Protests have broken out in Syria over the burning of a Christmas tree, prompting calls for the new Islamist authorities to take steps to protect minorities.

A video posted on social media showed the tree on fire in the main square of Suqaylabiyah, a Christian-majority town in central Syria.

Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the main Islamist faction which led the uprising that toppled President Bashar al-Assad, said foreign fighters had been detained over the incident.

HTS representatives have promised to protect the rights and freedoms of religious and ethnic minorities in Syria.

Footage on social media appeared to show masked men dousing the Christmas tree with an unidentified liquid the night before Christians in Syria prepared to celebrate Christmas Eve. It was unclear whether they were trying to put the fire out or help it spread.

Videos of the aftermath showed a religious figure from the governing HTS rebel group assuring crowds who had gathered in Suqaylabiyah that the tree would be repaired before the morning.

The man then held up a cross in a show of solidarity, something Islamist conservatives would not normally do.

On Tuesday more protesters took to the streets over the arson attack, including in parts of the capital Damascus.

Some in the Kassa neighbourhood of Damascus chanted against foreign fighters in Syria.

“Syria is free, non Syrians should leave,” they said, in reference to the foreign fighters HTS said were behind the attack.

In the Bab Touma neighbourhood of Damascus, protesters carried a cross and Syrian flags, chanting “we will sacrifice our souls for our cross”.

“If we’re not allowed to live our Christian faith in our country, as we used to, then we don’t belong here anymore,” a demonstrator named Georges told AFP news agency.

• Syria’s minorities seek security
• New leaders must keep promises to respect rights, UN says

Syria is home to many ethnic and religious groups, including Kurds, Armenians, Assyrians, Christians, Druze, Alawite Shia and Arab Sunnis, the last of whom make up a majority of the Muslim population.

Just over two weeks ago, Bashar al-Assad’s presidency fell to rebel forces, ending the Assad family’s more than 50-year-rule.

How the HTS group will govern Syria remains to be seen.

HTS began as a jihadist group – espousing violence to achieve its goal of establishing a state governed by Islamic law (Sharia) – but in recent years adopted a more pragmatic, less uncompromising approach.

As fighters marched to Damascus earlier this month, its leaders spoke about building a Syria for all Syrians.

On Tuesday the new authorities announced that leader Ahmed al-Sharaa had reached an agreement with “revolutionary factions… to dissolve all factions and merge them under the umbrella of the Ministry of Defence”, according to Sana news agency.

Prime Minister Mohammed al-Bashir said the ministry would be restructured to include rebel fighters.

Although the statement mentioned “all factions”, it was not clear exactly which groups are included in the merger.

There are multiple armed groups in Syria, including some opposed to HTS and others with ambiguous relationships with it at best.

HTS remains designated as a terrorist organisation by the UN, US, EU and UK, though there are signs that a diplomatic shift may be under way.

On Friday, the US scrapped a $10m (£7.9m) bounty on the head of HTS leader Ahmed al-Sharaa, following meetings between senior diplomats and representatives from the group.

The US is continuing its military presence in Syria. It said on Friday that it carried out an air strike in the northern city of Deir Ezzor – killing two members of the Islamic State (IS) jihadist group.

The presence of foreign fighters, Islamist extremists, or even regime supporters who have interest in causing insecurity and attacking minorities to shake the country’s stability are the big challenge that the new Islamic leadership will face.

The former CEO of Abercrombie & Fitch (A&F) has dementia and late onset Alzheimer’s disease, his legal team has said in a court document filed in New York.

Lawyers for Mike Jeffries have requested a hearing to determine whether he is mentally fit to stand trial on federal sex trafficking charges.

The 80-year-old was arrested alongside his partner in October and charged with running an international sex trafficking and prostitution business. Both men have pleaded not guilty.

A so-called competency hearing has been scheduled for June next year.

Mr Jeffries, who ran US clothing brand A&F for two decades, is accused of running a sex trafficking and prostitution business from at least 2008-15.

US prosecutors allege that he used his wealth, power and status “to traffic men for his own sexual pleasure”, and for the pleasure of his British partner Matthew Smith, 61.

They said the couple, alongside a middleman James Jacobson, 71, used force, fraud and coercion to make vulnerable, aspiring models engage in violent and exploitative sex acts.

All three men have pleaded not guilty to the charges and been released on bond.

The FBI began investigating last year after the BBC revealed claims Mr Jeffries and Mr Smith had sexually exploited men at events they hosted around the world.

The BBC investigation, published in October 2023, found the pair were at the centre of a sophisticated operation involving a middleman scouting young men for sex.

In the same month, Brian Bieber, Mr Jeffries’ lawyer, said his client was examined several times by a neuropsychologist who later concluded diagnostic impressions that he was suffering from two types of dementia and probable late onset Alzheimer’s disease.

In the court filing, Mr Bieber added that during an initial meeting last year the former fashion boss “did not even come close to resembling a master’s degree-educated individual, who was just nine years earlier the chief executive officer of a publicly traded company”.

As a result, Mr Bieber questioned the ability of Mr Jeffries to “rationally assist” with the possible factual and legal defences to the allegations he was facing, according to the document.

The filing comes after Mr Jeffries’ legal team sought a competency hearing, which will now be held over two days on 16 and 17 June 2025.

Federal prosecutors in the Eastern District of New York declined to comment.

Mr Jeffries stepped down as CEO and chairman of A&F in 2014, and left with a $25m (£19.9m) retirement package.

Alongside the criminal case, A&F, Mr Jeffries and his partner have been defending a civil lawsuit accusing the retailer of having funded a sex trafficking operation.

Earlier this month, Mr Jeffries sued A&F after it refused to pay his criminal defence costs, arguing the brand had agreed to indemnify him for all claims arising out of his position.

With just weeks left in office, US President Joe Biden has commuted the sentences of 37 of 40 federal death row inmates – potentially thwarting President-elect Donald Trump’s plans to expand federal executions during his upcoming administration.

Biden’s move was swiftly condemned by Republicans, with some accusing the president of siding with criminals over law-abiding Americans.

Federal executions were relatively rare before Trump’s first term in office, which finished with a flurry of executions that ended a 130-year-old precedent of pausing executions amid a presidential transition.

He has vowed to resume the practice when he returns to the White House in January, setting the stage for possible legal battles early in the administration.

Here’s what we know.

On Monday, Biden commuted the sentences of 37 out of 40 death row inmates, switching their penalty to life without parole.

Only three inmates were left to face the death penalty, including convicted Boston marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev and Robert Bowers, who was sentenced to death for killing 11 worshippers and wounding seven during a shooting at a the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh in 2018.

The third, Dylann Roof, was sentenced to death in 2017 for a mass shooting that left nine black parishioners dead at the Mother Emanuel AME church in Charleston, South Carolina, in 2015.

While the move was widely praised by human rights groups such as Amnesty International, it was quickly condemned by some Republicans, as well as Trump’s transition team and political allies.

In a statement, Trump communications director Steven Cheung said that “these are among the worst killers in the world and this abhorrent decision by Joe Biden is a slap in the face to the victims, their families, and their loved ones.

“President Trump stands for the rule of law, which will return when he is back in the White House,” he added. Trump cannot undo the commutations when he returns to the White House next month.

Texas Republican Chip Roy posted on X that the decision was “unconscionable” and an abuse of power “to carry out a miscarriage of justice”.

Another Republican, Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton, said that “when given the choice between law-abiding Americans or criminals, Joe Biden and the Democrats choose criminals every time.”

Some family members also expressed anger.

On Facebook, Heather Turner – whose mother was killed in a 2017 bank robbery – called the commutations a “gross abuse of power”.

“At no point did the president consider the victims,” she wrote. “He, and his supporters, have blood on their hands.”

The commutations do not apply to the approximately 2,200 death row inmates convicted by state courts, over which the president holds no authority.

Over the course of his election campaign, Trump vowed to resume federal executions and make more people eligible to receive the death penalty, including those convicted of raping children or drug and human-trafficking cases, as well as migrants who kill US citizens or police officers.

“These are terrible, terrible, horrible people who are responsible for death, carnage and crime all over the country,” Trump said when he announced his presidential candidacy in 2022.

“We’re going to be asking everyone who sells drugs, gets caught, to receive the death penalty for their heinous acts,” he added.

There are more than 40 federal laws that can, in theory, result in the death penalty, ranging from murders committed during a drug-related shooting to genocide.

Almost all – with the exception of espionage and treason – explicitly involve the death of a victim.

Trump, however, has provided few details on how he plans to accomplish his campaign pledge.

Despite the lack of clarity, Trump’s vows to expand the federal death penalty have elicited strong warnings from human rights advocates.

In an 11 December statement, for example, the American Civil Liberties Union said Trump’s “chilling” plans amount to an expansion of the “killing spree he initiated in the final six months of his first presidency”.

“He’s already shown us that he will act on these promises,” the statement said.

The inmates executed during the waning days of Trump’s first administration included Lisa Montgomery, the first woman executed by the federal government since 1953, and Lezmond Mitchell, the only Native American on federal death row.

US media reported that Trump cannot reverse Biden’s commutations.

Trump’s efforts to expand the death penalty to crimes that do not involve murder are likely to face legal challenges.

In 2008, for example, the Supreme Court ruled that those convicted of raping children cannot be executed, adding that it’s unclear if the death penalty could be applied to crimes in which a victim is not killed.

According to the National Registry of Exonerations, cases with child victims are particularly prone to wrongful convictions, can be “extremely emotional” and pit family members against one another.

Any further expansion of crimes that are eligible for the federal death penalty would require Congress to act and change the law.

In 2024, two bills – both sponsored by Florida Republican and Trump ally Anna Paulina Luna – sought to expand the use of capital offences to include possession of child pornography, as well as the trafficking, exploitation and abuse of children.

Both failed to pass in the House of Representatives.

Trump is also unlikely to be able to quickly re-populate the pool of federal death row inmates, as most death penalty cases take years and are subject to lengthy appeals processes.

While he does not have any direct authority over state executions, some experts have warned that Trump’s pro-death penalty stance may trigger more executions at a state level.

“His rhetoric can and has spurred draconian measures and attitudes by leaders in states on several issues, including in the context of the criminal legal system,” Yasmin Cader, a deputy legal director at the American Civil Liberties Union and director of the Trone Center for Justice and Equality told CNN.

In addition to the federal government and US military, 27 US states still have the death penalty on the books.

A Gallup poll conducted in October found that a slim majority of Americans – 53% – support the death penalty for convicted murderers, up from 50% a year before.

Brazilian authorities have halted the construction of a factory for Chinese electric vehicle (EV) giant BYD, saying workers lived in conditions comparable to “slavery”.

More than 160 workers have been rescued in Brazil’s northeastern state of Bahia, according to a statement from the Public Labour Prosecutor’s Office (MPT).

They were allegedly put in a “degrading” environment and had their passports and salaries withheld by a building company.

BYD said in a statement that it had cut ties with the firm involved and remained committed to a “full compliance with Brazilian legislation”.

The factory was scheduled to be operational by March 2025, and was set to be BYD’s first EV plant outside of Asia.

The workers, hired by Jinjiang Construction Brazil, lived in four facilities in Camaçari city.

At one such facility, workers were made to sleep on beds without mattresses, according to prosecutors.

Each bathroom was also shared among 31 workers, forcing them to get up extremely early in order to be ready for work.

“The conditions found in the lodgings revealed an alarming picture of precariousness and degradation,” the MPT said.

“Slavery-like conditions”, as defined by Brazilian law, include debt bondage and work that violates human dignity.

The MPT added that the situation also constitutes “forced labour”, as many workers had their wages withheld and faced excessive costs for terminating their contracts.

BYD said affected workers had been moved to hotels.

It added that it had conducted a “detailed review” of the working and living conditions for subcontracted employees, and asked on “several occasions” for the construction firm to make improvements.

BYD, short for Build Your Dreams, is one of the world’s largest EV makers.

It sold more electric vehicles than Elon Musk’s Tesla in the last three months of 2023, as the two battled for top spot in the sector.

The company has also been expanding its foothold in Brazil, which is its largest overseas market by a wide margin.

It first opened a factory in São Paulo in 2015, producing chassis for electric buses.

Last year, it announced that it would invest 3 billion reais ($484.2m) in Brazil to build an EV manufacturing plant.

EV sales in China have been boosted by government subsidies. which encourage consumers to trade their petrol-powered cars for EVs or hybrids.

But there is a growing backlash abroad against what some see as the Chinese government’s unfair support for domestic car makers.

Major markets like the US and EU have placed tariffs on EVs from China, with more tariffs expected during the incoming administration of US president-elect Donald Trump.

A Russian cargo ship, Ursa Major, has sunk in the Mediterranean between Spain and Algeria after an explosion in the engine room, Russia’s foreign ministry has confirmed.

It said 14 members of the crew had been rescued and taken to the Spanish port of Cartagena but that two others were missing.

Ursa Major left port in St Petersburg 12 days ago, according to Russian news agency Interfax.

The ship’s owner said it was on its way to Vladivostok in Russia’s Far East carrying two cranes for the port weighing 380 tonnes apiece, although the destination could not be confirmed independently.

Before Ursa Major sank, Spain’s Salvamento Marítimo maritime rescue agency said 14 people were found on a lifeboat and taken safely to Spain and a Russian warship then arrived in the area to take charge of the rescue operation.

Ursa Major was in the same area of the Med as another sanctioned Russian ship, Sparta, when it ran into trouble and the two ships had been spotted heading through the English Channel last week, reportedly under escort.

Earlier this month, Ukrainian military intelligence (HUR) reported that the Sparta was heading to Russia’s naval base on the Syrian coast at Tartous to move military equipment out of Syria after the downfall of Bashar al-Assad.

A Kremlin official said on Monday that Russia was in contact with Syria’s new rulers on the future of its two military facilities, at both diplomatic and military level.

Ursa Major’s owner Oboronlogistika has been heavily involved in transporting cargo to Tartous, although Sparta’s reported destination on Tuesday was Port Said in Egypt.

Marine transport monitoring website LSEG told the BBC that Ursa Major’s automatic ID system (AIS) showed that its destination since 11 December had been Vladivostok, and that its last call at the port of Tartous had been in July.

On Monday, the HUR reported that the Sparta had broken down off Portugal, but the problem had been fixed. Ursa Major was also known as Sparta III, so it was not clear which ship it was referring to.

It is not known what caused the explosion on Ursa Major as it passed between Oran in Algeria and the Spanish town of Águilas.

However, video filmed from the tanker Ross Sea between 12:00-13:00GMT on Monday, and verified by the BBC, showed the ship listing badly.

It eventually sank at about 01:20GMT on Tuesday.

Ursa Major was built in 2009 and placed under sanction after Russia’s full-scale invasion in Ukraine in 2022 because of the ship owner’s role in delivering cargo to the Russian military.

Oboronlogistika said the cargo ship, which it described as the flagship of its fleet, was carrying 45-tonne hatch covers for icebreakers, as well as the large cranes for the port in Vladivostok.

American Airlines has resumed flights after suspending its services for around an hour on Tuesday due to a technical issue that impacted the systems needed to release its planes.

The nationwide halt was cancelled just before 13:00 GMT, according to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).

The disruption came during one of the busiest travel days of the year as passengers made journeys on Christmas Eve.

In a statement, the airline said a “vendor technology issue” had caused the issue and it was “all hands on deck” to minimise further disruption.

“We sincerely apologise to our customers for the inconvenience this morning,” the airline said.

“It’s all hands on deck as our team is working diligently to get customers where they need to go as quickly as possible.”

Departure boards at major US airports are still showing delays of up to two hours for some flights as the airline recovers from the nationwide issue, but real-time tracking website Flightradar24 shows planes taking off again at a number of major US travel hubs and most flights are departing on time.

Passengers reported on social media being stuck on the tarmac or at gates as flights were impacted by the outage for around an hour.

Some passengers were also told to disembark from their planes.

In a video posted on X by a CBS reporter in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, a gate agent announced a flight to Philadelphia was going to start boarding.

