Hamas responded to a US ceasefire proposal by saying it is prepared to release 10 living Israeli hostages and 18 dead hostages in exchange for a number of Palestinian prisoners, while requesting some amendments to the plan.

The group repeated its demands for a permanent truce, a complete Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and guarantees for the continuous flow of humanitarian aid. None of these are in the deal on the table.

It was neither an explicit rejection nor a clear acceptance of the US terms, which Washington says Israel has accepted.

Hamas said it had submitted its response to the US draft proposed by Steve Witkoff, US President Donald Trump’s special envoy for the Middle East.

In a statement, Witkoff said: “I received the Hamas response to the United States’ proposal. It is totally unacceptable and only takes us backward. Hamas should accept the framework proposal we put forward as the basis for proximity talks, which we can begin immediately this coming week.

“That is the only way we can close a 60-day ceasefire deal in the coming days.”

A statement from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said: “While Israel has agreed to the updated Witkoff outline for the release of our hostages, Hamas continues to adhere to its refusal.”

Hamas, a proscribed terror group in the US, UK and EU, said it was insisting on a “permanent ceasefire” and “complete withdrawal” of Israeli forces from the Gaza Strip.

The group demanded a sustained flow of aid for Palestinians living in the enclave, and said it would release 10 living hostages and the bodies of 18 dead hostages in exchange for “an agreed upon number” of Palestinian prisoners in Israel.

But Hamas now finds itself in the most complex and difficult position it has faced since the war began.

Under intense pressure from 2.2 million people living in the worst conditions in their history and from the mediators, the movement is unable to accept an American proposal that is, by all accounts, less generous than previous offers it has rejected multiple times, the most recent being in March.

At that time, senior Hamas official and head negotiator Khalil al-Hayya stated unequivocally that the movement would not agree to partial deals that fail to secure a complete and permanent end to the war.

Yet, Hamas also finds itself unable to reject the latest US offer outright, fully aware that Israel is preparing to escalate its ground offensive in Gaza.

The movement lacks the military capacity to prevent or even seriously resist such an assault.

Caught between these two realities, Hamas, in effect, responded to the US proposal not with an answer – but with an entirely new counterproposal.

The full details of the US plan have not been made public and are unconfirmed, but these key points are reportedly included:

• A 60-day pause in fighting

• The release of 28 Israeli hostages – alive and dead – in the first week, and the release of 30 more once a permanent ceasefire is in place

• The release of 1,236 Palestinian prisoners and the remains of 180 dead Palestinians

• The sending of humanitarian aid to Gaza via the UN and other agencies

The terms on offer were the ones Israel could accept – the White House made sure of that by getting Israel’s approval before passing the proposal to Hamas.

It is unlikely that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will be willing to negotiate the changes Hamas wants.

He is under pressure to bring the hostages home and has said he is willing to accept a temporary ceasefire to do so.

But the Israeli government has always insisted on the right to return to hostilities, despite Hamas’s core demand for guarantees that the temporary truce be a path to ending the war.

Netanyahu has said the war will end when Hamas “lays down its arms, is no longer in government [and] its leaders are exiled from the Gaza Strip”.

Defence Minister Israel Katz was more blunt this week. “The Hamas murderers will now be forced to choose: accept the terms of the ‘Witkoff Deal’ for the release of the hostages – or be annihilated,” he said.

Responding to Witkoff’s latest comments, Hamas official Basem Naim told the BBC the group had last week come to an agreement with him on a proposal “which he deemed acceptable for negotiation” – but that the Israeli response “disagreed with all the provisions we had agreed upon”.

“Why, each time, is the Israeli response considered the only response for negotiation?” he said.

“This violates the integrity and fairness of mediation and constitutes a complete bias towards the other side.”

Earlier on Saturday, the Hamas-run Gaza health ministry said 60 people were killed and another 284 injured in the past 24-hours in Israeli strikes.

That does not include numbers from hospitals located in the North Gaza Strip Governorate because of the difficulty of accessing the area, it adds.

Israel launched a military campaign in Gaza in response to Hamas’s cross-border attack on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

At least 54,381 people have been killed in Gaza since then, including 4,117 since Israel resumed its offensive on 18 March, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.

Two bridges have collapsed overnight in separate incidents in Russian regions bordering Ukraine, killing at least seven people and injuring dozens more.

A road bridge came down in Bryansk, bringing several heavy trucks on to a moving passenger train late on Saturday, the regional governor said.

Emergency services said at least seven people were killed. At least 47 people were taken to hospital, including one child, Governor Alexander Bogomaz said.

Moscow Railway alleged on Telegram that the bridge came down as a result of “illegal interference”.

Hours later a second bridge collapsed in the Zheleznogorsk district, derailing a locomotive train, acting governor Alexander Khinshtein said.

The train caught fire and a driver suffered injuries to his legs, Khinshtein said.

Khinshtein wrote on Telegram: “The cause of the bridge collapse will be established. All emergency services are working on the scene. I am keeping the situation under control.”

It is unclear whether the two collapses in the neighbouring regions are related and Ukraine is yet to comment.

Pictures online from Bryansk showed mangled carriages and passengers helping each other climb out of the wreckage in the dark.

Moscow’s interregional transport prosecutor’s office said an investigation had been launched.

Authorities said the train’s locomotive and several cars derailed when the road bridge fell on to it.

Additional emergency workers, as well as rescue equipment and light towers for carrying out work at night have been sent to the area, according to Russian news agency TASS.

The train was going from the town of Klimovo to Moscow and was in the Vygonichsky district when the collapse happened, officials said.

Passengers were evacuated and guided to a meeting point at a nearby station, Moscow Railway said, adding: “They will be able to continue their journey on a specially formed reserve train” travelling from Bryansk to Moscow.

The first incident took place about 100km (62 miles) from the Ukraine border.

An Byunghui was in the middle of a video game on the night of 3 December when she learned that the South Korean president had declared martial law.

She couldn’t quite believe it – until the internet blew up with the evidence. The shock announcement from then-president Yoon Suk Yeol, the now-famous shots of soldiers breaking down the windows of the National Assembly and MPs scaling the walls to force their way into the building so they could vote the motion down.

Within hours, thousands had spurred into protest, especially young women. And Byunghui joined them, travelling hundreds of miles from Daegu in the south-east to the capital Seoul.

They turned up not just because Yoon’s decision had alarmed and angered them, but to protest against a president who insisted South Korea was free of sexism – despite the deep discrimination and flashes of violence that said otherwise.

They returned week after week as the investigation into Yoon’s abuse of power went on – and they rejoiced when he was impeached after four dramatic months.

And yet, with the country set to elect a new president on 3 June, those very women say they feel invisible again.

The two main candidates have been largely silent about equality for women. A polarising subject, it had helped Yoon into power in 2022 as he vowed to defend men who felt sidelined in a world that they saw as too feminist. And a third candidate, who is popular among young men for his anti-feminist stance, has been making headlines.

For many young South Korean women, this new name on the ballot symbolises a new fight.

“So many of us felt like we were trying to make the world a better place by attending the [anti-Yoon] rallies,” the 24-year-old college student says.

“But now, I wonder if anything has really improved… I can’t shake the feeling that they’re trying to erase women’s voices.”

When Byunghui arrived at the protests, she was struck by the atmosphere.

The bitter December cold didn’t stop tens of thousands of women from gathering. Huddling inside hooded jackets or under umbrellas, waving lightsticks and banners, singing hopeful K-pop numbers, they demanded Yoon’s ouster.

“Most of those around me were young women, we were singing ‘Into the World’ by Girls’ Generation,” Byunghui says.

Into the World, a hit from 2007 by one of K-pop’s biggest acts, became an anthem of sorts in the anti-Yoon rallies. Women had marched to the same song nearly a decade ago in anti-corruption protests that ended another president’s career.

“The lyrics – about not giving up on this world and dreaming of a new world,” Byunghui says, “just overwhelmed me. I felt so close to everyone”.

There are no official estimates of how many of the protesters were young women. Approximately one in three were in their 20s or 30s, according to research by local news outlet Chosun Daily.

An analysis by BBC Korean found that women in their 20s were the largest demographic at one rally in December, where there were 200,000 of them – almost 18% of those in attendance. In comparison, there were just over 3% of men in their 20s at that rally.

The protests galvanised women in a country where discrimination, sexual harassment and even violence against them has long been pervasive, and the gender pay gap – at 31% – is the widest among rich nations.

Like in so many other places, plummeting birth rates in South Korea too have upped the pressure on young women to marry and have children, with politicians often encouraging them to play their part in a patriarchal society.

“I felt like all the frustration that has built up inside me just burst forth,” says 23-year-old Kim Saeyeon . “I believe that’s why so many young women turned up. They wanted to express all that dissatisfaction.”

For 26-year-old Lee Jinha, it was the desire to see Yoon go: “I tried to go every week. It wasn’t easy. It was incredibly cold, super crowded, my legs hurt and I had a lot of work to do… but it was truly out of a sense of responsibility.”

That is not surprising, according to Go Min-hee, associate professor of political science at Ewha Women’s University, who says Yoon had the reputation of being “anti-feminist” and had “made it clear he was not going to support policies for young women”.

There were protests on the other side too, backing Yoon and his martial law order. Throughout, many young South Korean men have supported Yoon, who positioned himself as a champion of theirs, mirroring their grievances in his presidential campaign in 2022.

These men consider themselves victims of “reverse discrimination”, saying they feel marginalised by policies that favour young women. One that is often cited is the mandatory 18 months they must spend in the military, which they believe puts them at a severe disadvantage compared to women.

They label as “man haters” those women who call themselves feminists. And they have been at the heart of a fierce online backlash against calls for greater gender equality.

These groups have long existed, mostly out of the public eye. But over the years they moved closer to the mainstream as their traction online grew, especially under Yoon.

It was them that Yoon appealed to in his campaign pledges, vowing to abolish the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family, saying it focused too much on women’s rights.

And he consistently denied systemic gender inequality existed in South Korea, which ranks near the bottom on the issue among developed countries.

But his message hit home. A survey by a local newspaper the year before he was elected had found that 79% of young men in their 20s felt “seriously discriminated against” because of their gender.

“In the last presidential election, gender conflict was mobilised by Yoon’s party,” says Kim Eun-ju, director of the Center for Korean Women and Politics. “They actively strengthened the anti-feminist tendencies of some young men in their 20s.”

During Yoon’s term, she says, government departments or publicly-funded organisations with the word “women” in their title largely disappeared or dropped the reference altogether.

The impact has been polarising. It alienated young women who saw this as a rollback of hard-won rights, even as it fuelled the backlash against feminism.

Byunghui saw this up-close back home in Daegu. She says anti-Yoon protests were overwhelmingly female. The few men who came were usually older.

Young men, she adds, even secondary school students, would often drive past the protests she attended cursing and swearing at them. She says some men even threatened to drive into the crowd.

“I wondered if they would have acted this way had the protest been led by young men?”

With Yoon gone, his People Power Party (PPP) is in disarray and still reeling from his fall.

And this is the first time in 18 years that there is no woman among the seven candidates runnning for president. “It’s shocking,” Jinha says, “that there’s no-one”. In the last election, there were two women among 14 presidential candidates.

The PPP’s Kim Moon-soo is trailing frontrunner Lee Jae-myung, from the main opposition Democratic Party (DP). But young women tell the BBC they have been disappointed by 61-year-old Lee.

“It’s only after criticism that that there were no policies targeting women that the DP began adding a few,” Saeyeon says. “I wish they could have drawn a blueprint for improving structural discrimination.”

When he was asked at the start of his campaign about policies targeting gender inequality, Lee responded: “Why do you keep dividing men and women? They are all Koreans.”

After drawing critcism, the DP acknowledged that women still “faced structural discrimination in many areas”. And it pledged to tackle inequality for women with more resources at every level.

During his presidential bid in 2022, Lee was more vocal about the prejudice South Korean women encounter, seeking their votes in the wake of high-profile sexual harassment scandals in his party.

He had promised to put women in top positions in the government and appointed a woman as co-chair of the DP’s emergency committee.

“It’s evident that the DP is focusing significantly less on young women than they did in the [2022] presidential election,” Ms Kim says.

Prof Go believes it’s because Lee “lost by a very narrow margin” back then. So this time, he is “casting the widest net possible” for votes. “And embracing feminist issues is not a good strategy for that.”

That stings for young women like Saeyeon, especially after the role they played in the protests calling for Yoon’s impeachment: “Our voices don’t seem to be reflected in the [campaign] pledges at all. I feel a bit abandoned.”

The ruling party’s Kim Moon-soo, who served in Yoon’s cabinet as labour minister, has emphasised raising birth rates by offering more financial support to parents.

But many women say rising costs are not the only obstacle. And that most politicians don’t address the deeper inequalities – which make it hard to balance a career and family – that are making so many women reconsider the usual choices.

The Ministry of Gender Equality and Family, which Yoon had wanted to shut down, has also re-emerged as a sticking point.

Lee has vowed to strengthen the ministry, while Kim says he will replace it with a Ministry of Future Youth and Family.

The ministry already focuses on family services, education and welfare for children. Just under 7% of its total funding, which is about 0.2% of the government’s annual budget, goes towards improving equality for women. But Prof Go says the ministry was “politicised by Yoon and has since been weaponised”.

“The ministry itself is not huge but it’s symbolic… abolishing it would show that gender equality is unimportant.”

It’s also the target of a third candidate, 40-year-old Lee Jun-seok, a former leader of Yoon’s party, who has since launched his own Reform Party.

Although trailing Kim in polls, Lee Jun-seok has been especially popular with many young men for his anti-feminist views.

Earlier this week, he drew swift outrage after a presidential debate in which he said: “If someone says they want to stick chopsticks in women’s genitals or some place like that, is that misogyny?”

He said the “someone” was frontunner Lee Jae-myung’s son, who he claimed made the comment online, an allegation which the Lee camp has sidestepped, apologising for other controversial posts.

But watching Lee Jun-seok say that on live TV “was genuinely terrifying,” Byunghui says. “I had the scary thought that this might boost incel communities.”

Saeyeon describes “anger and even despair” sinking the “hopes I had for politics, which weren’t that great to begin with”.

She believes his popularity “among certain sections of young men is one of the “significant repercussions” of South Korea “long neglecting structural discrimination” against women.

The only candidate to address the issue, 61-year-old Kwon Young-gook, didn’t fare well in early polling.

“I’m still deliberating whether to vote for Lee Jae-myung or Kwon Young-gook,” Saeyeon says.

While Kwon represents her concerns, she says it’s smart to shore up the votes for Lee because she is “much more afraid of the next election, and the one after that”.

She is thinking about Lee Jun-seok, who some analysts believe could eat into the votes of a beleagured PPP, while appealing to Yoon’s base: “He is in the spotlight and as the youngest candidate, he could have a long career ahead.”

That is all the more reason to keep speaking out, Byunghui says. “It’s like there is dust on the wall. If you don’t know it’s there, you can walk by, but once you see it, it sticks with you.”

It’s the same for Jinha who says things can “never go back to how they were before Yoon declared martial law”.

That was a time when politics felt inaccessible, but now, Jinha adds, it “feels like something that affects me and is important to my life”.

She says she won’t give up because she wants to be free of “things like discrimination at work… and live my life in peace”.

“People see young women as weak and immature but we will grow up – and then the world will change again.”

Australia’s defence minister Richard Marles has called on China to explain why it needs to have “such an extraordinary military build-up”.

He said Beijing needs to provide greater transparency and reassurance as it is the “fundamental issue” for the region.

Meanwhile, the Philippines defence minister Gilberto Teodoro Jr has called China “absolutely irresponsible and reckless” in its actions in the South China Sea.

The ministers had separately addressed reporters on the sidelines of an Asian defence summit held in Singapore.

China has yet to respond to either Marles or Teodoro.

Organised by the think tank International Institute for Strategic Studies, the Shangri-la Dialogue has traditionally been anchored by the US and China, which have been jostling for power in the region.

This year China has sent a lower-level delegation and scrapped its speech. In the absence of a strong Chinese presence, the dialogue has been dominated by criticism and questions of Beijing posed by the US and its allies.

On Sunday morning, Marles asserted that “what we have seen from China is the single biggest increase in military capability and build up in conventional sense, by any country since the end of the Second World War”.

It is not just the size of the military build-up that concerns other countries, he told reporters.

“It’s the fact that it is happening without strategic reassurance. It’s happening without a clear strategic intent on the part of China… what we want to see is strategic transparency and strategic reassurance be provided by China, and an understanding of why it is needed to have such an extraordinary military build-up.”

He cited Australia as an example of such transparency, noting that Canberra makes public its national defence strategy and defence reviews, and makes it “utterly clear” that when they build up their defences it is for Australia and Asia’s security.

“So there is total strategic clarity and assurance that is being provided by Australia to our neighbours, to the region, to the world. That’s what we would like to see,” he said.

Answering a question on a highly-scrutinised Chinese military exercise conducted near Australia and New Zealand’s waters in February, Marles said that while it was “disruptive, and we believe that it could have been done in a better way”, ultimately “China was acting in accordance with international law”.

“The guiding light, the bedrock here, needs to be compliance with international law. That’s what we keep talking about, is the rules-based order.”

Marles was also asked about Hegseth’s call for Indo-Pacific partners to increase defence spending as a bulwark against the threat of China.

Marles said “we actually are taking steps down this path… we understand it, we’re up for it.” US President Donald Trump has called on Australia to increase its spending to 3%, but Canberra has yet to publicly commit to that number.

Marles added that part of that spending would come under Aukus, a pact among Australia, the UK and the US to build up a fleet of nuclear-powered submarines.

He said projects under the pact were “on track” and he was “very optimistic” about the progress, including more visits of American submarines to Australia and rotations through a Perth-based navy base.

In a separate interview with the BBC’s security correspondent Frank Gardner, the Philippines defence minister Teodoro said China has been “absolutely irresponsible and reckless in appropriating most, if not all, of the South China Sea and the world cannot tolerate this.”

