Afua Kyei, the Bank of England's chief financial officer, has been named the UK's most influential black person.

The 43-year-old is one of the UK's most senior finance leaders, in charge of the financial governance of the Bank's £1 trillion balance sheet and funding reforms.

The BoE executive director topped the 2026 Powerlist, which recognises the most powerful people of African, African Caribbean, and African American heritage in the UK.

Other influential names include former footballer Ian Wright, who's new to the list, make-up artist Dame Pat McGrath and actor Idris Elba.

Kyei, who was recruited by the Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney in his former role as the governor of the Bank of England, said topping the list was "incredibly humbling".

The mum-of-four said growing up she saw obvious differences in the workplace.

She said: "I didn't see so many women in big leadership roles who had families and I know that there are lots of women who think that they need to choose between work and having a family.

"What I love about the Bank of England is that we really support working families and working parents."

Kyei studied chemistry at Oxford University and was also awarded a junior research fellowship by Princeton University in organic chemistry.

'You don't need to be a mathematician'

During the global financial crisis, she was an investment banker before joining Barclays Bank where she was the Chief Financial Officer for Mortgages.

She joined the Bank of England in 2019 and is at the core of the Bank's leadership and decision making.

She said her parents, who moved to the UK from Ghana to go to university at 18, have been her biggest role models.

"My mother came to Liverpool, trained to become a midwife and enjoyed a 40-year plus career working for the NHS.

"My father has enjoyed a long career in the oil industry. I saw them juggling work and home. They instilled really strong values in us," she added.

Kyei hopes to inspire more young people to consider banking as a career.

"You don't need to be a mathematician, you don't need to be an accountant and you don't need to be an economist. What we're looking for is fresh perspectives and we want the best people".

Kyei takes the place of tech CEO Dean Forbes at the head of the list.

The rest of the 2026 Powerlist

The annual Powerlist was first published in 2007, with its aim to provide role models for young black people, according to Powerful Media.

Powerlist founder Michael Eboda said he thought they would run out of people after three years, but the opposite has happened.

"Over the last 20 years we've seen more influencers from the private sector as opposed to the public sector and that's a great story of success in Britain".

Spoiler warning: This article reveals details from the sixth episode of The Celebrity Traitors.

It started with a cliffhanger and ended with a cliffhanger.

And host Claudia Winkleman was in no mood for messing around.

"Silence please," she barked at the contestants seated at the round table as the banishment vote was split and had to be decided for the first time by chance - or should we say, the Chest of Chance. A dramatic version of flipping a coin, if you will.

Poor Mark Bonnar - an actor punished for overacting - took the high road (perhaps he shouldn't have sung The Bonnie Banks of Loch Lomond on Wednesday's episode) after the chest he picked was empty. Historian David Olusoga luckily found a protective shield in his.

One fan on X was clearly amused. "Imagine the first time they do this chest's of chance thing and it's over 2 faithfuls," they mused, later joking: "They've literally just made this up behind the cameras."

But it was no laughing matter for the faithfuls, who are now officially the worst performing group of all time on the UK version of the show.

In the first series of The Traitors, it took the faithfuls six episodes to get a traitor. And the game was new. This lot are still on the hunt going into episode seven, with only nine players now left from the original 19. And three of those are traitors. The faithfuls have just three episodes left to catch them.

Once again, the faithfuls were left to mull over another failure.

Claudia sounded genuinely distraught, her voice breaking as she told the group: "You are breaking my heart, you are not getting it, what are you not seeing? You have to open your eyes please."

"I feel that we are disastrously losing this game. And I think it's going to get worse," David added gloomily.

On a lighter note, while we all know someone who fast forwards the challenges when watching on catch-up, there was some real excitement on Thursday night thanks to the return of last season's life-size chessboard and larger-than-life traitor figures. Think Darth Vader after a growth spurt.

Sir Stephen Fry lived up to his brainy reputation over breakfast, by predicting the chessboard was back: "I could be a knight - oh, I already am," he joked. Comic Alan Carr was predictably quick to prick any potential pomposity: "Or an old queen," he quipped.

In fact, Alan continues to relish his role as a traitor with increasing enthusiasm.

When in the turret discussing who to murder next, he asked fellow traitors singer Cat Burns and presenter Jonathan Ross: "Stephen Fry: Shall we just get on with it and kill him? What's a knighthood when you're dead?"

"Brutal," Jonathan replied, and he wasn't wrong.

"Gets easier every time," Alan said later.

"I'm bursting with confidence now... not a single bead of sweat."

But it was comedian Joe Wilkinson who was sent to meet his maker, another faithful put to the sword.

Leopard-print PJs

Alan's strategy skills were then put to the test on the giant chess board.

The contestants split into teams, but former rugby player Joe Marler wasn't happy, believing (correctly) that the traitors were all on one team and would know all the answers to Claudia's questions (which the traitors had set).

So some swapping between the groups ensued.

To audible gasps, Nick Mohammed later admitted at the round table that he and Joe Marler had colluded by sabotaging the final round of the chess game so that Nick's team lost. He wanted to protect more faithfuls as he believed there were more traitors in his own team. But that only caused journalist Kate Garraway to be suspicious.

One viewer, posting on X, noted: "Nick has done a faithful sabotage! Unheard of games!"

Speaking of Kate, she also used her profession as a journalist to defend her performance on the show (she was voted the weakest player during the chess game).

"My weakness has become a strength. At last, I've been of use," she joked, explaining that she wasn't very good at the game because she just asked questions and didn't give opinions in her job.

It was also her turn for a fashion moment when she was later spotted sitting at her dressing table in leopard-print pyjamas. Luckily, there was no clash with Jonathan, a man partial to an animal print, who instead opted for a Showaddywaddy-style long checked jacket (if you're old enough to remember them).

Other notable moments on the show included Celia bringing Alan's name up at breakfast.

"I woke up thinking about you..." she told him over a plate of croissants.

"A fantasy?" Alan giggled. Actress Celia Imrie confessed to a crush on Jonathan in a previous episode, so perhaps it's Alan's turn now.

The Big Dog theory reared its head once again - would Jonathan or Sir Stephen be put to the sword?

"I am one of the whimpering hounds it seems - it's either Jonathan or Alan I would say," said Sir Stephen earlier in the day.

They finally seemed to be getting closer to the truth. Or were they?

Joe Marler called Jonathan "the wolf of The Traitors," saying "time's up for Mr Ross."

It was the most tetchy round table so far, as the pressure and frustration mounted.

Sir Stephen stated that traitors don't get as much sleep as the faithfuls do, pointing at Cat. But she said her autism and ADHD meant she "found it a lot more effort to speak".

After much debate, one of the Big Dogs was finally removed. But not the right one (for the faithfuls at least). The knight in shining armour, AKA Sir Stephen, was banished.

Following the show, on the podcast Traitors Uncloaked, Sir Stephen found out who the Traitors were.

"Two big dogs and one small Cat," was his response.

On the losing chess team, Jonathan, Kate, Nick and Lucy are now up for murder. And it will be a face-to-face killing, back at the chess board. Your move, Traitors.

The Celebrity Traitors is on BBC One on Wednesdays and Thursdays at 21:00 BST and on BBC iPlayer. There will be nine episodes.

The five-week shutdown of Jaguar Land Rover's (JLR) factories following a cyber-attack drove car production down by more than a quarter in September.

JLR facilities did not produce a single vehicle last month, after the cyber-attack forced the car maker to shut down its IT systems and halt its global manufacturing operations, including at its three UK plants.

Overall UK car production fell by 27% with just over 51,000 made last month, data from the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) showed.

It is the lowest number of cars made in any September in the UK since 1952, including the pandemic, the SMMT said.

The JLR cyber-attack was largely responsible for the slump in UK car production, the SMMT said, because other manufacturers reported stable figures for the month.

The attack is also estimated to cost £1.9bn and be the most economically damaging cyber event in UK history, according to research published on Tuesday.

The Cyber Monitoring Centre (CMC) found 5,000 businesses have been affected by the event and a full recovery will not occur until January 2026.

JLR said production across sites in Solihull, Wolverhampton and Halewood was returning in a phased approach.

The maker of the Jaguar I-Pace and Range Rover Sport is the second-largest car producer by volume in the UK after Nissan.

Overall, total vehicle production slumped by 35.9% in September compared to a year ago to about 54,300 vehicles.

The SMMT chief executive Mike Hawes said: "September's performance comes as no surprise given the total loss of production at Britain's biggest automotive employer following a cyber incident.

"While the situation has improved, the sector remains under immense pressure," he added.

The majority of vehicles made in the UK are shipped overseas, and exports in September also slumped - down 24.5% - with the EU, US, Turkey, Japan and South Korea the top five destinations.

This year so far UK car and van factories have made 582,250 vehicles, which is 15.2% lower than at the same point in 2024.

The five-week JLR shutdown was a "severe, but short-term issue" for the overall industry, the boss of Autotrader Ian Plummer said.

"It'll be a bit like Covid, where after the shutdown and delays end, there's a surge in demand and sales," he said.

Mr Plummer, who runs the UK's biggest car-selling platform said, JLR brands had risen to have the highest number of monthly sales leads on Autotrader, "so there is demand out there, even as the pipeline is currently stuck".

The SMMT's Mr Hawes also said a recent ambition from the UK government to help foster a resurgence in domestic car production to 1.3m vehicles a year is in doubt if the chancellor Rachel Reeves ends tax breaks offered to Employee Car Ownership Schemes (ECOS).

"The industry is calling for rapid interventions to shore up its competitiveness," he said.

Keeping manufacturers' ECOS schemes would be "an immediate relief", he said, and bringing forward other interventions including programmes to bolster supply chain resilience "would further boost the sector".

Just 37 years old, Chen Zhi is accused of being "the mastermind behind a sprawling cyber-fraud empire… a criminal enterprise built on human suffering".

With his wispy goatee beard and baby-faced features, he looks even younger than he is. He has certainly become very wealthy, very quickly.

Last week the US Department of Justice charged him with running scam compounds in Cambodia that stole billions in cryptocurrency from victims all over the world. The US Treasury Department has confiscated more than $14bn (£10.5bn) worth of bitcoin that it says is linked to him - it said this was the largest ever crypto-currency seizure.

His own company, the Cambodian Prince Group, describes him on its website as "a respected entrepreneur and renowned philanthropist" whose "vision and leadership have transformed Prince Group into a leading business group in Cambodia that adheres to international standards". The BBC has contacted the Prince Group for comment.

So, how much do we know about Chen Zhi, the mysterious figure allegedly running a scam empire?

A startling rise

Brought up in Fujian province in south-eastern China, he started with a small, and apparently not very successful internet gaming company, and moved to Cambodia in either late 2010 or 2011, where he began working in the then-booming real estate sector.

His arrival coincided with the start of a speculative property boom in Cambodia. It was fuelled by the availability of large tracts of land expropriated by powerful, politically-connected figures and by a flood of Chinese capital.

Some of it was pouring in on the tail end of Xi Jinping's Belt and Road Initiative to export Chinese-made infrastructure, and some of it was from individual Chinese investors seeking more affordable alternatives to China's overheated property market. The number of Chinese tourists visiting Cambodia was also rising fast.

The skyline of the capital Phnom Penh changed dramatically. The characterful, low-rise cityscape of mustard-coloured French colonial mansions was transformed into another Asian high-rise forest of glass and steel towers.

The transformation of Sihanoukville, a once quiet little seaside resort, was even more extreme. It was not just Chinese holidaymakers and property speculators heading there, but also gamblers - gambling is illegal in China.

New casinos sprang up, alongside gaudy, luxury hotels and apartment blocks. There was plenty of money to be made.

Even so, Chen Zhi's trajectory was startling.

In 2014 he became a Cambodian citizen, giving up his Chinese nationality. This enabled him to buy land in his own name, but required a minimum investment or donation to the government of $250,000.

It was never clear where Chen Zhi's money came from. When applying for a bank account on the Isle of Man in 2019 he listed an unnamed uncle who he said had given him $2m to start his first property company in 2011, but no evidence for this was ever provided.

Chen Zhi founded the Prince Group in 2015, focused on property development, when he was still only 27 years old.

