After spending more than a week trying to save a humpback whale stranded off Germany's northern coast, rescue officials have conceded their hopes have run out.

The whale became stuck on a sandbank on 23 March before being rescued days later - only to swim into shallow waters on Poel Island, further down the Baltic Sea coast.

"We're of the firm opinion the animal will die there," Burkard Baschek, head of the German Oceanographic Museum, said on Wednesday.

During an emotional press briefing, local environment minister Till Backhaus said rescuers had "tried everything to give him a chance" and called the situation "an exceptional tragedy".

Greenpeace marine biologist Thilo Maack said they had tried to stop the whale entering a shallow bay on Poel Island, but it had done so anyway.

First spotted in German coastal waters in early March, the whale is thought to have become entangled in netting before eventually becoming stranded on a sandbank on Timmendorfer Strand, near the town of Travemünde.

The humpback is also thought to have been suffering from a skin condition brought on by the lower salt levels of the Baltic Sea.

Late last week, hopes had been high that the whale might move to deeper waters after excavators dug a channel enabling him to swim off.

Attempts to guide the humpback towards the saltier waters of the North Sea proved unsuccessful, and he swam some distance east along the coast before becoming stuck again in a coastal bay in the city of Wismar.

Rescuers coaxed him away but only as far as nearby Poel Island, where he is now lying on the seabed. With the water level set to drop, they believe he is too weak to swim any further.

Baschek said the whale's breathing and reaction to rescuers had deteriorated, and that the chances of coaxing him out of the bay were so slim it would be cruel to try.

It is thought his hopes of survival ran out early on Wednesday.

Backhaus, a leading rescue official in the northern state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, told reporters that a 500m (1,640ft) exclusion zone had been set up around the whale so it could die with dignity.

The Supreme Court appeared sceptical of President Donald Trump's executive order limiting birthright citizenship, a sign the high court could strike down a key element of his immigration agenda.

A majority of the court's justices on Wednesday seemed unconvinced that the US should stop granting citizenship to children of undocumented immigrants and some temporary US visitors.

The administration has argued that its effort to limit birthright citizenship is necessary to help rein in illegal immigration. Opponents argue it would upend more than a century of precedent and unravel a cornerstone of US immigration law enshrined by the 14th Amendment.

Trump attended the oral arguments in person on Wednesday, a rare move by a sitting president that underscored the high stakes of the case.

A defeat for Trump would mark a second straight setback at the high court, following the decision last month that invalidated the president's global tariffs. A win would help Trump deliver on his pledge to reshape America's immigration policies.

During more than two hours of arguments, U.S. Solicitor General John Sauer sought to convince the justices that the 14th Amendment - which establishes the concept of birthright citizenship and was extended formerly to enslaved people - and subsequent court rulings and laws passed by Congress all mistakenly expanded birthright citizenship.

Chief Justice John Roberts, a key swing vote on the court, questioned Trump's authority to exclude the children of undocumented immigrants from receiving US citizenship.

"I'm not quite sure how you can get to that big group," Roberts said.

• Trump says he will attend birthright citizenship arguments at Supreme Court
• Trump wants to end birthright citizenship. Where do other countries stand?

The oral arguments turned on a key clause in the 14th Amendment, which grants citizenship to all people born or naturalized in the US who are "subject to the jurisdiction thereof."

Bauer argued that the clause should only apply to the children of foreign diplomats and a few other limited groups. Parents who are in the country illegally when their children are born have "allegiance" to their home countries and therefore don't fall under the jurisdiction of US law, he said.

"Jurisdiction means allegiance," Sauer said. Citing a previous court opinion, he later argued that "permanent residence and domicile decides [citizenship]. That's what the court should be bound by."

But several justices said that interpretation would fundamentally reshape how Americans and people living around the world understand the US birthright citizenship process.

Justice Elena Kagan said the administration was seeking to undo a legal tradition of birthright citizenship that dates back to English common law. "What the 14th Amendment did was accept that tradition and not attempt to put any limitations on it. That was the clear rationale," Kagan said.