“The system is slowly coming back,” the agent announced from a gate.

In July, American Airlines, among other major operators, grounded flights across the US due to communication issues caused by a global IT crash.

That failure – which also affected banks and emergency services – was caused by a faulty software update from cybersecurity firm Crowdstrike.

War-hit Sudan is sliding into a “widening famine crisis” that has been marked by worsening starvation and a surge in acute malnutrition, an independent group of food security experts says.

Famine has spread to five areas, with 24.6 million people – about half the population – in urgent need of food aid, the experts said.

The hunger crisis has been caused by the 20-month civil war that has devastated Sudan.

Various mediation efforts aimed at ending the conflict between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) have so far failed.

The army and RSF had jointly staged a coup in 2021, but a power struggle between their commanders plunged the country into a civil war in 2023.

It has led to one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises, with the UN-backed Famine Review Committee (FRC) warning that a “greater catastrophe” could unfold if the conflict did not end.

The committee is linked to the Integrated Food Phase Classification (IPC) – a global initiative by UN agencies, aid groups and governments to identify famine conditions.

On Monday, Sudan’s military-backed government announced it was suspending its cooperation with the group, accusing it of issuing “unreliable reports that undermine Sudan’s sovereignty and dignity”, Reuters news agency reports.

The IPC had first identified a famine in August at the Zamzam camp in Sudan’s Darfur region, where about half a million people were taking refuge.

In its latest report, the FRC said that famine had now also hit the Abu Shouk and al-Salam camps in Darfur’s besieged city of el-Fasher, as well as two areas in South Kordofan state.

“Famine is the most extreme manifestation of human suffering, representing a catastrophic collapse of the systems and resources essential for survival,” the FRC said.

“It is not merely a lack of food but a profound breakdown of health, livelihoods and social structures, leaving entire communities in a state of desperation,” it added.

The FRC predicted that five further areas in Darfur could face famine by May, and there was a risk of it spreading to 17 other areas.

“In areas of high conflict intensity, the hostilities severely disrupted farming activities, resulting in farmers abandoning their crops, looting and stock destruction,” it added.

Both Darfur and South Kordofan have been hit by some of the worst violence, with scores of civilians killed, raped and abducted by gunmen.

In May, US special envoy for Sudan Tom Perriello said that some estimates suggested up to 150,000 people had been killed in the conflict across the country.

• BBC reveals fighters accused of massacre in Sudan
• BBC hears of horror and hunger in visit to Darfur massacre town
• Sudan – where more children are fleeing war than anywhere else

A Nasa spacecraft is attempting to make history with the closest-ever approach to the Sun.

The Parker Solar Probe is plunging into our star’s outer atmosphere, enduring brutal temperatures and extreme radiation.

It is out of communication for several days during this burning hot fly-by and scientists will be waiting for a signal, expected at 05:00 GMT on 28 December, to see if it has survived.

The hope is the probe could help us to better understand how the Sun works.

Dr Nicola Fox, head of science at Nasa, told BBC News: “For centuries, people have studied the Sun, but you don’t experience the atmosphere of a place until you actually go visit it.

“And so we can’t really experience the atmosphere of our star unless we fly through it.”

Parker Solar Probe launched in 2018, heading to the centre of our solar system.

It has already swept past the Sun 21 times, getting ever nearer, but the Christmas Eve visit is record-breaking.

At its closest approach, the probe is 3.8 million miles (6.2 million km) from our star’s surface.

This might not sound that close, but Nasa’s Nicola Fox puts it into perspective: “We are 93 million miles away from the Sun, so if I put the Sun and the Earth one metre apart, Parker Solar Probe is four centimetres from the Sun – so that’s close.”

The probe will have to endure temperatures of 1,400C and radiation that could frazzle the onboard electronics.

It is protected by a 11.5cm (4.5 inches) thick carbon-composite shield but the spacecraft’s tactic is to get in and out fast.

In fact, it will be moving faster than any human-made object, hurtling at 430,000mph – the equivalent of flying from London to New York in less than 30 seconds.

Parker’s speed comes from the immense gravitational pull it feels as it falls towards the Sun.

So why go to all this effort to “touch” the Sun?

Scientists hope that as the spacecraft passes through our star’s outer atmosphere – its corona – it will solve a long standing mystery.

“The corona is really, really hot, and we have no idea why,” explains Dr Jenifer Millard, an astronomer at Fifth Star Labs in Wales.

“The surface of the Sun is about 6,000C or so, but the corona, this tenuous outer atmosphere that you can see during solar eclipses, reaches millions of degrees – and that is further away from the Sun. So how is that atmosphere getting hotter?”

The mission should also help scientists to better understand solar wind – the constant stream of charged particles bursting out from the corona.

When these particles interact with the Earth’s magnetic field the sky lights up with dazzling auroras.

But this so-called space weather can cause problems too, knocking out power grids, electronics and communication systems.

“Understanding the Sun, its activity, space weather, the solar wind, is so important to our everyday lives on Earth,” says Dr Millard.

Nasa scientists face an anxious wait over Christmas while the spacecraft is out of touch with Earth.

Nicola Fox says that as soon as a signal is beamed back home, the team will text her a green heart to let her know the probe is OK.

She admits she is nervous about the audacious attempt, but she has faith in the probe.

“I will worry about the spacecraft. But we really have designed it to withstand all of these brutal, brutal conditions. It’s a tough, tough little spacecraft.”

If it survives this challenge, the probe will continue its mission around the Sun into the future.

Pokrovsk in eastern Ukraine is the birthplace of one of the world’s favourite carols, the Carol of the Bells.

But there are few signs of Christmas in the city this year. Just a dusting of snow on deserted streets and skeletal buildings – and the constant sound of heavy shelling.

Pokrovsk is Russia’s next target. Its troops are now less than two miles (three kilometres) from the city centre.

And it’s not just buildings and homes that are being destroyed. Ukraine accuses Russia of trying to erase its cultural identity too – including its associations with that well-known carol.

Most of Pokrovsk’s population has already fled. The gas supply’s been turned off and many homes are without electricity and water. Those who remain, like 59-year-old Ihor, only break cover to find the bare essentials. He says it’s like living on a powder keg – you never know when or where the next shell will land.

Oksana, 43, says she’s too frightened to leave her home, but goes out during a lull in the shelling to find wood and coal to keep warm.

She tells me she hopes Ukraine’s armed forces can hold on to the city, but she thinks that’s unlikely. Pokrovsk, she says, will probably fall.

The city has already prepared for the worst. The statue of its famous composer, Mykola Leontovych, has already been removed. The music school that bore his name now lies boarded up and empty.

Leontovych may not be well known in the West. But the tune he composed is familiar around the world – with its chime-like vocals. It’s thought that Leontovych wrote the early scores of the composition, based on a Ukrainian folk chant, while he was living and working in Pokrovsk between 1904 and 1908.

In Ukraine it’s known as . To most of the world it became known as the Carol of the Bells, after American composer Peter Wilhousky wrote English lyrics for the song. The tune’s use in the Hollywood film Home Alone helped boost its popularity.

Viktoria Ametova calls it “a masterpiece – the signature song of Pokrovsk”. She too was until recently teaching music in the city, in the school that bore Leontovych’s name.

She’s now moved to the relative safety of Dnipro. It’s where many of Pokrovsk’s former residents are still trying to keep the memories of their former home alive.

Beneath a salvaged portrait of Leontovych, Viktoria watches as 13-year-old Anna Hasych strikes the familiar chords of the carol on a piano.

The Hasych family fled Pokrovsk this summer. But they’re determined not to forget the place they still call home. Anna’s mother, Yulia, says she’s glad to see her daughters practising Shchedryk. “We won’t forget the history of our town,” she says.

For Anna, the tune brings back memories. “When I played it at home it seemed happy. It reminded me of winter and Christmas,” she says. “Now it’s more of a sad song to me because it reminds me of home, and I really want to go back.”

But for one Ukrainian military band,Shchedryk has become a song to inspire resistance. They’re even playing it in the trenches – using weapons as improvised instruments.

They may be musicians, but their commander reminds me that they’re soldiers first. All have spent time on the front line. Colonel Bohdan Zadorozhnyy, the head of the band and its conductor, says the song helps lifts soldiers spirits. “Those beats and rhythms cheer up the guys on the front line and inspire them to fight,” he says.

22-year-old Roman uses a rocket launcher casing, filled with rice, to shake vigorously in time with the music. Shchedryk, he says, is the “pride of our country, it’s freedom, it’s in our souls, I get goosebumps from this song”.

Colonel Zadorozhnyy says Shchedryk shows that Ukraine is a civilised nation, now at war, fighting for its identity.

Pokrovsk may well fall into Russian hands. But its people are doing all they can to preserve their culture and identity.

The director of Pokrovsk’s History Museum, Angelina Rozhkova, has already salvaged and transferred most of its prized possessions to safety – including artefacts from Leontovych’s life in Pokrovsk.

Russia, she says, doesn’t just want to take Ukraine’s territory – “It wants to destroy our culture and everything precious to us”.

Angelina says the people of Pokrovsk understand they may never go back, “but our heart and souls do not accept that”. Hence they’re doing everything they can to preserve the past. The new motto is “keeping and saving, equals winning”.

It’s hard to say you’re winning when your city’s being destroyed. But its people, like Leontovych’s music, are displaying extraordinary resilience.

Leontovych’s life came to an abrupt end in 1921 when he was shot by a Soviet agent. His composition had become a symbol for the fight for Ukraine’s independence. It still is.

French Prime Minister François Bayrou believes dozens of people died when Cyclone Chido hit the French Indian Ocean territory of Mayotte on 14 December, rather than thousands as some have feared.

Bayrou told BFMTV he thought the “alarmist and sometimes terrifying numbers put forward won’t be borne out in reality”.

The confirmed death toll on Mayotte so far is 35 but, in the immediate aftermath of the cyclone, local prefect François-Xavier Bieuville feared that it would “definitely be several hundred” and could reach thousands.

The prefect told France Info radio on Tuesday that investigations in the field were progressing well that “allow us to think that we will corroborate this figure of 35”.

Defending his initial remarks, Bieuville insisted “I have never been alarmist, I was simply unable to give the number of victims”.

Officials said it had been difficult to determine the scale of fatalities in the wake of the disaster 10 days ago, due to many areas of Mayotte being inaccessible and the fact that victims were buried within 24 hours in accordance with Islamic customs.

There is also uncertainty about the true population of Mayotte, a French Indian Ocean territory.

Officially it has 320,000 residents, but authorities estimate about 100,000 to 200,000 undocumented migrants may also be living there.

“I think [the number of dead] will be in the dozens and not in the thousands,” the prime minister told BFMTV on Monday night.

The archipelago is one of the poorest parts of France, with many of its residents living in shanty towns.

Cyclone Chido was the worst storm to hit the territory in 90 years, bringing winds of up to 260 km/h (160mph) and flattening areas where people lived in shacks with metal roofs.

France held a day of national mourning in the wake of the cyclone on Monday. President Emmanuel Macron visited the territory last week, and was heckled by angry locals demanding more aid in devastated areas.

Some survivors went for a week without water, communication or electricity.

Authorities restored water in the main points of the territory on Tuesday, Bieuville said. “Even if this water is still sometimes a little difficult to deliver, our fellow citizens have water.”

He also said there was no fuel shortage any more and cars could now be filled up.

The prime minister had earlier said that a field hospital would also be operational by Tuesday morning.

Cyclone Chido moved on to continental Africa after hitting Mayotte, killing 120 people in Mozambique and 13 in Malawi.

Four rioters have been given short jail terms for violence against football fans visiting Amsterdam for a Europa League match between Ajax and Israeli club Maccabi Tel Aviv.

Sefa Ö, 32, was handed the longest sentence of six months in jail by Amsterdam district court, while another man was given 10 weeks and two others a month’s detention each. A fifth defendant was given a community service order under the Netherlands’ juvenile law.

The judge said a prison sentence for the four was appropriate given the seriousness of the actions and the context in which they took place.

The riots broke out in several areas of the Dutch capital in early November and led to international condemnation.

The five defendants sentenced on Tuesday were the first to be tried for hit-and-run attacks that erupted in the early hours of 8 November, after incidents that took place over two days.

The court said that there was a lot of video evidence showing Maccabi fans facing extreme violence, and also pointed to footage of supporters pulling down Palestinian flags as well as chanting slogans against Arabs. Taxis were also vandalised by the fans.

The court chairman added that there had already been unrest in the Netherlands because of the war in Gaza.

While the court took “the context” of the events into account, it said there had been “no justification for calling for and using physical violence against Israeli supporters”.

• Amsterdam violence exposes tensions in society and spills over to politics
• New arrests made in Amsterdam over violence after football match

Sefa Ö was found to have given a karate-type kick to one victim, causing him to fall against a moving tram, as well as taking part in several other attacks.

The trial saw video footage appeared to show him kicking and hitting victims on Dam Square, Damrak and Zoutsteeg, and prosecutors said he had played a leading role in violence that had nothing to do with football.

Rachid O, 26, who was given 10 weeks in jail, was found to have taken part in a WhatsApp chat group called Buurthuis2, on which he referred to intended victims as “cowardly” Jews who he would never again get the chance to attack.

More than 900 people were in the group and the court said the chat had been used to pass on information to “commit violence against people of Jewish descent and/or supporters of Maccabi Tel Aviv”.

Umutcan A, 24, was also found to have kicked one of the victims several times while taking part in an attack with other men and then kicked another fan on the ground. CCTV footage had shown him attacking several Maccabi fans, as well as grabbing one fan by the throat and seizing his football scarf.

He had written in messaging groups about a “Jew hunt” but told the trial he did not harbour hatred towards Jews.

Karanveer S, 26, had already been convicted of assault in 2022 and the court noted that did not deter him from taking part in last month’s attacks.

The youngest of the five, Lucas D, 19, was found to have used violence against a police officer and taken part in a separate Snapchat group calling for violence against Maccabi Tel Aviv fans.

The five all have two weeks in which to appeal.

The court said he had an illegal, high-explosive “cobra” firework in his possession at the time of his arrest. Prosecutors had called for Lucas D to be given a jail term.

Chief prosecutor René de Beukelaer had earlier rejected suggestions that the attacks had amounted to terrorism, because he said it was not the aim of the group to instill fear in the people they were targeting.

However, he did say there were instances of antisemitism exchanged on a messaging group.

“I can well understand that the Jewish community in Amsterdam was left afraid because of this violence, but that’s different from saying that was the goal of the suspects,” he told Amsterdam’s AT5 TV channel earlier this month.

One of the founders of the Medellin drug cartel has returned to Colombia after serving more than 20 years in jail in the US for drug trafficking.

Fabio Ochoa Vasquez, now 67 years old, was deported by the US government and landed in Bogota on Monday a free man.

Ochoa was one of the founding members of the notorious cartel and had been a senior lieutenant to infamous drug lord Pablo Escobar.

The Medellin cartel dominated the cocaine trade and waged a violent campaign against the Colombian state before Escobar was killed in 1993.

On his arrival in Bogota, immigration officials ran Ochoa’s fingerprints through their database, the country’s immigration agency said.

Confirming that he is not wanted by Colombian authorities, it said that Ochoa was freed “to be reunited with his family”.

Amid a sea of reporters in the airport terminal, Ochoa was greeted by his relatives and hugged his daughter.

In 2001, Ochoa was flown to the US after being arrested in Colombia in 1999 along with about 30 other alleged traffickers.

He had already served a jail sentence in Colombia in the early 90s for his role as one of bosses of the Medellin cartel. Along with his brothers, he was the first major trafficker to surrender under a programme that protected cartel members from extradition to the US if they pleaded guilty to minor offences in Colombia.

Ochoa and his brothers were released from prison in 1996, but Ochoa was arrested once again during the so-called Millennium operation over his involvement in the cocaine smuggling business in the US in the late 1990s.

In 2003, Ochoa was sentenced to more than 30 years in a US court for his involvement in the cartel that brought an average of 30 tonnes of cocaine into the US each month between 1997 and 1999.

