The huge cuts in carbon emissions now needed to end the climate crisis mean it is “crunch time for real”, according to the UN’s environment chief.

An unprecedented global mobilisation of renewable energy, forest protection and other measures is needed to steer the world off the current path towards a catastrophic temperature rise of 3.1C, a report from the UN environment programme (Unep) has found. Extreme heatwaves, storms, droughts and floods are already ravaging communities with less than 1.5C of global heating to date.

Current carbon-cutting promises by countries for 2030 are not being met, according to the report, and even if they were met, the temperature rise would only be limited to a still-disastrous 2.6C to 2.8C. There is no more time for “hot air”, the report said, urging nations to act at the Cop29 summit in November.

Keeping the international goal of 1.5C within reach was technically possible, said the report, but it required emissions to fall by 7.5% annually until 2035. That means halting emissions equivalent to those of the EU every year for a decade. Delaying emissions cuts only means steeper reductions would be needed in future.

Unep said countries must collectively commit to cut 42% off annual greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 and 57% by 2035 in their next UN pledges, called nationally determined contributions and due in February. Without these pledges, and rapid action to back them up, the 1.5C goal would be gone, the UN said.

However, the head of Unep, Inger Andersen, said it was misguided to fixate only on whether the 1.5C target was kept or not, because every fraction of a degree of global heating avoided would save lives, damage and costs: “Don’t over-focus on a magic number. Keeping temperature as low as possible is where we need to be.”

The finance and technology to slash emissions exists, Andersen said, but “political courage” was needed, particularly from the G20 nations (excluding the African Union) that cause 77% of global emissions.

Andersen said the world’s nations made strong climate promises at the Paris summit in 2015. “Now is the time to live up to that – it’s climate crunch time for real. We need global mobilisation on a scale and pace never seen before, starting right now, or the 1.5C goal will soon be dead and the ‘well below 2C’ target will take its place in the intensive care unit.”

Unep’s last two annual reports highlighted “the closing window” for action and the “broken record” of failed promises. “Now we’re saying, this is it,” she said.

“The irritating thing is technology is there for the grasping, as are the job and economic development opportunities,” Andersen said. “It just takes political courage and some strong leadership.”

The UN secretary general, António Guterres, said: “We’re playing with fire; but there can be no more playing for time. We’re out of time.” He said global heating was supercharging monster hurricanes, bringing biblical floods, turning forests into tinder boxes and cities into saunas.

“Governments must wean us off our fossil fuel addiction: showing how they will phase them out – fast and fairly,” he said, adding that levies on fossil fuels could help pay for climate action.

The Unep report found that faster rollout of solar and wind energy could provide 27% of the emissions cuts needed. “That’s massive and this is a cheap, proven technology – it’s not a gamble to invest in,” Andersen said.

Stopping the destruction of forests could bring another 20% cut, the report said. Much of the rest could come from energy efficiency and the electrification of buildings, transport and industry, as well as cutting methane emissions from fossil fuel facilities, which Andersen described as “not hard”.

The estimated investment needed to cut emissions to net zero is $1-2tn a year, according to the report, about 1% of the value of the global economy and financial markets. “We’re talking a couple of percentage points that would be incremental in terms of renewal of ageing infrastructure” in developed countries, said Andersen. But developing countries would need finance from rich nations, a topic at the top of the Cop29 agenda.

The global geopolitical situation was difficult, acknowledged Andersen, with conflicts in the Middle East and Ukraine, and tensions between western nations and Russia and China. But she said: “If there is a space where the world has been able to meet, it is really the environment space.”

She cited a recent G20 meeting of environment and climate ministers. “These are not the best friends, all of them, and yet they managed to have a [good] communique.” She said there had been significant green policy shifts in the US, China, Germany, India and Brazil, but a a much greater effort was required.

“The sooner we strike out hard for a low-carbon, sustainable and prosperous future, the sooner we will get there – which will save lives, save money and protect the planetary systems upon which we all depend,” she said.

“World leaders continue to drag their feet, protecting the interests of the fossil fuel industry, while people are suffering right now. At Cop29, leaders must respond and act on their fair share of responsibility – especially wealthier nations who have fuelled this crisis for decades,” said Harjeet Singh, at the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty Initiative.

A former model who says she met Donald Trump through the late sexual abuser Jeffrey Epstein has accused the former president of groping and sexually touching her in an incident in Trump Tower in 1993, in what she believed was a “twisted game” between the two men.

Stacey Williams, who worked as a professional model in the 1990s, said she first met Trump in 1992 at a Christmas party after being introduced to him by Epstein, who she believed was a good friend of the then New York real estate developer. Williams said Epstein was interested in her and the two casually dated for a period of a few months.