Several justices also pointed to the 1898 Supreme Court ruling, United States v. Wong Kim Ark, the landmark decision that upheld birthright citizenship in the case of a child born to Chinese immigrants living in the US.

Cecillia Wang, an ACLU attorney representing the plaintiffs in court on Wednesday, used the decision to argue that Trump's executive order should be overturned.

"If we agree with you how to read Wong Kim Ark, then you win," Justice Brett Kavanaugh said. "That could be just a short opinion."

Whether the court ultimately issues a broad or narrow opinion remains to be seen. The difference between a sweeping ruling on constitutional grounds versus a more tailored opinion on statutory grounds is a critical one, legal experts said.

The justices could choose to focus on a 1952 law passed by Congress that codified birthright citizenship and not wade into the larger constitutional debate, said Stephen Yale-Loehr, an immigration law expert.

"The court does not like to rule on constitutional issues if it doesn't have to," Yale-Loehr said. "The court could argue that the Trump executive order is invalid on statutory grounds."

The court is expected to issue its decision in June. It would be the first major immigration case decided by the court on its merits since Trump started his second term. The court has taken up other immigration cases, but has so far sent them back to lower courts for further review.

Trump's push to end birthright citizenship is one part of his larger immigration crackdown. But it's nevertheless a longtime goal of many on the right, and something Trump has supported since his first term in office. A victory in this case would help Trump make the case that he is delivering on his campaign pledge to limit illegal immigration.

A loss would be a setback to Trump's immigration agenda. But it would also represent a larger blow to his efforts to aggressively expand executive power since returning to office. The ruling in February overturning Trump's sweeping global tariffs showed the justices are not willing to give Trump a blank check to bypass Congress and the courts.

Trump signaled his interest in the case by attending the oral arguments on Wednesday. Critics said his appearance was an improper effort to influence the court ahead of a decision that will have major repercussions for his domestic policy agenda.

"We are the only Country in the World STUPID enough to allow 'Birthright' Citizenship!" Trump said incorrectly on social media after leaving the court.

Two migrants have died attempting to cross the English Channel, French authorities have said.

Six others were rescued, with one of them taken to hospital requiring urgent care, after migrants got into difficulty boarding a boat near Calais on Wednesday morning.

The French maritime prefecture said the small boat was seen heading towards the beach at Gravelines at around 09:30 local time, where 30 migrants were waiting to board.

It comes a day after the UK and France extended talks over renewing a deal to try and stop small boats trying to the cross the Channel.

Responders pulled eight people onto a rescue boat when they got into difficulty, but two of them died.

A French naval helicopter was also deployed to carry out a search of the area to make sure no one was left in the water, the French authority said.

At least 12 French police officers were present in the beach area at the time.

Steve Smith, chief executive of refugee charity Care4Calais, said the two people who died had been "lost to our deadly border".

On Tuesday, the UK signed a two-month extension on a £476m deal made with France by the previous government for extra patrols to disrupt migrant smuggling gangs.

The agreement had been due to expire, but talks on renewing the deal were extended by two months to thrash out an agreement.

It means operational contracts will continue to be funded, costing the UK £16.2m.

A Home Office spokesperson claimed Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood was "driving a hard bargain".

The home secretary is understood to be pushing for the new arrangement to include performance-related clauses that would link funding to the proportion of boats intercepted by the French.

Under the current deal, nearly 700 law enforcement officers are on the ground patrolling beaches, using drones and buggies to stop people getting on boats.

The UK government claims the deal has prevented 42,000 illegal migrants getting on boats, although the overall number making the journey across the Channel has continued to increase.

Over the past three years, crossings in the Channel have increased, with 41,472 people arriving in the UK by small boat in 2025.

Between 1 January and 26 March 2026, a total of 4,441 people crossed the English Channel by small boat from France.