The two countries have repeatedly clashed over competing claims in the South China Sea, and the Philippines has complained of aggressive and violent tactics by the Chinese coast guard.

He echoed the call for a preservation of the international order, saying that “the takeaway of a lot of defence ministers is that Europe and the US must continue to lead” on this.

“That was the call of the Philippines. That is the call of Lithuania, Latvia, the smaller countries who have a way of life that values freedom and dignity of the human being.”

“And with a way of life that we don’t want the deep state looking over our shoulders or being scared of what we say,” he said, referring to China.

On Saturday, US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had warned of China’s “imminent” threat towards Taiwan and accused Beijing of becoming a “hegemonic power” in the region.

China has vigorously attacked Hegseth in two separate statements, with the latest posted on its Foreign Ministry website early on Sunday.

It said that Hegseth had “vilified China with defamatory allegations, and falsely called China a ‘threat’.

“No country in the world deserves to be called a hegemonic power other than the US itself, who is also the primary factor undermining the peace and stability in the Asia-Pacific.”

Earlier in the defence summit, French President Emmanuel Macron had made a pitch for Europe to be a new ally to Asia.

China also responded to Macron, who had compared the defence of Taiwan to the defence of Ukraine, and said the comparison was “unacceptable” as the “Taiwan question is entirely China’s affair”.

China claims Taiwan, a self-governing island, as its territory and has not ruled out the use of force to eventually “reunify” with it.

Indian singer Diljit Dosanjh’s Met Gala debut last month left a lasting impression on global fashion.

The 41-year-old singer, who is the only Punjabi musician to perform at Coachella, walked the red carpet dressed like an early 20th Century maharajah.

His opulent ivory and gold ensemble – created by designer Prabal Gurung – complete with a feathered bejewelled turban, trended in India for weeks.

He also wore a gorgeous diamond necklace, its design inspired by a Cartier piece worn by an erstwhile king of the northern Indian state of Punjab.

A Panthère de Cartier watch, a lion-headed and a jewel-studded sword completed the ensemble, which had a map of Dosanjh’s home state embroidered on the back of the cape along with letters from Gurmukhi, the script for Punjabi language.

Of course, Dosanjh is no stranger to such style.

Just like his music, he’s carved out a niche in fashion too – a hip hop singer who is known for melding traditional Punjabi styles with Western influences.

Often seen in anti-fit trousers, chunky sneakers, and stacks of necklaces that he matches with his colourful turbans, his unique form of self-expression has captured the imagination of millions, leading to interesting reinventions in the traditional Punjabi attire.

The changes can be felt everywhere. A 16-minute high-intensity bhangra competition in California would be impossible without high performance sneakers. And basement bhangra nights in Berlin are enjoyed in crop tops and deconstructed pants.

Punjabi music itself, high on volume and energy – with lyrics packed with the names of cities and global luxury brands – has become a subculture.

It’s not just Dosanjh – several other Punjabi musicians have also influenced the region’s style game.

Not long ago, Punjabi-Canadian singer Jazzy B’s rings, often the size of a cookie, along with his plus-sized Kanda pendant and silver blonde hair tints, were trending.

More recently, the yellow tinted glasses worn by singer Badshah; the baggy hoodies sported by Yo Yo Honey Singh; and AP Dhillon’s Louis Vuitton bombers and Chanel watches have been hugely popular with Punjabi youth.

But even though their influence was significant, it was restricted to a region. Dosanjh and a few others like him, however, have managed to mount it to a global level, their style speaking to both the Sikh diaspora as well as a broader audience. For instance, the t-shirts, pearls and sneakers Dosanjh wore to his world tour last year were sold out in a matter of hours. Dhillon’s style statements at Paris Couture Week have created aspiration among Punjabi youth.

Cultural experts say that this reinvention, both in music and fashion, has its roots in Western pop-culture as most of the artistes live and perform in the West.

“Punjabi men are inventive. The region has been at the forefront of fusion, it believes in hybridity. This is especially the case with the Punjabi diaspora – even when they live in ghettos, they are the showmen [of their lives],” says art historian, author and museum curator Alka Pande.

Over the years, as the Punjabi diaspora community grew, a new generation of musicians began mixing modern hip-hop sounds with elements of traditional Punjabi aesthetics.

Their distinct style lexicon – of gold chains, faux fur jackets, plus-sized accessories, braids and beards – went on to spawn media articles, books and doctoral theses on South Asian culture.

The coin dropped instantly back home in Punjab, which absorbed logo fashion like a sponge when luxury brands arrived in the 2000s. For Punjabis – who are largely a farming community – it was an aspirational uprising, symbolic of how success and prosperity should look.

“It symbolised the movement of the Punjabi identity from a farmer to a global consumer,” says acclaimed singer Rabbi Shergill.

Arguing that performers, like everyone else, are a product of their times, Shergill says these impulses are “a response to the hyper capitalist world”.

Curiously, the style game of Punjabi musicians – from hip-hop, R&B, bhangra pop, fusion, Punjabi rap, reggae or filmy music – has also remained rooted and androgynous, instead of being hyper masculine.

A pop star may wear Balenciaga or Indian designer Manish Malhotra’s opulent creations; perform anywhere from Ludhiana city to London; dance with Beyonce around Dubai’s Burj Khalifa, atop a luxury car, or in a British mansion – but they always wear their Punjabi identity on their sleeves.

Dosanjh underlined this clearly with his maharajah look at the Met Gala. “It’s like the popularity of his androgynous style was waiting to happen,” Pande says.

The composite impact of this trend on emerging artists is unmissable today in Punjab.

Local Bhangra performances, for instance, are no longer limited to traditional “dhoti-kurta-koti” costume sets paired with juttis (ethnic footwear). Performance attire now includes sneakers, typographic T-shirts, deconstructed bottoms and even denims.

“Such items are highly sought after by customers,” says Harinder Singh, owner of the brand 1469.

The merchandise in Singh’s stores, includes accessories popularised by Punjab’s music stars, such as versions of Phulkari turbans worn by Dosanjh, Kanda pendants that were first popularised by veteran Bhangra artist Pammi Bai. Singh himself owns turbans in more than a 100 shades.

Even overall men’s style in Punjab bears some of this cosmopolitan twang.

Young poet Gurpreet Saini, who performs at cultural festivals across India, says he sources his shawls – printed with ombre Gurmukhi letters – from Hariana, his hometown in Punjab, for a distinctive look. He admits to the influence of music icons, including those like folk singer Gurdas Mann, who he grew up watching.

What began as personal flair in some cases, went on to become fashion statements. Now these choices are cultural signatures. They have recast the Punjabi identity through rhythm, hybridity as well as a rooted sense of self.

Donald Trump has had a busy seven days. On Monday, he threatened to redirect $3bn in Harvard research funding to vocational schools. On Tuesday, the White House sent a letter to federal agencies, instructing them to review the approximately $100m in contracts the government has awarded Harvard and “find alternative vendors” where possible. On Wednesday, he had more to say on the matter still.

“Harvard’s got to behave themselves,” he told reporters gathered in the Oval Office. “Harvard is treating our country with great disrespect, and all they’re doing is getting in deeper and deeper and deeper.”

When combined with other administration attempts – freezing more than $3bn in research grants and suspending foreign students from enrolling in Harvard – Trump’s directives represent a frontal attack on one of America’s most prestigious, and wealthy, institutions of higher education.

Even if court challenges overrule some of these actions – some have already been put on hold – the impact is being felt across the landscape of American higher education.

“They’re doing multiple things every single day, some of those things are sneaking through,” says Greg Wolfson, president of the American Association of University Professors. “But more importantly, they’re changing the culture. They’re changing people.”

At Harvard’s commencement ceremonies on Thursday, students said there was a “palpable concern” on campus.

“People sort of knew Trump was trying some of these moves but [they were] shocked when it happens,” admits one graduate, a British national who requested anonymity because he was concerned public comments could threaten his US work visa. “It feels like the nuclear option.”

“If this can happen to Harvard it can happen to any university in the country,” he adds.

But the repercussions of this apparent Harvard-Trump fight run far deeper than the management of a single Ivy League university. Could the measures Trump is taking mark, as some suggest, the latest, albeit most ambitious, step by conservatives to erode some of the traditional pillars of support for the Democratic Party?

If that is the case, the campus has become a pivotal battle in shaping America’s cultural and political landscape.

Trump and his administration have offered various explanations for their actions, including a perceived lack of conservatives among the ranks of Harvard’s professors, along with suggestions of admitting too many foreign students and financial links to China.

But according to the White House, the most immediate cause has been the university’s apparent failure to address antisemitism on campus, in the wake of anti-Israel protests at universities across the US since the start of the Gaza war.

In December 2023, three prominent university presidents – including the then-president of Harvard, Claudine Gay – struggled to answer whether calling for the “genocide of Jews” violated their student conduct codes on bullying and harassment, sparking a firestorm of criticism.

Dr Gay, who was asked the question at a congressional hearing about antisemitism on US college campuses, answered that it depended on the context. She later apologised, telling the student newspaper: “When words amplify distress and pain, I don’t know how you could feel anything but regret.”

On the campaign trail last year, Trump promised to cut off federal funding and government accreditation for colleges that he said were engaging in “antisemitic propaganda”. Once Trump returned to the White House in January, he began following through on this.

Several universities – including Columbia, which saw some of the most high profile protests – agreed to sweeping changes in campus security rules and closer supervision of its Middle Eastern, South Asian and African Studies departments.

In April, Harvard released the results of a university task force review (commissioned before Trump’s election) of antisemitism and anti-Muslim prejudice on its own campus. It found that many Jewish and Muslim students faced bias, exclusion and alienation from the university curriculum and its community.

However, the administration’s demands go well beyond calls to address antisemitism. In a letter to the university, its “Joint Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism” laid out a laundry list of changes that Harvard must make, including terminating diversity programmes, reforming admissions and hiring, screening foreign students for views hostile to “American values”, and expanding and protecting “viewpoint diversity” among students and faculty.

Trump’s shock-and-awe strategy of rapid and aggressive pressure has stunned many in higher education, who never imagined the scope of the demands or the force behind them.

“It’s not about higher education,” argues Mr Wolfson. “Higher education is one of the levers they see as critical to transforming our society.”

But the potential for a long-term transformation could largely depend on whether the majority of American universities choose to accommodate the administration’s demands – or whether it stands and fights, as Harvard is trying to do.

While Harvard has been the most prominent target of the administration’s ire, and the most visible in its resistance, it is just one of many high-profile American universities that has received funding cuts or been subject of investigations.

Princeton and the University of Pennsylvania have reported that the administration has suspended hundreds of millions of dollars in their research grants. The Department of Education has launched investigations of 10 universities for alleged antisemitism – and warned dozens of others that they could face similar inquiries. It is also investigating 52 universities for illegal race-based programmes.

To some, this all amounts to an across-the-board war on elite higher education by the Trump administration in an effort to reshape universities in a more conservative-friendly image. To others, this is no bad thing.

“Universities are not about the pursuit of knowledge, they’re about the forceful pushing of a left-wing world view,” Charlie Kirk, founder of the conservative group Turning Point USA, said in a Fox News interview last month. “We’re here to shake it up.”

Many on the right have long viewed American college campuses as hotbeds of liberal indoctrination, whether it has taken the form of left-wing anti-war radicalism in the 1960s, “political correctness” of the 1990s, Occupy Wall Street anti-capitalism of the 2000s or the Black Lives Matter movement and anti-Israel demonstrations in recent years.

Polling has illustrated a certain divide in beliefs between those who have and haven’t attended college. In a recent survey by the polling company Civiqs, non-college graduates were split on the job Trump is doing in office, with 49% disapproving and 47% approving.

College graduates, on the other hand, had a significantly different view, as 58% disapproved of Trump’s performance in office versus only 38% who approved.

“I think a lot of this blowback is from the sense that they have become the universities of blue [Democratic] America, and that this is the consequence,” says Rick Hess, senior fellow and director of education policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute.

In recent years, according to Mr Hess, American higher education has become more closely tied to the government and more reliant on government funding.

He says that the new Trump team has simply adopted levers of control over higher education employed by recent Democratic administrations – including civil rights investigations, federal anti-discrimination laws and control over funding.

“In classic Trump form,” he added, “it’s absolutely the case that these levers have been turned up to 11.”

And there are fewer procedural and legal safeguards than there were under the Joe Biden and Barack Obama presidencies.

“It’s both an evolution and a revolution,” says Mr Hess.

But it is one, he argues, that universities have brought on themselves by being overtly political during Trump’s first term and making elite school the face of American higher education.

“The price for collecting billions a year in tax dollars is that institutions should both honour the promises they make, such as enforcing civil rights law, and hew to a mission in which they explicitly serve the whole nation,” says Mr Hess.

Withholding federal funding from universities may be a new challenge for higher education, but to some this is just the latest in a long effort by conservatives to undercut key traditional pillars of liberal power.

Through a combination of legislation and court rules, the influence of labour unions – which had provided the Democratic Party with volunteer personnel and funds – had diminished long before Trump succeeded in winning over white working-class voters in his three presidential runs.

State-level lawsuit reforms have also curtailed the vast sums that trial lawyers could contribute to Democratic coffers. And ongoing efforts to shrink the government workforce – which reached a peak with Elon Musk’s Doge reductions – have eroded another traditionally Democratic bloc.

However, Mr Wolfson fears that something greater could be lost if some of the Trump administration’s measures are enforced.

“The fact that we have multiracial, multicultural, multinational universities is a boon to our universities,” he says. “It creates really diverse communities, really diverse intellectual thought.”

Harvard – perhaps best known for its renowned law school – has turned the courts into its principal tool to resist Trump’s pressure.

On Thursday, a federal judge indefinitely suspended the administration’s attempts to prohibit foreign students from receiving visas to attend the university.

The university has also sued to prevent the Trump administration from terminating more than $2.2bn in federal grants, although that case is pending.

“The trade-off put to Harvard and other universities is clear,” Harvard wrote in its complaint filed with a Massachusetts federal court. “Allow the government to micromanage your academic institution or jeopardise the institution’s ability to pursue medical breakthroughs, scientific discoveries, and innovative solutions.”

Harvard’s president, Alan Garber, has also defended his university, saying that Harvard would be “firm” in its commitments to education and truth, during an interview with NPR.

“Harvard is a very old institution, much older than the country,” he continued. “As long as there has been a United States of America, Harvard has thought that its role is to serve the nation.”

Trump, meanwhile, has shared strong words of his own. “Harvard wants to fight,” he said on Wednesday. “They want to show how smart they are, and they’re getting their ass kicked.”

Opinion polls show that Trump’s political base supports his efforts, and the underlying message. Yet those same polls suggest a majority of the general population support American universities and don’t approve of his proposed funding cuts.

And opinion aside, the practicality of achieving such a fundamental reordering of America’s system of higher education, even with all the tools at the federal government’s disposal, is a daunting task.

According to Mr Wolfson, however, repairing what he says is the damage being done to academic independence will be equally challenging.

A growing number of members of the American Association of University Professors fear the consequences of expressing political views or conducting disfavoured research.

“The destruction is real,” argues Mr Wolfson. “Even if the courts step in, there will still be a massive undermining of the higher education project in this country due to Trump’s reckless, reckless moves.”

Mr Hess, who has pushed for conservative education reform for years, is less concerned. He believes that Trump’s chaotic, scattershot approach – including last week’s comments – could end up less effective than a more methodical restructuring of American universities.

“This is all an ambitious experiment,” Mr Hess said. “Whether it’s a strategy that’s going to work is very much an open question.”

One thing seems clear, however. Even if American universities resist – or outlast – Trump’s efforts, they are no longer insulated from the scorched-earth warfare of American politics. The walls of the ivory tower have been breached, regardless of whether one believes it is the barbarians – or liberators – at the gate.

It’s a condition that affects more than 10 million people in the UK. It can change futures, end careers, and shrink worlds. So when a hack comes along that says it can “cure”, or at the very least fend off a migraine, people will try it.

While there are medical treatments, there is no cure. Prescription medication can be very effective – but it doesn’t always work. For many people there is no simple solution.

Some discover their own ways of managing the debilitating pain: blasting the side of their face with a hairdryer, or sitting in a hot bath while wearing an ice pack and drinking a smoothie.

But now a new hack has suddenly gone viral – the McMigraine Meal. A simple offering of a full-fat cola and a portion of salty fries seems to be doing the trick for hundreds who’ve been extolling its virtues on TikTok.

If there is any science behind these hacks – what do they do to the body?

Nick Cook, from Oxfordshire, carries “a wallet full of drugs” around in case of a migraine attack. He will “try anything” to make the pain go away, he says.

“When you live with the condition, and you’re working a five-day week and you need to carry on, you’ll give anything a go.”

At its worst the pain around Nick’s eye socket can feel like his eyeball is getting crushed. He says it’s the caffeine and sugar in cola that helps him.

“If I catch it soon enough it can sometimes work, when my vision goes fuzzy and I can feel one coming on.”

He stresses that drinking cola doesn’t replace his amitriptyline tablets – the daily pain medication he takes to try to prevent migraines – but it does sometimes help him “last until the end of the day”.

For Kayleigh Webster, a 27-year-old who has had chronic migraines all her life, it’s the salt on the chips that might slow down a migraine attack.

“It can help,” she says cautiously, “but it’s certainly not a cure.

“Migraine is a complex neurological condition – and it can’t be cured by a bit of caffeine, salt and sugar in a fast food meal.”

Kayleigh’s tried cocktails of different medications, putting her feet in hot water, a flannel at the back of the head, acupuncture, cupping – but they’ve had little effect.

One of the few treatments that has given her relief is medical Botox – having dozens of injections in her head, face and neck. It’s still not clear how Botox works for migraine, but it’s believed to block powerful pain signals being released from the nerves.

A migraine – which can last days – is very different to a headache, which tend to be short-lived and can be treated more easily with painkillers like paracetamol. Migraines can cause head pain, neck pain, numbness, blurred vision, and even affect speech and movement.

Skulls dating back to 3,000 BC show ancient Egyptians even had trouble with migraines – but despite that long history, their exact cause is still unknown.