He got a commercial banking licence in 2018 to establish Prince Bank. The same year he obtained a Cypriot passport, in return for a minimum investment there of $2.5m, giving him easy access to the European Union. He later acquired Vanuatu citizenship as well.

He started Cambodia's third airline, and in 2020 obtained a certificate to operate a fourth. There were luxury malls in Phnom Penh built by the Prince property arm, five-star hotels in Sihanoukville, and an ambitious scheme to construct a $16bn "eco-city" called "Bay of Lights" there.

In 2020 Chen Zhi was awarded the highest title bestowed by Cambodia's king, that of "Neak Oknha", which requires a donation of at least $500,000 to the government.

He had already been made an official adviser to Interior Minister Sar Kheng since 2017, was a business partner with his son Sar Sokha, and an official adviser to Cambodia's most powerful man Hun Sen, and later his son Hun Manet after he succeeded his father as prime minister in 2023.

Chen Zhi was lauded in the local media as a philanthropist, who had funded scholarships for low-income students and donated substantially to help Cambodia deal with the Covid pandemic.

Yet he remained an enigmatic figure, staying out of the limelight, making few public statements.

"Everyone I've spoken to who's worked with him directly, been in the room with him, they all describe him as very courteous, very calm, very measured," says Jack Adamovic Davies, a journalist who did a three year-long investigation of Chen Zhi which was published by Radio Free Asia last year.

"I think not being the kind of flamboyant person that people will write tabloid-y things about was smart. Even those who no longer want to be associated with him are still impressed by his quiet charisma, his gravitas."

But where was all this wealth and power coming from?

'A litany of transnational crimes'

In 2019 the property bubble burst in Sihanoukville. The online gambling business had attracted Chinese criminal syndicates, who then began violent turf wars with each other. Tourists were scared off.

Under pressure from China, then-prime minister Hun Sen banned online gambling in August that year. Around 450,000 Chinese left the city as its main business collapsed. Many of Prince Group's residential blocks were left empty.

Yet Chen Zhi continued to expand his business interests and spend freely.

According to the UK authorities, in 2019 he bought a £12m mansion in north London and a £95m office block in the city's financial district. The US says he and his associates bought properties in New York, private jets and superyachts, and a Picasso painting.

And, they allege, Chen Zhi's wealth came from the most profitable business in Asia today, online fraud, and the human trafficking and money laundering that go with it.

The US and UK have imposed sanctions on 128 companies linked to Chen Zhi and Prince Group, and on 17 individuals from seven different nationalities who they allege helped run his scam empire. Assets linked to Chen Zhi in the US and UK have been frozen.

The sanctions announcement describes an elaborate web of shell companies and cryptocurrency wallets through which money was moved to conceal its origins.

It says: "Prince Group Transnational Crime Organisation profits from a litany of transnational crimes including sextortion - a type of fraud involving the solicitation for eventual blackmail of sexually explicit materials, often from minors - money laundering, various frauds and rackets, corruption, illegal online gambling, and the industrial-scale trafficking, torture, and extortion of enslaved workers in furtherance of the operation of at least 10 scam compounds in Cambodia."

The 'scam empire'

China too had been quietly investigating the Prince Group since at least 2020. There have been a number of court cases accusing the company of running online fraud schemes.

The Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau has established a task force "to investigate the "Prince Group, a major transnational online gambling syndicate based in Cambodia".

At its heart, the US and UK allege, were businesses like Golden Fortune Science and Technology Park, a compound built by the Prince Group in Chrey Thom, close to the Vietnamese border.

In the past the Prince Group has denied any involvement in scams, and said it no longer has any connection to Golden Fortune, but the US and UK investigation argues that there is still a clear business link between them.

Mr Adamovic Davies interviewed a number of people living and working near Golden Fortune for his investigation into Chen Zhi. They described brutal beatings of the mainly Chinese, Vietnamese and Malaysians who tried to escape from the compound, where they were forced to run online scams.

"I think it's the sheer scale of his operations which really makes Chen Zhi stand out," he says, adding that it is shocking the Prince Group was able to build a "global footprint" without raising alarm bells given the serious criminal charges it now faces.

"What should be uncomfortable for a lot of people is that Chen Zhi should never have been able to acquire all these assets, in Singapore, London or the US. Lawyers, accountants, real estate agents, bankers, all should have been looking at this group and saying, hang on, this doesn't add up. And they didn't."

Today, after all the publicity generated by the US and UK sanctions, businesses are rushing to dissociate themselves from the Prince Group.

The Cambodian Central Bank has had to issue a statement to nervous depositors assuring them they will be able to withdraw their funds from Prince Bank. The South Korean authorities have frozen $64m of its deposits held by Korean banks.

The Singapore and Thai governments are promising investigations into Prince subsidiaries in their jurisdictions - of the 18 individuals targeted by the US and UK, three are Singaporeans.

Cambodia's government has said little, apart from urging the US and UK authorities to be sure they have sufficient evidence for their allegations.

But it will be difficult for Cambodia's ruling elite to distance themselves from Chen Zhi, after being so close to him for so long. Cambodia was already facing growing pressure over its tolerance of scam businesses, which some estimate may account for around half of the entire economy.

And what of Chen Zhi himself?

Nothing has been heard or seen of him since the sanctions were announced last week. The enigmatic tycoon, once among the most powerful figures in Cambodia, appears to have vanished.

An NBA player and coach are among dozens of people arrested as part of a sweeping FBI investigation into illegal sports betting and rigged, mafia-linked poker games.

Miami Heat player Terry Rozier and Portland Trail Blazers head coach Chauncey Billups were named by federal prosecutors in two separate indictments on Thursday.

Rozier, 31, is among six people arrested over alleged betting irregularities, including other NBA players who may have faked injuries to influence gambling markets.

Billups, a Hall of Fame player who has coached the Portland Trail Blazers since 2021, is one of 31 people charged in a separate illegal poker game case involving retired players and the mafia.

That case, which prosecutors said involved four of the five major crime families in New York, uncovered an alleged scheme to lure victims into playing rigged poker games alongside high-profile sports stars before stealing millions of dollars.

They did so using technology including special contact lenses and glasses that could read pre-marked cards and an X-ray table, according to authorities.

In a statement, the NBA said that Rozier and Billups were being placed on immediate leave as it reviews the federal indictments.

"We take these allegations with the utmost seriousness, and the integrity of our game remains our top priority," the statement read.

Rozier's lawyer denied the allegations to CBS News, the BBC's US news partner, saying: "Terry is not a gambler, but he is not afraid of a fight, and he looks forward to winning this fight."

Rozier is due to appear in federal court in Orlando later on Thursday, while Billups was arrested in Portland and will appear in court there.

FBI Director Kash Patel held a news conference with other prosecutors in Brooklyn, New York, on Thursday where he announced the two indictments. He called the arrests "extraordinary" and said there was a "co-ordinated takedown across 11 states".

"We're talking about tens of millions of dollars in fraud and theft and robbery across a multi-year investigation," he said.

US Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, Joseph Nocella Jr, said all defendants are innocent until proven guilty, but warned: "Your winning streak has ended. Your luck has run out."

NBA games under scrutiny

Prosecutors said the first case involved players and associates who allegedly used information not available to the public to manipulate bets on major gambling platforms.

Nocella called it "one of the most brazen sports corruption schemes since online sports betting became widely legalised".

• EXPLAINED: What we know about the arrests

Seven NBA games between February 2023 and March 2024 have been identified as part of the case. Rozier is said to have been involved in one between the Charlotte Hornets and New Orleans Pelicans, when he was playing for the Hornets.

Rozier is alleged to have told a friend that he would leave the game early due to injury. The friend and his associates then placed bets, or directed others to bet, "more than $200,000" that Rozier would underperform expectations in the game, prosecutors said.

He left the game after nine minutes, they said, which resulted in tens of thousands of dollars in betting profits for those involved.

During the game, Rozier played roughly nine minutes and scored just five points because of a sore right foot, according to the official NBA match report.

Before that game, he averaged 35 minutes of playing time and about 21 points per game.

"As the NBA season tips off, his career is already benched, not for injury but for integrity," New York City Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said.

Rozier's lawyer James Trusty said in a statement that prosecutors "appear to be taking the word of spectacularly in-credible sources rather than relying on actual evidence of wrongdoing. Terry was cleared by the NBA and these prosecutors revived that non-case."

Trusty said he had been representing Rozier for more than a year and said prosecutors characterised Rozier as a subject, not a target, until they informed him FBI agents were arresting the player at a hotel on Thursday morning.

Former NBA player Damon Jones was also arrested as part of the investigation.

Jones is said to have been involved in two of the identified games - when the Los Angeles Lakers met the Milwaukee Bucks in February 2023, and a January 2024 game between the Lakers and Oklahoma City Thunder.

Sports betting was outlawed in most of the US from 1992 until 2018, when the Supreme Court turned regulation of the practice over to the states.

Since the federal ban was struck down, sports betting has exploded with major sports leagues and media companies making deals with gambling firms to get in on the billion-dollar industry.

Rigged poker games and the mafia

The second indictment announced on Thursday involves 31 defendants alleged to have participated in a scheme to rig illegal poker games and steal millions of dollars.

The case involved 13 members and associates of the Bonanno, Genovese and Gambino crime families in New York.

Nocella said the targeted victims were lured to play games with former professional athletes, including Billups and Jones, in Las Vegas, Miami, Manhattan and the Hamptons.

Victims were "fleeced" out of tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars per game, he said.

He said defendants used "very sophisticated technology" like altered off-the-shelf shuffling machines that could read the cards. Some of the defendants used special contact lenses and glasses to read pre-marked cards, and an X-ray table that could read cards when they were face-down.

"What [the victims] didn't know is that everybody else at the poker game - from the dealer to the players were in on the scam," Nocella said.

Tisch said when people refused to pay, the organised crime families used threats and intimidation to get people to hand over the money.

The charges include robbery, extortion, wire fraud, bank fraud and illegal gambling.

The conspiracy cheated victims out of $7m (£5.2m), with one losing $1.8 million, officials said.

"This is only the tip of the iceberg," Christopher Raia, the FBI assistant director of the New York field office, said, adding the FBI is working day and night to ensure members of mafia families "cannot continue to wreak havoc in our communities".

For two months, the US military has been building up a force of warships, fighter jets, bombers, marines, drones and spy planes in the Caribbean Sea. It is the largest deployment there for decades.

Long-range bomber planes, B-52s, have carried out "bomber attack demonstrations" off the coast of Venezuela. Trump has authorised the deployment of the CIA to Venezuela too, as tensions have escalated.

The US says it has killed dozens of people in strikes on small vessels from Venezuela which it alleges carry "narcotics" and "narco-terrorists", without providing evidence or details about those on board.

The strikes have drawn condemnation in the region and experts have questioned their legality. They are being sold by the US as a war on drug trafficking but all the signs suggest this is really an intimidation campaign that seeks to remove Venezuela's President Nicolás Maduro from power.

"This is about regime change. They're probably not going to invade, the hope is this is about signalling," says Dr Christopher Sabatini, a senior fellow for Latin America at the Chatham House think tank.

He argues the military build-up is a show of strength intended to "strike fear" in the hearts of the Venezuelan military and Maduro's inner circle so that they move against him.

BBC Verify has been monitoring publicly available tracking information from US ships and planes in the region - along with satellite imagery and images on social media - to try to build a picture of where Trump's forces are located.

The deployment has been changing, so we have been monitoring the region regularly for updates.

As of 23 October, we identified 10 US military ships in the region, including guided missile destroyers, amphibious assault ships and oil tankers for refuelling vessels at sea.

A $50m reward testing loyalty of inner circle

It is no secret that the US administration, particularly Secretary of State Marco Rubio, would like to see Maduro toppled.

Earlier this year, he told Fox News Maduro was a "horrible dictator" and when asked whether he was demanding that Maduro leave, added: "We're going to work on that policy."

But, even for overt critics of Maduro like Rubio, it is difficult to explicitly call for military-backed regime change - something Venezuela's opposition has longed called for.

Donald Trump campaigned against regime change in 2016, pledging to "stop racing to topple foreign regimes", and more recently has condemned engaging in "forever wars."

The US does not recognise Maduro as the president of Venezuela, after the last election in 2024 was widely dismissed internationally, and by the opposition in Venezuela, as neither free nor fair. The US embassy in Caracas was closed during Trump's first presidency in 2019.

