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In power for just 28 days – and for 10 of them politics was paused following the death of the Queen – it has been the worst possible start for Liz Truss.

A (mini) budget unveiling £45bn of tax cuts without a fiscal framework, precipitating a £65bn emergency bond buying programme by the Bank of England to protect pension funds.

The pound tanked, 1,000 mortgage deals were withdrawn from the markets in anticipation of an interest rates spike.

And then a prime minister who was not the lady for turning, has announced a huge policy U-turn.

So the question for the new prime minister was really a question of leadership – and judgement.

How bad is it and, crucially, can Liz Truss win back control?

She never had emphatic backing from the parliamentary party anyway – Rishi Sunak was initially their first choice.

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Can she reassert authority after only 28 days? Is this already a prime minister in office, but not in power?

A tough set of questions after a brutal couple of weeks, this is a prime minister determined to march on.

Her message: These are difficult times and we are delivering.

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Is Liz Truss trusted?

She batted away questions and ploughed on with her messages about making tough decisions and delivering the package of energy support for households and businesses.

As for the U-turn, the PM insisted that there was “absolutely no shame” in performing a reversal of her plan to abolish the 45p top rate of tax and she had listened to her party and the public.

A performance that, for her supporters, showed a politician with huge resilience and drive.

A PM clear-eyed about what she has to do for the economy. But for detractors, this is a leader in denial – deluded even – about the challenges she faces, with her party and the public too.

As she ploughs on, there are mutterings all around that she has lost control of her party and this will hamstring her agenda.

The U-turn on the 45p rate, the battleground now moving to the uprating of benefits.

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Do the public and cabinet still trust Truss?

Read more:
Liz Truss says she has ‘absolutely no shame’ in U-turn on cutting 45p tax

One senior figure joked to me on Monday night that this was a PM with dozens of former cabinet ministers on the backbenches, and agitating.

As one member of the emerging “rebel alliance” put it to me: “The PM doesn’t have a mandate for much of what she wants to do but what she does have is a group of MPs prepared to manage her from without cabinet rather than within.”

So, a prime minister who is not in control of events and a Conservative Party in disarray.

There is no message of discipline from within her cabinet, with different ministers sharing opposing views on lifting benefits by earnings rather than inflation.

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Meanwhile, Home Secretary Suella Braverman is taking a shot at the rebels and accusing them of staging a coup over the 45p rate.

As for the leader, Ms Truss has to try to get a grip on her party, and her speech on Wednesday will be a moment for the new PM to try and get some momentum behind her.

But even one of her supporters said the PM has a matter of months to turn this around and close the gap in the polls.

For now, this Conservative government is looking like it will hand the keys to power over to Labour in the next general election.

If it stays that way, Ms Truss’s tumultuous start will only get worse.

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Hamas’s Gaza chief ‘eliminated’, says Netanyahu – but military sources say they cannot confirm death

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Hamas's Gaza chief 'eliminated', says Netanyahu - but military sources say they cannot confirm death

Hamas’s Gaza chief Mohammed Sinwar has been “eliminated”, according to Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

But Israeli military sources have said they are not yet able to confirm the death.

Hamas has also not yet confirmed the apparent killing of its leader.

Meanwhile, with Gaza on the brink of famine, the Palestinian ambassador to the United Nations broke down in tears as he spoke of the suffering of its people.

Riyad Mansour
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Palestinian ambassador Riyad Mansour broke down in tears as he spoke of the suffering of people in Gaza

Riyah Mansour told the Security Council: “Children are dying of starvation. The images of mothers embracing their motionless bodies. Caressing their hair, talking to them, apologising to them, is unbearable.”

He added: “I have grandchildren. I know what they mean to their families. And to see this situation over the Palestinians without us having hearts to do something is beyond the ability of any normal human being to tolerate. Flames and hunger are devouring Palestinian children. This is why we are so outraged as Palestinians everywhere.”

Sinwar was one of Israel‘s most wanted and the younger brother of the Palestinian militant group’s former leader Yahya Sinwar.

The older sibling was the mastermind of the October 7 2023 attack, which killed 1,200 people in Israel, with around 250 others taken hostage into Gaza.

The attack triggered Israel’s assault on Gaza which decimated the territory, with more than 53,000 people killed, mostly women and children, and over two million displaced, according to health officials, who do not distinguish between civilians and combatants in their tally of fatalities.

Yahya Sinwar.
File pic: AP
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Yahya Sinwar was killed by Israel in October 2024. File pic: AP

Yahya Sinwar was killed in a gun battle with Israeli troops in Gaza last October. His younger sibling was believed to have then become the head of Hamas’s armed wing.

Speaking to the Knesset on Wednesday, Mr Netanyahu included Mohammed Sinwar in a list of Hamas leaders killed in Israeli strikes. Later, Israel Defence Forces (IDF) sources said they were not yet able to confirm the death.

