claims

A UN mission says 43 worshippers were killed in the attack at a night mass in a church.

The armed group ISIL (ISIS) has claimed responsibility for a deadly attack that a United Nations mission says killed at least 43 worshippers during a night mass at a church in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).

The attack, which took place at the church in Ituri province’s Komanda city, saw members of the ISIL-affiliated Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) killing people with guns and machetes, and taking captives.

ISIL said on its Telegram channel that rebels had killed some 45 churchgoers and burned dozens of homes and shops.

The UN mission known as MONUSCO said at least 43 people had been killed, including 19 women and nine children, and condemned the attack.

Pope Leo sent a message of condolences to the bereaved families and the Christian community who lost their relatives and friends in the assault, saying he would pray for them.

The Congolese government condemned the church attack as “horrific”, while the military described it as a “large-scale massacre” carried out in revenge for recent security operations targeting the ADF.

However, M23, another Congolese rebel group, backed by Rwanda, used the attack to accuse the government of “blatant incompetence” in attempts to protect citizens.

MONUSCO said the church killings will “exacerbate an already extremely worrying humanitarian situation in the province”.

The church attack on Sunday was the latest in a series of deadly ADF assaults on civilians, including an attack earlier this month when the group killed 66 people in Ituri province.

The attack happened on July 11, at about 1am (00:00 GMT) in the Irumu area, near the border with Uganda.

The ADF originates in neighbouring Uganda, but is now based in the mineral-rich eastern DRC. It mounts frequent attacks, further destabilising a region where many armed groups compete for influence and resources.

The ADF was formed by disparate small groups in Uganda in the late 1990s following alleged discontent with President Yoweri Museveni.

In 2002, following military assaults by Ugandan forces, the group moved its activities to the neighbouring DRC and has since been responsible for the killings of thousands of civilians. In 2019, it pledged allegiance to ISIL.

The ADF’s leadership says it is fighting to form a government in the East African country.

The DRC army has long struggled against the rebel group, and it is now also grappling with a complex web of attacks since renewed hostilities with the Rwanda-backed M23 rebels.

July 28 (UPI) — A cyber attack on Russia’s largest airline on Monday saw dozens of canceled flights after a pro-Ukraine team took responsibility for hacking airline computer systems.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov called it “quite alarming” after at least 42 scheduled Aeroflot flights largely domestic in Russia got canceled.

Aeroflot officials gave no specific details or how long it would take to restore its mainframe after officials informed passengers of a “failure” in its tech systems advising service disruptions, but did warn travelers of delays and cancellations.

The airline said its tech teams were “actively working to minimize the impact on flight operations and restore all services to normal as quickly as possible.”

“We kindly ask passengers to monitor real-time updates on airport websites, information displays, and public announcements across the airline’s route network,” the airline said in a statement.

Aeroflot’s cyber-security attack was a direct result of Russia’s full-on invasion of neighboring Ukraine, the hacker group calling itself “Silent Crow” confirmed.

Russia’s prosecutor general’s office also confirmed that Aeroflot’s technological issues were a result of a virtual attack on its computer systems and stated that a criminal investigation is underway.

Silent Crow says it worked with a separate group based in Belarus called “Cyber Partisans BY.”

They pressed unverified claimed of access to flight history data, that it destroyed roughly 7,000 Aeroflot servers, compromised its corporate computer structure and further threatened to released “the personal data of all Russians who have ever flown Aeroflot.”

On its Telegram channel, Silent Crow wrote how for a year, “we were inside their corporate network, methodically developing access, going deep into the very core of the infrastructure.”

Meanwhile, Aeroflot partner air carries Rossiya and Probed have not reported any technological issues.

The cyber attack on Russia’s flag air carrier arrived weeks after another on Australian airline Qantas exposed the data of six million customers. That followed a similar event at the end of June on Hawaiian Airlines by a group FBI officials believe to be young adults and teens living in the United States and Britain.

“Glory to Ukraine! Long live Belarus!” Silent Crow said in a statement.

Columbia University will pay $221m to settle accusations by the Trump administration that it failed to police anti-Semitism on campus. Critics say the deal threatens academic freedom and sets a dangerous precedent.

PARIS — A lawyer for France ‘s first couple said they’ll be seeking “substantial” damages from U.S. conservative influencer Candace Owens if she persists with claims that President Emmanuel Macron ‘s wife, Brigitte, is a man.

The lawyer, Tom Clare, said in an interview with CNN that a defamation suit filed Wednesday for the Macrons in a Delaware court was “really a last resort” after a fruitless yearlong effort to engage with Owens and requests that she “do the right thing: tell the truth, stop spreading these lies.”

“Each time we’ve done that, she mocked the Macrons, she mocked our efforts to set the record straight,” Clare said. “Enough is enough, it was time to hold her accountable.”

The Macrons have been married since 2007, and Emmanuel Macron has been France’s president since 2017.

In a YouTube video, Owens called the suit an “obvious and desperate public relations strategy,” and said the first lady is “a very goofy man.”

Owens is a right-leaning political commentator whose YouTube channel has about 4.5 million subscribers. In 2024, she was denied a visa from New Zealand and Australia, citing remarks in which she denied Nazi medical experimentation on Jews in concentration camps during World War II.

The 219-page complaint against Owens lays out “extensive evidence” that Brigitte Macron “was born a woman, she’s always been a woman,” the couple’s attorney said.

“We’ll put forward our damage claim at trial, but if she continues to double down between now and the time of trial, it will be a substantial award,” he said.

In Paris, the presidential office had no immediate comment.

In France, too, the presidential couple has for years been dogged by conspiracy theories that Brigitte was born as a man named Jean-Michel Trogneux, who supposedly then took the name Brigitte as a transgender woman. Jean-Michel Trogneux is, in fact, Brigitte’s brother.

Last September, Brigitte and Jean-Michel Trogneux won a defamation suit against two women who were sentenced by a Paris court to fines and damages for spreading the claims about the first lady online. A Paris appeals court overturned the ruling earlier this month. Brigitte and her brother have since turned to France’s highest court to appeal that decision, according to French media.

The Macrons first met at the high school where he was a student and she was a teacher. Brigitte Macron was then Brigitte Auzière, a married mother of three children.

Macron, 47, is serving his second and last term as president. The first lady celebrated her 72nd birthday in April.

