Mark Carney’s Liberals have won Canada’s federal election – riding a backlash of anti-Trump sentiment to form the next government.

It is a stunning political turnaround for a party who were widely considered dead and buried just a few months ago.

It’s not yet clear if the party – which has been in power for almost a decade – will be able to secure a majority as results continue to roll in.

Either way, the prime minister faces major challenges, including divisions in the country laid bare by the campaign.

Here are five takeaways from an election which saw the Conservative opposition make major gains but still lose.

There is no doubt the US president’s tariff threats and comments undermining Canada’s sovereignty played an outsized role in this election, suddenly making leadership and the country’s economic survival the defining issues of the campaign.

Mark Carney used it to his advantage, running as much against Trump as he did against his main opposition rival, Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre.

Carney warned Canada was at a crisis moment, saying frequently on the campaign trail – and in his victory speech – that Trump “wants to break us so America can own us”.

Poilievre brought Trump up much less frequently during the campaign, focusing his message on domestic issues – the cost of living, the housing affordability crisis, and crime – and targeting the Liberals for their record on those matters.

Carney – who has declared the old relationship with the US “over” – plans to start negotiations on a new economic and security relationship immediately following the election.

Kevin O’Leary, a Canadian businessman close to Trump who previously ran for the Conservative leadership, acknowledged it was a successful campaign strategy.

“Right now Canadians are very frustrated with America and Carney has used that to his advantage,” he told the BBC just before polls closed. “He was able to distract Canadians from his own mistakes… and say ‘Stop looking at that. Look south of the border and I can save you’.”

At the start of the year, Carney was a former central banker with no experience as a politician. By mid-March, he was being sworn in as prime minister – the first to have never held elected public office before – after a resounding win in the Liberal leadership race.

Now, he’s faced the Canadian electorate as a first time campaigner, won an Ottawa-area seat in the House of Commons and steered his party to an unlikely victory.

Carney had long flirted with entering Canadian politics – and he seized his moment, swooping in after former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s sudden resignation in January.

He also took full advantage of the new political landscape, leaning into his experience helping Canada and the UK navigate previous crises at a time when Canadians were feeling anxious about their economic future.

Trump’s late-March announcement of global levies on foreign automobile imports gave Carney the chance to publicly audition to keep his job during the campaign. He was able to step away from the trail and take on the prime minister’s mantle, setting up a call with the president and meeting US Cabinet ministers.

• REACTION: Follow the latest live
• RESULTS: How Canada voted – in charts
• ANALYSIS: A turnaround victory made possible by Trump
• EXPLAINER: What happens next?

In a different election, this would have been a successful one for the Conservatives.

In 2011, the Conservatives won a majority with 39.6% of the vote. Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre is on track to beat that this time, with roughly 41.7% of the vote with most polls reporting, according to Election Canada.

Poilievre’s Conservatives also made significant seat gains. They are currently projected to have won 149 seats – that’s up from 120 at dissolution, when the election was called in March.

But with the progressive vote coalescing around the Liberals, those numbers weren’t enough this time.

This will be a bitter loss for the Conservatives, who only months ago had a clear path to victory and will now need to figure out a way forward after a series of electoral defeats.

“We have much to celebrate tonight,” Poilievre said in his concession speech, nodding to the party’s significant gains.

But he added: “We are cognisant of the fact that we didn’t quite get over the finish line.”

It will now be up to the party to decide if they want to keep Poilievre as leader, the third they’ve had since the Liberals swept the 2015 election.

Poilievre on Monday night pushed to keep his job, telling Conservative supporters that “change takes time”.

The election results have highlighted divisions in Canada that could pose a challenge for Carney.

Notably, the Liberals are largely shut out of Alberta and Saskatchewan – oil-rich and gas-rich prairie provinces where a sense of alienation from the centre of power in Ottawa has long festered.

Even before the election, some in those regions were warning of a national unity crisis if the Liberals won another mandate.

Carney touched on those divisions in his victory speech, acknowledging the millions who had voted for a different outcome.

“I intend to govern for all Canadians,” he said.

Meanwhile, Poilievre’s message, which relentlessly focused on cost of living issues, especially on housing affordability, resonated with many young people.

Support for the Conservatives outpaced Liberals by 44% to 31.2% among 18 to 34 year olds, a Nanos poll on 25 April indicated. The divide was more stark among younger men.

Separately, Abacus Data polling found that about 18% of 18 to 29 year olds were worried about Trump. That jumped to 45% for voters over 60, suggesting a polarisation on issues between generations.

On Monday night, Poilievre remarked on demographic breakthroughs Conservative had made, including with younger Canadians.

“We gave voices to countless people across the country who’ve been left out and left behind for far too long,” he said.

In this election, the smaller political parties have taken a hit as Canadians choose to park their votes with either the Liberals or the Conservatives – especially the left-wing New Democrats, or NDP.

Some of the smaller parties have lost a significant amount of vote share – particularly the NDP who have received just 5% of votes counted across Canada so far, compared with 18% in 2021.

Jagmeet Singh, who has been NDP leader for almost eight years, lost his own riding in British Columbia and announced he will step down.

“Obviously I know this night is a disappointing night for New Democrats,” he said, adding: “We’re only defeated if we stop fighting.”

The Greens have also seen their vote share cut in half from 2% to 1%.

Shachi Kurl, president of the Angus Reid Institute, a non-profit public opinion research organisation, told the BBC that Trump’s rhetoric was behind the shift to the Liberals.

“The threats, the annexation talk, all of that has been a huge motivator for left of centre voters,” she said.

The sovereigntist Bloc Québécois have maintained a vote share of 8%, although it remains to be seen how that translates into seats.

This is based on around 30% of polls reporting.

Canada doesn’t have a two-party system, even though it has historically voted in conservative or liberal governments in some form.

In the country’s political system, these smaller parties still play a role in Parliament. Both the NDP and the Bloc have at some points formed Official Opposition in the House of Commons.

One of Prince Andrew’s prized business assets was administered for two years by a company controlled by the controversial millionaire Doug Barrowman, the BBC can reveal.

After the prince’s disastrous Newsnight interview in 2019, legal ownership of his Dragon’s Den-style start-up competition, Pitch@Palace Global, was transferred to a Barrowman-linked firm, Knox House Trustees (UK).

Barrowman and his wife, lingerie boss Baroness Michelle Mone, hit the headlines when she admitted they had lied about their links to a company that won large government contracts during the Covid pandemic after she recommended it to ministers.

A lawyer for Mr Barrowman said he “at no time… had any business or personal involvement with the duke”.

Pitch@Palace Global remained the prince’s company, under his control. But in line with longstanding royal practice, it was owned under the names of other people or companies, acting on his behalf as so-called “nominees”.

Documents filed at Companies House show that from 2021, the nominee owner was Knox House Trustees (UK), which was controlled and ultimately owned by Mr Barrowman until 2023.

Prince Andrew’s finances have been under intense scrutiny, with questions about how he can afford to live in his Royal Lodge mansion in Windsor after he was cut off financially by his brother, King Charles.

The prince’s choice of business associates has long been controversial. In December, he said he “ceased all contact” with Yang Tengbo, who led the Chinese arm of Pitch@Palace, after receiving advice from the UK government which alleged that he was a spy.

Mr Yang has denied being a spy or doing anything unlawful.

Mr Barrowman has attracted plenty of controversy too. In 2017, HMRC began an investigation into one of his companies, AML Tax (UK), which it said “aggressively promoted” tax avoidance schemes. It was fined £150,000 in 2022.

In January that year, the Guardian newspaper first reported links between Mr Barrowman, Baroness Mone and PPE Medpro. The pair denied involvement until December 2023, when she admitted in a BBC interview that they had lied about their links with the company.

The National Crime Agency is now investigating suspected criminal offences at the firm. Mr Barrowman and Baroness Mone both deny any wrongdoing.

Author Andrew Lownie, who is writing a biography of the prince, said: “Andrew has a long history of associating with dubious business figures and disguising his business activities behind nominee and offshore accounts. There really needs to be a full investigation into the duke’s financial activities.”

Pitch@Palace was a start-up competition, founded in 2014, where entrepreneurs would pitch their ideas to possible investors in the hope of winning their backing. It had two parts:

• a UK-based version, set up as a community interest company, which cannot pay profits to shareholders
• an international arm, Pitch@Palace Global Ltd, which held competitions in places such as Australia, Bahrain and China, and was set up as a for-profit UK company

Both arms of Pitch@Palace suspended operations following the Newsnight interview in 2019 about the prince’s links to the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, which led to Andrew stepping down as a working royal.

Nonetheless, the international operation has emerged as a possible way for the duke to fund his lifestyle. In a court witness statement from 2023, Mr Yang wrote that the duke had needed money “and saw the relationships with China through Pitch as one possible source of funding”.

Earlier this year a Dutch company said it was in talks to buy it, saying it saw “immense value” in the network, even though it had suspended operations.

However, Prince Andrew has never held the company in his own name.

Founded in 2017, Pitch@Palace Global Ltd was initially held in the name of Amanda Thirsk, the prince’s private secretary, in an arrangement often used by the Royal Family.

But early in 2021, the legal ownership was transferred to Knox House Trustees (UK) Limited.

This company had been set up the year before, and Mr Barrowman was named as having “significant influence and control” over it.

Corporate filings in the Isle of Man show Knox House Trustees (UK) was ultimately owned by Knox Limited, whose sole shareholder is Mr Barrowman.

In 2023, ownership of Knox House Trustees (UK) Ltd – which still owned Pitch@Palace Global – was transferred to Arthur Lancaster, an accountant who has a longstanding working relationship with both the prince and Mr Barrowman. This remains the situation today.

The same year Mr Lancaster took over as the sole director and shareholder of PPE Medpro. He was also a director of many of the companies involved in the AML tax avoidance case.

The judge in that case called him “evasive” and said he had “real concerns as to the reliability of Mr Lancaster’s evidence”, which contained “significant inconsistencies”.

After the case, his lawyer wrote to the court arguing that the conclusions were “unnecessarily harsh”, that Mr Lancaster had been a “diligent and truthful witness”, and that his efforts to provide information had been hampered by the Covid pandemic.

For decades the Royal Family has held investments through nominees, and still does. In the past this has served to keep details of their holdings private, though not in this case. Prince Andrew’s involvement in Pitch@Palace Global is well known, and he is listed as having “significant influence or control” over the company on Companies House.

Mr Barrowman’s lawyer said in a statement: “Mr Lancaster was a director of KHT (UK) Ltd which provided company administration services to a number of external companies, including Pitch@Palace, a company wholly owned by the duke. Mr Lancaster acted for the duke in a personal capacity at all times and has been an associate of the duke for many years.”

Mr Lancaster declined to comment. Prince Andrew did not respond to requests for comment.

A teenager has been charged after Australian opposition leader Peter Dutton’s office was vandalised for the third time during the election campaign.

The Liberal Party leader’s office in Arana Hills, Brisbane was splattered in red paint, and covered with posters criticising his stance on a number of issues.

Police say four people seen acting suspiciously at the site in the early hours of the morning fled when officers arrived, but an 18-year-old woman was tracked by the dog squad and charged with causing wilful damage.

Australians vote in an election on Saturday, 3 May, and Dutton has in recent days caused controversy for his comments about ceremonial Aboriginal rites.

The opposition leader has been criticised by some Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders, including former party colleagues, after saying Aboriginal “welcome to country” ceremonies are “overdone”. The short ritual has become standard at public events and recognises traditional land owners.

One of the posters plastered on his office said “always was, always will be Aboriginal land”. Others criticised his comments about finding “common ground” with Donald Trump, his stance on the Israel-Gaza war, and his links to mining billionaire Gina Rinehart.

The same office was vandalised earlier this month, with the words “maggot” and “scum” written in black, and again a few days later, with a window smashed and white paint splashed across the entrance.

Dutton is yet to comment on the vandalism, but members of his party have previously said attacks on political offices are “out of control”.

“Unfortunately this is an increasingly frequent occurrence, not just targeting Peter’s office – although his has been targeted a number of times – but targeting members of parliament all around the country with graffiti and even more serious acts of violence,” James Paterson told Sky News Australia last week.

Prosecutors have dropped some of the charges against an Australian woman accused of killing three relatives and seriously injuring another with a toxic mushroom lunch.

Erin Patterson will not face trial over allegations she also attempted to murder her husband, after those charges were withdrawn.

She still faces four charges: three counts of murder and one of attempted murder.

The 50-year-old has always maintained her innocence and has pleaded not guilty, with her trial to begin in the Supreme Court of Victoria on Wednesday.

Three people died in hospital days after the July 2023 lunch, including Patterson’s former in-laws, Don Patterson, 70, and Gail Patterson, 70, as well as Gail’s sister, Heather Wilkinson, 66.

Heather’s husband, 68-year-old Baptist pastor Ian Wilkinson, survived after weeks of treatment in hospital.

The jury has been picked and is receiving instructions from the judge ahead of opening statements, which are expected Wednesday.

Justice Christopher Beale told the jury that most if not all them would probably have been aware of the previous charges in relation to Patterson’s husband, but said that the Director of Public Prosecutions had dropped them.

“In other words… you must put them out of your mind,” he said.

He also urged them to “dispassionately” weigh the evidence in the case, using their heads and not their hearts.

The trial is being held at a small courthouse in Morwell, about 60km (37 miles) from Leongatha, Victoria, where prosecutors allege the lunch took place.

One week after a devastating militant attack near the mountain resort of Pahalgam in Indian-administered Kashmir killed 26 people, the town wears a look of quiet desolation, although tourists have begun trickling back in small numbers.

The main high street, abandoned by visitors last week – with shops shuttered and hotels completely emptied out – is seeing fleeting signs of life again.

Last Tuesday, militants opened fire on people, mostly tourists, who were visiting Baisaran, a mountain-top meadow three miles (5 km) from Pahalgam, often described as the “Switzerland of India”.

The attack was one of the deadliest in recent years, devastating the lives of many families and sparking widespread anger in India.

In the days since, tensions between India and Pakistan, which both claim Kashmir in full but administer it only in part, have significantly risen, with each side announcing retaliatory measures against the other.

There is now growing speculation about whether there will be a military response from Delhi. The government in Kashmir has closed down over half the tourist destinations in the valley, as authorities review the security situation and carry out search operations.

While violence has often broken out in the region, with militants targeting security forces and civilians since an insurgency broke out in 1989, the brazen killing of tourists has been rare and has shocked local businesses and tourists alike.

Tourism is a mainstay of the economy in places like Pahalgam and there’s now fear that many livelihoods might be irrevocably hit.

At a “selfie point” outside town, overlooking lush meadows and a rushing river, Akshay Solanki, a tourist from Mumbai, said there was “panic” among his group of travellers on the day of the attack. But they had decided to continue with their journey because flights back home had become unaffordable.

Other tourists said constant reassurances from the locals and security forces had given them a sense of comfort. A driver who had brought visitors from the capital, Srinagar, told BBC Hindi that he was pleading with those visiting not to “distance” themselves from Kashmir.

After a washout three days, shawl-seller Rafi Ahmed said he’d managed to sell just a few pieces and feared for his livelihood in the long run if tourists stopped coming.

Among those exhorting tourists to come to Pahalgam was Bollywood actor Atul Kulkarni, who visited the town days after the attack. He told BBC Hindi, if the message from the militants was “don’t come here, we should respond by coming in even larger numbers”.

“Don’t cancel bookings, cancel your other plans and come here,” Kulkarni said.

But uncertainty and apprehension loom large in Pahalgam and it could take several years before a sense of normalcy is restored, local business owners and residents told the BBC.

Indian authorities have launched combing operations in the region, detaining hundreds of people and destroying homes belonging to alleged militants.

India and Pakistan have also reportedly exchanged small arms fire across the border.

The escalation in tensions is keeping tourists and business owners on tenterhooks.

Indian authorities have often claimed Kashmir witnessed a period of relative peace after Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government revoked its autonomous status in 2019. Ahead of India’s general elections in 2024, Modi hailed the “freedom” that had come to the region, saying Kashmir was touching new heights of development because it was breathing freely.

Top leaders pointed to high tourism numbers – some 23 million last year and millions more in the years before – as proof of a big boom after years of unquiet. But last week’s attacks have, yet again, shattered any idea of lasting peace in the restive valley.

“This [attack] is a blot on us…How we wipe it off is a long-term concern,” Rafi Ahmed Meer, a politician from Pahalgam told BBC Hindi, urging tourists to remember that it was local Kashmiris who rushed to help after the attacks, even picking up bodies.