The US has upped its bounty for information leading to Maduro's arrest to $50m, an incentive for those within his loyal, inner circle to hand him in. But it has yielded no defections.

Venezuelan law professor and senior associate at the CSIS national security think tank, Jose Ignacio Hernández, says $50m is "nothing" for Venezuela's elites.

There is a lot of money to be made through corruption within an oil-rich state like Venezuela. The former head of Treasury Alejandro Andrade, made $1bn in bribes before he was convicted.

Many analysts agree the Venezuelan military would be key to any regime change, but for them to turn on Maduro and oust him, they would also likely want promises of immunity from prosecution.

Mr Hernández adds: "They will think, in some way or another I am involved in criminal activities too."

Michael Albertus, a political science professor at the University of Chicago who publishes extensively on Latin America, is not convinced that even a bounty of $500m would persuade Maduro's inner circle to turn him in.

"Authoritarian leaders are always suspicious of even their inner circle, and because of that, they create mechanisms for monitoring them and ensuring loyalty," he said.

Economic sanctions on Venezuela have exacerbated the already severe economic crisis, but have not succeeded in persuading senior figures to turn against their president.

Why this probably isn't just about drugs

Donald Trump has declared this is a war on narcotics traffickers and said one vessel the US struck, on 16 October, was "loaded up with mostly fentanyl."

But fentanyl is primarily produced in Mexico - not South America - and comes into the US over the southern border.

"It isn't about drugs," says Dr Sabatini. "But he's co-opted the Venezuelan opposition's language of how this is not just a dictatorship - it's a criminal regime."

Since 2020, the US Justice Department has accused President Maduro of leading a drug trafficking and narco-terrorism organisation, which he denies. Trump has said he has authorised the CIA to carry out covert operations in Venezuela in part because of "drugs coming in" from Venezuela.

Venezuela does not produce large quantities of cocaine - that's mainly Colombia, Peru and Bolivia. There is some cocaine trafficked through Venezuela, which its own government claims it is cracking down on.

A US Drug Enforcement Administration report from 2025 says 84% of the cocaine seized in the US comes from Colombia and mentioned other countries but not Venezuela in its cocaine section.

The first seven strikes were carried out in the Caribbean, which is not a major sea route for drug-trafficking compared with the Pacific Ocean, where the subsequent strikes were carried out.

• Venezuelan fishermen in fear after US strikes

The US has not detailed its evidence of Maduro leading a drug trafficking organisation. Maduro has repeatedly denied the accusations, and for his part accuses the US of imperialism and worsening the country's economic crisis through sanctions.

There are known cases of those close to him being indicted.

In 2016, a New York federal court convicted the two nephews of his wife for conspiring to import cocaine to the US. The case said they planned to use some of the money to fund his wife's political campaign. They were later freed.

Bolstering US sea and air strength

Intercepting drugs at sea does not require a force as big as the current US one, according to military analysts.

As well as the US ships we tracked around Puerto Rico - where the US has a military base - satellite imagery also showed two vessels about 75 miles (123km) east of Trinidad and Tobago.

One was a guided missile cruiser, the USS Lake Erie.

The other appeared to be the MV Ocean Trader according to Bradley Martin, a former US Navy captain, now a senior policy researcher at RAND Corp.

This is a converted cargo ship designed to support special forces missions while blending in with commercial traffic. It can house drones, helicopters, and small boats.

There are a wide variety of missions it could conceivably support, including reconnaissance to prepare for strikes. But Mr Martin stresses that its presence "doesn't necessarily mean that those kinds of activities are being carried out or are planned".

The US has bolstered its air presence in the region - BBC Verify has identified a number of US military aircraft across Puerto Rico.

Stu Ray, a senior analyst at McKenzie Intelligence Services, says a satellite image taken on 17 October shows F-35 fighter jets on the tarmac, possibly F-35Bs.

These are highly advanced stealth jets prized for their short take-off and vertical landing capability.

On social media, a private jet pilot shared a video of a MQ-9 Reaper drone, filmed at Rafael Hernández Airport on Puerto Rico.

These have been used by the US to carry out attacks and surveillance in Afghanistan, Syria, Libya and Mali.

Earlier in October, BBC Verify tracked three B-52 bombers which flew across the Caribbean and close to Venezuela's coast.

The US air force later confirmed that the planes had taken part in a "bomber attack demonstration".

Flights of B1 bombers and P-8 Poseidon spy planes have also been visible on plane tracking platforms.

Images on social media have also shown military helicopters operating off the coast of Trinidad and Tobago.

Some of these are Boeing MH-6M Little Birds - nicknamed "Killer Eggs" - used by US special forces.

What CIA could do inside Venezuela

When asked if the CIA had been given the authority to take out Maduro, Donald Trump dodged the question and said it would be "ridiculous" to answer.

He has also said that the US is "looking at land now", referring to possible military operations on Venezuelan soil.

The CIA is viewed with a lot of suspicion by many in Latin America because of a long history of covert interventions, attempts at regime-change, and support for past right-wing military dictatorships, notably in Chile and Brazil.

Ned Price, deputy to the US representative to the United Nations and formerly a CIA senior analyst and State Department senior adviser, said CIA covert action can take "many forms."

"It can be information operations. It can be sabotage operations. It can be funding opposition parties. It can go as far as the overthrow of a regime. There are a lot of options between the low-end and high-end option."

This could include agents being used to target trafficking suspects inside Venezuela. By the US's own definition, this could include Maduro himself.

Dr Sabatini says given Venezuela isn't a major production point for drugs, there are no cocaine or fentanyl labs to "take out" but there are airstrips or ports which the US could target.

"If he wants to be aggressive, he could send a missile to a military barrack. There is pretty good intelligence certain sectors of the military are involved in cocaine trafficking."

Or it could be a "smash and grab situation", he notes, where they attempt to seize Maduro or some of his lieutenants and bring them to justice in the US.

The big question, he argues, is how long Trump is willing to keep so many US assets parked in the Caribbean.

If the prime purpose of this military build-up is to threaten Maduro, it is unclear whether it is enough to prompt defections.

Whether that goes as far as an actual attempt to dislodge the Maduro regime through force, ponders Professor Albertus, it is hard to know.

This week, millions of people took part in "No Kings" protests against President Donald Trump's policies in cities across the US, Amazon Web Services almost broke the internet, and Strictly fans were stunned by presenters Tess Daly and Claudia Winkleman announcing their departure.

But how much attention did you pay to what else happened in the world over the past seven days?

Quiz collated by Ben Fell.

Fancy testing your memory? Try last week's quiz, or have a go at something from the archives.

Sign up for our morning newsletter and get BBC News in your inbox.

Celebrities, professional sports stars and wealthy gamblers sat at a table hoping to win big in a game of Texas Hold 'Em.

But they didn't know it was nearly impossible. They were "fishes" allegedly being targeted by the mafia in an elaborate poker gambling scheme that included X-ray card tables, secret cameras, analysers in chip trays and sunglasses and contact lenses that could read their hand.

In what sounds like an Ocean's Eleven film plot, prosecutors say these "unwitting" victims were cheated out of at least $7m (£5.25) in poker games - with one person losing at least $1.8m (£1.35m).

The scheme, which US prosecutors described as "reminiscent of a Hollywood movie," was dismantled in a sprawling federal investigation that led to more than 30 arrests, including members of the La Costra Nostra crime families, Portland Trail Blazers coach Chauncey Billups and former player Damon Jones.

FBI director Kash Patel called it a "mind-boggling" fraud scheme that cheated victims in New York, Miami, Las Vegas and other US cities.

The underground poker scheme started as early as 2019, prosecutors say, and was allegedly operated the mafia - specifically by members of notorious crime families, including Bonnano, Gambino, Luchesse and Genovese. A cut of the profits, prosecutors say, helped fund their criminal enterprise.

Former professional athletes, described by prosecutors as "face cards", were enlisted to help in the scheme and entice victims into playing.

Lured in by the opportunity to play with a high-profile celebrity - such as Billups or Jones - a wealthy, "unwitting victim" would be recruited for illegal, underground poker games where tens of thousands of dollars were on the line, prosecutors allege.

Unbeknownst to the lured-in players - referred to in the scheme as a "fish" - everyone surrounding them was in on the elaborate scam - from the players to the dealers, even the technology used to shuffle the deck and count the chips, according to a lengthy federal indictment.

Sophisticated wireless technology was also used to deceive the players during the games, most commonly in Texas Hold'em.

• NBA stars and mafia among dozens arrested in illegal gambling crackdown
• NBA injuries, poker and the mafia: What we know about gambling arrests

The technology was everywhere - an X-ray table that read any face-down card, analysers inside chip trays, a rigged shuffling machine that read cards and predicted who would have the best hand, and pre-marked cards that allowed those wearing special sunglasses and contact lenses to read what was in everyone's hands.

Secretive cameras - built into tables and light fixtures - also helped convey information to those helping in the plot, authorities say.

Then there was also a sophisticated method of communicating and rigging the game, prosecutors allege.

Information from the game would be sent to an off-site conspirator - called an "operator" by prosecutors - who then would send information to another player sitting at the table who was in on the scheme - which prosecutors call a "quarterback" or "driver".

That person would then secretly signal to others, prosecutors allege, effectively stealing money and making it impossible for victims to win.

Authorities estimate that each game would leave a victim out of tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Prosecutors say the defendants allegedly laundered the funds from the scheme through cryptocurrency, cash exchanges and shell companies.

A cut of the profits went to those who helped in the plot, prosecutors say, and some allegedly went to fund the mafia's criminal enterprise.

"This alleged scheme wreaked havoc across the nation, exploiting the notoriety of some and the wallets of others to finance the Italian crime families," said FBI Assistant Director in Charge Christopher Raia.

Arrests in the scheme were announced Thursday along with a basketball betting plot, where professional National Basketball Association (NBA) players are accused of faking injuries to influence betting odds.

Billups, who was accused of being a face card in the fixed card games, was arrested in Portland and was placed on leave by the NBA. In a statement, the Portland Trailblazers said that they are aware of the allegations involving their head coach and are "fully cooperating with the investigation".

Jones was arrested in relation to both the poker and NBA injuries scheme. He is charged with two counts each of wire fraud conspiracy and money laundering conspiracy.

When Brandi Carlile was 12 years old, living in a mobile home in an isolated community 50 miles outside Seattle, she begged her parents for a piano.

She'd fallen in love with her mum's Elton John albums and wanted to play along.

But when she broke her tiny Casio keyboard out of its Toys R Us box, she had to face an uncomfortable reality.

"I was just nowhere near talented enough," she laughs.

Instead, she put on Bruce Springsteen's Streets Of Philadelphia, dialled up the keyboard's "synth strings" setting, and pressed down two keys.

"You just hold them, all the way through the verse," she recalls. "Anyone can do it, but that's the foundation of my career."

Fast forward 32 years and Elton John is one of her best friends. In January, they released a collaborative album, Who Believes In Angels, that topped the UK charts (Carlile contributed significantly more than two notes).

The musician has also been responsible for Joni Mitchell's musical rehabilitation, coaxing the 81-year-old back onto the stage after a near-fatal brain haemorrhage.

And she's spent the last six years duetting with some of pop's biggest stars, from Miley Cyrus to Noah Kahan, while curating her annual Girls Just Wanna festival in Mexico.

All those opportunities stemmed from a single performance at the 2019 Grammys, where Carlile delivered a spine-tingling version of The Joke, an anthemic ballad for the persecuted.

"I'd played that song hundreds of times but I never could really hit that last note," she confesses now.

"But at the Grammys, I really wanted to get it right. So for days leading up to the show, I trained and I trained and I trained. And when I hit it, I could hardly finish the song. I wanted to jump up and down."

She wasn't the only one. Jaws were dropped. Eyes were popped. A star was born.

Before she'd even left the stage, Carlile's phone was blowing up with texts from people "so famous I couldn't fathom it".

"I suddenly had this river of opportunity flowing into my life, and I didn't know how long it was going to last, and so I said yes to everything," she recalls.

Looking back, she reckons the eagerness to grasp those opportunities was a reaction to her childhood.

Growing up in rural America, Carlile knew she was gay, but had "never met" another gay person in her life.

Her sexuality changed her relationship with her mother.

