threatened

Tottenham say they are supporting Destiny Udogie after confirming the Italy defender was allegedly threatened with a gun by a football agent.

On Monday, BBC Sport reported an unnamed Premier League footballer was targeted in London on 6 September.

Another man is also alleged to have been blackmailed and threatened by the same individual during the incident in question. No injuries were reported.

The Metropolitan police, who are investigating, said a 31-year-old man was arrested on 8 September on suspicion of possession of firearms with intent, blackmail and driving without a licence. He has been bailed while enquiries continue.

In a statement on Tuesday, Spurs said: “We have been providing support for Destiny and his family since the incident and will continue to do so. Given this is a legal matter, we cannot comment any further.”

The 22-year-old Udogie joined Spurs from Udinese for £15m on a five-year deal in the summer of 2022, before immediately returning to the Serie A club on a season-long loan.

He returned to Tottenham for the start of the 2023-24 campaign and has made 76 appearances for the club.

The Italian has played 10 times this season, including Tuesday night’s 4-0 win over Copenhagen in the league phase of the Champions League.

Petro, however, did acknowledge that a disruption in the two countries’ military cooperation could have serious consequences.

Colombia’s President Gustavo Petro has indicated that a suspension of aid from the United States would mean little to his country, but that changes to military funding could have an effect.

“What happens if they take away aid? In my opinion, nothing,” Petro told journalists on Thursday, adding that aid funding often moved through US agencies and employed Americans.

But a cut to military cooperation would matter, he added.

“Now, in military aid, we would have some problems,” Petro said, adding that the loss of US helicopters would have the gravest impact.

US President Donald Trump had threatened over the weekend to raise tariffs on Colombia and said on Wednesday that all funding to the country has been halted.

Colombia was once among the largest recipients of US aid in the Western Hemisphere, but the flow of money was suddenly curtailed this year by the shuttering of USAID, the government’s humanitarian assistance arm. Military cooperation has continued.

The Trump administration has already “decertified” Colombia’s efforts to fight drug trafficking, paving the way for potential further cuts, but some US military personnel remain in Colombia, and the two countries continue to share intelligence.

Petro has objected to the US military’s strikes against vessels in the Caribbean, which have killed dozens of people and inflamed tensions in the region. Many legal experts and human rights activists have also condemned the actions.

Trump has responded by calling Petro an “illegal drug leader” and a “bad guy” – language Petro’s government says is offensive.

Petro has recalled his government’s ambassador from Washington, DC, but he nevertheless met with the US’s charge d’affaires in Bogota late on Sunday.

Although Trump has not announced any additional tariffs on top of the 10-percent rate already assessed on Colombian goods, he said on Wednesday he may take serious action against the country.

Petro said Trump is unlikely to put tariffs on oil and coal exports, which represent 60 percent of Colombia’s exports to the US, while the effect of tariffs on other industries could be mitigated by seeking alternative markets.

An increase in tariffs would flip a long-established US policy stance that free trade can make legitimate exports more attractive than drug trafficking, and analysts say more duties could eventually bolster drug trafficking.

Although his government has struggled to take control of major hubs for rebel and criminal activity, Petro said it has made record seizures of 2,800 metric tonnes of cocaine in three years, partly through increased efforts at Pacific ports where container ships are used for smuggling.

He also repeated an accusation that Trump’s actions are intended to boost the far right in Colombia in next year’s legislative and presidential elections.

A TOP Tory minister has said she fears her hotel room was bugged on a fact-finding trip to Taiwan.

It comes after a case against an accused Chinese spy, Chris Cash, collapsed last month when the Government refused to class Beijing as a threat to national security.

5

5

Chris Cash, 30, and his friend Christopher Berry, 33, were both accused and denied spying for China.

Cash, a parliamentary researcher, received high level briefings from former MI6 spooks, ambassadors and ministers before he was dramatically arrested.

The former teacher, who had lived and worked in China, was accused of passing secrets to Beijing.

The Crown Prosecution Service case against the two alleged spies collapsed with ministers blamed for failing to provide key evidence that China was a national security threat at the time.

Starmer has since claimed that there was nothing he could do about the issue and blamed the former government for not designating China a threat when the offences took place.

The Daily Mail has now revealed that at the same time the Government was refusing to designate Beijing a threat, then foreign secretary David Lammy was doing just that.

He branded China an enemy of Britain during a debate in the commons in an effort to defend Labour’s surrender of the Chagos Islands.

The Shadow National Security Minister, Alicia Kearns, 37, has now revealed that she was a target during the alleged spy operation.

In what is thought to be a spy dossier, details of her hotel room in Taiwan were found.

When the senior Tory minister was on a fact finding trip to the country as chairman of the foreign affairs committee, she fears she was bugged by Beijing.

She told the Daily Mail: “They could have got in that room at any time.

“You can’t be sure that the room hasn’t got a bug or a camera somewhere.

“There could be photos of you walking around your hotel room naked.”

China had threatened that the mother-of-three’s trip would result in “repercussions.”

5

5

She worked alongside Mr Cash for a year and raised concern that others he met through work may have been exposed.

Chinese dissidents, victims of transnational repression and people intimidated in secret Chinese police stations in the UK may have all been laid bare to Mr Cash.

The Shadow National Security Minister continued, saying Mr Cash worked at the heart of government policy on China.

He gained insight from the Foreign Office, Home Office, Treasury and Department for Business and Trade according to Ms Kearns.

Mr Cash worked on key government policy around China including the TikTok ban on government devices and exposing covert Chinese police stations in the UK.

The alleged spy managed to speak to every top China expert in the UK, finding himself in a position to glean information as “valuable as gold dust” to Beijing Ms Kearns believes.

The revelations could raise more questions about why the case against the accused spooks was dropped.

Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper admitted: “We know China poses threats to the UK national security.”

“I am deeply frustrated about this case, because I, of course, wanted to see it prosecuted.”