It’s thought pain receptors in the blood vessels and nerve tissue around the brain misfire – sending incorrect signals that something is wrong. But we don’t know why some people have an oversensitive nervous system – and why it reacts to some things and not others.

Experts say there’s not enough research into why only some people – around one in seven – are affected, or what can actually help.

Dr Kay Kennis, a trustee for the Migraine Trust and a GP who specialises in migraines, says while there are elements of the McMigraine meal that can help stave off an attack, these aren’t innate to “a McDonald’s”.

“The caffeine in the coke can act as a nerve disruptor, it is a substance that affects nerve activity. For some, that disturbance works in a positive way,” Dr Kennis says.

“There are some painkillers that people take for migraines that have caffeine – and some do respond well to that – but we don’t fully know why.”

But she warns against using caffeinated fizzy drinks like cola as a way of regularly managing migraines.

“Too much caffeine can be a trigger too – and you can end up in a worse situation in the long run,” Dr Kennis says.

Other ingredients in a fast food meal, like the salt on the chips, can affect nerve activity, she explains, but adds the effects of sodium on migraines have not been tested.

She also warns that not only is fast food often ultra-processed and not conducive to a healthy diet, it can contain high levels of Tyramine, a natural compound commonly found in many foods, which can actually cause severe migraines.

For Eloise Underwood none of the quick fixes on social media work.

The chronic migraine sufferer has been looking for a “magic cocktail” for seven years – she’s seen people recommend putting feet in scorching water (not recommended by experts and potentially dangerous); drinking hot coffee (caffeine can be a trigger); or various vibrating devices which have had little effect.

“There are so many videos online that take advantage of the desperation we all feel,” Eloise explains.

She’s left several jobs – often due to lighting and noise in an office environment triggering migraines. She recently stopped working as an interior designer and has now launched a business pressing and framing wedding flowers from her home.

She wears loop ear buds to reduce the sharpness of the sounds around her, and limits her social life.

“People think a migraine is just a headache – that’s just one symptom of it,” Eloise says. “For me, a migraine is a whole body experience…

“Migraines have completely made my life smaller.”

Prof Peter Goadsby, a neurologist at the NIHR-King’s Clinical Research Facility, says research is beginning to produce positive results after years of underfunding.

His latest study shows medications known as gepants could block a group of pain receptors in the lead-up to a migraine attack, cutting off the pain before it starts.

“Any new treatment is a glimmer of hope,” Eloise says. “They do say that nothing will work for everyone – but something will work for someone.”

Lifestyle changes can also make a difference, Prof Goadsby explains. It might be boring, he says, but basically – “be careful of your brain”.

“You want to have regularity, avoid the highs and lows. If you can feel the warning signs – yawning, sleepiness, mood change, passing more urine and even craving salt and sugar – listen to your body.

“Listen to your body – don’t listen to TikTok, that’s my advice.”

Nick has been doing exactly that. He might reach for the odd cola and salty fries, but he’s moulded his whole life in order to manage his migraines.

“I don’t drink, I wear sunglasses even if it’s cloudy,” he says. “I don’t go wild. When me and my partner go away, half the stuff we take is to help us manage our migraines.

On a recent stag-do weekend, Nick noticed the difference between his and his friends’ lives.

“They were up all night drinking to the early hours,” Nick says. “I turned up with my own pillow, apples, bananas, Weetabix, and any snacks I would need to keep me going, because hunger can be a major trigger.

“I’m in bed by midnight – but my mates know me, and that’s OK, because this is how I have to live my life.”

A fifth of Ukrainian territory is now under Russian control, and for Ukrainians living under occupation there seems little chance that any future deal to end the war will change that.

Three Ukrainians in different Russian-controlled cities have told the BBC of the pressures they face, from being forced to accept a Russian passport to the risks of carrying out small acts of resistance. We are not using their real names for their own safety, and will call them Mavka, Pavlo and Iryna.

The potential dangers are the same, whether in Mariupol or Melitopol, seized by Russia in the full-scale invasion in 2022, or in Crimea which was annexed eight years before.

Mavka chose to stay in Melitopol when the Russians invaded her city on 25 February 2022, “because it is unfair that someone can just come to my home and take it out”.

She has lived there since birth, midway between the Crimean peninsula and the regional capital Zaporizhzhia.

In recent months she has noticed a ramping up of not only a strict policy of “Russification” in the city, but of an increased militarisation of all spheres of life, including in schools.

She has shared pictures of a billboard promoting conscription to young locals, a school notebook with Putin’s portrait on it, and photos and a video of pupils wearing Russian military uniforms instead of the school outfits – boys and girls – and performing military education tasks.

Some 200km (125 miles) along the coast of the sea of Azov, and much closer to the Russian border, the city of Mariupol feels as if it has been “cut off” from the outside world, according to Pavlo.

This key port and hub of Ukraine’s steel industry was captured after a devastating siege and bombardment that lasted almost three months in 2022.

Russian citizenship is now obligatory if you want to work or study or have an urgent medical help, Pavlo says.

“If someone’s child, let’s say, refuses to sing the Russian anthem at school in the morning, the FSB [Russia’s security service] will visit their parents, they will be ‘pencilled in’ and then anything can happen.”

Pavlo survived the siege despite being shot six times, including to his head.

Now that he has recuperated, he feels he cannot leave because of elderly relatives.

“Most of those who stayed in Mariupol or returned, did so to help their elderly parents or their sick grandparents, or because of their flat,” he tells me over the phone after midnight so no-one will overhear.

The biggest preoccupation in Mariupol is holding on to your home, as most of the property damaged in the Russian bombardment has been demolished, and the cost of living and unemployment has surged.

“I’d say 95% of all talk in the city is about property: how to claim it back, how to sell it. You’ll hear people talk about it while queuing to buy some bread, on your way to a chemist, in the food market, everywhere,” he says.

Crimea has been under occupation since Vladimir Putin annexed the peninsula in 2014, when Russia’s war in Ukraine began.

Iryna decided to remain, also to care for an elderly relative but also because she did not want to leave “her beautiful home”.

All signs of Ukrainian identity have been banned in public, and Iryna says she cannot speak Ukrainian in public any more, “as you never know who can tell the authorities on you”.

Children at nursery school in Crimea are told to sing the Russian anthem every morning, even the very youngest. All the teachers are Russian, most of them wives of soldiers who have moved in from Russia.

Iryna occasionally puts on her traditional, embroidered top when she has video calls with friends elsewhere on the peninsula.

“It helps us to keep our spirits high, reminding us about our happy life before the occupation”.

But the risks are high, even for wearing a vyshyvanka. “They might not shoot you straight away, but you can simply disappear afterwards, silently,” she declares.

She speaks of a Ukrainian friend being questioned by police because Russian neighbours, who came to Crimea in 2014, told police he had illegal weapons. “Of course he didn’t. Luckily they let him go in the end, but it’s so frightening.”

Iryna complains that she cannot go out on her own even for coffee “because solders can point a gun at you and say something abusive or order you to please them”.

Resistance in Ukraine’s occupied cities is dangerous, and it often comes in small acts of defiance aimed at reminding residents that they are not alone.

In Melitopol, Mavka talks of being part of a secret female resistance movement called (Angry Mavka) “to let people know that Ukrainians don’t agree with the occupation, we didn’t call for it, and we will never tolerate it”.

The network is made up of women and girls in “pretty much all occupied cities”, according to Iryna, although she cannot reveal its size or scale because of the potential dangers for its members.

Mavka describes her role in running the network’s social media accounts, which document life under occupation and acts like placing Ukrainian symbols or leaflets in public places “to remind other Ukrainians that they are not alone”, as well as even riskier practices.

“Sometimes we also put a laxative in alcohol and baked goods for the Russian soldiers, as a ‘welcome pack’,” she says.

Punishment for that kind of act, which the BBC is unable to verify, would be severe.

Russia’s occupation authorities treat the Ukrainian language or anything related to Ukraine as extremist, says Mavka.

Ukrainians are well aware of what happened to journalist Viktoriia Roshchyna, 27, who disappeared while investigating allegations of torture prisons in eastern Ukraine in 2023.

Russian authorities told her family she had died in custody in September 2024. Her body was returned earlier this month, with several organs removed and clear signs of torture.

Silent disappearance is what Mavka fears most: “When suddenly nobody can find out where you are or what’s happened to you.”

Her network has developed a set of tasks for new joiners to pass to avoid infiltration, and so far they have managed to avoid cyber attacks.

For now they are waiting and watching: “We cannot take up arms and fight back against the occupier right now, but we want at least to show that pro-Ukrainian population is here, and it will also be here”.

She and others in Melitopol are following closely what is happening in Kyiv, “because it is important for us to know whether Kyiv is ready to fight for us. Even small steps matter”.

“We have a rollercoaster of moods here. Many are worried documents might get signed that, God forbid, leave us under Russian occupation for even longer. Because we know what Russia will do here.”

The worry for Mavka and people close to her is that if Kyiv does agree a ceasefire it could mean Russia pursuing the same policy as in Crimea, erasing Ukrainian identity and repressing the population.

“They’ve already been replacing locals with their people. But people here are still hopeful, we will continue our resistance, we’ll just have to be more creative”.

Unlike Mavka, Pavlo believes the war must end, even if it means losing his ability to return to Ukraine.

“Human life is of the greatest value… but there are certain conditions for a ceasefire and not everyone might agree with them as it raises a question, why have all those people died then during the past three years? Would they feel abandoned and betrayed?”

Pavlo is wary of talking, even via an encrypted line, but adds: “I don’t envy anyone involved in this decision-making process. It won’t be simple, black and white.”

Iryna fears for Crimea’s next generation who have grown up in an atmosphere of violence and, she says, copy their fathers who have returned from Russia’s war against Ukraine.

She shows me her bandaged cat, and says a child on her street shot it with a rubber bullet.

“For them it was fun. These kids are not taught to build peace, they are taught to fight. It breaks my heart.”

The defence review will send a “message to Moscow” about Britain’s “readiness to fight if required”, Defence Secretary John Healey has told the BBC.

He was speaking as the government announced it would spend £1.5bn on at least six new defence factories and create 1,800 jobs across the UK.

The strategic defence review, to be published on Monday, is expected to conclude the UK faces a “new era of threat” and will warn of the “immediate and pressing” danger posed by Russia and other countries, including China.

John Healey told Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg the review would set out “big new investments in our national security” and send a strong signal to hostile states.

The Conservatives said they welcomed investment in new munitions but shadow defence secretary James Cartlidge called for “greater ambition for the pace and scale of rearmament our armed forces require”.

On a visit to a factory in Stevenage, where Storm Shadow missiles are assembled, Healey said the government would support the procurement up to 7,000 UK-built long-range weapons.

The new funding will see UK munitions spending hit £6bn during this parliament, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) said.

Healey told the BBC: “Six billion over the next five years in factories like this which allow us not just to produce the munitions that equip our forces for the future but to create the jobs in every part of the UK – 1,800 new jobs in every nation of the United Kingdom.”

He added: “This is a message to Moscow as well. This is Britain standing behind making our Armed Forces stronger but making our industrial base stronger, and this is part of our readiness to fight if required, but the strength in which to deter those fights in the future.”

The war in Ukraine has highlighted serious deficiencies in the West’s ability to produce weapons and munitions, and senior British military officers have long warned about the UK’s depleted stockpiles.

As part of its defence review, the government said it would build new factories to make key munitions and explosives to have an “always on” munitions production capacity that could be scaled up quickly.

Long-range weapons including drones and missiles would be procured over several years.

Ministers said the extra investment – which came after Healey said that UK defence spending would rise to 3% of GDP by 2034 at the latest – would strengthen the armed forces and boost British jobs.

Chancellor Rachel Reeves said: “A strong economy needs a strong national defence, and investing in weaponry and munitions and backing nearly 2,000 jobs across Britain in doing so is proof the two go hand-in-hand.

“We are delivering both security for working people in an uncertain world and good jobs, putting more money in people’s pockets.”

In a statement, Healey said the UK’s defence industry would become an “engine for economic growth” and “boost skilled jobs in every nation and region”.

“The hard-fought lessons from [Russian President Vladimir] Putin’s illegal invasion of Ukraine show a military is only as strong as the industry that stands behind them,” he added.

“We are strengthening the UK’s industrial base to better deter our adversaries and make the UK secure at home and strong abroad.”

The Tories, however, said it was hard to believe Labour was prepared for “always on” munitions production when procurement had been “largely switched off for the past year”.

“We welcome investment in new munitions factories, but we don’t know when they will be ready, only that these orders should have been placed months ago,” Cartlidge added.

“Rachel Reeves has deliberately used the SDR to put an effective freeze on new orders for the kit our military needs,” he said.

Senior Western military chiefs have long been warning the UK would quickly run out of ammunition in the event of a war.

In 2021, the former head of the US Army in Europe, Gen Ben Hodges, told MPs in a simulated wargame most of the British Army’s inventory was exhausted after just eight days.

The former head of the British Army, Gen Sir Patrick Sanders, has also been calling for the UK to boost weapons production.

He recently said the Army’s diminished stocks of artillery rounds and missiles “would put hairs on the back of your neck”.

The UK has now significantly increased production of artillery shells.

New contracts have been signed to produce more complex weapons, such as next generation light anti-tank weapons (NLAW) and long-range Storm Shadow (also known as Scalp) cruise missiles.

Both have been supplied to Ukraine but production rates have, in the past, been slow. Exact numbers are not made public.

With the war in Ukraine, global demand for explosives and propellants has also been high.

The UK has often had to source materials from abroad.

Two Scottish men have been killed in a shooting at a bar in southern Spain, according to Spanish officials.

A gunman fired several shots at Monaghans Bar in Fuengirola in Andalusia on Saturday evening.

Javier Salas from the central government in the Malaga province, confirmed to BBC News both men were believed to be Scottish.

Spanish media reported that officers from the region’s specialist and violent crime unit (UDEV) have launched an investigation.

Regional newspaper Diario Sur reported the attack took place just after 23:00 when a car pulled up and a masked man opened fire.

They said both men died at the scene, and the gunman fled in the vehicle.

The Foreign Office has been contacted for comment.

Monaghans is located on the seafront and is a popular bar with tourists and expats.

The bar had been screening the UEFA Champions League final on the evening of the attack.

The US has sent Iran a proposal for a nuclear deal between Tehran and Washington, the White House confirmed on Saturday.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said he had been presented with “elements of a US deal” by his Omani counterpart Badr Albusaidi during a short visit to the Iranian capital.

It comes after a report by the UN nuclear watchdog said Iran had further stepped up its production of enriched uranium, a key component in the making of nuclear weapons.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said on Saturday it was in Tehran’s “best interest to accept” the deal, adding: “President Trump has made it clear that Iran can never obtain a nuclear bomb”.

Leavitt said a “detailed and acceptable” proposal had been sent to Iran by US President Donald Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff.

The US proposal “will be appropriately responded to in line with the principles, national interests and rights of the people of Iran”, Araghchi wrote on X.

The precise details of the deal are not yet clear.

The proposal follows a report by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) – seen by the BBC – which found Iran now possesses over 400kg of uranium enriched to 60% purity – close to the 90% purity required for weapons-grade uranium.

This is well above the level of purity sufficient for civilian nuclear power and research purposes.

It is enough for about 10 nuclear weapons if further refined, making Iran the only non nuclear-armed state producing uranium at this level.

The report paves the way for the US, Britain, France and Germany to push for the IAEA’s board of governors to find Iran in violation of its non-proliferation obligations.

Iran insists its programme is peaceful. On Saturday, Iranian state media described the IAEA report as “politically motivated” containing “baseless accusations”.

Iran has said it will “implement appropriate measures” in response to any effort to take action against Tehran at the IAEA governors’ meeting.

The US has long sought to limit Iran’s nuclear capacity. Talks between the two powers mediated by Oman have been under way since April.

Both sides have expressed optimism during the course of the talks but remain divided over key issues – chief among them, whether Iran can continue enrichment under any future agreement.

Despite the ongoing negotiations between Tehran and Washington, the IAEA report offered no indication that Iran has slowed its nuclear enrichment efforts.

Iran has produced highly enriched uranium at a rate equivalent to roughly one nuclear weapon per month over the past three months, the IAEA report found.

US officials estimate that, if Iran chooses to make a weapon, it could produce weapons-grade material in less than two weeks and potentially build a bomb within months.

Iran has long denied it is attempting to develop nuclear weapons. However, the IAEA said it could not confirm whether this was still the case because Iran refuses to grant access to senior inspectors and has not answered longstanding questions about its nuclear history.

Trump is seeking a new nuclear agreement with Tehran after pulling the US out of a previous nuclear agreement between Iran and six world powers in 2018.

This nuclear deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action or JCPOA, was signed in 2015 by Iran and the US, China, France, Russia, Germany and the UK.

The JCPOA sought to limit and monitor Iran’s nuclear programme in return for lifting sanctions that had been placed on the regime in 2010 over suspicions that its nuclear programme was being used to develop a bomb.

But Donald Trump withdrew from the deal during his first term in office, claiming JCPOA was a “bad deal” because it was not permanent and did not address Iran’s ballistic missile programme, amongst other things.

Trump then re-imposed US sanctions as part of a “maximum pressure” campaign to compel Iran to negotiate a new and expanded agreement.

In the intervening years, Tehran has steadily overstepped the 2015 agreement’s limits on its nuclear programme, designed to make it harder to develop an atomic bomb.

Trump has previously threatened to bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities if diplomacy fails to achieve a deal.

When Edna Nicole Luckett sings the Blues on the stage at Red’s, her voice, deep and soulful, echoes against the walls. The juke joint in Clarksdale, Mississippi is one of the last of its kind in the region, a landmark for a bygone era of American music.

“I was raised in Delta dirt, sunshine and flatland that goes on for miles and miles,” she sings, as people nod their heads and stomp their feet to the beat.

Ms Luckett, like many who were raised in the Mississippi Delta, grew up listening to locally-crafted Blues music and singing in her church choir. It’s experiences like hers – and places like Red’s – that are getting a fresh moment to shine with the box office success of Ryan Coogler’s film Sinners.

