President Volodymyr Zelensky returned to the White House on Monday to meet US President Donald Trump for fresh talks aimed at ending the war in Ukraine.

Several European leaders also flew to Washington to attend the meeting, days after Trump met Russia’s President Vladimir Putin in Alaska for a summit that failed to result in a ceasefire.

Despite optimistic words by Trump and some more lukewarm assessments from his European partners, by Monday evening there were no concrete commitments to security guarantees or steps towards a peace deal.

Here are the key takeaways from the talks.

• Follow live updates on this story
• Analysis: Zelensky leaves White House unscathed as he buys more time
• Which countries are in Nato and why isn’t Ukraine a member?

Following the summit, Trump posted on Truth Social that he had called Putin to begin arranging talks between the Russian leader and Zelensky.

Trump said that following such a bilateral, at a location to be determined, there would be a trilateral where the US president would join them.

A Putin adviser said afterwards that Trump and Putin spoke for 40 minutes by phone on Monday.

Before European leaders sat down with Trump in the East Room at the White House, a hot mic picked up remarks between the US leader and French President Emmanuel Macron.

“I think he wants to make a deal. I think he wants to make a deal for me. You understand that? As crazy as that sounds,” Trump told Macron, appearing to refer to Putin.

It remains to be seen how straightforward it will be to bring two such bitter enemies face-to-face at the negotiating table for the first time since Russia’s full-scale invasion began in February 2022.

For months, Zelensky has been pushing to meet Putin, although this was likely a way of proving his argument that Russia is not serious about pursuing peace, as he believed the Kremlin had no interest in such a meeting.

Moscow has repeatedly turned down the idea of a Putin-Zelensky sit-down.

A noncommittal statement from Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov on Monday night said it was “worthwhile” to “explore the possibility of raising the level of representatives” from the Russian and Ukrainian delegations in negotiations.

Trump seemed to dismiss the need for any ceasefire before negotiations to end the war can take place.

In the past, that has been a key demand of Ukraine, which made clear it sees an end to the fighting as a prerequisite for further talks with Russia and, ultimately, for a longer-term settlement.

A ceasefire could also be marginally easier to agree than a full peace deal, which would take many months of negotiations, during which Russia’s assault on Ukraine would probably continue.

“I don’t know that it’s necessary,” Trump said of a ceasefire.

But the European leaders appeared to push back, with the strongest rebuttal coming from German Chancellor Friedrich Merz.

“I can’t imagine that the next meeting would take place without a ceasefire,” Merz said. “So, let’s work on that and let’s try to put pressure on Russia.”

When asked to speak, Zelensky did not reiterate his previous calls for a ceasefire to be put in place.

Trump told Zelensky the US would help guarantee Ukraine’s security in any deal to end the war, without specifying the extent of any assistance.

The US president did not offer boots on the ground. But when asked by reporters whether US security guarantees for Ukraine could include any American military in the country, Trump did not rule it out.

He said Europe was the “first line of defence”, but that “we’ll be involved”.

“We’ll give them good protection,” the president said at one point.

This is the most decisive Trump has ever sounded on the issue of security guarantees, which are generally seen as paramount to any sort of deal with Russia.

He also said that during last week’s Alaska summit Putin had accepted that there would be security guarantees for Ukraine as part of any peace deal.

At a news conference after Monday’s meetings, Zelensky said part of the security guarantee would involve a $90bn (£67bn) arms deal between the US and Ukraine.

He said this would include US weapons that Ukraine does not have, including aviation systems, anti-missile systems “and other things I will not disclose”.

Zelensky also said the US would buy Ukrainian drones, which would help fund their domestic production of the unmanned craft.

The Ukrainian president told reporters that security guarantees for Kyiv would probably be worked out within 10 days.

Given his acrimonious last visit to the Oval Office in February, the Ukrainian president went to considerable lengths to charm his American hosts – including a flurry of six “thank yous” within the first few minutes of the meeting.

The last time he was at the White House, Zelensky was scolded by Vice-President JD Vance for a perceived lack of gratitude for US support for Ukraine.

This time, Zelenksy was wearing a dark suit rather than his traditional military garb, which drew a gibe from Trump last time that his guest was “all dressed up today”.

Zelensky also sought to forge family ties during the meeting, handing his host a letter from Ukrainian First Lady Olena Zelenska to be delivered to US First Lady Melania Trump.

“It’s not to you – [it’s] to your wife,” he told Trump.

European leaders dialled up the flattery with Trump ahead of their multilateral meeting, heaping praise on him for his work in bringing them around the table.

“I really want to thank you for your leadership,” said Nato chief Mark Rutte.

Italian PM Giorgia Meloni said while there had previously been no sign that Russia wanted to move towards peace “something had changed” thanks to Trump.

Despite the warm tones, the Europeans tried to convey that they, too, feel exposed to any future Russian aggression.

French President Emmanuel Macron told fellow leaders somberly: “When we talk about security guarantees, we’re also talking about the matter of the security of the European continent.”

The eldest son of Norway’s crown princess has been charged with 32 offences, including four counts of rape, a prosecutor says.

The charges against Marius Borg Høiby, 28, include the abuse of a former partner and violations of restraining orders against another former partner.

He was born from a relationship before Crown Princess Mette-Marit married Crown Prince Haakon, who is the future king of Norway.

Mr Høiby denies the most serious accusations against him, but plans to plead guilty to some lesser charges when the trial starts, his lawyer Petar Sekulic told Reuters news agency.

He could face up to 10 years in prison if found guilty of the most serious charges.

He has also been charged with filming the genitals of a number of women without their knowledge or consent, prosecutor Sturla Henriksbø told reporters.

“He does not agree with the claims regarding rape and domestic violence,” Mr Sekulic said of his client, according to Reuters.

Speaking about the charges against his stepson, Norwegian Crown Prince Haakon on Tuesday said it was up to the courts what would happen, adding that everyone involved in the case “probably finds it challenging and difficult”, Norwegian public broadcaster NRK reported.

The four alleged rapes are said to have occurred between 2018 and 2024, with one of them allegedly taking place after his arrest, according to NRK.

Mr Høiby, who does not have a royal title or official duties, was arrested three separate times last year, in August, September and November. He had been under investigation since his August arrest on suspicion of assault. In June, police said he was suspected of three rapes and 23 other offences.

The prosecutor said the trial could take place in January and last some six weeks.

Arab mediators are awaiting a formal response from Israel after Hamas said it had accepted a new proposal for a Gaza ceasefire and hostage release deal.

The plan was presented by Qatar and Egypt, which are trying to avert a major new Israeli offensive to occupy Gaza fully.

Qatar said it was “almost identical” to a US proposal for a 60-day truce, during which around half of 50 hostages held in Gaza – 20 of whom are believed to be alive – would be handed over and the two sides would negotiate a lasting ceasefire and the return of the rest.

In recent days, Israel’s government has said it would no longer accept a partial deal – only a comprehensive one that would see all the hostages freed.

Local media quoted a senior Israeli official saying: “Israel’s position hasn’t changed – release of all hostages and fulfilment of other conditions defined for ending the war.”

Later this week, the Israeli cabinet is expected to approve the military’s plan to occupy Gaza City, where intensifying Israeli strikes have already prompted thousands of people to flee.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced Israel’s intention to conquer all of Gaza – including the areas where most of its 2.1 million Palestinian residents have sought refuge – after indirect talks with Hamas on a ceasefire deal broke down last month.

On Monday night, a Hamas statement announced that the armed group and other Palestinian factions had approved a ceasefire proposal presented by Egyptian and Qatari mediators to their delegations in Cairo the previous day.

Hamas official Taher al-Nunu told Al-Araby TV that they had not sought any amendments to the proposal, which he described as “a partial deal leading to a comprehensive deal”.

He also emphasised that on the first day of its implementation, negotiations would begin with the aim of agreeing a permanent ceasefire.

“We hope that the 60 days of ceasefire will be sufficient to conclude a final agreement that will completely end this war,” he said.

Qatar’s foreign ministry spokesman, Majed al-Ansari, told reporters in Doha on Tuesday that the proposal was “98%” similar to the one presented by US Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff.

“I won’t go into the details of the language that is on the table right now. But what I can say is that it is very close, almost identical to what was there on the table,” Ansari said.

“It is within the confines of the Witkoff plan… It’s a continuation of that process. Obviously, it’s in the details where the devil lies.”

Witkoff had proposed a 60-day truce that would see Hamas release 10 living hostages and the bodies of 18 dead hostages in two phases, in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners and detainees held in Israeli jails. He also said that negotiations on a final agreement to end the war would begin on the first day of the deal.

Israel accepted Witkoff’s plan, but Hamas rejected it, partly because it did not include a guarantee that the temporary ceasefire would lead to a permanent one.

Israeli media reported that Israeli officials were examining the new proposal and Hamas’s response.

According to public broadcaster Kan, Netanyahu has not ruled out the possibility of a partial deal despite his recent statements that he will only accept a comprehensive deal.

On Saturday night, his office put out a statement saying that Israel would “agree to a deal on condition that all the hostages are released in one go, and in accordance with our conditions for ending the war”.

Those conditions included the disarming of Hamas, the demilitarisation of Gaza, Israeli control of the Gaza perimeter, and the installation of a non-Hamas and non-Palestinian Authority governance, it added.

Netanyahu said in a video on Monday that he had discussed with senior Israeli military commanders their “plans regarding Gaza City and the completion of our missions”.

“Like you, I hear the reports in the media, and from them you can get one impression – Hamas is under immense pressure,” he added.

US President Donald Trump meanwhile wrote on social media: “We will only see the return of the remaining hostages when Hamas is confronted and destroyed!!! The sooner this takes place, the better the chances of success will be.”

However, the families of hostages fear the new offensive in Gaza City could endanger those being held there.

On Sunday night, hundreds of thousands of Israelis gathered in Tel Aviv to demand that their government agree a deal with Hamas to end the war now and bring all the hostages home. Netanyahu accused the demonstrators of hardening Hamas’s negotiating position.

The Israeli military launched a campaign in Gaza in response to the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

At least 62,004 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry.

Most of Gaza’s population has also been displaced multiple times; more than 90% of homes are estimated to be damaged or destroyed; the healthcare, water, sanitation and hygiene systems have collapsed; and UN-backed global food security experts have warned that the “worst-case scenario of famine is currently playing out” due to food shortages.

It was September last year when 24-year-old Kelly was on a Qatar Airways flight from Doha to London Gatwick after a trip to Africa.

Tucked underneath a blanket and with her headphones firmly on, she quickly fell asleep after a strenuous day of travel. The quiet murmuring of voices from the film playing on her screen helped her to drift off on a packed overnight flight.

But two hours before landing, Kelly – whose name has been changed for this article – was woken by the man sitting next to her, sexually assaulting her.

The man in his 60s has now been jailed but Kelly is finding it difficult to go on with her day-to-day life and is locked in a battle for compensation.

• Man jailed for sexually assaulting woman on flight

Speaking about the ordeal for the first time, she tells the BBC the man had pulled a second blanket over both of them before the attack.

“His hands were down my trousers and I said to him, ‘What are you doing?’ I said, ‘Stop’. He said, ‘No, please’. And I had to force his hand out of my trousers and that just made me get up straight away. I left my phone, I left my bag, I left my passport, I left everything. I left my shoes and ran into the toilet, left the door open [and] told the flight attendant,” she says.

Kelly was initially moved to a cabin crew seat before being moved elsewhere in the cabin until landing.

“I had to endure the rest of the plane journey, which was awful,” Kelly remembers. “I was so anxious… anyone that walked by I would instantly panic because I thought it would be him.”

Momade Jussab, 66, was arrested as soon as the flight arrived into Gatwick. He was subsequently charged with one count of sexual assault by penetration and two counts of sexual assault, and was found guilty after a trial in March. He is now serving a six-and-a-half year prison sentence.

