Everything was in place.

Streets in the centre of Paris have been blocked off, metro stations closed and thousands of police, soldiers and other guards deployed to maintain security on the big showpiece day to kick off the Olympics.

But the saboteurs struck away from the capital, at five apparently unguarded places.

France’s state-owned rail company SNCF says the saboteurs either vandalised or tried to vandalise five signal boxes and electricity installations between 01:00 and 05:30 on Friday.

One site was at Courtalain, east of Le Mans and 150km to the south-west of Paris. The local community’s social media page posted a picture of burnt-out cables in a shallow gulley, with its protective SNCF paving stones discarded.

SNCF spoke of a “massive, large-scale attack aimed at paralysing” its services, involving arson and theft targeting cabling, not just at Courtalain but at Pagny-sur-Moselle, a village outside the eastern city of Metz and Croisilles, not far from the northern city of Arras.

Small sites, but at big junctions on the high-speed TGV network.

Another attempted attack, on another TGV junction to the south-east of Paris at Vergigny, was foiled by SNCF workers who just happened to be carrying out maintenance on site in the early hours of Friday.

The sabotage was clearly co-ordinated and the effects were immediate, on one of the busiest days imaginable for France’s highly regarded rail system.

The head of SNCF, Jean-Pierre Farandou, has spoken of a “premeditated, calculated, co-ordinated” attack that demanded considerable repair work.

Friday 26 July marks the start of the or big getaway for many French holidaymakers heading out of the cities. It is also the day of the showpiece opening ceremony that the Paris Olympics organisers have worked on for years.

Hundreds of stranded passengers filled the main concourses at Gare Du Nord and Gare Montparnasse, two of the big rail hubs in Paris for travellers on the big lines to the north and west of the capital.

Passengers at Gare du Nord waited patiently for news about delayed trains, not just within France but to London, Brussels and Amsterdam.

The much-vaunted high-speed TGV network heading in and out of Paris – north to Lille, west to Le Mans and east towards Strasbourg – was down.

At the nearby Gare de L’Est, which serves the east, an SNCF official said they were making plans to put the high-speed TGV trains onto other, slower lines, which would mean long delays and disruptions, but would also keep the network moving.

“Everything points us to these fires being deliberate,” said Transport Minister Patrice Vergriete. “The timing [of the attacks], the vans that have been recovered after people have fled, the incendiary agents found on the scene.”

Clearly acts of sabotage, and evidently timed to cause severe disruption on the day that Paris is trying to show its best face to the world.

Caretaker Prime Minister Gabriel Attal said the repercussions for the rail network were massive and serious, and France’s intelligence services and forces of order had been deployed to “find and punish those behind these criminal acts”.

French authorities have been on alert for potential acts of sabotage targeting the Games for months.

During the spring, they warned that several groups had tried to disrupt Olympic events, including the torch relay that has been going on across France in the run-up to the opening ceremony.

It has now emerged that incendiary devices were found on the high-speed TGV line between Aix-en-Provence and Marseille on the day the Olympic flame arrived in France’s big southern port on 8 May.

Several bottles filled with yellow liquid were found 4km (2.5 miles) outside Aix, according to French TV.

But who would want to ruin the plans of hundreds of thousands of French travellers and disrupt the start of the Olympic Games?

One security source suggested in French media that the arson attacks bore all the hallmarks of the extreme left.

However, Mr Attal has refused to speculate who might have been behind the sabotage.

He appealed to the public to be cautious as the investigation is only just starting, although he did say the fact that the saboteurs had targeted “nerve centres” on the high-speed network indicated awareness of where it was vulnerable to attack.

In recent weeks, Russia has been linked to at least two alleged plots in France.

Last month, a Russian-Ukrainian national was arrested at a hotel near Charles de Gaulle airport on suspicion of being part of a Russian-sabotage campaign,

Only this week a Russian man was arrested on suspicion of involvement in a “destabilisation” plot targeting the Games.

Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin said he was suspected of aiming to “organise operations of destabilisation, interference, spying” on behalf of Russia’s FSB intelligence service.

So far no Russian link has been made by French authorities to Friday’s attacks.

Mr Darmanin said this month that 3,570 people had been barred from the Games, including people seen as security risks as well as “dozens of radical individuals close to Islamist, ultra-left and ultra-right circles”.

Almost a million people, ranging from athletes and coaches to Olympic volunteers, have gone through a security check ahead of the Games in Paris.

But preventing acts of sabotage at unguarded sites in rural areas is a wholly different prospect.

Rain and cooler temperatures have offered some respite for firefighters battling fast-moving fires that may have destroyed up to half of the historic Canadian town of Jasper.

The weather could help keep the fires at bay for the next 72 hours, according to Jasper National Park.

Around 10-15 mm (0.4-0.5in) of rainfall fell in the national park on Thursday night as crews take the opportunity to suppress the wildfire and reduce its spread.

But officials say the blaze remains out of control and the relief may be only temporary, with more warm and dry weather in the forecast.

Fire activity is “significantly subdued” with the weather change, park officials said in an update.

Entire streets have been levelled by the blazes in the town in the province of Alberta, with video released on Wednesday showing smouldering rubble where homes once stood.

The most significant structural damage from the fire is on the west side of town, Jasper National Park reported late on Thursday night local time.

Firefighters have prevented “significant” damage on the town’s east side.

Officials were able to confirm that critical infrastructure was protected, including the hospital, the public schools and activity centre, and the wastewater treatment plant.

The park said that “some homes and businesses have been lost” as well as some of the bridges in town and throughout the park itself.

Some 36,000 hectares (89,000 acres) of land has so far been affected.

No deaths or injuries have been reported so far, with officials crediting the early evacuation efforts.

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith became tearful during a Thursday news conference when recounting the details of the damage, but said “potentially 30 to 50%” of buildings had been destroyed.

Ms Smith became visibly emotional as she described the beauty of the park and its significance to the community, which relies largely on tourism. Some 2.5 million people visit the park, and nearby Banff National Park, each year.

More than 20,000 tourists and 5,000 residents fled the park and its township – popular tourist spots – earlier this week.

Hundreds of firefighters from around the world have been deployed to help with the response.

Officials on Thursday described the fire as a “monster”, with flames that at one point reached 100m (328ft) high in some places and that moved swiftly.

On Wednesday, winds pushed the blaze, which was sparked by lightning, 5km (3 miles) to the town in less than 30 minutes.

In British Columbia, the province neighbouring Alberta to the west, more than 400 wildfires have been burning and dozens of evacuation orders have been issued.

In the US, more than 3,000 people have been forced to flee their homes in the state of California due to the Park Fire, which continues to rage out of control.

The states of Oregon, Montana and Utah also continue to deal with wildfires.

The overall number of fires has decreased around the world over the last two decades.

But researchers say climate change could bring more lightning to forests in northern reaches of the globe, increasing the risk of wildfires.

With an anticipated 10,000 athletes parading through the heart of Paris, Friday’s Olympic opening ceremony promises a spectacle

Many of the details have been kept secret, so expect plenty of surprises.

The ceremony begins at 18:30 BST, and will last just under four hours.

Here are some of the things to watch out for during the curtain-raiser, which you can watch live on the BBC.

For the first time, the ceremony will take place not in a stadium, but in the heart of a city. The world’s Olympic teams are set to parade along the River Seine in boats, watched by about 300,000 spectators in a display directed by Thomas Jolly, the ceremony’s artistic director.

The flotilla will carry more than 10,000 athletes along a 6km (3.7 mile) route along the waterway, which has been under intense scrutiny for its cleanliness.

• Watch: BBC joins Parisian mayor for a dip in the Seine

Organisers hope Friday’s spectacle is free-flowing, amid a mammoth security operation that will involve tens of thousands of police.

Earlier this year, French President Emmanuel Macron admitted that a plan B (and a plan C) had been put together in case the challenges proved insurmountable.

The boats will pass some of the city’s best-known bridges and landmarks on their journey during the evening – including Notre-Dame cathedral and, naturally, the Eiffel Tower – before reaching the Trocadéro.

It will conclude as the sun sets over the city’s west, which organisers hope will further solidify the legend of the City of Lights. Games president Tony Estanguet has promised the timing will make the show “more sublime, with a truly poetic dimension”.

(And by the way – theories differ as to whether the French capital earned its nickname as a luminous centre of intellect and creativity, or due to the way it reportedly embraced street lighting early in the technology’s development.)

Organisers are promising cameras on each boat to show the stars up close.

But what remains to be seen is exactly how this arrangement scales up and down for Olympic delegations of different sizes.

The USA, for example, is sending just shy of 600 competitors while some smaller nations are being represented by just a single competitor each.

Dozens of vessels will be used, with help enlisted from local boat firms.

The spotlight will be shone on those athletes given the job of carrying their team’s flag. A pair of British Olympic veterans – diver Tom Daley and rower Helen Glover – have been given that responsibility for Team GB.

Jolly has signed up 3,000 performers – including musicians and 400 dancers on bridges – though he’s remained tight-lipped about who the famous names are.

It has been suggested that French-Malian R&B star Aya Nakamura could be among the musical acts, as the world’s most-streamed French-language artist.

That remains unconfirmed, and has proven unpopular with the French far-right, which has argued that her music owes more to Africa and the US than to France. Nakamura was prompted to reply to one group: “What do I owe you? Nothing.”

• Culture war erupts over singer’s suggested role in Olympics

There’s been some speculation that Canadian star Céline Dion – who sings in French and English – could perform, after she was seen in the French capital earlier this week. Again, nothing is confirmed, but a performance would represent a comeback for Dion, who cancelled shows after revealing in 2022 that she had a rare neurological condition called Stiff Person Syndrome.

Lady Gaga, too, has been spotted in Paris – stoking rumours that she could play her own part. But any Daft Punk fans hoping to “get lucky” with a performance from the French duo were left disappointed when the act shot down any rumours they’d take part.

The Olympic torch travelled to the French capital from Greece in a massive relay that began more than three months ago. As part of its journey, the torch was briefly transported on the world’s longest rowing boat – the 24-seat Stampfli Express.

As for who gets the honour of lighting the Olympic cauldron – tradition dictates that the identity of the final torchbearer stays a secret until the big televised reveal.

That duty has previously fallen to the likes of Muhammad Ali in Atlanta in 1996 and to Aboriginal sprinter Cathy Freeman in Sydney four years later.

Among those who’ve carried the torch so far are French former footballer Thierry Henry and judo star Romane Dicko. Rapper Snoop Dogg will also have a role in carrying the torch in the final stages of the relay before the opening ceremony begins.

With the athletes’ parade always comes a bold array of looks – not least when the Olympics are taking place this time in one of the world’s style capitals.

Team USA and Team GB will be kitted out by Ralph Lauren and Ben Sherman respectively. Other eye-catching outfits come courtesy of Stella Jean, whose designs for Haiti are designed to project a vibrant image of the Caribbean nation.

• Perfect 10? The looks the athletes are sporting

The event’s organisers say some 3,000 unique costumes have been made for both the Olympic and Paralympic opening and closing ceremonies in a secretive workshop near Paris. Many will be made of recycled materials as the Games looks to stress its green ethos.

The woman stitching together this part of the visual spectacle is Daphné Bürki, who says she has been getting ready for the “biggest show of the 21st century four times over”.

Keep your eyes peeled for sporting superstars among the athletes’ contingent.

But we also expect to see celebrities and dignitaries of all sorts in the crowd, with more than 100 heads of state and government due to attend, according to Reuters.

US First Lady Jill Biden and Argentine President Javier Milei are among the anticipated attendees, alongside French President Emmanuel Macron and Olympic chief Thomas Bach.

Elizabeth II appeared at the London 2012 curtain-raiser – and not just in her filmed appearance with Daniel Craig.

• ‘Good evening, Mr Bond’: When the Queen met 007

The opening ceremony will be shown live from 17:45 BST on BBC One, BBC iPlayer and the BBC Sport website and app.

You can tune in to radio coverage on BBC Radio 5 Live and BBC Sounds from 19:00 BST.

There will also be live text coverage on the BBC Sport website and app bringing you the best of the event from Paris.

One of the world’s most powerful drug lords, Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada, leader of Mexico’s Sinaloa cartel, has been arrested by US federal agents in El Paso, Texas.

Zambada, 76, founded the criminal organisation with Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, who is currently jailed in the US.

Arrested with Zambada on Thursday was Guzman’s son, Joaquin Guzman Lopez, said the US justice department.

In February, Zambada was charged by US prosecutors with a conspiracy to make and distribute fentanyl, a drug more powerful than heroin that has been blamed for the US opioid crisis.

Citing Mexican and US officials, the Wall Street Journal reports that Zambada was tricked into boarding the plane by a high-ranking Sinaloa member following a months-long operation by Homeland Security Investigations and the FBI.

Believing that he was going to inspect clandestine airstrips in southern Mexico, Zambada was instead flown to a private airfield outside El Paso, Texas.

Lopez was also arrested alongside Zambada by federal agents when the plane landed.

Officials said Zambada was “lured” onto a private plane under “false pretences” by Lopez, the New York Times reports.

Mexico’s Security Minister Rosa Rodriguez said his government was made aware of the detention of both Zambada and Lopez by the US Government but that the Mexican authorities were not involved in the operation to apprehend them.

Fox News Correspondent Bryan Llenas said Lopez surrendered to US authorities and turned on Zambada because he “blamed Mayo for the capture of his father”.

In a written statement on Thursday evening, US Attorney General Merrick Garland said the two men lead “one of the most violent and powerful drug trafficking organisations in the world”.

“Fentanyl is the deadliest drug threat our country has ever faced, and the Justice Department will not rest until every single cartel leader, member and associate responsible for poisoning our communities is held accountable,” he added.

American prosecutors say the Sinaloa cartel is the biggest supplier of drugs to the US.

US authorities have previously noted that fentanyl is the leading cause of death for Americans aged 18 to 45.

The US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) had been offering a reward of up to $15m (£12m) for Zambada’s capture.

During Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman’s trial in 2019, his lawyers accused Zambada of bribing the “entire” Mexican government in exchange for living openly without fear of prosecution.

“In truth [Guzman] controlled nothing,” Guzman’s lawyer, Jeffrey Lichtman, told jurors. “Mayo Zambada did,” he claimed.

According to the US state department, Zambada is also the owner of several legitimate businesses in Mexico, including “a large milk company, a bus line and a hotel”, as well as real estate assets.

Alongside fentanyl charges, he is also facing charges in the US ranging from drug trafficking, murder, kidnapping, money laundering and organised crime.