The genre-defying film has earned more than $300 million (£22 million) globally, against a $90m (£67m) budget, and attracted the world’s attention to a historic small town.

For the those who live there – and especially those who still sing the Blues – the spotlight is welcome, in no small part because of Coogler’s careful respect for their history.

“I’m protective of how the Mississippi Delta is represented,” Ms Luckett said.

Clarksdale was the place where blues legends like Sam Cooke, Johnny Lee Hooker and Muddy Waters got their start, but its significance was mostly known to music lovers.

Like other small towns in the US south, Clarksdale has faced struggles. The town, home to 14,000 people, lost its only movie theatre in 2003. That meant that residents couldn’t even watch Sinners in their hometown – until now. After a local appeal, Mr Coogler agreed to bring the film to town for six free showings this past week.

The charge was led by Tyler Yarbrough, a Clarksdale native, who wrote a public letter to the director after seeing the movie in a nearby town. Set in 1932, Sinners tells the story of twin brothers, both played by Michael B Jordan, who return home to Clarksdale after World War One. Combining elements of musicals, horror and period drama, the movie fuses vampire lore with meticulous historic research about that time and place in America.

“Beneath the horror and fantasy, your film captures the soul of this place: our history, our struggles, our genius, our joy, our community,” Mr Yarbrough wrote.

He told the BBC he was moved to see this place represented with careful detail.

“It was time traveling back to 1930’s in Clarksdale, in our town, so this is the lives of my great grandma,” he said. “The history from the farms to the juke joints was on full display.”

Mr Coogler, who also made Black Panther and Creed, said it was his Uncle James, a Mississippi native who loved Delta Blues, who helped inspire the film.

Although the movie was ultimately filmed in Louisiana, he visited Clarksdale to do extensive research.

“I never got to come here until working on this script,” Mr Coogler told a crowd of 1,500 on Thursday. “It blew my mind — I got to meet musicians, I got to meet community members. It really changed me just to come here and do the research.”

While some remnants of the town depicted in the film remain, like many towns in America, its storefronts have been emptied and modernised – though it still enjoys tourist interest for its history.

Odes to some of Clarksdale’s blues legends, like Robert Johnson, are colourfully painted onto the sides of buildings, reminding people of the history of the streets where they walk.

One of those streets used to be home to Delta Blues Alley Cafe, a blues joint owned by Jecorry Miller that burned to the ground last month.

Mr Miller wants people to have a better understanding of the history that lives on the streets on Clarksdale and the movie is a way to grasp that.

“The movie itself is going to be great for the town – we get nine times the population of our city that comes to visit the city every year, now it could be ten or 11 times the population that visits Clarksdale,” Mr Miller said. “People being here spending their dollars is a great thing for us.”

And local residents said the attention is all the more welcome because they see themselves and their culture in the film.

At the Thursday screening, longtime Clarksdale residents relished the details.

Ms Luckett, the Blues singer, was listening to make sure the characters’ dialect sounded right. She watched to see if the land in the backdrop of the film was as flat and green as it is in real life.

“It was,” she said with a smile.

It was love at first sight for Adarsh Ramchurn. “I couldn’t control it,” he says of his flourishing affection for Nav Sangha.

But their relationship is “frowned upon” by some in their communities, they say, as Adarsh is Hindu and Nav is Sikh.

They’ve been an item for three years and say they receive hateful comments on social media when posting about their life together.

They are also abused because Adarsh, 24, has a darker skin tone than Nav, a form of prejudice known as colourism.

“We push through it,” says Nav, 22. “There are also people who are very supportive and that are in similar situations.”

Data compiled by YouGov in January suggests 45% of 18 to 24-year-olds in the UK believe there is a God, or believe there are Gods. The next highest figure, 36%, is for the over-65s.

BBC News spoke to Nav and Adarsh as well as a Christian from Married At First Sight (MAFS), a Muslim from The Only Way is Essex (Towie), and a former Jehovah’s Witness for the Sex After documentary series.

During a discussion between the participants, Nav was asked what the hardest bit about being a Sikh was. “Probably getting the backlash of being with a Hindu,” she said.

She and Ardash knew their interfaith relationship could be an issue for their parents, so spoke to them early.

“I know it’s different for every family, there can be difficult dynamics,” says Adarsh.

“But if you can have the open discussion [about] dating outside of your religion… I’d always say [you should].”

Something Adarsh’s parents were quick to ask him about was marriage.

The couple say, if they were to wed, they would probably do a Sikh and a Hindu ceremony.

“If we have kids, I feel like it’s important that they learn about both religions and faiths,” Nav adds.

Adarsh agrees and says he’s “looking forward to it”.

Junaid Ahmed’s parents were not as accommodating. His fear of being rejected by them took hold at a young age. Junaid knew being gay contravened the Islamic beliefs he and his family shared.

“When I did finally come out [aged 18], I did expect the worst and… [it] did happen,” he tells us. “They threw me out; they disowned me.”

He says he doesn’t blame his parents for ostracising him.

“I genuinely don’t – it’s made me the person I am today.”

Junaid, now aged 26 and a star of Towie, says he often gets abuse online from other Muslims because he is open about his sexual orientation, but “that [has] never changed my relationship with God”.

He says he is grateful for his religious upbringing and still prays every day.

Like Junaid, Martin Riley – who was brought up a Jehovah’s Witness – was also ostracised by his family.

However, in his case, it was because a few years ago he was expelled from his religion completely, in a process called disfellowshipping.

For Riley, as he is known to his friends, this meant being shunned by other members of his congregation – including close friends and family.

His first marriage, which lasted 20 years, had broken down a few months before he was expelled.

He was a particularly strong believer and, while dating after he was expelled, he abided by the rule of not having sex before marriage.

It was only when Riley began dating the woman who is now his wife, that he began seriously considering whether he wanted to continue adhering to the religion that he’d been part of for 40 years. His wife is not a Jehovah’s Witness.

“I realised that I did not want to have a future that didn’t include her, whether that meant returning to the religion or not.”

After having sex with her for the first time, which he describes as being, “like in the movies”, he recalls: “I was actually surprised by how guiltless I felt about the whole thing.”

Riley, 48, now considers himself an atheist.

Looking back at his expulsion from the religion aged 42, he says: “It was devastating for me, at the time. Now I think it is probably one of the best things to ever happen to me.”

Unlike Riley, Sacha Jones did not grow up devoutly religious, but was baptised as a Christian last year after finding her faith. She has vowed to remain abstinent until she marries.

“I haven’t slept with anyone since my baptism,” she says. “So I’m fresh in the eyes of the Lord!”

Sacha, 30, also says the culture around dating today makes it difficult to form a long-term relationship.

Last year she participated in MAFS, but split up with her partner following the show.

“It’s the absolute trenches out here in the dating world… it’s difficult to trust a man anyway, but then to trust someone that doesn’t fear God as well?”

She says she doesn’t miss sex as much as she might do because she isn’t dating anyone at the moment. She believes the wait will be worth it – once she’s married.

“I no longer lack purpose or peace,” says Sacha, who isn’t the “party animal” she once was. “I’m happier than I’ve ever been.”

Few 27-year-olds look at used cooking oil and see a green business opportunity to produce soap or dog food.

But that is what Hugo Daniel Chávez, a project manager for the NGO Sustenta Honduras, has done.

“We have so many businesses and domestic practices that create waste, so we are trying to transform waste and give it a second life,” he tells the BBC.

Across Latin America, several million tonnes of cooking oil are consumed every year. It is often used to fry food, mostly chicken, plantain strips, chips and pork.

But reusing and heating it too often – as is often the case in Honduras, where there is a huge black market for used cooking oil – can create compounds which are bad for consumers’ health.

Improperly discarded, it can also have a massive detrimental impact on the environment.

If it is drained down the sink, it can damage pipes and contaminate groundwater, and when it is tossed by the side of the road, it can contaminate freshwater and crops many communities rely on.

Faced with these health and environmental hazards, the young green entrepreneurs behind Sustenta tried to come up with a solution which would not only give businesses an incentive to dispose of their oil and grease properly, but also turn these waste products into something useful.

The NGO’s executive director, Ricardo Pineda, explains that their idea originated from earlier efforts by different companies and organisations to transform used cooking oil into biodiesel. “But in Honduras, we don’t have a market for biodiesel,” he says.

“So we decided to produce products that can do well in our domestic markets [such as soap and dog food].”

In order to make it more attractive to people to get rid of the oil legally rather than sell it to unscrupulous buyers, Sustenta offers to buy the used cooking oil and pick it up regularly from the shops that participate in their project.

Their efforts have gained international recognition, most notably when they were awarded a $20,000-prize as one of the winners of the 2023 Youth4Climate Energy Challenge, a global initiative co-led by the Italian government and the United Nations Development Programme.

Sustenta also receives funding from the embassy of the The Netherlands in the region, which told the BBC that it chose Sustenta because “their project offered an innovative and viable solution, using an enterprising approach which has a social impact”.

“It [their project] not only contributes to lessening the environmental impact through an emphasis on creating a circular economy, but also empowers young people and women – the groups most affected by climate change – and generates green jobs.”

Sustenta offers between 2.50 and 3.50 Lempiras (£0.08 and £0.11) per pound of used cooking oil.

And it is not just small businesses it deals with.

In May of 2024, the NGO signed a contract with the Mexican and Central American division of the retail giant Walmart.

This contract guarantees a flow of used cooking oil and grease from all companies related to Walmart to Sustenta, which Mr Pineda says is critical to Sustenta’s project.

“We needed a reliable flow to scale up production. (…) Otherwise, we could quickly run out of used cooking oil, because of the black market that is competing with us,” adds Mr Chávez.

It then brings the cooking oil and grease to a plant in Comayagua, where they are purified and processed in a reaction known as saponification. This process combines fats or oils with an alkali to produce soap.

Mr Pineda says that Sustenta is keen to develop “a circular ecological system in which we reuse everything”.

“Next to our plant that produces the soap and dog food, someone else has a water purification plant and we use the water that plant cannot purify, its waste so to say, for our water cooling system,” he explains.

The idea of teaming up with Walmart, Mr Pineda says, is “to sell the dog food and soap we have refined from their waste at Walmart”.

“They could profit from their own waste and also see the economic value behind circular economies, ” he tells the BBC.

At 15 lempiras (£0.45) per bar of soap, the project makes a monthly revenue of over 106,000 Lempiras (£3,194.70), which excludes fixed costs like salaries, commission and distribution.

Mr Pineda emphasises that “the money doesn’t stay with us”. “We just help with the implementation of the project and as soon as it’s up and running we seek new opportunities,” he says.

The recycling of cooking oil is just one several projects running simultaneously at Sustenta.

The organisation is comprised of young people, all under 30 and averaging 23 years of age, and their youthful enthusiasm and impatience with established ways of doing things has been key to their approach.

“We started as a young group that was sick of the regular ways large institutions handle issues with climate change and the environment,” Mr Pineda says.

“We want to create actual solutions and not sit around only talking about what could be done.”

Their strategy also differs from that of other young environmental organisations in the region, who often focus on a confrontational approach, trying to halt large mining or energy projects and holding politicians accountable for corruption.

But Sustenta’s project coordinator, Paola Acevedo, says the two approached are not at odds, but rather complement each other: “This type of [classical] environmentalism is very important and there is no doubt that we need it.”

“We try to focus on solutions, while the others fight on the front lines,” she adds.

Indian singer Diljit Dosanjh’s Met Gala debut last month left a lasting impression on global fashion.

The 41-year-old singer, who is the only Punjabi musician to perform at Coachella, walked the red carpet dressed like an early 20th Century maharajah.

His opulent ivory and gold ensemble – created by designer Prabal Gurung – complete with a feathered bejewelled turban, trended in India for weeks.

He also wore a gorgeous diamond necklace, its design inspired by a Cartier piece worn by an erstwhile king of the northern Indian state of Punjab.

A Panthère de Cartier watch, a lion-headed and a jewel-studded sword completed the ensemble, which had a map of Dosanjh’s home state embroidered on the back of the cape along with letters from Gurmukhi, the script for Punjabi language.

Of course, Dosanjh is no stranger to such style.

Just like his music, he’s carved out a niche in fashion too – a hip hop singer who is known for melding traditional Punjabi styles with Western influences.

Often seen in anti-fit trousers, chunky sneakers, and stacks of necklaces that he matches with his colourful turbans, his unique form of self-expression has captured the imagination of millions, leading to interesting reinventions in the traditional Punjabi attire.

The changes can be felt everywhere. A 16-minute high-intensity bhangra competition in California would be impossible without high performance sneakers. And basement bhangra nights in Berlin are enjoyed in crop tops and deconstructed pants.

Punjabi music itself, high on volume and energy – with lyrics packed with the names of cities and global luxury brands – has become a subculture.

It’s not just Dosanjh – several other Punjabi musicians have also influenced the region’s style game.

Not long ago, Punjabi-Canadian singer Jazzy B’s rings, often the size of a cookie, along with his plus-sized Kanda pendant and silver blonde hair tints, were trending.

More recently, the yellow tinted glasses worn by singer Badshah; the baggy hoodies sported by Yo Yo Honey Singh; and AP Dhillon’s Louis Vuitton bombers and Chanel watches have been hugely popular with Punjabi youth.

But even though their influence was significant, it was restricted to a region. Dosanjh and a few others like him, however, have managed to mount it to a global level, their style speaking to both the Sikh diaspora as well as a broader audience. For instance, the t-shirts, pearls and sneakers Dosanjh wore to his world tour last year were sold out in a matter of hours. Dhillon’s style statements at Paris Couture Week have created aspiration among Punjabi youth.

Cultural experts say that this reinvention, both in music and fashion, has its roots in Western pop-culture as most of the artistes live and perform in the West.

“Punjabi men are inventive. The region has been at the forefront of fusion, it believes in hybridity. This is especially the case with the Punjabi diaspora – even when they live in ghettos, they are the showmen [of their lives],” says art historian, author and museum curator Alka Pande.

Over the years, as the Punjabi diaspora community grew, a new generation of musicians began mixing modern hip-hop sounds with elements of traditional Punjabi aesthetics.

Their distinct style lexicon – of gold chains, faux fur jackets, plus-sized accessories, braids and beards – went on to spawn media articles, books and doctoral theses on South Asian culture.

The coin dropped instantly back home in Punjab, which absorbed logo fashion like a sponge when luxury brands arrived in the 2000s. For Punjabis – who are largely a farming community – it was an aspirational uprising, symbolic of how success and prosperity should look.

“It symbolised the movement of the Punjabi identity from a farmer to a global consumer,” says acclaimed singer Rabbi Shergill.

Arguing that performers, like everyone else, are a product of their times, Shergill says these impulses are “a response to the hyper capitalist world”.

Curiously, the style game of Punjabi musicians – from hip-hop, R&B, bhangra pop, fusion, Punjabi rap, reggae or filmy music – has also remained rooted and androgynous, instead of being hyper masculine.

A pop star may wear Balenciaga or Indian designer Manish Malhotra’s opulent creations; perform anywhere from Ludhiana city to London; dance with Beyonce around Dubai’s Burj Khalifa, atop a luxury car, or in a British mansion – but they always wear their Punjabi identity on their sleeves.

Dosanjh underlined this clearly with his maharajah look at the Met Gala. “It’s like the popularity of his androgynous style was waiting to happen,” Pande says.

The composite impact of this trend on emerging artists is unmissable today in Punjab.

Local Bhangra performances, for instance, are no longer limited to traditional “dhoti-kurta-koti” costume sets paired with juttis (ethnic footwear). Performance attire now includes sneakers, typographic T-shirts, deconstructed bottoms and even denims.

“Such items are highly sought after by customers,” says Harinder Singh, owner of the brand 1469.

The merchandise in Singh’s stores, includes accessories popularised by Punjab’s music stars, such as versions of Phulkari turbans worn by Dosanjh, Kanda pendants that were first popularised by veteran Bhangra artist Pammi Bai. Singh himself owns turbans in more than a 100 shades.

Even overall men’s style in Punjab bears some of this cosmopolitan twang.

Young poet Gurpreet Saini, who performs at cultural festivals across India, says he sources his shawls – printed with ombre Gurmukhi letters – from Hariana, his hometown in Punjab, for a distinctive look. He admits to the influence of music icons, including those like folk singer Gurdas Mann, who he grew up watching.

What began as personal flair in some cases, went on to become fashion statements. Now these choices are cultural signatures. They have recast the Punjabi identity through rhythm, hybridity as well as a rooted sense of self.

Preye Maxwell looks distressed as he leaves his beloved dog Hanks at an animal shelter in Lagos, Nigeria’s commercial hub.

Fighting back tears, he says: “I can’t afford to take care of him. I can’t afford to feed him the way he should be fed.”

His two-year old American Eskimo barks as his owner turns his back and walks out of the St Mark’s Animal Rescue Foundation in the Lagos suburb of Ajah.

Dr Mark Afua, a vet and chairman of the rescue centre, takes Hanks and puts him in a big metal cage – one of many in the single-storey building designed for dogs, cats, snakes and other animals.

Hanks wheels around in circles in his cage – and Dr Afua tries to calm the distressed fluffy-haired dog.

Mr Maxwell, an online media strategist, was recently made redundant. His job-hunting means he is never at home and so feels unable to look after Hanks.

“I’m trying to get whatever I have to do to survive. I don’t even have the time now [to look after Hanks] because I’m always out looking for jobs,” he told the BBC.

The 33-year-old’s decision was difficult to make, but it is one that many pet owners are taking in the face of the rising cost of living in Nigeria.

Africa’s most-populous nation has been hit by high inflation since President Bola Tinubu came to power two years ago and removed a long-standing fuel subsidy.

The inflation rate surged from 22% in May 2023 to 35% in December 2024, a 28-year high, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS.)

Inflation has since fallen back to 24% but this means that prices are still continuing to rise, just not as quickly as before.