Although Kelly is pleased he has been convicted, she said the impact of the assault on her has been severe.

“I haven’t been out in almost a year – to events or summer parties with my friends. I can’t do that. I’m too scared. I don’t want to be touched or looked at. So it’s never leaving me. It’s literally there every single day before I sleep, I’m thinking about what happened.”

Kelly is now fighting for compensation under the government’s Criminal Injuries Compensation Scheme (CICS).

The scheme compensates people who have been physically or mentally injured as a result of a violent crime. According to CICS guidance, compensation can be awarded to victims of sexual or physical abuse.

But when Kelly applied to the scheme for compensation in April her application was refused.

A letter from the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority (CICA) – which processes applications on behalf of the Ministry of Justice – said the offence did not occur in a “relevant place” as defined by the scheme. She appealed against the decision but in May was refused again.

The current rules of the scheme state an aircraft is only considered a “relevant place” if it is a British-registered aircraft within the meaning of section 92 of the Civil Aviation Act 1982. Kelly was told as the offence occurred on a Qatari-registered aircraft, she was ineligible for compensation. She believes this is unfair.

“I understand that he’s been sentenced and he’s done what he’s done and he’s paying the price for that. But what about me? I can’t afford certain therapy,” Kelly said. “I just want to be compensated for what I’ve been through. I want professional help and I want to be heard.”

Her lawyers at the firm Leigh Day argue the decision is “irrational”.

In 1996, the Civil Aviation Act was changed so that crimes committed on foreign planes bound for the UK could be prosecuted in UK criminal courts. This change meant that Jussab could be arrested and charged when the Qatar Airways flight landed at Gatwick last autumn.

But victims in these cases still cannot claim compensation.

Leigh Day wants the change to also apply to the CICS scheme so that people like Kelly can successfully apply for compensation.

It is calling on Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood to close what it calls a gap in the law.

“Under the current scheme, it appears that a violent sexual assault on a British-registered aircraft is eligible for compensation while a victim of the same violent assault on a foreign registered aircraft – on a UK-bound flight where the perpetrator is prosecuted under UK law – is excluded,” Leigh Day’s Claire Powell said.

She called for this to be changed urgently “in light of this government’s commitment to addressing violence against women and girls”.

A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: “Our thoughts remain with this victim, and we remain resolute in our mission to halve violence against women and girls in a decade.

“The rules that the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority follows, and the values of payments for injuries, are set by Parliament. Other routes are available for victims to receive support.”

As well as her fight for compensation, Kelly says she is speaking out to persuade women to be aware of their surroundings, and of others, while travelling on public transport, especially when alone.

“Please be aware. Please be mindful. Don’t be scared, but people are out there that can actually hurt you so always be careful. This could happen to you.”

India and China should view each other as “partners” rather than “adversaries or threats”, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on Monday, as he arrived for a two-day visit to Delhi.

Yi met with Indian Foreign Minister S Jaishankar – only the second such meeting between the two sides since 2020 – when deadly clashes in the Galwan valley in Ladakh, a disputed Himalayan border region, led to a complete breakdown of ties between the countries.

Relations are now on a “positive trend” towards cooperation, Yi said ahead of a meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday.

Jaishankar said that India and China were seeking to “move ahead from a difficult period in our ties”.

The two counterparts held discussions on a range of bilateral issues from trade to pilgrimages and river data sharing.

Yi also met India’s National Security Advisor Ajit Doval on Tuesday for on-going negotiations on resolving the boundary dispute between the two countries.

“We are happy to share that stability has now been restored at the borders,” Yi said during the delegation-level meeting with Doval.

“The setbacks that we faced in the last few years were not in our interest,” he said.

Yi’s visit is being seen as the latest sign of a thaw in ties between the nuclear-armed neighbours.

India and China had agreed on patrolling arrangements to de-escalate tensions along the disputed Himalayan border in October last year.

Since then, the two sides have taken a range of steps to normalise relations, including China allowing Indian pilgrims to visit key places in the Tibet autonomous region this year. India has also restarted visa services to Chinese tourists and agreed to resume talks to open border trade through designated passes.

There are also reports that direct flights between the two countries will resume this year.

• India and China strive to reset ties but with caution
• India and China agree to de-escalate border tensions

Yi’s meetings are expected to lay the groundwork for Modi’s first visit to China in seven years later this month, to attend the summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), a regional security bloc.

Reports suggest Modi might also hold bilateral talks with China’s President Xi Jinping, but neither side has confirmed this.

The rapprochement between the countries comes in the backdrop of India’s worsening bilateral relationship with the US.

Earlier this month, US President Donald Trump imposed an additional 25% penalty on Indian imports for buying oil and weapons from Russia, taking total tariffs to 50% – the highest in Asia.

On Monday, White House Trade Advisor Peter Navarro wrote an opinion piece in The Financial Times in which he accused India of “cozying up to both Russia and China”.

“India acts as a global clearinghouse for Russian oil, converting embargoed crude into high-value exports while giving Moscow the dollars it needs,” Navarro wrote.

“If India wants to be treated as a strategic partner of the U.S., it needs to start acting like one,” he said.

In his remarks after meeting with Yi on Monday, Jaishankar said talks would include global developments.

“We seek a fair, balanced and multi-polar world order, including a multipolar Asia,” Jaishankar said.

“Reformed multilateralism is also the call of the day. In the current environment, there is clearly the imperative of maintaining and enhancing stability in the global economy as well,” he added.

A Japanese convenience store chain has suspended the sale of rice balls, or onigiri, and other deli items at 1,600 stores after it found that staff had faked their expiry dates.

Staff at some stores extended expiry dates by not sticking labels on the dishes until an hour or two after they were prepared. Others relabelled the items with false dates after they were put on sale, Ministop found.

The misconduct was reported at 23 stores across the country, including in major cities like Tokyo, Kyoto and Osaka.

The chain has paused onigiri sales at most of its outlets since 9 August, and on Monday extended the pause to other deli items, for an “emergency investigation”.

“We sincerely apologise for the significant inconvenience caused to our customers who have supported Ministop’s handmade onigiri and handmade bento boxes,” the company said in a statement on Monday.

Customers have not reported any health issues so far, it added.

Convenience stores or konbini are part of daily life in Japan, where people – especially commuters – stop by for affordable and filling meals and last-minute groceries and banking errands.

Onigiri is popular among customers who want grab-and-go meals as the rice balls are easy to carry – wrapped in nori or dried seaweed and filled with protein like tuna salad or cod eggs.

Ministop operates more than 1,800 stores across Japan. Its focus on fresh food – with hot meals prepared on site – sets it apart from the larger chains.

A Peruvian woman has been accused of attempting to smuggle $70,000-worth (£52,000) of cocaine and ecstasy into Bali, concealed in her underwear and a sex toy.

The woman, who was only identified by the initials N.S., was stopped by customs officials who felt she was acting oddly, police said.

“The narcotics were hidden in six plastic packages wrapped in black duct tape inside a green bra, three similar packages in black underwear, and a sex toy containing drugs, which was inserted into her body,” Radiant, Bali police’s narcotics unit director, who goes by one name, told reporters.

The 42-year-old has been charged under Indonesia’s drug laws, and if found guilty could face the death penalty.

Radiant said that 1.4kg (3.1lb) of cocaine and 43 ecstasy pills were found in total.

He added that the woman revealed she had been paid $19,000 to smuggle the drugs into Bali by someone she met on the dark web in April.

She took a flight from Barcelona, Spain, to the Indonesian island with a stopover in Doha, police said, arriving at the international airport on 12 August.

The woman was arrested shortly after being stopped at the airport, when customs officials alerted police.

Indonesia is known for the severe punishments it hands out for drug smuggling and has previously executed foreigners, but has upheld a temporary halt on the death sentence since 2017.

Last month, three British nationals avoided the death penalty after they were found guilty of smuggling cocaine disguised as packets of Angel Delight into Indonesia.

Alandmark 113-year-old church at risk from ground subsidence is being relocated in its entirety – in a 5km (3 miles) move along a road in Sweden’s far north.

The vast red timber structure in Kiruna dating back to 1912 has been hoisted on giant trailers and is on its way to the new city centre.

Travelling at a maximum speed of 500m an hour, the journey is expected to take two days.

The old city centre is at risk from ground fissures after more than a century of iron ore mining. The church’s move is the most spectacular and symbolic moment of the wider relocation of buildings in Kiruna, which lies 145km north of the Arctic Circle.

The journey began with a blessing from the church’s vicar, Lena Tjärnberg, and Bishop Åsa Nyström of the Diocese of Luleå.

As the short ceremony ended, engines rumbled to life and the massive wooden church began inching forward. In the first hour, it managed just 30m, the trailers’ wheels slowly turning under its weight.

Large crowds lined the streets under clear blue skies, watching in awe as the timber structure rolled forward. Safety barriers kept people back, but the building passed so close that many said it felt as though they could almost reach out and touch it.

“It’s a big crowd. People came not just from Kiruna and other parts of Sweden. I heard many different languages being spoken,” said culture strategist Sofia Lagerlöf Mättää. “It’s like history taking place in front of our eyes.”

The man in charge of the move, project manager Stefan Holmblad Johansson, said: “It’s a historic event, a very big and complex operation and we don’t have a margin of error. But everything is under control.”

By the mid-2010s, other buildings in Kiruna were already being shifted to safer ground. Most were demolished and rebuilt, but some landmarks were moved intact.

These include buildings in Hjalmar Lundbohmsgården such as the so-called yellow row of three old wooden houses and the former home of mining manager Hjalmar Lundbohm, which was split into three parts.

The clock tower on the roof of the old city hall was also moved and can now be found next to the new city hall.

Under Swedish law, mining activity cannot take place under buildings.

Robert Ylitalo, chief executive officer of Kiruna’s development company, explained: “There’s no risk of people falling through cracks. But fissures would eventually damage the water, electricity and sewage supply. People have to move before the infrastructure fails.”

The iron ore mine’s operator, LKAB – also Kiruna’s biggest employer – is covering the city’s relocation bill, estimated at more than 10bn Swedish krona ($1bn; £737m).

Kiruna Church is 35m (115ft) high, 40m wide and weighs 672 tonnes. It was once voted Sweden’s most beautiful pre-1950 building.

Relocating such a large building is an unusual feat. But instead of dismantling it, engineers are moving it in one piece, supported by steel beams and carried on self-propelled modular transporters.

“The biggest challenge was preparing the road for such a wide building,” said Mr Johansson.

“We’ve widened it to 24 metres (79ft) and along the way we removed lamp-posts, traffic lights as well as a bridge that was slated for demolition anyway.”

Among the onlookers were Lena Edkvist and her husband, who had driven from Gothenburg.

“I’m not a deeply religious person – I only go to church on special occasions. But this is part of my tradition, history and culture,” she said. “It feels like an honour that they’re moving it intact instead of dismantling it piece by piece.”

For Kjell Olovsson, project manager at Veidekke, the contractor leading the relocation, the moment brought calm satisfaction.

“After years of preparation, we’re finally moving. I’m thrilled and just enjoying the moment. The weather is good, and I’m confident everything will run smoothly.”

Among the most delicate aspects of the move is the protection of the church’s interior treasures, especially its great altar painting made by Prince Eugen, a member of Sweden’s royal family.

“It’s not something hanging on a hook that you just take off,” said project manager Mr Johansson.

“It’s glued directly onto a masonry wall so it would have been difficult to remove without damage. So it will remain inside the church during the move, fully covered and stabilised. So will the organ with its 1,000 pipes.”

The move is much more than an engineering marvel for local residents – it’s a deeply emotional moment.