“It became very clear then that he and Donald were really, really good friends and spent a lot of time together,” Williams said.

The alleged groping occurred some months later, in the late winter or early spring of 1993, when Epstein suggested during a walk they were on that he and Williams stop by to visit Trump at Trump Tower. Epstein was later convicted on sex offenses and killed himself in prison in 2019.

Moments after they arrived, she alleges, Trump greeted Williams, pulled her toward him and started groping her. She said he put his hands “all over my breasts” as well as her waist and her buttocks. She said she froze because she was “deeply confused” about what was happening. At the same time, she said she believed she saw the two men smiling at each other.

Karoline Leavitt, the press secretary for Donald Trump’s campaign, provided a statement denying the allegations, which said in part: “These accusations, made by a former activist for Barack Obama and announced on a Harris campaign call two weeks before the election, are unequivocally false. It’s obvious this fake story was contrived by the Harris campaign.”

Williams says that Trump sent her agent a postcard via courier later in 1993, an aerial view of Mar-a-Lago, his Palm Beach residence and resort. She shared it with the Guardian. In his handwriting – using what appears to be his usual black Sharpie – he wrote: “Stacey – Your home away from home. Love Donald”.

Williams, who is 56 and a native of Pennsylvania, has shared parts of her allegation on social media posts in the past, but revealed details about the alleged encounter on a call on Monday organized by a group called Survivors for Kamala, which supports Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris. The Zoom call featured actor Ashley Judd and law professor and academic Anita Hill, among others. Survivors for Kamala also took out an ad in the New York Times this week, signed by 200 survivors of sexual and gender violence, which was meant to serve as a reminder that Trump has been found liable for sexual abuse in a court.

After the alleged incident, Williams said that she and Epstein left Trump Tower, and that she began to feel Epstein growing angry at her.

“Jeffrey and I left and he didn’t look at me or speak to me and I felt this seething rage around me, and when we got down to the sidewalk, he looked at me and just berated me, and said: ‘Why did you let him do that?’” she said on the Zoom call.

“He made me feel so disgusting and I remember being so utterly confused,” she said.

She described how the alleged incident seemed to her to be part of a “twisted game”.

“I felt shame and disgust and as we went our separate ways, I felt this sensation of revisiting it, while the hands were all over me. And I had this horrible pit in my stomach that it was somehow orchestrated. I felt like a piece of meat,” she said in an interview with the Guardian.

She and Epstein parted ways soon after. Williams said she never had any knowledge of his pattern of sexual abuse, which would later become known. Epstein is now considered one of the worst and most prolific pedophiles in modern history.

The allegation of groping and unwanted sexual touching follows a well-documented pattern of behavior by Trump.

About two dozen women have accused the former president, who has been convicted of multiple felonies, of sexual misconduct dating back decades. The allegations have included claims of Trump kissing them without their consent, reaching under their skirts, and, in the case of some beauty pageant contestants, walking in on them in the changing room.

A former model named Amy Dorris shared allegations about Trump similar to what Williams described in an interview with the Guardian in 2020. Trump denied ever having harassed, abused or behaved improperly toward Dorris.

Last year, a jury found Trump liable for sexually abusing the columnist E Jean Carroll in 1996 and awarded her $5m in a judgment.

Williams’ allegations raise new questions about Trump’s relationship with Epstein.

No evidence has surfaced that Trump was aware of or involved in Epstein’s misconduct.

But Trump and Epstein knew each other for decades and were photographed at the same social events in the 1990s and early 2000s, years before Epstein pleaded guilty in Florida in 2008 to state charges of soliciting and procuring a minor for prostitution.

“I’ve known Jeff for 15 years. Terrific guy,” Trump told New York magazine in 2002. “He’s a lot of fun to be with. It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side.”

After Epstein was arrested on sex-trafficking charges in 2019, Trump told journalists in the Oval Office that he “knew him, like everybody in Palm Beach knew him” but that he had a “falling out” with Epstein in the early 2000s.

“I haven’t spoken to him in 15 years,” Trump said. “I was not a fan of his, that I can tell you.”

Asked whether she had considered coming forward in the past, as other women were making allegations against Trump, Williams said she was a person who wanted to avoid negative attention or risk the backlash many other survivors have faced.

“I left the business,” she said. “I disappeared on purpose because I love being anonymous and I love my life of being a private citizen. Then I watched what has happened to women who come out and it is so horrifying and abusive. The thought of doing that, especially as a mother with a child in my house, was just not possible,” she told the Guardian.

“I just chose in my own way – comments on social media to contradict people who said he didn’t do anything,” she said.

Like other survivors, she said, she has processed what happened to her and became more confident about facing an angry backlash, she said.

