Ukraine says it has agreed to the terms of a major deal that would give the US access to its deposits of rare earth minerals.

Kyiv hopes the deal – which would give the US a financial stake in the country – will encourage the White House to protect Ukraine if the war with Russia reignites after a potential ceasefire.

US President Donald Trump has not yet confirmed an agreement has been reached, but says a deal would help American taxpayers “get their money back” for aid sent to Ukraine throughout the war and give Kyiv “the right to fight on” against Russia.

Ukrainian President Zelensky said security guarantees he had been pushing for had not yet been agreed, but that he hoped this was a starting point which would “lead to further deals”.

Key details have not yet been made public, but on Wednesday Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said Ukraine and the US had finalised a version of the agreement.

Speaking to Ukrainian TV, Shmyhal said the preliminary agreement envisages that an “investment fund” would be set up for Ukraine’s reconstruction.

Kyiv and Washington would manage the fund on “equal terms”, the prime minister added.

He said Ukraine would contribute 50% of future proceeds from state-owned mineral resources, oil and gas to the fund, and the fund would then invest in projects in Ukraine itself.

Zelensky has acknowledged the fund but told the BBC on Wednesday it was “too early to talk about money”.

The New York Times reported, citing a draft document, that the US would own the maximum amount of the fund allowed under US law, but not necessarily all of it.

Disagreement over the terms of a minerals deal formed part of what was seen as a deepening rift between Trump and Zelensky in recent weeks.

The Ukrainian president had rejected an initial request from the US for $500bn (£395bn) in mineral wealth, but media reports say this demand has now been dropped.

“The provisions of the deal are much better for Ukraine now,” a source in Ukraine’s government told the BBC.

On Tuesday, Trump said the US had given Ukraine between $300bn (£237bn) and $350bn (£276bn) in aid, and that he wanted to “get that money back” through a deal.

But German think tank the Kiel Institute estimates the US has sent $119bn in aid to Ukraine.

Zelensky has been pushing for a deal to include a firm security guarantee from the US.

But on Wednesday, Ukraine’s leader said no such guarantee had been made.

“I wanted to have a sentence on security guarantees for Ukraine, and it’s important that it’s there,” he said.

Asked by the BBC if he would be prepared to walk away from the agreement if Trump did not offer the guarantees he wanted, Zelensky said: “I want to find a Nato path or something similar.

“If we don’t get security guarantees, we won’t have a ceasefire, nothing will work, nothing.”

Despite this, Shmyhal said on Wednesday the US supported “Ukraine’s efforts to obtain security guarantees to build lasting peace”.

He said Ukraine would not sign the deal until Zelensky and Trump “agree on security guarantees” and decide on how to “tie this preliminary agreement” to a US security guarantee.

The prospect of a minerals deal was first proposed by Zelensky last year as a way to offer the US a tangible reason to continue supporting Ukraine.

Trump said on Tuesday that Ukraine would get “the right to fight on” in return for access to its minerals, though he did not confirm an agreement had yet been reached.

He also suggested the US would continue to supply equipment and ammunition to Ukraine “until we have a deal with Russia”.

The US President said on Monday that Russia was open to accepting European peacekeepers in Ukraine, but Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said the Kremlin would not consider this as an option.

Shmyhal said the US and Ukraine have prepared a final version of the agreement, which Ukraine’s government will authorise for signing on Wednesday.

Trump has said he expects Zelensky to sign the deal on a visit to Washington on Friday.

Zelensky said he would be “very direct” with Trump by asking whether the US would continue supporting Ukraine or not.

Kyiv estimates that about 5% of the world’s “critical raw materials” are in Ukraine.

This includes some 19m tonnes of proven reserves of graphite, which the Ukrainian Geological Survey state agency says makes the nation “one of the top five leading countries” for the supply of the mineral. Graphite is used to make batteries for electric vehicles.

Ukraine also has significant deposits of titanium, lithium and rare earth metals – a group of 17 elements that are used to produce weapons, wind turbines, electronics and other products vital in the modern world.

But some of the country’s mineral deposits have been seized by Russia. According to Yulia Svyrydenko, Ukraine’s economy minister, resources worth $350bn (£277bn) remain in occupied territories today.

There are warnings too that a deal allowing the US access to Ukraine’s vast mineral wealth cannot happen unless the country addresses its problem with unexploded mines.

A quarter of Ukraine’s landmass is estimated to be contaminated with landmines, mainly concentrated in the war-torn east of the country.

• What minerals does Ukraine have?

Vladimir Putin has not yet addressed reports that the terms of a deal between the US and Ukraine have been agreed.

But on Monday evening he told state TV he was ready to “offer” resources to American partners in joint projects, including mining in Russia’s “new territories” – a reference to parts of eastern Ukraine that Russia has occupied since launching a full-scale invasion three years ago.

Putin said a potential US-Ukraine deal on rare minerals was not a concern and that Russia “undoubtedly have, I want to emphasise, significantly more resources of this kind than Ukraine”.

“As for the new territories, it’s the same. We are ready to attract foreign partners to the so-called new, to our historical territories, which have returned to the Russian Federation,” he added.

Commenting on Zelensky’s visit to Washington, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Tuesday: “Whether it will be [to sign] the aforementioned agreement or something else, we’ll see. There have been no official statements on this matter yet.”

An Australian radio presenter has left the network after comments he made about the country’s women’s football team – which have been branded as misogynist and disrespectful.

Marty Sheargold said on nationwide radio station Triple M that the Matildas players reminded him of “year 10 girls” and implied that their matches were boring.

He apologised earlier on Wednesday, and was due to be back on air but did not appear in his usual time slot.

Southern Cross Austereo (SCA), the parent company of Triple M, later said Sheargold and the station had agreed to “mutually part ways”.

In a statement on Wednesday, Sheargold said that he fully understood the gravity of his remarks and would like to “sincerely apologise to the Matildas and the broader organisation”.

The company said that it “takes its responsibility to listeners, shareholders, and clients seriously and its programming should align with the standards and expectations of its audience.”

“Right now, it’s clear this is a moment for reflection and review. Triple M, and the wider SCA network, will continue to take all necessary steps to support staff,” the firm’s chief content officer Dave Cameron said in a statement.

Earlier the sport’s governing body said the remarks “diminish the extraordinary achievements” of a team that were semi-finalists in the women’s world cup in 2023.

During his drivetime show on Monday afternoon, Sheargold interjected during a sports bulletin – which was discussing Australia’s defeat to the US in its second consecutive loss in the SheBelieves Cup.

“You know what they remind me of? Year 10 girls,” Sheargold said, to the laughter of his co-hosts.

“All the infighting and all the friendship issues… Now I’m sorry to undermine the whole sport, but that’s what I think of it.”

When his colleague mentioned the SheBelieves Cup by name, Sheargold interrupted saying: “Oh, she believes in what? It better be men.”

And when reference was made to Australia hosting the AFC Women’s Asian Cup next year, he said “oh god – the Asian Cup”, before criticising the event with an obscene comment. He then asked his co-host: “Got any men’s sport?”

Sheargold’s comments later went viral.

Minister for Sport Anika Wells called the comments “boorish, boring and wrong”.

“Australia’s most watched television event ever was the Matildas World Cup semi-final; the Tillies’ quarterfinal is the second-most-watched event in Australian history,” Ms Wells said.

Australian Olympian Ambrosia Malone, who represents her country in hockey, also criticised Sheargold.

“All I could think about was the young girls sitting in the car with their parents, maybe on the way to or from their own training sessions hearing this,” she wrote on social media.

“I’m sure many of them would have been hurt and confused… I was in disbelief.

“This is apparently acceptable on mainstream afternoon radio??? HOW??”

Football Australia said it was “deeply disappointed by the unacceptable comments” which “fail to recognise the profound impact they have had on Australian sport and society”.

“This incident is a stark reminder of the responsibility media outlets and personalities have in fostering respectful and constructive discussions about women’s sport and its participants,” it added.

An Australian couple have spoken of the “traumatic” moment the body of a dead passenger was placed next to them on a Qatar Airways flight.

Mitchell Ring and Jennifer Colin, who were travelling to Venice for a dream holiday, told Australia’s Channel 9 a woman had died in the aisle beside them during the flight from Melbourne to Doha.

The couple say cabin crew placed her corpse, covered in blankets, next to Mr Ring for the remaining four hours of the flight without offering to move him, despite there being empty seats.

Qatar Airways said it apologised for “any inconvenience or distress this incident may have caused”.

The couple said they had not been contacted or offered support by Qatar Airways or Qantas, the airline through which they booked the flight.

In a later statement on Wednesday, Qatar Airways said it had now spoken with the affected passengers to address their concerns, as well as the family of the woman who died.

Mr Ring told Channel Nine’s Current Affair programme that staff had responded “in no time” when the woman collapsed, but that “unfortunately the lady couldn’t be saved, which was pretty heart-breaking to watch”.

He said the cabin crew had tried to move her body towards business class “but she was quite a large lady and they couldn’t get her through the aisle”.

Mr Ring said the crew had seen seats were available beside him.

“They said, ‘Can you move over please?’ and I just said, ‘Yes no problem’.

“Then they placed the lady in the chair I was in.”

While Ms Colin was able to move to an empty seat nearby, Mr Ring said he had not been given the option to do so by cabin crew – even though there were vacant seats.

When the plane landed four hours later, he said passengers were asked to stay put while medical staff and police came on board.

He said ambulance officers had then started pulling blankets off the woman and he had seen her face.

The couple said there needed to be a “duty of care” for customers and staff.

“We should be contacted to make sure, do you need some support, do you need some counselling?”

Ms Colin called the experience “traumatic” and said: “We totally understand that we can’t hold the airline responsible for the poor lady’s death, but there has to be a protocol to look after the customers on board.”

In its latest statement, Qatar Airways said: “We have been in contact with the family of the passenger who passed away to express our condolences on their loss. We have also directly spoken with the affected passengers to address their concerns.

“The safety and comfort of all our passengers is of paramount importance to us.”

A Qantas spokesperson said: “The process for handling incidents onboard an aircraft like this is managed by the operating airline, which in this case is Qatar Airways.”

Barry Eustance, a former Virgin Atlantic captain, said deaths in the air “occur more frequently than people would think” but said as a far as he was aware there was no specific protocol in place for such situations.

“On a long haul flight it tends to depend largely on when it occurs and where it occurs and what the crew have in terms of facilities to place the body somewhere because on an aeroplane, there’s no access to the hold, there’s a crew rest area but that’s for the crew so it can be problematical.”

A toilet area or galley area could be blocked off, he said, but the crew are required to keep a certain number of toilets available.

Mr Eustance said that, while he was not being judgemental as he did not know the full situation, he was surprised that the crew did not move Mr Ring if there had been spare seats.

“I would expect the crew would do all they could to avoid that. You are creating potential future liabilities in terms of the trauma of the people next to whom the body was placed,” he said.

“In my experience the crew would normally try to isolate the body, so there is no passenger exposure to the body and vice versa, for respect and privacy but also for medical reasons. You have a dead body that is uncontained and all that goes with it.”

The parents of an eight-year-old diabetic girl in Australia who died after they denied her insulin for almost a week have each been sentenced to 14 years in jail for manslaughter.

Elizabeth Struhs had in 2019 been diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, and her family was told she would need daily insulin injections.

Her parents belonged to a religious sect known as The Saints, who opposed medical care, believing God would heal her.

She died from diabetic ketoacidosis, which causes a dangerous build-up of ketones – a type of acid – and blood sugar spikes at her home in Toowoomba west of Brisbane in January 2022.

Her father Jason Struhs and mother Elizabeth Struhs, were among 14 people convicted of manslaughter last month.

The Saints’ leader Brendan Stevens has been jailed for 13 years by the judge at the Supreme Court of Queensland, who called him a “dangerous, highly manipulative individual”.

Eleven other members were handed jail terms of six to nine years.

Stevens and the girl’s father had been on trial for murder but they were convicted of the lesser charge of manslaughter. All had pleaded not guilty.

When handing down his almost 500-page verdict last month, Justice Martin Burns said that although it was clear Elizabeth’s parents and “every member of the church including all other accused” had adored her, their actions had resulted in her death.

“Due to a singular belief in the healing power of God… she was deprived of the one thing that would most definitely have kept her alive.”

Elizabeth would have endured vomiting, extreme lethargy, and a loss of consciousness because she was denied medical care, prosecutor Caroline Marco said during the trial, which lasted several months and was heard by a judge sitting alone without a jury.

Prosecutors called 60 witnesses and painted a picture of an “intelligent” child who suffered greatly in her final days.

The congregation, meanwhile, had prayed and sung for the girl as she laid on a mattress and her condition deteriorated.

Believing she could be brought back to life, the sect member made no effort to call a doctor, and authorities were not notified until 36 hours after her death, the court heard.

“Elizabeth is only sleeping, and I will see her again,” her father Jason Struhs had earlier told the court.

Stevens, 63, had defended the group’s actions as faith-based and described the trial as an act of “religious persecution”. He said that the group was within its “rights to believe in the word of God completely”.

Type 1 diabetes is a disorder in which the pancreas fails to produce enough insulin. It is characterised by uncontrolled high blood glucose levels and it can be controlled by injecting insulin.

Elizabeth’s sister Jayde Struhs had earlier said she had left the Saints and fled her family home at 16, after coming out as gay, and was now estranged from them.

She and other witnesses described the congregation as having strict views, including that mainstream healthcare should be shunned and that both Christmas and Easter were “pagan” or ungodly festivals.

The Saints are not affiliated with an established church in Australia and count around two dozen members from three families among its members.

BP has announced it will cut its renewable energy investments and instead focus on increasing oil and gas production.

The energy giant revealed the shift in strategy on Wednesday following pressure from some investors unhappy its profits and share price have been lower than its rivals.

BP said it would increase its investments in oil and gas by about 20% to $10bn (£7.9bn) a year, while decreasing previously planned funding for renewables by more than $5bn (£3.9bn).

The move comes as rivals Shell and Norwegian company Equinor have also scaled back plans to invest in green energy and US President Donald Trump’s “drill baby drill” comments have encouraged investment in fossil fuels.

Murray Auchincloss, BP’s chief executive, said the energy giant had gone “too far, too fast” in the transition away from fossil fuels, and that its faith in green energy was “misplaced”.

He said BP would be “very selective” in investing in businesses working on the energy transition to renewables going forward, with funding reduced to between $1.5bn and $2bn per year.

He said this was part of a strategy “reset” by the company to focus on boosting returns for shareholders.

Helge Lund, chair of BP, added that the new direction of the firm had “cash flow growth” at its heart.

Shares in the company climbed before Tuesday’s announcement but fell shortly after.

BP is one of several firms in the energy industry to return focus on oil and gas production, which has seen an increase in profits as prices have increased following lows seen during the Covid pandemic.

