Published
24 minutes ago

A supermoon has lit up the sky across the world coinciding with a rare partial lunar eclipse.

The Moon could be seen to appear brighter and bigger on Tuesday night.

Supermoons happen when the Moon is at its closest point to Earth in its orbit.

A rare partial lunar eclipse - when the Earth's shadow covers part of the Moon - also happened with about 4% of the Moon's disc covered in darkness.

Over night from Tuesday into Wednesday, the lunar phenomenon was visible across the globe - with some of the clearest sightings in the UK and the US.

The eclipse was also visible in Latin America, Europe and Africa, as well as small parts of Asia and the Middle East.

This month's full moon - known as the Harvest moon - is the second of four "supermoons" this year.

The next partial eclipse will be in August 2026, which will be special as around 96% of the Moon will be in shadow.

Published
1 hour ago

The FBI and the US Postal Department are investigating suspicious packages received by election officials in 17 states.

Federal investigators said they were collecting the packages and that some contained “an unknown substance”, though there were no reports of injuries.

They were sent to secretaries of state and state election officials across a swathe of the country from New York to Alaska.

It comes amid reports of rising threats directed at election officials across the US and warnings of political violence as November's presidential election approaches.

The FBI and US Postal Department said they were trying to determine how many letters were sent and who was behind them, as well as their motive.

“Some of the letters contained an unknown substance and we are working closely with our law enforcement partners to respond to each incident and safely collect the letters,” the agencies said in a statement to BBC’s US partner CBS News.

The Associated Press news agency reported that packages were sent to election officials in Alaska, Georgia, Connecticut, Indiana, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Missouri, New York, Rhode Island, Iowa, Mississippi, Colorado, Kansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Tennessee and Wyoming.

Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold wrote in a post on X, formerly Twitter, that whoever posted the letters had called themselves as the “US Traitor Elimination Army”.

Officials in at least four of the states said there was no threat posed by the substances found in the packages. In Oklahoma, the Board of Elections said the substance was found to be flour.

In an interview with CBS, Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, a Democrat, said her office was receiving threats daily through voicemails, emails, social media or in person, adding that “it’s escalating”.

This is not the first time suspicious mail was mailed to US election offices.

Last November, offices in Georgia, Nevada, California, Oregon and Washington were sent envelopes with fentanyl or other substances.

Federal investigators are separately questioning a gunman who was found lurking in bushes on a Florida golf course where Trump was putting on Sunday.

Published
17 September 2024

Hip-hop mogul Sean "Diddy" Combs has been denied bail after pleading not guilty in a sex-trafficking case.

A New York federal judge remanded the musician in custody after prosecutors argued he was a "serious flight risk".

Mr Combs, 54, was arrested on Monday evening, accused of running a criminal enterprise from at least 2008 that relied on drugs and violence to force women to "fulfill his sexual desires", according to prosecutors.

A 14-page indictment charges him with racketeering, sex trafficking by force, and transportation to engage in prostitution.

If convicted on all three counts, the rapper and record producer faces a sentence of 15 years up to life in prison.

He was wearing a black T-shirt and grey sweatpants during Tuesday's court appearance in Manhattan.

Asked by US Magistrate Judge Robyn Tarnofsky how he wished to plead, Mr Combs stood up and said: "Not guilty."

According to court documents, Mr Combs "wielded the power" of his status to "lure female victims... to engage in extended sex acts" called "Freak Offs".

"During Freak Offs, Combs distributed a variety of controlled substances to victims, in part to keep the victims obedient and compliant," the indictment said.

In a news briefing, US prosecutor Damian Williams said officials found firearms, ammunition and more than 1,000 bottles of lubricant during raids on Mr Combs's homes in Miami and Los Angeles, about six months ago.

Mr Williams said federal agents had also found three semi-automatic rifles with defaced serial numbers, and a drum magazine.

He told reporters that further charges were possible, without offering specific details.

Mr Combs's lawyer, Marc Agnifilo, said the defence team had already launched an appeal against the judge's bail decision, with a hearing set for Wednesday.

"We believe in him wholeheartedly," Mr Agnifilo told reporters at the Manhattan court.

"He didn't do these things. There's no coercion and no crime. He's not afraid of the charges."

Mr Agnifilo said Mr Combs was the target of "an unjust prosecution".

In court documents, federal prosecutors said that Mr Combs had "abused, threatened, and coerced women and others around him to fulfill his sexual desires, protect his reputation, and conceal his conduct".

Prosecutors accuse Mr Combs of "creating a criminal enterprise" whose members - under his direction - engaged in sex trafficking, forced labour, kidnapping, arson and bribery.

"On numerous occasions", the documents said, Mr Combs assaulted women by "striking, punching, dragging, throwing objects at, and kicking them".

The indictment did not specify how many women were alleged victims. It also does not accuse Mr Combs himself of engaging directly in unwanted sexual acts with women.

The Bad Boy records founder, who was also known during his career as P. Diddy and Puff Daddy, has faced many of the accusations before.

Last November, his ex-girlfriend, singer Casandra Elizabeth Ventura, filed a civil lawsuit against him that included graphic descriptions of violent abuse. He denied the accusations, but settled the case a day after it was filed.

In May, Mr Combs released a public apology after video footage from a Los Angeles hotel appeared to show him beating Ms Ventura in a hallway.

Tuesday's indictment against Mr Combs accuses him of similar violence.

Ms Ventura's lawyer, Douglas Wigdor, declined to comment on Mr Combs's arrest.

The indictment follows a string of sexual assault allegations against Mr Combs, one of the most successful music moguls in the history of rap.

Four women, including Ms Ventura, have filed lawsuits accusing him of sexual and physical abuse.

In a statement issued last December, Mr Combs defended himself against what he described as "sickening allegations" made by "individuals looking for a quick payday".

In June, he returned a ceremonial "Key to the City of New York" following a request from Mayor Eric Adams, who had bestowed the honour on him just nine months beforehand.

Days later, Howard University announced it was revoking Mr Combs's 2014 honorary degree.

The musician is credited with helping turn rappers and R&B singers such as Usher, Mary J Blige and Notorious B.I.G. into stars in the 1990s and 2000s.

Published
17 September 2024

New York police have defended their actions after a bystander was shot in the head as two officers tackled a fare-evader armed with a knife in a busy subway station.

The man was in critical condition after the shooting at Sutter Avenue L station in Brooklyn on Sunday afternoon. Three others, including the suspect, were wounded.

Police said officers challenged a suspected fare-evader, then shot him after he threatened them with a knife. His condition is critical.

New York authorities have made reducing crime on the subway and buses a top priority following a series of violent attacks, robberies and murders. A crackdown on fare evasion is part of that push.

But critics have questioned how the pursuit of a minor offender escalated into the use of lethal force in a crowded space.

Tom Donlon, the city's interim police commissioner, ordered a full investigation but added: "Make no mistake, the events that occurred... were the results of an armed perpetrator".

The officers involved have not been named by police.

The bystander who was shot and had critical injuries has been identified in New York media as Gregory Delpeche. The New York Daily News reports that he was on the way to his job at a local hospital, which he's had for more than 20 years. The wound to his head has left him with possible brain damage, his family told the outlet.

Jennvine Wong, of the Legal Aid Society Cop Accountability Project, told The New York Times that police had endangered lives after choosing "in an enclosed space ... to use disproportionate force".

In a press conference, NYPD Chief of Department Jeffrey Maddrey said that two officers had seen a man - later identified as Derrell Mickles - go through barriers without paying.

Mr Maddrey said body camera footage showed the suspect threatening to "kill" the officers if they followed him, before confronting them with a knife.

The footage shows a train pull into the station as the confrontation escalates. The officers fired Tasers at the man - to no effect - as he attempted to board the train, before he jumped back to the platform.

"At one point, he is advancing on one of the officers with his knife," Mr Maddrey said. "The officer stands back, he draws his weapon, and both officers at this point fire."

Two bystanders, a police officer and the suspect were hit.

Mr Maddrey said that the officer realised he had been shot in the armpit but continued to perform "life-saving measures" on the suspect. Both officers then realised that two bystanders had also been hit by gunfire. Two other officers then arrived and aided the wounded.

Officials said that the suspect had a record of 20 previous arrests and a significant history of mental illness.

Janno Liever, the chief executive of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, said that the incident "started because somebody wanted to come to the transit system with a weapon, somebody who... had a history of crime and a history of violence and even gun charges".

The police said on Sunday that a knife had been recovered and posted a picture on social media. The next day, however, it posted another message saying the knife had been taken from the crime scene by an unidentified man.

Officers recovered a different knife from the scene, thinking it was the one that the suspect had been carrying, according to the Gothamist, external.

An NYPD spokesman told the news website that the knife they picked up must have been left behind by another subway rider.

City authorities have attempted to expand the police presence on its transport system following a surge in crime. All stations on the city's system have security cameras and pilot schemes are being run to scan passengers for weapons.

The MTA last year announced a crackdown on fare evasion, backed by enforcement by police. Officials say that aggressive enforcement can help in catching criminals and removing weapons from New York's trains.

But the problem continues to grow, with NYPD statistics showing 2,227 arrests and more than 30,000 summonses in the second quarter of this year - around double that of the same period five years ago.

Published
4 hours ago

As the sun was rising Baltimore 26 March, Maria del Carmen Castellón received news that she never expected: her husband, Miguel Angel Luna Gonzalez, was missing in the cold, dark waters of Maryland’s Patapsco river.

"I got a knock on the door from my husband's son," she recalls. "It's news I wouldn't wish on any wife. At that moment, I wished I had wings so I could fly and save him."

Luna, a 49-year-old father of three originally from El Salvador, was one of eight workers fixing potholes on Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge when it was struck by a 948ft (289m) cargo ship - the M/V Dali - sending an estimated 3,000 to 4,000 tonnes of debris into the shipping channel below.

Six of the workers - all originally from Latin America - died in the bridge collapse.

It would be more than five weeks until Luna’s body was recovered in early May.

"That was the hardest day of my life," Ms Castellón said. "It opened a wound in my heart that will never heal."

Now, six months on from the disaster, the families of three of the dead workers are suing the shipping company, Grace Ocean Private Ltd, arguing that its "negligence" and actions directly led to the collapse of the bridge and the deaths of their loved ones.

"We're fighting for justice," added Ms Castellón, speaking in Spanish to reporters at the Baltimore offices of Casa, an advocacy organisation focused on immigrants. "Justice means preventing future tragedies."

While a National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) investigation into the incident is ongoing, a preliminary report issued in May found that the Dali had lost electrical power four times in a span of less than 12 hours before colliding with the Key Bridge.

"There's a lot that we still don't know," said Matthew Wessler, a lawyer working on behalf of the three families. "But in our view, that [the repeated loss of power] should have led the ship to fully assess what had gone wrong and fix the problem."

In federal court earlier this year, Grace Ocean sought to limit its legal exposure from the disaster.