Williams spoke about the allegations to at least two friends who spoke to the Guardian. One friend, who asked not to be named, said Williams told her about the alleged incident in 2005 or 2006 during a conversation in which Williams mentioned knowing Epstein, and how he had introduced her to Trump. The friend specifically remembers Williams telling her that she had been groped by Trump. Epstein was not a household name at the time, but the friend would later recall the anecdote when the Epstein scandal erupted.

“What I recall is that it was groping … what we would call feeling someone up,” the friend said.

Ally Gutwillinger, another longtime friend, said Williams told her about the alleged incident in 2015. Gutwillinger remembers the timing because Trump had announced that he was running for president.

“I went to her house sometime in that week and I saw a postcard of Mar-a-Lago and I said: ‘What’s this?’ and she said ‘Turn it over,’” Gutwillinger said. “She said something like: ‘He’s vile, he groped me in Trump Tower.’”

At least 17 people including several children have been killed in Israeli bombing of a school turned shelter in the Nuseirat refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip, medics in the territory have said.

The strike, the latest bombing of a school sheltering displaced people across Gaza, came as the Qatari television network Al Jazeera accused Israel of turning its journalists reporting from north Gaza into targets after the Israeli military claimed a day earlier that six reporters were members of Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad.

Rescue efforts were still under way at the camp, said Mahmoud Bassal, a spokesperson for Gaza’s civil defence agency. The Israeli military said the school was being used as a Hamas command and control centre. The Nuseirat attack comes as Israel continues a new offensive in northern Gaza, which Bassal said had killed 770 people since it began on 6 October.

The civil defence agency said on Thursday it had been forced to suspend operations in northern Gaza after what it called threats from the Israeli military to “bomb and kill” rescue crews working in Jabaliya camp, the focus of the new Israeli offensive. Three workers had been wounded and another five arrested by the Israeli army, and the crews’ only working fire engine was destroyed by tank fire, he said.

A medic was killed by Israeli fire and another detained on his way to work, according to the Indonesian hospital, one of three struggling medical facilities still operating in the area, on Thursday.

Israel says the operation is necessary to prevent Hamas from regrouping and denies allegations that it intends to expel the remaining 400,000 people still living in the northern third of Gaza. Israel has split the territory in two by building the Netzarim corridor, which bisects the strip just south of Gaza City.

On Wednesday the Israeli military published documents which it said it had found in Gaza that proved that six Al Jazeera journalists had a military affiliation to Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad; the papers could not be immediately independently verified.

In a statement on Thursday, Al Jazeera said the Israel accusations were “criminal, draconian and irresponsible” and “part of a wider pattern of hostility”. Several of the network’s journalists have been killed by Israeli fire in the Gaza war, deaths the Israeli military denies were deliberate.

Israel outlawed Al Jazeera earlier this year for what it termed “security reasons”, and raided its offices in the occupied West Bank.

The Committee to Protect Journalists’ Middle East programme said on X that the allegations amounted to the smearing of Palestinian journalists “with unsubstantiated terrorist labels”.

Indirect talks aimed at a ceasefire and hostage release deal in the war in Gaza, mediated by the US, Qatar and Egypt, have been deadlocked since the assassination in July ofIsmail Haniyeh, the leader of Hamas and its main negotiator. The attack in the Iranian capital of Tehran is believed to have been carried out by Israel, although the country has not claimed responsibility.

The international community has pushed for a return to negotiations following Israel’s killing this month of the architect of the 7 October attacks, Yahya Sinwar. Sinwar, who had the final word on Hamas’s position in talks, had repeatedly blocked progress towards a deal.

The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, said after meetings in Doha with the Qatari leadership on Thursday that Israeli and US negotiators were expected to reconvene in “the coming days”.

Blinken has made more than a dozen trips to the Middle East over the past year in an effort to end the war in Gaza and calm regional tensions with Iran and its allies but has come away empty-handed almost every time.

Hamas, which has yet to name Sinwar’s successor, said on Thursday that delegations from the group were visiting Turkey, Qatar and Russia and were in contact with officials from the UN, Egypt and Iran.

Separately on Thursday, France hosted an international aid conference for Lebanon, but diplomatic efforts to end the new ground war between Israel and the powerful Lebanese group Hezbollah are yet to bear fruit.

The European parliament has awarded its top human rights honor, the Sakharov prize for freedom of thought, to Venezuelan opposition leaders María Corina Machado and Edmundo González for “representing the people of Venezuela fighting to restore freedom and democracy”.

Machado was set to run as the democratic opposition candidate against the incumbent president, Nicolás Maduro, in Venezuela’s contested 2024 election, but she was disqualified by the government, so González took her place. He had never run for office before the presidential election.

