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‘Extraordinary’ golden lamb’s head pillaged in 1874 from what is now Ghana remains hidden in officers’ mess

The Royal Artillery is facing criticism after it emerged they are refusing public access to an “extraordinary object” looted by the British army in the 19th century from the Asante people in modern-day Ghana.

The glistening golden ram’s head would seemingly be worthy of any museum, but it remains hidden within the regiment’s mess at Larkhill in Wiltshire.

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Bellarmine Chatunga Mugabe, known for lavish lifestyle, also accused of theft and being illegal immigrant after man allegedly shot in back

A son of the late Zimbabwean president Robert Mugabe has been charged with attempted murder after a 23-year-old man was allegedly shot in the back on 19 February in an upmarket area of Johannesburg.

Bellarmine Chatunga Mugabe, 28, appeared in court on Monday for a brief hearing alongside co-accused Tobias Mugabe Matonhodze. Mugabe’s lawyer Sinenhlanhla Mnguni declined to comment when asked by reporters whether the two men were related. Mnguni said he would request bail for his clients at the next hearing on 3 March.

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Report details harrowing 18-month occupation of North Darfur capital, showing destruction aimed at ethnic communities

The siege and capture of the Sudanese city of El Fasher by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces group last October bore “the hallmarks of genocide”, a UN-mandated fact-finding mission has said.

In a report detailing the harrowing 18-month occupation of the capital of North Darfur, investigators concluded that the RSF and allied militias deliberately inflicted conditions calculated to bring about the physical destruction of the Zaghawa and Fur ethnic communities.

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Intelligence findings read to parliament say ‘rogue’ agencies and individuals recruiting Kenyan nationals to frontline

More than 1,000 Kenyans have been lured to fight for Russia in its war with Ukraine, according to an intelligence report to the Kenyan parliament that highlights the scale of a Russian operation taking African men to the frontline.

The majority leader of Kenya’s national assembly, Kimani Ichung’wah, said “rogue recruitment agencies and individuals in Kenya” were continuing to send Kenyan nationals to fight in the conflict, as he read MPs the summary of an investigation by Kenya’s National Intelligence Service.

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Without AI you will be a ‘weaker and poorer nation’, says former UK chancellor two months into job at US firm

The former chancellor George Osborne has said countries that do not embrace the kind of powerful AI systems made by his new employer, OpenAI, risk “Fomo” and could be left weaker and poorer.

Osborne, who is two months into a job as head of the $500bn San Francisco AI company’s “for countries” programme, told leaders gathered for the AI Impact summit in Delhi: “Don’t be left behind.” He said that without AI rollouts they could end up with a workforce “less willing to stay put” because they might want to seek AI-enabled fortunes elsewhere.

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Chiquinho and Domingos Brazão accused of ordering shooting of Marielle Franco and her driver in 2018

Brazil’s supreme court has opened the trial of politicians accused of ordering the 2018 murder of Rio de Janeiro councillor Marielle Franco, a case that exposed deep ties between politics and organised crime in the city.

Franco, an activist who grew up in a favela and became an outspoken critic of Rio’s powerful militia groups, was 38 when she was shot dead in the city centre alongside her driver, Anderson Gomes.

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Mexico’s president says there is ‘no risk’ for those visiting for Fifa games after military killed drug lord ‘El Mencho’

• Violence in Mexico after military kills notorious drug cartel boss – a visual guide

Mexico’s president, Claudia Sheinbaum, has said that there is “no risk” for visitors coming to Fifa World Cup games scheduled to be held in the country, after the death of a top cartel boss triggered a wave of retaliatory violence from gunmen who blocked roads and attacked security forces across the country.

The Mexican military attempted to detain “El Mencho”, the leader of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, in a dawn raid on Sunday, leading to a firefight in which he was fatally wounded, before dying while being airlifted to hospital.

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Killing of Jalisco New Generation Cartel leader sparks wave of violence across western Mexico

• Analysis: Mexico faces uphill battle to appease kingpin Trump

• Who was El Mencho?

