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‘We are not scared’: the Ukrainians building families in the shadow of war

Four years ago Russian troops were a few kilometres away from Leleka maternity hospital, beyond a pine forest and a lake. Vladimir Putin’s plan to conquer Ukraine – wrapping it into a new Russian empire – began just down the road. They were meant to seize Kyiv and topple Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s pro-western government. To the Kremlin’s surprise, Ukraine fought back. A Russian armoured column was destroyed in nearby Bucha. For five weeks a battle raged. Maternity staff treated wounded Ukrainian soldiers. Then, in March 2022, Russian troops pulled out of the Kyiv region. They left behind the bodies of hundreds of civilians they had killed, including fleeing families gunned down in their cars. The hospital in the snowy health resort of Pushcha-Vodytsia has since returned to its original function: delivering babies. The war grinds on as Putin seemingly looks to the White House and Donald Trump to deliver a victory that has been elusive on the battlefield. In eastern Ukraine, Russia continues to slowly push forward, but there is a price: in January, 35,000 of its soldiers were killed or wounded. Moscow’s forces now occupy 20% of the country, including Crimea. It has taken 1.2 million dead and wounded for the army to advance 30 miles in the Donbas region, about the same number of casualties that the US suffered during the entire second world war. “I don’t believe Ukraine will lose, ultimately. This is my internal feeling. Russia won’t defeat us,” said Valeriia Ivashchenko, who gave birth at the clinic. “So many people have lost friends and loved ones. There’s been so much destruction. It’s taken a toll on both countries. Ukraine won’t stop existing. Our life can’t be called normal, but we try to adapt.” Ivashchenko was visiting the hospital with her 20-month-old daughter, Veronica, one of a new generation of Ukrainian children born during the conflict. In 2022, Russian shells damaged her family’s apartment building in the village of Horenka. Now enemy drones and ballistic missiles can be heard buzzing above their home, en route to the capital. “It’s scary. You don’t know their direction. We hide at home between two walls. Veronica recognises the air-raid sirens,” Ivashchenko said. “When the invasion began, I didn’t have a kid. I want to continue to build our life here. War means you can only plan for the short or medium term.” According to the UN refugee agency, 5.9 million Ukrainians have fled the country, and 3.7 million have been internally displaced. Many are women with children. After four years of all-out war, Ukraine has one of the lowest birthrates in the world, with about one birth for every three deaths. The hospital’s own figures illustrate the country’s stark demographic crisis. In 2020, there were 2,300 deliveries. In 2022, it was 868, and last year, 952. Dr Valerii Zukin, Leleka’s chief executive, described the fall in numbers as “very sad for me”. “I like the atmosphere in maternity clinics. It’s different from in a regular hospital, where there is pain and tragedy. Here, people come with positive emotions,” he said, adding: “We must learn to live and survive in these conditions. As Ernest Hemingway wrote: ‘It is silly not to hope.’” Another mother, Ivanna Didur, said her growing family had decided to stay in Kyiv. In October 2025 she gave birth to her third child, Anastasia. “We are not leaving unless Russia is going to be on the doorstep,” she said. She described having a baby in wartime as a “patriotic act”. “I feel I owe it to people on the frontline to stay, raise kids and tell them about Ukraine,” she said. Ukraine’s low birthrate was in line with European trends, she added. On top of that, many Ukrainians were struggling financially and felt they “could not afford” to have children. Now there is also a lack of security. Ivanna said she had taped up the windows on her son and daughters’ bedrooms, to protect them from flying glass. She and her husband, Anatolii, try to give their children as normal a life as possible. Their eight-year-old, Anna, does acrobatics, while Andrii – five – plays football and attends scouts. They eat pizza and go to the cinema. The couple have bought power banks, so their flat stays warm during blackouts caused by bombing. “I don’t think Ukraine is losing. In Donbas the Russians are taking micro-steps,” she said. Before the war, Ukraine’s population was 41 million. The estimated figure today is between 30 million and 32 million, excluding citizens living under Russian occupation. Kyrylo Ventskivsky, the former head of obstetrics at the Kyiv perinatal centre, said the demographic story was “complicated”. “Overall, the birthrate has decreased by maybe 30%. At the same time, some pregnant women who went abroad come back,” he said. One of his patients recently returned from the US to Kyiv, where basic maternity services are free. “She estimated she could buy a studio apartment in the suburbs with the $30,000-$40,000 it would take to give birth in America,” he said. One law exempts fathers with three children from fighting and allows them to leave the country. “Some women tell me they have a third child for this reason,” the doctor acknowledged. If the low birthrate continues, demographers predict that by 2050 only 25 million people will live in Ukraine. The Verkhovna Rada, Ukraine’s parliament, has taken steps to address this alarming decline. In January it increased a one-off payment given to new mothers to 50,000 hryvnia (£858). It also introduced a new monthly subsidy of 7,000 hryvnia for pregnant women without a job. Ventskivsky described himself as an optimist. “As a society we are changing. People are fighting, donating and trying to make things better ,” he said, predicting refugees would return in the event of peace. He added: “If there were no corruption, we could be a phenomenal country. We have sea, mountains, good food and great beer.” For parents who have gone abroad, life can be tough. Ivashchenko said a lot of her friends who had left Ukraine “were struggling”. “It’s hard to adapt. You are considered a refugee and don’t have the same social status as at home. Here we have family, friends and a circle. There you have to start from scratch. It’s hard enough to have a child under normal conditions,” she said. Ivashchenko said the outcome of the war in Ukraine would determine Europe’s future and the kind of world her daughter grew up in. “I don’t consider it to be a Russian-Ukrainian conflict. I think this is an attack on the whole liberal democratic system and on western values. The idea we live in a world based on rules and international law is an illusion. It doesn’t work any more,” she said. Few believe the Russians intend to stop their bloody 12-year attempt to destroy Ukraine. “The invasion was a dumb thing to do. They are blinded by their own propaganda and lies,” Ivashchenko said. “The war has made Ukraine more united. We became more proud of our Ukrainian identity. And we are brave. A lot of nations are scared of Russians. We are not scared.”

