At least 48 Palestinians have been killed in a series of Israeli air strikes in northern Gaza overnight, a local hospital says.

The Indonesian hospital reported that 22 children and 15 women were among the dead after a number of homes in Jabalia town and refugee camp were hit. A video shared online appeared to show at least a dozen bodies on the floor there.

The Israeli military said it was looking into the reports. It had warned residents of Jabalia and neighbouring areas to evacuate on Tuesday night after a Palestinian armed group launched rockets into Israel.

It came as the UN’s humanitarian affairs chief urged members of the UN Security Council to take action to “prevent genocide” in Gaza.

Speaking at a meeting in New York on Tuesday, Tom Fletcher accused Israel of “deliberately and unashamedly imposing inhumane conditions on civilians”.

He called on Israel to lift its 10-week blockade on Gaza and criticised the Israeli-US plan to take over the distribution of humanitarian aid in the territory.

The Israeli ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon, told the council that foreign aid was being used to help Hamas’s war effort.

Meanwhile, US Special Envoys Steve Witkoff and Adam Boehler said they would travel to Qatar for fresh negotiations on a possible ceasefire and hostage release deal.

Israel’s Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has threatened to expand its military offensive in Gaza this week unless Hamas agrees to release the 58 hostages it is still holding.

On Tuesday, a massive Israeli air strike on the European hospital’s compound in southern Gaza killed at least 28 people, according to local officials.

Israeli media reports said the target was Mohammed Sinwar, who is believed to have become the leader of Hamas in Gaza after his brother Yahya was killed by Israeli forces last October.

The Israeli military described it as “a precise strike on Hamas terrorists who were operating in a command-and-control centre” underneath the hospital.

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 52,908 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry.

Virat Kohli’s retirement from Tests has left Indian cricket beleaguered and the sporting world gasping in surprise.

Coming on the heels of captain Rohit Sharma quitting a few days earlier, it adds up to a double whammy for India who embark on a tough tour of England for a five-Test series come June without their two most experienced batters.

Like Sharma, Kohli took to Instagram, where he commands more than 270 million followers, to make his retirement public.

“As I step away from this format, it’s not easy – but it feels right…” he explained to his disconsolate fans.

Tributes for Kohli have come in a deluge since: from fellow cricketers, past and present, old and young, and also legends from other disciplines like tennis ace Novak Djokovic and football star Harry Kane, which highlights the sweep and heft of Kohli’s global appeal.

Leading India to victory in the Under-19 World Cup in 2008, Kohli was fast tracked into international cricket by the then-chairman of selectors, former India captain Dilip Vengsarkar, against the judgement of others in the cricket establishment.

“Many in the Indian cricket board felt he was too young but he was scoring heavily in domestic cricket, and the hunger to succeed was palpable in him,” recalls Vengsarkar.

An example of Kohli’s obsessive passion for the sport comes imbued with poignancy. Kohli was playing his second Ranji Trophy match for Delhi. His father passed away suddenly with his team in a crisis. After the funeral, he went back and scored a battling 90.

Vengsarkar’s approving eye earned Kohli an ODI debut in 2009. At 23, he was the youngest member of India’s 2011 ODI World Cup winning team under MS Dhoni. A few weeks later, he made his Test debut in the West Indies. Some months on, during the disastrous tour of Australia with his place under threat, Kohli made a gritty maiden century and never looked back. Within a couple of years he established himself as the pre-eminent batter of his generation.

Brash and provocative, without a benign muscle in his body, he was as volatile as potassium on water in his early years. He was unafraid to take on the most reputed opponents, often indulging in on-field fracases that sometimes earned him criticism.

Happily, this was not to become his defining identity in cricket. Prolific run-getting in dashing style across formats provided another more compelling dimension and was to take him to the pinnacle.

When his idol Sachin Tendulkar retired in 2013, Kohli, allying unbridled ambition with his abundant skills, grabbed the baton hungrily and went on to sketch one of the most stellar careers in cricket history.

He wielded the bat like a Jedi, with great skill and telling thrust to slay opponents, as it were. Coupled with his high-octane persona, his scintillating batting made him a cult hero whose very presence ensured blockbuster box-office returns everywhere he played.

Kohli always wore his passion on his sleeve. He was always demonstrative and dramatic on the field but over a period of time, misplaced angst was sublimated into a raging inner pursuit of excellence that took him to dizzying heights.

Marriage to film star Anushka Sharma made them the country’s foremost power couple, putting both under the glare of even more intense spotlight.

Metaphorically, Kohli’s outstanding exploits, especially in the first decade of his career, epitomised the emerging India of the 21st century: unabashedly, unrelentingly ambitious, discarding all past demons, willing to take on the best in the world.

His achievements across formats are monumental.

In ODIs, he is third in run aggregate behind Tendulkar and Kumar Sangakarra, but boasts the best average (57.88) among batters who have played more than 100 games. His ability to win ODI matches in the most daunting run chases is the stuff of folklore, many of his record 51 centuries coming in such pursuit.

In T20s, his run aggregate and centuries don’t put him in the top five, but he’s immortalised himself with incredible knocks, notably 82 not out in an emotion-charged, pulsating match against arch-rivals Pakistan in the 2022 World Cup and a vital 76 in the 2024 final against South Africa, which helped India win the title.

He is also the highest run scorer in the history of the Indian Premier League.

At one point, Kohli averaged 50-plus in all three formats, making him the most productive and versatile batter of his era – way ahead of contemporaries Joe Root, Kane Williamson and Steve Smith. The four were locked in a fascinating, long-running race for batting supremacy.

When it appeared he would break all batting records, Kohli’s career took an inexplicable downturn. From the start of the pandemic, the flow of runs began to ebb and centuries became a trickle. In his pomp – between 2014 and 2019 – he had been unstoppable, at one time scoring six double centuries in just 18 months.

The drought of runs hit him most adversely in Test cricket where his average, from a high of 55-plus in 2019 slumped to the current 46.75. In this period, Kohli also lost the captaincy, though his stellar standing in international cricket remained untouched.

Kohli finishes his Test career with 9,230 runs, which puts him 19th overall in aggregate, and fourth among Indians behind Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid and Sunil Gavaskar, all of whom finished with a 50-plus average and more centuries. But to judge him only on this yardstick would diminish the massive impact he has had on this format .

As captain, Kohli easily hurdles over Gavaskar, Tendulkar and Dravid. In Test cricket, winning 40 of the 68 matches he led in, making him the fourth most successful in the format. In the Indian context, this assumes Himalayan proportions.

Former Australia captain Greg Chappell says that Kohli’s energy, grit, sense of purpose and aura was “transformative” for Indian cricket. Chappell marks him out as the most influential Indian captain, ahead of even Sourav Ganguly and M S Dhoni.

Former India captain and chief coach Ravi Shastri, who collaborated with Kohli for years, gives first-hand perspective.

“Kohli made India into a fighting unit, especially when playing overseas,” says Shastri.

The lack of ICC and IPL titles according to Shastri, is misleading as an index to his captaincy ability.

“He always played to win, sought and nurtured fast bowlers to win overseas, demanded high intent and supreme fitness from all players, putting himself in the forefront, not as a backseat driver.”

For seven years when Kohli and Shastri collaborated, India were in the top three in ICC rankings in all formats almost continuously which is unprecedented.

The most cherished and significant triumph of this period came in 2018 when India beat Australia in its own backyard in a Test series for the first time ever.

Australia is where Kohli had launched himself into batting greatness, scoring 692 runs in four Tests in 2014-15. In 2018, he contributed as captain and batter to break an hitherto unassailable psychological barrier. In 2020 touring Australia, Kohli played only one match (which was lost) returning home for the birth of his child. But India, having overcome the mental barrier two years earlier, went on to win the rubber in a melodramatic see-saw series.

Australia was Kohli’s happy hunting ground and his last visit Down Under in late 2024 grabbed worldwide attention. He began with a roar, hitting a century in the first test at Perth. But his form fizzled out alarmingly and made only 190 runs in the five Tests.

How much this contributed to his decision to retire is moot. Advancing years, the dislike of being constantly under harsh scrutiny, wanting to be close to his young family and behind the scene shenanigans that abound in Indian cricket have doubtless played a part too.

Kohli ends his retirement post on Instagram enigmatically.

“I’ll always look back at my Test career with a smile. #269 signing off,” he wrote.

The greatest ambassador for the five-day format in the last decade and a half had moved into the sunset.

Svitlana says her daughter loved her school in Poland.

“Even when we moved to another area, she didn’t want to change schools,” says the 31-year-old Ukrainian mother. “She liked it so much. There was no bullying.”

Now she says the atmosphere at the school – and in Poland overall – has changed.

“Two weeks ago, she came home and said “One boy said to me today, ‘Go back to Ukraine’.” Svitlana was astonished.

She is one of dozens of Ukrainians living in Poland who have told the BBC that anti-Ukrainian sentiment has risen considerably in recent months.

Many described experiencing abuse on public transport, bullying in schools and xenophobic material online.

A polarising presidential election campaign has added to the tension, with the first round of voting taking place on Sunday.

The day after Svitlana’s daughter was told to go back to Ukraine, the abuse became even worse.

“Girls from the class above started complaining about her speaking Ukrainian. Then they pretended to fall to the ground shouting ‘Missile! Get down!’ and laughing,” Svitlana says. “She came home crying.”

A Russian missile had slammed into Svitlana’s hometown in Ukraine days before, killing scores of civilians, including children. Her daughter was traumatised.

Svitlana – not her real name did not want to be identified as she fears reprisals. She showed us screenshots of messages with school staff where she complains about her daughter’s treatment.

She said she had noticed attitudes changing towards Ukrainians in other places, too: “At work, many people have been saying Ukrainians come here and behave badly. And my Ukrainian friends say they want to go home because Polish people don’t accept us. It’s frightening to live here now.”

According to government statistics, at least 2.5 million Ukrainians live in Poland, comprising almost 7% of the total population of Poland.

When the full-scale invasion of Ukraine began in February 2022, there was an outpouring of compassion from Poles. “It was amazing. Every day people were calling, asking, ‘How can we help?'” says activist Natalia Panchenko, head of the Warsaw-based ‘Stand with Ukraine’ Foundation.

“Some of them organised humanitarian convoys or brought refugees here. They gave their houses, food, everything they have – and their hearts, too.”

Three years later, Natalia says she believes the majority of Poles still support Ukraine. But some don’t – and her organisation has noticed an upsurge of anti-Ukrainian online abuse that began several months ago.

“Then it started to come to real life,” she says. “Recently, we have more and more of these kinds of situations… xenophobic [abuse] of people working in shops or hotels just because they speak with a Ukrainian accent.”

Natalia says that many Ukrainian refugees are traumatised. “These groups of women and children are in Poland because of the war, very often their relatives are on the front line, in captivity or dead… and this is the group of people being targeted.”

Research suggests that Poland’s public opinion of Ukrainians is indeed worsening. According to a March 2025 poll by the respected CBOS Centre, just 50% of Poles are in favour of accepting Ukrainian refugees, a fall of seven percentage points in four months. Two years ago, the figure was 81%.

Around a million Ukrainians are officially registered as having arrived after the start of the full-scale invasion. Poland spends 4.2% of its GDP on Ukrainian refugees.

Ukraine has become a hot-button political issue in Poland’s crucial presidential election campaign.

Far-right populist Slawomir Mentzen, currently polling third, is virulently anti-Ukrainian and supports an “agreement” with Russia’s Vladimir Putin.

In second place is conservative Karol Nawrocki, who opposes EU and Nato membership for Ukraine and financial assistance for refugees, but supports the war effort.

The most pro-Ukraine candidate is front-runner Rafal Trzaskowski from Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s coalition, although even he has promised a reduction in social welfare for Ukrainians.

Trzaskowski has refrained from espousing his pro-Ukrainian credentials in order to attract the centrist vote in the elections, says political analyst Marcin Zaborowski.

“He’s responding to the change in public attitudes. The initial enthusiasm for supporting war victims is disappearing, negative sentiments are taking over and it’s not an entirely comfortable issue for him.”

Another far-right candidate, Grzegorz Braun, is under investigation by police for tearing down a Ukrainian flag from a city hall building during an election rally in April. Braun, who is polling at just 3%, regularly fulminates against what he calls the “Ukrainisation of Poland”.

Last week, the Polish government warned of an “unprecedented attempt” by Russia to interfere in the Polish elections by spreading “false information among Polish citizens online”. Moscow denies all allegations of election interference.

Michal Marek, who runs an NGO that monitors disinformation and propaganda in Poland, offers some examples of the anti-Ukraine material being circulated on social media.

“The main narratives are that Ukrainians are stealing money from the Polish budget, that Ukrainians do not respect us, that they want to rob and kill us and are responsible for the war,” he says.

“This information starts in Russian-speaking Telegram channels, and, after that, we see the same photos and the same text just translated by Google Translate. And they are pushing [the material] into the Polish infosphere.”

Mr Marek links such disinformation directly with the increase in anti-Ukraine sentiment in Poland, and says an increasing number of Poles are becoming influenced by propaganda.

“But we will only see the effect after the election – what percentage of Poles want to vote for openly pro-Russian candidates.”

A Los Angeles judge has reduced the sentence of Erik and Lyle Menendez, making them eligible for parole more than 30 years after they killed their parents in a Beverly Hills mansion.

Judge Michael Jesic resentenced the brothers on Tuesday, after hearing evidence from relatives and prison staff about their attempts to make amends while behind bars.

The district attorney had argued that they were not rehabilitated, but now the state parole board could order the brothers’ release as early as next month.

The brothers have long argued that they killed Kitty and Jose Menendez out of self-defence after years of sexual abuse, in a high-profile case that prompted a Netflix show which renewed interest in the story.

After hearing that they had been resentenced to 50 years to life with the possibility of parole, the brothers delivered an emotional statement to the court.

They went through grim details of the brutal killings and their decision to reload their shotguns and keep shooting their parents at point-blank range in the living room of their home. The siblings were aged 18 and 21 at the time.

“I had to stop being selfish and immature to really understand what my parents went though in those last moments,” Erik Menendez, 54, told the court.

He described the “shock, confusion and betrayal” they must have felt seeing their sons holding guns and opening fire.

• When might the Menendez brothers be released?

Both apologised for their actions and talked about their hopes of working with sex abuse victims and helping those incarcerated if they were given a second chance outside prison.

The voice of Lyle Menendez, 57, cracked as he talked about the impact of his “unfathomable” actions on their relatives.

“I lied to you and forced you into a spotlight of public humiliation,” he said to his family.

Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman said the decision to resentence the pair was “monumental” and carried “significant implications for the families involved”.

Much of the hearing centred on what the brothers have been doing in prison for the last 30 years.

Family members and those who worked with them in prison detailed the educational courses they completed and programmes they created to improve the lives of inmates, including a hospice initiative for the elderly and sick.

Judge Jesic called the brothers’ work while in prison “remarkable”, but noted that their 1996 sentences to life without parole were justified at the time.

He said that under the guidelines, they were eligible for resentencing, issuing his new sentence of 50 years to life. The brothers have been held in custody since 1990.

As the judge continued reading, the brothers smiled and waved to their attorneys and family members who crowded into the courtroom. Family members embraced with smiles.

“Today is a great day,” defence lawyer Mark Geragos told reporters outside court. He said they were “one huge step closer to bringing the boys home”.

Anamaria Baralt, the brothers’ cousin who testified inside court earlier in the day, said their family was elated.

“It is a difficult process,” she said of the parole hearing that awaits the brothers, but noted they will “eagerly step through those doors if it means we can have them home”.

Inside court earlier, relatives pleaded with the judge to allow the siblings’ release.

Ms Baralt, who said she has been close with them since they were children, told the judge they deserved a “second chance at life”.

“It’s been a nightmare,” she said. “I am desperate for this process to be over.”

Ms Baralt told the court she speaks with the brothers frequently and testified that they had taken “ownership of their actions”.

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She said Lyle Menendez had acknowledged to her he had asked a witness to lie when testifying at their previous trial.

But she added: “They are very different men from the boys they were.”

The judge also heard from a retired Florida judge – who said he has never testified on behalf of any criminal defendant – and Anerae “X-Raided” Brown, a rapper who was in prison with both brothers and credits their help for his release.

The district attorney’s office, which fiercely opposes the brothers being released, questioned each witness about Erik and Lyle Menendez’s “litany of lies” they have clung to since the murders.

Prosecutors said they lied to law enforcement immediately after the crimes, lied to family members about their guilt and gave false evidence at their trials.

Prosecutors have said the brothers have continued to “make excuses” for their conduct instead of taking full responsibility.

“There’s no doubt they’ve done all these positive things in prison,” Deputy District Attorney Habib Balian said in his closing argument.

But, he added, when reversing a jury’s unanimous verdict in such a brutal murder case, it’s important to “make certain they are truly rehabilitated”.

The case was thrust back into the spotlight after a new Netflix drama, Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story, as well as the release of docudrama, The Menendez Brothers.

It introduced the case to a new generation and garnered attention from celebrities – including Kim Kardashian and Rosie O’Donnell – who called for the brothers to be released. The previous district attorney, George Gascón, backed their resentencing bid, allowing the effort to go before a judge.

The next step for the brothers will be the California parole board.

The board has already been vetting the siblings after a request by Governor Gavin Newsom. The governor is separately weighing a request from the brothers for clemency, which could take the form of a reduced sentence or a pardon – if approved.