The economic crunch has meant that some companies have had to downsize to keep afloat in the face of rising operating costs, pushing young people like Mr Maxwell into an already saturated labour market.

Animal rights activists and animal shelters say that they are seeing an unprecedented numbers of abandoned animals as the cost of looking after pets spirals out of control.

Prices for pet food and veterinary care have jumped by more 100% as some things, especially medication, are imported – and the local currency has plummeted against the dollar.

“About 10 years ago when we started this project, we really didn’t have people giving up their dogs because they were unable to feed the dogs,” Dr Afua told the BBC.

“Right now, we have 10, 12 animals being dropped in a month.”

Some, like Mr Maxwell, hand their pets over to a shelter for adoption but others simply abandon their animals.

Animal cruelty campaigner Jackie Idimogu, who is president of My Dog and I – a dog-lovers’ community in Lagos who often helps to rehome pets, says she has noticed the change.

“Now they don’t even have that patience [to find new owners]. They just tie the dog out to a post on the road or they just unleash it on the road,” she told the BBC.

The 32-year-old says more that 50% of her income as a furniture maker and interior designer now goes on looking after her four dogs.

“I’m spending roughly 250,000 naira ($158; £117) every month on pets,” she says, adding that this includes someone to walk the dogs and look after them when she was not around.

But Ms Idimogu says she cannot bear to give them up.

“As a single lady, I have no kids of my own yet. My dogs are my babies. I don’t see any difference between myself as a dog mum and a human mum. I don’t think I have it in me to give up any of my babies for any reason whatsoever.”

Instead, she has chosen to adapt her lifestyle – fewer luxuries for herself like jewellery, expensive hair styles and spa visits and fewer treats for her pets like chicken, yoghurt treats and car rides.

“I used to be flashy, but now I had to tone down because of my dogs.”

The same goes for Amartya Odanokende, who goes by the name “Jason the Cat Guy” on social media, where he likes to impart his love of felines to his fellow Nigerians who often regard cats with suspicion because of their association with witchcraft.

He spends approximately $160 a month on food for five big cats and some kittens, plus another $7 on 10kg of cat litter. Since he got his Prussian cats in 2020 he says what he spends has gone up 100%.

Such “skyrocketing maintenance cost” is a concern and he worries about getting into debt.

Lagos sales executive Iyke Elueze is also struggling to look after her 10 dogs.

“There’s a particular brand of food I used to use. It was just about 30,000 naira then. That same brand of dog food is 165,000 naira,” he told the BBC.

He credits his first dog Hennessey with saving his life at a time he was struggling with depression – nonetheless he would like to get rid of some of his animals as he now needs to prioritise his toddlers.

But the 36-year-old fears that his dogs could end up being eaten – as they are considered a delicacy in some parts of southern Nigeria.

Celebrity chef and Guinness record breaker Hilda Baci once came under fire on social media after she admitted making a dog-meat themed menu.

“I am very careful with who adopts my dogs. I don’t want my dogs ending up in any other person’s pots,” said the father-of-two.

Mistura Ibrahim, a young tattoo artist in Lagos who has made it her mission to help cats after saving two who were about to be stoned, is depressed about the situation and is finding it hard to find new homes for others she continues to rescue.

“I get some calls from people that I’ve given cats to in the past and they say that they really cannot afford to keep the cats.”

She no longer feeds her cats tinned meals, opting to give them food from her own plate.

Her advice is to take pet welfare seriously: “It’s just like having a child. If you can’t afford to have a child, then don’t bring a child to the world.”

For Dr Afua, who uses the profit from his veterinary practice to fund his shelter, it is getting harder to house the unwanted animals.

“We try to help the animals get homes quickly but I’m careful [about] the homes they go to so they don’t come back. And some animals will never find homes because of previous abuse.”

With St Mark’s Animal Rescue Foundation caring for more than 60 dogs at the moment – around twice its capacity – would he ever turn away an animal?

“I don’t have the heart to. As I speak I have dogs and cats everywhere. My office and home is full – and I still make room for the next.”

• ‘I’ve been sleeping under a bridge in Lagos for 30 years’
• Are Nigerians abroad widening the class divide back home?
• ‘I scarred my six children by using skin-lightening creams’
• Blank questions, power cuts and a suicide: Nigeria’s exams fiasco
• The Nigerian professor who makes more money welding

A British man has been indicted in the US for allegedly trying to smuggle “sensitive American military technology” to China, including missiles, air defence radar and drones.

John Miller, 63, and a Chinese man, Cui Guanghai, are wanted by the FBI on charges relating to conspiracy to commit interstate stalking and conspiracy, smuggling and violations of the Arms Control Act.

Mr Miller, a permanent US resident, and Mr Cui, 43, were both arrested in Serbia. They remain there and could now face extradition to the US.

The Foreign Office has confirmed it is providing consular assistance to a British national following his arrest in April and it is “in touch with the local authorities and his family”.

Court documents suggest the two men discussed ways of exporting a device that could be used for encryption and decryption. They are alleged to have paid a $10,000 (£7,430) deposit for the equipment.

Mr Miller and Mr Cui are also accused of trying to “harass” an anti-Chinese government protester, which included installing a tracking device on their car and slashing their tyres.

Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche accused the pair of a “blatant assault” on US national security and its democratic values.

He added: “This Justice Department will not tolerate foreign repression on US soil, nor will we allow hostile nations to infiltrate or exploit our defence systems.”

If found guilty, Mr Miller could face up to 20 years in prison for violation of the Arms Export Control Act, and 10 years for smuggling.

Court documents detail how the men allegedly solicited the procurement of US defence articles, including missiles, air defence radar, drones and cryptographic devices for unlawful export to China.

Mr Cui and Mr Miller are said to have discussed with two individuals – identified as “Individual 5” and “Individual 6” in court documents – how to export a cryptographic device from the US to China.

Items the men allegedly discussed using to smuggle the technology include small electronics, a blender and a motor starter.

The indictment also alleges the pair enlisted two individuals in the US to carry out a plot that would have prevented a victim from protesting against Chinese President Xi Jinping’s attendance at the Asia Pacific Economic Co-operation (Apec) summit held in Los Angeles in November 2023.

Mr Miller and Mr Cui were unaware that those two individuals – identified in court documents as “Individual 1” and “Individual 2” – were acting at the direction of the FBI.

“The indictment alleges that Chinese foreign actors targeted a victim in our nation because he criticised the Chinese government and its president,” said US Attorney Bill Essayli for the Central District of California.

“My office will continue to use all legal methods available to hold accountable foreign nationals engaging in criminal activity on our soil.”

A similar scheme allegedly played out in the spring of 2025, when the alleged victim announced in a public video feed that he planned to unveil two new artistic statues that depicted Xi and his wife.

Mr Cui and Mr Miller paid two other individuals – identified in court documents as “Individual 3” and “Individual 4” – to try and dissuade the alleged victim from sharing his online display of statues.

Those individuals were paid $36,000 (£26,745), but the indictment notes that those two people were also affiliated with and acting at the direction of the FBI.

The two men remain in Serbia and the US is co-ordinating with Serbian officials regarding their pending extraditions.

“An indictment is merely an allegation,” the US Attorney’s Office of the Central District of California said in a statement. “All defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.”

Ncuti Gatwa regenerated into Billie Piper in the series finale of Doctor Who on Saturday night.

He left the role after playing the iconic character for two series.

Piper, who previously played the Doctor’s assistant, Rose Tyler, said the opportunity to “step back on that Tardis one more time was just something I couldn’t refuse”.

In a press release, the BBC said: “Just how and why she [Billie Piper] is back remains to be seen…”

The credit at the end of the programme said: “Ncuti Gatwa as the Doctor. Jodie Whittaker as the Doctor. And introducing Billie Piper”.

In a statement, Piper said she was delighted to be returning to the show, but that fans would have to “wait and see” what her character did next.

The new doctor has usually been introduced on the show through regeneration, but Piper’s statement does not make it clear whether she will be the 16th doctor.

If confirmed as the new Doctor, Piper will be the third woman to have played the role, following Whittaker and Jo Martin.

Piper added: “It’s no secret how much I love this show, and I have always said I would love to return to the Whoniverse as I have some of my best memories there, so to be given the opportunity to step back on that Tardis one more time was just something I couldn’t refuse, but who, how, why and when, you’ll just have to wait and see.”

Moments after the series finale aired, Piper shared a series of photos on Instagram, including two selfies of her holding a white rose and two of her playing the character Rose. The caption under the photos read: “A rose is a rose is a rose !!!”

Doctor Who showrunner and head writer Russell T Davies said: “Billie once changed the whole of television, back in 2005, and now she’s done it again!

“It’s an honour and a hoot to welcome her back to the Tardis, but quite how and why and who is a story yet to be told.

“After 62 years, the Doctor’s adventures are only just beginning!”

Piper first appeared in the show in 2005 when it returned to TV for the first time since the 1990s, appearing alongside Christopher Eccleston and then David Tennant.

Piper, a former pop star who later turned to acting, has enjoyed a successful career on TV and on the stage.

After playing Rose Tyler for two full series in 2005 and 2006, she won acclaim for roles including sex worker Belle de Jour in Secret Diary of a Call Girl and the lead character in Sky Atlantic’s I Hate Suzie.

In 2017 she won best actress at the Olivier Awards for her performance in the play Yerma. And most recently was nominated for a Bafta for playing TV producer Sam McAlister in Scoop, a drama about Prince Andrew’s disastrous interview on Newsnight in 2019.

After Peter Capaldi stepped down as the 12th Doctor, Piper told the BBC that while she thought that a woman should take over the role, she was doubtful about playing the part herself. Capaldi went on to be replaced by Whittaker.

Gatwa only played the Doctor for 18 months, appearing in two series. It’s the shortest time an actor has played the character since Christopher Eccleston left the show after one series in 2005.

In a statement, Gatwa said of his departure: “You know when you get cast, at some point you are going to have to hand back that sonic screwdriver and it is all going to come to an end, but nothing quite prepares you for it.”

He added: “There are no words to describe what it feels like to be cast as the Doctor, nor are there words to explain what it feels like to be accepted into this iconic role that has existed for over 60 years and is truly loved by so many across the globe.”

Gatwa thanked “Whoniverse” fans for “welcoming me in, and making this such a touching experience.

“I’ve loved every minute of it, but now is the time to hand over the keys to that beloved blue box and let someone else take control and enjoy it every bit as much as I have.

“I’ll truly miss it, and forever be grateful to it, and everyone that has played a part in my journey as the Doctor.”

There is still uncertainty about when the drama will return. Russell T Davies has previously said that no decision would be made on commissioning the next series until this series had been broadcast.

The last two series of the show have been co-produced and broadcast internationally by streaming service Disney+, which has given the time travel drama a bigger budget. Discussions about whether the BBC and Disney wish to renew that deal, or whether other options should be explored, are likely to take some time.

For a new series to be ready for 2026, production would need to get under way relatively soon. So at the moment a new series or a special starring Billie Piper before 2027 looks unlikely.

A military aircraft and helicopters are being used to evacuate residents in the Canadian province of Manitoba from fast-moving wildfires.

Thousands have already evacuated western Canada, particularly the central prairie provinces of Saskatchewan and Manitoba, as firefighters face growing flames and hot, dry weather predictions in the coming days.

Dense smoke from the fires – of which there are more than 180 according to officials – has spread across Canada and into parts of the US.

Both Saskatchewan and Manitoba have declared states of emergency for the next month and asked for international help in fighting the fires.

Large parts of Alberta and British Columbia have also ordered evacuations as the fires spread.

The evacuation of residents of the northern First Nations community of Pukatawagan, is a “rapidly evolving situation”, a Manitoba official told the BBC.

Canadian Armed Forces, Manitoba Wildfire Service and Manitoba’s Heavy Urban Search and Rescue Team have been using a military aircraft and helicopters to bring people to safety from the northern community in Manitoba.

As of Friday, more than 2,000 people still needed to be transported out of Pukatawagan.

In Flin Flon, a city of 5,000 in Manitoba, only firefighters and support workers are left in the town.

In Manitoba, there are a total of 25 fires burning, according to the province’s fire situation report, with 10 classified as out of control.

While Manitoba is facing the harshest conditions, other provinces are also dealing with worsening wildfires.

In Saskatchewan, there are 16 wildfires burning as of Saturday, with seven classified as not contained. The Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre (CIFFC) classified conditions in the province as extreme.

Danielle Desjardins, a meteorologist with Environment and Climate Change Canada based in Winnipeg, told the BBC that the forecast for both provinces is not promising.

While a cold front is expected to hit some parts of Saskatchewan, it will not bring relief to the regions where fires are burning.

“The bad news about this cold front is it’s going to be windy,” said Ms Desjardins, adding that the wind, coupled with the heat and lack of rain, are prime conditions for wildfire spread.

Smoke from the fires has also left an estimated 22 million Americans under air quality alerts this weekend.

Michigan and Wisconsin advisories are currently in place.

In northern Minnesota, residents have been warned smoke could reach levels “unhealthy for everyone”, while the rest of the state faces air quality warnings for sensitive groups. That alert runs through Monday evening.

Canada experienced its worst wildfire season on record in 2023, when more than 42 million acres (17.3m hectares) burned.

Fires happen naturally in many parts of the world, including in Canada.

But climate change is making the weather conditions needed for wildfires to spread more likely, according to the UN’s climate body.

Extreme and long-lasting heat draws more and more moisture out of the ground and vegetation.

Mass firings of federal employees which were ordered by US President Donald Trump will remain paused, an appeals court has ruled.

President Trump had signed an executive order in February directing agency heads to begin “large-scale reductions” in staffing. Those efforts to slash the federal workforce were halted by a California judge earlier this month.

On Friday in a 2-1 ruling, a San Francisco-based appeals court denied the Trump administration’s request to unfreeze that injunction.

The administration may request for the US Supreme Court to weigh in.

“The Executive Order at issue here far exceeds the President’s supervisory powers under the Constitution,” the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals wrote. “The President enjoys significant removal power with respect to the appointed officers of federal agencies.”

The Trump administration had sought an emergency stay of an injunction which had been given by Judge Susan Illston of San Francisco. The judge questioned how an overhaul of federal agencies could be actioned without congressional authorisation.

The case was brought by federal employees unions, local governments and non-profits who argued against Trump’s executive order, as well as directives which were issued by the Office of Personnel Management and Office of Management and Budget to implement Trump’s policy.

The cuts are part of the Trump administrations efforts to curtail government spending through funding freezes and firings – led by the Department of Government Efficiency (Doge).

Trump has repeatedly promised to slash government spending and reduce the federal workforce. He tasked billionaire Elon Musk and Doge with leading that charge.

Tens of thousands of federal workers have reportedly been fired, taken buyouts or been placed on leave since Trump took office.

The Trump administration said they plan to fight back against the latest court ruling.

“A single judge is attempting to unconstitutionally seize the power of hiring and firing from the Executive Branch,” the White House said in a statement to US media.

The EU has said it “strongly” regrets Donald Trump’s surprise plan to double US tariffs on steel and aluminium in a move that risks throwing bilateral trade talks into chaos.

On Friday, the US president told a rally in the steel-making city of Pittsburgh that the tariffs would rise from 25% to 50%, claiming this would boost local industry and national supplies.

The European Commission told the BBC on Saturday that Trump’s latest move on tariffs “undermines ongoing efforts” to reach a deal, warning about “countermeasures”.

This also raises questions about the UK’s zero tariff deal with the US on steel and aluminium which, although agreed, has not yet been signed.

UK steelmakers said the doubling of the tariffs is “yet another body blow” to the industry while a UK government spokesman said “we are engaging with the US on the implications of the latest tariff announcement and to provide clarity for industry”.

The UK – which left the EU following the 2016 Brexit referendum – was the first country to clinch a trade deal with the US earlier this month.

In a statement sent to the BBC on Saturday, the European Commission, the EU’s executive arm, said: “We strongly regret the announced increase of US tariffs on steel imports from 25% to 50%.

“This decision adds further uncertainty to the global economy and increases costs for consumers and businesses on both sides of the Atlantic.

“The tariff increase also undermines ongoing efforts to reach a negotiated solution.

“In good faith, the EU paused its countermeasures on 14 April to create space for continued negotiations,” the statement said, warning the bloc “is prepared to impose countermeasures”.

On Friday, Trump announced the tariff rate on steel and aluminium imports would double to 50%, starting on Wednesday.

He said the move would help boost the local steel industry and national supply, while reducing reliance on China.

Trump also said that $14bn (£10bn) would be invested in the area’s steel production through a partnership between US Steel and Japan’s Nippon Steel, though he later told reporters he had yet to see or approve the final deal.

The announcement was the latest turn in Trump’s rollercoaster approach to tariffs since re-entering office in January.

“There will be no layoffs and no outsourcing whatsoever, and every US steelworker will soon receive a well deserved $5,000 bonus,” Trump told the crowd, filled with steelworkers, to raucous applause.

US steel manufacturing has been declining in recent years, and China, India and Japan have pulled ahead as the world’s top producers. Roughly a quarter of all steel used in the US is imported.

The announcement comes amid a court battle over the legality of some of Trump’s global tariffs, which an appeals court has allowed to continue after the Court of International Trade ordered the administration to halt the taxes.

His tariffs on steel and aluminium were untouched by the lawsuit.

Last week, Trump had agreed to extend a deadline to negotiate tariffs with the EU by more than a month.

In April, he announced a 20% tariff – or import tax – on most EU goods, but later cut this to 10% to allow time for negotiations. Trump expressed frustration with the pace of talks and threatened to raise the tariff rate to an even higher level of 50% as soon as 1 June.

But last week he wrote on social media that he was pushing his deadline back to 9 July, after a “very nice” call with Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission chief.

Emmy winning actress Valerie Mahaffey has died at age 71, her family has confirmed.

Mahaffey’s publicist confirmed to The Hollywood Reporter that the star died in California on Friday after being diagnosed with cancer.

The star was known for her work on television series including Desperate Housewives, Young Sheldon and Big Sky.

In a statement provided to Variety, Mahaffey’s husband Joseph Kell said that he had “lost the love of my life, and America has lost one of its most endearing actresses”.