The lead-up to the poll saw widespread repression, including disqualifications, arrests and human rights violations. Machado went into hiding, fearing for her life. A Venezuelan court issued an arrest warrant for González, who claimed political asylum in Spain.

“In their quest for a fair, free and peaceful transition of power, they have fearlessly upheld values that millions of Venezuelans and the European parliament hold so dear: justice, democracy and the rule of law,” Roberta Metsola, president of the European parliament, told EU lawmakers.

“This parliament stands with the people of Venezuela and with María and Edmundo in their struggle for the democratic future of their country,” she added. “We are confident that Venezeula and democracy will ultimately prevail.”

Machado’s group maintains that it has evidence that González won the 28 July presidential election by a wide margin, despite Maduro’s claim to have won.

Maduro’s victory was contested by independent observers, including the United Nations. In a resolution last month, the EU parliament recognized González as Venezuela’s legitimate president.

In a post on X, González said that he was “honored and grateful” for the award.

He thanked Machado, describing her as “an exceptional person who, with all her political talent, her absolute dedication and her indomitable spirit, paved the way that we are currently following, keeping the flame of freedom alive in our country”.

González also expressed his “gratitude, pride and admiration for my Venezuelan compatriots, who with the utmost civility, courage and determination have for years confronted, and continue to confront, a regime that systematically violates human rights”.

But he warned that “the struggle is not over. The regime persists in blocking political change, committing more and more human rights violations and crimes against humanity,” and he urged supporters of democracy everywhere to help “enforce the sovereign mandate of the Venezuelan people”.

The EU award, named after Andrei Sakharov, a Soviet dissident and Nobel peace prize laureate, was created in 1988 to honor individuals or groups who defend human rights and basic freedoms.

The winner is chosen by senior EU lawmakers from among candidates nominated by the European parliament’s various political groups. The assembly says the award is “the highest tribute paid by the European Union to human rights work”.

Two Middle East grassroots groups, Women Wage Peace and Women of the Sun, were on the shortlist for their efforts to bridge the divide between Israelis and Palestinians, as was the Azerbaijan academic and anti-corruption activist Gubad Ibadoghlu.

Several laureates – including Nelson Mandela, Malala Yousafzai, Denis Mukwege and Nadia Murad – went on to win the Nobel peace prize.

The annual award, with its €50,000 ($54,000) endowment, will be presented in a ceremony at the European parliament in Strasbourg, France, in mid-December.

Britain has a legal and moral case to answer over its historical role in slavery, the chair of the Caribbean’s slavery reparation commission has said, as Keir Starmer continues to reject calls to put the issue on the agenda at the Commonwealth summit.

Responding to the British prime minister’s insistence to “look forward” rather than have “very long endless discussions about reparations on the past” when he meets 55 other country leaders on Friday, the distinguished Caribbean historian Sir Hilary Beckles, who chairs the Caribbean governments’ reparations body, articulated the region’s call to the British government and institutions to “engage in a compassionate, intergenerational strategy to support postcolonial reconstruction”.

The Caribbean Community (Caricom) reparations committee, which acts on behalf of 15 Caribbean governments and six associate members, has a 10-point reparatory justice plan, covering an apology and actions to address the enduring socioeconomic impacts of slavery.

Beckles’ strongly worded piece for the Guardian, which outlines the legal, ethical and moral justification for slavery reparations and reflects the views of Caribbean nations, follows weeks of political wrangling as Caribbean governments pushed for the matter to be discussed at the Commonwealth heads of government meeting (Chogm) and Starmer dug in his heels, saying that the UK was focused on “facing real challenges on things like climate in the here and now”.

Addressing Downing Street’s stance that the UK would not – now or ever – participate in the payment of any form of reparation, Beckles writes: “On the first matter, nothing could be further from the truth. Reparations are in the mouths and on the minds of all participants, and the formal agenda does not determine the real agenda. It is just a conciliatory framework for the moment, and does not reflect what in fact is a supportive movement.”

Pointing to the fact that slavery enriched Britain, Beckles said: “While imperial Britain soared to sustainable economic development and global military superpower status, the enslaved and their descendants were left to this day with enduring pain, persistent poverty and systemic suffering.”

He described the Slavery Abolition Act as “the most racist legislation ever passed in the British parliament” adding it defined 700,000 enslaved black people as “property”, rather than humans.

The piece continues: “Global opinion, however, has rallied around the idea – rooted in international law and bolstered by the best ethical and moral thinking – that there is a case to answer and that negotiations should be inevitable. In 1939, Arthur Lewis, a Nobel laureate in economics, set it out clearly. Britain, he said, had 200 years of free labour from an estimated 20 million black men, women and children. This was Britain’s black debt, which must be acknowledged and repaired.”

