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賴清德傳將訪巴拉圭、過境美國 北京:反對「竄訪」

null 周子馨
2025-07-15T08:55:21.121Z
消息人士稱,台灣總統賴清德即將在今年8月出訪中南美洲友邦,期間將過境美國

(德國之聲中文網)根據路透社報導,巴拉圭總統貝尼亞(Santiago Pena)週一(7月14日)在該國首都亞松森的一場雙邊投資會議上表示:「我們懷著期待與滿滿的熱情,準備在30天後迎接賴總統的到來。」

貝尼亞補充說:「這是為了向世界展示,小國也有能力成為全球的重要參與者。」據悉,台灣外交部長林佳龍也出席了這場會議。巴拉圭是台灣僅有的12個邦交國之一,也是台灣在南美洲唯一一個邦交國。

台灣媒體「聯合新聞網」週二引述消息人士報導,賴清德將在下個月出訪台灣的中南美洲邦交國,分別為巴拉圭、瓜地馬拉與貝里斯,期間將過境美國紐約及德州達拉斯。

台灣總統府未證實相關報導,稱目前「沒有相關說明」,如果有確定安排會適時對外公布;台灣外交部稱,目前沒有元首出訪的相關資訊;美國國務院亦未回應。

中國外交部發言人林劍週二在例行記者會中回應,美方必須嚴肅考慮台灣問題對於中美關係的敏感性,應謹慎處理,並說「中國一貫反對台灣領導人以任何形式、任何藉口『竄訪』美國的行為」。

自今年初美國總統川普就任以來,賴清德尚未過境或正式訪問美國。不過他在去年底前往太平洋地區時,曾經過境夏威夷關島

相关图集:台湾正副总统的过境外交

往返巴拉圭途中「低调」过境:2023年8月,台湾副总统赖清德前往巴拉圭参与新任总统就任典礼,去程过境美国纽约,回程则短暂停留旧金山。赖清德身为民进党党主席,也是下届总统选举的热门候选人,他此行保持「低调」、未安排与美国国会议员见面,但仍引发中国官方强烈不满。中国外交部发表声明谴责赖清德「窜美」,称其「顽固坚持『台独』分裂立场,是彻头彻尾的『麻烦制造者』」。台湾外交部则回应称中国无权干涉民主国家正常交往,没有理由过度反应。
过境美国 会晤麦卡锡:台湾总统蔡英文2023年3月底至4月初访问拉美邦交国,途中顺道停留美国纽约和洛杉矶,并且与美国众议院议长麦卡锡在洛杉矶见面,这也是几十年来在美国领土会见台湾领导人的最高层级美国政治人物。当时中国外交部对此批评道:「针对美台勾连的严重错误行径,中方将采取坚决有力措施捍卫国家主权和领土完整。」据华府智库战略暨国际研究中心(CSIS)统计,虽然台湾总统自1994年就有过境美国纪录,但在蔡英文任内,停留美国的时间明显更长,且她每次访问都会过夜,参与的活动也更丰富。
路途遥远 必然经停:蔡英文总统并非首次利用过境美国的机遇与美国高层开展互动。台湾为数不多的邦交国中,许多都位于拉美,离东亚地区路途遥远,航程往往比经乃至突破普通民航飞机的极限。因此,台湾领导人出访拉美,通常都会经停美国。图为2017年蔡英文过境夏威夷珍珠港。
三角关系风向标:台湾领导人在过境美国期间受到什么样的待遇、与谁会晤,自然也成为了台美、中美、两岸关系的风向标。图为2018年3月,蔡英文在加州里根总统图书馆与美国新墨西哥州长马丁内兹会面。
足迹遍布全美 独缺首都:自2016年上任总统以来,蔡英文过境的美国城市包括纽约、迈阿密、休斯顿、丹佛、旧金山、洛杉矶等。不过,台湾领导人从来没有在任内到过美国首都华盛顿。图为2019年7月,蔡英文抵达纽约时与前来机场的台湾侨民合影。
美国专门修法:台湾的过境外交始于1994年。时任总统李登辉借访问拉美之机,经停夏威夷,但是美国为了避免激怒中国,只允许机上人员上厕所、加油,但是不予“过境签证”。后来,美国专门为此修改法律,并且在1995年允许李登辉过境。图为李登辉总统1995年6月在纽约州雪城汉考克国际机场发表演讲,多名国会参议员出席。
私人行程 官方礼遇:李登辉的这次过境,是以“私人访问”的名义,受邀前往其母校康奈尔大学进行演讲。不过美方全程予以礼遇,这也触怒了北京,间接引发了之后的台海飞弹危机。
“麻烦制造者”不受欢迎:陈水扁总统的美国过境待遇则相对较低。当时,在反恐等多个议题上需要中方协助的小布什政府,视独立色彩鲜明的陈水扁为“麻烦制造者”,其过境地点也时常被迫选择在阿拉斯加等偏远地区。甚至还发生过专机起飞后美方通知不予过境的事件。
马英九外交休兵:马英九2008年上台后,两岸关系、台美关系均明显好转,同时期的中美关系也相对较好,因此美方给予马英九的过境待遇同前任陈水扁相比也显著提高。北京与台北在马英九任内达成了“外交休兵”的默契,因此马英九在过境时相对低调,北京也对此鲜有抗议。不过当时在野的民进党则抨击马英九低调过境美国为“自我矮化”。

影響川普與習近平會晤?

由於從台灣前往中南美洲的距離遙遠,過去台灣總統出訪中南美洲友邦時,通常會在美國領土「過境停留」。北京的一貫立場是譴責台灣總統過境美國的行為,並表示堅決反對台灣與美國之間的任何互動。賴清德可能在8月出訪巴拉圭期間過境美國的消息,也被預期會激怒北京。

《南華早報》15日引述不具名人士說法指,美國有可能擔心這影響到川普與習近平的雙邊峰會,因此拒絕賴清德的過境計劃。該報導稱,有消息指美中領導人可能今年10月底或11月初在韓國舉行的APEC峰會期間,在韓國慶州或北京會晤。

美國前國安委員會成員、中國問題分析師穆恩(Jeffrey Moon)表示,賴清德的行程必須要非常謹慎處理,避免對中美峰會帶來任何負面影響。

穆恩指出,若賴清德維持過往台灣領導人過境美國的標準做法、不參加政治會議或發表政治言論,那可能就不會干擾到中美雙邊關係,「中方會密切關注他的言行」。

DW中文有Instagram!歡迎搜尋dw.chinese,看更多深入淺出的圖文與影音報導。

© 2025年德國之聲版權聲明:本文所有內容受到著作權法保護,如無德國之聲特別授權,不得擅自使用。任何不當行為都將導致追償,並受到刑事追究。

I'm 'disappointed but not done' with Putin, Trump tells BBC

Reuters US president Trump is speaking in the Oval Office. He wears a navy suit and red tie. Reuters

Donald Trump has said that he is disappointed but not done with Vladimir Putin, in an exclusive phone call with the BBC.

The US president was pressed on whether he trusts the Russian leader, and replied: "I trust almost no-one."

Trump was speaking hours after he announced plans to send weapons to Ukraine and warned of severe tariffs on Russia if there was no ceasefire deal in 50 days.

In a wide-ranging interview from the Oval Office, the president also endorsed Nato, having once described it as obsolete, and affirmed his support for the organisation's common defence principle.

The president made the phone call, which lasted 20 minutes, to the BBC after conversations about a potential interview to mark one year on since the attempt on his life at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.

Asked about whether surviving the assassination attempt had changed him, Trump said he liked to think about it as little as possible.

"I don't like to think about if it did change me," Trump said. Dwelling on it, he added, "could be life-changing".

Having just met with Nato chief Mark Rutte at the White House, however, the president spent a significant portion of the interview expanding on his disappointment with the Russian leader.

Trump said that he had thought a deal was on the cards with Russia four different times.

When asked by the BBC if he was done with Putin, the president replied: "I'm disappointed in him, but I'm not done with him. But I'm disappointed in him."

Pressed on how Trump would get Putin to "stop the bloodshed" the US president said: "We're working it, Gary."

"We'll have a great conversation. I'll say: 'That's good, I'll think we're close to getting it done,' and then he'll knock down a building in Kyiv."

The conversation moved onto Nato, which Trump has previously criticised as "obsolete".

Asked if he still thought this was the case, he said: "No. I think Nato is now becoming the opposite of that" because the alliance was "paying their own bills".

He said he still believed in collective defence, because it meant smaller countries could defend themselves against larger ones.

President Trump was also asked about the UK's future in the world and said he thought it was a "great place - you know I own property there".

He spoke about how he was looking forward to an unprecedented second state visit to the UK in September this year.

On what he wanted to achieve during the visit, Trump said: "Have a good time and respect King Charles, because he's a great gentleman."

Rosenberg: Russia more relieved than rattled by US tariff threat

Getty Images Russian President Vladimir Putin smiles duting a meetng, while visiting a military base of nuclear submarines, March 26, 2025, in Murmansk, RussiaGetty Images
Trump has threatened further sanctions unless Russia strikes a deal to end the Ukraine war within 50 days

In the Oval Office on Monday, Donald Trump was talking tough, announcing new US arms shipments to Ukraine paid for by European governments, and threatening new tariffs which, if imposed, would hit Russia's war chest.

But, back in Moscow, how did the stock exchange react? It rose 2.7%.

That's because Russia had been bracing for even tougher sanctions from President Trump.

"Russia and America are moving towards a new round of confrontation over Ukraine," Monday's edition of the tabloid Moskovsky Komsomolets had warned.

"Trump's Monday surprise will not be pleasant for our country."

It wasn't "pleasant". But Russia will be relieved, for example, that the secondary tariffs against Russia's trading partners will only kick in 50 days from now.

That gives Moscow plenty of time to come up with counter proposals and delay the implementation of sanctions even further.

Nonetheless, Donald Trump's announcement does represent a tougher approach to Russia.

It also reflects his frustration with Vladimir Putin's reluctance to sign a peace deal.

On his return to the White House in January, Donald Trump had made ending Russia's war in Ukraine one of his foreign policy priorities.

For months, Moscow's response was: "Yes, but…"

Yes, Russia said in March, when it welcomed President Trump's proposal for a comprehensive ceasefire. But first, it said Western military aid and intelligence sharing with Kyiv should end, along with Ukrainian military mobilisation.

Yes, Moscow has been insisting, it wants peace. But the "root causes" of the war must be resolved first. The Kremlin views these very differently to how Ukraine and the West see them. It argues that the war is the result of external threats to Russia's security: from Kyiv, Nato, 'the collective West.'

Yet, in February 2022, it wasn't Ukraine, Nato or the West that invaded Russia. It was Moscow that launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, triggering the largest land war in Europe since World War Two.

Reuters A Russian contract soldier looks out of a T-72 tank during military drills held at a firing range amid Russia-Ukraine conflict, in the southern Krasnodar region, Russia, December 2, 2024.Reuters
Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine more than three years ago

For quite some time, the "Yes, but…" approach enabled Moscow to avoid additional US sanctions, while continuing to prosecute the war. Keen to improve bilateral relations with Russia and negotiate a peace deal on Ukraine, the Trump administration prioritised carrots to sticks in its conversations with Russian officials.

Critics of the Kremlin warned that with "Yes, but"… Russia was playing for time. But President Trump hoped he could find a way of persuading Vladimir Putin to do a deal.

The Russian president has appeared in no rush to do so. The Kremlin believes it holds the initiative on the battlefield. It insists it wants peace, but on its terms.

Those terms include an end to Western arms shipments to Ukraine. From Donald Trump's announcement it is clear that is not going to happen.

President Trump claims that he is "not happy" with Vladimir Putin.

But disillusionment is a two-way street. Russia, too, has been falling out of love with America's president. On Monday, Moskovsky Komsomolets wrote:

"[Trump] clearly has delusions of grandeur. And a very big mouth."

Ethiopian troops 'executed' aid workers in Tigray war, charity says

MSF From left to right: Yohannes Halefom Reda, María Hernández Matas and Tedros GebremariamMSF
The three were said to be professional and passionate about their jobs

Ethiopian government forces "executed" three employees of medical charity Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) while they were on a humanitarian mission in Ethiopia's war-hit northern Tigray region four years ago, a senior MSF official has told the BBC.

Raquel Ayora's comments came as MSF released its findings on what it called the "intentional and targeted" killing of the three - a Spanish national and two Ethiopians - at the height of the now-ended conflict in Tigray.

"They were executed," said Ms Ayora, MSF Spain's general director. "They were facing their attackers [and] were shot at very close range… several times."

The BBC has asked the Ethiopian government for a response to the allegation.

MSF said it was releasing its findings as the government had failed to provide a "credible account" of the deaths despite 20 face-to-face meetings over the last four years.

Thirty-five-year-old Spaniard María Hernández Matas, along with 32-year-old Yohannes Halefom Reda and 31-year-old Tedros Gebremariam, were killed on 24 June 2021 while travelling in central Tigray to assess medical needs.

"They were very professional and passionate," Ms Ayora told the BBC.

She added that the three were fully identifiable in MSF vests and their vehicle had the charity's flag and logos on either side when they were shot.

"So, they [Ethiopian troops] knew that they were killing humanitarian aid workers," she said, adding that the team's travel route had also been shared in advance with fighting groups.