The firm said it plans to increase its production to between 2.3 million and 2.5 million barrels of oil per day by 2030, with hopes of “major” oil and gas projects starting by the end of 2027.

Mr Auchincloss is under pressure to boost profits from some shareholders, including the influential activist group Elliot Management, which took a near £4bn stake in the £70bn company to push for more investment in oil and gas.

In 2024, BP’s net income fell to $8.9bn (£7.2bn), down from $13.8bn the previous year.

However, some other shareholders, as well as environmental groups have voiced concerns over switching focus back to fossil fuel production.

Last week, a group of 48 investors called on the company to allow them a vote on any potential plans to move away from commitments to renewables.

The environmental group Greenpeace UK said the latest move was “proof that fossil fuel companies can’t or won’t be part of climate crisis solutions”.

Alexander Kirk from Global Witness added BP “cannot be trusted to deliver the clean energy transition”, adding that it was “focusing on short-term profits to shareholders while energy prices are high, with the rest of the world picking up the tab from its climate-wrecking products”.

Global Witness drove a lorry around central London with messages criticising BP’s decision.

Sir Ian Cheshire, who has held many executive roles at companies such as B&Q owner Kingfisher and Barclays bank, questioned whether BP’s latest move would work.

“I do wonder whether this sort of decision will look right in 10 years,” he told the BBC’s Today programme.

“The climate change issue has not gone away, the science hasn’t changed,” he said.

Challenged on the reduced commitment to investing in renewable energy, Louise Kingham, BP’s senior vice president for Europe and the UK, said none of the changes announced on Tuesday would alter the UK’s green energy plans, which include three wind farms and carbon capture projects.

She said the shift to renewable energy sources had slowed but that BP’s ambition had “not changed” to become a net-zero company.

According to the International Energy Agency, no new fossil fuel projects are compatible with limiting global warming to 1.5C compared to pre-industrial levels,

“We just have to do this transition more smartly and more efficiently and try to get those returns for our owners because they are helping us to do that. If we don’t generate the returns, we can’t invest and do more,” Ms Kingham told a committee of MPs.

“It’s going to take everybody to move in concert to make this happen. It’s not just the decision of one company and what it chooses to do.”

The decrease in renewables will cover biogas, biofuels and electric vehicle charging projects, while BP will look to “capital-light partnerships” in other green energy such as wind and solar.

BP has already placed its offshore wind business in a joint venture with Japanese company Jera and is looking to find a partner to do the same with its solar business.

Five years ago, BP set some of the most ambitious targets among large oil companies to cut production of oil and gas by 40% by 2030, while significantly ramping up investment in renewables.

But in 2023, the company lowered this oil and gas reduction target to 25%.

In the five years since former chief executive Bernard Looney first unveiled his strategy, shareholders have received total returns including dividends of 36%.

In contrast, shareholders in rivals Shell and Exxon have seen returns of 82% and 160% respectively.

BP’s under performance has prompted speculation that it may be a takeover target or may consider moving its main stock market listing to the US where oil and gas companies command higher valuations.

Sign up for our Future Earth newsletter to get exclusive insight on the latest climate and environment news from the BBC’s Climate Editor Justin Rowlatt, delivered to your inbox every week. Outside the UK? Sign up to our international newsletter here.

Foodies in China have been reportedly flocking to an unlikely destination – a funeral home – after a noodle dish served at its canteen went viral on social media.

The dish is found at the Erlong Funeral Home in the southwestern province of Guizhou.

The canteen caters to the funeral home’s customers, but as word began to spread about its noodles, hordes of diners – some posing as mourners – began showing up to try the food.

Erlong has since announced it will allow some members of the public to eat at its premises, as long as they do not disturb genuine mourners.

The funeral home offers various types of noodle dishes during breakfast and supper hours, which cost 10 yuan per bowl ($1.38; £1.09).

The most popular type is reportedly the noodles topped with minced pork and peanuts.

One Erlong worker told Jiupai News that they “only served customers who come to the funeral home to handle matters”.

But other people have been sneaking in to get a bowl of noodles, the worker said, adding that sometimes queues at Erlong are so long that diners sometimes have to wait a couple of hours to get their food.

“There have been people pretending to be relatives of the deceased, it’s hard to tell them apart when it gets crowded, and it’s hard to manage,” he said.

To meet the demand, the funeral home has since decided to offer 50 bowls of noodles to members of the public every day – for free – as long as “they do not affect people’s mourning”, according to Erlong’s chef in an interview with local media.

While the noodle dish was already popular among locals, the craze appeared to have ramped up earlier this month when a social media user posted about the dish while visiting a friend in Guizhou, which is known for its spicy and sour dishes.

“My friend says the food at this funeral home is so good,” they wrote earlier this month on Xiaohongshu, also known as RedNote. “The queue for food is longer than the queue to lay flowers for the deceased.”

“I didn’t get to eat the noodles, because my friend’s mum didn’t know anyone who was holding a funeral service.”

Since then, many Chinese social media users have also shared their experiences eating the noodles.

On Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok, one user shared a photo of the dining hall’s tickets, with what appeared to be a crowd queuing up for food.

“I heard the noodles here were very good,” they wrote. “I thought about how short life was, and got another bowl.”

The UK’s decision to suspend some aid to Rwanda is “punitive”, authorities in the East African country have said.

In a statement, the UK said it was against Rwanda’s support for the M23, a rebel group that has captured swathes of eastern Democratic Republic of Congo in a deadly uprising.

Rwanda used to deny backing the M23, but recently it has adopted a more defensive line, saying fighting near the border between DR Congo and Rwanda is a threat to its security.

More than 7,000 people have died and hundreds of thousands have fled their homes since the conflict escalated in January, DR Congo’s government says.

• What’s the fighting in DR Congo all about?
• The evidence that shows Rwanda is backing rebels in DR Congo

The UK said the humanitarian situation in DR Congo was “critical” and that it would halt bilateral aid to Rwanda, “excluding support to the poorest and most vulnerable”.

Earlier this month, UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy said Rwanda receives about £32m ($40m) of bilateral aid from the UK every year.

Along with the suspension of aid, the UK will impose other measures, such as looking into potential sanctions and suspending “future defence training assistance”, the statement said.

These measures will last until “significant progress” is made in ceasing hostilities and withdrawing Rwandan military personnel from DR Congo, it added.

UN experts have previously estimated that between 3,000 and 4,000 Rwandan troops are in eastern DR Congo.

Rwanda’s foreign ministry said the “punitive measures” announced by the UK government “in response to the conflict in eastern DRC – where the UK has now clearly chosen a side – are regrettable”.

“The measures do nothing to help the Democratic Republic of Congo, nor do they contribute to achieving a sustainable political solution to the conflict in eastern DRC.”

The UK has previously enjoyed good relations with Rwanda. In 2022, the two countries signed a multi-million pound deal, in which some asylum seekers arriving on British soil would be deported to Rwanda.

The deal faced legal challenges and was scrapped last year after a change in the UK’s government.

DR Congo’s government has been campaigning for international powers to suspend aid and impose sanctions on Rwanda.

Last week, the US Treasury Department said it had imposed sanctions on Rwanda’s Minister of State for Regional Integration, James Kabarebe.

The US accused Kabarebe, a former army chief, of being central to Rwanda’s support for M23.

Also sanctioned was Lawrence Kanyuka, the M23’s spokesman, as well as two companies he controlled in France and the UK, the US Treasury said.

Responding to the US move, Rwanda’s foreign ministry said the sanctions were “unjustified”.

The M23 says it is fighting to achieve better rights for the Tutsis, an ethnic minority group in DR Congo, and to bring order to a failed state.

The rebels have captured eastern DR Congo’s two biggest cities, Goma and Bukavu.

• How DR Congo’s Tutsis become foreigners in their own country
• ‘They took all the women here’: Rape survivors recall horror of DR Congo jailbreak
• The DR Congo rebel leader whose fighters have created turmoil

Indian police have registered a case against leading businessman Shyam S Bhartia and three others for alleged criminal intimidation and rape of an aspiring Bollywood actress.

Bhartia is the founder and chairman of Jubilant Bhartia Group. Its subsidiary Jubilant Foodworks is the largest franchisee for Domino’s Pizza outside of the US.

The woman, who can’t be named under Indian law, accuses Bhartia of intoxicating and then “brutally” raping her in Singapore.

Bhartia has denied the allegations as “baseless, false and disparaging” in a filing with the Bombay Stock Exchange on Tuesday.

The company said Bhartia would fully cooperate with the investigation.

Jubiliant FoodWorks has not responded separately to the BBC’s request for comment.

The woman said she first complained to the police on 11 November 2024. But her case was registered only on 22 February on orders of the Bombay High Court after it heard her petition.

The petition and the police complaint seen by the BBC alleged that the woman first met Bhartia in 2022 at a five star hotel in Mumbai through a co-accused, who allegedly promised to introduce her to people who could help further her career in the entertainment industry.

She alleges that Bhartia agreed to invest in her film project and asked her to come to Singapore, giving her his credit card details to book flight tickets.

In the petition, the woman also alleged that the co-accused made a video of the rape in Singapore in 2023.

She further alleged that she was repeatedly sexually assaulted by Bhartia thereafter that year.

In the company’s filing with the stock exchange, Jubiliant FoodWorks said the court had made it clear it had not gone into the “merits of the complaint”. It rubbished the allegations against Bhartia saying they were made with a “clear mala fide intent against him”.

Ariana Grande, Timothée Chalamet and Demi Moore were among the Oscar nominees who gathered in Los Angeles on Tuesday for the annual “class photo”.

Ahead of the Academy Awards on Sunday (2 March), the nominees from all categories were invited to mingle over dinner and cocktails, as an eventful awards race reaches its conclusion.

• 17 facts you need to know before the Oscars

The class photo, a highlight of the film calendar, is usually taken much earlier in awards season, at the nominees luncheon, but that event was cancelled this year due to the LA wildfires.

Here are 12 things we spotted in this year’s class photo:

Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande have spent the last few months crying, holding space and stroking each other’s fingers as they promoted the screen adaptation of Wicked.

The two actresses have redefined the film press tour in recent weeks thanks to their absolute adoration for each other – an energy they will have to recreate later this year when they do it all again for the release of part two.

Before the photo was taken, instead of saying cheese, Erivo shouted: “Everyone say ‘Oscar nominee!'”

Last week, it was confirmed the pair will perform a medley of songs from the film during the Oscars ceremony which will last a reported 10 minutes long.

Wicked is the closest thing the Oscars have this year to a box office smash in the shape of last year’s Barbie, and they’ll be hoping the medley will recreate the energy of Ryan Gosling’s viral performance of I’m Just Ken last year.

We’re aware the weather is getting warmer and the sun is rising earlier as we hurtle towards Spring, but we are nevertheless always on the lookout for a colourful cosy jumper and we need to investigate the origin of this one as an urgent priority.

The woman with the impeccable sweater selection in the class photo is Maya Gnyp – a producer of I Am Ready, Warden – which is nominated for best documentary short.

The film follows Texas death row inmate John Henry Ramire in his final days.

Joining Ariana and Cynthia on the front row were fellow acting nominees Zoe Saldaña, Mikey Madison and Monica Barbaro.

Saldaña is almost certain to win best supporting actress for Emilia Pérez, having taken the trophy at a string of precursor events including the Baftas, SAG Awards and Golden Globes.

As a result, her fellow category nominees such as Barbaro, who plays Joan Baez in Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown, have had to practise their best “I’m just happy to be nominated” faces this year.

Madison, however, is a co-frontrunner in a tight race for leading actress. The Anora star is up against Demi Moore for The Substance in a category seen as a dead heat.

James Mangold, nominated this year for A Complete Unknown, is one of Hollywood’s most respected and loved directors.

So why is he sitting on an aisle seat in the second-back row, away from all his pals, looking sheepish?

It’s probably because he only just made the class photo by the skin of his teeth, arriving late to the event to an affectionate collective groan followed by cheers from his fellow nominees.

Despite a distinguished Hollywood career, Mangold is a first-time nominee in the best director category, as are his fellow nominees Coralie Fargeat, Sean Baker, Brady Corbet and Jacques Audiard.

In a year where disappointingly few of the stars pulled funny faces or made eye-catching hand gestures while the photo was being taken, we applaud the team from Black Box Diaries for joining hands and celebrating.

They are the film’s director Shiori Ito (second left), editor Ema Ryan Yamazaki (far right) and producers Hanna Aqvilin and Eric Nyari.

The movie, nominated in the documentary feature category, examines a sexual assault investigation in Japan.

Sitting in the back row, so far from the photographer that their faces are somewhat blurry and out of focus, are three of the biggest stars in this year’s awards race.

In the centre is The Substance star Demi Moore, nominated for playing an ageing aerobics instructor who takes a black-market drug to create a younger, more beautiful version of herself.

She is joined on either side by supporting actor nominees Guy Pearce (left), who is recognised for his role in The Brutalist, and Edward Norton, who is nominated for playing Pete Seeger in A Complete Unknown.

Also hanging out in the front row were songwriter Bernie Taupin and singer-songwriter Brandi Carlile.

The pair are nominated in the best original song category for writing Never Too Late, the title track from Sir Elton John’s recent documentary.

Sir Elton himself wasn’t there, however, despite co-writing the song with the pair.

It’s likely he will attend the Oscars on Sunday, but he won’t be singing his song as the Academy has done away with having the original song nominees perform during the ceremony this year.

Instead, Doja Cat, Lisa from Blackpink, Queen Latifah and Raye will be among the other performers during the ceremony alongside the Wicked medley.

Timothée Chalamet joined his fellow nominees just days after springing a surprise win at the SAG Awards for A Complete Unknown.

In his speech, the actor talked about his desire to be “one of the greats” of Hollywood.

However, the actor has not been campaigning as aggressively as frontrunner Adrien Brody, and for the class photo, Chalamet took an aisle seat, leaned out and put his fist to his chest.

Seated just in front of him are Anora’s director Sean Baker and his producer wife Samantha Quan.

Adding further star power to the blurry back row were best actor contenders Adrien Brody, Colman Domingo and Sebastian Stan.

Brody is the frontrunner to win, for his role in the Brutalist as a Hungarian architect who moves to the US after World War Two and is taken under the wing of a wealthy businessman.

Sing Sing star Domingo plays a prison inmate who joins a performing arts programme, while Stan is nominated for portraying a young Donald Trump.

The Brits nominated in the acting categories this year are The Brutalist’s Felicity Jones, Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo, and Conclave’s Ralph Fiennes.

The actor was on Fiennes form, sitting in the back row alongside Sing Sing’s John “Divine G” Whitfield.

Fiennes is unlikely to win best actor, but if Conclave wins the top Oscar, he’ll become the first actor ever to have appeared in four best picture winners.

