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Tuesday briefing: Why Labour banned Burnham – and what the ‘King of the North’ might do next

Good morning. The “King of the North” will not be marching south – at least not for now. Andy Burnham has been barred from standing as an MP in the forthcoming Gorton and Denton byelection, after a 10-strong “officers’ group” of Labour’s ruling body, which includes the prime minister, voted overwhelmingly to reject his request to stand. It has left the party, once again, in turmoil. The controversial decision staves off, at least for now, a potential leadership challenge. But the move has infuriated some Labour MPs and the party’s union backers. It was described as “petty factionalism”, a “huge mistake” and cowardly, and has been condemned as a failure by the party leadership to embrace the country’s most popular Labour politician. No 10 will hope the anger blows over and the decision swiftly ends this round of Labour’s chaos and, as one senior cabinet member put it, “psychodrama”. By putting out one fire, though, the party, as always, may have ignited several others. To understand why No 10 made this move and what is next for Andy Burnham and the party, I spoke to Peter Walker, the Guardian’s senior political correspondent. That’s after the headlines. Five big stories US news | Donald Trump’s efforts to deploy militarised immigration agents in US cities may finally be reaching a reckoning as he faces widespread opposition across the US, dissenting lawmakers in his own party, and impending court rulings after the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti. UK news | Former home secretary Suella Braverman has defected to Reform UK, making her the third sitting Conservative MP to join Nigel Farage’s party in little more than a week. Europe | As many as 380 people may have drowned attempting to cross the Mediterranean last week during Cyclone Harry, as a shipwreck that killed 50 is confirmed by Maltese authorities. Saudi Arabia | A judge has ordered Saudi Arabia to pay more than £3m in damages to London-based dissident Ghanem al-Masarir, whose phones were targeted with Pegasus spyware. Ukraine | A US security agreement for Ukraine is “100% ready” to be signed, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said, after two days of talks involving representatives from Ukraine, the US and Russia. In depth: ‘They see the threats from Reform getting bigger and bigger’ In a fateful Zoom meeting last weekend, Labour’s national executive committee scuppered Andy Burnham’s bid to return to Westminster. Though the move was seen as a deeply political one, the argument justifying it was procedural. Allowing Burnham to stand would have meant a costly mayoral byelection and political distraction, Labour’s leadership said. So what happens now? Peter Walker tells me Burnham (above right, with Starmer) simply goes back to his two day jobs: “Being mayor of Greater Manchester and getting on Keir Starmer’s nerves.” Burnham has long played a dual role inside Labour. As Peter puts it: “Burnham always says loyal things,” but at the same time insists: “We could be doing this, we could be doing that.” Burnham has never hidden the fact that he believes that if he were in Westminster, “he would be a better choice than Keir Starmer to lead the Labour party and give it a kind of direction”. (It is worth reading my colleague Archie Bland’s First Edition on Burnham’s political ambitions.) In some ways, Peter says, this is simply a politician’s ego. “There is always, in any party, probably 20 or 30 people who think they could be doing a better job.” But for a growing number of Labour MPs, Burnham’s appeal goes beyond that. “They see the threats from Reform getting bigger and bigger,” Peter says, and they worry that “if we stay under Keir, the country may be changed forever.” *** Burnham’s evolution Burnham’s political journey has not been a straight line. He ran for the leadership in 2010, coming fourth, and again in 2015, finishing second to Jeremy Corbyn. Back then, Peter says, he was seen as “Mr Cabinet Minister”, who was loyal and would get the job done. At that time he was broadly a centrist, but two things changed him, Peter explains. The first was Hillsborough. “There was this famous occasion where he was culture secretary when the government was holding out against a formal inquiry and he got booed,” Peter says. “He went back to cabinet and argued, ‘We need to do something about it,’” then went on to play a central role in getting the Hillsborough law passed. The second was becoming mayor of Greater Manchester in 2017 and building what he now calls “Manchesterism” (Burnham himself delved into what that means for the Guardian a few days ago.) Peter describes this form of governing as “soft left, pro-growth, but quite interventionist devolution”. It’s about giving people local powers, but intervening when necessary, and includes public ownership of utilities. The clearest expression of this ideology is the Bee Network, Greater Manchester’s integrated transport system linking buses, trams, cycling and walking. “It’s pretty good,” Peter says. “Aside from London, it’s a model of how UK cities can do integrated transport.” Peter remembers how fervently Burnham was pushing for this kind of governing at the Labour party conference in 2021, when Starmer was in opposition and Labour were suffering under the Boris Johnson vaccine bounce. “I actually asked his aide at the time the number of fringe meetings he’d been to, and they had lost count,” he says. “He would say then, ‘This is what it’s like to be Labour actually in power. This is what we need to do’.” It places him on the left, Peter says, but far from the politics of the Jeremy Corbyn era. *** To block or not to block From Labour’s perspective, this was an open and shut case, Peter tells me. Party rules prevent mayors from standing as MPs because of their policing responsibilities. Burnham was “seeking an exception”, and “they didn’t think there was a good enough reason why”. Had he been selected, Burnham would have had to step down as mayor partway through his term, triggering a Greater Manchester byelection covering 27 constituencies. “It would have cost the party and the country a huge amount of money. They would have had to endlessly campaign for that, while also trying to campaign for the local elections in May,” Peter says. On the flip side are Labour’s and Keir Starmer’s dire polling. “Burnham’s got this burning personal ambition, but some of the people backing him think it’s not just about having a different person in No 10 – it’s about having someone who they genuinely believe has got more of a vision, of a