During the 1980s, he was one of the top operators in Escobar’s Medellin ring, a supplier in its prime of 80% of the US cocaine market.

The defunct Medellin cartel, along with the Cali cartel, was one of the most powerful and feared drug networks of the 1980s.

Its violent campaigns of bombings and assassinations led to extraditions of drugs suspects between Colombia and the US to be suspended, before being resumed in 1997.

An investigation has been launched after a passenger’s hand became trapped in the closing doors of an Elizabeth line train as it was leaving London’s Ealing Broadway station.

The incident on 24 November saw the passenger having to run alongside the train before they were freed by a member of staff who was working on the platform.

The driver was alerted to what was happening by other rail users, and the train stopped after moving approximately 17m (56 ft). The passenger reportedly suffered minor injuries.

The Rail Accident Investigation Branch (RAIB) said it would look into what happened. Transport for London (TfL) said it was sorry the customer “experienced this distressing incident”.

Among the issues the RAIB said it would consider are the actions of those involved and the arrangements in place to manage and control the risks associated with passengers getting on and off Elizabeth line trains.

A TfL spokesperson said the operator of the service, MTR-Elizabeth line, is currently carrying out a thorough investigation into the incident which happened just after midnight.

The spokesperson said: “We will always strive to learn from incidents and improve operational safety.

“MTR-Elizabeth line is fully co-operating with the RAIB to establish the root cause of this incident to determine what steps they can take to avoid any further events of this nature and to share learnings with the industry.

“While serious injuries on our network are rare, we are undertaking a huge range of work aimed eradicating such incidents and making travelling even safer for everyone.”

In June 2023 the RAIB investigated after two people were dragged along London Underground platforms by trains when their coats got stuck in the train doors.

The incidents happened at Archway and Chalk Farm stations on the Northern line.

The passenger at Archway was seriously injured after being dragged along the platform for about 2m (6.5ft) when their coat became trapped in the doors of a northbound Northern line train.

In its report into the incidents the RAIB recommended that London Underground should look at reducing the risk of a passenger becoming trapped and dragged along by a departing train.

This could include technology that can detect when thin objects, such as fingers, straps or clothing, become trapped in train doors and when something is being dragged along by the departing train.

It said Tube bosses should consider modifying door seals to make it easier for small, trapped objects, such as clothing and straps to be pulled free from closed doors.

The board also said London Underground should review the current minimum automatic train dwell times to determine if passengers have sufficient time to safely get on or off trains.

TfL told BBC London it is taking action to drive improvements to reduce risk in this area, including infrastructure changes, technology improvements, and more training for station colleagues and train operators.

It added it is also developing plans to trial technology to help reduce risks and it is talking to other metros and rail operators in the UK and worldwide to share how they manage risks.

Concerns have previously been raised about passenger safety on the Elizabeth line at Ealing Broadway due to the gap between the platform and the train.

In July the mayor of London apologised to several Elizabeth line passengers who were seriously injured using trains at the station and said work was being done to make sure the high gap would be fixed.

Three passengers told BBC London they had been hurt using the service at Ealing Broadway station because the gap between the platform and trains is too big.

Sadiq Khan said he was “shocked” to see reports on BBC London of those injured, adding: “I’m really sorry. You should not be injured going about your daily business.”

At the time TfL and Network Rail both said they were “sorry” some passengers had sustained injuries and safety was their “priority”.

The £18.8bn Elizabeth line opened in May 2022 and links Reading and Essex via central London.

Kennesaw, Georgia, has all the small-town fixings one might imagine in the American South.

There’s the smell of baked biscuits wafting from Honeysuckle Biscuits & Bakery and the rumble of a nearby railroad train. It’s the kind of place where newlyweds leave hand-written thank-you cards in coffee shops, praising the “cozy” atmosphere.

But there’s another aspect of Kennesaw that some might find surprising – a city law from the 1980s that legally requires residents to own guns and ammo.

“It’s not like you go around wearing it on your hip like the Wild Wild West,” said Derek Easterling, the town’s three-term mayor and self-described “retired Navy guy”.

“We’re not going to go knock on your door and say, ‘Let me see your weapon.'”

Kennesaw’s gun law plainly states: “In order to provide for and protect the safety, security and general welfare of the city and its inhabitants, every head of household residing in city limits is required to maintain a firearm, together with ammunition.”

Residents with mental or physical disabilities, felony convictions, or conflicting religious beliefs are exempt from the law.

To Mayor Easterling’s knowledge, and that of multiple local officials, there have been no prosecutions or arrests made for violating Article II, Sec 34-21, which came into law in 1982.

And no one that the BBC spoke to could say what the penalty would be for being found in violation.

Still, the mayor insisted: “It’s not a symbolic law. I’m not into things just for show.”

For some, the law is a source of pride, a nod to the city’s embrace of gun culture.

For others, it’s a source of embarrassment, a page in a chapter of history they wish to move beyond.

But the main belief amongst the townsfolk about the gun law is that it keeps Kennesaw safe.

Patrons eating pepperoni slices at the local pizza parlour will propose: “If anything, criminals need to be concerned, because if they break into your home, and you’re there, they don’t know what you got.”

There were no murders in 2023, according to Kennesaw Police Department data, but there were two gun-involved suicides.

Blake Weatherby, a groundskeeper at the Kennesaw First Baptist Church, has different thoughts on why violent crime might be low.

“It’s the attitude behind the guns here in Kennesaw that keep the gun crimes down, not the guns,” Mr Weatherby said.

“It doesn’t matter if it’s a gun or a fork or a fist or a high heel shoe. We protect ourselves and our neighbours.”

Pat Ferris, who joined Kennesaw’s city council in 1984, two years after the law was passed, said the law was created to be “more of a political statement than anything”.

After Morton Grove, Illinois, became the first US city to ban gun ownership, Kennesaw became the first city to require it, triggering national news headlines.

A 1982 opinion piece by the New York Times described Kennesaw officials as “jovial” over the law’s passage but noted that “Yankee criminologists” were not.

Penthouse Magazine ran the story on its cover page with the words Gun Town USA: An American Town Where It’s Illegal Not to Own a Gun printed over an image of a bikini-clad blonde woman.

Similar gun laws have been passed in at least five cities, including Gun Barrel City, Texas and Virgin, Utah.

In the 40 years since Kennesaw’s gun law was passed, Mr Ferris said, its existence has mostly faded from consciousness.

“I don’t know how many people even know that the ordinance exists,” he said.

The same year the gun law took effect, Mr Weatherby, the church groundskeeper, was born.

He recalled a childhood where his dad would half-jokingly tell him: “I don’t care if you don’t like guns, it’s the law.”

“I was taught that if you’re a man, you’ve got to own a gun,” he said.

Now 42, he was 12 years old the first time he fired a weapon.

“I almost dropped it because it scared me so bad,” he said.

Mr Weatherby owned over 20 guns at one point but said now he doesn’t own any. He sold them over the years – including the one his dad left him when he died in 2005 – to overcome hard times.

“I needed gas more than guns,” he said.

One place he could’ve gone to sell his firearms is the Deercreek Gun Shop located on Kennesaw’s Main Street.

James Rabun, 36, has been working at the gun store ever since he graduated high school.

It’s the family business, he said, opened by his dad and grandad, both of whom can still be found there today; his dad in the back restoring firearms, his grandad in the front relaxing in a rocking chair.

For obvious reasons, Mr Rabun is a fan of Kennesaw’s gun law. It’s good for business.

“The cool thing about firearms”, he said with earnest enthusiasm, “is that people buy them for self-defence, but a lot of people like them like artwork or like bitcoin – things of scarcity.”

Among the dozens and dozens of weapons hanging on the wall for sale are double barrel black powder shotguns – akin to a musket – and a few “they-don’t-make-these-anymore” Winchester rifles from the 1800s.

In Kennesaw, gun fandom has a broad reach that extends beyond gun shop owners and middle-aged men.

Cris Welsh, a mother of two teenaged daughters, is unabashed about her gun ownership. She hunts, is a member at a gun club, and shoots at the local gun range with her two girls.

“I’m a gun owner”, she admitted, listing off her inventory which includes “a Ruger carry pistol, a Beretta, a Glock, and about half a dozen shotguns”.

However, Ms Welsh is not fond of Kennesaw’s gun law.

“I’m embarrassed when I hear people talk about the gun law,” Ms Welsh said. “It’s just an old Kennesaw thing to hang onto.”

She wished that when outsiders thought of the city, they called to mind the parks and schools and community values – not the gun law “that makes people uncomfortable”.

“There’s so much more to Kennesaw,” she said.

City council member Madelyn Orochena agrees that the law is “something that people would prefer not to advertise”.

“It’s just a weird little factoid about our community,” she said.

“Residents will either roll their eyes in a bit of shame or laugh along about it.”

From the moment Justin Baldoni announced in 2019 that he was adapting the best-selling book It Ends With Us into a film, there was a widespread frenzy.

There are few books in recent years that have become as big a cultural phenomenon as Colleen Hoover’s novel – it has sold 20m copies and became an internet sensation on TikTok with more than one billion tags on the app.

When Blake Lively, who rose to fame in the 2000s playing Serena van der Woodsen in Gossip Girl, was cast as the main character, fans became even more excited, describing her as the perfect choice to play Lily Bloom, a young woman who grew up witnessing domestic abuse and winds up in the same position years later.

Lily, a florist in Boston, navigates a complicated love triangle between her charming but abusive boyfriend Ryle Kincaid – played by Jane the Virgin’s Justin Baldoni – and her compassionate first love, Atlas Corrigan (Brandon Sklenar).

Released at the beginning of August, the film became a box office success bringing in more than $350m (£280m) globally.

But despite its financial success, everything wasn’t running so smoothly behind the scenes. Rumours of a feud between Baldoni and Lively began swirling before the film was even released.

Last week, Lively filed a legal complaint against her co-star, accusing him of sexual harassment and starting a smear campaign against her, something Baldoni strongly denies. Here is the story so far:

For a film about domestic abuse, the press tour for It Ends With Us was probably not what you would have expected. There were pink carpets, flowers galore and the promotion of Lively’s new haircare brand and her husband’s gin company.

Instead of advocacy on the red carpet, Lively highlighted fashion and florals.

At the London premiere, press were told to keep questions “fun and light-hearted” with one event organiser telling me to “steer away from questions on domestic abuse”.

One of her remarks made at the New York premiere – “you are so much more than just a survivor or just a victim” – sparked backlash on social media.

Domestic abuse survivor Ashley Paige criticised Ms Lively’s language and told the BBC that her own trauma “shaped my identity”.

Lively was also criticised for her comments in another clumsy promotional tour video where she said: “Grab your friends, wear your florals and head out to see it.”

Ms Paige accused Lively of promoting the film like it’s “the sequel to Barbie”.

Alongside the press tour being described as “tone-deaf”, people started asking questions about why the Lively and Baldoni weren’t photographed on the red carpet together at the film’s New York premiere on 6 August.

The pair also did no interviews together during the press tour and at the London premiere, which Baldoni didn’t attend, I was warned by Lively’s team to not “ask any questions about Justin”.

Internet sleuths also spotted that cast members including Lively and author Hoover did not follow Baldoni on social media.

Neither Lively or Baldoni addressed rumours of a feud during the press tour and the only reference to each other was Baldoni telling Today that his co-star was a “dynamic creative”.

“She had her hands in every part of this production, and everything she touched made [it] better,” he said about the 37-year-old.

While the film was a box office success, it received mixed reviews from critics with some saying it romanticised domestic abuse.

There was a two-star review from The Telegraph’s Tim Robey, who called it a “queasy drama” that “repackages domestic violence as slick romance”.

He suggested the film “splices abuse and glossy courtship in the big city to deeply dubious effects”.

The movie also sparked a debate on TikTok, with some saying that it’s not clear from the trailer that this story is about an abusive relationship and rather it appears to be telling a love story.

Based on this misconception, some people said they found the film traumatic as they didn’t know it contained scenes of domestic abuse.

During the film’s press tour, Baldoni hired a crisis manager, Melissa Nathan, whose previous clients include Johnny Depp and Drake.

Shortly after the press tour, Lively faced a barrage of criticism on social media relating to her comments on that tour as well as from old interviews.

One of the interviews to resurface was one shared by a Norwegian journalist, Kjersti Flaa, who posted a video on YouTube of her interviewing Lively in 2016. It was titled “The Blake Lively interview that made me want to quit my job.”

Flaa has since said she had “nothing to do with Justin Baldoni and his smear campaign”.

Actor Brandon Sklenar, who plays Atlas in the film, defended Lively and said in a post on Instagram that people had been “vilifying” the women involved in the film online.

He said it was “disheartening to see the amount of negativity being projected” and that someone close to him who had experienced a relationship similar to Lily’s had credited the film with “saving her life”.

Four months after the film’s launch, Lively filed a legal complaint against Mr Baldoni in which she accused him of sexual harassment.

The complaint also listed Wayfarer Studios, Mr Baldoni’s production company which produced It Ends With Us, as a defendant.

The legal filing accuses Mr Baldoni and Wayfarer CEO Jamey Heath of “repeated sexual harassment and other disturbing behaviour”. Some other female cast and crew had also spoken up about their conduct, the filing alleges.

It also alleges that Ms Lively, Mr Baldoni and other people involved in the development of the film attended a meeting in January to address “the hostile work environment” on set. Her husband, actor Ryan Reynolds, attended the meeting alongside her, according to the complaint.

At the meeting, attendees agreed to a list of demands, including Mr Baldoni and Mr Heath making “no more descriptions of their own genitalia”, requiring an intimacy coordinator on set at all times when Ms Lively was in scenes with Mr Baldoni and no “friends” of the producers and directors being on set during scenes when Ms Lively was in a state of nudity.

The list of demands also implied that Mr Baldoni had asked Ms Lively’s trainer how much she weighed and alleged that Mr Baldoni and Mr Heath had spoken about their “pornography addiction” to Ms Lively.

In the filing, Ms Lively also alleges that Mr Baldoni and his team attacked her public image after the meeting.

She accuses him of orchestrating a plan to “destroy” her reputation in the press and online, including hiring a crisis manager who led a “sophisticated, coordinated, and well-financed retaliation plan” against her and used a “digital army” to post social media content that seemed authentic.

“To safeguard against the risk of Ms Lively ever revealing the truth about Mr Baldoni, the Baldoni-Wayfarer team created, planted, amplified, and boosted content designed to eviscerate Ms Lively’s credibility,” her team wrote in the filing.

It adds: “They engaged in the same techniques to bolster Mr Baldoni’s credibility and suppress any negative content about him.”

In the filing, Ms Lively says that this had led to “substantial harm” that affected “all aspects” of her life.

Mr Baldoni’s legal team told the BBC the allegations are “categorically false” and said they hired a crisis manager because Ms Lively had threatened to derail the film unless her demands were met.

Responding to the legal complaint, Mr Baldoni’s lawyer, Bryan Freedman, said on Saturday: “It is shameful that Ms Lively and her representatives would make such serious and categorically false accusations against Mr Baldoni, Wayfarer Studios and its representatives.”

Mr Freedman accused Ms Lively of making numerous demands and threats, including “threatening to not show up to set, threatening to not promote the film”, which would end up “ultimately leading to its demise during release, if her demands were not met”.

Hollywood stars including America Ferrera, Amber Tamblyn and Alexis Bledel have publicly backed Blake Lively after she filed her complaint.

Ferrera, Tamblyn and Bledel, who starred with Lively in 2005 film The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, issued a joint statement on Instagram, on Sunday saying they “stand with her in solidarity”.

“Throughout the filming of It Ends with Us, we saw her summon the courage to ask for a safe workplace for herself and colleagues on set, and we are appalled to read the evidence of a premeditated and vindictive effort that ensued to discredit her voice,” they wrote.

Colleen Hoover, the author of It Ends With Us, also showed her support, describing Ms Lively as “honest, kind, supportive and patient”.