In May, Zambada’s nephew – Eliseo Imperial Castro, who was known as “Cheyo Antrax” – was killed in an ambush in Mexico. He was also wanted by US authorities.

Zambada is arguably the biggest drug lord in the world and certainly the most influential in the Americas.

He had evaded authorities for decades, and as such, his arrest has come as a shock in Mexico.

In a statement, US Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas said the Sinaloa cartel “pioneered the manufacture of fentanyl and has for years trafficked it into our country, killing hundreds of thousands of Americans and devastating countless communities”.

FBI director Chris Wray said the arrests are “an example of the FBI’s and our partners’ commitment to dismantling violent transnational criminal organisations like the Sinaloa Cartel,” he said.

As more information emerges, Zambada’s arrest will no doubt be heralded by President Joe Biden’s administration as one of the most significant operations by the DEA in years.

Zambada co-founded the Sinaloa cartel in the wake of the collapse of the Guadalajara cartel at the end of the 1980s.

While Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman was the public face of the organisation and the most notorious of the two men, many believed it was in fact El Mayo who was its real leader.

Not only ruthless, he was also innovative, creating and maintaining some of the earliest links with Colombian cartels to flood the US with cocaine and heroin.

And more latterly, fentanyl.

His leadership of the criminal empire has endured in the face of changing presidents in Mexico and the US, amid repeated anti-drug offensives from successive governments and constant efforts by his enemies in other drug-trafficking organisations to bring him down.

That is no mean feat in the violent, dangerous and treacherous underworld in which he has operated as an unassailable kingpin for many years.

Yet that extraordinary resilience appears to have run out in El Paso, Texas – a city blighted by the influx of the synthetic opioid, fentanyl, much of which was smuggled in by his organisation.

Barack Obama has endorsed Vice-President Kamala Harris to be the Democratic presidential nominee, ending days of speculation over whether he would support her.

Former President Obama and ex-First Lady Michelle Obama said in a joint statement that they believe Ms Harris has the “vision, the character, and the strength that this critical moment demands”.

Mr Obama was reportedly among more than 100 prominent Democrats Ms Harris spoke to after President Joe Biden announced last Sunday he was dropping out of the race.

In a statement at the time, Mr Obama praised Mr Biden’s exit, but stopped short of endorsing Ms Harris.

The US vice-president has already secured the support of a majority of Democratic delegates, setting her on course to become the official nominee at the party convention in August.

The Obamas said in Friday’s statement that they could not be “more thrilled to endorse” Ms Harris. They vowed to do “everything we can” to elect her.

“We agree with President Biden,” said the couple’s statement, “choosing Kamala was one of the best decisions he’s made. She has the resume to prove it.”

They cited her record as California’s attorney general, a US senator and then vice-president.

“But Kamala has more than a resume,” the statement continued. “She has the vision, the character, and the strength that this critical moment demands.

“There is no doubt in our mind that Kamala Harris has exactly what it takes to win this election and deliver for the American people.

“At a time when the stakes have never been higher, she gives us all reason to hope.”

The statement was accompanied by a video of Ms Harris taking a phone call from the Obamas in which they pledge their support.

“Oh my goodness,” says the vice-president in the clip. “Michelle, Barack, this means so much to me.”

Ms Harris has held a number of campaign events across the US in the days since Mr Biden withdrew from the race.

On Thursday, she addressed the American Federation of Teachers union in Houston.

While the event was billed as part of her vice-presidential duties, it had the air of a campaign rally, with loud applause and cheers from the audience.

Echoing language used in campaign events earlier in the week, Ms Harris took aim at what she termed “extremist” Republicans and “failed” policies.

“We want to ban assault weapons, and they want to ban books,” she said.

Meanwhile, Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump continued to pivot to assail his new rival.

“Lyin’ Kamala Harris is a radical left Marxist, and worse!” he said in a partially all-capital-letters post on his social media platform Truth Social.

Trump also refused to commit to a televised debate with Ms Harris until she is officially confirmed as the party’s nominee.

He suggested Democrats were “still holding out for someone ‘better'”.

Ms Harris has also had “frank and constructive” talks with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and told him it was time for the Israel-Gaza war to end.

Israel launched a campaign in Gaza to destroy Hamas in response to the attack on southern Israel last October, during which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

More than 39,000 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry.

Kamala Harris said she made clear her “serious concerns” about casualties in Gaza, telling Mr Netanyahu how Israel defended itself mattered.

Ms Harris also stressed the need for a path to a two-state solution.

The Israeli prime minister also met President Biden while on a trip to the White House, and will meet Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump on Friday.

The National Wax Museum in Dublin is “committed” to creating a new wax figure of Irish singer Sinéad O’Connor after significant public backlash.

It comes after the museum unveiled a waxwork of the late singer and activist to coincide with the one year anniversary of her death.

O’Connor was found dead at the age of 56 in her south London home last July.

The figure was first unveiled on Thursday as a tribute to her legacy and influence within music and Irish culture, but the museum has now said it will be removed in order to create “a more accurate representation”.

Among those who criticised the original figure was O’Connor’s brother, John.

He said he was shocked when he first saw the waxwork online and said it was “inappropriate”.

“It looked nothing like her and I thought it was hideous,” he told Irish broadcaster RTÉ’s Liveline radio programme on Friday.

He added that the figure looked “between a mannequin and something out of the Thunderbirds”.

A statement from the museum said: “In response to the public’s feedback regarding the wax figure, we acknowledge that the current representation did not meet our high standards or the expectations of Sinéad’s devoted fans.

“We have listened closely to the reactions and agree that the figure does not fully capture Sinéad’s unique presence and essence as we intended.”

The museum said O’Connor’s impact on music is “immeasurable” and its goal was to honour the late singer in the “most fitting and respectful manner”.

“With this in mind, we are committed to creating a new wax figure that better reflect’s Sinéad O’Connor’s true spirit and iconic image,” it added.

“Our team of skilled artists will begin this project immediately, ensuring that every detail is meticulously crafted to celebrate her legacy appropriately.”

It said the museum looks forward to unveiling a new figure that “truly honours” O’Connor and her “extraordinary impact”.

Sinéad Marie Bernadette O’Connor was born on 8 December 1966 in the affluent Glenageary suburb of Dublin.

Her debut album in 1987, The Lion and the Cobra, was a storming success, earning O’Connor a Grammy nomination for best female rock vocal performance.

But it was her 1990 Prince cover single Nothing Compares 2 U which saw her catapult to worldwide fame.

O’Connor was outspoken on subjects including religion, women’s rights and racism.

In 1992, she tore up a photo of Pope John Paul II while performing on US television programme Saturday Night Live in protest against child sexual abuse in the Catholic Church.

In 2018, she converted to Islam, changing her name to Shuhada Sadaqat.

However she continued to perform under her birth name.

On 26 July 2023, the musician was found unresponsive at her home in Herne Hill, south London and was later pronounced dead.

A coroner ruled that she died of natural causes.

An Australian field hockey player has opted to amputate part of his finger to compete at the Paris Olympics.

Matt Dawson badly broke a digit on his right hand during team training in Perth two weeks ago, and recovery from surgery to repair it would have taken months.

So, the 30-year-old decided to have the finger removed from the knuckle up in order to take part in his third Games, shocking his team-mates and coach.

He will take to the field with the Kookaburras as they face Argentina on Saturday, just 16 days after he was injured.

Dawson has told media the break was so bad that he passed out when he saw his finger in the changing room. He thought his Olympic dream was over.

He urgently consulted a plastic surgeon who said that even with surgery to repair the finger – and the long recovery time – it may not regain full function. But if it was amputated, he could be back playing in 10 days.

Despite being warned by his wife not to do anything “rash”, Dawson says he made his “informed” decision that same afternoon.

“I’m definitely closer to the end of my career than the start and, who knows, this could be my last [Olympics], and if I felt that I could still perform at my best then that’s what I was going to do,” he told the Parlez Vous Hockey podcast.

“If taking the top of my finger was the price I had to pay, that’s what I would do.”

Team captain Aran Zalewski said the decision sent ripples of shock around the squad, but ultimately, they supported Dawson.

“We didn’t really know what to think, and then we heard that he went to the hospital and chopped his finger off, which was pretty interesting because I know people would give an arm and a leg and even a little bit of finger to be here sometimes,” he said at a news conference in Paris.

“When you’ve spent a lifetime of choice and sacrifice to come and compete at the highest level, I think for him it was an easy decision.”

Earlier this week Kookaburras coach Colin Batch said Dawson was back training with the team.

“Full marks to Matt. Obviously he’s really committed to playing in Paris. I’m not sure I would have done it, but he’s done it, so great,” he told Australia’s Seven News Network.

It is not the first time Dawson has faced an extreme injury, nearly losing an eye after being hit by a hockey stick in the lead up to the 2018 Commonwealth Games.

He managed to still play for the Kookaburras as they won gold in that tournament, and again when they won a silver medal at the Tokyo Olympics.

As their ship started sinking rapidly into the sea, nine crew members onboard a cargo ship in Taiwan realised they did not have enough time to reach their life raft.

They decided to jump off the boat into sea, holding on to each other in groups.

On Thursday afternoon, Taiwan’s coast guard announced that one of the groups – made up of four Myanmar nationals – had been found. The captain of the ship was later on Friday found dead and four others are still missing.

They had all been working on the Tanzania-flagged Fu Shun, which capsized after Typhoon Gaemi made landfall on the island.

The vessel capsized at about 05:45 local time on Thursday (21:45 GMT Wednesday).

The nine Myanmar nationals said they decided to separate into two groups – one of five, and another of four.

All of them were wearing life jackets, but the survivors said they had watched as three of their colleagues in the other group, had their jackets swept away by high waves.

Search and rescue personnel said they had later found the body of the ship’s captain at about 06:55 on Friday. The other four in his group are still missing.

Locals found two of the survivors swept up on a beach in Kaohsiung at about 16:00 and brought them to a police station, while the Taiwanese Coast Guard rescued the other two at another part of the city’s coast later in the evening.

One of the survivors said he had swum backwards to retrieve a waist bag containing his passport, before swimming “with all his life” to reach the shore.

Another burst out crying after calling his family – he later told the coast guard that his wife and mother had thought he was dead after reading the news on Thursday.

Officials had earlier said the high waves and rough waters were hampering rescue efforts.

Photographs shared by the coast guard show the survivors clad in ponchos and towels for warmth, while coast guard staff tend to injuries on their arms and legs.

Eight other cargo ships carrying 79 crew members are still stranded in the stormy waters. The crew are safe, said Taiwan’s Ocean Affairs Council, adding that it is making effort to prevent potential oil spills.

Gaemi was downgraded to a tropical storm on Thursday evening, after leaving a trail of destruction in Taiwan and the Philippines and killing at least 21 people.

The storm made its second landfall in China’s southeastern Fujian province on Thursday evening.

Nearly 300,000 people have been evacuated and public transport suspended across eastern China on Friday.

Bangladesh’s leader has been accused of crying “crocodile tears” after she was photographed weeping at a train station that was destroyed during anti-government protests.

At least 150 people have been killed as a result of nationwide clashes between police and university students, with security forces accused of execessive force.

Protesters had been calling for quotas on government jobs to be scrapped.

Online, many accused Ms Hasina of not expressing the same level of sympathy towards those who had died, or their families.

The pictures were taken during Ms Hasina’s visit to a metro rail station in the city of Mirpur on Thursday, where ticket vending machines and the signalling control station were shattered. Ms Hasina was pictured frowning and wiping her tears with tissue paper.

“What kind of mentality leads them to destroy facilities that make people’s lives easier? Dhaka city was clogged with traffic. The metro rail offered respite. I cannot accept the destruction of this transport facility made with modern technology,” Bangladeshi daily The Business Standard quoted the prime minister as saying.

These comments drew the ire of Bangladeshi internet users.

“We lost [hundreds of] students. But PM Sheikh Hasina had the time to go “cry” for a metro rail, not for the people who won’t return ever again,” said one Twitter user.

“Shedding crocodile tears for a railway track while others [have died]….” another chimed in.

Journalist Zulkarnian Saer, who has in the past spoken out against the government, said: “Hasina had the time to visit the vandalised train station, but she did not visit [the families] of the students… shot dead [during protests].”

Some called the photographs an attempt to drive attention away from deaths from the protests.

“No doubt that she went there to … get some attention and empathy,” said one Facebook user.

Security forces have been accused of using excessive force to quell the unrest, but Ms Hasina had instead blamed her political opponents for the wave of violence.

Her government is working to “suppress these militants and create a better environment”, the 76-year-old said earlier this week, adding she was “forced” to impose a curfew for public safety.

The protests, mostly by university students, began about two weeks ago over quotas imposed on government jobs.

Bangladesh had earlier reserved about 30% of its high-paying government jobs for relatives of those who fought in the country’s war for independence from Pakistan in 1971.

On Sunday, Bangladesh’s top court rolled back most of these quotas and ruled that 93% of roles would now be filled on merit – meeting a key demand of protesters.

The wave of unrest is an unprecedented test for Ms Hasina, who secured her fourth straight term as prime minister in January, in a controversial election boycotted by the country’s main opposition parties.

Political analysts told the BBC that Ms Hasina’s authoritarian regime and “over-politicising” of Bangladesh’s war for independence from Pakistan in 1971 have angered large sections of society.

Limited internet connectivity was restored on Tuesday after a nationwide blackout since last Thursday.

Some student leaders have vowed to continue protesting to demand justice for protesters killed and detained in recent days. They are also seeking the resignation of government ministers and an apology from Ms Hasina.

“The ick” and “boop” are among more than 3,200 new words and phrases added to the Cambridge Dictionary this year.

The latest additions – which have gained prominence in online and youth culture in recent years – are expected to be more than a fleeting part of the English language.

Wendalyn Nichols, Cambridge Dictionary’s publishing manager, said that while language is constantly evolving, these new additions have “staying power”.

The dictionary defines “the ick”, popularised by the reality show Love Island, as “a sudden feeling that you dislike someone or something or are no longer attracted to someone because of something they do”.

It describes “boop” as “a gentle hit or touch” on the nose or head as a joke or to indicate affection.

The dictionary gives an example useage of “the ick” as: “I used to like Kevin, but seeing him in that suit gave me the ick.”

Other new terms include “IYKYK” – an abbreviation for “if you know you know” – and “face journey”, which denotes a series of expressions on a person’s face as they react to something.

“Chef’s kiss” was another phrase added. It is used to describe something deemed perfect or excellent.

