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The inevitable Commons row over Rishi Sunak blocking the Scottish Gender Recognition Reform Bill quickly descended into a pantomime.

And not just because the SNP’s Westminster leader, Stephen Flynn, and his MPs repeatedly mocked the Scotland secretary, calling him “Baron Jack”.

That’s a reference to widely reported claims that Alister Jack is on his way to the House of Lords, courtesy of a peerage from Boris Johnson.

But the Commons proceedings were also a pantomime at times because a 13-page legal document explaining the reasons for the veto, referred to several times by Mr Jack, was initially kept under wraps and withheld from MPs.

MPs clash over veto of controversial Scottish gender reform bill – politics latest

Even when Mr Flynn was about to open a two-hour emergency debate he’d secured on the gender row between Westminster and Holyrood, the document – “statement of reasons” – was nowhere to be seen.

A set of feeble excuses from Mr Jack about the delay and an even more feeble offer to email it to senior MPs only made matters worse. And at one point an exasperated Sir Lindsay Hoyle, the Speaker, appeared poised to postpone the emergency debate.

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Yes, that’s right. Sir Lindsay was urged by some MPs to postpone a debate that was so urgent it was an emergency. You couldn’t, as they say, make it up.

Eventually, Mr Jack’s much-sought after document miraculously appeared on the government website. But that didn’t bring an end to the pantomime. If anything, the farce got worse.

It was “not worth the paper it’s written on”, complained the SNP’s former Westminster leader, Ian Blackford. It was “a load of mince”, declared Kirsty Blackman. Undercooked mince as well, no doubt.

The SNP’s veteran jester Pete Wishart said the document’s claims were “specious” and “hypothetical”.

He claimed the UK government seemed to be arguing that under the bill a man might change gender so that he could qualify for lower pay. Howls of laughter at that, not surprisingly.

But Mr Jack claimed the Gender Recognition Reform (Scotland) Bill was in conflict with UK equality laws and could have an impact on single sex clubs, schools, equal pay and even – according to the document – tax, benefits and state pensions.

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UK to block Scottish gender bill

The Tories’ normally excitable Scottish leader, Douglas Ross, had a sensible suggestion, however. Surely, the Bill should simply be amended to protect the rights of women and girls in the rest of the UK.

Later, the Father of the House, the eminently sensible and wise Sir Peter Bottomley, called on Mr Jack and Scotland’s First Minister, Nicola Sturgeon, simply to get together and sort it out.

But with such bad blood between the Tories and the SNP, the chances of that happening are near zero. And that’s why this pantomime is no laughing matter.

Read more: Why is Scotland’s gender recognition reform bill controversial?

Nicola Sturgeon’s opponents will claim she is relishing a confrontation with Rishi Sunak on this or any other issue to use as ammunition in her drive for a second independence referendum.

Some Tories also suspect that the new Holyrood gender legislation is not as popular with voters as the SNP would have us believe. Others argue that there are bigger issues than this to have a massive fight over.

Mr Sunak, we’re learning fast, is not one to seek confrontations and would prefer to avoid one on this issue.

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‘Completely reasonable’ to intervene on gender laws

This week, after all, he has retreated from a Commons showdown with rebel Tory backbenchers on online safety, after similar climbdowns on onshore wind farms and planning rules.

So this issue looks certain to be fought out in the courts now. Mr Jack acknowledged that. That’s right: another legal quagmire, to go along with the dispute over the legality of a second referendum.

In this row, the Scotland secretary is the pantomime villain, according to the SNP. But the prime minister will be hoping Nicola Sturgeon doesn’t emerge as the fairy godmother to the SNP’s controversial gender Bill.

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Four more arrests made over Louvre heist as £76m haul remains missing

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Four more arrests made over Louvre heist as £76m haul remains missing

Four more arrests have been made by French police investigating the Louvre museum heist.

Two men and two women from the Paris region were detained on Tuesday, prosecutor Laure Beccuau said.

Ms Beccuau’s statement did not say what role the quartet are suspected of having played in the robbery. The two men are aged 38 and 39, and the two women are aged 31 and 40.

They are being interrogated by police, who can hold them for questioning for 96 hours.

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Louvre: How ‘heist of the century’ unfolded

The latest arrests come after investigating magistrates filed preliminary charges against three men and one woman who were arrested last month.

Some of the French Crown Jewels, worth an estimated £76m, were stolen in the audacious October raid.

The haul – which included a diamond and emerald necklace Napoleon gave to Empress Marie-Louise, jewels linked to 19th-century Queens Marie-Amelie and Hortense, and Empress Eugenie’s pearl and diamond tiara – has not been recovered.

The heist was pulled off in mere minutes last month – and took place while the Louvre was open to visitors, raising doubts over the credibility of the world’s most-visited museum as a guardian for its priceless works.

On Sunday 19 October, two men used a stolen furniture lift to access the second floor Galerie d’Apollon.

They then cracked open display cases with angle grinders before escaping with their loot and fleeing on the back of two scooters driven by accomplices.

Read more:
Louvre director offers to resign
Gallery closed as structure in ‘dire state’

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Moment thieves escape Louvre in jewel heist

The Paris prosecutor previously said the robbery appeared to be the work of small-time criminals rather than professional gangsters.

Speaking shortly after the heist, art detective Arthur Brand told Sky News that detectives faced a “race against time” to recover the stolen treasure.

“These crown jewels are so famous, you just cannot sell them,” Mr Brand said. “The only thing they can do is melt the silver and gold down, dismantle the diamonds, try to cut them. That’s the way they will probably disappear forever.