The Tigray conflict broke out in 2020 following a massive fall-out between the regional and federal governments, with neighbouring Eritrea entering the war on the side of the Ethiopian National Defence Force (ENDF).

The conflict ended two years later following a peace deal brokered by the African Union (AU). Its envoy, former Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo, put the number of people who died in the conflict at around 600,000.

Researchers said the deaths were caused by fighting, starvation and a lack of health care.

The killings took place at a time when the conflict was intensifying, and Ethiopian and Eritrean troops were becoming increasingly hostile towards aid workers in the region, MSF said in its report.

Ms Matas had been working in Tigray since before the war and "was very much loved" by people in the region, Ms Ayora said.

Her death has been particularly devastating for her mother as she was her only child, the MSF official added.

Mr Tedros was killed soon after his wife had given birth to a baby girl. His widow named the baby Maria, after her father's killed Spanish colleague, Mr Ayora said.

MSF Burnt-out vehicle of MSF, with a flag of the charityMSF
The aid workers were targeted despite the fact that their vehicle had an MSF flag

The bodies of Ms Matas and Mr Yohannes were found between 100m (300ft) and 400m from the wreckage of their vehicle.

The body of Mr Tedros, the driver, was found by the vehicle."In line with MSF travel policy, the driver stays close to the vehicle", Ms Ayora said.

The vehicle was shot at multiple times and burned on the main road from the town of Abi Adi to Yech'illa, Ms Ayora said.

Ms Matas and Mr Yohannes were walking when they were shot, she said, adding: "We don't know if they were called for interrogation or they decided to engage with the soldiers."

MSF said it had relied on satellite images, witnesses and publicly available information on the Ethiopian military's movements at the time of the killings to draw its conclusions.

Its investigation placed Ethiopian troops at the "precise location" where the killings occurred, the charity added.

MSF's report quoted witnesses as saying they overhead an officer informing the local commander of an approaching white car and the commander giving an order to shoot.

Moments later, the commander was allegedly informed that the soldiers had tried to shoot but that the car had turned towards Abi Adi and stopped, at which point the commander gave the order to "go and catch them" and "remove them", the report alleged.

Ms Ayora told the BBC that officials from Ethiopia's Ministry of Justice had verbally informed MSF in mid-2022 that their preliminary investigation showed that government troops were not at the scene of the killing.

However, the officials refused to give this in writing, and the charity kept engaging with the government in order to end "impunity" at a time when an increasing number of aid workers were being killed in conflicts around the world, Ms Ayora said.

More BBC stories on Tigray conflict:

Getty Images/BBC A woman looking at her mobile phone and the graphic BBC News AfricaGetty Images/BBC

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

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

As theories swirl about Air India crash, key details remain unknown

Government of India / Ministry of Civil Aviation Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau Vertical Stabilizer adjacent to the building referenced as building A in the report. The Aircraft was destroyed due to impact with the buildings on the ground and subsequent fire. A total of five buildings, shown in the image on the right, were impacted and suffered major structural and fire damages.Government of India / Ministry of Civil Aviation Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau

While the preliminary report into what caused the loss of Air India Flight 171 last month has provided some answers, it has also prompted a wave of speculation about its cause.

The Boeing 787 Dreamliner crashed into a building less than a minute after take-off from the city of Ahmedabad in western India en route to London, killing 241 people on board, along with 19 on the ground. One passenger survived.

Information contained in India's Air Accident Investigation Bureau report, the first official account of what happened, has raised questions about the role of the pilots.

However, experts within the aviation industry claim investigators have been highly selective in what they have chosen to say.

What the report says

Under international protocols, the state leading an air accident investigation is meant to issue a preliminary report within 30 days. The 15-page document published by India's Air Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) on Saturday fulfils this requirement.

Although the AAIB has been leading the investigation, US interests are also represented, because Boeing, the maker of the aircraft, and GE Aerospace, the engine manufacturer are American.

The report does not set out any conclusions as to the cause of the accident. Nevertheless, it has sparked considerable controversy.

In its account of the accident flight, the AAIB states that two fuel cut-off switches were moved from the 'run' to the 'cut-off' position seconds after take-off.

This deprived the engines of fuel and caused them to lose thrust. Although data from the flight recorder shows the engines were subsequently restarted, it was too late to prevent the crash.

These switches are normally only used to turn the engines on before a flight and off afterwards. They have a locking mechanism, which means they need to be pulled out before being flipped, a system designed to prevent accidental deployment.

The report also states that one pilot asks the other "why did he cutoff", while his colleague "responded that he did not do so".

However, it does not provide any direct transcript of the conversation, which would have been picked up by the cockpit voice recorder (CVR). Nor does it identify which pilot asked the question.

It is worth remembering that preliminary reports are not intended to offer a full picture of what happened or draw firm conclusions. They are meant to be a factual summary of the information obtained in the early stages of what could be a lengthy investigation.

The investigating authority is also under no obligation to make their preliminary reports public.

Reuters Wreckage of the Air India Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner plane sits on the open ground, outside Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel International Airport, where it took off and crashed nearby shortly afterwards, in Ahmedabad, India July 12, 2025. Reuters

Missing information

The information released so far has prompted a number of commentators to claim, in the media and online, that the accident was the result of deliberate and intentional action by one of the pilots.

It is a view that has attracted an angry response from the Indian Commercial Pilots' Association, which warned that "invoking such a serious allegation based on incomplete or preliminary information is not only irresponsible – it is deeply insensitive to the individuals and families involved".

It added that "to casually suggest pilot suicide in the absence of verified evidence is a gross violation of ethical reporting".

In a memo to staff, the chief executive of Air India struck a similar note. Campbell Wilson warned against drawing "premature conclusions".

Since the report was issued, the BBC has spoken to a range of people within the industry, including pilots, accident investigators and engineers. While theories as to what actually happened vary widely, the dominant view is that important information is currently missing.

"They've told us stuff they want us to know at the moment, and withheld what they don't want us to know," explained one pilot, who asked not to be identified. "It's not a complete report."

One of the main criticisms is the lack of a transcript from the cockpit voice recorder, which would enable the reported conversation between the pilots about the fuel cut-off switches to be put in context.

Bjorn Fehrm, an aeronautical analyst at consultants Leeham News said this was "totally unacceptable".

"They have all this technical detail. Then you have this reference to dialogue, but it doesn't even tell you who's speaking," he said.

Mr Fehrm was also concerned that there was no reference to what happened in the cockpit between the switches being flipped from run to cut-off, and the first switch being pushed back into position to relight the first engine 10 seconds later.

"It's someone trying to hide something," he said.

Close-up view of Dreamliner 787 aircraft cockpit control panel with labelled components. The thrust levers are prominent in the centre. Engine fuel control switches, which cut fuel supply and shut down engines, are on the left. Switches with a stop lock mechanism that must be lifted before turning are on the right. Guard brackets prevent accidental movement of the switches

An engineering source, meanwhile, said the report was "very selective", and did not have any detailed information about what the engines were doing immediately before the switches were flipped. The document does say that the engine speed began to decrease from take-off values "as the fuel supply to the engines was cut off."

This, they said was important - because flipping the switches to cut-off and back was something a pilot would be trained do to in order to restart an engine that was already losing power.

Tim Atkinson, an aviation consultant and former air accident investigator in the UK said, "it is very disappointing to read a report which does provide a few salient facts, leaves many more questions".

Another element of the report that has caused controversy is a reference to a safety bulletin – known as a Special Airworthiness Information Bulletin – published by the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in 2018.

This was used to alert the aviation community that operators of some Boeing 737 models had reported cases in which the fuel cut-off switches had been fitted with the locking feature disengaged - potentially enabling the switch to be flipped by accident.

At the time, the FAA described this as an "airworthiness concern", but said it was "not an unsafe condition" that would require mandatory action via what is known as an Airworthiness Directive.

Operators of a number of different Boeing models fitted with similar switches, including 787s, were advised to carry out simple inspections.

The investigation report says Air India did not carry out those inspections - prompting speculation that the accident could have been caused by faulty switches being flipped by accident.

However, in an internal note seen by the BBC, the FAA has since reiterated its belief that the issue did not compromise safety.

Engineering sources have also pointed out that the report says the throttle control module on the crashed aircraft was replaced on two occasions, most recently two years before the accident. This would have involved replacing the cut-off switches as well.

According to Bjorn Fehrm of Leeham News, the reference to the FAA's advice contained in the report was "totally irrelevant" in the context of the accident.

Nevertheless, India's Directorate General of Civil Aviation has asked the operators of all aircraft covered by the FAA's original bulletin to carry out inspections by 21 July.

For former accident investigator Tim Atkinson, the vagueness of the report may have been deliberate - in order to suggest an explanation for the crash, while avoiding being too explicit.

"The very worst reports are those written to be read 'between the lines', and if that is what we have here, then it does no credit to the investigators," he said.

Meanwhile those seeking firm answers to what happened on Flight 171 may well have to wait.

International protocols stipulate that a final report should be published within a year of the accident. However, in practice, it can take a lot longer than that.

I've never seen a case like Constance Marten and Mark Gordon's - it was jaw-dropping

Julia Quenzler Constance Marten, a woman with long dark-brown hair who is wearing a black jacket with a blue scarf and white top, sitting behind glass in a court dock Julia Quenzler

I've reported on many criminal cases, but nothing like Constance Marten and Mark Gordon's. Their trials were extraordinary.

A couple who were twice in the dock over the death of their baby, they appeared to be completely in love and still fiercely united. And yet they had utter contempt for the court process.

They caused chaos across their two trials, which both overran by months. At one point, the Old Bailey's most senior judge accused them of trying to "sabotage" and "manipulate" their retrial. It nearly collapsed a number of times.

Their behaviour - from refusing to turn up to court and claiming to be ill, to sacking countless barristers and Gordon's trousers even being misplaced one day - left His Honour Judge Mark Lucraft KC exasperated on many occasions.

At one point he said two teenagers, who had been in his court the previous week, were "rather better behaved" than Marten, adding: "And they pleaded guilty to murder."

Over the last 18 months I've sat through Marten and Gordon's two criminal trials.

The first, which started in January 2024, resulted in the pair being found guilty of concealing the birth of their baby, Victoria, of perverting the course of justice and child cruelty.

But in late June, the jury in that trial was dismissed, unable to decide on one of the two, more serious charges about Victoria's death.

A second trial began almost nine months later. They have now both been found guilty of manslaughter by gross negligence.

Now their case is over, we can report some of the remarkable moments when jurors were not in court. At times what happened across the trials was jaw-dropping.

'Will you stop flirting with me'

Marten and Gordon were highly unusual defendants. They would often talk during proceedings - as if completely unaware they were on trial. They knew their conversations were disruptive, but they didn't seem to care.

One day, while a witness was giving evidence, Marten sent a note to the judge asking: "Could I nip out for a coffee as we're falling asleep?"

The judge said it "doesn't look good" if defendants aren't interested in the evidence. They were, of course, on trial over the death of their baby.

It was obvious from the moment I first saw Marten and Gordon that they were still very much in love. They presented as a couple in court, rather than as co-defendants.

"Will you stop flirting with me," Marten said loudly to Gordon one day after the judge left court.

On her 38th birthday, they had a lingering embrace in the dock. "Where's my present," she playfully asked.

They appeared fixated on each other. "Obsession" was how Gordon described his love for Marten to police, saying he would have done anything for her.

Later, while giving evidence in their retrial, as if reading an open love letter to court, he declared "it was love" between him and his "noble" and "beautiful" wife.

"She was one of the best things that ever happened to me in my life."

Julia Quezler A court sketch showing Constance Marten, a woman with long brown hair wearing a dark top, and Mark Gordon, who has a peach-coloured headscarf and is wearing a shirt, looking at each other past a dock officer while sitting in a glass dock in court. The dock officer is a woman wearing a white shirt and black tie, with brown hair tied back and to the sideJulia Quezler

Marten and Gordon were often excited to see each other when they were brought up from the cells. Her face would light up when he appeared at the dock door. Sometimes she would blow Gordon kisses.

They were affectionate. They hugged and kissed on the cheek. Sometimes they tenderly stroked each other's hand. When Marten became tearful Gordon put his arm out to comfort her.

During proceedings, sitting with a dock officer between them, Gordon would often try to catch Marten's eye and smile. She would frequently lean towards him, with her chin resting on her hand.

At the end of the day, before being led back to their cells, they'd sometimes say "love you" to each other. It seemed like they looked forward to coming to court, a place they got to spend time together.

But there was a sense of chaos before the couple's first trial began in the early weeks of 2024. Marten and Gordon's legal representation kept changing - a running theme throughout their protracted case.

Some they sacked. Others withdrew. Sometimes they didn't have lawyers at all. It caused unending disruption.

In trials like this, involving serious charges, a defendant would typically have two barristers representing them. Marten got through an extraordinary number.

From her first appearance at the Old Bailey, in March 2023, to the end of the second trial, more than two years later, she had been represented by 14 barristers.

Why had she got through so many?

"Because she thinks she's entitled and doesn't listen to instructions," a source close to one of her former legal teams told the BBC.

Gordon also changed his legal team and ended up representing himself.

It caused significant delays - the couple's first trial overran by about three months, while the second overran by nearly two months.

'She is not running this trial'

Their "antics", as the judge put it, got increasingly worse as the second trial went on and on.