The cancellation rate for trips planned from cities like Pune, Mumbai and Bengaluru are very high, Abhishek Sansare, a Mumbai-based tour operator told the BBC. A group of prominent tour operators said in a press conference that some 80-90% of all bookings had been cancelled.

“After the attack, there’s a sense that a war is looming. So tourists are confused about what to do,” said Sansare. “Some of those who’ve already made advance bookings are going ahead with their plans. I’m also going there on the 2nd of next month.”

The attack on tourists is also likely to weigh on Kashmir in other ways. The inauguration of the world’s highest single-arch rail bridge, set to connect the Kashmir valley with the rest of India was slated to happen this month after several delays.

The timeline for the opening of this showpiece project now “looks uncertain”, a source told the BBC.

The region was just beginning to attract fledgling business investments, but those too could dry up if hostilities go up.

“People who were investing in logistics and other sectors will now think twice because of the security environment. Until they regain some confidence, I don’t foresee investments coming to Kashmir immediately,” said Ubair Shah, who owns one of Kashmir’s largest cold storage facilities for fruits in Pulwama district in south Kashmir.

As the region continues to boil over, local leaders have expressed deep anguish to the families who lost their loved ones.

In an impassioned speech in the Jammu and Kashmir assembly on Monday, the state’s chief minister and tourism minister Omar Abdullah paid tributes to the victims by reading out names of all the 26 people.

He said people from every part of the country had come under attack, and while they’d come to Kashmir at his invitation he could not ensure their safe return.

“I had no words to apologise to them. What could I say to the children who saw their father drenched in blood? To the widow of the navy officer who was married barely a few days ago?

“Some people told me they’d come to Kashmir for the first time, but will have to pay for their holiday life long,” he said, adding that the attack had “hollowed out” Kashmir.

Hong Kong has released four former opposition lawmakers who were among dozens of pro-democracy leaders jailed under the city’s controversial National Security Law (NSL).

The four – Claudia Mo, Kwok Ka-ki, Jeremy Tam and Gary Fan – had pleaded guilty and were each sentenced to four years and two months behind bars in November.

They were released on Tuesday because the fact they had been in prison since their arrests in 2021 was taken into account when calculating their sentence.

The four lawmakers were part of a group known as the Hong Kong 47. They were accused of trying to overthrow the government by running an unofficial primary to pick opposition candidates for local elections.

Police said they had left their correctional facilities early on Tuesday.

This was the biggest trial under the national security law (NSL) which China imposed on the city shortly after explosive pro-democracy protests in 2019.

Hundreds of thousands took to the streets in a months-long standoff against Beijing. Triggered by a proposed government treaty that would have allowed extradition to mainland China, the protests quickly grew to reflect wider demands for democratic reform.

Beijing and Hong Kong authorities argue the law is necessary to maintain stability and deny it has weakened autonomy.

But critics have called it “the end of Hong Kong” and say it has created a climate of fear in the city.

The Hong Kong 47 included famous figures like Joshua Wong and Benny Tai, who were icons of the 2014 pro-democracy protests that rocked Hong Kong.

Others were arrested after they stormed the city’s Legislative Council (LegCo) and spray-painted Hong Kong’s emblem in what became a pivotal moment in the 2019 protests.

A total of 45 people were jailed for conspiring to commit subversion. Two of the defendants were acquitted in May.

The sentences were widely condemned by the international community including the UK and the US.

Claudia Mo, known affectionately in Cantonese as Auntie Mo, is among the most well known of the group.

A prominent opposition lawmaker, the 67-year-old helped set up the now disbanded opposition Civic Party in 2006 and by 2012 she had won a seat in LegCo.

She was among 15 lawmakers who resigned en masse from LegCo after four pro-democracy lawmakers were ousted in November 2020. The move left LegCo with no opposition presence.

Kwok Ka-ki and Jeremy Tam were also former Civic Party lawmakers. Gary Fan was a co-founder of another opposition party, the Neo Democrats.

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has dismissed concerns that election spending promises could jeopardise the country’s prized AAA sovereign credit rating.

Analysts at S&P Global this week wrote that Australia’s public spending was at “post-war highs”, and warned both major parties that the country’s rating was at risk if savings were not found.

Party leaders have made big spending promises in Australia’s tightly-fought election, scheduled for 3 May – with the cost of living a critical issue for voters.

Speaking to reporters on Tuesday morning, Albanese said that he was proud of his Labor Party’s economic record, adding that he “delivered responsible economic management”.

Earlier, Albanese had said the authors of the S&P report “must have been beside themselves”. He added: “The Coalition left us with a A$78bn ($5bn; £3.7bn) deficit. We turned that into a $2bn surplus.”

Angus Taylor, Australia’s shadow treasurer, wrote on social media that Albanese “mocking the ratings agency shows he’s not fit to lead”.

During Australia’s election campaign, both main parties have pledged billions of dollars for housing, healthcare and energy – aimed at easing cost pressures for citizens.

But the S&P report wrote that “larger, structural deficits”, coupled with more volatility in the global economy, could threaten Australia’s AAA credit rating – the highest tier.

Sovereign credit ratings are an indication of a country’s creditworthiness. The highest rating means a country can borrow at cheaper rates.

Only 11 countries currently have a AAA sovereign credit rating from S&P, including Australia, Germany and Denmark – higher than the US and UK.

Anthony Walker, one of the S&P Global report’s authors, told Sky News Australia that neither party seemed “interested” in raising taxes to fund their spending plans.

“We are seeing tax cuts in the next 12 to 18 months from both parties. So the answer for us is: ‘Is there going to be additional taxes to cover it? Are they going to find internal savings or are they just going to keep debt funding it?'”

The warning came on the same day Albanese’s ruling Labor Party announced costing plans.

If re-elected, the government said it would slash $6.4bn in costs on consultants, and raise $760m by increasing application fees for student visas.

The first sign of trouble Peter Hughes noticed was when his train to Madrid started to slow down.

Then the TV monitor and lights went off. Emergency lights switched on, but did not last, and the locomotive ground to a halt.

Four hours later, Mr Hughes was still stuck on the train 200 kilometres (124 miles) outside of Spain’s capital. He had food and water, but the toilets were not working.

“It will be getting dark soon and we could be stuck here for hours,” he told the BBC.

The massive power cut that stranded Mr Hughes triggered chaos across Spain and Portugal, and also impacted Andorra and parts of France, from about midday local time (10:00 GMT).

Traffic lights shut off. Metros closed. Businesses shuttered and people joined queues to get cash as card payments did not work.

Jonathan Emery was on a different train halfway between Seville and Madrid when the cuts hit.

For an hour, he sat on the train, the doors closed, until people could pry them open to let in ventilation. Half an hour later, passengers left, only to find themselves stranded.

That was when people from local villages started coming and dropping off supplies – water, bread, fruit.

“Nobody is charging for anything, and word must be getting around in the local town because people just keep coming,” he said.

Commuters in Madrid were left confused in the dark when the blackout hit the city’s metro station network. One resident, Sarah Jovovich, was getting off the train when the lights went out.

People were “hysterical” and “panicking”, she told the BBC. “It was quite chaotic really.”

Mobile phones had stopped working and nobody had any information. Once out of the metro station, she found the roads gridlocked with heavy traffic.

“No-one understood anything. Businesses were closed and buses were full,” she said.

Hannah Lowney was halfway through scanning her grocery shopping at Aldi when the power went out in the Spanish capital.

People were coming out of their offices and walking home because they could not tell when the buses were coming, Ms Lowney said in a voice message sent to BBC Radio 5 Live.

“It’s a bit disconcerting that it’s the whole country, I’ve never experienced this before,” she said.

Mark England was eating lunch in the restaurant of the hotel where he is staying on holiday in Benidorm when “everything went off and the fire alarm started going off and the fire doors started closing”.

In an international school in Lisbon, the electricity flickered on and off for a while, then gave up, teacher Emily Thorowgood said.

She kept teaching in the dark, the children in good spirits, but lots of parents were taking their children out of school, she said.

Will David, a Brit living in Lisbon, was having a haircut and beard trim in the basement of a barber when the power went down. The barber found him a spot by the window upstairs to finish the cut with scissors.

“The walk home felt very strange, both with the lack of traffic lights meaning a complete free-for-all for vehicles and pedestrians on the roads – as well as so many people milling around outside their places of work with nothing to do,” he said.

Initially, mobile phone networks also went down for some, leaving many scrambling for information.

Curtis Gladden, who is in La Vall D’Uixo, about 30 miles from Valencia, said it was “scary” as he struggled to get updates about what was happening.

Eloise Edgington, who could not do any work as a copywriter in Barcelona, said she was only receiving occasional messages, could not load web pages on her phone and was trying to conserve her battery.

An hour and a half after the power went out, one resident of Fortuna, in south-east Spain, said her husband was driving around, trying to find a petrol station that could supply fuel to run a generator and keep their fridge powered.

“We are worried about food, water, cash and petrol in case this goes on for a couple of days,” said Lesley, a Brit who has been living in Spain for 11 years.

• LIVE UPDATES: Disruption continues after widespread power outage
• TRAVEL IMPACT: Flights cancelled and trains called off
• DAY IN PICTURES: The best news photographs from a day of chaos

Locals “have more to worry about” than the Madrid Open tennis tournament being suspended, she said, adding there is “very little news about what’s happened”.

Mr England said walking down the street in Benidorm, a “majority of shops are in darkness and shuttered or have people on the entrances saying you can’t come in. There’s no cash machines, no traffic lights so it’s strange.”

After Mr Gladden’s phone signal returned after about two hours, he and others ventured out to cafes, but found “nothing is working – we came to get some food and a drink but they can’t cook without electricity”.

Within two hours, Spanish power grid operator Red Electrica said it was beginning to recover power in the north and south of the country.

But two-and-a-half hours after the cuts, Madrid’s mayor José Luis Martínez-Almeida still urged all residents to “keep their movements to an absolute minimum and, if at all possible, to remain where they are”, in a video recorded from the city’s integrated emergency security centre.

At 15:00 local time, Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez pulled together an “extraordinary” meeting of Spain’s national security council.

Red Electrica CEO Eduardo Prieto said at a news conference shortly afterwards that it could take “between six and ten hours” to restore power.

Just before 16:00, electricity flicked back on in Malaga. By 17:00, the grid operator said power was being restored “in several areas of the north, south and west of the [Iberian] peninsula”.

Portugal’s power firm REN gave a more dire prediction, saying that it could “take up to a week” before the network was back to normal.

A state of emergency was later declared across Spain, with regions able to request special measures.

But by Monday evening, Sanchez said 50% of power had been restored across Spain, while REN said electricity had been restored to 750,000 customers. Many, however, remain without power.

Knock on effects continue: Back-up generators at airports kicked on, allowing most flights to leave on time, but some have been unable to operate.

Tom McGilloway, on holiday in Lisbon, was due to return to London on Monday night, but as of early evening did not know what would happen.

He said for the time being people were getting drinks and food – but vendors told him they would only be able to keep working until the batteries ran out on their payment terminals.

“If I need to book a hotel if the plane is cancelled, I don’t know how I can do it if payments are down,” he added.

“My partner’s parents are trying to get petrol so they can pick us up to take us back to Alentejo but many petrol stations are closed or not taking payment. We might be stuck with no plan for where to stay tonight.”

Spanish violinist Isaac Bifet went to a rehearsal in the morning at the symphony orchestra in Madrid. But the building was all dark and most of the other orchestra players hadn’t turned up because they were stranded with no transport.

People without cash were particularly stuck, he told the BBC, because online payments systems were down.

The day without power was “strange” and “a little medieval”, Mr Bifet said. But “the atmosphere was actually pretty nice.”

And with the electricity still out in his apartment, he spent the evening drinking beers with friends by candlelight.

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Three young children who are US citizens – including one with cancer – were deported to Honduras alongside their mothers last week, according to advocacy groups and the families’ lawyers.

One of the children is a four-year-old with Stage 4 cancer who was sent without medication, a lawyer for the child’s family said.

Donald Trump’s border czar Tom Homan said the mothers had made the choice for their citizen children to be removed with them. “Having a US citizen child does not make you immune from our laws,” he said, adding the mothers were in the US illegally.

Trump faced a backlash during his first term for a policy that separated thousands of children from their parents.

On Friday, New Orleans Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials deported the two mothers and three children aged two, four, and seven, to Honduras from Louisiana, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) said in a statement.

The two families – including one pregnant mother – had lived in the US for years and were “deported from the U.S. under deeply troubling circumstances that raise serious due process concerns”, the ACLU said.

One of the US citizen children who was removed was suffering from metastatic cancer and was deported without the ability to consult with doctors, the advocacy group alleged.

Speaking to reporters at a news conference on Monday morning, Homan said deporting families together was better than separating them.

“We’re keeping families together,” he said. “What we did was remove children with their mothers who requested the children depart with them. There’s a parental decision.”

Homan dismissed the use of the word “deported” to describe the removal of the children from the country.

“They weren’t deported. We don’t deport US citizens. Their parents made that decision, not the United States government,” he said.

Last week, a federal judge said he had a “strong suspicion” that one of the children deported to Honduras, a two-year-old citizen, – was sent away with “no meaningful process”.

The Louisiana-born child and her family members were apprehended during a routine appointment at a New Orleans immigration office on 22 April, according to court documents.

Homan, in an interview with CBS Face the Nation on Sunday, said “the judge was due process”, adding that the two-year-old’s mother “had due process at great taxpayer expense and was ordered by an immigration judge after those hearings, so she had due process.”

A hearing has been scheduled in the case for 19 May for the government to address whether the family was given due process.

The second family was detained on 24 April, when ICE refused to respond to their attorneys’ and family members’ requests to contact them, the ACLU said.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt on Monday touted the administration’s immigration enforcement actions during its first 100 days.

Leavitt said Trump would sign two new executive orders as a part of his crackdown on immigration, including one that directs officials to publish a list of places that administration has identified as “sanctuary cities”.

The term “sanctuary city” has been popular in the US for more than a decade to describe places that limit their assistance to federal immigration authorities. As it is not a legal term, cities have taken different approaches, some establishing policies in law and others simply changing policing practices.

Leavitt also touted an immigration raid at an “underground” nightclub in Colorado Springs, Colorado, on Sunday, where she said officials detained more than 100 undocumented immigrants and seized weapons and drugs.

The Drug Enforcement Administration wrote in a post on X that 114 immigrants were arrested and placed “on buses for processing and likely eventual deportation”.

Thousands of undocumented immigrants have been detained since Donald Trump returned to the White House on 20 January.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has announced a temporary ceasefire for the war in Ukraine.

The Kremlin said the ceasefire would run from the morning of 8 May until 11 May – which coincides with victory celebrations to mark the end of World War Two.

In response, Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha called for an immediate ceasefire lasting “at least 30 days”.

While US President Donald Trump, who has been attempting to broker a truce between the two sides, said he wants to see a permanent ceasefire, the White House said.

The Kremlin announced a similar, 30-hour truce over Easter, but while both sides reported a dip in fighting, they accused each other of hundreds of violations.

Ceasefires have been attempted more than 20 times in Ukraine – all of them failed eventually, and some within minutes of going into effect.

The most recent one, over Easter, was very limited in scope and only resulted in a slight reduction in fighting, with both sides accusing each other of violating the truce.

In a statement on Monday, the Kremlin said Putin declared the ceasefire “based on humanitarian considerations”.

A translation of the statement said: “Russia believes that the Ukrainian side should follow this example.

“In the event of violations of the ceasefire by the Ukrainian side, the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation will give an adequate and effective response.

“The Russian side once again declares its readiness for peace talks without preconditions, aimed at eliminating the root causes of the Ukrainian crisis, and constructive interaction with international partners.”

Following its release, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Sybiha said: “If Russia truly wants peace, it must cease fire immediately.”

“Why wait until May 8th?” he wrote on X. “If the fire can be ceased now and since any date for 30 days—so it is real, not just for a parade.”

He said Ukraine is ready to support a “lasting, durable, and full ceasefire. And this is what we are constantly proposing, for at least 30 days”.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Trump was growing “increasingly frustrated with leaders of both countries”.

“He wants to see a permanent ceasefire.

“I understand Vladimir Putin this morning offered a temporary ceasefire. The president has made it clear he wants to see a permanent ceasefire first to stop the killing, stop the bloodshed.”

The latest announcement comes during what the US has described as a “very critical” week for Russia-Ukraine peace talks.

Washington has been trying to broker a deal between the two sides, but the Donald Trump administration has threatened to pull out if they do not see progress.

Putin is keen to create the impression that Russia is serious about seeking peace – and he is keen for Trump to hear that message given Ukraine has accepted Washington’s proposal for a more lasting 30-day ceasefire.