Macron moved to Paris for his last year of high school, but promised to marry Brigitte. She later moved to the French capital to join him and divorced before they finally married.

Their relationship came under the spotlight in May when video images showed Brigitte pushing her husband away with both hands on his face before they disembarked from a plane on a tour of Southeast Asia.

Macron later dismissed the incident as play-fighting, telling reporters that “we are squabbling and, rather, joking with my wife,” and that it had been overblown into “a sort of geo-planetary catastrophe.”

Settlement marks victory in US President Donald Trump’s efforts to exert greater control over third-level education.

Columbia University, one of the top educational institutions in the United States, has agreed to pay $221m to settle claims by US President Donald Trump’s administration that it failed to police anti-Semitism on campus.

Under the agreement announced on Wednesday, Columbia will see the “vast majority” of $400m in federal grants frozen by the Trump administration reinstated, the New York-based university said.

Columbia will also regain access to billions of dollars in current and future grants under the deal, the university said.

Columbia said the agreement formalised reforms announced in March to address harassment against Jews, including the hiring of more public safety personnel, changes to disciplinary processes, and efforts to foster “an inclusive and respectful learning environment”.

The agreement also commits Columbia to maintaining merit-based admissions and ending programs that promote “unlawful efforts to achieve race-based outcomes, quotas [and] diversity targets”.

Under the agreement, Columbia will pay the federal government $200m over three years, in addition to a $21m payment to settle claims by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

Claire Shipman, Columbia’s acting president, said that while the settlement was “substantial”, the university could not continue with a situation that would “jeopardize our status as a world-leading research institution”.

“Furthermore, as I have discussed on many occasions with our community, we carefully explored all options open to us,” Shipman said in a statement.

“We might have achieved short-term litigation victories, but not without incurring deeper long-term damage – the likely loss of future federal funding, the possibility of losing accreditation, and the potential revocation of visa status of thousands of international students.”

Shipman said Columbia did not accept the Trump administration’s findings that it had violated civil rights law by turning a blind eye to the harassment of Jews, but acknowledged the “very serious and painful challenges our institution has faced with antisemitism”.

“We know there is still more to do,” she said.

The settlement marks a victory in Trump’s efforts to exert greater control over third-level education, including campus activism in support of Palestine and other causes.

Trump hailed the settlement as “historic” in a post on his Truth Social platform.

“Numerous other Higher Education Institutions that have hurt so many, and been so unfair and unjust, and have wrongly spent federal money, much of it from our government, are upcoming,” Trump wrote.

Columbia University Apartheid Divest (CUAD), a student activist group, slammed the settlement as an effective bribe.

“Imagine selling your students out just so you can pay Trump $221 million dollars and keep funding genocide,” the group said on X.

Columbia was among dozens of US universities that were roiled by protests against Israel’s war in Gaza throughout the spring and summer of 2024.

Many Jewish students and faculty complained that the campus demonstrations veered into anti-Semitism, while pro-Palestinian advocates have accused critics of often wrongly conflating opposition to Israel with the hatred of Jews.

On Tuesday, Columbia University’s Judicial Board announced that it had finalised disciplinary proceedings against students who took part in protests at the university’s main library in May and the “Revolt for Rafah” encampment last year.

CUAD said nearly 80 students had been expelled or suspended for between one and three years for joining the protests, sanctions it argued “hugely” exceeded the precedent for non-Palestine-related demonstrations.

United States President Donald Trump has called for the arrest of former President Barack Obama, repeating unproven claims that the Democrat’s administration intentionally misled the public in its assessment of the 2016 election.

At Tuesday’s Oval Office meeting with Philippine President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr, Trump accused Obama, a longtime rival, of helming a criminal conspiracy.

“ The leader of the gang was President Obama, Barack Hussein Obama,” Trump told the media.

“ He’s guilty. This was treason. This was every word you can think of. They tried to steal the election. They tried to obfuscate the election. They did things that nobody’s ever even imagined, even in other countries.”

President Trump has a history of spreading election-related falsehoods, including by denying his own defeat in the 2020 race.

But since taking office for a second term, he has sought to settle scores over his victory in the 2016 presidential contest, which raised questions about Russia’s alleged attempts to influence the outcome.

In 2016, in the waning days of Obama’s second term, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) concluded that Russia had attempted to sway the results in Trump’s favour. Obama responded to the allegations by expelling Russian diplomats and slapping sanctions on the country.

An intelligence community assessment in 2017 later offered details into the Russian influence campaign.

But in 2019, a special counsel’s report found there was not enough evidence to support the claim that the Trump campaign had colluded with Russia. It did, however, once again underscore the government’s assertion that Russia had interfered in the election “in sweeping and systematic fashion”.

Trump, however, has described such probes as politicised attacks designed to undermine his authority.

In Tuesday’s appearance, Trump cited recent claims from his director of national intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, to assert wrongdoing on the part of the Obama administration.

“They caught President Obama absolutely cold,” Trump said. “They tried to rig the election, and they got caught, and there should be very severe consequences for that.”

Tulsi Gabbard renews Obama attacks

Trump’s latest remarks about what he calls the “Russia hoax” come just days after Gabbard released a press release about the subject on July 18.

In the statement, Gabbard’s office asserts she “revealed overwhelming evidence” that “President Obama and his national security cabinet members manufactured and politicised intelligence to lay the groundwork for what was essentially a years-long coup against President Trump”.

Gabbard followed that release up with a series of social media posts, some indicating she had pressed the Department of Justice (DOJ) for criminal charges against Obama. She has called the scrutiny on the 2016 election a “treasonous conspiracy”.

“Their goal was to usurp President Trump and subvert the will of the American people,” Gabbard wrote.

“No matter how powerful, every person involved in this conspiracy must be investigated and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law,” she continued. “We are turning over all documents to the DOJ for criminal referral.”

However, the veracity of Gabbard’s report has been widely questioned. Critics have pointed out that she appears to confuse different conclusions.

Gabbard, for instance, has highlighted internal government documents from the 2016 election period that indicate Russia was not using cyberattacks to alter the overall vote count.

But the published 2017 intelligence report did not assert that Russia was attempting to hack the election. Instead, it highlighted ways that Russia tried to influence public sentiment through disinformation.

Russia’s campaign included online propaganda, the dissemination of hacked data, and targeted messaging about individuals and entities involved in the election.