Contacted by the BBC, a spokesman for Grace Ocean said the filing of claims from the families "was anticipated", but the company "will have no further comments on the merits of any claim" for the time being.

The lawsuit is one of several faced by Synergy and Grace Ocean in the wake of the accident.

The city of Baltimore and a collection of local business owners have also sued the firms, claiming that the ship was unseaworthy when it set off for its March voyage.

Speaking to reporters in Baltimore on Tuesday, Ms Castellón recalled that the day before the accident, the couple went to look at a rental property where they were hoping to open a small restaurant.

The two had already worked together on a food truck, with Luna helping when not at his construction job.

"As we looked through the windows, we spoke about a future in which he wouldn't have to suffer at a dangerous job," Ms Castellón said, crying. "Those moments were filled with laughter, and love," she added.

"But those dreams were shattered that morning when I lost him," Ms Castellón added.

That night as he left for work, he left her a letter which he signed off with "I love you".

"I carry that in my heart now," she added.

Lawyers and immigration advocates working with the families say they also hope the incident highlights the often dangerous - but crucial work - of immigrants in the US.

Published
4 hours ago

Somalia may be one of the poorest countries in the world and beset by violence, but it is “fixable”, according to its top climate official.

The country has been torn apart by more than 30 years of overlapping conflicts - including an Islamist insurgency, a civil war, and a series of regional and clan confrontations. Yet Abdihakim Ainte, the Somali prime minister’s climate advisor, still regards his country as “as story of potential - of promise”.

What makes his optimism all the more surprising is the fact climate change is amplifying virtually all the challenges his country faces.

One commentator described climate change as a “chaos multiplier”, because it exacerbates existing tensions and entrenches conflict in fragile states like this.

Listen to Justin Rowlatt’s reporting from Somalia on The Climate Question

But Somalia, the easternmost country in continental Africa, can’t be held responsible for our changing climate. The figures are staggering. Somalia has emitted roughly as much carbon dioxide from fossil fuels since the 1950s as the US economy does in an average three days, external.

The most obvious effects of climate change here have been in agriculture. Somalia is still overwhelmingly an agricultural economy, with about two thirds of the population depending on farming and animal herding for most of their income.

In 2022 the country experienced its worst drought for 40 years – an event scientists estimate was made 100 times more likely by human-caused climate change.

The extent of the challenge Somalia faces became clear as the convoy of International Red Cross (ICRC) Land Cruisers we were travelling in rumbled into the dry scrub that covers most of the country. We were accompanied by three guards clutching AK47s - Somalia is the only country in the world where Red Cross staff travel with armed security as standard.

The camel herders and small-scale farmers we met are on the front line of climate change here. For thousands of years Somalis have been eking out a living moving their herds of camels and goats from one pasture to the next across this dry land.

But climate change is disrupting the patterns of rain that made this way of life possible.

Sheik Don Ismail told us he lost all his camels during the drought, when grazing grounds dried up and the fodder he grew on his small farm wasn't enough to sustain them.

“The well became dry and there was no pasture, so the animals began to die,” he said, shaking his head. “The life we lead now is really bad - really bad.”

That drought left farmers and herders fighting for access to water and pasture. Sheik Don said he was sometimes forced to defend his land at gunpoint.

“There is no respect if you don’t have a gun,” he said. “The herders who lead their animals into the farm stay back when they see my weapon. They get scared.”

In a country divided into rival clan groups and already scarred by violence, these localised disputes can easily spiral into full-blown battles, said Cyril Jaurena, who runs the ICRC operation in Somalia.

“Access to boreholes and pastureland gets more and more difficult to find, and so the population in the area might end up fighting - competing for those resources, and sometimes it goes to people shooting at each other,” he warned.

And drought isn't the only problem here. Last year Somalia experienced terrible floods as a result of rains scientists say were made twice as intense by human-caused global warming. The floodwater washed away precious soils killing hundreds of people and displacing one million others.

The effects of Somalia’s climate change “double whammy” are all too evident in the hunger clinic the Red Cross runs in a hospital in the port city of Kismayo on the south coast.

Every day a steady stream of mothers bring their malnourished babies here. Many have had to cross from territory controlled by al-Qaeda’s lethal affiliate, Islamist militants al-Shabab, to get here.

The UN estimates more than 1.5m children under the age of five are acutely malnourished in Somalia.

Around four million Somalis have been driven into vast makeshift refugee camps – about a fifth of the total population.

Displaced people make their homes out of anything they can get hold of – pieces of old fabric, plastic sheets and rusty corrugated iron - all draped over a web of dry sticks. Some people even unroll tin cans into strips to form parts of their walls.

There is little international support, if any. At the refugee camp I visited, just outside the city of Garowe in the north of Somalia, families have to pay for their food and water, as well as pay rent for the scraps of land where they build their shacks.

After more than three decades of war, Somalia has fallen way down the list of international priorities. Its problems have been eclipsed by what seem like more urgent conflicts, in places like Ukraine and Gaza. The UN calculates Somalia needs at least $1.6bn (about £1.2bn) to meet the basic humanitarian needs of the people this year, but so far just $600 million has been pledged by donor governments.

The entwined impacts of climate and conflict have created a huge reservoir of potential recruits for the country’s many conflicts.

Those in the camps are desperate for money, and the easiest work to come by - according to the people I spoke to - is as a paid fighter with one of the many rival armies.

One woman told me of her fears for her husband and four of her five sons after they became fighters with a local militia.

“They are rural people with no skills, so the only work they could get was in the army,” Halima Ibrahim Ali Mohamud said as we sat on carpets laid over the dirt floor of her hut.

“They were desperate, and when you are without food long enough, and your children are looking at you, you will do anything.”

As we went from shack to shack, mothers told us similar stories of husbands and sons who had left to become fighters, some of whom had been killed.

But many Somali people are taking action. The local power station in Garowe has been investing in wind and solar power, for example.

The decision wasn’t prompted by some international initiative, says the company CEO. Abdirazak Mohamed said he hasn’t received any grants or aid from abroad. The National Energy Corporation of Somalia (NECSOM), who he works for, is making the investments because renewables - energy derived from natural sources like the sun and the wind - are much better value than the diesel generators the power station used to rely on.

I met Somali entrepreneurs setting up businesses, including a woman who had arrived in the Garowe refugee camp with nothing, but who set up a thriving business.

Amina Osman Mohamed explained how she had borrowed food from a local stall, cooked it, and used the small profit she made to do the whole thing again the following day.

The small but busy café she created generates the extra cash she so desperately needs to care for her sick husband and 11 children - including those of her widowed daughter.

As I left Amina’s bustling café, I began to understand why the Somali prime minister’s climate advisor is optimistic about his country’s future.

There is hope. But with climate change turbo-charging the conflict here, this country will need continued international help to make peace and build resilience against our changing climate.

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

Published
4 hours ago

“I thought I’d spend my whole life here, fighting a corrupt government - but the younger generation did something.”

Samadhi Paramitha Brahmananayake is looking at the field where she spent months camped out with thousands of other demonstrators in Sri Lanka’s capital in 2022.

She can’t quite believe that luscious green grass has replaced the hundreds of protester tents that filled the field opposite the presidential secretariat.

“I feel we’re now more energetic, more powerful,” says Ms Brahmananayake, a 33-year-old banker based in Colombo.

Two years ago, huge crowds forced the country’s deeply unpopular leader from office – now voters are just days away from choosing who they want for president.

It’s the first election since the mass protests - called the “aragalaya”, Sinhalese for struggle – which were sparked by Sri Lanka’s worst economic crisis. Inflation was at 70%. Basics like food, cooking gas and medicine were scarce.

Gotabaya Rajapaksa, the president at the time, and his government were blamed for the mess. He fled the country just before crowds stormed his residence. Euphoric protesters leapt into the presidential pool, taking victory laps.

Mithun Jayawardana, 28, was one of those swimmers. “It was awesome,” he said thinking back. Jobless, with no gas or electricity at home, he says he joined the aragalaya for a lark.

Today, he recognises how crucial the elections on Saturday are: “We need a president who is elected by the people. The people didn’t elect the current president.”

Ranil Wickremesinghe, the man who currently holds the job, was appointed to the position after Gotabaya Rajapaksa resigned. Mr Wickremesinghe, who’s been tasked with steering Sri Lanka through a period of painful economic reform, is running for re-election as an independent.

He's stood for president twice before but never succeeded, and his political future appears uncertain.

Many associate Wickremesinghe with the Rajapaksas, a political dynasty who have dominated Sri Lankan politics for decades. Many blame them for the years of financial mismanagement that led to Sri Lanka’s economic woes.

Even the country’s top court ruled that Gotabaya Rajapaksa and his brother Mahinda, another former president, were among 13 former leaders responsible for the financial crisis.

Despite the political baggage that comes with the name, a Rajapaksa has entered the political fray in these elections - there are still places the family enjoys a lot of support.

One such district is just over an hour outside Colombo. Music, fireworks and the cheers of supporters greeted Namal Rajapaksa as he approached the podium to address the hundreds that had come to hear him speak on Monday in the town of Minuwangoda. Even his father, Mahinda joined him on stage.

Namal Rajapaksa denied his family’s role in Sri Lanka’s economic collapse.

“We know our hands are clean, we know we have not done anything wrong to the people or this country,” he told the BBC.

“We are willing to face the people, let the public decide what they want and who to vote for.”

In all, a record 38 candidates are contesting the 21 September election, none of them women. In 2019, Sajid Premadasa, leader of the country's main opposition party, won 42% of the popular vote, losing to Gotabaya Rajapaksa. This time around he is thought to be in with a chance too.

For people looking for change, many are looking to Anura Kumara Dissanayake. The candidate of the leftist National People’s Party alliance has emerged as an unlikely frontrunner.

Thousands of people flocked to a field in the small town of Mirigama, two hours north-west from Colombo, to hear Mr Dissanayake speak last Saturday, many wearing bright pink hats or T-shirts with his face.

“Yes 100% sure, okay,” he tells the BBC, when asked if he can win. Campaigning as the voice of the working class, he is hoping to disrupt Sri Lanka’s political establishment.

Unlike past elections in Sri Lanka, the economy is front and centre in this one.

Holding her four-year-old son Nehan, Rangika Munasinghe laments the higher taxes she now pays.

“It’s very difficult. Salaries are being reduced, taxes on products and food are high. Kids meals, milk powder, all more expensive. Taxes are so high, we can’t manage it,” the 35-year-old told the BBC at a busy market in Colombo.

Sri Lanka was able to stave off bankruptcy in 2022 thanks to loans from the International Monetary Fund, and countries like China and India. But now everyone is feeling the pressure from the country’s enormous $92bn (£69bn) debt burden, which includes both foreign and national debt.

“I’m doing two jobs,” says Mohamed Rajabdeen, who’s in his 70s. He is selling spoons from a stall off a busy street. Once this is done, he will travel to his second job, working in security.

“We should get good salaries, university students should get jobs, and people should be able to live in peace and harmony. We expect our government to fulfil all of that.”