message, more of a charismatic approach, which could turn the polls around,” Peter says. There is an argument that this leadership challenge is different from the political musical chairs we saw with the Conservatives. “Back then, they were switching between PMs because people were out of favour, they were Boris fans or Rishi fans or Liz fans,” Peter says. “People in Labour argue there is more to it this time. They see where Labour are in the polls, they see where their polls are going, and they’re getting scared – not just for their own seats – but about what a Reform government could do.” *** A three-way race Peter believes Burnham’s “star power would have been enough” to hold the Gorton and Denton seat for Labour. Burnham has said as much, posting on social media on Sunday that the party would now lose the byelection. The contest will be a tough one. “Andrew Gwynne’s majority in the last election was about 13,400, which you would think would be enough to hold. But you’ve got Reform, who will go for it. You’ve got the Greens, with a very good local candidate who’s likely to stand and is well known,” Peter says. The Greens have been bullish about their chances. “It’s a tough ask, but it’s possible they could take enough votes away from Labour for Reform to sneak in and win the seat,” he says. “That’s really bad for Starmer. It makes him look as if he’s made this factional decision based on personal reasons to protect his own position and lost his party a seat.” For now, Burnham waits. If Labour loses Denton and Gorton, pressure will grow to give him the next available seat, Peter says. He isn’t alone in thinking this. Tom Watson, the former Labour deputy leader, predicted that Andy Burnham will become an MP “sooner rather than later”, in a Substack essay published yesterday. But when and where is important. Running in a byelection and losing could spell the end of Burnham’s career, Peter says. As for Starmer, plenty of dangers lie ahead: he is going to China this week, he has to keep Trump on a leash, and he has to maintain support for Ukraine, all while keeping the domestic news focused on the cost of living. “No 10’s argument is that the only way we can beat Reform UK is by making people feel that their daily lives are getting better,” Peter says. “So schools are better, hospitals are better, people have more money in their pocket. And anything that doesn’t do that is taking away the party’s central message.” But the local election is looming and there are threats from all sides. In Wales, Labour is forecast to do “very, very badly”, Peter says. In England, councils that have been Labour “since the dawn of time” are under threat. In London, Reform could take outer boroughs, while the Greens eye inner ones. A red wedding is coming. Time will tell whether Burnham or Starmer is the unfortunate groom. What else we’ve been reading Joel Snape has some encouraging news for those of us who’ve been put off trying to build muscle thanks to conventional “no pain, no gain” wisdom: namely, that science suggests there’s a better way. Lucinda Everett, newsletter team Georgia has become ground zero in the fight over AI’s explosive growth, and its massive demands for energy and water. This fascinating piece explores why opposition is rising and how the backlash is taking shape. Aamna Simon Hattenstone’s interview with Sajid Javid runs the gamut from Partygate to the omnipresent racism in his childhood to his (actually quite serious) teenage brush with the law. An engrossing read. Lucinda Jason Okundaye is sharp and nuanced on why claims of injustice by six-figure earners are absurd, yet reveal something profound about what it now means to live well in the UK capital. Aamna I enjoyed hearing from Guardian readers about their favourite baffling TV shows, from Legion, the Marvel spin-off with no superheroes, to The Leftovers, which reader Mark Hawksley gave the write-up: “I still don’t really understand how it ended, but what a ride it was.” Lucinda Sport Football | Thierno Barry, the £27m summer signing from Villarreal, struck his fourth goal in five Premier League games to earn Everton a 1-1 draw against profligate Leeds. Tennis | World No 1 Aryna Sabalenka ended the teenage challenge at the Australian Open with an emphatic quarter-final final victory over Iva Jovic. Rugby | The Rugby Football Union is hopeful a proposed overhaul of Twickenham rail station and the deployment of undercover police officers on matchdays will help sway opponents of plans to host more concerts to pay for the £660m stadium upgrade. The front pages “Tories face backlash after ‘mental health’ jibe over Braverman’s exit” is top story at the Guardian. The i paper splashed on “Tories weaponise ‘mental health’ claim on defector Braverman – as exodus grows”, while the Mirror ran “Reform’s latest Con” and the Telegraph led on “China hacked phones in No10”. The Mail says “Burnham rebellion growing” and the Times has “Labour fears stumbling to third in by-election”. “Dollar slumps to four-month low and yen rises as gold breaks $5,100 barrier” was the FT splash. The Sun ran “Clan United”, in reference to the Beckham family. Today in Focus Starmer v Burnham: will it split Labour? The prime minister may have seen off the challenge for the moment – but what will be the cost to his leadership? Peter Walker reports. Cartoon of the day | Pete Songi The Upside A bit of good news to remind you that the world’s not all bad Mass layoffs and cancelled projects in the gaming industry. The White House using video game memes as ICE recruitment tools. The rise of the “manosphere” and the fall of mainstream feminist websites such as Teen Vogue, while bigots celebrate the death of “woke”. “[It’s] a dismal stew of doom for someone like me, a queer woman and a feminist who’s been a games journalist and critic since 2007,” says Maddy Myers, who is launching a gender- and identity-focused gaming publication called Mothership. Independent and worker-owned, it will rely on subscribers’ support and will “report on the good and bad of modern-day game-making – alongside investigations, reviews, criticism, and historical deep dives into games and developers who paved the way to now”. Myers says: “It should have existed before, when I and millions of other girls who grew up playing games were made to feel out of place by media and advertising that was laser-focused on teenage boys. But it’s not too late for me to make sure it exists now.” Sign up here for a weekly roundup of The Upside, sent to you every Sunday Bored at work? And finally, the Guardian’s puzzles are here to keep you entertained throughout the day. Until tomorrow. Quick crossword Cryptic crossword Wordiply