Thailand moves to cut sugar in popular drinks amid health drive

A crowd of customers, holding phones aloft, watch intently as Auntie Nid mixes up her bestseller: an iced Thai tea. Condensed milk is poured into a glass, followed by three heaped tablespoons of sugar, and then freshly strained tea. The end product – a deep orange, creamy treat – is poured into a plastic bag filled with ice. “I want to spoil my customers,” says Auntie Nid, 68, who prefers to be known by her nickname. The Thai government, however, is trying to reduce the amount of sugar added to the country’s most popular drinks. This month, nine of the country’s major coffee chains committed to halving the amount of sugar that is considered “normal sweetness” in some of their drinks as part of a new campaign to reset people’s taste buds and improve public health. Thai people consume an average of 21 teaspoons of sugar a day – far more than the World Health Organization’s recommended daily limit of six teaspoons. Sugary drinks are a major culprit, with Thailand historically being one of Asia’s biggest consumers of calories from sweetened drinks. Thailand has taken other steps to tackle sugar, including a sugar tax, which was introduced gradually from 2017, with the last phase rolled out last year. This targets pre-packaged sugary drinks. The tax has helped, said Pojjana Hunchangsith, assistant professor at Mahidol University. “One of the biggest impacts has been product reformulation, with many manufacturers lowering sugar levels to avoid higher tax rate,” she said. However, the tax does not affect street vendors or cafes, where menus are packed with a dazzling array of sweet options – from boba milk teas and iced cocoa, to lemon tea and pink milk, a Thai drink made from sala syrup. “They are very important sources of sugar intake in Thailand,” Pojjana added, but freshly made drinks are far more difficult to regulate. The latest government initiative will include some of the country’s biggest cafe chains. Many shops already display cards offering customers different levels of sweetness: 0%, 25%, 50%, 75% and 100%. Under the new campaign, for certain drinks, 100% sweetness will be half as sugary as it once was. Ann Thumthong, 55, a taxi driver in Bangkok, welcomes the measures, saying it is difficult to avoid sweet things when buying food and drinks. It is possible to retrain your sweetness preferences so you need less sugar, Thumthong said, adding that she has become more health conscious with age. “For me, in the past, when I finished the meal I went straight for the desert, but now I opt for fruits instead,” she said. Phumsith Mahasuweerachai, associate professor at the faculty of economics in Khon Kaen University, said it was possible to encourage customers to make better choices even with simple adjustments. He conducted a study, which found that simply giving customers the option to choose how sweet their drinks would be prompted them to opt for less sugary drinks. Providing calorie information did not significantly change their choices, he added. “If we don’t nudge [customers] or prompt them, it’s difficult for them to make the change,” he said. “They go to the coffee shop and it’s automatic.” At Auntie Nid’s shop, customer Phakamas, 39, has just bought an iced cocoa on her lunch break, a relief in the Bangkok heat. “I think consuming sugar is OK, I don’t consume it very frequently – I might consume a cup or two during the week,” she says. Auntie Nid, whose shop has served teas and coffees in Bangkok’s old town for 30 years, can’t comprehend changing her recipe. “No, no, no,” she says, as a queue of tourists, as well as some locals workers and students stretches out the door. The shop has always been popular, she says, but has become especially famous among foreign visitors thanks to social media. “The reasons why these drinks are popular is because of their strong, intense taste,” she says. “Without sugar, the coffee and tea will be bland and bitter.”