The prime minister said: “We have killed tens of thousands of terrorists. We killed (Mohammed) Deif, (Ismail) Haniyeh, Yahya Sinwar and Mohammed Sinwar.” He did not elaborate.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks at a news conference on 21 May. Pic: AP
Image:
Benjamin Netanyahu’s claimed could not be confirmed. Pic: AP

Mohammed Sinwar had reportedly been the target of an Israeli strike on a hospital in southern Gaza on 13 May and Mr Netanyahu said on 21 May that it was likely he had been killed.

The Israeli military had said it struck a Hamas command centre under the European Hospital in the Sinwars’ hometown of Khan Younis, and it declined to comment on whether Sinwar was targeted or killed.

At least six people were killed in the strike and 40 wounded, Gaza’s health ministry said at the time.

Sinwar rose through ranks

Like his older brother, Mohammed Sinwar joined Hamas after it was founded in the late 1980s as the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood. He became a member of the group’s military wing, known as the Qassam Brigades.

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Sinwar rose through the ranks to become a member of its so-called joint chiefs of staff, bringing him close to its longtime commander, Deif, who was killed in a strike last year.

Read more from Sky News:
Humanitarian chief talks of Gaza ‘catastrophe’
UN boss condemns ‘teaspoon’ of aid allowed into Gaza

“In the last two days, we have been in a dramatic turn towards a complete defeat of Hamas,” the Israeli leader told the Knesset.

Mr Netanyahu also spoke about how Israel was “taking control of food distribution”, a reference to a new aid distribution system that has been criticised and boycotted by humanitarian groups and the UN.

One killed at site of aid hub

The development comes after one person was killed and 48 others injured when forces opened fire on a crowd that overwhelmed an aid hub in Gaza, according to local health officials.

Palestinians have become increasingly desperate for food after almost three months of Israeli border closures. A blockade has recently been eased.

People broke through fences around the distribution site on Wednesday, and a journalist with the Associated Press said they heard Israeli tank and gunfire, and saw a military helicopter firing flares.

It was not yet known whether the death and injuries were caused by Israeli forces, private contractors or others.

The Israeli and US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which set up the hub outside Rafah, said its military contractors had not fired on the crowd but “fell back” before resuming aid operations. Israel said its troops nearby had fired warning shots.

The UN and other humanitarian organisations have rejected the new system, saying it will not meet the needs of Gaza’s 2.3 million people and allows Israel to use food to control the population.

Israel has vowed to seize control of Gaza and fight until Hamas is destroyed or disarmed and exiled, and until the militant group returns the last 58 hostages, including around a third thought to be still alive.

‘This is a man-made catastrophe’

Meanwhile, a US trauma surgeon who has been working in Gaza urged the UN Security Council to not “claim ignorance” about the humanitarian devastation.

Dr Feroze Sidhwa said: “Let’s not forget, this is a man-made catastrophe. It is entirely preventable. Participating in it or not allowing it to happen is a choice.

“This is a deliberate denial of conditions necessary for life: food, shelter, water and medicine. Preventing genocide means refusing to normalise these atrocities.”

The UN World Health Organization has documented around 700 attacks on healthcare facilities in Gaza during the war. Israel accuses Hamas of using hospitals as command centres and to hide fighters.

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Andrew Tate and his brother Tristan charged with rape in the UK

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Andrew Tate and his brother Tristan charged with rape in the UK

Andrew Tate and his brother Tristan Tate have been charged with rape and other offences in the UK.

Andrew Tate, 38, faces 10 charges, including rape, actual bodily harm, human trafficking and controlling prostitution for gain, relating to three women.

His brother Tristan Tate, 36, faces 11 charges relating to one woman – including rape, actual bodily harm and human trafficking.

The charges were authorised in January 2024, but full details have only been released now.

Bedfordshire Police issued an international arrest warrant for the brothers over allegations, which they “unequivocally deny”, said to have occurred between 2012 and 2015.

The Tate brothers are facing separate allegations of trafficking minors, sexual intercourse with a minor and money laundering in Romania.

They are also accused of human trafficking and forming a criminal gang to sexually exploit women in a different case, which has been sent back to prosecutors.

They are due to be extradited to the UK following the conclusion of proceedings in Romania.

Andrew Tate and his brother Tristan outside a Bucharest court last month. File pic: Inquam Photos/Octav Ganea via Reuters
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Andrew Tate and his brother Tristan outside a Bucharest court in January. File pic: Inquam Photos/Octav Ganea via Reuters

A Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) spokesperson said: “We can confirm that we have authorised charges against Andrew and Tristan Tate for offences including rape, human trafficking, controlling prostitution and actual bodily harm against three women.

“These charging decisions followed receipt of a file of evidence from Bedfordshire Police.

“A European Arrest Warrant was issued in England in 2024, and as a result the Romanian courts ordered the extradition to the UK of Andrew and Tristan Tate.”