“The church has served as a spiritual centre and a gathering place for the community for generations,” said Sofia Lagerlöf Määttä, who remembers walking into the church for the first time as a young child with her grandmother.

“The move has brought back memories of joy and sorrow to us, and we’re now moving those memories with us into the future.”

That feeling is also shared by project manager Stefan Holmblad Johansson, an engineer who doubles as a member of the church’s gospel choir.

“This is a very special task for me,” he said. “The church was built over a 100 years ago for the municipality by LKAB. Now we move it to the new city. There simply can’t be any other way.”

For the vicar, Lena Tjärnberg, the moment carries added meaning.

“The church is leaving a place where it truly belongs,” she said.

“Everyone knows it has to be relocated: we live in a mining community and depend on the mine. I’m grateful that we’re moving the church with us to the new city centre but there is also sorrow in seeing it leave the ground where it became a church.”

If all goes to plan, the church will reach its new home in the city centre by Wednesday evening.

Swedish television is also broadcasting the entire journey live as “slow TV”, marking a rare moment when a piece of history does not just survive change – it moves with it.

Canada’s Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre has won a crucial by-election in the province of Alberta to secure a new Parliament seat after losing his constituency in the last general election.

With final ballots still being counted, Poilievre leads with 80.4% of the vote in the rural riding of Battle River-Crowfoot, according to preliminary results from Canada’s electoral commission.

“Getting to know the people in this region has been the privilege of my life,” he told a rapturous crowd on Monday.

His victory comes four months after his party was defeated by Mark Carney’s Liberals and he lost the Ottawa-area seat he had held for two decades to Liberal Bruce Fanjoy.

In this by-election, Poilievre faced a record 214 candidates, many of whom are associated with a protest group seeking electoral reform.

It is the second time the group has targeted Poilievre in a campaign. Voters were asked to fill out a write-in ballot due to the unusually high number of candidates.

More than 50,000 people cast a ballot, according to preliminary results from Elections Canada. The riding has nearly 86,000 eligible voters.

Poilievre’s win will allow the 46-year-old to return to Parliament for the autumn sitting after his April defeat. He will assume his role as leader of Canada’s official opposition.

In a statement on X, Prime Minister Carney congratulated Poilievre “on returning to the House of Commons”. He also thanked his Liberal opponent, Darcy Spady, who received 4% of the vote in the historically Conservative riding.

“Working together, Canada’s new government will keep building a stronger future for all Albertans and Canadians,” he said.

• Canada’s conservative leader faces crucial election test
• How Canada’s Conservatives threw away a 27-point lead to lose again

The special election was called in June after former Conservative member of Parliament Damian Kurek stepped aside to let Poilievre run.

Poilievre thanked Kurek for his “gracious sacrifice” in his victory speech.

Alberta is a Conservative stronghold – Kurek, the former MP for the riding, had won with 83% of the vote. In the past, the riding was won by Conservatives with at least 70% of the vote.

Poilievre faced pushback from some locals, including independent candidate Bonnie Critchley, who had accused him of seeking to win the riding as “nothing more than a means to an end”.

Poilievre defended his campaign, telling the Calgary Herald newspaper that he had canvassed like he was “one vote behind”.

“I believe in humility and earning people’s trust,” he said.

Poilievre now faces a mandatory leadership review in January, where Conservative party members will vote on whether he should stay on as leader at their upcoming national convention.

Canada’s House of Commons is scheduled to return from summer break on 15 September.

Flight crew at Air Canada have ended a dispute with the airline which had grounded flights and stranded thousands of passengers since Saturday.

A tentative agreement was announced by the union representing flight attendants and confirmed by the airline, which said flights will resume later on Tuesday.

More than 10,000 staff had walked out in protest at pay and scheduling. The deal has not been disclosed in full, though the union said it achieves “transformational change” for workers and the industry.

The agreement will now be presented to members to be ratified.

The breakthrough came nine hours after talks began with the help of an approved mediator appointed by the government.

“Unpaid work is over,” said the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) in a statement early on Tuesday, calling the negotiations a “historic fight” for the industry.

The union also advised its members to “fully co-operate with resumption of operations”.

The dispute between Air Canada and the union had escalated when CUPE rejected an order to return to work issued by the Canadian Industrial Relations Board, which deemed the strike “unlawful” in a ruling on Monday.

Following news of a tentative deal, Air Canada said the first flights would restart on Tuesday evening, but it may take days to return to a full service because aircraft and crew are out of position.

It added that it would not comment on the terms of the agreed deal until it had been ratified.

In contract negotiations, Air Canada said it had offered flight attendants a 38% increase in total compensation over four years, with a 25% raise in the first year.

CUPE said the offer was “below inflation, below market value, below minimum wage” and would still leave flight attendants unpaid for some hours of work, including boarding and waiting at airports ahead of flights.

The union also rejected an order by the Canadian government to enter binding arbitration and return to work over the weekend, accusing it of “caving to corporate pressure”.

After the union’s refusal, Jobs Minister Patty Hajdu encouraged the two parties on Monday to resume talks and said her ministry will order a probe into “the allegations of unpaid work in the airline sector”.

The nearly four-day strike has impacted more than 500,000 passengers, Air Canada has said. The airline – Canada’s largest – operates around 700 flights daily, serving both domestic and international travellers.

High on a hill in the west of the Afghan capital, Kabul, behind a steel gate topped with barbed wire, lies a place few locals speak of, and even fewer visit.

The women’s wing of a mental health centre run by the Afghan Red Crescent Society (ARCS) is the largest of only a handful of facilities in the country dedicated to helping women with mental illnesses.

Locals call it Qala, or the fortress.

The BBC gained exclusive access to the crowded centre where staff find it difficult to cope with the 104 women currently within its walls.

Among them are women like Mariam* who says she is a victim of domestic violence.

Thought to be in her mid-20s, she’s been here for nine years, after enduring what she describes as abuse and neglect by her family, followed by a period of homelessness.

“My brothers used to beat me whenever I visited a neighbour’s house,” she alleges. Her family did not want to let her out of the house alone, she says, because of a cultural belief that young girls should not leave the house without supervision.

Eventually, her brothers appeared to have kicked her out, forcing her to live on the streets at a young age. It was here a woman found her and, apparently concerned about her mental health, brought her to the centre.

Despite her story, Mariam’s smile is constantly radiant. She is often seen singing, and is one of the few patients allowed to work around the building, volunteering to help with cleaning.

She is ready – and willing – to be discharged.

But she cannot leave because she has nowhere to go.

“I don’t expect to return to my father and mother. I want to marry someone here in Kabul, because even if I go back home, they’ll just abandon me again,” Mariam says.

As she can’t return to her abusive family, she is effectively trapped in the facility.

In Afghanistan, strict Taliban regulations and deeply-rooted patriarchal traditions make it nearly impossible for women to live independently. Women are legally and socially required to have a male guardian for travel, work, or even accessing many services, and most economic opportunities are closed to them.

Generations of gender inequality, limited education, and restricted employment have left many women financially dependent on male breadwinners, reinforcing a cycle where survival often hinges on male relatives.

Sat on a bed in one of the dormitories is Habiba.

The 28-year-old says she was brought to the centre by her husband, who was forcing her out of the family home after he married again.

Like Mariam, she now has nowhere else to go. She too is ready to be released, but her husband will not take her back, and her widowed mother cannot support her either.

Her three sons now live with an uncle. They visited her initially, but Habiba hasn’t seen them this year; without access to a phone, she cannot even make contact.

“I want to be reunited with my children,” she says.

Their stories are far from unique at the centre, where our visit, including conversations with staff and patients, is overseen by officials from the Taliban government.

Some patients have been here for 35 to 40 years, says Saleema Halib, a psychotherapist at the centre.

“Some have been completely abandoned by their families. No-one comes to visit, and they end up living and dying here.”

Years of conflict has left its mark on the mental health of many Afghans, especially women, and the issue is often poorly understood and subject to stigma.

In response to a recent UN report on the worsening situation of women’s rights in Afghanistan, Hamdullah Fitrat, Taliban government’s deputy spokesperson, told the BBC that their government did not allow any violence against women and they have “ensured women’s rights in Afghanistan”.

But UN data released in 2024 points to a worsening mental health crisis linked to the Taliban’s crackdown on women’s rights: 68% of women surveyed reported having “bad” or “very bad” mental health.

Services are struggling to cope, both inside and outside the centre, which has seen a several-fold increase in patients over the last four years, and now has a waiting list.

“Mental illness, especially depression, is very common in our society,” says Dr Abdul Wali Utmanzai, a senior psychiatrist at a nearby hospital in Kabul, also run by ARCS.

He says he sees up to 50 outpatients a day from different provinces, most of them women: “They face severe economic pressure. Many have no male relative to provide for them – 80% of my patients are young women with family issues.”

The Taliban government says it is committed to providing health services. But with restrictions on women’s movement without a male chaperon, many cannot seek help.

All of this makes it more difficult for women like Mariam and Habiba to leave – and the longer they stay, the fewer places there are for those who say they desperately need help.

One family had been trying for a year to admit their 16-year-old daughter, Zainab, to the centre, but they were told there were no beds available. She is now one of the youngest patients there.

Until then she had been confined to her home – her ankles shackled to prevent her running away.

It’s not clear what mental health problems Zainab has been experiencing, but she struggles to verbalise her thoughts.

A visibly distressed Feda Mohammad says the police recently found his daughter miles from home.

Zainab had gone missing for days, which is especially dangerous in Afghanistan, where women are not allowed to travel long distances from home without a male guardian.

“She climbs the walls and runs away if we unchain her,” Feda Mohammad explains.

Zainab breaks down into tears every now and then, especially when she sees her mother crying.

Feda Mohammad says they noticed her condition when she was eight. But it worsened after multiple bombings hit her school in April 2022.

“She was thrown against a wall by the blast,” he says. “We helped carry out the wounded and collect the bodies. It was horrific.”

Exactly what would have happened if space hadn’t been found is unclear. Zainab’s father said her repeated attempts to run away were dishonouring him, and he argued it was better for her and her family that she is confined to the centre.

Whether she – like Mariam and Habiba – will now become one of Qala’s abandoned women remains to be seen.

Manas Kumar* has been abandoned on a cargo ship in Ukrainian waters since April.

The Indian seaman was part of a crew of 14 transporting popcorn to Turkey from Moldova when the vessel was raided on 18 April, as it made its way down the Danube river which divides Ukraine and Romania.

Ukraine claimed the vessel, Anka, was part of Russia’s “shadow” fleet, which it said was being used to sell “looted” Ukrainian grain to third countries.

But Mr Kumar, who is Anka’s chief officer, said that the vessel was running under the flag of Tanzania and was managed by a Turkish company.

But exactly who owns the ship is not clear from the papers provided by the crew, made up of Mr Kumar, five other Indian nationals, as well as two Azerbaijanis and six Egyptians.

All are still on board, five months later – despite Ukrainian authorities informing them they were free to leave as they were not under investigation, Mr Kumar said.

The problem is disembarking means the crew losing their salaries – amounting to $102,828 by June all together, according to a joint database of abandoned ships maintained by International Labour Organization (ILO) and International Maritime Organization (IMO).

The BBC has reached out to the ship’s management and owners on details provided by the crew.

Mr Kumar says that the crew was not aware of the ship’s past at the time of taking the job. Now stuck in a situation far beyond their control, the crew wants a quick resolution.

He says the owner and Indian shipping officials keep asking us for one more day to resolve the crisis but nothing promising has come out yet.

“This is a war zone. All we want is to return home quickly,” he told the BBC.

India is the second-largest supplier of sailors and crew of commercial ships globally.

But it also tops the list of crew members known as “abandoned seafarers” – a term used by 2006 Maritime Labour Convention to describe the situation when shipowners sever ties with the crew and fail to provide them for repatriation, regular provisions and wages.