Other investigations related to the matter, including a separate Department of Justice inspector general report and a Republican-led Senate investigation, all supported that Russia did indeed seek to influence the 2016 election.

Backlash against Gabbard’s statements

But Gabbard’s argument that the scrutiny over the 2016 election was criminal has prompted uproar, particularly from the Democratic Party.

Senator Mark Warner of Virginia even questioned whether Gabbard should remain in her role as director of national intelligence.

“It is sadly not surprising that DNI Gabbard, who promised to depoliticize the intelligence community, is once again weaponizing her position to amplify the president’s election conspiracy theories,” he wrote on social media.

Obama himself released a statement through his office, calling Gabbard’s claims “bizarre”.

“Nothing in the document issued last week undercuts the widely accepted conclusion that Russia worked to influence the 2016 presidential election but did not successfully manipulate any votes,” it said.

Some critics have speculated that Trump may be using the years-old question of Russian election interference to distract from his current political woes: He recently faced backlash from members of his base over his handling of files related to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

Still, President Trump has doubled down on Gabbard’s assertions, even reposting a video generated by artificial intelligence (AI) on Monday showing Obama being handcuffed in the Oval Office, while the song YMCA played.

“ This is, like, proof – irrefutable proof – that Obama was seditious, that Obama was trying to lead a coup,” Trump said on Tuesday. “Obama headed it up.”

Experts have long speculated that Trump may use a second term as president to settle political scores and seek retaliation against his foes.

Marcus Daniels, a former flight attendant who spent five years in the job, claims that airlines are too afraid of offending passengers to resolve an apparently longstanding toilet-related issue

A former flight attendant claims that airlines are afraid of teaching passengers how to use toilets properly, for fear of offending them.

Marcus Daniels spent five years working the aisles at 30,000 feet. He loved his job, but not all aspects of it. Marcus says he was disgusted on multiple occasions by messes left behind by passengers. He believes many of these incidents occurred because some flyers were unfamiliar with these types of toilets, and he noticed a trend emerging on certain routes.

“On those flights, passengers will defecate on the floor, and you just do your best to smile and not say anything. You get used to it after a while and can start mentally preparing yourself for those flights,” Mr Daniels said.

The flight attendant added that the language barrier made it difficult to address this delicate topic with passengers.

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“It would be great if there were visual guides showing how to use the toilet properly, rather than just guides for flushing,” he added, according to the Daily Mail.

Daniels recalled one occasion when he had to lock off the toilet for the remainder of a flight after a passenger repeatedly urinated on the floor. “Airlines are very particular about how they communicate with customers because they don’t want to offend anyone,” he said.

In other plane-toilet news, a flight attendant recently revealed that birdsong is now being played in lavatories to mask embarrassing “toilet sounds.” KLM attendant Esther Sturrus posted a video on TikTok demonstrating this new feature inside the bathroom of a brand-new Airbus A321neo.

Sturrus, 24, who has worked for the Dutch airline since 2020, laughed as the sound of birds chirping filled the space. Since summer 2024, KLM has gradually replaced its Boeing 737 fleet with A321neos, according to its website.

“The birdsong definitely catches people by surprise the first time. You’re expecting the usual hum of the engines or total silence, and instead you’re suddenly surrounded by chirping birds. The idea behind it is to make the onboard experience a little more soothing and enjoyable, even in the smallest and most unexpected places,” said Sturrus, who is from Rotterdam.

“The birdsong gives a sort of spa-like vibe. Let’s be honest, it also nicely covers the classic toilet sounds, so it might just be functional too. I found it unusual and amusing and just had to capture the moment. It’s little touches like these that show how much thought can go into even the tiniest details of a flight experience.”

A Married At First Sight UK contestant has reportedly claimed they were sexually assaulted during the filming process of the show

A Married At First Sight UK contestant has reportedly claimed they were sexually assaulted by their new partner during filming for the E4 show. It is understood the police are currently probing the contestant’s claims.

The popular reality series sees couples meet at the altar before spending their wedding night in a hotel. They then head on a honeymoon together. After returning, they live together and each week take part in a commitment ceremony, during which they can choose to stay or leave their marriage.

The series then concludes with one final commitment ceremony, during which the couples must make a lasting decision about the future of their marriage.

It has been reported by The Sun that the “non-recent” claim was reported on June 14. A spokesperson for Channel 4 told the Mirror that they are aware that a report has been made to police about an alleged sexual assault during filming.

They added: “We take any issues on the show incredibly seriously. Producers follow strict welfare protocols as the wellbeing of the cast is always the first priority. Support would be offered to anyone who wished to report a matter to the authorities, and naturally we would cooperate with any enquiries or investigations.”

A source told The Sun that the alleged assault “is a disastrous look for bosses” as the show has been criticised before.

According to the publication, police said: “We received a report of a non-recent sexual assault on June 14. Enquiries remain ongoing,” with a show spokesman telling them they’re “aware” of the report and adding they offer support to “anyone who wished to report a matter”.

Filming for the UK version began in February. The series usually airs in the autumn. Experts for the series include Mel Schilling, Charlene Douglas and Paul C Brunson.

* If you’ve been the victim of sexual assault, you can access help and resources via www.rapecrisis.org.uk or calling the national telephone helpline on 0808 802 9999

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READ MORE: Save almost £40 on a family day out to Chessington World of Adventures this summer holiday

Donald Trump gained momentum for his political career by promoting the unfounded “birther” conspiracy theory about President Obama. Now, facing a pandemic, a shattered economy and unrest after three-plus years in the White House, Trump continues to push incendiary and unsubstantiated theories about his predecessor.

Trump said last week, without evidence, that Obama had committed “treason” by spying on his campaign, in reference to his years-old claim that the Obama administration tapped his phone lines at Trump Tower before the 2016 general election.

“It’s treason,” he said during an interview with the Christian Broadcast Network that aired Tuesday. “Look, when I came out a long time ago, I said they’ve been spying on my campaign … turned out I was right. Let’s see what happens to them now.”

Trump tweeted last month that Obama committed “the biggest political crime in American history.” One missive in a Mother’s Day tweetstorm said simply, “OBAMAGATE!”

But when asked at a news conference to explain what he was claiming Obama had done, Trump declined. “You know what the crime is,” Trump told reporters. “The crime is very obvious to everybody.”