“They [the police] have a week. If they catch the thieves, the stuff might still be there. If it takes longer, the loot is probably gone and dismantled. It’s a race against time.”

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Zelenskyy is racing to beat Donald Trump’s peace plan deadline – but what will Russia do?

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Zelenskyy is racing to beat Donald Trump's peace plan deadline – but what will Russia do?

Washington woke up this morning to a flurry of developments on Ukraine.

It was the middle of the night in DC when a tweet dropped from Ukraine’s national security advisor, Rustem Umerov.

He said that the US and Ukraine had reached a “common understanding on the core terms of the agreement discussed in Geneva.”

He added that Volodymyr Zelenskyy would travel to America “at the earliest suitable date in November to complete final steps and make a deal with President Trump”.

Ukraine latest: ‘Delicate’ deal details must be sorted, White House says

By sunrise in Washington, a US official was using similar but not identical language to frame progress.

The official, speaking anonymously to US media, said that Ukraine had “agreed” to Trump’s peace proposal “with some minor details to be worked out”.

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In parallel, it’s emerged that talks have been taking place in Abu Dhabi. The Americans claim to have met both Russian and Ukrainian officials there, though the Russians have not confirmed attendance.

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Peace deal ‘agreement’: What we know

“I have nothing to say. We are following the media reports,” Dmitry Peskov, Vladimir Putin’s spokesperson, told Russian state media.

Trump is due to travel to his Florida resort Mar-a-Lago tonight, where he will remain until Sunday.

He set a deadline of Thursday – Thanksgiving – for some sort of agreement on his plan.

We know the plan has been changed from its original form, but it’s clear that Zelenskyy wants to be seen to agree to something quickly – that would go down well with President Trump.

Read more:
US hails ‘tremendous progress’ on Ukraine peace plan

In full: Europe’s 28-point counter proposal

My sense is that Zelenskyy will try to get to Mar-a-Lago as soon as he can. Before Thursday would be a push but would meet Trump’s deadline.

It will then be left for the Russians to state their position on the revised document.

All indications are that they will reject it. But maybe the secret Abu Dhabi talks will yield something.

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Controversial US and Israeli-backed aid operation the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation to close

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Controversial US and Israeli-backed aid operation the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation to close

The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a controversial US and Israeli-backed aid distribution group, has said it will permanently cease operations.

Set up as an alternative to United Nations aid programmes in May, GHF’s executive director John Acree said on Monday that it “succeeded in our mission of showing there’s a better way to deliver aid to Gazans”.

The foundation had already closed down aid distribution sites after US President Donald Trump’s ceasefire plan was agreed by Hamas and Israel in October.

The GHF which began operations in Gaza after an Israeli blockade of food deliveries, lasting nearly three months, was criticised by Palestinians, aid workers and health officials who said it forced people to risk their lives to reach the sites.

File pic: Reuters
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File pic: Reuters

According to witnesses and videos posted to social media, Israeli soldiers repeatedly opened fire at the sites, killing hundreds. The IDF denied this, saying it only fired warning shots as a crowd-control measure or if its troops were in danger.

In July, analysis from Sky News’ Data and Forensics team found that aid distributions by GHF were associated with a significant increase in deaths.

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Gaza deaths increase when aid sites open

MSF – also known as Doctors Without Borders – said in a report in August that the GHF sites “morphed into a laboratory of cruelty,” and described scenes there as “orchestrated killing”.

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‘We are proud,’ says GHF director

Mr Acree said in a statement through the GHF’s website that “from the outset, GHF’s goal was to meet an urgent need” and to hand over a successful aid operation to “the broader international community”.

The GHF would hand over its work to the US-led Civil-Military Coordination Center in Israel overseeing the Gaza ceasefire.

“We are winding down our operations as we have succeeded in our mission of showing there’s a better way to deliver aid to Gazans,” Mr Acree said.

File pic: Reuters
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File pic: Reuters

The GHF director added: “At a critical juncture, we are proud to have been the only aid operation that reliably and safely provided free meals directly to Palestinian people in Gaza, at scale and without diversion.

“From our very first day of operations, our mission was singular: feed civilians in desperate need. We built a new model that worked, saved lives, and restored dignity to civilians in Gaza.”

According to the GHF website, the group distributed more than three million food boxes, totalling 187 million meals, and supplied 1.1 million packs of Ready-to-Use Supplementary Food (RUSF) for malnourished children.

Read more:
Sky’s Adam Parsons sees Gaza destruction
Israel launches strikes on Gaza
Israel strikes Beirut for first time in months

Hamas welcomes GHF closure

In a statement, Hamas welcomed the closure of GHF and accused it of being a project that “engineered starvation” in partnership with Israel.

A Hamas spokesperson said: “Since its entry into the Gaza Strip, this foundation was part of the occupation’s security system, which adopted distribution mechanisms entirely disconnected from humanitarian principles, and created dangerous and degrading conditions for the dignity of the starving Palestinian people during their attempts to obtain a piece of bread, resulting in the killing and injury of thousands, through sniper operations and deliberate killing.”

They also called on international legal bodies to hold “this foundation and its officers accountable for their crimes against our people”.

US state department deputy spokesperson Tommy Piggot also said on X that the aid group “shared valuable lessons learned with us and our partners”.

“GHF’s model, in which Hamas could no longer loot and profit from stealing aid, played a huge role in getting Hamas to the table and achieving a ceasefire,” he added.

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