The spokesperson added: “However, the domestic criminal matters in Romania must be settled first.

“The Crown Prosecution Service reminds everyone that criminal proceedings are active, and the defendants have the right to a fair trial.

“It is extremely important that there be no reporting, commentary or sharing of information online which could in any way prejudice these proceedings.”

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Representatives for Andrew Tate have been contacted by Sky News for comment.

Lawyer Matt Jury, of McCue Jury & Partners, representing several alleged British victims of Andrew Tate, said: “We welcome the clarity from the Crown Prosecution Service that our authorities are working to ensure the Tates face justice here in the UK – they cannot be allowed to escape extradition.

“At the same time, we ask once more that CPS admit its mistake in failing to prosecute Tate when he lived in the UK and finally charge him for the rape and assault of the other three women, our clients, who originally filed criminal complaints against him as long ago as 2014 but were failed by the system.

“They deserve justice, too.”

The allegations were subject to a police investigation, which was closed in 2019.

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Joel Le Scouarnec: French surgeon who sexually abused hundreds of children is jailed

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Joel Le Scouarnec: French surgeon who sexually abused hundreds of children is jailed

A former surgeon who sexually abused hundreds of children in France has been sentenced to 20 years in prison.

Joel Le Scouarnec, 74, was found guilty of raping and sexually assaulting 299 children in one of France‘s largest-ever child sex abuse cases.

Most of the victims were abused while under anaesthesia or waking up from operations, with an almost equal number of boys and girls. Two victims took their own lives years before the trial.

He was accused of 300 separate offences – 111 rapes and 189 sexual assaults – in more than a dozen hospitals between 1989 and 2014.

Le Scouarnec is already serving a 15-year prison sentence for a 2020 conviction for the rape and sexual assault of four children, including two nieces.

During the trial in Morbihan, in western France, prosecutors described Le Scouarnec as “a devil in a white coat” and requested the maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.

“I’m aware that the harm I’ve caused is beyond repair,” Le Scouarnec said at the opening of the trial in February.

“I owe it to all these people and their loved ones to admit my actions and their consequences, which they’ve endured and will keep having to endure all their lives.”

The court ordered Le Scouarnec should serve at least two-thirds of the sentence before he can be eligible for release.

Presiding Judge Aude Buresi said Le Scouarnec had preyed on victims when they were at their most vulnerable.

“Your acts were a blind spot in the medical world, to the extent that your colleagues, the medical authorities, were incapable of stopping your actions,” the judge told Le Scouarnec.

Read more:
A monster who lived among us – and got away with it
How did surgeon carry out abuse unchecked for decades?

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French child abuse victim speaks out

Le Scouarnec had confessed to all the sexual abuse, as well as to other assaults that are now beyond the statute of limitations.

He kept detailed records of the abuse he inflicted in notebooks and diaries and some only became aware they had been abused when contacted by investigators after their names appeared in his journals.

Others only realised they had been admitted to hospital at the time by checking their medical journals.

FILE PHOTO: French ex-surgeon Joel Le Scouarnec, accused of the aggravated rape and sexual assault against hundreds of children during three decades, is seen during his trial at the courthouse in Saintes,  France, March 3, 2020 in this courtroom sketch. REUTERS/Alain Paillou/File Photo
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Le Scouarnec in a courtroom sketch. Pic: Reuters

“I didn’t see them as people,” Le Scouarnec told the court during the trial.

“They were the destination of my fantasies. As the trial went on, I began to see them as individuals, with emotions, anger, suffering and distress.”

Le Scouarnec was never investigated during his career, despite being sentenced in 2005 for owning child sexual abuse images.

He was only apprehended after he retired in 2017 when a girl told her mother that Le Scouarnec had sexually abused her while she was playing in the garden of her home.

When the police searched Le Scouarnec’s house they found 300,000 indecent photos and videos of children, 70 child-sized dolls and hundreds of notebooks and diaries detailing his acts of abuse.

A woman peers behind a banner representing anonymous victims during a demonstration ahead of the verdict in the trial of Joel Le Scouarnec, a 74-year-old former surgeon, accused of raping and sexually assaulting 299 children, Wednesday, May 28, 2025 in Vannes, Brittany, western France. (AP Photo/Mathieu Pattier)

Dozens of victims and rights campaigners gathered outside the courthouse in Brittany ahead of the verdict with a banner made of hundreds of pieces of white paper with black silhouettes – one for each victim. Some papers featured a first name and age, while others referred to the victim as “Anonymous”.

The local prosecutor has opened a separate investigation to determine if there was any criminal liability by agencies or individuals who could have prevented the abuse.

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A group of victims said in a statement before the verdict: “This trial, which could have served as an open-air laboratory to expose the serious failings of our institutions, seems to leave no mark on the government, the medical community, or society at large.”

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