Earlier in December, Baldoni was awarded a women’s solidarity honour by Vital Voices, a global non-profit organisation that focuses on empowering women.

The organisation has now rescinded the award after the legal complaint filed by Lively alleged “abhorrent conduct” by the actor, his studio and a crisis public relations team that it said was “contrary to the values” it held.

And since the legal complaint, Baldoni’s podcast co-host Liz Plank announced she was leaving The Man Enough show.

The podcast bills itself as creating “a safe environment” for exploring issues such as how “masculinity” shows up in relationships, as well as “sex, success” and “mental health”.

Two-year-old Shaina is hooked up to an intravenous drip at one of the few functioning hospitals in Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince. Her mother, Venda, desperately hopes it will alleviate the acute malnutrition the emaciated young girl is suffering from.

Shaina is one of 760,000 children who are on the brink of famine in Haiti.

Terrified of the gang warfare raging in her neighbourhood, for weeks Venda was too frightened to leave her home to seek treatment for her daughter.

Now that she has made it to the paediatric ward, she hopes it is not too late for Shaina.

“I want to get proper care for my child, I don’t want to lose her,” she says tearfully.

Haiti has been engulfed in a wave of gang violence since the assassination in 2021 of the then-president, Jovenel Moïse, and now an estimated 85% of the capital is under gang control.

Even inside the hospital, Haitians are not safe from the fighting, which the UN says has killed 5,000 people this year alone and left the country on the verge of collapse.

The hospital’s medical director explains that the previous day, police clashed with gang members in the emergency ward among terrified patients.

The victims of the violence are everywhere. One ward is full of young men with gunshot wounds.

Pierre is one of them.

He says he was walking home from work when he was caught in the crossfire of one street battle, with a bullet ripping through his collar bone.

“I think if the government were more stable and had put in place better youth programmes, they would not get involved in the gangs,” he says of the young men who make up a large proportion of the groups terrorising the capital.

To combat the growing violence, the UN Security Council authorised the establishment of a Multinational Security Support Mission (MSS) in October 2023.

Funded primarily by the US, the Kenyan-led force deployed to Haiti six months ago tasked with restoring law and order.

On a patrol in downtown Port-au-Prince, the ferocity of the gang violence is clear.

Kenyan officers drive along the streets in heavily armoured personnel carriers (APC) through once bustling areas of the capital that now lie deserted. Shops and houses are boarded up.

Burnt out cars and debris are piled high along the side streets – barricades built by the gangs to block access.

The convoy weaves its way through the rubble when suddenly it comes under fire.

Bullets slam into the APC’s armour as the Kenyan police shoot back with their assault rifles through gun ports in the vehicle’s walls.

After nearly an hour of back-and-forth gunfire, the convoy moves on.

But it is not long before there are signs of more horrific gang violence. A human body burns in the middle of the street.

One of the Kenyan police in our APC says he suspects it was a gang member cornered and killed by a rival group, his body set alight to send a gruesome warning.

The Kenyan officers on our patrol are by now well accustomed to seeing this sort of brutality on the streets of Port-au-Prince, but they also tell us they are exhausted.

Four hundred officers arrived in June – but they are hugely outnumbered. In July, Haiti’s government estimated there were 12,000 armed gang members in the country.

The Kenyans were promised additional personnel. When the UN authorised the mission, a force of 2,500 was envisioned, but that support, which was supposed to arrive in November, has yet to materialise.

Despite the situation, the force’s leadership remains optimistic. Commander Godfrey Otunge is under pressure from the Kenyan government to make a success of this mission.

The mission commander says there is “overwhelming support” for the MSS in Haiti.

“The population are demanding that our team extend and go to other places and pacify,” he says.

The uphill struggle they face is clear at a former Haitian police station, which had been occupied by a gang but has now been re-taken by the Kenyan forces.

It is still entirely surrounded by gangs and, as officers head up to the roof, they come under sniper fire.

The Kenyan officers shoot back while urging everyone to remain low.

The Kenyan officers say some of their much-delayed additional forces will arrive by the end of this year, bringing their total to 1,000.

And the support is urgently needed. There are areas in Port-au-Prince which are under such tight gang control they are virtually impenetrable for the police.

In one such area, Wharf Jérémie, almost 200 civilians were killed by a single gang over the space of one weekend earlier in December.

In total, as many as 100 gangs are estimated to be operating in the Port-au-Prince area, with boys as young as nine joining their ranks.

And the problem only appears to be growing. According to the UN children’s agency, Unicef, the number of children recruited to the gangs has soared by 70% in a year.

One of the gang leaders to whom they flock is Ti Lapli, whose real name is Renel Destina.

As head of the Gran Ravine gang, he commands more than 1,000 men from his fortified headquarters high above Port-au-Prince.

Gangs like his have exacerbated an already dire situation in Haiti, and are known to slaughter, rape and terrorise civilians.

Gran Ravine is infamous for carrying out kidnappings for ransom, a practice which has earned Ti Lapli a place on the FBI’s wanted list.

Ti Lapli tells us that he and his gang members “love our country a lot” – but when pressed on the rapes and murders gangs like his inflict on civilians, he claimed his men “do things they weren’t supposed to do [to members of rival gangs] because the same is done to us”.

The reason children join Gran Ravine is simple, he says: “The government doesn’t create any jobs, it’s a country with no economic activity whatsoever. We are living on trash, it’s basically a failed state.”

He failed to acknowledge the strangulating impact gangs like his have on Haiti’s economy. Often afraid to leave their homes for work, civilians are regularly extorted for money, too.

With 700,000 residents forced to flee their homes due to the violence inflicted by groups such as Gran Ravine, the capital’s schools have become camps for internally displaced people.

Negociant is one of those who has had to seek shelter.

She sits with her five children, squeezed onto the small section of a school balcony they now call home.

“Just weeks ago I was living in my own house,” she says. “But gangs took over my neighbourhood.”

She explains that she left for an area of the city called Solino, until that too was overrun by gangs and she fled along with hundreds of other people.

“Today, again, I’m on the run to save my life and my children,” she says.

“We have appalling roads, no street lights, no fibre broadband, no mobile phone signal, no gas, no mains water, no mains sewerage and no mains electricity.”

Sam Wood is one of the 48 people living in the remote Upper Coquet valley in Northumberland, in farms and cottages dotted along a single track road winding into the Cheviot Hills, straddling the border between England and Scotland.

She has campaigned for a decade to get mains power to an off-grid community she describes as “on the edge of society”.

But with a connection to mains electricity coming, this is the last Christmas the community will have to celebrate with the threat of a blackout hanging over them.

The noisy diesel generators that power their homes cost up to £10,000 a year to run, and can break down at any moment, including on Christmas Day.

“We never know when it might happen, we can go months with no problems then the generator can stop working three times in a week,” Sam says.

“My husband Daniel has to go out in the dark to try and sort it and if he can’t, well, I get the candles out.”

There are very few people in the country who are able to repair and service them.

For now, the community relies on Claude Schiavetta, who travels from his home in Dunkeld in Scotland.

“Sometimes when I arrive, families have been without power for a week or two,” he says. “So they’re usually very pleased to see me.”

He may no longer be needed in the valley, but Claude doesn’t begrudge the residents.

“I’ll miss them all when they get power, but it’s about time,” he says. “Nobody should be without mains electricity in this country in this day and age.”

The valley missed out on the electrification programmes of the 20th Century because the farms were too remote, and for many years the community was told a connection would be too expensive.

But when the Home Office decided it needed to supply mains electricity to three emergency telecommunication masts in the valley, an opportunity arose to connect many of the properties too.

The project is being funded by the Home Office and Ministry of Defence (MoD) which owns the land.

The valley is within the Northumberland National Park and its planning authority initially wanted all the lines buried.

A compromise was agreed, which will see 7.5 miles (12km) carried by poles and three miles (4.7km) run underground.

• Powerless: The rural community getting connected to the national grid

Northern Powergrid site team manager Matthew Brown says their aim is to have “the least impact possible”.

“We did so many surveys, on the trees, on great crested newts, on the birds of prey and we have an on site archaeologist to make sure we don’t damage anything we come across.”

“I grew up in this area, we want to preserve it for future generations,” he adds.

Scott Anderson’s family has been at Linshiels for generations and although he still farms there, he and his family live in a house further down the valley which has mains electricity.

Shona Anderson says there were many reasons why they moved out, but the reliance on a noisy, dirty generator was definitely one of them.

“It would break down and sometimes we’d be without power for weeks or even months, she says, adding: “We have had times when we went away for the weekend just to have power.

“It’s great to think next Christmas we should be back in here, the kids are older now but we’ve had some amazing times here, they’ve got good memories of the place.”

Not everybody in the valley is getting mains electricity.

Sheep farmer Megan Byatt’s home is too remote to get a reliable connection.

“It’s a bit of a running joke that we’re not getting it, but I don’t begrudge my neighbours,” she says.

“I’m hoping we’ll get some renewables so at least we’ll get something out of it.”

Upper Coquetdale is a community of fewer than 50 people, some living many miles apart, but the valley Christmas party is well attended and all the talk this year is of the new cable.

“There’s still that little doubt,” Shona says, “but it’s so nice to see the poles as you drive up the valley and you think to yourself, yes, this could actually happen.”

Sam agrees: “This is a community where we look out for each other.

“If someone’s in trouble, we all help, and that’s happened many times.

“Mains electricity won’t change that, the valley will always be a very special place.”

• Listen to Daniela read this article

There is a festive chill at Sandringham on Christmas Day morning – especially when you find yourself standing outside St Mary Magdalene Church at 5am, as I often have in my years as a royal correspondent.

Last year I watched as King Charles and Queen Camilla led the royal party to church on Christmas Day, followed by the Prince and Princess of Wales, holding the hands of their children as they spoke to the crowds.

The Princess kept a firm grip on playful Prince Louis as they left church, and they were given Christmas cards and presents by well wishers, along with dozens of flowers.

I could never have predicted that this was the last time we would see her in person for more than six months. I was expecting to head to Italy with the couple on a royal tour, but she wouldn’t join the Royal Family on another official engagement until Trooping the Colour in June.

On 16 January, the Princess of Wales was admitted to hospital for major abdominal surgery. At the end of March, she went public with her cancer diagnosis and chemotherapy.

For her husband, it was the start of a year that he would go on to call “the hardest of his life”.

It throws up memories of Queen Elizabeth’s own “sombre year” of 1992 when there were multiple marriage breakdowns within the family and a major fire. At the time she described it with the now infamous phrase, “annus horribilis”.

In 2024, Prince William faced not only his wife’s ill health, but the King’s cancer diagnosis too, and always there in the background was the apparently unresolved conflict with his brother Prince Harry.

But it was also a year in which certain aspects of Prince William’s approach were cemented – family came first, the school run was prioritised. For the Prince of Wales, this time of turbulence appears to have reinforced what matters to him most.

Along the way, however, it has also become evident what kind of senior royal William wants to be. We’ve seen more of his apprenticeship as a global statesman, especially during the 80th anniversary of D-Day on a stage alongside world leaders – but the William way has also left some questioning certain choices he has made.

On 27 February, the Prince of Wales was due to give a reading at the thanksgiving service for the late King Constantine of Greece at St George’s Chapel in Windsor. The illustrious guest list included European royalty.

Around an hour before the service was due to begin, however, Kensington Palace announced that the Prince would be unable to attend due to a “personal matter”. There were reassuring words from the Prince’s team that there was “nothing to panic about” but it was highly unusual.

Around this time, the Princess was given the news that cancerous cells had been discovered in post-operative tests.

Over the next three weeks, the couple told the children what was happening and had time to deal with their questions privately before going public.

“I think what was remarkable was just how hard it was for the Prince of Wales at the start of the year,” says a friend of the Prince. “His wife had gone in for major surgery and it became worse than expected. Then there was, ‘How do I tell my three children that Mummy is ill?'”

All of this was happening against the backdrop of the King’s own cancer treatment, which he made public on 5 February.

“At a time when he was trying to protect his wife and children, he had that terrible thought that that if his father dies then everything changes,” says the friend.

Several people who know the Prince personally or have worked with him this year told me that the spotlight on what was wrong with his wife took its toll on both William and Catherine.

“He was having to operate against the backdrop of the entire world questioning what was happening to his wife,” one friend told me.

With his father largely out of action for several weeks and the Princess away from public duty, the royal diary was looking stretched. Prince William was adamant that public duty would have to wait until the situation at home was more settled.

It offered a hint of Prince William’s way of doing things. Yes, he understood that his was a life where duty and service are expected. But for him, a man who had experienced immense loss at a young age, his wife and children were most important of all.

There were two other important factors at home that helped the Prince of Wales support his wife and children – his in-laws, the Middletons; and living in Windsor.

When the Princess made her public announcement about her diagnosis, the message was posted on royal social media accounts, and one of the first people to publicly respond was her brother James.

Alongside a childhood holiday photo of himself and his sister, he wrote: “Over the years, we have climbed many mountains together. As a family, we will climb this one with you too.”

Together with his sister Pippa and parents Carole and Michael, the family became key to keeping life as normal as possible for the royal children. People living locally reported seeing Carole Middleton, who lives 30 miles away in Bucklebury, Berkshire, regularly driving in and out of Windsor Castle.

And when the Princess’s surgery prevented her from driving, it was her mother who often drove her daughter to school to collect the three children.

The decision to move from Kensington Palace to Windsor Castle in 2022 also proved timely.

“Windsor has been a sanctuary. It has provided the protection and privacy the family needed this year,” said a friend.

The family live in Adelaide Cottage, a four-bedroom house within the Castle grounds that is secluded enough to give the family freedom that Kensington Palace, which is located in central London, could not.

Snatched photos show the Prince of Wales using an electric scooter to get around the grounds. When on royal duty, he would occasionally reveal a snippet about life at home, such as his continued devotion to Aston Villa FC, or a favoured film or TV series – earlier this year he enjoyed action film The Fall Guy and more recently he and the Princess watched spy thriller series Black Doves on Netflix.

He has also taken his children to football matches at local clubs and both he and the Princess have continued to be part of school life at Lambrook, the private school in Berkshire that their children attend. During her treatment, the Princess was still able to be on the sidelines during sports days.

All of this appears to have pushed other personal issues right down the Prince’s agenda.

The rancour between William and Harry is said to remain. Harry has visited the UK over the past 12 months but is not believed to have met his brother. They are thought to have not spoken to one another in around two years.

There have been new controversies around Prince Andrew in recent months too, including revelations about his links to Chinese businessman Yang Tengbo, who was barred from the UK after concerns about national security risks. Prince Andrew has said that he had ceased contact with Mr Yang.

But the prince did not attend the Royal Family’s traditional pre-Christmas lunch.

Such matters will have been dealt with by the King but, as heir to the throne, William’s voice in family matters is increasingly significant.

Robert Hardman, journalist and author of Charles III: New King. New Court. The Inside Story, says the relationship between Charles and his eldest son “has reached a new level of understanding”.

“We still have a tendency to look at William as the kid, the apprentice, the understudy,” he says. “But he’s now been a front rank royal for 10 years. He’s been around the block more than many current heads of State.”

Unusually, much of what the Prince has said about his year has come directly from him rather than via formal statements or briefings.

During his visit to South Africa in November for the Earthshot Prize, the Prince’s environmental project, he spoke about his passion for the cause but also about the struggles of 2024.

“From a family point of view, it’s been brutal,” he told the group of us who had travelled to Cape Town. For someone who has been guarded in the past, his language was surprisingly frank.

His demeanour was open and positive too, clearly energised by Earthshot and being back in Africa, but he a gave a glimpse into how conflicted he was when he viewed his role as Prince of Wales.

“It’s a tricky one,” he said. “Do I like more responsibility? No. Do I like the freedom that I can build something like Earthshot, then yes.”

What struck me the most after spending almost a week in Cape Town was how he framed his outlook on the modern monarchy, saying he wanted to do the job with a “smaller R in Royal”.

“I’m trying to do it differently,” he admitted, “and I’m trying to do it for my generation.”