A risk assessment has been completed on the brothers as part of their request for clemency. The district attorney said it indicated a “moderate risk of violence”. However, the full report has not been released.

Newsom asked the parole board to conduct a risk assessment, which has already been drafted, that examines whether they pose a risk to the general public if released.

The state’s parole board is set to conduct a separate hearing on 13 June for the brothers.

It’s unclear what could come at the hearing, or if there might be multiple hearings vetting their potential release.

In the latest India-Pakistan stand-off, there were no ultimatums, no red buttons.

Yet the cycle of military retaliation, veiled signals and swift international mediation quietly evoked the region’s most dangerous shadow. The crisis didn’t spiral towards nuclear war, but it was a reminder of how quickly tensions here can summon that spectre.

Even scientists have modelled how easily things could unravel. A 2019 study by a global team of scientists opened with a nightmare scenario where a terrorist attack on India’s parliament in 2025 triggers a nuclear exchange with Pakistan.

Six years later, a real-world stand-off – though contained by a US-brokered ceasefire on Saturday – stoked fears of a full-blown conflict. It also revived uneasy memories of how fragile stability in the region can be.

As the crisis escalated, Pakistan sent “dual signals” – retaliating militarily while announcing a National Command Authority (NCA) meeting, a calculated reminder of its nuclear capability. The NCA oversees control and potential use of the country’s nuclear arsenal. Whether this move was symbolic, strategic or a genuine alert, we may never know. It also came just as US Secretary of State Marco Rubio reportedly stepped in to defuse the spiral.

President Trump said the US didn’t just broker a ceasefire – it averted a “nuclear conflict”. On Monday, in an address to the nation, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said: “[There] is no tolerance for nuclear blackmail; India will not be intimidated by nuclear threats.

“Any terrorist safe haven operating under this pretext will face precise and decisive strikes,” Modi added.

India and Pakistan each possess about 170 nuclear weapons, according to the think-tank Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (Sipri). As of January 2024, Sipri estimated there were 12,121 nuclear warheads worldwide. Of these, about 9,585 were held in military stockpiles, with 3,904 actively deployed – 60 more than the previous year. The US and Russia together account for more than 8,000 nuclear weapons.

The bulk of both India’s and Pakistan’s deployed arsenals lies in their land-based missile forces, though both are developing nuclear triads capable of delivering warheads by land, air and sea, according to Christopher Clary, a security affairs expert at the University at Albany in the US.

“India likely has a larger air leg (aircraft capable of delivering nuclear weapons) than Pakistan. While we know the least of Pakistan’s naval leg, it is reasonable to assess that India’s naval leg is more advanced and more capable than Pakistan’s sea-based nuclear force,” he told the BBC.

One reason, Mr Clary said, is that Pakistan has invested nowhere near the “time or money” that India has in building a nuclear-powered submarine, giving India a “clear qualitative” edge in naval nuclear capability.

Since testing nuclear weapons in 1998, Pakistan has never formally declared an official nuclear doctrine.

India, by contrast, adopted a no-first-use policy following its own 1998 tests. But this stance has shown signs of softening. In 2003, India reserved the right to use nuclear weapons in response to chemical or biological attacks – effectively allowing for first use under certain conditions.

Further ambiguity emerged in 2016, when then–defence minister Manohar Parrikar suggested India shouldn’t feel “bound” by the policy, raising questions about its long-term credibility. (Parrikar clarified that this was his own opinion.)

The absence of a formal doctrine doesn’t mean Pakistan lacks one – official statements, interviews and nuclear developments offer clear clues to its operational posture, according to Sadia Tasleem of Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Pakistan’s nuclear threshold remains vague, but in 2001, Khalid Kidwai – then head of the Strategic Plans Division of the NCA – outlined four red lines: major territorial loss, destruction of key military assets, economic strangulation or political destabilisation.

In 2002, then-president Pervez Musharraf clarified that “nuclear weapons are aimed solely at India”, and would only be used if “the very existence of Pakistan as a state” was at stake.

In his memoir, former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo wrote that he was jolted awake at night to speak with an unnamed “Indian counterpart” who feared Pakistan was preparing to use nuclear weapons during the 2019 stand-off with India.

Around the same time, Pakistani media quoted a senior official issuing a stark warning to India: “I hope you know what the [National Command Authority] means and what it constitutes. I said that we will surprise you. Wait for that surprise… You have chosen a path of war without knowing the consequences for the peace and security of the region.”

During the 1999 Kargil War, Pakistan’s then-foreign secretary Shamshad Ahmed warned that the country would not “hesitate to use any weapon” to defend its territory. Years later, US official Bruce Riedel revealed that intelligence indicated Pakistan was preparing its nuclear arsenal for possible deployment.

But there is scepticism on both sides over such claims.

Former Indian high commissioner to Pakistan Ajay Bisaria wrote in his memoir that Pompeo overstated both the risk of nuclear escalation and the US role in calming the conflict in 2019. And during Kargil, Pakistan “knew the Indian Air Force wouldn’t cross into its territory” – so there was no real trigger for even an implicit nuclear threat, insist Pakistani analysts.

“Strategic signalling reminds the world that any conflict can spiral – and with India and Pakistan, the stakes are higher due to the nuclear overhang. But that doesn’t mean either side is actively threatening nuclear use,” Ejaz Haider, a Lahore-based defence analyst, told the BBC.

But nuclear escalation can happen by accident too. “This could happen by human error, hackers, terrorists, computer failures, bad data from satellites and unstable leaders,” Prof Alan Robock of Rutgers University, lead author of the landmark 2019 paper by a global team of scientists, told the BBC.

In March 2022, India accidentally fired a nuclear-capable cruise missile which travelled 124km (77 miles) into Pakistani territory before crashing, reportedly damaging civilian property. Pakistan said India failed to use the military hotline or issue a public statement for two days. Had this occurred during heightened tensions, the incident could have spiralled into serious conflict, experts say. (Months later, India’s government sacked three air force officers for the “accidental firing of a missile”.)

Yet, the danger of nuclear war remains “relatively small” between India and Pakistan, according to Mr Clary.

“So long as there is not major ground combat along the border, the dangers of nuclear use remain relatively small and manageable,” he said.

“In ground combat, the ‘use it or lose it’ problem is propelled by the possibility that your ground positions will be overrun by the enemy.” (‘Use it or lose it‘ refers to the pressure a nuclear-armed country may feel to launch its weapons before they are destroyed in a first strike by an adversary.)

Sumit Ganguly, a senior fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution, believes that “neither India nor Pakistan wants to be labelled as the first violator of the post-Hiroshima nuclear taboo”.

“Furthermore, any side that resorts to the use of nuclear weapons would face substantial retaliation and suffer unacceptable casualties,” Mr Ganguly told the BBC.

At the same time, both India and Pakistan appear to be beefing up their nuclear arsenal.

With new delivery systems in development, four plutonium reactors and expanding uranium enrichment, Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal could reach around 200 warheads by the late 2020s, according to The Nuclear Notebook, researched by the Federation of American Scientists’ Nuclear Information Project.

And as of early 2023, India was estimated to have about 680kg of weapons-grade plutonium – enough for roughly 130-210 nuclear warheads, according to the International Panel on Fissile Materials.

Despite repeated crises and close calls, both sides have so far managed to avoid a catastrophic slide into nuclear conflict. “The deterrent is still holding. All Pakistanis did was to respond to conventional strikes with counter-conventional strikes of their own,” writes Umer Farooq, an Islamabad-based analyst.

Yet, the presence of nuclear weapons injects a constant undercurrent of risk – one that can never be entirely ruled out, no matter how experienced the leadership or how restrained the intentions.

“When nuclear weapons can be involved, there is always an unacceptable level of danger,”John Erath, senior policy director at the non-profit Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation, told the BBC.

“The Indian and Pakistani governments have navigated these situations in the past, so the risk is small. But with nuclear weapons, even a small risk is too large.”

Former world champion cyclist Rohan Dennis has been given a two-year suspended sentence over a car incident in Australia which killed his wife, fellow Olympian Melissa Hoskins.

Dennis pleaded guilty to one aggravated count of creating the likelihood of harm, after Hoskins was struck by the car he was driving during a fight outside the couple’s Adelaide home in 2023.

A judge said Dennis had disregarded his wife’s safety, but was not criminally responsible for her death.

Hoskins’ parents spoke outside the court after sentencing, saying they were “glad” the case was over and they hoped the family could “move on”.

The court had previously heard that Dennis and Hoskins were arguing about kitchen renovations shortly before the incident occurred, and Hoskins had held on to the car her husband was driving as he tried to leave.

While sentencing Dennis, Judge Ian Press said calling the incident tragic “really does not do justice to the grief, the anguish and the turmoil those events have brought into the lives of those who knew and loved your wife”.

He said he understood that Dennis had tried to “de-escalate the argument” by driving off, but said it did not excuse his actions.

“It was your obligation to stop the vehicle when driving that vehicle became dangerous to her physical wellbeing,” he said, according to a report by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC).

“That you did not stop because you wanted to leave, is a very poor reason for not doing so.”

Hoskins was taken to hospital after being struck but later died of her injuries.

Dennis was initially charged with dangerous driving causing death and driving without due care and pleaded not guilty, but he later admitted to a single, lesser charge.

Dennis’ lawyer had argued that he had no intention of harming his wife and either did not know or was “reckless to the fact” that Hoskins was holding onto the car.

She told an earlier hearing that despite his “stoic” front, Dennis felt a “deep, deep grief”.

On Wednesday, Judge Press emphasised that Dennis was not criminally responsible for causing Hoskins’ death, and accepted he was remorseful.

“I accept you have a sense of responsibility for all that occurred. I accept you have anguished over what could have been different if you had acted in some other way,” Judge Press said.

In victim impact statements read to the court last month, Hoskins’ mother said that while she accepted Dennis wouldn’t have intentionally hurt her daughter, his temper was his “downfall” and “needs to be addressed”.

Speaking outside court, Peter and Amanda Hoskins said they missed their daughter “terribly”.

“She was someone really special,” Mr Hoskins said.

He said the family was yet to receive an apology from Dennis, but expected it “will come with time”.

“It’s now time for us to move on, which would be Melissa’s expectations of us,” Mr Hoskins said, adding it was important for the couple to have a “well-mannered relationship” with Dennis going forward.

“There are two young children caught up in this tragedy… Clearly, we want to continue to be an integral part of [the] children’s lives and their future.”

Hoskins was a world champion cyclist in the Australian team pursuit in 2015, and a two-time Olympian. Her death triggered a wave of tributes from around the world.

She and Dennis married in 2018.

Dennis retired at the end of the 2023 season after a cycling career in which he won a silver medal team pursuit at the London 2012 Olympics and a road time trial bronze at Tokyo 2020. He also won a gold medal at the Commonwealth Games in 2022.

Some families of those killed in a Jeju Air plane crash last December have filed a criminal complaint against 15 people, including South Korea’s transport minister and the airline’s CEO, for professional negligence.

The 72 bereaved relatives are calling for a more thorough investigation into the crash, which killed 179 of the 181 people on board – making it the deadliest plane crash on South Korean soil.

The crash was “not a simple accident”, they allege, but a “major civic disaster caused by negligent management of preventable risks”.

Nearly five months on, authorities are still studying what may have caused the plane to crash-land at Muan International Airport and then burst into flames.

The police had already opened a criminal investigation before this latest complaint, and barred Jeju Air CEO Kim E-bae from leaving the country, but no one has been indicted over the incident.

One of the relatives, Kim Da-hye, denounced the “lack of progress” in investigations.

“We are filled with deep anger and despair. Having taken this extraordinary measure of filing a criminal complaint, we will not give up and will continue to pursue the truth,” Mr Kim said in a statement to the media.

Among the 15 people named in the complaint were government officials, airline officials and airport staff responsible for construction, supervision, facility management and bird control.

The complaint filed on Tuesday raises questions around the circumstances of the crash, including whether air traffic control responded appropriately and whether the reinforcement of a mound at the end of the runway violated regulations.

The aircraft, a Boeing 737-800, took off from the Thai capital of Bangkok on the morning of 29 December, and was flying to Muan in South Korea.

Five minutes after the pilots made contact with Muan International Airport, they reported striking a bird and declared a mayday signal.

The pilots then tried to land from the opposite direction, during which the aircraft belly-landed without its landing gear deployed. It later overran the runway, slammed into a concrete structure and exploded.

Earlier this year, investigators said they found bird feathers in both engines of the jet, but did not conclude the extent to which the bird strike was a contributing factor.

Since the incident, some bereaved families have also been targeted by a torrent of conspiracies and malicious jokes online.

These included suggestions that families were “thrilled” to receive compensation from authorities, or that they were “fake victims”. As of March this year, eight people have been apprehended for making such derogatory and defamatory online posts.

Airbnb says users will now be able to book luxury services like personal trainers, massages and chefs on its redesigned app as it continues to expand beyond its main short-term rentals business.

“People choose hotels for their services. People choose Airbnbs for the space… now, we’re giving you the best of both worlds”, the company’s chief executive Brian Chesky said in a statement.

It comes just weeks after the firm signalled bookings may slow in the US as President Trump’s unpredictable trade policies hit consumer sentiment.

Despite hosting more than two billion guests since its launch in 2008, Airbnb has also faced challenges in recent years with some cities moving to ban short lets.

Airbnb’s new services will initially be available in 260 cities, with the company saying they will cost from below $50 (£37.57).

The luxury offerings, which include spa treatments, photographers and makeup artists, can also be booked by people who are not staying in Airbnbs.

The company’s revamped app also includes an updated experiences tab, allowing users to book bespoke tours and activities. That service was first launched in 2016.

The new hotel-like features reflect the changing needs of tourists, Gary Bowerman, director of travel marketing firm Check-in Asia told the BBC.

“Travellers are now thinking much more about how to customise the trip for themselves, not just the actual functional parts of how they get there and where they stay.”

Another feature of the new app is an originals tab, which offers exclusive experiences across the world.

This includes playing beach volleyball in Rio de Janeiro with Olympian Carol Solberg or spending a Sunday with National Football League superstar Patrick Mahomes.

Bespoke options like this are part of a wider trend as tourists seek out off-the-beaten path experiences, said luxury travel consultant Anastasia Oriordan.

“There are so many people that have travelled and done so many things, that the benchmark or the goalpost for unique experiences is constantly moving.”

Former Uruguayan President José Mujica, known as “Pepe”, has died at the age of 89.

The ex-guerrilla who governed Uruguay from 2010 to 2015 was known as the world’s “poorest president” because of his modest lifestyle.

Current President Yamandú Orsi announced his predecessor’s death on X, writing: “thank you for everything you gave us and for your deep love for your people.”

The politician’s cause of death is not known but he had been suffering from oesophageal cancer.

Because of the simple way he lived as president, his criticism of consumerism and the social reforms he promoted – which, among other things, meant Uruguay became the first country to legalise the recreational use of marijuana – Mujica became a well-known political figure in Latin America and beyond.

His global popularity is unusual for a president of Uruguay, a country with just 3.4 million inhabitants where his legacy has also generated some controversy.

In fact, even though many tended to see Mujica as someone outside the political class, that was not the case.

He said his passion for politics, as well as for books and working the land, was passed on to him by his mother, who raised him in a middle-class home in Montevideo, the capital city.

As a young man, Mujica was a member of the National Party, one of Uruguay’s traditional political forces, which later became the centre-right opposition to his government.

In the 1960s, he helped set up the Tupamaros National Liberation Movement (MLN-T), a leftist urban guerrilla group that carried out assaults, kidnappings and executions, although he always maintained that he did not commit any murder.

Influenced by the Cuban revolution and international socialism, the MLN-T launched a campaign of clandestine resistance against the Uruguayan government, which at the time was constitutional and democratic, although the left accused it of being increasingly authoritarian.

During this period, Mujica was captured four times. On one of those occasions, in 1970, he was shot six times and nearly died.

He escaped from prison twice, on one occasion through a tunnel with 105 other MLN-T prisoners, in one of the largest escapes in Uruguayan prison history.

When the Uruguayan military staged a coup in 1973, they included him in a group of “nine hostages” who they threatened to kill if the guerrillas continued their attacks.

During the more than 14 years he spent in prison during the 1970s and 1980s, he was tortured and spent most of that time in harsh conditions and isolation, until he was freed in 1985 when Uruguay returned to democracy.

He used to say that during his time in prison, he experienced madness first hand, suffering from delusions and even talking to ants.

The day he was freed was his happiest memory, he says: “Becoming president was insignificant compared to that.”

A few years after his release, he served as a lawmaker, both in the Chamber of Representatives and in the Senate, the country’s lower and upper houses respectively.

In 2005, he became minister in the first government of the Frente Amplio, the Uruguayan leftist coalition, before becoming Uruguay’s president in 2010.

He was 74 years old at the time, and, to the rest of the world, still unknown.

His election marked an important moment for the Latin American left, which was already strong on the continent at that time. Mujica became leader alongside other left-wing presidents such as Luis Inácio Lula da Silva in Brazil and Hugo Chávez in Venezuela.

However, Mujica governed in his own way, demonstrating pragmatism and audacity on several occasions, political commentators say.

During his administration, amid a fairly favourable international context, the Uruguayan economy grew at an average annual rate of 5.4%, poverty was reduced, and unemployment remained low.

Uruguay also drew global attention for the social laws passed by parliament during those years, such as the legalisation of abortion, the recognition of same-sex marriage, and state regulation of the marijuana market.

