Russia-Ukraine war: Kyiv’s allies must respond to strikes ‘in language that Putin understands’, says Polish foreign minister – as it happened

Radosław Sikorski says allies must deliver long-range missiles to Ukraine following barrage of strikes by Russia

The Russian military has said it shot down 12 Ukrainian missiles over the southern Belgorod region bordering Ukraine, as Kyiv’s forces seek to embarrass President Vladimir Putin and puncture his argument that life in Russia is going on as normal despite the 22-month war.

The Belgorod governor, Vyacheslav Gladkov, said the situation in the regional capital, also called Belgorod, remained tense. The city came under two rounds of shelling on Wednesday morning, Gladkov wrote on Telegram.

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Ryanair ticket sales hit after travel agent websites delist airline

Carrier says such sites only account for ‘small fraction’ of its bookings but move has affected load factor

Ryanair has said that it has seen a drop in the number of tickets it has been able to sell after a number of major online booking websites stripped the budget carrier’s flights from their listings.

Europe’s largest airline said that in early December “most” of the larger online travel agent sites – including Booking.com, Kiwi and Kayak – “suddenly removed Ryanair’s flights from sale on their websites”.

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Young lover in Robert Doisneau’s Paris kiss photograph dies aged 93

Françoise Bornet’s embrace with then boyfriend in 1950 became one of the most famous images of the city

It was one of the most famous kisses of the 20th century – a postwar clinch that became a 1980s poster phenomenon, bringing fame and court battles.

Françoise Bornet, the young lover immortalised in the French photographer Robert Doisneau’s The Kiss by the Hôtel de Ville, has died aged 93.

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Vladimir Putin will use election to show war-weary Russia he’s still calling the shots

Russia’s presidential is a foregone conclusion, but the appearance of democracy still matters greatly to its leader

In news that likely shocked no one, Vladimir Putin last month announced that he will seek a fifth presidential term in the upcoming March elections.

In a country where Putin, 71, has come to dominate Russia’s political system and the media over the past two decades, the outcome will probably leave little room for imagination.

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Japan jet crash: passenger plane was cleared to land, say officials

Smaller plane on runway was not cleared for takeoff, however, say authorities as investigations begin

A passenger jet that collided with a coastguard plane at Haneda airport in Tokyo had been given permission to land, but the smaller plane was not cleared for takeoff, Japanese authorities have said, as police reportedly prepared to investigate whether the crash involved professional negligence.

Five people on the coastguard aircraft died but all 379 passengers and crew escaped to safety down emergency slides minutes before the Japan Airlines Airbus was engulfed in flames on Tuesday.

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Japan earthquake: death toll rises to 62 amid warnings of landslides and aftershocks

Ishikawa and its Noto peninsula, one of the worst affected areas, has been hit by more than 100 aftershocks

Japanese rescuers were scrambling to search for survivors as authorities warned of landslides and heavy rain after a powerful earthquake that killed at least 62 people.

The 7.5-magnitude quake on Monday that rattled Ishikawa prefecture on the main island of Honshu triggered tsunami waves more than a metre high, sparked a major fire and tore apart roads.

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Russia-Ukraine war at a glance: what we know on day 679

At least five people die in wave of Russian strikes on Kyiv and Kharkiv; Russia accidentally bombs its own city

Russian missile and drone strikes on Kyiv and the north-eastern city of Kharkiv killed at least five people on Tuesday and injured dozens of others, Ukrainian officials said. The attacks caused widespread damage and hit power supplies, Ukraine’s authorities said.

Kyiv’s mayor, Vitali Klitschko, said gas pipelines had been damaged in Kyiv’s Pecherskyi district, while electricity and water had been cut off in several districts of the capital. Heating and water supplies were damaged in Kharkiv, said its mayor, Ihor Terekhov.

Russia said it had accidentally bombed a village in its own southern Voronezh region near Ukraine. In a statement quoted by Russian news agencies, the Russian army said “an abnormal discharge of aircraft ammunition occurred over the village of Petropavlovka in the Voronezh region. There are no casualties.”

Turkey said it would not allow two British minehunter ships to transit its waters en route to the Black Sea for use by Ukraine. Turkey is enforcing an international pact under which it can block passage of military ships of warring parties through the Bosphorus and Dardanelles straits. It exempts naval ships that are returning to home bases.