Understandably, not every nominee was available to attend the dinner – best supporting actor frontrunner Kieran Culkin was among the stars missing from the class photo.

But others were conspicuous by their absence, most notably Emilia Pérez star Karla Sofía Gascón.

The actress is persona non grata in Hollywood at the moment, after some historic tweets she posted resurfaced in recent weeks, severely damaging the film’s awards chances in many categories.

However, it’s been confirmed she will attend the Oscars ceremony itself on Sunday – although it remains to be seen if she will walk the red carpet and sit with her co-stars.

Sing Sing star Clarence Maclin was widely considered the most notable absence in the best supporting actor category this year.

But he is still nominated at the Oscars thanks to his story credit on the film, which means he is recognised in the best adapted screenplay category.

Maclin was one of the real-life inmates at the Sing Sing jail, after being sentenced to 17 years in jail for robbery, aged 29, and was a member of the prison’s Rehabilitation Through the Arts (RTA) programme.

In the class photo, Maclin, who plays a version of himself in Sing Sing, is either checking his watch or possibly about to sneeze.

Look back on previous class photos:

2024: 10 things we spotted from Margot Robbie to Billie Eilish

2023: Brendan Fraser has a ‘whale of a time

2020: From Quentin Tarantino to a Frozen couple

2019: Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper among stars

2018: Cardboard cutouts and splashes of colour

2017: Pharrell Williams dresses down

Apple says it is working to fix its speech-to-text tool after some social media users found that when they spoke the word “racist” into their iPhones it typed it out as “Trump.”

The tech giant has suggested the issue with its Dictation service has been caused by a problem it has distinguishing between words with an “r” in them.

“We are aware of an issue with the speech recognition model that powers Dictation and we are rolling out a fix today,” an Apple spokesperson said.

However an expert in speech recognition told the BBC this explanation was “just not plausible.”

Peter Bell, professor of speech technology at the University of Edinburgh, said it was more likely that someone had altered the underlying software that the tool used.

Videos shared online show people speaking the word “racist” into the Dictation tool.

Sometimes it is transcribed correctly – but on other occasions it is turned into “Trump”, before being quickly restored to the correct word.

The BBC has not been able to replicate the mistake, suggesting Apple’s fix is already taking effect.

Prof Bell said Apple’s explanation of phonetic overlap did not make sense because the two words were not similar enough to confuse an artificial intelligence (AI) system.

Speech-to-text recognition models are trained by inputting clips of real people speaking alongside an accurate transcript of what they say.

They are also taught to understand words in context – for example, they could distinguish the word “cup” from “cut” if it was within the phrase “a cup of tea”.

Prof Bell says the situation with Apple is unlikely to be a genuine mistake with its data because its English language model would be trained on hundreds of thousands of hours of speech, which should give it a high level of accuracy.

For “less well-resourced languages” he said it could be an AI training issue.

But he said in this case: “it probably points to somebody that’s got access to the process.”

A former Apple employee who worked on its AI assistant Siri told the New York Times: “This smells like a serious prank.”

Apple had to row back on another AI-powered feature last month after complaints from the BBC and other news organisations.

It suspended its AI summaries of news headlines after it displayed false notifications on stories – including one where it said tennis player Rafael Nadal had come out as gay.

The company announced yesterday it would be investing $500bn (£395bn) in the US over the next four year, including on a large data centre in Texas to power Apple Intelligence.

The company’s chief executive Tim Cook also said it may have to change its policies on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) after President Donald Trump has called for an end to DEI programmes.

Doctors in the Indian capital, Delhi, have performed a life-changing surgery on a 17-year-old boy to remove his “parasitic” twin that was attached to his abdomen.

A parasitic twin is an underdeveloped conjoined twin that relies entirely on the host twin for survival.

They are extremely rare, with less than one case occurring per 100,000 births.

The teenager who had a fully developed extra set of limbs and a pelvis – sustained by a chest artery – underwent a two-hour surgery at Aiims hospital in Delhi.

Dr Asuri Krishna, who led the team of specialists, said the surgery was particularly challenging because of the patient’s age.

“Only 40-50 cases of parasitic twins have been documented in world medical literature and, in those cases, the surgery had been attempted on children,” Dr Krishna told the BBC.

With insufficient medical literature to guide them, the team had to rely on their “intuition, skill and knowledge”, he added.

Parasitic twins form when one foetus partially develops while attached to the other.

In this case, the teenager had two fully formed legs, buttocks and external genitalia – weighing nearly 15kg – protruding from his abdomen.

Remarkably, the parasitic limbs could feel pain, touch and change in temperature.

Dr Krishna said the first thing they did was identify how interconnected the parasitic and host twins were.

Through scans, the doctors found out that the parasitic twin was attached to the teen’s breastbone and was being supplied blood from a vessel in his chest.

“But there wasn’t much connection with other main organs like the liver or kidneys,” Dr Krishna said, adding that they also found a large cyst in the teen’s abdomen.

The surgery was done in two stages – first, removing the parasitic twin, then extracting the cystic mass from surrounding organs.

A team of doctors, including radiologists, anaesthetists and plastic surgeons, completed the procedure in two-and-a-half hours.

“A mesh of shared blood vessels, nerves and tissues had to be separated. Care had to be taken to see that none of the host’s organs or tissues were damaged,” Dr Krishna said.

During surgery, the teen’s blood pressure dropped dangerously as 30-40% of his blood flowed to the parasitic twin. But the doctors said they were prepared for it and swiftly stabilised him.

The teen was discharged four days after being admitted. He is healthy and has suffered no complications from the surgery, Dr Krishna says.

The teenager’s unusual appearance made him the subject of gossip and ridicule in his neighbourhood in Unnao, Uttar Pradesh. The stares and jokes took a toll on his mental health, leaving him feeling isolated and lonely.

“I couldn’t travel anywhere or do any physical activity,” he told the Indian Express newspaper, adding that he had dropped out of school in the eighth grade.

The 17-year-old told the Express that he was ecstatic and now wanted to live an active life.

“I hope to study and get a job. A new world has opened up to me,” he said.

When police officers stopped 18-year-old Nicholas Prosper in Luton one Friday morning last September, he had already killed his mother, brother and sister and was planning to commit a mass shooting at his old primary school. So who is he, what do we know about his background and what questions remain unanswered?

Prosper lived in a council flat with his mum Juliana and two of his younger siblings, Kyle and Giselle, on Luton’s Marsh Farm estate.

In the early hours of Friday, 13 September, Prosper shot them all dead. An inquest heard they each had gunshot wounds to the head.

Police, responding to reports of a disturbance, apprehended him, before finding a loaded shotgun and more than 30 cartridges in a bush.

At Prosper’s first court hearing, his father Ray Prosper shouted: “I still love you, son. It’s not your fault, OK?” and then wept.

On Monday, Prosper pleaded guilty to the murders. Police have since confirmed he intended to carry out an attack at St Joseph’s Catholic Primary School in Luton.

Prosper had no history with the local mental health trust.

Few details were released in the 10-minute court hearing, but Prosper’s internet history – analysed by the BBC – paints a troubling picture.

One website he seemed to be a frequent user of featured videos of people’s final moments.

Eerily, he also appeared to have an interest in mass shootings, including the 1999 Columbine High School massacre.

He was banned from that website after making comments of a pro-paedophile nature, and even admitted to having watched a notorious child sexual abuse video.

However, he has not been charged in relation to possessing any such material.

Perhaps even more disturbing was Prosper’s apparent growing obsession with a child character called Clementine from The Walking Dead video game.

In a video posted after the killings, he told the camera: “I am the chosen one; chosen by Clementine. I am guided as Christians are guided by Jesus Christ.”

Both Prosper and his brother Kyle had attended Cardinal Newman Catholic School, which described Kyle as a “much-loved former student… known for his kindness and for simply being ‘a brilliant friend’ to so many of his fellow students”.

In light of revelations that Prosper had been planning a mass shooting, it said it wanted to “reassure our community that the safety, wellbeing and happiness of the students and staff at our school will always be our number one priority, and this will never be compromised”.

It added: “Security at the school is constantly reviewed and monitored, and that gives us the assurance that the measures we have in place are robust and effective.”

It is not known whether there were any behavioural concerns about Prosper; whether he received any additional support or whether he was on an education, health and care plan.

Hazel Simmons, Labour leader of Luton Borough Council, said: “When we heard the revelation that he planned to cause further harm after the terrible murders [there] was shock, upset, concern.”

She said she had received emails from some concerned parents of St Joseph’s pupils.

“Obviously I can’t underestimate how the parents and the school must be feeling at the moment and I can assure them we will do all we can to work with them around the security at the school and any other help that they need at this time,” she said.

Ms Simmons added that she did not know whether the family were known by the council to have problems.

Schools across Luton had already been asked to review security after a fatal knife attack at a school in Sheffield, but the council has asked them to conduct a further review in the wake of Prosper’s admissions.

Prosper will be sentenced over the course of two days next week, during which many more details will be made public.

What is already clear is that his actions have torn a family apart.

Bedfordshire Police’s Det Ch Insp Sam Khanna said: “This was a truly tragic and shocking case in which three innocent members of the same family have been brutally killed by their son and brother.”

After back-to-back debates in both English and French, the candidates to replace Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as leader of the Liberal Party in Canada have made their case to voters.

Card-holding Liberals will now choose between former governor of the banks of Canada and England Mark Carney, former finance minister Chrystia Freeland, House government leader Karina Gould and businessman and former MP Frank Baylis.

Whoever wins the vote on 9 March will become Canada’s next prime minister and will lead the Liberals in the forthcoming general election, which must be held on or before 20 October of this year.

A big focus of the debates has been how Canada should respond to US President Donald Trump, who has threatened steep tariffs on America’s northern neighbour and has suggested that Canada become the “51st state.”

Here are five big takeaways from the two Liberal leadership debates.

How Canada should respond to what many have dubbed an “existential threat” from US President Donald Trump has unsurprisingly dominated the agenda at both debates.

Trump has said he plans to impose a 25% tariff on all Canadian exports, with the exception of energy that would be tariffed at a lower 10% – a move that economists say would be devastating for Canada while increasing prices for Americans.

He has also repeatedly proposed that the US should annex Canada, which has been met with alarm and anger from large swathes of the Canadian population.

Freeland, a former top minister who served during Trump’s first term, positioned herself as an experienced negotiator who has fought – and won – against the US president and his previous tariffs.

But Carney warned that the Trump of today was not the Trump of the past. “He is more isolationist. He is more aggressive,” Carney said. “In the past he wanted our markets. Now he wants our country.”

Gould, the youngest candidate, suggested that Canada should “put everything on the table” to protect its sovereignty, and that the federal government should help businesses diversify their portfolios to depend less on the US.

Baylis, meanwhile, said Canada needed to forge closer economic ties with the UK, New Zealand and Australia, saying all four were like-minded countries with shared values, culture, and government systems.

Trump’s threats are made more alarming by Canada’s current economic situation.

Canadians have voiced frustrations over the stubborn high cost of living.

Carney – an economist by trade – promised a plan that would balance Canada’s operational budget in three years and proposed that Canada rethink the way it spends its money.

But he has also noted his support for key Liberal programmes, like affordable childcare and dental care.

As the former finance minister, Freeland defended her track record, saying the country’s finances were still “very strong”. She added that Canada should capitalise on the surge of patriotism in the face of Trump’s threats, using that momentum to support Canadian industries and promote job growth.

Baylis drew on his expertise as a businessman to say that Canada should work on building its productivity.

Gould, on the other hand, said the Liberal Party should be “realistic with Canadians” and that balancing the budget in three years was not possible without significant cuts, which she did not support. She said Canada should instead focus on “modernising its social safety net” to help those who are struggling.

“We are facing extreme threats from the US, so we have to be able to invest in our people and in our businesses to protect them,” Gould said.

The four candidates were debating with each other but they often presented a united front against their shared opponent, Conservative party leader Pierre Poilievre, whose party is favoured in the polls as the most likely to form Canada’s next government.

Liberal leadership hopefuls threw several jabs at Poilievre throughout the debate. Gould called him “our little version of Trump here at home” while Freeland said Poilievre was looking to “imitate” Trump.

Carney criticised Poilievre as “irresponsible” and added that Canada could “not afford” to have him as prime minister.

Poilievre, who has enjoyed a sizable lead in the polls ahead of an unpopular Trudeau, has had to pivot his pitch to Canadians since Trudeau’s resignation.

His message changed from criticising the sitting prime minister for leading a “broken” Canada to putting “Canada First” in the face of threats from the US. He has also shifted his focus to attacking Carney, who is favoured to win the Liberal leadership race.

Poilievre is still polling ahead nationally, but some polls suggest that the lead between him and the Liberals has shrunk since Trudeau’s exit.

Responding to shifting US policy on the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war, all four candidates affirmed their commitment to continuing Canada’s support for Ukraine.

All of them also backed the need for Canada to hit its 2% military spending target as set out in its commitments to the Nato alliance, though they disagreed on the timeline and how to get there.

Freeland said Canada should hit the target by 2027, and should do so by investing in the “next generation of warfare”. Baylis and Carney have said their plan would be for Canada to reach that target by 2030.

Both Freeland and Carney said Canada needed to invest that money into Canadian military ventures instead of into the US.

Freeland noted that Canada should reduce its reliance on the US, and should look to work with the EU and other Nato partners on security assurances.

A tax on carbon for consumers and businesses has been the cornerstone of the Trudeau government’s policy on climate change.

But that tax has proven to be unpopular with Canadians, forcing Carney and Freeland to promise that they would ditch the policy.

Carney, a former UN special envoy on climate action and finance, has long been a proponent of the carbon tax. In the debates, however, he acknowledged the tax on consumers had become divisive, and said he would instead focus on taxing big polluters and growing clean energy projects in Canada.

Freeland, who resigned from Trudeau’s government because of disagreements with the prime minister on spending, said that history would judge his climate action favourably despite his policies’ unpopularity. But she, too, vowed to scrap the carbon tax.

“Democracy is about listening to people, and Canadians were very clear with us that they did not think that policy worked for them,” she said.

Gould and Baylis, on the other hand, said they would keep some version of the consumer tax on carbon in place, saying that fighting climate change comes with a price.

Sir Keir Starmer’s promise to increase defence spending will have several consequences. It may one day actually strengthen the UK’s ability to defend itself. More immediately it will mean billions less spent on foreign aid.

But what will it buy the prime minister diplomatically in Washington?

In times past visiting dignitaries would give emperors gifts and tributes. Starmer will now turn up at the White House on Thursday with a large goodie bag marked “more defence spending”.

Donald Trump is just the latest in a long line of US presidents urging European powers to spend more on their own defence.

The prime minister will be able to say to the president that he has heard the call and acted. He might not want Trump to ask too many detailed questions: What does an added 0.2% of GDP mean in real money? When will the UK actually spend 3% on defence?