What he meant was not doing things in the same way as his father and grandmother.

Charles and William “are different characters”, observes Robert Hardman. “The King is more intellectually curious, and spiritually and theologically engaged. These areas aren’t of deep interest to William.

“The tone of their communication is different. The King remains fairly traditional. William has his own way of doing things.”

Some have questioned the William way. One critic, Graham Smith, chief executive of the anti-monarchy group Republic, argues against the Prince’s decision to focus his efforts on the issue of homelessness.

“[It is] crass and hypocritical of William to get involved in it, given the excessive wealth we gift him,” he argues.

However, Mr Hardman disputes the notion that William’s involvement in projects like this are inappropriate. “I think William is currently a more conventional Prince of Wales than his father was at this age. Prince Charles was a more radical heir to the throne.

“The creation of the Prince’s Trust sounded alarm bells at Buckingham Palace and Downing Street. William isn’t ringing alarm bells.”

Prince William has far fewer patronages than his father. The King currently has 669 – many maintained from his 70 years as heir to the throne. Prince William’s slimline, more focused approach leaves him with around 30.

It is a deliberate strategy: fewer projects but higher impact in the hope of bringing about social change. Those who have worked closely with him this year praise this approach.

“His contribution is unbelievable,” said Hannah Jones, the CEO of the Earthshot Prize. “He has set the vision.”

But that bold action comes with more risk.

Last month, I travelled to Newport in South Wales with the Prince to meet those working on his homelessness project in the city. It was 10 months since his wife’s cancer diagnosis, her chemotherapy was complete and William seemed to me to be less burdened by life.

He was in listening mode, and spoke to dozens of people. In some of the conversations, it struck me how many ventured into the political.

The Prince told the project team to think differently, to be disruptors and challenge the way things had always been done.

“We drive in a very non-political lane,” a royal source told me. “We use our platform to convene and shine the spotlight on a societal issue and that remains unchanged. We are feeling bullish about what we can achieve even in really hard circumstances.”

In the years ahead William will no doubt face further challenges around his role. In this current age of social media, for example, deference and respect for monarchy isn’t the mood in the room.

But it is clear from his public work that he doesn’t view his future as one filled with plaque unveilings and handshaking.

“I have to be seen to be believed,” is a quote attributed to his grandmother, Queen Elizabeth II. For her grandson, the approach is more: “I have to be seen to be making a difference.”

Through 2024, he has ticked off meetings with many world leaders from the Emperor of Japan to the President of South Africa rounded off by the US president-elect, cementing his role on the global stage, promoting the UK with a touch of soft diplomacy.

Next November, the COP climate summit is being held in Brazil and the Prince is “looking forward to playing a role there”. An Earthshot Prize in Brazil may be a possibility too.

Ultimately, the development of Prince William as family man-meets-global statesman is ongoing – and he’s looking increasingly comfortable juggling both roles.

The House Ethics Committee report on Donald Trump ally Matt Gaetz released on Monday revealed fresh details about the former congressman’s alleged behaviour, at least one new accusation and insights into the panel’s investigation.

From at least 2017 to 2020, the committee concluded that the former Florida congressman regularly paid women for “engaging in sexual activity”, had sex with a 17-year-old girl, used or possessed illegal drugs, accepted gifts beyond House limits and helped a woman obtain a passport, according to the report.

The 42-year-old was first elected as a Republican member of the US House of Representatives in 2016.

He resigned in November – days before the report was scheduled to be made public and after Trump announced him as his pick for US attorney general. Gaetz withdrew from consideration a week later.

He denied the committee’s findings and has accused it of conducting an unfair investigation.

Here are four parts of the much-anticipated report that stand out.

House investigators said Gaetz paid more than $90,000 (£71,843) to women for sex and drugs, but created a complicated web of transactions that were hard to trace, according to the report.

“The committee was unable to determine the full extent to which Representative Gaetz’s payments to women were compensation for engaging in sexual activity with him,” the report found.

He allegedly used his friend Joel Greenberg, currently serving 11 years in prison for crimes he said he committed with Gaetz, as a frequent go-between and logged onto Greenberg’s account on SeekingArrangement.com, which bills itself as a “luxury dating site”, to interact with young women.

Gaetz also paid women directly, sometimes through platforms such as Venmo, according to the report. But the committee said he often used another person’s PayPal account or an account linked to an email address with a fake name.

He also obscured payments, the panel wrote. In one example, he gave a college student a cheque made out to “cash” with “tuition reimbursement” in the memo line. The woman said she received it after a group encounter, which “could potentially be a form of coercion because I really needed the money”.

Gaetz has posted on social media that he gave money to women he was involved with as gifts, not payments. The committee found that two women, aged 27 and 25, did not consider their relationships transactional.

Another woman who was considered his girlfriend invoked her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination when asked if she was given money for sex or drugs, or to pay others.

The committee attempted to prove Gaetz frequently paid for sex through evidence such as a text message where he reportedly balked at a woman’s request that he send her money after he accused her of “ditching” him one night. The woman then asserted she was “treated differently” than other women he was paying for sex.

In another message, his then-girlfriend said that he and Greenberg were “a little limited in their cash flow” and asked a group of women “if it can be more of a customer appreciation week”.

A few months later, according to the committee, she wrote: “Btw Matt also mentioned he is going to be a bit generous cause of the ‘customer appreciation’ thing last time.”

As a Congressman, Gaetz earned $174,000 (£138,843) a year.

His net worth is greater: On his most recent federal financial disclosure filed in August, he reported owning assets worth at least $575,000. His father Don Gaetz, who co-founded hospice provider Vitas Healthcare, has a fortune of about $35m, Forbes reported.

The committee also said Gaetz bought illegal drugs or reimbursed people for them.

It gives examples of his alleged cocaine and ecstasy/MDMA use, but focused on what appeared to be a heavy marijuana habit. He allegedly asked women to bring marijuana cartridges to meetings and events, and created the fake-name email account to buy marijuana.

A trip he took to the Bahamas “was paid for by an associate of Representative Gaetz with connections to the medical marijuana industry, who allegedly also paid for female escorts to accompany them”, according to the report.

One woman felt the use of drugs and alcohol at parties had impaired her ability “to really know what was going on or fully consent”.

“Indeed, nearly every woman that the committee spoke with could not remember the details of at least one or more of the events they attended with Representative Gaetz and attributed that to drug or alcohol consumption,” the report said.

His then-girlfriend, who was 21 when they met and “was paid tens of thousands of dollars” during their two-year relationship”, often participated in encounters with women and acted as an intermediary, according to the report.

A woman who told the committee she was 17 at the time she had sex with Gaetz twice at a party in 2017 – at least once in front of other people – while under the influence of ecstasy. The woman, who had just completed her junior year in high school, then received $400 from him.

She also told the panel she did not tell Gaetz she was a minor and the committee did not find any evidence that the former congressman knew she was underage.

The age of consent in Florida is 18, although a 16 or 17 year-old can legally consent to sexual conduct with a person between the ages of 16 and 23. Gaetz turned 35 in 2017.

The Department of Justice investigated an allegation that he had sex with a minor, but ultimately did not file any criminal charges against him.

In 2021, Greenberg pleaded guilty to sex trafficking the girl. According to his plea agreement, Greenberg paid for sex acts with the minor and introduced her to other adult men who engaged in commercial sex acts with her.

Gaetz also allegedly directed his chief of staff to expedite a passport application for a woman he was sleeping with, whom he said was a voter in his district. He also allegedly gave her $1,000.

Gaetz violated House rules that bar using his position for special favours, according to the committee, which wrote: “The woman was not his constituent, and the case was not handled in the same manner as similar passport assistance cases”.

The committee dedicated a great deal of the report to detailing how Gaetz allegedly obstructed its investigation, including failing to produce evidence he said would “exonerate” him.

The report concluded he “continuously sought to deflect, deter, or mislead the Committee in order to prevent his actions from being exposed”.

Gaetz, who has accused the committee of being “weaponised” against him and leaking information to the press, alleged the panel was working on behalf of former Speaker Kevin McCarthy, according to the report. Last year he helped lead an effort to oust then-Speaker McCarthy from his role.

While Gaetz claimed he had “voluntarily produced tens of thousands of records,” he gave the committee “only a couple hundred records, more than 90% of which was either irrelevant or publicly available,” the report found.

One sore point was a trip to the Bahamas, where the committee said he withheld information. Ultimately it concluded he violated rules on gifts because the trip was too high in value.

The committee also cited the Justice Department’s probe into the allegations against Gaetz as a reason for delays.

Some witnesses asked the committee to use statements they had given to the department, but it refused to share them because they had not issued charges and because it said it could deter future witnesses in other cases from coming forward.

The report ends with a single-page statement from Ethics Committee Chairman Michael Guest “on behalf of dissenting committee members” who are not named.

Those members do not challenge the committee’s findings, but disagree with releasing the report after Gaetz resigned from the House, which has not happened since 2006, they write.

It “breaks from the Committee’s long-standing practice, opens the Committee to undue criticism, and will be viewed by some as an attempt to weaponise the Committee’s process”.

Former US President Bill Clinton has been admitted to a hospital after developing a fever, according to a spokesman for the Democrat.

“He remains in good spirits and deeply appreciates the excellent care he is receiving,” Angel Ureña wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

He said Clinton was admitted to Georgetown University Medical Center in Washington, DC on Monday evening for tests and observation after developing the fever.

Mr Ureña’s statement did not give more details on the Arkansas Democrat’s condition, though US media reports indicate Clinton is expected to recover.

A source close to Clinton told NBC News that the situation is “not urgent” and the former president would be “fine.” The news network reported Clinton was awake and alert.

This is the latest health scare for the 42nd US president, who served in the White House from 1993 to 2001.

Clinton, 78, was last admitted to the hospital for six days in 2021 in California after developing an infection in his blood. He is also known to have suffered with heart issues in the past.

In 2004, aged 58, he had a quadruple bypass surgery after doctors found signs of extensive heart disease and, ten years later, he had a clogged artery opened after complaining of chest pains.

Not long after his second surgery, the ex-president – known for his love of fatty foods – went vegan. He told Politico in 2016, “I might not be around if I hadn’t become a vegan. It’s great.”

Clinton was active on the presidential campaign trail this year, as he travelled the country to boost Vice-President Kamala Harris’s bid for president.

Last month, he released his latest book, Citizen: My Life After the White House.

A women’s solidarity honour that was recently awarded to Justin Baldoni has been rescinded after the actor was accused by his It Ends With Us co-star Blake Lively of sexual harassment and mounting a campaign to “destroy” her reputation.

Baldoni was honoured by Vital Voices, a global non-profit organisation that focuses on empowering women, with the award earlier this month.

The organisation announced Monday evening that it rescinded the award after the legal complaint filed by Lively alleged “abhorrent conduct” by the actor, his studio and a crisis public relations team that it said was “contrary to the values” it held.

Baldoni’s legal team have told the BBC the allegations are “categorically false” and said they hired a crisis manager because Lively had threatened to derail the film unless her demands were met.

In the romantic drama, Lively plays a woman who finds herself in a relationship with a charming but abusive boyfriend, played by Baldoni.

The Voices of Solidarity Award was given to Baldoni on 9 December during an awards ceremony in New York, Vital Voices said in a statement. The award was presented by comedian Hasan Minhaj and celebrates “remarkable men who have shown courage and compassion in advocating on behalf of women and girls”.

He posted about the award on his Instagram page, saying he was “deeply honoured and humbled” and noting the continued work to needed to be done to help future generations of men.

“My hope is that we can teach our boys, while they are still young, that vulnerability is strength, sensitivity is a super power, and empathy makes them powerful,” he said in the post.

In a statement on Monday, Vital Voices explained it had revoked the award and notified Baldoni of the decision.

Also on Monday, Baldoni’s podcast co-host Liz Plank announced she was leaving The Man Enough show following the allegations.

The podcast bills itself as creating “a safe environment” for exploring issues such as how “masculinity” shows up in relationships, as well as “sex, success” and “mental health”.

Author and journalist Plank told their listeners via Instagram: “I’m writing to you today to let you know that I have had my representatives inform [Baldoni’s production company] Wayfarer that I will no longer be co-hosting The Man Enough podcast.”

She thanked fans for “trusting me with your hearts and stories, for holding space for mine, and for making this show what it was”.

Lively, who is best known for her role on the TV show Gossip Girl, recently filed a legal complaint accusing Baldoni and his team of attacking her public image.

She says in the complaint the attacks followed a meeting to address “repeated sexual harassment and other disturbing behaviour” by Baldoni and a producer on the movie.

According to the filing to the California Civil Rights Department, a list of 30 demands relating to the pair’s alleged misconduct was made at the meeting to ensure they could continue to produce the film.

The list included requests such as no more mention of Baldoni’s “pornography addiction”, no descriptions of genitalia and no addition of intimate scenes that weren’t approved by her when she read the script.

Lively also accused Baldoni and Wayfarer Studios of leading a “multi-tiered plan” to wreck her reputation in the media and online, including hiring a crisis manager who led a “sophisticated, coordinated, and well-financed retaliation plan” against her and used a “digital army” to post social media content that seemed authentic.

Responding to the legal complaint, Baldoni’s lawyer, Bryan Freedman, said in a statement on Saturday that the accusations were “categorically false”.

Freedman accused Lively of making numerous demands and threats, including “threatening to not show up to set, threatening to not promote the film”, which would end up “ultimately leading to its demise during release, if her demands were not met”.

He alleged that Lively’s claims were “intentionally salacious with an intent to publicly hurt and rehash a narrative in the media”.

An explosion at an ammunition and explosives factory in north-west Turkey has killed at least 12 people and injured four others.

The blast happened at 08:25 local time (05:25 GMT) in the capsule production section, the governor of the city of Balikesir, Ismail Ustaoglu, said.

Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said the cause was not yet clear, but that authorities had ruled out sabotage.

Videos from the scene showed a fireball erupt from the factory, destroying part of the building, followed by plumes of dark smoke.

Further footage from the aftermath shows mangled parts of steel littering the surrounding area.

The explosion caused tremors throughout the Köteyli township, witnesses told CNN Turk.

Many fire crews were sent to deal with the blaze and health and security units were dispatched to the area, officials said.

“I wish God’s mercy upon our deceased citizens and a speedy recovery to our injured,” Mr Ustaoglu said in a post on social media

An investigation has been launched into the circumstances that led to the blast, Justice Minister Yilmaz Tunc said.

Two NHS hospital trusts in London are using AI technology to see if they can spot type 2 diabetes in patients up to a decade in advance of the condition occuring.

Imperial College and Chelsea and Westminster hospital NHS foundation trusts have started training the AI system – called Aire-DM – that checks patients’ ECG heart traces for subtle early warning signs that are tricky for doctors to otherwise detect.

Clinical trials are planned for 2025 to see if it works as well as is hoped.

Early work suggests the system can spot risk about 70% of the time.

Giving the AI extra details about other background risk factors, such as the patient’s age, sex and whether they already have high blood pressure and or are overweight, can improve the predictive power, says lead researcher Dr Fu Siong Ng.

He told BBC News: “It is already quite good just with the ECG data, but it is even better when you add in those.”

An ECG (electrocardiogram) records and can reveal problems with the electrical activity of the heart, including the rate and rhythm.

Dr Ng says the ECG changes that the system detects are too varied and subtle for even highly skilled doctors to interpret with the naked eye.

“It’s not as simple as saying it’s this or that bit of the ECG. It’s looking at a combination of subtle things.”

As part of the trial up to 1,000 patients at both hospitals will have ECG scans read by the AI system to see if it helps detect and predict disease.

It’s not something that will be offered to routinely yet, although the experts hope it could be rolled out more widely on the NHS. That could take five years or more, says Dr Ng.

The British Heart Foundation, which is funding the work, says detecting people at risk of diabetes could ultimately save lives.

Having uncontrolled type 2 diabetes can lead to heart attacks and strokes, for example.

Maintaing a healthy weight and eating a healthy diet and exercising can help protect against complications.