They repeatedly didn't turn up, meaning many court days were lost and jurors were hugely inconvenienced.

Often one of them would say they weren't well enough to come to court, only to be assessed as being medically fit to do so.

"Constance Marten is not running this trial," Judge Lucraft said firmly one day after she refused again to come to court.

Marten spent days complaining about her tooth pain. Court days were lost because of it. On one of those days she was found to be "medically fit" but "refused" to come.

"She is on trial for extremely serious offences and I've bent over backwards," the judge said. "I've given her more latitude than I suspect I ought to in some situations."

"In my view this is a complete sham," he said later referring to Marten's absence. Despite Marten's complaints of tooth pain, she declined treatment.

Julia Quenzler A court sketch showing Constance Marten, a woman with long brown hair wearing a dark top, and Mark Gordon, who has a peach-coloured headscarf and is wearing a shirt, looking at each other while sitting in a glass dock in court with the judge before them wearing a wig and red and black robes.Julia Quenzler

There were other highly unusual delays.

Marten refused to attend court one day after she had become "very argumentative and abusive to the staff in prison", according to the note from HMP Bronzefield.

The judge expressed his frustration again and again.

"This trial has had so many delays and quite frankly it is an insult to this court and to the jury", he said one day without jurors in the room.

On that particular day, the judge asked for Marten to join on a remote link from prison to explain why she wasn't at court.

She said she had been "lied on" and had asked to see a nurse but none were available.

"I am happy to come to court," she told the judge, "but yesterday at the Old Bailey I was abused for three hours by a guy in the cells next to me, shouting I am a baby killer."

One day Gordon, who normally wore a shirt and tie, turned up in a blue and yellow prison escape suit - used to spot runaway prisoners. On another occasion it emerged his court trousers had gone missing.

The judge, who said he could not be allowed in court in prison wear, remarked: "It would be a great shame to lose any more time through a lack of trousers."

'Don't touch me man'

Marten and Gordon repeatedly ignored the judge's instructions not to speak to each other during breaks in their evidence.

Unusually, he started coming into court before they were brought up from the cells to stop it from happening, with a warning that if they didn't, he would put them in different courtrooms.

One day Marten repeatedly exhaled so loudly during the evidence that the whole courtroom heard.

"Huffing and puffing at the back of the court is not the way these proceedings are done," said the unimpressed judge. Other days she yawned repeatedly.

She complained of feeling tired and said she had never experienced anything like travelling to court and back. "There are women locked in a metal cage in a van."

Julia Quenzler Judge Mark Lucraft, who is wearing red and black judges robes, a white legal wig and glasses. He is looking at a tablet in front of him and there are two microphones to the sideJulia Quenzler

Sometimes Marten and Gordon would abruptly blurt things out from the dock when they took issue with the evidence.

They were rude to some of the dock officers: When one tried to separate them after they tried to hug in the dock, Gordon kicked off.

"Don't touch me, man," said an irate Gordon amid the commotion before telling the dock officer to "shut up" when the judge and jury weren't in the room.

During the first trial, Gordon refused to return to the dock unless a dock officer was changed and then demanded to speak to the cell manager.

Sometimes we heard loud arguing in the corridor behind the dock door between Marten and Gordon and dock officers.

'Deliberate attempt to sabotage'

One of the most explosive moments in the couple's retrial happened when Marten was giving evidence. She suddenly blurted out to the jury that her husband had a "violent rape conviction".

We all knew about Gordon's previous conviction. But the jury didn't.

To ensure he received a fair trial, an order preventing the media from reporting Gordon's previous offences was put in place. It was never mentioned in front of the jury.

It was a jaw-dropping moment, which set off an unforeseen chain of events.

"This is plainly a deliberate attempt by the defendant to sabotage the trial," the judge said after the jury was ushered out quickly.

One of the prosecutors, Joel Smith KC, described it as a "deliberate attempt to take a wrecking ball" to the the trial.

Marten claimed Mr Smith had already told the jury about the conviction. He hadn't. She said she had been exhausted and later blamed her "agonising toothache".

"I'm extremely tired and I am irate that this word 'deliberate' keeps being expounded in this courtroom," she said.

Julia Quenzler A court sketch showing a barrister addressing the court and Constance Marten in the witness box next to the judgeJulia Quenzler

From then on it was difficult to keep up with the flurry of twists and turns that followed. Gordon initially wanted the jury discharged in his case.

The judge agreed. He said he had "little choice" and that Gordon would be tried next year. But the case against Marten would continue "alone", he decided during legal discussions.

Gordon then quickly changed his mind. "I can't do another year in prison," he pleaded with the judge. "I really beseech the court to allow this trial to continue," he added.

In the end, the case against Gordon continued. But the couple's behaviour appeared increasingly impulsive.

The number of barristers in court started to dwindle. Marten sacked her lead barrister but kept her junior. Not long after, Gordon's barristers withdrew their services.

He said he had sacked them and then declared that he was representing himself with the help of a solicitor. She also eventually withdrew.

The retrial had entered a whole new dimension.

Unlike at the first trial, when Gordon would often sit looking zoned out with his eyes half shut, now he appeared emboldened.

The problem was he wasn't a trained lawyer. It became hugely complicated. He often went on lengthy rants.

Without the jury in the room he would flip flop between complaining that things were "not fair" to turning the charm on, telling the judge that he was "tolerant", "kind", "patient" and gracious".

Other days he would shout at the judge as he left the courtroom.

He complained that he didn't have the same access as barristers. He wanted a desk, power to make legal applications and Archbold, a criminal law book running to more than 3,000 pages.

He repeatedly asked for more and more time to get his head around the case. It led to huge delays.

"Do you want me to adjourn for three years while you do a law degree?" the judge said to him one day.

At times Gordon appeared overwhelmed. He even pleaded for a royal intervention, describing the monarch as "compassionate and merciful".

"I ask the King in his mercy and those who work for him to help me," he said.

As the weeks went by, the judge warned Gordon a number of times that he might still remove him from the retrial because of the continued delays.

"It's simply him manipulating the system," the judge said on one occasion.

Julia Quenzler A court sketch showing Mark Gordon, who is wearing a shirt and peach-coloured headscarf while holding some papers, questioning Constance Marten, a woman with dark brown hair who is wearing a dark jumper and sitting in the witness box with microphones in front of her,  from the glass dock. Julia Quenzler
In a highly unusual turn of events Gordon questioned his own wife while representing himself

One of the most gripping and unusual moments of the retrial was when Gordon cross-examined Marten.

Normally a barrister would be expected to be forensic, but there was a tenderness in how he asked questions.

"Who was hands on and gentle with the kids?" he asked. "Both of us… especially you," she replied.

"Was the baby always a priority?"

"Absolutely, that's why we did what we did," Marten responded. "Our number one priority was Victoria. We were doing what we were doing for her."

Marten cried when Gordon asked her about their four other children who had been taken into care. "Alright, babes," he said trying to comfort her.

There was a marked change in her demeanour too.

When questioned by her husband she spoke softly, but when she was cross-examined by the prosecution she bristled and became increasingly strident, before cutting short her time on the stand.

'I'm actually happy'

When it came to the moment of the verdicts, the courtroom filled. There was silence. "Would the defendants please stand," the clerk said. They refused.

Guilty of gross negligence manslaughter for Gordon, the jury foreman told the court. Marten shook her head and crossed her arms.

Guilty of the same for her. She looked intensely at her partner. He leaned his head back against the wall and closed his eyes.

"It's a scam," Marten later shouted from the dock.

"It was an unfair trial," Gordon said loudly.

He told a dock officer: "I'm actually happy with the result because I will win the appeal."

He then thanked the court usher. "It's been a pleasure."

Up until the very last moments of their case Marten and Gordon were still disrupting, doing things their way.

A couple who were so fixated on each other, they were unable to grasp what the jury was sure of: that it was their chaotic and dangerous choices that ultimately led to the death of their baby, Victoria.

Additional reporting by Claire Ellison, Levi Jouavel and Daniel Sandford.

Gaza father's outrage after Israeli strike kills son 'searching for sip' at water point

Reuters A Palestinian boy inspects the site of an Israeli strike that killed 10 Palestinians, including six children, who were queueing at a water distribution point, in Nuseirat refugee camp, central Gaza (13 July 2025)Reuters
Ten people were killed as they gathered near a water distribution point in Nuseirat refugee camp

Mahmoud Abdul Rahman Ahmed says his son, Abdullah, was "searching for a sip of water" when he took the family's jerrycans on Sunday morning and headed as usual to one of the water distribution points in the urban Nuseirat camp, in central Gaza.

"That area was inhabited by displaced people, others who were exhausted by the war, and those who have seen the worst due to the imposed siege and limitations, and the ongoing aggression," Mahmoud said in an interview with a local journalist working for the BBC.

"The children, Abdullah among them, stood in a queue with empty stomachs, empty jerrycans, and thirsty lips," he added.

"Minutes after the children and thirsty people of the camp gathered, the warplanes bombed those children and the water distribution point, without prior notice."

Mahmoud Abdul Rahman Ahmed speaks to the BBC in Nuseirat refugee camp after his son Abdullah was killed in an Israeli air strike that hit a water distribution point on 13 July 2025
Mahmoud called on the world to put pressure on Israel to end the 21-month war

Graphic video filmed by another local journalist and verified by the BBC showed the immediate aftermath of the Israeli strike on a street in the New Camp area of Nuseirat.

He passes two men carrying young children before coming across a destroyed structure, beneath which dozens of yellow plastic jerrycans are clustered.

Women scream as bystanders pull a man from the rubble, while others try to help another man covered in blood. Other adults and children are seen lying motionless nearby.

Al-Awda hospital in Nuseirat said 10 people, including six children, were killed in the strike, and that 16 others were injured.

Along with Abdullah, they named the children who died as Badr al-Din Qaraman, Siraj Khaled Ibrahim, Ibrahim Ashraf Abu Urayban, Karam Ashraf al-Ghussein and Lana Ashraf al-Ghussein.

When asked about the strike, the Israeli military said it had targeted a Palestinian Islamic Jihad "terrorist" but that "as a result of a technical error with the munition, the munition fell dozens of meters from the target".

The military said it was "aware of the claim regarding casualties in the area as a result" and "regrets any harm to uninvolved civilians", adding: "The incident is under review."

However, Mahmoud claimed that Israel "intended to convey a message: it won't allow people to drink even the drinking water that they crave."

He also lamented that dreams of Abdullah and the other children would never be realised.

"They were looking at reality with the hope of it changing, and of becoming like the other children of the world - practicing their normal role of playing, moving, traveling, eating, drinking, and living in safety," he said.

Reuters Abandoned jerrycans at the site of an Israeli strike that killed 10 Palestinians, including six children, who were queueing at a water distribution point, in Nuseirat refugee camp, central Gaza (13 July 2025)Reuters
The Israeli military said a "technical error" caused a munition to land dozens of meters from its target

The UN says water shortages in Gaza are worsening due to the lack of fuel and spare parts for desalination, pumping and sanitation facilities, as well as insecurity and inaccessibility due to Israeli military operations against Hamas and evacuation orders.

As a result, many people are receiving less than the emergency standard of 15 litres per day, amounting to what the UN calls "a human-made drought crisis".

"You see children queuing up, by the side of the road, with yellow jerrycans every single morning, waiting for the daily water truck to come and get their five litres [or] 10 litres, of water used for washing, cleaning, cooking, drinking, etc," Sam Rose, the acting Gaza director for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (Unrwa), told the BBC.

"Every death is a tragedy. This one is particularly emblematic, given the circumstances in which it took place. But it's one of many," he added.

Last Thursday, 10 children and three women were killed as they waited for nutritional supplements outside a clinic in the nearby town of Deir al-Balah.

The Israeli military said it had targeted a Hamas "terrorist" nearby and, as with Sunday's incident, that it regretted harming any civilians.

"We focus on these incidents, but of course these weren't the only children killed in Gaza [on Sunday]," Rose said. "Every single day, since the start of the war, on average of classroom full of children have been killed."

The executive director of the UN children's agency (Unicef), Catherine Russell, meanwhile called both incidents "horrific" and demanded that Israeli authorities "urgently review the rules of engagement and ensure full compliance with international humanitarian law".

Men and boys pray beside the body of a child killed in an Israeli air strike that hit a water distribution point on 13 July 2025
Sam Rose of Unrwa said a "classroom full of children" had been killed on average every day in Gaza since the war began

Later this week, the UN Security Council will convene to discuss the situation of children in Gaza, following a request by the UK.

However, Israel's permanent representative Danny Danon said council members would be "better served to apply pressure on Hamas for prolonging this conflict".

"The children in Gaza are victims of Hamas, not Israel. Hamas is using them as human shields and the UN is silent," he claimed.

Mahmoud said it was Israel which should be pressured to end the war.

"We have no power and no strength. We are victims. We are civilians just like other people in the world, and we don't own any nuclear weapons or arms or anything," he added.

"This war needs to stop, and so does the ongoing massacre happening in the Gaza Strip."

'My disabled son was punched' - how a CCTV error exposed a major abuse scandal

BBC Glynn Brown stands in his white kitchen holding a framed photo of his disabled son Aaron. He looks into the camera with a serious expression and the photo of Aaron features him smiling. BBC
Glynn Brown says he was told his son had been kicked, punched and trailed across the floor

Warning - this story contains details some people may find distressing.