Mexican authorities tracked down and killed “El Mencho”, one of the world’s most wanted drug traffickers, by following a romantic partner to his safe house near a picturesque mountain town, the country’s defence secretary has revealed.

In a press conference, officials provided the first details about the operation that led to the death of the leader of Mexico’s most powerful organised crime group, the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG).

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Company had suspended account of Tumbler Ridge shooter in June 2025 over ‘furtherance of violent activities’

Canada’s artificial intelligence minister says he has summoned representatives from the technology company OpenAI after the company declined to alert police after suspending the account of a user who became the perpetrator of one of the country’s worst-ever school shootings.

Evan Solomon says he is “deeply disturbed” by reports that the company, which operates the popular ChatGPT chatbot, suspended the account of Jesse Van Rootselaar over the “furtherance of violent activities” in June 2025 but did not reach out to Canadian law enforcement.

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Trump tells Mexico to ‘step up’ effort to combat cartels even after military operation kills drug lord known as ‘El Mencho’

• Violence in Mexico after military kills notorious drug cartel boss – a visual guide

With schools still closed, flights cancelled and the charred carcasses of buses smouldering on streets across the country, Mexico was still reeling from the cartel backlash prompted by the killing of cartel kingpin Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, also known as “El Mencho”.

Defense minister, Ricardo Trevilla Trejo, was moved almost to tears on Monday as he offered his condolences to the families of soldiers felled in the operation to kill the country’s most-wanted drug lord. Mexican military personnel, he said, “fulfilled their mission”.

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Not enough support for freed victims, say aid agencies, with growing numbers sleeping on the streets, unable to travel home without passports or money

Charities and aid workers have called for urgent international government support for victims of south-east Asia’s deadly scam compounds, following a damning report by Amnesty International.

The numbers of survivors of cyberscam “farms” left destitute and abandoned on the city streets of Cambodia and Myanmar is an “international crisis”, according to the research published in January.

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Booking system freezes and screens crash amid rush of fans trying to secure tickets to 21 March free concert

Tickets for BTS’s comeback concert in central Seoul were snapped up almost immediately on Monday night, with authorities expecting an estimated 260,000 fans to descend for the K-pop group’s first full performance in nearly four years.

At one point, more than 100,000 people flooded the booking website when sales opened at 8pm for the free concert at Gwanghwamun square on 21 March, causing screens to crash and booking systems to freeze.

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China has opposed the ‘smearing of its nuclear policy’ while insisting Beijing would not ‘engage in any nuclear arms race’

The US has accused China of dramatically expanding its nuclear arsenal, while doubling down on claims that Beijing had conducted secret nuclear tests.

Washington said the lapsing of New Start – the last treaty between top nuclear powers the US and Russia – earlier this month presented the possibility of striking a “better agreement” that included Beijing.

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Ex-president, accused of crimes against humanity, selected targets and promised immunity for death squad members, prosecutor says

Rodrigo Duterte, the former president of the Philippines, was “at the very heart” of brutal anti-drugs campaigns that led to the killing of thousands of people, prosecutors at the international criminal court (ICC) have argued, as they called for charges against him to proceed to trial.

Duterte, 80, who was arrested in Manila last year and flown to The Hague, is facing three counts of crimes against humanity over campaigns against drug users and dealers during his presidency, and his earlier tenure as mayor of the city of Davao.

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Footage of Punch, a seven-month-old Japanese macaque, has gone viral around the world after he was rejected by his mother and formed a bond with a soft toy

A baby monkey in Japan has captured hearts around the world after videos of him being bullied by other monkeys and rejected by his mother went viral last week.

Punch, a Japanese macaque, was born last July at Ichikawa zoo. He has drawn international attention after zookeepers gave him a stuffed orangutan toy after he was abandoned by his mother.

