A new vote is being held in the US House of Representatives among indications of a government shutdown beginning at midnight on Saturday. Faced with a rebellion by fellow hard-line Republicans, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy is trying to secure agreement on a temporary 45-day respite. It’s not clear if the measure – stripped aid to […]

Female Israeli soldiers are to be banned from serving as high security prison guards after allegations of sex with a Palestinian inmate. Israeli media say a soldier admitted to physical intimacy with a Palestinian man said to have carried out a deadly attack on Israeli civilians. The woman is thought to have been on military […]

Superb New Zealand scored an incredible 14 tries and hit 96 points against Italy in Pool A to move to the cusp of the World Cup quarter-finals. Knowing a defeat would see them eliminated, the All Blacks raced into a pulsating 49-3 half-time lead. They ultimately ran out 96-17 victors with scrum-half Aaron Smith scoring […]

At least 50 people have been killed and more than 50 injured in a suicide attack in Pakistan, police say. The blast happened near a mosque in the southwestern province of Balochistan on Friday as people gathered to celebrate the birth of the Prophet Muhammad. Officials in Balochistan have declared a state of emergency. No […]

House Republicans have branded the first day of their impeachment inquiry against Joe Biden a success, saying they justified their case. But expert witnesses called by Republicans cautioned there was not yet enough proof for impeachment. Thursday’s hearing was dominated by the business dealings of the president’s son, Hunter, who Republicans allege was selling access […]

Four of six women rescued from the back of a lorry in France on Wednesday must leave the country within 30 days, a French public prosecutor said. The four Vietnamese and two Iraqi women were found by police after getting into the lorry, which they believed was heading for the UK. One of the women […]

The actor Sir Michael Gambon has died aged 82, his family has said. He was best known for playing Professor Albus Dumbledore in six of the eight Harry Potter films. The Dublin-born star worked in TV, film, theatre and radio over his six-decade career. He won four Baftas. His widow Lady Gambon and son Fergus […]

At least 11 people have been killed after heavy rain and winds hit South Africa’s Western Cape province, including Cape Town, over the weekend leaving a trail of destruction. Authorities warn that the death toll may rise as the floodwater subsides. The destructive weather flooded homes, tore off roofs, destroyed crops and damaged roads and […]

Donald Trump “repeatedly” misrepresented his wealth by hundreds of millions of dollars to banks and insurers, a New York judge has ruled. The decision resolves the key claim made by New York’s attorney general in her civil lawsuit against the former president. “The documents here clearly contain fraudulent valuations that defendants used in business,” the […]

At least 100 people have died and 150 others injured after a fire broke out at a wedding in northern Iraq, state media has reported. The bride and the groom are reported to be among the victims, according to local media. The fire happened in the district of Al-Hamdaniya in Iraq’s northern Nineveh province late […]

Police across South America are searching for the leader of a Venezuelan gang who escaped from the luxurious prison which he controlled, shortly before it was raided. When 11,000 soldiers and police entered the inmate-run Tocorón jail in Venezuela on Wednesday, Héctor Guerrero Flores was nowhere to be found. Under Guerrero Flores’s rule, Tocoron came […]

At nine years old, skateboarder Mazel Alegado has the world at her feet. The youngest member of the Philippines team at the Asian Games – and thought to be the youngest competitor at the entire event – finished seventh in the women’s park final in Hangzhou, China. Now the United States resident has her eyes […]

Zambia’s former President Edgar Lungu has been warned against jogging in public, as police describe his weekly workouts as “political activism”. His Saturday runs with ordinary members of the public and supporters of his Patriotic Front (PF) party have been attracting a lot of attention. Lungu has been told to seek police approval for future […]

Chances of India’s Moon lander waking up after a freezing cold lunar night are “dimming with each passing hour”, space scientists from the country have told the BBC. But they said that they would keep trying until the end of the lunar day. A day and night on the Moon

Dusty samples from the “most dangerous known rock in the Solar System” have been brought to Earth. The American space agency Nasa landed the materials in a capsule that came down in the West Desert of Utah state. The samples had been scooped up from the surface of asteroid Bennu in 2020 by the Osiris-Rex […]

A seven-year mission to study what has been described as the most dangerous rock in the Solar System is about to reach its dramatic conclusion. The Osiris-Rex spacecraft is bringing home the “soil” samples it grabbed from the surface of asteroid Bennu. These dusty materials will be dropped off by the Nasa probe as it […]

A sleepy town in southern Spain is in shock after it emerged that AI-generated naked images of young local girls had been circulating on social media without their knowledge. The pictures were created using photos of the targeted girls fully clothed, many of them taken from their own social media accounts. These were then processed […]

A veteran US senator has temporarily stepped down as head of the chamber’s powerful foreign relations committee as he battles bribery charges. Justice department prosecutors allege Robert Menendez and his wife accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars in exchange for aid to Egypt’s government. The couple have denied the charges. The embattled senator has rejected […]

France are on the brink of reaching the World Cup quarter-finals after claiming their biggest-ever win with a 96-0 victory over Namibia in Pool A. Damian Penaud scored a hat-trick, while Jonathan Danty, Charles Ollivon and Louis Bielle-Biarry all scored twice. Antoine Dupont, Thibaud Flament, Baptiste Couilloud and Melvyn Jaminet also crossed before a penalty […]

The lower house of the Indian parliament has passed a bill guaranteeing a third of seats for women in the parliament and state assemblies. First proposed in 1996, the bill had been pending for decades amid opposition from some political parties. On Wednesday, the Lok Sabha passed it with near unanimity after hours of fierce […]

Former staff and users tell the BBC the app's algorithm has encouraged harmful real-life behaviour.