But Starmer will want to land the idea that the UK is responding to Trump’s agenda.

Early signs are positive. Peter Hegseth, the US Secretary of Defence, said he had spoken to his UK counterpart, John Healey, and described the increase as “a strong step from an enduring partner”.

So Starmer’s announcement may well get his foot in the door at the White House and a hearing from the president.

But will it help him make the case for the security of Ukraine and Europe? Will Trump now be more amenable to allowing both a seat at the negotiating table? Will Trump be more open to the idea that the United States should play a role guaranteeing post-war Ukraine’s security, giving air, logistics and intelligence cover to European forces helping to keep the peace on the ground?

The answer to those questions is not clear cut. The prime minister may suggest the UK is showing leadership, pointing the way for other European allies to follow suit.

He may also argue that the defence hike shows the UK will not have to make what he calls the “historic mistake” of having to choose between Europe and the US, something made much harder by the US decision to vote with Russia against Ukraine and Europe at the United Nations on Monday.

The problem is that Trump and his administration have made it clear that their security priority is China and Europe will just have to do more to look after itself.

Malcolm Chalmers, deputy director of the Royal United Services Institute, told the BBC: “The reality is that whatever we do on defence, the US is going to pivot elsewhere, it is not going to take the lead role in European security that it has done for more than half a century.”

In that context, the government’s promised increase in defence spending may be seen as a short-term tactical move ahead of Starmer’s visit to Washington, rather than an historic response to the existential geopolitical changes posed by Trump’s election.

European diplomats told me they were underwhelmed by the UK defence offer, saying it was not enough to have a real impact. They said the UK would have to spend at least 3% of national wealth soon to give itself a chance to develop the capability it would need.

To do that, the government would have to do more than raid the development budget. Aid charities noted that their spending was a soft target compared to those of massive spending departments such as welfare, health and education.

But few politicians of any political colour appear prepared to start making an argument for a transformation of the post-war European welfare model and prepare voters for a massive change in defence spending.

For now, the government is cutting foreign aid and international charities are furious.

The reduction from 0.5% of national income to 0.3% means £6bn less will be spent on foreign aid each year. Given that billions of this budget still pays for asylum seekers’ hotels here in the UK, the actual amount spent on aid overseas will be about 0.15%.

The prime minister said the UK would use this remaining aid money to help Sudan, Ukraine and Gaza, tackle climate change, and support multinational efforts on global health.

Aid charities were stunned. Save the Children said it was betrayal of the world’s most vulnerable children. The One campaign said it would create huge problems for the delivery of vital humanitarian assistance. The aid network BOND said there would be devastating consequences for millions of marginalised people.

All this after Donald Trump froze America’s development spending arm, USAID.

By cutting foreign aid, the government has broken a manifesto commitment to protect the budget. It has also damaged its policy of using aid to engage more closely with countries in the global south.

David Miliband, head of the International Rescue Committee and former Labour foreign secretary, said the cut was “a blow to Britain’s proud reputation as a global humanitarian and development leader”.

Sign up for our Politics Essential newsletter to read top political analysis, gain insight from across the UK and stay up to speed with the big moments. It’ll be delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

To reach north-east Syria, we cross a rickety floating bridge over the River Tigris. Our minibus rattles as it takes us from Iraqi Kurdistan through Syrian oil fields, where jacks pumping crude oil line the roads.

This part of Syria is controlled by Kurds, who call it Rojava – meaning western Kurdistan. Since 2012, after the outbreak of civil war, they have run it as a self-declared autonomous region, protected by Kurdish-led armed forces.

But Bashar al-Assad’s regime never recognised it and, despite his fall from power, its future remains uncertain.

As well as more than a decade of civil war, the Syrian Kurds have faced years of conflict with its northern neighbour, Turkey – a battle they are still fighting.

A decade ago, the Islamic State group (IS) swept through this region, capturing cities and villages with little resistance – until it reached the city of Kobane, next to the Turkish border, in September 2014.

IS militants didn’t manage to enter the city, but they imposed a brutal siege that lasted for months.

Kurdish-led factions, supported by the US-led military coalition, broke the siege in early 2015. This January, I join the city’s residents as they mark the 10-year anniversary.

At the entrance to Kobane, women in their 50s, armed with AK-47 assault rifles, guard the checkpoints. Women played a crucial role in the fight against IS – many volunteered in the all-female Women’s Protection Units (YPJ).

As we drive around the city, the scars of war are still visible, along with posters of young men and women who lost their lives.

But in the main square, the mood is festive. Young girls and boys, dressed in colourful Kurdish outfits dance hand in hand, singing as they celebrate.

For the older generation, though, it is a bittersweet moment. “Last night I lit candles for my martyred brother and others killed in Kobane,” says Newrouz Ahmad, a 45-year-old mother of four. “It is a joyful day, but also a painful one. I wish he was here to see it.”

The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) declared victory over IS in north-east Syria in 2019. But freedom from IS hasn’t brought lasting peace.

Turkey and a coalition of Turkish-backed rebel groups known as the Syrian National Army (SNA) have launched several military operations against SDF-controlled territories since 2016, and captured a swathe of territory running along hundreds of kilometres of the border.

Turkey considers the largest component in the SDF – the People’s Protection Units (YPG) – an extension of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has fought for Kurdish rights in Turkey for decades and is listed by Ankara as a terrorist organisation. The country wants to push the SDF back from its border.

As the Assad regime collapsed in late 2024, the Turkish-backed SNA launched a new offensive to capture territory west of the River Euphrates from the SDF.

Now battles have reached areas near Kobane. A Kurdish commander in the city quietly tells me: “Don’t film here, we have built tunnels beneath the city to prepare for another siege.”

In the city, the smell of gasoline fills the air, and the deafening sound of generators can be heard everywhere. Locals tell me that most of the power stations, refineries, and even telecommunications antennas have been destroyed by Turkish air strikes over the past two years.

Newrouz Ahmad says that having “defeated IS in Kobane… we won’t allow Turkey and its proxies to occupy our city, we will defeat them too”.

At a restaurant, the moment people realise we are not locals, they surround us. I ask an old man with grey hair and a stick in his hands how old he is. I guess he is about 80, but the answer he gives embarrasses me. “I am 60,” he says.

It’s clear that people here have been exhausted by war, having witnessed so much death and bloodshed.

And now the threat of another battle is looming.

Turkish-made drones and Turkish jets have targeted SDF positions and supply routes around the city. Even civilians protesting have been hit.

In a regional hospital, I find one of the wounded – Lea Bunse, a 28-year-old German peace activist who has been volunteering at a women’s shelter in Rojava for over two years.

She shows me a video of an attack on a demonstration she says she was part of in January. The footage shows two projectiles dropping from the sky and hitting a crowd of people dancing.

The protest was held near the strategic Tishreen Dam, where fighting has been ongoing. The SDF says six civilians were killed, and dozens more injured.

“An old man next to me was also injured,” she tells me from her bed.

“I lost some blood… but when we got into the ambulance, another drone attack was carried out next to our ambulance,” she adds.

Human Rights Watch has condemned an attack that hit a Kurdish Red Crescent ambulance as an “apparent war crime” by the Turkish-SNA coalition.

The Turkish foreign ministry told the BBC that “reports claiming Turkey is involved in the attacks against civilians and critical infrastructure do not reflect the truth” adding that the SDF sends civilians to a “conflict-ridden area on purpose” to use them as “human shields… in order to not to lose control on the said dam”.

It accused the SDF of using “violence and terror” to pursue “its own separatist agenda”, violating a ceasefire and stopping technical teams from getting access to the dam for repairs.

Syria’s new leader, Ahmad al-Sharaa, is stuck between a rock and a hard place.

The interim president – whose Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) led the rebel offensive that overthrew Assad – has been promising to form an inclusive government in Damascus, and he has asked all armed factions to lay down their weapons. Negotiations are reportedly being held with the SDF to find a solution for the north-east.

But the inclusion of the Kurdish factions puts Sharaa in a difficult position with one of his main allies – Turkey.

And when Sharaa opened a conference for national dialogue on Syria’s future on Tuesday, the Kurdish autonomous administration was absent – it said it had not been invited.

Speaking to me from a discreet location near an American base in Hassakeh province in the north-east of Syria, SDF commander Gen Mazloum Abdi tells me he has met Sharaa in Damascus before.

But the two sides have still not reached an agreement.

“In reality, we are still at war with Turkey and its proxies. Turkish jets and drones continue to bomb us,” he says, adding: “In Damascus, it remains unclear what steps the new government will take. Their statements are positive, but they are under pressure from Turkey to act against the areas under our control.

“But the US, France, and some Arab nations are pushing them to recognize Kurdish rights,” he says.

For the US, SDF fighters have been the most reliable allies in the fight against IS.

Today, hundreds of US troops remain in Kurdish-controlled areas, to counter IS sleeper cells.

But the Kurds now fear President Donald Trump might withdraw these troops, leaving the region vulnerable to any Turkish military operation, and a possible IS resurgence.

It’s estimated that there are still about 40,000 IS family members and up to 10,000 jihadist fighters held in SDF-controlled camps and prisons in the north-east, says Gen Abdi.

“If Turkey attacks, we will have no choice but to redirect our forces,” he warns. “That would give IS an opportunity to attack prisons and free its fighters.”

There is further uncertainty for the women who fought against IS in the all-female YPJ ranks.

The walls in the office of 29-year-old YPJ spokesperson Roksana Mohamed are covered with pictures of fellow female commanders killed in battle.

“So far, we haven’t seen any roles given to women in Damascus’ new leadership,” she says. “Why shouldn’t a woman be defence minister?”

Ms Mohamed says women fought for their rights in this region. They have been actively involved in every aspect of political, social, and military life.

“If our rights are not respected, how can we be expected to lay down our arms?” she asks.

So while some believe stability in Syria is on the horizon, for the Kurds, the future remains unclear. Will they be recognised as partners in a new Syria, or face another existential battle?

“I just wanted to own a house and pay off my debts – that’s why I decided to sell my kidney,” says Zeya, a farm worker in Myanmar.

Prices had soared after a military coup in 2021 triggered civil war. He could barely feed his young family and was badly in debt.

They all lived in his mother-in-law’s house, in a village where thatched houses lined dirt roads, a few hours’ drive from the country’s largest city, Yangon.

Zeya, whose name has been changed to conceal his identity, knew of local people who had sold one of their kidneys. “They looked healthy to me,” he says. So he started asking around.

He is one of eight people in the area who told BBC Burmese they had sold a kidney by travelling to India.

Illegal organ trading is a problem across Asia, and Zeya’s story gives an insight into how it takes place.

Buying or selling human organs is illegal in both Myanmar and India, but Zeya says he soon found a man he describes as a “broker”.

He says the man arranged medical tests and, a few weeks later, told him a potential recipient – a Burmese woman – had been found, and that both of them could travel to India for the surgery.

In India, if the donor and recipient are not close relatives, they must demonstrate that the motive is altruistic and explain the relationship between them.

Zeya says the broker forged a document, which every household in Myanmar must have, listing the details of family members.

“The broker put my name in the recipient’s family tree,” he explains.

He says the broker made it appear as if he was donating to someone he was related to by marriage: “Someone who is not a blood relative, but a distant relative”.

Then, he says, the broker took him to meet the recipient in Yangon. There, he says a man who introduced himself as a doctor completed more paperwork and warned Zeya he would have to pay a substantial fee if he backed out.

The BBC contacted this man afterwards, who said his role was to check whether a patient was fit to undergo the procedure, not to check the relationship between donor and recipient.

Zeya says he was told he would receive 7.5m Myanmar kyats. This has been worth somewhere between $1,700 and $2,700 over the past couple of years – the unofficial exchange rate has fluctuated since the coup.

He says he flew to northern India for the operation and it took place in a large hospital.

All transplants involving foreign nationals in India must be approved by a panel called an authorisation committee, established either by the hospital or by local government.

Zeya says he was interviewed, via a translator, by about four people.

“They asked me if I was willingly donating my kidney to her, not by force,” he says.

He says he explained the recipient was a relative and the transplant was approved.

Zeya remembers the doctors administering the anaesthetic before he lost consciousness.

“There were no big issues after the surgery, except that I couldn’t move without pain,” he says, adding that he stayed in hospital for a week afterwards.

Another donor, Myo Win – also not his real name – told the BBC he too had pretended to be related to a stranger.

“The broker gave me a piece of paper, and I had to memorise what was written on it,” he says, adding that he was told to say the recipient was married to one of his relatives.

“The person assessing my case also called my mum, but the broker arranged a fake mum for the call,” he says. He adds that the person who answered the call confirmed he was donating his kidney to a relative with her permission.

Myo Win says he was offered the same amount of money as Zeya, but that it was described as a “charitable donation”, and he had to pay the broker about 10% of the amount.

Both men say they were given a third of the money up front. Myo Win says this was in his thoughts as he entered the operating theatre: “I made up my mind that I had to do it because I had already taken their money.”

He adds that he “chose this desperate way” as he was struggling with debt and medical bills for his wife.

Unemployment rates have climbed in Myanmar since the coup – the war has ravaged the economy and sent foreign investors fleeing. In 2017, a quarter of the population were living in poverty – but by 2023, this had risen to half, according to the UN’s development agency, UNDP.

Myo Win says the broker did not tell him selling his kidney was illegal. “I wouldn’t have done it if he did. I am afraid of ending up in prison,” he says.

The BBC is not naming any of organisations or individuals involved in order to protect the anonymity and safety of the interviewees.

However, another man in Myanmar, also speaking anonymously, told the BBC he had helped about 10 people buy or sell kidneys via surgery in India.

He said he referred people to an “agency” in Mandalay in central Myanmar, which he said made arrangements.

“But don’t worry about donors,” he said. “We have a list of donors who are queuing up to donate their kidneys.”

He too said documents were faked to label strangers as related by marriage. When asked whether he received money for his help, he did not answer.

Organ transplants have increased by more than 50% worldwide since 2010, with about 150,000 carried out annually, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). But it says the supply of organs meets only about 10% of global need.

Trading in human body parts is illegal in nearly all countries and is hard to measure. In 2007, the WHO estimated that 5-10% of transplanted organs came from the black market, but the figure may be higher.

Illegal kidney sales driven by poverty have been documented in recent years across Asia, including in Nepal, Pakistan, Indonesia, Afghanistan, India and Bangladesh.

India has long been a hub for medical tourism and concern there about kidney sales has been rising, following accounts in media reports and a recent police investigation.

Last July, Indian police said they had arrested seven people in connection with an alleged kidney racket, including an Indian doctor and her assistant.

Police allege the group arranged for poor Bangladeshis to sell their kidneys, using forged documents to secure approval for the transplants.