It also means the movement “in which you put your fingers and thumb together, kiss them, then pull your hand away from your lips”.

Gaming terminology has also been incorporated into the latest edition, such as “speedrun” – completing a game or level quickly – and “side quest”, an ancillary activity within a game.

Colin McIntosh, Cambridge Dictionary’s programme manager, said: “These gaming-inspired words have also begun to influence how we talk about our offline lives.”

For instance, “side quest” can be used to mean one’s attention being diverted by something unimportant, or someone disappearing from a larger group on a night out.

At the end of last year, Cambridge Dictionary announced that “hallucinate” was its word of the year, as it had gained a new meaning since the development of artificial intelligence.

While the traditional definition is “to seem to see, hear, feel, or smell something that does not exist”, it now includes “when an artificial intelligence (AI) hallucinates, it produces false information”.

The latest additions to the English dictionary follow in the footsteps of other terminology coined in the modern age, including “selfie” and “babyccino”.

Meanwhile, “rizz” was named as word of the year by Oxford University Press in 2023.

The Gen Z slang for “style, charm or attractiveness” or “the ability to attract a romantic or sexual partner” won out over other contenders, such as “Swiftie” – an enthusiastic fan of Taylor Swift – and “situationship”, an informal romantic or sexual relationship.

A humanitarian crisis is unfolding in the north of Ethiopia, driven by drought, crop failure and continued insecurity in the aftermath of a brutal war.

With local officials warning that more than two million people are now at risk of starvation, the BBC has gained exclusive access to some of the worst affected areas in Tigray province, and analysed satellite imagery to reveal the full scale of the emergency the region now faces.

The month of July is a critical period for food security, when farmers need to plant crops to take advantage of the seasonal rains.

The satellite images we have identified show that reservoirs, and the farmlands they help irrigate, have dried up because the rains failed last year. They now need to be replenished by seasonal rains if farmers are to stand any hope of a successful season later in the year.

The images below are of the Korir dam and reservoir, about 45km (28 miles) north of the regional capital, Mekele.

A small lake with an artificial barrier, known as a micro-dam, is clearly visible in the first photograph, taken in June 2023. Below the dam is fertile land irrigated by the reservoir.

Systems such as this have been able to support more than 300 farmers growing wheat, vegetables and sorghum – a grain crop.

The lower image shows the same area in June 2024, with the reservoir empty and parched fields.

Without adequate rainfall, the irrigation system cannot operate and farmers are unable to survive off the land.

“Even though our dam has no water, our land will not go anywhere,” says Demtsu Gebremedhin who used to farm tomatoes, onions and sorghum.

“So we don’t give up and we hope we will go back to farming.”

Tigray’s population is estimated to be between six and seven million.

Until the end of 2022, the region was engulfed in a bitter two-year war pitting local Tigray forces against the federal government and its allies.

It is estimated that hundreds of thousands of people were killed in the conflict, or died because of starvation and lack of health care.

Dozens of displacement camps were set up to provide refuge, and humanitarian support.

Now the war is over, some have been able to return home – but most have remained in camps, reliant on food aid being delivered there because the lack of rainfall has meant they have no crops to harvest and eat.

One of these camps is near the town of Shire about 280km (174 miles) by road to the west of the Korir dam. Set up by UN agencies, it now provides shelter to more than 30,000 people.

The blue tents seen in this satellite image have been provided by the International Organization of Migration (IOM) and the white by the UN refugee agency (UNHCR).

Tsibktey Teklay looks after five of her children in the camp. Her husband was killed in the war.

“We had animals. We used to harvest crops in winter,” she told the BBC in May. “In short, we had the best lifestyle. Now we are down to nothing.”

In the camp, she does some cooking and some handicraft work to earn money, but some of her children have had to beg.

“I hope I will get my land back at least. Food grown on our land is better than food aid,” she says.

“If we can return to our home town, our children can work or go to school.

“So I hope that after our miserable life here, this will be the best future for them.”

The BBC has spoken to doctors at a hospital in the town of Endabaguna, some 20km (12 miles) south of Shire about their growing concerns.

“We’ve been treating increasing numbers of children in recent months,” says the hospital’s medical director, Dr Gebrekristos Gidey.

One woman – 20-year-old Abeba Yeshalem – gave birth prematurely as a result of malnutrition, he says.

At the hospital, Abeba told us: “My husband went away to study, leaving me on my own, and he was unable to help me financially. I don’t have enough food to feed either myself or the baby.“

The dozens of children being treated are not only from families living in the camps, but also those from the nearby towns.

“We don’t have the resources to care for all those in need,” says Dr Gebrekristos.

The region is facing its most critical time of the year, known as the “peak hunger season” according to Dr Gebrehiwet Gebregzabher, head of the Disaster Risk Management Commission in Tigray.

It is a time when food supplies traditionally run low – and crops must be planted to be ready for the October harvest.

“There are 2.1 million people that are at risk of starvation,” he tells the BBC, “with a further 2.4 million relying on an uncertain aid supply.“

Data obtained from the Ethiopian government’s meteorology agency shows the consequence of poor rains last year.

Tigray’s northern regions and neighbouring Afar both suffered from drought.

To the south of Ethiopia, heavy rains caused flooding, with damage to crops and livestock.

Rainfall in January and February this year was also below normal in large parts of Tigray, although it improved in some areas in March.

Famine “creeps up in the darkness” warns Prof Alex de Waal, executive director of the advocacy group, the World Peace Foundation at Tufts University. He says too little attention is being paid to the crisis.

“Famines are man-made, so the men who make them like to conceal the evidence and hide their role,” he says.

He says the current situation in Tigray has echoes of the catastrophic famine of 1984 in which as many as a million people died of starvation.

“In 1984, the Ethiopian government wanted the world to believe that its revolution heralded a bright new era of prosperity, and foreign donors refused to believe warnings of starvation until they saw pictures of dying children on the BBC news.”

Aid agencies have mapped the scale of the crisis facing Ethiopia based on a range of factors, including failed rains, ongoing insecurity and a lack of access for aid distributions.

The Famine Early Warning Systems Network (Fews Net) describes parts of Tigray, along with neighbouring Afar and Amhara, as facing an emergency

The federal government in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa disputes these warnings of critical food shortages.

Shiferaw Teklemariam, head of Ethiopia’s national Disaster Risk Management Commission, told the BBC that based on official assessments “there are no looming dangers of famine and starvation in Tigray…[or] elsewhere in Ethiopia.”

He added that officials were “doing their best” to address the challenges facing the country and that “beneficiaries most in need” would continue to be prioritised.

Relations between the Ethiopian government and aid agencies have been strained in recent years, amid allegations from the UN that food aid was being blocked from reaching Tigray during the conflict there.

In 2021, the federal government denied reports of hunger in Tigray and expelled seven senior UN workers, accusing them of “meddling in the internal affairs of the country”.

Then in June last year, the UN’s World Food Programme and the US Agency for International Development (USAID) suspended all food aid to Ethiopia, saying they had uncovered evidence that government and military officials were stealing humanitarian supplies.

Deliveries were only resumed in November.

There have also been public disputes within Ethiopia about the severity of the situation.

In February, after Ethiopia’s ombudsman reported nearly 400 deaths from hunger in the country, including in Tigray, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed said: “There are no people dying due to hunger in Ethiopia.”

In response to these political tensions, Alex de Waal says aid agencies which are “strapped for cash and averse to controversy” have been slow to respond to the current crisis.

A spokesperson for USAID told the BBC they “continue to urge the government of Ethiopia and other donors to increase funding to the humanitarian needs of the most vulnerable”.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) says the funding currently available is “insufficient to meet the extensive humanitarian needs”, but the resources available are channelled “to the most urgent, life-saving response.”

“They look for him everywhere and the man is not even hidden” go the lyrics to a song by Los Tucanes de Tijuana, in honour of Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada.

The famous 76-year-old drug trafficker, one of the three founders and, until now, leader of Mexico’s Sinaloa cartel, was arrested on Thursday by the US authorities.

Also in custody is Joaquín Guzmán López, the 38-year-old son of the cartel’s other founder, the infamous Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán – who has been serving a life sentence in the US since 2019.

Citing Mexican and US officials, the Wall Street Journal reports that Zambada was tricked into boarding the plane by a high-ranking Sinaloa member following a months-long operation by Homeland Security Investigations and the FBI.

It is an unprecedented blow to two of the most wanted drug traffickers in the world, accused of extortion, corruption, drug trafficking and money laundering.

El Mayo, also known as “The Man with the Hat”, has attracted admiration and notoriety over five decades in the business.

Los Tucanes’ song, which has 10 million views on YouTube, continues: “The law wants to stop him, the enemies want to kill him, but no one has succeeded – the devil appears to them.”

Zambada’s rise from common trafficker to “capo de capos” (boss of bosses), as he is often called, is a story of pragmatism, cunning and corruption.

After a short stint as a furniture deliveryman on the streets of Culiacán, a city in northwestern Mexico, Zambada began his underworld career as a trafficker in the 1970s.

He first worked for the Guadalajara cartel, a pioneer in the industry, which traded opium, marijuana and, eventually, cocaine.

He then worked in the Juárez cartel, first as a middle manager and then as a leader, becoming increasingly close to Amado Carrillo, the so-called “Lord of the Skies”.

From there, it is believed that he created a network of contacts in Colombia, the country where he went on to make great friends and cocaine-producing partners.

As other bosses died or fell, Zambada became more powerful. He rarely had a problem with betraying an ally.

But if anything differentiates him from other drug lords, it is that he always kept a low profile. There are almost no images of him.

It has been reported that he has had surgeries to change his appearance. That he is 1.8m tall. That he is big and strong. That he has many wives and children. But little more.

One of El Mayo’s sons, Vicente Zambada Niebla, was detained by the Mexican authorities in 2009. His prison diary was later released.

In it, and in the testimony he gave to the US authorities, Zambada junior said that his father budgeted $1m per month for bribes, and that his network of complicity included banks and governments.

El Mayo has also reportedly been one of the drug traffickers most concerned about generating a bond with his community.

He has been a patron of El Álamo, his native ranchería, and other towns in the Sinaloa region, financing their works and celebrations.

Little is known about Joaquín Guzmán López, who was detained alongside Zambada on Thursday.

The 38-year-old man, known as El Güero, is the son of El Chapo and Griselda López Pérez, the drug trafficker’s second wife.

El Chapo had 10 children with three women: Alejandrina Salazar, Griselda López and Emma Coronel.

Joaquín is a member of Los Chapitos, a cell made up of El Chapo’s children, including Joaquín’s brother Ovidio, who was extradited to the United States in September last year, following his arrest in Mexico in January 2023.

Some consider Joaquín’s role in the criminal organisation secondary to Ovidio’s. However, the US State Department states that Joaquín performed “high-level command and control functions” in both the Los Chapitos group and the Sinaloa cartel.

US authorities maintain that after the death of Chapo’s older son Edgar, Joaquín and Ovidio inherited much of the profits from narcotics sales and began investing large amounts of cash in purchasing marijuana in Mexico and cocaine in Colombia.

According to a former associates of El Chapo, Joaquín and Ovidio were also involved in helping the drug lord escape from a maximum security prison in Mexico in 2015 – his second prison escape after charges related to murder and drug trafficking in 1993.

US authorities also maintain that Joaquín and Ovidio Guzmán López run at least 11 laboratories that produce methamphetamine in the Mexican state of Sinaloa.

Joaquín was first indicted on federal drug trafficking charges in 2018 in the US.

Thomas Matthew Crooks walked into Donald Trump’s election rally in Pennsylvania, unopposed with a gun, explosives and a rangefinder to measure distance to his target.

The aftermath of the 13 July shooting reveals a detailed plan hatched in the days before – and a series of security failings that allowed its execution.

Three congressional hearings were held this week with the head of the FBI, the Secret Service’s director and Pennsylvania’s state police chief.

Here is what those hearings have added to what is known about the attempt on Trump’s life, what went wrong, and important unanswered questions.

It is becoming clear that Crooks’ attack was not the result of a last-minute meltdown: He had method, and purpose.

The FBI has said that 6 July appeared to be the inception date: Crooks registered to attend Trump’s rally, and researched the assassination of President John F Kennedy, googling: “How far away was Oswald from Kennedy?”

“That’s a search that’s obviously significant in terms of his state of mind,” Christopher Wray, the FBI’s director, told the House Judiciary committee on Wednesday. He added that searches by Crooks then became “focused” on Trump.

He was working alone – the FBI say they do not think he received any help.

There was also reconnaissance. Mr Wray said Crooks was flying a drone about 200 yards (183m) from the stage two hours before Trump’s rally.

Its camera ran for about 11 minutes, Mr Wray said, and the footage would have shown “a rear-view mirror of the scene” behind Crooks’ eventual firing position.

Mr Wray said that Crooks had bought an AR-15-style rifle from his father, legally, although he did not say when. The gun had a collapsible stock, making it easier to conceal.

State police officers reported him using a rangefinder, a marksman aid that measures distance to a target, as the rally got under way.

Crooks had also obtained explosives: two “crude” devices fitted with receivers were found in Crooks’ car after the attack, Mr Wray said, and a transmitter was found on his body.

A bloodied receipt was also found on Crooks for a 5ft ladder, Mr Wray said – suggesting a recent buy. No ladder was found at the site, however, and Mr Wray said Crooks had used “mechanical equipment” to get to his perch – but did not elaborate.

And so Crooks turned up on the day with a concealable rifle, knowledge of previous assassinations, a rangefinder, two bombs, and detailed information on the layout of the area.

It should be impossible for a man to walk into a presidential rally with so much gear, let alone carry it up to an undefended roof with a direct line of sight to the stage. But this is exactly what happened in Butler.

Statements to the House Homeland Security committee by Pennsylvania’s police commissioner, Christopher Paris, convey a series of lapses from law enforcement.

The venue had two layers of security – an outer area patrolled by state police and an inner perimeter manned by Secret Service agents, including an anti-sniper team on a roof behind the stage.

An operations centre was staffed by members of the various agencies present. But on the day, communication was haphazard and areas of responsibility unclear.

Mr Paris told his hearing that state police were responsible for the area around the AGR International warehouse, the building from which Crooks fired that was around 400ft (122m) from the stage with a clear line of sight.

He revealed his men had raised its risk in the days before the rally and were told by the Secret Service that it was a state police matter as it was in the outer area.

As a consequence, a local SWAT-style Emergency Services Unit (ESU) team was stationed inside the building complex, Mr Paris added.