In the days that followed, it became clear that “Obamagate” was a catchall term for the unsubstantiated claim that Obama led an illegal plot to undermine Trump. It’s also one of the latest in a series of groundless accusations Trump has made against his predecessor.

Trump has often spread conspiracy theories about the people he sees as political enemies. He amplifies accusations of illegal or immoral behavior through tweets and comments, often with vague qualifiers — “people are saying.”

During the 2016 presidential election alone, Trump said the circumstances around the 1993 death of Clinton administration counsel Vince Foster were “fishy” and claims of Hillary Clinton’s involvement were “serious”; he retweeted an article that falsely claimed Sens. Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz weren’t eligible to run for president; and he cited the National Enquirer to claim Cruz’s father was linked to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

Trump has returned to conspiracy theories about Obama time and again, and the accusations have grown more serious in nature.

2011: Birtherism

Trump amplified the false conspiracy theory questioning where Obama was born, becoming the face of the racist “birther” movement. Obama, who was born in Hawaii, had released his certification of live birth during the 2008 presidential campaign.

In a series of interviews, Trump said he had “doubts” about where Obama was born and suggested that his birth certificate might list his religion as Muslim. (Obama is Christian.)

During an interview with CNN’s Anderson Cooper that aired April 25, 2011, Trump repeated his claim that he had a team in Hawaii investigating Obama’s birth and said he’d been told the birth certificate was “missing” or didn’t exist. “I’ve been told…,” Trump said repeatedly, but would not say by whom. (CNN staff reporting on Obama’s birth certificate said they saw no evidence of Trump associates looking into the matter.)

Obama released his long-form birth certificate on April 27, 2011. In his remarks on the release, Obama criticized those who perpetuated the conspiracy and the news cycle and said the country was “not going to be able to solve our problems if we get distracted by sideshows and carnival barkers.”

A few days later, at the 2011 White House Correspondents’ Assn. dinner, Obama addressed Trump by name.

“Now he can get back to focusing on the issues that matter,” Obama said. “Like, did we fake the moon landing? What really happened at Roswell? And where are Biggie and Tupac?”

But Trump kept returning to the conspiracy theory. In 2013, he tweeted: “How amazing, the State Health Director who verified copies of Obama’s ‘birth certificate’ died in plane crash today. All others lived.”

Trump cast doubts on where Obama was born until 2016, when he pivoted to a new false theory: Hillary Clinton had started the rumors.

April 2011: Obama’s school records

In the midst of the birther controversy, Trump asked for a different set of records: proof that Obama earned his way into college.

“I heard he was a terrible student, terrible,” Trump told the Associated Press in an April 2011 interview. “How does a bad student go to Columbia and then to Harvard? I’m thinking about it; I’m certainly looking into it. Let him show his records.”

Trump continued to promote articles challenging Obama’s academic record as late as 2014. In 2012 he tweeted a Breitbart article — written by far-right activist Charles C. Johnson — that speculated Obama had lower SAT scores than President George W. Bush and benefited from affirmative action when he transferred to Columbia University. Trump also tweeted: “I wonder if @BarackObama ever applied to Occidental, Columbia or Harvard as a foreign student. When can we see his applications? What do they say about his place of birth.”

In his 1995 memoir, “Dreams From My Father,” Obama acknowledged that his mother was concerned about his “slipping” grades, and he’d had doubts about college. But, he wrote, he wasn’t “flunking out” and he did end up applying and being accepted to college. He attended Occidental College for two years before transferring to Columbia, where he began focusing more on his studies, he told Columbia College Today in 2005.

“When I transferred, I decided to buckle down and get serious,” he said. “I spent a lot of time in the library. I didn’t socialize that much. I was like a monk.”

Obama’s record at Harvard has been well-documented. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard Law School and was the first African American elected to edit the prestigious Law Review. The election was covered by the New York Times and led to a book deal to write his 1995 memoir, according to the Miller Center at the University of Virginia. As Obama prepared to launch his presidential campaign in 2007, his Harvard Law School professors described him as “brilliant” and a “serious intellectual” in a Harvard Crimson article.

Like Obama, Trump has not released his academic transcripts.

After two years at Fordham University, Trump moved to the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania, where he received his bachelor’s degree in 1968. James Nolan, a former University of Pennsylvania admissions officer, was friends with Fred Trump Jr. and interviewed his brother Donald at his request, he told the Washington Post last year. Nolan said it was “not very difficult” to get into the school at the time.

March 2017: A claim of wiretapping

As the investigation into Russian meddling in the presidential election ramped up in the early months of his presidency, Trump accused Obama of having tapped his phone lines in Trump Tower.

The allegation spread through conservative media outlets before making its way to the White House and eventually into a series of March 4, 2017, tweets by the president. “Terrible! Just found out Obama had my ‘wires tapped’ in Trump Tower just before the victory,” he wrote in one post. “Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!”

James B. Comey, the FBI director at the time, asked the Justice Department to publicly reject the claim, and a spokesman for Obama said the claim was “simply false.” House Intelligence Committee leaders said they’d seen no evidence that Trump was wiretapped by Obama. The Justice Department has since refuted the claim that Trump’s lines were wiretapped.

In the days that followed Trump’s tweets, White House officials broadened the claim to suggest the Obama administration had improperly spied on his campaign.

Trump’s allies seized on revelations that the FBI made numerous errors in a counterintelligence probe into whether associates of Trump and his campaign coordinated with Russia to influence the election. In December 2019, Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz released a report sharply criticizing the FBI for withholding information from the department about a former Trump campaign aide suspected of working with Russian intelligence. Horowitz concluded, however, that the FBI had legal and factual justification to start the investigation.

The report also said investigators found no evidence that the mistakes were influenced by political bias. But Trump claimed he had survived “an attempted overthrow.”

May 2020: ‘Obamagate’

On May 7, the Justice Department announced it was dropping its case against Michael Flynn, Trump’s former national security advisor who pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about his calls with Russia’s ambassador to the U.S. Three days later, Trump launched a tweetstorm railing against the media, the criticism of his response to the COVID-19 pandemic and “the biggest political scandal in American history.”

Trump and his allies are pushing the theory that Obama and his administration officials illegally targeted Flynn as part of a conspiracy to undermine the president-elect.

Phone transcripts show that Flynn urged Russia’s ambassador not to retaliate against Obama administration sanctions and told him “we can have a better conversation” after Trump’s inauguration. Flynn later pleaded guilty to lying to federal agents about his talks with the ambassador. Trump fired Flynn after only 24 days in office, then said his top security advisor had been treated unfairly.