When Glynn Brown was told that his severely disabled adult son, Aaron, may have been assaulted by staff at a psychiatric hospital, he was shocked and suspicious.

He wanted to know exactly what had happened, but could not ask Aaron, who is non-verbal and whom he describes as having the mental age of a two-year-old.

Glynn was told there was no video evidence because CCTV cameras, installed throughout Muckamore Abbey Hospital six months earlier, had never been switched on.

But this was far from the case.

In fact, what police officers found when they visited the hospital in September 2017, triggered the UK's largest adult safeguarding investigation and made the hospital one of the nation's biggest ever crime scenes - according to data released by the police.

Unbeknown to staff, the CCTV cameras had been mistakenly left running for the six months since their installation, according to the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI).

A staggering 300,000 hours of footage was discovered - equivalent to 34 years' worth. It revealed not only the alleged assault on Aaron, but hundreds of other incidents carried out by hospital staff.

However, almost eight years after the discovery, no cases have come to trial and the hospital has not been closed. A separate public inquiry is also yet to report back.

What is more, the patients' families still have not been allowed to see the CCTV footage.

BBC File on 4 Investigates has now obtained descriptions of what the footage shows.

These include accounts of patients facing appalling cruelty and physical abuse, and being ignored while seriously unwell. They describe:

  • Vulnerable young adults being punched, kicked, dragged across floors, tipped off furniture and having balls kicked at them
  • Possessions being taken away, shoes being dangled from one patient's ears and crisps packets pushed into another's face
  • Emotional abuse, including patients with severe learning disabilities being provoked into a reaction and then restrained and placed in seclusion

Families say they have been told they are unable to view the footage to prevent any prejudice of criminal investigations.

"We're left to conjure up these images in our own mind as to what has happened to our loved ones," Glynn told us.

Aaron and his dad Glynn captured side by side with wide, open smiles - as if caught laughing. Aaron, on the left, is wearing a grey hoodie and his dad is wearing a dark blue jacket.
Every Friday for months, Glynn was called by CCTV reviewers who detailed new incidents about Aaron

The task of reviewing the footage was originally undertaken by Belfast Health Trust, even though it was responsible for managing Muckamore Abbey.

It watched samples of the footage from eight different cameras, at up to eight times normal speed - an "impossible" task, according to one of the team.

Hearing fresh horrifying details about Aaron's treatment became a regular occurrence for his father.

Every Friday for months, Glynn received a grim phone call from the reviewers, detailing new incidents. He says he lost count at about 200.

"I was told there were videos of him being kicked, punched, trailed across the floor with his genitals exposed," he says.

Eventually, the PSNI seized all the footage themselves and appeared astonished by what they found. After an early police review of the CCTV, officers said in just one of four wards with cameras being investigated, they had identified 1,500 "crimes".

One of the most striking features of the descriptions of footage obtained by the BBC is the scale of staff neglect. Patients are frequently described as being ignored - even when seriously unwell.

According to the descriptions, one was locked in a room for 18 hours on one day, and frequently left without access to a bathroom, despite being incontinent.

Muckamore Abbey hospital - a lowrise white and brick building - in the background with grass and shrubbery in the foreground, with a path alongside.
Staff wrongly believed that cameras positioned throughout Muckamore Abbey Hospital had never been switched on

Muckamore Abbey is the largest systemic abuse case uncovered in the UK, according to Prof Andrew McDonnell, a clinical psychologist, who advised BBC Panorama on a 2011 investigation into abuse at Winterbourne View, a private hospital near Bristol.

"The sheer volume and scale of it - it dwarfs anything I've ever seen before," he says.

Prof McDonnell says he can't understand why there is such little public awareness of the scandal outside Northern Ireland.

A public inquiry, which sat from 2022 until March 2025, is expected to deliver its final report and recommendations later this year.

However, it has attracted criticism from the families of patients, who do not think that hospital managers have been rigorously cross-examined.

Glynn says it feels like nobody is to blame and nobody will be held culpable.

"We expected a robust interrogation," Glynn says. "We thought we'd find out all the answers to all our questions."

Disappointment has also been expressed that the inquiry did not call any of Northern Ireland's health ministers to give evidence - unlike the Post Office Inquiry where a minister was questioned over his refusal to meet campaigner Sir Alan Bates.

The criticisms are echoed by public health expert Dr Gabriel Scally, who has led a number of reviews into health service failures, including an NHS panel on Winterbourne View.

He agrees that managers have not been sufficiently held to account at the inquiry: "Imagine that the people representing the families and the patients cannot directly ask questions to the witnesses - I find that astounding."

Dr Scally also says the inquiry has been needlessly protracted and has lost its "sense of outrage".

In a statement, the Muckamore Abbey Inquiry expressed disappointment with Dr Scally's comments, ahead of the publication of its report. It said that lawyers for families of patients were able to make an application to the chair to ask witnesses questions directly - but none had been received.

More than 180 witnesses had given evidence, including senior figures, a spokesperson said, and the decision not to call any ministers was the subject of a judicial review which had been dismissed.

A close-crop of Catherine looking into the distance. She looks serious and pensive and her blonde shoulder-length hair is half in shadow.
Catherine Fox says she repeatedly complained to authorities about her daughter's treatment prior to the discovery of the footage

Senior officials from Belfast Health Trust told the inquiry they did not have concerns about Muckamore prior to the CCTV footage being found.

But the BBC has learned that three meetings were held between a health watchdog and the Trust over concerns about the hospital in the three years before the discovery.

More than 200 substantiated reports of abuse were also recorded there in 2014, according to inspections by the Regulation and Quality Improvement Authority - although these may have included incidents where patients abused staff.

Another parent, Catherine Fox, says she had repeatedly complained about the treatment of her daughter, Alicia, before the CCTV footage was discovered.

She says Alicia was being kept in seclusion - something meant to be used only as a last resort - for hours on end, in a very small room. There was no bathroom and the buzzer to call staff did not work.

"I would say it was a form of torture, and it was also a form of instilling fear, and no-one else will convince me of anything different," she says.

Catherine was so "horrified" she took her complaints to a Stormont health minister, who replied to say her concerns were a matter for the health trust.

Aaron on a trip to a farm. He is smiling and holding a can of fizzy drink. He is sitting in a wheelchair with a blanket over his knees. In the background there is black goat grazing on grass behind a fence.
Aaron is now in supported living and doing "brilliantly", according to Glynn

Patients' families have formed a group called Action for Muckamore which campaigns for mandatory CCTV installation in places where vulnerable people are cared for - a move supported by PSNI.

The force told the BBC that 122 people have been reported to Northern Ireland's Public Prosecution Service (PPS). To date, 38 people have been arrested - and some have gone on to plead not guilty. PSNI said it submitted its first file to the PPS more than five years ago.

The PPS said 15 suspects are currently before the courts and that the progress of cases is also the responsibility of the defence and judges.

In a statement to the BBC, the Belfast Health Trust apologised to families and said some staff have been dismissed. It said it would be inappropriate to comment on other specific issues while the inquiry was ongoing - as did the Department of Health in Northern Ireland.

Meanwhile, Aaron is now in supported living and doing "brilliantly", according to Glynn.

His son is able to go on trips every day, he says - especially to the donkey park and his beloved Nando's.

Glynn is still frustrated that nobody yet has been held responsible for the events at Muckamore Abbey, but he carries on campaigning for justice.

"Once the world sees the footage," he says, "there will be a profound understanding of how bad and malign the scandal is."

  • You can reach Noel directly and securely through encrypted messaging app Signal on: +44 7809 334720, by email at noel.titheradge@bbc.co.uk or on SecureDrop

World's biggest human imaging project scans its 100,000th volunteer

Bourigault et al. 2024 An image from the UK Biobank project. It shows for MRI scans of the body showing the legs and major organs including the heart, spine and stomach in different colours.Bourigault et al. 2024
Thousands of scans of each participant are recorded and stored as part of the imaging project. Here showing images of the abdomen and major organs

Scientists say they can study our bodies as we age in greater detail than ever before, thanks to more than a billion scans of UK volunteers.

The world's biggest human imaging project says it has now hit its target of scanning the brains, hearts and other organs of 100,000 people - the culmination of an ambitious 11-year study.

"Researchers are already starting to use the imaging data, along with other data we have, to identify disease early and then target treatment at an earlier stage," says Prof Naomi Allen, chief scientist at UK Biobank.

The data is made available at low cost to teams around the world to find new ways of preventing common health conditions from heart disease to cancer.

The 100,000th volunteer to be scanned was Steve, who recently retired from a job in sales and now helps out at a charity run by his daughter.

The BBC watched as he entered a full-body MRI scanner in an industrial park outside Reading, and detailed images of brain cells, blood vessels, bones and joints appeared on the screens.

"My mum was diagnosed with early-stage dementia a few years ago and has not been well," he says.

"So with that in mind I want to give more back to research so the next generation can learn from people like me."

A portrait of Steve (we are not using his surname) who is staring straight at camera. He is a man in his 60s with white hair, black glasses and a tan. He is wearing a green medical overall and standing in a corridor outside the scanning room. He is smiling.
Steve from southern England was the 100,000th person scanned in what's become the world's largest medical imaging project

The giant medical imaging project has been running for 13 hours a day, seven-days-a-week across four sites in England.

Participants are given a five-hour appointment to be scanned using five different types of MRI, X-ray and ultrasound machines.

The data gathered is anonymised and volunteers like Steve receive no individual feedback unless the radiographers happen to spot a potentially serious health problem.

The project does not allow personal data, such as a volunteer's surname or the precise area where they live, to be published.

What is UK Biobank?

UK Biobank / Dave Guttridge A shot of the operation room at UK Biobank. In the distance is a window showing a person being scanned in an MRI machine. They are being attended to by two radiographers operating the machine. In the foreground is a picture of a brain scan on a monitor and another video screen showing the internal MRI scanner tube.UK Biobank / Dave Guttridge
Volunteers have been scanned at four sites across the UK over an 11-year period

Launched in 2003, UK Biobank is one of the largest collections of biological samples and health data in the world.

In total, half a million people – all middle-aged volunteers – have been asked to complete physical tests, answer regular health and lifestyle questions, and provide DNA and other biological samples.

Their blood, urine and saliva are frozen in liquid nitrogen and stored at temperatures of -80C (-112F) in huge refrigerators in Stockport, Greater Manchester.

The imaging part of the project began in 2014, and involves taking detailed scans of 100,000 of those same participants.

All of that group will be invited back to repeat the process every few years to see how their bodies and organs change as they grow older.

By combining those scans with the other data collected by UK Biobank, scientists can test whether early changes to the make-up of the brain or body then lead to diseases or other health problems in later life.

The whole UK Biobank project, which is non-profit making, was set up by the Medical Research Council and the Wellcome Trust charity, along with the Department of Health and the Scottish government.

Two decades later it is now reaching maturity.

Over 30 petabytes, or 30,000 terabytes, of anonymised health data is already available to researchers working for universities, charities, governments and the private sector.

Scientists in the UK and the rest of the world can apply for access and most are charged between £3,000 and £9,000 to help cover running costs.

Louise Thomas, professor of metabolic imaging at the University of Westminster, says it is "completely transforming" how she and other researchers do their jobs.

"We thought it was a crazy idea, there was absolutely no way anybody could scan this number of people," she says.

"To analyse these images manually would have taken us thousands of years but now... we can extract all the information automatically, so we can measure everything in the body in a matter of minutes."

Researchers are increasingly using artificial intelligence (AI) to process the huge amounts of data generated by the project.

Almost 1,700 peer-reviewed papers have been written using all types of Biobank data since work started in 2003, with dozens more now published every week.

The scans and images taken so far have already been used to show that:

UK Biobank is one of the 10 largest stores of personal health data in the world alongside similar initiatives in Germany, China and the United States, although those projects don't all make their data available to scientists globally in the same way.

The imaging element of the project is also funded by a number of other organisations including the British Heart Foundation, Calico, a subsidiary of Alphabet which also owns Google, and the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, established by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan.

As theories swirl about Air India crash, key details remain unknown

Government of India / Ministry of Civil Aviation Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau Vertical Stabilizer adjacent to the building referenced as building A in the report. The Aircraft was destroyed due to impact with the buildings on the ground and subsequent fire. A total of five buildings, shown in the image on the right, were impacted and suffered major structural and fire damages.Government of India / Ministry of Civil Aviation Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau

While the preliminary report into what caused the loss of Air India Flight 171 last month has provided some answers, it has also prompted a wave of speculation about its cause.

The Boeing 787 Dreamliner crashed into a building less than a minute after take-off from the city of Ahmedabad in western India en route to London, killing 241 people on board, along with 19 on the ground. One passenger survived.

Information contained in India's Air Accident Investigation Bureau report, the first official account of what happened, has raised questions about the role of the pilots.

However, experts within the aviation industry claim investigators have been highly selective in what they have chosen to say.

What the report says

Under international protocols, the state leading an air accident investigation is meant to issue a preliminary report within 30 days. The 15-page document published by India's Air Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) on Saturday fulfils this requirement.

Although the AAIB has been leading the investigation, US interests are also represented, because Boeing, the maker of the aircraft, and GE Aerospace, the engine manufacturer are American.