It comes after the US president expressed annoyance with Russia’s continued attacks on Ukraine.

Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022, and currently controls about 20% Ukraine’s territory, including the southern Crimea peninsula annexed by Moscow in 2014.

It is estimated that hundreds of thousands of people – the vast majority of them soldiers – have been killed or injured on all sides since 2022.

Four people, including children, were killed and several others injured when a vehicle drove through a building used by an after-school camp in Illinois.

The victims at the YNOT After School Camp are believed to range in age from four to 18, police said.

The vehicle struck multiple people outside a building in Chatham on Monday afternoon, then continued through the building, hitting several people inside before exiting out the opposite side. It is unclear if it was deliberate.

Six people were injured and taken to hospital by ambulance and helicopter. Illinois State Police said the driver was unhurt and was taken to hospital for evaluation.

Police have not released the age of the driver and investigation for a motive is ongoing.

State police said they responded to the scene at about 15:30 local time (21:30 BST) on Monday. Three of the dead were struck by the vehicle outside the building, while one victim was hit inside the building.

Police across Illinois attended the scene to secure the area and help victims and parents locate their children, according to CBS, the BBC’s US partner.

Footage posted online appeared to show large holes in the building. Traffic near the scene was also shut down.

In a post on X, Illinois Governor JB Pritzker said his administration was monitoring the crash.

“Let’s wrap our arms around the community tonight as we receive updates on the situation,” he wrote.

Illinois state senator Doris Turner said she was “heartbroken” by the incident and that her office was ready to assist local authorities.

Chatham police department also asked for people to pray for the community in a Facebook post.

YNOT After School Camp runs outdoor programs for children, including field trips and activities such as hiking and fishing, according to their website.

Chatham is a village of 14,000 people about three miles (4.8km) outside of the state capital Springfield.

When is a ceasefire a genuine attempt to secure peace? And when is it simply PR?

It’s a question that’s been asked a lot lately.

Mostly in relation to Russia’s president.

Short ceasefires are becoming quite the Kremlin thing.

First, Vladimir Putin declared a 30-hour cessation of hostilities over Easter, portraying it as a “humanitarian” gesture.

Now the Kremlin leader has announced a three-day unilateral truce for early May. It will run from 8 May to 10 May to coincide with events marking the 80th anniversary of the end of World War Two.

In a statement, the Kremlin said that for 72 hours all military actions would cease. It cited “humanitarian” considerations (again) and made it clear Moscow expected Ukraine to follow suit.

In response to the proposal, Ukraine questioned why Russia could not commit to a ceasefire immediately and called for one to be implemented for at least 30 days.

“If Russia truly wants peace, it must cease fire immediately,” Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said, adding: “Why wait until May 8th?”

So, from the Russian president who launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine more than three years ago, is this a sincere effort to end the fighting?

Or simply a public relations exercise by the Kremlin to impress Donald Trump?

Kremlin critics will suspect PR.

During the extremely brief so-called Easter ceasefire, Ukraine had accused Russian troops of violating it repeatedly.

Moscow had used its announcement of a 30-hour pause in the fighting to send a signal to the White House: that in this war Russia is the peacemaker and Kyiv the aggressor. It accused Ukraine of ignoring what Moscow presented as an olive branch and of prolonging the war.

• Trump questions Putin’s desire for peace
• Critical week for US’s future in war talks

Recent comments by Trump suggest the US president hasn’t bought that.

In a post on his Truth Social platform at the weekend, Trump wrote that “there was no reason” for Putin “to be shooting missiles into civilian areas, cities and towns [in Ukraine], over the last few days”.

“It makes me think,” he added, “that maybe he doesn’t want to stop the war, he’s just tapping me along, and has to be dealt with differently, through ‘Banking’ or ‘Secondary Sanctions?’ Too many people are dying!!!”

Cue today’s announcement of another Russian ceasefire. This one slightly longer: three days. And, again, that claim of “humanitarian” concerns.

Another attempt to signal to Washington that the Kremlin has only the best of intentions? That Russia is really the good guy in all of this?

If so, it doesn’t appear to have worked. Not immediately. The White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt noted Moscow’s offer of a temporary ceasefire, but said: “The president [Donald Trump] has made it clear he wants to see a permanent ceasefire first to stop the killing, stop the bloodshed.

“He is increasingly frustrated with leaders of both countries,” Leavitt said.

It’s an indication that the US president may be losing patience now with the Kremlin, despite having directed most of his public criticism in recent months towards President Zelensky.

Last month the Trump administration was pushing both Russia and Ukraine to agree to a 30-day comprehensive unconditional ceasefire. Ukraine had signed up to that. Russia did not.

Already senior Russian officials are using President Putin’s three-day ceasefire offer to try to cast Ukraine in a bad light.

“It is doubtful that [President] Zelensky will support the decision of our president and accept the ceasefire,” the speaker of the lower house of the Russian parliament, Vyacheslav Volodin, told Russian state TV.

Hardly an encouraging sign, so soon after the announcement of another brief ceasefire.

Now predominantly Muslim, North Africa was once a Christian heartland, producing Catholic popes who left their mark on the Church to this day.

Their papacies were in the era of the Roman Empire, which stretched across modern-day Tunisia, the north-east of Algeria and the coast of western Libya.

“North Africa was the Bible Belt of ancient Christianity,” says Prof Christopher Bellitto, a historian at Kean University in the US.

Many Catholics in Africa are hoping that that the papacy will return to the continent for the first time in more than 1,500 years, as a successor to Pope Francis is chosen.

Here, we look at the three previous African popes – and how they got Christians to celebrate Easter Sunday and St Valentine’s Day.

All three have been recognised in the Church as saints.

Thought to be of Berber origin, Pope Victor I was in charge of the Catholic Church at a time when Christians were sometimes being persecuted by Roman officials for refusing to worship Roman gods.

He is perhaps best known for ensuring Christians celebrate Easter on a Sunday.

In the 2nd Century, some Christian groups from the Roman province of Asia (in modern-day Turkey) celebrated Easter on the same day that Jews celebrated Passover, which could fall on different days of the week.

However, Christians in the Western part of the Empire believed that Jesus was resurrected on a Sunday, so Easter should always be celebrated on that day.

The debate over when the resurrection took place made it an extremely contentious issue.

The “Easter controversy” was symbolic of larger conflicts between East and West, and whether or not Christians should follow Jewish practices.

Victor I called the very first Roman Synod – a gathering of Church leaders – to resolve the impasse.

He did this by threatening to excommunicate from the Church those bishops who refused to comply with his wishes.

“He was a rather forceful voice for getting everyone on literally the same page,” Prof Bellitto told the BBC.

This was an impressive feat, the historian said, because “he was the Bishop of Rome when Christianity was illegal in the Roman empire.”

Another important part of Victor I’s legacy was to introduce Latin as the common language of the Catholic Church. Previously Ancient Greek was the primary language of the Catholic Liturgy as well as official communication for the Church.

Victor I himself wrote in – and spoke – Latin, which was widely spoken in North Africa.

Pope Miltiades is believed to have been born in Africa.

During his reign, Christianity gained increasing acceptance from successive Roman emperors, eventually becoming the Empire’s official religion.

Before this, the persecution of Christians had been widespread at different points in the Empire’s history.

However, Prof Bellitto pointed out that Militiades was not responsible for this change, saying the Pope was the “recipient of the Roman benevolence” rather than being a great negotiator.

Miltiades was given a palace by the Roman Emperor Constantine, becoming the first pope to have an official residence.

He was also granted permission by Constantine to build the Lateran Basilica, now the oldest public church in Rome.

While modern popes live and work in the Vatican, the Lateran church is sometimes referred to in Catholicism as “the mother of all churches”.

Gelasius I is the only one of the three African popes who historians believe was not born in Africa.

“There’s a reference to him being… Roman-born. So we don’t know if he [ever] lived in North Africa, but it seems clear that he was of North African descent,” Prof Bellitto explained.

He was the most important of the three African church leaders, according to Prof Bellitto.

Gelasius I is widely recognised as the first pope to officially be called the “Vicar of Christ”, a term that signifies the Pope’s role as Christ’s representative on Earth.

He also developed the Doctrine of the Two Swords, which emphasised the separate-but-equal powers of the Church and the state.

Gelasius I made the critical distinction that both powers were given to the Church by God, who then delegated earthly power to the state, making the Church ultimately superior.

“Later on, in the Middle Ages, popes sometimes tried to veto the selection of an emperor or a king, because they said God gave them that power,” said Prof Bellitto.

Gelasius I is remembered, too, for his response to the Acacian Schism – a split between the Eastern and Western Christian Churches from 484 to 519.

During this period, Gelasius I asserted the supremacy of Rome and the papacy over the entire Church, East and West, which experts believe went further than any of his predecessors.

Gelasius is also responsible for a popular celebration which is still marked every year – establishing St Valentine’s Day on 14 February in 496 to commemorate the Christian martyr St Valentine.

Some accounts say Valentine was a priest who continued to perform weddings in secret when they were banned by Emperor Claudius II.

Historians believe that Valentine’s Day is rooted in the Roman love and fertility festival, Lupercalia, and was a move by Gelasius I to Christianise pagan traditions.

Prof Bellitto says there is no way of knowing with any degree of accuracy what the three popes looked like.

“We have to remember that the Roman Empire, and indeed the Middle Ages, didn’t think of race as we think of it nowadays. It had nothing to do with skin colour,” he told the BBC.

“People in the Roman Empire didn’t deal with race, they dealt with ethnicity.”

Prof Philomena Mwaura, an academic at Kenya’s Kenyatta University, told the BBC that Roman Africa was very multicultural, with local Berber and Punic groups, freed slaves and people who had come from Rome found there.

“The North African community was quite mixed, and it was a trade route also for many people who were involved in trade in the earlier antiquity,” she explained.

Rather than identifying with specific ethnic groups, “most people who belonged to areas within the Roman Empire regarded themselves as Roman”, Prof Mwaura added.

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None of of the 217 popes since Gelasius I are believed to have come from Africa.

“The church in North Africa was weakened by very many forces, including the fall of the Roman Empire and also the incursion of Muslims [into North Africa] in the 7th Century,” Prof Mwaura said.

However, some experts argue that the prevalence of Islam in North Africa does not explain the absence of a pope from the entire continent over more than 1,500 years.

Prof Bellitto said the process of electing a new pontiff became an “Italian monopoly” for many years.

However, he said there was a strong chance of a pope from Asia or Africa in the near future because Catholics in the southern hemisphere outnumber those in the north.

In fact, Catholicism is expanding more rapidly in sub-Saharan Africa today than anywhere else.

The latest figures show there were 281 million Catholics in Africa in 2023. This accounts for 20% of the worldwide congregation.

Three Africans are in the race to succeed Pope Francis – the Democratic Republic of Congo’s Fridolin Ambongo Besungu, Ghana’s Peter Kodwo Appiah Turkson and Guinea’s Robert Sarah.

But Prof Mwaura argued that “although Christianity is very strong in Africa, the power of the Church is still in the north, where the resources have been”.

“Maybe, as it continues to be very strong within the continent and supporting itself, then a time will come when there could be an African pope,” she said.

• Will the next pope be from Africa?
• Africa remembers Pope who spoke for the continent
• Extraordinary photos from the funeral of Pope Francis

Vancouver’s Lapu Lapu festival, meant to be a celebration of Filipino pride, ended in a wail of sirens and screams on Saturday.

Eleven people – the youngest just five – died and many more were hospitalised after a man drove an SUV through the crowd.

“A lot of us are still numb. A lot of us are still angry, confused, sad, devastated – and some of us don’t know how to feel, what to feel,” says R. J. Aquino, chairman of Filipino B.C., the organisation which put on the festival.

He spoke at a vigil attended by hundreds of people from across the Lower Mainland on Sunday night.

“Honestly, I’m kind of all of the above right now,” he adds.

Those who had been at the festival site all day were left with an intense feeling of shock, sorrow and fury in the aftermath of the attack.

Roger Peralta and Bjorn Villarreal, friends who both arrived in Canada in 2016, spent the evening listening to the music and eating the food of their homeland.

“Suddenly I hear this unimaginable noise,” Bjorn recalls.

“It was a loud bang,” Roger says.

Both men describe seeing bodies bouncing off an SUV just meters away from them.

“I did not run away,” Bjorn continues. “I actually followed the vehicle, because I felt like I could stop him.

“It was horrendous. A lot of people [were] just lying on the street and crying and begging for help.”

Almost a day later, Roger is still in shock and unable to sleep as the scene replays in his mind. He says he is finding himself having to stop and cry.

But he also spoke of a strong Filipino spirit which he says will lift the community.

“We have in our culture Bayanihan,” he explains, which translates as a spirit of unity and cooperation among Filipinos.

“When you meet another Filipino, even if you don’t know them, you greet them, you feel like they’re family, even if you’re not.”

The Premier of British Columbia, David Eby, has also paid tribute to the Filipino community in Canada, saying he didn’t “think there’s a British Columbian who hasn’t been touched in some way by the Filipino community”.

“You can’t go to a place that delivers care in our province and not meet a member of that community,” he said.

“Our long-term care homes, our hospitals, childcare, schools. This is a community that gives and gives.”

Bjorn, who works at a hospital as a magnetic resonance imaging technologist, agrees.

“We are very caring people,” he says.

Both he and Roger were furious the SUV got into the crowd in the first place. They said they felt let down by Canada.

Premier Eby said he feels that rage too.

“But I want to turn the rage that I feel into ensuring that we stand with the Filipino community,” he said as he stood in front of a police cruiser blocking access to the crime scene.

“This event does not define us and the Filipino community or that celebration.”

The members of Kenya’s security forces who shot dead anti-tax protesters at the country’s parliament last June have been identified by the BBC.

The BBC’s analysis of more than 5,000 images also shows that those killed there were unarmed and not posing a threat.

The East African nation’s constitution guarantees the right to peaceful protest, and the deaths caused a public outcry.

Despite a parliamentary committee ordering Kenya’s Independent Policing Oversight Authority (IPOA) to investigate the deaths on the streets of the capital, Nairobi – and make public its findings – no report regarding the killings at parliament has yet been issued and no-one has been held to account.

The BBC World Service team analysed videos and photos taken by protesters and journalists on the day. We determined when each was taken using camera metadata, livestream timings and public clocks visible in the shots.

We plotted three of the killings on a 3D reconstruction of Kenya’s parliament, allowing us to trace the fatal shots back to the rifles of a police officer and a soldier.

What follows is BBC Africa Eye’s detailed timeline of events as Kenya’s MPs entered parliament for the final vote on the government’s controversial finance bill, while protesters amassed on the streets outside on Tuesday 25 June 2024.

Young people, labelled Gen Z protesters who had mobilised themselves on social media, began streaming into central Nairobi early in the morning – in what would be the capital’s third large-scale protest since the finance bill was introduced on 9 May.

“It was a beautiful party,” says prominent human rights activist Boniface Mwangi, who was there.

“Kids came out with Bluetooth speakers and their water. It was a carnival.”

Protests earlier in the week had already led lawmakers to axe tax increases on bread, cooking oil, mobile money and motor vehicles, as well as an eco levy that would have raised the cost of goods like nappies and sanitary towels.

But other measures to raise the $2.7bn (£2bn) the government said it needed to cut its reliance on external borrowing, such as higher import taxes and another on specialised hospitals, remained.

“For the first time it was the Kenyan people – the working class and the middle class and the lower class – against the ruling class,” says Mwangi.

The protesters had one target – parliament, where the final vote was taking place.

By 09:30 local time, the last of the MPs filed into the lower house.

Outside, thousands pushed towards Parliament Road from the east, north and west of the city.

“For me, it was just a normal day,” says 26-year-old student journalist Ademba Allans.

People were livestreaming on their TikTok and Instagram accounts, while events were broadcast live on national TV, he adds.

At first, protesters were held back at roadblocks by tear gas and truncheons, then police started using water cannons and rubber bullets.

By 13:00, more than 100,000 people were on the streets.

“The numbers start getting bigger and people actually start getting arrested,” says Allans. “The police are everywhere. They’re trying to push people back. People are even climbing on top of those water cannons.”

Despite the growing chaos outside, MPs remained in the chamber and the voting began.

By 14:00, protesters had pushed police all the way back to the north-eastern corner of parliament.

Inside at 14:14, the Finance Bill 2024 was voted in: 195 in favour, 106 against. Opposition MPs stormed out and word instantly reached the masses outside.

“This is when everybody is saying: ‘Whatever happens, we are going to enter the parliament and show the MPs that we believe in what we’re fighting for,'” says Allans.