The New York Times reported that the team was in fact two men who stayed inside because of the hot weather. The plan had been approved by the Secret Service, the newspaper’s source said.

Kimberly Cheatle, director of the Secret Service until she stepped down this week, told lawmakers she could not account for why no one was stationed on the roof.

Mr Paris said the first sighting of Crooks came from a state police ESU unit.

Unlike others in the crowd, Crooks was walking around and did not try to enter the venue, he said. “Crooks never made it through the secure perimeter.”

He was not challenged. Mr Paris said he was one of three people flagged as “suspicious” at this point in the event.

About 25 minutes before the rally began, however, Mr Paris said that the ESU team spotted him again – this time using his rangefinder, though no gun was reported.

This is perhaps the point where security broke down irrevocably.

A photograph of Crooks was sent by a member of the ESU team to a state trooper in the joint operations room. Mr Paris said that a Secret Service liaison asked the trooper to send the photo to another number.

At this point, it seems that agents charged with protecting Trump did not consider Crooks dangerous enough to act – no weapon had been spotted.

During her fractious hearing before the House Oversight committee on Monday, Ms Cheatle acknowledged her agents were told about Crooks at least twice before the shooting began.

She said that agents only became aware of the gravity of the threat “seconds before the gunfire started”.

Mr Paris said several local police, including the ESU team, then began searching for Crooks. It appears he was lost again, despite his growing threat.

Witnesses told the BBC that by this point they had seen a man with a gun crawling along a roof. All of this was happening with Trump already on stage.

Mr Paris said that Crooks was eventually seen on the roof by local traffic police and his ESU team. One traffic officer boosted up to the roof by a colleague was forced to fall back after being confronted by Crooks, Mr Paris told the hearing.

That confrontation, the commissioner said, happened “a matter of seconds” before the shooting.

Agents surrounded Trump immediately after the first shots, and he was off the stage within two minutes. By this point Crooks had been shot dead by a sniper.

A video recorded on the roof about an hour after the attack shows snipers and Secret Service agents trying to understand who saw what and when, adding to the sense of confusion among law enforcement.

Eight bullet casings were found near his body. He had killed one crowd member and injured two others.

In his evidence to Congress, Mr Wray said that with respect to Trump there was “still some question of whether or not a bullet or shrapnel hit his ear”.

Trump has said he “took a bullet for democracy” but has given no official information about his medical care.

Trump was on stage for around 10 minutes between the moment Crooks was spotted on the roof with a gun and the moment he fired his first shot.

There is almost no public account of the Secret Service’s actions and decisions during the rally. Ms Cheatle declined to answer most of the questions put to her in Congress – down to how many agents were protecting Trump.

We do know, via Ms Cheatle, that agents dismissed the alerts about him because he was not seen with a weapon.

She could not provide her hearing a detailed timeline, as requested, saying she “did not have specifics”.

She quit as director of the Secret Service a day after her hearing, under pressure from both sides of the House, and it seems we won’t get answers any time soon.

More than a week on, we still do not know of any specific ideology or belief that drove Crooks to do what he did.

Mr Wray of the FBI told his hearing that a motive was one of the “central questions” of his bureau’s investigations.

However, he said that interviews with Crooks’ associates and searches of his home and online history did not give a “clear picture”.

Analysis of the gunman’s phone showed that he had “done a lot of searches” for news articles – but there was no pattern, Mr Wray added.

Investigators were still decrypting messages on the phone, he said.

We know he donated $15 to a Democratic Party platform shortly after the Capitol riot of 2021, then months later registered as a Republican.

No “manifesto” has been found.

What he planned to do with his explosives, meanwhile, remains unclear – Mr Wray said that while his bombs were viable, their receivers were off and Crooks would not have been able to detonate them remotely.

Once upon a time, the vulture was an abundant and ubiquitous bird in India.

The scavenging birds hovered over sprawling landfills, looking for cattle carcasses. Sometimes they would alarm pilots by getting sucked into jet engines during airport take-offs.

But more than two decades ago, India’s vultures began dying because of a drug used to treat sick cows.

By the mid-1990s, the 50 million-strong vulture population had plummeted to near zero because of diclofenac, a cheap non-steroidal painkiller for cattle that is fatal to vultures. Birds that fed on carcasses of livestock treated with the drug suffered from kidney failure and died.

Since the 2006 ban on veterinary use of diclofenac, the decline has slowed in some areas, but at least three species have suffered long-term losses of 91-98%, according to the latest State of India’s Birds report.

And that’s not all, according to a new peer-reviewed study. The unintentional decimation of these heavy, scavenging birds allowed deadly bacteria and infections to proliferate, leading to the deaths of about half a million people over five years, says the study published in the American Economic Association journal.

“Vultures are considered nature’s sanitation service because of the important role they play in removing dead animals that contain bacteria and pathogens from our environment – without them, disease can spread,” says the study’s co-author, Eyal Frank, an assistant professor at University of Chicago’s Harris School of Public Policy.

“Understanding the role vultures play in human health underscores the importance of protecting wildlife, and not just the cute and cuddly. They all have a job to do in our ecosystems that impacts our lives.”

Mr Frank and his co-author Anant Sudarshan compared human death rates in Indian districts that once thrived with vultures to those with historically low vulture populations, both before and after the vulture collapse. They also examined rabies vaccine sales, feral dog counts and pathogen levels in the water supply.

They found that after anti-inflammatory drug sales had risen and vulture populations had collapsed, human death rates increased by more than 4% in districts where the birds once thrived.

The researchers also found that the effect was greatest in urban areas with large livestock populations where carcass dumps were common.

The authors estimated that between 2000 and 2005, the loss of vultures caused around 100,000 additional human deaths annually, resulting in more than $69bn (£53bn) per year in mortality damages or the economic costs associated with premature deaths.

These deaths were due to the spread of disease and bacteria that vultures would have otherwise removed from the environment.

For example, without vultures, the stray dog population increased, bringing rabies to humans.

Rabies vaccine sales rose during that time but were insufficient. Unlike vultures, dogs were ineffective at cleaning rotting remains, leading to bacteria and pathogens spreading into drinking water through runoff and poor disposal methods. Faecal bacteria in the water more than doubled.

“The vulture collapse in India provides a particularly stark example of the type of hard-to-reverse and unpredictable costs to humans that can come from the loss of a species,” says Mr Sudarshan, an associate professor at the University of Warwick and co-author of the study.

“In this case, new chemicals were to blame, but other human activities – habitat loss, wildlife trade, and now climate change – have an impact on animals and, in turn, on us. It’s important to understand these costs and target resources and regulations towards preserving especially these keystone species.”

Of the vulture species in India, the white-rumped vulture, Indian vulture and red-headed vulture have suffered the most significant long-term declines since the early 2000s, with populations dropping by 98%, 95% and 91%, respectively. The Egyptian vulture and the migratory griffon vulture have also declined significantly, but less catastrophically.

The 2019 livestock census in India recorded more than 500 million animals, the highest in the world. Vultures, highly efficient scavengers, were historically relied upon by farmers to swiftly remove livestock carcasses. The decline of vultures in India is the fastest ever recorded for a bird species and the largest since the passenger pigeon’s extinction in the US, according to researchers.

India’s remaining vulture populations are now concentrated around protected areas where their diet consists more of dead wildlife than potentially contaminated livestock, according to the State of Indian Birds report. These continuing declines suggest “ongoing threats for vultures, which is of particular concern given that vulture declines have negatively affected human well-being”.

Experts warn that veterinary drugs still pose a major threat to vultures. The dwindling availability of carcasses, due to increased burial and competition from feral dogs, exacerbates the problem. Quarrying and mining can disrupt nesting habitats for some vulture species.

Will the vultures come back? It is difficult to say, though there are some promising signs. Last year, 20 vultures – bred in captivity and fitted with satellite tags and rescued – were released from a tiger reserve in West Bengal. More than 300 vultures were recorded in the recent survey in southern India. But more action is required.

Ten years ago, musician Usman Riaz grabbed a pencil and started to sketch.

He might have hoped, but didn’t know at the time, that it would start him on a path to making history.

That initial drawing became The Glassworker – Pakistan’s first ever hand-drawn animated feature film.

It follows the story of young Vincent and his father Tomas, who run a glass workshop, and a war that threatens to upend their lives.

Vincent’s relationship with violinist Alliz, the daughter of a military colonel, begins to test the bond between father and son.

Usman tells BBC Asian Network the characters ultimately come to learn “that life is beautiful but fragile, like glass”.

He describes The Glassworker as an “anti-war film” set in an ambiguous and fantastical world that takes inspiration from his home country.

“I wanted to tackle issues and themes that would have been difficult to tackle if it was based in Pakistan,” he says.

The country doesn’t have the thriving film industry of neighbouring India and there is no government support or incentive for budding creatives like Usman.

So The Glassworker was a passion project, he says.

“These 10 years for me have just been purely driven with passion and obsession.

“Since I was a child, I have loved hand-drawn animation and there’s something so magical about it.

“The beauty of the lines drawn and painted by the human hand always resonated with me.”

Usman says he travelled the world looking for mentors and his search took him to Japanese animation house Studio Ghibli.

The influence of the Oscar-winning artists behind classics such as Spirited Away and Princess Mononoke can be seen in The Glassworker’s own style.

Usman says the industry veterans at Ghibli were also the ones who encouraged him to start the production himself.

After raising $116,000 through a 2016 crowdfunding campaign he founded his own studio, Mano Animations.

From there it’s been a painstaking process, especially since full production started in 2019.

“What you are watching is essentially a moving painting,” says Usman.

“Every single frame you see, whether it’s a background or the character moving, it’s all drawn by hand.”

Usman says that, so far, he hasn’t made any money from the project and has been unable to pay his wife Maryam and cousin Khizer, who he recruited to help him.

But there’s hope that the labour of love could be the start of something bigger.

Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy is another experienced industry figure Usman turned to for advice about getting The Glassworker off the ground.

She directed 3 Bahadur, a computer-generated tale that was Pakistan’s first-ever animated feature film.

On its 2015 release it broke box office records, even surpassing US imports and dethroning previous record-holder Rio 2.

Her studio was also the country’s first female-led animation studio, and she understands the challenges of getting started better than most.

“Everything in Pakistan is driven by passion” she says. “I had to run pillar to post.

“We’re a country that has limited access to electricity and our industry is heavily taxed.

“We’re unable to import computers and hardware needed for animation.”

But Sharmeen – who is going to direct upcoming Star Wars film New Jedi Order – says The Glassworker could be a “monumental step” for Pakistan’s animation scene.

If it finds commercial success, she believes it will “ignite” something in the country, but there are barriers to home-grown animation becoming a red-hot trend.

Arafat Mazhar from Lahore-based Puffball animation agrees that “the technical skills are already there” in Pakistan despite there being “no formal training or schools available”.

But “how do you not censor yourself?” he asks.

It’s a question facing any Pakistani filmmaker who has to deal with its strict board of film censors.

“Every time there’s a good film that comes out that’s sincere, the state ends up censoring it,” says Arafat.

He doesn’t believe the rules are likely to relax soon.

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Sharmeen agrees the government will only encourage the domestic film industry to grow if they work to “provide opportunity to create a level playing field for us to compete with the rest of the world”.

“There is a lot of scope in Pakistan for animation,” she says. “We’ve just never been given the opportunity to create it.”

She shares Arafat’s pessimism about the pace of change.

“Unfortunately, it will just be a few filmmakers who have that passion, who will continue to create films,” she says.

But Sharmeen says she is eager to see how the world embraces The Glassworker.

“I know that there is so much in there that will touch people’s hearts,” she says.

Usman will finally get to find out how audiences react to the work he’s spent 10 years pouring his energy into as The Glassworker goes on general release.

He says he hopes to “put Pakistan on the map” and show it can stand up to the giants across the border in Bollywood.

But he admits the process has been “gruelling”.

“It is extremely difficult, but we’ve done something nobody has ever done in the country before,” he says.

“I think we’ve created something special that can stand toe-to-toe with the rest of the animation produced in the world.”

Listen to Ankur Desai’s show on BBC Asian Network live from 15:00-18:00 Monday to Thursday – or listen back here.

The first F-16 fighter jets are set to arrive in Ukraine from Nato member states, after many months of preparation and pilot training.

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky has said they are essential to help Ukrainians push back against Russia’s aerial dominance and “unblock the skies”.

Russian forces have been preparing for the Ukrainian F-16s too.

They have targeted a number of Ukrainian military airfields and there are growing concerns that these long-awaited jets will be attacked and destroyed soon after they arrive.

In July alone, at least three airfields have come under attack: Myrhorod and Kryvyi Rih in central Ukraine and one in southern Odesa region.

Moscow claims it has destroyed five Ukrainian Su-27 fighter jets and one MiG-29, along with a radar and valuable Patriot air defence launchers.

Kyiv authorities are keeping mostly silent and the air force has refused a BBC request for comment, claiming on social media that the destroyed jets and air defence system were in reality decoys that had cost Russia several expensive Iskander missiles.

Decoys or not, Ukraine’s allies, and many Ukrainians themselves, fear there may be insufficient protection for the US-built F-16s.

Until now the Ukrainian air force has largely relied on “dispersed operations” to ensure its warplanes are not hit on the ground, according to Prof Justin Bronk, senior research fellow for air power and technology at Royal United Service Institute.

Planes and equipment are regularly moved around within or between bases, he explains, so “if Russia does launch an airstrike, they’ll probably just hit an empty tarmac or grass”.

But that may have to change if Ukraine is to protect its valuable fleet of Western aircraft from Russian missiles.

F-16s require perfectly smooth runways swept clear of stones and other small items of debris, if they are not to run the risk of engine failure.

Any attempt to improve the infrastructure on existing bases will become visible to “Russian observation whether orbital or human intelligence sources,” Prof Bronk believes.

Until recently, Russia would have relied on surveillance or satellite imagery to spy on Ukraine’s air bases, so it never knew for sure if its missiles had struck their targets.

Now it has spy drones such as Zala, Supercam and Orlans that can send real-time images from deep inside Ukrainian territory, avoiding Ukraine’s electronic detection and jamming systems.

Drone unit commander Oleksandr Karpyuk says the drones can now be pre-programmed to fly long distance in radio silence.

Russian defence ministry video showing the attack on Myrhorod airbase earlier this month appears to show the moment Iskander ballistic missiles hit the area where several jets were parked.

There is no indication that the F-16s have yet arrived in Ukraine, although Kyiv-based aviation expert Anatoliy Khrapchynsky suggests Russian forces are “probing” Ukrainian airfields because they believe they might be.