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Human remains suspected of being those of Baghsarian were found on Tuesday morning near a golf club in Pitt Town, on Sydney’s northwest fringe

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Two men have been arrested “in relation to the alleged kidnapping and murder of 85-year-old Chris Baghsarian”, police have said.

NSW police said a man, 29, was arrested in Kenthurst and a man, 24, was arrested in Castle Hill. They were taken to Riverstone police station as inquiries continued. No charges had been laid as of Wednesday morning.

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More on the discovery of human remains yesterday

Police believe the body of missing 85-year-old Chris Baghsarian could have been dumped on Sydney’s outskirts just 40 hours after he was kidnapped in a case of mistaken identity.

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Rolling coverage of the latest economic and financial news

While many exporters around the world cheered when the supreme court ruled against Trump’s “reciprocal” tariffs last week, the unintended consequence could be that the trade war escalates further, says Neil Wilson at the broker Saxo Markets.

Trump warned countries not to ‘play games’ and threatened ‘a much higher tariff’ than they had agreed to...the unintended consequence of the Supreme Court ruling could be an escalatory trade war that markets hadn’t anticipated. Or as Trump put it the Supreme Court had ‘unwittingly’ handed him ‘far more powers and strength’ to levy fresh tariffs than before the ruling.

… The White House insists it’s working on a 15% levy at a later date, which gives the president a degree of optionality, but this is evolving into a far messier situation than we had a week ago.

We can all agree that the US is not facing a ⁠balance of payments crisis, which is when countries experience an exorbitant increase in international borrowing costs and lose access to financial markets.

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Daly River region is home to threatened species such as the ghost bat, Gouldian finch, pig-nosed turtle and red goshawk

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The environment minister, Murray Watt, has given the green light for the bulldozing of nearly 3,000 hectares of tropical savanna in the Northern Territory without an assessment under Australia’s nature laws.

Top End Pastoral Company’s development would clear 2,723 hectares of woodland – an area 10 times the size of Sydney’s CBD – on Claravale farm and station in the Daly River region for crops, including sorghum and cotton.

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Exclusive: State parliament’s inquiry will propose a crackdown amid concerns over injuries and deaths

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Children should be banned from riding ebikes and e-scooters until they turn 16 and then require a driver’s licence to use one, a Queensland parliamentary inquiry will recommend.

The state parliament’s inquiry into e-mobility safety and use is expected to finish its report this week, more than a month early.

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Sammy Azdoufal alerted New York-based outlet the Verge after he took control of DJI Romo devices around the world

A Spanish software engineer reportedly contacted a New York-based tech outlet recently to reveal he had remotely taken control of about 7,000 vacuums worldwide, in the process shedding light on a broad vulnerability with smart products, according to a cybersecurity expert.

The Verge reported that the situation came to light when Sammy Azdoufal was trying to reverse-engineer his new DJI Romo vacuum so that he could control it with his Playstation 5 gamepad.

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The Paris-born artist reinvented the synthesizer through meditative and feedback-drenched sonic explorations

The French composer and musique concrète pioneer Éliane Radigue has died at the age of 94.

“It is with immense sadness that we learn of the passing of Éliane Radigue at the age of 94,” the Paris-based experimental music center INA GRM posted on Instagram. “A major figure in musical creation has left us.”

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Laurence des Cars steps down days after parliamentary inquiry called Paris museum a ‘state within a state’

The president of the Louvre in Paris has resigned, four months after a gang of thieves broke into the museum’s Apollo gallery and made off with €88m (£76m) of Napoleonic jewellery in France’s most dramatic heist in decades.

Laurence des Cars, who had offered to step down in the immediate aftermath of the burglary, tendered her resignation to Emmanuel Macron on Tuesday in what the French president called “an act of responsibility”, the Elysée Palace said.

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Ursula von der Leyen talks up prospect of €90bn loan but appears cautious on timetable for Ukraine joining bloc

Zelenskyy says “we must be just as determined and strong as we were when the invasion began,” as “the threat hasn’t become smaller.”