"All the ways she thought she was going to relate to me, she couldn't," says Carlile.

"I didn't want to do make-up or learn to shave my legs or have long hair, and she was just like, 'What do I do with this child?'"

They eventually bonded over music - even forming a sort of informal tribute act to mother-daughter band The Judds.

But the sense of otherness remained, even after Carlile married and had two kids with British charity director Catherine Shepherd. So when opportunity came knocking, she felt obliged to chase it.

"I think it could be the gay thing, this kind of coyote thing, where it's like, 'Keep your eye on the prize. You're being included right now, you might not be included tomorrow. Accept everything, do everything, achieve, assimilate,'" she says.

Then, as suddenly as it arrived, the instinct vanished.

Last October, she flew straight from a show with Joni Mitchell to a recording session with Aaron Dessner - co-founder of rock group The National, and a key collaborator for Taylor Swift.

By the time she landed in New York, she was hungover and overwhelmed with emotion. Instinctively, she knew the comeback concerts she'd masterminded with Joni had run their course.

"I couldn't bear the thought of not sitting next to her and listening to her sing Both Sides Now again," she says. "I'd had the best damn seat in the house."

Dessner showed Carlile a few pieces he'd been working on, then left her to work in his barn. Exhausted, she went upstairs, climbed into bed, and wrote a poem that captured her mood.

"Returning to myself is such a lonely thing to do / But it's the only thing to do."

After six years of chasing opportunities, it was time to turn inwards.

"I knew I was at the end of something," she says, "and that, yes, the phone might stop ringing, but I don't want to miss out on my kids' childhood."

The poem became the title track and north star for her new album, which wrestles with the passage of time, and the delicacy of human connection.

When Dessner started playing atmospheric synth chords in the studio, it unlocked the memory of those first musical experiments on her Casio keyboard.

"I felt 13 or 14 again, and it made me write things differently," she says. "I had this huge lump in my throat the whole time. I was embarrassed to sing the songs in front of everybody because I thought I would cry - and I did."

Listeners might need a box of tissues, too.

When Carlile played You Without Me at Glastonbury this summer, there were more than a few misty eyes, as people digested the story of a parent coming to terms with their child's independence.

"I've started to see those moments, and it's soul crushing," says the singer, whose eldest daughter, Evangeline, is 11. "But at the same time you're overwhelmed with pride."

Same-sex marriage threat

Her daughters inspired one of the record's angrier songs, too. Church And State rails against the increasing influence of conservative religious ideology on US politics.

Recorded live on election night 2024, it addresses Carlile's fear that the Supreme Court could overturn Obergefell v Hodges, which recognised same-sex marriage in 2015.

It was prompted by a dinner conversation, where Evangeline suggested the family could just get on Carlile's boat and "bebop up to Canada" if gay marriage was outlawed.

"I don't want to go to Canada," protested their youngest, Elijah.

"And Evangeline just snapped and said, 'Elijah, it's better than not having a mommy or a mama'.

"I felt so ashamed for not explaining it better. They assumed that if it ever happened, they'd be orphans.

"And then I felt so angry that something so archaic and antiquated could even be a possibility in the country I live in, let alone legitimately on the horizon."

The album's other guiding light is Mitchell, whose strict quality control is "the reason I write a lot fewer songs," Carlile says.

She pays an affectionate but cheeky tribute to the singer on a song simply called Joni.

"She doesn't suffer fools, she won't make cups of tea, and she won't bandage bruised egos," sings Carlile over a delicately plucked guitar.

"She is a wild woman," laughs the star. "She's 83 and she will drink you under the table.

"She loves Cadillac margaritas and plain Black Jack. And she is unpredictable, untameable, unknowable sometimes, and it's amazing."

Presumably it was nerve-wracking to play Mitchell the song?

"Oh, I was quaking," she laughs. "She was sitting at her desk in her bedroom, putting butterfly clips in her hair, as Joni Mitchell does, and just listening to the song with this furrowed brow, not reacting whatsoever.

"But this big smile spread across her face after the last chorus. Then she made me wait a good minute before she nodded at me like, 'This is great.'"

One lyric, however, created a little friction.

"When I tell you I love you, and you tell me 'OK'... That's love in your way."

"When she heard that she called me an asshole!" Carlile laughs, "because she knew exactly what I meant - and you're not supposed to get Joni Mitchell. She doesn't want to be understood."

As you might expect, Carlile is full of similarly starry anecdotes.

She recalls seeing Paul McCartney at the side of the stage during her Glastonbury set ("that was a top five moment"); and spills the beans on Dolly Parton's tattoos ("I haven't seen them, but I know people who have. She can be really rugged and curse.")

So what would that lonely child, who warmed her hands around a wooden stove and struggled to play Elton John songs, think about her elevation to the highest echelons of music?

"I have a lot of affection for that girl now, in ways that I didn't at the time," she reflects.

"She would love to know that it happened and that she made it. Because I've made it beyond where I hoped, and I'm not sure what to do with that."

If Returning To Myself is the first draft of her answer, it suggests the possibilities are limitless.

With a new confidence and a new direction, Carlile is breaking into uncharted territory: Herself.

The issue of grooming gangs in the UK has been a political hot potato for years, with particular sensitivities around ethnicity and race.

Despite a number of local reviews and the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse - IICSA - it's widely accepted that no one has got to grips with the specific issue of grooming gangs.

So when Baroness Louise Casey recommended a national inquiry she said she wanted it to be a different kind to past proceedings.

Not an overarching judge-led process, but instead a series of local investigations, directed and overseen by a national commission with statutory powers.

Why then, do the wheels seem to be coming off before things have got going?

First of all, there's the issue of the inquiry's scope. The four survivors who've resigned from the consultation panel have all said they're concerned that its remit will be too wide. They're worried that it will extend beyond grooming gangs to examine other forms of child sexual abuse and exploitation.

The government has rebutted this strongly. Earlier this week Safeguarding Minister Jess Phillips wrote a letter to the Chair of the Home Affairs Select Committee in which she said, plainly, that it is "untrue" that "the government is seeking to dilute the focus of the inquiry… by expanding the scope beyond grooming gangs".

That triggered another round of anger from the four survivors who've resigned. They say it's Jess Phillips whose words are untrue. They wrote to the Home Secretary to say, "being publicly contradicted and dismissed by a government minister when you are a survivor telling the truth takes you right back to that feeling of not being believed all over again".

The four survivors are calling for Phillips to resign. A fifth survivor, Carly, who remains on the panel, has told the BBC that she also wants the safeguarding minister to go.

However, five other survivors have written to the prime minister and home secretary saying one of their conditions for remaining on the panel is that Phillips remains in her post.

Their joint letter says: "Jess Philips MP has remained impartial to the process, only listening to feedback, we want her to remain in position for the duration of the process for consistency."

The five women also say they want stronger confidentiality assurances for victims, and no re-entry to the panel if a person has decided to leave.

Additionally, they have said they would like all forms of Child Sexual Exploitation to be within the inquiry's scope – including but not exclusively grooming gangs.

So, what are the survivors who are resigning basing their position on?

The BBC has seen screenshots of the agenda of one of the meetings held between officials and survivors, as part of the pre-inquiry consultation process. Several "questions for reflection" are listed as up for discussion. Number three on the list is this: "Should the inquiry have an explicit focus on 'grooming gangs' or 'group-based CSEA', or take a broader approach?"

One survivor told me that she was angered that this question had even been posed.

The official terms of reference for the inquiry have not yet been set. That's something that can only happen once the chair has been appointed. But the survivors say that the recommendation for an inquiry into grooming gangs has been made precisely because the subject hasn't been looked at in isolation at a national level before. They are offended that the question of a 'broader approach' was put to them.

The BBC has also been shown screenshots of text messages sent between one survivor, Fiona Goddard, and Jess Phillips.

After that consultation meeting, with the agenda item about a 'broader approach', Fiona texted the minister to ask why the question had been included. She wrote, "This is being manipulated away from what it was supposed to be and its unfair".

Jess Phillips replied via text to Fiona saying, "the reason for the question is because there have been differing views and we want you to be able to give a clear steer on what you want. I know it's hard to trust but I can promise you no one is trying to manipulate the response and it is my view that it is only a grooming gangs specific inquiry but it is not right for me to make that decision without it being formally consulted on."

Away from the remit of the inquiry, there's also been dissent over who should be selected to act as its chairperson.

Contrary to Louise Casey's point of view, some survivors DO want a judge led inquiry - and have objected to the concept of a chair with a background in policing or social work.

They say such a career history is too close to home and could pose a conflict of interest, given that the police and social services are two of the agencies who've previously failed victims of grooming gangs.

But not all survivors feel like this.

Others have said that a chairperson who has worked in a related field could bring understanding and relevance to the post. They've also pointed out that the judiciary and courts have failed victims in the past – as have parts of the health, education, and social care systems.

In other words, it may be virtually impossible to find someone without a connection to one of the agencies of state which will fall under the microscope.

Even if a judge-led approach was to be taken, there's no guarantee of an easy road ahead.

There are uncomfortable reminders of the national Inquiry into child sexual abuse which went through three chairwomen, before the fourth - Prof Alexis Jay - took the reins.

The issues of picking a chair, and the scope of the inquiry aren't the only ones which survivors have complained about. Others say they have been asked to sign confidentiality agreements and have felt silenced by officials, which is an upsetting reminder of how they've been made to feel in the past, by other agencies.

But it's hard to get a handle on how widespread this feeling is.

So far, the four survivors who've resigned have all been vocal about their reasons. Others, who've chosen to stay on board with the inquiry have also spoken out.

Some survivors have waived their right to anonymity and have gained a degree of profile as a result. Others have chosen not to. It's difficult to know how representative of the general feeling their comments are – and whether there is a majority consensus amongst survivors.

My experience of following a range of different public inquiries is that it's rarely the case that all victims and survivors have the same perspective.

The test of this inquiry will be whether it can find its feet whilst retaining the confidence of all of the very people who've been calling for it for so many years.

Five abuse survivors have written to prime minister Sir Keir Starmer to say they will only continue working with the grooming gang inquiry if Safeguarding Minister Jess Phillips keeps her job.

It comes after four different members of the survivors panel quit the inquiry and said they would only rejoin it if Phillips resigned.

The survivors panel, thought to include about 16 women, is playing a central role in setting up the national inquiry into grooming gangs.

But they are at odds over whether it should be expanded to cover other types of child sexual exploitation - and whether they can trust Phillips to lead the process of setting it up. The prime minister has repeatedly backed the minister.

The second group of survivors, headed by Samantha Walker-Roberts, has written to Sir Keir and Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood with a list of seven conditions for their continued support.

"Jess Phillips has remained impartial to the process, only listening to feedback [and] we want her to remain in position for the duration of the process for consistency," they wrote.

"Her previous experience and drive to reduce VAWG [violence against women and girls] and her clear passion and commitment is important to us."

They praised Phillips, who they said had "devoted her life to hearing and amplifying the voices of women and girls who would otherwise have been unheard" and had helped some of them access support.

Earlier today, the first group called on Phillips to quit in order to restore trust in the inquiry, accusing her of "betrayal" for describing reports the scope of the inquiry could be widened as "untrue".

Headed up by Fiona Goddard, the group of four said they would only re-join it if the minister went, because they had "raised legitimate concerns around the inquiry's direction" but "in response, your safeguarding minister, Jess Phillips called our accounts untrue".

Another survivor, known as Carly, from Huddersfield, told the BBC she wanted to remain part of the inquiry, but she also believes Phillips should go, because "she can't lie about what we all know" around the question of whether to widen the inquiry's scope.

There is disagreement among survivors on whether the focus should be widened, which the BBC understands can be tracked back to an email sent to the panel by NWG, the charity tasked with organising it on behalf of the government.

This email asked survivors if they wanted to keep the the inquiry focused on grooming gangs or if they would like it to be widened out.

Ms Walker-Roberts' group of survivors stressed that this request had not come from Phillips.

"When asked directly in the feedback session, Jess was clear that the focus would be on grooming gangs," they wrote.

"However survivors in the group explained they would be excluded for not fitting the generalised stereotype of what that is and [the inquiry] should focus on CSE (child sexual exploitation]."