The report does not set out any conclusions as to the cause of the accident. Nevertheless, it has sparked considerable controversy.

In its account of the accident flight, the AAIB states that two fuel cut-off switches were moved from the 'run' to the 'cut-off' position seconds after take-off.

This deprived the engines of fuel and caused them to lose thrust. Although data from the flight recorder shows the engines were subsequently restarted, it was too late to prevent the crash.

These switches are normally only used to turn the engines on before a flight and off afterwards. They have a locking mechanism, which means they need to be pulled out before being flipped, a system designed to prevent accidental deployment.

The report also states that one pilot asks the other "why did he cutoff", while his colleague "responded that he did not do so".

However, it does not provide any direct transcript of the conversation, which would have been picked up by the cockpit voice recorder (CVR). Nor does it identify which pilot asked the question.

It is worth remembering that preliminary reports are not intended to offer a full picture of what happened or draw firm conclusions. They are meant to be a factual summary of the information obtained in the early stages of what could be a lengthy investigation.

The investigating authority is also under no obligation to make their preliminary reports public.

Reuters Wreckage of the Air India Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner plane sits on the open ground, outside Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel International Airport, where it took off and crashed nearby shortly afterwards, in Ahmedabad, India July 12, 2025. Reuters

Missing information

The information released so far has prompted a number of commentators to claim, in the media and online, that the accident was the result of deliberate and intentional action by one of the pilots.

It is a view that has attracted an angry response from the Indian Commercial Pilots' Association, which warned that "invoking such a serious allegation based on incomplete or preliminary information is not only irresponsible – it is deeply insensitive to the individuals and families involved".

It added that "to casually suggest pilot suicide in the absence of verified evidence is a gross violation of ethical reporting".

In a memo to staff, the chief executive of Air India struck a similar note. Campbell Wilson warned against drawing "premature conclusions".

Since the report was issued, the BBC has spoken to a range of people within the industry, including pilots, accident investigators and engineers. While theories as to what actually happened vary widely, the dominant view is that important information is currently missing.

"They've told us stuff they want us to know at the moment, and withheld what they don't want us to know," explained one pilot, who asked not to be identified. "It's not a complete report."

One of the main criticisms is the lack of a transcript from the cockpit voice recorder, which would enable the reported conversation between the pilots about the fuel cut-off switches to be put in context.

Bjorn Fehrm, an aeronautical analyst at consultants Leeham News said this was "totally unacceptable".

"They have all this technical detail. Then you have this reference to dialogue, but it doesn't even tell you who's speaking," he said.

Mr Fehrm was also concerned that there was no reference to what happened in the cockpit between the switches being flipped from run to cut-off, and the first switch being pushed back into position to relight the first engine 10 seconds later.

"It's someone trying to hide something," he said.

Close-up view of Dreamliner 787 aircraft cockpit control panel with labelled components. The thrust levers are prominent in the centre. Engine fuel control switches, which cut fuel supply and shut down engines, are on the left. Switches with a stop lock mechanism that must be lifted before turning are on the right. Guard brackets prevent accidental movement of the switches

An engineering source, meanwhile, said the report was "very selective", and did not have any detailed information about what the engines were doing immediately before the switches were flipped. The document does say that the engine speed began to decrease from take-off values "as the fuel supply to the engines was cut off."

This, they said was important - because flipping the switches to cut-off and back was something a pilot would be trained do to in order to restart an engine that was already losing power.

Tim Atkinson, an aviation consultant and former air accident investigator in the UK said, "it is very disappointing to read a report which does provide a few salient facts, leaves many more questions".

Another element of the report that has caused controversy is a reference to a safety bulletin – known as a Special Airworthiness Information Bulletin – published by the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in 2018.

This was used to alert the aviation community that operators of some Boeing 737 models had reported cases in which the fuel cut-off switches had been fitted with the locking feature disengaged - potentially enabling the switch to be flipped by accident.

At the time, the FAA described this as an "airworthiness concern", but said it was "not an unsafe condition" that would require mandatory action via what is known as an Airworthiness Directive.

Operators of a number of different Boeing models fitted with similar switches, including 787s, were advised to carry out simple inspections.

The investigation report says Air India did not carry out those inspections - prompting speculation that the accident could have been caused by faulty switches being flipped by accident.

However, in an internal note seen by the BBC, the FAA has since reiterated its belief that the issue did not compromise safety.

Engineering sources have also pointed out that the report says the throttle control module on the crashed aircraft was replaced on two occasions, most recently two years before the accident. This would have involved replacing the cut-off switches as well.

According to Bjorn Fehrm of Leeham News, the reference to the FAA's advice contained in the report was "totally irrelevant" in the context of the accident.

Nevertheless, India's Directorate General of Civil Aviation has asked the operators of all aircraft covered by the FAA's original bulletin to carry out inspections by 21 July.

For former accident investigator Tim Atkinson, the vagueness of the report may have been deliberate - in order to suggest an explanation for the crash, while avoiding being too explicit.

"The very worst reports are those written to be read 'between the lines', and if that is what we have here, then it does no credit to the investigators," he said.

Meanwhile those seeking firm answers to what happened on Flight 171 may well have to wait.

International protocols stipulate that a final report should be published within a year of the accident. However, in practice, it can take a lot longer than that.

Constance Marten spent months at 'torture' church, friend tells BBC

BBC An image of Constance Marten, a young woman with long brown hair smiling and holding a cigarette, next to an image of a building with The Synagogue Church of All Nations written on itBBC

Constance Marten was a disciple of infamous Christian preacher, TB Joshua, who was accused of rape and violence in a BBC News investigation.

Marten spent four months at Joshua's Synagogue Church of All Nations in Nigeria as a teenager.

A fellow disciple, who knew Marten when she was at the church, told the BBC it was "a place of torture" and sexual assault. The BBC has no reason to believe Marten was subjected to any abuse there.

Marten, 38, has been found guilty of gross negligence manslaughter following the death of her baby, Victoria.

Warning: This story contains descriptions of physical and sexual abuse

Now the retrial is over BBC News can report Marten, who comes from an aristocratic family with royal connections, was a disciple at the Synagogue Church of All Nations (Scoan) from September 2006, when she was aged 19.

She lived at a compound while at Scoan, one of the world's biggest Christian evangelical churches.

The BBC Eye investigation, published last year, found evidence of widespread abuse and torture by Joshua. A televangelist who had an immense global following, Joshua died in 2021.

As part of the investigation, dozens of former members alleged atrocities by Joshua, including rape and forced abortions, spanning almost 20 years.

Marten was taken to Scoan by her mother, Virginie De Selliers, after leaving school. She remained in Lagos, Nigeria, to become a disciple when her mother returned to the UK.

Speaking to the BBC, Angie said she shared a dormitory with Marten while the pair were at the church.

"It's no wonder she just ended up distrusting normal institutions - because clearly, something broke within her at some point," she said.

Angie
Angie was a Scoan disciple who knew Constance Marten while she lived at the church compound, in Lagos

Joshua had a worldwide following among some evangelical Christians thanks to videos of his "miracles" posted online by the church. After meeting him, people in wheelchairs were seen to walk again, and people with HIV and Aids showed off certificates saying they had been "cured".

However, the BBC Eye investigation revealed those videos had been faked and found how disciples had been discouraged from contacting their families, deprived of sleep, forced to denounce one another, and sometimes physically assaulted by Joshua - a man they called "Daddy".

One woman told the investigation it was her role to recruit teenage female visitors as live-in disciples, because Joshua liked to prey on them, especially virgins. Other interviewees said they were stripped and beaten with electrical cables and horse whips.

Scoan did not respond to allegations in the BBC investigation but has said previous claims were unfounded.

"Making unfounded allegations against Prophet TB Joshua is not a new occurrence… None of the allegations was ever substantiated," it wrote.

Nigerian pastor TB Joshua speaks at his Lagos megachurch on 31 December, 2014. He wears a brown and white shirt with a white scarf and is holding a black book in his left hand and speaks into a microphone.
TB Joshua was hugely influential in Nigeria - and across the world

Angie, who was a Scoan disciple for 10 years, recalls Marten as being "bright, witty, compassionate, funny, kind, and very independent".

She told the BBC how the church was "a place of torture, psychological abuse, physical abuse, spiritual abuse, and sexual abuse" under Joshua's leadership.

Angie said: "I wouldn't wish that experience on anyone and I feel very sad that she [Marten] was taken there in the first place."

Unlike some Scoan disciples, who remained under Joshua's control for years, Marten was thrown out after a few months and returned to the UK, where she went to Leeds University to study for a degree in Arabic and Middle Eastern Studies.

But messages seen by BBC News suggest she was still affected by her experiences in Nigeria years later. In October 2012, she got in touch with Angie via Facebook Messenger.

"I haven't spoken to anyone about what happened at the synagogue," Marten wrote. "All my university friends are secular, and if I told them about what I'd seen in Lagos, they'd think I was lying or mad!"

Marten wrote about how TB Joshua had abruptly thrown her out of the church and explained that, for years, she thought it was her fault. She said she didn't want to acknowledge Joshua was effectively running what she and others felt was a cult at the time.

Marten said she had tried to deal with what she experienced "silently and with a lot of confusion". "It's taken me years to get back to normal," she wrote.

She said it would be a great help "both emotionally and spiritually" to talk to Angie, who replied and later met Marten twice.

Inside Synagogue Church of all Nations in Lagos, founded by TB Joshua. It is a vast hall with a raised platform and rows of chairs.
Inside Synagogue Church of All Nations in Lagos, founded by TB Joshua

In another message, Marten said she couldn't talk about her experiences with her mother, who BBC News understands continued to donate small sums to the church at the time, prior to allegations about Joshua surfacing.

"I honestly think that she needed help back then and that she needs help now," Angie said of Marten. "I feel extremely sad to see what has happened subsequently."

"The story that I see is very different from what you see on the headlines. The story that I see is a young girl who was taken to an awful place, was broken down, doesn't understand what happened to her, and is therefore unable to process what's happening to her now. She really, really needs help."

For Angie it has been difficult to watch how events have unfolded for her former friend. "My heart breaks for her because I don't wish this on anyone - at the same time I wish I could shake her," she added.

Marten's first job after leaving university was as a researcher at the Al Jazeera news channel, where she tried to make a documentary about TB Joshua's megachurch - a project she mentioned in messages sent to Angie in early 2013.

"I really want this film to give an understanding to viewers of how cults work, and the very subtle manipulation that happens, so subtle that you can't even notice it," Marten wrote.

She said Joshua's "hoodwinking of innocent people" must "come into the light".

Bisola Hephzibah Johnson, another former disciple, told the BBC she persuaded Marten not to return to Scoan in 2013 to carry out secret filming for her documentary, saying it would be too dangerous.

She says everyone who spent time at Scoan has been deeply affected by their experiences there. "Some cannot until today co-ordinate their lives," she said.

The last message Angie received from Marten was in September 2014.

AFP Headquarters of the Synagogue Church of All Nations in the Ikotun neighbourhood in Lagos on 17 September 2014AFP
Headquarters of the Synagogue Church of All Nations in the Ikotun neighbourhood

Marten and her husband Mark Gordon were found guilty of gross negligence manslaughter on Monday, following the death of their baby daughter, Victoria.

At an earlier trial, which ended last year, they were found guilty of child cruelty, concealing a birth of their daughter and perverting the course of justice.

That trial heard Marten and Gordon, 51, were "arrogant" and "selfish individuals" who were in a toxic relationship.

Their baby had been "neglected and exposed to dangerous conditions", the trial heard.

The BBC approached Constance Marten's mother, Virginie de Selliers, for comment but she did not respond.

Sudan’s paramilitary RSF accused of killing almost 300 people in village raids

File shot of people queuing to register for aid at an internally displaced persons’ camp in North Kordofan state

Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) killed nearly 300 people in attacks in North Kordofan state that began on Saturday, according to Sudanese activists.

The RSF has been fighting the Sudanese army in that area, one of the key frontlines of a civil war in Sudan that has raged since April 2023.

The Emergency Lawyers human rights group said on Monday that the RSF had attacked several villages on Saturday around the city of Bara, which the paramilitary controls.

In one village, Shag Alnom, more than 200 people were killed via arson or gunshot. Looting raids of the other villages killed 38 civilians, it said, while dozens of others had gone missing.

The next day, the group said in its statement, the RSF attacked the village of Hilat Hamid, killing 46 people, including pregnant women and children.

More than 3,400 people were forced to flee, according to the UN.

“It has been proven that these targeted villages were completely empty of any military objectives, which makes clear the criminal nature of these crimes carried out in complete disregard of international humanitarian law,” Emergency Lawyers said, placing the responsibility with RSF leadership.

The army has taken firm control of the centre and east of Sudan while the RSF is working to consolidate its control of western regions, including North Kordofan.

The US and human rights groups have accused the RSF of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide. Its soldiers have carried out a series of violent looting raids in territory it has taken control of across the country.

The RSF leadership says it will bring those found responsible for such acts to justice.

Sudan’s civil war has created the world’s largest humanitarian crisis, driving more than half the population into hunger and spreading diseases including cholera across the country. A global reduction in aid spending has stretched the humanitarian response.