Some Caribbean officials have already made it clear that the region will not back down on the issue, with the Bahamas’ foreign minister, Frederick Mitchell, telling the BBC’s Today programme that it was “only a matter of time” before Starmer “changes” his position on reparations, adding that it is “unusual to us because you’ve got the Labour party in power”.

Mitchell said: “And this, we thought was something that the Conservative party in the UK would be the progenitor of, and that Labour would certainly change its position on this.”

When asked about the issue, the outgoing Commonwealth secretary general, Patricia Scotland, told the Guardian: “One of the benefits of the Commonwealth platform is that everybody is around that table – everybody who is affected, every region who participated in any way is around the table, because quite often in other spheres, someone is left out …

“Our leaders have the opportunity to discuss if they wish to, but it’s up to them. The secretariat does not dictate the agenda, and it does not take sides. We are here to serve.”

The Commonwealth summit, which happens every two years, is a platform for leaders of the 56-member bloc to meet to discuss shared concerns and solutions. Historically, the intergovernmental organisation has played a role in addressing serious issues such as apartheid in South Africa.

At the heart of its operations is the Commonwealth charter, which was signed by the late Queen Elizabeth II in 2013. The charter is built on 16 principles, including support for small and vulnerable nations and a commitment to equality.

Britain has a legal and moral case to answer over its historical role in slavery, the chair of the Caribbean’s slavery reparation commission has said, as Keir Starmer continues to reject calls to put the issue on the agenda at the Commonwealth summit.

Responding to the British prime minister’s insistence to “look forward” rather than have “very long endless discussions about reparations on the past” when he meets 55 other country leaders on Friday, the distinguished Caribbean historian Sir Hilary Beckles, who chairs the Caribbean governments’ reparations body, articulated the region’s call to the British government and institutions to “engage in a compassionate, intergenerational strategy to support postcolonial reconstruction”.

The Caribbean Community (Caricom) reparations committee, which acts on behalf of 15 Caribbean governments and six associate members, has a 10-point reparatory justice plan, covering an apology and actions to address the enduring socioeconomic impacts of slavery.

Beckles’ strongly worded piece for the Guardian, which outlines the legal, ethical and moral justification for slavery reparations and reflects the views of Caribbean nations, follows weeks of political wrangling as Caribbean governments pushed for the matter to be discussed at the Commonwealth heads of government meeting (Chogm) and Starmer dug in his heels, saying that the UK was focused on “facing real challenges on things like climate in the here and now”.

Addressing Downing Street’s stance that the UK would not – now or ever – participate in the payment of any form of reparation, Beckles writes: “On the first matter, nothing could be further from the truth. Reparations are in the mouths and on the minds of all participants, and the formal agenda does not determine the real agenda. It is just a conciliatory framework for the moment, and does not reflect what in fact is a supportive movement.”

Pointing to the fact that slavery enriched Britain, Beckles said: “While imperial Britain soared to sustainable economic development and global military superpower status, the enslaved and their descendants were left to this day with enduring pain, persistent poverty and systemic suffering.”

He described the Slavery Abolition Act as “the most racist legislation ever passed in the British parliament” adding it defined 700,000 enslaved black people as “property”, rather than humans.

The piece continues: “Global opinion, however, has rallied around the idea – rooted in international law and bolstered by the best ethical and moral thinking – that there is a case to answer and that negotiations should be inevitable. In 1939, Arthur Lewis, a Nobel laureate in economics, set it out clearly. Britain, he said, had 200 years of free labour from an estimated 20 million black men, women and children. This was Britain’s black debt, which must be acknowledged and repaired.”

Some Caribbean officials have already made it clear that the region will not back down on the issue, with the Bahamas’ foreign minister, Frederick Mitchell, telling the BBC’s Today programme that it was “only a matter of time” before Starmer “changes” his position on reparations, adding that it is “unusual to us because you’ve got the Labour party in power”.

Mitchell said: “And this, we thought was something that the Conservative party in the UK would be the progenitor of, and that Labour would certainly change its position on this.”

When asked about the issue, the outgoing Commonwealth secretary general, Patricia Scotland, told the Guardian: “One of the benefits of the Commonwealth platform is that everybody is around that table – everybody who is affected, every region who participated in any way is around the table, because quite often in other spheres, someone is left out …

“Our leaders have the opportunity to discuss if they wish to, but it’s up to them. The secretariat does not dictate the agenda, and it does not take sides. We are here to serve.”