At 14:20, protesters finally broke through the police blockade and reached the road running alongside parliament.

An abandoned police truck stationed outside the gates was set on fire. Fences were torn down and protesters set foot on parliamentary grounds. The incursion was short-lived. Parliamentary security forces quickly cleared them out.

At the same time, police officers went back up Parliament Road in force to drive the protesters back.

While this was happening, journalists were filming, producing minute-by-minute footage from many angles.

One of those videos captured a plain-clothes police officer shouting “uaa!”, the Swahili word for “kill”. Seconds later, a police officer knelt, gunshots were heard and protesters in the crowd collapsed – seven in total.

David Chege, a 39-year-old software engineer and Sunday-school teacher, and Ericsson Mutisya, a 25-year-old butcher, were shot dead. Five other men were wounded, one of whom was left paralysed from the waist down.

Footage shows Allans, the student journalist, holding up a Kenyan flag as he tried to reach Chege and another casualty bleeding out after the gunfire.

But who fired those shots?

In the video of the officer shouting, “uaa!”, the shooter’s back was to the camera. But the BBC compared his body armour, riot shield and headgear with that of every police officer at the scene.

In his case, he had an upturned neck guard. We matched his distinctive uniform to an officer in a video recorded seconds later. There, he made sure to hide his face before firing into the crowd. We do not know his name.

Even after the fatal shots, the plain-clothes officer could still be heard urging his colleagues forward to “kill”. He was not so cautious about concealing his identity: his name is John Kaboi.

Multiple sources have told the BBC he is based at the Central Nairobi Police Station.

The BBC put its allegations to Kenya’s police service, which said the force could not investigate itself, adding that the IPOA was responsible for investigating alleged misconduct.

Kaboi has been approached for comment and not replied.

No-one has been held accountable for the deaths of Chege or Mutisya. The BBC found that neither of them was armed.

But these would not be the only lives lost. Rather than spook the demonstrators, the killings galvanised them and they tried for parliament again.

At 14:57 they made it in.

Footage shows them breaking down the fences and walking across the parliament’s grounds. Many had their hands up. Others were holding placards or the Kenyan flag.

Warning shots were fired. The demonstrators ducked down, then continued towards the building, filming on their phones as they went.

Once inside, momentum turned to mayhem. Doors were kicked in, part of the complex was set alight and the last of the MPs fled the building.

The destruction was severe but, after five minutes, footage showed them leaving the same way they had come in.

At 15:04, shots rang out again and protesters tumbled across the flattened fence. As the smoke cleared, camera footage showed three bodies lying on the ground. Two were wounded – one raised his hand but could not get up.

The third, 27-year-old finance student Eric Shieni, was dead – shot in the head from behind as he was leaving the grounds. The BBC again found, as in the cases of Chege and Mutisya, that he had been unarmed.

BBC Africa Eye analysed more than 150 images taken during the minutes before and after Shieni was shot. We are able to identify the soldier who fired at the back of his head from 25m (82ft) away – again, we do not know his name.

“The video is very clear,” says Faith Odhiambo, president of the Law Society of Kenya.

“The aim was to kill those protesters. They could have had him arrested. But the fact that you shoot his head – it was clearly an intention to kill.

“You have become the judge, the jury and the sentence executioner for Eric.”

The Kenyan Defence Forces (KDF) told the BBC the IPOA had not forwarded any request to look into any of its personnel involved in the operations at parliament.

It added: “The KDF remains fully committed to upholding the rule of law and continues to operate strictly within its constitutional mandate.”

After the shooting Allans is seen again, leading the evacuation. Footage shows him carrying a man with blood gushing from his leg.

“I feared for my life, that my parents would never see me again,” he says.

“But I also feared to let other people die when I could help.”

People outside the UK can watch here

As the sun set on 25 June, the country was reeling. After a week of protests, the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights declared that 39 people had died and 361 had been injured around the country.

That evening President William Ruto thanked his security officers for their “defence of the nation’s sovereignty” against “organised criminals” who had “hijacked” the protests.

The following day, the finance bill was dropped.

“Listening keenly to the people of Kenya, who have said loudly that they want nothing to do with this Finance Bill 2024, I concede,” the president said in a national televised address, adding he would not sign it into law.

But to this day no security officer has been held to account for the deaths and no official investigation has been published.

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A massive power cut has caused widespread disruption in parts of Spain and Portugal, with airports, trains and petrol stations impacted.

The chaos has also hit stores, with some supermarkets shutting and local grocery stores switching to cash as card payments stopped working.

Here we collect some of the day’s most powerful news photographs.

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During last year’s presidential campaign, Donald Trump constantly repeated his intention to bring about dramatic change as soon as he returned to the White House.

But few expected it to come at such breakneck speed.

In the three months since he took the oath of office, the 47th president has deployed his power in a way that compares to few predecessors.

In stacks of bound documents signed off with a presidential pen and policy announcements made in all caps on social media, his blizzard of executive actions has reached into every corner of American life.

To his supporters, the shock-and-awe approach has been a tangible demonstration of an all-action president, delivering on his promises and enacting long-awaited reforms.

But his critics fear he is doing irreparable harm to the country and overstepping his powers – crippling important government functions and perhaps permanently reshaping the presidency in the process.

Here are six turning points from the first 100 days.

For once, it wasn’t a Trump social media post that sparked an outcry.

Three weeks into the new term, at 10.13am on a Sunday morning, Vice-President JD Vance wrote nine words that signalled a strategy which has since shaped the Trump administration’s second term.

“Judges aren’t allowed to control the executive’s legitimate power,” he declared on X.

In the media frenzy that followed, legal experts lined up to challenge that assertion, pointing to a 220-year-old principle which lies at the heart of American democracy.

Courts have the power to check and strike down any government action – laws, regulations and executive orders – they think violates the US Constitution.

Vance’s words represented a brazen challenge to judicial authority and, more broadly, the system of three co-equal branches of government crafted by America’s founders.

But Trump and his team remain unapologetic in extending the reach of the executive branch into the two other domains – Congress and the courts.

The White House has moved aggressively to wrest control of spending from Congress, unilaterally defunding programmes and entire agencies.

This erosion of its power has been largely met by silence on Capitol Hill, where Trump’s Republicans hold slim majorities in both chambers.

The courts have been more resistant, with well over 100 rulings so far halting presidential actions they deem to be unconstitutional, according to a tally by the New York Times.

Some of the biggest clashes have been over Trump’s immigration crackdown. In March, more than 200 Venezuelans deemed a danger to the US, were deported to El Salvador, many under sweeping wartime powers and without the usual process of evidence being presented in court.

A Republican-appointed judge on a federal appeals court said he was “shocked” by how the White House had acted.

“Now the branches come too close to grinding irrevocably against one another in a conflict that promises to diminish both,” Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson wrote.

Trump and White House officials have said they will obey court rulings, even as the president lambasts many of the judges who issue them and the administration at times moves slowly to fully comply.

It all amounts to a unique test of a constitutional system that for centuries has operated under a certain amount of good faith.

While Trump has been at the centre of this push, one of his principal agents of chaos is a man who wasn’t born in the US, but who built a business empire there.

Elon Musk, dressed in black from head to toe and wearing sunglasses, stood centre stage and basked in the adulation of the Conservative Political Action Conference crowd.

The richest man in the world, who wants to cut trillions of dollars from the federal government, said he had a special surprise.

Argentinian President Javier Milei, known for his own budget-slashing, emerged from backstage and handed him a shiny gold chainsaw.

“This is the chainsaw for bureaucracy,” Musk exclaimed. “CHAINSAW!!”

It was a dramatic illustration not only of Musk’s enthusiasm for his “Department of Government Efficiency” (Doge) assignment, but also of the near rock-star status that the South African-born technologist has developed among the Trump faithful.

Since that appearance, Musk has dispatched his operatives across the federal government, pushing to access sensitive government databases and identify programmes to slash.

Although he has not come anywhere near to finding the trillions of dollars of waste he once promised, his cuts have drastically reduced dozens of agencies and departments – essentially shutting down the US Agency for International Development (USAID) and attempting to dismantle the Department of Education.

While pledges to cut “waste, fraud and abuse” in government and trim the ballooning federal deficit typically have broad appeal, the manner in which Musk has used his metaphorical chainsaw has led to conflict with senior government officials and stoked anger among some of the American public.

Some Trump supporters may approve of the administration’s aggressive budget-cutting but other constituents have berated Republican legislators at town hall events.

Hecklers have expressed fear that the cuts will adversely affect popular government programmes like Social Security retirement plans, veterans benefits, and health insurance coverage for the poor and elderly.

Their concerns may not be entirely misplaced, given that these schemes make up the bulk of federal spending.

If these programmes are not cut back, sweeping tax cuts that Trump has promised would further increase the scale of US government debt and put at risk arguably his biggest election promise – economic prosperity.

When trader Richard McDonald saw Trump hold up his charts in the White House Rose Garden showing a list of countries targeted by US tariffs, he knew he had to act fast.

“I jumped to my feet because I wasn’t expecting a board [of charts] – I was expecting an announcement,” he says.

McDonald expected tariff cuts of 10% or 20%, but says “nobody expected these huge numbers”.

He raced to understand which companies might be worst hit. Then he sold.

“There are billions being wiped off share prices every second, so it’s really ‘fastest finger first’.”

He is one of the many traders who were at the coal face of global markets when share prices plunged everywhere following Trump’s so-called “Liberation Day” tariff announcement.

The S&P 500 index of the largest firms listed in the US was hit particularly hard – and even though the White House has reversed course on some of the highest tariffs, it hasn’t fully recovered since.

The economy was the biggest concern for US voters in November’s election, and Trump rode a tide of deep unhappiness over Biden’s handling of inflation all the way to victory.

His pledge to cut prices, pare back government regulation and boost homegrown industry was a pro-business message warmly welcomed on Wall Street and by many working Americans.

But as Trump tries to follow through on his promise of new tariffs, the economic costs, at least in the short term, have become painfully apparent.

The stock market is sinking, interest rates – including for home mortgages – are rising, and consumer confidence is down. Unemployment is also ticking up, in part due to the growing number of federal employees forced out of their jobs.

The Federal Reserve Bank, along with economic experts, warn Trump’s plan will shrink economic growth and possibly lead to a recession.

While the president’s approval ratings on his handling of the economy have tumbled, many of his supporters are sticking with him. And in former industrial areas hollowed out by the loss of manufacturing jobs, there are hopes that tariffs could even the global playing field.

“Trump has earned back the respect,” says truck driver Ben Maurer in Pennsylvania, referring to tariffs on China. “We are still the force to be reckoned with.”

Economic concerns have contributed to Trump’s overall decline in the polls, but in one key area, he is still largely on solid ground in the public’s eye – immigration.

“It’s him! It’s him! I recognise his features,” says Myrelis Casique Lopez, pointing at a photo of men shackled and cuffed on the floor of one of the most infamous prisons in the world.

She had spotted her son in the image, taken from above, of a sea of shaven heads belonging to men in white T-shirts sat in long, straight rows.

At home in Maracay, Venezuela, Ms Casique was shown the photograph, first shared online by the El Salvador authorities, by a BBC reporter.

When she last had contact with her son, he was in the US and facing deportation to Venezuela but now he was 1,430 miles (2,300 km) away from her, one of 238 men sent by US authorities to a notorious mega-jail in El Salvador.

The Trump administration says they are members of the Tren de Aragua gang – a powerful, multi-national crime operation – but Ms Casique insists her son is innocent.

A tough stance on immigration was a central plank of Trump’s re-election campaign, and the president has used his broad powers of enforcement to deliver that pledge.

Illegal border crossings were falling at the end of the Biden presidency, but are now at their lowest monthly total for more than four years.

A majority of the US public still backs the crackdown, but it has had a chilling effect on communities of foreign students who have found themselves caught up in the blitz.

Some, including permanent residents, have been detained and face deportation because of their role in pro-Palestinian campus protests. They have rejected accusations that they support Hamas.

Civil rights lawyers warn that some migrants are being deported without due process, sweeping up the innocent among the “killers and thugs” that Trump says are being targeted.

While so far there haven’t been the level of mass deportations that some hoped for and others feared, newly empowered immigration enforcement agents have taken action across the US in businesses, homes and churches.

They have been active in universities too, which have become a prominent target of President Trump in several other ways.

On 21 April, Harvard University’s president, Alan Garber, decided to confront the White House head-on.

In a letter to the university community, he announced a lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s move to freeze billions of dollars in federal grants.

It was, he said, an illegal attempt to “impose unprecedented and improper control” over Harvard’s operations.

The White House said it had to take action because Harvard had not tackled antisemitism on campus – an issue that Garber said the university was taking steps to address.

But the Ivy League college’s move was the most prominent display of resistance against Trump’s use of presidential power to target American higher education, a longstanding goal energised by pro-Palestinian protests that engulfed campuses in 2024.

The president and his officials have since impounded or threatened to withhold billions of dollars in federal spending to reshape elite institutions like Harvard, which the president and many of his supporters think push a liberal ideology on students and researchers.

Earlier in the month, Columbia University in New York City had agreed to a number of White House demands, including changes to its protest policies, campus security practices and Middle Eastern studies department.

A similar dynamic has played out in the corporate and media worlds.

Trump has used the withholding of federal contracts as a way to pressure law firms to recruit and represent more conservatives.

Some of the firms have responded by offering the Trump administration millions of dollars in free legal services, while two firms have filed suit challenging the constitutionality of the administration’s punishments.

A defamation lawsuit Trump brought against ABC News has led to the media company contributing $15m (£11m) to Trump’s presidential foundation.

CBS is also in talks to settle a separate lawsuit over a Kamala Harris interview, as its parent company Paramount seeks federal approval for a merger with Skydance Media.

The Associated Press, by contrast, has resisted administration pressure to accept Trump’s “Gulf of America” name change despite the White House’s efforts to block the news agency from coverage of the president.

On the campaign trail, Trump warned about the runaway power of the federal government. Now in office, he is wielding that power in a way no previous modern president has attempted.

Nowhere, however, have the impacts of his efforts been more visible than within the federal government agencies and departments that he now controls.

The press conference at the White House began with a moment’s silence for the victims of an aircraft collision over the Potomac River.

Within seconds of the pause coming to an end, however, Trump was on the attack.

A diversity and inclusion initiative at the Federal Aviation Agency was partly to blame for the tragedy, the president claimed, because it hired people with severe intellectual disabilities as air traffic controllers. He did not provide any evidence.

It was a startling moment that was emblematic of the attack his presidency has launched against inclusivity programmes that have proliferated in recent years across the US government and corporate world.

Trump has directed the federal government to end its diversity and equity (DEI) programmes and investigate private companies and academic institutions thought to be engaged in “illegal DEI”.

His directive has accelerated moves among leading global companies like Meta and Goldman to cut back or eliminate these programmes.

First introduced in the 1960s in the wake of civil rights victories, early forms of DEI were an attempt to expand opportunities for black Americans. They later expanded to take in women, LGBT rights and other racial groups.

Efforts were stepped up and embraced by much of corporate America in the wake of the 2020 Black Lives Matters protests following the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis Police officers.

But to its critics, DEI was putting politics and race above talent, creating division and was no longer needed in modern America.

While Trump’s directive seems to have support from a narrow majority of voters, some of the unexpected consequences have raised eyebrows.

Arlington National Cemetery scrubbed from its website all mentions of the history of black and female service members. And the Enola Gay aircraft that dropped an atomic bomb on Japan was initially flagged for removal from Pentagon documents, apparently due to the word “gay”.

Donald Trump’s first 100 days have been an unprecedented display of unilateral power exercised by a modern American president.

His efforts to dismantle large swaths of the federal government will take years, if not decades, for subsequent presidents to restore – if they so desire.

In other ways, however, Trump’s efforts so far may end up being less permanent. Without the support of new laws passed by Congress, many of his sweeping reforms could be wiped away by a future president.

And so to what extent this whirlwind start leads to lasting change remains an open question.

Later this year, the narrow Republican majorities in Congress will attempt to provide the legislative backing for Trump’s agenda, but their success is far from guaranteed.

And in next year’s mid-term congressional elections, those majorities could be replaced by hostile Democrats bent on investigating the administration and curtailing his authority.

Meanwhile, more court battles loom – and while the US Supreme Court has a conservative tilt, its decisions on a number of key cases could ultimately cut against Trump’s efforts.

The first 100 days of Trump’s second term have been a dramatic show of political force, but the next 1,361 will be the real test of whether he can carve an enduring legacy.