This is 33% lower than the number who had reached the UK by this point in 2025, which was 6,642, although weather conditions may have played a part in this, with rougher conditions in the Channel compared with the same period in 2025.

Presenter Scott Mills has confirmed he was investigated over a sexual offence, in his first statement since he was sacked from the BBC over allegations relating to his personal conduct.

In a statement, Mills said the announcement of his sacking had led "to the publication of rumour and speculation".

It comes after it emerged the police launched an investigation into Mills in 2016 before closing it in 2019 after prosecutors decided there was insufficient evidence to bring charges.

Mills said he had "fully cooperated and responded" to the investigation at the time, and thanked "from the bottom of my heart all those who have reached out to me with kindness" including his listeners and former colleagues.

The allegations, first published in the Mirror, are reported to have happened between 1997 and 2000, police said, when Mills would have been in his mid-20s.

On Tuesday, the Metropolitan Police told BBC News that they had investigated Mills for serious sexual offences against a teenage boy who was under the age of 16.

In a statement on Wednesday afternoon, the 53-year-old said: "The recent announcement that I am no longer contracted to the BBC has led to the publication of rumour and speculation.

"In response to this the Metropolitan Police has made a statement, which I confirm relates to me.

An allegation was made against me in 2016 of a historic sexual offence which was the subject of a police investigation in which I fully cooperated and responded to in 2018.

"As the police have stated, a file of evidence was submitted to the Crown Prosecution Service, which determined that the evidential threshold had not been met to bring charges.

"Since the investigation related to an allegation that dates back nearly 30 years and the police investigation was closed 7 years ago, I hope that the public and the media will understand and respect my wish not to make any further public comment on this matter."

He added: "I wish to thank from the bottom of my heart all those who have reached out to me with kindness, my former colleagues, and my beloved listeners, who I greatly miss."

The announcement that the former presenter had been sacked by the BBC caused shock among listeners, and led to mounting pressure on the broadcaster to explain what led to his sudden departure.

Earlier on Wednesday, the BBC confirmed it knew about the sexual offences investigation in 2017.

But in a statement, a spokesperson added that the Radio 2 presenter was sacked after "new information" about his conduct came to light in recent weeks.

It said it was "doing more work to understand the detail of what was known by the BBC" at the time.

Travelodge's chief executive was sent a "serious complaint" on email by the victim of a sexual assault in one of its hotels - carried out by a man given the key card to her room - soon after the attack, despite the boss saying she only found out years later.

Kyran Smith entered the woman's room at a hotel in Maidenhead, Berkshire, in December 2022 and was jailed in February this year.

On Sunday, Jo Boydell said she had only become aware of the attack during Smith's trial, which began in November 2025.

When the BBC asked Travelodge about the victim's email, sent in January 2023 one month after the assault, Boydell said it had been "handled on my behalf" and there had been "serious failures".

Smith, from Staines, Surrey, gained access to the woman's hotel room after lying to hotel staff that he was her boyfriend, and was jailed for seven-and-a-half years.

In the email sent to Boydell's Travelodge email address, and seen by the BBC, the victim wrote in detail in January 2023 about what had happened and the conversations that she had had with reception staff minutes after she woke up to Smith sexually assaulting her in her bed.

'In tears'

"I was in tears, shock and absolutely appalled this happened," she wrote in the email, marked "serious complaint" and which Travelodge does not deny it received.

During Sunday's interview, Boydell told the BBC: "The first time I became aware of this was after the court reported the incident, which is completely unacceptable and also shows there are issues with the way we handled the case."

She also apologised, as she has done in previous statements, to the victim, both for the incident and how it was handled.

In the weeks following the attack, staff from the chief executive's office offered the victim a £30 refund, an offer that the victim said was "insulting".

Following the victim speaking with the BBC, Travelodge has committed to an independent review of their room security policies and has also made immediate changes to their door key policies, so that now the company will check with someone in the room before a new keycard is issued.

The firm has said it is also investigating more reports of strangers accessing rooms.