Dr Vijaya Rajakumari, who had been working at the prestigious Indraprastha Apollo Hospital in Delhi, is alleged to have carried out the operations as a visiting consultant at a different hospital, Yatharth, a few kilometres away.

Her lawyer told the BBC the allegations “are entirely baseless and without evidence”, that she only carried out surgeries approved by authorisation committees and always acted in accordance with the law. According to her bail order, she is not accused of preparing forged documents.

Yatharth Hospital told the BBC all its cases, including those managed by visiting consultants, “are subject to our robust protocols to ensure compliance with legal and ethical standards”.

“We have further enhanced our processes to prevent any such occurrences in the future,” the hospital said.

After her arrest, Apollo Hospitals said Dr Rajakumari was a freelance consultant engaged on a fee-for-service basis and it had discontinued all clinical engagements with her.

Dr Rajakumari has not been charged in court.

Last April, a senior health ministry official wrote to Indian states warning of a “surge” in transplants involving foreigners and calling for better monitoring.

Under Indian law, foreign nationals who wish to donate or receive organs must have their documents, including those showing the relationship between donor and recipient, verified by their own country’s embassy in India.

The BBC contacted India’s heath ministry and the National Organ and Tissue Transplant Organization, as well as Myanmar’s military government for comment, but has received no response.

A public health campaigner in Myanmar, Dr Thurein Hlaing Win, said: “Law enforcement is not effective.”

He added that potential donors need to be aware of the risks, including of bleeding during surgery and damage to other organs, adding that proper follow-up care is needed.

The BBC last heard from Zeya several months after his surgery.

“I was able to settle my debts and bought a plot of land,” he said.

But he said he couldn’t afford to build a house and had not been able to construct one while recovering from the surgery. He said he had been suffering from back pain.

“I have to restart working soon. If the side effects strike again, I have to deal with it. I have no regrets about it,” he added.

He said he stayed in touch with the recipient for a while, and she had told him she was in good health with his kidney.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, she told the BBC she paid 100m kyats (between around $22,000 and $35,000 in recent years) in total. She denied that documents were forged, maintaining that Zeya was her relative.

Six months after his surgery, Myo Win told the BBC he had paid off most of his debts, but not all.

“I have no job and not even a penny left,” he said, adding that he had been experiencing some stomach problems since the surgery.

He said he had no regrets, but then added: “I am telling other people not to do this. It is not good.”

Skywatchers are in for a treat this week as seven planets – Mars, Jupiter, Uranus, Venus, Neptune, Mercury, and Saturn will all be briefly visible in the evening sky.

This phenomenon, known as a ‘planetary parade’ is a rare sight, and it will be the last time seven planets can be seen simultaneously so well until 2040.

The best chance to see as many planets as possible will be just after sunset on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.

Four of the planets – Mercury, Venus, Jupiter, and Mars – will be visible to the naked eye. Saturn will be harder to see because it will be low in the horizon. You will need a telescope to spot the other two planets – Uranus and Neptune.

A good view of the horizon and clear skies will offer the best chance of spotting them all. However, the window to see all seven planets will be very brief.

Dr Edward Bloomer, astronomer at the Royal Observatory Greenwich said: “There’s a rare opportunity to have seven planets in essentially a convenient place for you to look for them.”

As the sun sets, Saturn and Mercury will also be setting, making them particularly difficult to see.

“You really only have a few minutes after sunset to catch them before they drop below the horizon. After that, you’ll still be able to see Venus, Jupiter, and Mars clearly for a much longer time,” Dr Bloomer added.

The planets in our solar system orbit the Sun within roughly the same flat plane as the Earth.

As they orbit at different speeds and distances from the Sun, there are moments when they appear to line up from Earth’s perspective creating a spectacular visual display, although the planets remain separated by vast distances in space.

• Send us your pictures of the planetary parade.

Venus and Jupiter will be the easiest to spot due to their brightness, while Mars will have a distinct reddish hue.

“Uranus is technically visible with the naked eye, but you’d need perfect eyesight and ideal conditions,” Dr Bloomer explains.

To improve your chances of seeing as many planets as possible, Dr Bloomer advises heading to a location with a clear view of the horizon and minimal light pollution.

“If you just pop out of your kitchen into your back garden, you will take time to adjust to the light levels. Give it a bit of time – your eyes take about half an hour to fully adjust,” said Dr Bloomer.

“Avoid looking at your phone, get comfortable, and ensure you have an unobstructed view of the horizon.”

While this is an exciting opportunity, Dr Bloomer encourages people to make a habit of gazing at the night sky.

“See how things change,” he said, adding that observing the heavens is “a chance to witness the ongoing mechanics of the solar system at work.”

On Wednesday night, skies will be generally cloudier with showery rain at times.

By Thursday, expect a drier, clearer view of the night sky. Earlier in the evening is best, as mist and fog patches may develop further into the night.

For Friday high pressure is expected to dominate, keeping dry conditions for most with clear spells. Soon after sunset is most favoured as mist and fog patches may develop later.

Pope Francis remains in a critical condition, the Vatican has said in a medical update, with respiratory and kidney problems.

Around the world, prayers and services are being held in support of the pontiff.

In the Vatican, people gathered in St. Peter’s Square.

In Rome, flowers and tributes were left outside the Gemelli Polyclinic, where the Pope is being treated.

The Archbishop of the City of Buenos Aires, Jorge Garcia Cuerva, led a mass for the health of the Pope.

Pope Francis was born in the city and was Archbishop in 1998.

People prayed in Guatemala City.

A woman was emotional during a mass in honor of Venezuelan Jose Gregorio Hernandez, known as the “Doctor of the Poor,” after Pope Francis approved his canonisation, in Caracas, Venezuela.

And in Mumbai, India, an artist made his own colourful dedication.

India is home to 1.4 billion people but around a billion lack money to spend on any discretionary goods or services, a new report estimates.

The country’s consuming class, effectively the potential market for start-ups or business owners, is only about as big as Mexico, 130-140 million people, according to the report from Blume Ventures, a venture capital firm.

Another 300 million are “emerging” or “aspirant” consumers but they are reluctant spenders who have only just begun to open their purse strings, as click-of-a-button digital payments make it easy to transact.

What is more, the consuming class in Asia’s third largest economy is not “widening” as much as it is “deepening”, according to the report. That basically means India’s wealthy population is not really growing in numbers, even though those who are already rich are getting even wealthier.

All of this is shaping the country’s consumer market in distinct ways, particularly accelerating the trend of “premiumisation” where brands drive growth by doubling down on expensive, upgraded products catering to the wealthy, rather than focusing on mass-market offerings.

This is evident in zooming sales of ultra-luxury gated housing and premium phones, even as their lower-end variants struggle. Affordable homes now constitute just 18% of India’s overall market compared with 40% five years ago. Branded goods are also capturing a bigger share of the market. And the “experience economy” is booming, with expensive tickets for concerts by international artists like Coldplay and Ed Sheeran selling like hot cakes.

• Why global stars like Coldplay and Ed Sheeran are hitting India

Companies that have adapted to these shifts have thrived, Sajith Pai, one of the report’s authors, told the BBC. “Those who are too focused at the mass end or have a product mix that doesn’t have exposure to the premium end have lost market share.”

The report’s findings bolster the long-held view that India’s post-pandemic recovery has been K-shaped – where the rich have got richer, while the poor have lost purchasing power.

In fact, this has been a long-term structural trend that began even before the pandemic. India has been getting increasingly more unequal, with the top 10% of Indians now holding 57.7% of national income compared with 34% in 1990. The bottom half have seen their share of national income fall from 22.2% to 15%.

The latest consumption slump, however, has deepened amid not just a destruction in purchasing power, but also a precipitous drop in financial savings and surging indebtedness among the masses.

The country’s central bank has also cracked down on easy unsecured lending that propped up demand after the Covid pandemic.

Much of the consumption spending of the “emerging” or “aspirant” class of Indians was led by such borrowing and “turning off that tap will definitely have some impact on consumption”, says Pai.

In the short run, two things are expected to help boost spending – a pick-up in rural demand on the back of a record harvest and a $12 billion tax give-away in the recently concluded budget. It will not be “dramatic” but could boost India’s GDP – largely driven by consumption – by over half a percent, says Pai.

But major longer-term headwinds remain.

India’s middle class – which has been a major engine for consumer demand – is being squeezed out, with wages pretty much staying flat, according to data compiled by Marcellus Investment Managers.

“The middle 50% of India’s tax-paying population has seen its income stagnate in absolute terms over the past decade. This implies a halving of income in real terms [adjusted for inflation],” says the report, published in January.

“This financial hammering has decimated the middle class’s savings – the RBI [Reserve Bank of India] has repeatedly highlighted that net financial savings of Indian households are approaching a 50-year low. This pounding suggests that products and services associated with middle-class household spending are likely to face a rough time in the years ahead,” it adds.

The Marcellus report also points out that white-collar urban jobs are becoming harder to come by as artificial intelligence automates clerical, secretarial and other routine work. “The number of supervisors employed in manufacturing units [as a percentage of all employed] in India has gone down significantly,” it adds.

The government’s recent economic survey has flagged these concerns as well.

It says labour displacement as a result of these technological advancements is of particular concern for a mainly services-driven economy like India, where a significant share of the IT workforce is employed in low value-added services sectors that are most prone to disruption.

“India is also a consumption-based economy, thus the fall in consumption that can result from the displacement of its workforce is bound to have macroeconomic implications. If the worst-case projections materialise, this could have the potential to set the country’s economic growth trajectory off course,” the survey says.

An Australian couple have spoken of the “traumatic” moment the body of a dead passenger was placed next to them on a Qatar Airways flight.

Mitchell Ring and Jennifer Colin, who were travelling to Venice for a dream holiday, told Australia’s Channel 9 a woman had died in the aisle beside them during the flight from Melbourne to Doha.

The couple say cabin crew placed her corpse, covered in blankets, next to Mr Ring for the remaining four hours of the flight without offering to move him, despite there being empty seats.

Qatar Airways said it apologised for “any inconvenience or distress this incident may have caused”.

The couple said they had not been contacted or offered support by Qatar Airways or Qantas, the airline through which they booked the flight.

In a later statement on Wednesday, Qatar Airways said it had now spoken with the affected passengers to address their concerns, as well as the family of the woman who died.

Mr Ring told Channel Nine’s Current Affair programme that staff had responded “in no time” when the woman collapsed, but that “unfortunately the lady couldn’t be saved, which was pretty heart-breaking to watch”.

He said the cabin crew had tried to move her body towards business class “but she was quite a large lady and they couldn’t get her through the aisle”.

Mr Ring said the crew had seen seats were available beside him.

“They said, ‘Can you move over please?’ and I just said, ‘Yes no problem’.

“Then they placed the lady in the chair I was in.”

While Ms Colin was able to move to an empty seat nearby, Mr Ring said he had not been given the option to do so by cabin crew – even though there were vacant seats.

When the plane landed four hours later, he said passengers were asked to stay put while medical staff and police came on board.

He said ambulance officers had then started pulling blankets off the woman and he had seen her face.

The couple said there needed to be a “duty of care” for customers and staff.

“We should be contacted to make sure, do you need some support, do you need some counselling?”

Ms Colin called the experience “traumatic” and said: “We totally understand that we can’t hold the airline responsible for the poor lady’s death, but there has to be a protocol to look after the customers on board.”

In its latest statement, Qatar Airways said: “We have been in contact with the family of the passenger who passed away to express our condolences on their loss. We have also directly spoken with the affected passengers to address their concerns.

“The safety and comfort of all our passengers is of paramount importance to us.”

A Qantas spokesperson said: “The process for handling incidents onboard an aircraft like this is managed by the operating airline, which in this case is Qatar Airways.”

Barry Eustance, a former Virgin Atlantic captain, said deaths in the air “occur more frequently than people would think” but said as a far as he was aware there was no specific protocol in place for such situations.

“On a long haul flight it tends to depend largely on when it occurs and where it occurs and what the crew have in terms of facilities to place the body somewhere because on an aeroplane, there’s no access to the hold, there’s a crew rest area but that’s for the crew so it can be problematical.”

A toilet area or galley area could be blocked off, he said, but the crew are required to keep a certain number of toilets available.

Mr Eustance said that, while he was not being judgemental as he did not know the full situation, he was surprised that the crew did not move Mr Ring if there had been spare seats.

“I would expect the crew would do all they could to avoid that. You are creating potential future liabilities in terms of the trauma of the people next to whom the body was placed,” he said.

“In my experience the crew would normally try to isolate the body, so there is no passenger exposure to the body and vice versa, for respect and privacy but also for medical reasons. You have a dead body that is uncontained and all that goes with it.”

Skywatchers are in for a treat this week as seven planets – Mars, Jupiter, Uranus, Venus, Neptune, Mercury, and Saturn will all be briefly visible in the evening sky.

This phenomenon, known as a ‘planetary parade’ is a rare sight, and it will be the last time seven planets can be seen simultaneously so well until 2040.

The best chance to see as many planets as possible will be just after sunset on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.

Four of the planets – Mercury, Venus, Jupiter, and Mars – will be visible to the naked eye. Saturn will be harder to see because it will be low in the horizon. You will need a telescope to spot the other two planets – Uranus and Neptune.

A good view of the horizon and clear skies will offer the best chance of spotting them all. However, the window to see all seven planets will be very brief.

Dr Edward Bloomer, astronomer at the Royal Observatory Greenwich said: “There’s a rare opportunity to have seven planets in essentially a convenient place for you to look for them.”

As the sun sets, Saturn and Mercury will also be setting, making them particularly difficult to see.

“You really only have a few minutes after sunset to catch them before they drop below the horizon. After that, you’ll still be able to see Venus, Jupiter, and Mars clearly for a much longer time,” Dr Bloomer added.

The planets in our solar system orbit the Sun within roughly the same flat plane as the Earth.

As they orbit at different speeds and distances from the Sun, there are moments when they appear to line up from Earth’s perspective creating a spectacular visual display, although the planets remain separated by vast distances in space.

• Send us your pictures of the planetary parade.

Venus and Jupiter will be the easiest to spot due to their brightness, while Mars will have a distinct reddish hue.

“Uranus is technically visible with the naked eye, but you’d need perfect eyesight and ideal conditions,” Dr Bloomer explains.

To improve your chances of seeing as many planets as possible, Dr Bloomer advises heading to a location with a clear view of the horizon and minimal light pollution.

“If you just pop out of your kitchen into your back garden, you will take time to adjust to the light levels. Give it a bit of time – your eyes take about half an hour to fully adjust,” said Dr Bloomer.

“Avoid looking at your phone, get comfortable, and ensure you have an unobstructed view of the horizon.”

While this is an exciting opportunity, Dr Bloomer encourages people to make a habit of gazing at the night sky.