Allies of the president have pointed to two declassified documents released in May related to the investigation into Flynn. In an email, then-national security advisor Susan Rice described a Jan. 5, 2017, Oval Office meeting in which Comey expressed concern to Obama about sharing information with Flynn because of his communications with the Russian ambassador. Another document shows that Vice President Joe Biden was among dozens of senior Obama administration officials who might have been informed about Flynn’s contacts with the Russian ambassador.

Neither document shows any wrongdoing. Rice’s email states that Obama told Comey to proceed “by the book,” and the document listing Biden as an official who learned of Flynn’s contacts states that the former Trump advisor’s “unmasking” was approved by the National Security Agency.

The Justice Department’s decision to try to drop the Flynn prosecution has prompted critics to question whether Trump was improperly influencing criminal prosecutions in a politically charged case.

But Trump has continued with the “Obamagate” narrative, and a Senate committee headed by Trump ally Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) is now investigating the Russia investigation.

He told BBC Sport: “We signed a two-fight deal, we were ready to go. The date was announced straight after the first fight for September, done a lot of negotiations in terms of venues, dates.

“They had all agreed September 20th, then Eubank came out and said he wasn’t ready.”

Asked if Benn was prepared to wait until the end of the year, Hearn added: “So we have to give them a chance.

“We just appeal to Eubank, if you’re not ready to go back to war with Benn and you’d rather sit at a poker table in Las Vegas, good luck to you. But let us move on.”

“We’re ready to move on, drop down to 147 and get a world title,” said Benn.

The first fight was organised by Ring Magazine, which is owned by Turki Alalshikh, and it was thought the rematch would also fall under the Riyadh Season promotion.

Appearing on Saturday’s broadcast before Oleksandr Usyk’s win over Daniel Dubois at Wembley Stadium, Alalshikh said the Eubank-Benn bout could still happen and suggested January or February as potential alternative dates.

Eubank has not commented on the situation himself, and it is unclear when an official decision will be made.

The 35-year-old was fined £10,000 earlier this month by the British Boxing Board of Control over “misuse of social media” in the build-up to the first contest.

July 19 (UPI) — The Obama administration should be investigated for abuse of power to smear President Donald Trump in 2016, National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard said on Friday.

Gabbard announced the release of files and a memo related to claims of Russia’s alleged attempt to disrupt the 2016 elections to help Trump win the presidency over former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

“There was a treasonous conspiracy in 2016 committed by officials at the highest level of government,” Gabbard said in a news release on Friday.

“Their goal was to subvert the will of the American people and enact what was essentially a years-long coup with the objective of trying to usurp the president from fulfilling the mandate bestowed upon him by the American people,” Gabbard said.

She accused the Obama administration of an “egregious abuse of power and blatant rejection of our Constitution” that “threatens the very foundation and integrity of our democratic republic.”

President Barack Obama and his national security cabinet members “manufactured and politicized intelligence to lay the groundwork” for falsifying claims that Russia acted to influence the election in Trump’s favor and to impeach the president, according to the DNI release.

Gabbard in 2019 was a member of the Democratic Party and a representative from Hawaii who said, “I could not in good conscience vote either yes or no,” during the Dec. 18, 2019, House vote to impeach Trump, according to Politico.

The DNI release says the U.S. intelligence community consistently concluded Russia likely was not trying to influence the 2016 election, and then-DNI Director James Clapper on Dec. 7, 2016, concluded “foreign adversaries did not use cyberattacks” to alter the election results.

Despite evidence to the contrary, Gabbard says Obama and others tasked Clapper with creating a new intelligence community assessment that claimed Russia acted to influence the election.

Obama officials then leaked false statements claiming Russia tried to influence the election’s outcome and produced a new assessment on Jan. 6, 2017, that contradicted prior assessments on the matter, according to the DNI.

Gabbard said she is forwarding relevant materials to the Department of Justice for possible legal action.

Some congressional Democrats have challenged Gabbard’s announcement.

“The unanimous, bipartisan conclusion was that Russia interfered in the 2016 election to benefit Donald Trump,” Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., told CNN on Friday.

“This is just another example of the DNI trying to cook the books, rewrite history and erode trust in the intelligence agencies she’s supposed to be leading,” Warner added.

Warner is vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee.

House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence Ranking Member Rep. Jim Himes, D-Conn., said “every legitimate investigation” into the matter affirmed the findings of the 2016 Intelligence Community Assessment, CNN reported.

JOHN Torode directed the N-word at staff member as well as singing it in a Kanye West song, claimed a source.

We reported yesterday how the MasterChef star, 59, repeated lyrics from Gold Digger, which contain the racial slur, at an after-work ­gathering six or seven years ago.

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Torode is said to have used the word again while ­chatting to a pal on the BBC show’s production team – who did not take offence.

Torode, who vehemently denies ever using the N-word, is “utterly devastated” by the accusations and has “absolutely no recollection”.

He was sacked this week after an investigation by the Beeb and production company Banijay – which also saw former co-host Gregg Wallace axed for inappropriate behaviour.

However, the BBC has how revealed the second incident was not the one reported and led to a complaint.

The allegation was actually in reference to an incident that unfolded a year before.

An insider claimed Torode used the “extremely offensive racist term” on set after filming a MasterChef episode.

It was allegedly directed towards a member of staff.

And, there were eight further complaints lodged against Torode, which ranged from alleged racist comments, sexual remarks and abusive language towards junior production employees.

But, they were not upheld due to lack of evidence.

The report has also highlighted a complaint against a third unnamed person for swearing.

According to the BBC, this is in reference to a senior exec on the show.

The company also lifted the lid on Torode and Wallace’s partnership and how the on-screen pals were “never friends” behind the scenes.

An ex-staffer claimed: “Clearly they had a good chemistry when the cameras were rolling. But you rarely saw them interact when the cameras were off.

“And when Gregg was saying inappropriate things like that, John held his counsel. I never saw him step in.”

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Torode himself admitted “we’ve never been friends. We’ve not been to each other’s houses”, in 2017.

He even confessed to the Mirror there had been “a couple of standoffs” which left Torode walking away from his co-star.

When allegations about Wallace came to light last year, Torode’s lack of support was glaringly obvious.