• DOGE: How much has Musk’s initiative really saved?
• DEMOCRATS: Opposition struggles to find a unified message
• TARIFFS: There are signs Trump could be willing to retreat
• VOTERS: We return to five Trump voters – are they happy?
• WATCH: Trump: The first 100 days (if in UK) – (here if outside UK)

Nunavut is Canada’s largest federal district. The entire territory – all 1.8 million sq km (695,000 sq miles) and its 40,000 people – will be represented by one person in parliament.

“Nunavut is at least three times the size of France. If it was its own country, it would be the 13th largest behind Greenland,” Kathy Kettler, the campaign manager for local Liberal candidate Kilikvak Kabloona, told the BBC.

Located in the Arctic, where average temperatures in the capital city Iqaluit are below freezing for eight months of the year, it is so vast and inaccessible that the only way to travel between its 25 communities is by air.

“Yesterday, in 24 hours, we travelled 1,700 km (1,050 miles) by air and campaigned in Pangnirtung, Iqaluit, Rankin Inlet, and Arviat,” said Ms Kettler.

“There are not very many people who understand the reality of the north,” Ms Kettler said, describing the challenges of running a campaign where so much is different from southern Canada.

She recalled knocking on doors earlier this month as she campaigned for her candidate in -24C (-11F) temperatures.

She said it’s rare in northern communities for people to knock before entering someone’s home. Instead, the tight-knit culture permits visitors to simply “walk in and say hello” – almost unthinkable in other parts of the country.

As an Inuk from northern Quebec, she said it “feels weird” even for her to knock and wait for a response.

In Nunavut, one of Canada’s three northern territories, the majority-Inuit population speak Inuktitut.

Ms Kettler said one of the biggest expenses was translating campaign signs and hiring an interpreter for Kabloona, the candidate.

Election issues for northerners too are unique.

“The national campaign is really focused on Arctic security and sovereignty, whereas our campaign here is focused on food security and people being able to survive,” Ms Kettler said.

Food can be prohibitively expensive and there are infrastructure challenges to accessing clean water for a number of Indigenous and northern communities.

She was boiling water to drink while campaigning in Arviat, she said, and described being unable to rely on calling voters as she canvasses because a phone plan is the first thing they sacrifice to afford food.

The seat is currently held by the New Democratic Party (NDP), with incumbent Lori Idlout running for re-election.

James Arreak is the Conservative candidate.

Jean-Claude Nguyen, the returning officer in Nunavut, is responsible for conducting the election in the district.

He described how difficult it is to ensure ballots and voter lists get to every community – including to workers at remote gold mines.

“[Elections Canada] sent a team from our Ottawa headquarters via Edmonton and Yellowknife to the mine where they work, gave them sufficient time to vote, and then they brought the ballots back,” he said.

Mr Nguyen also spoke about security considerations.

Once polls close, the ballots are counted at the polling station and then stored safely either with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), or a local hamlet – a small community that provides municipal services to its residents.

The ballot boxes are then flown to Iqaluit, and then to Ottawa.

Mr Nguyen recalled how in the 2019 election, a ballot box arrived with a big hole.

“When we asked the charter flight company what happened, they said it was eaten by a raven,” he said laughing.

“That’s part of the reality here in the territories, you have wild animals eating the ballot boxes.”

No ballots were damaged by the bird.

Beyond all the challenges, Kathy Kettler said she is most drawn to the spirit of the people.

“The generosity, love, and care that people have for each other in every community shines through,” she said.

“That’s what keeps me going, and it’s what makes campaigning across Nunavut so meaningful.”

People who eat lots of ultra-processed foods (UPF) may be at greater risk of dying early, a study in eight countries including the UK and the US suggests.

Processed meats, biscuits, fizzy drinks, ice cream and some breakfast cereals are examples of UPF, which are becoming increasingly common in diets worldwide.

UPFs tend to contain more than five ingredients, which are not usually found in home cooking, such as additives, sweeteners and chemicals to improve the food’s texture or appearance.

Some experts say it’s not known why UPFs are linked to poor health – there is little evidence it’s down to the processing itself and could be because these foods contain high levels of fat, salt and sugar.

The researchers behind the study, published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, looked at previous research to estimate the impact of ultra-processed food intake on mortality.

The study cannot definitively prove that UPFs caused any premature deaths.

This is because the amount of ultra-processed foods in someone’s diet is also linked to their overall diet, exercise levels, wider lifestyle and wealth, which can all also affect health.

The studies looked at surveys of people’s diets and at data on deaths from eight countries – Australia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, UK and US.

The report estimates that in the UK and the US, where UPFs account for more than half of calorie intake, 14% of early deaths could be linked to the harms they cause.

In countries such as Colombia and Brazil, where UPF intake is much lower (less than 20% of calorie intake), the study estimated these foods are linked to around 4% of premature deaths.

Lead study author Dr Eduardo Nilson, from Brazil, said UPFs affected health “because of the changes in the foods during industrial processing and the use of artificial ingredients, including colorants, artificial flavours and sweeteners, emulsifiers, and many other additives and processing aids”.

By their calculations, in the US in 2018, there were 124,000 premature deaths due to the consumption of ultra-processed food. In the UK, nearly 18,000.

The study says governments should update their dietary advice to urge people to cut back on these foods.

But the UK government’s expert panel on nutrition recently said there wasn’t any strong evidence of a link between the way food is processed and poor health.

There is no one definition that everyone agrees on, but the NOVA classification is often used. Examples include:

• cakes, pastries and biscuits
• crisps
• supermarket bread
• sausages, burgers, hot dogs
• instant soups, noodles and desserts
• chicken nuggets
• fish fingers
• fruit yoghurts and fruit drinks
• margarines and spreads
• baby formula

The numbers in the study are based on modelling the impact of ultra-processed foods on people’s health.

Prof Kevin McConway, emeritus professor of applied statistics, Open University, said the study makes lots of mathematical assumptions which make him cautious about what the findings mean.

“It’s still far from clear whether consumption of just any UPF at all is bad for health, or what aspect of UPFs might be involved.

“This all means that it’s impossible for any one study to be sure whether differences in mortality between people who consume different UPF amounts are actually caused by differences in their UPF consumption.

“You still can’t be sure from any study of this kind exactly what’s causing what.”

Dr Nerys Astbury, an expert in diet and obesity at the University of Oxford, also agrees there are limitations to the research.

It’s been known for some time that diets high in energy, fat and sugar can increase the risk of diseases, such as type 2 diabetes, obesity, heart conditions and some cancers, which can lead to premature death.

“Many UPF tend to be high in these nutrients,” she says, adding that studies to date haven’t been able to prove that the effects of UPFs are due to anything more than “diets high in foods which are energy dense and contain large amounts of fat and sugar”.

This type of research cannot prove that consumption of ultra-processed foods is harmful, says Dr Stephen Burgess at Cambridge University.

How physically fit someone is may be the main cause of poor health instead. But when numerous studies across many countries and culture suggest UPFs could be a risk to health, Dr Burgess says “ultra-processed foods may be more than a bystander”.

The Food and Drink Federation, which represents manufacturers, said the term ‘ultra-processed food’ “demonises a wide variety of food that can help people achieve a healthy balanced diet, such as yoghurt, pasta sauces or bread”.

It said all additives used by food manufacturers are approved by the Food Standards Agency, who ensure they are safe to eat and drink.

Cardinals will meet next month in a secret conclave to elect the next pope, the Vatican has said.

The closed-door meeting will start inside the Sistine Chapel on 7 May and will involve some 135 cardinals from across the world.

It follows the death of Pope Francis who died at the age of 88 on Easter Monday and whose funeral was held on Saturday.

There is no timescale as to how long it will take to elect the next pope, but the previous two conclaves, held in 2005 and 2013, lasted just two days.

Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni said cardinals will take part in a solemn mass at St Peter’s Basilica, after which those eligible to vote will gather in the Sistine Chapel for the secretive ballot.

Once they enter the Sistine Chapel, cardinals must have no communication with the outside world until a new Pope is elected.

There is only one round of voting on the first afternoon of the conclave, but the cardinals will vote up to four times every day afterwards.

A new pope requires a two-thirds majority – and that can take time.

• Who will be the next Pope?
• How a Pope is elected
• Why the conclave is so unpredictable
• Extraordinary photos from the funeral of Pope Francis

Each cardinal casts his vote on a simple card that says, in Latin: “I elect as Supreme Pontiff” to which they add the name of their chosen candidate.

If the conclave completes its third day without reaching a decision, the cardinals may pause for a day of prayer.

Outside the Sistine Chapel the world will be watching for the smoke from the chimney.

If the smoke is black, there will be another round of voting. White smoke signals that a new pope has been chosen.

On Saturday, politicians and royalty joined thousands of mourners as Pope Francis’ funeral was held in St Peter’s Square.

Hymns played out on giant speakers, occasionally drowned out by the sound of helicopters flying overhead, before 91-year-old Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re gave a homily on the pope’s legacy.

After a ceremony, huge crowds lined the streets of Rome to watch as the Pope’s coffin was carried in a procession to his final resting place, Santa Maria Maggiore Basilica.

Authorities said 140,000 people had lined the streets, clapping and waving as the hearse – a repurposed white popemobile – crossed the Tiber river and drove past some of Rome’s most recognisable sights: the Colosseum, the Forum and the Altare della Patria national monument on Piazza Venezia.

On Sunday images of Pope Francis’s tomb at the church were released showing a single white rose lying on the stone that bears the name he was known by during his pontificate, below a crucifix illuminated by a single spotlight.

Days after a 7.7-magnitude earthquake shook Myanmar at the end of March, killing at least 3,700 people, the country’s ruling junta agreed to a halt in its devastating military campaign.

It then violated that ceasefire, again and again.

I went inside rebel-held territory in the eastern Karenni state for 10 days from mid-April. I witnessed daily violations by the junta, including rocket and mortar attacks which killed and injured civilians and resistance fighters.

One of those was Khala, a 45-year-old father killed in a strike by military warplanes, in a place his wife Mala said should have been safe.

When the ceasefire was announced, on 2 April, Mala and Khala sensed an opportunity to return to their home for the first time in years.

With their four-year-old child, they headed from the camp where they’d taken refuge to their village, Pekin Coco. They found it abandoned, with buildings shattered from drawn-out fighting. Almost everyone there had moved to farmland further away from the junta’s weapons.

But as the young family was about to leave Pekin Coco again, their car loaded with their possessions, the shelling started.

“We were all at the front of the house. Then, shells landed near us. We hid at the back of the house. But he [Khala] stayed where he was,” said Mala. “The artillery shell landed and exploded near him. He died in the place where he thought he was safe.

“He was a good man,” she said and began to cry.

• Myanmar military announces temporary ceasefire
• Inside Mandalay: BBC finds huge devastation and little help for Myanmar quake survivors

Later that afternoon, the junta’s warplanes attacked a house on the same street, killing four more men.

“I hate them,” Mala said. “They always attack people without reason. I don’t feel safe here. Jet fighters are flying over the sky often but there is no place to hide.”

Mala is 31 and seven months pregnant. When we spoke she was back in a displaced people’s camp, grieving. Her son Zoe, missing his father, wouldn’t leave her side.

Before the earthquake, Myanmar was in the midst of a nationwide civil war.

After decades of military rule and brutal repression, ethnic groups, along with a new army of young insurgents, brought the dictatorship to crisis point. As much as two-thirds of the country has fallen to the resistance.

Tens of thousands of people have been killed, including many children, since the military seized power in a coup in 2021. The UN says the earthquake has pushed a further two million people into need, some 2.5 million were already displaced before the quake.

Karenni, or Kayah, state is far from the earthquake’s epicentre. Its remoteness is both a blessing and a curse. Its thick jungle provides cover for those who oppose military rule, but it is difficult to get around, the roads are poor and main highways remain in range of the army’s guns. Most of the state is now controlled by rebel and armed ethnic groups.

On 28 March when the quake hit, there were no reported deaths in Karenni – but the hospitals still filled quickly with people suffering spinal and crush injuries.

A 30m (100ft) sinkhole had appeared in the forests around the town of Demoso. Locals who heard the ground open up thought it was another air strike. For many weeks, the sinkhole continued to expand with the aftershocks.

The UN noted that the Myanmar military continued operations after the earthquake and beyond the ceasefire, and called for them to end. The State Administration Council, the ruling junta, has not commented on the alleged violations but has claimed that it was attacked by resistance groups. During the ceasefire all sides in the conflict have reserved the right to respond if attacked.

During my 10 days in Mobeye, Karenni, I witnessed daily attacks by the junta.

I met Stefano there, a 23-year-old fighting the military dictatorship with the Karenni Nationalities Defence Force (KNDF).

He leads a platoon of young fighters who have set up trenches around the base.

From a dugout just 100m (330ft) from the junta’s positions, he explained the army had continued attacks “using all means” during the ceasefire – soldiers on the ground, drones and jets.

“They usually attack with drones and heavy artillery on this side. When it rains, they advance by taking advantage of the weather.”

He called the ceasefire a “joke”.

“We did not believe the military council from the beginning. We don’t believe it now, and we won’t believe it in the future.”

The day after we spoke, the military launched a full-scale assault with heavy weapons and men, attacking rebel lines. As we made our way to the front lines, small-arms fire could be heard nearby, along with mortar strikes. The ground was pitted with fresh hits from armed drones.

Nearby lay the corpse of a junta fighter who had tried to breach the rebel positions. The resistance forces say they have suspended all offensive activities during the ceasefire, but they have said they will respond if attacked. Yi Shui, the commander of another resistance group, the Karenni National Army, showed me pictures on his phone. “When we saw them, we shot them. One of them got hit” and another ran away, he said.

And again, the military wasn’t just targeting the resistance forces. Its rockets hit farmland beyond, killing a 60-year-old woman. We arrived at fields where four rockets had landed, children were playing with the bent metal and shrapnel from the strikes.

The injured were taken to local hospitals, which are hidden deep in the jungle to avoid air strikes from junta warplanes.

In one, a young fighter was being treated in a wooden ward with a dirt floor. He had a shrapnel wound to his shoulder and was losing a lot of blood.

The doctor in charge, 32-year-old Thi Ha Tun, said he’d treated around a dozen patients for war-related injuries since the ceasefire was declared. Two of the patients, resistance fighters, died.

He dismissed what he called the junta’s lies. “They only care about their own interests,” he said. “They will only care about their own organisation. They will not care about the rest of this country, their own generation, the youth, the children, the elderly, anything.”

The only solution is to keep fighting, he said.

High on a hilltop in the rebel-controlled areas is the church of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. The earthquake brought down the church steeple and part of the roof. The bell from Rome now sits in a temporary cradle. Repairs have been made, but the church will probably need to be rebuilt.

They are still feeling the aftershocks here weeks later.

But for Father Philip, the local priest, the greatest threat to his congregation, many of whom are the war displaced, comes from above, not below.

“No place is safe. When we have jet fighters flying in the sky… you never know what will come falling from the sky.”

Back at the Mobeye front, Stefano and his men pass the hours between attacks, cleaning their weapons and singing songs. “I can hear the people’s prayers, cries, and cries. We will overthrow the dictatorship,” they sing in unison. They say the only ceasefire they will trust will come with the junta’s defeat.

The truce will finish at the end of the month, but for most of the people here, it’s as if it never existed at all.

The head of Israel’s Shin Bet domestic intelligence agency has resigned.

Ronen Bar made the announcement that he would leave his position on 15 June at a memorial event for Shin Bet members who have died in service.

It came after he had been engaged in a fierce trading of recriminations with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who dismissed him last month. A challenge to the Supreme Court by the attorney general and the opposition had put the move on hold.

Ronen Bar said he had chosen to announce his resignation on an evening that, in his words, symbolised “remembrance, heroism and sacrifice”.

He said every public servant who failed to stop the Hamas-led attacks on Israel on 7 October 2023, which triggered the Gaza war, needed to bow their heads “humbly before those who were killed, or wounded, or taken hostage, and act accordingly”.

On Sunday, Netanyahu presented an affidavit to the Supreme Court in which he accused Bar of being a liar.

In his own affidavit, the Shin Bet chief had accused the prime minister of demanding excessive personal loyalty and ordering his agency to spy on anti-government protesters.

The confrontation has further exposed the deepening rifts in Israeli politics and society between the right-wing and hardliners supporting Netanyahu and the more liberal elements in the country, who took to the streets to protest against the government’s moves to curb the powers of the judiciary for many months before the 7 October attacks.

It centres on Netanyahu’s insistence that he fired the Shin Bet head for professional failures.

Bar countered by saying that his dismissal was motivated by political and personal considerations.