“See how things change,” he said, adding that observing the heavens is “a chance to witness the ongoing mechanics of the solar system at work.”

On Wednesday night, skies will be generally cloudier with showery rain at times.

By Thursday, expect a drier, clearer view of the night sky. Earlier in the evening is best, as mist and fog patches may develop further into the night.

For Friday high pressure is expected to dominate, keeping dry conditions for most with clear spells. Soon after sunset is most favoured as mist and fog patches may develop later.

Ukraine says it has agreed to the terms of a major deal that would give the US access to its deposits of rare earth minerals.

Kyiv hopes the deal – which would give the US a financial stake in the country – will encourage the White House to protect Ukraine if the war with Russia reignites after a potential ceasefire.

US President Donald Trump has not yet confirmed an agreement has been reached, but says a deal would help American taxpayers “get their money back” for aid sent to Ukraine throughout the war and give Kyiv “the right to fight on” against Russia.

Ukrainian President Zelensky said security guarantees he had been pushing for had not yet been agreed, but that he hoped this was a starting point which would “lead to further deals”.

Key details have not yet been made public, but on Wednesday Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said Ukraine and the US had finalised a version of the agreement.

Speaking to Ukrainian TV, Shmyhal said the preliminary agreement envisages that an “investment fund” would be set up for Ukraine’s reconstruction.

Kyiv and Washington would manage the fund on “equal terms”, the prime minister added.

He said Ukraine would contribute 50% of future proceeds from state-owned mineral resources, oil and gas to the fund, and the fund would then invest in projects in Ukraine itself.

Zelensky has acknowledged the fund but told the BBC on Wednesday it was “too early to talk about money”.

The New York Times reported, citing a draft document, that the US would own the maximum amount of the fund allowed under US law, but not necessarily all of it.

Disagreement over the terms of a minerals deal formed part of what was seen as a deepening rift between Trump and Zelensky in recent weeks.

The Ukrainian president had rejected an initial request from the US for $500bn (£395bn) in mineral wealth, but media reports say this demand has now been dropped.

“The provisions of the deal are much better for Ukraine now,” a source in Ukraine’s government told the BBC.

On Tuesday, Trump said the US had given Ukraine between $300bn (£237bn) and $350bn (£276bn) in aid, and that he wanted to “get that money back” through a deal.

But German think tank the Kiel Institute estimates the US has sent $119bn in aid to Ukraine.

Zelensky has been pushing for a deal to include a firm security guarantee from the US.

But on Wednesday, Ukraine’s leader said no such guarantee had been made.

“I wanted to have a sentence on security guarantees for Ukraine, and it’s important that it’s there,” he said.

Asked by the BBC if he would be prepared to walk away from the agreement if Trump did not offer the guarantees he wanted, Zelensky said: “I want to find a Nato path or something similar.

“If we don’t get security guarantees, we won’t have a ceasefire, nothing will work, nothing.”

Despite this, Shmyhal said on Wednesday the US supported “Ukraine’s efforts to obtain security guarantees to build lasting peace”.

He said Ukraine would not sign the deal until Zelensky and Trump “agree on security guarantees” and decide on how to “tie this preliminary agreement” to a US security guarantee.

The prospect of a minerals deal was first proposed by Zelensky last year as a way to offer the US a tangible reason to continue supporting Ukraine.

Trump said on Tuesday that Ukraine would get “the right to fight on” in return for access to its minerals, though he did not confirm an agreement had yet been reached.

He also suggested the US would continue to supply equipment and ammunition to Ukraine “until we have a deal with Russia”.

The US President said on Monday that Russia was open to accepting European peacekeepers in Ukraine, but Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said the Kremlin would not consider this as an option.

Shmyhal said the US and Ukraine have prepared a final version of the agreement, which Ukraine’s government will authorise for signing on Wednesday.

Trump has said he expects Zelensky to sign the deal on a visit to Washington on Friday.

Zelensky said he would be “very direct” with Trump by asking whether the US would continue supporting Ukraine or not.

Kyiv estimates that about 5% of the world’s “critical raw materials” are in Ukraine.

This includes some 19m tonnes of proven reserves of graphite, which the Ukrainian Geological Survey state agency says makes the nation “one of the top five leading countries” for the supply of the mineral. Graphite is used to make batteries for electric vehicles.

Ukraine also has significant deposits of titanium, lithium and rare earth metals – a group of 17 elements that are used to produce weapons, wind turbines, electronics and other products vital in the modern world.

But some of the country’s mineral deposits have been seized by Russia. According to Yulia Svyrydenko, Ukraine’s economy minister, resources worth $350bn (£277bn) remain in occupied territories today.

There are warnings too that a deal allowing the US access to Ukraine’s vast mineral wealth cannot happen unless the country addresses its problem with unexploded mines.

A quarter of Ukraine’s landmass is estimated to be contaminated with landmines, mainly concentrated in the war-torn east of the country.

• What minerals does Ukraine have?

Vladimir Putin has not yet addressed reports that the terms of a deal between the US and Ukraine have been agreed.

But on Monday evening he told state TV he was ready to “offer” resources to American partners in joint projects, including mining in Russia’s “new territories” – a reference to parts of eastern Ukraine that Russia has occupied since launching a full-scale invasion three years ago.

Putin said a potential US-Ukraine deal on rare minerals was not a concern and that Russia “undoubtedly have, I want to emphasise, significantly more resources of this kind than Ukraine”.

“As for the new territories, it’s the same. We are ready to attract foreign partners to the so-called new, to our historical territories, which have returned to the Russian Federation,” he added.

Commenting on Zelensky’s visit to Washington, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Tuesday: “Whether it will be [to sign] the aforementioned agreement or something else, we’ll see. There have been no official statements on this matter yet.”

Ariana Grande, Timothée Chalamet and Demi Moore were among the Oscar nominees who gathered in Los Angeles on Tuesday for the annual “class photo”.

Ahead of the Academy Awards on Sunday (2 March), the nominees from all categories were invited to mingle over dinner and cocktails, as an eventful awards race reaches its conclusion.

• 17 facts you need to know before the Oscars

The class photo, a highlight of the film calendar, is usually taken much earlier in awards season, at the nominees luncheon, but that event was cancelled this year due to the LA wildfires.

Here are 12 things we spotted in this year’s class photo:

Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande have spent the last few months crying, holding space and stroking each other’s fingers as they promoted the screen adaptation of Wicked.

The two actresses have redefined the film press tour in recent weeks thanks to their absolute adoration for each other – an energy they will have to recreate later this year when they do it all again for the release of part two.

Before the photo was taken, instead of saying cheese, Erivo shouted: “Everyone say ‘Oscar nominee!'”

Last week, it was confirmed the pair will perform a medley of songs from the film during the Oscars ceremony which will last a reported 10 minutes long.

Wicked is the closest thing the Oscars have this year to a box office smash in the shape of last year’s Barbie, and they’ll be hoping the medley will recreate the energy of Ryan Gosling’s viral performance of I’m Just Ken last year.

We’re aware the weather is getting warmer and the sun is rising earlier as we hurtle towards Spring, but we are nevertheless always on the lookout for a colourful cosy jumper and we need to investigate the origin of this one as an urgent priority.

The woman with the impeccable sweater selection in the class photo is Maya Gnyp – a producer of I Am Ready, Warden – which is nominated for best documentary short.

The film follows Texas death row inmate John Henry Ramire in his final days.

Joining Ariana and Cynthia on the front row were fellow acting nominees Zoe Saldaña, Mikey Madison and Monica Barbaro.

Saldaña is almost certain to win best supporting actress for Emilia Pérez, having taken the trophy at a string of precursor events including the Baftas, SAG Awards and Golden Globes.

As a result, her fellow category nominees such as Barbaro, who plays Joan Baez in Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown, have had to practise their best “I’m just happy to be nominated” faces this year.

Madison, however, is a co-frontrunner in a tight race for leading actress. The Anora star is up against Demi Moore for The Substance in a category seen as a dead heat.

James Mangold, nominated this year for A Complete Unknown, is one of Hollywood’s most respected and loved directors.

So why is he sitting on an aisle seat in the second-back row, away from all his pals, looking sheepish?

It’s probably because he only just made the class photo by the skin of his teeth, arriving late to the event to an affectionate collective groan followed by cheers from his fellow nominees.

Despite a distinguished Hollywood career, Mangold is a first-time nominee in the best director category, as are his fellow nominees Coralie Fargeat, Sean Baker, Brady Corbet and Jacques Audiard.

In a year where disappointingly few of the stars pulled funny faces or made eye-catching hand gestures while the photo was being taken, we applaud the team from Black Box Diaries for joining hands and celebrating.

They are the film’s director Shiori Ito (second left), editor Ema Ryan Yamazaki (far right) and producers Hanna Aqvilin and Eric Nyari.

The movie, nominated in the documentary feature category, examines a sexual assault investigation in Japan.

Sitting in the back row, so far from the photographer that their faces are somewhat blurry and out of focus, are three of the biggest stars in this year’s awards race.

In the centre is The Substance star Demi Moore, nominated for playing an ageing aerobics instructor who takes a black-market drug to create a younger, more beautiful version of herself.

She is joined on either side by supporting actor nominees Guy Pearce (left), who is recognised for his role in The Brutalist, and Edward Norton, who is nominated for playing Pete Seeger in A Complete Unknown.

Also hanging out in the front row were songwriter Bernie Taupin and singer-songwriter Brandi Carlile.

The pair are nominated in the best original song category for writing Never Too Late, the title track from Sir Elton John’s recent documentary.

Sir Elton himself wasn’t there, however, despite co-writing the song with the pair.

It’s likely he will attend the Oscars on Sunday, but he won’t be singing his song as the Academy has done away with having the original song nominees perform during the ceremony this year.

Instead, Doja Cat, Lisa from Blackpink, Queen Latifah and Raye will be among the other performers during the ceremony alongside the Wicked medley.

Timothée Chalamet joined his fellow nominees just days after springing a surprise win at the SAG Awards for A Complete Unknown.

In his speech, the actor talked about his desire to be “one of the greats” of Hollywood.

However, the actor has not been campaigning as aggressively as frontrunner Adrien Brody, and for the class photo, Chalamet took an aisle seat, leaned out and put his fist to his chest.

Seated just in front of him are Anora’s director Sean Baker and his producer wife Samantha Quan.

Adding further star power to the blurry back row were best actor contenders Adrien Brody, Colman Domingo and Sebastian Stan.

Brody is the frontrunner to win, for his role in the Brutalist as a Hungarian architect who moves to the US after World War Two and is taken under the wing of a wealthy businessman.

Sing Sing star Domingo plays a prison inmate who joins a performing arts programme, while Stan is nominated for portraying a young Donald Trump.

The Brits nominated in the acting categories this year are The Brutalist’s Felicity Jones, Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo, and Conclave’s Ralph Fiennes.

The actor was on Fiennes form, sitting in the back row alongside Sing Sing’s John “Divine G” Whitfield.

Fiennes is unlikely to win best actor, but if Conclave wins the top Oscar, he’ll become the first actor ever to have appeared in four best picture winners.

Understandably, not every nominee was available to attend the dinner – best supporting actor frontrunner Kieran Culkin was among the stars missing from the class photo.

But others were conspicuous by their absence, most notably Emilia Pérez star Karla Sofía Gascón.

The actress is persona non grata in Hollywood at the moment, after some historic tweets she posted resurfaced in recent weeks, severely damaging the film’s awards chances in many categories.

However, it’s been confirmed she will attend the Oscars ceremony itself on Sunday – although it remains to be seen if she will walk the red carpet and sit with her co-stars.

Sing Sing star Clarence Maclin was widely considered the most notable absence in the best supporting actor category this year.

But he is still nominated at the Oscars thanks to his story credit on the film, which means he is recognised in the best adapted screenplay category.

Maclin was one of the real-life inmates at the Sing Sing jail, after being sentenced to 17 years in jail for robbery, aged 29, and was a member of the prison’s Rehabilitation Through the Arts (RTA) programme.

In the class photo, Maclin, who plays a version of himself in Sing Sing, is either checking his watch or possibly about to sneeze.

Look back on previous class photos:

2024: 10 things we spotted from Margot Robbie to Billie Eilish

2023: Brendan Fraser has a ‘whale of a time

2020: From Quentin Tarantino to a Frozen couple

2019: Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper among stars

2018: Cardboard cutouts and splashes of colour

2017: Pharrell Williams dresses down

An Australian radio presenter has left the network after comments he made about the country’s women’s football team – which have been branded as misogynist and disrespectful.

Marty Sheargold said on nationwide radio station Triple M that the Matildas players reminded him of “year 10 girls” and implied that their matches were boring.

He apologised earlier on Wednesday, and was due to be back on air but did not appear in his usual time slot.

Southern Cross Austereo (SCA), the parent company of Triple M, later said Sheargold and the station had agreed to “mutually part ways”.

In a statement on Wednesday, Sheargold said that he fully understood the gravity of his remarks and would like to “sincerely apologise to the Matildas and the broader organisation”.

The company said that it “takes its responsibility to listeners, shareholders, and clients seriously and its programming should align with the standards and expectations of its audience.”

“Right now, it’s clear this is a moment for reflection and review. Triple M, and the wider SCA network, will continue to take all necessary steps to support staff,” the firm’s chief content officer Dave Cameron said in a statement.

Earlier the sport’s governing body said the remarks “diminish the extraordinary achievements” of a team that were semi-finalists in the women’s world cup in 2023.

During his drivetime show on Monday afternoon, Sheargold interjected during a sports bulletin – which was discussing Australia’s defeat to the US in its second consecutive loss in the SheBelieves Cup.

“You know what they remind me of? Year 10 girls,” Sheargold said, to the laughter of his co-hosts.

“All the infighting and all the friendship issues… Now I’m sorry to undermine the whole sport, but that’s what I think of it.”

When his colleague mentioned the SheBelieves Cup by name, Sheargold interrupted saying: “Oh, she believes in what? It better be men.”

And when reference was made to Australia hosting the AFC Women’s Asian Cup next year, he said “oh god – the Asian Cup”, before criticising the event with an obscene comment. He then asked his co-host: “Got any men’s sport?”

Sheargold’s comments later went viral.

Minister for Sport Anika Wells called the comments “boorish, boring and wrong”.

“Australia’s most watched television event ever was the Matildas World Cup semi-final; the Tillies’ quarterfinal is the second-most-watched event in Australian history,” Ms Wells said.

Australian Olympian Ambrosia Malone, who represents her country in hockey, also criticised Sheargold.

“All I could think about was the young girls sitting in the car with their parents, maybe on the way to or from their own training sessions hearing this,” she wrote on social media.

“I’m sure many of them would have been hurt and confused… I was in disbelief.

“This is apparently acceptable on mainstream afternoon radio??? HOW??”