I'm 'disappointed but not done' with Putin, Trump tells BBC

Reuters US president Trump is speaking in the Oval Office. He wears a navy suit and red tie. Reuters

Donald Trump has said that he is disappointed but not done with Vladimir Putin, in an exclusive phone call with the BBC.

The US president was pressed on whether he trusts the Russian leader, and replied: "I trust almost no-one."

Trump was speaking hours after he announced plans to send weapons to Ukraine and warned of severe tariffs on Russia if there was no ceasefire deal in 50 days.

In a wide-ranging interview from the Oval Office, the president also endorsed Nato, having once described it as obsolete, and affirmed his support for the organisation's common defence principle.

The president made the phone call, which lasted 20 minutes, to the BBC after conversations about a potential interview to mark one year on since the attempt on his life at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.

Asked about whether surviving the assassination attempt had changed him, Trump said he liked to think about it as little as possible.

"I don't like to think about if it did change me," Trump said. Dwelling on it, he added, "could be life-changing".

Having just met with Nato chief Mark Rutte at the White House, however, the president spent a significant portion of the interview expanding on his disappointment with the Russian leader.

Trump said that he had thought a deal was on the cards with Russia four different times.

When asked by the BBC if he was done with Putin, the president replied: "I'm disappointed in him, but I'm not done with him. But I'm disappointed in him."

Pressed on how Trump would get Putin to "stop the bloodshed" the US president said: "We're working it, Gary."

"We'll have a great conversation. I'll say: 'That's good, I'll think we're close to getting it done,' and then he'll knock down a building in Kyiv."

The conversation moved onto Nato, which Trump has previously criticised as "obsolete".

Asked if he still thought this was the case, he said: "No. I think Nato is now becoming the opposite of that" because the alliance was "paying their own bills".

He said he still believed in collective defence, because it meant smaller countries could defend themselves against larger ones.

President Trump was also asked about the UK's future in the world and said he thought it was a "great place - you know I own property there".

He spoke about how he was looking forward to an unprecedented second state visit to the UK in September this year.

On what he wanted to achieve during the visit, Trump said: "Have a good time and respect King Charles, because he's a great gentleman."

I've never seen a case like Marten and Gordon's - it was jaw-dropping

Julia Quenzler Constance Marten, a woman with long dark-brown hair who is wearing a black jacket with a blue scarf and white top, sitting behind glass in a court dock Julia Quenzler

I've reported on many criminal cases, but nothing like Constance Marten and Mark Gordon's. Their trials were extraordinary.

A couple who were twice in the dock over the death of their baby, they appeared to be completely in love and still fiercely united. And yet they had utter contempt for the court process.

They caused chaos across their two trials, which both overran by months. At one point, the Old Bailey's most senior judge accused them of trying to "sabotage" and "manipulate" their retrial. It nearly collapsed a number of times.

Their behaviour - from refusing to turn up to court and claiming to be ill, to sacking countless barristers and Gordon's trousers even being misplaced one day - left His Honour Judge Mark Lucraft KC exasperated on many occasions.

At one point he said two teenagers, who had been in his court the previous week, were "rather better behaved" than Marten, adding: "And they pleaded guilty to murder."

Over the last 18 months I've sat through Marten and Gordon's two criminal trials.

The first, which started in January 2024, resulted in the pair being found guilty of concealing the birth of their baby, Victoria, of perverting the course of justice and child cruelty.

But in late June, the jury in that trial was dismissed, unable to decide on one of the two, more serious charges about Victoria's death.

A second trial began almost nine months later. They have now both been found guilty of manslaughter by gross negligence.

Now their case is over, we can report some of the remarkable moments when jurors were not in court. At times what happened across the trials was jaw-dropping.

'Will you stop flirting with me'

Marten and Gordon were highly unusual defendants. They would often talk during proceedings - as if completely unaware they were on trial. They knew their conversations were disruptive, but they didn't seem to care.

One day, while a witness was giving evidence, Marten sent a note to the judge asking: "Could I nip out for a coffee as we're falling asleep?"

The judge said it "doesn't look good" if defendants aren't interested in the evidence. They were, of course, on trial over the death of their baby.

It was obvious from the moment I first saw Marten and Gordon that they were still very much in love. They presented as a couple in court, rather than as co-defendants.

"Will you stop flirting with me," Marten said loudly to Gordon one day after the judge left court.

On her 38th birthday, they had a lingering embrace in the dock. "Where's my present," she playfully asked.

They appeared fixated on each other. "Obsession" was how Gordon described his love for Marten to police, saying he would have done anything for her.

Later, while giving evidence in their retrial, as if reading an open love letter to court, he declared "it was love" between him and his "noble" and "beautiful" wife.

"She was one of the best things that ever happened to me in my life."

Julia Quezler A court sketch showing Constance Marten, a woman with long brown hair wearing a dark top, and Mark Gordon, who has a peach-coloured headscarf and is wearing a shirt, looking at each other past a dock officer while sitting in a glass dock in court. The dock officer is a woman wearing a white shirt and black tie, with brown hair tied back and to the sideJulia Quezler

Marten and Gordon were often excited to see each other when they were brought up from the cells. Her face would light up when he appeared at the dock door. Sometimes she would blow Gordon kisses.

They were affectionate. They hugged and kissed on the cheek. Sometimes they tenderly stroked each other's hand. When Marten became tearful Gordon put his arm out to comfort her.

During proceedings, sitting with a dock officer between them, Gordon would often try to catch Marten's eye and smile. She would frequently lean towards him, with her chin resting on her hand.

At the end of the day, before being led back to their cells, they'd sometimes say "love you" to each other. It seemed like they looked forward to coming to court, a place they got to spend time together.

But there was a sense of chaos before the couple's first trial began in the early weeks of 2024. Marten and Gordon's legal representation kept changing - a running theme throughout their protracted case.

Some they sacked. Others withdrew. Sometimes they didn't have lawyers at all. It caused unending disruption.

In trials like this, involving serious charges, a defendant would typically have two barristers representing them. Marten got through an extraordinary number.

From her first appearance at the Old Bailey, in March 2023, to the end of the second trial, more than two years later, she had been represented by 14 barristers.

Why had she got through so many?

"Because she thinks she's entitled and doesn't listen to instructions," a source close to one of her former legal teams told the BBC.

Gordon also changed his legal team and ended up representing himself.

It caused significant delays - the couple's first trial overran by about three months, while the second overran by nearly two months.

'She is not running this trial'

Their "antics", as the judge put it, got increasingly worse as the second trial went on and on.

They repeatedly didn't turn up, meaning many court days were lost and jurors were hugely inconvenienced.

Often one of them would say they weren't well enough to come to court, only to be assessed as being medically fit to do so.

"Constance Marten is not running this trial," Judge Lucraft said firmly one day after she refused again to come to court.

Marten spent days complaining about her tooth pain. Court days were lost because of it. On one of those days she was found to be "medically fit" but "refused" to come.

"She is on trial for extremely serious offences and I've bent over backwards," the judge said. "I've given her more latitude than I suspect I ought to in some situations."

"In my view this is a complete sham," he said later referring to Marten's absence. Despite Marten's complaints of tooth pain, she declined treatment.

Julia Quenzler A court sketch showing Constance Marten, a woman with long brown hair wearing a dark top, and Mark Gordon, who has a peach-coloured headscarf and is wearing a shirt, looking at each other while sitting in a glass dock in court with the judge before them wearing a wig and red and black robes.Julia Quenzler

There were other highly unusual delays.

Marten refused to attend court one day after she had become "very argumentative and abusive to the staff in prison", according to the note from HMP Bronzefield.

The judge expressed his frustration again and again.

"This trial has had so many delays and quite frankly it is an insult to this court and to the jury", he said one day without jurors in the room.

On that particular day, the judge asked for Marten to join on a remote link from prison to explain why she wasn't at court.

She said she had been "lied on" and had asked to see a nurse but none were available.

"I am happy to come to court," she told the judge, "but yesterday at the Old Bailey I was abused for three hours by a guy in the cells next to me, shouting I am a baby killer."

One day Gordon, who normally wore a shirt and tie, turned up in a blue and yellow prison escape suit - used to spot runaway prisoners. On another occasion it emerged his court trousers had gone missing.

The judge, who said he could not be allowed in court in prison wear, remarked: "It would be a great shame to lose any more time through a lack of trousers."

'Don't touch me man'

Marten and Gordon repeatedly ignored the judge's instructions not to speak to each other during breaks in their evidence.

Unusually, he started coming into court before they were brought up from the cells to stop it from happening, with a warning that if they didn't, he would put them in different courtrooms.

One day Marten repeatedly exhaled so loudly during the evidence that the whole courtroom heard.

"Huffing and puffing at the back of the court is not the way these proceedings are done," said the unimpressed judge. Other days she yawned repeatedly.

She complained of feeling tired and said she had never experienced anything like travelling to court and back. "There are women locked in a metal cage in a van."

Julia Quenzler Judge Mark Lucraft, who is wearing red and black judges robes, a white legal wig and glasses. He is looking at a tablet in front of him and there are two microphones to the sideJulia Quenzler

Sometimes Marten and Gordon would abruptly blurt things out from the dock when they took issue with the evidence.

They were rude to some of the dock officers: When one tried to separate them after they tried to hug in the dock, Gordon kicked off.

"Don't touch me, man," said an irate Gordon amid the commotion before telling the dock officer to "shut up" when the judge and jury weren't in the room.

During the first trial, Gordon refused to return to the dock unless a dock officer was changed and then demanded to speak to the cell manager.

Sometimes we heard loud arguing in the corridor behind the dock door between Marten and Gordon and dock officers.

'Deliberate attempt to sabotage'

One of the most explosive moments in the couple's retrial happened when Marten was giving evidence. She suddenly blurted out to the jury that her husband had a "violent rape conviction".

We all knew about Gordon's previous conviction. But the jury didn't.

To ensure he received a fair trial, an order preventing the media from reporting Gordon's previous offences was put in place. It was never mentioned in front of the jury.

It was a jaw-dropping moment, which set off an unforeseen chain of events.

"This is plainly a deliberate attempt by the defendant to sabotage the trial," the judge said after the jury was ushered out quickly.

One of the prosecutors, Joel Smith KC, described it as a "deliberate attempt to take a wrecking ball" to the the trial.

Marten claimed Mr Smith had already told the jury about the conviction. He hadn't. She said she had been exhausted and later blamed her "agonising toothache".

"I'm extremely tired and I am irate that this word 'deliberate' keeps being expounded in this courtroom," she said.

Julia Quenzler A court sketch showing a barrister addressing the court and Constance Marten in the witness box next to the judgeJulia Quenzler

From then on it was difficult to keep up with the flurry of twists and turns that followed. Gordon initially wanted the jury discharged in his case.

The judge agreed. He said he had "little choice" and that Gordon would be tried next year. But the case against Marten would continue "alone", he decided during legal discussions.

Gordon then quickly changed his mind. "I can't do another year in prison," he pleaded with the judge. "I really beseech the court to allow this trial to continue," he added.

In the end, the case against Gordon continued. But the couple's behaviour appeared increasingly impulsive.

The number of barristers in court started to dwindle. Marten sacked her lead barrister but kept her junior. Not long after, Gordon's barristers withdrew their services.

He said he had sacked them and then declared that he was representing himself with the help of a solicitor. She also eventually withdrew.

The retrial had entered a whole new dimension.

Unlike at the first trial, when Gordon would often sit looking zoned out with his eyes half shut, now he appeared emboldened.

The problem was he wasn't a trained lawyer. It became hugely complicated. He often went on lengthy rants.

Without the jury in the room he would flip flop between complaining that things were "not fair" to turning the charm on, telling the judge that he was "tolerant", "kind", "patient" and gracious".

Other days he would shout at the judge as he left the courtroom.

He complained that he didn't have the same access as barristers. He wanted a desk, power to make legal applications and Archbold, a criminal law book running to more than 3,000 pages.

He repeatedly asked for more and more time to get his head around the case. It led to huge delays.

"Do you want me to adjourn for three years while you do a law degree?" the judge said to him one day.

At times Gordon appeared overwhelmed. He even pleaded for a royal intervention, describing the monarch as "compassionate and merciful".

"I ask the King in his mercy and those who work for him to help me," he said.

As the weeks went by, the judge warned Gordon a number of times that he might still remove him from the retrial because of the continued delays.

"It's simply him manipulating the system," the judge said on one occasion.

Julia Quenzler A court sketch showing Mark Gordon, who is wearing a shirt and peach-coloured headscarf while holding some papers, questioning Constance Marten, a woman with dark brown hair who is wearing a dark jumper and sitting in the witness box with microphones in front of her,  from the glass dock. Julia Quenzler
In a highly unusual turn of events Gordon questioned his own wife while representing himself

One of the most gripping and unusual moments of the retrial was when Gordon cross-examined Marten.

Normally a barrister would be expected to be forensic, but there was a tenderness in how he asked questions.

"Who was hands on and gentle with the kids?" he asked. "Both of us… especially you," she replied.

"Was the baby always a priority?"

"Absolutely, that's why we did what we did," Marten responded. "Our number one priority was Victoria. We were doing what we were doing for her."

Marten cried when Gordon asked her about their four other children who had been taken into care. "Alright, babes," he said trying to comfort her.

There was a marked change in her demeanour too.

When questioned by her husband she spoke softly, but when she was cross-examined by the prosecution she bristled and became increasingly strident, before cutting short her time on the stand.