According to the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF), which represents seafarers globally, there were 3,133 abandoned sailors across 312 ships in 2024 – of which Indian nationals accounted for 899.

For many, leaving the ship without a salary is not possible – especially if they have already paid hefty sums to agents for landing the job or for acquiring training certifications, Mohammad Gulam Ansari, a former seafarer who helps repatriate Indian crew from other parts of the world, tells the BBC.

The most significant reason for abandonment is the widespread practice of registering ships – called flags of convenience – in countries that have weak shipping rules, according to ITF.

International maritime rules allow a ship to be registered or flagged in a country different from its owners.

“A country can set up a ship registry and charge fees to shipowners, while having reduced standards for crew safety and welfare and often failing to live up to the responsibilities of a genuine flag state,” the ITF website states.

This system, the group says, also obscures the identity of the real owner, which helps dubious owners ply ships.

ITF data shows that in 2024, around 90% of the abandoned vessels sailed under a flag of convenience.

But complications arise also because of the globalised nature of the shipping industry, with owners, managers, flags and crews of the ship often coming from different countries, industry observers say.

On 9 January 2025, Captain Amitabh Chaudhary* was steering a cargo vessel from Iraq to the United Arab Emirates when bad weather forced him to make a slight detour.

Minutes later, Tanzania-flagged Stratos vessel hit rocks underneath and damaged its oil-laden tank, forcing an unplanned stall near Saudi Arabia’s Jubail port.

The crew – including nine Indians and one Iraqi – made several attempts to float it again but they failed.

Stuck, they waited there for help for nearly six months before the ship was refloated.

The ship’s Iraqi owner, meanwhile, refused to pay their salaries citing losses incurred due to the stalled vessel, Mr Chaudhary told the BBC.

The BBC reached out to the owners of the ship for a response to these allegations but they didn’t respond.

Seafarers often blame India’s maritime regulator, Directorate General (DG) of Shipping – which is tasked with verifying the credentials of ships, their owners and recruitment and placement agencies – for lax scrutiny of stakeholders. The DG Shipping didn’t respond to a request for comment.

Others, however, point out that even the crew needs to be more vigilant.

“When you are hired, you get enough time to inform the DG Shipping [about any discrepancies in your contract],” said Sushil Deorukhkar, an ITF representative working for the welfare of the seafarers. “Once you sign the papers, you are stuck and have to knock on every door for resolution.”

Things can get complicated even for the crew on Indian-owned ships operating within the country’s waters for a variety of reasons.

Captain Prabjeet Singh was employed on Nirvana, an Indian-owned, Curacao-flagged oil tanker, with 22 other Indian crew members. It had recently been sold to a new owner, who wanted it decommissioned, and their salary was under dispute between the new and old owners.

In early April, Mr Singh was taking it to a port in western India’s Gujarat state for dismantling when an Indian court ordered its seizure “for non-payment of crew”, according to the ILO-IMO database.

Within days, the crew realised they were abandoned, Mr Singh said. “We were without adequate food and provisions. The ship had run out of diesel and was in complete blackout,” Mr Singh told the BBC. “We were forced to break and burn the ship’s wood to cook food.”

Hired in October 2024, Mr Singh had hoped to earn a decent living with this job, and that is why leaving the ship without salary was not a viable option for him.

The crew could finally disembark on 7 July after a court-ordered settlement. But the crew’s wages remain unpaid despite the court order, according to the ILO-IMO database.

Back in the Gulf, the crew of Stratos said their biggest fear was that the hole in the ship’s bottom would sink it.

But the immediate challenge, they found, was hunger.

“For days, we had to eat only rice or potatoes because there were no supplies,” Mr Chaudhary told the BBC last week.

After nearly six months, the crew finally managed to float the ship back – but the accident had left its rudder damaged, making it unfit to sail.

The crew are still at the ship waiting for their salaries to be paid.

“We are still at the same place in the same situation. The mind has stopped working, can’t think what [more] we should do,” Mr Chaudhary said.

“Can we get some help? We just want to go home and meet our loved ones.”

Why would anyone brave hand-numbing cold, icy winds and rough seas – sometimes working through the night – to dig up mud from the Antarctic seabed?

That is what an international team of particularly adventurous researchers did earlier this year in the remote Antarctic Peninsula, on a mission aiming to reveal centuries of scientific secrets about the Southern Ocean.

Scientists around the world will now share and analyse these precious mud samples to work out how human activity – including a century of industrial whaling – affected Antarctica and the rest of our planet.

The research is part of a global effort to understand the relationship between the ocean and the climate.

Researchers used a special coring drill – a bit like a huge apple-corer – tethered to a research ship, to drill at depths of up to 500m.

They collected more than 40 long cores, or tubes, of seafloor sediment from locations around the peninsula.

This is one of the richest habitats for marine life in Antarctica, and a focal point for fishing, tourism and – before it was banned in the 1980s – industrial whale hunting.

Collecting the sediment gives insight and clues to the past, “like a book of history”, explained lead researcher Dr Elisenda Balleste from the University of Barcelona.

“What is living in the seas now, what was living in the seas in the past and evidence of our human impact” is recorded in layer upon layer of sediment over centuries, she said.

By preserving and dating those layers, and analysing what they contain, researchers can build a picture of the history of Antarctic marine life.

Once on board the ship, the cores were frozen and transported to Barcelona and Dr Balleste’s laboratory.

From there, carefully extracted pieces of this Antarctic mud will be sent out to several academic institutions around the world.

Scientists will scan and date the sediment layers, work out what microbial life they contain, measure levels of pollution and calculate how much carbon is buried in the mud.

It is part of a mission – the Convex Seascape Survey – which involves universities and research institutions around the globe working together to better understand how our ocean and climate are connected.

Claire Allen, an oceanographer from the British Antarctic Survey who has studied Antarctica’s past for more than 20 years, said that cores like these were particularly valuable.

“Before 1950 – before there was any kind of monitoring capacity in Antarctica – sediment cores and ice cores are the only way that we can get an insight into any of the climatic or physical properties that have changed over time,” she said.

The newly collected samples being stored for DNA analysis have to be kept at temperatures low enough to stop all biological processes.

Dr Balleste took them out of the industrial-sized freezer where they are being stored to show them to us, very briefly.

“They’re kept at minus 80 degrees to stop them degrading,” she explained.

These small pieces of the seabed – frozen in time at temperatures that preserve genetic material – will be used for what is known as environmental DNA analysis.

It is an area of science which has developed rapidly in recent years. It gives researchers the ability to extract genetic information from water, soil and even air, like a fingerprint of life left behind in the environment.

Dr Carlos Preckler, from King Abdullah University in Saudi Arabia, is leading this part of the research and will be trying to measure how almost a century of industrial whaling in Antarctica affected the ocean and our atmosphere.

Carbon – when it is released into the atmosphere as carbon dioxide – warms up our planet like a blanket.

So, as the world struggles to reduce those emissions, any processes that absorb and lock significant amounts of carbon might help to rein in global warming.

“We know whales have a lot of carbon in their bodies, because they are huge animals,” said Dr Preckler.

What he and his colleagues want to know is how much of that carbon gets buried in the seafloor – and locked away from the atmosphere – when the animals die.

“We can measure whale DNA and the carbon in the sediment,” explained Dr Preckler.

“So we can measure what happened before industrial whaling removed most of the whales in the [Southern] ocean,” he added.

That, the researchers say, will provide a measure of how much whales – simply by existing, being huge and living out their natural lives – remove carbon from our atmosphere and help in the fight against climate change.

The jailing of hundreds of Scottish gangsters has left prison staff playing what has been described as “a daily game of chess” as they try to keep violent rivals apart.

The Scottish Prison Service says more inmates are being held in segregation than ever before, amid a rise in attacks linked to serious organised crime groups (SOCGs).

The service’s chief executive says the recent gangland feud in central Scotland has raised the temperature behind bars, and that staff are carrying out “a heroic task” in overcrowded jails.

The Prison Officers’ Association says many of its members have been left fearing for their safety because of threats and intimidation from gang-affiliated criminals.

Justice Secretary Angela Constance said the Scottish government was aware of the impact of the rise in inmates and organised crime on the prison system, and was working with partners to reduce the harm caused.

Scotland’s prison population stood at 8,251 on Monday. About 660 of those inmates are thought to have “strong SOCG associations” and many others are linked to lower level, local gangs.

In recent years, Police Scotland and prosecutors at the Crown Office have secured dozens of gangland convictions.

These have included those of top level figures like Jamie “Iceman” Stevenson and James “The Don” White, who were both involved in international drug smuggling.

But tension has ramped up this year, thanks to a wave of gangland violence and the murder of two senior Scottish figures in Spain.

Add overcrowding to the mix, and the end result is a jail system under significant pressure.

The feud began in March with attacks against properties and people associated with Edinburgh gangster Mark Richardson.

He has links with the Daniels crime family in Glasgow, long-time rivals of another west coast crime group, the Lyons.

The violence spread from Edinburgh to Lanarkshire and Glasgow, targeting people linked to the Daniels family.

When two senior members of the Lyons crime group were shot dead in Spain on 31 May, it was widely assumed the murders were connected to the feud back in Scotland.

Ross Monaghan and Eddie Lyons Jnr were gunned down at a bar in Fuengirola in the Costa Del Sol.

Within days, fearing reprisals, Police Scotland issued a carefully-worded statement insisting there was “no current evidence” to suggest the double shooting was “orchestrated from Scotland”.

The murders of Ross Monaghan and Eddie Lyons Jnr would have caused great shock within HMP Shotts, where prisoners linked to the Lyons gang form the largest group of SOCG inmates.

It is the only jail in Scotland which solely deals with people on sentences of four years or more. Of its 538 prisoners, 221 are serving life for murder.

With 30 years’ experience in the service, HMP Shotts governor Gillian Walker says managing prisoners linked to serious organised crime is a bigger challenge than ever before.

“It’s a daily battle to keep on top of it,” she said. “For want of a better phrase, it’s moving chess pieces constantly.

“We’re trying to keep up with things and understand a moving picture. As it moves in the community, it moves in prisons as well.”

Closer co-operation with the police helps the SPS decide where prisoners should be held, although gang affiliations aren’t always clear and can change.

Across Scotland’s jails, the number of violent incidents has risen from 95 a month in 2022 to 135 a month this year. Some of those incidents are related to organised crime rivalry.

Scottish Prison Service chief executive Teresa Medhurst said: “It’s very worrying, and it’s not just assaults on individuals and different factions, it’s assaults on our staff.”

The number of prisoners held “out of association” – kept apart from other inmates – is at an all-time high. They have to be accommodated, exercised and fed separately.

Mrs Medhurst said the recent feud was “changing the temperature” in some jails as inmates waited to see how it would play out.

“It is a heroic ask that staff are undertaking just now, to keep on top of keeping people safe,” she said.

“There are so many factions, so many people who need to be kept separate, that it is making life very difficult for them.”

The chief executive says overcrowding is making things worse because staff don’t have enough time to gather intelligence and build relationships with prisoners.

Hundreds of short-term inmates have been released early but the population is edging back up towards its previous all-time high of 8,420.

Mrs Medhurst says it’s a “realistic expectation” that that record, set in 2012, will be broken.

Angela Constance said the Scottish government had taken a range of actions to address challenges in prisons, including the early release scheme for short-term inmates.

She said: “We are continuing to work with the Scottish Prison Service and partners on further measures to manage the complex prison population in a sustainable way.

“In the longer term, this will be informed by the recommendations of the independent Sentencing and Penal Policy Commission, which we established earlier this year and is due to report by the end of 2025.”