He says Europe can only respond to this war working together with the US, even as he remarks it “is not an easy task to maintain transatlantic unity and cooperation in the current conditions.”

“So there must be no place in the free world for Russian oil, for Russian tankers, Russian banks, Russian sanctions …, schemes, or for any Russian war criminals. The time has come to fully ban all participants in Russia’s aggression from entire Europe.”

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Charles Kushner, father of president’s son-in-law Jared, failed to show up to meeting to explain US comments relating to death of far-right activist

Donald Trump’s envoy to Paris has called France’s foreign minister and pledged not to interfere in the country’s domestic affairs, a day after he was barred from talking to government officials for failing to attend a formal meeting at the ministry.

The foreign ministry said on Monday that Charles Kushner would not be permitted to carry out his diplomatic duties until he had explained his refusal to comply with the summons over US comments about the killing of a far-right activist in France.

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Secretary of state’s address comes as US deploys largest force of aircraft and warships to Middle East since 2003

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Marco Rubio will deliver a rare briefing to top US lawmakers on Iran at the White House on Tuesday as Washington deploys its largest force of aircraft and warships to the Middle East since the 2003 buildup to the Iraq war.

The audience for the secretary of state’s briefing is reported to include the so-called “gang of eight”, which includes the senior lawmakers from both parties in the House and Senate, as well as the chairs and ranking members of the House and Senate intelligence committees.

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Campus clashes provide uneasy backdrop to third round of talks on nuclear programme in Geneva

Plainclothes police and security forces, many of them armed, have tried to flood Iran’s remaining open universities in an attempt to crush a fourth day of student protests against the supreme leader, Ali Khamenei.

Running battles were reported on some campuses, with videos showing fistfights between the Basji state-backed militia and students at the University of Science and Technology in Tehran. Pick-up trucks with machine-guns were photographed parked outside the University of Tehran, with demonstrations also in Mashhad.

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Exclusive: Some of the 11 mothers detained in Kurdish-controlled al-Roj camp say they want Australian government to repatriate children at any cost

• Families in convoy from Syrian camp warned they would be attacked unless they turned around

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Australian women detained in north-east Syria over ties to Islamic State fighters said they would accept separation from their children if it meant the children could return to Australia.

Some of the 11 women held in Kurdish-controlled al-Roj camp said on Monday that they wanted the Australian government to repatriate their children at any cost, even if it meant placing children in the hands of relatives at home while they stayed behind in the camp.

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Exclusive: Government forces issued threat because Australian government failed to coordinate with them, official says

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Syrian government officials warned a convoy of Australian families linked to Islamic State fighters that they would be fired upon if they continued towards Damascus last week, a Kurdish official said.

A group of 34 Australian women and children, assisted by their relatives, left al-Roj detention camp on Monday 16 February under a Kurdish military escort, with the aim of reaching Damascus before flying to Australia.

But about 50km away from the camp, Kurdish security forces received a call from the government in Damascus, telling them that the convoy would be “struck” if they tried to reach territory controlled by Syrian government forces. Kurdish forces de-facto control much of north-east Syria, including the area by the Iraqi border where al-Roj is located, and the convoy needed to “cross” a checkpoint controlled by the Syrian government to reach Damascus.

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Exclusive: Trump’s decision will be driven by envoys’ judgment on whether Iran is stalling on a nuclear deal

Donald Trump’s decision to order airstrikes against Iran will hinge in part on the judgment of Trump’s special envoys, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, about whether Tehran is stalling over a deal to relinquish its capacity to produce nuclear weapons, according to people familiar with the matter.

The president has not made a final determination on any strikes, as the administration prepares for Iran to send its latest proposal this week, ahead of what officials have described as a last-ditch round of negotiations scheduled for Thursday in Geneva.

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Dominic Ethan Stewart was among 19 killed when vehicle veered off road and plunged down mountainside

Tributes have been paid to a young British hiker who was among 19 people killed when a packed passenger bus veered off a treacherous stretch of road and plunged 200 metres down a steep mountainside in Nepal.