Ukraine war briefing: Nato chief warns of ‘harshest winter’ in a decade as Russian attacks cut power in Kharkiv

Russian drones and missile strikes hit Kharkiv on Monday, knocking out power to 80% of Ukraine’s second-largest city and the surrounding region and injuring two people, local officials said.Mayor Ihor Terekhov said an “energy site” had been targeted in the city as night-time temperatures dipped to -14C. The capital, Kyiv, has been hit by three massive air attacks since the New Year, knocking out power and heating to hundreds of buildings. The war correspondent and executive director of war crimes unit the Reckoning Project, Janine di Giovanni, has suggested Russian president Vladimir Putin is intentionally “weaponising the savage eastern European winter”. Nato secretary general Mark Rutte has warned Ukraine is facing its “harshest winter” for over a decade. He urged lawmakers in the European parliament on Monday to show flexibility on the use of EU funds and welcomed the French move to seize a suspected shadow fleet tanker in a hit to Russia’s model of funding its war. Rutte also highlighted Nato’s continued support of Ukraine with costly US military equipment – and noted Ukraine’s desire to join Nato, but pointed out some member states remained opposed, so “politically, it’s practically not on the cards” for now. Rutte said the aim of the ongoing US-led peace talks should be a peace deal or a long-term ceasefire “as soon as possible”, saying that Ukraine’s security “I think we all know … is also our security”. Discussing Zelenskyy’s recent comments that the US security guarantees are “close to being agreed upon”, he acknowledged the major and “very sensitive” issue of territory with Russia, saying only Ukraine could decide what, if any, compromise they accepted. But according to Tuesday reporting from the Financial Times citing eight people familiar with the talks, the Trump administration has signalled to Ukraine that guarantees depend on Kyiv agreeing to a deal likely requiring it to cede the Donbas region – and indicated it could offer more weapons to strengthen Ukraine’s peacetime army if Kyiv agreed to withdraw forces from the parts of the eastern region it controls. Reuters could not immediately verify the report and the White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Another Russian drone and missile attack has damaged parts of the Kyiv Pechersk Lavra, Ukraine’s culture ministry said on Monday. The attack on Ukraine’s most famous religious landmark – a Unesco world heritage site – took place overnight to Saturday, the ministry said, leaving “damage to doors and window frames”. Agence France-Presse was not able to immediately verify the extent of the damage. Orthodox Christians consider the complex Ukraine’s spiritual centre. Founded in the 11th century, it is home to more than 100 buildings as well as a subterranean labyrinth of caves where monks stay and worship. Russia’s top general, Valery Gerasimov, claimed on Tuesday that Russian forces have captured 17 settlements and took control of more than 500sqkm of territory in Ukraine so far in January. Reuters was unable to immediately verify battlefield accounts from either side. Gerasimov has visited troops fighting in eastern Ukraine, Russia’s defence ministry said on Telegram on Tuesday. Kim Jong-un has viewed sculptures for a memorial of soldiers who died in Ukraine. The North Korean leader visited the Mansudae art studio on Sunday to guide the creation of the sculptures, state media KCNA said on Monday. He said they would “convey forever the legendary feats ... of admirable sons of the DPRK Democratic People’s Republic of Korea”. Under a 2024 mutual defence pact with Russia, North Korea sent about 14,000 soldiers to fight alongside Russian troops in Ukraine, where more than 6,000 of them were killed, according to South Korean, Ukrainian and western sources. Kim has repeatedly lauded the troops’ “heroism” in fighting abroad and honoured them. Bangladeshi workers were lured to Russia by the false promise of civilian jobs and thrust onto the battlefield in the Ukraine war, an Associated Press investigation has found, with duties including advancing ahead of Russian forces, transporting supplies, evacuating wounded soldiers and recovering the dead. The Russian Defense Ministry and the Bangladeshi government did not respond to questions from AP. A Monday Guardian exclusive revealed similar ways men in Africa have been tricked into fighting for Russia.