Professor Bryan Williams, Chief Scientific and Medical Officer at the British Heart Foundation, said: “This exciting research uses powerful artificial intelligence to analyse ECGs, revealing how AI can spot things that cannot usually be observed in routinely collected health data. This kind of insight could be a gamechanger in predicting future risk of developing type 2 diabetes, years before the condition begins.

“Type 2 diabetes is a rapidly growing health challenge that increases the risk of developing heart disease, however with the right support it is possible for people to reduce their risk of developing the condition. We look forward to seeing how this technology could be incorporated into clinical practice.”

Dr Faye Riley from Diabetes UK said: “Type 2 diabetes often goes undiagnosed, sometimes for many years. With 1.2 million people in England alone unaware they’re living with the condition and millions more at high risk of developing it, identifying those at risk early on is crucial.

“AI-powered screening methods offer a promising new way to spot those likely to develop type 2 diabetes years in advance, allowing them to access the right support and prevent serious complications, such as heart failure and sight loss.”

Type 2 diabetes is a common condition where the level of sugar (glucose) in the blood becomes too high.

It happens if the body cannot make enough of, or cannot correctly use, a hormone called insulin, which controls blood sugar.

Some cases are linked to being overweight.

That is because fat can build up in and around the pancreas – the organ that makes insulin.

Type 1 diabetes, meanwhile, is an autoimmune disease.

A Moscow court has sentenced a Russian-born US citizen to 15 years in prison on espionage charges, Russian news agencies report.

Businessman Gene Spector was already serving a three-and-a-half-year sentence, having been originally arrested in 2020 on bribery charges.

Last year, he was also accused of spying. Details of the alleged offences have not been publicly released due to the secretive nature of the case, agencies report, and the trial took place behind closed doors.

Russia has taken a number of high-profile American prisoners in recent times – one of whom, journalist Evan Gershkovich, was released earlier this year as part of the biggest swap deal between the countries for decades.

The US Department of State is yet to comment on Spector’s case. The BBC has approached it for a statement.

Spector’s 15-year sentence was reportedly due to be served in a strict-regime penal colony.

It comprises 13 years for the new conviction, plus the time he had left to serve on the prior one. An earlier fine of 14 million roubles ($140,000; £112,000) was also upheld.

In the earlier charges, Spector was accused in 2020 of acting as an intermediary in a bribery case relating to an assistant of Russia’s former deputy prime minister. He pleaded guilty.

Spector, whose Russian name is Yevgeny Mironovich, was born in 1972 in what is now St Petersburg, and was again living the city with his family, the agency RIA Novosti reported.

At some point in his life, he moved to the US and obtained citizenship, according to another news agency, Tass. Back in Russia, he went on to lead Medpolimerprom: a group of companies that make medical supplies.

The news comes just months after a landmark prisoner swap.

In August, 24 people were involved in an exchange between Russia and some Western countries including the US and Germany.

They included US citizens Evan Gershkovich – a Wall Street Journal reporter – and former US Marine Paul Whelan.

The trade was described as the biggest exchange since the end of the Cold War between Russia and the West.

Tensions between the two sides have been especially high in recent years, following Russia’s full-scale invasion of neighbouring Ukraine in February 2022.

Residents in an Australian region engulfed by bushfires were given two hours to return home to collect their belongings before Christmas on Tuesday, as emergency crews try to contain the blaze.

Communities around the Grampians, in Victoria, have been evacuated amid warnings from authorities that conditions there in the days ahead could be the worst since Australia’s most severe fire season on record, the so-called “Black Summer” of 2019-20.

The bushfires have already burnt over 41,000 hectares (101,000 acres) of land in the past week, however there have been no deaths or loss of property.

Intense heat forecast for Boxing Day has also prompted a string of fire warnings across the country.

Throughout Victoria, temperatures are expected to reach 40C (104F) and be accompanied by strong dry winds, while parts of South Australia and New South Wales could also face bushfire conditions on Thursday into Friday.

“We’re expecting to see extreme fire danger across almost the entire state,” Luke Hegarty, a spokesman for Victoria’s State Control Centre, said.

“This is the most significant fire danger that the state has seen – across the whole sections of state that we’re talking about – since Black Summer. It’s important that people understand that Thursday is a day with serious potential,” he added.

Four interstate firefighting forces and two incident management teams – made up of over 100 personnel – will land in Victoria in the coming days to provide reprieve for emergency crews that have been working around the clock to fight the current fires.

The decision to give families around the Grampians temporary access to their homes “to get Christmas items … presents and the like” on Tuesday morning was made by the state’s Country Fire Authority (CFA) chief officer, Jason Heffernan.

“[This is] to ensure if the residents of Halls Gap will be relocated for Christmas, at least they will have what they need,” he told Seven’s Sunrise programme.

Mary Ann Brown, who lives on the southern edge of the Grampians National Park, told the ABC that her community are on edge heading into the holidays.

“We are not out of the woods until we get a really good drop of rain and that may not come until March or April, so it’s going to be a long summer.”

Parts of Australia have been on high alert for bushfire danger this summer, following several quieter seasons compared with the 2019-20 fires which were linked to hundreds of deaths and swept across 24 million hectares of land.

The country has reeled from disaster to disaster in recent years, experiencing both record breaking floods and extreme heat, as it feels the effects of climate change.

Former US President Bill Clinton has been admitted to a hospital after developing a fever, according to a spokesman for the Democrat.

“He remains in good spirits and deeply appreciates the excellent care he is receiving,” Angel Ureña wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

He said Clinton was admitted to Georgetown University Medical Center in Washington, DC on Monday evening for tests and observation after developing the fever.

Mr Ureña’s statement did not give more details on the Arkansas Democrat’s condition, though US media reports indicate Clinton is expected to recover.

A source close to Clinton told NBC News that the situation is “not urgent” and the former president would be “fine.” The news network reported Clinton was awake and alert.

This is the latest health scare for the 42nd US president, who served in the White House from 1993 to 2001.

Clinton, 78, was last admitted to the hospital for six days in 2021 in California after developing an infection in his blood. He is also known to have suffered with heart issues in the past.

In 2004, aged 58, he had a quadruple bypass surgery after doctors found signs of extensive heart disease and, ten years later, he had a clogged artery opened after complaining of chest pains.

Not long after his second surgery, the ex-president – known for his love of fatty foods – went vegan. He told Politico in 2016, “I might not be around if I hadn’t become a vegan. It’s great.”

Clinton was active on the presidential campaign trail this year, as he travelled the country to boost Vice-President Kamala Harris’s bid for president.

Last month, he released his latest book, Citizen: My Life After the White House.

Protests have broken out in Syria over the burning of a Christmas tree, prompting calls for the new Islamist authorities to take steps to protect minorities.

A video posted on social media showed the tree on fire in the main square of Suqaylabiyah, a Christian-majority town in central Syria.

Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the main Islamist faction which led the uprising that toppled President Bashar al-Assad, said foreign fighters had been detained over the incident.

HTS representatives have promised to protect the rights and freedoms of religious and ethnic minorities in Syria.

Footage on social media appeared to show masked men dousing the Christmas tree with an unidentified liquid the night before Christians in Syria prepared to celebrate Christmas Eve. It was unclear whether they were trying to put the fire out or help it spread.

Videos of the aftermath showed a religious figure from the governing HTS rebel group assuring crowds who had gathered in Suqaylabiyah that the tree would be repaired before the morning.

The man then held up a cross in a show of solidarity, something Islamist conservatives would not normally do.

On Tuesday more protesters took to the streets over the arson attack, including in parts of the capital Damascus.

Some in the Kassa neighbourhood of Damascus chanted against foreign fighters in Syria.

“Syria is free, non Syrians should leave,” they said, in reference to the foreign fighters HTS said were behind the attack.

In the Bab Touma neighbourhood of Damascus, protesters carried a cross and Syrian flags, chanting “we will sacrifice our souls for our cross”.

“If we’re not allowed to live our Christian faith in our country, as we used to, then we don’t belong here anymore,” a demonstrator named Georges told AFP news agency.

• Syria’s minorities seek security
• New leaders must keep promises to respect rights, UN says

Syria is home to many ethnic and religious groups, including Kurds, Armenians, Assyrians, Christians, Druze, Alawite Shia and Arab Sunnis, the last of whom make up a majority of the Muslim population.

Just over two weeks ago, Bashar al-Assad’s presidency fell to rebel forces, ending the Assad family’s more than 50-year-rule.

How the HTS group will govern Syria remains to be seen.

HTS began as a jihadist group – espousing violence to achieve its goal of establishing a state governed by Islamic law (Sharia) – but in recent years adopted a more pragmatic, less uncompromising approach.

As fighters marched to Damascus earlier this month, its leaders spoke about building a Syria for all Syrians.

On Tuesday the new authorities announced that leader Ahmed al-Sharaa had reached an agreement with “revolutionary factions… to dissolve all factions and merge them under the umbrella of the Ministry of Defence”, according to Sana news agency.

Prime Minister Mohammed al-Bashir said the ministry would be restructured to include rebel fighters.

Although the statement mentioned “all factions”, it was not clear exactly which groups are included in the merger.

There are multiple armed groups in Syria, including some opposed to HTS and others with ambiguous relationships with it at best.

HTS remains designated as a terrorist organisation by the UN, US, EU and UK, though there are signs that a diplomatic shift may be under way.

On Friday, the US scrapped a $10m (£7.9m) bounty on the head of HTS leader Ahmed al-Sharaa, following meetings between senior diplomats and representatives from the group.

The US is continuing its military presence in Syria. It said on Friday that it carried out an air strike in the northern city of Deir Ezzor – killing two members of the Islamic State (IS) jihadist group.

The presence of foreign fighters, Islamist extremists, or even regime supporters who have interest in causing insecurity and attacking minorities to shake the country’s stability are the big challenge that the new Islamic leadership will face.

A Russian cargo ship, Ursa Major, has sunk in the Mediterranean between Spain and Algeria after an explosion in the engine room, Russia’s foreign ministry has confirmed.

It said 14 members of the crew had been rescued and taken to the Spanish port of Cartagena but that two others were missing.

Ursa Major left port in St Petersburg 12 days ago, according to Russian news agency Interfax.

The ship’s owner said it was on its way to Vladivostok in Russia’s Far East carrying two cranes for the port weighing 380 tonnes apiece, although the destination could not be confirmed independently.

Before Ursa Major sank, Spain’s Salvamento Marítimo maritime rescue agency said 14 people were found on a lifeboat and taken safely to Spain and a Russian warship then arrived in the area to take charge of the rescue operation.

Ursa Major was in the same area of the Med as another sanctioned Russian ship, Sparta, when it ran into trouble and the two ships had been spotted heading through the English Channel last week, reportedly under escort.

Earlier this month, Ukrainian military intelligence (HUR) reported that the Sparta was heading to Russia’s naval base on the Syrian coast at Tartous to move military equipment out of Syria after the downfall of Bashar al-Assad.

A Kremlin official said on Monday that Russia was in contact with Syria’s new rulers on the future of its two military facilities, at both diplomatic and military level.

Ursa Major’s owner Oboronlogistika has been heavily involved in transporting cargo to Tartous, although Sparta’s reported destination on Tuesday was Port Said in Egypt.

Marine transport monitoring website LSEG told the BBC that Ursa Major’s automatic ID system (AIS) showed that its destination since 11 December had been Vladivostok, and that its last call at the port of Tartous had been in July.

On Monday, the HUR reported that the Sparta had broken down off Portugal, but the problem had been fixed. Ursa Major was also known as Sparta III, so it was not clear which ship it was referring to.

It is not known what caused the explosion on Ursa Major as it passed between Oran in Algeria and the Spanish town of Águilas.

However, video filmed from the tanker Ross Sea between 12:00-13:00GMT on Monday, and verified by the BBC, showed the ship listing badly.

It eventually sank at about 01:20GMT on Tuesday.

Ursa Major was built in 2009 and placed under sanction after Russia’s full-scale invasion in Ukraine in 2022 because of the ship owner’s role in delivering cargo to the Russian military.

Oboronlogistika said the cargo ship, which it described as the flagship of its fleet, was carrying 45-tonne hatch covers for icebreakers, as well as the large cranes for the port in Vladivostok.

Brazilian authorities have halted the construction of a factory for Chinese electric vehicle (EV) giant BYD, saying workers lived in conditions comparable to “slavery”.

More than 160 workers have been rescued in Brazil’s northeastern state of Bahia, according to a statement from the Public Labour Prosecutor’s Office (MPT).

They were allegedly put in a “degrading” environment and had their passports and salaries withheld by a building company.

BYD said in a statement that it had cut ties with the firm involved and remained committed to a “full compliance with Brazilian legislation”.

The factory was scheduled to be operational by March 2025, and was set to be BYD’s first EV plant outside of Asia.

The workers, hired by Jinjiang Construction Brazil, lived in four facilities in Camaçari city.

At one such facility, workers were made to sleep on beds without mattresses, according to prosecutors.

Each bathroom was also shared among 31 workers, forcing them to get up extremely early in order to be ready for work.

“The conditions found in the lodgings revealed an alarming picture of precariousness and degradation,” the MPT said.

“Slavery-like conditions”, as defined by Brazilian law, include debt bondage and work that violates human dignity.

The MPT added that the situation also constitutes “forced labour”, as many workers had their wages withheld and faced excessive costs for terminating their contracts.

BYD said affected workers had been moved to hotels.

It added that it had conducted a “detailed review” of the working and living conditions for subcontracted employees, and asked on “several occasions” for the construction firm to make improvements.

BYD, short for Build Your Dreams, is one of the world’s largest EV makers.

It sold more electric vehicles than Elon Musk’s Tesla in the last three months of 2023, as the two battled for top spot in the sector.

The company has also been expanding its foothold in Brazil, which is its largest overseas market by a wide margin.

It first opened a factory in São Paulo in 2015, producing chassis for electric buses.

Last year, it announced that it would invest 3 billion reais ($484.2m) in Brazil to build an EV manufacturing plant.

EV sales in China have been boosted by government subsidies. which encourage consumers to trade their petrol-powered cars for EVs or hybrids.

But there is a growing backlash abroad against what some see as the Chinese government’s unfair support for domestic car makers.

Major markets like the US and EU have placed tariffs on EVs from China, with more tariffs expected during the incoming administration of US president-elect Donald Trump.

The former CEO of Abercrombie & Fitch (A&F) has dementia and late onset Alzheimer’s disease, his legal team has said in a court document filed in New York.

Lawyers for Mike Jeffries have requested a hearing to determine whether he is mentally fit to stand trial on federal sex trafficking charges.

The 80-year-old was arrested alongside his partner in October and charged with running an international sex trafficking and prostitution business. Both men have pleaded not guilty.

A so-called competency hearing has been scheduled for June next year.

Mr Jeffries, who ran US clothing brand A&F for two decades, is accused of running a sex trafficking and prostitution business from at least 2008-15.

US prosecutors allege that he used his wealth, power and status “to traffic men for his own sexual pleasure”, and for the pleasure of his British partner Matthew Smith, 61.

They said the couple, alongside a middleman James Jacobson, 71, used force, fraud and coercion to make vulnerable, aspiring models engage in violent and exploitative sex acts.

All three men have pleaded not guilty to the charges and been released on bond.

The FBI began investigating last year after the BBC revealed claims Mr Jeffries and Mr Smith had sexually exploited men at events they hosted around the world.

The BBC investigation, published in October 2023, found the pair were at the centre of a sophisticated operation involving a middleman scouting young men for sex.

In the same month, Brian Bieber, Mr Jeffries’ lawyer, said his client was examined several times by a neuropsychologist who later concluded diagnostic impressions that he was suffering from two types of dementia and probable late onset Alzheimer’s disease.

In the court filing, Mr Bieber added that during an initial meeting last year the former fashion boss “did not even come close to resembling a master’s degree-educated individual, who was just nine years earlier the chief executive officer of a publicly traded company”.

As a result, Mr Bieber questioned the ability of Mr Jeffries to “rationally assist” with the possible factual and legal defences to the allegations he was facing, according to the document.