In a statement, Boydell said on Wednesday: "I am deeply sorry for the distress experienced by the survivor and I apologise for our handling of what happened to her.

"I have been very clear there were serious failures in our handling of every aspect of our response to her.

"The email sent by the survivor in January 2023 was handled on my behalf and I am clear this should never have happened."

She added: "Our response was deeply inappropriate and our processes did not work as they should have done in this instance because what happened was not escalated to me.

"We have conducted an internal review and made immediate changes to both our room security processes for additional key cards and our review and escalation processes since I became aware of what happened."

"I have commissioned an independent review led by a leading KC which is looking at every aspect of our handling of this case."

Nearly 100 MPs signed a letter calling for Boydell to meet with MPs to discuss the incident and safety at the company.

The prime minister also wrote directly to her calling for her to meet with MPs.

A search is under way for a gunman after a shooting left a man with potentially life-changing injuries.

Police said they were called to reports a gun had been fired at a car in Speedwell Road, Bristol, at 13:47 BST. A man in his 20s suffered serious injuries and was taken to hospital.

Avon and Somerset Police said the suspect fled the scene on a black and grey electric bike in the direction of Soundwell.

Four schools in the area were placed into precautionary lockdowns while the incident unfolded but have since begun to allow pupils to return home.

Police described the gunman as white, in his late teens or early 20s, of slim build, and about 1.8m (6ft) tall.

He was wearing a grey hoodie, black trousers, and a balaclava.

Ch Insp James Clements acknowledged the incident was "incredibly concerning" for people in the area and said police had deployed "significant resources" to find the gunman.

"We're doing everything we can to identify this person and arrest him," he added.

Clements said there would be a significant police presence in the area over the coming days.

"Our neighbourhood officers fully recognise how concerning this incident is and if you have any concerns I would urge you to speak to them," he added.

Police have also appealed for any witnesses to come forward.

Schools locked down

The incident saw Bristol Brunel Academy, Two Mile Hill Primary and Chester Park Infant and Junior schools placed on precutionary lockdowns.

In a statement, Two Mile Hill Primary said: "We understand that this is very close to the end of the school day and may cause inconvenience, however, the safety and security of our pupils and wider community is our highest priority."

The father of a Year 6 pupil at Two Mile Hill said while it was a "pain" waiting outside, the school had kept parents updated and the children were "happy inside playing".

"It's not a nice situation for anyone," he added.

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Of all the warnings in President Trump's arsenal, quitting the Nato military alliance is among those he's wielded the most.

Now he's doing it again.

Asked by Britain's Telegraph newspaper if he is reconsidering US membership of Nato, he said: "Oh yes… I would say [it's] beyond reconsideration" – fuming again that his partners weren't joining America's military operations, alongside Israel, against Iran.

"I just think it should be automatic," he emphasised in his remarks to the paper.

Trump's invective underlines again his misunderstanding of how this 32-member alliance works.

Nato's Article 5 does commit it to collective defence. An attack against one member is deemed to be an attack against all but invoking this principle requires a consensus. And the 1949 treaty only referred to crises in Europe and North America.

One ally after another has held back from joining a war they weren't consulted on, given they still don't understand its goals in the face of mixed messaging from the Trump administration.

Article 5 has only been triggered once, in the wake of the September 11th attacks on the US in 2001.

Trump also referenced Ukraine in the Telegraph, saying: "We've been there automatically, including Ukraine."

After Russia's audacious full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the then-US President Joe Biden did take a leading role in shaping the response of individual Western governments because he believed President Putin's actions threatened them all.

Nato, as an alliance, provided assistance but avoided the dangerous prospect of becoming directly involved as a party to this conflict.

Even before Trump entered the White House in 2017, he repeatedly dismissed Nato as a "paper tiger," described it as "obsolete", and said that it was "costing a fortune" for the US.

This year, he's mocked the alliance, saying Russia would have occupied all of Ukraine if the US had not been Nato's enforcer.