In his brief statement, he said the “thought of anyone who has appeared on our show not having a brilliant experience is awful to hear”.

It was enough to reportedly make Wallace “furious” and led to the chef unfollowing him and his co-host’s wife Lisa Faulkner.

This comes after a source told The Sun Torode is in “a pretty bad way — he’s feeling very fragile” since being sacked this week.

Melbourne-born John moved to the UK in 1991 and started working in London restaurants including Quaglino’s.

It was there he met greengrocer Wallace, who provided their veg.

He started cooking on This Morning in 1996 before he and Wallace began hosting the revamped MasterChef in 2005.

But the host was only spoken to by a representative from legal firm Lewis Silkin at the end of June as part of the inquiry into his ­MasterChef co-host Gregg Wallace.

A source added: “One of the allegations is that he said the N-word while repeating Kanye’s Gold Digger song during a gathering with his colleagues when filming had ended. John is adamant he would never have used the N-word and only knows the radio version of the song which says, ‘Now I ain’t sayin’ she a gold digger, but she ain’t messin’ with no broke, broke’. The clean version of the song is the only one he knows.

“The person who raised the complaint didn’t say anything at the time. So John only found out a few weeks ago that this issue had been raised.

“This has hit him like a ton of bricks as he does not recall it.

“He insists he would never have repeated the N-word in those lyrics because he only knows the radio edit of that song.”

Those close to Torode have criticised the BBC’s handling of his departure, with his representatives only being made aware his contract wasn’t being renewed after the BBC press office released a statement.

A source added: “John is devastated by all of this. He is being supported by his wife Lisa and friends. They’re keeping him close because he has really been struggling.

“John abhors this kind of language and does not recall ever reciting a racist slur in a lyric, or directing one to someone he considered a friend at work.

“He adored MasterChef. It was a huge part of his life. To have it all ending like this is awful.”

Wallace, 60, was also officially sacked this week by the BBC and Banijay after an independent investigation was carried out into allegations of bad behaviour on the show between 2005 and 2024.

A total of 45 out of 83 allegations were upheld.

The majority were inappropriate sexual language.

One related to unwanted touching.

BBC boss Tim Davie has since broke his silence on the future of MasterChef following the scandal.

He said: “I absolutely think it does, I think a great programme that’s loved by audiences is much bigger than individuals.

“It absolutely can survive and prosper, but we’ve got to make sure we’re in the right place in terms of the culture of the show.”

The Sun revealed that the final MasterChef series, with Wallace and Torode as hosts, will air “once the dust has settled”.

Meanwhile, Torode’s wife Lisa Faulkner has revealed “I don’t read anything about us” as she opened up about her six-year marriage.

Ta’ang National Liberation Army rebels did not acknowledge the loss of Nawnghkio town to the military, saying they moved to ‘safe locations’.

Myanmar’s military government has claimed to have removed rebel fighters and recaptured a town after a yearlong battle near the country’s main army training academy, marking a rare turnaround for the regime in the northeast region of the country.

The country’s ruling military announced on Thursday that it made the advance in Shan State’s town of Nawnghkio, which had been under the control of the Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA).

The rebel group, part of the Three Brotherhood Alliance, had seized the strategically important town, which sits on a key highway linking central Myanmar to China, in July 2024.

In a statement published in the state-run Global New Light of Myanmar, the military government said it had retaken Nawnghkio after “566 armed engagements within 11 operational months”. A rare one-page spread in the newspaper showed soldiers holding rifles aloft in celebration. It detailed the battle, admitting initial attacks led to officers and enlisted men “sacrificing their lives”.

But “by combining strategic ground and air military tactics”, the military captured “the whole Nawnghkio area” by Wednesday, it said.

Nawnghkio is located about 40km (25 miles) from Pyin Oo Lwin, the town that hosts the country’s main military officer training academy, and some 80km (50 miles) from Myanmar’s second-most populous city, Mandalay.

In a statement, the TNLA did not acknowledge the military government’s claim of victory, saying only that “it has been difficult to continue administrative work in the town due to the heavy offensive”. The TNLA added that it had “moved civil administration services to safe locations”.

While the combined rebel offensive against government forces has inflicted sweeping losses since it was launched in October 2023, analysts say the military government’s control over large population centres is secure as it wields an air force capable of staving off large-scale rebel advances.

Northeastern Lashio city was also captured by the rebels but was handed back to the ruling military in April after a deal brokered by China.

Since a 2021 military coup toppled the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi and ignited a civil war in Myanmar, a myriad of pro-democracy armed groups and ethnic rebel armies have joined forces to fight against military rule.

The groups in the Three Brotherhood Alliance, which also include the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army and the Arakan Army, have been fighting for decades for greater autonomy from Myanmar’s central government. The alliance is also loosely allied with the People’s Defence Force, a pro-democracy resistance group that has emerged to fight the military regime.

US president has pushed other countries to crack down on manufacturing and exportation of fentanyl.

United States President Donald Trump has said that China may start sentencing people to death for involvement in the manufacture or distribution of fentanyl, whose trafficking Trump has sought harsh measures to counteract.

Speaking as he signed anti-drug legislation on Wednesday, the US president said that the need to combat fentanyl was one of the reasons for his imposition of tariffs on countries across the world.

“I think we’re going to work it out so that China is going to end up going from that to giving the death penalty to the people that create this fentanyl and send it into our country,” Trump said. “I believe that’s going to happen soon.”

China, which has long imposed severe penalties on people involved with drug distribution, including capital punishment, has been at the centre of Trump’s ire over the opioid that helped fuel an overdose epidemic in the US.

The country raised outrage when it executed four Canadian dual citizens earlier this year for drug-related offences, despite pleas for clemency from the Canadian government.

Experts have questioned whether such penalties will help address the distribution of fentanyl, which China has said is driven largely by demand from people in the US.

Trump has previously linked his tariffs on countries such as Mexico and Canada to fentanyl, although trafficking from the latter into the US is close to nonexistent.

Drug overdoses in the US have been a subject of concern and political debate for years, with the country’s opioid epidemic beginning with the aggressive promotion of painkillers by pharmaceutical companies but later being mostly driven by synthetic opioids such as fentanyl.

Overdose deaths have started to drop in recent years, giving experts cause for optimism after years of communities being ravaged by opioids. Overdoses over a 12-month period ending in June 2024 dropped by 12 percent compared with the same period the previous year, down from 113,000 to 97,000.