Football Australia said it was “deeply disappointed by the unacceptable comments” which “fail to recognise the profound impact they have had on Australian sport and society”.

“This incident is a stark reminder of the responsibility media outlets and personalities have in fostering respectful and constructive discussions about women’s sport and its participants,” it added.

Hundreds of thousands of people have signed a petition to revoke Elon Musk’s Canadian citizenship amid tensions between the Trump administration and Canada.

The petition, which opened to signatures five days ago, accuses Mr Musk of acting against Canada’s national interest and undermining its sovereignty.

In Canada, citizenship can be revoked only if someone has committed fraud, misrepresented themselves or knowingly hid information on an immigration or citizenship application. Mr Musk, who was born in South Africa, holds both Canadian and US citizenship.

Responding to the petition, the billionaire wrote on X: “Canada is not a real country.” The post was later deleted.

The petition claims the billionaire “has used his wealth and power to influence our elections” and “has now become a member of a foreign government that is attempting to erase Canadian sovereignty”. Mr Musk has Canadian citizenship through his mother, who was born in Saskatchewan.

Launched on 20 February, the petition, already signed by more than 250,000 Canadians, remains open for signatures until 20 June.

• What it means when Musk brings his children to work
• Who is Musk and what is he worth?

It is mostly symbolic and has no legal force. But petitions with at least 500 signatures and a member of parliament’s backing typically receive a government response, this one may not, as a spring election could dissolve parliament.

It was created by a British Columbia author and endorsed by MP Charlie Angus of the New Democratic Party. Angus, a 20-year MP for Timmins–James Bay, has announced he will not seek re-election.

The BBC has contacted his office for comment.

US-Canada tensions have escalated since Trump’s return, with the president repeatedly suggesting Canada could become a US state and threatening tariffs on steel, aluminium, and other imports.

Canadian leaders have pushed back, vowing counter-tariffs.

The spat has spilled out beyond government, with Canadians cancelling US trips, boycotting American products, and booing opposing anthems at hockey and basketball games.

• What is Doge and why is Musk cutting so many jobs?

Mr Musk moved to Canada from South Africa at 18, and worked odd jobs before studying at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario. He later emigrated to the US.

The billionaire has backed Trump’s hardline immigration policies but now faces scrutiny over claims he worked illegally in the US on a student visa.

In a recent interview, Steve Bannon, a former advisor to President Trump, called Mr Musk a “parasitic illegal immigrant”.

The Tesla CEO has denied the accusations, and has said he did not work illegally. He became a naturalised US citizen in 2002, according to a recent biography.

The BBC has contacted Mr Musk via his businesses for comment.

Indian police have registered a case against leading businessman Shyam S Bhartia and three others for alleged criminal intimidation and rape of an aspiring Bollywood actress.

Bhartia is the founder and chairman of Jubilant Bhartia Group. Its subsidiary Jubilant Foodworks is the largest franchisee for Domino’s Pizza outside of the US.

The woman, who can’t be named under Indian law, accuses Bhartia of intoxicating and then “brutally” raping her in Singapore.

Bhartia has denied the allegations as “baseless, false and disparaging” in a filing with the Bombay Stock Exchange on Tuesday.

The company said Bhartia would fully cooperate with the investigation.

Jubiliant FoodWorks has not responded separately to the BBC’s request for comment.

The woman said she first complained to the police on 11 November 2024. But her case was registered only on 22 February on orders of the Bombay High Court after it heard her petition.

The petition and the police complaint seen by the BBC alleged that the woman first met Bhartia in 2022 at a five star hotel in Mumbai through a co-accused, who allegedly promised to introduce her to people who could help further her career in the entertainment industry.

She alleges that Bhartia agreed to invest in her film project and asked her to come to Singapore, giving her his credit card details to book flight tickets.

In the petition, the woman also alleged that the co-accused made a video of the rape in Singapore in 2023.

She further alleged that she was repeatedly sexually assaulted by Bhartia thereafter that year.

In the company’s filing with the stock exchange, Jubiliant FoodWorks said the court had made it clear it had not gone into the “merits of the complaint”. It rubbished the allegations against Bhartia saying they were made with a “clear mala fide intent against him”.

The parents of an eight-year-old diabetic girl in Australia who died after they denied her insulin for almost a week have each been sentenced to 14 years in jail for manslaughter.

Elizabeth Struhs had in 2019 been diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, and her family was told she would need daily insulin injections.

Her parents belonged to a religious sect known as The Saints, who opposed medical care, believing God would heal her.

She died from diabetic ketoacidosis, which causes a dangerous build-up of ketones – a type of acid – and blood sugar spikes at her home in Toowoomba west of Brisbane in January 2022.

Her father Jason Struhs and mother Elizabeth Struhs, were among 14 people convicted of manslaughter last month.

The Saints’ leader Brendan Stevens has been jailed for 13 years by the judge at the Supreme Court of Queensland, who called him a “dangerous, highly manipulative individual”.

Eleven other members were handed jail terms of six to nine years.

Stevens and the girl’s father had been on trial for murder but they were convicted of the lesser charge of manslaughter. All had pleaded not guilty.

When handing down his almost 500-page verdict last month, Justice Martin Burns said that although it was clear Elizabeth’s parents and “every member of the church including all other accused” had adored her, their actions had resulted in her death.

“Due to a singular belief in the healing power of God… she was deprived of the one thing that would most definitely have kept her alive.”

Elizabeth would have endured vomiting, extreme lethargy, and a loss of consciousness because she was denied medical care, prosecutor Caroline Marco said during the trial, which lasted several months and was heard by a judge sitting alone without a jury.

Prosecutors called 60 witnesses and painted a picture of an “intelligent” child who suffered greatly in her final days.

The congregation, meanwhile, had prayed and sung for the girl as she laid on a mattress and her condition deteriorated.

Believing she could be brought back to life, the sect member made no effort to call a doctor, and authorities were not notified until 36 hours after her death, the court heard.

“Elizabeth is only sleeping, and I will see her again,” her father Jason Struhs had earlier told the court.

Stevens, 63, had defended the group’s actions as faith-based and described the trial as an act of “religious persecution”. He said that the group was within its “rights to believe in the word of God completely”.

Type 1 diabetes is a disorder in which the pancreas fails to produce enough insulin. It is characterised by uncontrolled high blood glucose levels and it can be controlled by injecting insulin.

Elizabeth’s sister Jayde Struhs had earlier said she had left the Saints and fled her family home at 16, after coming out as gay, and was now estranged from them.

She and other witnesses described the congregation as having strict views, including that mainstream healthcare should be shunned and that both Christmas and Easter were “pagan” or ungodly festivals.

The Saints are not affiliated with an established church in Australia and count around two dozen members from three families among its members.

BP has announced it will cut its renewable energy investments and instead focus on increasing oil and gas production.

The energy giant revealed the shift in strategy on Wednesday following pressure from some investors unhappy its profits and share price have been lower than its rivals.

BP said it would increase its investments in oil and gas by about 20% to $10bn (£7.9bn) a year, while decreasing previously planned funding for renewables by more than $5bn (£3.9bn).

The move comes as rivals Shell and Norwegian company Equinor have also scaled back plans to invest in green energy and US President Donald Trump’s “drill baby drill” comments have encouraged investment in fossil fuels.

Murray Auchincloss, BP’s chief executive, said the energy giant had gone “too far, too fast” in the transition away from fossil fuels, and that its faith in green energy was “misplaced”.

He said BP would be “very selective” in investing in businesses working on the energy transition to renewables going forward, with funding reduced to between $1.5bn and $2bn per year.

He said this was part of a strategy “reset” by the company to focus on boosting returns for shareholders.

Helge Lund, chair of BP, added that the new direction of the firm had “cash flow growth” at its heart.

Shares in the company climbed before Tuesday’s announcement but fell shortly after.

BP is one of several firms in the energy industry to return focus on oil and gas production, which has seen an increase in profits as prices have increased following lows seen during the Covid pandemic.

The firm said it plans to increase its production to between 2.3 million and 2.5 million barrels of oil per day by 2030, with hopes of “major” oil and gas projects starting by the end of 2027.

Mr Auchincloss is under pressure to boost profits from some shareholders, including the influential activist group Elliot Management, which took a near £4bn stake in the £70bn company to push for more investment in oil and gas.

In 2024, BP’s net income fell to $8.9bn (£7.2bn), down from $13.8bn the previous year.

However, some other shareholders, as well as environmental groups have voiced concerns over switching focus back to fossil fuel production.

Last week, a group of 48 investors called on the company to allow them a vote on any potential plans to move away from commitments to renewables.

The environmental group Greenpeace UK said the latest move was “proof that fossil fuel companies can’t or won’t be part of climate crisis solutions”.

Alexander Kirk from Global Witness added BP “cannot be trusted to deliver the clean energy transition”, adding that it was “focusing on short-term profits to shareholders while energy prices are high, with the rest of the world picking up the tab from its climate-wrecking products”.

Global Witness drove a lorry around central London with messages criticising BP’s decision.

Sir Ian Cheshire, who has held many executive roles at companies such as B&Q owner Kingfisher and Barclays bank, questioned whether BP’s latest move would work.

“I do wonder whether this sort of decision will look right in 10 years,” he told the BBC’s Today programme.

“The climate change issue has not gone away, the science hasn’t changed,” he said.

Challenged on the reduced commitment to investing in renewable energy, Louise Kingham, BP’s senior vice president for Europe and the UK, said none of the changes announced on Tuesday would alter the UK’s green energy plans, which include three wind farms and carbon capture projects.

She said the shift to renewable energy sources had slowed but that BP’s ambition had “not changed” to become a net-zero company.

According to the International Energy Agency, no new fossil fuel projects are compatible with limiting global warming to 1.5C compared to pre-industrial levels,

“We just have to do this transition more smartly and more efficiently and try to get those returns for our owners because they are helping us to do that. If we don’t generate the returns, we can’t invest and do more,” Ms Kingham told a committee of MPs.

“It’s going to take everybody to move in concert to make this happen. It’s not just the decision of one company and what it chooses to do.”

The decrease in renewables will cover biogas, biofuels and electric vehicle charging projects, while BP will look to “capital-light partnerships” in other green energy such as wind and solar.

BP has already placed its offshore wind business in a joint venture with Japanese company Jera and is looking to find a partner to do the same with its solar business.

Five years ago, BP set some of the most ambitious targets among large oil companies to cut production of oil and gas by 40% by 2030, while significantly ramping up investment in renewables.

But in 2023, the company lowered this oil and gas reduction target to 25%.

In the five years since former chief executive Bernard Looney first unveiled his strategy, shareholders have received total returns including dividends of 36%.

In contrast, shareholders in rivals Shell and Exxon have seen returns of 82% and 160% respectively.

BP’s under performance has prompted speculation that it may be a takeover target or may consider moving its main stock market listing to the US where oil and gas companies command higher valuations.

Sign up for our Future Earth newsletter to get exclusive insight on the latest climate and environment news from the BBC’s Climate Editor Justin Rowlatt, delivered to your inbox every week. Outside the UK? Sign up to our international newsletter here.

Foodies in China have been reportedly flocking to an unlikely destination – a funeral home – after a noodle dish served at its canteen went viral on social media.

The dish is found at the Erlong Funeral Home in the southwestern province of Guizhou.

The canteen caters to the funeral home’s customers, but as word began to spread about its noodles, hordes of diners – some posing as mourners – began showing up to try the food.

Erlong has since announced it will allow some members of the public to eat at its premises, as long as they do not disturb genuine mourners.

The funeral home offers various types of noodle dishes during breakfast and supper hours, which cost 10 yuan per bowl ($1.38; £1.09).

The most popular type is reportedly the noodles topped with minced pork and peanuts.

One Erlong worker told Jiupai News that they “only served customers who come to the funeral home to handle matters”.

But other people have been sneaking in to get a bowl of noodles, the worker said, adding that sometimes queues at Erlong are so long that diners sometimes have to wait a couple of hours to get their food.

“There have been people pretending to be relatives of the deceased, it’s hard to tell them apart when it gets crowded, and it’s hard to manage,” he said.

To meet the demand, the funeral home has since decided to offer 50 bowls of noodles to members of the public every day – for free – as long as “they do not affect people’s mourning”, according to Erlong’s chef in an interview with local media.

While the noodle dish was already popular among locals, the craze appeared to have ramped up earlier this month when a social media user posted about the dish while visiting a friend in Guizhou, which is known for its spicy and sour dishes.

“My friend says the food at this funeral home is so good,” they wrote earlier this month on Xiaohongshu, also known as RedNote. “The queue for food is longer than the queue to lay flowers for the deceased.”

“I didn’t get to eat the noodles, because my friend’s mum didn’t know anyone who was holding a funeral service.”

Since then, many Chinese social media users have also shared their experiences eating the noodles.

On Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok, one user shared a photo of the dining hall’s tickets, with what appeared to be a crowd queuing up for food.

“I heard the noodles here were very good,” they wrote. “I thought about how short life was, and got another bowl.”

The parents of an eight-year-old diabetic girl in Australia who died after they denied her insulin for almost a week have each been sentenced to 14 years in jail for manslaughter.

Elizabeth Struhs had in 2019 been diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, and her family was told she would need daily insulin injections.

Her parents belonged to a religious sect known as The Saints, who opposed medical care, believing God would heal her.

She died from diabetic ketoacidosis, which causes a dangerous build-up of ketones – a type of acid – and blood sugar spikes at her home in Toowoomba west of Brisbane in January 2022.

Her father Jason Struhs and mother Elizabeth Struhs, were among 14 people convicted of manslaughter last month.

The Saints’ leader Brendan Stevens has been jailed for 13 years by the judge at the Supreme Court of Queensland, who called him a “dangerous, highly manipulative individual”.

Eleven other members were handed jail terms of six to nine years.

Stevens and the girl’s father had been on trial for murder but they were convicted of the lesser charge of manslaughter. All had pleaded not guilty.

When handing down his almost 500-page verdict last month, Justice Martin Burns said that although it was clear Elizabeth’s parents and “every member of the church including all other accused” had adored her, their actions had resulted in her death.

“Due to a singular belief in the healing power of God… she was deprived of the one thing that would most definitely have kept her alive.”

Elizabeth would have endured vomiting, extreme lethargy, and a loss of consciousness because she was denied medical care, prosecutor Caroline Marco said during the trial, which lasted several months and was heard by a judge sitting alone without a jury.

Prosecutors called 60 witnesses and painted a picture of an “intelligent” child who suffered greatly in her final days.

The congregation, meanwhile, had prayed and sung for the girl as she laid on a mattress and her condition deteriorated.

Believing she could be brought back to life, the sect member made no effort to call a doctor, and authorities were not notified until 36 hours after her death, the court heard.

“Elizabeth is only sleeping, and I will see her again,” her father Jason Struhs had earlier told the court.