In his affidavit last week, the spy chief said that it was “clear” that if there were to be a constitutional crisis, Netanyahu would expect him to obey the prime minister and not the courts.

He also said Netanyahu had put pressure on him to use the Shin Bet to spy on Israelis leading or providing financial support to anti-government protests.

Many in Israel reacted with alarm, saying it was evidence of what appeared to be an unprecedented effort to overstep the powers of the domestic intelligence agency.

In his affidavit, which functioned as a form of rebuttal, Netanyahu excoriated the Shin Bet head.

“The accusation according to which I allegedly demanded action against innocent civilians, or against a non-violent and legitimate protest during the protests of 2023, is an absolute lie,” he said.

Netanyahu also trained his sights on the security failures in the lead-up to and during the 7 October attacks, saying that Bar bore “massive and direct responsibility” for them and had “failed in his role as chief of Shin Bet and lost the confidence of the entire Israeli government as far as his ability to continue to manage the organisation”.

Bar immediately responded in kind in a statement, saying Netanyahu’s affidavit was “full of inaccuracies, biased quotes and half-truths aimed at taking things out of context and changing reality”.

The Supreme Court was facing a quandary over who to believe – which Bar’s resignation may have to some extent pre-empted.

However, Bar made clear on Monday that he would play a part, if necessary, in any future proceedings.

“The court hearing is not about my personal affairs, but about the independence of the next heads of the Shin Bet, and of course I am ready to appear for any procedure that the court may require in this regard in the future,” he said.

The issues which have been exposed in the fierce recriminations between the two men have once again focused attention on the increasing bitterness between opposed sections of Israeli society.

These have been further exacerbated by the ever-growing fault line between those who support Netanyahu and his hard-line government in wanting to continue the war in Gaza to eliminate Hamas at all costs, and those who believe the fate of the living Israeli hostages still being held by Hamas must be put first, even if it means ending the war.

The UN’s top court, the International Court of Justice (ICJ), has begun hearings for an opinion on Israel’s legal duty to allow aid to Palestinians and to co-operate with the UN’s Palestinian aid agency, Unrwa – both of which Israel has barred in Gaza.

Israel stopped allowing aid into Gaza on 2 March, which it said was to pressure Hamas into releasing hostages. The UN and aid agencies say food and supplies are running out in Gaza, which Israel denies.

Last year Israel severed ties with Unrwa, accusing it of colluding with Hamas.

The hearings at The Hague are expected to last for five days, though a ruling could take many months.

Ammar Hijazi, the Palestinian ambassador to International Organisations in The Hague, opened the hearings with a disturbing and graphic testimony.

He accused Israel of a “genocidal campaign” against the Palestinians, adding that Israel’s “crimes” put Palestinians at risk of irreparable harm.

The Palestinian ambassador to the United Nations, Riyad Mansour, at times his voice breaking, hands shaking, told the judges it has “never been more painful to be Palestinian”.

He said Israel was seeking “deliberately to deprive the population in Gaza” to ensure it has “no way to survive” and that people were “trapped between death and displacement”.

He described Unrwa as a “shining example of multilateralism at the UN” and called for a place where Palestinian families could be “reunited in life rather than death”.

In a statement coinciding with the start of the hearings, Israel’s Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said it had decided “not to take part in this circus”.

“It is another attempt to politicise and abuse the legal process in order to persecute Israel,” he said.

Israel won’t be among the 39 countries speaking at the ICJ this week, but has provided a 37-page written submission to the court, in which it outlines the ways in which it claims Unrwa has been infiltrated by Hamas and argues that Israel is entitled to end cooperation with the organisation for the sake of its own security.

The only countries likely to defend Israel in court are the US and Hungary.

At issue are two bills passed by Israel’s parliament in October that declared Unrwa harboured terrorists, and ordered the government to end all co-operation and contact with the organisation, including the supply of visas to Unrwa international employees.

Unrwa has challenged Israel’s allegation that it knowingly has Hamas members in its ranks, or that it co-operated with the armed group.

The focus of these hearings is to aid the judges in answering the question posed by the UN General Assembly, specifically whether Israel acted unlawfully in overriding the immunities and privileges of a UN body. But with statements live-streamed around the world from the Peace Palace, home to the ICJ in the Hague – the process is being used to highlight the wider concerns and context.

In December, a vast majority of countries at the UN General Assembly voted to get the ICJ involved for a definitive interpretation of the law and Israel’s obligations.

Since then, the humanitarian situation in Gaza has got worse.

Two weeks after cutting off aid, a ceasefire which had offered some respite for Gazans since January collapsed when Israel resumed its military offensive. Israel and Hamas blamed each other for the end of the truce.

The current Israeli blockade is the longest closure Gaza has ever faced.

The UN says Israel – as an occupying power – is obliged under international law to ensure supplies for the 2.1 million Palestinians in Gaza.

Israel says it is complying with international law and there is no aid shortage.

That’s something disputed by a number of humanitarian relief organisations operating on the ground in Gaza.

At the end of March, all 25 bakeries supported by the World Food Programme (WFP) there were forced to close after wheat flour and cooking fuel ran out.

According to the UN, malnutrition is spreading.

The UN Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs (Ocha) says there are also severe shortages of medicine, medical supplies and equipment for hospitals overwhelmed by casualties from the Israeli bombardment, and that fuel shortages are hampering water production and distribution.

The WFP warned food prices had skyrocketed by up to 1,400% compared to during the ceasefire, and the shortages of essential commodities raised serious nutrition concerns for vulnerable populations, including children under five, pregnant and breastfeeding women, and the elderly.

Earlier this month, the head of Unrwa said a “man-made famine” was “tightening its grip” across Gaza.

Human rights groups argue that Israel is using the aid blockade as a form of collective punishment and as political leverage in hostage release negotiations.

Hamas is holding 59 hostages, taken when it attacked Israel on 7 October 2023, killing about 1,200 people. Israel responded with a massive military campaign, which has killed at least 52,243 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry.

France, Germany and the UK described the blockade as “intolerable” and condemned as unacceptable remarks by the Israeli Defence Minister, Israel Katz, linking the supply of aid to political pressure on Hamas.

The Israeli foreign ministry said more than 25,000 lorries carrying almost 450,000 tonnes of aid had entered Gaza during the ceasefire, adding: “Israel is monitoring the situation on the ground, and there is no shortage of aid in Gaza.”

It also said Israel was not obliged to allow in aid because Hamas had “hijacked” supplies “to rebuild its terror machine”.

Hamas has previously denied stealing aid and the UN has said it has kept “a very good chain of custody on all the aid it’s delivered”.

The WFP says more than 116,000 tonnes of food supplies – enough to feed one million people for up to four months – is positioned at aid corridors and is ready to be delivered as soon as Israel reopens Gaza’s border crossings.

Palestinian ambassador to the UN, Mansour, warned the judges that “people are starving” while “food rots at the border”.

The hearings represent the biggest test of Israel’s compliance with international law since the ICJ’s landmark rulings in January, March and June of 2024 that ordered it to take immediate steps to allow aid to enter Gaza unrestricted and unhindered.

The UN has argued blocking Unrwa amounts to a violation of the Palestinians inalienable right to self-determination.

The ICJ judges’ advisory opinion is expected within months.

Belfast-based rap group Kneecap have apologised to the families of murdered MPs Sir David Amess and Jo Cox.

The statement posted on X follows the emergence of footage of the group at a concert in November 2023, where one of the band members appears to say: “The only good Tory is a dead Tory. Kill your local MP.”

The footage is being assessed by counter-terrorism police and Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch has called for prosecution.

A spokesperson for Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said he did not think “individuals expressing those views should be receiving government funding”.

In a statement, Kneecap said they rejected “any suggestion that we would seek to incite violence against any MP or individual. Ever.”

They added that “an extract of footage, deliberately taken out of all context, is now being exploited and weaponised, as if it were a call to action”.

The trio added: “To the Amess and Cox families, we send our heartfelt apologies, we never intended to cause you hurt.”

Labour MP Jo Cox was fatally shot and stabbed in June 2016.

Earlier, the daughter of Conservative MP Sir David Amess, who was stabbed to death at a constituency surgery in 2021 said the rap group should apologise.

Katie Amess said she was “gobsmacked at the stupidity of somebody or a group of people being in the public eye and saying such dangerous, violent rhetoric”.

Sir Keir’s spokesperson said the PM believed the comments were “completely unacceptable” and there would be no further public funds directed towards Kneecap.

Kneecap has previously been given arts funding from the government. Last year, they won a discrimination case against the UK government after it withdrew arts funding for the band, and were awarded £14,250.

The Metropolitan Police have said they are also looking at another video, from November last year, where the footage appeared to show a band member shouting “up Hamas, up Hezbollah” at a performance in London.

In its statement on Monday, the group said: “Let us be unequivocal: We do not, and have never, supported Hamas or Hezbollah.

“We condemn all attacks on civilians, always. It is never okay. We know this more than anyone, given our nation’s history.”

Both Hamas and Hezbollah are banned in the UK and it is a crime to express support for them.

Taoiseach (Irish prime minister) Micháel Martin earlier called on the trio to “urgently clarify” their comments.

Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) leader Gavin Robinson said Kneecap had become a “hatefest”.

The East Belfast MP said the band’s position was “appalling and outrageous” and said there was a collective political will in London and Dublin to “call out” their comments.

Alliance MLA Sian Mulholland said that Kneecap’s alleged comments crossed a “line from art as a tool of protest and into incitement”.

The first minister of Scotland, John Swinney, backed calls for Kneecap to be axed from Glasgow’s TRNSMT music festival this summer, adding that the band’s alleged comments had “crossed a line” and were “beyond the pale”.

There was also a call by two MPs for the group to be removed from the Glastonbury Festival line-up in June.

In a letter to Sir Michael Eavis, a co-creator of the festival, Labour MP David Taylor said it would be “deeply troubling” to see the band performing at the event.

North Antrim MP and leader of the Traditional Unionist Voice (TUV) Jim Allister said he had written to organisers of the Glastonbury Festival asking them to drop Kneecap.

The TUV has also written to the US Department of State “to request that Kneecap be denied visas to spread their toxic ideology to America”.

Speaking to BBC Radio Ulster’s Good Morning Ulster programme, Upper Bann MP and DUP politician Carla Lockhart said a “forced apology doesn’t undo the fact that they thought it was acceptable to say such mindless things in the first place”.

Although she welcomes the apology to the Amess family, Lockhart said it “very much screams sorry because they were caught”.

Lockhart said she wrote to the US Department of Homeland Security and Canadian Border Services Agency on Monday “to carefully review any applications for entry and to take all necessary steps to prevent their planned tour from proceeding”.

“The very name of this group sends out the wrong message,” she added.

“And any language that undermines values or incites hate, shouldn’t be used, or shouldn’t be tolerated in our society.

“Those words: ‘Kill your MP’, how can they be taken out of context? You either say that or you don’t.”

A BBC spokesperson said: “As the broadcast partner, the BBC will be bringing audiences extensive music coverage from Glastonbury, with artists booked by the festival organisers.

“The Glastonbury broadcast plans will be considered in the coming weeks, and all output will adhere to our editorial guidelines,” they added.

None of the members of Kneecap has been charged with any offences.

Mark Carney’s Liberal Party is expected to win enough seats in the House of Commons to form a government in Canada. It is not yet clear whether they will be able to secure a majority.

Carney is set to remain prime minister, having only assumed the role in early March following Justin Trudeau’s resignation.

Carney’s Liberals are leading in 167 seats but are currently short of the 172 needed for a majority.

The Conservatives, led by Pierre Poilievre, are set to remain in opposition as the second-largest party and are leading in 145 seats, with 97% of polls having reported results.

The remaining seats are split between the Bloc Québécois – which only runs candidates in the province of Quebec – the New Democratic Party (NDP) and the Green Party.

Canada has a “first-past-the-post” electoral system.

The candidate who gets the most votes in each electoral district, or riding, wins that seat and become a Member of Parliament (MP).

The Liberals and the Conservatives have dominated the popular vote, with both parties receiving more than 40% of ballots counted across Canada so far.

This has them on track to win a combined 90% of seats.

The NDP has received just over 6% of the total vote declared so far, but this translates to just 2% of seats in the House of Commons.

Both the Liberals and the Conservatives have seen a significant rise in their share of the national vote compared with four years ago.

Increased support for Canada’s two largest parties has come at the expense of smaller parties, particularly the NDP whose share is down by around 12 percentage points.

The Liberals are on course to win the most seats in the key provinces of Ontario and Quebec, which account for 200 of Canada’s 343 electoral districts.

The Conservatives are ahead in Alberta, while there is little to choose between the two main parties in British Columbia.

• LIVE: Follow BBC’s coverage of the results
• VOTERS: How I decided who gets my vote

Mark Carney’s Liberals have won Canada’s federal election – riding a backlash of anti-Trump sentiment to form the next government.

It is a stunning political turnaround for a party who were widely considered dead and buried just a few months ago.

It’s not yet clear if the party – which has been in power for almost a decade – will be able to secure a majority as results continue to roll in.

Either way, the prime minister faces major challenges, including divisions in the country laid bare by the campaign.

Here are five takeaways from an election which saw the Conservative opposition make major gains but still lose.

There is no doubt the US president’s tariff threats and comments undermining Canada’s sovereignty played an outsized role in this election, suddenly making leadership and the country’s economic survival the defining issues of the campaign.

Mark Carney used it to his advantage, running as much against Trump as he did against his main opposition rival, Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre.

Carney warned Canada was at a crisis moment, saying frequently on the campaign trail – and in his victory speech – that Trump “wants to break us so America can own us”.

Poilievre brought Trump up much less frequently during the campaign, focusing his message on domestic issues – the cost of living, the housing affordability crisis, and crime – and targeting the Liberals for their record on those matters.

Carney – who has declared the old relationship with the US “over” – plans to start negotiations on a new economic and security relationship immediately following the election.

Kevin O’Leary, a Canadian businessman close to Trump who previously ran for the Conservative leadership, acknowledged it was a successful campaign strategy.

“Right now Canadians are very frustrated with America and Carney has used that to his advantage,” he told the BBC just before polls closed. “He was able to distract Canadians from his own mistakes… and say ‘Stop looking at that. Look south of the border and I can save you’.”

At the start of the year, Carney was a former central banker with no experience as a politician. By mid-March, he was being sworn in as prime minister – the first to have never held elected public office before – after a resounding win in the Liberal leadership race.

Now, he’s faced the Canadian electorate as a first time campaigner, won an Ottawa-area seat in the House of Commons and steered his party to an unlikely victory.

Carney had long flirted with entering Canadian politics – and he seized his moment, swooping in after former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s sudden resignation in January.

He also took full advantage of the new political landscape, leaning into his experience helping Canada and the UK navigate previous crises at a time when Canadians were feeling anxious about their economic future.

Trump’s late-March announcement of global levies on foreign automobile imports gave Carney the chance to publicly audition to keep his job during the campaign. He was able to step away from the trail and take on the prime minister’s mantle, setting up a call with the president and meeting US Cabinet ministers.

• REACTION: Follow the latest live
• RESULTS: How Canada voted – in charts
• ANALYSIS: A turnaround victory made possible by Trump
• EXPLAINER: What happens next?

In a different election, this would have been a successful one for the Conservatives.

In 2011, the Conservatives won a majority with 39.6% of the vote. Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre is on track to beat that this time, with roughly 41.6% of the vote with most polls reporting, according to Election Canada.

Poilievre’s Conservatives also made significant seat gains. They are currently projected to have won 149 seats – that’s up from 120 at dissolution, when the election was called in March.

But with the progressive vote coalescing around the Liberals, those numbers weren’t enough this time.

This will be a bitter loss for the Conservatives, who only months ago had a clear path to victory and will now need to figure out a way forward after a series of electoral defeats.

“We have much to celebrate tonight,” Poilievre said in his concession speech, nodding to the party’s significant gains.

But he added: “We are cognisant of the fact that we didn’t quite get over the finish line.”

It will now be up to the party to decide if they want to keep Poilievre as leader, the third they’ve had since the Liberals swept the 2015 election.

Poilievre on Monday night pushed to keep his job, telling Conservative supporters that “change takes time”.

The election results have highlighted divisions in Canada that could pose a challenge for Carney.

Notably, the Liberals are largely shut out of Alberta and Saskatchewan – oil-rich and gas-rich prairie provinces where a sense of alienation from the centre of power in Ottawa has long festered.

Even before the election, some in those regions were warning of a national unity crisis if the Liberals won another mandate.

Carney touched on those divisions in his victory speech, acknowledging the millions who had voted for a different outcome.