The filing comes after Mr Jeffries’ legal team sought a competency hearing, which will now be held over two days on 16 and 17 June 2025.

Federal prosecutors in the Eastern District of New York declined to comment.

Mr Jeffries stepped down as CEO and chairman of A&F in 2014, and left with a $25m (£19.9m) retirement package.

Alongside the criminal case, A&F, Mr Jeffries and his partner have been defending a civil lawsuit accusing the retailer of having funded a sex trafficking operation.

Earlier this month, Mr Jeffries sued A&F after it refused to pay his criminal defence costs, arguing the brand had agreed to indemnify him for all claims arising out of his position.

With just weeks left in office, US President Joe Biden has commuted the sentences of 37 of 40 federal death row inmates – potentially thwarting President-elect Donald Trump’s plans to expand federal executions during his upcoming administration.

Biden’s move was swiftly condemned by Republicans, with some accusing the president of siding with criminals over law-abiding Americans.

Federal executions were relatively rare before Trump’s first term in office, which finished with a flurry of executions that ended a 130-year-old precedent of pausing executions amid a presidential transition.

He has vowed to resume the practice when he returns to the White House in January, setting the stage for possible legal battles early in the administration.

Here’s what we know.

On Monday, Biden commuted the sentences of 37 out of 40 death row inmates, switching their penalty to life without parole.

Only three inmates were left to face the death penalty, including convicted Boston marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev and Robert Bowers, who was sentenced to death for killing 11 worshippers and wounding seven during a shooting at a the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh in 2018.

The third, Dylann Roof, was sentenced to death in 2017 for a mass shooting that left nine black parishioners dead at the Mother Emanuel AME church in Charleston, South Carolina, in 2015.

While the move was widely praised by human rights groups such as Amnesty International, it was quickly condemned by some Republicans, as well as Trump’s transition team and political allies.

In a statement, Trump communications director Steven Cheung said that “these are among the worst killers in the world and this abhorrent decision by Joe Biden is a slap in the face to the victims, their families, and their loved ones.

“President Trump stands for the rule of law, which will return when he is back in the White House,” he added. Trump cannot undo the commutations when he returns to the White House next month.

Texas Republican Chip Roy posted on X that the decision was “unconscionable” and an abuse of power “to carry out a miscarriage of justice”.

Another Republican, Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton, said that “when given the choice between law-abiding Americans or criminals, Joe Biden and the Democrats choose criminals every time.”

Some family members also expressed anger.

On Facebook, Heather Turner – whose mother was killed in a 2017 bank robbery – called the commutations a “gross abuse of power”.

“At no point did the president consider the victims,” she wrote. “He, and his supporters, have blood on their hands.”

The commutations do not apply to the approximately 2,200 death row inmates convicted by state courts, over which the president holds no authority.

Over the course of his election campaign, Trump vowed to resume federal executions and make more people eligible to receive the death penalty, including those convicted of raping children or drug and human-trafficking cases, as well as migrants who kill US citizens or police officers.

“These are terrible, terrible, horrible people who are responsible for death, carnage and crime all over the country,” Trump said when he announced his presidential candidacy in 2022.

“We’re going to be asking everyone who sells drugs, gets caught, to receive the death penalty for their heinous acts,” he added.

There are more than 40 federal laws that can, in theory, result in the death penalty, ranging from murders committed during a drug-related shooting to genocide.

Almost all – with the exception of espionage and treason – explicitly involve the death of a victim.

Trump, however, has provided few details on how he plans to accomplish his campaign pledge.

Despite the lack of clarity, Trump’s vows to expand the federal death penalty have elicited strong warnings from human rights advocates.

In an 11 December statement, for example, the American Civil Liberties Union said Trump’s “chilling” plans amount to an expansion of the “killing spree he initiated in the final six months of his first presidency”.

“He’s already shown us that he will act on these promises,” the statement said.

The inmates executed during the waning days of Trump’s first administration included Lisa Montgomery, the first woman executed by the federal government since 1953, and Lezmond Mitchell, the only Native American on federal death row.

US media reported that Trump cannot reverse Biden’s commutations.

Trump’s efforts to expand the death penalty to crimes that do not involve murder are likely to face legal challenges.

In 2008, for example, the Supreme Court ruled that those convicted of raping children cannot be executed, adding that it’s unclear if the death penalty could be applied to crimes in which a victim is not killed.

According to the National Registry of Exonerations, cases with child victims are particularly prone to wrongful convictions, can be “extremely emotional” and pit family members against one another.

Any further expansion of crimes that are eligible for the federal death penalty would require Congress to act and change the law.

In 2024, two bills – both sponsored by Florida Republican and Trump ally Anna Paulina Luna – sought to expand the use of capital offences to include possession of child pornography, as well as the trafficking, exploitation and abuse of children.

Both failed to pass in the House of Representatives.

Trump is also unlikely to be able to quickly re-populate the pool of federal death row inmates, as most death penalty cases take years and are subject to lengthy appeals processes.

While he does not have any direct authority over state executions, some experts have warned that Trump’s pro-death penalty stance may trigger more executions at a state level.

“His rhetoric can and has spurred draconian measures and attitudes by leaders in states on several issues, including in the context of the criminal legal system,” Yasmin Cader, a deputy legal director at the American Civil Liberties Union and director of the Trone Center for Justice and Equality told CNN.

In addition to the federal government and US military, 27 US states still have the death penalty on the books.

A Gallup poll conducted in October found that a slim majority of Americans – 53% – support the death penalty for convicted murderers, up from 50% a year before.

American Airlines has resumed flights after suspending its services for around an hour on Tuesday due to a technical issue that impacted the systems needed to release its planes.

The nationwide halt was cancelled just before 13:00 GMT, according to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).

The disruption came during one of the busiest travel days of the year as passengers made journeys on Christmas Eve.

In a statement, the airline said a “vendor technology issue” had caused the issue and it was “all hands on deck” to minimise further disruption.

“We sincerely apologise to our customers for the inconvenience this morning,” the airline said.

“It’s all hands on deck as our team is working diligently to get customers where they need to go as quickly as possible.”

Departure boards at major US airports are still showing delays of up to two hours for some flights as the airline recovers from the nationwide issue, but real-time tracking website Flightradar24 shows planes taking off again at a number of major US travel hubs and most flights are departing on time.

Passengers reported on social media being stuck on the tarmac or at gates as flights were impacted by the outage for around an hour.

Some passengers were also told to disembark from their planes.

In a video posted on X by a CBS reporter in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, a gate agent announced a flight to Philadelphia was going to start boarding.

“The system is slowly coming back,” the agent announced from a gate.

In July, American Airlines, among other major operators, grounded flights across the US due to communication issues caused by a global IT crash.

That failure – which also affected banks and emergency services – was caused by a faulty software update from cybersecurity firm Crowdstrike.

From the moment Justin Baldoni announced in 2019 that he was adapting the best-selling book It Ends With Us into a film, there was a widespread frenzy.

There are few books in recent years that have become as big a cultural phenomenon as Colleen Hoover’s novel – it has sold 20m copies and became an internet sensation on TikTok with more than one billion tags on the app.

When Blake Lively, who rose to fame in the 2000s playing Serena van der Woodsen in Gossip Girl, was cast as the main character, fans became even more excited, describing her as the perfect choice to play Lily Bloom, a young woman who grew up witnessing domestic abuse and winds up in the same position years later.

Lily, a florist in Boston, navigates a complicated love triangle between her charming but abusive boyfriend Ryle Kincaid – played by Jane the Virgin’s Justin Baldoni – and her compassionate first love, Atlas Corrigan (Brandon Sklenar).

Released at the beginning of August, the film became a box office success bringing in more than $350m (£280m) globally.

But despite its financial success, everything wasn’t running so smoothly behind the scenes. Rumours of a feud between Baldoni and Lively began swirling before the film was even released.

Last week, Lively filed a legal complaint against her co-star, accusing him of sexual harassment and starting a smear campaign against her, something Baldoni strongly denies. Here is the story so far:

For a film about domestic abuse, the press tour for It Ends With Us was probably not what you would have expected. There were pink carpets, flowers galore and the promotion of Lively’s new haircare brand and her husband’s gin company.

Instead of advocacy on the red carpet, Lively highlighted fashion and florals.

At the London premiere, press were told to keep questions “fun and light-hearted” with one event organiser telling me to “steer away from questions on domestic abuse”.

One of her remarks made at the New York premiere – “you are so much more than just a survivor or just a victim” – sparked backlash on social media.

Domestic abuse survivor Ashley Paige criticised Ms Lively’s language and told the BBC that her own trauma “shaped my identity”.

Lively was also criticised for her comments in another clumsy promotional tour video where she said: “Grab your friends, wear your florals and head out to see it.”

Ms Paige accused Lively of promoting the film like it’s “the sequel to Barbie”.

Alongside the press tour being described as “tone-deaf”, people started asking questions about why the Lively and Baldoni weren’t photographed on the red carpet together at the film’s New York premiere on 6 August.

The pair also did no interviews together during the press tour and at the London premiere, which Baldoni didn’t attend, I was warned by Lively’s team to not “ask any questions about Justin”.

Internet sleuths also spotted that cast members including Lively and author Hoover did not follow Baldoni on social media.

Neither Lively or Baldoni addressed rumours of a feud during the press tour and the only reference to each other was Baldoni telling Today that his co-star was a “dynamic creative”.

“She had her hands in every part of this production, and everything she touched made [it] better,” he said about the 37-year-old.

While the film was a box office success, it received mixed reviews from critics with some saying it romanticised domestic abuse.

There was a two-star review from The Telegraph’s Tim Robey, who called it a “queasy drama” that “repackages domestic violence as slick romance”.

He suggested the film “splices abuse and glossy courtship in the big city to deeply dubious effects”.

The movie also sparked a debate on TikTok, with some saying that it’s not clear from the trailer that this story is about an abusive relationship and rather it appears to be telling a love story.

Based on this misconception, some people said they found the film traumatic as they didn’t know it contained scenes of domestic abuse.

During the film’s press tour, Baldoni hired a crisis manager, Melissa Nathan, whose previous clients include Johnny Depp and Drake.

Shortly after the press tour, Lively faced a barrage of criticism on social media relating to her comments on that tour as well as from old interviews.

One of the interviews to resurface was one shared by a Norwegian journalist, Kjersti Flaa, who posted a video on YouTube of her interviewing Lively in 2016. It was titled “The Blake Lively interview that made me want to quit my job.”

Flaa has since said she had “nothing to do with Justin Baldoni and his smear campaign”.

Actor Brandon Sklenar, who plays Atlas in the film, defended Lively and said in a post on Instagram that people had been “vilifying” the women involved in the film online.

He said it was “disheartening to see the amount of negativity being projected” and that someone close to him who had experienced a relationship similar to Lily’s had credited the film with “saving her life”.

Four months after the film’s launch, Lively filed a legal complaint against Mr Baldoni in which she accused him of sexual harassment.

The complaint also listed Wayfarer Studios, Mr Baldoni’s production company which produced It Ends With Us, as a defendant.

The legal filing accuses Mr Baldoni and Wayfarer CEO Jamey Heath of “repeated sexual harassment and other disturbing behaviour”. Some other female cast and crew had also spoken up about their conduct, the filing alleges.

It also alleges that Ms Lively, Mr Baldoni and other people involved in the development of the film attended a meeting in January to address “the hostile work environment” on set. Her husband, actor Ryan Reynolds, attended the meeting alongside her, according to the complaint.

At the meeting, attendees agreed to a list of demands, including Mr Baldoni and Mr Heath making “no more descriptions of their own genitalia”, requiring an intimacy coordinator on set at all times when Ms Lively was in scenes with Mr Baldoni and no “friends” of the producers and directors being on set during scenes when Ms Lively was in a state of nudity.

The list of demands also implied that Mr Baldoni had asked Ms Lively’s trainer how much she weighed and alleged that Mr Baldoni and Mr Heath had spoken about their “pornography addiction” to Ms Lively.

In the filing, Ms Lively also alleges that Mr Baldoni and his team attacked her public image after the meeting.

She accuses him of orchestrating a plan to “destroy” her reputation in the press and online, including hiring a crisis manager who led a “sophisticated, coordinated, and well-financed retaliation plan” against her and used a “digital army” to post social media content that seemed authentic.

“To safeguard against the risk of Ms Lively ever revealing the truth about Mr Baldoni, the Baldoni-Wayfarer team created, planted, amplified, and boosted content designed to eviscerate Ms Lively’s credibility,” her team wrote in the filing.

It adds: “They engaged in the same techniques to bolster Mr Baldoni’s credibility and suppress any negative content about him.”

In the filing, Ms Lively says that this had led to “substantial harm” that affected “all aspects” of her life.

Mr Baldoni’s legal team told the BBC the allegations are “categorically false” and said they hired a crisis manager because Ms Lively had threatened to derail the film unless her demands were met.

Responding to the legal complaint, Mr Baldoni’s lawyer, Bryan Freedman, said on Saturday: “It is shameful that Ms Lively and her representatives would make such serious and categorically false accusations against Mr Baldoni, Wayfarer Studios and its representatives.”

Mr Freedman accused Ms Lively of making numerous demands and threats, including “threatening to not show up to set, threatening to not promote the film”, which would end up “ultimately leading to its demise during release, if her demands were not met”.

Hollywood stars including America Ferrera, Amber Tamblyn and Alexis Bledel have publicly backed Blake Lively after she filed her complaint.

Ferrera, Tamblyn and Bledel, who starred with Lively in 2005 film The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, issued a joint statement on Instagram, on Sunday saying they “stand with her in solidarity”.

“Throughout the filming of It Ends with Us, we saw her summon the courage to ask for a safe workplace for herself and colleagues on set, and we are appalled to read the evidence of a premeditated and vindictive effort that ensued to discredit her voice,” they wrote.

Colleen Hoover, the author of It Ends With Us, also showed her support, describing Ms Lively as “honest, kind, supportive and patient”.

Earlier in December, Baldoni was awarded a women’s solidarity honour by Vital Voices, a global non-profit organisation that focuses on empowering women.

The organisation has now rescinded the award after the legal complaint filed by Lively alleged “abhorrent conduct” by the actor, his studio and a crisis public relations team that it said was “contrary to the values” it held.

And since the legal complaint, Baldoni’s podcast co-host Liz Plank announced she was leaving The Man Enough show.

The podcast bills itself as creating “a safe environment” for exploring issues such as how “masculinity” shows up in relationships, as well as “sex, success” and “mental health”.

Kennesaw, Georgia, has all the small-town fixings one might imagine in the American South.

There’s the smell of baked biscuits wafting from Honeysuckle Biscuits & Bakery and the rumble of a nearby railroad train. It’s the kind of place where newlyweds leave hand-written thank-you cards in coffee shops, praising the “cozy” atmosphere.

But there’s another aspect of Kennesaw that some might find surprising – a city law from the 1980s that legally requires residents to own guns and ammo.

“It’s not like you go around wearing it on your hip like the Wild Wild West,” said Derek Easterling, the town’s three-term mayor and self-described “retired Navy guy”.

“We’re not going to go knock on your door and say, ‘Let me see your weapon.'”

Kennesaw’s gun law plainly states: “In order to provide for and protect the safety, security and general welfare of the city and its inhabitants, every head of household residing in city limits is required to maintain a firearm, together with ammunition.”

Residents with mental or physical disabilities, felony convictions, or conflicting religious beliefs are exempt from the law.

To Mayor Easterling’s knowledge, and that of multiple local officials, there have been no prosecutions or arrests made for violating Article II, Sec 34-21, which came into law in 1982.

And no one that the BBC spoke to could say what the penalty would be for being found in violation.

Still, the mayor insisted: “It’s not a symbolic law. I’m not into things just for show.”

For some, the law is a source of pride, a nod to the city’s embrace of gun culture.

For others, it’s a source of embarrassment, a page in a chapter of history they wish to move beyond.