Being that vocal about their expectations from elected officials is something new for many people in Sri Lanka. That change has been brought about by the protest movement, says Buwanaka Perera, a youth political activist.

“People are more gutsy in confronting the state or in confronting what’s wrong,” the 28-year-old said. “It’s not just the state, it’s trickled down to everyday things - it can be in your household, it can be in your streets. To make a stand to voice out and to look out for one another.”

Ms Brahmananayake agrees, calling it a lasting impact of her efforts and the thousands of others who participated in the uprising two years ago.

“People are talking about politics now. They are asking questions. I think people have the power in their hands. They can vote.”

Like her, climate and political activist Melani Gunathilaka, 37, knows the path forward will not be easy for Sri Lanka, but they have hope.

“There hasn’t been a change in the political and economic culture - but there has been a massive change in terms of society,” she says.

“For the first time people took charge, people exercised their democratic rights to do what’s right for the country.”

Ranil Wickremesinghe, a six-time former prime minister, was appointed president after Gotabaya Rajapaksa was ousted in 2022.

The 75-year-old, who faced the monumental task of trying to lead Sri Lanka out of economic collapse, has been accused of protecting the Rajapaksa family, allowing them to regroup, while shielding them from prosecution - allegations he has denied.

Anura Kumara Dissanayake is the candidate of the leftist National People’s Party alliance.

His promises of tough anti-corruption measures and good governance have boosted his candidacy, positioning the 55-year-old as a serious contender.

Sajith Premadasa, the runner-up last time, is the leader of the country's main opposition Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB).

Earlier this week, he told news agency AP that he would ensure that the rich would pay more taxes and the poor would see their conditions improve if he won.

Namal Rajapaksa comes from a powerful political clan that produced two presidents.

The 38-year-old's campaign has centred around the legacy of his father, who is still seen as a hero by some Sri Lankans for presiding over the bloody end to the civil war against Tamil Tiger rebels. But he needs to win over voters who blame the Rajapaksas for the economic crisis.

Published
17 September 2024

Thousands of people have been injured in Lebanon, after pagers used by the armed group Hezbollah to communicate dramatically exploded almost simultaneously across the country on Tuesday.

At least nine people were killed and some 2,800 injured, many of them seriously.

It is unclear how the attack - which looks to have been highly sophisticated - occurred, though Hezbollah has blamed its adversary Israel. Israeli officials have so far declined to comment.

Here is what we know so far.

The blasts began in Lebanon's capital Beirut and several other areas of the country at about 15:45 local time (13:45 BST) on Tuesday.

Witnesses reported seeing smoke coming from people's pockets, before seeing small explosions that sounded like fireworks and gunshots.

In one clip, CCTV footage appeared to show an explosion in a man’s trouser pocket as he stood at a shop till.

Explosions continued for around an hour after the initial blasts, the Reuters news agency reported.

Soon after, scores of people began arriving at hospitals across Lebanon, with witnesses reporting scenes of mass confusion.

Analysts have been quick to express shock at the scale of Tuesday's attack - saying Hezbollah prides itself on its security measures.

Some suggested a hack may have caused the pager batteries to overheat, causing the devices to explode. Such an act would be unprecedented.

But many experts say that is unlikely, with footage of the explosions inconsistent with the batteries overheating.

Some analysts say instead that some sort of supply chain attack, which involved the pagers being tampered with during their manufacture or in transit, was more likely.

Supply chain attacks are a growing concern in the cyber security world with many high-profile incidents recently caused by hackers gaining access to products whilst they are in development.

But these attacks are normally contained to software. Hardware supply chain attacks are far rarer as they involve getting hands on to the device.

If this was indeed a supply chain attack it would have involved a huge operation to secretly tamper with the pagers in some way.

A former British Army munitions expert, who asked not to be named, told the BBC the devices could have been packed with between 10 to 20 grams each of military-grade high explosive, hidden inside a fake electronic component.

This, said the expert, would have been armed by a signal, something called an alphanumeric text message.

A source close to Hezbollah told AFP that two of those killed were the sons of two Hezbollah MPs. They also said the daughter of a Hezbollah member was killed.

Among the injured was Iran's ambassador to Lebanon, Mojtaba Amani. Reports in Iranian media said his injuries were minor.

Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah was not hurt in the explosions, Reuters reported quoting a source.

Lebanese Public Health Minister Firass Abiad said damage to the hands and face made up the majority of injuries.

Speaking to the BBC's Newshour programme, he said: "Most of the injuries appear to be to the face and especially to the eyes and also the hand with some amputations, whether it's in the hands or the fingers, and some of them have injuries to their flank."

He added: "The vast majority of the people who are presenting to the emergency rooms are in civilian clothes, so it's very difficult to discern whether they belong to a certain entity like Hezbollah or others...

"But we are seeing among them people who are old or people who are very young, like the child who unfortunately died... and there are some of them who are healthcare workers," the minister said.

Outside of Lebanon, 14 people were injured in similar blasts in neighbouring Syria, according to UK-based campaign group the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

So far, nobody has claimed responsibility - though Lebanon's prime minister and Hezbollah have blamed Israel.

Prime Minister Najib Mikati said the explosions represented a “serious violation of Lebanese sovereignty and a crime by all standards”.

In its statement accusing Israel of being behind the attacks, Hezbollah said it held the country "fully responsible for this criminal aggression that also targeted civilians".

"This treacherous and criminal enemy will certainly receive its just punishment for this sinful aggression, whether it expects it or not," it added.

Israeli officials have not commented on the allegations, but most analysts agree that it seems likely it is behind the attack.

Prof Simon Mabon, chair in International Relations at Lancaster University, told the BBC: "We know that Israel has a precedent of using technology to track its target" - but he called the scale of this attack "unprecedented".

Lina Khatib, from the UK-based Chatham House, said the attack suggested that Israel has "deeply" infiltrated Hezbollah's "communications network".

Hezbollah has relied heavily on pagers as a low-tech means of communications to try to evade location-tracking by Israel.

A pager is a wireless telecommunications device that receives and displays alphanumeric or voice messages.

Mobile phones have long since been abandoned as simply too vulnerable, as Israel’s assassination of the Hamas bomb-maker Yahya Ayyash demonstrated as long ago as 1996, when his phone exploded in his hand.

But one Hezbollah operative told the AP news agency that the pagers were a new brand that the group had not used before.

Emily Harding, an ex-analyst with the CIA, said the security breach was deeply embarrassing to Hezbollah.

"A breach of this magnitude is not only physically harmful, but will also make them question their entire security apparatus," she told the BBC.

"I would expect to see them conduct an intensive internal investigation that will distract them from a potential fight with Israel."

Hezbollah is allied with Israel's arch-nemesis in the region, Iran. The group is part of Tehran's Axis of Resistance and has been engaged in a low-level war with Israel for months, frequently exchanging rocket and missile fire across Israel's northern border. Entire communities have been displaced from both sides.

The blasts came just hours after Israel's security cabinet made the safe return of residents to the north of the country an official war goal.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told a visiting US official that Israel would "do what is necessary to ensure its security".

Earlier on Monday, Israel's domestic security agency said it had thwarted a Hezbollah attempt to assassinate a former official.

Despite the ongoing tensions, observers say that until now both sides have aimed to contain hostilities without crossing the line into full-scale war. But there are fears that the situation could spiral out of control, with Hezbollah already threatening to respond to Tuesday's explosions.

Additional reporting by Frances Mao

Published
17 September 2024

Nine people, including a child, have been killed after handheld pagers used by members of the armed group Hezbollah to communicate exploded across Lebanon, the country’s health minister says.

Iran’s ambassador to Lebanon was among 2,800 other people who were wounded by the simultaneous blasts in Beirut and several other regions.

Hezbollah, which is backed by Iran, said the pagers belonged “to employees of various Hezbollah units and institutions” and confirmed the deaths of eight fighters.

The group blamed Israel for what it called “this criminal aggression” and vowed that it would get “just retribution”. The Israeli military declined to comment.

Hours before the explosions, Israel’s security cabinet said stopping Hezbollah attacks on the north of the country to allow the safe return of displaced residents was an official war goal.

There have been almost daily exchanges of fire across the Israel-Lebanon border since the day after the start of the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza on 7 October.

Hezbollah has said it is acting in support of the Iran-backed Palestinian group. Both are proscribed as terrorist organisations by Israel, the UK and other countries.

The UN's spokesman said the latest developments in Lebanon were "extremely concerning, especially given that this is taking place within a context that is extremely volatile".

Many Lebanese were in a state of shock and disbelief on Tuesday evening, unable to get their heads around an event that was unprecedented in scale and nature.

Hezbollah said an unspecified number pagers - which the group relies on heavily for communications due to the risk of mobile phones being hacked or tracked - exploded at around 15:30 local time (12:30 GMT) in the capital Beirut and many other areas.

One CCTV video showed an explosion in a man’s bag or pocket at a supermarket. He is then seen falling backwards to the ground and crying out in pain as other shoppers run for cover.

Hours later, ambulances were still rushing to hospitals overwhelmed with the number of casualties, 200 of whom the health minister said were in a critical condition. Outside, relatives were waiting in the hope of receiving updates.

The LAU Medical Centre in Beirut's Ashrafieh district closed its main gate and was limiting the number of people getting in. “It’s very sensitive and some scenes are horrific,” one staff member told the BBC.

Most of the wounds were at the level of the waist, face, eyes and hands, he said, adding: “A lot of casualties have lost fingers, in some cases all of them.”

The wife of Iranian ambassador Mojtaba Amani said he was "slightly inured" by one of the explosions and that he was "doing well" in hospital.

Hezbollah's media office announced the deaths of eight fighters. It did not give details on the locations and circumstances, saying only that they were “martyred on the road to Jerusalem".

A source close to the group told AFP news agency that the son of Hezbollah MP Ali Ammar and the 10-year-old daughter of a Hezbollah member in the Bekaa Valley were among those killed. Later, the source said the son of another lawmaker, Hassan Fadlallah, was wounded, having initially reported that he was dead.

Fourteen people were also wounded by exploding pagers in neighbouring Syria, where Hezbollah is fighting alongside government forces in the country's civil war, according to the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

“We hold the Israeli enemy fully responsible for this criminal aggression,” Hezbollah said in a statement on Tuesday evening.

“This treacherous and criminal enemy will certainly get his just retribution on this sinful aggression from where it counts and from where it does not count,” it added.

Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati also blamed Israel for the explosions, saying that they represented a “serious violation of Lebanese sovereignty and a crime by all standards”.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said he told his Lebanese counterpart that he "strongly condemned Israeli terrorism".

The US, Israel's closest ally, denied any involvement and urged Iran not to heighten tensions.

Hezbollah did not say what it believed had caused the pagers to explode.

The Wall Street Journal cited a source as saying the affected devices were from a new shipment that Hezbollah had received in recent days. A Hezbollah official also told the newspaper some people had felt the pagers heat up before the blasts.