SEOUL, July 16 (UPI) — South Korea summoned a Japanese attache to protest a territorial claim over disputed islands that Tokyo made in an annual white paper, Seoul’s Defense Ministry announced Wednesday.

The islets, which are called Dokdo in Korean and Takeshima in Japanese, are located in the East Sea between the two countries. South Korea has controlled the islands since 1952 with a coast guard contingent, but they have been at the center of a diplomatic dispute that goes back hundreds of years.

Tokyo’s latest annual defense white paper asserts that Dokdo and the Russian-controlled Kuril Islands are “inherent territories of Japan” and calls issues around them “unresolved.” It uses the Japanese names for both island groups, referring to the Kuril Islands as the Northern Territories and to Dokdo as Takeshima.

Defense Ministry director general for international policy Lee Gwang-seok summoned Japanese defense attache Inoue Hirofumi on Tuesday over the claims.

In the meeting, Lee “reaffirmed that Dokdo is [South Korea’s] inherent territory historically, geographically and under international law,” according to a ministry statement sent to reporters.

Lee added that South Korea would “respond resolutely to any attempt to infringe upon our sovereignty over Dokdo.”

South Korea’s Foreign Ministry also responded to the white paper on Tuesday by calling in the Japanese Embassy’s acting minister Yoshiyasu Iseki and urging Tokyo to withdraw its claims.

“The [South Korean] government strongly protests the Japanese government’s repeated unjust territorial claims to Dokdo, which is clearly our inherent territory in terms of history, geography and international law,” the ministry said in a statement.

“The government once again makes it clear that no claims by the Japanese government regarding Dokdo … have any influence on our sovereignty, and declares that it will respond resolutely to any provocations by Japan regarding Dokdo,” the statement said.

The dispute comes as historically frosty relations between Seoul and Tokyo have thawed in recent years, with improved diplomatic ties and closer trilateral security cooperation with Washington.

This year’s defense white paper includes language, introduced in last year’s edition, calling South Korea “an important neighboring country with which we should cooperate as a partner in responding to various challenges in the international community.”

Two groups of commercial pilots reject initial probe into the deadly June 12 crash, calling it a ‘reckless and unfounded insinuation’.

Two groups of commercial pilots have rejected claims that human error caused an Air India plane crash that killed 260 people after a preliminary investigation found the aircraft’s engine fuel switches had been turned off.

The Indian Commercial Pilots Association (ICPA) and the Airline Pilots’ Association of India (ALPA India) issued statements on Sunday after the release of the initial findings, which showed that fuel control switches to the engines of Flight AI171 were moved from the “run” to the “cutoff” position moments before last month’s deadly impact.

The report sparked speculation by several independent aviation experts that deliberate or inadvertent pilot action may have caused the Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner to crash soon after takeoff from Ahmedabad in western India.

Flight AI171 was headed to London’s Gatwick Airport when it crashed on June 12.

The report on the crash, issued on Saturday by India’s Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB), did not offer any conclusions or apportion blame for the disaster but indicated that one pilot asked the other why he cut off the fuel and the second pilot responded that he had not.

After the switches flipped, the Boeing 787 Dreamliner immediately began to lose thrust and altitude, according to the report.

One pilot can be heard on the cockpit voice recorder asking the other why he had cut off the fuel. “The other pilot responded that he did not do so,” the report said.

It did not identify which remarks were made by the flight’s captain and which by the first officer or which pilot transmitted “Mayday, Mayday, Mayday” just before the crash.

No more details about the cockpit dialogue between the pilots were revealed.

The ICPA said it was “deeply disturbed by speculative narratives, … particularly the reckless and unfounded insinuation of pilot suicide”.

“There is absolutely no basis for such a claim at this stage,” it said in a statement. “It is deeply insensitive to the individuals and families involved.

“To casually suggest pilot suicide without verified evidence is a gross violation of ethical reporting and a disservice to the dignity of the profession.”

The ICPA was referring to a number of aviation experts suggesting engine fuel control switches can only be moved deliberately and manually.

United States-based aviation safety expert John Cox earlier said a pilot would not be able to accidentally move the fuel switches that feed the engines. “You can’t bump them and they move,” he told the Reuters news agency.

ALPA India, which has 800 members, also accused the investigative agency of “secrecy” surrounding the investigation, saying “suitably qualified personnel” were not involved in it.

“We feel that the investigation is being driven in a direction presuming the guilt of pilots and we strongly object to this line of thought,” ALPA India President Sam Thomas said in a statement issued on Saturday.

ALPA requested the AAIB be included as “observers so as to provide the requisite transparency in the investigations”.

Meanwhile, Air India CEO Campbell Wilson said the probe into last month’s crash is far from over and it is unwise to jump to any premature conclusions.

Wilson added: “The preliminary report identified no cause nor made any recommendations, so I urge everyone to avoid drawing premature conclusions as the investigation is far from over.”

The crash killed all but one of the 242 people on board as well as 19 people on the ground.

Next year’s Fifa World Cup in the United States, Canada and Mexico is set to be “the most climate-damaging” in the tournament’s history, according to new research by environmentalists.

Scientists for Global Responsibility (SGR) has calculated the greenhouse gas emissions attributable to the tournament, which has been expanded from 32 to 48 teams.

“Driven by a high reliance on air travel and significant increase in the quantity of matches” the campaign group claims the expanded 2026 World Cup will generate more than nine million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent.

SGR says that is almost double the average for the last four World Cup finals, and significantly more than Qatar 2022, which is estimated to have had a footprint of up to 5.25 million tonnes of CO2e.

It says the predicted 2026 total is “equivalent to nearly 6.5 million average British cars being driven for an entire year” – and will make it the most polluting tournament ever staged.

Next year’s World Cup will be the first to be held across an entire continent and have 40 more matches (104) than before, although all will be played at existing stadia.

In their original bid book, the three prospective host nations for the 2026 tournament revealed a preliminary estimate of 3.6 million tonnes of CO2e, although at that stage it was expected to stage just 80 matches. They also said the bid “hopes the 2026 World Cup will establish new standards for environmental sustainability in sport and deliver measurable environmental benefits”.

Fifa has been approached for comment.

US President Donald Trump and his Middle East envoy both claimed the talks could happen next week, following the Iranian president’s comments on being open to dialogue.