'I'm actually happy'

When it came to the moment of the verdicts, the courtroom filled. There was silence. "Would the defendants please stand," the clerk said. They refused.

Guilty of gross negligence manslaughter for Gordon, the jury foreman told the court. Marten shook her head and crossed her arms.

Guilty of the same for her. She looked intensely at her partner. He leaned his head back against the wall and closed his eyes.

"It's a scam," Marten later shouted from the dock.

"It was an unfair trial," Gordon said loudly.

He told a dock officer: "I'm actually happy with the result because I will win the appeal."

He then thanked the court usher. "It's been a pleasure."

Up until the very last moments of their case Marten and Gordon were still disrupting, doing things their way.

A couple who were so fixated on each other, they were unable to grasp what the jury was sure of: that it was their chaotic and dangerous choices that ultimately led to the death of their baby, Victoria.

Additional reporting by Claire Ellison, Levi Jouavel and Daniel Sandford.

The fate of the Sycamore Gap tree has shed light on a deeper concern

Joe Daniel Price via Getty A treated image of the Sycamore Gap TreeJoe Daniel Price via Getty

James Canton spent two years sitting beneath an 800-year-old oak tree near his home in Essex, watching acorns fatten and butterflies land on the massive knurled grey trunk. Sometimes he sat in the branches too.

Canton, a lecturer at the University of Essex, recalls how it helped him feel a "sense of connection". "We're happier sat in an oak tree ten foot from the ground, watching blue tits feeding on caterpillars – involved and immersed in that natural world." He went on to write a book called The Oak Papers about that time spent studying the Honywood Oak.

For years, it was easy to forget that we used to be a woodland nation: around 6,000 years ago untouched swathes of oak, hazel, birch and pine blanketed an estimated 75% of the UK. But in recent months the felling of the Sycamore Gap tree next to Hadrian's Wall in Northumberland has put our relationship with trees, and the natural world more widely, back under the spotlight.

Two men are due to be sentenced today for the crime that has been called a "mindless destruction". Canton calls it a "symbolic" moment. The felling of the Sycamore Gap has prompted calls for stricter legal protections for trees, not only to help prevent similar crimes in future but also to help the public appreciate the value of trees at a time when many of our woodlands are in poor health and targets for tree-planting are not being met.

PA Media The Sycamore Gap tree which was illegally felledPA Media
The Sycamore Gap tree stood in a natural dip along Hadrian's Wall in Northumberland for over a century before it was felled in the early hours of 28 September 2023

But even if the government were to back calls for greater legal protections, other questions remain - namely, which trees should be afforded greater legal protection? And arguably even more pressingly: should Britain be thinking more broadly about how to save our depleting woodlands - and is legal protection enough or is a fundamental rethink required?

UK's 'odd relationship' with trees

The Sycamore Gap wasn't a particularly ancient tree, nor a native species, but its position gave it a totemic status. Tucked into a fold of the hills in an area of outstanding beauty, the tree was famous around the world. People went there to have picnics, propose marriage, scatter ashes and to seek solace during lockdown.

Experts at Northumbria University say the single tree's "dramatic and photogenic setting made it a culturally significant landmark", and it was often used as a symbol of the surrounding Northumberland region. Local people spoke of their sense of devastation at its loss, while Northumberland National Park Authority received thousands of emails, letters and messages.

Northumbria Police Handout photos issued by Northumbria Police of Daniel Graham, 39, (left) and Adam Carruthers, 32Northumbria Police
Daniel Graham and Adam Carruthers were both found guilty of two counts of criminal damage in connection with the felling of the Sycamore Gap tree

And yet despite being a nation of tree lovers, we live in one of the most nature-depleted countries on Earth - while we still aren't planting enough trees, despite calls by successive governments. The UK has 13% woodland cover, compared to an average of 38% in Europe, according to Prof Mary Gagen of the University of Swansea.

We've been planting more woodland in recent decades, with woodland creation rates much higher now than they were in the 2010s, yet even they remain off track, according to statistics from Forest Research. The target set by the previous Conservative government was to plant 30,000 hectares a year by 2025 across the UK, in line with the heyday of tree planting in the 1970s.

Statistics show that 20,700 hectares of new woodland was created in the UK between April 2023 and March 2024, a big achievement. However, this fell to 15,700 hectares over the year to March 2025, largely as a result of a drop-off in planting in Scotland. Rates in England, Wales and Northern Ireland went up – though from a low base.

Mike Kemp via Getty Images Bucknell Wood ancient woodland in mist and sunlight Mike Kemp via Getty Images
Experts warn that the UK's native woodlands are in crisis, with only 7% currently in good ecological condition

And the woodlands that already exist aren't in great shape. Only 7% of it is in good ecological health, says Prof Gagen.

She is among those who think that this all nods to an "odd relationship" with trees – one of "simultaneously adoring and denuding woodlands".

Andrew Allen of the Woodland Trust warns there could be a knock-on effect: "While money goes into getting new trees in the ground, we continue to spend very little on looking after the trees we already have - and this risks serious consequences."

'Why would a tree older than Stonehenge go unprotected?''

Ancient trees provide a home to hundreds of different bird, insect and mammal species, yet they have no automatic right of protection. This is unlike some other countries, including Italy and Poland, where so-called "heritage" trees have specific legal protections.

Some UK trees are protected through being in a nature reserve or a site of special scientific interest, while Tree Preservation Orders can be made by a local planning authority to protect specific trees or woodland from deliberate damage or destruction.

PA Media The Northern Lights, or Aurora Borealis, shining over the Sycamore Gap PA Media
The Tree Council has published a report urging stronger protection for the country's most significant and irreplaceable trees, like the one at Sycamore Gap

Yet many fall through the gaps. Only a fifth of our "oldest and most important veteran trees" are in protected areas, says Prof Gagen. Veteran trees are trees that through their own decay act as a habitat for other species, promoting biodiversity.

The Tree Council charity has written a report calling for greater protections for the country's "most important trees", such as at the Sycamore Gap. The outpouring of emotion and anger after the felling of the tree shows how valued these "socially, culturally and environmentally important trees are", says Jess Allan, science and research projects manager at the charity.

On the back of a Heritage Trees Bill, introduced in December 2023 as a private members bill in the House of Lords, the charity is calling for legislation to create a statutory list of the most valuable trees and to impose stricter penalties for damaging them, mirroring the system for listed buildings.

Crucially, this could protect trees that are much-loved and culturally important because of their place in the landscape, as well as protecting ancient trees that are vital in preserving nature.

PA Media People gather around the stump of the Sycamore Gap tree in Northumberland National ParkPA Media
Backed by the proposed Heritage Trees Bill in the House of Lords, the Tree Council is calling for a legal register of the UK's most valuable trees, along with tougher penalties for damaging them

Jon Stokes, the charity's director of trees, science and research, points out that in Portugal, the maximum fine for destroying a notable tree is €500,000 (£433,000).

He says protecting our "most celebrated trees" is a no-brainer. "There are yew trees in this country that are older than Stonehenge – nobody would ever contemplate not protecting Stonehenge so why would a living thing that's older than Stonehenge not receive some protection?"

He hopes something positive could come out of the felling of the Sycamore Gap: it's made people realise that some of the UK's trees are "truly vital to our culture and heritage and history – and our biodiversity - we should be looking after them better than we are at the moment".

The Tree Council's report is currently being assessed by the government, but there is no date on when any decision will be released.

'You can't stop reckless acts'

There are some who believe legal reforms are not enough. Even the proposed new measures might not have saved the famous sycamore: its felling involved trespass onto land owned by the Northumberland National Park. And a Tree Preservation Order wouldn't have made a difference either, says Sarah Dodd of Tree Law in Barry, Wales, a law firm that specialises in legal issues involving trees.

"Ultimately, you can put all the protection you want on trees, but some people are just going to break the law, you can't stop some people doing some reckless acts," she says.

PA Media Dame Judi Dench is presented with a seedling from the Sycamore Gap treePA Media
At the RHS Chelsea Flower Show, Dame Judi Dench was presented with a seedling from the Sycamore Gap tree

The bigger question, she says, is how we get people to appreciate the value of trees and therefore not want to fell them. She hopes that giving trees special legal status will raise their profile, and therefore make people recognise their importance.

Mr Stokes, of the Tree Council, says if we are to maximise the biodiversity value of our trees we've got to celebrate and protect the old ones. And we need to build up new trees next to our older ones, so that wildlife can flow "from these ancient bastions into the new woods and hedges and individual trees that we're planting", he says.

A recent report by the Woodland Trust found that the current health of our woods and trees is "concerning", and proposed solutions include more woodland creation, better woodland management, agroforestry (combining agriculture and trees), ancient woodland restoration, and natural flood management, whereby trees are planted to slow down water flow.

Difficult choices ahead

This will not be easy and Prof Gagen of Swansea University says saving the UK's woodlands is a complex problem that demands difficult choices around building.

"Unfortunately, for most people if asked if they'd like more new, cheaper housing or faster transport, or to protect nature, they are going to sacrifice a woodland," she says.

She says there is a need to ensure people are aware of the "true value of nature".

"A single big tree in the right place is providing thousands of pounds worth of carbon store, flood protection, free air conditioning, habitat, wellbeing provision, pollution control and a hundred other benefits, and no one is asked to pay those costs if the tree is felled for development. That needs to change to save UK woodlands."

As for Canton, he stills visits the Honywood Oak near his home, and is involved in projects to turn around the fortunes of the "forgotten forests", areas of ancient woodland that were historically turned into timber plantations and now need to be restored.

He hopes that years from now we will have learned from the loss of the Sycamore Gap tree and others like it, and changed our attitude.

"I'd really like to think that in a generation's time, there will be rights for trees – trees that are over say 100 years old that you cannot do this, and you get much worse punishments than currently exist," he says.

"Hopefully in time we will gradually get there – our society is naturally catching up with our natural emotional connection with the natural world."

Top image credit: Joe Daniel Price via Getty

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Drivers offered up to £3,750 discount to buy electric cars

Getty Images Woman with dark hair plugs in electric vehicle to charging pointGetty Images

The cost of a new electric car will soon be reduced by up to £3,750 after the government introduced grants to encourage drivers to move away from petrol and diesel vehicles.

The discounts will apply to eligible vehicles costing up to £37,000, with the most environmentally friendly vehicles seeing the biggest reductions, the Department for Transport (DfT) said.

Carmakers can apply for funding from Wednesday, with the RAC saying discounted cars should start appearing at dealerships "within weeks".

But some drivers have previously told the BBC that ultimately, the UK needs more charging points to spur people to buy electric vehicles (EVs).

The government has pledged to ban the sale of new fully petrol or diesel cars and vans from 2030.

Under the scheme, discounts will range between £1,500 and £3,750 and buyers will be able to claim a discount at the dealership.

The grants to lower the cost of EVs will be funded through a £650m scheme, and will be available for three years.

There are around 1.3 million electric cars on Britain's roads but currently only around 82,000 public charging points.

At the weekend, Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander said the government would invest £63m to fund EV charging points.

But it will not arrive soon enough for Carolyn Hammond, 49, from North Devon.

"We would like to invest in an electric car, but we only have "single phase" electricity in our home," she told the BBC. "That means there isn't enough electricity to run the household and charge an electric car."

She says that is the case for her neighbours too. "To upgrade our electricity connection would be £20k plus VAT, then there are more costs when putting in charging points, and buying a car," she said.

"Just makes it, sadly, too pricey."

Carolyn Hammond Carolyn Hammond smiling, wearing a knitted hat with a sunset and a field in the background.Carolyn Hammond
Carolyn Hammond says upgrading her electricity connection makes an EV "too pricey"

Alexander said: "This EV grant will not only allow people to keep more of their hard-earned money, it'll help our automotive sector seize one of the biggest opportunities of the 21st century."

But Shadow Transport Secretary Gareth Bacon said: "Labour are forcing families into more expensive electric vehicles before the country is ready," adding that EVs were a "product people demonstrably do not want".

"Labour are putting net zero ahead of common sense and ahead of the family finances," he said.

The government said: "The discount means that zero emission cars are now cheaper to buy and run than ever before, and comes on top of preferential tax rates, delivering real savings for working families."

'I don't regret switching'

Jimmy Kim, a 43-year-old from London, has been weighing up whether or not he can afford to move to electric.

"The financial argument for an EV vehicle compared to a efficient petrol or hybrid vehicle doesn't add up at all," he said.

He added that the long-term cost of EV ownership, "coupled with the fact that cars devaluate after 10 years", mean it "doesn't make any logical sense to buy one in the current economic climate".

But Paul Cole, 38, also from London, said he wouldn't go back to a petrol car.

Paul Cole Paul Cole smiling and looking at the camera.Paul Cole
Paul Cole says he saves money by charging his EV overnight

"I would say having made the switch that it is brilliant and you should do it if you have the infrastructure to do so," he told the BBC.

"We had recently moved house and there was a charging point already in the driveway when we moved in. We had since had solar panels installed as well, so an electric car made perfect sense," he added.

He adds that to save money on the electricity needed to charge the car, he charges the car overnight when electricity is the cheapest.

"We've now had it two years, and we haven't regretted getting it for a moment."

Drivers buying electric cars can get tax breaks if their employer has a company car scheme.