Ex-diplomat Charles Parton previously told The Sun that the Government’s refusal to brand Beijing a threat clearly showed “a desire not to offend China.”

Mr Parton, who was due to testify for the prosecution, slammed the CPS for failing to find new witnesses after the Government pulled its national security official at the last minute.

He told The Sun: “They are both to blame. The Government for withdrawing.

“But the CPS should have got some evidence from experts to say, ‘Is China a threat?’

“Then the jury could have said, ‘Yes, national security threat,’ and now we’re going ahead and trying this case.

“That smacks either of interference by the Government or just sheer incompetence.”

Chris Cash and Christopher Berry both deny all charges brought against them under the official secrets act.

5

WASHINGTON — Washington is barreling toward a government shutdown Tuesday night, with few signs of an off-ramp as Democrats and Republicans dig in for a fight over government spending.

Democratic leadership on Capitol Hill is insisting on an extension of Affordable Care Act tax credits as part of a package to fund the government. At least seven Democratic votes are needed in the Senate to pass a seven-week stopgap bill that cleared the House last week.

But Republican lawmakers and the White House have dismissed the proposal, with senior officials in the Trump administration threatening to use unique legal authorities granted during a government shutdown to conduct yet more mass firings of federal workers.

Bipartisan congressional leadership met with President Trump at the White House on Monday afternoon in a last-minute effort to avert the crisis. But neither side exited the meeting with expectations of a breakthrough. On the contrary, Republican leaders in the House told the GOP caucus to plan to return to work next week and said they would hold a news conference on Wednesday anticipating the government’s closure.

“We are not going to support a partisan Republican spending bill that continues to gut the healthcare of everyday Americans, period, full stop,” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) said Monday.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer talk to reporters outside the White House.

(Alex Brandon / Associated Press)

Vice President JD Vance said he thought the country was “headed to a shutdown,” labeling Democratic calls for healthcare tax credits an “absurd” demand that amounts to an “excuse for shutting down the people’s government.”

“You don’t use your policy disagreements as leverage to not pay our troops,” Vance said. “That’s exactly what they’re proposing out there.”

When the government shuts down, the law requires all nonessential government services to cease, requiring most federal workers to go on furlough or work without pay. Essential services — such as national security functions and air traffic control — are not affected.

Ahead of the meeting, Trump told reporters he hoped Democrats would agree to “keeping our country open,” before proceeding to criticize their proposals.

“They’re going to have to do some things, because their ideas are not very good ones,” Trump said. “They’re very bad for our country. So we’ll see how that works out.”

But Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said he thought his message was beginning to resonate with the president after their meeting Monday afternoon.

“We have very large differences, on healthcare, and on their ability to undo whatever budget we agree to, through rescissions and through impoundment,” Schumer said. “I think for the first time, the president heard our objections and heard why we needed a bipartisan bill. Their bill has not one iota of Democratic input. That is never how we’ve done this before.”

“We’ve made to the president some proposals,” Schumer added. “Ultimately, he’s a decision-maker.”

Schumer faced widespread ridicule from within his party in March after reversing course during the last showdown, choosing then to support the Trump administration’s continuing resolution to fund the government at the height of an aggressive purge of the federal workforce.

At that point, Schumer feared a shutdown could accelerate the firings. But Schumer is now defiant, despite the renewed threat of layoffs, after the White House Office of Management and Budget circulated a memo last week directing federal agencies to relieve workers on discretionary projects that lose funding after Oct. 1.

“This is an attempt at intimidation,” Schumer said in response to the memo. “Donald Trump has been firing federal workers since day one — not to govern, but to scare. This is nothing new and has nothing to do with funding the government.”

Vice President JD Vance talks to reporters as House Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune listen.

(Alex Brandon / Associated Press)

Still, Schumer began gauging his caucus Monday afternoon on the prospects of a continuing resolution that would in effect delay a shutdown by a week, briefly extending government funding in order to continue negotiations.

Betting markets had chances of a shutdown soaring above 70% by the end of the day on Monday.

Speaking to Fox News on Monday, Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said the president’s position was “the reasonable and commonsense thing to do,” calling on Democrats to continue funding to the military and its veterans.

“All we are asking for is a commonsense, clean funding resolution — a continuing resolution — to keep the government open,” Leavitt said. “This is a bill that keeps the government funded at the exact same levels as today, just adjusted for inflation.”

“So there is zero good reason for the Democrats to vote against this,” she added. “The president is giving Democrat leadership one last chance to be reasonable.”

But Jeffries dismissed Leavitt as “divorced from reality” in a podcast interview.

“In what world will any rational American conclude, after we’ve been lectured throughout the year about this so-called mandate that the Republican Party has in this country, and their complete control of government in Washington, that because Democrats are unwilling to gut the healthcare of the American people as part of the Republican healthcare crisis, that it’s us shutting the government down?” Jeffries said.

“Nobody’s buying that,” he continued, “outside of the parts of the MAGA base who basically, seemingly, will buy anything that Donald Trump has to peddle.”

Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) said he would call a vote on funding the government Tuesday afternoon.

“This is purely and simply hostage-taking,” Thune said Monday. Whether it passes or fails, he said, is “up to the Democrats.”

A WOMAN armed with three knives threatened to kill migrants after watching far-right videos, a court heard.

Drunk and stoned Nina Manley, 51, got a taxi to a Premier Inn hotel — but it was the wrong one as there were no migrants living there.

2

2

Staff at the hotel in North Petherton, Somerset, called cops, in August.

Manley told police: “I’m pissed off and I’m going to f***ing kill someone.”

Recorder Matthew Cannings told her at Taunton crown court: “You watched videos of extreme far-right social media personalities like Nigel Farage and Tommy Robinson.”

Defending, Anjam Arif said Manley came from a military background and lost a brother who was killed while serving in Afghanistan.

“Her actions were born out of bravado rather than a real threat to kill.”