While in office, Mujica rejected moving into the presidential residence (a mansion), as heads of state around the world usually do.

Instead, he remained with his wife – politician and former guerrilla Lucía Topolansky – in their modest home on the outskirts of Montevideo, with no domestic help and little security.

This combined with the fact that he always dressed casually, that he was often seen driving his light blue 1987 Volkswagen Beetle and gave away a large portion of his salary, led some media outlets to call him “the world’s poorest president”.

But Mujica always rejected that title: “They say I’m the poorest president. No, I’m not,” he told me in a 2012 interview at his home. “Poor are those who want more […] because they’re in an endless race.”

Despite Mujica preaching austerity, his government did significantly increase public spending, widening the fiscal deficit and leading his opponents to accuse him of waste.

Mujica was also criticised for failing to reverse the growing problems in Uruguayan education, despite having promised that education would be a top priority for his administration.

However, unlike other leaders in the region, he was never accused of corruption or of undermining his country’s democracy.

By the end of his administration, Mujica had a high domestic popularity rating (close to 70%) and was elected senator, but also spent part of his time travelling the world after he stepped down as president.

“So what it is that catches the world’s attention? That I live with very little, a simple house, that I drive around in an old car? Then this world is crazy because it’s surprised by [what is] normal,” he reflected before leaving office.

Mujica retired from politics in 2020 though he remained a central figure in Uruguay.

His political heir, Yamandú Orsi, was elected president of Uruguay in November 2024 and his group within the Frente Amplio obtained the largest number of parliamentary seats since the country’s return to democracy.

Last year, Mujica announced he had cancer and references to his age and the inexorable proximity of death became more frequent – but he always accepted the final outcome as something natural, without drama.

In the last interview he gave the BBC in November last year, he said: “One knows that death is inevitable. And perhaps it’s like the salt of life.”

Actress and singer Halle Bailey has been granted a restraining order against rapper and YouTube star DDG, her former boyfriend and the father of their one-year-old son.

The Little Mermaid star alleges he was repeatedly violent with her and made her fear for herself and their child.

On Tuesday, a Los Angeles judge ordered DDG, whose full name is Darryl Dwayne Granberry Jr, to stay away from Bailey and their son until a hearing on 6 June.

Bailey, 25, alleged there had been “multiple acts of physical violence” from Granberry since their split in October. BBC News has asked representatives for Granberry for comment.

In documents requesting the order, reported by the Associated Press, Bailey said: “Throughout our relationship, Darryl has been and continues to be physically, verbally, emotionally, and financially abusive towards me.

“I am seeking orders to protect myself and our son Halo from his ongoing abuse.”

Bailey and Granberry, 27, were in a relationship from 2022 until last year.

In the documents, the actress claims “things got physical between us” after Granberry repeatedly insulted her as she strapped the baby into a seat in his car in January.

“We fought each other, wrestling and tussling,” she said. “At one point, Darryl was pulling my hair. He then slammed my face on the steering wheel, causing my tooth to get chipped. I then stopped fighting back as I was in a lot of pain.”

Bailey included photos of her tooth and bruises on her arms in her filing, which have since been published by some US media outlets.

Two months after the alleged altercation, Bailey alleges that Granberry entered her house when she wasn’t home and texted her a photo of her bed along with a threatening message suggesting she was having sex with other men.

A few days later, she claimed, Granberry berated her when she did not want to send their unwell baby on a visit with him, then smashed the Ring doorbell camera on her porch when he realised it was recording their confrontation.

She further alleged that, when she called a relative for help, he took her phone and slammed a car door on her as she was holding the baby. Bailey filed a police report over the incident.

As part of the restraining order, Granberry was also instructed not to possess any weapons. The judge can extend the order for up to five years at the 6 June hearing.

Bailey also requested that Granberry be ordered to stop using his social media platforms to continue “bad mouthing me to his several millions of fans”.

“He claims I am withholding our son and that I am with other men. As a result, I then receive threats and hate on social media,” she said in the documents.

Bailey shot to fame as part of Chloe x Halle, a pop duo with her sister, and later released music as a solo artist. She has been nominated for five Grammy Awards.

As an actress, she appeared in sitcom Grown-ish from 2018 to 2022. Her biggest role to date, however, was playing the titular character in Disney’s 2023 live-action remake of The Little Mermaid.

DDG rose to fame in the mid-2010s by posting videos on YouTube, and signed a record deal in 2018. He has released four studio albums.

President Cyril Ramaphosa has called a group of 59 white South Africans who have moved to the US to resettle “cowards”, saying “they’ll be back soon”.

The group of Afrikaners arrived in the US on Monday after President Donald Trump granted them refugee status, saying they faced racial discrimination.

But Ramaphosa said those who wanted to leave were not happy with efforts to address the inequities of the apartheid past, terming their relocation a “sad moment for them”.

“As South Africans, we are resilient. We don’t run away from our problems. We must stay here and solve our problems. When you run away you are a coward, and that’s a real cowardly act,” he added.

Trump and his close ally, South Africa-born Elon Musk, have said there was a “genocide” of white farmers in South Africa – a claim that has been widely discredited.

The US has also accused the South African government of seizing land from white farmers without paying compensation.

More than 30 years after the end of decades of rule by South Africa’s white minority, black farmers own only a small fraction of the country’s best farmland, with the majority still in white hands, leading to anger over the slow pace of change.

In January President Ramaphosa signed a controversial law allowing the government to seize privately owned land without compensation in certain circumstances, when it is deemed “equitable and in the public interest”.

But the government says no land has yet been seized under the act.

• Racially charged row between Musk and South Africa over Starlink
• What’s really driving Trump’s fury with South Africa?

Trump has offered to resettle the white Afrikaners, descendants of mostly Dutch settlers, saying they were fleeing a “terrible situation” in South Africa.

Speaking on Monday at an agricultural exhibition in the Free State province, Ramaphosa said the Afrikaners were moving to the US because they were not “favourably disposed” to efforts aimed at addressing the country’s challenges.

“If you look at all national groups in our country, black and white, they’ve stayed in this country because it’s our country and we must not run away from our problems. We must stay here and solve our problems,” Ramaphosa said.

“I can bet you that they will be back soon because there is no country like South Africa,” he added.

His “coward” remark angered some social media users, who condemned it as an insult to aggrieved white South Africans.

The group of Afrikaners were welcomed by top US officials who claimed they had been “living under a shadow of violence and terror” in South Africa.

“Welcome to the land of the free,” Deputy Secretary of State Chris Landau said as he received the South Africans who landed at Dulles airport near Washington DC on Monday.

Some held young children and waved small American flags in the arrival area adorned with red, white and blue balloons on the walls.

Earlier on Monday, President Ramaphosa told an Africa CEO forum in Abidjan, Ivory Coast, that he had recently told Trump during a phone call the US assessment of the situation was “not true”.

“We’re the only country on the continent where the colonisers came to stay and we have never driven them out of our country,” he added, dismissing claims Afrikaners were being persecuted.

Ramaphosa said dozens of white South Africans who arrived in the US on Monday “don’t fit the bill” for refugees.

According to the US embassy in South Africa, to be considered eligible for the refugee resettlement scheme, someone must be:

• Of South African nationality
• Afrikaner or from a racial minority
• Able to cite an incident of past persecution or fear of persecution in the future.

The South African leader said he was due to meet his US counterpart soon regarding the issue.

Trump has threatened to boycott the forthcoming G20 summit in South Africa unless the “situation is taken care of”.

• Almost 70,000 South Africans interested in US asylum
• Is it checkmate for South Africa after Trump threats?
• US cuts send South Africa’s HIV treatment ‘off a cliff’

The prime minister of Peru, Gustavo Adrianzén, has resigned hours before he was due to face a no-confidence vote in Congress.

Members of Peru’s Congress had called for the no-confidence vote after the recent kidnap and killing of 13 mine workers, which shocked the country.

Adrianzén’s resignation is another blow to the embattled president, Dina Boluarte, who has seen her approval ratings plummet as crime rates in the country have soared.

The resignation of the prime minister – the third to serve under Boluarte – forces the president to replace her entire cabinet, adding to Peru’s political upheaval.

Under Peru’s constitution, all ministers have to step down if the prime minister quits.

While the president can rename the same people to the posts they resigned from, she can only do so once a new prime minister is in place.

The collapse of the cabinet comes at an already rocky time in Peruvian politics.

Shortly before Prime Minister Adrianzén announced his resignation, Boluarte had reshuffled her existing cabinet, announcing new ministers of finance, interior, and transport.

All three will now have to step down, just hours after being sworn in by the president.

The already low approval rating of President Boluarte – who was sworn in when the previous president, Pedro Castillo, was impeached – have fallen further as Peruvians grow increasingly impatient at what they say is her failure to tackle crime.

In recent months, hundreds of people have taken to the streets in protest at the growing problem of extortion, as gangs increasingly demand payments even from the smallest businesses, including transport workers.

Dressed in white, they demanded “an immediate answer to combat extortion and targeted killings”.

In the latest India-Pakistan stand-off, there were no ultimatums, no red buttons.

Yet the cycle of military retaliation, veiled signals and swift international mediation quietly evoked the region’s most dangerous shadow. The crisis didn’t spiral towards nuclear war, but it was a reminder of how quickly tensions here can summon that spectre.

Even scientists have modelled how easily things could unravel. A 2019 study by a global team of scientists opened with a nightmare scenario where a terrorist attack on India’s parliament in 2025 triggers a nuclear exchange with Pakistan.

Six years later, a real-world stand-off – though contained by a US-brokered ceasefire on Saturday – stoked fears of a full-blown conflict. It also revived uneasy memories of how fragile stability in the region can be.

As the crisis escalated, Pakistan sent “dual signals” – retaliating militarily while announcing a National Command Authority (NCA) meeting, a calculated reminder of its nuclear capability. The NCA oversees control and potential use of the country’s nuclear arsenal. Whether this move was symbolic, strategic or a genuine alert, we may never know. It also came just as US Secretary of State Marco Rubio reportedly stepped in to defuse the spiral.

President Trump said the US didn’t just broker a ceasefire – it averted a “nuclear conflict”. On Monday, in an address to the nation, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said: “[There] is no tolerance for nuclear blackmail; India will not be intimidated by nuclear threats.

“Any terrorist safe haven operating under this pretext will face precise and decisive strikes,” Modi added.

India and Pakistan each possess about 170 nuclear weapons, according to the think-tank Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (Sipri). As of January 2024, Sipri estimated there were 12,121 nuclear warheads worldwide. Of these, about 9,585 were held in military stockpiles, with 3,904 actively deployed – 60 more than the previous year. The US and Russia together account for more than 8,000 nuclear weapons.

The bulk of both India’s and Pakistan’s deployed arsenals lies in their land-based missile forces, though both are developing nuclear triads capable of delivering warheads by land, air and sea, according to Christopher Clary, a security affairs expert at the University at Albany in the US.

“India likely has a larger air leg (aircraft capable of delivering nuclear weapons) than Pakistan. While we know the least of Pakistan’s naval leg, it is reasonable to assess that India’s naval leg is more advanced and more capable than Pakistan’s sea-based nuclear force,” he told the BBC.

One reason, Mr Clary said, is that Pakistan has invested nowhere near the “time or money” that India has in building a nuclear-powered submarine, giving India a “clear qualitative” edge in naval nuclear capability.

Since testing nuclear weapons in 1998, Pakistan has never formally declared an official nuclear doctrine.

India, by contrast, adopted a no-first-use policy following its own 1998 tests. But this stance has shown signs of softening. In 2003, India reserved the right to use nuclear weapons in response to chemical or biological attacks – effectively allowing for first use under certain conditions.

Further ambiguity emerged in 2016, when then–defence minister Manohar Parrikar suggested India shouldn’t feel “bound” by the policy, raising questions about its long-term credibility. (Parrikar clarified that this was his own opinion.)

The absence of a formal doctrine doesn’t mean Pakistan lacks one – official statements, interviews and nuclear developments offer clear clues to its operational posture, according to Sadia Tasleem of Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Pakistan’s nuclear threshold remains vague, but in 2001, Khalid Kidwai – then head of the Strategic Plans Division of the NCA – outlined four red lines: major territorial loss, destruction of key military assets, economic strangulation or political destabilisation.

In 2002, then-president Pervez Musharraf clarified that “nuclear weapons are aimed solely at India”, and would only be used if “the very existence of Pakistan as a state” was at stake.

In his memoir, former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo wrote that he was jolted awake at night to speak with an unnamed “Indian counterpart” who feared Pakistan was preparing to use nuclear weapons during the 2019 stand-off with India.

Around the same time, Pakistani media quoted a senior official issuing a stark warning to India: “I hope you know what the [National Command Authority] means and what it constitutes. I said that we will surprise you. Wait for that surprise… You have chosen a path of war without knowing the consequences for the peace and security of the region.”

During the 1999 Kargil War, Pakistan’s then-foreign secretary Shamshad Ahmed warned that the country would not “hesitate to use any weapon” to defend its territory. Years later, US official Bruce Riedel revealed that intelligence indicated Pakistan was preparing its nuclear arsenal for possible deployment.

But there is scepticism on both sides over such claims.

Former Indian high commissioner to Pakistan Ajay Bisaria wrote in his memoir that Pompeo overstated both the risk of nuclear escalation and the US role in calming the conflict in 2019. And during Kargil, Pakistan “knew the Indian Air Force wouldn’t cross into its territory” – so there was no real trigger for even an implicit nuclear threat, insist Pakistani analysts.

“Strategic signalling reminds the world that any conflict can spiral – and with India and Pakistan, the stakes are higher due to the nuclear overhang. But that doesn’t mean either side is actively threatening nuclear use,” Ejaz Haider, a Lahore-based defence analyst, told the BBC.

But nuclear escalation can happen by accident too. “This could happen by human error, hackers, terrorists, computer failures, bad data from satellites and unstable leaders,” Prof Alan Robock of Rutgers University, lead author of the landmark 2019 paper by a global team of scientists, told the BBC.

In March 2022, India accidentally fired a nuclear-capable cruise missile which travelled 124km (77 miles) into Pakistani territory before crashing, reportedly damaging civilian property. Pakistan said India failed to use the military hotline or issue a public statement for two days. Had this occurred during heightened tensions, the incident could have spiralled into serious conflict, experts say. (Months later, India’s government sacked three air force officers for the “accidental firing of a missile”.)

Yet, the danger of nuclear war remains “relatively small” between India and Pakistan, according to Mr Clary.

“So long as there is not major ground combat along the border, the dangers of nuclear use remain relatively small and manageable,” he said.

“In ground combat, the ‘use it or lose it’ problem is propelled by the possibility that your ground positions will be overrun by the enemy.” (‘Use it or lose it‘ refers to the pressure a nuclear-armed country may feel to launch its weapons before they are destroyed in a first strike by an adversary.)

Sumit Ganguly, a senior fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution, believes that “neither India nor Pakistan wants to be labelled as the first violator of the post-Hiroshima nuclear taboo”.

“Furthermore, any side that resorts to the use of nuclear weapons would face substantial retaliation and suffer unacceptable casualties,” Mr Ganguly told the BBC.

At the same time, both India and Pakistan appear to be beefing up their nuclear arsenal.

With new delivery systems in development, four plutonium reactors and expanding uranium enrichment, Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal could reach around 200 warheads by the late 2020s, according to The Nuclear Notebook, researched by the Federation of American Scientists’ Nuclear Information Project.

And as of early 2023, India was estimated to have about 680kg of weapons-grade plutonium – enough for roughly 130-210 nuclear warheads, according to the International Panel on Fissile Materials.

Despite repeated crises and close calls, both sides have so far managed to avoid a catastrophic slide into nuclear conflict. “The deterrent is still holding. All Pakistanis did was to respond to conventional strikes with counter-conventional strikes of their own,” writes Umer Farooq, an Islamabad-based analyst.

Yet, the presence of nuclear weapons injects a constant undercurrent of risk – one that can never be entirely ruled out, no matter how experienced the leadership or how restrained the intentions.

“When nuclear weapons can be involved, there is always an unacceptable level of danger,”John Erath, senior policy director at the non-profit Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation, told the BBC.

“The Indian and Pakistani governments have navigated these situations in the past, so the risk is small. But with nuclear weapons, even a small risk is too large.”

Chimpanzees in Uganda have been observed using medicinal plants – in multiple ways – to treat open wounds and other injuries.

University of Oxford scientists, working with a local team in the Budongo Forest, filmed and recorded incidents of the animals using plants for first aid, both on themselves and occasionally on each other.

Their research builds on the discovery last year that chimps seek out and eat certain plants to self-medicate.

The scientists also compiled decades of scientific observations to create a catalogue of the different ways in which chimpanzees use “forest first aid”.

Researchers say the study, which is published in the journal Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, adds to a growing body of evidence that primates, including chimps, orangutans and gorillas, use natural medicines in a number of ways to stay healthy in the wild.

• Chimpanzees ‘self-medicate’ with healing plants
• Wounded orangutan seen using plant as medicine

Lead researcher Elodie Freymann explained there was “a whole behavioural repertoire that chimpanzees use when they’re sick or injured in the wild – to treat themselves and to maintain hygiene”.

“Some of these include the use of plants that can be found here,” she explained. “The chimpanzees dab them on their wounds or chew the plants up, and then apply the chewed material to the open injury.”

The researchers studied footage of a very young, female chimpanzee chewing plant material and applying it to an injury on its mother’s body.