Number of US-style pickup trucks on UK roads up 92% in a decade, data shows

The number of US-style pickup trucks on UK roads has almost doubled in the past 10 years, data shows. The vehicles are more environmentally damaging than ordinary cars, and more dangerous for pedestrians and cyclists. Campaigners have said the extra-large vehicles, which are often too big for UK streets and parking spaces, are built like “battering rams”. Analysis by Clean Cities of Department for Transport data has found that registrations of the most commonly sold pickup trucks have risen by 92% in just over a decade, with close to 600,000 (590,587) now on UK roads, compared with 308,103 in 2014. This is a particular problem in urban areas, where the vehicles are not suited to narrow streets, pavements and school environments. Clean Cities is calling for increased parking charges for larger and more dangerous vehicles and applying safety standards to pickup trucks, including tests on whether a child can be seen from the drivers’ seat. Oliver Lord, the UK head of Clean Cities, said: “This boom in US-style pickup trucks is lifestyle over practicality in exchange for parking mayhem and dangerous roads. City leaders must act to discourage these menacing vehicles from our streets. How is it acceptable to have a vehicle so tall that children cannot be seen?” Hundreds of thousands of these cars are longer than a second world war tank, and the 10 most common pickup models, including the Ford Ranger, Toyota Hilux, Mitsubishi L200 and Nissan Navara, account for more than half a million registered vehicles. The Ford Ranger is the UK’s most popular pickup truck, weighing between 2,200kg and 2,400kg with a bonnet height of more than a metre. Research from the US found that the vehicle’s large front blind zone can hide several children. This is followed by the Toyota Hilux, which weighs between 2,100kg and 2,300kg and has a bonnet height of 1.05 metres. These cars are more dangerous than other vehicles. Because of their height, SUVs and pickup trucks strike higher on the body than smaller cars, which means fatal head and chest injuries are more likely than survivable leg injuries, and international crash data shows that a pedestrian or cyclist hit by a pickup was 90% more likely to face serious injury than one hit by a regular car, and almost 200% more likely to be killed. In many cases, children cannot be seen over the bonnets of these extra-large cars; their height often exceeds 1 metre meaning an average six-year-old can stand in front of the car undetected. Jemima Hartshorn, the founder of Mums for Lungs, said: “These pickup trucks are built like battering rams and pump out pollution like chimneys. For children, that’s a deadly combination – invisible at the front of the vehicle and breathing in the fumes from the back. No parent wants their kids in daily danger, yet we’re allowing these trucks to become normal on our streets.”