The Commonwealth summit, which happens every two years, is a platform for leaders of the 56-member bloc to meet to discuss shared concerns and solutions. Historically, the intergovernmental organisation has played a role in addressing serious issues such as apartheid in South Africa.

At the heart of its operations is the Commonwealth charter, which was signed by the late Queen Elizabeth II in 2013. The charter is built on 16 principles, including support for small and vulnerable nations and a commitment to equality.

The international criminal court’s prosecutor, Karim Khan, has been accused of misconduct towards a member of his office, the court’s governing body has said.

The unspecified allegation, which Khan said there is “no truth to”, comes as a panel of judges at the ICC considers applications for arrest warrants he filed against the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and defence minister, Yoav Gallant, for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

Khan has faced intense criticism from supporters of Israel over the applications. At the same time as they were made, he also requested arrest warrants for senior Hamas figures including its then leader, Yahya Sinwar, but they are all since believed to have been killed by Israel.

The president of the ICC’s assembly of state parties, its management oversight and legislative body, said on Thursday: “I am aware of recent public reports regarding alleged misconduct by the ICC prosecutor towards a member of his office. I can confirm that the independent oversight mechanism (IOM) was seized of this matter on the basis of a third-party report.”

In response to the president’s statement, Khan said: “There is no truth to suggestions of such misconduct. I have worked in diverse contexts for 30 years and there has never been such a complaint lodged against me by anyone.”

He said he would be willing to provide any information needed to the IOM, adding: “I stand with any victim of harassment or abuse and would encourage all survivors to raise their voice and come forward with such accounts wherever they may occur.”

In his statement, Khan also made apparent reference to the attacks he has faced over the arrest warrants sought for Israeli leaders, as well as a Guardian investigation, published in May, which revealed how Israeli intelligence attempted over a nine-year period to undermine, influence and allegedly intimidate the ICC chief prosecutor’s office.

Khan, a British lawyer who has served as the ICC’s prosecutor since 2021, said: “This is a moment in which myself and the international criminal court are subject to a wide range of attacks and threats. It has never been more important that the ICC, including myself as prosecutor, is able to focus on its job to deliver justice for the victims of international crimes, and demonstrate through our actions that all lives deserve the protection of international law.”

Last month, Israel submitted an “official challenge” to the request for arrest warrants against Netanyahu and Gallant, questioning their legality and the ICC’s jurisdiction.

In August, Khan’s office urged the court to take action on the warrants “with utmost urgency”, saying that it was “settled law that the court has jurisdiction in this situation”.

Turkey has launched airstrikes against suspected Kurdish militant targets in Syria and Iraq after blaming the Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK) for a deadly attack on the headquarters of the Turkish national aerospace company on Wednesday that killed five people.

Turkey’s National Intelligence Organization said it had targeted numerous “strategic locations” used by the PKK, or by Syrian Kurdish militia affiliated with the militants, the Anadolu Agency reported.

There was no immediate statement from the PKK on the attack or the Turkish airstrikes.

The targets included military, intelligence, energy and infrastructure facilities and ammunition depots, the report said. A security official said armed drones were used in Thursday’s strikes.

The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) said on Thursday that Turkish airstrikes killed 12 civilians in north-east Syria.

“Over the past hours … a new wave of [Turkish] attacks on northern and eastern Syria” killed 12 civilians, including two children, and wounded 25 others, a statement from the US-backed SDF said.

“In addition to populated areas, Turkish warplanes and UAVs [drones] targeted bakeries, power stations, oil facilities and [Kurdish] Internal Security Force checkpoints,” added the statement, which also reported Turkish shelling.

On Wednesday, Turkey’s air force carried out strikes against similar targets in northern Syria and northern Iraq, hours after Turkish government officials blamed the PKK for the deadly attack at the headquarters of the aerospace and defence company Tusaş near Ankara.

More than 30 targets were destroyed in the aerial offensive, the Turkish defence ministry said.

The attack on Tusaş occurred when two assailants – a man and a woman – arrived at the firm’s headquarters in a taxi they commandeered after killing its driver, reports said.

Armed with assault rifles, the pair set off explosives and opened fire, killing four people at the company, including a member of the security personnel and a mechanical engineer.

Security teams were dispatched as soon as the attack started at about 3.30pm local time, the interior minister said. The two assailants were also killed and more than 20 people were injured in the attack.

Tusaş designs, manufactures and assembles civilian and military aircraft, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and other defence industry and space systems. Its defence systems have been credited as key to Turkey gaining an upper hand in its fight against Kurdish militants.

The attack occurred a day after the head of a far-right nationalist party allied to the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, raised the possibility that the PKK’s imprisoned leader could be granted parole if he renounced violence and disbanded his organisation.