“She will be missed,” he said.

On Facebook, the couple’s daughter Alice wrote: “I don’t really have the words to say right now. Cancer sucks. I’ll look for you in all the fun moments of life. I know that’s where you’ll be.”

In 1992, Mahaffey won an primetime Emmy for Outstanding Actress in a Drama Series for her portrayal of Eve in the American dark comedy Northern Exposure.

Her primetime success came after a daytime Emmy award in the previous decade for her role in The Doctors, a soap opera which aired from 1979-1981.

She also appeared in several films, including Sully and Seabiscuit.

More recent roles have included an appearance as Madame Reynard in the 2020 film French Exit, for which she was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award.

Born to a Canadian mother and American father in Sumatra, Indonesia, Mahaffey relocated as a teen to Texas.

Her first film credit came in 1977, with a role in the film Tell Me My Name.

Mahaffey appeared in episodes of dozens of television series over her five-decade career, including medical drama ER, the dystopian series The Man in the High Castle, and the musical series Glee.

In Desperate Housewives, her memorable role as Alma Hodge, the manipulative ex-wife of Orson Hodge, saw her appear on the drama-filled Wisteria Lane for eight episodes.

She also appeared as teacher Victoria MacElroy in Young Sheldon, a spin-off of the Big Bang Theory that focuses on the upbringing of the show’s titular star Sheldon Cooper.

At least 151 people in central Nigeria are now known to have died following flash floods that destroyed homes and displaced thousands of residents earlier this week.

The Niger State Emergency Management Agency (Nsema) confirmed to the BBC the death toll had risen sharply from 115, after floods hit the town of Mokwa.

A Nsema spokesman told the BBC more than 500 households with a population in excess of 3,000 people were affected. Some families are said to have lost between two and five relatives including children.

The agency warned the death toll could rise further after people were washed into the River Niger below the town.

Local authorities said 11 people had been rescued and taken to hospitals for treatment.

Nsema said the Tiffin Maza and Anguwan Hausawa districts of Mokwa were worst affected.

Mokwa’s district head Muhammad Shaba Aliyu said it has been 60 years since the community had suffered this kind of flooding.

“I beg the government to support us,” Mr Aliyu said.

But the officials appear to be overwhelmed by the scale of destruction as families desperately seek food and shelter.

Mokwa is located at the edge of the River Niger, a transit point between the northern and southern part of Nigeria.

A bridge linking the northern and south-western parts of the country has collapsed in the floods and left motorists stranded.

Nigerian President Bola Tinubu directed “all relevant emergency and security agencies to intensify ongoing search and rescue operations”.

Torrential rain fell in the region on late Wednesday into Thursday, causing flash floods.

Nigeria’s rainy season is just beginning and usually lasts from April to October.

Authorities have warned of heavy downpours in at least 15 of the country’s 36 states.

Australia’s defence minister Richard Marles has called on China to explain why it needs to have “such an extraordinary military build-up”.

He said Beijing needs to provide greater transparency and reassurance as it is the “fundamental issue” for the region.

Meanwhile, the Philippines defence minister Gilberto Teodoro Jr has called China “absolutely irresponsible and reckless” in its actions in the South China Sea.

The ministers had separately addressed reporters on the sidelines of an Asian defence summit held in Singapore.

China has yet to respond to either Marles or Teodoro.

Organised by the think tank International Institute for Strategic Studies, the Shangri-la Dialogue has traditionally been anchored by the US and China, which have been jostling for power in the region.

This year China has sent a lower-level delegation and scrapped its speech. In the absence of a strong Chinese presence, the dialogue has been dominated by criticism and questions of Beijing posed by the US and its allies.

On Sunday morning, Marles asserted that “what we have seen from China is the single biggest increase in military capability and build up in conventional sense, by any country since the end of the Second World War”.

It is not just the size of the military build-up that concerns other countries, he told reporters.

“It’s the fact that it is happening without strategic reassurance. It’s happening without a clear strategic intent on the part of China… what we want to see is strategic transparency and strategic reassurance be provided by China, and an understanding of why it is needed to have such an extraordinary military build-up.”

He cited Australia as an example of such transparency, noting that Canberra makes public its national defence strategy and defence reviews, and makes it “utterly clear” that when they build up their defences it is for Australia and Asia’s security.

“So there is total strategic clarity and assurance that is being provided by Australia to our neighbours, to the region, to the world. That’s what we would like to see,” he said.

Answering a question on a highly-scrutinised Chinese military exercise conducted near Australia and New Zealand’s waters in February, Marles said that while it was “disruptive, and we believe that it could have been done in a better way”, ultimately “China was acting in accordance with international law”.

“The guiding light, the bedrock here, needs to be compliance with international law. That’s what we keep talking about, is the rules-based order.”

Marles was also asked about Hegseth’s call for Indo-Pacific partners to increase defence spending as a bulwark against the threat of China.

Marles said “we actually are taking steps down this path… we understand it, we’re up for it.” US President Donald Trump has called on Australia to increase its spending to 3%, but Canberra has yet to publicly commit to that number.

Marles added that part of that spending would come under Aukus, a pact among Australia, the UK and the US to build up a fleet of nuclear-powered submarines.

He said projects under the pact were “on track” and he was “very optimistic” about the progress, including more visits of American submarines to Australia and rotations through a Perth-based navy base.

In a separate interview with the BBC’s security correspondent Frank Gardner, the Philippines defence minister Teodoro said China has been “absolutely irresponsible and reckless in appropriating most, if not all, of the South China Sea and the world cannot tolerate this.”

The two countries have repeatedly clashed over competing claims in the South China Sea, and the Philippines has complained of aggressive and violent tactics by the Chinese coast guard.

He echoed the call for a preservation of the international order, saying that “the takeaway of a lot of defence ministers is that Europe and the US must continue to lead” on this.

“That was the call of the Philippines. That is the call of Lithuania, Latvia, the smaller countries who have a way of life that values freedom and dignity of the human being.”

“And with a way of life that we don’t want the deep state looking over our shoulders or being scared of what we say,” he said, referring to China.

On Saturday, US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had warned of China’s “imminent” threat towards Taiwan and accused Beijing of becoming a “hegemonic power” in the region.

China has vigorously attacked Hegseth in two separate statements, with the latest posted on its Foreign Ministry website early on Sunday.

It said that Hegseth had “vilified China with defamatory allegations, and falsely called China a ‘threat’.

“No country in the world deserves to be called a hegemonic power other than the US itself, who is also the primary factor undermining the peace and stability in the Asia-Pacific.”

Earlier in the defence summit, French President Emmanuel Macron had made a pitch for Europe to be a new ally to Asia.

China also responded to Macron, who had compared the defence of Taiwan to the defence of Ukraine, and said the comparison was “unacceptable” as the “Taiwan question is entirely China’s affair”.

China claims Taiwan, a self-governing island, as its territory and has not ruled out the use of force to eventually “reunify” with it.

Two people have died and hundreds have been arrested across France after Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) fans celebrated the club’s victory in the Champions League final, according to the French interior ministry.

In the south-west town of Dax, a 17-year-old boy died after being stabbed in the chest late on Saturday evening, local media reported.

A 23-year-old man who was riding a scooter in central Paris was also killed after being hit by a vehicle, the prosecutor’s office said.

Flares and fireworks were set off, bus shelters smashed and cars torched amid wild celebrations as PSG won the biggest prize in European club football for the first time in their history.

Paris police prefect Laurent Nuñez said PSG’s Champions League trophy parade will go ahead on Sunday evening – but there will be an increased police and military presence on the ground.

Nuñez spoke after the French interior ministry said 192 people were injured in the overnight clashes and 559 people arrested, including 491 in Paris.

Twenty-two police officers and seven firefighters were injured, the ministry said, adding that 264 vehicles were set on fire.

Nuñez said: “The toll is lower than what we have seen in the past, but we will never get used to this kind of abuse, with people who only came to commit acts of vandalism and who did not even watch the match, and we will always have a very firm response.”

He added that “PSG supporters shouldn’t be mixed up with gangs of looters and vandals”.

Separately, the Paris Prosecutor’s Office told the BBC “several shops were looted” in the Place des Ternes area. About 30 people were arrested and taken into custody near a Foot Locker on the Champs-Elysées that was robbed, the office said.

Elsewhere across France, Dax mayor Julien Dubois, reacting to the fatal stabbing, said his “thoughts are with the young victim, his family and friends”.

“We are floored by all the drama tonight,” he wrote on social media. “It is advisable to quickly shed light on these facts in order to severely punish the perpetrator.”

While clashes broke out near the city’s Champs-Élysées avenue and PSG’s Parc des Princes stadium, the majority of fans celebrated PSG’s 5-0 win over Inter Milan peacefully, with many singing and dancing in the streets or blaring their car horns.

The Eiffel Tower was illuminated with PSG’s blue and red colours.

French President Emmanuel Macron, a keen supporter of rivals Olympique de Marseille, posted on X: “A glorious day for PSG! Bravo, we are all proud. Paris, the capital of Europe this evening.”

Approximately 5,400 police were deployed across Paris in anticipation of the raucous celebrations.

At least 300 people detained were suspected of possessing fireworks and causing disorder, Paris police said.

“Troublemakers on the Champs-Elysees were looking to create incidents and repeatedly came into contact with police by throwing large fireworks and other objects,” police said in a statement.

Riot police reportedly used a water cannon to stop a crowd reaching the Arc de Triomphe, and fired tear gas into the crowds.

Other clashes between police and crowds occurred on the Paris ring road. At least two cars were torched near the Parc des Princes.

French Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau took a hard line against the disorder, writing on social media: “True PSG supporters are enjoying their team’s magnificent match.

“Meanwhile, barbarians have taken to the streets of Paris to commit crimes and provoke the police.

“It’s unbearable that it’s unthinkable to party without fearing the savagery of a minority of thugs who respect nothing.”

Meanwhile, outside Paris, police said a car ploughed into PSG fans in Grenoble in south-east France, leaving four people injured.

All those hurt were from the same family, police said. Two were seriously injured.

The driver handed himself into the police and was placed under arrest. A source close to the investigation told the AFP news agency it was believed the driver had not acted intentionally.

The trophy parade in central Paris – scheduled for 17:00 local time (16:00 BST) – will run for one hour from the Champs Elysees to the Arc de Triomphe.

After the parade, the PSG players and staff will be received at the Élysée Palace and later on Sunday evening the trophy will be presented in front of season ticket holders at the Parc des Princes.

Donald Trump has had a busy seven days. On Monday, he threatened to redirect $3bn in Harvard research funding to vocational schools. On Tuesday, the White House sent a letter to federal agencies, instructing them to review the approximately $100m in contracts the government has awarded Harvard and “find alternative vendors” where possible. On Wednesday, he had more to say on the matter still.

“Harvard’s got to behave themselves,” he told reporters gathered in the Oval Office. “Harvard is treating our country with great disrespect, and all they’re doing is getting in deeper and deeper and deeper.”

When combined with other administration attempts – freezing more than $3bn in research grants and suspending foreign students from enrolling in Harvard – Trump’s directives represent a frontal attack on one of America’s most prestigious, and wealthy, institutions of higher education.

Even if court challenges overrule some of these actions – some have already been put on hold – the impact is being felt across the landscape of American higher education.

“They’re doing multiple things every single day, some of those things are sneaking through,” says Greg Wolfson, president of the American Association of University Professors. “But more importantly, they’re changing the culture. They’re changing people.”

At Harvard’s commencement ceremonies on Thursday, students said there was a “palpable concern” on campus.

“People sort of knew Trump was trying some of these moves but [they were] shocked when it happens,” admits one graduate, a British national who requested anonymity because he was concerned public comments could threaten his US work visa. “It feels like the nuclear option.”

“If this can happen to Harvard it can happen to any university in the country,” he adds.

But the repercussions of this apparent Harvard-Trump fight run far deeper than the management of a single Ivy League university. Could the measures Trump is taking mark, as some suggest, the latest, albeit most ambitious, step by conservatives to erode some of the traditional pillars of support for the Democratic Party?

If that is the case, the campus has become a pivotal battle in shaping America’s cultural and political landscape.

Trump and his administration have offered various explanations for their actions, including a perceived lack of conservatives among the ranks of Harvard’s professors, along with suggestions of admitting too many foreign students and financial links to China.

But according to the White House, the most immediate cause has been the university’s apparent failure to address antisemitism on campus, in the wake of anti-Israel protests at universities across the US since the start of the Gaza war.

In December 2023, three prominent university presidents – including the then-president of Harvard, Claudine Gay – struggled to answer whether calling for the “genocide of Jews” violated their student conduct codes on bullying and harassment, sparking a firestorm of criticism.

Dr Gay, who was asked the question at a congressional hearing about antisemitism on US college campuses, answered that it depended on the context. She later apologised, telling the student newspaper: “When words amplify distress and pain, I don’t know how you could feel anything but regret.”

On the campaign trail last year, Trump promised to cut off federal funding and government accreditation for colleges that he said were engaging in “antisemitic propaganda”. Once Trump returned to the White House in January, he began following through on this.

Several universities – including Columbia, which saw some of the most high profile protests – agreed to sweeping changes in campus security rules and closer supervision of its Middle Eastern, South Asian and African Studies departments.

In April, Harvard released the results of a university task force review (commissioned before Trump’s election) of antisemitism and anti-Muslim prejudice on its own campus. It found that many Jewish and Muslim students faced bias, exclusion and alienation from the university curriculum and its community.

However, the administration’s demands go well beyond calls to address antisemitism. In a letter to the university, its “Joint Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism” laid out a laundry list of changes that Harvard must make, including terminating diversity programmes, reforming admissions and hiring, screening foreign students for views hostile to “American values”, and expanding and protecting “viewpoint diversity” among students and faculty.

Trump’s shock-and-awe strategy of rapid and aggressive pressure has stunned many in higher education, who never imagined the scope of the demands or the force behind them.

“It’s not about higher education,” argues Mr Wolfson. “Higher education is one of the levers they see as critical to transforming our society.”

But the potential for a long-term transformation could largely depend on whether the majority of American universities choose to accommodate the administration’s demands – or whether it stands and fights, as Harvard is trying to do.

While Harvard has been the most prominent target of the administration’s ire, and the most visible in its resistance, it is just one of many high-profile American universities that has received funding cuts or been subject of investigations.

Princeton and the University of Pennsylvania have reported that the administration has suspended hundreds of millions of dollars in their research grants. The Department of Education has launched investigations of 10 universities for alleged antisemitism – and warned dozens of others that they could face similar inquiries. It is also investigating 52 universities for illegal race-based programmes.

To some, this all amounts to an across-the-board war on elite higher education by the Trump administration in an effort to reshape universities in a more conservative-friendly image. To others, this is no bad thing.

“Universities are not about the pursuit of knowledge, they’re about the forceful pushing of a left-wing world view,” Charlie Kirk, founder of the conservative group Turning Point USA, said in a Fox News interview last month. “We’re here to shake it up.”

Many on the right have long viewed American college campuses as hotbeds of liberal indoctrination, whether it has taken the form of left-wing anti-war radicalism in the 1960s, “political correctness” of the 1990s, Occupy Wall Street anti-capitalism of the 2000s or the Black Lives Matter movement and anti-Israel demonstrations in recent years.

Polling has illustrated a certain divide in beliefs between those who have and haven’t attended college. In a recent survey by the polling company Civiqs, non-college graduates were split on the job Trump is doing in office, with 49% disapproving and 47% approving.

College graduates, on the other hand, had a significantly different view, as 58% disapproved of Trump’s performance in office versus only 38% who approved.

“I think a lot of this blowback is from the sense that they have become the universities of blue [Democratic] America, and that this is the consequence,” says Rick Hess, senior fellow and director of education policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute.

In recent years, according to Mr Hess, American higher education has become more closely tied to the government and more reliant on government funding.

He says that the new Trump team has simply adopted levers of control over higher education employed by recent Democratic administrations – including civil rights investigations, federal anti-discrimination laws and control over funding.

“In classic Trump form,” he added, “it’s absolutely the case that these levers have been turned up to 11.”

And there are fewer procedural and legal safeguards than there were under the Joe Biden and Barack Obama presidencies.

“It’s both an evolution and a revolution,” says Mr Hess.

But it is one, he argues, that universities have brought on themselves by being overtly political during Trump’s first term and making elite school the face of American higher education.

“The price for collecting billions a year in tax dollars is that institutions should both honour the promises they make, such as enforcing civil rights law, and hew to a mission in which they explicitly serve the whole nation,” says Mr Hess.

Withholding federal funding from universities may be a new challenge for higher education, but to some this is just the latest in a long effort by conservatives to undercut key traditional pillars of liberal power.

Through a combination of legislation and court rules, the influence of labour unions – which had provided the Democratic Party with volunteer personnel and funds – had diminished long before Trump succeeded in winning over white working-class voters in his three presidential runs.

State-level lawsuit reforms have also curtailed the vast sums that trial lawyers could contribute to Democratic coffers. And ongoing efforts to shrink the government workforce – which reached a peak with Elon Musk’s Doge reductions – have eroded another traditionally Democratic bloc.

However, Mr Wolfson fears that something greater could be lost if some of the Trump administration’s measures are enforced.

“The fact that we have multiracial, multicultural, multinational universities is a boon to our universities,” he says. “It creates really diverse communities, really diverse intellectual thought.”

Harvard – perhaps best known for its renowned law school – has turned the courts into its principal tool to resist Trump’s pressure.

On Thursday, a federal judge indefinitely suspended the administration’s attempts to prohibit foreign students from receiving visas to attend the university.

The university has also sued to prevent the Trump administration from terminating more than $2.2bn in federal grants, although that case is pending.

“The trade-off put to Harvard and other universities is clear,” Harvard wrote in its complaint filed with a Massachusetts federal court. “Allow the government to micromanage your academic institution or jeopardise the institution’s ability to pursue medical breakthroughs, scientific discoveries, and innovative solutions.”