Trump says he will impose new tariffs on South Korea as he criticises delays in trade deal

Donald Trump has said he is raising tariffs on South Korean goods including automobiles, lumber and pharmaceuticals, accusing the country of not living up to a trade deal struck last year and briefly sending shares in Korean carmakers tumbling. In a post on social media, the US president said the tariffs paid on South Korean exports into America would rise from 15% to 25% because the “Korean Legislature hasn’t enacted our Historic Trade Agreement, which is their prerogative”. “South Korea’s Legislature is not living up to its Deal with the United States,” Trump said. The administration has yet to issue formal notices to enact the changes. South Korea scrambled on Tuesday to assure the US it remained committed to implementing the trade deal, after Trump and President Lee Jae Myung agreed in principle last July for Seoul to make $350bn of investments in the US. South Korea’s presidential Blue House said on Tuesday it had not been informed about the tariff hike plans in advance and that it would continue to take the required steps to finalise the deal. It said Lee’s chief policy aide convened an emergency meeting with officials and that the trade minister, Kim Jung-kwan – currently in Canada – would head to Washington for talks on the issue with the US commerce secretary, Howard Lutnick. South Korea’s trade envoy, Yeo Han-koo, said the government was still trying to figure out the background of Trump’s tariffs post and the measures Seoul could take. Yeo said he planned to visit the US soon and talk to his counterpart at the Office of the US Trade Representative in order to find a rational solution between the two governments. Trump’s apparent about-face comes months after Washington and Seoul struck the trade and security deal last year, capping a period of tense negotiations. The agreement was finalised after Trump met Lee in October and included the investment promises by South Korea in return for tariff cuts by the US. Since then, however, the deal has remained in something of a legal limbo in South Korea. Seoul’s presidential office insisted in November the deal did not require parliamentary approval, arguing it represented a memorandum of understanding rather than a binding legal document. But on Tuesday, the country’s ruling party said it would work with the opposition to speed up the passage of five pending bills that would allow the enactment of investment in the US. Officials in the national assembly said the five bills would likely be incorporated into a single proposed law, which would need approval from the finance and judiciary committees before it could go to a floor vote. Under the agreement, Washington would maintain tariffs of up to 15% on South Korean goods including vehicles, car parts and pharmaceuticals. Crucially, the deal’s terms brought US tariffs on South Korean cars down from a 25% level imposed by Trump earlier in 2025. Trump’s latest threat, if enacted, would reverse that. The auto industry accounts for 27% of South Korea’s exports to the US, which takes in nearly half of the country’s car exports. In the minutes after Trump’s announcement, shares in several South Korean carmakers fell as much as 5%, but clawed back their losses later in the day. Trump has used the threat of tariffs throughout his second term as an instrument of foreign policy. Economists have raised concerns about the approach and the policy also faces a test in an ongoing case in front of the US supreme court. Tuesday’s threat targeting South Korea is his latest against key trading partners in recent days. Over the weekend, Trump warned Canada that if it concluded a trade deal with China, he would impose a 100% tariff on all goods coming across the border. Earlier in January, Trump also threatened to slap tariffs on multiple European nations until his purchase of Greenland is achieved. He has since backed off the threat. The chair of international economics at the Atlantic Council, Josh Lipsky, said Trump’s action on South Korea reflected impatience with the pace of Seoul’s enactment of the framework trade agreement. “It’s just another reminder that the markets were wrong to believe we were going to get into tariff stability in 2026,” Lipsky said. “People say, ‘Oh, but he doesn’t follow through,’ and sometimes that’s true, but sometimes it isn’t. And the volatility alone – there is a price around that.” With Reuters and Agence France-Presse

Wife of oil tanker captain captured by US in North Sea starts legal action to free him