On how to reconcile the differences between the two groups of survivors, they suggested "the panel should be smaller" and there should be "no re-entry to the panel after you have forfeited your position".

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The rapper Ghetts has been charged with causing serious injury by dangerous driving after a fatal crash in north-east London.

The musician, whose real name is Justin Clarke-Samuel, allegedly failed to stop after hitting a 20-year-old man in Redbridge Lane East, Ilford, on Saturday, 18 October, the Met Police said.

Mr Clarke-Samuel, 41, appeared at Stratford Magistrates' Court on Monday, the same day the man died in hospital. The indictment is expected to change from causing serious injury to causing death by dangerous driving at the next hearing.

The rapper, from Woodford Green, was remanded into custody and is due to appear at Barkingside Magistrates' Court on Monday, 27 October.

Mobo Pioneer Award

Police are appealing for witnesses to the crash to come forward.

Ghetts is a Mercury Prize-nominated grime MC, rapper and songwriter who has had high-profile musical collaborations with major acts including Stormzy, Ed Sheeran and Skepta.

Ghetts won the Best Male Act at the Mobo Awards in 2021 and received the Mobo Pioneer Award in 2024 for his significant contribution to British black culture.

He also had a supporting role in the Netflix show Supacell.

Listen to the best of BBC Radio London on Sounds and follow BBC London on Facebook, X and Instagram. Send your story ideas to hello.bbclondon@bbc.co.uk

Five abuse survivors have written to prime minister Sir Keir Starmer to say they will only continue working with the grooming gang inquiry if Safeguarding Minister Jess Phillips keeps her job.

It comes after four different members of the survivors panel quit the inquiry and said they would only rejoin it if Phillips resigned.

The survivors panel, thought to include about 16 women, is playing a central role in setting up the national inquiry into grooming gangs.

But they are at odds over whether it should be expanded to cover other types of child sexual exploitation - and whether they can trust Phillips to lead the process of setting it up. The prime minister has repeatedly backed the minister.

The second group of survivors, headed by Samantha Walker-Roberts, has written to Sir Keir and Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood with a list of seven conditions for their continued support.

"Jess Phillips has remained impartial to the process, only listening to feedback [and] we want her to remain in position for the duration of the process for consistency," they wrote.

"Her previous experience and drive to reduce VAWG [violence against women and girls] and her clear passion and commitment is important to us."

They praised Phillips, who they said had "devoted her life to hearing and amplifying the voices of women and girls who would otherwise have been unheard" and had helped some of them access support.

Earlier today, the first group called on Phillips to quit in order to restore trust in the inquiry, accusing her of "betrayal" for describing reports the scope of the inquiry could be widened as "untrue".

Headed up by Fiona Goddard, the group of four said they would only re-join it if the minister went, because they had "raised legitimate concerns around the inquiry's direction" but "in response, your safeguarding minister, Jess Phillips called our accounts untrue".

Another survivor, known as Carly, from Huddersfield, told the BBC she wanted to remain part of the inquiry, but she also believes Phillips should go, because "she can't lie about what we all know" around the question of whether to widen the inquiry's scope.

There is disagreement among survivors on whether the focus should be widened, which the BBC understands can be tracked back to an email sent to the panel by NWG, the charity tasked with organising it on behalf of the government.

This email asked survivors if they wanted to keep the the inquiry focused on grooming gangs or if they would like it to be widened out.

Ms Walker-Roberts' group of survivors stressed that this request had not come from Phillips.

"When asked directly in the feedback session, Jess was clear that the focus would be on grooming gangs," they wrote.

"However survivors in the group explained they would be excluded for not fitting the generalised stereotype of what that is and [the inquiry] should focus on CSE (child sexual exploitation]."

On how to reconcile the differences between the two groups of survivors, they suggested "the panel should be smaller" and there should be "no re-entry to the panel after you have forfeited your position".

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King Charles and Pope Leo made history in the Sistine Chapel by praying side by side - a first for the leaders of the Church of England and Catholic Church.

Under the scrutinising eyes of Michelangelo's Last Judgment, when Pope Leo said "let us pray", it meant everyone, including the King, closing a gap that stretched back to the Reformation in the 16th century.

With music and prayers about nature that would bridge any theological divide, the service offered the King and Queen some calm amid scrutiny over Prince Andrew during their Vatican visit.

But despite the significance of the state visit, there was no escaping the media - with questions about Andrew's links to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein that show no sign of abating.

Even here, as he met the Pope inside the Vatican, the King commented that the cameras were a "constant hazard".

Rather laconically the Pope said: "You get used to it", as he too has faced a rapid lesson in the unrelenting attention that comes with such a high-profile role, although it still seems a surprise to hear a Pope speaking in such relaxed American tones.

There might be irritation at the media during such moments, but without the press such state visits wouldn't really exist.

It's all about big images for the media to capture, because no members of the public are allowed past the security barriers to watch.

It's the intruding lenses of the cameras and the words rushed out for news websites that give such moments shape and impact. Otherwise they could do a state visit on Zoom.

There were many such elegantly choreographed moments in this whistle-stop visit to the Vatican, a city state where every corner could be a postcard, creaking under the weight of its own history and architectural splendour.

In the Sistine Chapel the Catholic and Anglican choirs literally sang from the same hymn sheet. The images of harmony and unity were there in abundance. Once hostile churches were now the closest friends.

Surrounded by Renaissance masterpieces, this was a meeting in one of the great cradles of Western civilisation. A lover of art, music and religion, this must have been a big occasion for King Charles.

But actually later in the day there seemed to be a more intense moment, something that gave the King and Queen a chance to pause for more private prayer and reflection.

At the church of St Paul Outside the Walls they walked down some steps to the tomb of St Paul, one of Christ's apostles. It was like walking down to the roots of Christianity. They waited there a moment and there were some prayers recited.

The King and Queen, who had switched to a white outfit after wearing black to meet the Pope, walked back up the main body of the church, where another congregation were waiting. Maybe they could have done with a few more minutes in such a simple and sacred place.

But they returned to the huge and gorgeously embellished basilica above. Even by the epic standards of churches in Rome, this was remarkably massive, with choirs once again to fill the operatically high ceilings.

The symbolic point of coming here was that before the Reformation this was a church associated with the English monarchy. It was joining up the historical dots.

As the day ended, the King and Queen and Vatican will have seen this visit as fulfilling its historic purpose, binding the Catholic and Anglican churches together at the top in a knot of friendship, as they often already can be at the grassroots.

There were exchanges of gifts, including an icon given to Pope Leo, reflecting the King's fascination with the Orthodox Church and its images.

There were also knighthoods exchanged between King Charles and Pope Leo, but at the moment there might be a question about the value of honours.

For Buckingham Palace, it will have been the completion of a state visit that had previously been postponed by the ill-health of Pope Francis. And it might have been a welcome pause from the growing pressure for answers about Prince Andrew.

Maybe the message was about reconciliation, even if it takes centuries. In the Sistine Chapel there was a serene moment with the singing of a piece by the English Catholic composer Thomas Tallis.

He lived in south London during the some of the vicious and violent religious conflicts of the 16th Century, making his music against this troubled background.

Five centuries later, his music was being played for a King and a Pope, who were no longer fighting but were on same side.

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Changpeng Zhao, founder of the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange Binance, has been pardoned by US President Donald Trump.

Mr Zhao, also known as "CZ", was sentenced to four months in prison in April 2024 after pleading guilty to violating US money laundering laws.

Binance was ordered to pay $4.3bn (£3.4bn) after a US investigation found it helped users bypass sanctions.

A White House official confirmed to the BBC Mr Zhao has been pardoned, which was first reported by the Wall Street Journal.

Binance has been approached for comment.

The exchange, which is registered in the Cayman Islands, remains the world's most popular platform for buying and selling cryptocurrencies and other digital assets.

According to the WSJ, the company has spent nearly a year pursuing a pardon for its former boss, who completed his four month prison sentence in September 2024.

The move comes amid the Trump administration's adoption of a more friendly stance towards cryptocurrency.

The President has vowed to make the US the "crypto capital" of the world and made his own mark in the digital currency landscape by releasing his own coin shortly ahead of his inauguration in January.

Since then, he has sought to establish a national cryptocurrency reserve and pushed for making it easier for Americans to use retirement savings to invest in them.

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US President Donald Trump plans to knock down the entire "existing structure" of the White House East Wing to construct a new ballroom - despite previous assurances that the addition would "not interfere with the current building".

The sight of demolitions has sparked an uproar from Democrats as well as conservation groups, including the National Trust for Historic Preservation, which wrote a letter calling on Trump to hold a public review process.

As a former property developer, Trump has extensive experience of navigating planning restrictions, and has occasionally found himself on a collision course with campaigners objecting to his plans.

Under a nearly-60-year-old law, the White House and several other notable buildings are exempt from a key historic preservation rule - though one expert told the BBC that presidents typically follow it anyway.

• Full story: Trump says 'existing structure' to be torn down
• Who is paying for Trump's new ballroom?

What does the law say?

Trump's renovation appears to be the biggest in decades, but the president of the US does have the power to make those changes.

And he is not the first to reconstruct the White House. Over the years, a host of presidents have made renovations, from a bowling alley to an indoor swimming pool.

Under a law known as National Historic Preservation Act, federal agencies are required to examine the impact of any construction projects on historic properties. Specifically, Section 106 requires the agencies to undergo a review process, including getting input from the public.

Then-President Lyndon B Johnson signed the law in 1966, after a period of rapid development in the US - including through federally-funded infrastructure projects - as concerns grew that cultural and historical landmarks were being destroyed.

Why is the White House exempt?

According to Section 107 of the act, three buildings and their grounds are exempt from the Section 106 review process: the White House, the US Capitol and the US Supreme Court building.

In the past, however, typically presidents have voluntarily submitted their plans to the National Capital Planning Commission - which oversees federal building construction - before the construction project begins.

Trump officials have not yet done so, but say they plan to, though the renovation has already begun.

What's the precedent?

Priya Jain, the chair of a heritage preservation committee at the Society of Architectural Historians, told the BBC that the process laid out by the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966 was well established and would have been the "best practice" for Trump's East Wing renovation.

These reviews - which can take years - involves discussions about programmatic requirements and potential alternatives.

"In this case, it would have been: do we need such a big ballroom? Should it be smaller?" said Jain, a professor of architecture at Texas A&M University. "Could it be an extension of the East Wing? Could it have been submerged?"

At stake, she said, is the "history" that the building contains. All the additions to the White House over time have added to how the public understands the building and the country at that point in time, she said.

"It's the memory," she said. "The East Wing is 83 years old. It has assumed a historical importance of its own. I haven't seen much out there about how that was assessed."

The case of R v Soldier F was one of the most controversial, significant and high-profile trials over killings from the conflict in Northern Ireland.

The fatal shootings of 13 people by the Army on Bloody Sunday was one of the most consequential days during 30 years of violence known as the Troubles.

Mr Justice Lynch's remarks about what happened on that January afternoon were scathing.

He said troops had "lost all sense of military discipline", as they shot unarmed civilians "in the back…as they were fleeing from them, on the streets of a British city".

Furthermore, the judge said he had no doubt "the soldiers who opened fire did so with the intention to kill" – and they "did not act in lawful self-defence".

Soldiers G and H 'serially untruthful'

However, he explained that the burden of proof in criminal cases lay with the prosecution – they had to prove who fired the shots.

Therefore, the whole case rested on the evidence which came from two statements given by two other former soldiers – G and H – to the initial investigations in 1972.

The statements, which were read to the court, were the only pieces of evidence which specifically said that Soldier F had fired his rifle.

The judge said that Soldiers G and H had been found to be "serially untruthful" in their accounts of Bloody Sunday – and therefore, their statements could not be used to prove the case against Soldier F.

• EXPLAINER: The 50-year-road to a soldier standing trial for murder
• REACTION: Soldier F's acquittal as it happened
• BACKGROUND: What happened on Bloody Sunday?
• THE STATE OF US: Soldier F not guilty

Reaction to verdict

Bereaved families who had pushed for a prosecution feel vindicated, to a degree, by the judge's remarks about the Parachute Regiment's actions on Bloody Sunday.

Representatives of veterans are welcoming the acquittal – and re-emphasising that paramilitaries killed 90% of the people who died during the Troubles.