Iran says it has not requested talks with the United States over its nuclear programme, as claimed by US President Donald Trump.

“No request for a meeting has been made on our side to the American side,” Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei said on Tuesday in comments carried by the country’s Tasnim news agency.

The clarification came a day after Trump, during a dinner in the White House with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, said Iran was actively seeking negotiations on a new nuclear deal following the 12-day war with Israel last month, which the US also joined.

“We have scheduled Iran talks. They want to talk,” Trump told reporters. “They want to work something out. They are very different now than they were two weeks ago.”

Trump’s Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff – also present during the dinner – had even said the meeting could take place in the next week or so.

Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi wrote in an opinion piece published in the Financial Times newspaper on Tuesday that Tehran remains interested in diplomacy but “we have good reason to have doubts about further dialogue”.

Sanctions relief

On June 13, Israel launched an unprecedented bombing campaign on Iran that targeted military and nuclear sites as well as residential areas, killing senior military commanders and nuclear scientists. Iranian authorities say the Israeli strikes killed at least 1,060 people. Israel says retaliatory drone and missile fire by Iran killed at least 28 people.

The US joined the war, bombing Iranian nuclear sites at Fordow, Isfahan and Natanz, just days before a planned meeting between Tehran and Washington, DC on reviving the nuclear talks. Trump then went on to announce a ceasefire between Israel and Iran.

The negotiations, aimed at limiting Iran’s nuclear programme in exchange for sanctions relief, would replace the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) – a deal signed with the US, China, Russia, France, Germany, the United Kingdom and the European Union – which Trump ditched during his first term in office.

Floating the prospect of more talks on Monday, Trump also dangled the prospect of lifting punitive US sanctions on Iran, imposed after the US withdrawal from JCPOA, with further restrictions piled on this year.

This month, the US issued a new wave of sanctions against Iranian oil exports, the first penalties against Tehran’s energy sector since the US-backed ceasefire ended the war between Israel and Iran.

“I would love to be able to, at the right time, take those sanctions off,” said Trump.

Towards the end of last month, Trump said he was working on “the possible removal of sanctions”, but dropped his efforts after Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei claimed “victory” in the Iran-Israel war.

Tehran’s denial regarding talks with the US came after Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian told US journalist Tucker Carlson that Iran had “no problem” resuming talks so long as trust could be rebuilt between the two sides.

The interview, aired on Monday, provoked a backlash in Iran, with the critics accusing Pezeshkian of being “too soft” in the wake of last month’s attacks on the country.

“Have you forgotten that these same Americans, together with the Zionists, used the negotiations to buy time and prepare for the attack?” said an editorial in the hardline Kayhan newspaper.

The conservative Javan daily also took aim at Pezeshkian, saying his remarks appeared “a little too soft”.

In contrast, the reformist Ham Mihan newspaper praised Pezeshkian’s “positive approach”.

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French officials allege China’s foreign embassies leading charge to undermine Rafale sales after India-Pakistan conflict in May, says report.

French military and intelligence officials claim China has deployed its embassies to spread doubts about the performance of French-made Rafale jets following the aerial combat between India and Pakistan in May.

The Associated Press news agency, quoting French officials, reported on Sunday that Beijing is working to harm the reputation and sales of France’s flagship fighter aircraft.

French officials say they have found that the Chinese embassies are trying to undermine Rafale sales by persuading countries that have already ordered the jets, notably Indonesia, not to buy them and instead choose Chinese-made fighters.

The AP report said the findings were shared by a French military official on condition that they should not be named.

Four days of India-Pakistan clashes in May were the most serious confrontation in years between the two nuclear-armed neighbours, which included air combat involving dozens of aircraft from both sides.

Military officials and researchers have since been digging for details of how Pakistan’s Chinese-made military hardware – particularly warplanes and air-combat missiles – fared against weaponry that India used in air strikes on Pakistani targets, notably French-made Rafale fighters.

Sales of Rafales and other armaments are big business for the French defence industry and help Paris to strengthen ties with other nations, including in Asia, where China is becoming the dominant regional power.

India confirms losses

Pakistan says its air force downed five Indian planes during the fighting, including three Rafales. French officials say that prompted questions about their performance from countries that have bought the fighter from French manufacturer Dassault Aviation.

India acknowledged aircraft losses but did not say how many. French air force chief General Jerome Bellanger said he has seen evidence pointing to just three aircraft losses – a Rafale, a Russian-made Sukhoi and a Mirage 2000, which is an earlier generation French-made jet.

It was the first known combat loss of a Rafale, which France has sold to eight countries. “Of course, all those, the nations that bought Rafales, asked themselves questions,” Bellanger said.

French officials have been battling to protect the plane from reputational damage, pushing back against what they allege was a concerted campaign of Rafale-bashing and disinformation online from Pakistan and its ally, China.

They say the campaign included viral posts on social media, manipulated imagery showing supposed Rafale debris, AI-generated content and video-game depictions to simulate supposed combat.

More than 1,000 social media accounts newly created as the India-Pakistan clashes erupted also spread a narrative of Chinese technological superiority, according to French researchers who specialise in online disinformation.

French claims

Military officials in France say they have not been able to link the online Rafale-bashing directly to the Chinese government.

But the French intelligence service said Chinese embassy defence attaches echoed the same narrative in meetings they held with security and defence officials from other countries, arguing that Indian Rafale jets performed poorly and promoting Chinese-made weaponry.

The defence attaches focused their lobbying on countries that have ordered Rafales and other potential customer nations that are considering purchases, the intelligence service said. It said French officials learned of the meetings from nations that were approached.

The French Ministry for Armed Forces said the Rafale was targeted by “a vast campaign of disinformation” that “sought to promote the superiority of alternative equipment, notably of Chinese design”.

“The Rafale was not randomly targeted. It is a highly capable fighter jet, exported abroad and deployed in a high-visibility theatre,” the French ministry wrote on its website.

Asked by AP to comment on the alleged effort to dent Rafale’s appeal, the Ministry of National Defence in Beijing said: “The relevant claims are pure groundless rumours and slander. China has consistently maintained a prudent and responsible approach to military exports, playing a constructive role in regional and global peace and stability.”

Dassault Aviation has sold 533 Rafales, including 323 exported to Egypt, India, Qatar, Greece, Croatia, the United Arab Emirates, Serbia and Indonesia. Indonesia has ordered 42 planes and is considering buying more.