Only this month US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the transfer of F-16s was already under way from Denmark and the Netherlands.

Some 65 F-16s have been pledged by Nato countries.

When in theatre they will roughly double the number of fighter jets currently at Ukraine’s disposal, which are all Soviet-era MiG-29s and Su-27s.

For Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelensky they cannot come a moment too soon, after an 18-month wait.

He had originally opened for twice as many as the 65 he has been promised, such is the need for fighter aircraft to carry out key types of mission:

• Suppression of Enemy Air Defences – SEAD missions – the military is desperate to take out Russia’s surface to air missile systems
• Air Interdiction operations, to disrupt, delay or destroy Russia’s ground forces
• Defensive Counter Air (DCA), to protect Ukrainian territory from Russian aircraft and missiles.

These defensive missions are for the moment perhaps the most important.

This year Ukraine has been under huge threat from Russian glide bombs, which are basically dumb bombs fitted with pop-out wing kits and guidance modules to deliver precision strike stand-off capabilities, similar to the JDAM munitions from the United States.

Russia is churning out these add-on kits and these souped-up bombs have been wreaking havoc on the front lines.

Around 3,000 were dropped in March alone, mostly from Su-34 fighter-bombers.

If Ukraine can protect its F-16s on the ground, the hope is that they could play an important part in pushing back the Russian aircraft to a point where the glide bombs can no longer target Ukrainian ground forces.

The F-16s would work alongside the limited number of Western-supplied surface to air missile systems such as Patriot and NASAMS which are already on the ground.

The warplanes will be armed with AIM-120 AMRAAM air-to-air missiles, which can turn “autonomous” and self-guide to target after a certain distance from launch.

Currently Ukraine’s Soviet-era aircraft use missiles that require a constant “lock” on a Russian plane throughout the targeting and launching phase.

That places the Ukrainian jets under greater threat because they cannot fire a missile and then turn away, which the F-16s can do.

Not everyone believes the F-16s will be able to protect Ukraine’s frontline towns.

If the jets fly high, they will be vulnerable to Russia’s air defence systems, warns Prof Bronk. If they fly low, they will have to fly deeper into Russian territory to give their missiles sufficient range. And that carries even greater risks.

Rather than seeing the F16s as potential targets, Anatoliy Khrapchynsky argues they will only enhance Ukraine’s air defences, because of their ability to intercept cruise missiles while Patriot batteries shoot down ballistic missiles.

Each airbase will have crews on shift that will take off in case of an aerial threat.

But the problem is that Ukraine is facing a big shortage of Patriots and missiles for them. President Zelensky says Ukraine needs at least 25 Patriot defence systems to protect its skies and it has only a handful.

The F-16s won’t necessarily turn the tide of the war, but they will have a significant impact in attacks on the ground and in the air.

The question is whether there will be enough of them, and whether they can be protected on the ground.

Venezuelans will be going to the polls on Sunday in the most tensely awaited presidential election in more than a decade.

Opposition supporters think that they stand a real chance of ousting the incumbent, President Nicolás Maduro, from office after 11 years.

Meanwhile, Mr Maduro, who is running for a third consecutive term, has painted the election in stark terms, warning that a defeat for his socialist PSUV party could trigger “a bloodbath”.

Here, we look at five things you need to know about the polls and how we got here.

This election could bring a change of government to Venezuela after 25 years in which it has been run by the socialist PSUV party – first under the leadership of the late President Hugo Chávez, and after his death from cancer in 2013, under his protegee, Nicolás Maduro.

During this quarter of a century, the PSUV has come to dominate key institutions in the country.

A PSUV-led coalition holds 256 out of 277 seats in the National Assembly, Venezuela’s legislative body.

This almost total control of the legislature has in turn allowed the Maduro government to take control of two other key institutions whose members are chosen by the National Assembly:

• Supreme Tribunal of Justice – Venezuela’s highest court
• National Electoral Council (CNE) – the body responsible for organising elections

With the government in control of the executive, the legislative and, to a large extent, the judiciary, democracy has been undermined.

A divided opposition has in the past failed to pose a serious challenge to the Maduro Administration.

Its strategy of boycotting elections because they were not free and fair resulted in Mr Maduro being re-elected in 2018 in an election widely dismissed as a sham, and in the National Assembly being almost completely in his party’s hands.

But the main opposition parties, which have now united behind one candidate, have dropped their election boycott, arguing that even though they have been hampered and harassed by the government along the way, this presidential election constitutes their best chance to oust Mr Maduro from power.

They point to opinion polls which suggest their candidate, Edmundo González, has an overwhelming lead over Mr Maduro and argue that support for Mr González is so overwhelming that it will thwart any potential attempts by the government to steal the election.

Mr González has said that if he wins, he will restore the independence of Venezuela’s institutions.

Another win for Mr Maduro is expected to allow him to further tighten his grip on power and to curtail the activities of the opposition even more.

The result of the election will have repercussions well beyond the South American country of 29.4 million inhabitants.

Over the past 10 years, 7.8 million Venezuelans have fled the country because of the economic and political crisis into which the country was plunged under the Maduro Administration.

Polls conducted in the run-up to the election suggest that exodus is only going to increase if President Maduro wins another term.

One poll put the number of those saying they would leave if Mr Maduro is re-elected at 10% of the current population. Another even suggested a third of the population could emigrate.

Either way, the number of those planning to leave the country in case of a Maduro win is expected to increase.

While the majority of Venezuelans have migrated to other Latin American countries, a sizeable number have chosen the United States as their destination.

With immigration a hot topic in the US election, who emerges victorious in Venezuela will therefore be closely watched in Washington, as well as in Latin American countries to which Venezuelans have emigrated en masse.

Relations between Mr Maduro and his US counterparts have been rocky.

The Venezuelan leader blames US sanctions for his country’s economic woes and has forged close alliances with China, Iran, and Russia – nations which also have a thorny relationship with the US.

A change of government could see Venezuela turn away from these countries as well as from its close ally, Cuba.

Who Venezuela does business with matters because the Andean country has the world’s biggest oil reserve.

Its oil output has plummeted under President Maduro – the result of a combination of lack of investment, mismanagement and oil sanctions.

A lifting of the oil sanctions – imposed by the US in order to exert pressure on Mr Maduro following the 2018 presidential election which was widely dismissed as neither free nor fair – could have repercussions on the price of oil globally.

While opposition supporters have united behind Edmundo González, the person who inspired hope in the opposition ranks that Mr Maduro can be defeated is María Corina Machado.

Ms Machado won an opposition primary held in October 2023 with 93% of the roughly 2.3 million votes cast.

What made the result even more extraordinary was that she was barred from running for public office at the time.

She appealed against the ban, but it was upheld by the Supreme Court, which is dominated by government loyalists.

Her handpicked stand-in, Corina Yoris, was prevented from registering as a candidate and it was only then that Mr González was chosen as a “provisional” candidate.

However, the soft-spoken and low-key former diplomat managed to gain the trust of the opposition parties in the following weeks and Mr González was picked as their unity candidate.

Ms Machado has thrown her weight behind him and criss-crossed the country campaigning for Mr González and the two have formed a powerful alliance.

The ban imposed on Ms Machado by the then comptroller general, Elvis Amoroso, is just one of the many difficulties the opposition has faced.

Since the beginning of the year, more than 100 of its campaign activists have been jailed.

Ms Machado has been stopped at roadblocks, her car was vandalised and damaged, and restaurants that had served her were closed down.

Many observers fear that Maduro and his allies will do everything in their power to stay in the presidential palace.

There have been reports of many anomalies and changes which benefit the governing party, including the fact that the majority of the 7.8 million Venezuelans living abroad were not able to register.

With the National Electoral Council (CNE) – the body which organises elections and announces their results – dominated by government allies and led by Elvis Amoroso, the same man who banned Ms Machado from running for office, many fear that Maduro allies could resort to fraud.

This fear has been further stoked by the fact that Mr Amoroso revoked the invitation to European Union election observers to monitor the polls.

The ex-President of Argentina, Alberto Fernández, was also uninvited after he said that the Maduro government should accept a possible defeat at the polls and Brazil suspended its observer mission after being criticised by President Maduro.

Now, only four observers from the United Nations and a handful of technical observers from the Carter Center will be present at the election.

The Carter Center has already warned that “given its limited size and scope, the Center’s mission will not conduct a comprehensive assessment of the voting, counting, and tabulation processes”.

Voting in Venezuela is electronic. Voters punch in a button assigned to their preferred candidate on a voting machine.

The machine prints out a paper receipt which is then placed in a ballot box.

The electronic results are sent to the CNE headquarters and should be made public shortly after the polling booths close.

The opposition is planning to deploy thousands of witnesses to monitor the count of the paper receipts at individual polling stations and plans to keep its own tally to get a sense of the number of votes it has won.

While the opposition has so far struck an optimistic note, pointing to the large number of people who have flocked to their campaign rallies, there is no doubt that the hours after the polling stations close and before the result is announced will be some of the tensest in the past decade.

A psychological thriller by Lisa Jewell and an adult fantasy novel by Rebecca Yarros were among the winners at the TikTok Book Awards for 2024.

The winners at the ceremony in London were voted for by thousands of members of the #BookTok community on the video-sharing app.

Book lovers use the platform to make recommendations, and share their thoughts and opinions on trending books.

Jack Edwards, a YouTuber and TikTok creator, sat on this year’s panel of judges.

Lisa Jewell’s None of This Is True was named book of the year. The British author’s thriller follows two young women whose chance meeting at a local pub has dark consequences.

The author said: “I genuinely can’t believe it, I knew there was a lot of buzz and chat about my book on TikTok but I was on an amazing shortlist, my mind is blown to be honest!

“What I’ve realised is that the three books that I was the most nervous about while writing, because I thought they were too weird, too ‘out there’, too sinister, too creepy, too unconventional, were the three that have been the most popular for me on TikTok!”

Elsewhere, the award for international book of the year went to Fourth Wing by US author Rebecca Yarros.

The fantasy novel went viral on TikTok, which propelled it to reach No1 on The New York Times bestseller list.

Yarros, who could not attend the awards ceremony, sent a video message: “It has been a wild ride, and none of it would have happened without TikTok! Huge love to the #BookTok community.”

The shortlist at the TikTok Book Awards was chosen by a panel of figures from the literary and media world including the author Samantha Shannon, broadcaster Sara Cox and the CEO of the Publishers Association, Dan Conway.

But the winners came from TikTok’s #BookTok community, with 82,000 people casting their votes online.

TikTok says more than 35 million videos have been made using the hashtag “BookTok”, making the sub-community one of the biggest on the platform.

The awards were launched last year to celebrate some of the best-loved books, independent book shops, authors and creators that circulate on the social media platform.

Jack Edwards, who has been dubbed the “internet’s resident librarian”, sat on the judging panel for this year’s shortlist.

“It was a privilege to be a judge, I feel really lucky to be here because the best thing that we can do is champion more creators, more bookstores and more books!”

Edwards has amassed more than 650,000 followers on TikTok, but, despite his success in the #BookTok community, he started his career creating content on a different platform – YouTube.

He boasts more than 1.39 million subscribers on the social media site and in the early days of his channel, he made videos about his experience in higher education, as the first person in his family to attend university.

But Edwards says the catalyst for shifting his online presence towards book content was being in lockdown during the Covid-19 pandemic.

“TikTok is a different style and format to YouTube, for sure, but it’s a fun creative challenge to think ‘how do I make this accessible for audiences who are looking for something slightly different’, that’s the beauty of it.”

Now, he’s writing a book of his own.

“It’s inspiring being in a room with all these amazing authors, I’m hoping that one day we’ll be able to rub shoulders and talk about the craft of writing – I love storytelling and I love storytellers, it’s something I’ve always wanted to do, regardless of social media.”

Book of the Year – None of This is True by Lisa Jewell

Book of the Year (International) – Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros

BookTok Breakthrough Author – Talia Hibbert (@TaliaHibbert)

BookTok Creator of the Year – Maisie Matilda (@Maisie_Matilda)

BookTok Rising Star Creator – John-Paul Kunrunmi (@JPreads6)

Indie Bookshop of the Year -The Bookshop by the Sea

TikTok Shop Book of the Year – The Pumpkin Spice Café by Laurie Gilmore

Russia and China have staged a joint patrol over the north Pacific Ocean and the Bering Sea near the coast of Alaska.

The two countries have carried out several joint patrols in the past, and Russia regularly flies its bombers over the Bering Sea.

But Wednesday’s joint patrol was the first that brought together bombers from both countries in the north Pacific area.

Moscow and Beijing said it was “not aimed at any third party”, while the US-Canadian North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) said the bombers, which it intercepted, stayed in international airspace and were “not seen as a threat”.

But Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski described the event as an “unprecedented provocation by our adversaries”, adding that it was “the first time they have been intercepted operating together.”

China has said the patrol has “nothing to do with the current international and regional situation”.

Russian TU-95MS strategic missile carriers and the Chinese air force’s Xian H-6 strategic bombers were deployed, according to Russia.

China and Russia have developed closer ties since Moscow was placed under sanctions by the West following its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Any display of deepening cooperation is watched with apprehension by the US and European countries.

Earlier this month, Moscow and Beijing wrapped up their fourth joint naval patrol in the northern and western Pacific Ocean.

Nato countries issued a joint statement at the end of a recent summit in Washington accusing China of being a “decisive enabler” of Russia’s war in Ukraine and urging it to “cease all material and political support” to the country’s war effort.

In a report on Arctic security published on Monday, the US Department of Defence expressed concern over the two countries’ “growing alignment”, and predicted that their military cooperation would continue to increase.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov rejected this, saying Russian-Chinese cooperation in the Arctic could only contribute to an atmosphere of “stability and predictability” in the area.

When divers in the Baltic Sea first saw the wreck on the sonar, they thought it was a fishing boat.

But when they went to investigate, they found a 19th Century sailing ship, “loaded to the sides” with champagne, wine, mineral water and porcelain.

They counted more than 100 bottles of champagne in the wreck, off the coast of Sweden.

And now Tomasz Stachura, of Polish diving group Baltitech, believes the shipment could have been destined for a Russian tsar.

Baltitech, which specialises in exploring shipwrecks in the Baltic, described the find as “treasure”.

Mr Stachura, leader of the team, said: “I’ve been a diver for 40 years. From time to time, you see one or two bottles.

“But I’ve never seen crates with bottles of alcohol, and baskets of water, like this.”