They also found records of chimpanzees tending to the wounds of other animals they weren’t related to. This is particularly exciting, explained Dr Freymann, “because it adds to the evidence that wild chimpanzees have the capacity for empathy”.

Some of the hundreds of written observations that Dr Freymann and her colleagues studied came from a log book at the field station in the forest site, which is northwest of the capital, Kampala.

This record of anecdotal evidence dates back to the 1990s – local field staff, researchers and visitors have written in, describing any interesting behaviour they have observed.

There are stories in that book of leaf-dabbing on injuries and chimps helping other chimps to remove snares from their limbs.

There are some surprisingly human-like hygiene habits: One note describes a chimpanzee using leaves to wipe itself after defecating.

This team of researchers has previously identified some of the plants that chimpanzees sought out and ate when they were injured. The scientists took samples of those plants, tested them and discovered most had antibacterial properties.

Chimpanzees are not the only non-human apes with apparent knowledge of plant-based medicine. A recent study showed a wild oranguatan using chewed leaf material to heal a facial wound.

Scientists think studying this wild ape behaviour – and understanding more about the plants the chimps use when they are sick or injured – could help in the search for new medicines.

“The more we learn about chimpanzee behaviour and intelligence, the more I think we come to understand how little we as humans actually know about the natural world,” Dr Freymann told BBC News.

“If I were plopped down here in this forest with no food and no medicine, I doubt that I’d be able to survive very long, especially if I were injured or sick.”

“But chimpanzees thrive here because they know how to access the secrets of this place, and how to find all they need to survive from their surroundings.”

The US is a country of 340 million people, 71 interstate highways, more than 5,000 public airports, and currently no high-speed railways.

Yet with two high-speed rail (HSR) projects now under construction, and others planned, is the US finally on track to start catching up with the fast trains seen in China, Japan and Europe?

Rick Harnish, of US campaign group High Speed Rail Alliance, says it is at least good to see the first two schemes being built.

“The first is the San Francisco to Los Angeles route,” he explains. “That’s an incredibly challenging route to build because of the mountains in California.

“Then there’s Las Vegas to Los Angeles, a relatively easy project to build, as it is flat land.”

In addition, there are plans for a HSR line from Portland in Oregon to Seattle in Washington State, and onto Vancouver in Canada. And another between Dallas and Houston.

Yet Mr Harnish warns that planning efforts for the former are “moving slowly”, while the Texas line is now more doubtful after President Trump’s government cancelled a $63.9m (£48m) grant.

By marked contrast, the total length of China’s HSR network will reportedly exceed 50,000 km (31,000 miles) this year.

Meanwhile, the European Union has 8,556 km of HSR lines, led by Spain’s 3,190 km.

In the UK, the only current HSR line is High Speed 1, the 68 miles link between the Channel Tunnel and London St Pancras. But High Speed 2 continues to be constructed from London Euston to Birmingham, despite well-publicised funding issues.

While there is no universally agreed definition on what constitutes HSR, global railways trade group International Union of Railways says that trains generally need to be moving at more than 250 km/h (155 mph).

So why does US lag behind Europe and especially China?

“We’re a very car-addicted nation,” says American rail industry journalist and author Will Doig. “There’s lots of people who just don’t think we need it, or don’t really want it coming through their area.

“And the US government has really shown a willingness to shut down investment in a lot of projects, especially rail.”

Further complicating the situation in the US is that the boss of the government-owned passenger train service Amtrak, Stephen Gardner, resigned last month. It was widely reported that he stood down after pressure from the White House.

Amtrak currently does not operate any HSR trains. Later this year it is due to enter 28 new 160mph NextGen Acela trains into service on its Northeast Corridor route between Boston and Washington DC. However, only around 50 miles of the 457-mile line can presently allow trains to travel at more than 150mph.

Amtrak is not involved in the high-speed lines being built in California and Nevada. The LA to San Francisco project, called California High-Speed Rail, is being led by the state of California, and due to be completed by 2033.

The line from Los Angeles to Las Vegas, Brightline West, is a privately-run project. It is expected to open in 2028.

Globally, there are 23 nations with HSR, according to Mr Harnish. His non-profit organisation has the sole mission of bringing it to the US.

Allowing HSR trains to run safely is far from straightforward, he adds. “You can’t have any crossings with highways, it needs to be very straight and a sealed corridor.”

In China the country is still building more and more HSR lines, with the total distance expected to reach around 60,000km by 2030.

Chinese cities that get HSR links see their economies increase by 14.2%, according to data from Denmark-based think tank 21st Europe.

Chinese firms are also helping to build HSR systems in other Asian countries, such as Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam.

Will Doig, who wrote a book called High-Speed Empire, Chinese Expansion, and the Future of Southeast Asia, says that China is not just interested in helping its neighbours improve their rail networks.

“It is a way of China spreading its influence across a region that it felt was geopolitically strategic,” he says.

“In some of these cases, countries have taken out loans from China so that China can then build the railways.” He warns that this may put them “in a position where they’re beholden to China”.

Europe’s growing HSR network is testament to the continent’s history of investing in its public infrastructure, says Kaave Pour from 21st Europe.

His think tank is now calling for further expansion of HSR, so that it connects most capitals and main cities in the EU, and those in the UK.

Mr Pour says that if the US wants to develop HSR it needs to start with a cultural shift, a move towards more public transport, and asking itself “what type of future does it want?”.

Mr Harnish from the High Speed Rail Alliance says that in order for HSR to work in the US, “the federal government is an essential component”.

Yet as already flagged, the White House has pulled the plug on giving the planned high-speed line between Houston and Dallas a federal grant. US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy described the project as a “waste of taxpayers’ money”.

Scott Sherin is an executive at French train manufacturer Alstom. His firm is suppling Amtrak’s new high-speed trains, but he questions whether the US has the political will “to spend the public purse on rail versus other modes of transportation”.

He also notes that any future HSR lines would struggle to get into city centres such as Dallas and Houston, because there are too many buildings. “The issue is that the cities are so densely built [in their centres]”.

Will Doig says that going forward he would love to see China helping to build more HSR in the US, but that he is not holding his breath.

“It’s politically very difficult,” he says. “Which is too bad because without the animosity between the US and China, you could see how a partnership between them could really create great things for America, that America is not so good at building itself.”

China’s defiance as it faced down US President Donald Trump’s tariffs has been a defining image of this trade war.

It has prompted viral memes of Trump waiting for the Chinese leader to call.

“We will not back down,” has been an almost daily message from Beijing’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. As the tariffs and the rhetoric from Washington escalated, China dug its heels in.

Even as Chinese officials headed to Switzerland for talks, a state-run social media account published a cartoon of the US Treasury secretary pushing an empty shopping trolley.

There were even conflicting versions of who initiated the talks in Geneva.

But after two days of “robust” talks, the situation appears to have changed.

So, is this a major turning point for Washington and Beijing? The answer is yes and no.

• Faisal Islam: US and China step back from beyond brink
• ‘We don’t care’: A defiant China looks beyond Trump’s America

“The consensus from both delegations this weekend is neither side wants a decoupling,” said US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent during a press conference in Geneva.

“And what had occurred with these very high tariffs… was the equivalent of an embargo, and neither side wants that. We do want trade.”

Economists admit that this agreement is better than expected.

“I thought tariffs would be cut to somewhere around 50%,” Zhiwei Zhang, chief economist at Pinpoint Asset Management in Hong Kong, told Reuters news agency.

But in fact, US tariffs on Chinese imports will now fall to 30%, while Chinese tariffs on US goods will drop to 10%.

“Obviously, this is very positive news for economies in both countries and for the global economy, and makes investors much less concerned about the damage to global supply chains in the short term,” he added.

Trump hailed the progress on Sunday on his Truth Social site: “Many things discussed, much agreed to. A total reset negotiated in a friendly, but constructive, manner.”

Beijing has also softened its tone considerably– and perhaps for good reason.

China can take the pain of an economic war with America – to an extent. It is the lead trade partner for more than 100 other countries.

But officials have become increasingly concerned about the impact the tariffs could have on an economy that is already struggling to deal with a property crisis, stubbornly high youth unemployment and low consumer confidence.

Factory output has slowed and there are reports that some companies are having to lay off workers as production lines of US-bound goods grind to a halt, bringing trade to a standstill.

Data on Saturday showed China’s consumer price index dropped 0.1 percent in April, the third month in a row of decline as consumers hold back from spending and businesses drop prices to compete for customers.

The Chinese Commerce Ministry said on Monday that the agreement reached with the US was an important step to “resolve differences” and “lay the foundation to bridge differences and deepen cooperation”.

Such a positive statement from Beijing would have seemed inconceivable just a month ago.

The two sides have also agreed to more talks, or an “economic and trade consultation mechanism”, as Beijing puts it.

But Trump’s characterisation of a “total reset” in relations may be overly optimistic as there is a slight sting in the tail in Beijing’s statement.

The Commerce Ministry ended with a reminder of who it sees as being in the wrong.

“We hope that the US will continue to work with China to meet each other halfway based on this meeting, thoroughly correct the wrong practice of unilateral tariff increases,” said the spokesperson.

Chinese state media also had a warning for Washington. Xinhua News Agency’s commentary claimed China’s “goodwill and patience has its limits, and it will never be used on those who repress and blackmail us without pause or have no qualms about going back on their word”.

Leaders in Beijing will want to portray an image of strength both to its own people and to the international community. They will want to appear as if they have not budged an inch. The message from China is that it is being responsible and rational and doing what it can to avoid a global recession.

• Xi’s real test is not Trump’s trade war

“This is a victory for conscience and rationality,” said Zhang Yun from the School of International Relations at Nanjing University.

“The talks also established the necessary framework for continued dialogue and negotiations in the future.”

This “victory” is only for 90 days. The tariffs are only paused temporarily to allow for negotiations.

It will allow some trade to flow, and it will soothe worried markets.

But the root of the problem still exists. China still sells far more to the United States than it buys. And there are other, far thornier differences to unpick, from Chinese government subsidies, to key industries, to geopolitical tensions in the Taiwan Strait and beyond.

The fight for a more balanced trade relationship is far from over – it has simply moved.

The frontline has shifted from China’s factory floors and American supermarkets to negotiating tables in both Beijing and Washington.

US President Donald Trump has said his administration wants to accept a plane worth an estimated $400m (£303m) as a gift from Qatar, calling it “a great gesture” that he would be “stupid” to turn down.

The potential move has been labelled “wildly illegal” by some members of the rival Democratic Party – something the White House denies – and it has attracted criticism from some of Trump’s supporters.

Qatar itself earlier said the reports about the plane were “inaccurate”, and that negotiations were continuing.

The news comes as Trump visits several countries in the Middle East, including Qatar.

BBC Verify has been looking into the legality of presidents accepting gifts.

On Sunday, US media reported that the Trump administration was preparing to accept a Boeing jumbo jet from the Qatari royal family – saying that the plane would be refitted and used temporarily as Air Force One, the name for the plane used by presidents.

Trump later posted on Truth Social: “The Defense Department is getting a gift, free of charge, of a 747 aircraft to replace the 40-year-old Air Force One, temporarily, in a very public and transparent transaction.”

When questioned by reporters, Trump said: “It’s a great gesture from Qatar. I appreciate it very much. I would never be one to turn down that kind of an offer.”

In February, Trump said he was “not happy with Boeing” about delays to two new Air Force One jets that he is expecting to receive directly from the firm. He added that the White House could instead “buy a plane or get a plane, or something”.

The Qatari plane was pictured in Palm Beach, Florida, in February where Trump inspected it. It is currently fitted with three bedrooms, a private lounge and an office, according to its specification summary document from 2015.

A Qatari official has told CNN the plane is being given from the Qatari defence ministry to the Pentagon, and that it will be modified to meet Air Force One’s safety and security standards.

Experts say this is likely to take years, which means the plane may not be ready for use until near the end of Trump’s term.

Trump has said the plane will go directly to his presidential library after he leaves office, and that he “wouldn’t be using it” after his presidency.

Nonetheless, the move has led to criticism from Democrats as well as some long-time Trump supporters, including Laura Loomer who said: “This is really going to be such a stain on the admin if this is true.”

Several senior Democrats have claimed that accepting the gift would be illegal.

Democratic Senator Adam Schiff quoted a section of the US Constitution that said no elected official could accept “any present… of any kind whatever” from the leader of a foreign state without congressional approval.

Frank Cogliano, a professor of American history at the University of Edinburgh, says this clause “was intended to prevent bribery to influence the government”.

“It is certainly stretching the Constitution and we have not seen a gift on this scale, or of this nature”, says Professor Andrew Moran, a constitutional law expert at London Metropolitan University.

There have been a number of other laws passed by Congress relating to the acceptance of foreign gifts, such as the Foreign Gifts and Decorations Act of 1966, which means that congressional consent is required for the acceptance of foreign gifts above a certain value.

Currently US officials can accept gifts valued at less than $480 (£363).

Although Trump has referred to the plane ultimately going to his “library”, experts have suggested he really means his museum foundation.

Ex-presidents typically have a library housing their archive of documents, and a museum – typically funded by private donations – full of memorabilia and open to the public.

Experts who BBC Verify spoke to said the fact that the plane could be given to the administration – and not to the president directly – before being transferred to his museum, may not get around the potential violation of the constitution.

Jordan Libowitz – from the organisation Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington – said any use of the plane by Trump after leaving office would cross a line: “Reagan’s Air Force One ended up in his presidential library, but there’s a difference there. The plane was decommissioned, Reagan never flew on it again, and it sits inside as a museum piece.”

The US Justice Department has reportedly drafted a memo explaining why it thinks accepting the jet would be permissible, although this has not been made public.

When the White House Press Secretary, Karoline Leavitt was asked about the legality of the deal, she said: “The legal details of that are still being worked out, but of course, any donation to this government is always done in full compliance with the law.”

President Trump is on a four-day trip to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and UAE, hoping to drum up investment for the US.

His visit follows a series of business deals announced by the Trump Organization, which is run by the president’s sons, Eric and Donald Jr.

These include plans to build golf courses and luxury villas in Qatar and the UAE.

President Trump is not currently affiliated with the Trump Organization, having handed over management responsibilities to his children after entering the White House on 20 January.

A deal was announced by the Trump Organization at the beginning of May to develop a Trump-branded luxury 18-hole golf course and a collection of luxury villas north of Qatar’s capital, Doha.

At the time, Eric Trump said: “We are incredibly proud to expand the Trump brand into Qatar through this exceptional collaboration with Qatari Diar and Dar Global.”

Dar Global is a publicly owned Saudi construction company; Qatari Diar is a Qatari state-owned company.

Separately, on 30 April, the Trump Organization announced it would build “the region’s first Trump International Hotel & Tower” in the “heart of Dubai” consisting of 80 floors of “luxury living and world-class hospitality”.

Eric Trump also visited the UAE recently, speaking at Token 2049, a cryptocurrency conference, on 1 May.

Asked if Trump was likely to meet anyone involved in the family business during his trip, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said it was “ridiculous” to suggest the president was doing anything for his own benefit.

What do you want BBC Verify to investigate?

Days after India and Pakistan agreed to a ceasefire, questions remain over what lies ahead for the two South Asian neighbours.

Early on 7 May, India launched air strikes into Pakistan and Pakistan-administered Kashmir in response to a deadly militant attack on tourists in India-administered Kashmir (Islamabad has denied involvement in the attack).

What followed were four days of intense shelling and aerial incursions between the two nuclear-armed countries, until the surprise ceasefire announcement on Saturday.

But – even accounting for the usually tense relationship between India and Pakistan – things are nowhere close to normal yet.

The fragile ceasefire, now in its fourth day, is still holding as life slowly begins to return to normal in towns along the de facto border between India and Pakistan.

Meanwhile, days before launching the military operation, India had announced a flurry of diplomatic measures against Pakistan, including suspending a key water-sharing treaty, halting most visas and stopping all trade.

In response, Islamabad announced its own set of tit-for-tat actions, including the suspension of visas for Indians, a trade ban and the closure of its airspace to Indian flights.

None of these punitive measures have been reversed by both countries so far. Here’s where things currently stand between the two neighbours in terms of the measures announced since the Pahalgam attack:

On Monday, in his first public comments on the strike, India Prime Minister Narendra Modi said, “India’s stand is absolutely clear – terror and talks cannot go hand in hand.”

“Water and blood cannot flow together,” he added.

His comments align with media reports citing sources that say that the key water-sharing treaty between India and Pakistan, known as the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT), remains suspended.

The 1960 treaty, brokered by the World Bank, governs water sharing of six rivers in the Indus basin between the two countries.

The IWT has survived two wars between the countries and was held up as an example of trans-boundary water management, until the suspension late last month.

• READ: Can India really stop river water from flowing into Pakistan?

Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif had earlier said that he believed the water issue with India would be resolved through peaceful negotiations.

India’s decision to suspend the treaty marks a significant diplomatic shift. Pakistan depends heavily on these rivers for agriculture and civilian water supply.

“Water cannot be weaponised,” Pakistan’s Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb told Reuters news agency on Monday, adding that “unilateral withdrawal has no legal basis”.

But experts say it’s nearly impossible for India to hold back tens of billions of cubic metres of water from the western rivers during high-flow periods. It lacks both the massive storage infrastructure and the extensive canals needed to divert such volumes. However, if India begins controlling the flow with its existing and potential infrastructure, Pakistan could feel the impact during the dry season.