But the main belief amongst the townsfolk about the gun law is that it keeps Kennesaw safe.

Patrons eating pepperoni slices at the local pizza parlour will propose: “If anything, criminals need to be concerned, because if they break into your home, and you’re there, they don’t know what you got.”

There were no murders in 2023, according to Kennesaw Police Department data, but there were two gun-involved suicides.

Blake Weatherby, a groundskeeper at the Kennesaw First Baptist Church, has different thoughts on why violent crime might be low.

“It’s the attitude behind the guns here in Kennesaw that keep the gun crimes down, not the guns,” Mr Weatherby said.

“It doesn’t matter if it’s a gun or a fork or a fist or a high heel shoe. We protect ourselves and our neighbours.”

Pat Ferris, who joined Kennesaw’s city council in 1984, two years after the law was passed, said the law was created to be “more of a political statement than anything”.

After Morton Grove, Illinois, became the first US city to ban gun ownership, Kennesaw became the first city to require it, triggering national news headlines.

A 1982 opinion piece by the New York Times described Kennesaw officials as “jovial” over the law’s passage but noted that “Yankee criminologists” were not.

Penthouse Magazine ran the story on its cover page with the words Gun Town USA: An American Town Where It’s Illegal Not to Own a Gun printed over an image of a bikini-clad blonde woman.

Similar gun laws have been passed in at least five cities, including Gun Barrel City, Texas and Virgin, Utah.

In the 40 years since Kennesaw’s gun law was passed, Mr Ferris said, its existence has mostly faded from consciousness.

“I don’t know how many people even know that the ordinance exists,” he said.

The same year the gun law took effect, Mr Weatherby, the church groundskeeper, was born.

He recalled a childhood where his dad would half-jokingly tell him: “I don’t care if you don’t like guns, it’s the law.”

“I was taught that if you’re a man, you’ve got to own a gun,” he said.

Now 42, he was 12 years old the first time he fired a weapon.

“I almost dropped it because it scared me so bad,” he said.

Mr Weatherby owned over 20 guns at one point but said now he doesn’t own any. He sold them over the years – including the one his dad left him when he died in 2005 – to overcome hard times.

“I needed gas more than guns,” he said.

One place he could’ve gone to sell his firearms is the Deercreek Gun Shop located on Kennesaw’s Main Street.

James Rabun, 36, has been working at the gun store ever since he graduated high school.

It’s the family business, he said, opened by his dad and grandad, both of whom can still be found there today; his dad in the back restoring firearms, his grandad in the front relaxing in a rocking chair.

For obvious reasons, Mr Rabun is a fan of Kennesaw’s gun law. It’s good for business.

“The cool thing about firearms”, he said with earnest enthusiasm, “is that people buy them for self-defence, but a lot of people like them like artwork or like bitcoin – things of scarcity.”

Among the dozens and dozens of weapons hanging on the wall for sale are double barrel black powder shotguns – akin to a musket – and a few “they-don’t-make-these-anymore” Winchester rifles from the 1800s.

In Kennesaw, gun fandom has a broad reach that extends beyond gun shop owners and middle-aged men.

Cris Welsh, a mother of two teenaged daughters, is unabashed about her gun ownership. She hunts, is a member at a gun club, and shoots at the local gun range with her two girls.

“I’m a gun owner”, she admitted, listing off her inventory which includes “a Ruger carry pistol, a Beretta, a Glock, and about half a dozen shotguns”.

However, Ms Welsh is not fond of Kennesaw’s gun law.

“I’m embarrassed when I hear people talk about the gun law,” Ms Welsh said. “It’s just an old Kennesaw thing to hang onto.”

She wished that when outsiders thought of the city, they called to mind the parks and schools and community values – not the gun law “that makes people uncomfortable”.

“There’s so much more to Kennesaw,” she said.

City council member Madelyn Orochena agrees that the law is “something that people would prefer not to advertise”.

“It’s just a weird little factoid about our community,” she said.

“Residents will either roll their eyes in a bit of shame or laugh along about it.”

A Nasa spacecraft is attempting to make history with the closest-ever approach to the Sun.

The Parker Solar Probe is plunging into our star’s outer atmosphere, enduring brutal temperatures and extreme radiation.

It is out of communication for several days during this burning hot fly-by and scientists will be waiting for a signal, expected at 05:00 GMT on 28 December, to see if it has survived.

The hope is the probe could help us to better understand how the Sun works.

Dr Nicola Fox, head of science at Nasa, told BBC News: “For centuries, people have studied the Sun, but you don’t experience the atmosphere of a place until you actually go visit it.

“And so we can’t really experience the atmosphere of our star unless we fly through it.”

Parker Solar Probe launched in 2018, heading to the centre of our solar system.

It has already swept past the Sun 21 times, getting ever nearer, but the Christmas Eve visit is record-breaking.

At its closest approach, the probe is 3.8 million miles (6.2 million km) from our star’s surface.

This might not sound that close, but Nasa’s Nicola Fox puts it into perspective: “We are 93 million miles away from the Sun, so if I put the Sun and the Earth one metre apart, Parker Solar Probe is four centimetres from the Sun – so that’s close.”

The probe will have to endure temperatures of 1,400C and radiation that could frazzle the onboard electronics.

It is protected by a 11.5cm (4.5 inches) thick carbon-composite shield but the spacecraft’s tactic is to get in and out fast.

In fact, it will be moving faster than any human-made object, hurtling at 430,000mph – the equivalent of flying from London to New York in less than 30 seconds.

Parker’s speed comes from the immense gravitational pull it feels as it falls towards the Sun.

So why go to all this effort to “touch” the Sun?

Scientists hope that as the spacecraft passes through our star’s outer atmosphere – its corona – it will solve a long standing mystery.

“The corona is really, really hot, and we have no idea why,” explains Dr Jenifer Millard, an astronomer at Fifth Star Labs in Wales.

“The surface of the Sun is about 6,000C or so, but the corona, this tenuous outer atmosphere that you can see during solar eclipses, reaches millions of degrees – and that is further away from the Sun. So how is that atmosphere getting hotter?”

The mission should also help scientists to better understand solar wind – the constant stream of charged particles bursting out from the corona.

When these particles interact with the Earth’s magnetic field the sky lights up with dazzling auroras.

But this so-called space weather can cause problems too, knocking out power grids, electronics and communication systems.

“Understanding the Sun, its activity, space weather, the solar wind, is so important to our everyday lives on Earth,” says Dr Millard.

Nasa scientists face an anxious wait over Christmas while the spacecraft is out of touch with Earth.

Nicola Fox says that as soon as a signal is beamed back home, the team will text her a green heart to let her know the probe is OK.

She admits she is nervous about the audacious attempt, but she has faith in the probe.

“I will worry about the spacecraft. But we really have designed it to withstand all of these brutal, brutal conditions. It’s a tough, tough little spacecraft.”

If it survives this challenge, the probe will continue its mission around the Sun into the future.

The Pelicot rape trial, which ended in France on Thursday, held a terrible fascination for almost every woman I know. As it unfolded in an Avignon court, I found myself following every awful detail, then discussing it with my female friends, my daughters, colleagues, even women in my local book club, as we tried to process what happened.

For nearly a decade, Gisèle Pelicot’s husband had been secretly drugging her and inviting men he’d met on the internet to have sex with his “Sleeping Beauty” wife in the marital bedroom while he videoed them.

These strangers, ranging from 22 to 70 years in age, with jobs that included fireman, nurse, journalist, prison warden and soldier, complied with Dominique Pelicot‘s instructions. Such was their desire for a submissive female body to penetrate, they blithely had sex with a retired grandmother whose heavily sedated body resembled a rag doll.

There were 50 men in court, all living within a 50km (30 mile) radius of Mazan, a small town in southern France where the Pelicots lived. They were, apparently, just like “any other man”.

One woman in her 30s told me “When I first read about it, I didn’t want to be around men for at least a week, even my fiancé. It just horrified me.”

Another in her late 60s, so close to Gisèle Pelicot’s age, couldn’t stop thinking about what men’s minds could be harbouring, even her husband and sons. “Is this just the tip of the iceberg?”

As Dr Stella Duffy, 61, an author and therapist, wrote on Instagram on the day the verdict was delivered: “I hope and try to believe #notallmen, but I imagine the wives and girlfriends and best mates and daughters and mothers of Gisèle Pelicot’s village thought that too. And now they know different. Every woman I talk to says this case has changed how she views men. I hope it’s changed how men view men too.”

Now that justice has been done, we can look beyond this monstrous case and ask: where did these men’s callous and violent behaviour come from? Could they not see that sex without consent is rape?

But there is a broader question too. What does the fact that so many men in a relatively small area shared this fantasy of extreme domination over a woman say about the nature of male desire?

It is hard to imagine the scale of the orchestrated rapes and sexual assaults of Ms Pelicot without the internet.

The platform on which Dominique Pelicot advertised for men to rape his wife was an unmoderated French website, which made it easier to bring together people who shared sexual interests, with no holds barred, than it would have been in the days before the internet. (It has now been closed down.)

One of Ms Pelicot’s lawyers likened the site to a “murder weapon”, telling the court that without it the case “would never have reached such proportions”.

But the internet has played a role in gradually changing attitudes to sex in consensual and non-abusive settings too, normalising what many might have once seen as extreme.

In the shift from old school skin mags and blue movies bought in a murky Soho sex shop to modern-day websites like PornHub, which had 11.4 billion mobile visits globally in the month of January 2024 alone, the boundaries of porn have expanded hugely. Adding in more and more extreme or niche activity ramps up the expectation, so “vanilla” sex may become mundane.

According to a survey of UK online users in January 2024, almost one in 10 respondents aged between 25 and 49 years reported watching porn most days, the great majority of them male.

Twenty-four-year-old university graduate Daisy told me that most people she knows watch porn, including her. She prefers to use a feminist site whose search filters include “passionate” and “sensual”, as well as “rough”. But some of her male friends say they no longer watch porn “as they couldn’t have a nice time having sex because of watching too much porn when they were just kids“.

A 2023 study for the children’s commissioner for England, Dame Rachel de Souza, found that a quarter of 16 to 21-year-olds first saw pornography on the internet while still at primary school.

At the time Ms de Souza said: “The adult content which parents may have accessed in their youth could be considered ‘quaint’ in comparison to today’s world of online pornography.”

Children who regularly viewed porn on mobiles before puberty inevitably grow up with different sexual expectations than those aroused by Playboy in the 20th century.

While no direct causal link has been established, there is substantial evidence of an association between the use of pornography and harmful sexual attitudes and behaviours towards women.

According to government research before the Covid-19 pandemic: “There is evidence that use of pornography is associated with greater likelihood of desiring or engaging in sexual acts witnessed in porn, and a greater likelihood of believing women want to engage in these specific acts.”

Some of those acts may involve aggressive, dominating behaviour such as face slapping, choking, gagging and spitting. Daisy told me: “Choking has become normalised, routine, expected, like neck-kissing. With the last person I was seeing, I told him from the start that I wasn’t into choking and he was fine with that.”

But she believes that not all women will speak out. “And in my experience most men don’t want a woman to be dominant in the bedroom. That’s where they want to have the power.”

Forty years older than Daisy, Suzanne Noble has written about her own sexual adventures and now has a website and podcast called Sex Advice for Seniors. She believes that the availability of porn that depicts rape fantasies normalises an act that is rooted in violence and depicts rape as an activity women crave.

“There’s simply not enough education about the difference between re-enacting a fantasy that involves a pseudo-rape, with a completely non-consensual version of the same,” she argues.

Just as the internet brought porn out of backstreets and into bedrooms, it has also facilitated easier access to events in real life. Previously people into, say, S&M (sadomasochism), might have connected through small ads in the back of “contact” magazines, using Post Office boxes rather than mail to their own homes. It was a very slow and arduous way of setting up a sexual encounter. Now it’s far easier to connect with those groups online then plan to meet in person.

In the UK, it has become mainstream to find love and relationships through dating apps, and so too is it easier to connect with people who wish to try out particular sexual kinks, with a plethora of social apps such as Feeld, which is designed for people to explore “desire outside of existing blueprints”. Its online glossary includes a list of 31 desires, including polyamory, bondage and submission.

Albertina Fisher is an online psychosexual therapist who, in the course of her job, talks to her clients about their sexual fantasies. “There is nothing wrong with having a sexual fantasy — the difference is if fantasy becomes behaviour without consent,” she says.

Male and female fantasies are different she tells me, “but they very often include submission and domination. The key thing about sexual preferences such as BDSM (bondage, discipline or domination, sadism, and masochism) is that it is safe, sane and consensual. What two people want to do together is absolutely fine.” This, she stresses, is the case when both consent.

All of this is, of course, entirely separate to the Pelicot case. “That is sexual violence,” she says. “And it’s extremely distressing that this can happen within what appeared to be a loving relationship. Acting out a fantasy without consent is an extreme form of narcissism.

“With the partner incapacitated, all their needs are denied. So you have a fantasy of a woman who you don’t have to worry about pleasing.”

A key and problematic aspect of the whole question of fantasy is desire. In the post-Freudian age it has become a truism that desires should not be repressed. And much of the liberation theory of the 1960s emphasised self-actualisation through the realisation of sexual desire.

But male desire has become an increasingly contested concept, not least because of the questions of power and domination often entangled within it.

The men who stood trial in the Pelicot case struggled to see themselves as perpetrators. Some argued that they assumed Ms Pelicot had consented, or that they were taking part in a libertine sex game. As many of them saw it, they were simply pursuing their desires.

There is a dark borderline where a very basic form of heterosexual male desire – (or the primal urge to have sex with a woman, or women, in the most uncomplicated manner) – can grow into a shared endeavour, creating an esprit de corps of boundary-pushing that may pay little heed or care to the female experience.

This perhaps explains why an OnlyFans performer, Lily Phillips, recently drew a huge queue of participants in her quest to have sex with 100 men in one day.

The tendency to objectify women may in some cases also develop into a desire to annihilate the whole question of female desire, let alone agency.

Obviously male desire takes many forms, most of an entirely healthy nature, but it has traditionally been constrained by cultural limits. Now those limits have shifted radically in the UK and elsewhere in the West, and the underlying conviction that the realisation of desire is an act of self-liberation amounts to a potent and sometimes troubling combination.

Andre de Trichateau, a therapist based in South Kensington, London, brought up the appeal of masculinist influencers such as Andrew Tate, a self-proclaimed “misogynist”, who has 10.4 million followers on X.

Mr de Trichateau says that he has encountered men feeling demeaned and displaced by the rise of feminism. “Some men don’t know who to be,” he says. “Men are socialised to be dominant but also expected to be in touch with their emotions, able to show vulnerability.

“This confusion can lead to anger, directed to the feminist movement, and [in turn this can lead them to] people such as Tate.”

With a 60% male client base, Mr de Trichateau observes that “men can be socialised to view power and dominance as part of their identity”.

“This is not to justify anything like the Pelicot case,” he continues, “but objectively I can see that such behaviour is an escape from powerlessness and inadequacy. It’s tantalising and forbidden.

“The case is disturbing because it shows the extremities that people will go to.”

He also pointed out that online groups such as the one Mr Pelicot used can be very powerful. “In a group you are accepted. Ideas are validated. One person says its OK then everyone will go along with it.”

Many of the conversations during and since the Pelicot trial have focused on how to make the distinction between consensual and non-consensual sex and whether it should be better defined in law – but the problem is that what consent amounts to is a complex question.

As 24-year-old Daisy sees it, some women of her age tend to go along with men’s sexual preferences regardless of their own feelings. “They think something is hot if the man they are with thinks it’s hot.”

So, if heterosexual men, in particular, really are increasingly taking their sexual cues from pornography, then that prompts further questions about the changing shape of male desire. And if young women can feel that the price of intimacy is to go along with those desires, however extreme, then arguably consent is not a black and white matter.

Ultimately, there may be widespread relief that the Pelicot case is over and that justice was served, but it leaves behind even more questions – questions that, in the spirit of an amazingly strong French woman, are perhaps best discussed out in the open.