The find was made about 20 nautical miles (37km) south of the Swedish island of Oland.

Two divers had said they would do “a quick dive” but then were gone for nearly two hours.

“So we already knew that there was something very interesting on the bottom,” Mr Stachura added.

The clay water bottles, showing the brand name of German company Selters, helped them date the wreck to 1850 to 1867.

While champagne would be of more interest to many today, mineral water was an exclusive product “treated almost like medicine” which “only found its way to royal tables”, said Mr Stachura.

“Its value was so precious that transports were escorted by the police.”

Mr Stachura told the BBC he believes the goods could have been heading for the table of Russia’s Tsar Nicholas I – who is reported to have lost one of his ships in the area in 1852.

“That would explain why the ship had this cargo – which was all very exclusive,” he said.

“Usually, when we find wrecks the cargo is very cheap.”

He thinks the ship was heading across the Baltic to either Stockholm or St Petersberg – which would again tie in with the theory.

“A dive itself only takes about 20 minutes,” he said. “But then diving into the archives is what can be more interesting.

“In the future, maybe we will know more about this wreck.”

As for the champagne – and prestigious mineral water – Mr Stachura believes both would be drinkable today.

For now, the treasure is staying where it is, with underwater archaeologists called in to assist. Swedish authorities have been notified, and administration also has to be done before it can be brought to the surface.

“It had been lying there for 170 years so let it lie there one more year,” said Mr Stachura.

Wine writer Henry Jeffreys, author of Empire of Booze, said: “Champagne was generally a lot sweeter in the 19th Century.

“And if it was going to the Russian market, they liked it very, very sweet. Russia was the biggest market for champagne then. In London, they preferred it drier.”

Brandy was sometimes added to champagne back then, he said. This, along with the sugar, would have helped with preservation.

And the conditions – 58m underwater, in the cold and dark – were perfect for the bottles.

“If you’re going to leave champagne for 150 plus years, the bottom of the sea is a really good place,” said Mr Jeffreys.

Depending on the state of the corks, the champagne could still be “palatable”, he added – even though it’s likely to have lost its fizz by now.

A selection of the week’s best photos from across the African continent and beyond:

• ‘I wanted my clitoris back’ – FGM survivors fight back
• Frantic digging at scene of deadly Ethiopia landslides
• Batons, tear gas, live fire – Kenyans face police brutality
• Olympic fencer and Playboy model champions body positivity

Several athletes have complained about a shortage of food at the Olympic Village in Paris, according to reports.

Competitors have said the amount of food available, specifically eggs, which were rationed at breakfast on Wednesday, and grilled meats, is insufficient, according to the French newspaper L’Équipe.

The official catering partner to the Olympic Village, Sodexo Live!, confirmed “a very high demand” for certain products and said that “volumes will be increased” to “satisfy the needs of the athletes”.

The Olympic Village is set to serve approximately 13 million meals during the Olympic and Paralympic Games.

“It was requested to revise upwards the quantities initially planned, which the group will be able to satisfy,” a spokesman for the Carrefour group, which is in charge of supplying fresh products to the Olympic Village, confirmed.

Feeding 15,000 international athletes from 208 territories and nations, plus support teams, officials and volunteers, is a gargantuan task.

During the two 15-day periods of the Olympic and Paralympic Games, more than 13 million meals will be served – the equivalent of the amount of food provided at 10 football World Cups.

Athletes have access to six main areas devoted to French, Asian, Afro-Caribbean and world cuisine, with 500 different recipes catering to a wide variety of tastes.

A strict quality charter also governed the food at the Paris Olympics. It was developed over the course of four years of work with the goal of halving the carbon footprint of meals produced during the Games, in comparison to London 2012.

As a result, a quarter of all ingredients will be sourced in a 250km radius from Paris, and 20% will be certified organic.

All meat, milk and eggs will be from France, and a third of the food will be plant-based.

Two hundred water, juice and soda fountains have been installed in the Olympic Village, and only reusable cups and crockery will be offered.

MrBeast says he’s hired investigators after his former co-host was accused of grooming a teenager.

Ava Kris Tyson was accused by other YouTubers of sending inappropriate messages to the minor when she was 20.

The 28-year-old, who’d worked on MrBeast’s channel since 2012, strenuously denied grooming but said the pair had “mutually agreed” she should quit.

In a follow-up statement, MrBeast, real name Jimmy Donaldson, said he was “disgusted” by the “serious allegations of Ava Tyson’s behaviour online”.

Ava has apologised for “past behaviour” which was “not acceptable”.

MrBeast is the world’s biggest YouTuber with more than 300m subscribers.

He said he had become aware of the allegations against Ava, which first started circulating online last month, “over the last few days”.

“I am disgusted and opposed to such unacceptable acts,” he says.

MrBeast’s statement said he had “been focused on hiring an independent third party to conduct a thorough investigation to ensure I have all the facts”.

“That said,” he continued, “I’ve seen enough online and taken immediate action to remove Ava from the company, my channel, and any association with MrBeast.

“I do not condone or support any of the inappropriate actions.”

The US YouTuber added that he would wait for the investigators to finish their work and “take any further actions based on their findings”.

Ava previously said she had “never groomed anyone” and “to create a narrative that my behaviour extended beyond bad edgy jokes is disgusting and did not happen”.

She added: “In past years, I have learned that my old humour is not acceptable.

“I cannot change who I was, but I can continue to work on myself.”

Ava revealed last year that she was a transgender woman and that she was undergoing gender-affirming therapy while changing her pronouns to she/her.

She has not yet responded to MrBeast’s most recent comments.

The person alleged to have recieved the messages from Ava came to her defence, saying that descriptions of their relationship online were “massive lies and twisting the truth”.

In a post shared on X, he wrote: “Ava never did anything wrong and just made a few edgy jokes. I was never exploited or taken advantage of.”

BBC Newsbeat has contacted Ava Tyson and MrBeast’s representatives for comment.

MrBeast first posted on YouTube in 2012 when he was 13.

Over the next 10 years he became one of the most popular content creators, sharing increasingly elaborate videos before being named the most subscribed YouTuber in 2022.

His videos include challenges inspired by Squid Game, a “deadly” obstacle course and spending a week in solitary confinement.

The 26-year-old from Kansas now has 306 million subscribers and more than 55 billion views.

He’s won the prize for favourite male creator at the Nickelodeon Kids’ Choice Awards for the past three years running.

MrBeast is well known for his giveaways, giving fans cash, cars and even houses.

He has a separate channel for his charitable causes where he’s shared videos of him building a school, wells, and supporting an orphanage.

In 2022, Forbes estimated MrBeast makes $54m (£42m) a year and he’s previously spoken about how much he reinvests in his videos.

Away from YouTube, in 2022 MrBeast founded a food company called Feastables following the launch of his virtual fast-food chain, MrBeast Burger.

In 2023 he sued the company behind the fast-food chain, claiming the food was “revolting” and was damaging his reputation.

In March, it was announced he was partnering with Prime Video to create Beast Games which has been billed as “the biggest reality competition series” with 1,000 people competing for a $5m prize.

Listen to Newsbeat live at 12:45 and 17:45 weekdays – or listen back here.

Everything was in place.

Streets in the centre of Paris have been blocked off, metro stations closed and thousands of police, soldiers and other guards deployed to maintain security on the big showpiece day to kick off the Olympics.

But the saboteurs struck away from the capital, at five apparently unguarded places.

France’s state-owned rail company SNCF says the saboteurs either vandalised or tried to vandalise five signal boxes and electricity installations between 01:00 and 05:30 on Friday.

One site was at Courtalain, east of Le Mans and 150km to the south-west of Paris. The local community’s social media page posted a picture of burnt-out cables in a shallow gulley, with its protective SNCF paving stones discarded.

SNCF spoke of a “massive, large-scale attack aimed at paralysing” its services, involving arson and theft targeting cabling, not just at Courtalain but at Pagny-sur-Moselle, a village outside the eastern city of Metz and Croisilles, not far from the northern city of Arras.

Small sites, but at big junctions on the high-speed TGV network.

Another attempted attack, on another TGV junction to the south-east of Paris at Vergigny, was foiled by SNCF workers who just happened to be carrying out maintenance on site in the early hours of Friday.

The sabotage was clearly co-ordinated and the effects were immediate, on one of the busiest days imaginable for France’s highly regarded rail system.

The head of SNCF, Jean-Pierre Farandou, has spoken of a “premeditated, calculated, co-ordinated” attack that demanded considerable repair work.

Friday 26 July marks the start of the or big getaway for many French holidaymakers heading out of the cities. It is also the day of the showpiece opening ceremony that the Paris Olympics organisers have worked on for years.

Hundreds of stranded passengers filled the main concourses at Gare Du Nord and Gare Montparnasse, two of the big rail hubs in Paris for travellers on the big lines to the north and west of the capital.

Passengers at Gare du Nord waited patiently for news about delayed trains, not just within France but to London, Brussels and Amsterdam.

The much-vaunted high-speed TGV network heading in and out of Paris – north to Lille, west to Le Mans and east towards Strasbourg – was down.

At the nearby Gare de L’Est, which serves the east, an SNCF official said they were making plans to put the high-speed TGV trains onto other, slower lines, which would mean long delays and disruptions, but would also keep the network moving.

“Everything points us to these fires being deliberate,” said Transport Minister Patrice Vergriete. “The timing [of the attacks], the vans that have been recovered after people have fled, the incendiary agents found on the scene.”

Clearly acts of sabotage, and evidently timed to cause severe disruption on the day that Paris is trying to show its best face to the world.

Caretaker Prime Minister Gabriel Attal said the repercussions for the rail network were massive and serious, and France’s intelligence services and forces of order had been deployed to “find and punish those behind these criminal acts”.

French authorities have been on alert for potential acts of sabotage targeting the Games for months.

During the spring, they warned that several groups had tried to disrupt Olympic events, including the torch relay that has been going on across France in the run-up to the opening ceremony.

It has now emerged that incendiary devices were found on the high-speed TGV line between Aix-en-Provence and Marseille on the day the Olympic flame arrived in France’s big southern port on 8 May.

Several bottles filled with yellow liquid were found 4km (2.5 miles) outside Aix, according to French TV.

But who would want to ruin the plans of hundreds of thousands of French travellers and disrupt the start of the Olympic Games?

One security source suggested in French media that the arson attacks bore all the hallmarks of the extreme left.

However, Mr Attal has refused to speculate who might have been behind the sabotage.

He appealed to the public to be cautious as the investigation is only just starting, although he did say the fact that the saboteurs had targeted “nerve centres” on the high-speed network indicated awareness of where it was vulnerable to attack.

In recent weeks, Russia has been linked to at least two alleged plots in France.

Last month, a Russian-Ukrainian national was arrested at a hotel near Charles de Gaulle airport on suspicion of being part of a Russian-sabotage campaign,

Only this week a Russian man was arrested on suspicion of involvement in a “destabilisation” plot targeting the Games.

Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin said he was suspected of aiming to “organise operations of destabilisation, interference, spying” on behalf of Russia’s FSB intelligence service.

So far no Russian link has been made by French authorities to Friday’s attacks.

Mr Darmanin said this month that 3,570 people had been barred from the Games, including people seen as security risks as well as “dozens of radical individuals close to Islamist, ultra-left and ultra-right circles”.

Almost a million people, ranging from athletes and coaches to Olympic volunteers, have gone through a security check ahead of the Games in Paris.

But preventing acts of sabotage at unguarded sites in rural areas is a wholly different prospect.

Barack Obama has endorsed Vice-President Kamala Harris to be the Democratic presidential nominee, ending days of speculation over whether he would support her.

Former President Obama and ex-First Lady Michelle Obama said in a joint statement that they believe Ms Harris has the “vision, the character, and the strength that this critical moment demands”.

Mr Obama was reportedly among more than 100 prominent Democrats Ms Harris spoke to after President Joe Biden announced last Sunday he was dropping out of the race.

In a statement at the time, Mr Obama praised Mr Biden’s exit, but stopped short of endorsing Ms Harris.

The US vice-president has already secured the support of a majority of Democratic delegates, setting her on course to become the official nominee at the party convention in August.

The Obamas said in Friday’s statement that they could not be “more thrilled to endorse” Ms Harris. They vowed to do “everything we can” to elect her.

“We agree with President Biden,” said the couple’s statement, “choosing Kamala was one of the best decisions he’s made. She has the resume to prove it.”

They cited her record as California’s attorney general, a US senator and then vice-president.

“But Kamala has more than a resume,” the statement continued. “She has the vision, the character, and the strength that this critical moment demands.

“There is no doubt in our mind that Kamala Harris has exactly what it takes to win this election and deliver for the American people.

“At a time when the stakes have never been higher, she gives us all reason to hope.”

The statement was accompanied by a video of Ms Harris taking a phone call from the Obamas in which they pledge their support.

“Oh my goodness,” says the vice-president in the clip. “Michelle, Barack, this means so much to me.”

Ms Harris has held a number of campaign events across the US in the days since Mr Biden withdrew from the race.

On Thursday, she addressed the American Federation of Teachers union in Houston.

While the event was billed as part of her vice-presidential duties, it had the air of a campaign rally, with loud applause and cheers from the audience.

Echoing language used in campaign events earlier in the week, Ms Harris took aim at what she termed “extremist” Republicans and “failed” policies.

“We want to ban assault weapons, and they want to ban books,” she said.

Meanwhile, Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump continued to pivot to assail his new rival.

“Lyin’ Kamala Harris is a radical left Marxist, and worse!” he said in a partially all-capital-letters post on his social media platform Truth Social.

Trump also refused to commit to a televised debate with Ms Harris until she is officially confirmed as the party’s nominee.

He suggested Democrats were “still holding out for someone ‘better'”.

Ms Harris has also had “frank and constructive” talks with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and told him it was time for the Israel-Gaza war to end.

Israel launched a campaign in Gaza to destroy Hamas in response to the attack on southern Israel last October, during which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

More than 39,000 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry.

Kamala Harris said she made clear her “serious concerns” about casualties in Gaza, telling Mr Netanyahu how Israel defended itself mattered.

Ms Harris also stressed the need for a path to a two-state solution.

The Israeli prime minister also met President Biden while on a trip to the White House, and will meet Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump on Friday.

With an anticipated 10,000 athletes parading through the heart of Paris, Friday’s Olympic opening ceremony promises a spectacle

Many of the details have been kept secret, so expect plenty of surprises.

The ceremony begins at 18:30 BST, and will last just under four hours.

Here are some of the things to watch out for during the curtain-raiser, which you can watch live on the BBC.