One man was killed and seven people were injured on Tuesday in a Ukrainian attack on the city and region of Belgorod, near Russia’s border with Ukraine, the Russian defence ministry and regional officials claimed.

Ukraine’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, urged faster supplies of air defence systems, combat drones and long-range missiles. His ministry said Kuleba called on Ukraine’s western partners to respond to a new Russian strike on Ukraine by “accelerating the supply of additional air defence systems, combat drones of all types, long-range missiles with a range of 300+ km”.

Lithuania’s president, Gitanas Nausėda, and Latvia’s president, Edgars Rinkēvičs, also called for more air defence systems for Ukraine.

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Ocean Alley musician apologises for shoplifting after New Zealand shop shares CCTV footage

Lachlan Galbraith says he feels ‘deep regret’ for stealing a drink bottle lid, but the Hunting and Fishing store in Queenstown says embarrassment ‘is punishment enough’

Ocean Alley keyboardist Lachlan Galbraith has publicly apologised after a shop in New Zealand shared CCTV footage of him shoplifting.

Hunting and Fishing Queenstown uploaded footage to Facebook and Instagram showing Galbraith placing a A$17.95 drink bottle lid in his bag on New Year’s Eve. The Australian rock band is currently touring New Zealand and is due to play in Wellington on Wednesday and Whangamatā on Friday.

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Saleh al-Arouri: assassinated leader was Hamas’s link to Iran and Hezbollah

Arouri had talked with Hezbollah of ‘real victory’ over Israel after 7 October attacks

The killing of Saleh al-Arouri in Beirut is the first strike in a campaign of assassinations overseas promised by Israeli officials for several months.

The target was carefully chosen – one of the most senior Hamas leaders and the organisation’s main link to Iran and the Lebanon-based militia Hezbollah. Arouri was also influential in the occupied West Bank, where he was born and where violence has soared in recent months.

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Gaza death toll passes 22,000 as Israel steps up war against Hamas

Israeli defence minister says his country is planning for a long conflict as senior Hamas official is killed in Beirut drone strike

The death toll from Israeli attacks on Gaza has climbed to more than 22,000 after a day of intense fighting across the territory, including in the southern city of Khan Younis, where the Palestinian Red Crescent (PRCS) said five people had been killed in a second Israeli attack on its compound.

The day after Israel announced the first drawdown of troops from Gaza, there was no sign of relief for its residents, who after three months of heavy bombardment and weeks of ground fighting, are almost all displaced, hungry and stalked by disease.

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Family of man found dead on Bibby Stockholm turn to crowdfunding to repatriate his body

Leonard Farruku’s family ‘facing a double tragedy with not being able to have his body back home’ in Albania

The family of a man believed to have killed himself on the controversial Bibby Stockholm barge in Portland, Dorset, say they have had to turn to crowdfunding to bring him back to Albania for burial.

Leonard Farruku, 27, was found unresponsive onboard the vessel commissioned by the Home Office to accommodate up to 500 asylum seekers at Portland Port, Dorset, on 12 December.

In the UK and Ireland, Samaritans can be contacted on freephone 116 123, or email jo@samaritans.org or jo@samaritans.ie. In the US, you can call or text the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline on 988, chat on 988lifeline.org, or text HOME to 741741 to connect with a crisis counsellor. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. Other international helplines can be found at befrienders.org

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Japan: plane collision at Tokyo airport leaves five dead on coastguard aircraft but Japan Airlines passengers evacuate – as it happened

Six coastguards were on plane, which was delivering earthquake relief supplies, which hit Japan Airlines plane at Haneda airport. This live blog is closed

Roughly 400 people on board a Japan Airlines plane that is now on fire at Tokyo’s Haneda Airport have evacuated, Reuters reports citing NHK.

Here’s what we know about the situation at Tokyo’s Haneda Airport.

A Japan Airlines plane appears to have struck a Japan Coast Guard plane as it was coming in to land at Tokyo’s Haneda airport.

Japan Coast Guard said it was looking into whether its plane collided with the airline flight.

Footage shows a Japan Airlines plane on fire and surrounded by smoke on the ground, with crews around it trying to extinguish the flames.

It is not yet clear if the coastguard plane had anything to do with rescue efforts for the quake or whether there are casualties.

A spokesperson for the airline said the plane carries more than 300 passengers, Reuters reports. It is unclear where the passengers are at the moment.