Harvard’s president, Alan Garber, has also defended his university, saying that Harvard would be “firm” in its commitments to education and truth, during an interview with NPR.

“Harvard is a very old institution, much older than the country,” he continued. “As long as there has been a United States of America, Harvard has thought that its role is to serve the nation.”

Trump, meanwhile, has shared strong words of his own. “Harvard wants to fight,” he said on Wednesday. “They want to show how smart they are, and they’re getting their ass kicked.”

Opinion polls show that Trump’s political base supports his efforts, and the underlying message. Yet those same polls suggest a majority of the general population support American universities and don’t approve of his proposed funding cuts.

And opinion aside, the practicality of achieving such a fundamental reordering of America’s system of higher education, even with all the tools at the federal government’s disposal, is a daunting task.

According to Mr Wolfson, however, repairing what he says is the damage being done to academic independence will be equally challenging.

A growing number of members of the American Association of University Professors fear the consequences of expressing political views or conducting disfavoured research.

“The destruction is real,” argues Mr Wolfson. “Even if the courts step in, there will still be a massive undermining of the higher education project in this country due to Trump’s reckless, reckless moves.”

Mr Hess, who has pushed for conservative education reform for years, is less concerned. He believes that Trump’s chaotic, scattershot approach – including last week’s comments – could end up less effective than a more methodical restructuring of American universities.

“This is all an ambitious experiment,” Mr Hess said. “Whether it’s a strategy that’s going to work is very much an open question.”

One thing seems clear, however. Even if American universities resist – or outlast – Trump’s efforts, they are no longer insulated from the scorched-earth warfare of American politics. The walls of the ivory tower have been breached, regardless of whether one believes it is the barbarians – or liberators – at the gate.

Two bridges have collapsed overnight in separate incidents in Russian regions bordering Ukraine, killing at least seven people and injuring dozens more.

A road bridge came down in Bryansk, bringing several heavy trucks on to a moving passenger train late on Saturday, the regional governor said.

Emergency services said at least seven people were killed. At least 47 people were taken to hospital, including one child, Governor Alexander Bogomaz said.

Moscow Railway alleged on Telegram that the bridge came down as a result of “illegal interference”.

Hours later a second bridge collapsed in the Zheleznogorsk district, derailing a locomotive train, acting governor Alexander Khinshtein said.

The train caught fire and a driver suffered injuries to his legs, Khinshtein said.

Khinshtein wrote on Telegram: “The cause of the bridge collapse will be established. All emergency services are working on the scene. I am keeping the situation under control.”

It is unclear whether the two collapses in the neighbouring regions are related and Ukraine is yet to comment.

Pictures online from Bryansk showed mangled carriages and passengers helping each other climb out of the wreckage in the dark.

Moscow’s interregional transport prosecutor’s office said an investigation had been launched.

Authorities said the train’s locomotive and several cars derailed when the road bridge fell on to it.

Additional emergency workers, as well as rescue equipment and light towers for carrying out work at night have been sent to the area, according to Russian news agency TASS.

The train was going from the town of Klimovo to Moscow and was in the Vygonichsky district when the collapse happened, officials said.

Passengers were evacuated and guided to a meeting point at a nearby station, Moscow Railway said, adding: “They will be able to continue their journey on a specially formed reserve train” travelling from Bryansk to Moscow.

The first incident took place about 100km (62 miles) from the Ukraine border.

It’s a condition that affects more than 10 million people in the UK. It can change futures, end careers, and shrink worlds. So when a hack comes along that says it can “cure”, or at the very least fend off a migraine, people will try it.

While there are medical treatments, there is no cure. Prescription medication can be very effective – but it doesn’t always work. For many people there is no simple solution.

Some discover their own ways of managing the debilitating pain: blasting the side of their face with a hairdryer, or sitting in a hot bath while wearing an ice pack and drinking a smoothie.

But now a new hack has suddenly gone viral – the McMigraine Meal. A simple offering of a full-fat cola and a portion of salty fries seems to be doing the trick for hundreds who’ve been extolling its virtues on TikTok.

If there is any science behind these hacks – what do they do to the body?

Nick Cook, from Oxfordshire, carries “a wallet full of drugs” around in case of a migraine attack. He will “try anything” to make the pain go away, he says.

“When you live with the condition, and you’re working a five-day week and you need to carry on, you’ll give anything a go.”

At its worst the pain around Nick’s eye socket can feel like his eyeball is getting crushed. He says it’s the caffeine and sugar in cola that helps him.

“If I catch it soon enough it can sometimes work, when my vision goes fuzzy and I can feel one coming on.”

He stresses that drinking cola doesn’t replace his amitriptyline tablets – the daily pain medication he takes to try to prevent migraines – but it does sometimes help him “last until the end of the day”.

For Kayleigh Webster, a 27-year-old who has had chronic migraines all her life, it’s the salt on the chips that might slow down a migraine attack.

“It can help,” she says cautiously, “but it’s certainly not a cure.

“Migraine is a complex neurological condition – and it can’t be cured by a bit of caffeine, salt and sugar in a fast food meal.”

Kayleigh’s tried cocktails of different medications, putting her feet in hot water, a flannel at the back of the head, acupuncture, cupping – but they’ve had little effect.

One of the few treatments that has given her relief is medical Botox – having dozens of injections in her head, face and neck. It’s still not clear how Botox works for migraine, but it’s believed to block powerful pain signals being released from the nerves.

A migraine – which can last days – is very different to a headache, which tend to be short-lived and can be treated more easily with painkillers like paracetamol. Migraines can cause head pain, neck pain, numbness, blurred vision, and even affect speech and movement.

Skulls dating back to 3,000 BC show ancient Egyptians even had trouble with migraines – but despite that long history, their exact cause is still unknown.

It’s thought pain receptors in the blood vessels and nerve tissue around the brain misfire – sending incorrect signals that something is wrong. But we don’t know why some people have an oversensitive nervous system – and why it reacts to some things and not others.

Experts say there’s not enough research into why only some people – around one in seven – are affected, or what can actually help.

Dr Kay Kennis, a trustee for the Migraine Trust and a GP who specialises in migraines, says while there are elements of the McMigraine meal that can help stave off an attack, these aren’t innate to “a McDonald’s”.

“The caffeine in the coke can act as a nerve disruptor, it is a substance that affects nerve activity. For some, that disturbance works in a positive way,” Dr Kennis says.

“There are some painkillers that people take for migraines that have caffeine – and some do respond well to that – but we don’t fully know why.”

But she warns against using caffeinated fizzy drinks like cola as a way of regularly managing migraines.

“Too much caffeine can be a trigger too – and you can end up in a worse situation in the long run,” Dr Kennis says.

Other ingredients in a fast food meal, like the salt on the chips, can affect nerve activity, she explains, but adds the effects of sodium on migraines have not been tested.

She also warns that not only is fast food often ultra-processed and not conducive to a healthy diet, it can contain high levels of Tyramine, a natural compound commonly found in many foods, which can actually cause severe migraines.

For Eloise Underwood none of the quick fixes on social media work.

The chronic migraine sufferer has been looking for a “magic cocktail” for seven years – she’s seen people recommend putting feet in scorching water (not recommended by experts and potentially dangerous); drinking hot coffee (caffeine can be a trigger); or various vibrating devices which have had little effect.

“There are so many videos online that take advantage of the desperation we all feel,” Eloise explains.

She’s left several jobs – often due to lighting and noise in an office environment triggering migraines. She recently stopped working as an interior designer and has now launched a business pressing and framing wedding flowers from her home.

She wears loop ear buds to reduce the sharpness of the sounds around her, and limits her social life.

“People think a migraine is just a headache – that’s just one symptom of it,” Eloise says. “For me, a migraine is a whole body experience…

“Migraines have completely made my life smaller.”

Prof Peter Goadsby, a neurologist at the NIHR-King’s Clinical Research Facility, says research is beginning to produce positive results after years of underfunding.

His latest study shows medications known as gepants could block a group of pain receptors in the lead-up to a migraine attack, cutting off the pain before it starts.

“Any new treatment is a glimmer of hope,” Eloise says. “They do say that nothing will work for everyone – but something will work for someone.”

Lifestyle changes can also make a difference, Prof Goadsby explains. It might be boring, he says, but basically – “be careful of your brain”.

“You want to have regularity, avoid the highs and lows. If you can feel the warning signs – yawning, sleepiness, mood change, passing more urine and even craving salt and sugar – listen to your body.

“Listen to your body – don’t listen to TikTok, that’s my advice.”

Nick has been doing exactly that. He might reach for the odd cola and salty fries, but he’s moulded his whole life in order to manage his migraines.

“I don’t drink, I wear sunglasses even if it’s cloudy,” he says. “I don’t go wild. When me and my partner go away, half the stuff we take is to help us manage our migraines.

On a recent stag-do weekend, Nick noticed the difference between his and his friends’ lives.

“They were up all night drinking to the early hours,” Nick says. “I turned up with my own pillow, apples, bananas, Weetabix, and any snacks I would need to keep me going, because hunger can be a major trigger.

“I’m in bed by midnight – but my mates know me, and that’s OK, because this is how I have to live my life.”

The ban on the sale of single-use disposable vapes will come into force on Sunday across the UK, aimed at protecting children’s health and the environment.

It means shops and supermarkets will no longer be able to stock them – but they can still sell rechargeable or refillable devices.

Disposable vapes have been cited as a key driver in the rise in youth vaping, while every week five million vapes are thrown away.

Ministers predict it will have a significant impact but health experts say further regulation is needed to tackle youth vaping.

Retailers in England and Wales breaching the ban face a £200 fine for the first offence with potentially unlimited fines or jail for those who repeatedly re-offend.

The ban was first announced for England and Wales by the previous Conservative government but the law was not enacted before last summer’s general election.

Labour then pushed ahead with it.

Scotland and Northern Ireland have introduced their own bans, timed to coincide with the one in England and Wales.

Vape use has risen rapidly over the last decade with 9% of the British public now buying and using e-cigarettes.

Latest figures suggest about one in four vapers use the disposable versions, although that proportion has fallen since the ban was announced.

And while it is illegal to sell vapes to anyone under 18, disposable vapes, often sold in smaller, more colourful packaging than refillable ones, have been cited as an important factor in the rise of youth vaping.

Currently one in seven 18 to 24-year-olds vape but have never smoked.

Vaping is substantially less harmful than smoking but it has not been around for long enough for its long-term risks to be known, according to the NHS.

The environmental impact is considerable. Single-use vapes are difficult to recycle and typically end up in landfill where their batteries can leak harmful chemicals like battery acid, lithium, and mercury into the environment, the government said.

Batteries thrown into household waste also cause hundreds of fires in bin lorries and waste-processing centres every year.

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs estimates almost five million single-use vapes were either littered or thrown into general waste each week last year.

Environment minister Mary Creagh said: “For too long, single-use vapes have blighted our streets as litter and hooked our children on nicotine. That ends today.

“The government calls time on these nasty devices.”

But Action on Smoking and Health chief executive Hazel Cheeseman questioned what impact the ban would have, pointing out new refillable vape kits were coming on to the market that look and cost similar to the single-use ones.

She said it would not be until the Tobacco and Vapes Bill, which includes powers to regulate marketing, branding and advertising, came into power that the issue of youth vaping could be truly tackled.

“Their appeal is driven by bright colours, wide availability and cheap prices,” she said.

“The new regulations will hopefully help to address the environmental impact, but government will need further regulations to address the appeal of products to teenagers.”

She said this was very much a balancing act as vapes were an important tool to help people quit.

“Vaping is very much less harmful than smoking and is the most popular aid to quitting in the UK,” she added.

John Dunne, of the UK Vaping Industry Association, said bans were “not the answer”.

He said he was concerned that a black market in single-use vapes could develop and some people may be tempted to return to smoking cigarettes.

“Disposables have played a huge role in reducing smoking levels amongst adults to record low levels. It’s why we are seeing stockpiling in the lead up to the ban,” he added.

Scott Butler, executive director of Material Focus, an independent not-for-profit organisation, said that he was still concerned that vapes are still difficult to recycle and reuse.

He said customers and businesses should demand sustainable options.

“Given the rampant binning and littering that we already see, will we see any behaviour change? Only if producers, importers and retailers step up and meet their long existing legal obligations to provide and pay for takeback and recycling,” he said.

It was love at first sight for Adarsh Ramchurn. “I couldn’t control it,” he says of his flourishing affection for Nav Sangha.

But their relationship is “frowned upon” by some in their communities, they say, as Adarsh is Hindu and Nav is Sikh.

They’ve been an item for three years and say they receive hateful comments on social media when posting about their life together.

They are also abused because Adarsh, 24, has a darker skin tone than Nav, a form of prejudice known as colourism.

“We push through it,” says Nav, 22. “There are also people who are very supportive and that are in similar situations.”

Data compiled by YouGov in January suggests 45% of 18 to 24-year-olds in the UK believe there is a God, or believe there are Gods. The next highest figure, 36%, is for the over-65s.

BBC News spoke to Nav and Adarsh as well as a Christian from Married At First Sight (MAFS), a Muslim from The Only Way is Essex (Towie), and a former Jehovah’s Witness for the Sex After documentary series.

During a discussion between the participants, Nav was asked what the hardest bit about being a Sikh was. “Probably getting the backlash of being with a Hindu,” she said.

She and Ardash knew their interfaith relationship could be an issue for their parents, so spoke to them early.

“I know it’s different for every family, there can be difficult dynamics,” says Adarsh.

“But if you can have the open discussion [about] dating outside of your religion… I’d always say [you should].”

Something Adarsh’s parents were quick to ask him about was marriage.

The couple say, if they were to wed, they would probably do a Sikh and a Hindu ceremony.

“If we have kids, I feel like it’s important that they learn about both religions and faiths,” Nav adds.

Adarsh agrees and says he’s “looking forward to it”.

Junaid Ahmed’s parents were not as accommodating. His fear of being rejected by them took hold at a young age. Junaid knew being gay contravened the Islamic beliefs he and his family shared.

“When I did finally come out [aged 18], I did expect the worst and… [it] did happen,” he tells us. “They threw me out; they disowned me.”

He says he doesn’t blame his parents for ostracising him.

“I genuinely don’t – it’s made me the person I am today.”

Junaid, now aged 26 and a star of Towie, says he often gets abuse online from other Muslims because he is open about his sexual orientation, but “that [has] never changed my relationship with God”.

He says he is grateful for his religious upbringing and still prays every day.

Like Junaid, Martin Riley – who was brought up a Jehovah’s Witness – was also ostracised by his family.

However, in his case, it was because a few years ago he was expelled from his religion completely, in a process called disfellowshipping.

For Riley, as he is known to his friends, this meant being shunned by other members of his congregation – including close friends and family.

His first marriage, which lasted 20 years, had broken down a few months before he was expelled.

He was a particularly strong believer and, while dating after he was expelled, he abided by the rule of not having sex before marriage.

It was only when Riley began dating the woman who is now his wife, that he began seriously considering whether he wanted to continue adhering to the religion that he’d been part of for 40 years. His wife is not a Jehovah’s Witness.

“I realised that I did not want to have a future that didn’t include her, whether that meant returning to the religion or not.”

After having sex with her for the first time, which he describes as being, “like in the movies”, he recalls: “I was actually surprised by how guiltless I felt about the whole thing.”

Riley, 48, now considers himself an atheist.

Looking back at his expulsion from the religion aged 42, he says: “It was devastating for me, at the time. Now I think it is probably one of the best things to ever happen to me.”

Unlike Riley, Sacha Jones did not grow up devoutly religious, but was baptised as a Christian last year after finding her faith. She has vowed to remain abstinent until she marries.

“I haven’t slept with anyone since my baptism,” she says. “So I’m fresh in the eyes of the Lord!”

Sacha, 30, also says the culture around dating today makes it difficult to form a long-term relationship.

Last year she participated in MAFS, but split up with her partner following the show.

“It’s the absolute trenches out here in the dating world… it’s difficult to trust a man anyway, but then to trust someone that doesn’t fear God as well?”

She says she doesn’t miss sex as much as she might do because she isn’t dating anyone at the moment. She believes the wait will be worth it – once she’s married.

“I no longer lack purpose or peace,” says Sacha, who isn’t the “party animal” she once was. “I’m happier than I’ve ever been.”

An Byunghui was in the middle of a video game on the night of 3 December when she learned that the South Korean president had declared martial law.

She couldn’t quite believe it – until the internet blew up with the evidence. The shock announcement from then-president Yoon Suk Yeol, the now-famous shots of soldiers breaking down the windows of the National Assembly and MPs scaling the walls to force their way into the building so they could vote the motion down.

Within hours, thousands had spurred into protest, especially young women. And Byunghui joined them, travelling hundreds of miles from Daegu in the south-east to the capital Seoul.

They turned up not just because Yoon’s decision had alarmed and angered them, but to protest against a president who insisted South Korea was free of sexism – despite the deep discrimination and flashes of violence that said otherwise.

They returned week after week as the investigation into Yoon’s abuse of power went on – and they rejoiced when he was impeached after four dramatic months.

And yet, with the country set to elect a new president on 3 June, those very women say they feel invisible again.

The two main candidates have been largely silent about equality for women. A polarising subject, it had helped Yoon into power in 2022 as he vowed to defend men who felt sidelined in a world that they saw as too feminist. And a third candidate, who is popular among young men for his anti-feminist stance, has been making headlines.

For many young South Korean women, this new name on the ballot symbolises a new fight.

“So many of us felt like we were trying to make the world a better place by attending the [anti-Yoon] rallies,” the 24-year-old college student says.

“But now, I wonder if anything has really improved… I can’t shake the feeling that they’re trying to erase women’s voices.”

When Byunghui arrived at the protests, she was struck by the atmosphere.

The bitter December cold didn’t stop tens of thousands of women from gathering. Huddling inside hooded jackets or under umbrellas, waving lightsticks and banners, singing hopeful K-pop numbers, they demanded Yoon’s ouster.

“Most of those around me were young women, we were singing ‘Into the World’ by Girls’ Generation,” Byunghui says.