Overheated lithium-ion batteries can catch fire, but experts said hacking into the pagers and making them overheat would not usually cause such explosions.

A former British Army munitions expert, who asked not to be named, told the BBC the pagers would have likely been packed with between 10g and 20g of military-grade high explosive, hidden inside a fake electronic component.

Once armed by a signal, called an alphanumeric text message, the next person to use the device would have triggered the explosive, the expert said.

Lina Khatib, a Middle East analyst at the UK-based Chatham House think tank, told the BBC: "Israel has been engaging in cyber operations against Hezbollah for several months, but this security breach is the largest in scale.”

Nicholas Blanford, a Beirut-based senior fellow of the American think tank the Atlantic Council, said: “Israel in one fell swoop has rendered combat ineffective hundreds if not thousands of Hezbollah fighters, in some cases permanently.”

He warned that Hezbollah's leaders would now “face extreme pressure from the ranks and supporters to retaliate heavily”, describing it as "the most dangerous moment" in the Hezbollah-Israel conflict since October.

A statement put out by the Israeli military on Tuesday evening did not comment on the pager explosions, but said the chief of staff Lt Gen Herzi Halevi had held a situational assessment with commanders "focusing on readiness in both offence and defence in all arenas".

It also said there was no change in defensive guidelines to the Israeli public but asked them to remain alert and vigilant.

Earlier in the day, the military said an air strike had killed three “Hezbollah terrorists operating within a terrorist infrastructure site” in the Blida area, near Lebanon’s border with Israel.

Lebanon’s health ministry confirmed that three people had been killed in an Israeli strike, while Hezbollah’s media office said it had carried out missile and drone attacks targeting Israeli troops and military sites.

Israel’s Shin Bet internal security service also said it had foiled a Hezbollah bomb attack targeting an unnamed former senior Israeli security official. Hezbollah did not comment on the accusation.

This comes at a time when Israel's government is threatening to step up its military effort against Hezbollah.

On Tuesday morning, Israel's security cabinet made the safe return of 60,000 residents displaced in the north by Hezbollah attacks an official goal of the Gaza war.

Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said during a meeting with US envoy Amos Hochstein on Monday that the only way to return northern residents was through "military action".

“The possibility for an agreement is running out as Hezbollah continues to ‘tie itself’ to Hamas, and refuses to end the conflict,” a statement from his office said.

Since the hostilities escalated in October, at least 589 people have been killed in Lebanon, the vast majority of them Hezbollah fighters, according to the Lebanese health ministry.

On the Israeli side, 25 civilians and 21 members of security forces have been killed, the Israeli government says.

Additional reporting by Frances Mao

Published
6 hours ago

A former employee of the company behind the doomed Titan submersible has told a public hearing he believed a safety incident was "inevitable" as the firm "bypassed" all standard rules.

OceanGate's former operations director David Lochridge testified to US Coast Guard investigators that he had warned of potential safety problems before he was fired in 2018, but was ignored.

Five people on board the Titan sub died when the experimental deep-sea craft imploded in June 2023 as it began a planned descent to the wreck of the Titanic.

The public hearings began on Monday as part of a two-week inquiry by the US Coast Guard into the disaster. The investigation has been going on for 15 months.

Mr Lochridge's highly anticipated testimony on Tuesday marked his first time speaking out publicly since raising concerns with his former employer.

He was fired from OceanGate and sued by the company for revealing confidential information. He countersued for wrongful dismissal.

A key former employee of the company, he had been asked by the CEO, Stockton Rush, to assemble a quality inspection report in 2018 of the Titan.

US court documents show Mr Lochridge had major concerns with the Titan's design, including the fact it was made from carbon fibre, warning that the material would damage further with every dive.

On Tuesday, he told US Coast Guard investigators the "whole idea" of OceanGate was "to make money".

"There was very little in the way of science," he said.

Mr Lochridge also accused the company and its CEO of "arrogance", saying they refused to work with experts at the University of Washington to develop the Titan submersible and opted to do all the engineering in house.

"They think they could do this on their own without proper engineering support," he said.

He testified his relationship with the company began breaking down in 2016 because he raised concerns about safety, saying he was probably labelled "the troublemaker" for being outspoken.

Mr Lockridge was one of as many as 10 former OceanGate employees, including co-founder Guillermo Sohnlein, and experts in marine safety and undersea exploration expected to speak to the Coast Guard's Marine Board of Investigations (MBI).

On Monday, officials detailed communications between the Titan and its mother ship, the Polar Prince.

It was revealed "all good here" was one of the final messages from the submersible before it imploded.

OceanGate’s former engineering director Tony Nissen told the hearing that he once refused to get into the sub several years before Titan’s last trip.

“‘I’m not getting in it,’” Mr Nissen said he told the company CEO, Rush, also testifying that he had felt pressured to get the vessel ready to dive.

While offering a historical look at the Titan, officials noted it was never subject to third-party testing and had been left exposed to weather and other elements while in storage.

They noted that during 13 dives to the Titanic in 2021 and 2022, the submersible had 118 equipment issues.

Officials also offered a handful of specific examples of submersible failures including its batteries dying and leaving passengers stuck inside for 27 hours.

As well as OceanGate's CEO, British explorer Hamish Harding, veteran French diver Paul Henri Nargeolet, the British-Pakistani businessman Shahzada Dawood and his 19-year-old son Suleman were on board the ship.

OceanGate suspended all exploration and commercial operations following the incident.

Published
17 September 2024

Intense storms battering central Europe are now reaching Italy, where warnings for heavy rain, strong winds and floods have been issued for much of the country.

Floods are already reported in the central city of Pescara, while the Italian meteorological service's weather alerts apply from the northern coast of Emilia-Romagna to the far-south.

The warnings come as flooding has devastated parts of Poland, the Czech Republic, Romania and Austria this week, leaving at least 21 people dead.

Authorities in Croatia, Hungary and Slovakia are also warning of flooding in the coming days.

The significant flooding has been caused by Storm Boris, which brought vast amounts of rain and snow at the weekend.

More than 5,000 soldiers have been deployed to help people in southern Poland, including the 40,000 residents evacuated from the town of Nysa.

The flood waters are receding in some places in the region and spreading in others, with the extent of the damage revealed in Polish towns like Glucholazy.

The town's main bridge collapsed after being damaged by the swollen river, while many of its streets have been covered in mud.

Polish police on Tuesday confirmed at least six people have died, cautioning against “false information” following media reports that put the total number of people killed at more than a dozen.

The country's prime minister, Donald Tusk, has declared a month-long state of natural disaster - with the worst flooding expected to hit the city of Wroclaw on Wednesday.

Areas along the Czech-Polish border are among the worst-hit, where 15,000 people have been evacuated in Czech Republic as well.

The country has experienced the worst flooding in over 27 years, according to local NGO Člověk v tísn.

Ostrava has been one of the most-affected towns, after the river Oder burst its banks following heavy downpours on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, water levels are continuing to rise fast on the River Danube in Slovakia and Hungary, with the Slovak capital Bratislava and its Hungarian counterpart Budapest preparing for possible flooding.

Emergency services and volunteers, in some places backed up by the army, are also working round the clock to protect low-lying settlements in the region.

Austrian authorities have closed sections of the Danube to shipping traffic over the elevated water levels along the vital waterway, according to reports in local media.

The Croatian Meteorological and Hydrological Service has warned the river could experience an "extremely rare" water increase - and confirmed plans are in place to put up flood barriers if necessary.

In Italy, the country's National Civil Protection Service has also issued yellow alerts for nearly 50 regions tomorrow, warning there is a risk of storms, landslides and floods.

Prof Hannah Cloke, a meteorologist from the University of Reading, told the BBC that river levels had peaked in most of the smaller, upland rivers of flood-hit eastern Europe.

"Some bigger rivers, such as the Danube and Oder, are still rising in parts and will not start to go down again until late Tuesday or Wednesday, and will remain much higher than normal," she added.

BBC Weather forecasts are pinpointing the Emilia-Romagna and Marche regions as areas of greatest concern.

The region could see one or two months' worth of rainfall in the next three days alone, and there are major concerns over the prospect of flooding.

Firefighters in Pescara, Abruzzo say they have already received more than 200 calls for help after heavy rainfall triggered flooding.

In Romania, more rain is forecast in the eastern Carpathians, endangering towns and villages in Galati and Vaslui counties, which have already been hard hit.

Extreme rainfall is becoming more frequent and intense across central Europe, as across much of the world.

While events in central Europe fit with expectations of more extreme rainfall in a warming world, it is not yet possible to quantify exactly how much of a role climate change has played.

To know for certain, that requires a full scientific analysis of the natural and human influences - which can take weeks or months.

But climate scientists have been warning for years about extreme rainfall events like these occurring as the planet warms.

A warmer atmosphere holds more moisture, leading to more intense rainfall.

Warmer oceans also lead to more evaporation, feeding storm systems.

For every 1C rise in the global average temperature, the atmosphere is able to hold about 7% more moisture.

Prof Cloke told the BBC experts expect climate change to lead to worse flooding in the coming years if global temperatures continue to rise, as "extreme summer downpours are heavier and fill up rivers more quickly".

She also noted: "Only a few weeks ago, parts of southern and eastern Europe were suffering from droughts, heatwaves and fires".

"We have gone out of the frying pan and into the hot water."

Published
7 hours ago

“We can’t say why we’re here, it’s top secret!”

I’d never asked what the drunk British man in strange military fatigues was doing in a Ukrainian cafe, but he was keen to tell me regardless.

It was the summer of 2022, and dotted across Kyiv’s main Khreshchatyk Street were similar types who all claimed they were joining Ukraine’s war effort against Russia.

“War attracts all sorts,” I thought.

We now know they included Ryan Routh, the suspect in an apparent attempted assassination of Donald Trump in the US on Sunday.

Routh “was an omnipresent dude” in the Ukrainian capital, remarks Chris Lutz, an aid worker who met him several times.

“I wouldn’t call him crazy,” he says. “He was trying his best to help Ukraine, but it was getting to an unhealthy level.”

Ukrainian officials have firmly distanced themselves from the man accused of trying to assassinate Donald Trump at the former president's Florida golf course.

Routh, 58, had repeatedly tried to recruit foreign soldiers for the Ukrainian military, but was unsuccessful.

“He has never served in Ukraine’s International Legion and has no relation to the unit,” said the legion's spokesperson.

The American reportedly contacted the legion on a regular basis with ideas described by one Ukrainian soldier as “nonsensical” and “delusional”.

The suspect had also admitted to being turned down himself, claiming it was down to his age and lack of fighting experience.

In an online post reacting to the events in the US over the weekend, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he was “glad” Donald Trump was unharmed.

There was no mention of the suspect who’d been a staunch supporter of Zelensky's country - and for good reason.

Three days after Russia’s full-scale invasion, Zelensky called for "friends of peace and democracy" to join the fight from abroad, and they did so in their thousands.

Ukraine’s International Legion was born.

It was initially thought 20,000 volunteers were willing to sign up. Experts now think there are more than 4,000 foreign fighters in Ukraine.