Soon after India suspended the IWT, Pakistan threatened to suspend a 1972 peace treaty called the Simla Agreement, which established the Line of Control, or de facto border between the countries. It hasn’t suspended this so far.

India scaled down its diplomatic relations with Pakistan as part of its retaliatory measures.

It expelled all Pakistani defence attachés, declaring them “persona non grata” (unwelcome) and announced it would withdraw its own defence advisers from its high commission in Islamabad.

Pakistan responded with similar steps. Both countries reduced the staff at their respective high commissions.

Both India and Pakistan also suspended almost all visas given to people from the other country.

As part of their retaliatory measures, both India and Pakistan shut down the Attari-Wagah border, the only land crossing between the two countries.

The border, which is heavily guarded and requires special permits to cross, has long been used by people visiting family members, attending weddings or reconnecting with loved ones across the border.

Both countries initially gave their citizens nearly a week to return, but the deadline was later extended.

For days, emotional scenes unfolded at the border, as families were separated, with some people staying behind.

• ‘What is our fault?’: Families separated at India-Pakistan border

After the 7 May strikes, India also announced that it would be closing entry from its side to the Kartarpur Sahib Corridor, which allows Indian pilgrims to visit one of Sikhism’s holiest shrines in Pakistan without a visa.

Almost 200,000 Indians visited the Kartarpur shrine between 2021 and 2023, Indian officials said last year. The latest figures have not yet been released.

Indian Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri told reporters last week that the suspension would remain in place until further notice.

As part of its retaliatory measures, Pakistan also announced the closure of its airspace to all Indian flights.

In the following days, India responded with similar restrictions, closing its airspace to all Pakistani flights, both military and commercial.

International flights are now being forced to take longer, costlier detours, increasing both travel time and fuel expenses.

The two countries have also suspended all direct and indirect trade.

Experts say the impact on India would be minimal because it does not import much from Pakistan. However, it creates bigger problems for Pakistan.

Already struggling with high inflation and a weak economy, Pakistan could face more pressure as it loses access to trade routes and crucial goods from India, such as raw materials and medicines.

In 1989, brothers Lyle and Erik Menendez killed their parents by shooting them multiple times at close range at their mansion in Beverly Hills.

They were found guilty of first-degree murder and conspiracy to murder in 1996, and sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.

On Tuesday, a Los Angeles judge reduced their sentence, making them eligible for parole.

There has been renewed public interest in the case after a new Netflix drama, Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story, was released in September.

Last year, the previous district attorney of Los Angeles, George Gascón, requested a change to the brothers’ sentence from life without the possibility of parole to 50 years to life.

The hearing was put to Los Angeles County superior court Judge Michael Jesic on Tuesday who resentenced the brothers.

“I do believe they’ve done enough in the past 35 years that they should get that chance,” he said, concluding a day-long hearing.

• Menendez sentences reduced, given them chance of freedom

The brothers are eligible for parole under California’s youthful offender law which allows individuals who committed crimes before the age of 26 to seek a reduced sentence.

The siblings were aged 18 and 21 at the time. They are now aged 54 and 57.

During the hearing, family members and a former fellow inmate were among those who testified in support of the resentencing.

People who worked with the brothers in prison spoke about the educational courses they had completed and how they created a hospice initiative for the elderly and sick.

The district attorney’s office, which fiercely opposes a lower sentence, said the brothers have continued to “make excuses” for their conduct instead of taking full responsibility and were not rehabilitated.

The brothers spoke to the court via video and apologised for their actions.

They also spoke about their hopes of working with sex abuse victims and helping those incarcerated if they were given a second chance outside prison.

The California parole board will now decide whether to release the brothers from prison.

Separately, the state’s governor, Gavin Newsom, is considering a request from the brothers for clemency. If approved, it could lead to a reduced sentence or a pardon.

Governor Newsom requested that the parole board conduct a risk assessment that examines whether the brothers pose a risk to the general public if released.

The full report has not been released, but the district attorney said it indicated a “moderate risk of violence”.

The parole board hearing on the clemency petition is set to take place on 13 June.

It is unclear whether the board will also consider the possibility of parole based on Judge Jesic’s resentencing at the same hearing.

Lyle and Erik Menendez killed their parents, Jose and Kitty Menendez, on 20 August 1989 at their home in Beverly Hills.

Their father, a 45-year-old Hollywood executive, was shot six times with a shotgun the brothers had purchased days before the attack.

Their mother died after suffering 10 shotgun blasts to several parts of her body.

The brothers initially told police they found their parents dead when they arrived home.

They were arrested after the girlfriend of a psychologist that had been treating Erik Menendez went to police to say that he had physically threatened the doctor.

The brothers claimed they committed the murders in self defence after years of alleged physical, emotional and sexual abuse, although no molestation was ever proven in court.

They said they feared their father would kill them after they threatened to expose him.

However, prosecutors argued that the young men had killed their successful parents to inherit their multi-million-dollar estate.

The brothers were taken into custody in 1990 and in 1993 they were tried for the murders, first individually, with one jury for each brother.

However, both juries were deadlocked in 1994, resulting in a mistrial, and the pair were later tried again together in 1995.

During their joint trial the judge excluded apparent evidence of abuse from their defence case. Taped sessions with a doctor, in which the killings were discussed, were ruled admissible in court by the judge.

A jury found them guilty and the pair were convicted of first-degree murder and conspiracy to murder in 1996.

The brothers, who were separated during their detention after a detective who investigated the slayings said they may conspire to escape if housed together, reunited in jail in 2018.

The case was thrust back into the spotlight after Netflix released a drama series about the brothers in September.

Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story, shot to the top of the platform’s streaming chart and was reported to have had 12.3 million views in its first weekend of release.

It explores what might have led the siblings to kill their parents and it presents the murders from different perspectives.

Its creators said the series was based on extensive research and it follows the events surrounding the murders.

It includes the brothers’ claims of abuse as well as showing things from the parents’ point of view.

The show introduced the case to a new generation and garnered attention from celebrities – including Kim Kardashian and Rosie O’Donnell – who called for the brothers to be released.

The series was a follow-up to the controversial first Monsters series about US serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer.

Following its release, Erik Menendez shared a statement, released on X by his wife.

He said the show was “disheartening slander” and he “believed we had moved beyond the lies and ruinous character portrayals of Lyle”.

“It is sad for me to know that Netflix’s dishonest portrayal of the tragedies surrounding our crime have taken the painful truths several steps backward – back through time to an era when the prosecution built a narrative on a belief system that males were not sexually abused, and that males experienced rape trauma differently than women,” he added.

Members of the family also spoke out and said the brothers had been “victimised by this grotesque shockadrama,” and the show was “riddled with mistruths”.

Ryan Murphy, who created the show, told Variety that the comments were “predictable at best”.

He added that the family’s response was “interesting because I would like specifics about what they think is shocking or not shocking. It’s not like we’re making any of this stuff up. It’s all been presented before”.

Kim Kardashian has given emotional testimony to a Paris court, telling judges she thought she was going to die at the hands of masked gunmen who stole millions of dollars of jewellery from her in a luxury hotel suite in 2016.

The reality TV star and businesswoman – who was bound and had a gun held to her head during the ordeal – faced her alleged attackers for the first time while giving evidence in the case.

Nine men and one woman are on trial for the armed burglary of £10m (£7.55m) worth of jewellery, including a diamond engagement ring from her ex-husband Kanye West.

Kardashian, who gave testimony in a seat in front of the BBC, spoke for more than three hours in court on Tuesday.

Her evidence was at times interrupted by apologies from two defendants.

After one of the defendants, Aomar Ait Khedache, 71, sitting metres from Kardashian in the courtroom expressed his regret, she turned to him and said she forgave him.

Referencing her activism in the US to improve the justice system and her dreams of becoming a lawyer, she thanked Khedache for his apology letter.

“I do appreciate it, I forgive you,” she said to him in the stand, while crying.

“But it doesn’t change the emotion, the feelings and the trauma and the way my life has changed.”

“I just want to thank everyone, especially the French authorities, for allowing me to testify today and tell my truth,” the TV star told the court on Tuesday which was packed with media.

The trial for the crime committed more than nine years ago has been long-anticipated and closely followed by press.

Wearing a tailored black suit and diamond jewellery, Kardashian was supported in the courtroom by her mother, Kris Jenner, several friends, and a bevy of bodyguards.

She faltered at times in her first hour of giving testimony, fidgeting with her long nails, and pausing when overwhelmed by emotion and fighting back tears. However she appeared to relax and gather strength the longer she went on, her voice becoming steadier.

She also expressed forgiveness for one of the defendants, who issued an apology to her during her testimony.

Tuesday’s session in court was the first time Kardashian had relayed to a criminal court her account of the armed burglary, and the extent of her fears during and after the attack.

She recounted how she had been in town for Paris Fashion Week on 2 October, and had retired for the night at around 03:00 when two masked gunmen wearing police uniforms burst into her room, dragging with them the hotel’s receptionist who had been bound and gagged.

She managed to call her bodyguard before one of the men then took her phone off her. They snatched her engagement ring, which had been lying on the bedside table, and then “picked me up off the bed and grabbed me and took me down the hallway” to look for more jewellery,” she said.

One of the men held a gun to her back at this point, and “that was the first moment I thought, should I run for it? But it wasn’t an option so I just stayed,” she said, adding that she realised she should just “do whatever they say” for her safety.

Kardashian said she was then thrown onto the bed and her hands bound with zip ties. At this point, she told the concierge: “Please translate to them that I have babies, I have to make it home.”

One of the men then pulled her towards him, which opened her robe, under which she wasn’t wearing anything.

She told the court she was afraid she was going to be raped, saying she said a prayer to mentally prepare herself.

But then her legs were tied together and a gun pointed at her. She said at that point, “I was sure that’s when they were going to shoot me.”

She thought of her family at that point, offering them a “prayer” that they would not have to experience her killing.

She expressed fear for her sister, Kourtney, having to walk into the hotel room to find that “I would be shot dead on the bed and she would see that and have that memory forever.”

When asked by the judge David de Pas if she thought she was going to die she replied in a small voice: “I absolutely did think I was gonna die.”

Kardashian said she looked in the eyes of the man who tied her up to try to remember details – and that he told her if she remained quiet, she would be ok.

After the robbers took the jewellery, they dashed out of the suite, leaving Kardashian in the bathroom. She said she then managed to free her hands from the cable ties and hopped down the staircase to the first floor of the suite, where her stylist and friend Simone Harouche helped release the other ties.

The two then ran out onto the balcony where they called for help while hiding in the bushes. Kardashian said she was worried the men would return, and that when Parisian police turned up, she couldn’t trust them because the robbers had also been wearing police uniforms.

During the testimony in the packed courtroom, Kardashian also answered several questions from the judge about why her security were not present at the time.

Her usual team had been sent to accompany her sister Kourtney to the club, while Kim had stayed in.

She told the court she did not have a bodyguard with her because up until the robbery, she and her family had not believed they needed that level of security. She said she had previously always felt safe to go out on the streets of Paris on her own, and they had been comfortable with their security team staying at a different hotel.

“Everything changed” after Paris, she said, noting that she employs up to six people to guard her house at night now, and that she started to get a “phobia of going out” because she thought people would “see me out and know my home was empty”.

“I can’t even sleep at night if I know there’s not multiple security” guards, she said, noting her concern about copycat attacks, and that her Los Angeles house was robbed even before the family returned from the Paris trip.

Kardashian’s testimony on Tuesday was interrupted at several points by offers of apology from two of the defendants in the court room, who have pleaded guilty to the charge. While she accepted Khedache’s apology, she did not acknowledge the presence of the other defendants who are contesting the charges.

She ignored her former driver Gary Madar who is accused of having tipped off the burglary ring about her whereabouts. He has denied the charges.

She also expressed anger over one of the defendants who has pleaded guilty, Yunice Abbas, who published a memoir in 2021 prior to the trial titled ‘”I Held Up Kim Kardashian”.

Kardashian told the court on Tuesday she was “really shocked when I saw there was a book”.

“Not only did he do this, but now [he’s] making money off that – my jewellery, my memories, the watch my dad who passed away gave me when I graduated high school. I can’t get that back.”

She also told the court she wanted closure from the trial’s proceedings.

“I wanted to be a part of today because I am a victim in this case and it’s the first time I’m able to really hear from everyone and follow along,” she said.

“This is what I do. I want to become a lawyer and I do believe everyone has the opportunity to speak their truth, and this is my closure and my opportunity to put this to rest after everything I’ve been through.”

Kardashian added that her job is “to tell my truth and hope this doesn’t happen to anyone else”.

“It was terrifying and life-changing and I don’t wish that kind of terror on anyone – to think you could be killed or raped – I wouldn’t wish that on my worst enemy.”

A duck has been caught speeding on traffic cameras in the town of Koeniz in central Switzerland.

Local police said the mallard – a wild duck – was snapped on radar images on 13 April clocking in at 52km/h (32 mph) in a 30km zone.

Adding to the mystery, authorities said the duck was likely a repeat offender and shared an image of a similar looking duck travelling in the same spot, at the same speed and on the same date in 2018.

There has been speculation about whether the “notorious racer” duck incident was a belated April Fool’s joke, but the police inspectorate said it is impossible to manipulate images on the radar system.

Authorities said traffic cameras are tested each year by Switzerland’s Federal Institute of Metrology and the photos taken are sealed.

In a Facebook post, Koeniz officials wished the public “a lot of fun” in making sense of the “curious coincidences” seven years in the making.

“We wish you a lot of fun sensing about curious coincidences, criminal machinations of animals and the maximum flight speed of ducks,” the post read.

Some comments have asked what the penalty will be for the “racer duck’s” transgressions.

Rosemary Coogan is surrounded by a team of people pushing, pulling, squishing and squeezing her into a spacesuit.

It takes about 45 minutes to get all her gear on before a helmet is carefully lowered over her head.

The British astronaut is about to undergo her toughest challenge yet – assessing whether she is ready for a spacewalk. The test will take place in one of the largest pools in the world: Nasa’s Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas.

The pool – which is 12m deep (40ft) – contains a life-sized replica of the International Space Station (ISS), and a “spacewalk” here is as close as it gets to mimicking weightlessness on Earth.

“It’s a big day,” Rosemary says before the dive, which is going to last more than six hours. “It’s very physically intense – and it’s very psychologically intense.”

But Rosemary doesn’t seem too fazed. She smiles and waves as the platform she’s standing on is slowly lowered into the water.

Being an astronaut was Dr Rosemary Coogan’s dream from a young age, she says. But it was a dream that seemed out of reach.

“At the careers day at school, you don’t tend to meet astronauts,” Rosemary says. “You don’t get to meet people who’ve done it, you don’t really get to hear their stories.”

So she decided to study the stars instead, opting for a career in astrophysics. But when the European Space Agency (ESA) announced it was looking for new recruits to go to space, Rosemary applied and was chosen from more than 22,000 people.

ESA aims to get Rosemary to the International Space Station (ISS) by 2030. She’ll be following in the footsteps of Britons Helen Sharman, who visited the Soviet’s Mir Space Station in 1991, and Tim Peake who launched to the ISS in 2015.

Rosemary has spent the last six months training at the Johnson Space Center. As well as exploring the outside of the submerged ISS, she can head inside the orbiting lab in another life-sized mock-up located in a huge hangar.

She takes us on a tour of the lab’s interconnected modules. It feels very cramped, especially considering astronauts usually spend many months on board. But Rosemary reminds us about the spectacular views.

“It is an isolated environment, but I think this helps to give that kind of connection to being outside – to alleviate that sense of claustrophobia.”

Rosemary’s training here covers every aspect of going to space – including learning how to use the onboard toilet.

“The lower part is where you put your solid waste,” she says, pointing to a loo in a small cubicle that looks like something you might find at a very old campsite. “And this funnel here is actually attached to an air suction system, and that is where you put your liquid waste.”

Female astronauts have the option of suppressing their periods using drugs, Rosemary says, but can also opt not to.

“There’s essentially a filter that you put on top of the cone in which you urinate and it’s to stop any particles, any blood, from going into the urine system.”

Urine needs to be kept separate because it’s purified and treated to be re-used as drinking water, she explains.

Back in the pool, divers are constantly adjusting Rosemary’s buoyancy in the water to make the experience as close as possible to microgravity.

She moves around painstakingly, making sure she’s always attached to the submerged structure using two hooks.

Every hand-hold is carefully chosen along the bars on the outside of each module. They’re in exactly the same positions as the ones on the real thing, vital muscle memory if she gets to carry out a spacewalk 200 miles (322km) above the Earth.

It’s slow and difficult work, requiring plenty of upper body strength and physical effort in the hot, bulky spacesuit.

“You do a lot of mental preparation – you really think through every single movement,” Rosemary explains. “You have to be really efficient with your energy. You don’t want to do something and realise it wasn’t quite right and have to do it again.”

Rosemary is working alongside another astronaut to complete a list of space station repairs and maintenance for the test. Her every move is monitored by a team in a control room overlooking the pool. They’re in constant communication with her as she works through her tasks.

Former space station commander Aki Hoshide, from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, is on hand for advice. He has completed four spacewalks and says it’s a steep learning curve for new astronauts.

“When we first start out, there’s so much information thrown at you, so many skills that you have to learn and show and demonstrate,” he says. “It is baby steps, but they are moving forward – and I can see their excitement every time they come here and jump in the pool.”