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Israeli military forces in a state of ‘high readiness’ says senior IDF spokesperson – as it happened

This blog is now closed

AFP reports that in addition to the four Palestinians the IDF said it killed overnight in the occupied West Bank, Israel says it has arrested seven others.

More than 2,550 people have been arrested in the territory since the Israel-Hamas war began.

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Senior Hamas figure Saleh al-Arouri killed in Lebanon

Death of Arouri in Israeli drone strike on Beirut suburb threatens significant escalation of war in region

One of Hamas’s most senior officials, Saleh al-Arouri, has been killed in an Israeli drone strike in Beirut that threatens a significant and dangerous escalation of Israel’s war against Hamas and its related conflict with the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.

The Lebanese prime minister, Najib Mikati, echoing fears of further regional violence, described the assassination as a “new Israeli crime intended to spur a new phase of conflict, following daily attacks in the south [of Lebanon]”.

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Harvard Corporation condemns ‘racist vitriol’ directed at Claudine Gay and says she ‘acknowledged missteps’ – as it happened

This live blog is now closed. For more on this story, you can read our latest:

The Democrats are, unsurprisingly, laying into Republican House majority leader Steve Scalise for his endorsement of Donald Trump today.

Even before his endorsement, Scalise was among the many House Republicans who have cast doubt on the validity of Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 election, and supported the Trump campaign’s failed effort to get the supreme court to interfere in the vote result four years ago.

MAGA House Republicans keep showing America they’ve turned the House into little more than an arm of Donald Trump’s campaign – so it’s no surprise Steve Scalise, who called himself ‘David Duke without the baggage,’ is joining the parade of House extremists backing Trump’s bid. Scalise’s top priority has always been pushing Trump’s unpopular agenda: He voted against certifying the 2020 election, is hellbent on banning abortion nationwide, and worked with Trump to try to rip away Americans’ health care. Scalise’s endorsement is the latest proof that while the House GOP is unable to accomplish anything on behalf of the American people, they are laser-focused on advancing Trump’s MAGA agenda and ripping away freedoms.

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Polar bear dies from bird flu as H5N1 spreads across globe

Highly contagious virus could bring “one of largest ecological disasters of modern times” say scientists

A polar bear has been killed by bird flu as the highly contagious H5N1 virus spreads into the most remote parts of the planet.

The death was confirmed in December by the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation. “This is the first polar bear case reported, for anywhere,” Dr Bob Gerlach, Alaska’s state veterinarian, told the Alaska Beacon.

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Jimmy Lai pleads not guilty to all charges at Hong Kong national security trial

Media tycoon and pro-democracy activist is accused of conspiring to commit foreign collusion and publish seditious material

Jimmy Lai has pleaded not guilty to all charges at the resumption of his national security trial in Hong Kong.

The media tycoon and pro-democracy activist is facing up to life in prison if found guilty on the charges against him, brought under the 2021 national security law and a colonial-era sedition law.

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West ‘colluding in terrible failure’ in Gaza, warns Peter Hain

Labour peer and former Middle East minister says Hamas will have to be included in future governance of Gaza

Western policy towards Gaza represents collusion in a terrible failure and will not lead to the permanent elimination of Hamas or security for Israel, the former UK Middle East minister Lord Hain has warned in an Guardian article, demanding a rethink of British approach to the war.

Hain, a cabinet minister in post-1997 Labour governments and a Foreign Office minister from 1999 to 2001, also accuses the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, of playing an indirect role in promoting Hamas by refusing to negotiate on a two-state solution and imposing a “near-constant state of siege” on Gaza.

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China’s BYD overtakes Tesla as top-selling electric car seller

Build Your Dreams outsells rival in final quarter of 2023 figures for battery-only vehicles

Elon Musk’s Tesla has been overtaken by its Chinese rival, BYD, as the world’s top selling electric carmaker.

BYD, which has been backed by the US investment billionaire Warren Buffett since 2008, has beaten Tesla’s production for a second consecutive year.

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Five dead after horrific runway crash at Tokyo airport leaves jet in flames

Hundreds evacuated from burning passenger jet after collision with coastguard plane at Haneda airport

Five crew members on a coastguard plane were killed and 379 people forced to evacuate a burning Japan Airlines jet after a horrific collision on a runway at Haneda airport in Tokyo.

JAL flight 516, an Airbus A350, was engulfed in flames soon after landing as it struck the smaller coastguard aircraft waiting to deliver aid to the earthquake-hit Noto peninsula.

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