For the first time, the ceremony will take place not in a stadium, but in the heart of a city. The world’s Olympic teams are set to parade along the River Seine in boats, watched by about 300,000 spectators in a display directed by Thomas Jolly, the ceremony’s artistic director.

The flotilla will carry more than 10,000 athletes along a 6km (3.7 mile) route along the waterway, which has been under intense scrutiny for its cleanliness.

• Watch: BBC joins Parisian mayor for a dip in the Seine

Organisers hope Friday’s spectacle is free-flowing, amid a mammoth security operation that will involve tens of thousands of police.

Earlier this year, French President Emmanuel Macron admitted that a plan B (and a plan C) had been put together in case the challenges proved insurmountable.

The boats will pass some of the city’s best-known bridges and landmarks on their journey during the evening – including Notre-Dame cathedral and, naturally, the Eiffel Tower – before reaching the Trocadéro.

It will conclude as the sun sets over the city’s west, which organisers hope will further solidify the legend of the City of Lights. Games president Tony Estanguet has promised the timing will make the show “more sublime, with a truly poetic dimension”.

(And by the way – theories differ as to whether the French capital earned its nickname as a luminous centre of intellect and creativity, or due to the way it reportedly embraced street lighting early in the technology’s development.)

Organisers are promising cameras on each boat to show the stars up close.

But what remains to be seen is exactly how this arrangement scales up and down for Olympic delegations of different sizes.

The USA, for example, is sending just shy of 600 competitors while some smaller nations are being represented by just a single competitor each.

Dozens of vessels will be used, with help enlisted from local boat firms.

The spotlight will be shone on those athletes given the job of carrying their team’s flag. A pair of British Olympic veterans – diver Tom Daley and rower Helen Glover – have been given that responsibility for Team GB.

Jolly has signed up 3,000 performers – including musicians and 400 dancers on bridges – though he’s remained tight-lipped about who the famous names are.

It has been suggested that French-Malian R&B star Aya Nakamura could be among the musical acts, as the world’s most-streamed French-language artist.

That remains unconfirmed, and has proven unpopular with the French far-right, which has argued that her music owes more to Africa and the US than to France. Nakamura was prompted to reply to one group: “What do I owe you? Nothing.”

• Culture war erupts over singer’s suggested role in Olympics

There’s been some speculation that Canadian star Céline Dion – who sings in French and English – could perform, after she was seen in the French capital earlier this week. Again, nothing is confirmed, but a performance would represent a comeback for Dion, who cancelled shows after revealing in 2022 that she had a rare neurological condition called Stiff Person Syndrome.

Lady Gaga, too, has been spotted in Paris – stoking rumours that she could play her own part. But any Daft Punk fans hoping to “get lucky” with a performance from the French duo were left disappointed when the act shot down any rumours they’d take part.

The Olympic torch travelled to the French capital from Greece in a massive relay that began more than three months ago. As part of its journey, the torch was briefly transported on the world’s longest rowing boat – the 24-seat Stampfli Express.

As for who gets the honour of lighting the Olympic cauldron – tradition dictates that the identity of the final torchbearer stays a secret until the big televised reveal.

That duty has previously fallen to the likes of Muhammad Ali in Atlanta in 1996 and to Aboriginal sprinter Cathy Freeman in Sydney four years later.

Among those who’ve carried the torch so far are French former footballer Thierry Henry and judo star Romane Dicko. Rapper Snoop Dogg will also have a role in carrying the torch in the final stages of the relay before the opening ceremony begins.

With the athletes’ parade always comes a bold array of looks – not least when the Olympics are taking place this time in one of the world’s style capitals.

Team USA and Team GB will be kitted out by Ralph Lauren and Ben Sherman respectively. Other eye-catching outfits come courtesy of Stella Jean, whose designs for Haiti are designed to project a vibrant image of the Caribbean nation.

• Perfect 10? The looks the athletes are sporting

The event’s organisers say some 3,000 unique costumes have been made for both the Olympic and Paralympic opening and closing ceremonies in a secretive workshop near Paris. Many will be made of recycled materials as the Games looks to stress its green ethos.

The woman stitching together this part of the visual spectacle is Daphné Bürki, who says she has been getting ready for the “biggest show of the 21st century four times over”.

Keep your eyes peeled for sporting superstars among the athletes’ contingent.

But we also expect to see celebrities and dignitaries of all sorts in the crowd, with more than 100 heads of state and government due to attend, according to Reuters.

US First Lady Jill Biden and Argentine President Javier Milei are among the anticipated attendees, alongside French President Emmanuel Macron and Olympic chief Thomas Bach.

Elizabeth II appeared at the London 2012 curtain-raiser – and not just in her filmed appearance with Daniel Craig.

• ‘Good evening, Mr Bond’: When the Queen met 007

The opening ceremony will be shown live from 17:45 BST on BBC One, BBC iPlayer and the BBC Sport website and app.

You can tune in to radio coverage on BBC Radio 5 Live and BBC Sounds from 19:00 BST.

There will also be live text coverage on the BBC Sport website and app bringing you the best of the event from Paris.

The National Wax Museum in Dublin is “committed” to creating a new wax figure of Irish singer Sinéad O’Connor after significant public backlash.

It comes after the museum unveiled a waxwork of the late singer and activist to coincide with the one year anniversary of her death.

O’Connor was found dead at the age of 56 in her south London home last July.

The figure was first unveiled on Thursday as a tribute to her legacy and influence within music and Irish culture, but the museum has now said it will be removed in order to create “a more accurate representation”.

Among those who criticised the original figure was O’Connor’s brother, John.

He said he was shocked when he first saw the waxwork online and said it was “inappropriate”.

“It looked nothing like her and I thought it was hideous,” he told Irish broadcaster RTÉ’s Liveline radio programme on Friday.

He added that the figure looked “between a mannequin and something out of the Thunderbirds”.

A statement from the museum said: “In response to the public’s feedback regarding the wax figure, we acknowledge that the current representation did not meet our high standards or the expectations of Sinéad’s devoted fans.

“We have listened closely to the reactions and agree that the figure does not fully capture Sinéad’s unique presence and essence as we intended.”

The museum said O’Connor’s impact on music is “immeasurable” and its goal was to honour the late singer in the “most fitting and respectful manner”.

“With this in mind, we are committed to creating a new wax figure that better reflect’s Sinéad O’Connor’s true spirit and iconic image,” it added.

“Our team of skilled artists will begin this project immediately, ensuring that every detail is meticulously crafted to celebrate her legacy appropriately.”

It said the museum looks forward to unveiling a new figure that “truly honours” O’Connor and her “extraordinary impact”.

Sinéad Marie Bernadette O’Connor was born on 8 December 1966 in the affluent Glenageary suburb of Dublin.

Her debut album in 1987, The Lion and the Cobra, was a storming success, earning O’Connor a Grammy nomination for best female rock vocal performance.

But it was her 1990 Prince cover single Nothing Compares 2 U which saw her catapult to worldwide fame.

O’Connor was outspoken on subjects including religion, women’s rights and racism.

In 1992, she tore up a photo of Pope John Paul II while performing on US television programme Saturday Night Live in protest against child sexual abuse in the Catholic Church.

In 2018, she converted to Islam, changing her name to Shuhada Sadaqat.

However she continued to perform under her birth name.

On 26 July 2023, the musician was found unresponsive at her home in Herne Hill, south London and was later pronounced dead.

A coroner ruled that she died of natural causes.

An Australian field hockey player has opted to amputate part of his finger to compete at the Paris Olympics.

Matt Dawson badly broke a digit on his right hand during team training in Perth two weeks ago, and recovery from surgery to repair it would have taken months.

So, the 30-year-old decided to have the finger removed from the knuckle up in order to take part in his third Games, shocking his team-mates and coach.

He will take to the field with the Kookaburras as they face Argentina on Saturday, just 16 days after he was injured.

Dawson has told media the break was so bad that he passed out when he saw his finger in the changing room. He thought his Olympic dream was over.

He urgently consulted a plastic surgeon who said that even with surgery to repair the finger – and the long recovery time – it may not regain full function. But if it was amputated, he could be back playing in 10 days.

Despite being warned by his wife not to do anything “rash”, Dawson says he made his “informed” decision that same afternoon.

“I’m definitely closer to the end of my career than the start and, who knows, this could be my last [Olympics], and if I felt that I could still perform at my best then that’s what I was going to do,” he told the Parlez Vous Hockey podcast.

“If taking the top of my finger was the price I had to pay, that’s what I would do.”

Team captain Aran Zalewski said the decision sent ripples of shock around the squad, but ultimately, they supported Dawson.

“We didn’t really know what to think, and then we heard that he went to the hospital and chopped his finger off, which was pretty interesting because I know people would give an arm and a leg and even a little bit of finger to be here sometimes,” he said at a news conference in Paris.

“When you’ve spent a lifetime of choice and sacrifice to come and compete at the highest level, I think for him it was an easy decision.”

Earlier this week Kookaburras coach Colin Batch said Dawson was back training with the team.

“Full marks to Matt. Obviously he’s really committed to playing in Paris. I’m not sure I would have done it, but he’s done it, so great,” he told Australia’s Seven News Network.

It is not the first time Dawson has faced an extreme injury, nearly losing an eye after being hit by a hockey stick in the lead up to the 2018 Commonwealth Games.

He managed to still play for the Kookaburras as they won gold in that tournament, and again when they won a silver medal at the Tokyo Olympics.

Bangladesh’s leader has been accused of crying “crocodile tears” after she was photographed weeping at a train station that was destroyed during anti-government protests.

At least 150 people have been killed as a result of nationwide clashes between police and university students, with security forces accused of execessive force.

Protesters had been calling for quotas on government jobs to be scrapped.

Online, many accused Ms Hasina of not expressing the same level of sympathy towards those who had died, or their families.

The pictures were taken during Ms Hasina’s visit to a metro rail station in the city of Mirpur on Thursday, where ticket vending machines and the signalling control station were shattered. Ms Hasina was pictured frowning and wiping her tears with tissue paper.

“What kind of mentality leads them to destroy facilities that make people’s lives easier? Dhaka city was clogged with traffic. The metro rail offered respite. I cannot accept the destruction of this transport facility made with modern technology,” Bangladeshi daily The Business Standard quoted the prime minister as saying.

These comments drew the ire of Bangladeshi internet users.

“We lost [hundreds of] students. But PM Sheikh Hasina had the time to go “cry” for a metro rail, not for the people who won’t return ever again,” said one Twitter user.

“Shedding crocodile tears for a railway track while others [have died]….” another chimed in.

Journalist Zulkarnian Saer, who has in the past spoken out against the government, said: “Hasina had the time to visit the vandalised train station, but she did not visit [the families] of the students… shot dead [during protests].”

Some called the photographs an attempt to drive attention away from deaths from the protests.

“No doubt that she went there to … get some attention and empathy,” said one Facebook user.

Security forces have been accused of using excessive force to quell the unrest, but Ms Hasina had instead blamed her political opponents for the wave of violence.

Her government is working to “suppress these militants and create a better environment”, the 76-year-old said earlier this week, adding she was “forced” to impose a curfew for public safety.

The protests, mostly by university students, began about two weeks ago over quotas imposed on government jobs.

Bangladesh had earlier reserved about 30% of its high-paying government jobs for relatives of those who fought in the country’s war for independence from Pakistan in 1971.

On Sunday, Bangladesh’s top court rolled back most of these quotas and ruled that 93% of roles would now be filled on merit – meeting a key demand of protesters.

The wave of unrest is an unprecedented test for Ms Hasina, who secured her fourth straight term as prime minister in January, in a controversial election boycotted by the country’s main opposition parties.

Political analysts told the BBC that Ms Hasina’s authoritarian regime and “over-politicising” of Bangladesh’s war for independence from Pakistan in 1971 have angered large sections of society.

Limited internet connectivity was restored on Tuesday after a nationwide blackout since last Thursday.

Some student leaders have vowed to continue protesting to demand justice for protesters killed and detained in recent days. They are also seeking the resignation of government ministers and an apology from Ms Hasina.

Once upon a time, the vulture was an abundant and ubiquitous bird in India.

The scavenging birds hovered over sprawling landfills, looking for cattle carcasses. Sometimes they would alarm pilots by getting sucked into jet engines during airport take-offs.

But more than two decades ago, India’s vultures began dying because of a drug used to treat sick cows.

By the mid-1990s, the 50 million-strong vulture population had plummeted to near zero because of diclofenac, a cheap non-steroidal painkiller for cattle that is fatal to vultures. Birds that fed on carcasses of livestock treated with the drug suffered from kidney failure and died.

Since the 2006 ban on veterinary use of diclofenac, the decline has slowed in some areas, but at least three species have suffered long-term losses of 91-98%, according to the latest State of India’s Birds report.

And that’s not all, according to a new peer-reviewed study. The unintentional decimation of these heavy, scavenging birds allowed deadly bacteria and infections to proliferate, leading to the deaths of about half a million people over five years, says the study published in the American Economic Association journal.

“Vultures are considered nature’s sanitation service because of the important role they play in removing dead animals that contain bacteria and pathogens from our environment – without them, disease can spread,” says the study’s co-author, Eyal Frank, an assistant professor at University of Chicago’s Harris School of Public Policy.

“Understanding the role vultures play in human health underscores the importance of protecting wildlife, and not just the cute and cuddly. They all have a job to do in our ecosystems that impacts our lives.”

Mr Frank and his co-author Anant Sudarshan compared human death rates in Indian districts that once thrived with vultures to those with historically low vulture populations, both before and after the vulture collapse. They also examined rabies vaccine sales, feral dog counts and pathogen levels in the water supply.

They found that after anti-inflammatory drug sales had risen and vulture populations had collapsed, human death rates increased by more than 4% in districts where the birds once thrived.

The researchers also found that the effect was greatest in urban areas with large livestock populations where carcass dumps were common.

The authors estimated that between 2000 and 2005, the loss of vultures caused around 100,000 additional human deaths annually, resulting in more than $69bn (£53bn) per year in mortality damages or the economic costs associated with premature deaths.

These deaths were due to the spread of disease and bacteria that vultures would have otherwise removed from the environment.

For example, without vultures, the stray dog population increased, bringing rabies to humans.

Rabies vaccine sales rose during that time but were insufficient. Unlike vultures, dogs were ineffective at cleaning rotting remains, leading to bacteria and pathogens spreading into drinking water through runoff and poor disposal methods. Faecal bacteria in the water more than doubled.