Lawyers acting for the wife of the captain of a Venezuela-linked oil tanker captured by US forces in UK waters are calling for a judicial review of his situation, claiming he is being detained unlawfully. The Marinera, a Russian-flagged vessel previously known as Bella 1, has been in the Moray Firth in recent days. The Moray Firth is a sheltered area of sea between the east Highland coast and the coasts of Moray and Aberdeenshire. The vessel was captured by US forces earlier this month as it travelled through the waters between Iceland and Scotland. The sanctioned oil tanker had reportedly been pursued across the Atlantic by US forces, after apparently approaching the naval blockade around Venezuela. Lawyers acting for Natia Dzadzama, the wife of the vessel’s captain, Avtandil Kalandadze, lodged a petition at the court of session in Edinburgh on Monday to call for a judicial review of his situation. Aamer Anwar, the solicitor acting on Dzadzama’s behalf, said: “Today we lodged a petition for judicial review of the lawfulness of the detention of Captain Avtandil Kalandadze. “We submit that Natia Dzadzama’s husband, of Georgian nationality, was unlawfully detained and held by the US navy in Scotland since 7 January, on the marine vessel known as the Marinera and formerly known as Bella 1. “The captain’s wife is reasonably concerned about her husband’s safety and security on the ship, and today we are seeking the intervention of the Scottish court of session in order to protect the legal rights of her husband.” The petition submitted to the court alleges that her husband is “unlawfully being held in legal limbo without any recourse to a court or tribunal to vindicate his rights”. Lawyers are seeking an emergency order to prevent the ship and those on board being removed from the jurisdiction of the Scottish court. It is hoped a full hearing will take place in the coming days. During a hearing on Monday evening, Lord Young granted an interim interdict in a restricted form. He said the interdict prohibits the respondents – the advocate general for Scotland, the lord advocate and the Scottish ministers – or anyone acting on their behalf, from removing the captain and the crew of the Marinera from the territorial jurisdiction of the court. The UK’s armed forces assisted in the operation in the Atlantic earlier this month but did not board the vessel, which had initially been falsely flying the flag of Guyana before switching to a Russian flag. The Scottish Courts and Tribunal Service confirmed that a petition for judicial review was lodged with the court on Monday afternoon.

Record 9 tonnes of cocaine seized from ‘narco-sub’ by Portuguese police

Portuguese police have made a record seizure of almost nine tonnes of cocaine after intercepting a “narco-sub” off the Azores carrying what is thought to be the largest shipment of the drug ever found on one of the Europe-bound, semi-submersible vessels. The Portuguese Judicial police said its officers had confiscated the haul in a recent joint operation with the country’s navy and air force that had been conducted in coordination with the US Drug Enforcement Administration and the UK National Crime Agency. The intercepted vessel eventually sank, taking 35 bales of cocaine with it to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean. The four men on board – three Colombians and a Venezuelan – were arrested. “The vessel, which had come from Latin America and was crewed by four foreign nationals, was carrying 300 bales of cocaine,” the Portuguese police said in a statement. “The interception of the semi-submersible occurred at sea, approximately 230 nautical miles from the Azores, under extremely difficult and dangerous conditions due to the current adverse weather conditions.” A police spokesperson told Agence France-Presse that the operation had resulted in “the biggest seizure of cocaine ever in Portugal”. According to Portuguese media reports, the impounded drugs could be worth up to €600m (£520m). In March last year, Portuguese police located and intercepted another narco-sub off the Azores that was ferrying almost 6.5 tonnes of cocaine to Europe. Although semi-submersible vehicles have been used regularly in Colombia and other parts of South and Central America since the 1980s, they were not detected in European waters until 2006, when an abandoned sub was found in an estuary in the north-west Spanish region of Galicia. The first full-laden narco-sub found in European waters was recovered from an inlet in Galicia in 2019, where it had been scuttled along with its cargo of three tonnes of cocaine. Four months ago, Spanish police seized 3.6 tonnes of cocaine that had been brought to Galicia by narco-sub. In an interview with the Guardian last month, the head of the central narcotics brigade of Spain’s National police said plummeting cocaine prices were leading drug gangs to reuse the narco-subs they would once have ditched at the end of a one-way journey from South America. “The price of the merchandise is really, really low, so the organisations have, logically, had a rethink,” said Alberto Morales. “Rather than sink them, what they do now is unload the merchandise and set up a refuelling platform at sea so that the semi-submersibles can head back to the countries they came from and make as many journeys as possible.” Spanish police on Monday separately announced they had dismantled a massive and highly sophisticated cocaine smuggling operation that used powerful speed boats and offshore bases in the Atlantic to bring more than 57 tonnes of the drug into Europe over the past year. The year-long investigation, led by the National police, has resulted in 105 arrests and the confiscation of 10.4 tonnes of cocaine and the seizure of 30 boats. Officers discovered that gang members based in southern Spain, Portugal, the Canary Islands and Morocco were using the cover of dark to set off in speedboats and rendezvous with supply and storage ships. The drugs were loaded on to the speedboats, some of which had a speed of 40 knots, and brought back to mainland Spain and the Canaries. “They created real aquatic platforms where drivers would remain at sea for over a month at a time, carrying out several successive operations,” the force said in a statement. “They had their own fuel storage facilities, with evidence showing the use of over 100,000 litres. Smaller vessels were responsible for supplying gasoline, provisions, communication equipment, and even clothing for the couriers who escorted the drugs from the mother ship to our country.” Investigators also discovered the lengths to which the gang was prepared to go to in order to keep its activities secret: the family of one member who died was paid €12m to “guarantee their silence and avoid any suspicion of criminal activities”.