Despite the fact Routh failed in his attempts to add to that number, his arrest in Florida has still given Kyiv a headache.

Lt Andriy Kovalenko, who’s from Ukraine’s National Security and Defence Council, warned Russia would use the assassination attempt for propaganda purposes.

“Playing with fire has its consequences,” was the response from Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov when asked whether Ukraine could have been behind the plot.

On Russian state TV, host Olga Skabeyeva called Routh a “crazed fan of Zelensky, walking around with a machine gun”.

“There has been another attempt on Donald’s life, and the attempt is officially linked to Ukraine,” she added, making reference to an earlier effort by a gunman in Pennsylvania to shoot Trump in July.

A popular pro-Russian Telegram channel in Ukraine claimed the Ukrainian intelligence service was behind the assassination attempt. A similar account said the American had travelled to Ukraine to “recruit American mercenaries”.

No evidence has accompanied these claims.

“Of course, all this is a lie,” said Lt Kovalenko. “But information confrontation is a component of the war.”

Sandra Andersen Eira, a Norwegian national fighting with the Ukrainian Marine Corps on the southern front line, says she is puzzled.

“My only question is: how did he get rejected by the International Foreign Legion?” she asks.

She says that until last May there was very little vetting. A minimum contract of six months and basic training have since been brought in.

Recruits still don’t have to have any military experience, though some consider this to be an advantage. “Routh was just another one of those types,” Ms Eira says.

“You had characters fundraising, scamming people, claiming to be in the front lines, with a unit, and then they're not.

“Some volunteers have good intentions and really want to make a difference, but maybe they're just not mentally or physically fit for it. Some of them are just delusional.”

Perhaps this applied to Ryan Routh.

He might not have helped Ukraine, but his time in the country has given it an unwelcome connection to an assassination attempt on a US presidential candidate.

Additional reporting by Hanna Chornous and Charlotte Scarr

Published
9 hours ago

It is hard to think of an attack more calculated to sow fear and confusion.

Hezbollah relies heavily on pagers for the group’s communications.

Mobile phones have long since been abandoned as simply too vulnerable - as Israel’s assassination of a Hamas bombmaker demonstrated as long ago as 1996.

But today’s attacks were terrifying in their scope.

Hezbollah members were blown up in supermarkets, on the street, in their cars, at home, next to their children.

Incidents were reported from all across Lebanon, from Beirut to the Bekaa Valley. Even from neighbouring Syria.

Iranian state TV confirmed that Tehran’s ambassador in Lebanon was among those injured.

Each explosion may have been small, but some resulted in catastrophic injuries.

One particularly graphic image showed a lifeless young man slumped in a barber’s chair, his face bloodied.

At a time when Hezbollah and Israel have been locked in a low-level war for almost a year, these attacks will have devastating consequences for Hezbollah’s manpower, communications and morale.

Israel has yet to comment, but this was undoubtedly its work - no other group or country has the motivation or capacity to do something like this.

It is the latest in a series of sophisticated military and undercover operations that have included, since mid-July, a long-range air raid in Yemen, as well as assassinations in Beirut and Tehran.

Do the pager attacks herald a larger Israeli operation?

With large numbers of Hezbollah's personnel now injured and its vital communication network massively - and embarrassingly - disrupted, this would clearly be a tempting moment for Israel to take advantage.

Israeli leaders have been signalling, in recent days, their desire to alter the military status quo along the Lebanese border.

On Sunday, Israel’s Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said Israel needed “a change in the balance of power on our northern border".

Tens of thousands of Israeli citizens have spent most of a year away from their homes. Israel ordered an evacuation of vulnerable northern communities when Hezbollah started firing rockets into northern Israel, soon after the Gaza war began.

Months of retaliatory Israeli air strikes have also forced huge numbers of Lebanese civilians to abandon their homes.

On Monday, Mr Netanyahu and his defence minister, Yoav Gallant, both warned a visiting US official that Israel was prepared to do whatever it took to ensure its security.

For the first time, the government also said its Gaza war aims included allowing Israelis to return to their homes, raising the spectre of a wider conflict, possibly involving a limited ground invasion to create a buffer zone in southern Lebanon.

There are no signs yet of the sort of build up of men and armour that would be needed for a major military incursion, but today’s attacks represent yet another dangerous escalation.

It is hard to see how Hezbollah won’t feel compelled to respond in some way.

Published
17 September 2024

An al-Qaeda-linked group has said it was behind an early morning attack in the Malian capital, Bamako.

Armed men targeted a military training school and other areas in the city, the authorities said, blaming “a group of terrorists” for the assault.

Jihadist group Jama'at Nusrat al-Islam wal Muslimin (JNIM) claimed responsibility, saying it had inflicted heavy human and material losses.

The attack was the first of its kind in years to hit Bamako. Before Tuesday, the city had largely avoided the Islamist insurgency that has wracked Mali for more than a decade.

JNIM is considered to be one of the most active militant groups in the wider Sahel region, having staged numerous attacks in Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger.

It said "special operation" on Tuesday struck both the training centre and Bamako's military airport, leading to casualties on the military's behalf.

The New York Times, external also reported losses - members of Mali's security forces told the US paper "several" officers had been killed or injured. The sources also said that a dozen ambulances had carried the troops to hospital.

The government did not mention any such losses, but said the military training school was among a number of "sensitive points" "targeted by terrorist attacks" at dawn.

A military statement issued at about 08:00 local time (08:00 GMT) said the situation "was under control", while a statement from the security ministry said residents could go about their business as normal.

AFP news agency later reported "heavy exchanges of fire" had taken place in the early afternoon near a police station controlling access to the civilian airport terminal.

At a similar time, JNIM said that it had taken complete control of the nearby military airport. The BBC has not been able to verify this claim.

Earlier, Mali's state television channel broadcast footage appearing to show roughly 20 prisoners. The men all had blindfolds on and their wrists tied.

"The terrorists have been neutralised. The sweep is continuing," army chief-of-staff Oumar Diarra said during the ORTM news report.

The news report also showed footage of three unmoving bodies laying on the ground.

International organisations such as the UN have reportedly advised their staff to restrict their movement.

Videos posted earlier on social media showed black plumes of smoke rising from a part of the city.

As shots rang out, people heading to the mosque for morning prayers had to turn back, news agency Reuters said.

Bamako's Modibo Keita International Airport was closed following the attack.

The military seized power in a coup in 2021, accusing the government of failing to do enough to quell the insurgency.

The junta expelled French troops and UN peacekeepers and brought in Russia's Wagner group to help fight the jihadists, but there is no sign of the insurgency ending.

Go to BBCAfrica.com, external for more news from the African continent.

Follow us on Twitter @BBCAfrica, external, on Facebook at BBC Africa, external or on Instagram at bbcafrica, external

Published
16 September 2024

At least seven people, including three firefighters, have died as wildfires continue to rage across Portugal, according to local news outlets.

Parts of the country have been ablaze since the weekend, with temperatures in some areas topping 30C (86F). The northern and central parts have been worst affected.

The firefighters - two women and a man - died while tackling a blaze in Tábua in Coimbra, central Portugal, the country's civil protection authority said, external.

More than 5,000 firefighters have been tackling the wildfires that Portuguese Prime Minister Luís Montenegro said are "raging across the country".

Ten thousand hectares (37 sq miles) have already been burned between Porto and Aveiro in the north, the Portuguese news agency Lusa said on Monday.

André Fernandes, Portugal's national civil protection commander, said that there were 65 fires in progress at 13:00 local time (13:00 BST) on Tuesday.

Local media reported that hospitals in affected areas have received people with burns, breathing difficulties and other injuries from the fires. At least 12 firefighters have been injured, two seriously, reports say.

Police have shut motorways, including the main road between the capital, Lisbon, and Porto, and dozens of houses, external have been destroyed by the fire. Many schools in Gondomar, an area near central Porto, closed on Tuesday, its mayor said.

Portugal's civil protection authority named the three firefighters who died as Sonia Cláudia Melo, Paulo Jorge Santos, and Susana Cristina Carvalho.

The president of Portugal, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, said, external that he was “deeply saddened” by the deaths and Montenegro issued a note of condolence, external.

Mr Fernandes said the vehicle caught fire but that it wasn't clear whether it had crashed beforehand, according to the news agency, AP.

Two more firefighters were injured during the incident, he added.

Montenegro had previously said that firefighter João Silva had died of "a sudden illness" while battling a blaze in Oliveira de Azeméis.

The EU said, external it would send eight firefighting planes to Portugal to help it tackle the severe blazes.

EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the bloc was "urgently mobilising" and urged other member states to send further assistance.

Montenegro also thanked France, Greece, Italy and Spain for their "rapid and essential help in combating this scourge" in a post on X.

Portugal already owns 30 water bombers - and has deployed over 1,500 fire engines - but authorities said the complex situation required additional support.

Several fires that broke out in the Aveiro region over the weekend forced about 70 residents to flee, the civil protection authority has said.

"The situation is not out of control, but it is very complex," Fernandes said.

Portugal and neighbouring Spain have recorded fewer wildfires this year, largely due to a wet and rainy start to the year. But they remain vulnerable to blazes due to hot and dry conditions.

Climate change increases the risk of the hot, dry weather that is likely to fuel wildfires.

The world has already warmed by about 1.1C since the industrial era began and temperatures will keep rising unless rapid efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions are made.

Published
17 September 2024

Ghislaine Maxwell's appeal against her sex trafficking conviction has been rejected by a US court.

Maxwell, 62, was found guilty in December 2021 of helping disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein sexually abuse young girls.

She was sentenced to 20 years in prison in June 2022.

Judges at Manhattan's Second US Circuit Court of Appeals upheld Maxwell's five convictions and said her sentence was "procedurally reasonable".

A lawyer for Maxwell said she plans to challenge the ruling at the US Supreme Court.

Epstein, a former boyfriend of Maxwell's, died by suicide in 2019 in a Manhattan jail cell, five weeks after he was arrested and charged with sex trafficking.

Maxwell had claimed that she should be set free under the terms of a 2008 deal between Epstein and federal prosecutors in Florida.

Under the agreement, prosecutors agreed not to pursue his alleged co-conspirators.

Maxwell's lawyers argued in March that the British socialite "should never have been prosecuted", because of the "weird" agreement.

But three judges dismissed her arguments, saying Epstein's non-prosecution deal was intended to bind only prosecutors in southern Florida.

The judgement also dismissed Maxwell's claims that she did not have a fair trial because one of the jurors did not disclose that he had been sexually abused as a child.

Maxwell's lawyer indicated she will now take the appeal against her conviction to the US Supreme Court.

"We are obviously very disappointed by the court's decision and we vehemently disagree with the outcome," Arthur Aidala said in a statement.

"We are cautiously optimistic that Ghislaine will get the justice she deserves from the Supreme Court of the United States."

Throughout the course of Maxwell's 2022 trial, four women testified that they had been abused as minors at Epstein's homes in Florida, New York, New Mexico and the Virgin Islands.