“The vulture collapse in India provides a particularly stark example of the type of hard-to-reverse and unpredictable costs to humans that can come from the loss of a species,” says Mr Sudarshan, an associate professor at the University of Warwick and co-author of the study.

“In this case, new chemicals were to blame, but other human activities – habitat loss, wildlife trade, and now climate change – have an impact on animals and, in turn, on us. It’s important to understand these costs and target resources and regulations towards preserving especially these keystone species.”

Of the vulture species in India, the white-rumped vulture, Indian vulture and red-headed vulture have suffered the most significant long-term declines since the early 2000s, with populations dropping by 98%, 95% and 91%, respectively. The Egyptian vulture and the migratory griffon vulture have also declined significantly, but less catastrophically.

The 2019 livestock census in India recorded more than 500 million animals, the highest in the world. Vultures, highly efficient scavengers, were historically relied upon by farmers to swiftly remove livestock carcasses. The decline of vultures in India is the fastest ever recorded for a bird species and the largest since the passenger pigeon’s extinction in the US, according to researchers.

India’s remaining vulture populations are now concentrated around protected areas where their diet consists more of dead wildlife than potentially contaminated livestock, according to the State of Indian Birds report. These continuing declines suggest “ongoing threats for vultures, which is of particular concern given that vulture declines have negatively affected human well-being”.

Experts warn that veterinary drugs still pose a major threat to vultures. The dwindling availability of carcasses, due to increased burial and competition from feral dogs, exacerbates the problem. Quarrying and mining can disrupt nesting habitats for some vulture species.

Will the vultures come back? It is difficult to say, though there are some promising signs. Last year, 20 vultures – bred in captivity and fitted with satellite tags and rescued – were released from a tiger reserve in West Bengal. More than 300 vultures were recorded in the recent survey in southern India. But more action is required.

A police officer has been suspended after a video circulated online of a man being kicked and stamped on the head at Manchester Airport.

An officer had been removed from all duties after a “thorough review of further information” of the incident, which took place on Tuesday, Greater Manchester Police confirmed.

The footage showed a uniformed male officer holding a Taser over the man who was lying on the ground at Terminal 2 before kicking him twice at about 20:30 BST.

Mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham, who has met the home secretary over the incident, has appealed for calm.

After the meeting, Yvette Cooper said she understood “the widespread distress” the footage had caused, adding she had spoken to police about the “urgent steps” they are taking.

She said it was “essential” police had the trust of communities, and the public “rightly expect high standards from those in charge of keeping us safe”.

Greater Manchester Police (GMP) said it understood the “deep concerns” that had been “widely raised”.

The footage sparked a protest outside Rochdale police station on Wednesday night, with hundreds of people gathered, and chants of “shame on you” heard.

In the build-up to the incident shown in the clip, a police spokesman said that firearms officers had been punched to the ground after trying to make an arrest following a fight in the airport.

There was a “clear risk” their weapons could be taken from them, the police spokesman said, adding all three had been taken to hospital, one with a broken nose.

Four men were later arrested on suspicion of assault and affray, and all have since been bailed.

It remains unclear what led to the incident, but Mr Burnham said he thought there had been “an issue on a flight coming into Manchester”.

“When the flight landed, two individuals were waiting for their mum, who said there had been an issue,” he said.

“She pointed somebody out and there was an altercation in the arrivals hall.”

He said those involved had been “followed by camera through the airport and then we get to the scene that people have seen in the car park area”.

Mr Burnham told BBC Radio Manchester he had seen “the full footage” that showed a “fast-moving and complicated situation in a challenging location – it’s not clear cut”.

“Time has been taken to get a clearer picture of what has happened,” he said, adding that an investigation needed to proceed now “in a thorough and measured way”.

• Anderson remarks on airport video irresponsible – Burnham

Amar Minhas from Leeds was travelling through the terminal with his family when he saw officers approach the man to arrest him.

“They pinned him up against a wall”, he told the BBC, before another man tried to intervene and a fight broke out, with the pinned man throwing punches until he was Tasered to the floor, when the officer kicked him.

Prime Minster Sir Keir Starmer has said he “completely understands” the public’s concern over the footage.

Sir Keir said the home secretary was being kept updated.

Former chief superintendent of the Met Police, Dal Babu, told BBC Radio 4 the police actions were “appalling and unnecessary” and in his opinion racism played a part in the incident.

He said the men were arrested for affray and assault, not offences at the “serious end” like attempted murder, gross bodily harm, or malicious wounding.

“I think racism played a significant part in this,” he said, adding GMP had been “slow out of the block in understanding the seriousness” of the incident at a time when trust in police was “so low”.

Many of those who spoke to the BBC in Rochdale about the video asked to remain anonymous.

One woman said: “If I were to kick a person in the face, I would be arrested and sentenced, not have the charges dropped and a policeman should be treated the same.”

Meanwhile, a man in the town said: “The police reaction was wrong but I don’t know what the context is.

“We need to see the full picture. But when you’re kicking a man who can’t defend himself – it’s exceeding the need for force.”

Usman Nawaz from the Rochdale Community Alliance, said the “extremely disturbing” footage was “not the policing we recognise in this country”.

Mr Nawaz said the people of Rochdale had “generally had a very good relationship with our police”, but that the force must “get a handle on this really quickly” or mistrust could grow between police and local communities.

The force said in its latest statement that it would “continue to meet” with Greater Manchester residents and elected representatives to discuss concerns raised about the footage.

It said it had referred itself to the Independent Office for Police Conduct over the incident.

The MP of the man who was filmed being kicked told the House of Commons the video was “truly shocking and disturbing”.

Paul Waugh, Labour MP for Rochdale, said he was meeting the man’s family later today.

He said police faced a difficult job but that they had to expect the highest standards of conduct in their duties.

The Leader of the House, Lucy Powell, MP for Manchester Central, also said the footage was “incredibly disturbing”, adding that there was “understandably a lot of concern”.

IOPC Regional Director Catherine Bates said the police watchdog was investigating the “level of force” used by a GMP officer in the incident, adding it was “vitally important” all the circumstances were investigated.

She said inquiries were at an early stage, but a “significant amount of body-worn video and CCTV footage” of the incident had been secured.

“We appreciate people want answers and we will work to provide those answers as quickly as we can,” Ms Bates said.

A spokesman for GMP’s police federation said it was supporting the suspended officer, as well as “all of our colleagues who were involved in this incident”.

They added: “Everyone has the right to a fair hearing where all sides of the story are told and context is provided.”

Huge, fast-moving wildfires have destroyed up to half of the historic Canadian town of Jasper, officials say, as firefighters try to save as many buildings as possible.

Entire streets have been levelled by the blazes in Alberta province, with video showing smouldering rubble where homes once stood.

Cooling temperatures brought some relief on Thursday, but park authorities said the fires were still out of control and further warm weather was forecast.

Meanwhile, there are hundreds of active blazes in neighbouring British Columbia, while fires are burning in western US states including California and Utah.

While no deaths have been reported, some 20,000 tourists and 5,000 residents have fled the mountainous area in Alberta province – a hugely popular tourist spot.

Some 36,000 hectares (89,000 acres) of land has so far been affected, Jasper National Park reported late on Thursday night local time – adding that neighbouring communities were not at risk.

It said that efforts to map the fires had been complicated by factors including strong winds, the extreme nature of the fire, and smoke.

During a news conference on Thursday, a tearful Alberta Premier Danielle Smith struggled at times to recount the scale of the damage, but said “potentially 30 to 50%” of buildings had been destroyed.

“There is no denying that this is the worst nightmare for any community,” she said, adding that Jasper National Park had been “a source of pride” for many generations.

Ms Smith became visibly emotional as she described the beauty of the park and its significance to the community, which relies largely on tourism. Some 2.5 million people visit the park, and nearby Banff National Park, each year.

Rail, phone and power services in the area have been affected, CBC News reported.

Karyn Decore, the owner of the Maligne Lodge in Jasper, was on holiday when she learned her hotel had burned down. On Wednesday night, she received a photograph of the building in flames.

“I was horrified and devastated when I saw that photo,” she told the BBC. “I think it’s going to take a couple of days for the shock to wear down.”

“It’s really hard for everyone to comprehend that we lost one of our properties,” she said, adding that she intended to rebuild the lodge.

BBC journalist Wendy Hurrell was in Jasper National Park when the fires began to burn on Monday. She drove through the night with her husband and daughter in a rush to leave town.

“The storm was ferocious – the skies went dark red and there were whipping winds, fierce rain and lightning,” she said.

“We are some of the last travellers to see Jasper in its full beauty – it will be a very long time before it will recover. It’s utterly devastating for them all and my heart is breaking.”

Hundreds of firefighters from around the world have been deployed to help with the response, but officials warn the extent of the damage is still emerging. The focus on Thursday, they said, was on containing the towering flames which engulfed the town from two sides.

Pierre Martel, director for the national fire management programme at Parks Canada, said the fire was started by a lightning storm and escalated late on Wednesday as it was fanned by powerful winds.

“It [was] just a monster at that point,” Mr Martel said. “There are no tools we have in our tool box to deal with it.”

The flames reached 100m (328ft) high in some places, covering “an inordinate amount of space in a very little amount of time”, one official said.

Mike Ellis, Alberta’s minister for public safety, said the fire was 5km (3 miles) outside of Jasper when it was pushed by the winds to the town in “less than 30 minutes”.

“Any firefighter will tell you there is little to nothing you can do when you have a wall of flames coming at you like that,” he said.

“Nobody anticipated that fire to come so fast, so large and so quickly.”

Justin Trudeau, Canada’s prime minister, thanked the emergency services for their response to the wildfires.

“As the heartbreaking images from Jasper emerge, I want to thank the brave first responders who are in Alberta right now, fighting to save every home and every community they can,” he said.

This marks another year of difficult fire conditions for the province. Last year, a record 2.2 million hectares burned in Alberta between 1 March and 31 October.

In British Columbia, the province neighbouring Alberta to the west, more than 400 wildfires have been burning and dozens of evacuation orders have been issued.

In the US, more than 3,000 people have been forced to flee their homes in the state of California due to the Park Fire, which continues to rage out of control.

A man has been arrested in connection with the blaze, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, also known as Cal Fire, said.

The states of Oregon, Montana and Utah also continue to deal with wildfires.

The overall number of fires has decreased around the world over the last two decades.

But researchers say climate change could bring more lightning to forests in northern reaches of the globe, increasing the risk of wildfires.

One of the world’s most powerful drug lords, Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada, leader of Mexico’s Sinaloa cartel, has been arrested by US federal agents in El Paso, Texas.

Zambada, 76, founded the criminal organisation with Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, who is currently jailed in the US.

Arrested with Zambada on Thursday was Guzman’s son, Joaquin Guzman Lopez, said the US justice department.

In February, Zambada was charged by US prosecutors with a conspiracy to make and distribute fentanyl, a drug more powerful than heroin that has been blamed for the US opioid crisis.

Citing Mexican and US officials, the Wall Street Journal reports that Zambada was tricked into boarding the plane by a high-ranking Sinaloa member following a months-long operation by Homeland Security Investigations and the FBI.

Believing that he was going to inspect clandestine airstrips in southern Mexico, Zambada was instead flown to a private airfield outside El Paso, Texas.

Lopez was also arrested alongside Zambada by federal agents when the plane landed.

Officials said Zambada was “lured” onto a private plane under “false pretences” by Lopez, the New York Times reports.

Mexico’s Security Minister Rosa Rodriguez said his government was made aware of the detention of both Zambada and Lopez by the US Government but that the Mexican authorities were not involved in the operation to apprehend them.

Fox News Correspondent Bryan Llenas said Lopez surrendered to US authorities and turned on Zambada because he “blamed Mayo for the capture of his father”.

In a written statement on Thursday evening, US Attorney General Merrick Garland said the two men lead “one of the most violent and powerful drug trafficking organisations in the world”.

“Fentanyl is the deadliest drug threat our country has ever faced, and the Justice Department will not rest until every single cartel leader, member and associate responsible for poisoning our communities is held accountable,” he added.

American prosecutors say the Sinaloa cartel is the biggest supplier of drugs to the US.

US authorities have previously noted that fentanyl is the leading cause of death for Americans aged 18 to 45.

The US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) had been offering a reward of up to $15m (£12m) for Zambada’s capture.

During Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman’s trial in 2019, his lawyers accused Zambada of bribing the “entire” Mexican government in exchange for living openly without fear of prosecution.

“In truth [Guzman] controlled nothing,” Guzman’s lawyer, Jeffrey Lichtman, told jurors. “Mayo Zambada did,” he claimed.

According to the US state department, Zambada is also the owner of several legitimate businesses in Mexico, including “a large milk company, a bus line and a hotel”, as well as real estate assets.

Alongside fentanyl charges, he is also facing charges in the US ranging from drug trafficking, murder, kidnapping, money laundering and organised crime.

In May, Zambada’s nephew – Eliseo Imperial Castro, who was known as “Cheyo Antrax” – was killed in an ambush in Mexico. He was also wanted by US authorities.

Zambada is arguably the biggest drug lord in the world and certainly the most influential in the Americas.

He had evaded authorities for decades, and as such, his arrest has come as a shock in Mexico.

In a statement, US Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas said the Sinaloa cartel “pioneered the manufacture of fentanyl and has for years trafficked it into our country, killing hundreds of thousands of Americans and devastating countless communities”.

FBI director Chris Wray said the arrests are “an example of the FBI’s and our partners’ commitment to dismantling violent transnational criminal organisations like the Sinaloa Cartel,” he said.

As more information emerges, Zambada’s arrest will no doubt be heralded by President Joe Biden’s administration as one of the most significant operations by the DEA in years.

Zambada co-founded the Sinaloa cartel in the wake of the collapse of the Guadalajara cartel at the end of the 1980s.

While Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman was the public face of the organisation and the most notorious of the two men, many believed it was in fact El Mayo who was its real leader.

Not only ruthless, he was also innovative, creating and maintaining some of the earliest links with Colombian cartels to flood the US with cocaine and heroin.

And more latterly, fentanyl.

His leadership of the criminal empire has endured in the face of changing presidents in Mexico and the US, amid repeated anti-drug offensives from successive governments and constant efforts by his enemies in other drug-trafficking organisations to bring him down.

That is no mean feat in the violent, dangerous and treacherous underworld in which he has operated as an unassailable kingpin for many years.

Yet that extraordinary resilience appears to have run out in El Paso, Texas – a city blighted by the influx of the synthetic opioid, fentanyl, much of which was smuggled in by his organisation.