Manley, of Bridgwater, admitted threats to kill and got a 12-month suspended jail sentence.

Long Moh, Sarawak — William Tinggang throws a handful of fish food into a glass-clear river.

A few seconds pass before movement under the water’s surface begins, and soon a large shoal splashes to the surface, fighting for the food.

He waits for the underwater crowd to disperse before hurling the next handful into the river. The splashing resumes.

“These fish aren’t for us to eat,” explains Tinggang, who has emerged as a community leader in opposing the logging industry in Long Moh, a village in the Ulu Baram region of Malaysia’s Sarawak state.

“We want the populations here to replenish,” he tells Al Jazeera.

As part of a system known as Tagang – an Iban language word that translates as “restricted” – residents of Long Moh have agreed there will be no hunting, fishing or cutting of trees in this area.

Just a few hours’ flight from Malaysia’s capital Kuala Lumpur, Sarawak is one of two Malaysian states on the island of Borneo that contain some of the oldest rainforests on the planet.

It is an internationally recognised biodiversity hotspot, and within its Ulu Baram region lies the Nawan Nature Discovery Centre, a community-initiated forest reserve spanning more than 6,000 hectares (23 square miles).

The forest in Nawan is dense and thriving; bats skim the surface of the Baram River, palm-sized butterflies drift between trees, and occasionally, monkeys can be heard from the canopy.

The river remains crystal clear, a testament to the absence of nearby activities.

The community’s preservation effort stands in contrast to much of the surrounding landscape in Sarawak, where vast tracts of forest have been systematically cut down for timber extraction and palm oil plantations.

Conservation groups estimate that Sarawak may have lost 90 percent of its primary forest cover in the past 50 years.

Limiting hunting is one of the numerous ways communities in the region are working together to protect what remains of Sarawak’s biodiversity heritage.

For the community of Long Moh, whose residents are Kenyah Indigenous people, the forests within their native customary lands have spiritual significance.

“Nawan is like a spiritual home,” says Robert Lenjau, a resident of Long Moh, who is a keen player of the sape, a traditional lute instrument which is popular across the state and is steeped in Indigenous mythology.

“We believe there are ancestors there,” says Lenjau.

While most Kenyah people have converted to Christianity following decades of missionary influence in the region, many still retain elements of their traditional beliefs.

The community’s leading activist, Tinggang, believes the forest to have spiritual importance.

“We hear sounds of machetes clashing, and sounds of people in pain when we sleep by the river’s mouth,” he explains.

“Our parents once told us that there was a burial ground there.”

Sarawak’s dwindling forest cover

Sarawak’s logging industry boomed in the 1980s, and the following decades saw large concessions granted to companies.

Timber exports remain big business. In 2023, exports were estimated to be worth $560m, with top importers of Sarawak’s wood including France, the Netherlands, Japan and the United States, according to Human Rights Watch.

In recent years, the timber industry has turned to meeting the rapidly growing demand for wood pellets, which are burned to generate energy.

While logging reaped billions in profits, it often came at the expense of Indigenous communities, who lacked formal legal recognition of their ancestral lands, despite their historical connection to the forest and their deep ecological knowledge of the region.

“In Sarawak, there are very limited options for communities to actually claim native customary land rights,” says Jessica Merriman from The Borneo Project, an organisation that campaigns for environmental protection and human rights across Malaysian Borneo.

“Even communities who do decide to try the legal route, which takes years, lawyers, and costs money, they risk losing access to the rest of their customary territories,” Merriman says, explaining that making a legal claim to one tract of land may mean losing much more.

“Because you’ve agreed – essentially – that the rest [of the land] doesn’t belong to you,” she says.

Even successful community claims may only grant rights to a very small fraction of what Indigenous communities actually consider to be their native customary land in Sarawak, according to The Borneo Project.

This also means that logging companies might legally obtain permits to cut the forest in areas which had been previously disputed.

While timber companies have brought economic opportunities for some, providing job opportunities to villagers as drivers or labourers, many Kenyah community members in the Ulu Baram region have negative associations with the industry.

“We don’t agree with logging, because it is very damaging to the forests, water and ecosystems in our area,” says David Bilong, a member of Long Semiyang village, which is about a half-hour boat ride from Long Moh village.

Both Long Moh and Long Semiyang have dwindling populations, with about 200 and 100 full-time residents, respectively.

Extensive logging roads in the region have increased accessibility for the villages, resulting in younger community members migrating to nearby towns for work and sending remittances back home to support relatives.

Those who remain in the village, or “kampung”, live in traditional longhouses which are made up of rows of private family apartments connected by shared verandas. Here, community activities like rattan weaving, meetings and karaoke-singing take place.

Bilong has played an active role in community activism over the years. For him, deforestation activities have contributed to the undermining of generational knowledge, as physical landmarks have been removed from their lived environment.

“It’s difficult for us to go to the jungle now,” he explains.

“We don’t know any more which hill is the one we go to for hunting,” he says.

“We don’t even know where the hill went.”

For decades, Indigenous communities across Ulu Baram have shown their resistance to logging activities by making physical blockades.

This typically entails community members camping for weeks, or even months, along logging roads to physically obstruct unwanted outsiders from entering native customary territories.

The primary legal framework regulating forest use is the Sarawak Forest Ordinance (1958), which grants the state government sweeping control over forest areas, including the issuance of timber licences.

Now, local communities are increasingly turning to strategic tools to assert their rights.

One of these tools is the creation of community maps.

“We are moving from oral tradition to physical documentation,” says Indigenous human rights activist Celine Lim.

Lim is the managing director of Save Rivers, one of the local organisations supporting Ulu Baram’s Indigenous communities to map their lands.

“Because of outside threats, this transition needs to take place,” Lim tells Al Jazeera.

Unlike official government maps, these maps reflect the community’s cultural landmarks.