Phil Fairlie, the Prison Officers’ Association’s assistant general secretary for Scotland, says officers have had their cars firebombed and gangsters have tried to manipulate and recruit vulnerable staff.

“They’ve spent a lifetime exploiting people and they try to do exactly the same to prison officers,” said Mr Fairlie.

“We’re talking about people who are high up enough the ladder of organised crime gangs, that the level of threat and intimidation is beyond what staff have been used to before.

“It is constant, it is hectic and it’s very stressful.

“We’re constantly talking to staff who’ve got fears and concerns for their safety, just because they’re doing their job.

“That level of fear and anxiety should be a worry to everybody.”

Teresa Medhurst says in the last three or four years, SOCGs have come to regard prisons as places where they can expand their business.

Drones are being used on a weekly basis to get dangerous psychoactive drugs, weapons and mobile phones into jails.

Mrs Medhurst said that had been “a game changer”.

She said the packages carried by a single drone were often worth more than £10,000.

“We had a recent incident at one establishment where we think there were a number of drone incidents.

“As a consequence of that we had a number of people who had to be treated at prison and in hospital.”

To tackle the problem, anti-drone grills are being fitted over cell block windows throughout the prison estate.

Air Canada and the union representing its cabin crew have announced they reached a tentative agreement, ending a nearly four-day strike that has stranded thousands of passengers.

The airline said on Tuesday that it plans to resume flights by the evening, but warned that it could take several days before operations return to normal.

Air Canada and the union resumed talks late Monday evening, after flight attendants defied a back-to-work order from the government that deemed their strike unlawful.

The two sides then worked to resolve the key areas where they had deadlocked – pay and hours. The full terms of the deal, which still needs to be ratified by union members, have not been disclosed, but the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) said it achieves “transformational change” for workers and the industry.

It also advised its members to “fully co-operate with the resumption of operations.”

Here’s what you need to know as Air Canada prepares to fly again.

Air Canada said it will “gradually restart operations” on Tuesday after reaching an agreement with the union that will bring 10,000 flight attendants back to work.

The first flights are scheduled to take off Tuesday evening, but the company will need about a week to resume full service, it added.

Over the next seven to 10 days, some flights will be cancelled “until the schedule is stabilised”, the airline said in a statement.

Air Canada advised that only passengers with confirmed bookings should head to the airport.

Those with cancelled flights will still be able to get a full refund or credit for future travel, it added, or be rebooked on another airline.

After nine hours of negotiations, with help of a mediator, the two sides reached a tentative agreement early Tuesday morning. Neither CUPE or Air Canada have said yet what is in that agreement, but there are some hints.

We know that a major sticking point for the union was what flight attendants called “unpaid work”. They wanted to change the compensation system, which only covered the hours they were in the air, to also pay them for time in the airport, when they guide boarding or wait for flights.

CUPE, in its statement on the deal, said “unpaid work is over”.

The agreement will still have to be voted on by union members.

Air Canada said it will not comment on the agreement until “ratification is complete.”

It added that during the voting process, “a strike or lockout is not possible.”

Flight attendants gave a 72-hour strike notice last week after months-long contract talks reached an impasse. Soon afterwards, Air Canada began delaying and cancelling some flights.

By Saturday, Air Canada said it was forced to suspend “all operations” after workers voted to go on strike.

With the strike in effect, the airline announced it would halt flights on its Air Canada and Air Canada Rouge service.

Air Canada Express flights, which carry about 20% of Air Canada’s daily customers, were not affected.

Air Canada said the strike has impacted half of a million passengers. The airline operates around 700 flights daily, both domestically and internationally.

CUPE said the company was not addressing key issues such as wages and unpaid work.

It said it bargained in good faith with the airline for more than eight months.

Before the strike, the airline said it had offered flight attendants a 38% increase in total compensation over four years, with a 25% raise in the first year.

But the union said the offer was “below inflation, below market value, below minimum wage” and would leave flight attendants unpaid for some hours of work.

They said wages had not kept up with inflation, so Air Canada’s suggested pay increase was “in effect, a pay cut”.

Almost all of the attendants – 99.7% – voted to strike earlier this month. The company asked the government to intervene.

As the cancellations mounted, the Canadian government used its powers to force the airline and the union into binding arbitration, hoping to minimise disruptions for travel and the economy.

“Despite significant supports from the government, these parties have been unable to resolve their differences in a timely manner,” Jobs Minister Patty Hajdu said on Saturday, in invoking Section 107 of the Canada Labour Code.

“I am exercising this authority because it is critical to maintaining and securing industrial peace, protecting Canadians and promoting conditions to resolve the dispute.”

The Canada Industrial Relations Board then issued a return-to-work order, which the union defied.

CUPE accused the federal government of violating the rights of striking workers. They alleged that forcing an end to the strike would “ensure unresolved issues will continue to worsen by kicking them down the road”.

In binding arbitration, an independent third party sets the terms of a contract in an agreement that is legally enforceable.

After the union’s refusal to return to work, Hajdu released a statement on Monday encouraging Air Canada and CUPE to resume negotiations.

She added that her ministry will order a probe into “the allegations of unpaid work in the airline sector”.

Air Canada has said it will notify passengers if there is a change to the flight’s scheduled departure time.

Customers whose flights are cancelled will be notified and will receive a full refund, the airline said, or can receive flight credits for future bookings.

The company has also made arrangements with other Canadian and foreign carriers to provide customers alternative travel options, though it cautioned that space on other airlines will be limited “due to the peak summer travel season.”

If it’s a round trip, return flights are not automatically cancelled in case the passenger reaches the destination.

Those bookings can be cancelled with no fees.

A Japanese convenience store chain has suspended the sale of rice balls, or onigiri, and other deli items at 1,600 stores after it found that staff had faked their expiry dates.

Staff at some stores extended expiry dates by not sticking labels on the dishes until an hour or two after they were prepared. Others relabelled the items with false dates after they were put on sale, Ministop found.

The misconduct was reported at 23 stores across the country, including in major cities like Tokyo, Kyoto and Osaka.

The chain has paused onigiri sales at most of its outlets since 9 August, and on Monday extended the pause to other deli items, for an “emergency investigation”.

“We sincerely apologise for the significant inconvenience caused to our customers who have supported Ministop’s handmade onigiri and handmade bento boxes,” the company said in a statement on Monday.

Customers have not reported any health issues so far, it added.

Convenience stores or konbini are part of daily life in Japan, where people – especially commuters – stop by for affordable and filling meals and last-minute groceries and banking errands.

Onigiri is popular among customers who want grab-and-go meals as the rice balls are easy to carry – wrapped in nori or dried seaweed and filled with protein like tuna salad or cod eggs.

Ministop operates more than 1,800 stores across Japan. Its focus on fresh food – with hot meals prepared on site – sets it apart from the larger chains.

Burkina Faso’s junta has expelled the UN’s top official to the West African nation over a report about children caught up in the jihadist conflict.

Carol Flore-Smereczniak was declared “persona non grata” because of her role in drafting the report that came out in March.

Covering a two-year period, the study detailed more than 2,000 cases of reported child recruitment, killings, sexual violence and abuse – blaming Islamist insurgents, government soldiers and civilian defence forces.

The military government, which came to power in September 2022 and is led by Capt Ibrahim Traoré, said it had not been consulted by the UN, saying the report contained unfounded allegations.

It did not cite any documentation “or court rulings to support the alleged cases of violations against children attributed to the valiant Burkinabé fighters”, the government’s statement said.

Since 2015, jihadist rebels affiliated with al-Qaeda and the Islamic State group have waged an insurgency that has killed thousands of people and forced millions to flee their homes.

It has prompted political instability, with two military coups in 2022. Capt Traoré took power promising to deal with the dire security situation within “two to three months”.

• How an al-Qaeda offshoot became one of Africa’s deadliest militant groups
• Why Burkina Faso’s junta leader has captured hearts around the world
• How ‘blood gold’ is fuelling conflict in West Africa

Ms Flore-Smereczniak was appointed in July 2024 – more than 18 months after her predecessor was expelled.

From Mauritius, she has worked in areas experiencing or recovering from conflict for more than two decades, holding posts in Ivory Coast, Chad and Malawi, according to the UN.

The UN representative before her, Italian Barbara Manzi, was declared “persona non grata” by the junta in December 2022 not long after publishing a blog post describing how the crisis was affecting education and health services, forcing many to close down.

The UN has not yet officially commented on the latest expulsion, but the UN chief had expressed his regret over the decision to expel Ms Manzi whilst reiterating the UN’s desire to engage with the junta to support Burkinabés.

There have been concerns over the effectiveness of Capt Traoré’s operation to quash the militants – with the junta rejecting the assistance of former colonial power France in favour of Russia.

In the first half of 2025, jihadist group JNIM said it had carried out over 280 attacks in Burkina Faso – double the number for the same period in 2024, according to data verified by the BBC

Rights groups have also accused the army of targeting civilians as well as suppressing political activity and the freedom of expression.

Last year, the military government announced it was extending junta rule for another five years.

It also said that Capt Traoré, who has built up the persona of a pan-Africanist leader, would be allowed to run for president in 2029.

• Burkina Faso outcry over ‘conscription used to punish junta critics’
• Why ‘pan-Africanist’ influencers pushed rumours of a coup
• Why France faces so much anger in West Africa

A woman dubbed the “Ketamine Queen” has agreed to plead guilty to selling the drugs that ultimately killed Friends actor Matthew Perry.

Jasveen Sangha, 42, will plead guilty to five charges in Los Angeles, including one count of distributing ketamine resulting in death or bodily injury, according to the Justice Department.

The American-British dual-national originally faced nine criminal counts. Federal prosecutors called her Los Angeles home a “drug-selling emporium” and found dozens of vials of ketamine during a raid.

Perry was found dead in a back yard jacuzzi at his Los Angeles home in October 2023, with an examination finding his death was caused by the acute effects of ketamine.

Sangha is one of five people – including medical doctors and the actor’s assistant – who US officials say supplied ketamine to Perry, exploiting his drug addiction for profit, and leading to his overdose death.

They include: Dr Salvador Plasencia and Dr Mark Chavez, two doctors who sold ketamine; Kenneth Iwamasa, who worked as Perry’s live-in assistant and both helped purchase and inject the actor with ketamine; and Eric Fleming, who sold ketamine he’d got from Sangha to Perry.

All five have since agreed to plead guilty to charges in the case. Sangha’s criminal trial had been pushed several times and currently was scheduled to begin next month.

She is expected to appear in federal court in the coming weeks to formally enter her guilty plea as part of the agreement with federal authorities.

Her attorney, Mark Geragos, told the BBC in a statement that “she’s taking responsibility for her actions”.

She plans to plead guilty to one count of maintaining a drug-involved premises, three counts of distributing ketamine, and one count of distributing ketamine resulting in death or serious bodily injury.

Sangha faces a maximum sentence of 65 years in federal prison, according to the Justice Department.

Ketamine is a dissociative anaesthetic that has some hallucinogenic effects, according to the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). It can distort perception of sight and sound and makes the user feel disconnected and not in control.

It is used as an injectable anaesthetic for humans and animals because it makes patients feel detached from their pain and environment.

The substance is supposed to be administered only by a physician, investigators say, and patients who have taken the drug should be monitored by a professional because of its possible harmful effects.

Perry’s death and the investigation into how he obtained so much of the drug over multiple years offered a glimpse into Hollywood’s ketamine drug network, which one doctor called the “wild west” in an interview with the BBC.

As part of her plea agreement, Sangha also plead guilty to selling ketamine to a man named Cody McLaury in August 2019, who died hours after the purchase from a drug overdose, according to the justice department.

Federal authorities accused Sangha of supplying ketamine from her “stash house” in North Hollywood since at least 2019, alleging in an indictment that she worked with celebrities and high-end clients.