Fate of China’s top general more likely to do with power struggle than corruption

Standing inches from Xi Jinping at a military ceremony in late December, China’s highest-ranking general, Zhang Youxia, may have had little inkling about the fate that was to befall him just a few weeks later when he was put under investigation. The 75-year-old’s physical proximity to China’s leader, who stands to his right, reflects the position he holds in China’s hierarchy. As vice-chair of the Central Military Commission (CMC), the ruling body of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), he is the second-most powerful person in China’s military, after Xi, the commander-in-chief. But on Saturday, China’s defence ministry announced that Zhang and Liu Zhenli, another CMC member, were under investigation for “suspected serious violations of discipline and law”, party-speak for corruption. Zhang and Liu have not been formally removed from the party or the commission, but being placed under investigation is all but certain to lead to those outcomes. “This is easily the most significant PLA purge in the post-Mao era,” said Neil Thomas, a fellow on Chinese politics at the Asia Society thinktank. “It’s hard to overstate how rare this is … it would be like arresting the chair of the US joint chiefs of staff for corruption.” A Sunday editorial in the PLA’s official newspaper laid out the charges against Zhang and Liu. The men allegedly “seriously betrayed the trust and expectations” of the party and the CMC and “fostered political and corruption problems that undermined the party’s absolute leadership over the military”. Precise details of the allegations have not been revealed, but the editorial suggests that political problems were a factor as well as corruption. Alfred Wu, an associate professor at the National University of Singapore, said Zhang’s recent appearance alongside Xi and his nomination to the CMC at the 20th party congress in 2022, when he was past the normal retirement age, indicated that he was a trusted figure until relatively recently. “Corruption does not just happen overnight,” Wu said. Zhang is the most senior in a string of top PLA officials who have been defenestrated in recent years, including Li Shangfu, the former defence minister, who was kicked off the CMC in 2023 and expelled from the party in 2024. The Wall Street Journal reported that Zhang’s downfall was linked to the fact that he had promoted Li. Dennis Wilder, a senior fellow at Georgetown University and a former senior CIA analyst, said a power struggle was a more likely explanation than corruption. The purge “isn’t about corruption, it isn’t about leaking secrets, it is about a general that became too powerful”, he said. Whatever the reason for Zhang’s fall from grace, one thing is certain: Xi wants him gone. “The fact that Xi is purging his right-hand man in the military is a shocking development, which suggests Zhang was guilty of a significant betrayal of Xi’s trust,” Thomas said. Zhang was once considered to be one of Xi’s closest military allies. He is a fellow Communist party “princeling”, the son of revolutionaries who served under Mao Zedong. He is one of the few generals to have seen active combat as a frontline officer during China’s conflict with Vietnam in 1978. These credentials, and the fact Xi handpicked him to serve on the CMC, might have suggested a degree of political protection. But Xi seems determined to prove otherwise. “For Xi, there’s nothing more important than strengthening party discipline and ensuring it does not go the same way as the Soviet Communist party, which in his view was rendered ineffective by corruption,” said Thomas. “No one is safe in Beijing because Xi puts the party above any individual.” The party’s control of the armed forces is central to its, and therefore Xi’s, grip on power. That means that Xi is willing to assert his authority at all costs, even if the result is a somewhat absurd CMC lineup effectively down to two people: Xi himself and the CMC’s anti-corruption chief, Zhang Shengmin. For western analysts, the biggest question is what it means for China’s military buildup, and particularly its readiness to launch an assault on Taiwan. US intelligence believes Xi has ordered the military to be ready to win a fight for it by 2027, making this a crucial year for modernisation. Unification with the self-governing island which Beijing claims as its territory is one of Xi’s main priorities and he has not ruled out the use of force to achieve it. Some argue that the purges make an attack on Taiwan less likely, at least in the short term, because the army does not have the high level decision-making capacity to launch a sophisticated operation. “It gives the US military more time to prepare for a Taiwan conflict,” said Wilder. Others caution that the ousted men could be replaced by a younger, more aggressive lineup of officers who are unlikely to question their leader. Lyle Goldstein, the director of the Asia programme at Defense Priorities, a US foreign policy thinktank, noted that China had unveiled a suite of powerful new weapons at its military parade in September, a sabre-rattling display of bravado. “I think it would be a major mistake to assume that the Chinese military lacks capable senior officers or that it is less likely to move against Taiwan due to this recent shake-up of the CMC,” he said. One aspect widely agreed on is that the investigations will not end with Zhang and Liu. Scholars of the Chinese Communist party describe corruption as a feature of the system, not a bug. Zhang and Liu are likely to be interrogated about whatever offences they are specifically accused of, which will throw up more names. “More arrests are likely,” Wu said. Additional research by Lillian Yang