Rosemary takes us to see a Saturn V – the rocket that took the Apollo astronauts to the Moon in 1969. More than 50 years on, Nasa is planning an imminent return to the lunar surface with its Artemis programme. European astronauts will join later missions. With an expected 35-year space career ahead, Rosemary may one day get the chance to become the first Briton to walk on the Moon.

“It’s incredibly exciting that we, as humanity, are going back to the Moon, and of course, any way that I could be a part of that, I would be absolutely delighted. I think it’s absolutely thrilling,” she says.

After six gruelling hours underwater, Rosemary is nearing the end of her spacewalk test – but then she’s thrown a curve ball.

In the control room, we hear her call out for a comms check with her astronaut partner who’s working on another part of the space station. But she’s met with silence.

On a video screen, we can see he’s motionless. Rosemary doesn’t know it, but he’s been asked to pretend to lose consciousness. Rosemary’s job is to reach him, check his condition – and tow him back to the airlock.

After so long under water, we can see how exhausted she is – but working slowly and steadily, she gets him safely to the airlock.

“Rosemary has the endurance of a champion. She crushed it today,” says Jenna Hanson, one of Nasa’s spacewalk instructors who’s been assessing Rosemary. “We’re really happy with where she’s at – she’s doing awesome.”

The spacewalk is finally over. Rosemary’s platform is hoisted out of the pool and the support team help her out of her suit. As her helmet is removed, we can see she’s clearly very tired, but still smiling.

“It was a challenging one, it really was, and a challenging rescue,” she tells us, “But yeah, it was a really enjoyable day.”

Rosemary’s hard work is bringing her ever closer to her dream of getting to space.

“It’s amazing,” Rosemary says, “If I could do that for the real space station – where you can look out and see the stars and see the Earth at the same time – that would just be the cherry on top.”

An inmate who allegedly knifed hip-hop artist Tory Lanez inside a US prison is a convicted killer, say prison officials.

The Canadian rapper was rushed to hospital after being stabbed 14 times on Monday morning at a housing unit at the California Correctional Institution in Tehachapi.

The prisoner suspected of the attack, Santino Casio, 41, is serving a life sentence for murder, officials told the BBC. They said he has been placed in “restricted housing” pending an investigation into the attack on Lanez, 32.

The rapper, whose legal name is Daystar Peterson, is serving a 10-year prison sentence for shooting fellow musician Megan Thee Stallion in 2020.

Casio arrived at the Tehachapi institution from Los Angeles County jail in February 2004.

“He was sentenced to life with the possibility of parole for second-degree murder, first degree attempted murder, personal use of a dangerous or deadly weapon, and inflict [sic] great bodily injury,” said a statement from the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR).

Casio has added to his criminal record during his incarceration, the statement added.

In January 2008, he was sentenced to six years for assaulting a fellow prisoner with a deadly weapon.

In 2018, he was sentenced to another two years for possessing a deadly weapon.

Casio’s alleged attack left Tory Lanez with wounds across his body, causing both of his lungs to collapse, according to a post on the rapper’s Instagram account.

He was stabbed in the back, torso, head and face, and had to temporarily be placed on a breathing apparatus, the Instagram post added.

“Despite being in pain, he is talking normally, in good spirits, and deeply thankful to God that he is pulling through,” the post said.

Lanez was sentenced in 2023 for three felony gun-related charges, including assault with a semi-automatic firearm.

He shot Megan Thee Stallion, whose legal name is Megan Pete, as they were leaving a pool party at reality star Kylie Jenner’s Hollywood mansion.

Lanez had seven US top 10 albums in the seven years before his conviction. He has teased the release of a new album from prison titled Peterson.

Former world champion cyclist Rohan Dennis has been given a two-year suspended sentence over a car incident in Australia which killed his wife, fellow Olympian Melissa Hoskins.

Dennis pleaded guilty to one aggravated count of creating the likelihood of harm, after Hoskins was struck by the car he was driving during a fight outside the couple’s Adelaide home in 2023.

A judge said Dennis had disregarded his wife’s safety, but was not criminally responsible for her death.

Hoskins’ parents spoke outside the court after sentencing, saying they were “glad” the case was over and they hoped the family could “move on”.

The court had previously heard that Dennis and Hoskins were arguing about kitchen renovations shortly before the incident occurred, and Hoskins had held on to the car her husband was driving as he tried to leave.

While sentencing Dennis, Judge Ian Press said calling the incident tragic “really does not do justice to the grief, the anguish and the turmoil those events have brought into the lives of those who knew and loved your wife”.

He said he understood that Dennis had tried to “de-escalate the argument” by driving off, but said it did not excuse his actions.

“It was your obligation to stop the vehicle when driving that vehicle became dangerous to her physical wellbeing,” he said, according to a report by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC).

“That you did not stop because you wanted to leave, is a very poor reason for not doing so.”

Hoskins was taken to hospital after being struck but later died of her injuries.

Dennis was initially charged with dangerous driving causing death and driving without due care and pleaded not guilty, but he later admitted to a single, lesser charge.

Dennis’ lawyer had argued that he had no intention of harming his wife and either did not know or was “reckless to the fact” that Hoskins was holding onto the car.

She told an earlier hearing that despite his “stoic” front, Dennis felt a “deep, deep grief”.

On Wednesday, Judge Press emphasised that Dennis was not criminally responsible for causing Hoskins’ death, and accepted he was remorseful.

“I accept you have a sense of responsibility for all that occurred. I accept you have anguished over what could have been different if you had acted in some other way,” Judge Press said.

In victim impact statements read to the court last month, Hoskins’ mother said that while she accepted Dennis wouldn’t have intentionally hurt her daughter, his temper was his “downfall” and “needs to be addressed”.

Speaking outside court, Peter and Amanda Hoskins said they missed their daughter “terribly”.

“She was someone really special,” Mr Hoskins said.

He said the family was yet to receive an apology from Dennis, but expected it “will come with time”.

“It’s now time for us to move on, which would be Melissa’s expectations of us,” Mr Hoskins said, adding it was important for the couple to have a “well-mannered relationship” with Dennis going forward.

“There are two young children caught up in this tragedy… Clearly, we want to continue to be an integral part of [the] children’s lives and their future.”

Hoskins was a world champion cyclist in the Australian team pursuit in 2015, and a two-time Olympian. Her death triggered a wave of tributes from around the world.

She and Dennis married in 2018.

Dennis retired at the end of the 2023 season after a cycling career in which he won a silver medal team pursuit at the London 2012 Olympics and a road time trial bronze at Tokyo 2020. He also won a gold medal at the Commonwealth Games in 2022.

New rules making migrants wait longer to qualify for permanent settlement in the UK will apply to people already in the country, under government plans.

On Monday the government announced immigrants would now typically have to live in the UK for 10 years before applying for the right to stay here indefinitely – double the current five-year period.

It was previously unclear whether this would apply to the approximately 1.5 million foreign workers who have moved to the UK since 2020.

The BBC understands a document published in the coming weeks will make clear the government is preparing to apply the 10-year qualifying period to those who are already in the UK as well as to new visa applicants.

The move will be subject to a public consultation.

A government source said Home Secretary Yvette Cooper had for some time been concerned that under the current five-year process there is set to be a significant increase in settlement and citizenship applications in the next few years, reflecting the surge in immigration in the early years of this decade.

A policy document published on Monday said there would continue to be a five-year qualification period for non-UK dependents of British citizens.

There will also be shorter qualification periods for people who can show they have contributed to the UK’s “economy and society”.

The announcement was part of a wider package of measures set out on Monday to cut legal migration.

Net migration – the number of people coming to the UK minus the number leaving – climbed to a record 906,000 in June 2023, and last year it stood at 728,000.

In a speech on Monday, Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said the measures would mean “settlement becomes a privilege that is earned, not a right, easier if you make a contribution, if you work, pay in, and help rebuild our country.”

Some Labour MPs have raised concerns about the possibility longer qualifying periods for settlement could apply to people already in the UK.

Florence Eshalomi, who chairs the Commons housing, communities and local government committee, told MPs the lack of clarity had left some of her constituents “understandably worried”, with one telling her they were considering leaving the UK “because their settled status here is in jeopardy”.

In response, Cooper told MPs the government would set out further details later this year, with a consultation to follow.

The Migration Observatory said a 10-year route to settlement would make the UK more restrictive than most other high-income countries but comparable to Switzerland and Japan.

It said the move was unlikely to significantly affect migration levels but it would bring in more visa-fee revenue for the Home Office because people on temporary visas pay ongoing fees.

Migrants would also face longer periods without the rights that come with permanent settlement, which include the right to live, work and study in the UK for as long as desired, and to apply for benefits.

Permanent settlement can also be used to apply for British citizenship.

Enny Choudhury, co-legal director at the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants charity, said the move was “a cruel betrayal”.

“These are our neighbours and friends. They’ve already built their lives in the UK, and moving the goalposts now will plunge many into deeper debt, uncertainty and trauma,” he said.

“We need a system that offers people a clear, affordable and compassionate pathway to settlement.”

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Dominated by a fiery feud between two political dynasties, the Philippine mid-term elections have thrown up unexpected results that may shake President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr’s hold on the senate.

According to the latest count of 80% of the votes, Marcos allies appear to have captured fewer senate seats than expected.

Meanwhile his rival, former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte who is detained in The Hague over his drug war that killed thousands, has been elected mayor of his family’s stronghold.

The fate of his daughter Vice President Sara Duterte, who is facing an impeachment trial, remains in the balance.

The mid-terms held on Monday saw 18,000 seats contested, from local officials to governors and senators. It served as a proxy war between Marcos Jr and Sara Duterte, who were one-time allies.

The senate race, where 12 seats were up for grabs, was closely watched as it affects Sara Duterte’s trial, which she has called “political persecution”.

The popular vice-president, who is widely expected to run for president in 2028, is facing the prospect of a ban from politics, should a jury made up of senators vote to impeach her.

Many people had expected Marcos Jr’s picks to win most of the 12 seats. But according to the latest count of 80% of the votes, only six from his camp appear to have won seats, and one of them has also been endorsed by the Dutertes.

In the top five ranking – a barometer of public popularity – only one Marcos-backed candidate, broadcaster Erwin Tulfo, made it.

Meanwhile, at the very top of the list is a Duterte loyalist – long-time aide Christopher “Bong” Go – while at number three is another Duterte ally, former police chief Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa.

The Duterte camp appears to have won at least four seats. They include Marcos Jr’s older sister Imee, who recently bolted from her brother’s alliance to side with the Dutertes.

What complicates things is that it is still unclear how Marcos’ allies in the senate will move on Sara Duterte’s impeachment. Their loyalty can shift, as senators also balance their own interests and ambitions with their political allegiances.

Meanwhile, two people who are not affiliated with either camp appear to have also won senate seats.

They are Paolo Benigno “Bam” Aquino, and an Aquino ally, Francis Pangilinan.

Bam Aquino, the cousin of a former president, has in fact clinched second place in the rankings, in what he called a “very, very surprising” result.

It marks the first time in years that voters had chosen outside the Marcos and Duterte dynasties.

The Aquino family was the Marcoses’ main political nemesis in the 1980s and early 1990s before the rise of the Dutertes.

It was the assassination of opposition leader Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino Jr in 1983 that galvanised protests against Ferdinand Marcos Sr – the current president’s father – culminating in the Marcos family’s ouster and exile in 1986.

Monday’s result signals their comeback after being wiped out of national politics in recent years.

Results so far also show the Dutertes have managed to retain their power base in the south of the country, just two months after the 80-year-old populist leader Rodrigo Duterte was arrested at Manila Airport and flown to the Netherlands on the same day to face the International Criminal Court.

It was his arrest – approved by Marcos Jr – which pushed the rivalry between his daughter and the current president to boiling point, a few weeks after the president’s allies in the House of Representatives voted to impeach Vice-President Duterte.

Rodrigo Duterte was always expected to win as mayor, given the family has held the post since the mid-1980s.

Duterte himself led Davao, a sprawling southern metropolis, for two decades before he was elected president in 2016. There, he showcased his drug war that he credited for the city’s success, and won him the support of millions far beyond its borders.

His youngest son, Sebastian, the incumbent mayor, was elected vice-mayor, meaning he can discharge his father’s duties in his absence. Another Duterte son, Paolo, was re-elected as congressman. His grandchildren won local posts.

Duterte’s name remained on the ballot as he has not been convicted of any crime. He beat the scion of a smaller rival political family.

Maintaining a political base in Davao city in the south is crucial for the Dutertes – it is where they get the most voter support.

The election was not just a battle between the two families, however.

Monday’s vote saw long queues under temperatures of 33C (91F) and sporadic reports of violence and vote machines malfunctioning.

Like past elections, song-and-dance, showbusiness-style campaigns played out on stage and on social media, underscoring the country’s personality and celebrity politics that sometimes overshadow more pressing issues such as corruption, high cost of living and creaking infrastructure.

In the latest India-Pakistan stand-off, there were no ultimatums, no red buttons.

Yet the cycle of military retaliation, veiled signals and swift international mediation quietly evoked the region’s most dangerous shadow. The crisis didn’t spiral towards nuclear war, but it was a reminder of how quickly tensions here can summon that spectre.

Even scientists have modelled how easily things could unravel. A 2019 study by a global team of scientists opened with a nightmare scenario where a terrorist attack on India’s parliament in 2025 triggers a nuclear exchange with Pakistan.

Six years later, a real-world stand-off – though contained by a US-brokered ceasefire on Saturday – stoked fears of a full-blown conflict. It also revived uneasy memories of how fragile stability in the region can be.

As the crisis escalated, Pakistan sent “dual signals” – retaliating militarily while announcing a National Command Authority (NCA) meeting, a calculated reminder of its nuclear capability. The NCA oversees control and potential use of the country’s nuclear arsenal. Whether this move was symbolic, strategic or a genuine alert, we may never know. It also came just as US Secretary of State Marco Rubio reportedly stepped in to defuse the spiral.

President Trump said the US didn’t just broker a ceasefire – it averted a “nuclear conflict”. On Monday, in an address to the nation, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said: “[There] is no tolerance for nuclear blackmail; India will not be intimidated by nuclear threats.

“Any terrorist safe haven operating under this pretext will face precise and decisive strikes,” Modi added.

India and Pakistan each possess about 170 nuclear weapons, according to the think-tank Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (Sipri). As of January 2024, Sipri estimated there were 12,121 nuclear warheads worldwide. Of these, about 9,585 were held in military stockpiles, with 3,904 actively deployed – 60 more than the previous year. The US and Russia together account for more than 8,000 nuclear weapons.

The bulk of both India’s and Pakistan’s deployed arsenals lies in their land-based missile forces, though both are developing nuclear triads capable of delivering warheads by land, air and sea, according to Christopher Clary, a security affairs expert at the University at Albany in the US.

“India likely has a larger air leg (aircraft capable of delivering nuclear weapons) than Pakistan. While we know the least of Pakistan’s naval leg, it is reasonable to assess that India’s naval leg is more advanced and more capable than Pakistan’s sea-based nuclear force,” he told the BBC.

One reason, Mr Clary said, is that Pakistan has invested nowhere near the “time or money” that India has in building a nuclear-powered submarine, giving India a “clear qualitative” edge in naval nuclear capability.

Since testing nuclear weapons in 1998, Pakistan has never formally declared an official nuclear doctrine.

India, by contrast, adopted a no-first-use policy following its own 1998 tests. But this stance has shown signs of softening. In 2003, India reserved the right to use nuclear weapons in response to chemical or biological attacks – effectively allowing for first use under certain conditions.

Further ambiguity emerged in 2016, when then–defence minister Manohar Parrikar suggested India shouldn’t feel “bound” by the policy, raising questions about its long-term credibility. (Parrikar clarified that this was his own opinion.)

The absence of a formal doctrine doesn’t mean Pakistan lacks one – official statements, interviews and nuclear developments offer clear clues to its operational posture, according to Sadia Tasleem of Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Pakistan’s nuclear threshold remains vague, but in 2001, Khalid Kidwai – then head of the Strategic Plans Division of the NCA – outlined four red lines: major territorial loss, destruction of key military assets, economic strangulation or political destabilisation.

In 2002, then-president Pervez Musharraf clarified that “nuclear weapons are aimed solely at India”, and would only be used if “the very existence of Pakistan as a state” was at stake.

In his memoir, former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo wrote that he was jolted awake at night to speak with an unnamed “Indian counterpart” who feared Pakistan was preparing to use nuclear weapons during the 2019 stand-off with India.

Around the same time, Pakistani media quoted a senior official issuing a stark warning to India: “I hope you know what the [National Command Authority] means and what it constitutes. I said that we will surprise you. Wait for that surprise… You have chosen a path of war without knowing the consequences for the peace and security of the region.”

During the 1999 Kargil War, Pakistan’s then-foreign secretary Shamshad Ahmed warned that the country would not “hesitate to use any weapon” to defend its territory. Years later, US official Bruce Riedel revealed that intelligence indicated Pakistan was preparing its nuclear arsenal for possible deployment.

But there is scepticism on both sides over such claims.

Former Indian high commissioner to Pakistan Ajay Bisaria wrote in his memoir that Pompeo overstated both the risk of nuclear escalation and the US role in calming the conflict in 2019. And during Kargil, Pakistan “knew the Indian Air Force wouldn’t cross into its territory” – so there was no real trigger for even an implicit nuclear threat, insist Pakistani analysts.