Grants for EVs have previously been available, but were scrapped in 2022 under Conservative leadership.

First started in 2011, the grants were designed to make buying new electric vehicles more affordable by providing a discount of £1,500 for cars under £32,000.

When the scheme ended, the Department for Transport said funding would be "refocussed" towards the main barriers to the electric vehicle transition, such as public charging, and supporting the purchase of electric vans, taxis and motorcycles.

Additional reporting by Your Voice, Your BBC and Connie Bowker.

How a massive database of body scans aims to unlock the secrets of ageing

Bourigault et al. 2024 An image from the UK Biobank project. It shows for MRI scans of the body showing the legs and major organs including the heart, spine and stomach in different colours.Bourigault et al. 2024
Thousands of scans of each participant are recorded and stored as part of the imaging project. Here showing images of the abdomen and major organs

Scientists say they can study our bodies as we age in greater detail than ever before, thanks to more than a billion scans of UK volunteers.

The world's biggest human imaging project says it has now hit its target of scanning the brains, hearts and other organs of 100,000 people - the culmination of an ambitious 11-year study.

"Researchers are already starting to use the imaging data, along with other data we have, to identify disease early and then target treatment at an earlier stage," says Prof Naomi Allen, chief scientist at UK Biobank.

The data is made available at low cost to teams around the world to find new ways of preventing common health conditions from heart disease to cancer.

The 100,000th volunteer to be scanned was Steve, who recently retired from a job in sales and now helps out at a charity run by his daughter.

The BBC watched as he entered a full-body MRI scanner in an industrial park outside Reading, and detailed images of brain cells, blood vessels, bones and joints appeared on the screens.

"My mum was diagnosed with early-stage dementia a few years ago and has not been well," he says.

"So with that in mind I want to give more back to research so the next generation can learn from people like me."

A portrait of Steve (we are not using his surname) who is staring straight at camera. He is a man in his 60s with white hair, black glasses and a tan. He is wearing a green medical overall and standing in a corridor outside the scanning room. He is smiling.
Steve from southern England was the 100,000th person scanned in what's become the world's largest medical imaging project

The giant medical imaging project has been running for 13 hours a day, seven-days-a-week across four sites in England.

Participants are given a five-hour appointment to be scanned using five different types of MRI, X-ray and ultrasound machines.

The data gathered is anonymised and volunteers like Steve receive no individual feedback unless the radiographers happen to spot a potentially serious health problem.

The project does not allow personal data, such as a volunteer's surname or the precise area where they live, to be published.

What is UK Biobank?

UK Biobank / Dave Guttridge A shot of the operation room at UK Biobank. In the distance is a window showing a person being scanned in an MRI machine. They are being attended to by two radiographers operating the machine. In the foreground is a picture of a brain scan on a monitor and another video screen showing the internal MRI scanner tube.UK Biobank / Dave Guttridge
Volunteers have been scanned at four sites across the UK over an 11-year period

Launched in 2003, UK Biobank is one of the largest collections of biological samples and health data in the world.

In total, half a million people – all middle-aged volunteers – have been asked to complete physical tests, answer regular health and lifestyle questions, and provide DNA and other biological samples.

Their blood, urine and saliva are frozen in liquid nitrogen and stored at temperatures of -80C (-112F) in huge refrigerators in Stockport, Greater Manchester.

The imaging part of the project began in 2014, and involves taking detailed scans of 100,000 of those same participants.

All of that group will be invited back to repeat the process every few years to see how their bodies and organs change as they grow older.

By combining those scans with the other data collected by UK Biobank, scientists can test whether early changes to the make-up of the brain or body then lead to diseases or other health problems in later life.

The whole UK Biobank project, which is non-profit making, was set up by the Medical Research Council and the Wellcome Trust charity, along with the Department of Health and the Scottish government.

Two decades later it is now reaching maturity.

Over 30 petabytes, or 30,000 terabytes, of anonymised health data is already available to researchers working for universities, charities, governments and the private sector.

Scientists in the UK and the rest of the world can apply for access and most are charged between £3,000 and £9,000 to help cover running costs.

Louise Thomas, professor of metabolic imaging at the University of Westminster, says it is "completely transforming" how she and other researchers do their jobs.

"We thought it was a crazy idea, there was absolutely no way anybody could scan this number of people," she says.

"To analyse these images manually would have taken us thousands of years but now... we can extract all the information automatically, so we can measure everything in the body in a matter of minutes."

Researchers are increasingly using artificial intelligence (AI) to process the huge amounts of data generated by the project.

Almost 1,700 peer-reviewed papers have been written using all types of Biobank data since work started in 2003, with dozens more now published every week.

The scans and images taken so far have already been used to show that:

UK Biobank is one of the 10 largest stores of personal health data in the world alongside similar initiatives in Germany, China and the United States, although those projects don't all make their data available to scientists globally in the same way.

The imaging element of the project is also funded by a number of other organisations including the British Heart Foundation, Calico, a subsidiary of Alphabet which also owns Google, and the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, established by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan.

Antisemitism report finds 'unacceptable' increase in anti-Jewish discrimination

Reuters Penny Mordaunt is pictured walking outdoors. She wears a dark suit. Reuters

A new report into antisemitism has laid out a number of recommendations, including that the NHS tackle what it found was a "specific unaddressed issue of antisemitism".

Launched by the Board of Deputies of British Jews in 2024, the report made 10 recommendations after taking evidence from a range of organisations, including the NHS, the arts industry and the police.

Lord John Mann, the government's independent advisor on antisemitism, who led the review with ex-Conservative cabinet minister Dame Penny Mordaunt, said the commission heard "shocking experiences".

He said it was "unacceptable" there had been what he called an "onslaught of antisemitism" in the UK since 7 October.

He added that they hoped the recommendations would provide guidance and action.

About 1,200 people were killed in a Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, while 251 others were taken hostage.

The Israeli military launched an ongoing campaign in Gaza in response to the attack. At least 57,823 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory's Hamas-run health ministry.

The majority of the recommendations in the report pointed towards antisemitism training in different capacities.

One was the creation of an "Antisemitism Training Qualification" for those who carry out training on what it called "contemporary antisemitism".

It explained that Jewish communal organisations wanted to increase knowledge on anti-Jewish discrimination, which could be done if there was a standard training given by a "credible provider".

On Jewish identity, it said Judaism "should always be seen and understood... as an ethnicity as well as a religion", which the commission said would ensure antisemitism is dealt with appropriately.

The report found many Jewish employees within the NHS felt antisemitism was not being addressed in the workplace, as well as some Jewish patients feeling "uneasy about using the service".

Among its recommendations are that the NHS should hold a summit to tackle the "specific unaddressed issue of antisemitism" within the health service.

It also suggested that antisemitism should be included in all Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) training, which it said would increase the number of people "educated" about it and "confident in tackling it".

"No person should face abuse or discrimination whilst going about their business, whether it is pursuing the career of their choice or accessing public services," Dame Penny said.

On education, the report claimed to have received evidence of some Christian primary school teachers "inadvertently using antisemitic tropes" in subjects such as religious studies.

It said it welcomed an initiative proposed by the Winchester Diocese and the local Jewish community to teach the teachers how to avoid doing so, and recommended that it be evaluated and applied to all faith schools.

The Board of Deputies said that while it believed "everyone should have the right to express their opinions and beliefs", those in a role of "welfare, safety or security... have an additional duty to ensure people feel able to ask for their assistance".

Other recommendations asked that Jewish members of the arts industry and unions be treated equally.

Another key recommendation was on policing and devising a "consistent approach" to dealing with antisemitic crimes.

Board of Deputies president Phil Rosenberg said the report could be "summarised as one of a failure to apply the protections rightly afforded to different vulnerable groups equally to Jewish people in the same positions".

Animals react to secret sounds from plants, say scientists

Listen to the sounds three different plants might make if they were stressed

Animals react to sounds being made by plants, new research suggests, opening up the possibility that an invisible ecosystem might exist between them.

In the first ever such evidence, a team at Tel Aviv University found that female moths avoided laying their eggs on tomato plants if they made noises they associated with distress, indicating that they may be unhealthy.

The team was the first to show two years ago that plants scream when they are distressed or unhealthy.

The sounds are outside the range of human hearing, but can be perceived by many insects, bats and some mammals.

"This is the first demonstration ever of an animal responding to sounds produced by a plant," said Prof Yossi Yovel of Tel Aviv University.

"This is speculation at this stage, but it could be that all sorts of animals will make decisions based on the sounds they hear from plants, such as whether to pollinate or hide inside them or eat the plant."

The researchers did a series of carefully controlled experiments to ensure that the moths were responding to the sound and not the appearance of the plants.

They will now investigate the sounds different plants make and whether other species make decisions based on them, such as whether to pollinate or hide inside them or eat the plant.

"You can think that there could be many complicated interactions, and this is the first step," says Prof Yovel.

Another area of investigation is whether plants can pass information to each other through sound and act in response, such as conserving their water in drought conditions, according to Prof Lilach Hadany, also of Tel Aviv University.

"This is an exciting question," she told BBC News.

"If a plant is stressed the organism most concerned about it is other plants and they can respond in many ways."

TAU A brown moth laying white eggs on a green tomato plantTAU
Moths layed eggs on plants based on the sounds they made, which indicated their health

The researchers stress that plants are not sentient. They sounds are produced through physical effects caused by a change in their local conditions. What today's discovery shows is that these sounds can be useful to other animals, and possibly plants, able to perceive these sounds.

If that is the case, then plants and animals have coevolved the ability to produce and listen to the sounds for their mutual benefit, according to Prof Hadany.

"Plants could evolve to make more sounds or louder ones if they were of benefit to it and the hearing of animals may evolve accordingly so they can take in this huge amount of information.

"This is a vast, unexplored field - an entire world waiting to be discovered."

In the experiment the researchers focused on female moths, which typically lay their eggs on tomato plants so that the larvae can feed on them once hatched.

The assumption was that the moths seek the best possible site to lay their eggs - a healthy plant that can properly nourish the larvae. So, when the plant signals that it is dehydrated and under stress, the question was whether the moths would heed the warning and avoid laying eggs on it?

The answer was that they didn't lay eggs, because of the sound the plants were producing.

The research has been published in the journal eLife.

US tariff threat leaves Russia less rattled than relieved

Getty Images Russian President Vladimir Putin smiles duting a meetng, while visiting a military base of nuclear submarines, March 26, 2025, in Murmansk, RussiaGetty Images
Trump has threatened further sanctions unless Russia strikes a deal to end the Ukraine war within 50 days

In the Oval Office on Monday, Donald Trump was talking tough, announcing new US arms shipments to Ukraine paid for by European governments, and threatening new tariffs which, if imposed, would hit Russia's war chest.

But, back in Moscow, how did the stock exchange react? It rose 2.7%.

That's because Russia had been bracing for even tougher sanctions from President Trump.

"Russia and America are moving towards a new round of confrontation over Ukraine," Monday's edition of the tabloid Moskovsky Komsomolets had warned.

"Trump's Monday surprise will not be pleasant for our country."

It wasn't "pleasant". But Russia will be relieved, for example, that the secondary tariffs against Russia's trading partners will only kick in 50 days from now.

That gives Moscow plenty of time to come up with counter proposals and delay the implementation of sanctions even further.

Nonetheless, Donald Trump's announcement does represent a tougher approach to Russia.

It also reflects his frustration with Vladimir Putin's reluctance to sign a peace deal.

On his return to the White House in January, Donald Trump had made ending Russia's war in Ukraine one of his foreign policy priorities.

For months, Moscow's response was: "Yes, but…"

Yes, Russia said in March, when it welcomed President Trump's proposal for a comprehensive ceasefire. But first, it said Western military aid and intelligence sharing with Kyiv should end, along with Ukrainian military mobilisation.

Yes, Moscow has been insisting, it wants peace. But the "root causes" of the war must be resolved first. The Kremlin views these very differently to how Ukraine and the West see them. It argues that the war is the result of external threats to Russia's security: from Kyiv, Nato, 'the collective West.'

Yet, in February 2022, it wasn't Ukraine, Nato or the West that invaded Russia. It was Moscow that launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, triggering the largest land war in Europe since World War Two.

Reuters A Russian contract soldier looks out of a T-72 tank during military drills held at a firing range amid Russia-Ukraine conflict, in the southern Krasnodar region, Russia, December 2, 2024.Reuters
Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine more than three years ago

For quite some time, the "Yes, but…" approach enabled Moscow to avoid additional US sanctions, while continuing to prosecute the war. Keen to improve bilateral relations with Russia and negotiate a peace deal on Ukraine, the Trump administration prioritised carrots to sticks in its conversations with Russian officials.

Critics of the Kremlin warned that with "Yes, but"… Russia was playing for time. But President Trump hoped he could find a way of persuading Vladimir Putin to do a deal.

The Russian president has appeared in no rush to do so. The Kremlin believes it holds the initiative on the battlefield. It insists it wants peace, but on its terms.

Those terms include an end to Western arms shipments to Ukraine. From Donald Trump's announcement it is clear that is not going to happen.

President Trump claims that he is "not happy" with Vladimir Putin.

But disillusionment is a two-way street. Russia, too, has been falling out of love with America's president. On Monday, Moskovsky Komsomolets wrote:

"[Trump] clearly has delusions of grandeur. And a very big mouth."

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