Suella Braverman avoids press questions after travelling to Manston in £3,500-an-hour military helicopter
Downing Street has defended Suella Braverman after she flew to an overcrowded migration centre in a £3,500-an-hour military helicopter.
The home secretary avoided questions from the press as she met the Dover coastguard and travelled to the Manston facility in a Chinook.
At one point in recent days, as many as 4,000 people were being detained at the site for weeks – even though it is only intended to hold 1,600 for no more than 24 hours.
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Braverman visits Manston
The government claims more than 1,000 migrants have been moved from Manston this week, meaning 2,700 people remain at the facility.
And Downing Street officials stressed that Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is receiving twice-daily updates on the situation.
Ms Braverman spent about two hours at Manston and left using a side gate – away from the journalists who were gathered at the main entrance.
While North Thanet’s MP Sir Roger Gale was also seen leaving the processing centre, Dover MP Natalie Elphicke said it was a “great pity” that the home secretary had not taken the opportunity to meet other Kent politicians.
“The small boats crisis is not just in the migrant processing facilities, it is on our Kent beaches, schools, services and housing,” she added.
Chancellor Jeremy Hunt later said Ms Braverman was prepared to “face the music”, even though she avoided questions from the media throughout yesterday.
The Home Office has said steps are being taken “immediately” to improve conditions at Manston – enhancing medical facilities, supplying extra bedding as well as providing better catering.
Ms Braverman added: “This is a complex and difficult situation which we need to tackle on all fronts and look at innovative solutions.
“To break the business model of the people smugglers, we need to ensure that the illegal migration route across the Channel is ultimately rendered unviable.”
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Migrant from Manston left stranded
‘Disoriented, desperate and completely lost’
An asylum seeker who says he was among a group of migrants left stranded in central London on Tuesday night has said they were not told where they were going by officials.
The man – who gave his name as Hasibullah from Afghanistan – said he was among a group of 45 migrants who were removed from Manston and taken to Victoria coach station.
He told Sky News: “They tell us ‘you go by bus’. We know that we go to London but we don’t know where.
“When we reach London, the driver tell us ‘you go out’. Then, we don’t know where we go.”
Hasibullah said officials had not told them where their accommodation was. His group later received support from volunteers, and they were eventually taken to a hotel in Norwich.
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Migrants ‘threatening self-harm’
One of those volunteers, Danial Abass, told Sky News that he was on a routine walk to feed homeless people on Tuesday when he was approached by individuals who were “disoriented, desperate and completely lost” near Victoria coach station.
He said: “It was really a quite disturbing and distressing sight to see.”
Mr Abass added that many of the men were wearing flip-flops, grey tracksuits, identification tags around their hands and “big blue industrial bin bags with no jackets or socks”.
He took one of the men to Primark on Oxford Street and bought him jackets, shoes, clothes, hats and dinner from McDonald’s.
A Home Office spokesperson said: “The welfare of those in our care is of the utmost importance and asylum seekers are only released from Manston when we have assurances that they have accommodation to go to.
“We worked at pace to find accommodation for the individuals as soon as we were notified, and they are now in accommodation and being supported.”
Thousands of troops are taking part in a joint military exercise between Russia and Belarus, as tensions with the EU run high following a Russian drone incursion into Polish airspace earlier this week.
The Zapad joint military exercise which began on Friday will involve drills in both Russia and Belarus as well as in the Baltic and Barents seas, the Russian defence ministry said.
Belarusian defence officials initially said about 13,000 troops would participate in the drill, but in May, its defence ministry said that would be cut nearly in half.
It comes just two days after Poland, with support from its NATO allies, shot down Russian drones over its airspace.
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Poland’s Prime Minister Donald Tusk on Friday morning hit back at a suggestion by US President Donald Trump on Thursday that the incursion may have been a “mistake”.
He said in a post on X: “We would also wish that the drone attack on Poland was a mistake. But it wasn’t. And we know it.”
Russia said its forces had been attacking Ukraine at the time of the incursions and that it had not intended to hit any targets in Poland.
Friday also saw Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper travelling to Ukraine’s capital of Kyiv on the same day the UK announced fresh sanctions against Moscow.
Prince Harry was also in Kyiv for a surprise visit to help with the recovery of military personnel seriously injured in the three-year war with Russia.
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Prince Harry arrives in Kyiv
Ms Cooper, who was appointed foreign secretary last week, posted about her visit on X saying: “The UK’s support for Ukraine is steadfast. I am pleased to be in Kyiv on my first visit as Foreign Secretary.”
The UK’s new sanctions include bans on 70 vessels that Britain says are part of Russia’s “shadow fleet” that transports Russian oil in defiance of sanctions already in place.