More than 80 vials of ketamine were allegedly found there in a search before her arrest in March 2024, along with thousands of pills that included methamphetamine, cocaine and Xanax.

The home, called the “Sangha Stash House” in a federal indictment, was where she is alleged to have packaged and distributed drugs.

Sangha is said to have mixed with celebrities socially, with one of her friends telling the Daily Mail she attended the Golden Globes and the Oscars.

Her social media presence depicted an extravagant lifestyle, including parties and trips to Japan and Mexico.

The US director of national intelligence says the UK has withdrawn its controversial demand to access global Apple users’ data if required.

Tulsi Gabbard said in a post on X the UK had agreed to drop its instruction for the tech giant to provide a “back door” which would have “enabled access to the protected encrypted data of American citizens and encroached on our civil liberties”.

The BBC understands Apple has not yet received any formal communication from either the US or UK governments.

“We do not comment on operational matters, including confirming or denying the existence of such notices,” a UK government spokesperson said.

“We have long had joint security and intelligence arrangements with the US to tackle the most serious threats such as terrorism and child sexual abuse, including the role played by fast-moving technology in enabling those threats.

In December, the UK issued Apple with a formal notice demanding the right to access encrypted data from its users worldwide.

However Apple itself cannot view the data of customers who have activated its toughest security tool, Advanced Data Protection (ADP), which prevents anyone other than the user from reading their files.

In order to do so, it would have had to break its own encryption methods.

“We have never built a backdoor or master key to any of our products or services, and we never will,” it said.

Instead, Apple responded by withdrawing ADP from the UK market, and started a legal process to challenge the order. This was due to be heard at a tribunal in early 2026.

It is not yet clear whether that will continue to go ahead.

Because of the secrecy surrounding the government order, issued under the Investigatory Powers Act, it is not known whether other tech companies have also received a demand.

The messaging platform WhatsApp, used by millions of Brits, says so far it has not.

The notice, which neither Apple nor the Home Office has ever confirmed, enraged privacy campaigners, who are now cautiously optimistic about the news.

“If true, this decision is hugely welcome,” said Sam Grant from civil rights group Liberty, which along with Privacy International previously launched separate legal action against the UK government.

He told the BBC the creation of a back door to citizens’ private data would be a “reckless and potentially unlawful move from the government”.

“This would present a huge threat to our personal and national security, especially as we know it’d leave politicians, campaigners and minority groups especially at risk of being targeted,” he said.

“As long as this power exists within the Investigatory Powers Act, it remains a risk that any future government might also try to use it to create a back door into other end-to-end encrypted services we all use.”

Jim Killock, executive director of the Open Rights Group, voiced similar concerns.

“The UK’s powers to attack encryption are still on the law books, and pose a serious risk to user security and protection against criminal abuse of our data,” he said.

There is already a legal agreement between the US and UK governments – the Data Access Agreement – which allows both countries to share data for law enforcement purposes.

India and China should view each other as “partners” rather than “adversaries or threats”, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on Monday, as he arrived for a two-day visit to Delhi.

Yi met with Indian Foreign Minister S Jaishankar – only the second such meeting between the two sides since 2020 – when deadly clashes in the Galwan valley in Ladakh, a disputed Himalayan border region, led to a complete breakdown of ties between the countries.

Relations are now on a “positive trend” towards cooperation, Yi said ahead of a meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday.

Jaishankar said that India and China were seeking to “move ahead from a difficult period in our ties”.

The two counterparts held discussions on a range of bilateral issues from trade to pilgrimages and river data sharing.

Yi also met India’s National Security Advisor Ajit Doval on Tuesday for on-going negotiations on resolving the boundary dispute between the two countries.

“We are happy to share that stability has now been restored at the borders,” Yi said during the delegation-level meeting with Doval.

“The setbacks that we faced in the last few years were not in our interest,” he said.

Yi’s visit is being seen as the latest sign of a thaw in ties between the nuclear-armed neighbours.

India and China had agreed on patrolling arrangements to de-escalate tensions along the disputed Himalayan border in October last year.

Since then, the two sides have taken a range of steps to normalise relations, including China allowing Indian pilgrims to visit key places in the Tibet autonomous region this year. India has also restarted visa services to Chinese tourists and agreed to resume talks to open border trade through designated passes.

There are also reports that direct flights between the two countries will resume this year.

• India and China strive to reset ties but with caution
• India and China agree to de-escalate border tensions

Yi’s meetings are expected to lay the groundwork for Modi’s first visit to China in seven years later this month, to attend the summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), a regional security bloc.

Reports suggest Modi might also hold bilateral talks with China’s President Xi Jinping, but neither side has confirmed this.

The rapprochement between the countries comes in the backdrop of India’s worsening bilateral relationship with the US.

Earlier this month, US President Donald Trump imposed an additional 25% penalty on Indian imports for buying oil and weapons from Russia, taking total tariffs to 50% – the highest in Asia.

On Monday, White House Trade Advisor Peter Navarro wrote an opinion piece in The Financial Times in which he accused India of “cozying up to both Russia and China”.

“India acts as a global clearinghouse for Russian oil, converting embargoed crude into high-value exports while giving Moscow the dollars it needs,” Navarro wrote.

“If India wants to be treated as a strategic partner of the U.S., it needs to start acting like one,” he said.

In his remarks after meeting with Yi on Monday, Jaishankar said talks would include global developments.

“We seek a fair, balanced and multi-polar world order, including a multipolar Asia,” Jaishankar said.

“Reformed multilateralism is also the call of the day. In the current environment, there is clearly the imperative of maintaining and enhancing stability in the global economy as well,” he added.

It was September last year when 24-year-old Kelly was on a Qatar Airways flight from Doha to London Gatwick after a trip to Africa.

Tucked underneath a blanket and with her headphones firmly on, she quickly fell asleep after a strenuous day of travel. The quiet murmuring of voices from the film playing on her screen helped her to drift off on a packed overnight flight.

But two hours before landing, Kelly – whose name has been changed for this article – was woken by the man sitting next to her, sexually assaulting her.

The man in his 60s has now been jailed but Kelly is finding it difficult to go on with her day-to-day life and is locked in a battle for compensation.

• Man jailed for sexually assaulting woman on flight

Speaking about the ordeal for the first time, she tells the BBC the man had pulled a second blanket over both of them before the attack.

“His hands were down my trousers and I said to him, ‘What are you doing?’ I said, ‘Stop’. He said, ‘No, please’. And I had to force his hand out of my trousers and that just made me get up straight away. I left my phone, I left my bag, I left my passport, I left everything. I left my shoes and ran into the toilet, left the door open [and] told the flight attendant,” she says.

Kelly was initially moved to a cabin crew seat before being moved elsewhere in the cabin until landing.

“I had to endure the rest of the plane journey, which was awful,” Kelly remembers. “I was so anxious… anyone that walked by I would instantly panic because I thought it would be him.”

Momade Jussab, 66, was arrested as soon as the flight arrived into Gatwick. He was subsequently charged with one count of sexual assault by penetration and two counts of sexual assault, and was found guilty after a trial in March. He is now serving a six-and-a-half year prison sentence.

Although Kelly is pleased he has been convicted, she said the impact of the assault on her has been severe.

“I haven’t been out in almost a year – to events or summer parties with my friends. I can’t do that. I’m too scared. I don’t want to be touched or looked at. So it’s never leaving me. It’s literally there every single day before I sleep, I’m thinking about what happened.”

Kelly is now fighting for compensation under the government’s Criminal Injuries Compensation Scheme (CICS).

The scheme compensates people who have been physically or mentally injured as a result of a violent crime. According to CICS guidance, compensation can be awarded to victims of sexual or physical abuse.

But when Kelly applied to the scheme for compensation in April her application was refused.

A letter from the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority (CICA) – which processes applications on behalf of the Ministry of Justice – said the offence did not occur in a “relevant place” as defined by the scheme. She appealed against the decision but in May was refused again.

The current rules of the scheme state an aircraft is only considered a “relevant place” if it is a British-registered aircraft within the meaning of section 92 of the Civil Aviation Act 1982. Kelly was told as the offence occurred on a Qatari-registered aircraft, she was ineligible for compensation. She believes this is unfair.

“I understand that he’s been sentenced and he’s done what he’s done and he’s paying the price for that. But what about me? I can’t afford certain therapy,” Kelly said. “I just want to be compensated for what I’ve been through. I want professional help and I want to be heard.”

Her lawyers at the firm Leigh Day argue the decision is “irrational”.

In 1996, the Civil Aviation Act was changed so that crimes committed on foreign planes bound for the UK could be prosecuted in UK criminal courts. This change meant that Jussab could be arrested and charged when the Qatar Airways flight landed at Gatwick last autumn.

But victims in these cases still cannot claim compensation.

Leigh Day wants the change to also apply to the CICS scheme so that people like Kelly can successfully apply for compensation.

It is calling on Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood to close what it calls a gap in the law.

“Under the current scheme, it appears that a violent sexual assault on a British-registered aircraft is eligible for compensation while a victim of the same violent assault on a foreign registered aircraft – on a UK-bound flight where the perpetrator is prosecuted under UK law – is excluded,” Leigh Day’s Claire Powell said.

She called for this to be changed urgently “in light of this government’s commitment to addressing violence against women and girls”.

A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: “Our thoughts remain with this victim, and we remain resolute in our mission to halve violence against women and girls in a decade.

“The rules that the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority follows, and the values of payments for injuries, are set by Parliament. Other routes are available for victims to receive support.”

As well as her fight for compensation, Kelly says she is speaking out to persuade women to be aware of their surroundings, and of others, while travelling on public transport, especially when alone.

“Please be aware. Please be mindful. Don’t be scared, but people are out there that can actually hurt you so always be careful. This could happen to you.”

President Volodymyr Zelensky returned to the White House on Monday to meet US President Donald Trump for fresh talks aimed at ending the war in Ukraine.

Several European leaders also flew to Washington to attend the meeting, days after Trump met Russia’s President Vladimir Putin in Alaska for a summit that failed to result in a ceasefire.

Despite optimistic words by Trump and some more lukewarm assessments from his European partners, by Monday evening there were no concrete commitments to security guarantees or steps towards a peace deal.

Here are the key takeaways from the talks.

• Follow live updates on this story
• Analysis: Zelensky leaves White House unscathed as he buys more time
• Which countries are in Nato and why isn’t Ukraine a member?

Following the summit, Trump posted on Truth Social that he had called Putin to begin arranging talks between the Russian leader and Zelensky.

Trump said that following such a bilateral, at a location to be determined, there would be a trilateral where the US president would join them.

A Putin adviser said afterwards that Trump and Putin spoke for 40 minutes by phone on Monday.

Before European leaders sat down with Trump in the East Room at the White House, a hot mic picked up remarks between the US leader and French President Emmanuel Macron.

“I think he wants to make a deal. I think he wants to make a deal for me. You understand that? As crazy as that sounds,” Trump told Macron, appearing to refer to Putin.

It remains to be seen how straightforward it will be to bring two such bitter enemies face-to-face at the negotiating table for the first time since Russia’s full-scale invasion began in February 2022.

For months, Zelensky has been pushing to meet Putin, although this was likely a way of proving his argument that Russia is not serious about pursuing peace, as he believed the Kremlin had no interest in such a meeting.

Moscow has repeatedly turned down the idea of a Putin-Zelensky sit-down.

A noncommittal statement from Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov on Monday night said it was “worthwhile” to “explore the possibility of raising the level of representatives” from the Russian and Ukrainian delegations in negotiations.

Trump seemed to dismiss the need for any ceasefire before negotiations to end the war can take place.

In the past, that has been a key demand of Ukraine, which made clear it sees an end to the fighting as a prerequisite for further talks with Russia and, ultimately, for a longer-term settlement.