Trump almost walked out in early 2019, during his first term in office.

"We saw clear signs that Trump was preparing to act on his threat," the former Nato Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg wrote in his recent memoir, On my Watch.

Stoltenberg recounted how he went on Fox News and credited Trump with pressuring Nato allies to increase their military spending.

In his telling, Trump immediately acknowledged that praise on social media and then didn't make the speech the White House had reportedly drafted for a US pullout.

At the centre of Trump's concerns was the 2014 agreement that countries should spend 2% of their GDP on defence; at the time, it was only described as a "guideline".

Military spending has ramped up significantly by almost all Nato members, partly in response to Trump's threats, partly because of Russia's growing menace.

This new crisis will again strengthen the resolve of European countries and Canada to bolster their own defences and depend on themselves for their own security. But there's still that cold hard fact that the might of the US military matters - immensely.

The US's contribution now makes up some 62% of Nato's budget and the Pentagon has assets and intelligence capabilities others still can't match.

This time, his Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who calls himself a former supporter of the alliance, has also chimed in.

"I think there's no doubt, unfortunately, after this conflict is concluded we are going to have to re-examine that relationship," he told Fox News.

Referring to US bases in Europe he said not using them "to defend America's interests" meant "Nato is a one-way street."

Britain initially refused access to US warplanes but later changed tack, saying bases could be used for "defensive operations." That delay continues to be derided by Trump and his secretary of defence, the self-styled Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth. They've repeatedly taunted Prime Minister Starmer as being "no Churchill" – a reference to Britain's leader during the Second World War.

On Tuesday, Italy denied US aircraft permission to land as they were en route to the Middle East for combat operations. Spain has closed its airspace to US planes conducting missions against Iran.

Rubio added it was "ultimately" up to the President to decide this issue.

But it's not his alone.

The US Congress voted at the end of 2023 to prohibit the president from unilaterally withdrawing from Nato without the approval of a two-thirds Senate majority or an act of Congress.

Nato leaders, and most of all its current secretary general Mark Rutte, will need to spend time again trying to convince and cajole Trump that it's in his interest, and America's, to stay.

Rutte, like Stoltenberg, is called the "Trump whisperer" for his efforts in public, and private, to keep the unpredictable president on side. Rutte, the former Dutch leader armed with his toolbox of praise, is widely seen as having played a significant role in pulling Trump back from the brink in his threats to "take" Greenland – a semi-autonomous territory of fellow Nato member Denmark - earlier this year.

But Rutte has also come under fire from other Nato states for going too far with his staunch support for a war against Iran he said Trump was doing "to make the whole world safe."

But his top priority is keeping his 77-year-old coalition intact as it confronts growing threats in Ukraine, the Middle East – and the White House.

Relatives of the 57 people who died in Greece's worst ever train disaster crowded into a courtroom on Wednesday, demanding justice for the victims.

The trial had already been postponed once because of the chaotic start last week.

Most of the victims of the crash three years ago were students, killed when their intercity service from Athens to Thessaloniki smashed head-on into a goods train on the same line near Tempi in the centre of the country.

Some of the victims are thought to have burnt to death after surviving the initial collision.

Many relatives were unable to get into the courtroom in the central town of Larisa last week, and the situation was little different when it resumed on Wednesday.

Police officers allowed in only participants who were legally scheduled to attend.

Some relatives complained that two rows of seats had been taken up by police, while others said they still could not witness proceedings clearly enough.

Defence lawyer Zoe Konstantopoulou appealed for the proceedings to be filmed as access for families had been restricted.

The February 2023 disaster is widely known in Greece as the "Tempi crime" - with many arguing it encapsulates negligence and corruption at the heart of the state.

Thirty-six people are on trial in a case that is expected to hear from 350 witnesses and set to last years.

Among those killed was 20-year-old Anastasia Plakias, a student at the University of Thessaloniki.

She, like so many other victims, was travelling back to lectures in the northern city after spending a public holiday with her family.