“Strategic signalling reminds the world that any conflict can spiral – and with India and Pakistan, the stakes are higher due to the nuclear overhang. But that doesn’t mean either side is actively threatening nuclear use,” Ejaz Haider, a Lahore-based defence analyst, told the BBC.

But nuclear escalation can happen by accident too. “This could happen by human error, hackers, terrorists, computer failures, bad data from satellites and unstable leaders,” Prof Alan Robock of Rutgers University, lead author of the landmark 2019 paper by a global team of scientists, told the BBC.

In March 2022, India accidentally fired a nuclear-capable cruise missile which travelled 124km (77 miles) into Pakistani territory before crashing, reportedly damaging civilian property. Pakistan said India failed to use the military hotline or issue a public statement for two days. Had this occurred during heightened tensions, the incident could have spiralled into serious conflict, experts say. (Months later, India’s government sacked three air force officers for the “accidental firing of a missile”.)

Yet, the danger of nuclear war remains “relatively small” between India and Pakistan, according to Mr Clary.

“So long as there is not major ground combat along the border, the dangers of nuclear use remain relatively small and manageable,” he said.

“In ground combat, the ‘use it or lose it’ problem is propelled by the possibility that your ground positions will be overrun by the enemy.” (‘Use it or lose it‘ refers to the pressure a nuclear-armed country may feel to launch its weapons before they are destroyed in a first strike by an adversary.)

Sumit Ganguly, a senior fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution, believes that “neither India nor Pakistan wants to be labelled as the first violator of the post-Hiroshima nuclear taboo”.

“Furthermore, any side that resorts to the use of nuclear weapons would face substantial retaliation and suffer unacceptable casualties,” Mr Ganguly told the BBC.

At the same time, both India and Pakistan appear to be beefing up their nuclear arsenal.

With new delivery systems in development, four plutonium reactors and expanding uranium enrichment, Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal could reach around 200 warheads by the late 2020s, according to The Nuclear Notebook, researched by the Federation of American Scientists’ Nuclear Information Project.

And as of early 2023, India was estimated to have about 680kg of weapons-grade plutonium – enough for roughly 130-210 nuclear warheads, according to the International Panel on Fissile Materials.

Despite repeated crises and close calls, both sides have so far managed to avoid a catastrophic slide into nuclear conflict. “The deterrent is still holding. All Pakistanis did was to respond to conventional strikes with counter-conventional strikes of their own,” writes Umer Farooq, an Islamabad-based analyst.

Yet, the presence of nuclear weapons injects a constant undercurrent of risk – one that can never be entirely ruled out, no matter how experienced the leadership or how restrained the intentions.

“When nuclear weapons can be involved, there is always an unacceptable level of danger,”John Erath, senior policy director at the non-profit Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation, told the BBC.

“The Indian and Pakistani governments have navigated these situations in the past, so the risk is small. But with nuclear weapons, even a small risk is too large.”

A Los Angeles judge has reduced the sentence of Erik and Lyle Menendez, making them eligible for parole more than 30 years after they killed their parents in a Beverly Hills mansion.

Judge Michael Jesic resentenced the brothers on Tuesday, after hearing evidence from relatives and prison staff about their attempts to make amends while behind bars.

The district attorney had argued that they were not rehabilitated, but now the state parole board could order the brothers’ release as early as next month.

The brothers have long argued that they killed Kitty and Jose Menendez out of self-defence after years of sexual abuse, in a high-profile case that prompted a Netflix show which renewed interest in the story.

After hearing that they had been resentenced to 50 years to life with the possibility of parole, the brothers delivered an emotional statement to the court.

They went through grim details of the brutal killings and their decision to reload their shotguns and keep shooting their parents at point-blank range in the living room of their home. The siblings were aged 18 and 21 at the time.

“I had to stop being selfish and immature to really understand what my parents went though in those last moments,” Erik Menendez, 54, told the court.

He described the “shock, confusion and betrayal” they must have felt seeing their sons holding guns and opening fire.

• When might the Menendez brothers be released?

Both apologised for their actions and talked about their hopes of working with sex abuse victims and helping those incarcerated if they were given a second chance outside prison.

The voice of Lyle Menendez, 57, cracked as he talked about the impact of his “unfathomable” actions on their relatives.

“I lied to you and forced you into a spotlight of public humiliation,” he said to his family.

Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman said the decision to resentence the pair was “monumental” and carried “significant implications for the families involved”.

Much of the hearing centred on what the brothers have been doing in prison for the last 30 years.

Family members and those who worked with them in prison detailed the educational courses they completed and programmes they created to improve the lives of inmates, including a hospice initiative for the elderly and sick.

Judge Jesic called the brothers’ work while in prison “remarkable”, but noted that their 1996 sentences to life without parole were justified at the time.

He said that under the guidelines, they were eligible for resentencing, issuing his new sentence of 50 years to life. The brothers have been held in custody since 1990.

As the judge continued reading, the brothers smiled and waved to their attorneys and family members who crowded into the courtroom. Family members embraced with smiles.

“Today is a great day,” defence lawyer Mark Geragos told reporters outside court. He said they were “one huge step closer to bringing the boys home”.

Anamaria Baralt, the brothers’ cousin who testified inside court earlier in the day, said their family was elated.

“It is a difficult process,” she said of the parole hearing that awaits the brothers, but noted they will “eagerly step through those doors if it means we can have them home”.

Inside court earlier, relatives pleaded with the judge to allow the siblings’ release.

Ms Baralt, who said she has been close with them since they were children, told the judge they deserved a “second chance at life”.

“It’s been a nightmare,” she said. “I am desperate for this process to be over.”

Ms Baralt told the court she speaks with the brothers frequently and testified that they had taken “ownership of their actions”.

• Prosecutors claim retaliation by new LA DA over Menendez brothers support
• What is the controversy around Netflix’s Menendez drama?

She said Lyle Menendez had acknowledged to her he had asked a witness to lie when testifying at their previous trial.

But she added: “They are very different men from the boys they were.”

The judge also heard from a retired Florida judge – who said he has never testified on behalf of any criminal defendant – and Anerae “X-Raided” Brown, a rapper who was in prison with both brothers and credits their help for his release.

The district attorney’s office, which fiercely opposes the brothers being released, questioned each witness about Erik and Lyle Menendez’s “litany of lies” they have clung to since the murders.

Prosecutors said they lied to law enforcement immediately after the crimes, lied to family members about their guilt and gave false evidence at their trials.

Prosecutors have said the brothers have continued to “make excuses” for their conduct instead of taking full responsibility.

“There’s no doubt they’ve done all these positive things in prison,” Deputy District Attorney Habib Balian said in his closing argument.

But, he added, when reversing a jury’s unanimous verdict in such a brutal murder case, it’s important to “make certain they are truly rehabilitated”.

The case was thrust back into the spotlight after a new Netflix drama, Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story, as well as the release of docudrama, The Menendez Brothers.

It introduced the case to a new generation and garnered attention from celebrities – including Kim Kardashian and Rosie O’Donnell – who called for the brothers to be released. The previous district attorney, George Gascón, backed their resentencing bid, allowing the effort to go before a judge.

The next step for the brothers will be the California parole board.

The board has already been vetting the siblings after a request by Governor Gavin Newsom. The governor is separately weighing a request from the brothers for clemency, which could take the form of a reduced sentence or a pardon – if approved.

A risk assessment has been completed on the brothers as part of their request for clemency. The district attorney said it indicated a “moderate risk of violence”. However, the full report has not been released.

Newsom asked the parole board to conduct a risk assessment, which has already been drafted, that examines whether they pose a risk to the general public if released.

The state’s parole board is set to conduct a separate hearing on 13 June for the brothers.

It’s unclear what could come at the hearing, or if there might be multiple hearings vetting their potential release.

Former world champion cyclist Rohan Dennis has been given a two-year suspended sentence over a car incident in Australia which killed his wife, fellow Olympian Melissa Hoskins.

Dennis pleaded guilty to one aggravated count of creating the likelihood of harm, after Hoskins was struck by the car he was driving during a fight outside the couple’s Adelaide home in 2023.

A judge said Dennis had disregarded his wife’s safety, but was not criminally responsible for her death.

Hoskins’ parents spoke outside the court after sentencing, saying they were “glad” the case was over and they hoped the family could “move on”.

The court had previously heard that Dennis and Hoskins were arguing about kitchen renovations shortly before the incident occurred, and Hoskins had held on to the car her husband was driving as he tried to leave.

While sentencing Dennis, Judge Ian Press said calling the incident tragic “really does not do justice to the grief, the anguish and the turmoil those events have brought into the lives of those who knew and loved your wife”.

He said he understood that Dennis had tried to “de-escalate the argument” by driving off, but said it did not excuse his actions.

“It was your obligation to stop the vehicle when driving that vehicle became dangerous to her physical wellbeing,” he said, according to a report by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC).

“That you did not stop because you wanted to leave, is a very poor reason for not doing so.”

Hoskins was taken to hospital after being struck but later died of her injuries.

Dennis was initially charged with dangerous driving causing death and driving without due care and pleaded not guilty, but he later admitted to a single, lesser charge.

Dennis’ lawyer had argued that he had no intention of harming his wife and either did not know or was “reckless to the fact” that Hoskins was holding onto the car.

She told an earlier hearing that despite his “stoic” front, Dennis felt a “deep, deep grief”.

On Wednesday, Judge Press emphasised that Dennis was not criminally responsible for causing Hoskins’ death, and accepted he was remorseful.

“I accept you have a sense of responsibility for all that occurred. I accept you have anguished over what could have been different if you had acted in some other way,” Judge Press said.

In victim impact statements read to the court last month, Hoskins’ mother said that while she accepted Dennis wouldn’t have intentionally hurt her daughter, his temper was his “downfall” and “needs to be addressed”.

Speaking outside court, Peter and Amanda Hoskins said they missed their daughter “terribly”.

“She was someone really special,” Mr Hoskins said.

He said the family was yet to receive an apology from Dennis, but expected it “will come with time”.

“It’s now time for us to move on, which would be Melissa’s expectations of us,” Mr Hoskins said, adding it was important for the couple to have a “well-mannered relationship” with Dennis going forward.

“There are two young children caught up in this tragedy… Clearly, we want to continue to be an integral part of [the] children’s lives and their future.”

Hoskins was a world champion cyclist in the Australian team pursuit in 2015, and a two-time Olympian. Her death triggered a wave of tributes from around the world.

She and Dennis married in 2018.

Dennis retired at the end of the 2023 season after a cycling career in which he won a silver medal team pursuit at the London 2012 Olympics and a road time trial bronze at Tokyo 2020. He also won a gold medal at the Commonwealth Games in 2022.

Ofcom has launched investigations into two pornographic websites it believes may be falling foul of the UK’s newly introduced child safety rules.

The regulator said Itai Tech Ltd – which operates a so-called “nudifying” site – and Score Internet Group LLC had failed to detail how they were preventing children from accessing their platforms.

Ofcom announced in January that, in order to comply with the Online Safety Act, all websites on which pornographic material could be found must introduce “robust” age-checking techniques from July.

It said the two services it was investigating did not appear to have any effective age checking mechanisms.

Firms found to be in breach of the Act face huge fines.

The regulator said on Friday that many services publishing their own porn content had, as required, provided details of “highly effective age assurance methods” they were planning to implement.

• What the Online Safety Act is – and how to keep children safe online

They added that this “reassuringly” included some of the largest services that fall under the rules.

It said a small number of services had also blocked UK users entirely to prevent children accessing them.

Itai Tech Ltd and Score Internet Group LLC did not respond to its request for information or show they had plans to introduce age checks, it added.

The “nudifying” technology that one of the company’s platforms features involves the use of artificial intelligence (AI) to create the impression of having removed a person’s clothing in an image or video.

The Children’s Commissioner recently called on the government to introduce a total ban on such AI apps that could be used to create sexually explicit images of children.

Under the Online Safety Act, platforms that publish their own pornographic content were required to take steps to implement age checks from January.

These can include requiring UK users to provide photo ID or running credit card checks.

But all websites where a user might encounter pornographic material are also required to demonstrate the robustness of the measures they are taking to verify the age of users.

These could even apply to some social media platforms, Ofcom told the BBC in January.

The rules are expected to change the way many UK adults will use or encounter some digital services, such as porn sites.

“As age checks start to roll out in the coming months, adults will start to notice a difference in how they access certain online services,” said Dame Melanie Dawes, Ofcom’s chief executive, in January.

In April, Discord said it would start testing face-scanning as a way to verify some users’ ages in the UK and Australia.

Experts said it marked “the start of a bigger shift” for platforms as lawmakers worldwide look to impose strict internet safety rules.

Critics suggest such measures risk pushing young people to “darker corners” of the internet where there are smaller, less regulated sites hosting more violent or explicit material.

Svitlana says her daughter loved her school in Poland.

“Even when we moved to another area, she didn’t want to change schools,” says the 31-year-old Ukrainian mother. “She liked it so much. There was no bullying.”

Now she says the atmosphere at the school – and in Poland overall – has changed.

“Two weeks ago, she came home and said “One boy said to me today, ‘Go back to Ukraine’.” Svitlana was astonished.

She is one of dozens of Ukrainians living in Poland who have told the BBC that anti-Ukrainian sentiment has risen considerably in recent months.

Many described experiencing abuse on public transport, bullying in schools and xenophobic material online.

A polarising presidential election campaign has added to the tension, with the first round of voting taking place on Sunday.

The day after Svitlana’s daughter was told to go back to Ukraine, the abuse became even worse.

“Girls from the class above started complaining about her speaking Ukrainian. Then they pretended to fall to the ground shouting ‘Missile! Get down!’ and laughing,” Svitlana says. “She came home crying.”

A Russian missile had slammed into Svitlana’s hometown in Ukraine days before, killing scores of civilians, including children. Her daughter was traumatised.

Svitlana – not her real name did not want to be identified as she fears reprisals. She showed us screenshots of messages with school staff where she complains about her daughter’s treatment.

She said she had noticed attitudes changing towards Ukrainians in other places, too: “At work, many people have been saying Ukrainians come here and behave badly. And my Ukrainian friends say they want to go home because Polish people don’t accept us. It’s frightening to live here now.”

According to government statistics, at least 2.5 million Ukrainians live in Poland, comprising almost 7% of the total population of Poland.

When the full-scale invasion of Ukraine began in February 2022, there was an outpouring of compassion from Poles. “It was amazing. Every day people were calling, asking, ‘How can we help?'” says activist Natalia Panchenko, head of the Warsaw-based ‘Stand with Ukraine’ Foundation.

“Some of them organised humanitarian convoys or brought refugees here. They gave their houses, food, everything they have – and their hearts, too.”

Three years later, Natalia says she believes the majority of Poles still support Ukraine. But some don’t – and her organisation has noticed an upsurge of anti-Ukrainian online abuse that began several months ago.

“Then it started to come to real life,” she says. “Recently, we have more and more of these kinds of situations… xenophobic [abuse] of people working in shops or hotels just because they speak with a Ukrainian accent.”

Natalia says that many Ukrainian refugees are traumatised. “These groups of women and children are in Poland because of the war, very often their relatives are on the front line, in captivity or dead… and this is the group of people being targeted.”

Research suggests that Poland’s public opinion of Ukrainians is indeed worsening. According to a March 2025 poll by the respected CBOS Centre, just 50% of Poles are in favour of accepting Ukrainian refugees, a fall of seven percentage points in four months. Two years ago, the figure was 81%.

Around a million Ukrainians are officially registered as having arrived after the start of the full-scale invasion. Poland spends 4.2% of its GDP on Ukrainian refugees.

Ukraine has become a hot-button political issue in Poland’s crucial presidential election campaign.

Far-right populist Slawomir Mentzen, currently polling third, is virulently anti-Ukrainian and supports an “agreement” with Russia’s Vladimir Putin.

In second place is conservative Karol Nawrocki, who opposes EU and Nato membership for Ukraine and financial assistance for refugees, but supports the war effort.

The most pro-Ukraine candidate is front-runner Rafal Trzaskowski from Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s coalition, although even he has promised a reduction in social welfare for Ukrainians.

Trzaskowski has refrained from espousing his pro-Ukrainian credentials in order to attract the centrist vote in the elections, says political analyst Marcin Zaborowski.

“He’s responding to the change in public attitudes. The initial enthusiasm for supporting war victims is disappearing, negative sentiments are taking over and it’s not an entirely comfortable issue for him.”

Another far-right candidate, Grzegorz Braun, is under investigation by police for tearing down a Ukrainian flag from a city hall building during an election rally in April. Braun, who is polling at just 3%, regularly fulminates against what he calls the “Ukrainisation of Poland”.

Last week, the Polish government warned of an “unprecedented attempt” by Russia to interfere in the Polish elections by spreading “false information among Polish citizens online”. Moscow denies all allegations of election interference.

Michal Marek, who runs an NGO that monitors disinformation and propaganda in Poland, offers some examples of the anti-Ukraine material being circulated on social media.

“The main narratives are that Ukrainians are stealing money from the Polish budget, that Ukrainians do not respect us, that they want to rob and kill us and are responsible for the war,” he says.

“This information starts in Russian-speaking Telegram channels, and, after that, we see the same photos and the same text just translated by Google Translate. And they are pushing [the material] into the Polish infosphere.”

Mr Marek links such disinformation directly with the increase in anti-Ukraine sentiment in Poland, and says an increasing number of Poles are becoming influenced by propaganda.