“I intend to govern for all Canadians,” he said.

Meanwhile, Poilievre’s message, which relentlessly focused on cost of living issues, especially on housing affordability, resonated with many young people.

Support for the Conservatives outpaced Liberals by 44% to 31.2% among 18 to 34 year olds, a Nanos poll on 25 April indicated. The divide was more stark among younger men.

Separately, Abacus Data polling found that about 18% of 18 to 29 year olds were worried about Trump. That jumped to 45% for voters over 60, suggesting a polarisation on issues between generations.

On Monday night, Poilievre remarked on demographic breakthroughs Conservative had made, including with younger Canadians.

“We gave voices to countless people across the country who’ve been left out and left behind for far too long,” he said.

In this election, the smaller political parties have taken a hit as Canadians choose to park their votes with either the Liberals or the Conservatives – especially the left-wing New Democrats, or NDP.

Some of the smaller parties have lost a significant amount of vote share – particularly the NDP who have received just 6% of votes counted across Canada so far, compared with 18% in 2021.

Jagmeet Singh, who has been NDP leader for almost eight years, lost his own riding in British Columbia and announced he will step down.

“Obviously I know this night is a disappointing night for New Democrats,” he said, adding: “We’re only defeated if we stop fighting.”

The Greens have also seen their vote share cut in half from 2% to 1%.

Shachi Kurl, president of the Angus Reid Institute, a non-profit public opinion research organisation, told the BBC that Trump’s rhetoric was behind the shift to the Liberals.

“The threats, the annexation talk, all of that has been a huge motivator for left of centre voters,” she said.

The sovereigntist Bloc Québécois have maintained a vote share of around 7%. They are on track to win 23 seats in Quebec.

This is based on around 97% of polls reporting.

Canada doesn’t have a two-party system, even though it has historically voted in conservative or liberal governments in some form.

In the country’s political system, these smaller parties still play a role in Parliament. Both the NDP and the Bloc have at some points formed Official Opposition in the House of Commons.

Millions of Canadians voted on Monday in a snap federal election that has largely focused on how the candidates would respond to US President Donald Trump’s threats of tariffs as well as his call to make Canada the 51st state.

Prime Minister Mark Carney, current leader of the Liberal Party, called the vote in March shortly after taking over from former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. His main opponent in the race was Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre.

Carney is now projected to have won a fourth mandate for the party.

Here’s what you need to know.

Shortly after 22:00 EDT (03:00 BST), Canada’s public broadcaster CBC News projected that Mark Carney’s Liberal Party was on its way to win enough seats in the House of Commons to form a government.

It’s not yet clear if they have secured a majority and the counting of ballots is ongoing. It’s likely we’ll know how many seats each party has won in the coming hours.

Federal election officials are required to count ballots by hand in front of witnesses. Ballots are tallied only after polls close in each location where the votes were cast.

These projections are based on initial results from Elections Canada, which runs the country’s federal elections.

Officials double-check vote totals after the election.

• Follow the latest Canada election news here

Liberal leader Mark Carney does not need to be sworn in again. Instead, he will continue doing his job, as do his Cabinet ministers.

Should Carney decide to reshuffle his Cabinet, there will be a ceremony with the governor general, but until then, the ministers stay in their posts.

Carney may indeed choose to shuffle his Cabinet after bringing in a leaner team when he became prime minister last month.

When Parliament opens after an election, expect the swearing-in of members and the election of the Speaker.

One of his priorities is to navigate the relationship with US President Donald Trump.

When the pair spoke in late March, Carney and Trump agreed they would begin negotiations about a new economic and security relationship right after the election.

When Parliament returns, it’s possible we see the Liberals quickly introduce legislation focused on securing Canada’s economy in the face of US tariff headwinds.

That could include a promised tax cut for middle-class Canadians, and moving ahead with a “one project, one review” process to speed up approval for key energy and mining proposals.

The Liberals have said they want to make Canada a “clean and conventional energy” superpower.

They have also committed to putting C$5bn into a trade diversification fund.

The Liberals could be the largest party in the House of Commons, but may still fall short of the 172 required for a majority.

The most likely scenario if this happens is that they form a minority government with Carney as prime minister, where they strike deals with the other parties to survive no-confidence votes and pass legislation in Parliament.

The Conservatives are on track to once again form the Official Opposition.

Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre is on track to make significant inroads with the party’s vote share, securing roughly 41% of the vote with just over half of polls reporting, according to Election Canada.

That would be the highest the party has in decades.

They are currently projected to have won 148 seats – that’s up from 120 at dissolution, when the election was called.

But with the progressive vote coalescing around the Liberals, those numbers weren’t enough to win.

This will be a bitter loss for the Conservatives, who only months ago had a clear path to victory and will now need to figure out a way forward after a series of electoral defeats.

It will now be up to the party to decide if they want to keep Pierre Poilievre on as leader, the third leader they’ve had since the Liberals swept the 2015 election.

• LIVE: Follow BBC’s coverage of the election

• RESULTS: How Canada voted – in charts

• ANALYSIS: Why Carney’s Liberals won – and the Conservatives lost

A child has damaged a painting worth millions of pounds by the American artist Mark Rothko at a museum in Rotterdam.

A spokesperson for the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen said it was considering the “next steps” for the treatment of Rothko’s Grey, Orange on Maroon, No. 8.

The damage occurred during an “unguarded moment”, a museum spokesperson told the Dutch media outlet Algemeen Dagblad (AD) last week.

A spokesperson for the museum told the BBC the damage was “superficial”, adding: “Small scratches are visible in the unvarnished paint layer in the lower part of the painting”.

The abstract painting is estimated to be worth up to €50m (£42.5m), according to newspaper AD.

“Conservation expertise has been sought in the Netherlands and abroad. We are currently researching the next steps for the treatment of the painting”, the museum spokesperson told the BBC.

“We expect that the work will be able to be shown again in the future,” they added.

Sophie McAloone, the conservation manager at the Fine Art Restoration Company, said that “modern unvarnished” paintings like Rothko’s Grey, Orange on Maroon, No. 8 are “particularly susceptible to damage”.

This is “owing to a combination of their complex modern materials, lack of a traditional coating layer, and intensity of flat colour fields, which make even the smallest areas of damage instantly perceptible,” she said.

“In this case, scratching of the upper paint layers can have a significant impact on the viewing experience of the piece,” Ms McAloone said.

The Rothko painting was hanging in the museum’s Depot – a publicly accessible storage facility beside the main museum – as part of an exhibition displaying a selection of “public favourites” from the gallery’s collection.

Jonny Helm, a marketing manager at the art restoration service Plowden & Smith, said the incident had implications for UK institutions such as V&A East and the British Museum, which are considering “opening up the display of things that would otherwise be obscured in archives.”

“How will this event affect other UK institutions who are opening up their archives in the same way?” Mr Helm said.

Restoring a Rothko painting is a difficult task because “Rothko’s mixture of pigments and resins and glues were quite complex”, Mr Helm said.

He said the fact the painting is unvarnished – meaning it is “open to the environment” – will pose an additional challenge to conservators.

Conservators working to restore the painting will now likely be in the process of documenting the extent of the damage and researching “historic successful treatments” of Rothko paintings.

“Rothko works seem to have terrible luck – this isn’t the first damaged Rothko we’ve heard about,” Mr Helm said.

Rothko’s 1958 work, Black on Maroon, was deliberately vandalised by Wlodzimierz Umaniec at London’s Tate Modern gallery in October 2012.

Umaniec was sent to prison for two years and subsequently apologised for his actions.

During his trial, prosecuting barrister Gregor McKinley said the cost of repairing the work would be about £200,000. It took conservators 18 months to repair the painting.

Rachel Myrtle, Head of Specie and Fine Arts at Aon, a company that offers insurance broking to its clients, said fine art insurance policies typically cover “all risks associated with physical loss and damage to artwork”.

This includes “accidental damage caused by children or visitors, albeit with certain exclusions”, she said.

She said that when an artwork is damaged, a gallery’s insurer will appoint a specialist fine art loss adjuster to visit the museum.

The loss adjustor typically “reviews the damage to the artwork, examines any CCTV footage to determine the exact cause of the loss, and assesses conservation options”, Ms Myrtle said.

The museum did not comment on who will be held liable for the damage to the 1960 painting, which the gallery reportedly bought in the 1970s.

The Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen has previously billed visitors who have caused damage to artworks on display.

In 2011, the museum asked an unsuspecting tourist who stepped on Wim T. Schippers’ peanut butter floor artwork, called Pindakaasvloer, to pay for repairs to the work.

Sharon Cohen, a spokesperson for the museum at the time, was quoted by AD as saying: “It is normal procedure for people to pay if they damage art.”

The Rothko painting is described by the museum as an example of colour field painting, a term used to describe art characterised by large blocks of flat, solid colour spread across a canvas.

Rothko’s Grey, Orange on Maroon, No. 8 painting is one of several works of modern art that have been damaged in the Netherlands in recent years.

In November 2024, multiple screen prints by the US pop artist Andy Warhol were damaged by thieves during an attempted robbery of the MPV art gallery in the town of Oisterwijk.

In another incident, a Dutch town hall admitted it “most likely” disposed of 46 artworks by accident – including an Andy Warhol print of the former Dutch queen – during renovation works last year.

Museums have different policies when responding to damage caused by children.

In August last year, a four-year-old boy accidentally smashed a 3,500-year-old jar into pieces at the Hecht Museum in Israel.

At the time, Hecht Museum worker Lihi Laszlo told the BBC the museum would not treat the incident “with severity” because “the jar was accidentally damaged by a young child”.

The family were invited back to the exhibition with his family for an organised tour shortly after the incident occurred.

Prosecutors have dropped some of the charges against an Australian woman accused of killing three relatives and seriously injuring another with a toxic mushroom lunch.

Erin Patterson will not face trial over allegations she also attempted to murder her husband, after those charges were withdrawn.

She still faces four charges: three counts of murder and one of attempted murder.

The 50-year-old has always maintained her innocence and has pleaded not guilty, with her trial to begin in the Supreme Court of Victoria on Wednesday.

Three people died in hospital days after the July 2023 lunch, including Patterson’s former in-laws, Don Patterson, 70, and Gail Patterson, 70, as well as Gail’s sister, Heather Wilkinson, 66.

Heather’s husband, 68-year-old Baptist pastor Ian Wilkinson, survived after weeks of treatment in hospital.

The jury has been picked and is receiving instructions from the judge ahead of opening statements, which are expected Wednesday.

Justice Christopher Beale told the jury that most if not all them would probably have been aware of the previous charges in relation to Patterson’s husband, but said that the Director of Public Prosecutions had dropped them.

“In other words… you must put them out of your mind,” he said.

He also urged them to “dispassionately” weigh the evidence in the case, using their heads and not their hearts.

The trial is being held at a small courthouse in Morwell, about 60km (37 miles) from Leongatha, Victoria, where prosecutors allege the lunch took place.

The first sign of trouble Peter Hughes noticed was when his train to Madrid started to slow down.

Then the TV monitor and lights went off. Emergency lights switched on, but did not last, and the locomotive ground to a halt.

Four hours later, Mr Hughes was still stuck on the train 200 kilometres (124 miles) outside of Spain’s capital. He had food and water, but the toilets were not working.

“It will be getting dark soon and we could be stuck here for hours,” he told the BBC.

The massive power cut that stranded Mr Hughes triggered chaos across Spain and Portugal, and also impacted Andorra and parts of France, from about midday local time (10:00 GMT).

Traffic lights shut off. Metros closed. Businesses shuttered and people joined queues to get cash as card payments did not work.

Jonathan Emery was on a different train halfway between Seville and Madrid when the cuts hit.

For an hour, he sat on the train, the doors closed, until people could pry them open to let in ventilation. Half an hour later, passengers left, only to find themselves stranded.

That was when people from local villages started coming and dropping off supplies – water, bread, fruit.

“Nobody is charging for anything, and word must be getting around in the local town because people just keep coming,” he said.

Commuters in Madrid were left confused in the dark when the blackout hit the city’s metro station network. One resident, Sarah Jovovich, was getting off the train when the lights went out.

People were “hysterical” and “panicking”, she told the BBC. “It was quite chaotic really.”

Mobile phones had stopped working and nobody had any information. Once out of the metro station, she found the roads gridlocked with heavy traffic.

“No-one understood anything. Businesses were closed and buses were full,” she said.

Hannah Lowney was halfway through scanning her grocery shopping at Aldi when the power went out in the Spanish capital.

People were coming out of their offices and walking home because they could not tell when the buses were coming, Ms Lowney said in a voice message sent to BBC Radio 5 Live.

“It’s a bit disconcerting that it’s the whole country, I’ve never experienced this before,” she said.

Mark England was eating lunch in the restaurant of the hotel where he is staying on holiday in Benidorm when “everything went off and the fire alarm started going off and the fire doors started closing”.

In an international school in Lisbon, the electricity flickered on and off for a while, then gave up, teacher Emily Thorowgood said.

She kept teaching in the dark, the children in good spirits, but lots of parents were taking their children out of school, she said.

Will David, a Brit living in Lisbon, was having a haircut and beard trim in the basement of a barber when the power went down. The barber found him a spot by the window upstairs to finish the cut with scissors.

“The walk home felt very strange, both with the lack of traffic lights meaning a complete free-for-all for vehicles and pedestrians on the roads – as well as so many people milling around outside their places of work with nothing to do,” he said.

Initially, mobile phone networks also went down for some, leaving many scrambling for information.

Curtis Gladden, who is in La Vall D’Uixo, about 30 miles from Valencia, said it was “scary” as he struggled to get updates about what was happening.

Eloise Edgington, who could not do any work as a copywriter in Barcelona, said she was only receiving occasional messages, could not load web pages on her phone and was trying to conserve her battery.

An hour and a half after the power went out, one resident of Fortuna, in south-east Spain, said her husband was driving around, trying to find a petrol station that could supply fuel to run a generator and keep their fridge powered.

“We are worried about food, water, cash and petrol in case this goes on for a couple of days,” said Lesley, a Brit who has been living in Spain for 11 years.

• LIVE UPDATES: Disruption continues after widespread power outage
• TRAVEL IMPACT: Flights cancelled and trains called off
• DAY IN PICTURES: The best news photographs from a day of chaos

Locals “have more to worry about” than the Madrid Open tennis tournament being suspended, she said, adding there is “very little news about what’s happened”.

Mr England said walking down the street in Benidorm, a “majority of shops are in darkness and shuttered or have people on the entrances saying you can’t come in. There’s no cash machines, no traffic lights so it’s strange.”

After Mr Gladden’s phone signal returned after about two hours, he and others ventured out to cafes, but found “nothing is working – we came to get some food and a drink but they can’t cook without electricity”.

Within two hours, Spanish power grid operator Red Electrica said it was beginning to recover power in the north and south of the country.

But two-and-a-half hours after the cuts, Madrid’s mayor José Luis Martínez-Almeida still urged all residents to “keep their movements to an absolute minimum and, if at all possible, to remain where they are”, in a video recorded from the city’s integrated emergency security centre.

At 15:00 local time, Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez pulled together an “extraordinary” meeting of Spain’s national security council.

Red Electrica CEO Eduardo Prieto said at a news conference shortly afterwards that it could take “between six and ten hours” to restore power.

Just before 16:00, electricity flicked back on in Malaga. By 17:00, the grid operator said power was being restored “in several areas of the north, south and west of the [Iberian] peninsula”.

Portugal’s power firm REN gave a more dire prediction, saying that it could “take up to a week” before the network was back to normal.

A state of emergency was later declared across Spain, with regions able to request special measures.

But by Monday evening, Sanchez said 50% of power had been restored across Spain, while REN said electricity had been restored to 750,000 customers. Many, however, remain without power.

Knock on effects continue: Back-up generators at airports kicked on, allowing most flights to leave on time, but some have been unable to operate.

Tom McGilloway, on holiday in Lisbon, was due to return to London on Monday night, but as of early evening did not know what would happen.

He said for the time being people were getting drinks and food – but vendors told him they would only be able to keep working until the batteries ran out on their payment terminals.

“If I need to book a hotel if the plane is cancelled, I don’t know how I can do it if payments are down,” he added.

“My partner’s parents are trying to get petrol so they can pick us up to take us back to Alentejo but many petrol stations are closed or not taking payment. We might be stuck with no plan for where to stay tonight.”

Spanish violinist Isaac Bifet went to a rehearsal in the morning at the symphony orchestra in Madrid. But the building was all dark and most of the other orchestra players hadn’t turned up because they were stranded with no transport.