They recounted how Maxwell, who is the daughter of former Daily Mirror owner Robert Maxwell, had talked them into giving Epstein massages which turned sexual.

They claimed they were lured with gifts and promises about how Epstein could use his money and connections to help them.

During her trial, a judge rejected attempts to throw out the case, including an argument by Maxwell's lawyers that she had not been allowed to prepare adequately for her trial and that prosecutors had waited too long to bring their case against her.

Published
16 September 2024

Amazon is ordering staff back to the office five days a week as it ends its hybrid work policy.

The change will come into force from January, Amazon's chief executive Andy Jassy said in a memo to staff, external.

"We’ve decided that we’re going to return to being in the office the way we were before the onset of Covid," he said, adding that it would help staff be "better set up to invent, collaborate, and be connected enough to each other".

Mr Jassy has long been known as a sceptic of remote work, but Amazon staff were previously allowed to work from home two days a week.

Amazon's push to get corporate staff back into the office has been a source of tension within the firm which employs more than 1.5 million people globally in full-time and part-time roles.

Staff at its Seattle headquarters staged a protest last year as the company tightened the full remote work allowance that was put in place during the pandemic.

Amazon subsequently fired the organiser of the protest, prompting claims of unfair retaliation, a dispute that has been taken up with labour officials.

In his message on Monday, Mr Jassy said he was worried that Amazon - which has long prided itself on preserving the intensity of a start-up while growing to become a tech giant - was seeing its corporate culture diluted by flexible work and too many bureaucratic layers.

Mr Jassy, who replaced founder Jeff Bezos as chief executive in 2021, said he had created a "bureaucracy mailbox" for staff to make complaints about unnecessary rules and the company was asking managers to reorganise so that managers are overseeing more people.

Amazon said those changes could lead to job cuts.

In addition to returning to the office five days a week, Amazon said it would end hot-desking in the US, although it will continue in most of Europe.

The company said staff could still work from home in unusual circumstances, such as a sick child or house emergency, as was the case before the pandemic.

But unless they have been granted an exemption, Mr Jassy said: "Our expectation is that people will be in the office outside of extenuating circumstances."

Amazon's stance contrasts with the UK government's approach, which has promised to make flexible working a default right from day one as part of a new employment rights bill due to be published next month.

Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds told the Times newspaper, external that the government wants to end the "culture of presenteeism", and said there were "real economic benefits" to people working from home.

He said there was a balance to be struck, but flexible working arrangements could help businesses recruit from a wider pool of people.

Graeme from Northumberland, who didn't want us to use his surname, mainly works from home and believes "you just get so much more done".

The difference between that and office work was "night and day" in terms of productivity, he said.

In the office people can come over for a chat, or to make requests, and then it can be more difficult to get back into a work flow, he said.

However, he added that the socialising aspect of working in an office was also important.

Remote work peaked during the pandemic. Many companies started recalling staff in 2022, but the return has been incomplete.

As of this summer, about 12% of full-time employees in the US were fully remote and another 27% reported having hybrid work policies in place, according to a monthly survey by economists Jose Maria Barrero, Nicholas Bloom, and Steven J Davis.

Bank bosses such as JP Morgan's Jamie Dimon have been among the most high-profile figures critical of remote work and likely to demand full-time office attendance.

But the attitude has also spread to other industries, with UPS and Dell recalling staff to the office full-time this year.

In his memo, Mr Jassy said that Amazon's experience with its move to a hybrid policy had "strengthened our conviction about the benefits" of working in person.

But Prof Bloom, from Stanford University, said he did not think the announcements were a sign of a wider shift in work policies, noting that his data has found time spent at the office has been fairly stable for more than a year.

"For every high-profile company cancelling work-from-home, there's others that seem to be expanding it - they just don't get picked up in the media," he said.

Published
17 September 2024
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Instagram is overhauling the way it works for teenagers, promising more "built-in protections" for young people and added controls and reassurance for parents.

The new “teen accounts” are being introduced from Tuesday in the UK, US, Canada and Australia.

They will turn many privacy settings on by default for all under 18s, including making their content unviewable to people who don't follow them, and making them actively approve all new followers.

But children aged 13 to 15 will only be able to adjust the settings by adding a parent or guardian to their account.

Social media companies are under pressure worldwide to make their platforms safer, with concerns that not enough is being done to shield young people from harmful content.

UK children's charity the NSPCC said Instagram’s announcement was a "step in the right direction".

But it added that account settings can “put the emphasis on children and parents needing to keep themselves safe."

Rani Govender, the NSPCC’s online child safety policy manager, said they "must be backed up by proactive measures that prevent harmful content and sexual abuse from proliferating Instagram in the first place”.

Meta describes the changes as a "new experience for teens, guided by parents".

It says they will "better support parents, and give them peace of mind that their teens are safe with the right protections in place."

Ian Russell, whose daughter Molly viewed content about self-harm and suicide on Instagram before taking her life aged 14, told the BBC it was important to wait and see how the new policy was implemented.

“Whether it works or not we’ll only find out when the measures come into place," he said.

“Meta is very good at drumming up PR and making these big announcements, but what they also have to be good at is being transparent and sharing how well their measures are working."

Teen accounts will mostly change the way Instagram works for users between the ages of 13 and 15, with a number of settings turned on by default.

These include strict controls on sensitive content to prevent recommendations of potentially harmful material, and muted notifications overnight.

Accounts will also be set to private rather than public - meaning teenagers will have to actively accept new followers and their content cannot be viewed by people who don't follow them.

Parents who choose to supervise their child's account will be able to see who they message and the topics they have said they are interested in - though they will not be able to view the content of messages.

However, media regulator Ofcom raised concerns in April over parents' willingness to intervene to keep their children safe online.

In a talk last week, senior Meta executive Sir Nick Clegg said: “One of the things we do find… is that even when we build these controls, parents don’t use them.”

The system will primarily rely on users being honest about their ages, but Instagram already uses tools to verify a user's age if they are suspected to be lying about their age.

From January, in the US, it will use artificial intelligence (AI) tools to proactively detect teens using adult accounts, to put them back into a teen account.

The UK's Online Safety Act, passed earlier this year, requires online platforms to take action to keep children safe, or face huge fines.

Ofcom warned social media sites in May they could be named, shamed or banned for under-18s if they fail to comply with its new rules.

Social media industry analyst Matt Navarra said Instagram's changes were significant, but hinged on enforcement.

"As we've seen with teens throughout history, in these sorts of scenarios, they will find a way around the blocks, if they can," he told the BBC.

Instagram is not the first platform to introduce such tools for parents - and already claims to have more than 50 tools aimed at keeping teens safe.

In 2022 it introduced a family centre and supervision tools for parents, letting them see accounts their child follows and who follows them, among other features.

Snapchat also introduced its own family centre allowing parents over the age of 25 see who their child is messaging and limit their ability to view certain content.

YouTube said in September it would limit recommendations of certain health and fitness videos to teenagers, such as those which "idealise" certain body types.

Instagram's new measures raises the question of why, despite the large number of protections on the platform, young people are still exposed to harmful content.

An Ofcom study earlier this year, external found that every single child it spoke to had seen violent material online, with Instagram, WhatsApp and Snapchat being the most frequently named services they found it on.

Under the Online Safety Act, platforms will have to show they are committed to removing illegal content, including child sexual abuse material (CSAM) or content that promotes suicide or self-harm.

But the rules are not expected to fully take effect until 2025.

In Australia, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese recently announced plans to ban social media for children by bringing in a new age limit for kids to use platforms.

Instagram’s latest tools put more control in the hands of parents, who will now take even more direct responsibility for deciding whether to allow their child greater freedom on Instagram, and supervising their activity and interactions.

They will also need to have their own Instagram account.

But parents cannot control the algorithms which push content towards their children, or what is shared by its billions of users around the world.

Social media expert Paolo Pescatore said it was an "important step in safeguarding children’s access to the world of social media and fake news."

"The smartphone has opened up to a world of disinformation, inappropriate content fuelling a change in behaviour among children," he said.

"More needs to be done to improve children’s digital wellbeing and it starts by giving control back to parents."

Published
17 September 2024

Warning: This story contains distressing details from the start.

Dominique Pelicot, the 71-year-old man accused of drugging his wife to sleep and recruiting dozens of men to abuse her for over 10 years, has admitted to all the charges against him in his first testimony since the trial opened on 2 September.

Referring to the 50 co-defendants who are accused of raping his now ex-wife Gisèle, Mr Pelicot said: "I am a rapist like the others in this room."

"They all knew, they cannot say the contrary," he said. Only 15 of the 50 defendants admit rape, with most saying they only took part in sexual acts.

Of his ex-wife, Mr Pelicot said: "She did not deserve this."

"I was very happy with her," he told the court.

He begged his wife and family to accept his apology, saying: "I ask for forgiveness, even though it is unacceptable."

Gisèle, who was given the chance to respond shortly after, said: "It is difficult for me to listen to this. For 50 years, I lived with a man who I would've never imagined could be capable of this. I trusted him completely."

Although no cameras are allowed in court, the trial is open to the public at the request of Gisèle Pelicot, who waived her right to anonymity at the beginning of the proceedings. Her legal team said opening up the trial would shift the "shame" back on to the accused.

As she stepped out of the courtroom during a pause in the hearing on Tuesday, Gisèle was met by applause from onlookers, and she smiled as she accepted a bouquet of flowers.

Since the trial began, Gisèle has become a symbol of resilience and courage. Last weekend, thousands of people gathered in cities across France to show their support to her and other victims of rape, and the trial has ignited a national conversation on marital rape, consent and chemical submission.

Mr Pelicot, who is a father and grandfather, began his testimony by telling the court of traumatic childhood experiences and said he was abused by a male nurse when he was nine years old.

When asked about his marriage to Gisèle, Mr Pelicot said he considered suicide when he found out she was having an affair.

Throughout his testimony on Tuesday morning, Mr Pelicot repeatedly assured the court that he never "hated" his wife and was in fact "crazy about [her]... I loved her immensely and I still do."

"I loved her well for 40 years and badly for 10," he added, apparently referring to the decade during which he drugged her and abused her.

Mr Pelicot was then questioned by Stéphane Babonneau, one of Gisèle's lawyers, who asked him why he had been unable to find the will to stop abusing her, even when she started presenting medical problems.

In previous sessions of the trial, Gisèle said she had been worried she was developing Alzheimer’s or a brain tumour because of hair and weight loss and large memory gaps. These were, in fact, side-effects of the drugs her husband was giving her.

"I tried to stop, but my addiction was stronger, the need was growing," he said.

"I was trying to reassure her, I betrayed her trust. I should've stopped sooner, in fact I should've never started at all."

Mr Pelicot is also accused of drugging and abusing his daughter, Caroline, after semi-naked photos of her were found on his laptop. He has previously denied this and on Tuesday he also stated he had never touched his grandchildren. "I can look my family in the eyes and tell them that nothing else occurred," he said.