A ceasefire could also be marginally easier to agree than a full peace deal, which would take many months of negotiations, during which Russia’s assault on Ukraine would probably continue.

“I don’t know that it’s necessary,” Trump said of a ceasefire.

But the European leaders appeared to push back, with the strongest rebuttal coming from German Chancellor Friedrich Merz.

“I can’t imagine that the next meeting would take place without a ceasefire,” Merz said. “So, let’s work on that and let’s try to put pressure on Russia.”

When asked to speak, Zelensky did not reiterate his previous calls for a ceasefire to be put in place.

Trump told Zelensky the US would help guarantee Ukraine’s security in any deal to end the war, without specifying the extent of any assistance.

The US president did not offer boots on the ground. But when asked by reporters whether US security guarantees for Ukraine could include any American military in the country, Trump did not rule it out.

He said Europe was the “first line of defence”, but that “we’ll be involved”.

“We’ll give them good protection,” the president said at one point.

This is the most decisive Trump has ever sounded on the issue of security guarantees, which are generally seen as paramount to any sort of deal with Russia.

He also said that during last week’s Alaska summit Putin had accepted that there would be security guarantees for Ukraine as part of any peace deal.

At a news conference after Monday’s meetings, Zelensky said part of the security guarantee would involve a $90bn (£67bn) arms deal between the US and Ukraine.

He said this would include US weapons that Ukraine does not have, including aviation systems, anti-missile systems “and other things I will not disclose”.

Zelensky also said the US would buy Ukrainian drones, which would help fund their domestic production of the unmanned craft.

The Ukrainian president told reporters that security guarantees for Kyiv would probably be worked out within 10 days.

Given his acrimonious last visit to the Oval Office in February, the Ukrainian president went to considerable lengths to charm his American hosts – including a flurry of six “thank yous” within the first few minutes of the meeting.

The last time he was at the White House, Zelensky was scolded by Vice-President JD Vance for a perceived lack of gratitude for US support for Ukraine.

This time, Zelenksy was wearing a dark suit rather than his traditional military garb, which drew a gibe from Trump last time that his guest was “all dressed up today”.

Zelensky also sought to forge family ties during the meeting, handing his host a letter from Ukrainian First Lady Olena Zelenska to be delivered to US First Lady Melania Trump.

“It’s not to you – [it’s] to your wife,” he told Trump.

European leaders dialled up the flattery with Trump ahead of their multilateral meeting, heaping praise on him for his work in bringing them around the table.

“I really want to thank you for your leadership,” said Nato chief Mark Rutte.

Italian PM Giorgia Meloni said while there had previously been no sign that Russia wanted to move towards peace “something had changed” thanks to Trump.

Despite the warm tones, the Europeans tried to convey that they, too, feel exposed to any future Russian aggression.

French President Emmanuel Macron told fellow leaders somberly: “When we talk about security guarantees, we’re also talking about the matter of the security of the European continent.”

The State Department has revoked more than 6,000 international student visas because of violations of US law and overstays, the department told the BBC.

The agency said the “vast majority” of the violations were assault, driving under the influence (DUI), burglary and “support for terrorism”.

The move comes as the Trump administration continues its crackdown on immigration and international students.

While the State Department did not specify what they meant by “support for terrorism”, the Trump administration has targeted some students who have protested in support of Palestine, arguing they had expressed antisemitic behaviour.

Of the 6,000 student visas that were revoked, the State Department said about 4,000 of those were revoked because visitors broke the law.

Another 200-300 visas were also revoked for “terrorism done under INA 3B”, the State Department said, referring to code that defines “terrorist activity” broadly as acts that endanger human life or violate US law.

• US resumes student visas but orders enhanced social media vetting
• Students say they ‘regret’ applying to US universities after visa changes

Earlier this year, the Trump administration paused scheduling visa appointments for international students. In June, when they restarted appointments, they announced they would ask all applicants to make their social media accounts public for enhanced screening.

They said they would search for “any indications of hostility toward the citizens, culture, government, institutions, or founding principles of the United States”.

State Department officers were also instructed to screen for those “who advocate for, aid, or support designated foreign terrorists and other threats to national security; or who perpetrate unlawful anti-Semitic harassment or violence”.

• Why has Trump revoked hundreds of international student visas?

Secretary of State Marco Rubio told lawmakers in May that he estimated “thousands” of student visas had been rescinded since January.

“I don’t know the latest count, but we probably have more to do,” Rubio told US lawmakers on 20 May. “We’re going to continue to revoke the visas of people who are here as guests and are disrupting our higher education facilities.”

Democrats have pushed back against the Trump administration’s effort to revoke student visas, describing it is an attack on due process.

More than 1.1 million international students from over 210 countries were enrolled in US colleges in the 2023-24 school year, according to Open Doors, an organisation that collects data on foreign students.

You can also get in touch by following this link

The eldest son of Norway’s crown princess has been charged with 32 offences, including four counts of rape, a prosecutor says.

The charges against Marius Borg Høiby, 28, include the abuse of a former partner and violations of restraining orders against another former partner.

He was born from a relationship before Crown Princess Mette-Marit married Crown Prince Haakon, who is the future king of Norway.

Mr Høiby denies the most serious accusations against him, but plans to plead guilty to some lesser charges when the trial starts, his lawyer Petar Sekulic told Reuters news agency.

He could face up to 10 years in prison if found guilty of the most serious charges.

He has also been charged with filming the genitals of a number of women without their knowledge or consent, prosecutor Sturla Henriksbø told reporters.

“He does not agree with the claims regarding rape and domestic violence,” Mr Sekulic said of his client, according to Reuters.

Speaking about the charges against his stepson, Norwegian Crown Prince Haakon on Tuesday said it was up to the courts what would happen, adding that everyone involved in the case “probably finds it challenging and difficult”, Norwegian public broadcaster NRK reported.

The four alleged rapes are said to have occurred between 2018 and 2024, with one of them allegedly taking place after his arrest, according to NRK.

Mr Høiby, who does not have a royal title or official duties, was arrested three separate times last year, in August, September and November. He had been under investigation since his August arrest on suspicion of assault. In June, police said he was suspected of three rapes and 23 other offences.

The prosecutor said the trial could take place in January and last some six weeks.

India and China should view each other as “partners” rather than “adversaries or threats”, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on Monday, as he arrived for a two-day visit to Delhi.

Yi met with Indian Foreign Minister S Jaishankar – only the second such meeting between the two sides since 2020 – when deadly clashes in the Galwan valley in Ladakh, a disputed Himalayan border region, led to a complete breakdown of ties between the countries.

Relations are now on a “positive trend” towards cooperation, Yi said ahead of a meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday.

Jaishankar said that India and China were seeking to “move ahead from a difficult period in our ties”.

The two counterparts held discussions on a range of bilateral issues from trade to pilgrimages and river data sharing.

Yi also met India’s National Security Advisor Ajit Doval on Tuesday for on-going negotiations on resolving the boundary dispute between the two countries.

“We are happy to share that stability has now been restored at the borders,” Yi said during the delegation-level meeting with Doval.

“The setbacks that we faced in the last few years were not in our interest,” he said.

Yi’s visit is being seen as the latest sign of a thaw in ties between the nuclear-armed neighbours.

India and China had agreed on patrolling arrangements to de-escalate tensions along the disputed Himalayan border in October last year.

Since then, the two sides have taken a range of steps to normalise relations, including China allowing Indian pilgrims to visit key places in the Tibet autonomous region this year. India has also restarted visa services to Chinese tourists and agreed to resume talks to open border trade through designated passes.

There are also reports that direct flights between the two countries will resume this year.

• India and China strive to reset ties but with caution
• India and China agree to de-escalate border tensions

Yi’s meetings are expected to lay the groundwork for Modi’s first visit to China in seven years later this month, to attend the summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), a regional security bloc.

Reports suggest Modi might also hold bilateral talks with China’s President Xi Jinping, but neither side has confirmed this.

The rapprochement between the countries comes in the backdrop of India’s worsening bilateral relationship with the US.

Earlier this month, US President Donald Trump imposed an additional 25% penalty on Indian imports for buying oil and weapons from Russia, taking total tariffs to 50% – the highest in Asia.

On Monday, White House Trade Advisor Peter Navarro wrote an opinion piece in The Financial Times in which he accused India of “cozying up to both Russia and China”.

“India acts as a global clearinghouse for Russian oil, converting embargoed crude into high-value exports while giving Moscow the dollars it needs,” Navarro wrote.

“If India wants to be treated as a strategic partner of the U.S., it needs to start acting like one,” he said.

In his remarks after meeting with Yi on Monday, Jaishankar said talks would include global developments.

“We seek a fair, balanced and multi-polar world order, including a multipolar Asia,” Jaishankar said.

“Reformed multilateralism is also the call of the day. In the current environment, there is clearly the imperative of maintaining and enhancing stability in the global economy as well,” he added.

Flight crew at Air Canada have ended a dispute with the airline which had grounded flights and stranded thousands of passengers since Saturday.

A tentative agreement was announced by the union representing flight attendants and confirmed by the airline, which said flights will resume later on Tuesday.

More than 10,000 staff had walked out in protest at pay and scheduling. The deal has not been disclosed in full, though the union said it achieves “transformational change” for workers and the industry.

The agreement will now be presented to members to be ratified.

The breakthrough came nine hours after talks began with the help of an approved mediator appointed by the government.

“Unpaid work is over,” said the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) in a statement early on Tuesday, calling the negotiations a “historic fight” for the industry.

The union also advised its members to “fully co-operate with resumption of operations”.

The dispute between Air Canada and the union had escalated when CUPE rejected an order to return to work issued by the Canadian Industrial Relations Board, which deemed the strike “unlawful” in a ruling on Monday.

Following news of a tentative deal, Air Canada said the first flights would restart on Tuesday evening, but it may take days to return to a full service because aircraft and crew are out of position.

It added that it would not comment on the terms of the agreed deal until it had been ratified.

In contract negotiations, Air Canada said it had offered flight attendants a 38% increase in total compensation over four years, with a 25% raise in the first year.

CUPE said the offer was “below inflation, below market value, below minimum wage” and would still leave flight attendants unpaid for some hours of work, including boarding and waiting at airports ahead of flights.

The union also rejected an order by the Canadian government to enter binding arbitration and return to work over the weekend, accusing it of “caving to corporate pressure”.

After the union’s refusal, Jobs Minister Patty Hajdu encouraged the two parties on Monday to resume talks and said her ministry will order a probe into “the allegations of unpaid work in the airline sector”.

The nearly four-day strike has impacted more than 500,000 passengers, Air Canada has said. The airline – Canada’s largest – operates around 700 flights daily, serving both domestic and international travellers.

The number of people in the UK visiting the most popular pornography sites has decreased sharply since enhanced age verification rules came into place, new figures indicate.

Data analytics firm Similarweb said leading adult site Pornhub lost more than one million visitors in just two weeks.

Pornhub and other major adult websites introduced advanced age checks on 25 July after the Online Safety Act said sites must make it harder for under-18s to see explicit material.

Data experts at Similarweb compared the daily average user figures of popular pornography sites from 1 to 9 August with the daily average figures for July.

Pornhub is the UK’s most visited website for adult content and it experienced a 47% decrease in traffic between 24 July, one day before the new rules came into place, and 8 August, according to Similarweb’s data.

Over the same time period, traffic to XVideos, another leading adult site, was also down 47% and OnlyFans saw traffic drop by over 10%.

The number of average daily visits to Pornhub fell from 3.2 million in July to 2 million in the first nine days of August.

However, the data also showed that some smaller and less well regulated pornography sites saw visits increase.

A spokesperson for Pornhub told the BBC: “As we’ve seen in many jurisdictions around the world, there is often a drop in traffic for compliant sites and an increase in traffic for non-compliant sites.”