“But we will only see the effect after the election – what percentage of Poles want to vote for openly pro-Russian candidates.”

Former Uruguayan President José Mujica, known as “Pepe”, has died at the age of 89.

The ex-guerrilla who governed Uruguay from 2010 to 2015 was known as the world’s “poorest president” because of his modest lifestyle.

Current President Yamandú Orsi announced his predecessor’s death on X, writing: “thank you for everything you gave us and for your deep love for your people.”

The politician’s cause of death is not known but he had been suffering from oesophageal cancer.

Because of the simple way he lived as president, his criticism of consumerism and the social reforms he promoted – which, among other things, meant Uruguay became the first country to legalise the recreational use of marijuana – Mujica became a well-known political figure in Latin America and beyond.

His global popularity is unusual for a president of Uruguay, a country with just 3.4 million inhabitants where his legacy has also generated some controversy.

In fact, even though many tended to see Mujica as someone outside the political class, that was not the case.

He said his passion for politics, as well as for books and working the land, was passed on to him by his mother, who raised him in a middle-class home in Montevideo, the capital city.

As a young man, Mujica was a member of the National Party, one of Uruguay’s traditional political forces, which later became the centre-right opposition to his government.

In the 1960s, he helped set up the Tupamaros National Liberation Movement (MLN-T), a leftist urban guerrilla group that carried out assaults, kidnappings and executions, although he always maintained that he did not commit any murder.

Influenced by the Cuban revolution and international socialism, the MLN-T launched a campaign of clandestine resistance against the Uruguayan government, which at the time was constitutional and democratic, although the left accused it of being increasingly authoritarian.

During this period, Mujica was captured four times. On one of those occasions, in 1970, he was shot six times and nearly died.

He escaped from prison twice, on one occasion through a tunnel with 105 other MLN-T prisoners, in one of the largest escapes in Uruguayan prison history.

When the Uruguayan military staged a coup in 1973, they included him in a group of “nine hostages” who they threatened to kill if the guerrillas continued their attacks.

During the more than 14 years he spent in prison during the 1970s and 1980s, he was tortured and spent most of that time in harsh conditions and isolation, until he was freed in 1985 when Uruguay returned to democracy.

He used to say that during his time in prison, he experienced madness first hand, suffering from delusions and even talking to ants.

The day he was freed was his happiest memory, he says: “Becoming president was insignificant compared to that.”

A few years after his release, he served as a lawmaker, both in the Chamber of Representatives and in the Senate, the country’s lower and upper houses respectively.

In 2005, he became minister in the first government of the Frente Amplio, the Uruguayan leftist coalition, before becoming Uruguay’s president in 2010.

He was 74 years old at the time, and, to the rest of the world, still unknown.

His election marked an important moment for the Latin American left, which was already strong on the continent at that time. Mujica became leader alongside other left-wing presidents such as Luis Inácio Lula da Silva in Brazil and Hugo Chávez in Venezuela.

However, Mujica governed in his own way, demonstrating pragmatism and audacity on several occasions, political commentators say.

During his administration, amid a fairly favourable international context, the Uruguayan economy grew at an average annual rate of 5.4%, poverty was reduced, and unemployment remained low.

Uruguay also drew global attention for the social laws passed by parliament during those years, such as the legalisation of abortion, the recognition of same-sex marriage, and state regulation of the marijuana market.

While in office, Mujica rejected moving into the presidential residence (a mansion), as heads of state around the world usually do.

Instead, he remained with his wife – politician and former guerrilla Lucía Topolansky – in their modest home on the outskirts of Montevideo, with no domestic help and little security.

This combined with the fact that he always dressed casually, that he was often seen driving his light blue 1987 Volkswagen Beetle and gave away a large portion of his salary, led some media outlets to call him “the world’s poorest president”.

But Mujica always rejected that title: “They say I’m the poorest president. No, I’m not,” he told me in a 2012 interview at his home. “Poor are those who want more […] because they’re in an endless race.”

Despite Mujica preaching austerity, his government did significantly increase public spending, widening the fiscal deficit and leading his opponents to accuse him of waste.

Mujica was also criticised for failing to reverse the growing problems in Uruguayan education, despite having promised that education would be a top priority for his administration.

However, unlike other leaders in the region, he was never accused of corruption or of undermining his country’s democracy.

By the end of his administration, Mujica had a high domestic popularity rating (close to 70%) and was elected senator, but also spent part of his time travelling the world after he stepped down as president.

“So what it is that catches the world’s attention? That I live with very little, a simple house, that I drive around in an old car? Then this world is crazy because it’s surprised by [what is] normal,” he reflected before leaving office.

Mujica retired from politics in 2020 though he remained a central figure in Uruguay.

His political heir, Yamandú Orsi, was elected president of Uruguay in November 2024 and his group within the Frente Amplio obtained the largest number of parliamentary seats since the country’s return to democracy.

Last year, Mujica announced he had cancer and references to his age and the inexorable proximity of death became more frequent – but he always accepted the final outcome as something natural, without drama.

In the last interview he gave the BBC in November last year, he said: “One knows that death is inevitable. And perhaps it’s like the salt of life.”

Sean “Diddy” Combs’ ex-girlfriend, Casandra Ventura, has told the hip-hop mogul’s sex-trafficking trial that he controlled her life and coerced her into “humiliating” sex acts.

The prosecution’s star witness testified about the alleged physical and emotional abuse she endured at the hands of the rapper during so-called “freak-offs”, or sexual encounters the couple had with male escorts.

Family and friends have come to court in large numbers to support Mr Combs, whose legal team has not yet questioned Ms Ventura.

Mr Combs has pleaded not guilty to charges including racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking, and transportation to engage in prostitution.

Prosecutors began by questioning Ms Ventura – one of their two central witnesses in the case – about her 11-year, on-and-off relationship with Mr Combs.

Now 38 and pregnant with her third child, she met Mr Combs when she was a 19-year-old aspiring singer and he was 37.

His record label would later sign Ms Ventura as an artist, and shortly afterwards their romantic relationship began.

At the time, she testified, she felt like they were in a monogamous relationship, though she knows now that he had other girlfriends.

She said she “fell in love” with the “larger-than-life entrepreneur and musician”. But it was not long before she noticed another side to him, she said.

Mr Combs wanted to “control” her life, Ms Ventura said. She said he paid for her home, her cars, her phone and other technology that he would sometimes take away to “punish” her.

“Control was everything, from the way that I looked… to what I was working on,” Ms Ventura said.

Eventually, she claimed, the control turned violent. Mr Combs would “bash on my head, knock me over, drag me and kick me” frequently, Ms Ventura testified, sometimes through tears.

She alleged that she was left with swollen lips, black eyes and knots on her forehead.

Prosecutors spent hours on Tuesday asking Ms Ventura about so-called “freak-offs”.

Ms Ventura told the court how Mr Combs introduced her to the sexual events during the first year of their relationship. They would hire a male escort or stripper to have sex with Ms Ventura while Mr Combs watched.

Ms Ventura told the court that she first tried the encounters to make Mr Combs “happy”. But she said they humiliated her, and sometimes lasted three to four days.

“I felt pretty horrible about myself,” she told the court, wiping away tears. “It made me feel worthless.”

Ms Ventura told the court she never wanted to have sex with anyone but Mr Combs, and claimed she would take myriad drugs – marijuana, ecstasy and ketamine – to help her perform to Mr Combs’ satisfaction, but also to “disassociate”.

The drugs were “a way to not feel it for what it really was”, she said, “having sex with a stranger I didn’t really want to be having sex with”.

As prosecutors pressed Ms Ventura about the “freak-offs”, she told the court of how Mr Combs would direct her to find male escorts, strippers or dancers to have sex with while he watched.

She alleged that Mr Combs would pay the men anywhere from $1,500 to $6,000 in cash, depending on their performance.

They found the men through stripper companies and sites like Craigslist. Some of their photos were displayed to the jurors, including Daniel Phillip, who finished his testimony earlier on Tuesday.

Ms Ventura and Mr Combs had the enounters in cities around the world, including Los Angeles, New York, Las Vegas and Ibiza, Spain, Ms Ventura testified.

Sometimes, men would be flown in during vacations, she alleged, and Mr Combs would direct her to ask staff to pay for and arrange their travel, calling them new employees.

Among other charges, prosecutors are trying to prove that Mr Combs engaged in sex trafficking – human trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation – and transportation to engage in prostitution.

As prosecutors pressed Ms Ventura for graphic details, one key element emerged: Ms Ventura claimed that Mr Combs controlled every part of the encounters.

He chose the outfits she wore – down to the extremely high heels she kept on for hours – as well as the sexual acts that transpired and the lighting, Ms Ventura told jurors.

“If Sean wanted something to happen, that was what was going to happen,” she said. “I couldn’t say no.”

Sometimes, Ms Ventura said, she would take the lead on which male escorts to hire because Mr Combs was “very busy”, but she only did so at his direction, she said.

She said freak-offs had a very specific “pattern” of sexual acts each time.

“He was controlling the whole situation,” she alleged. “He was directing it.”

At times, Ms Ventura said, she tried to tell Mr Combs that she felt “horrible”. But when he dismissed her concerns, she said, she relented, worried he would get angry or question their relationship.

Ms Ventura is expected to continue her testimony on Wednesday, when she could also face cross-examination.

At least 48 Palestinians have been killed in a series of Israeli air strikes in northern Gaza overnight, a local hospital says.

The Indonesian hospital reported that 22 children and 15 women were among the dead after a number of homes in Jabalia town and refugee camp were hit. A video shared online appeared to show at least a dozen bodies on the floor there.

The Israeli military said it was looking into the reports. It had warned residents of Jabalia and neighbouring areas to evacuate on Tuesday night after a Palestinian armed group launched rockets into Israel.

It came as the UN’s humanitarian affairs chief urged members of the UN Security Council to take action to “prevent genocide” in Gaza.

Speaking at a meeting in New York on Tuesday, Tom Fletcher accused Israel of “deliberately and unashamedly imposing inhumane conditions on civilians”.

He called on Israel to lift its 10-week blockade on Gaza and criticised the Israeli-US plan to take over the distribution of humanitarian aid in the territory.

The Israeli ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon, told the council that foreign aid was being used to help Hamas’s war effort.

Meanwhile, US Special Envoys Steve Witkoff and Adam Boehler said they would travel to Qatar for fresh negotiations on a possible ceasefire and hostage release deal.

Israel’s Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has threatened to expand its military offensive in Gaza this week unless Hamas agrees to release the 58 hostages it is still holding.

On Tuesday, a massive Israeli air strike on the European hospital’s compound in southern Gaza killed at least 28 people, according to local officials.

Israeli media reports said the target was Mohammed Sinwar, who is believed to have become the leader of Hamas in Gaza after his brother Yahya was killed by Israeli forces last October.

The Israeli military described it as “a precise strike on Hamas terrorists who were operating in a command-and-control centre” underneath the hospital.

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 52,908 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry.

A man whose illegal cannabis factory exploded in a block of flats, killing seven-year-old Archie York, has been jailed for 14 years.

Archie died when the blast caused by Reece Galbraith, 33, obliterated several homes in Benwell in the early hours of 16 October 2024, Newcastle Crown Court heard.

The fatal explosion was caused by a build-up of butane created in the process of making drug-infused sweets in one of the flats by Jason Laws, 35, who was also killed, and Galbraith.

Galbraith, of Gateshead, admitted two counts of manslaughter, with Archie’s mother screaming at him in court that he had killed her son.

Mr Laws and Galbraith were using a ground-floor flat in the block of 12 homes on Violet Close to make so-called cannabis shatter, a brittle substance containing a high concentration of the psychoactive compound THC which is used to form sweets from, prosecutor David Brooke KC said.

• ‘My son was killed by criminals making cannabis’

At about 00:40 BST, their “sophisticated” factory exploded, killing Archie, who lived upstairs with his parents and baby brother, and totally destroying six homes, the court heard.

There was then a “fierce fire” and the block ultimately had to be demolished, with dozens of people losing their homes and treasured possessions, Mr Brooke said.

Archie had been asleep in his living room when the blast occurred and was killed instantly, while his father Robbie York, mother Katherine Errington and seven-week-old brother Finley all survived, the court heard.

Mr Brooke said there had also been an “enormous impact” on the local area, with the damage and costs to Newcastle City Council valued at £3.7m, 81 adults and 59 children from 51 homes displaced and 10 households having to be permanently rehoused.

Ms Errington told the court her son’s death had “broken us in ways I didn’t know possible” and the family had “lost everything”, adding she felt “survivor’s guilt”.

In a fury, she angrily told Galbraith he “took risks for profit” before screaming at him: “You killed my son.”

“This was your choice,” Ms Errington said. “We will never forgive you for what you did to our beautiful boy.”

The court heard Archie’s beloved dog Chase had also been killed in the blast.

In a statement read to the court, Mr York said he felt “nothing but anger” towards Galbraith and Mr Laws, adding he had “no sympathy” for the latter’s death.

“They were making drugs whilst my family slept upstairs unaware of the danger that was below us,” Mr York said.

He said Galbraith and Mr Laws’ illegal operation had put multiple children at risk while their own children slept safely elsewhere, adding: “We worked hard for what we had and they did nothing but inflict pain and misery on others.”

Another neighbour, who had lost her home of 18 years, said the men were horrible, selfish and greedy.

One woman said her seven-month-old daughter had been blown across her bedroom and was found beneath a pile of drawers and bricks, with the woman fearing the girl would need medical treatment for the rest of her life.

Police found dozens of cannisters of liquid butane gas and expensive equipment used to make cannabis shatter in the debris, the court heard.

Mr Brooke said butane was used in the production process but it was “highly dangerous” and “extremely flammable”.

He said the cannisters clearly displayed multiple vivid warnings which Mr Laws and Galbraith had ignored.

Galbraith, of Rectory Road, had also been in the flat and was found in the wreckage covered in severe burns, going on to spend a month in a coma in hospital.

His finger prints were found on some of the butane cannisters and on packages of cannabis sweets discovered in Mr Laws’ car, Mr Brooke said, with evidence from his phones showing he had been selling cannabis sweets for at least 11 months before the blast.

Galbraith, who also admitted producing and selling cannabis, had previous convictions related to the drug and was under police investigation at the time of the blast, the court heard.

In mitigation, Richard Wright KC said Galbraith had not intended to harm or kill anybody and was “genuinely sorry”.

President Cyril Ramaphosa has called a group of 59 white South Africans who have moved to the US to resettle “cowards”, saying “they’ll be back soon”.

The group of Afrikaners arrived in the US on Monday after President Donald Trump granted them refugee status, saying they faced racial discrimination.

But Ramaphosa said those who wanted to leave were not happy with efforts to address the inequities of the apartheid past, terming their relocation a “sad moment for them”.

“As South Africans, we are resilient. We don’t run away from our problems. We must stay here and solve our problems. When you run away you are a coward, and that’s a real cowardly act,” he added.

Trump and his close ally, South Africa-born Elon Musk, have said there was a “genocide” of white farmers in South Africa – a claim that has been widely discredited.

The US has also accused the South African government of seizing land from white farmers without paying compensation.

More than 30 years after the end of decades of rule by South Africa’s white minority, black farmers own only a small fraction of the country’s best farmland, with the majority still in white hands, leading to anger over the slow pace of change.

In January President Ramaphosa signed a controversial law allowing the government to seize privately owned land without compensation in certain circumstances, when it is deemed “equitable and in the public interest”.

But the government says no land has yet been seized under the act.

• Racially charged row between Musk and South Africa over Starlink
• What’s really driving Trump’s fury with South Africa?

Trump has offered to resettle the white Afrikaners, descendants of mostly Dutch settlers, saying they were fleeing a “terrible situation” in South Africa.

Speaking on Monday at an agricultural exhibition in the Free State province, Ramaphosa said the Afrikaners were moving to the US because they were not “favourably disposed” to efforts aimed at addressing the country’s challenges.

“If you look at all national groups in our country, black and white, they’ve stayed in this country because it’s our country and we must not run away from our problems. We must stay here and solve our problems,” Ramaphosa said.

“I can bet you that they will be back soon because there is no country like South Africa,” he added.

His “coward” remark angered some social media users, who condemned it as an insult to aggrieved white South Africans.

The group of Afrikaners were welcomed by top US officials who claimed they had been “living under a shadow of violence and terror” in South Africa.

“Welcome to the land of the free,” Deputy Secretary of State Chris Landau said as he received the South Africans who landed at Dulles airport near Washington DC on Monday.

Some held young children and waved small American flags in the arrival area adorned with red, white and blue balloons on the walls.

Earlier on Monday, President Ramaphosa told an Africa CEO forum in Abidjan, Ivory Coast, that he had recently told Trump during a phone call the US assessment of the situation was “not true”.

“We’re the only country on the continent where the colonisers came to stay and we have never driven them out of our country,” he added, dismissing claims Afrikaners were being persecuted.

Ramaphosa said dozens of white South Africans who arrived in the US on Monday “don’t fit the bill” for refugees.

According to the US embassy in South Africa, to be considered eligible for the refugee resettlement scheme, someone must be:

• Of South African nationality
• Afrikaner or from a racial minority
• Able to cite an incident of past persecution or fear of persecution in the future.

The South African leader said he was due to meet his US counterpart soon regarding the issue.

Trump has threatened to boycott the forthcoming G20 summit in South Africa unless the “situation is taken care of”.

• Almost 70,000 South Africans interested in US asylum
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