Abdullah Öcalan’s PKK has been fighting for autonomy in south-east Turkey in a conflict that has killed tens of thousands of people since the 1980s. It is considered a terrorist group by Turkey and the country’s western allies.

Associated Press and AFP contributed to this report

Mech Dara, one of Cambodia’s most prominent journalists, known for exposing the country’s billion-dollar scam industry, has been released on bail after a video of him apologising to the country’s leaders appeared in pro-government media.

Dara was arrested last month while travelling with his family, and charged with incitement over social media posts.

On Wednesday a government-friendly site published a video of Dara, wearing a prison uniform, apologising and asking for forgiveness for various social media posts. He had been held in a cramped cell with more than a hundred inmates for more than three weeks.

“In all the messages that I posted, I conveyed false information that affected the leaders and the country’s reputation. I sincerely apologise for my mistakes and promise to stop sharing such harmful content,” Dara said in the video.

He could still face up to two years in prison on the charges, which have been widely condemned by press freedom and human rights advocates. Dara said after his release that he would take a break from journalism while he fought the charges against him.

The arrest was a serious blow to the country’s independent media, which has faced years of attacks aimed at shutting down any scrutiny of leadership in the country, which is in effect a one-party state.

His case also has ramifications beyond Cambodia’s borders. Dara was at the forefront of reporting on the industrial-scale scam operations that have exploded in the country over recent years, where workers are trafficked, held in heavily fortified compounds and forced to trick victims around the world into handing over vast sums of money.

It is feared the legal charges will have a chilling effect on independent reporting of such crime, which is estimated to bring in more than $12.5bn annually – equal to half of Cambodia’s formal GDP, according to an estimate by the United States Institute of Peace.

“There’s absolutely no way that the international attention that is now on scam activity and the human trafficking related to it would be on the same level if it wasn’t for Dara,” said Nathan Paul Southern, an investigative journalist and operations director at the Eye Witness Project, who collaborated with Dara.

Dara investigated scam compounds doggedly for the outlet Voice of Democracy (VOD) until it was shuttered last year by authorities in a move widely seen as an attack on independent media. He continued reporting for other outlets, doing so at far greater risk and with fewer rewards than many international reporters, Southern said.

His reports documented the Telegram channels where trafficked workers are bought and sold, and the desperate pleas of those trapped inside compounds; he wrote about workers who jumped from balconies in attempts to escape, and the role and response of Cambodian officials.

Last month the US announced sanctions against Ly Yong Phat, a ruling party senator, for his “role in serious human rights abuse related to the treatment of trafficked workers subjected to forced labour in online scam centres”. Dara had reported on the tycoon’s links to scam operations.

Cambodia’s foreign ministry called the sanctions politically motivated.

Phil Robertson, the director of Asia Human Rights and Labour Advocates (AHRLA), said a concerted international effort was needed to ensure the charges against Dara were dropped. “The only reason that the Cambodian government will [give in] in any way shape or form, is if they feel that they’re going to lose something.

“The fact that they’re going after [Dara] instead of going after these companies and criminals who are running these scam centres – it really shows that the Cambodian government is in on it.”

According to a 2024 US trafficking report, “corruption and official complicity – including by high-level senior government officials” in trafficking was “widespread and endemic”.

Samantha Power, the administrator of the United States Agency for International Development, who is visiting Cambodia this week, told media the US was following Dara’s case “very closely”.

Dara was born in rural Kandal province, near the capital, Phnom Penh. In an interview with the BBC he described how as a child he would sometimes wake at 3am and walk 6 miles (10km) to collect leftover rice harvested by local farmers and bring it home to his grandmother before starting school. “I often skipped school to try and catch fish, from morning to evening. Sometimes I would almost faint [from hunger]. It was a part of country life,” he said.

When his grandmother died, he stayed at a pagoda and later moved to live with relatives in Phnom Penh. It was in the capital that his path to journalism began. He learned English and began cycling to the offices of the Cambodia Daily after school so that he could read the pages of the paper that were posted on a board outside. He managed to secure a job there, sorting the archives, and went on to become a reporter.

Although best known for his reporting on scams and human trafficking – he was given a hero award last year by the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, in recognition of such work – he has spent years covering human rights and environmental issues. Multiple other outlets that he has written for have been shuttered or silenced, including the Cambodia Daily, which was closed in 2017, while the Phnom Penh Post was sold to a PR company. He has contributed to a wide range of international outlets, including the Guardian.

Lucy Letby has been refused permission to appeal against a conviction for attempting to murder a baby girl, as judges ruled she was able to have a fair trial.

The former nurse, who is serving 14 whole-life prison terms, had sought to overturn the conviction on the basis that she had been subjected to “unadulterated vitriol” in the media before the trial.