Twenty-five others were injured in the pre-dawn crash in the Himalayan foothills on Monday. The bus was carrying 44 people, including a number of tourists.

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Motorway stretch plays music as a safety feature but those close to it say ‘intrusive’ noise is constant and distressing

Residents of one of India’s most upmarket neighbourhoods say the country’s first “musical road” has turned their daily lives into a nightmare soundtrack.

A stretch of Mumbai’s recently opened Coastal Road seafront expressway has been engineered to play the pulsating Oscar-winning tune Jai Ho from the movie Slumdog Millionaire when vehicles drive on it at lower speeds.

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‘Intelligence-based, selective operations’ carried out against Pakistani Taliban camps, says information ministry

Pakistan launched multiple airstrikes on Saturday night targeting militants in neighbouring Afghanistan, where the government reported children were among dozens of people killed and wounded.

Islamabad did not say precisely where the strikes were carried out or provide other details.

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Google, Anthropic and OpenAI bosses to mingle with global south leaders wrestling for control over technology

Silicon Valley tech billionaires will land in Delhi this week for an AI summit hosted by India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, where leaders of the global south will wrestle for control over the fast-developing technology.

During the week-long AI Impact Summit, attended by thousands of tech executives, government officials and AI safety experts, tech companies valued at trillions of dollars will rub along with leaders of countries such as Kenya and Indonesia, where average wages dip well below $1,000 a month.

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Many voice hope that moment will mark move away from repression and unrest and a chance to revive economy

Bangladesh’s new prime minister has been sworn in, sealing a dramatic comeback for the Bangladesh Nationalist party (BNP) and formally closing the turbulent chapter that toppled Sheikh Hasina in 2024.

The swearing-in of Tarique Rahman restored an elected government after 18 months of caretaker rule led by the Nobel peace prize laureate Muhammad Yunus.

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Former Labour grandee’s arrest over his links to Epstein came after Met police informed he was preparing to fly to British Virgin Islands

Peter Mandelson condemned the police for his arrest on Monday and claimed he was only taken into custody because detectives had wrongly believed he was about to flee the country.

In a remarkable rebuke to the Metropolitan police, lawyers for the former peer challenged the force to provide the evidence to justify their actions, insisting it was prompted by a “baseless” suggestion that he was planning to move abroad.

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Former US ambassador issues statement via lawyers saying his priority is to cooperate with police and clear his name

Keir Starmer is taking part in a coalition of the willing video call to discuss Ukraine. There is a live feed of his public contribution here.

Kemi Badenoch is holding a press conference now. She is appearing with the relatives of children who she says have died as a result of social media – either because they took their own lives, or because it led to them being attacked. She says she wants to give them a platform to tell their stories.

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National security committee warns until tougher safeguards are in place, UK elections dangerously exposed to covert foreign money

Political donations in cryptocurrency should be subject to an urgent temporary ban to stop foreign interference in British elections, the chair of the national security committee has said.

Matt Western, who leads the committee of MPs and peers, said a moratorium was needed until the risks of donations in cryptocurrency have been dealt with – including adequate checks on the source of the money.

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Richard Tice echoes Donald Trump with pledge of ‘great repeal act’ and ‘tight quotas and significant tariffs’

Unions and renters’ groups have criticised Reform UK after the party’s business spokesperson, Richard Tice, pledged to introduce a “great repeal act” that would abolish Labour legislation on workers’ rights and protection for tenants.

In his first speech since being appointed by Nigel Farage to a portfolio covering business, trade and energy, Tice promised a bonfire of regulations, including an end to net zero targets and a new push for home-produced shale gas using fracking.

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Huw Pill warns combined effect of national insurance and minimum wage rises have ‘acute’ effect on youth employment

The negative effect of a combined increase in employers’ taxes and minimum wages has been “particularly acute” for young people, the Bank of England’s chief economist has warned.