They include markers for things like burial grounds, sacred sites and trees which contain poison for hunting with blow darts, reflecting how Indigenous people actually relate to and manage their land sustainably.

“For Indigenous people, the way that they connect to land is definitely a lot deeper than many of our conventional ways,” says Lim.

“They see the mountains, the rivers, the land, the forest and in the past, these were entities,” she says.

“The way you’d respect a person is the way that they would respect these entities.”

By physically documenting how their land is managed, Indigenous communities can use maps to assert their presence and protect their native customary territory.

“This community map is really important for us,” says Bilong, who played a role in the creation of Long Semiyang’s community map.

“When we make a map, we know what our area is and what is in our area,” he says.

“It is important that we create boundaries”.

The tradition of creating community maps in Sarawak first emerged in the 1990s, when the Switzerland-based group Bruno Manser-Fonds – named after a Swiss environmental activist who disappeared in Sarawak in 2000 – began supporting the Penan community with mapping activities.

The Penan are a previously nomadic indigenous group in Sarawak who have now mostly settled as farmers.

Through mapping, they have documented at least 5,000 river names and 1,000 topographic features linked to their traditions, and their community maps have been used numerous times as critical documentation to prevent logging.

Other groups, such as the Kenyah, are following suit with the creation of their own community maps.

“The reason why the trend of mapping has continued is because in other parts of Baram and Sarawak, they’ve proven to be successful,” says the Borneo Project’s Merriman, “at least in getting the attention of logging companies and the government.”

Now, local organisations are encouraging communities to further solidify their assertion to their native customary territories by joining a global platform hosted by the United Nations Environment Programme that recognises Indigenous and community conserved areas, known as the ICCA.

Communities participating in the ICCA are listed on a globally accessible online database, and this international visibility offers a place for them to publicise threats and land grabs.

In Sarawak, the international visibility afforded through ICCA registration could offer an alternative avenue of protection for communities.

Merriman says that another important aspect of applying for ICCA recognition is the process itself of registering.

“The ICCA process is fundamentally an organising tool and a self-strengthening tool,” she says.

“It’s not just about being on the database. It’s about going through the process of a community banding together to protect its own land, to come up with a shared vision of responding to threats and what they want to do to try to make alternative income.”

Safeguarding Indigenous communities in Sarawak also has an international significance, activists say.

As the impacts of climate change intensify in Malaysia and globally, the potential role of Sarawak’s rainforests in climate change mitigation is increasingly being recognised.

“There’s plenty of talk at the state level about protecting forests,” says Jettie Word, executive director of The Borneo Project.

“Officials often say the right things in terms of recognising their importance in combatting climate change. Though ongoing logging indicates a gap between rhetoric and reality,” Word says.

“While mapping alone can’t protect a forest from a billion-dollar timber project, when it’s combined with community organising and campaigning, it’s often quite powerful and we’ve seen it successfully keep the companies away,” she says.

“The maps provide solid evidence of a community’s territory that is difficult to refute.”

THIS is the shocking moment a Virgin Atlantic passenger hurled abuse at a hostess he threatened to “gang rape and set alight”

Disturbing footage shows Salman Iftikhar, 37, tell stewardess Angie Walsh she would be attacked in her hotel after landing.

7

7

7

He spouted his vile rant after downing champagne on an eight-hour flight from London Heathrow to Lahore on February 7 2023.

Iftikhar said Ms Walsh would be taken from her hotel room, gang raped and set on fire.

Another passenger, who filmed the shocking scenes, can be heard saying “holy s–t”.

Iftikhar repeatedly accuses Ms Walsh of being a racist and says: “You called me a p-ki in front of everybody.”

The 37-year-old had been flying with his wife and three children, Isleworth Crown Court heard.

Prosecuting, Abdul Kapadia, said: “During the defendant’s first meal service, the defendant was seen helping himself to ice, leaning over the bar he was drinking at, and taking ice with his hands.

“When told to stop, the defendant became irate, and started to film cabin crew with his phone, telling them: ‘Do not tell me what to do you b***h.

“When asked by the cabin crew to return to his seat, he then said: ‘Don’t tell me what to do you racist f***ing b***h. I know where you are from in Cardiff.”

Staff alerted the pilot and the seat belt signs were turned on, which only aggravated Iftikhar more.

He continued to call Ms Walsh a “f***ing b***h” before his escalating behaviour sparked a possible flight diversion to Turkey.

“The defendant was informed of this possible diversion, to which he replied: ‘I don’t care. F–it, go to Turkey. I have contacts,” the prosecutor told the court.

“The defendant then sat down, but his aggressive behaviour continued.

“His wife was ashamed. His three children were also on-board,
and other crew members were called to assist, but the defendant continued shouting and swearing.

“He was slurring his words, with his voice raised.

7

7

7

“He shouted at the cabin crew: ‘Do you know who I am?’

“The defendant’s wife went to the food bar and tried to talk to cabin crew, but the defendant pushed his wife away, and shouted at her not to talk to crew.”

He grabbed one flight attendant, called Tommy Merchant, and threatened him with a fight.

‘YOU WILL BE DEAD’

The out-of-control passenger then told cabin crew he would blow up the floor of their hotel.

“The defendant knew the specific hotel, but also the hotel room numbers, and threatened the cabin crew with this,” Mr Kapadia told the court.

“He told Ms Walsh: ‘You will be dead on the floor of your hotel’.

“Iftikhar shouted at Ms Walsh and said: ‘The white sheep sh**ging b***h will be dead. The floor of your hotel will be blown up and it will disappear.

“He told Ms Walsh: ‘You will be dragged by your hair from your room and gang raped and set on fire’.”

His violent rant unfolded in front of his wife and three young children – who were brought to tears.

Iftikhar was arrested at his £900,000 detached home in Iver, Bucks, on March 16, 2024.

‘IT HAS BROKEN ME’

In an impact statement, Ms Walsh said she was forced to take off 14 months and the altercation “changed my life enormously”.