Remains of last Israeli held in Gaza after 7 October 2023 returned

The remains of the Israeli police sergeant Ran Gvili, who was killed fighting Hamas-led militants on 7 October 2023, have been returned to Israel. Militants took Gvili’s body to Gaza to use as a bargaining chip. He was the last of 251 people captured that day still held in the territory. “With this, all hostages have been returned from the Gaza Strip to the state of Israel,” the Israeli military said in a statement. Gvili, 24, a member of an elite police unit, was killed defending Kibbutz Alumim. He was on medical leave after dislocating his shoulder in a motorcycling accident but when news of the attack began filtering out he put on his uniform and went to support the military. In Israel, Gvili’s father stood in front of the coffin and said: “You had the option to stay home but you said to me: ‘Father, I’m not going to leave my friends to fight alone.’ “You came out, and you need to see the honour you have here, all the people who brought you. All the police are here with you, the entire army is here with you, the entire nation is here with you. I’m proud of you, my son,” he said, in comments reported by the BBC. Rani Gvili’s sister Shira earlier told the Hostages and Missing Families Forum: “I feel an insane sense of relief. I feel relieved. I am sad. I’m very sad that it ended this way, but it had to end at some point. I am so happy he’s coming back home.” The handover of the body marks the completion of a key initial demand of Donald Trump’s ceasefire plan for Gaza. It should open the way for progress in its second stage, which the US announced was under way earlier this month. Key Trump aides last week laid out an extremely ambitious plan for Gaza, with his son-in-law, Jared Kusher, describing it as a blueprint for “catastrophic success”. It envisages a unified Palestinian-run Gaza, which represents a rebuff to the aims of Israeli extremists, including some in the governing coalition, who have sought the deportation of Gaza’s population and the building of Israeli settlements in its place. The plan’s success will depend largely on whether Trump and his “board of peace” have the determination to implement the plan, overcoming Israeli objections and obstruction. That includes whether a mechanism can be created inside Gaza to oversee the disarming of Hamas, with potential contributors to a proposed international security force ruling out any direct confrontation with the militant group. After the return of Gvili’s body was announced, the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, told lawmakers that the next step for Gaza would be not the reconstruction promised by Kushner but instead “the disarmament of Hamas and the demilitarisation of the Gaza Strip”, Haaretz reported. Israel had said the vital Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt would reopen when Gvili’s body had been returned. It has been closed since Israeli troops seized control of it in May 2024. But it will only be open to pedestrians, so this will not ease shortages of food and shelter aid, medicine and other basic humanitarian goods in Gaza, and Israel will retain full control of everyone who enters and leaves, Israeli media reported. Although the ceasefire reduced the number of attacks inside Gaza, Israeli forces have killed nearly 500 Palestinians since it came into force. The lack of shelter and aid mean hunger is still widespread and at least eight children have died from hypothermia. The return of Gvili’s remains marks the end of a long public campaign to bring back the living and the dead, including some who had been captured before 2023. Israel’s president, Isaac Herzog, said in a statement: “After many difficult years, for the first time since 2014 there are no Israeli citizens held hostage in Gaza. An entire nation prayed and waited for this moment.” Israel keeps the bodies of Palestinians to use as leverage, including detainees who died without being charged or tried and children killed by Israeli forces. Under the terms of Trump’s deal, Israel agreed to hand over the remains of 15 Palestinians for each body returned from Gaza. Many Israeli campaigners have been shifting focus as the final bodies were returned, demanding an independent inquiry into the 7 October 2023 attack and the war that followed. Protesters and some returned hostages and their relatives have accused Netanyahu of sabotaging ceasefire deals that could have brought their loved ones back sooner and prolonging the war to protect his political career. Of 166 people who came back from Gaza alive, the vast majority were freed in ceasefire deals. Eight were released by Israeli military operations. Of the dead, some were killed before they were taken to Gaza, some were killed by their captors, some by Israeli forces and some died of uncertain causes in captivity. Gvili’s body was found in a cemetery in northern Gaza inside the Israeli-controlled area behind the “yellow line”, the military said.