Mr Pelicot also said he "became perverted" when, in 2010, he met a male nurse on the internet who suggested he drug his wife with a sedative, explained how to administer it and shared photos of drugged women. "That's when it all clicked," Mr Pelicot said. "Everything started then."

In one section of Tuesday's hearing, Mr Pelicot was also asked about the thousands of videos he filmed of men abusing his unconscious wife. These were found by investigators and were instrumental in tracking down the 50 men who are now accused of rape.

Mr Pelicot recognised he had filmed the men partly for "pleasure," but also "as insurance".

Throughout the morning, Mr Pelicot appeared determined to rebut one of the main lines of defence of several of the accused, which hinges on the premise they did not “know” they were raping Gisèle - in other words, that they thought they were having consensual intercourse with her.

Mr Pelicot met the defendants on a chat room called "Without her knowledge" on a now-closed website which hosted pornographic material.

"I didn't force anyone, they came to look for me," he said on Tuesday. "They asked me if they could come, and I said yes. I never handcuffed and dragged anyone."

Some have said they were "manipulated" by Mr Pelicot into believing they were taking part in an erotic game in which Gisèle was only pretending to be asleep because she was shy, and several denied they knew they were being filmed.

But Mr Pelicot said the only person he ever "manipulated" was his wife, and also said that the men must have known they were being filmed: "There was a tripod and a screen attached to it, everyone could see it as soon as they walked into the room."

Mr Pelicot said he wanted to prove that his wife "was a victim and not an accomplice. To prove that everything happened without her knowledge. I'm aware many [defendants] have disputed this."

Béatrice Zavarro, Mr Pelicot's lawyer, told French TV that she did not know what people would think of her client, but that he was "sharing his truth".

She added that Mr Pelicot was "very downtrodden" and that although she did not know what his wife would make of his request for forgiveness, "the confession is now under way and he will continue."

She said: "We will get to the end of this trial and we will know everything about Dominique Pelicot."

Mr Pelicot, who was diagnosed with a kidney infection and kidney stones, was absent from court for nearly a week because of illness. He is set to give his testimony throughout the day, although he will be allowed frequent breaks.

Published
17 September 2024

Norway, one of the world's largest exporters of oil, now has more electric cars on its roads than petrol-driven vehicles.

Of the 2.8 million private cars registered there, 754,303 are now all-electric, compared with 753,905 that run on petrol, according to new figures from the Norwegian Road Federation.

The Nordic country of 5.5 million people is aiming to become the first nation to end the sale of new petrol and diesel cars - by 2025.

Sales of electric vehicles (EVs) have been boosted by tax breaks and other incentives, funded in large part from the money Norway makes out of oil and gas.

The country has a sovereign wealth fund worth more than $1.7 trillion (£1.3tn), built up from the proceeds of its oilfields, to act as a "pension fund" for when it runs out.

This cash cushion has made it possible for the government to offer green incentives to motorists, including exempting electric car buyers from sales tax.

In the early days of the EV revolution, Norway's environmental activists even enlisted the help of the country's biggest pop group, A-ha, to promote the use of the vehicles.

Despite this milestone, there is still work to be done. Diesel models remain most numerous at just under one million, but their sales are falling rapidly, says the Norwegian Road Federation.

At present, nine out of 10 new cars sold in Norway are electric vehicles, industry figures indicate. And it's not hard to see why when you consider how much the authorities do to favour them.

Many places offer free parking for EVs and their drivers do not have to pay city tolls.

And while electric car owners in many countries complain about the lack of charging facilities, there are numerous free chargers in every Norwegian town and city, with 2,000 of them in Oslo alone.

Published
17 September 2024

Facebook owner Meta says it is banning several Russian state media networks, alleging they use deceptive tactics to conduct influence operations and avoid detection on its platforms.

"After careful consideration, we expanded our ongoing enforcement against Russian state media outlets. Rossiya Segodnya, RT and other related entities are now banned from our apps globally for foreign interference activity," Meta said.

In a news bulletin, RT newsreader Eunan O'Neill said the broadcaster "and Russia as a whole denies the accusations that have been coming en masse against this channel and others in the past number of days".

The bans are expected to come into effect in the next few days.

The Russian embassy in Washington and the owner of the Sputnik news agency, Rossiya Segodnya, did not immediately respond to BBC requests for comment.

Russian state media outlets have come under increased scrutiny over claims they have tried to influence politics in Western countries.

As well as Facebook, social media giant Meta owns Instagram, WhatsApp and Threads.

In a statement to the BBC, RT said: "It’s cute how there’s a competition in the West — who can try to spank RT the hardest, in order to make themselves look better.

"Don’t worry, where they close a door, and then a window, our ‘partisans’ (or in your parlance, guerrilla fighters) will find the cracks to crawl through — as by your own admission we are apt at doing."

Meta's move marks an escalation in the world's biggest social media firm's stance towards Russian state media companies.

Two years ago, Meta took more limited measures to restrict the spread of Russian state-controlled media, including stopping the outlets from running adverts on its platforms and limiting the reach of their content.

After the start of the war in Ukraine, Meta - like other social media platforms - complied with requests from the EU, UK and Ukraine to block some Russian state media in those regions.

Earlier this month, the US accused state broadcaster RT of paying a Tennessee firm $10m (£7.6m) to "create and distribute content to US audiences with hidden Russian government messaging".

An indictment said videos - which often promoted right-wing narratives on issues such as immigration, gender and the economy - were secretly "edited, posted, and directed" by two RT employees.

Last week, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced new sanctions against RT, accusing it of being a "de facto arm of Russia's intelligence apparatus".

The top US diplomat told reporters on Friday that RT was part of a network of Russian-backed media outlets which have sought to covertly "undermine democracy in the United States".

He added that the Russian government has "embedded within RT, a unit with cyber-operational capabilities and ties to Russian intelligence".

RT livestreamed Mr Blinken's remarks on X and declared it the "US's latest conspiracy theory".

Published
17 September 2024

Prominent opposition leader and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has resigned from his post, days after getting bail in a corruption case.

Kejriwal spent five months in jail in connection with a now-scrapped alcohol sales policy. He has denied the allegations against him.

He has said that he will take up the post only if people re-elect his Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in the upcoming assembly elections.

Kejriwal's colleague and senior Delhi minister Atishi will replace him as the leader of the government, the party announced on Tuesday.

AAP made its poll debut in 2013 Delhi assembly elections and has governed the capital city since, focussing on welfare measures such as affordable electricity and water for residents.

In 2020, the party won 62 seats in the 70-seat assembly – in almost a repeat of its performance in the previous election when it won 67 seats.

Kejriwal had announced his intention to resign over the weekend, saying he would sit on the chief minister's chair only if the people of Delhi gave him a "certificate of honesty".

"I got justice from the legal court, now I will get justice from the people's court," he told reporters.

Kejriwal has called for advancing the Delhi elections, which are scheduled for February next year, to November, aligning them with the upcoming polls in Maharashtra state.

Experts, however, say that is unlikely to happen.

Indian laws stipulate that elections cannot be scheduled less than six months before an assembly term's end unless the assembly is dissolved early. Additionally, the Election Commission considers factors like weather, festivals, and electoral roll revisions before announcing elections.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which is the AAP's main opposition in Delhi, has called Kejriwal's resignation a "publicity stunt" to galvanise public sympathy.

An anti-corruption crusader, Kejriwal was the third AAP leader to be arrested over alleged irregularities in the now-scrapped alcohol sales policy.

Manish Sisodia, a former deputy chief minister, and AAP leader Sanjay Singh were also arrested in the case. Sisodia was granted bail in August after spending 17 months in jail and Singh was released on bail in April.

The policy was introduced by AAP in 2021, saying it would curb black market sales, increase revenues and ensure even distribution of liquor licences.

It was withdrawn a few months later after Delhi’s Lieutenant-Governor Vinai Kumar Saxena accused AAP of exploiting rules to benefit private liquor barons.

The AAP denies the charges and has accused the BJP of using investigating agencies to unjustly target opposition leaders, a charge it denies.

At 43, Atishi has become the youngest and third woman to serve as chief minister of Delhi.

She currently holds important portfolios such as water, finance, power and education in Delhi's cabinet.

In the absence of senior AAP leaders, who were jailed until recently, she served as the face of the party and swiftly gained prominence as a powerful leader.

Born to professors with Marxist leanings, Atishi studied at Delhi University and went to the University of Oxford for her master’s degree.

After spending a few years in teaching at a school in Karnataka, she was involved with alternative farming and education reforms in Madhya Pradesh.

She joined AAP in 2013 and has significantly contributed to overhauling Delhi's public schools as an advisor to former Deputy Chief Minister Sisodia.

Riding on her reputation as an education reformer, she was elected to the Delhi assembly in 2020.

She had contested the 2019 parliamentary elections, but lost to former cricketer Gautam Gambhir.

Earlier this year, she made headlines after she went on an indefinite hunger strike to highlight Delhi's water crisis during its peak summer months.

Published
17 September 2024

A burning oil tanker that was attacked by Yemen’s Houthi movement has been towed to a safe area in the Red Sea without any spill, an EU naval mission says.

The Greek-owned and flagged MV Sounion, carrying about a million barrels of crude, was abandoned by its crew after being hit by missiles on 21 August. Houthi fighters later detonated explosives on board, sparking several fires.

A photo released on Monday night showed three vessels belonging to what the EU mission described as “private stakeholders” carrying out the salvage operation, protected by a warship.

The Sounion’s destination was not given, but Saudi Arabia has reportedly offered to help the salvagers offload its oil.

“The completion of this phase of the salvage operation is the result of a comprehensive approach and close co-operation between all stakeholders committed to prevent an environmental disaster affecting the whole region,” the EU’s Operation Aspides said on X, external.

A potential spill from the Sounion could be almost four times larger than the 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster, which saw 2,100km (1,300 miles) of coastline contaminated after a tanker ran aground off Alaska, according to the US.

The Iran-backed Houthis said at the end of August that they had agreed to allow the Sounion to be towed away from Yemen after being contacted by “several international parties”.

They also stressed that the attack on the tanker showed their “seriousness in targeting any ship that violates the Yemeni embargo”.

The Houthis have repeatedly targeted commercial shipping in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden since November, sinking two vessels, seizing another and causing the deaths of at least four crew members.

They say they are acting in support of the Palestinians in the war between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip. They have claimed - often falsely - that they are targeting ships only linked to Israel, the US or the UK.

They have not been deterred by the deployment of Western warships to protect merchant vessels, nor by US and British air strikes on territory they control in north-western Yemen.

Israel also bombed Yemen in retaliation for a deadly drone strike on Tel Aviv, and it has vowed to make the Houthis pay a “heavy price” for a missile attack on Sunday.

In a separate development on Monday, the Houthis said they had shot down a US-made MQ-9 Reaper drone over Yemen’s Dhamar province and released videos which they said showed the charred wreckage on the ground. The US military said it was aware of the claim.