Political reactions in Northern Ireland are predictably divisive.

Irish nationalist politicians are expressing disappointment at the verdict, and say there should have been a fuller investigation into Bloody Sunday at an earlier stage.

Unionists are arguing the outcome raises questions about whether Soldier F should ever have been prosecuted.

The Westminster government has given a more nuanced reaction – saying it is "committed to finding a way forward that acknowledges the past, whilst supporting those who served their country during an incredibly difficult period in Northern Ireland's history".

The issue of how killings from the Troubles should be investigated is one of the most complex in Northern Ireland – and the prosecution of former members of the security forces is one of the most controversial elements of that debate.

It will remain to the fore as legislation on a new investigative approach makes its way through Parliament in the coming months.

A Metropolitan Police officer has been sacked for gross misconduct after appearing in an undercover report by BBC Panorama.

Three allegations were upheld against PC Philip Neilson, including making "highly racist and discriminatory remarks" about different ethnic groups.

Mr Neilson is the first of 10 officers to face a hearing as part of the Met's accelerated misconduct proceedings over footage recorded during the Panorama investigation.

In it, he used derogatory and violent language about suspects who belong to ethnic and religious minorities while serving as a constable in the Central West Command Unit.

Mr Neilson was also accused of "glorifying what he was describing as inappropriate use of force on a restrained detainee" and for suggesting unlawful violence against migrants who broke the law. Chair of the panel, Cmdr Jason Prins, found all the allegations proven.

The hearing, in south-west London on Thursday, was told that he did not dispute the words he said but argued they only amounted to just misconduct.

Giving evidence, Mr Neilson said he had been a police officer for four years and denied he was a racist.

He said he believed the undercover reporter "breached his humans rights" and it was the reporter who "kept bringing up these conversations" and "egging me on".

Mr Neilson said he had eight or nine pints of Guinness while at the pub when he made some of the comments and said he was not a "drinker".

He said he did not discriminate against anyone and footage from his body worn camera would show "no matter the ethnicity I did everything with the utmost respect".

Cmdr Prins ruled that Mr Neilson's comments caused "significant harm" to the reputation of Metropolitan Police and wider public confidence in the police and amounted to gross misconduct, describing the conduct of the officer as an "utter disgrace".

"He alone was responsible for the comments and it was or must have been obvious to him his comments were abhorrent," Cmdr Prins added.

A former member of the Parachute Regiment has been found not guilty of murder and attempted murder in Londonderry on Bloody Sunday in 1972.

Thirteen people were shot dead and at least 15 others injured on Bloody Sunday in January 1972 at a civil rights demonstration in the Bogside area of Derry.

Soldier F, whose anonymity is protected by a court order, faced charges of murdering James Wray, 22, and William McKinney, 26, as well as five charges of attempted murder.

The judge said members of the Parachute Regiment had shot unarmed civilians as they ran away, but the evidence against Soldier F had fallen well short of what is required for conviction.

• Follow live reaction to the Soldier F verdict

Judge Patrick Lynch told Belfast Crown Court that the members of the Parachute Regiment who had entered Glenfada Park North on Bloody Sunday had "totally lost all sense of military discipline".

They had, the judge said, shot "unarmed civilians fleeing from them on the streets of a British city.

"Those responsible should hang their heads in shame," he said.

Speaking outside court William McKinney's brother Mickey said the verdicts marked the "end of prosecution of Soldier F for murder and attempted murder of the innocents on Bloody Sunday".

"The families and wounded and their supporters leave this courthouse with an incredible sense of pride of our achievements," he said.

Liam Wray, brother of Jim Wray, welcomed the judge's criticism of the soldiers on Bloody Sunday, adding it was a "tough, sad and emotional" day for the family.

He said that justice had not been achieved, but that he "appreciated the difficulties the judge faced in the case".

Northern Ireland's veterans' commissioner David Johnstone said the trial had brought into focus the "deep pain" events of 50 years ago still cause.

He said the Bloody Sunday families and all families who lost relatives in the Troubles, "continue to experience pain" adding "we should not forget that today."

'Deeply disappointing'

First Minister Michelle O'Neill said it was "deeply disappointing" that the Bloody Sunday families faced a "continued denial of justice".

"For more than five decades, they have campaigned with dignity and resilience for justice for their loved ones, their deeply cherished sons and fathers, uncles and brothers," the Sinn Féin deputy leader said.

She added: "I extend my full solidarity to the families and to the wider community of Derry who will be hurting today."

Foyle Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) MP Colum Eastwood said it was a "difficult day" for the Bloody Sunday families, but said they could "hold their heads up high".

"These were innocent people, no weapons, just on a civil rights march, mowed down by the parachute regiment of the British army. That's what happened and that's absolutely clear," he said.

Eastwood added: "Everybody now knows what happened on Bloody Sunday. Everybody knows the victims were innocent and everybody knows where the guilt actually lies."

'Common sense judgement'

Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) leader Gavin Robinson said he welcomed the "common sense judgement".

Robinson said the trial had been a "a painful and protracted process".

"There needs to be a better way of dealing with the legacy of the past and to ensure no rewriting of it," he said.

Doug Beattie of the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) said questions should be asked as to how the case had gone to trail when "the evidence was so clearly flawed".

"Yet again, those who work in our justice system must answer questions… they would have known, without a doubt, that the evidence was unsafe and could not be relied on in court," Beattie said.

Traditional Unionist Voice (TUV) MP Jim Allister said Soldier F's acquittal was "most welcome", but that it also "raises the fundamental question of why this veteran was put through the ordeal of the last few years".

'Complex legacy of the Troubles'

The British government said it noted Thursday's judgement, adding the Ministry of Defence (MoD) had "provided legal and welfare support throughout".

"This case is part of the complex legacy of the Troubles, which affected so many families and communities.

"We are committed to finding a way forward that acknowledges the past, whilst supporting those who served their country during an incredibly difficult period in Northern Ireland's history," a government spokesperson said.

A public inquiry, which concluded in 2010, found that none of the people who were killed posed any threat to the Army.

Who is Soldier F?

Soldier F is the only military veteran who has been prosecuted over the shootings.

The five charges of attempted murder related to two teenagers at the time 16-year-old Joe Mahon and 17-year-old Michael Quinn as well as Joseph Friel, who was 20, and Patrick O'Donnell, 41, and an unknown person.

The case was heard by a judge sitting without a jury at Belfast Crown.

The trial began on 15 September and lasted five weeks.

To protect his identity, Soldier F was screened from public view and his name not disclosed, as a result of a court order.

The decision to charge Soldier F was taken by the Public Prosecution Service (PPS) in 2019.

He was one of 18 former soldiers reported to the PPS as a result of a police investigation, which followed the public inquiry into Bloody Sunday conducted by Lord Saville.

But he was the only one charged.

Two years later, the PPS dropped the case after the collapse of the trial of two other veterans who had been accused of a 1972 murder in Belfast.

But the prosecution resumed in 2022 after a legal challenge.

Five abuse survivors have written to prime minister Sir Keir Starmer to say they will only continue working with the grooming gang inquiry if Safeguarding Minister Jess Phillips keeps her job.

It comes after four different members of the survivors panel quit the inquiry and said they would only rejoin it if Phillips resigned.

The survivors panel, thought to include about 16 women, is playing a central role in setting up the national inquiry into grooming gangs.

But they are at odds over whether it should be expanded to cover other types of child sexual exploitation - and whether they can trust Phillips to lead the process of setting it up. The prime minister has repeatedly backed the minister.

The second group of survivors, headed by Samantha Walker-Roberts, has written to Sir Keir and Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood with a list of seven conditions for their continued support.

"Jess Phillips has remained impartial to the process, only listening to feedback [and] we want her to remain in position for the duration of the process for consistency," they wrote.

"Her previous experience and drive to reduce VAWG [violence against women and girls] and her clear passion and commitment is important to us."

They praised Phillips, who they said had "devoted her life to hearing and amplifying the voices of women and girls who would otherwise have been unheard" and had helped some of them access support.

Earlier today, the first group called on Phillips to quit in order to restore trust in the inquiry, accusing her of "betrayal" for describing reports the scope of the inquiry could be widened as "untrue".

Headed up by Fiona Goddard, the group of four said they would only re-join it if the minister went, because they had "raised legitimate concerns around the inquiry's direction" but "in response, your safeguarding minister, Jess Phillips called our accounts untrue".

Another survivor, known as Carly, from Huddersfield, told the BBC she wanted to remain part of the inquiry, but she also believes Phillips should go, because "she can't lie about what we all know" around the question of whether to widen the inquiry's scope.

There is disagreement among survivors on whether the focus should be widened, which the BBC understands can be tracked back to an email sent to the panel by NWG, the charity tasked with organising it on behalf of the government.

This email asked survivors if they wanted to keep the the inquiry focused on grooming gangs or if they would like it to be widened out.

Ms Walker-Roberts' group of survivors stressed that this request had not come from Phillips.

"When asked directly in the feedback session, Jess was clear that the focus would be on grooming gangs," they wrote.

"However survivors in the group explained they would be excluded for not fitting the generalised stereotype of what that is and [the inquiry] should focus on CSE (child sexual exploitation]."

On how to reconcile the differences between the two groups of survivors, they suggested "the panel should be smaller" and there should be "no re-entry to the panel after you have forfeited your position".

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The Israeli military is exerting control over more of Gaza than expected from the ceasefire deal with Hamas, a BBC Verify analysis has found.

Under the first stage of the deal, Israel agreed to retreat to a boundary running along the north, south and east of Gaza. The divide was marked by a yellow line on maps released by the military and has become known as the "Yellow Line".

But new videos and satellite images show that markers placed by Israeli troops in two areas to mark the divide have been positioned hundreds of metres deeper inside the strip than the expected withdrawal line.

Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz - who instructed troops to place the yellow blocks as markers - warned that anyone crossing the line "will be met with fire". There have already been two deadly incidents near the boundary line.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) did not address the allegations when approached by BBC Verify, stating simply that: "IDF troops under the Southern Command have begun marking the Yellow Line in the Gaza Strip to establish tactical clarity on the ground."

There has been a consistent lack of clarity as to where exactly the boundary will be imposed, with three separate maps posted by the White House, Donald Trump and the Israeli military in the run up to the ceasefire agreement which came into force on 10 October.

On 14 October the IDF issued the latest version marking the Yellow Line on their online map, which is used to communicate its position to people in Gaza.

But in the north, near the al-Atatra neighbourhood, drone footage from the IDF showed that a line of six yellow blocks were up to 520m further inside the Strip than would have been expected from the IDF maps.

Footage geolocated by BBC Verify showed workers using bulldozers and diggers to move the heavy yellow blocks and place them along the coastal al-Rashid road.

A similar situation was visible in southern Gaza, where a satellite image taken on 19 October showed 10 markers erected near the city of Khan Younis. The line of blocks ranges between 180m-290m inside the Yellow Line set out by the IDF.

If these two sections of boundary were typical of how the markers were being placed along the entirety of the line then Israel would be exerting control over a notably larger area than expected from the ceasefire agreement.

Multiple analysts who spoke to BBC Verify suggested that the blocks were intended to create a "buffer zone" between Palestinians and IDF personnel. One expert said the move would be consistent with a long-term "strategic culture" which seeks to insulate Israel from nearby territories it does not fully control.

"This gives the IDF space to manoeuvre and create a 'kill zone' against potential targets," Dr Andreas Krieg, associate professor at King's College London, said.

"Potential targets can be engaged before they reach the IDF perimeter. It is a bit like no man's land that does not belong to anyone – and Israel tends to take that territory from the opponent's chunk not its own."

Three experts who spoke to BBC Verify suggested that the disparity between the markers and the IDF map was an intentional design to warn civilians they are "approaching an area of increased risk".

Noam Ostfeld, an analyst with the risk consultancy Sibylline, said that some blocks "seem to be positioned near roads or walls, making them easier to spot".

But a post to X by the Israeli defense minister seemed to suggest that the yellow blocks marked the actual line, warning that "any violation or attempt to cross the line will be met with fire".

There is already confusion among Gazans over areas where it is safe to go.

Abdel Qader Ayman Bakr, who lives near the temporary boundary in the eastern part of Gaza City's Shejaiya district, told the BBC that, despite promises from Israel of clear markings, he had seen none put in place.

