lunch, he said.

Mr Wilkinson said that after the lunch, Erin Patterson announced that she had cancer – something the defence has already told the jury it accepted was a false claim.

“She said she was very concerned because she believed it was very serious, life-threatening,” he said. “She was anxious about telling the kids. She was asking our advice about that. ‘Should I tell the kids or not tell the kids about this threat to my life?’

“She was asking, ‘What do you think I should do?”

“In that moment, I thought this is the reason we’ve been invited to the lunch,” said Mr Wilkinson, adding that he “didn’t quite catch” what type of cancer she had said.

“I thought it was some sort of ovarian or cervical cancer – something like that.”

He said it was a “relatively short conversation” and felt like it lasted around 10 minutes. The discussion ended because the Patterson children and a friend were arriving back at the house.

“I realised we weren’t able to continue, and that we hadn’t prayed about it,” Mr Wilkinson said. “I suggested we pray and I asked a prayer asking for God’s blessing that Erin would get the treatment she needed, that the kids would be okay.”

Ms Patterson, wearing a light pink striped shirt sat emotionless as Mr Wilkinson began his evidence.

Last week when the trial opened, her lawyer said there was no intent to hurt anyone and the deaths were the result of a tragic accident – though many of the facts are not in dispute and it is accepted that she lied several times to police.

On Monday the jury heard from members of a true crime Facebook group that Ms Patterson was part of.

One of the witnesses, Christine Hunt, was asked about Erin Patterson’s relationship with her estranged husband Simon.

She told the court that the words “controlling” and “coercive” had been used by Ms Patterson.

Another member of the same group, Daniela Barkley, told the court that Erin Patterson had been “excited” about buying a dehydrator, and the jury was shown several images shared with the group, which showed mushrooms drying on the metal racks of the appliance.

In a text message shown to the court, Ms Patterson said “I’ve been hiding powdered mushrooms in everything” – including recipes such as brownies so her children couldn’t tell they were eating them.

The court also heard that in July 2023, she’d asked the group for advice on cooking a beef Wellington, the dish that was served to the four guests at that deadly lunch later the same month.

A senior Hamas official has said there is “no point” in further talks on a new Gaza ceasefire and hostage release deal, after Israel approved an expanded offensive that may include seizing all of the Palestinian territory indefinitely.

Bassem Naim told the BBC the armed group would not engage with new proposals while Israel continued its “starvation war”.

On Monday, the Israeli military said the aim of the “wide-scale” operation was the return of hostages held by Hamas and its “decisive defeat”.

Israeli officials said it would involve “capturing” Gaza, displacing the majority of its population, and taking control of aid after a two-month blockade the UN says has caused severe food shortages.

The officials also said the offensive would not begin until after US President Donald Trump’s visit to the region next week, giving Hamas what they called a “window of opportunity” to agree to a deal.

But Bassem Naim’s comments on Tuesday seemed to counter that.

UN Secretary General António Guterres warned that expanded Israeli ground operations and a prolonged military presence would “inevitably lead to countless more civilians killed and the further destruction of Gaza”.

UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron expressed deep concern at recent developments and agreed that “a renewed peace process was required”, Downing Street said.

In Washington, President Trump said the US would help supply food to people in Gaza, without going into details.

“People are starving and we’re going to help them get some food. A lot of people are making it very, very bad,” he said. “Hamas is making it impossible because they’re taking everything that’s brought in.”

Israel cut off all deliveries of aid and other supplies on 2 March and resumed its offensive two weeks later after the collapse of a two-month ceasefire, saying it was putting pressure on Hamas to release hostages.

It also accused Hamas of stealing and storing aid – an allegation the group has denied.

Aid agencies have warned that with no change in policy, mass starvation is imminent.

They have also condemned Israel’s proposal to deliver aid through private companies at military hubs, saying it would be a breach of basic humanitarian principles and that they would not co-operate.

The UN has said Israel is obliged under international law to ensure food and medical supplies for Gaza’s population. Israel has said it is complying with international law and there is no aid shortage.

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

At least 52,567 people have been killed in Gaza since then, including 2,459 since the Israeli offensive resumed, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry.

The pace at 64-year-old Thirunavkarsu’s spinning mill in southern India’s Tamil Nadu state has noticeably slowed down.

The viscose yarn – a popular material that goes into making woven garments – he produces, now sits in storage, as orders from local factories have dropped nearly 40% in the last month.

That’s because Chinese imports of the material have become cheaper by 15 rupees ($0.18; £0.13) per kilo and flooded Indian ports.

With Donald Trump imposing tariffs of up to 145% on Chinese goods going into the US, manufacturers in China have begun looking for alternative markets.