People without cash were particularly stuck, he told the BBC, because online payments systems were down.

The day without power was “strange” and “a little medieval”, Mr Bifet said. But “the atmosphere was actually pretty nice.”

And with the electricity still out in his apartment, he spent the evening drinking beers with friends by candlelight.

• Have you been affected? Email haveyoursay@bbc.co.uk

Mark Carney and the Liberal Party have claimed a remarkable victory in the Canadian election – and it appears to have come with a big assist from Donald Trump.

The US president’s constant badgering of America’s northern neighbour and taunts about making it the 51st US state since his return to office in January coincided with a dramatic reversal in fortune for the centre-left party.

Until then, Pierre Poilievre’s Conservative Party had held what looked like high and insurmountable ground in voter preference polls amidst general dissatisfaction with the state of the Canadian economy and 10 years of Liberal government under then leader Justin Trudeau.

The past year has been devastating for incumbent governments around the world, with parties all along the political spectrum losing ground or outright control – with the US, UK, Japan, Germany, France and India among the most prominent examples.

This Canadian general election broke that trend, as the Liberals forced Trudeau to resign and picked a political outsider, former Bank of England chief Carney, as their leader.

He ran hard against what the party continuously characterised as the real threat Trump posed not just to their economy but also to Canada’s very sovereignty.

Although Trump doesn’t appear to have the same distaste for Carney that he clearly held for Trudeau, his political and policy interests and those of Canada now appear destined to continue to diverge.

Already there are indications that Canada is looking more toward Europe as a reliable partner, rather than Trump’s America – a move that is sure to irk the American leader.

Carney has pledged to quickly begin new trade negotiations with Trump in an attempt to stave off US tariffs on Canadian auto exports set to kick in on 3 May.

The Canadian economy, which heavily depends on exports to the US, is at considerable risk if a full trade war erupts, and Carney – an economist by training and a veteran central banker – has promised voters that he will do everything in his power to keep Canada from tumbling into a recession.

Meanwhile, Trump belly-flopped into Canadian politics one more time on Monday, while voters were casting their ballots, again calling the US-Canadian border “artificially drawn” and saying the nation would be better off as a “cherished” American state.

Carney ascended to political power quite suddenly, at a time when his country is facing a generational challenge from its superpower neighbour. Many world leaders are still working out how to deal with Donald Trump in his second term, but few will face this kind of test.

• LIVE: Follow BBC’s coverage of the election
• RESULTS: How Canada voted – in charts
• ANALYSIS: Why Carney’s Liberals won – and the Conservatives lost
• VIDEO: Moment Liberal supporters cheer projected election win
• VOTERS: How I decided who gets my vote
• US VIEW: A turnaround victory made possible by Trump

No one should expect those Liberals to say thank you to the American leader, however – or for Trump to soften his rhetoric, even though last month he said he preferred a Liberal prime minister. (He would go on to say that he really didn’t care who won.)

Instead, more of the same is the likely result – more pointed quips about Canada joining the US, more threats of a trade war and more willingness to cast longstanding ties and agreements with America’s northern neighbour into doubt.

The irony, however, is that Trump’s derisive focus on Canada may have denied him a northern neighbour run by, if not a kindred spirit, at least a politician more in line with his populist conservative priorities than Liberal Carney.

While Poilievre, a veteran politician, will never be mistaken for the American businessman-turned-president, they have some similarities – a goal of shrinking government, lowering taxes and trimming social services, a desire to promote fossil fuel production, and a distaste for what they both deride as “woke” leftist culture.

A Conservative victory in this election would have been viewed by many – in America and throughout the world – as a new sign that the Trump win last year was more than just a singular American event. It would have represented what many in Trump’s orbit like to believe is a global movement toward their brand of culturally conservative, anti-elite, anti-immigration, and pro-working-class politics.

One of Prince Andrew’s prized business assets was administered for two years by a company controlled by the controversial millionaire Doug Barrowman, the BBC can reveal.

After the prince’s disastrous Newsnight interview in 2019, legal ownership of his Dragon’s Den-style start-up competition, Pitch@Palace Global, was transferred to a Barrowman-linked firm, Knox House Trustees (UK).

Barrowman and his wife, lingerie boss Baroness Michelle Mone, hit the headlines when she admitted they had lied about their links to a company that won large government contracts during the Covid pandemic after she recommended it to ministers.

A lawyer for Mr Barrowman said he “at no time… had any business or personal involvement with the duke”.

Pitch@Palace Global remained the prince’s company, under his control. But in line with longstanding royal practice, it was owned under the names of other people or companies, acting on his behalf as so-called “nominees”.

Documents filed at Companies House show that from 2021, the nominee owner was Knox House Trustees (UK), which was controlled and ultimately owned by Mr Barrowman until 2023.

Prince Andrew’s finances have been under intense scrutiny, with questions about how he can afford to live in his Royal Lodge mansion in Windsor after he was cut off financially by his brother, King Charles.

The prince’s choice of business associates has long been controversial. In December, he said he “ceased all contact” with Yang Tengbo, who led the Chinese arm of Pitch@Palace, after receiving advice from the UK government which alleged that he was a spy.

Mr Yang has denied being a spy or doing anything unlawful.

Mr Barrowman has attracted plenty of controversy too. In 2017, HMRC began an investigation into one of his companies, AML Tax (UK), which it said “aggressively promoted” tax avoidance schemes. It was fined £150,000 in 2022.

In January that year, the Guardian newspaper first reported links between Mr Barrowman, Baroness Mone and PPE Medpro. The pair denied involvement until December 2023, when she admitted in a BBC interview that they had lied about their links with the company.

The National Crime Agency is now investigating suspected criminal offences at the firm. Mr Barrowman and Baroness Mone both deny any wrongdoing.

Author Andrew Lownie, who is writing a biography of the prince, said: “Andrew has a long history of associating with dubious business figures and disguising his business activities behind nominee and offshore accounts. There really needs to be a full investigation into the duke’s financial activities.”

Pitch@Palace was a start-up competition, founded in 2014, where entrepreneurs would pitch their ideas to possible investors in the hope of winning their backing. It had two parts:

• a UK-based version, set up as a community interest company, which cannot pay profits to shareholders
• an international arm, Pitch@Palace Global Ltd, which held competitions in places such as Australia, Bahrain and China, and was set up as a for-profit UK company

Both arms of Pitch@Palace suspended operations following the Newsnight interview in 2019 about the prince’s links to the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, which led to Andrew stepping down as a working royal.

Nonetheless, the international operation has emerged as a possible way for the duke to fund his lifestyle. In a court witness statement from 2023, Mr Yang wrote that the duke had needed money “and saw the relationships with China through Pitch as one possible source of funding”.

Earlier this year a Dutch company said it was in talks to buy it, saying it saw “immense value” in the network, even though it had suspended operations.

However, Prince Andrew has never held the company in his own name.

Founded in 2017, Pitch@Palace Global Ltd was initially held in the name of Amanda Thirsk, the prince’s private secretary, in an arrangement often used by the Royal Family.

But early in 2021, the legal ownership was transferred to Knox House Trustees (UK) Limited.

This company had been set up the year before, and Mr Barrowman was named as having “significant influence and control” over it.

Corporate filings in the Isle of Man show Knox House Trustees (UK) was ultimately owned by Knox Limited, whose sole shareholder is Mr Barrowman.

In 2023, ownership of Knox House Trustees (UK) Ltd – which still owned Pitch@Palace Global – was transferred to Arthur Lancaster, an accountant who has a longstanding working relationship with both the prince and Mr Barrowman. This remains the situation today.

The same year Mr Lancaster took over as the sole director and shareholder of PPE Medpro. He was also a director of many of the companies involved in the AML tax avoidance case.

The judge in that case called him “evasive” and said he had “real concerns as to the reliability of Mr Lancaster’s evidence”, which contained “significant inconsistencies”.

After the case, his lawyer wrote to the court arguing that the conclusions were “unnecessarily harsh”, that Mr Lancaster had been a “diligent and truthful witness”, and that his efforts to provide information had been hampered by the Covid pandemic.

For decades the Royal Family has held investments through nominees, and still does. In the past this has served to keep details of their holdings private, though not in this case. Prince Andrew’s involvement in Pitch@Palace Global is well known, and he is listed as having “significant influence or control” over the company on Companies House.

Mr Barrowman’s lawyer said in a statement: “Mr Lancaster was a director of KHT (UK) Ltd which provided company administration services to a number of external companies, including Pitch@Palace, a company wholly owned by the duke. Mr Lancaster acted for the duke in a personal capacity at all times and has been an associate of the duke for many years.”

Mr Lancaster declined to comment. Prince Andrew did not respond to requests for comment.

When is a ceasefire a genuine attempt to secure peace? And when is it simply PR?

It’s a question that’s been asked a lot lately.

Mostly in relation to Russia’s president.

Short ceasefires are becoming quite the Kremlin thing.

First, Vladimir Putin declared a 30-hour cessation of hostilities over Easter, portraying it as a “humanitarian” gesture.

Now the Kremlin leader has announced a three-day unilateral truce for early May. It will run from 8 May to 10 May to coincide with events marking the 80th anniversary of the end of World War Two.

In a statement, the Kremlin said that for 72 hours all military actions would cease. It cited “humanitarian” considerations (again) and made it clear Moscow expected Ukraine to follow suit.

In response to the proposal, Ukraine questioned why Russia could not commit to a ceasefire immediately and called for one to be implemented for at least 30 days.

“If Russia truly wants peace, it must cease fire immediately,” Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said, adding: “Why wait until May 8th?”

So, from the Russian president who launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine more than three years ago, is this a sincere effort to end the fighting?

Or simply a public relations exercise by the Kremlin to impress Donald Trump?

Kremlin critics will suspect PR.

During the extremely brief so-called Easter ceasefire, Ukraine had accused Russian troops of violating it repeatedly.

Moscow had used its announcement of a 30-hour pause in the fighting to send a signal to the White House: that in this war Russia is the peacemaker and Kyiv the aggressor. It accused Ukraine of ignoring what Moscow presented as an olive branch and of prolonging the war.

• Trump questions Putin’s desire for peace
• Critical week for US’s future in war talks

Recent comments by Trump suggest the US president hasn’t bought that.

In a post on his Truth Social platform at the weekend, Trump wrote that “there was no reason” for Putin “to be shooting missiles into civilian areas, cities and towns [in Ukraine], over the last few days”.

“It makes me think,” he added, “that maybe he doesn’t want to stop the war, he’s just tapping me along, and has to be dealt with differently, through ‘Banking’ or ‘Secondary Sanctions?’ Too many people are dying!!!”

Cue today’s announcement of another Russian ceasefire. This one slightly longer: three days. And, again, that claim of “humanitarian” concerns.

Another attempt to signal to Washington that the Kremlin has only the best of intentions? That Russia is really the good guy in all of this?

If so, it doesn’t appear to have worked. Not immediately. The White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt noted Moscow’s offer of a temporary ceasefire, but said: “The president [Donald Trump] has made it clear he wants to see a permanent ceasefire first to stop the killing, stop the bloodshed.

“He is increasingly frustrated with leaders of both countries,” Leavitt said.

It’s an indication that the US president may be losing patience now with the Kremlin, despite having directed most of his public criticism in recent months towards President Zelensky.

Last month the Trump administration was pushing both Russia and Ukraine to agree to a 30-day comprehensive unconditional ceasefire. Ukraine had signed up to that. Russia did not.

Already senior Russian officials are using President Putin’s three-day ceasefire offer to try to cast Ukraine in a bad light.

“It is doubtful that [President] Zelensky will support the decision of our president and accept the ceasefire,” the speaker of the lower house of the Russian parliament, Vyacheslav Volodin, told Russian state TV.

Hardly an encouraging sign, so soon after the announcement of another brief ceasefire.

One week after a devastating militant attack near the mountain resort of Pahalgam in Indian-administered Kashmir killed 26 people, the town wears a look of quiet desolation, although tourists have begun trickling back in small numbers.

The main high street, abandoned by visitors last week – with shops shuttered and hotels completely emptied out – is seeing fleeting signs of life again.

Last Tuesday, militants opened fire on people, mostly tourists, who were visiting Baisaran, a mountain-top meadow three miles (5 km) from Pahalgam, often described as the “Switzerland of India”.

The attack was one of the deadliest in recent years, devastating the lives of many families and sparking widespread anger in India.

In the days since, tensions between India and Pakistan, which both claim Kashmir in full but administer it only in part, have significantly risen, with each side announcing retaliatory measures against the other.

There is now growing speculation about whether there will be a military response from Delhi. The government in Kashmir has closed down over half the tourist destinations in the valley, as authorities review the security situation and carry out search operations.

While violence has often broken out in the region, with militants targeting security forces and civilians since an insurgency broke out in 1989, the brazen killing of tourists has been rare and has shocked local businesses and tourists alike.

Tourism is a mainstay of the economy in places like Pahalgam and there’s now fear that many livelihoods might be irrevocably hit.

At a “selfie point” outside town, overlooking lush meadows and a rushing river, Akshay Solanki, a tourist from Mumbai, said there was “panic” among his group of travellers on the day of the attack. But they had decided to continue with their journey because flights back home had become unaffordable.

Other tourists said constant reassurances from the locals and security forces had given them a sense of comfort. A driver who had brought visitors from the capital, Srinagar, told BBC Hindi that he was pleading with those visiting not to “distance” themselves from Kashmir.

After a washout three days, shawl-seller Rafi Ahmed said he’d managed to sell just a few pieces and feared for his livelihood in the long run if tourists stopped coming.

Among those exhorting tourists to come to Pahalgam was Bollywood actor Atul Kulkarni, who visited the town days after the attack. He told BBC Hindi, if the message from the militants was “don’t come here, we should respond by coming in even larger numbers”.

“Don’t cancel bookings, cancel your other plans and come here,” Kulkarni said.

But uncertainty and apprehension loom large in Pahalgam and it could take several years before a sense of normalcy is restored, local business owners and residents told the BBC.

Indian authorities have launched combing operations in the region, detaining hundreds of people and destroying homes belonging to alleged militants.

India and Pakistan have also reportedly exchanged small arms fire across the border.

The escalation in tensions is keeping tourists and business owners on tenterhooks.

Indian authorities have often claimed Kashmir witnessed a period of relative peace after Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government revoked its autonomous status in 2019. Ahead of India’s general elections in 2024, Modi hailed the “freedom” that had come to the region, saying Kashmir was touching new heights of development because it was breathing freely.

Top leaders pointed to high tourism numbers – some 23 million last year and millions more in the years before – as proof of a big boom after years of unquiet. But last week’s attacks have, yet again, shattered any idea of lasting peace in the restive valley.

“This [attack] is a blot on us…How we wipe it off is a long-term concern,” Rafi Ahmed Meer, a politician from Pahalgam told BBC Hindi, urging tourists to remember that it was local Kashmiris who rushed to help after the attacks, even picking up bodies.

The cancellation rate for trips planned from cities like Pune, Mumbai and Bengaluru are very high, Abhishek Sansare, a Mumbai-based tour operator told the BBC. A group of prominent tour operators said in a press conference that some 80-90% of all bookings had been cancelled.

“After the attack, there’s a sense that a war is looming. So tourists are confused about what to do,” said Sansare. “Some of those who’ve already made advance bookings are going ahead with their plans. I’m also going there on the 2nd of next month.”

The attack on tourists is also likely to weigh on Kashmir in other ways. The inauguration of the world’s highest single-arch rail bridge, set to connect the Kashmir valley with the rest of India was slated to happen this month after several delays.

The timeline for the opening of this showpiece project now “looks uncertain”, a source told the BBC.

The region was just beginning to attract fledgling business investments, but those too could dry up if hostilities go up.

“People who were investing in logistics and other sectors will now think twice because of the security environment. Until they regain some confidence, I don’t foresee investments coming to Kashmir immediately,” said Ubair Shah, who owns one of Kashmir’s largest cold storage facilities for fruits in Pulwama district in south Kashmir.

As the region continues to boil over, local leaders have expressed deep anguish to the families who lost their loved ones.

In an impassioned speech in the Jammu and Kashmir assembly on Monday, the state’s chief minister and tourism minister Omar Abdullah paid tributes to the victims by reading out names of all the 26 people.

He said people from every part of the country had come under attack, and while they’d come to Kashmir at his invitation he could not ensure their safe return.

“I had no words to apologise to them. What could I say to the children who saw their father drenched in blood? To the widow of the navy officer who was married barely a few days ago?

“Some people told me they’d come to Kashmir for the first time, but will have to pay for their holiday life long,” he said, adding that the attack had “hollowed out” Kashmir.