"Each day, we can see Israeli military vehicles and soldiers at a relatively close distance, yet we have no way of knowing whether we are in what is considered a 'safe zone' or 'an active danger zone'," he said.

"We are constantly exposed to danger, especially since we are forced to remain here because this is where our home once stood."

Since the ceasefire came into effect, the IDF has reported a number of instances of people crossing the Yellow Line. On all occasions the IDF said it fired upon those involved.

BBC Verify has obtained and geolocated footage showing the aftermath of one incident on 17 October, which the Hamas-run Civil Defence agency said killed 11 civilians - including women and children all reportedly from the same family. The agency said the Palestinians' vehicle was targeted by Israel after crossing the Yellow Line east of Gaza City in the Zeitoun neighbourhood.

The footage showed rescue workers inspecting the burnt out remnants of a vehicle and covering a nearby badly-mangled body of a child with a white sheet. BBC Verify geolocated the video to a spot around 125m over the Yellow Line marked on maps by the IDF.

The IDF said warning shots were fired towards a "suspicious vehicle" that had crossed the line. The statement added when the vehicle failed to stop troops opened fire "to remove the threat".

Meanwhile, the legal status of the boundary has also been questioned.

"Israel's obligations under the law of armed conflict do not cease even for those breaching the Yellow Line," said Dr Lawrence Hill-Cawthorne, professor of Public International Law at the University of Bristol.

"It can only target enemy fighters or those directly participating in hostilities, and in so doing it must not cause excessive civilian harm."

In a statement, an Israeli military spokesperson said: "IDF troops under the Southern Command continue to operate to remove any threat to the troops and to defend the civilians of the State of Israel."

They added that that the concrete blocks are "being placed every 200 metres".

Israel launched a military campaign in Gaza in response to the 7 October 2023 attack, in which Hamas-led gunmen killed about 1,200 people and took 251 others as hostages.

At least 68,280 have been killed in Israeli attacks in Gaza since then, according to the territory's Hamas-run health ministry.

Additional reporting by Erwan Rivault, Lamees Altalebi and Maha El Gaml

What do you want BBC Verify to investigate?

One week ago I had the distinct feeling it was Groundhog Day, or as the Russians call it, Dyen Surka.

Amid US threats to pressure Moscow - by supplying Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine - Vladimir Putin and President Donald Trump held a telephone call. The result: the announcement of a US-Russia summit in Budapest.

Last August, amid threats of additional US sanctions against Russia, Putin met Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff. The result: the announcement of a US-Russia summit in Alaska.

Déjà vu.

But Groundhog Day seems to be over.

The Alaska meeting went ahead, with minimal preparation and little result.

But the Budapest summit is off. It barely had time to be "on", to be fair. Now President Trump has cancelled it.

"It didn't feel like we were going to get to the place we have to get," the US president told reporters.

And that's not all.

Previously, Trump had not followed through on threats of more pressure on Russia, preferring carrots to sticks in his dealings with the Kremlin.

For the moment he has put his carrots away.

Instead he's imposed sanctions on two major Russian oil companies, Rosneft and Lukoil.

That's unlikely to force a U-turn on the war from President Putin. But it's a sign of Trump's frustration with the Kremlin's unwillingness to make any compromise or concessions to end the fighting in Ukraine.

Read more:

Trump says Putin talks 'don't go anywhere' as he imposes new sanctions

What's the significance of US sanctions on Russian oil?

The Russians don't take kindly to sticks.

"The USA is our enemy and their talkative 'peacemaker' has now fully set on the path to war with Russia," wrote former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on social media. "The decisions that have been taken are an act of war against Russia."

Thursday morning's edition of the tabloid Moskovsky Komsomolets was slightly less dramatic, but obviously unflattering. The paper criticised "the capriciousness and fickleness of [Russia's] main negotiating partner."

So what's changed?

Instead of rushing off to summit no.2, as he had done for summit no.1, this time around President Trump was slightly more cautious.

He had asked Secretary of State Marco Rubio to lay the groundwork for the summit with the Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov; to make sure there was a point in decamping to Budapest.

It soon became clear that there wasn't, and that a new summit now was unlikely to produce a breakthrough.

Russia is fiercely opposed to Donald Trump's idea of freezing the current battle lines in Ukraine.

The Kremlin is determined to take control, at the very least, of the entire Donbas region in eastern Ukraine. It has seized and occupied much of it.

But President Volodymyr Zelensky is refusing to cede to Russia those parts of the Donbas that Ukraine still controls.

Moscow would have welcomed a second US-Russia summit.

The first, in Alaska, was a diplomatic and political coup for the Kremlin. The red-carpet welcome in Anchorage for President Putin symbolised Russia's return to the international stage and the West's failure to isolate Moscow.

Over the last week Russian state media have been savouring the idea of a summit with President Trump in Europe, but without the European Union at the table. Russian commentators portrayed the proposed meeting in Budapest as a slap in the face for Brussels.

At the same time, few here seemed to believe that, even if it went ahead, the Budapest summit would produce the kind of result Moscow wanted.

Some Russian newspapers have been calling for the Russian army to continue fighting.

"There isn't a single reason Moscow should agree to a ceasefire," declared Moskovsky Komsomolets yesterday.

That doesn't mean the Kremlin doesn't want peace.

It does. But only on its terms. And right now those are unacceptable to Kyiv and, it would appear, to Washington.

Those terms involve more than just territory. Moscow is demanding that what it calls the "root causes" of the Ukraine war be addressed: an all-encompassing phrase with which Russia broaden its demands to include a halt to Nato enlargement eastwards.

Moscow is also widely believed to retain the goal of forcing Ukraine back into Russia's orbit.

Is Donald Trump ready to increase the pressure on Russia even more?

Possibly.

But it's also possible we may wake up one morning and find ourselves back in Groundhog Day.

"In the game of Trump tug-of-war, Russia is leading again," wrote Moskovsky Komsomolets after the Budapest summit had been announced.

"In the couple of weeks before the meeting in Budapest, Trump will be pulled in the opposite direction by telephone calls and visits from Europe. Then Putin will pull him back to our side again."

Thames Water has been given a one star rating for its poor environmental performance by the Environment Agency (EA) in 2024, as part of a scathing assessment of England's water companies.

All but one of the nine English water and sewerage companies were rated as "requiring improvement" - or worse - by the EA, in a year where serious pollution rose by 60% versus 2023.

It is their worst combined score since the assessment process began in 2011.

Industry body Water UK acknowledged that "the performance of some companies is not good enough" but said there were some signs of improvement.

A Thames Water spokesperson said: "Transforming Thames is a major programme of work that will take time; it will take at least a decade to achieve the scale of change required."

The chair of the EA, Alan Lovell, wrote: "Many companies tell us how focussed they are on environmental improvement. But the results are not visible in the data."

The collective rating for 2024 was 19 stars - down from 25 stars in 2023. No year had previously got fewer than 22 stars.

Only Severn Trent got the top rating of four stars. All others got two stars, except Thames - the UK's largest water company - which got one.

The EA says its assessment criteria has been tightened over time, so its ratings do "not mean performance has declined since 2011".

The EA attributed last year's poor performance to three factors – wet and stormy weather, long-standing underinvestment in infrastructure, and increased monitoring and inspection "bringing more failings to light".

Dave Ball, one half of the pioneering 1980s synth-pop band Soft Cell, has died at the age of 66.

Alongside singer Marc Almond, the duo scored a worldwide hit with their cover of Gloria Jones' Tainted Love in 1984, and their debut album Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret is considered a classic of electronic music.

He later formed the pioneering techno group The Grid, who achieved chart success with 1994's Swamp Thing.

Ball died peacefully in his sleep at his home in London, just weeks after playing a headline show with Soft Cell at the Rewind Festival in Henley-on-Thames.

During that show, Ball performed in a wheelchair, as he had for the last two years, following a spate of ill-health.

"I managed to damage myself quite a bit," he told the Yorkshire Post in 2023. "I fractured lower vertebrae in my spine and cracked about five ribs and broke my wrist".

After catching pneumonia and developing sepsis, he was placed in an induced coma and remained in hospital for seven months.

However, he had been in "a great place emotionally" over the summer, as he worked on a new album with Almond, called Danceteria, which is scheduled for release next year.

"He was focused and so happy with the new album that we literally completed only a few days ago," said the singer in a tribute.

"It's so sad as 2026 was all set to be such an uplifting year for him, and I take some solace from the fact that he heard the finished record and felt that it was a great piece of work."

Almond described his bandmate as "a wonderfully brilliant musical genius", adding: "He was the heart and soul of Soft Cell and I'm very proud of our legacy.

"Thank you Dave for being an immense part of my life and for the music you gave me. I wouldn't be where I am without you."

Richard Norris from The Grid, also paid tribute, remembering Ball's "endless laughter" and "unwavering friendship".

"Being in a duo with someone is different from being in a band, the bond is very tight," he added.

"That's how it was with us. We went through so many remarkable, extraordinary, life-affirming experiences together. Thank you, Dave."

Born into a single-parent household in Chester in 1959, Ball was given up for adoption when he was 18 months old.

He grew up in Blackpool with adoptive parents Donald and Brenda Ball, who changed his first name from Paul to David, alongside his younger sister Susan, who was also adopted.

He met Almond at Leeds Polytechnic in 1977, where they were both studying art. Fuelled by a shared love of Northern Soul, they formed Soft Cell the same year, and quickly recorded an EP.

The duo were an unusual pairing: Ball was the quiet technician, hunched over his keyboard, while Almond was a flamboyant showman, all glitter and eye-liner; but they achieved a rare musical alchemy.

Ball had developed a fascination with synthesizers after watching Kraftwerk appear on BBC science show Tomorrow's World, and began to marry dark electronica to the soaring melodies Almond was writing.

Tainted Love became the UK's biggest-selling single of 1981, shifting 21 million copies worldwide. Alongside hits by Gary Numan and Ultravox, it helped paved the way for the synth-pop sound of the 80s.

The song was also included on their full-length debut, Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret, which spawned two further top five singles: Bedsitter and Say Hello, Wave Goodbye.

They followed the album up with the stand-alone single, Torch, which peaked at number two in 1982.

Fame had its upsides. "I loved being able to afford my first home, having money and travelling, which makes me sound like a Miss World," Ball recently told Classic Pop Magazine.

But it also presented problems. "Newfound wealth meant we could afford newfound drugs to relieve the boredom" of media interviews and TV performances, Ball said.

"I know that's a cliché, but it's a cliché for a good reason, because it works for so many bands."

Amidst the hedonistic lifestyle, the duo were also drifting apart, but they managed to create a second classic album - the wayward, tense and aptly-titled The Art Of Falling Apart.

They released one more album, 1984's This Last Night In Sodom, before dissolving the band to concentrate on other projects.

Almond went on to have a successful solo career, including the top 10 hit Something's Got A Hold Of My Heart; while Ball created The Grid, who mixed acid house with ambient pop over a long-lasting collaboration.

Soft Cell reunited in 2001, producing the Top 40 album Cruelty Without Beauty.

After another hiatus, they reappeared in 2018, releasing the original singles Northern Lights and Guilty (Cos I Say You Are) before performing what was supposed to be a farewell show at the O2 Arena on 30 September, 2018.

However, they remained together, recording their fifth album, Happiness Not Included, during the 2020 Covid lockdown.

Ball recently described the band's new album as a tribute to the New York club scene they frequented while recording their first two albums.

He added that his time in hospital had influenced the band's sound.

"I had strange recollections when I was in and out of hospital because I was on morphine," he told Classic Pop.

"The new songs are a digital reflection of the sounds in my head from that time.

"In parallel, it's about the times me and Marc got up to in the 80s."

The final mixes were completed only days before Ball died. It is due for release in Spring 2026.

Strictly Come Dancing presenters Tess Daly and Claudia Winkleman are to leave the show.

"We have loved working as a duo and hosting Strictly has been an absolute dream. We were always going to leave together and now feels like the right time," the pair wrote in a joint statement on Instagram.

"We will have the greatest rest of this amazing series and we just want to say an enormous thank you to the BBC and to every single person who works on the show."

Daly has presented since the first series 21 years ago. Winkleman joined in 2014, having hosted Strictly's sister show It Takes Two since 2004.