In the weeks after the crash, her grieving father Dimitris told the BBC he would always be proud of his daughter who "only had love to give".

He said: "We relatives call it a state assassination of our children, and all the people who were aboard that train… in which European country could this be possible?"

Anastasia had been travelling with her 20-year-old twin cousins, Thomi and Chrysa, who were also killed.

Thirty-three of the defendants face up to life in prison if convicted.

Among those in the dock is a station master who failed - along with everyone else - to spot that the two trains had been travelling towards each other on the same line for 10 minutes.

Other railway officials are also on trial along with two Italian former employees of the trains' parent company, Ferrovie dello Stato.

The Tempi disaster provoked widespread anger and protest across Greece.

The railway network had not made use of EU funding intended to improve safety. The head of the European Public Prosecutor's Office, Laura Kovesi, later said the collision could have been avoided if the money had been spent on modernising the signalling system in time.

Trade unions in Greece had warned that some sort of catastrophe on the railway network was waiting to happen.

To the amazement of some, the crash site was bulldozed within days, which experts say destroyed potentially crucial evidence.

This fuelled claims of a cover-up, which authorities have denied.

Despite the public outcry, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis was re-elected soon after the disaster and has survived two related no-confidence votes in parliament.

Mitsotakis apologised to the families of the victims in the days after the crash and has asked repeatedly for public patience so that justice can take its course.

To the frustration of many campaigners, no politician is among those on trial.

The case is taking place in a remodelled conference hall that cost hundreds of thousands of euros and Mitsotakis has said it is "among the most functional and modern in Europe".

More than 60,000 pages on evidence is to be presented and 200 lawyers are involved in the case, but proceedings descended into chaos on 23 March when the courtroom became overcrowded.

Survivors of the disaster and family members of the deceased were forced to sit in the seats of the accused, most of whom were absent.

Lawyers argued health and safety regulations were being violated.

Maria Karystianou, who lost her 19-year-old daughter Marthi, said relatives had been "packed like sardines" and the spectacle was "an absolute disgrace".

Across the world on Wednesday night, millions of people will tune in to watch Donald Trump deliver a primetime update on the war in Iran. Many will hope for some insight on how the war ends and what might come after.

The Trump administration has, so far, given little clue as to what prompted the hastily-arranged remarks, or whether they will mark the beginning of the end of the conflict or a potentially bloody escalation.

This ambiguity is, at least partly, by design. Trump often changes course or leaves his thinking a mystery to all but a small inner circle of supporters, which he has acknowledged leaves friend and foe alike wondering about his next move.

The president also knows that the address comes at a critical time in his presidency and amid mounting domestic pressure to find a way out of the conflict.

Poll after poll has shown that Americans have little appetite for a protracted conflict in Iran, particularly if it involves the prospect of US soldiers on Iranian soil.

A Reuters poll released this week, for example, found that two-third of Americans believe the US should work to swiftly wrap up its involvement in the war, even if the administration's stated military objections are not fully accomplished.

Closer to home, many Americans are increasingly wary of higher prices at the petrol pump, which this week crossed the average of $4 a gallon for the first time in years.

For a president who, pre-war, often pointed to lower petrol prices as a mark of success, this trend represents a challenge.

Imran Bayoumi, a geostrategy expert with the Atlantic Council in Washington DC and former policy adviser to the defence department, told the BBC that the "deep domestic unpopularity" of the war, along with the economic fall-out, "both pose a problem ahead of midterm elections" if the war were to drag on.

The US president will also likely present his view on how the conflict - or at least US involvement in it - will come to a close.

This has shifted repeatedly, from initial calls for an "unconditional" Iranian surrender to a potential negotiated agreement. Just yesterday, he abruptly shifted course, saying that the war could end in "two to three" weeks even without any deal.

This morning, he again seemed to shift, posting on Truth Social that Iran's "much less radicalised" president had asked the US for a ceasefire, but that the US would not consider it until the Strait of Hormuz is open.