Yvette Cooper with Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Kyiv. Pic: Valentyn Ogirenko/PA
Some 30 individuals and companies – including Chinese and Turkey-based firms – have also been sanctioned for their part in supplying Russia with electronics, chemicals, explosives and other weapons components.
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Meanwhile on the frontline, Ukrainian drones struck Russia’s oil-loading Primorsk port overnight, an SBU official said.
The attack caused fires and suspended oil-loading operations, the official added.
Russian defence systems also intercepted and destroyed 221 Ukrainian drones overnight.
Prince Harry has made a surprise visit to the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv, a spokesperson for the royal has said.
Harry, who served 10 years in the British Army, visited the city at the invitation of the Ukrainian government.
The Duke of Sussex travelled to the capital to help with the recovery of military personnel seriously injured in the three-year war with Russia.
Pic: Railway of Ukraine Ukrzaliznytsia/AP
Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper will also be travelling to Kyiv on Friday in what will be her first foreign trip since being appointed to the job last week.
Her visit coincides with the UK launching a new package of Russia-related sanctions targeting ships carrying Russian oil as well as companies and individuals supplying electronics, chemicals and explosives used to make Russian weapons.
It comes as Russia and Belarus began a major joint military exercise on on NATO’s doorstep on Friday, just two days after Poland, with support from its NATO allies, shot down suspected Russian drones over its airspace.
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Drones shot down in Poland
The Zapad-2025 exercise – a show of force by Russia and its close ally – will involve drills in both countries and in the Baltic and Barents seas, the Russian defence ministry said.
Meanwhile on the frontline, Russian defence systems intercepted and destroyed 221 Ukrainian drones overnight,
including nine over the Moscow region, the ministry said on Friday.
The duke told the Guardian while on an overnight train to Kyiv: “We cannot stop the war but what we can do is do everything we can to help the recovery process.
“We can continue to humanise the people involved in this war and what they are going through.
“We have to keep it in the forefront of people’s minds. I hope this trip will help to bring it home to people because it’s easy to become desensitised to what has been going on.”
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Harry, who served two tours in Afghanistan, previously travelled to Ukraine in April, when he visited war victims as part of his work with wounded veterans.
The prince visited the Superhumans Center, an orthopaedic clinic in Lviv that treats and rehabilitates wounded military personnel and civilians.
Earlier this week, Harry said the King is “great” after he reunited with him at Clarence House for a private tea.
It was their first meeting in 19 months and lasted just 54 minutes.
The last time the father and son saw each other was in February 2024 when the prince flew to the UK after the monarch announced his cancer diagnosis.
Harry and his wife Meghan Markle have lived in California since they quit roles as senior working royals in March 2020.
Brazil’s former president Jair Bolsonaro has been sentenced to 27 years and three months in prison for attempting a coup to stay in power after his 2022 election defeat.
The far-right politician, who ruled Brazil between 2019 and 2022, is currently under house arrest in the capital, Brasilia.
A panel of five Supreme Court justices handed down the sentence several hours after they found the 70-year-old guilty on five counts.
The counts were trying to stage a coup, being part of an armed criminal organisation, attempting violent abolition of the democratic rule of law, being implicated in violence, and posing a serious threat to the state’s assets and listed heritage.
Bolsonaro‘s lawyers have said they will appeal the verdict.
Pic: AP
The ruling will deepen political divisions in Brazil and is also likely to prompt a backlash from the United States government – with Donald Trump already sharing his thoughts on the vote.
President Trump, an ally of Bolsonaro, has said he was surprised and “very unhappy” with the decision.
Speaking to reporters outside the White House, he said he always found Bolsonaro “outstanding” and said the conviction is “very bad for Brazil”.
Mr Trump previously called the case a “witch hunt”, slapped Brazil with tariff hikes, and revoked US visas for most members of Brazil’s high court.
Bolsonaro is the first former Brazilian president to be convicted of attempting a coup.
He has not attended the court proceedings, and on Thursday, he was seen at the garage of his property, but did not talk to the media.
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Justice Carmen Lucia. Pic: AP
Justice Alexandre de Moraes, who has been overseeing the case, said on Tuesday that Bolsonaro was the leader of a coup plot and of a criminal organisation, and voted in favour of convicting him. Justices Flavio Dino, Carmen Lucia, and Cristiano Zanin sided with Justice Moraes in the trial.
On Wednesday, another justice, Luiz Fux, disagreed and voted to acquit the ex-president of all charges.
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Justice Lucia said she was convinced by the evidence the attorney general’s office put forward against Bolsonaro, saying: “He is the instigator, the leader of an organisation that orchestrated every possible move to maintain or seize power.”
Bolsonaro had been previously banned from running for office until 2030 in a different case.
He is expected to choose an heir who is likely to challenge President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva next year.
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