The duo called the show's crew "the most brilliant team" who they would "miss every day".

"We will cry when we say the last 'keep dancing' but we will continue to say it to each other.

"Just possibly in tracksuit bottoms at home while holding some pizza," they added.

One of the BBC's highest-rated shows, Strictly Come Dancing launched in 2004. It was originally hosted by Daly and Sir Bruce Forsyth, who stepped down in 2014.

Describing her 21 years on the show, Daly said it was "hard to put into words" what the experience had meant to her.

"Strictly has been more than just a television programme. It's felt like having a third child, a second family, and a huge part of my life since that very first show.

"I knew then it was something special, but I could never have imagined the magic it would bring."

She also paid tribute to "the incomparable Sir Bruce Forsyth".

Winkleman, who also hosts Celebrity Traitors, added: "Strictly is a magical, glittery, fake-tanned train and it's been a privilege to be a tiny part of it.

"It has been my everything, the show I will be eternally grateful for.

"I will never forget Len Goodman trying to teach me what a cucaracha is (I still don't know) and the complete thrill and honour it was to work with Tess on the results show to co-hosting on Saturday nights."

The pair also referenced the off-screen friendship they built up over two decades on screen.

"Tess - I'm so so lucky I got to stand next to you. You're funny, kind, whip smart and a true friend and I love you," Winkleman said.

Daly added: "To my beloved Claud - what an absolute joy and pleasure it has been sharing this adventure with you.

"You're one of a kind, and I'll treasure every giggle, every live show, and every backstage moment we've shared. I'm so grateful to have you as my friend for life."

The Israeli military is exerting control over more of Gaza than expected from the ceasefire deal with Hamas, a BBC Verify analysis has found.

Under the first stage of the deal, Israel agreed to retreat to a boundary running along the north, south and east of Gaza. The divide was marked by a yellow line on maps released by the military and has become known as the "Yellow Line".

But new videos and satellite images show that markers placed by Israeli troops in two areas to mark the divide have been positioned hundreds of metres deeper inside the strip than the expected withdrawal line.

Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz - who instructed troops to place the yellow blocks as markers - warned that anyone crossing the line "will be met with fire". There have already been two deadly incidents near the boundary line.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) did not address the allegations when approached by BBC Verify, stating simply that: "IDF troops under the Southern Command have begun marking the Yellow Line in the Gaza Strip to establish tactical clarity on the ground."

There has been a consistent lack of clarity as to where exactly the boundary will be imposed, with three separate maps posted by the White House, Donald Trump and the Israeli military in the run up to the ceasefire agreement which came into force on 10 October.

On 14 October the IDF issued the latest version marking the Yellow Line on their online map, which is used to communicate its position to people in Gaza.

But in the north, near the al-Atatra neighbourhood, drone footage from the IDF showed that a line of six yellow blocks were up to 520m further inside the Strip than would have been expected from the IDF maps.

Footage geolocated by BBC Verify showed workers using bulldozers and diggers to move the heavy yellow blocks and place them along the coastal al-Rashid road.

A similar situation was visible in southern Gaza, where a satellite image taken on 19 October showed 10 markers erected near the city of Khan Younis. The line of blocks ranges between 180m-290m inside the Yellow Line set out by the IDF.

If these two sections of boundary were typical of how the markers were being placed along the entirety of the line then Israel would be exerting control over a notably larger area than expected from the ceasefire agreement.

Multiple analysts who spoke to BBC Verify suggested that the blocks were intended to create a "buffer zone" between Palestinians and IDF personnel. One expert said the move would be consistent with a long-term "strategic culture" which seeks to insulate Israel from nearby territories it does not fully control.

"This gives the IDF space to manoeuvre and create a 'kill zone' against potential targets," Dr Andreas Krieg, associate professor at King's College London, said.

"Potential targets can be engaged before they reach the IDF perimeter. It is a bit like no man's land that does not belong to anyone – and Israel tends to take that territory from the opponent's chunk not its own."

Three experts who spoke to BBC Verify suggested that the disparity between the markers and the IDF map was an intentional design to warn civilians they are "approaching an area of increased risk".

Noam Ostfeld, an analyst with the risk consultancy Sibylline, said that some blocks "seem to be positioned near roads or walls, making them easier to spot".

But a post to X by the Israeli defense minister seemed to suggest that the yellow blocks marked the actual line, warning that "any violation or attempt to cross the line will be met with fire".

There is already confusion among Gazans over areas where it is safe to go.

Abdel Qader Ayman Bakr, who lives near the temporary boundary in the eastern part of Gaza City's Shejaiya district, told the BBC that, despite promises from Israel of clear markings, he had seen none put in place.

"Each day, we can see Israeli military vehicles and soldiers at a relatively close distance, yet we have no way of knowing whether we are in what is considered a 'safe zone' or 'an active danger zone'," he said.

"We are constantly exposed to danger, especially since we are forced to remain here because this is where our home once stood."

Since the ceasefire came into effect, the IDF has reported a number of instances of people crossing the Yellow Line. On all occasions the IDF said it fired upon those involved.

BBC Verify has obtained and geolocated footage showing the aftermath of one incident on 17 October, which the Hamas-run Civil Defence agency said killed 11 civilians - including women and children all reportedly from the same family. The agency said the Palestinians' vehicle was targeted by Israel after crossing the Yellow Line east of Gaza City in the Zeitoun neighbourhood.

The footage showed rescue workers inspecting the burnt out remnants of a vehicle and covering a nearby badly-mangled body of a child with a white sheet. BBC Verify geolocated the video to a spot around 125m over the Yellow Line marked on maps by the IDF.

The IDF said warning shots were fired towards a "suspicious vehicle" that had crossed the line. The statement added when the vehicle failed to stop troops opened fire "to remove the threat".

Meanwhile, the legal status of the boundary has also been questioned.

"Israel's obligations under the law of armed conflict do not cease even for those breaching the Yellow Line," said Dr Lawrence Hill-Cawthorne, professor of Public International Law at the University of Bristol.

"It can only target enemy fighters or those directly participating in hostilities, and in so doing it must not cause excessive civilian harm."

In a statement, an Israeli military spokesperson said: "IDF troops under the Southern Command continue to operate to remove any threat to the troops and to defend the civilians of the State of Israel."

They added that that the concrete blocks are "being placed every 200 metres".

Israel launched a military campaign in Gaza in response to the 7 October 2023 attack, in which Hamas-led gunmen killed about 1,200 people and took 251 others as hostages.

At least 68,280 have been killed in Israeli attacks in Gaza since then, according to the territory's Hamas-run health ministry.

Additional reporting by Erwan Rivault, Lamees Altalebi and Maha El Gaml

What do you want BBC Verify to investigate?

The government is under increasing pressure to gain control of the grooming gangs inquiry after abuse survivors who quit their roles in the process listed conditions for their return.

Top of the demands - published in a joint letter to the home secretary - was the resignation of Safeguarding Minister Jess Phillips, who the four women accuse of "betrayal" citing her response to their concerns about the inquiry's scope.

They said Phillips had lost survivors' trust and that she, as well as the chair candidates, were unfit for their roles. Her exit would mean the government was "serious about accountability", they added.

Home Office sources insist Phillips has the Home Secretary's full support.

The letter came hours after former senior police officer Jim Gamble ruled himself out of chairing the inquiry, saying focus on political "point-scoring" had created a "highly charged and toxic environment".

He was the last significant candidate after Annie Hudson, who has a background in social work, withdrew earlier in the week.

On Wednesday, Jess, which is not her real name, joined Fiona Goddard, Ellie Reynolds and Elizabeth, also not her real name, in standing down from the survivors' panel.

They raised concerns that those being lined up to lead the inquiry had backgrounds in either policing or social work, citing the failures of those services to bring their abusers to justice.

They also said the inquiry was being widened "in ways that downplay the racial and religious motivations behind our abuse".

Phillips has said it is "untrue" the government is seeking to dilute the focus of the inquiry, insisting its scope will be "laser-focused".

In a joint letter to Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood, posted on X by Ms Reynolds, they criticise Phillips for rejecting their accounts of concerns about the inquiry's direction.

"Being publicly contradicted and dismissed by a government minister when you are a survivor telling the truth takes you right back to that feeling of not being believed all over again. It is a betrayal that has destroyed what little trust remained," they said.

Their letter lists five demands before they would consider returning to the panel.

Among them is keeping the probe focused on grooming gangs and group child exploitation, as Baroness Louise Casey - whose report recommended a statutory inquiry - advised. They also want a senior or former judge to chair the inquiry, and to have a say in their selection.

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer announced in June there would be a national inquiry into grooming gangs covering England and Wales, with a panel of survivors set up to oversee the process. However, a chairperson has yet to be appointed.

Not all the survivors on the oversight panel agree with the four women; many continue to support the government's approach.

The BBC spoke to two of those women.

Samantha Walker-Roberts, from Oldham, wants the scope of the inquiry to include victims of other types of sexual abuse, so they are not "silenced".

She was the victim of a grooming gang when she was 12 - but she was also raped and abused by a man who groomed her online, and as a younger child she was raped and abused by older men who she met through friends.

Ms Walker-Roberts said: "This is a one-of-a-kind type of inquiry where survivors are in control and it's wrong that certain survivors get special treatment to be part of this."

She added she had no problem with a chair who had a background in policing or social work, as this had been "proven" to work with previous reviews.

Another supporter of the inquiry is Carly, from Huddersfield, who said she believes "the most effective way to drive meaningful change is from within" and remains "hopeful" the concerns raised by others "will lead to constructive improvements".

Maggie Oliver, a police whistleblower and child protection campaigner, echoed survivors' criticism of Phillips on Wednesday night, but also criticised the government's handling of the inquiry.

She told Newsnight that the prime minister was "dragged kicking and screaming" into announcing the inquiry.

"We shouldn't be fighting a battle with the government," she said. "The inquiry is being led, or has been led, by a government that really doesn't want it to work."

Ms Oliver also raised concerns about transparency and survivor involvement: "We want a judge-led inquiry... I want it to be open and to involve all survivors and victims who want to be involved, not just a cherry-picked selection of a few."

On Wednesday night, the Home Office reiterated its commitment to "a full, statutory, national inquiry to uncover the truth".

Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch joined calls for Phillips to be sacked, saying the inquiry is about "Labour failure".

She said: "Labour never wanted this inquiry, we demanded it... It is Labour ministers attacking the victims. We're standing up for them."

Speaking at PMQs on Wednesday, the prime minister defended Phillips, saying she "has probably more experience than any other person in this House in dealing with violence against women and girls".

He said "survivors have been ignored for many years" by the state and he wanted the inquiry to change that, adding "injustice will have no place to hide."

He invited those that have quit the inquiry to re-join, but added that whether they did or not "we owe it to them" to answer their concerns.

"The inquiry is not and will never be watered down. Its scope will not change. It will examine the ethnicity and religion of the offenders and we will find the right person to chair the inquiry," he told MPs.

The prime minister also announced Baroness Casey was being drafted in to support the work of the inquiry.

Baroness Casey previously led a "national audit" of group-based child sexual exploitation that found the ethnicity of people involved in grooming gangs had been "shied away from" by authorities.

Her findings, published in June 2025, prompted Sir Keir to order the creation of the national inquiry.

Voters in Caerphilly are heading to the polls in a by-election to choose a new member of the Senedd.

Polls are open from 07:00 until 22:00 BST, with the result expected early on Friday morning.

The vote is taking place following the death of Labour's Hefin David, who died suddenly on 12 August aged 47 after being Member of the Senedd for Caerphilly since 2016.

There are eight candidates standing, with all the main parties represented.

The by-election will fill the vacancy until May 2026 when a Wales-wide election will decide the shape of the newly expanded Welsh Parliament.

Unlike Westminster elections, 16 and 17-year-olds can vote in this election and ID is not required at polling stations.

There will be full coverage of the result, reaction and analysis across BBC digital, television and radio services.

The full list of candidates for the by-election is:

• Liberal Democrats: Steve Aicheler
• Gwlad: Anthony Cook
• Greens: Gareth Hughes
• Conservatives: Gareth Potter
• Reform: Llyr Powell
• UKIP: Roger Quilliam
• Labour: Richard Tunnicliffe
• Plaid Cymru: Lindsay Whittle