“I can’t quite believe that one passenger has had this much of an impact on my, my job, my career and my life,” she said.

“I am a strong brave, happy stewardess, and loved my job. I am well known within the company.

“But I had to take 14 months off work. 

“I have been flying with Virgin Atlantic for 37 years. I was working when all flights were grounded on 9/11, and I’ve even flown into a warzone. But this incident has broken me.

“But I don’t feel strong enough anymore. I was abused for eight hours and 15 mins. It has broken me. It was a very personal attack.

“I was doing everything in my power to protect passengers and the crew from him. I felt exposed and vulnerable, especially as we were 39,000 feet in the air. There was nowhere for me to go.

“There was one moment where I felt I could not cope. I went into the cockpit and had a meltdown. I said to the captain I don’t know what to do. 

“Even the threat of diverting the plane to Turkey or Baku, Azerbaijan, had no effect.

“I was traumatised by the threat of being gang raped.

“Never in my entire career flying for 37 years have I not been sure what to do.

“I have had the best career in the world for 37 years. But he has taken that away from me.”

He told Ms Walsh: ‘You will be dead on the floor of your hotel’

Prosecutor Abdul Kapadia

Iftikhar, of Iver, Bucks, admitted making threats to kill and racially aggravated harassment, in relation to Ms Walsh.

He was cleared of assault by beating and threats to kill in relation to Mr Merchant.

Ben Walker-Nolan, defending, said Iftikhar was suffering from “amnesia blood loss” at the time.

Mr Walker-Nolan added: “Although there were over 100 incidents over the course of eight hours, the most serious, including threats to kill, were limited.

“The defendant has buried his head in the sand for a long period, and expressed regret.

“He has a long standing drug and alcohol problem which he has not addressed for many years.

“He is a successful businessman who employs a lot of people.”

THUG JAILED

Iftikhar has six previous convictions arising from 15 offences, including common assault in 2004 and drink driving in 2008 and failing to stop and possession of cannabis in 2021.

Judge Ms Recorder Annabel Darlow KC said: “Your threats to kill were made in the presence of children, specifically your three young children. 

“These were threats made with significant violence. 

“Your children had to be comforted by cabin crew staff while you made those threats.

“Ms Walsh has given up a job which she has loved for 14 months, but thankfully has now returned to work.

“This was a sustained incident which involved repeated racist abuse to Ms Walsh.

“You have a lengthy and appalling record of misconduct. You have not addressed the underlying cause of this for many years, that is your drug and alcohol problem.

“Given your lifestyle and your ability to earn money, your harm and risk has not moved.

“This was an appalling incident which has caused long lasting and devastating consequences.”

Iftikhar cried in the dock as he was jailed for 15 months.

His LinkedIn profile stated that he was the director and founder of recruitment firm Staffing Match.

Virgin Atlantic was contacted for comment.

7

Family handout

Family handout

‘Last phone call’

Reuters

‘No evidence of assault’

‘Off his head’

Reuters

‘Did not steal’

Warned him

President Trump announced a trade framework with Japan on Tuesday, placing a 15% tax on goods imported from that nation.

“This Deal will create Hundreds of Thousands of Jobs — There has never been anything like it,” Trump posted on Truth Social, adding that the United States “will continue to always have a great relationship with the Country of Japan.”

The president said Japan would invest “at my direction” $550 billion into the U.S. and would “open” its economy to American autos and rice. The 15% tax on imported Japanese goods is a meaningful drop from the 25% rate that Trump, in a recent letter to Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, said would be levied starting Aug. 1.

Early Wednesday, Ishiba acknowledged the new trade agreement, saying it would benefit both sides and help them work together.

With the announcement, Trump is seeking to tout his ability as a dealmaker — even as his tariffs, when initially announced in early April, led to a market panic and fears of slower growth that for the moment appear to have subsided. Key details remained unclear from his post, such as whether Japanese-built autos would face a higher 25% tariff that Trump imposed on the sector.

But the framework fits a growing pattern for Trump, who is eager to portray the tariffs as win for the U.S. His administration says the revenues will help reduce the budget deficit and more factories will relocate to America to avoid the import taxes and cause trade imbalances to disappear.

The wave of tariffs continues to be a source of uncertainty about whether it could lead to higher prices for consumers and businesses if companies simply pass along the costs. The problem was seen sharply Tuesday after General Motors reported a 35% drop in its net income during the second quarter as it warned that tariffs would hit its business in the months ahead, causing its stock to tumble.

As the Aug. 1 deadline for the tariff rates in his letters to world leaders is approaching, Trump also announced a trade framework with the Philippines that would impose a tariff of 19% on its goods, while American-made products would face no import taxes. The president also reaffirmed his 19% tariffs on Indonesia.

The U.S. ran a $69.4-billion trade imbalance on goods with Japan last year, according to the Census Bureau.

America had a trade imbalance of $17.9 billion with Indonesia and an imbalance of $4.9 billion with the Philippines. Both nations are less affluent than the U.S. and an imbalance means America imports more from those countries than it exports to them.

The president is set to impose the broad tariffs listed in his recent letters to other world leaders on Aug. 1, raising questions of whether there will be any breakthrough in talks with the European Union. At a Tuesday dinner, Trump said the EU would be in Washington on Wednesday for trade talks.

“We have Europe coming in tomorrow, the next day,” Trump told guests.

The president earlier this month sent a letter threatening the 27 member states in the EU with 30% taxes on their goods to be imposed starting on Aug. 1.

The Trump administration has a separate negotiating period with China that is currently set to run through Aug. 12 as goods from that nation are taxed at an additional 30% baseline.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said he would be in the Swedish capital of Stockholm next Monday and Tuesday to meet with his Chinese counterparts. Bessent said his goal is to shift the American economy away from consumption and to enable more consumer spending in the manufacturing-heavy Chinese economy.