Huw Pill said on Tuesday that the increase in national insurance contributions (NICs) from April last year and the government’s efforts to equalise the “national living wage” had caused a particular problem for young people trying to find jobs.

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Victims, as well as 32-year-old suspect, confirmed dead after incident on street in Gig Harbor, says county sheriff’s office

A man stabbed four people to death in the street in Gig Harbor, Washington, on Tuesday morning, the Pierce county sheriff’s office confirmed to local news outlets.

The four stabbing victims, as well as the 32-year-old suspect, are confirmed dead, the sheriff’s office said. Three of the victims died at the scene, while a fourth was taken to a hospital and later died from their injuries, authorities said.

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About 30 lawmakers have said they won’t attend Trump’s State of the Union address; top Senate Democrat predicts ‘tedious’ speech after president vows to give long remarks

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About 30 members of Congress are planning to attend a Democratic counter-program event tonight instead of the State of the Union, according to the organizers of the “People’s State of the Union,” led by liberal group MoveOn and progressive media outlet MeidasTouch.

Here are the lawmakers who are expected to attend the separate event and skip the Trump speech:

Senator Ruben Gallego (D-AZ)

Senator Ed Markey (D-MA)

Senator Jeff Merkley (D-OR)

Senator Chris Murphy (D-CT)

Senator Adam Schiff (D-CA)

Senator Tina Smith (D-MN)

Senator Chris Van Hollen (D-MD)

Representative Yassamin Ansari (AZ-03)

Representative Becca Balint (D-VT)

Representative Greg Casar (TX-35)

Representative Lizzie Fletcher (TX-7)

Representative Maxwell Frost (FL-10)

Representative Robert Garcia (CA-42)

Representative Adelita Grijalva (AZ-07)

Representative Jim Himes (CT-04)

Representative Sara Jacobs (CA-51)

Representative Pramila Jayapal (WA-07)

Representative John B. Larson (CT-01)

Representative Summer Lee (PA-12)

Representative Teresa Leger Fernandez (NM-03)

Representative Sydney Kamlager-Dove (CA-37)

Representative April McClain Delaney (MD-6)

Representative Christian Menefee (TX-18)

Representative Chellie Pingree (ME-01)

Representative Ayanna Pressley (MA-7)

Representative Emily Randall (WA-6)

Representative Mary Gay Scanlon (PA-05)

Representative Melanie Stansbury (NM-01)

Representative Delia Ramirez (IL-03)

Representative Bonnie Watson Coleman (NJ-12)

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Zohran Mamdani calls for ‘respect’ of New York police as hundreds of thousands in US still face power outages

New York City’s mayor, Zohran Mamdani, called for “respect” of local police officers in the wake of Monday’s blizzard after a viral video showed some getting pelted by snowballs in Washington Square Park.

In the video, a crowd of people boo and jeer at two officers, and some throw snowballs in their faces. At one point, the officers push at least two people to the ground in response to the snowballs.

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Sunset phenomenon at national park’s Horsetail waterfall still drew large crowds even with freezing temperatures

Heavy snow did not deter visitors from flocking to Yosemite in recent days, in hopes of seeing the park’s spectacular natural light show.

Firefall occurs each year in February during sunset when the light hits Horsetail Fall in such a way that, for a brief period, the waterfall appears illuminated by lava. In recent years, the phenomenon has drawn large crowds – and lots of photographers.

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US president had said he would raise levy to 15% after last week’s supreme court ruling

Donald Trump’s new global tariffs have taken effect at 10%, even though last weekend he had threatened a higher rate, of 15%, providing “some relief” for British businesses, according to a lobby group.

After the US president suffered a defeat at the hands of the supreme court on Friday, which struck down his sweeping “liberation day” tariffs imposed last year, he angrily reacted by announcing a 10% global tariff, which he raised to 15% on Saturday in a post on his social media platform, Truth Social.

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