The UK’s new online safety rules, explained:

• What is the Online Safety Act?
• How could age checks for porn work in the UK?
• From Reddit to Pornhub: Which sites will require UK age verification?
• The debate: Will new rules for porn sites do more harm than good?

This comes after Virtual private network (VPN) apps became the most downloaded on Apple’s App Store in the UK in the days after the age verification rules were enforced.

VPNs can disguise your location online – allowing you to use the internet as though you are in another country.

The apps would also make it harder to collect data on how many people are visiting sites from specific locations.

Media regulator Ofcom estimates 14 million people watch online pornography.

It has set out a number of ways websites can verify the age of users including through credit card checks, photo ID matching and estimating age using a selfie.

Critics have suggested an unintended consequence of the changes could be to drive people to more extreme content in darker corners of the internet, such as the dark web.

Sign up for our Tech Decoded newsletter to follow the world’s top tech stories and trends. Outside the UK? Sign up here.

The government needs to stop children using virtual private networks (VPNs) to bypass age checks on porn sites, the children’s commissioner for England has said.

Dame Rachel de Souza told BBC Newsnight it was “absolutely a loophole that needs closing” and called for age verification on VPNs.

VPNs can disguise your location online – allowing you to use the internet as though you are in another country. It means that they can be used to bypass requirements of the Online Safety Act, which mandated platforms with certain adult content to start checking the age of users.

A government spokesperson said VPNs are legal tools for adults and there are no plans to ban them.

The children’s commissioner’s recommendation is included in a new report, which found the proportion of children saying they have seen pornography online has risen in the past two years.

Last month VPNs were the most downloaded apps on Apple’s App Store in the UK after sites such as PornHub, Reddit and X began requiring age verification.

Virtual private networks connect users to websites using a remote server and conceal their actual IP address and location, meaning they can circumvent blocks on particular sites or content.

Dame Rachel told BBC Newsnight: “Of course, we need age verification on VPNs – it’s absolutely a loophole that needs closing and that’s one of my major recommendations.”

She wants ministers to explore requiring VPNs “to implement highly effective age assurances to stop underage users from accessing pornography.”

The report also found more children are stumbling across pornography accidentally, with some of the 16 to 21-year-olds surveyed saying they had viewed it “aged six or younger”.

More than half of respondents to the survey had viewed strangulation as children, prompting Dame Rachel to also ask the government to ban depictions of it.

Pornography depicting rape of a sleeping person was also seen by 44% of respondents as children.

The data was gathered prior to the amendments to the Online Safety Act in July, which brought in age verification tools for pornography.

Dame Rachel described the findings as “rock bottom”.

“This tells us how much of the problem is about the design of platforms, algorithms and recommendation systems that put harmful content in front of children who never sought it out,” the commissioner said, calling for the report to act as a “line in the sand”.

The Department of Science, Innovation and Technology told the BBC “children have been left to grow up in a lawless online world for too long” and “the Online Safety Act is changing that’.

On Dame Rachel’s VPN comments, the spokesperson said there are no plans to ban them “but if platforms deliberately push workarounds like VPNs to children, they face tough enforcement and heavy fines.”

Josh Lane was addicted to porn by 14-years-old after first finding it via a Google search when he was aged 12.

He told Newsnight the addiction caused him to isolate himself from friends and family because he was “afraid of anyone discovering that I was hooked.”

Mr Lane described finding “the only place I could get, I guess, love and intimacy was from pornography” at the same time as feeling “heaps of guilt and shame”

Now 25 and happily married, he has not looked at porn in almost a year but said the addiction is “a problem that affects you forever”.

Kerry Smith, CEO of the Internet Watch Foundation, said “children’s exposure to extreme or violent sexual imagery can normalise harmful sexual behaviours, and is increasingly linked to sexual violence against girls and women”.

She added: “It is clear this is something we all need to be taking seriously, and the safeguards adult sites have put in place to make sure children can’t access sexual content must be robust and meaningful.”

A woman dubbed the “Ketamine Queen” has agreed to plead guilty to selling the drugs that ultimately killed Friends actor Matthew Perry.

Jasveen Sangha, 42, will plead guilty to five charges in Los Angeles, including one count of distributing ketamine resulting in death or bodily injury, according to the Justice Department.

The American-British dual-national originally faced nine criminal counts. Federal prosecutors called her Los Angeles home a “drug-selling emporium” and found dozens of vials of ketamine during a raid.

Perry was found dead in a back yard jacuzzi at his Los Angeles home in October 2023, with an examination finding his death was caused by the acute effects of ketamine.

Sangha is one of five people – including medical doctors and the actor’s assistant – who US officials say supplied ketamine to Perry, exploiting his drug addiction for profit, and leading to his overdose death.

They include: Dr Salvador Plasencia and Dr Mark Chavez, two doctors who sold ketamine; Kenneth Iwamasa, who worked as Perry’s live-in assistant and both helped purchase and inject the actor with ketamine; and Eric Fleming, who sold ketamine he’d got from Sangha to Perry.

All five have since agreed to plead guilty to charges in the case. Sangha’s criminal trial had been pushed several times and currently was scheduled to begin next month.

She is expected to appear in federal court in the coming weeks to formally enter her guilty plea as part of the agreement with federal authorities.

Her attorney, Mark Geragos, told the BBC in a statement that “she’s taking responsibility for her actions”.

She plans to plead guilty to one count of maintaining a drug-involved premises, three counts of distributing ketamine, and one count of distributing ketamine resulting in death or serious bodily injury.

Sangha faces a maximum sentence of 65 years in federal prison, according to the Justice Department.

Ketamine is a dissociative anaesthetic that has some hallucinogenic effects, according to the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). It can distort perception of sight and sound and makes the user feel disconnected and not in control.

It is used as an injectable anaesthetic for humans and animals because it makes patients feel detached from their pain and environment.

The substance is supposed to be administered only by a physician, investigators say, and patients who have taken the drug should be monitored by a professional because of its possible harmful effects.

Perry’s death and the investigation into how he obtained so much of the drug over multiple years offered a glimpse into Hollywood’s ketamine drug network, which one doctor called the “wild west” in an interview with the BBC.

As part of her plea agreement, Sangha also plead guilty to selling ketamine to a man named Cody McLaury in August 2019, who died hours after the purchase from a drug overdose, according to the justice department.

Federal authorities accused Sangha of supplying ketamine from her “stash house” in North Hollywood since at least 2019, alleging in an indictment that she worked with celebrities and high-end clients.

More than 80 vials of ketamine were allegedly found there in a search before her arrest in March 2024, along with thousands of pills that included methamphetamine, cocaine and Xanax.

The home, called the “Sangha Stash House” in a federal indictment, was where she is alleged to have packaged and distributed drugs.

Sangha is said to have mixed with celebrities socially, with one of her friends telling the Daily Mail she attended the Golden Globes and the Oscars.

Her social media presence depicted an extravagant lifestyle, including parties and trips to Japan and Mexico.

Alandmark 113-year-old church at risk from ground subsidence is being relocated in its entirety – in a 5km (3 miles) move along a road in Sweden’s far north.

The vast red timber structure in Kiruna dating back to 1912 has been hoisted on giant trailers and is on its way to the new city centre.

Travelling at a maximum speed of 500m an hour, the journey is expected to take two days.

The old city centre is at risk from ground fissures after more than a century of iron ore mining. The church’s move is the most spectacular and symbolic moment of the wider relocation of buildings in Kiruna, which lies 145km north of the Arctic Circle.

The journey began with a blessing from the church’s vicar, Lena Tjärnberg, and Bishop Åsa Nyström of the Diocese of Luleå.

As the short ceremony ended, engines rumbled to life and the massive wooden church began inching forward. In the first hour, it managed just 30m, the trailers’ wheels slowly turning under its weight.

Large crowds lined the streets under clear blue skies, watching in awe as the timber structure rolled forward. Safety barriers kept people back, but the building passed so close that many said it felt as though they could almost reach out and touch it.

“It’s a big crowd. People came not just from Kiruna and other parts of Sweden. I heard many different languages being spoken,” said culture strategist Sofia Lagerlöf Mättää. “It’s like history taking place in front of our eyes.”

The man in charge of the move, project manager Stefan Holmblad Johansson, said: “It’s a historic event, a very big and complex operation and we don’t have a margin of error. But everything is under control.”

By the mid-2010s, other buildings in Kiruna were already being shifted to safer ground. Most were demolished and rebuilt, but some landmarks were moved intact.

These include buildings in Hjalmar Lundbohmsgården such as the so-called yellow row of three old wooden houses and the former home of mining manager Hjalmar Lundbohm, which was split into three parts.

The clock tower on the roof of the old city hall was also moved and can now be found next to the new city hall.

Under Swedish law, mining activity cannot take place under buildings.

Robert Ylitalo, chief executive officer of Kiruna’s development company, explained: “There’s no risk of people falling through cracks. But fissures would eventually damage the water, electricity and sewage supply. People have to move before the infrastructure fails.”

The iron ore mine’s operator, LKAB – also Kiruna’s biggest employer – is covering the city’s relocation bill, estimated at more than 10bn Swedish krona ($1bn; £737m).

Kiruna Church is 35m (115ft) high, 40m wide and weighs 672 tonnes. It was once voted Sweden’s most beautiful pre-1950 building.

Relocating such a large building is an unusual feat. But instead of dismantling it, engineers are moving it in one piece, supported by steel beams and carried on self-propelled modular transporters.

“The biggest challenge was preparing the road for such a wide building,” said Mr Johansson.

“We’ve widened it to 24 metres (79ft) and along the way we removed lamp-posts, traffic lights as well as a bridge that was slated for demolition anyway.”

Among the onlookers were Lena Edkvist and her husband, who had driven from Gothenburg.

“I’m not a deeply religious person – I only go to church on special occasions. But this is part of my tradition, history and culture,” she said. “It feels like an honour that they’re moving it intact instead of dismantling it piece by piece.”

For Kjell Olovsson, project manager at Veidekke, the contractor leading the relocation, the moment brought calm satisfaction.

“After years of preparation, we’re finally moving. I’m thrilled and just enjoying the moment. The weather is good, and I’m confident everything will run smoothly.”

Among the most delicate aspects of the move is the protection of the church’s interior treasures, especially its great altar painting made by Prince Eugen, a member of Sweden’s royal family.

“It’s not something hanging on a hook that you just take off,” said project manager Mr Johansson.

“It’s glued directly onto a masonry wall so it would have been difficult to remove without damage. So it will remain inside the church during the move, fully covered and stabilised. So will the organ with its 1,000 pipes.”

The move is much more than an engineering marvel for local residents – it’s a deeply emotional moment.

“The church has served as a spiritual centre and a gathering place for the community for generations,” said Sofia Lagerlöf Määttä, who remembers walking into the church for the first time as a young child with her grandmother.

“The move has brought back memories of joy and sorrow to us, and we’re now moving those memories with us into the future.”

That feeling is also shared by project manager Stefan Holmblad Johansson, an engineer who doubles as a member of the church’s gospel choir.

“This is a very special task for me,” he said. “The church was built over a 100 years ago for the municipality by LKAB. Now we move it to the new city. There simply can’t be any other way.”

For the vicar, Lena Tjärnberg, the moment carries added meaning.

“The church is leaving a place where it truly belongs,” she said.

“Everyone knows it has to be relocated: we live in a mining community and depend on the mine. I’m grateful that we’re moving the church with us to the new city centre but there is also sorrow in seeing it leave the ground where it became a church.”

If all goes to plan, the church will reach its new home in the city centre by Wednesday evening.

Swedish television is also broadcasting the entire journey live as “slow TV”, marking a rare moment when a piece of history does not just survive change – it moves with it.