Stevens, 63, had defended the group’s actions as faith-based and described the trial as an act of “religious persecution”. He said that the group was within its “rights to believe in the word of God completely”.

Type 1 diabetes is a disorder in which the pancreas fails to produce enough insulin. It is characterised by uncontrolled high blood glucose levels and it can be controlled by injecting insulin.

Elizabeth’s sister Jayde Struhs had earlier said she had left the Saints and fled her family home at 16, after coming out as gay, and was now estranged from them.

She and other witnesses described the congregation as having strict views, including that mainstream healthcare should be shunned and that both Christmas and Easter were “pagan” or ungodly festivals.

The Saints are not affiliated with an established church in Australia and count around two dozen members from three families among its members.

An Australian radio presenter has left the network after comments he made about the country’s women’s football team – which have been branded as misogynist and disrespectful.

Marty Sheargold said on nationwide radio station Triple M that the Matildas players reminded him of “year 10 girls” and implied that their matches were boring.

He apologised earlier on Wednesday, and was due to be back on air but did not appear in his usual time slot.

Southern Cross Austereo (SCA), the parent company of Triple M, later said Sheargold and the station had agreed to “mutually part ways”.

In a statement on Wednesday, Sheargold said that he fully understood the gravity of his remarks and would like to “sincerely apologise to the Matildas and the broader organisation”.

The company said that it “takes its responsibility to listeners, shareholders, and clients seriously and its programming should align with the standards and expectations of its audience.”

“Right now, it’s clear this is a moment for reflection and review. Triple M, and the wider SCA network, will continue to take all necessary steps to support staff,” the firm’s chief content officer Dave Cameron said in a statement.

Earlier the sport’s governing body said the remarks “diminish the extraordinary achievements” of a team that were semi-finalists in the women’s world cup in 2023.

During his drivetime show on Monday afternoon, Sheargold interjected during a sports bulletin – which was discussing Australia’s defeat to the US in its second consecutive loss in the SheBelieves Cup.

“You know what they remind me of? Year 10 girls,” Sheargold said, to the laughter of his co-hosts.

“All the infighting and all the friendship issues… Now I’m sorry to undermine the whole sport, but that’s what I think of it.”

When his colleague mentioned the SheBelieves Cup by name, Sheargold interrupted saying: “Oh, she believes in what? It better be men.”

And when reference was made to Australia hosting the AFC Women’s Asian Cup next year, he said “oh god – the Asian Cup”, before criticising the event with an obscene comment. He then asked his co-host: “Got any men’s sport?”

Sheargold’s comments later went viral.

Minister for Sport Anika Wells called the comments “boorish, boring and wrong”.

“Australia’s most watched television event ever was the Matildas World Cup semi-final; the Tillies’ quarterfinal is the second-most-watched event in Australian history,” Ms Wells said.

Australian Olympian Ambrosia Malone, who represents her country in hockey, also criticised Sheargold.

“All I could think about was the young girls sitting in the car with their parents, maybe on the way to or from their own training sessions hearing this,” she wrote on social media.

“I’m sure many of them would have been hurt and confused… I was in disbelief.

“This is apparently acceptable on mainstream afternoon radio??? HOW??”

Football Australia said it was “deeply disappointed by the unacceptable comments” which “fail to recognise the profound impact they have had on Australian sport and society”.

“This incident is a stark reminder of the responsibility media outlets and personalities have in fostering respectful and constructive discussions about women’s sport and its participants,” it added.

Shares in electric car maker Tesla have slumped more than 9% after EU and UK sales fell by almost half in January.

The drop in Tesla shares took the company’s valuation back below $1trn for the first time since November 2024.

Tesla has been facing stiff competition in the European market from Chinese and other manufacturers.

In addition, Tesla owner Elon Musk has been making controversial political waves on both sides of the Atlantic, an analyst said.

Tesla sales in January bucked European electric car sale trends, which grew by more than a third in the month, according to trade body Acea.

Instead, Tesla sales across the EU, EFTA and the UK fell more than 45%, and more than 50% in the EU alone.

It comes after Tesla sales fell last year for the first time in more than a decade as demand faltered and rivals gained pace.

The main factor in the January sales slump was likely to be increasing competition, AJ Bell investment director Russ Mould said.

Chinese manufacturer BYD has been making big strides, in part because it includes as standard some features which cost extra from other makers, Mould said.

However, some car buyers may also be taking a “principled stand” on Musk’s political interventions, he said.

Musk has made waves in the US with his involvement in slashing US development funds and efforts to drastically reduce US federal funding.

In the UK he supports jailed far-right activist Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, also known as Tommy Robinson, and repeatedly criticised Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer.

Musk also supports the far-right AfD party in Germany, and congratulated its leader after the party’s record second-place result in elections.

Asked if the reason for Tesla’s share price slump was down to Musk being too toxic, a former senior director of the car maker’s Europe, Middle East and Asia division said it was “definitely one of the reasons for the decline”, but added there was a “cumulative number of things that are piling up a domino effect”.

“There’s no doubt his flirting with the right in politics, running around on TV with a chainsaw is not exactly helping his image,” Peter Bardenfleth-Hansen told the BBC’s Today programme.

“He may be getting a bigger fanbase within a specific type of clientele, but they’re not the ones that are buying the Teslas. They’re not the ones putting money in to his company. So he has a problem.”

Tesla shares got a big boost after the US election due to Musk’s closeness to Donald Trump – Musk has described himself as “first buddy” to the US president.

Investors thought this would stand his businesses in good stead.

However, Trump is not a supporter of electric vehicles, and has said he will cancel efforts to boost their ownership.

“How anybody thought this was going to be good for Tesla, I don’t know,” Mould said.

There is also general market skittishness about the path of interest rate cuts and concerns about Trump tariff plans that could be contributing to the fall, he added.

Far-right populist Călin Georgescu has been detained by police as part of an inquiry by prosecutors into election campaign fraud, after he came from nowhere to win the first round of last year’s presidential election.

Georgescu was stopped in traffic in the capital, Bucharest, on Wednesday.

His supporters said he was on his way to submit his candidacy for new elections in May, after last December’s second-round run-off was annulled by the constitutional court.

Two right-wing populist parties said they were mobilising their supporters to head for the prosecutor’s office, where Georgescu was taken for questioning.

Romanian reports said police were erecting barriers around the building and that dozens of demonstrators had gathered to protest.

Prosecutors have made a series of allegations against Georgescu, according to Romanian media, including acts against the constitutional order and involvement in an extremist organisation.

Populist opposition parties had earlier filed a no-confidence motion against Romania’s democratically elected pro-European government.

Romania’s outgoing president, Klaus Iohannis, resigned earlier this month ahead of an impeachment vote prompted by the cancelled December election. He had decided to stay in office until a successor was elected in May.

Before the second round of the election was annulled in December, Iohannis declassified intelligence documents that suggested that hundreds of TikTok accounts had been activated backing Georgescu.

Romanian foreign intelligence said Russia had been behind that move, as well as thousands of cyber-attacks and other sabotage.

Opposition politicians had at the time accused Iohannis of an undemocratic move, and Georgescu’s communications team repeated the claim against prosecutors.

“Where is democracy now?” they posted on X on Wednesday, tagging President Donald Trump, Elon Musk and US Vice-President JD Vance.

Earlier this month, Vance had accused Romania of annulling the elections based on “flimsy suspicions” of Romanian intelligence and pressure from its neighbours.

Romania is a vital part of Nato’s eastern flank as well as being a member of the European Union.

Meanwhile, Romanian police said they had carried out raids in several counties around the country, targeting 27 individuals as part of a criminal case relating to the creation of an organisation “with a fascist, racist or xenophobic nature”.

Investigations were also being conducted into false statements regarding the sources of election campaign funding, police said.

The statement made no mention of Georgescu himself and it was not clear if the raids were linked.

Georgescu has been accused of being pro-Russian and he has praised Romania’s fascist and nationalist leaders from the last century as heroes.

He denied he was “Moscow’s man”, in a BBC interview last year, but referred to Vladimir Putin as a “patriot and a leader” while pointing out “I am not a fan”.

Romanian Foreign Minister Emil Hurezeanu accused Elon Musk of a “form of interference” in Romania’s elections, after the billionaire posted several messages of support for Georgescu.

Hundreds of thousands of people have signed a petition to revoke Elon Musk’s Canadian citizenship amid tensions between the Trump administration and Canada.

The petition, which opened to signatures five days ago, accuses Mr Musk of acting against Canada’s national interest and undermining its sovereignty.

In Canada, citizenship can be revoked only if someone has committed fraud, misrepresented themselves or knowingly hid information on an immigration or citizenship application. Mr Musk, who was born in South Africa, holds both Canadian and US citizenship.

Responding to the petition, the billionaire wrote on X: “Canada is not a real country.” The post was later deleted.

The petition claims the billionaire “has used his wealth and power to influence our elections” and “has now become a member of a foreign government that is attempting to erase Canadian sovereignty”. Mr Musk has Canadian citizenship through his mother, who was born in Saskatchewan.

Launched on 20 February, the petition, already signed by more than 250,000 Canadians, remains open for signatures until 20 June.

• What it means when Musk brings his children to work
• Who is Musk and what is he worth?

It is mostly symbolic and has no legal force. But petitions with at least 500 signatures and a member of parliament’s backing typically receive a government response, this one may not, as a spring election could dissolve parliament.

It was created by a British Columbia author and endorsed by MP Charlie Angus of the New Democratic Party. Angus, a 20-year MP for Timmins–James Bay, has announced he will not seek re-election.

The BBC has contacted his office for comment.

US-Canada tensions have escalated since Trump’s return, with the president repeatedly suggesting Canada could become a US state and threatening tariffs on steel, aluminium, and other imports.

Canadian leaders have pushed back, vowing counter-tariffs.

The spat has spilled out beyond government, with Canadians cancelling US trips, boycotting American products, and booing opposing anthems at hockey and basketball games.

• What is Doge and why is Musk cutting so many jobs?

Mr Musk moved to Canada from South Africa at 18, and worked odd jobs before studying at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario. He later emigrated to the US.

The billionaire has backed Trump’s hardline immigration policies but now faces scrutiny over claims he worked illegally in the US on a student visa.

In a recent interview, Steve Bannon, a former advisor to President Trump, called Mr Musk a “parasitic illegal immigrant”.

The Tesla CEO has denied the accusations, and has said he did not work illegally. He became a naturalised US citizen in 2002, according to a recent biography.

The BBC has contacted Mr Musk via his businesses for comment.

A Sydney nurse who was suspended over a video in which she allegedly made threats against Israeli patients has been charged by police.

Sarah Abu Lebdeh, 26, is facing three charges: threatening violence to a group, using a carriage service to threaten to kill, and using a carriage service to harass or cause offence.

Ms Abu Lebdeh and another man were both suspended from their duties at Bankstown Hospital after the video – filmed on an anonymous online platform which pairs people randomly for a chat – was released online.

Authorities say there is “no evidence” the pair actually harmed patients.

In the footage, which appeared to have been filmed inside a hospital and was published by an Israeli content creator, Ms Abu Lebdeh and Ahmad Rashad Nadir allegedly bragged about refusing to treat Israeli patients, killing them, and said they would go to hell.

The video spread widely online and caused public outcry, with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese describing it as “disgusting” and “vile”.

New South Wales Police Commissioner Karen Webb said the charges are a significant breakthrough in what has been a complicated investigation as it involves an overseas witness.

“Detectives must be commended for acting swiftly under enormous pressure and public expectation,” she said.

Ms Abu Lebdeh was granted bail – although she is banned from social media and from leaving the country – and will return to court on 19 March.

Mr Nadir is receiving medical treatment and has not been charged but is still under investigation, NSW Police said.

Earlier this month Australia passed tougher laws against hate crimes following a wave of unrelated antisemitic attacks.

In recent months, there have been a several of arson and graffiti incidents involving homes, cars, and synagogues in Jewish communities across Australia.

A caravan packed with power gel explosives that police warned had the potential to cause a “mass casualty event” was found in New South Wales in January, alongside a document with antisemitic sentiments and a list of Jewish targets in Sydney.

An Australian radio presenter has left the network after comments he made about the country’s women’s football team – which have been branded as misogynist and disrespectful.

Marty Sheargold said on nationwide radio station Triple M that the Matildas players reminded him of “year 10 girls” and implied that their matches were boring.

He apologised earlier on Wednesday, and was due to be back on air but did not appear in his usual time slot.

Southern Cross Austereo (SCA), the parent company of Triple M, later said Sheargold and the station had agreed to “mutually part ways”.

In a statement on Wednesday, Sheargold said that he fully understood the gravity of his remarks and would like to “sincerely apologise to the Matildas and the broader organisation”.

The company said that it “takes its responsibility to listeners, shareholders, and clients seriously and its programming should align with the standards and expectations of its audience.”

“Right now, it’s clear this is a moment for reflection and review. Triple M, and the wider SCA network, will continue to take all necessary steps to support staff,” the firm’s chief content officer Dave Cameron said in a statement.

Earlier the sport’s governing body said the remarks “diminish the extraordinary achievements” of a team that were semi-finalists in the women’s world cup in 2023.

During his drivetime show on Monday afternoon, Sheargold interjected during a sports bulletin – which was discussing Australia’s defeat to the US in its second consecutive loss in the SheBelieves Cup.

“You know what they remind me of? Year 10 girls,” Sheargold said, to the laughter of his co-hosts.

“All the infighting and all the friendship issues… Now I’m sorry to undermine the whole sport, but that’s what I think of it.”

When his colleague mentioned the SheBelieves Cup by name, Sheargold interrupted saying: “Oh, she believes in what? It better be men.”

And when reference was made to Australia hosting the AFC Women’s Asian Cup next year, he said “oh god – the Asian Cup”, before criticising the event with an obscene comment. He then asked his co-host: “Got any men’s sport?”

Sheargold’s comments later went viral.

Minister for Sport Anika Wells called the comments “boorish, boring and wrong”.

“Australia’s most watched television event ever was the Matildas World Cup semi-final; the Tillies’ quarterfinal is the second-most-watched event in Australian history,” Ms Wells said.

Australian Olympian Ambrosia Malone, who represents her country in hockey, also criticised Sheargold.

“All I could think about was the young girls sitting in the car with their parents, maybe on the way to or from their own training sessions hearing this,” she wrote on social media.

“I’m sure many of them would have been hurt and confused… I was in disbelief.

“This is apparently acceptable on mainstream afternoon radio??? HOW??”

Football Australia said it was “deeply disappointed by the unacceptable comments” which “fail to recognise the profound impact they have had on Australian sport and society”.

“This incident is a stark reminder of the responsibility media outlets and personalities have in fostering respectful and constructive discussions about women’s sport and its participants,” it added.