“President Trump is remaking the U.S. into a manufacturing economy,” Bessent said on the Fox Business show “Mornings With Maria.” “If we could do that together, we do more manufacturing, they do more consumption. That would be a home run for the global economy.”

Boak writes for the Associated Press.

July 18 (UPI) — A federal judge overturned the approval by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers of a mixed-use project in Chico, Calif., after environmentalists claimed it will destroy the natural habitat of threatened species.

At issue was the Stonegate Development Project, a 314-acre development. It was to include 423 single-family residential lots, 13.4 acres of multi-family residential land uses, 36.6 acres of commercial land uses, 5.4 acres of storm water facilities, 3.5 acres of park and a 137-acre, open-space preserve, the ruling said.

U.S. District Judge Daniel Calabretta gave summary judgment requested by the Center for Biological Diversity and AquAlliance and halted implementation of the project until the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service prepares a legally adequate biological opinion that the development wouldn’t jeopardize protected species.

Calabretta, a President Joe Biden appointee, wrote that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service issued a Biological Opinion for the project in early 2020. That opinion “acknowledged there would be harm to some ESA-listed species, but that the project would not jeopardize the continued survival and recovery of the listed fairy shrimp, tadpole shrimp and meadowfoam.” It also did not analyze impacts on the giant garter snake, he added.

“The court finds that federal defendants’ failure to consider potential effects on the ESA-listed giant garter snake was based on a faulty assumption that there have been no sightings of the snake within five miles of the project renders its Biological Opinion arbitrary and capricious,” Calabretta said.

According to the conservation groups, the project also would permanently destroy 9.14 acres of wetlands. But some meadowfoam habitat may be established through mitigation efforts.

The Butte County meadowfoam is found nowhere in the world but Butte County, Calif., the Center for Biological Diversity said. The species has only 21 distinct populations remaining, and the project would destroy one population and further encroach on two others.

According to the fish and wildlife service, the giant garter snake is one of the largest garter snakes, reaching 63.7 inches long. It has been listed as threatened since 1993 and now only exists in three counties in California. Only about 5% of its historical wetland habitat remains.

Vernal pool fairy shrimp are restricted to vernal pools found in California and southern Oregon. They are found in 32 counties across California’s Central Valley, central coast and southern California and in Jackson County in southern Oregon, the service said.

Denise Richards has accused estranged husband Aaron Phypers of abuse, death threats and possession of unregistered weapons in a request for a temporary restraining order that was granted Wednesday in Los Angeles County Superior Court.

Phypers, who filed for divorce on July 7 and gave July 4 as the date of separation, has denied abusing Richards.

Richards’ TRO request, reviewed by The Times, refers to abuse that allegedly occurred during their marriage, including between July 4 and July 14, after she had moved out of the family home and into three townhouses that she uses separately as a studio, an office and her residence.

“Throughout our relationship, Aaron would frequently violently choke me, violently squeeze my head with both hands, tightly squeeze my arms, violently slap me in my face and head, aggressively slam my head into the bathroom towel rack, threaten to kill me, hold me down with his knee on my back to the point where I would have to plead with him to get off me so that he would not kill me,” Richards said in her filing.

She added that he “regularly threatened to ‘break my jaw’ and would cry, beg me to stay, and promise to get help — none of which ever happened.”

Richards alleged that Phypers gave her at least three concussions and regularly called her profane and degrading names. She also accused him of downloading her private text messages to her laptop and taking photos of the texts.

“Until now, I have been afraid to report Aaron to the police or file for a restraining order because he has repeatedly threatened to kill himself and me if I reported him to the police,” Richards said in the document, “among his other threats of harm to me and himself if he is reported for his abuse to anyone.”

She said he told her he had eight unregistered guns and some bulletproof vests.

Describing an incident from mid-April, she alleged that she had returned from a business trip and told Phypers he could not stay at the studio townhouse and had to leave. She locked the doors behind him.

While she was unpacking, Richards said in the filing, “Aaron climbed onto the balcony and pushed through the screen and entered the room I was in on the second floor. Once inside, Aaron aggressively approached me and grabbed the back of my head by my hair and pushed me on the ground and put his knee on my back so I could not get up. He would often do this. Aaron then screamed in my face.”

Richards said she told Phypers that she was going to call the police.

“[H]e responded, as he typically did, ‘Watch them try and take me away, they have no idea who they are dealing with and you have no idea who you are dealing with.’ When he refused to leave, I felt unsafe and chose to leave the premises.”

Richards also included photos of herself from January 2022 showing a severe black eye, which she alleged she got when Phypers hit her with “the heel of his palm” during an after-hours incident at his workplace.

There was yelling during the incident, which attracted a police officer who happened to be in the parking lot. After the officer left, Phypers “resumed screaming,” she said, then struck her and used profanity, calling her a derogatory name, she alleged in the filing.

Phypers, born Aaron William Cameron and referred to in the TRO request as Aaron William Cameron Phypers, has denied Richards’ allegations, telling TMZ in a statement Thursday that they are “false and deeply hurtful.” He told the website that he never abused her or anyone else physically or emotionally.

Phypers and actor Nicollette Sheridan of “Desperate Housewives” got married secretly in December 2015, but she filed for divorce six months later. That split wasn’t finalized until August 2018.

He and Richards began their relationship in 2017. They wed a little more than a year later in September 2018, a month after Phypers and Sheridan’s split was finalized, in a private ceremony in Malibu. Richards was previously married to “Two and a Half Men” star Charlie Sheen from 2002 to 2006.

For now, Phypers must stay 100 yards away from Richards and her car, workplace and home and cannot possess firearms or body armor. She requested that he return her laptops and asked for permission to record any phone calls that violate the stay-away order. A hearing on making the restraining order permanent is scheduled for Aug. 8.

Times staff writer Alexandra Del Rosario contributed to this report.