But senior judges dismissed her legal challenge after a two-hour hearing at the court of appeal in London on Thursday.

Letby, now 34, gave no reaction to the judges’ ruling, listening via video link from HMP Bronzefield, a women’s prison in Surrey.

Her new barrister, Mark McDonald, is preparing to ask for a wide-ranging review of the convictions by the Criminal Cases Review Commission.

Letby was originally convicted of murdering seven babies and attempting to murder six on the neonatal unit at the Countess of Chester hospital in north-west England.

She was found guilty after a retrial in June of attempting to murder a seventh infant, known as Baby K.

Letby, who has consistently maintained her innocence, had been refused permission to appeal against last year’s convictions and on Thursday launched a bid to appeal against her conviction for trying to kill Baby K.

Benjamin Myers KC, for Letby, told the three judges that it was “unprecedented” for such “highly prejudicial and emotive” comments to have been made about a defendant before a criminal trial.

He said police detectives had described the nurse as “evil, cruel and devoid of emotion”, while a senior prosecutor had labelled her “devious, cold-blooded, calculated [and] manipulative” after her first trial last year.

Myers said the trial judge, Mr Justice Goss, had been wrong to allow the retrial to go ahead given the “overwhelming and irremediable” public comment that followed her original convictions.

He said the media had been “saturated with unadulterated vitriol” towards the former nurse before the retrial, citing 62 examples of hostile coverage, including a debate on ITV’s Loose Women titled: “Was Lucy Letby born evil?”

Myers said it had been “unprecedented” for a police force, in this case Cheshire constabulary, to launch into “blistering attacks” on a defendant at a time when a retrial was under consideration.

However, Lord Justice Davis, sitting with Lord Justice Baker and Mrs Justice McGowan, said they would refuse permission for Letby to challenge the conviction.

In a ruling briefly interrupted by a fire alarm inside the Royal Courts of Justice in London, Davis said: “We conclude that the judge was right to find that Letby would be able to have a fair trial.”

The judges concluded that “almost all” of the media coverage complained about had been published or broadcast in the week after the convictions and therefore the “fade factor” – the reduced effect of this material over time – had been significant.

They said it was “fanciful” that police and prosecutors should not be able to comment in emotive terms about a defendant immediately after convictions. The prospect of a retrial “did not materially affect the position”, the judges decided.

Davis said their ruling related only to Letby’s contention that her retrial should not have been allowed to go ahead and that it was not a judgment on the wide-ranging critique of her convictions.

“This application related to a narrow legal issue,” he said. “Nothing we have said can contribute to any debate about the wider case against Lucy Letby.”

Nick Johnson KC, the prosecutor, had said Myers’ characterisation of the media coverage was not “reasonable or accurate”.

He told the judges that most of the disapproving public comment had been directed towards hospital management for allowing Letby to remain on the neonatal unit despite concerns raised by senior doctors.

Johnson also said the vast majority of the media material cited by Letby appeared in the immediate aftermath of the convictions in August 2023, 10 months before the retrial, so would have “faded” from the memory of any jurors.

He cited the example of a “very, very pro-Lucy Letby” article by the New Yorker, published in the weeks before the retrial, which he said had been given “significant traction” when it was mentioned in parliament by Sir David Davis.

Johnson said: “If ever this court wants evidence that publicity had no effect on this jury, this is it. Because this was very pro-Letby, anti-prosecution material circulating with significant traction on the internet in the weeks and days before the trial.”

He added: “In that context, one remembers the old epithet that today’s front page is tomorrow’s fish and chip wrappers.”

The Belgian ultrarunners Merijn Geerts, Ivo Steyaert and Frank Gielen set a Backyard Ultra ultramarathon world record in the early hours of Thursday by running nearly 738km in four days and 14 hours in Retie, Belgium. The Backyard Ultra takes place on a looped track of around 6.7km (4.2 miles). Participants must complete one loop every hour, running about 100 miles each day. The race continues until one runner is left standing.

The bi-annual world championship allows national teams to field 15 runners and the country with most combined completed loops wins the competition. Races began around the world on Saturday, with 63 countries competing.

Belgium, aided by Geerts, Steyaert and Gielen’s contribution of 110 laps each, won with 1,147 loops, beating Australia and United States who completed 971 and 969 loops respectively.

The Belgian trio broke the record of 108 laps set by the American Harvey Lewis last year and linked their arms as they completed the 110th loop to end the race together. “I didn’t think it was possible to break that world record,” Steyaert told Sporza. “We decided in the last round to stop together. We are three friends and we thought it would be nicer to share the record with the three of us.”

When asked what was next, Gielen said: “I think I’m not going to move for two weeks.”