Until then, Trump promised, the US will be "blasting Iran into oblivion, or as they say, back to the Stone Ages".

According to Bayoumi, what constitutes victory for Trump is "loosely defined", which provides the president with some flexibility.

"Not having clearly defined goals going into the conflict allows Trump to declare victory at any time," he said. "[He] has mentioned that he's halted the nuclear threat from Iran, but it's not clear he actually has."

While on a tactical level the US-Israeli operation has been successful in severely degrading Iran's military, Trump's assertion that the war is winding down soon leaves a very narrow window for more complex military options, such as seizing control of Iran's highly-enriched uranium or opening the Strait.

On the latter point, we are likely to hear the president dismiss the Nato alliance as one that he believes has proven itself unwilling to help advance US interests.

What he says tonight will be carefully scrutinised by US allies and adversaries, some of whom will wonder whether it constitutes a ruse.

In Tehran, the country's remaining leadership will remember that Trump had publicly endorsed negotiations he said were ongoing and positive nearly until the moment US bombers struck Iranian nuclear facilities during Operation Midnight Hammer.

Prosecutors are providing "early investigative advice" to police forces as they carry out inquiries into Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor and Lord Peter Mandelson's links to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

A spokesperson for the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said: "We can confirm that we are now providing early investigative advice to the Metropolitan Police Service regarding the force's investigation into a 72-year-old man and will continue to liaise as requested.

"We can now also confirm that we are providing early investigative advice to Thames Valley Police in relation to a 66-year-old man."

Mountbatten-Windsor and Lord Mandelson have separately been arrested on suspicion of misconduct in public office over their connections to the paedophile and have both since been released under investigation.

Mountbatten-Windsor has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing in relation to Epstein.

Lord Mandelson has repeatedly let it be known that he believes he has not acted criminally.

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Councillors have approved plans by fashion designer Stella McCartney and her husband Alasdhair Willis for a clifftop home in the Highlands.

The proposals for a site on Loch Ailort, a sea loch west of Fort William, had received more than 65 objections.

Opponents raised concerns about the property's size, design and impacts on the landscape and wildlife.

A spokesperson for the couple said the stone walls and turfed roof would make it barely visible, and that the energy efficient house would be used as a "family, forever home".

McCartney and Willis' proposed site is in an area at Roshven on a rocky headland called Commando Rock which historically was used for military training.

A previous owner of the land had started work on a house in the early 2000s, but later abandoned the project leaving some low walls.

The couple's project overlaps some of the previous site, and avoids removing pine trees, which had been a cause of some objections.

Renewable energy would provide power to the new house.

McCartney, daughter of former Beatle Sir Paul McCartney, has established herself as one of the world's leading fashion designers.

She was awarded a CBE in recognition of her services to fashion and sustainability in 2022.

Willis is a creative director at clothing brand Adidas.

Highland Council's south planning applications committee approved the plans on Wednesday, subject to a number of conditions.

They included measures to mitigate the impact of external lighting on the landscape due to the site's elevated position.

There was also a requirement that sewage and surface water drainage be handled away from the site's cliff edge.

A licence is also required from Scotland's nature body, NatureScot, due to the presence of otters in the area.

'Sympathetically designed'

Fort William and Ardnamurchan Green Party councillor Kate Willis asked that "strong" conditions be placed on the project.

But her request for a decision on the application to be deferred to allow for a site visit was not supported by other councillors.

Highland Independent councillor Thomas MacLennan said the property would sit "more comfortably" in the landscape than the previously consented property.

A spokesperson said the couple had sought to deliver a "highly sustainable home that has been sympathetically designed".

They said the property would use natural Scottish stone and have a turfed roof.

The spokesperson added: "It will be secluded and barely visible due to the site's contours, including views from the water.

"Unlike many of the homes in the area, this is not a holiday home; it is a house that the family will live in, our forever home.

"We look forward to continuing to engage with the local community as we progress our development and when we move into our new home."