Published
17 September 2024

Starvation in war-stricken Sudan "is almost everywhere", the head of the World Health Organization (WHO) has told the BBC's Today programme after visiting the country.

"The situation in Sudan is very alarming... the massive displacement - it's now the largest in the world, and, of course, famine," director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.

He said 12 million people were already displaced, adding that attention in the global community to Sudan was "really low" and race was a factor.

Thousands of people have been killed since a civil war broke out in April 2023 between Sudan's army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF).

"Imagine: destruction, displacement, diseases everywhere, and now famine," Dr Tedros told the BBC.

He said he had recently visited a camp for the internally displaced people and a hospital in Sudan.

"You see there many children skin and bone, emaciated."

Close to 25 million people - half of Sudan's population - "need support", Dr Tedros said.

He stressed that Sudan "is not getting the attention it deserves", and that was the case with other recent conflicts in Africa.

"I think race is in the play here. That's what I feel now. We see the pattern now."

Dr Tedros - who grew up during war in Ethiopia - said: “Especially in Africa, I think the attention is really, really low.”

“That’s the sad part, because you see it repeatedly, not just in Sudan,” he added.

“I know the smell of war, the image of war, the sound of war," the WHO chief said.

"From that, I can understand how it impacts others, and I remember my mother praying I survive a day at a time - growing up, survival of the day was a big thing, I see the same thing is Sudan and Gaza."

Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Dr Tedros said the world did not give “equal attention to black and white lives".

At the time, he elaborated by saying only a fraction of the aid given to Ukraine was given to other humanitarian crises, with Tigray in Ethiopia, Yemen, Afghanistan and Syria not receiving the same treatment.

Dr Tedros urged mainstream media to give more attention to Sudan, describing the situation there as a "tragedy".

In August, a UN-backed committee of experts declared a famine at a camp housing about 500,000 displaced people near the besieged city of el-Fasher in Darfur, one of the regions worst affected by the conflict.

The leader of Sudan's army, Gen Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and the head of the RSF, Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, had jointly staged a coup in 2021, but then fell out eventually plunging Sudan into a civil war last year.

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) is accused of supporting the RSF with money and guns - which it denies - while Saudi Arabia is said to have close ties with the Sudanese government.

Various mediation efforts, brokered by Saudi Arabia and the US, have failed to end the conflict.

Published
17 September 2024

Israel has made the safe return of residents to the north of the country an official war goal, the prime minister's office has said.

The decision was taken by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's security cabinet late on Monday.

About 60,000 people have been evacuated from northern Israel because of near-daily attacks by Iran-backed Hezbollah in neighbouring Lebanon.

Cross-border fighting escalated on 8 October 2023 - a day after the deadly attack on Israel by Hamas gunmen from the Gaza Strip - when Hezbollah fired at Israeli positions, in solidarity with the Palestinians.

"The Security Cabinet has updated the objectives of the war to include the following: Returning the residents of the north securely to their homes," a statement from the prime minister's office said.

"Israel will continue to act to implement this objective," it added.

Earlier on Monday, Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said the only way to return Israel's northern residents to their homes was through "military action", during a meeting with US envoy Amos Hochstein.

“The possibility for an agreement is running out as Hezbollah continues to ‘tie itself’ to Hamas, and refuses to end the conflict,” a statement from his office said.

"Therefore, the only way left to ensure the return of Israel’s northern communities to their homes, will be via military action.”

Gallant's comments came as speculation grew that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wanted to replace him amid differences between the two men over the war in Gaza.

US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin warned of the devastating consequences of further escalation.

In a statement from the US defence department, his office said he "reaffirmed the necessity of a ceasefire and hostage deal, and that Israel should give diplomatic negotiations time to succeed, noting the devastating consequences that escalation would have on the people of Israel, Lebanon, and the broader region."

Israel has repeatedly warned it could launch a military operation to drive Hezbollah away from the border.

Hezbollah is a Shia Muslim organisation which is politically influential and in control of the most powerful armed force in Lebanon.

The group has so far made no public comments on the issue.

The latest Israeli move marks an expansion of the country's previously stated war goals:

Israeli forces launched a campaign to destroy Hamas in response to the group's unprecedented attack, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken back to Gaza as hostages.

More than 41,220 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory's Hamas-run health ministry.

Published
17 September 2024

A gunman hid for nearly 12 hours in bushes before Donald Trump played an unscheduled game of golf at his oceanfront club in Florida – leaving locals stunned at what authorities say appears to be the second attempt to assassinate the former president in as many months.

It was hot and cloudy on Sunday afternoon when Trump and his good friend, real estate developer Steve Witkoff, arrived on the course of Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach.

The former president was on the fifth fairway at 13:31 EDT (17:31 GMT), an area adjacent to busy roads near Palm Beach International Airport, when a member of his protection detail spotted a rifle poking out of foliage by the sixth hole.

Trump - who was evacuated unharmed - recounted on Monday night that he heard “probably four or five” shots ring out in the near-distance.

A quick-thinking Secret Service agent had opened fire in the direction of the suspect, who was about 300-500 yards away and did not have a clear line of sight to Trump, federal investigators said.

"Secret Service knew immediately it was bullets, and they grabbed me," said Trump during a live-streamed event on X, formerly Twitter, from his Mar-a-Lago resort.

"We got into the carts and we moved along pretty, pretty good. I was with an agent, and the agent did a fantastic job."

The gunman - who investigators say did not fire any shots - was concealed by the well-manicured shrubbery and tall palm trees that line the perimeter of the 27-hole course.

He had been lurking there on the public side of a fence since 01:59 local time on Sunday morning, according to mobile phone records, cited by federal officials.

The suspect was equipped with two digital cameras, a black plastic bag of food, an SKS-style semi-automatic rifle - a weapon with a range of nearly 440 yards - and a scope to magnify its lens.

The Republican presidential candidate’s last publicly scheduled campaign event had been on Saturday evening, on the other side of the country, in the state of Utah.

Residents say Trump spends almost every Sunday at the West Palm Beach golf club when he is not on the campaign trail.

But Secret Service director Ronald Rowe said on Monday that the former president was “not even really supposed to go there”, so agents had to put together a security plan at the last minute.

The foiled plot has left Trump’s neighbours in Palm Beach with pressing questions.

Did the suspect know the former president would be coming to play golf, or was it a guess?

How could he have gone undetected for so long, hiding in the bushes with a rifle?

The gunman escaped the scene in a black Nissan, ditching his backpack of goods and weapon.

A civilian woman was able to take a picture of his licence plate and pass it to investigators, Trump said on Monday night.

The gunman made it about 40 minutes before officers pulled over his vehicle on Interstate 95 and ordered him out.

Bodycam footage shows he seemed calm as officers shouted at him to step to the side before handcuffing him without incident.

On Monday, the suspect Ryan Routh, 58, appeared in a crowded Palm Beach court, wearing a blue prison jumpsuit and smiling as he chatted with his attorney.

He was charged with one count of possession of a firearm by a convicted felon and one count of possession of a firearm with an obliterated serial number. More charges could follow.

Mr Routh, a Hawaii resident with a criminal history, had come across the FBI’s radar in 2019 for being a felon in possession of a firearm. The bureau tipped off law enforcement in Honolulu at the time.

While his motive for allegedly planning to target Trump has not been revealed, the suspect had said in the past on social media that he voted for the Republican in 2016 before souring on him.

On the perimeter of Trump’s golf course on Monday, bright orange cones, barricades, police cars and officers shielded all corners of the club.

The incident has shocked West Palm Beach and neighbouring towns.

Shelby Stevens, a 52-year-old Trump supporter from West Palm Beach, told the BBC: “No matter how much security you have and everything else, if someone is willing to give their life to take someone else’s, it can happen.”

Cosme Blanco has lived just a few blocks away from the course for most of his life, where he said Trump comes as often as twice a week when he’s not campaigning.

The 61-year-old Trump supporter said the security presence around the golf club is typically not overwhelming. But all that changed on Sunday, when Mr Blanco ran outside five minutes after shots were fired to see helicopters circling the neighbourhood.

“I was concerned. I’m going to be 62 years old and I’ve never seen America change this much,” said the Cuban immigrant.

Mr Blanco said it would not be hard for a suspect to target Trump at his golf course.

The former president travelled there in a motorcade that would have taken about 12 minutes to go from Mar-a-Lago across a bridge overlooking the Lake Worth Lagoon.

“If they see the motorcade coming, I’m sure at that point they know he’s going to play golf - it’s common sense,” Mr Blanco said.

But Anka Palitz, a Palm Beach resident who says she has known Trump personally for years, said Routh’s timing was suspicious.

“He doesn’t play golf every Sunday,” she said. “I think there’s a conspiracy.”

“How was he [the gunman] not seen?” she added.

Ms Palitz, who said she used to go skiing with Trump’s ex-wife, Ivana, said she believed someone must have alerted the suspect that the former president was going to the course that day.

Patricia Pelham, a United Kingdom native who has been living in Florida for 30 years, wondered where the suspect was able to park his car close enough to quickly make a getaway.

“How come there’s not security around the outside?” asked the Briton, who added that she was no supporter of Trump.

Ms Pelham said security measures have increased around Mar-a-Lago on the island of Palm Beach since Trump was injured when a 20-year-old gunman attempted to assassinate him at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, in July.

On Monday, police cars lined the roads of the island nearly every half mile, with the 17-acre resort blocked off to visitors.

Authorities have said that the entire golf course would have been surrounded had it been a sitting president of the United States on the green.

After blaming White House rhetoric for the latest alleged attempt to kill him, Trump said on Monday night that he had had a "very nice call" with President Joe Biden about boosting Secret Service protection.

President Biden, a Democrat, asked Congress on Monday to approve more money for the agency in the coming weeks, saying the Secret Service "needs more help".

Michael Matranga, a former Secret Service agent who worked for former President Barack Obama, said Trump has had better security than many other former presidents, who typically receive less protection than White House incumbents.

For example, he said, former presidents aren’t typically offered counter-sniper teams like Trump.

The Secret Service has faced intense scrutiny since the first attempt on Trump’s life, with the leader of the agency, Kimberly Cheatle, resigning less than two weeks after the rally.

Agency officials have said the Secret Service is short on resources.

But even with the extra resources, Mr Matranga said agents are forced to contend with a delicate balance of protecting Trump while allowing him to engage with constituents on the campaign trail and “enjoy a round of golf”.

They can’t just “keep him in a bullet proof box”, Mr Matranga said.

Nor does Trump seem to want to be put in one.

In a fundraising email sent on Monday afternoon, he told his supporters: “My resolve is only stronger after another attempt on my life!”

It’s the kind of “tough” attitude that Mr Stevens expects Trump to maintain as he continues to court voters in the weeks leading up to November's general election.

“The way I see him, he’s not going to want the American people to know that he’d be afraid of going out,” Stevens said.

“I think he’ll still make a presence, not just here but everywhere. I don't think that’s something he’s going to be shying away from.”

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