A BRIDGERTON star has revealed a phone thief threatened to stab her in a cafe attack before she bravely tackled him.

Genevieve Chenneour was sitting in a Joe & The Juice in Kensington, South West London when the terrifying ordeal happened.

3

3

Zacariah Boulares snuck up behind the 27-year-old and swiped her phone on February 8.

Genevieve – who plays Clara Livingston in the hit Netflix show – revealed that the “full on scrap” lasted for about five minutes.

She pinned the 18-year-old thief to the floor but has now said he threatened to stab her.

“I was threatened with being stabbed, so it became a matter of life and death,” she told ITV.

“I remember kicking him back with my leg to create space in case he had a weapon on him.”

She described it as a “life-changing, crazy moment”.

The star said the ordeal has left her feeling scared to venture outside and she has even left her home in the capital to take a “break” from the lawless city.

Astonishing footage from police showed Genevieve grabbing Boulares’ shoulder as she realised her phone had been taken.

She then tackled the serial thief to the ground with the help of another customer.

Genevieve managed to take her phone back from Boulares before repeatedly hitting him with it in the posh cafe.

She previously claimed she suffered a concussion in the horror in February and said even her dog was “traumatised”.

The star added: “They didn’t expect me to stand up for myself – but I did.”

Algerian national Boulares previously pleaded guilty to stealing the phone.

The teen also admitted common assault against fellow Joe and the Juice customer Carlo Kurcishi, who had stepped in to help.

Boulares pleaded guilty to a separate charge of theft after he swiped a black leather hand bag from a diner at a pizza restaurant.

The court heard he has 12 previous convictions for a total of 28 offences – all relating to theft.

His rap sheet includes threatening to cut off Aled Jones’ arm while stealing his £17,000 Rolex.

The Songs of Praise presenter, 52, was out with his son Lucas when he was targeted near their home in Chiswick, South West London.

Boulares – then aged 16 – pulled out 20 inch machete and repeatedly threatened Aled in a bid to steal the luxury timepiece.

He told him: “Give me your f***king Rolex or I will cut your arm off.”

Aled handed over the £17,000 Rolex Daytona watch rather than fight with the armed robber.

He and his son bravely followed the 6ft teen but when he spotted them, he snarled: “Walk the other way or I will cut your head off.”

Boulares was given a two year training and detention order after pleading guilty to robbery at Ealing Youth Court.

But he was released from youth detention early after serving just 14 months of his 24-month sentence. 

He will be sentenced for robbing Genevieve on June 17 at Isleworth Crown Court.

3

Cameron told ICC chief prosecutor Karim Khan that applying for arrest warrants for Israeli officials would be like ‘dropping hydrogen bomb’, media report says.

Several United Kingdom lawmakers have criticised the previous government over allegations in a recent media report that former Foreign Secretary David Cameron “privately threatened” to defund and withdraw from the International Criminal Court (ICC) over its plans to issue arrest warrants for Israeli officials over alleged war crimes in Gaza.

The report, published on Monday by the UK-based outlet Middle East Eye (MEE), cited sources with knowledge of a phone call Cameron allegedly made to ICC chief prosecutor Karim Khan on April 23, 2024, after he had given advance notice of his intention to apply for the warrants targeting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and then Defence Minister Yoav Gallant.

MEE’s report cited unnamed sources, including former staff in Khan’s office, and had seen minutes of the conversation, claiming that Cameron warned the arrest warrants, which were issued in November that year, would be – in quotes reported by the sources – tantamount to “dropping a hydrogen bomb”, warning that if the ICC went ahead, the UK would “defund the court and withdraw from the Rome Statute”.

Khan reportedly stood his ground, with sources telling MEE that he said afterwards that he did not like “being pressurised”. “I won’t say if it rises to blackmail – I don’t like being threatened,” he reportedly said, adding that the government was “debasing” the UK with its clear attack on the independence of the court and the rule of international law.

Neither Khan nor Cameron, who was prime minister between 2010 and 2016, and now sits in the House of Lords as a life peer, has commented on the report.

Following the report’s publication, Labour Party MP Zarah Sultana said on X that Cameron “and every UK minister complicit in arming and enabling Israel’s genocide in Gaza” should be investigated.

David Cameron — and every UK minister complicit in arming and enabling Israel’s genocide in Gaza — must be investigated for war crimes. https://t.co/YYcsmFg1BN

— Zarah Sultana MP (@zarahsultana) June 9, 2025

Scottish National Party MP Chris Law said the allegations were “shocking”, but added the country was “not seeing much better under Labour”.

Shocking that the UK Tory govt tried to undermine the International Criminal Court for investigating those responsible for war crimes in Gaza. However not seeing much better under Labour #GazaGenocide‌ https://t.co/Wd3nK9UkhV

— Chris Law MP (@ChrisLawSNP) June 9, 2025

Bell Ribeiro-Addy, a Labour MP, called for an “independent inquiry into the UK’s role in the Gaza genocide”.

Concerning new allegations, which suggest the last foreign secretary tried to shield Israeli leaders from facing justice for war crimes.

We need an independent inquiry into the UK’s role in the Gaza genocide.https://t.co/JROBHyqtDo

— Bell Ribeiro-Addy MP (@BellRibeiroAddy) June 9, 2025

Zack Polanski, the deputy leader of the Green Party, was cited by MEE as saying: “It’s been clear for all to see that both the former and current government have stood with the oppressors, not the marginalised.”

When the ICC applied for the arrest warrants in May last year, the previous Conservative Party government, a strong backer of Israel, decried the move as “not helpful in relation to reaching a pause in the fighting, getting hostages out or getting humanitarian aid in”.

In July, the new Labour government, led by Prime Minister Keir Starmer, dropped the previous Rishi Sunak-led government’s bid to challenge the ICC’s power to seek the warrants, which were issued for Netanyahu, Gallant and three Hamas leaders in November.