Into the World, a hit from 2007 by one of K-pop’s biggest acts, became an anthem of sorts in the anti-Yoon rallies. Women had marched to the same song nearly a decade ago in anti-corruption protests that ended another president’s career.

“The lyrics – about not giving up on this world and dreaming of a new world,” Byunghui says, “just overwhelmed me. I felt so close to everyone”.

There are no official estimates of how many of the protesters were young women. Approximately one in three were in their 20s or 30s, according to research by local news outlet Chosun Daily.

An analysis by BBC Korean found that women in their 20s were the largest demographic at one rally in December, where there were 200,000 of them – almost 18% of those in attendance. In comparison, there were just over 3% of men in their 20s at that rally.

The protests galvanised women in a country where discrimination, sexual harassment and even violence against them has long been pervasive, and the gender pay gap – at 31% – is the widest among rich nations.

Like in so many other places, plummeting birth rates in South Korea too have upped the pressure on young women to marry and have children, with politicians often encouraging them to play their part in a patriarchal society.

“I felt like all the frustration that has built up inside me just burst forth,” says 23-year-old Kim Saeyeon . “I believe that’s why so many young women turned up. They wanted to express all that dissatisfaction.”

For 26-year-old Lee Jinha, it was the desire to see Yoon go: “I tried to go every week. It wasn’t easy. It was incredibly cold, super crowded, my legs hurt and I had a lot of work to do… but it was truly out of a sense of responsibility.”

That is not surprising, according to Go Min-hee, associate professor of political science at Ewha Women’s University, who says Yoon had the reputation of being “anti-feminist” and had “made it clear he was not going to support policies for young women”.

There were protests on the other side too, backing Yoon and his martial law order. Throughout, many young South Korean men have supported Yoon, who positioned himself as a champion of theirs, mirroring their grievances in his presidential campaign in 2022.

These men consider themselves victims of “reverse discrimination”, saying they feel marginalised by policies that favour young women. One that is often cited is the mandatory 18 months they must spend in the military, which they believe puts them at a severe disadvantage compared to women.

They label as “man haters” those women who call themselves feminists. And they have been at the heart of a fierce online backlash against calls for greater gender equality.

These groups have long existed, mostly out of the public eye. But over the years they moved closer to the mainstream as their traction online grew, especially under Yoon.

It was them that Yoon appealed to in his campaign pledges, vowing to abolish the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family, saying it focused too much on women’s rights.

And he consistently denied systemic gender inequality existed in South Korea, which ranks near the bottom on the issue among developed countries.

But his message hit home. A survey by a local newspaper the year before he was elected had found that 79% of young men in their 20s felt “seriously discriminated against” because of their gender.

“In the last presidential election, gender conflict was mobilised by Yoon’s party,” says Kim Eun-ju, director of the Center for Korean Women and Politics. “They actively strengthened the anti-feminist tendencies of some young men in their 20s.”

During Yoon’s term, she says, government departments or publicly-funded organisations with the word “women” in their title largely disappeared or dropped the reference altogether.

The impact has been polarising. It alienated young women who saw this as a rollback of hard-won rights, even as it fuelled the backlash against feminism.

Byunghui saw this up-close back home in Daegu. She says anti-Yoon protests were overwhelmingly female. The few men who came were usually older.

Young men, she adds, even secondary school students, would often drive past the protests she attended cursing and swearing at them. She says some men even threatened to drive into the crowd.

“I wondered if they would have acted this way had the protest been led by young men?”

With Yoon gone, his People Power Party (PPP) is in disarray and still reeling from his fall.

And this is the first time in 18 years that there is no woman among the seven candidates runnning for president. “It’s shocking,” Jinha says, “that there’s no-one”. In the last election, there were two women among 14 presidential candidates.

The PPP’s Kim Moon-soo is trailing frontrunner Lee Jae-myung, from the main opposition Democratic Party (DP). But young women tell the BBC they have been disappointed by 61-year-old Lee.

“It’s only after criticism that that there were no policies targeting women that the DP began adding a few,” Saeyeon says. “I wish they could have drawn a blueprint for improving structural discrimination.”

When he was asked at the start of his campaign about policies targeting gender inequality, Lee responded: “Why do you keep dividing men and women? They are all Koreans.”

After drawing critcism, the DP acknowledged that women still “faced structural discrimination in many areas”. And it pledged to tackle inequality for women with more resources at every level.

During his presidential bid in 2022, Lee was more vocal about the prejudice South Korean women encounter, seeking their votes in the wake of high-profile sexual harassment scandals in his party.

He had promised to put women in top positions in the government and appointed a woman as co-chair of the DP’s emergency committee.

“It’s evident that the DP is focusing significantly less on young women than they did in the [2022] presidential election,” Ms Kim says.

Prof Go believes it’s because Lee “lost by a very narrow margin” back then. So this time, he is “casting the widest net possible” for votes. “And embracing feminist issues is not a good strategy for that.”

That stings for young women like Saeyeon, especially after the role they played in the protests calling for Yoon’s impeachment: “Our voices don’t seem to be reflected in the [campaign] pledges at all. I feel a bit abandoned.”

The ruling party’s Kim Moon-soo, who served in Yoon’s cabinet as labour minister, has emphasised raising birth rates by offering more financial support to parents.

But many women say rising costs are not the only obstacle. And that most politicians don’t address the deeper inequalities – which make it hard to balance a career and family – that are making so many women reconsider the usual choices.

The Ministry of Gender Equality and Family, which Yoon had wanted to shut down, has also re-emerged as a sticking point.

Lee has vowed to strengthen the ministry, while Kim says he will replace it with a Ministry of Future Youth and Family.

The ministry already focuses on family services, education and welfare for children. Just under 7% of its total funding, which is about 0.2% of the government’s annual budget, goes towards improving equality for women. But Prof Go says the ministry was “politicised by Yoon and has since been weaponised”.

“The ministry itself is not huge but it’s symbolic… abolishing it would show that gender equality is unimportant.”

It’s also the target of a third candidate, 40-year-old Lee Jun-seok, a former leader of Yoon’s party, who has since launched his own Reform Party.

Although trailing Kim in polls, Lee Jun-seok has been especially popular with many young men for his anti-feminist views.

Earlier this week, he drew swift outrage after a presidential debate in which he said: “If someone says they want to stick chopsticks in women’s genitals or some place like that, is that misogyny?”

He said the “someone” was frontunner Lee Jae-myung’s son, who he claimed made the comment online, an allegation which the Lee camp has sidestepped, apologising for other controversial posts.

But watching Lee Jun-seok say that on live TV “was genuinely terrifying,” Byunghui says. “I had the scary thought that this might boost incel communities.”

Saeyeon describes “anger and even despair” sinking the “hopes I had for politics, which weren’t that great to begin with”.

She believes his popularity “among certain sections of young men is one of the “significant repercussions” of South Korea “long neglecting structural discrimination” against women.

The only candidate to address the issue, 61-year-old Kwon Young-gook, didn’t fare well in early polling.

“I’m still deliberating whether to vote for Lee Jae-myung or Kwon Young-gook,” Saeyeon says.

While Kwon represents her concerns, she says it’s smart to shore up the votes for Lee because she is “much more afraid of the next election, and the one after that”.

She is thinking about Lee Jun-seok, who some analysts believe could eat into the votes of a beleagured PPP, while appealing to Yoon’s base: “He is in the spotlight and as the youngest candidate, he could have a long career ahead.”

That is all the more reason to keep speaking out, Byunghui says. “It’s like there is dust on the wall. If you don’t know it’s there, you can walk by, but once you see it, it sticks with you.”

It’s the same for Jinha who says things can “never go back to how they were before Yoon declared martial law”.

That was a time when politics felt inaccessible, but now, Jinha adds, it “feels like something that affects me and is important to my life”.

She says she won’t give up because she wants to be free of “things like discrimination at work… and live my life in peace”.

“People see young women as weak and immature but we will grow up – and then the world will change again.”

Ncuti Gatwa regenerated into Billie Piper in the series finale of Doctor Who on Saturday night.

He left the role after playing the iconic character for two series.

Piper, who previously played the Doctor’s assistant, Rose Tyler, said the opportunity to “step back on that Tardis one more time was just something I couldn’t refuse”.

In a press release, the BBC said: “Just how and why she [Billie Piper] is back remains to be seen…”

The credit at the end of the programme said: “Ncuti Gatwa as the Doctor. Jodie Whittaker as the Doctor. And introducing Billie Piper”.

In a statement, Piper said she was delighted to be returning to the show, but that fans would have to “wait and see” what her character did next.

The new doctor has usually been introduced on the show through regeneration, but Piper’s statement does not make it clear whether she will be the 16th doctor.

If confirmed as the new Doctor, Piper will be the third woman to have played the role, following Whittaker and Jo Martin.

Piper added: “It’s no secret how much I love this show, and I have always said I would love to return to the Whoniverse as I have some of my best memories there, so to be given the opportunity to step back on that Tardis one more time was just something I couldn’t refuse, but who, how, why and when, you’ll just have to wait and see.”

Moments after the series finale aired, Piper shared a series of photos on Instagram, including two selfies of her holding a white rose and two of her playing the character Rose. The caption under the photos read: “A rose is a rose is a rose !!!”

Doctor Who showrunner and head writer Russell T Davies said: “Billie once changed the whole of television, back in 2005, and now she’s done it again!

“It’s an honour and a hoot to welcome her back to the Tardis, but quite how and why and who is a story yet to be told.

“After 62 years, the Doctor’s adventures are only just beginning!”

Piper first appeared in the show in 2005 when it returned to TV for the first time since the 1990s, appearing alongside Christopher Eccleston and then David Tennant.

Piper, a former pop star who later turned to acting, has enjoyed a successful career on TV and on the stage.

After playing Rose Tyler for two full series in 2005 and 2006, she won acclaim for roles including sex worker Belle de Jour in Secret Diary of a Call Girl and the lead character in Sky Atlantic’s I Hate Suzie.

In 2017 she won best actress at the Olivier Awards for her performance in the play Yerma. And most recently was nominated for a Bafta for playing TV producer Sam McAlister in Scoop, a drama about Prince Andrew’s disastrous interview on Newsnight in 2019.

After Peter Capaldi stepped down as the 12th Doctor, Piper told the BBC that while she thought that a woman should take over the role, she was doubtful about playing the part herself. Capaldi went on to be replaced by Whittaker.

Gatwa only played the Doctor for 18 months, appearing in two series. It’s the shortest time an actor has played the character since Christopher Eccleston left the show after one series in 2005.

In a statement, Gatwa said of his departure: “You know when you get cast, at some point you are going to have to hand back that sonic screwdriver and it is all going to come to an end, but nothing quite prepares you for it.”

He added: “There are no words to describe what it feels like to be cast as the Doctor, nor are there words to explain what it feels like to be accepted into this iconic role that has existed for over 60 years and is truly loved by so many across the globe.”

Gatwa thanked “Whoniverse” fans for “welcoming me in, and making this such a touching experience.

“I’ve loved every minute of it, but now is the time to hand over the keys to that beloved blue box and let someone else take control and enjoy it every bit as much as I have.

“I’ll truly miss it, and forever be grateful to it, and everyone that has played a part in my journey as the Doctor.”

There is still uncertainty about when the drama will return. Russell T Davies has previously said that no decision would be made on commissioning the next series until this series had been broadcast.

The last two series of the show have been co-produced and broadcast internationally by streaming service Disney+, which has given the time travel drama a bigger budget. Discussions about whether the BBC and Disney wish to renew that deal, or whether other options should be explored, are likely to take some time.

For a new series to be ready for 2026, production would need to get under way relatively soon. So at the moment a new series or a special starring Billie Piper before 2027 looks unlikely.

A fifth of Ukrainian territory is now under Russian control, and for Ukrainians living under occupation there seems little chance that any future deal to end the war will change that.

Three Ukrainians in different Russian-controlled cities have told the BBC of the pressures they face, from being forced to accept a Russian passport to the risks of carrying out small acts of resistance. We are not using their real names for their own safety, and will call them Mavka, Pavlo and Iryna.

The potential dangers are the same, whether in Mariupol or Melitopol, seized by Russia in the full-scale invasion in 2022, or in Crimea which was annexed eight years before.

Mavka chose to stay in Melitopol when the Russians invaded her city on 25 February 2022, “because it is unfair that someone can just come to my home and take it out”.

She has lived there since birth, midway between the Crimean peninsula and the regional capital Zaporizhzhia.

In recent months she has noticed a ramping up of not only a strict policy of “Russification” in the city, but of an increased militarisation of all spheres of life, including in schools.

She has shared pictures of a billboard promoting conscription to young locals, a school notebook with Putin’s portrait on it, and photos and a video of pupils wearing Russian military uniforms instead of the school outfits – boys and girls – and performing military education tasks.

Some 200km (125 miles) along the coast of the sea of Azov, and much closer to the Russian border, the city of Mariupol feels as if it has been “cut off” from the outside world, according to Pavlo.

This key port and hub of Ukraine’s steel industry was captured after a devastating siege and bombardment that lasted almost three months in 2022.

Russian citizenship is now obligatory if you want to work or study or have an urgent medical help, Pavlo says.

“If someone’s child, let’s say, refuses to sing the Russian anthem at school in the morning, the FSB [Russia’s security service] will visit their parents, they will be ‘pencilled in’ and then anything can happen.”

Pavlo survived the siege despite being shot six times, including to his head.

Now that he has recuperated, he feels he cannot leave because of elderly relatives.

“Most of those who stayed in Mariupol or returned, did so to help their elderly parents or their sick grandparents, or because of their flat,” he tells me over the phone after midnight so no-one will overhear.

The biggest preoccupation in Mariupol is holding on to your home, as most of the property damaged in the Russian bombardment has been demolished, and the cost of living and unemployment has surged.

“I’d say 95% of all talk in the city is about property: how to claim it back, how to sell it. You’ll hear people talk about it while queuing to buy some bread, on your way to a chemist, in the food market, everywhere,” he says.

Crimea has been under occupation since Vladimir Putin annexed the peninsula in 2014, when Russia’s war in Ukraine began.

Iryna decided to remain, also to care for an elderly relative but also because she did not want to leave “her beautiful home”.

All signs of Ukrainian identity have been banned in public, and Iryna says she cannot speak Ukrainian in public any more, “as you never know who can tell the authorities on you”.

Children at nursery school in Crimea are told to sing the Russian anthem every morning, even the very youngest. All the teachers are Russian, most of them wives of soldiers who have moved in from Russia.

Iryna occasionally puts on her traditional, embroidered top when she has video calls with friends elsewhere on the peninsula.

“It helps us to keep our spirits high, reminding us about our happy life before the occupation”.

But the risks are high, even for wearing a vyshyvanka. “They might not shoot you straight away, but you can simply disappear afterwards, silently,” she declares.

She speaks of a Ukrainian friend being questioned by police because Russian neighbours, who came to Crimea in 2014, told police he had illegal weapons. “Of course he didn’t. Luckily they let him go in the end, but it’s so frightening.”

Iryna complains that she cannot go out on her own even for coffee “because solders can point a gun at you and say something abusive or order you to please them”.

Resistance in Ukraine’s occupied cities is dangerous, and it often comes in small acts of defiance aimed at reminding residents that they are not alone.

In Melitopol, Mavka talks of being part of a secret female resistance movement called (Angry Mavka) “to let people know that Ukrainians don’t agree with the occupation, we didn’t call for it, and we will never tolerate it”.

The network is made up of women and girls in “pretty much all occupied cities”, according to Iryna, although she cannot reveal its size or scale because of the potential dangers for its members.

Mavka describes her role in running the network’s social media accounts, which document life under occupation and acts like placing Ukrainian symbols or leaflets in public places “to remind other Ukrainians that they are not alone”, as well as even riskier practices.

“Sometimes we also put a laxative in alcohol and baked goods for the Russian soldiers, as a ‘welcome pack’,” she says.

Punishment for that kind of act, which the BBC is unable to verify, would be severe.

Russia’s occupation authorities treat the Ukrainian language or anything related to Ukraine as extremist, says Mavka.

Ukrainians are well aware of what happened to journalist Viktoriia Roshchyna, 27, who disappeared while investigating allegations of torture prisons in eastern Ukraine in 2023.

Russian authorities told her family she had died in custody in September 2024. Her body was returned earlier this month, with several organs removed and clear signs of torture.

Silent disappearance is what Mavka fears most: “When suddenly nobody can find out where you are or what’s happened to you.”

Her network has developed a set of tasks for new joiners to pass to avoid infiltration, and so far they have managed to avoid cyber attacks.

For now they are waiting and watching: “We cannot take up arms and fight back against the occupier right now, but we want at least to show that pro-Ukrainian population is here, and it will also be here”.

She and others in Melitopol are following closely what is happening in Kyiv, “because it is important for us to know whether Kyiv is ready to fight for us. Even small steps matter”.

“We have a rollercoaster of moods here. Many are worried documents might get signed that, God forbid, leave us under Russian occupation for even longer. Because we know what Russia will do here.”

The worry for Mavka and people close to her is that if Kyiv does agree a ceasefire it could mean Russia pursuing the same policy as in Crimea, erasing Ukrainian identity and repressing the population.

“They’ve already been replacing locals with their people. But people here are still hopeful, we will continue our resistance, we’ll just have to be more creative”.

Unlike Mavka, Pavlo believes the war must end, even if it means losing his ability to return to Ukraine.

“Human life is of the greatest value… but there are certain conditions for a ceasefire and not everyone might agree with them as it raises a question, why have all those people died then during the past three years? Would they feel abandoned and betrayed?”

Pavlo is wary of talking, even via an encrypted line, but adds: “I don’t envy anyone involved in this decision-making process. It won’t be simple, black and white.”

Iryna fears for Crimea’s next generation who have grown up in an atmosphere of violence and, she says, copy their fathers who have returned from Russia’s war against Ukraine.

She shows me her bandaged cat, and says a child on her street shot it with a rubber bullet.

“For them it was fun. These kids are not taught to build peace, they are taught to fight. It breaks my heart.”