India’s textiles makers say they are bearing the brunt of the trade tensions as Chinese producers are dumping yarn in key production hubs.

While China is the leading producer of viscose yarn, India makes most of the viscose yarn the country needs locally with imports only bridging supply gaps.

Mill owners like Thirunavkarsu fear their yarn won’t survive the onslaught of such competition.

“We can’t match these rates. Our raw material is not as cheap,” he says.

Jagadesh Chandran, of the South India Spinners Association, told the BBC nearly 50 small spinning mills in the textile hubs of Pallipalayam, Karur and Tirupur in southern India are “slowing production”. Many say they’ll be forced to scale down further if the issue isn’t addressed.

China’s Ambassador to India, Xu Feihong, has sent assurances to India that his country will not dump products and in fact wants to buy more high-quality Indian products for Chinese consumers.

“We will not engage in market dumping or cut-throat competition, nor will we disrupt other countries’ industries and economic development,” he wrote in an opinion piece for the Indian Express newspaper.

But anxieties about dumping are spread across sectors in India, as China – Asia’s biggest economy – is the world’s largest exporter of practically all industrial goods, from textiles and metals, to chemicals and rare minerals.

While pharmaceuticals – and later phones, laptops, and semiconductor chips – were exempted from steep tariffs, large chunks of Chinese exports still run into Trump’s 145% tariff wall. It is these goods that are expected to chase other markets like India.

Their sudden inflow will prove “very disruptive” to emerging economies in Asia, according to Japanese broking house Nomura, whose research earlier revealed that China was flooding global markets with cheap goods even before Donald Trump took office earlier this year.

In 2024, investigations against unfair Chinese imports rose to a record high. Data from the World Trade Organization (WTO) shows nearly 200 complaints were filed against China at the forum – a record – including 37 from India.

India, in particular, with heavy dependencies on Chinese raw materials and intermediate goods, could be hit hard. Its trade deficit with China – the difference between what it imports and exports – has already ballooned to $100bn (£75bn). And imports in March jumped 25%, driven by electronics, batteries and solar cells.

In response, India’s trade ministry has set up a committee to track the influx of cheap Chinese goods, with its quasi-judicial arm probing imports across sectors, including viscose yarn.

India also recently imposed a 12% tax on some steel imports, locally known as a safeguard duty, to help halt an increase in cheap shipments primarily from China, which were pushing some Indian mills to scale down.

Despite such protections – and a loud marketing campaign by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government to boost manufacturing locally – India has found it hard to reduce its reliance on China, with imports rising even when border tensions between the two neighbours peaked after 2020.

That’s because the government has only had “limited success” with its plans to turn India into the world’s factory through things like the production linked subsidies, says Biswajit Dhar, a Delhi-based trade expert. And India continues to depend heavily on China for the intermediate goods that go into manufacturing finished products.

While western multi-national companies like Apple are increasingly looking towards India to diversify their assembly lines away from China, India is still dependent on Chinese components to make these phones. As a result, imports in sectors like electronics have risen significantly, pushing up its trade deficit.

India’s burgeoning deficit is a “worrying story”, says Ajay Srivastava, founder of the Global Trade Research Initiative (GTRI) think tank, all the more so because its exports to China have dropped to below 2014 levels despite a weaker currency, which should ideally help exporters.

“This isn’t just a trade imbalance. It’s a structural warning. Our industrial growth, including through PLI (production linked incentive) schemes, is fuelling imports, not building domestic depth,” Srivastava wrote in a social media post. In other words, the subsidies are not helping India export more.

“We can’t bridge this deficit without bridging our competitiveness gap.”

India needs to get its act together quickly to do that, given the opportunity US trade tensions with China have presented. But also because countries with a large rise in imports from China generally tend to see the sharpest slowdown in manufacturing growth, according to Nomura.

Akash Prakash of Amansa Capital agrees. A key reason why Indian private companies were not investing enough, was because they feared being “swamped by China”, he wrote in a column in the Business Standard newspaper. A recent study by the ratings agency Icra also corroborates this view.

With fears of Chinese dumping becoming more widespread and the likes of the European Union seeking firm guarantees from Beijing that its markets will not be flooded, pressure is mounting on China – which is now urgently looking to secure newer trading partners outside the US.

China wants to completely shift the narrative, says Mr Dhar, “It is trying to come clean amidst increased scrutiny”.

Despite the reassurances from Beijing, Delhi should use thawing relations with its larger neighbour to kickstart a proper dialogue on its firm stance about dumping, says Mr Dhar.

“This is an issue that India must flag, like most of the Western countries have.”