Mastering control of the ever rising and falling rattan chinlone ball instils patience, a veteran of Myanmar’s traditional sport says.

“Once you get into playing the game, you forget everything,” 74-year-old Win Tint says.

“You concentrate only on your touch, and you concentrate only on your style.”

Chinlone, Myanmar’s national game, traces its roots back centuries. Described as a fusion of sport and art, it is often accompanied by music and typically sees men and women playing in distinct ways.

Teams of men form a circle, passing the ball among themselves using stylised movements of their feet, knees and heads in a game of “keepy-uppy” with a scoring system that remains inscrutable to outsiders.

Women, meanwhile, play solo in a fashion reminiscent of circus acts – kicking the ball tens of thousands of times per session while walking tightropes, spinning umbrellas and balancing on chairs placed atop beer bottles.

Participation has declined in recent years with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, followed by the 2021 military coup and subsequent civil conflict.

Poverty is on the rise, and artisans face mounting challenges in sourcing materials to craft the balls.

Variants of the hands-free sport, colloquially known as caneball, are played widely across Southeast Asia.

In Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia, participants use their feet and heads to send the ball over a net in the volleyball-style game “sepak takraw”.

In Laos, it is known as “kataw” while Filipinos play “sipa”, meaning kick.

In China, it is common to see people kicking weighted shuttlecocks in parks.

Myanmar’s version is believed to date back 1,500 years.

Evidence for its longevity is seen in a French archaeologist’s discovery of a replica silver chinlone ball at a pagoda built during the Pyu era, which stretched from 200 BC to 900 AD.

Originally, the sport was played as a casual pastime, a form of exercise and for royal amusement.

In 1953, however, the game was codified with formal rules and a scoring system, part of efforts to define Myanmar’s national culture after independence from Britain.

“No one else will preserve Myanmar’s traditional heritage unless the Myanmar people do it,” player Min Naing, 42, says.

Despite ongoing conflict, players continue to congregate beneath motorway flyovers, around street lamps dimmed by wartime blackouts and on purpose-made chinlone courts – often open-sided metal sheds with concrete floors.

“I worry about this sport disappearing,” master chinlone ball maker Pe Thein says while labouring in a sweltering workshop in Hinthada, 110km (68 miles) northwest of Yangon.

“That’s the reason we are passing it on through our handiwork.”

Seated cross-legged, men shave cane into strips, curve them with a hand crank and deftly weave them into melon-sized balls with pentagonal holes before boiling them in vats of water to enhance their durability.

“We check our chinlone’s quality as if we’re checking diamonds or gemstones,” the 64-year-old Pe Thein says.

“As we respect the chinlone, it respects us back.”

Each ball takes about two hours to produce and brings business-owner Maung Kaw $2.40.

But supplies of the premium rattan he seeks from Rakhine state in western Myanmar are becoming scarce.

Fierce fighting between military forces and opposition groups that now control nearly all of the state has made supplies precarious.

Farmers are too frightened to venture into the jungle battlegrounds to cut cane, Maung Kaw says, which jeopardises his livelihood.

A claim by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem that an immigrant threatened the life of President Trump has begun to unravel.

Noem announced an arrest of a 54-year-old man who was living in the U.S. illegally, saying he had written a letter threatening to kill Trump and would then return to Mexico. The story received a flood of media attention and was highlighted by the White House and Trump’s allies.

But investigators actually believe the man may have been framed so that he would be arrested and deported from the U.S. before he got a chance to testify in a trial as a victim of assault, a person familiar with the matter told the Associated Press. The person could not publicly discuss details of the investigation and spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity.

Law enforcement officials believe the man, Ramon Morales Reyes, never wrote a letter that Noem and her department shared with a message written in light blue ink expressing anger over Trump’s deportations and threatening to shoot him in the head with a rifle at a rally. Noem also shared the letter on X along with a photo of Morales Reyes, and the White House also shared it on its social media accounts. The letter was mailed to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement office along with the FBI and other agencies, the person said.

As part of the investigation, officials had contacted Morales Reyes and asked for a handwriting sample and concluded that his handwriting and the threatening letter didn’t match and that the threat was not credible, the person said. It’s not clear why Homeland Security officials still decided to send a release making that claim.

In an emailed statement asking for information about the letter and the new information about Morales Reyes, the Department of Homeland Security said “the investigation into the threat is ongoing. Over the course of the investigation, this individual was determined to be in the country illegally and that he had a criminal record. He will remain in custody.”

His attorneys said he was not facing current charges and they did not have any information about convictions in his record. The revelations were first reported by CNN.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s records show Morales Reyes is being held at a county jail in Juneau, Wis., northwest of Milwaukee. The Milwaukee-based immigrant rights group Voces de la Frontera, which is advocating for his release, said he was arrested May 21. Attorney Cain Oulahan, who was hired to fight against his deportation, said he has a hearing in a Chicago immigration court next week and is hoping he is released on bond.

Morales Reyes had been a victim in a case of another man who is awaiting trial on assault charges in Wisconsin, the person familiar with the matter said. The trial is scheduled for July.

Morales Reyes works as a dishwasher in Milwaukee, where he lives with his wife and three children. He had recently applied for a U visa, which is carved out for people in the country illegally who become victims of serious crimes, said attorney Kime Abduli, who filed that application.

The Milwaukee Police Department said it is investigating an identity theft and victim intimidation incident related to this matter and the county district attorney’s office said the investigation was ongoing. Milwaukee police said no one has been criminally charged at this time.

Abduli, Morales Reyes’ attorney, says he could not have written the letter, saying he did not receive formal education and can’t write in Spanish and doesn’t know how to speak English. She said it was not clear whether he was arrested because of the letters.

“There is really no way that it could be even remotely true,” Abduli said. “We’re asking for a clarification and a correction from DHS to clear Ramon’s name of anything having to do with this.”

Balsamo, Bauer and Licon write for the Associated Press.