Ukraine war briefing: Kyiv condemns ‘blackmail’ by Hungary and Slovakia in energy supplies dispute

Ukraine’s foreign ministry has condemned what it describes as “ultimatums and blackmail” by Hungary and Slovakia on Saturday, after both governments threatened to stop electricity supplies to Ukraine unless Kyiv restarts flows of Russian oil. Hungary has also threatened to block a €90bn Ukrainian war loan. Shipments of Russian oil to Hungary and Slovakia have been cut off since 27 January, when Kyiv says a Russian drone strike hit pipeline equipment in western Ukraine. Hungary and Slovakia both accuse Ukraine of delaying the restart, without evidence. The Ukrainian foreign ministry said in a statement the country “rejects and condemns the ultimatums and blackmail by the governments of Hungary and the Slovak Republic regarding energy supplies between our countries”. “Ultimatums should be sent to the Kremlin, and certainly not to Kyiv.” Slovakia and Hungary are the only two EU countries that still rely on significant amounts of Russian oil shipped via the Soviet-era Druzhba pipeline over Ukraine. The issue has become one of the angriest disputes yet between Ukraine and two neighbours that are members of the EU and Nato but whose leaders have bucked the largely pro-Ukrainian consensus in Europe to cultivate ties with Moscow. The Slovak leader, Robert Fico, has accused Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy of acting “maliciously” towards his country. Russia attacked Ukraine overnight with dozens of strike drones and ballistic and cruise missiles, focusing on energy infrastructure, officials said on Sunday. The strikes hit Kyiv and the region around the capital, the Black Sea port Odesa and central Ukraine, they said. Powerful explosions shook Kyiv early on Sunday, after officials warned of a possible ballistic missile attack. The alert, just before 4am, urged people to take cover immediately. Moments later, several loud blasts were heard, according to reports. Authorities said air defence units were engaging drones detected over the wider Kyiv region. Kyiv mayor, Vitali Klitschko, said a woman and a child were injured in the attack. Poland’s Operational Command said early on Sunday it had scrambled jets after detecting “long-range aviation of the Russian federation conducting strikes on the territory of Ukraine”. The attacks on Kyiv followed explosions in the western Ukrainian city of Lviv which killed a policewoman and wounded at least 15 people in what local authorities called an “act of terror”. The blasts in Lviv occurred just after police responded to a report of a break-in at a shop in the city centre, according to officials. A first explosion struck as the initial patrol arrived, followed by a second blast moments later. “This is definitely an act of terror,” the Lviv mayor, Andriy Sadovy, said in a Facebook post. Volodymyr Zelenskyy says “real opportunities to end war with dignity still exist”, calling for another round of talks, and hinting at a fresh leaders’ meeting. After he was debriefed on this week’s peace talks with Russia and the US in Geneva, Zelenskyy called for another round of talks to be held “very soon, as early as this February”. He said “Ukraine’s responses to the most difficult questions ahead of the next meeting are ready,” and that they still want to raise some issues at the leaders’ level with Trump and Putin. “It is the leaders’ format that could prove decisive in many respects, and Ukraine is ready for such a format,” he said. Former British prime minister Boris Johnson says the UK and its European allies should immediately deploy noncombat troops to Ukraine to show the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, that western nations are committed to the nation’s freedom and independence. Speaking ahead of the fourth anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Johnson told the BBC that the troops should be sent to peaceful regions in non-fighting roles. A strike by Ukraine against a major missile factory deep inside Russia wounded 11 people, officials in Russia’s Udmurt Republics said. Ukraine’s General Staff confirmed it used Ukrainian-made FP-5 “Flamingo” cruise missiles against the Votkinsk plant. Unofficial Russian Telegram channels also pointed to that site. Russia suspended flights at airports in and near the region. Ukraine also reported a strike on a gas plant in Samara, Russia. About 2,000 people marched in Paris on Saturday, according to police, to show their support for Ukraine. European parliament member Raphael Glucksmann told Agence France-Presse there was “massive” support for Ukraine in France which “has not wavered since the first day of the full-scale invasion”. “On the other hand, in the French political class, sounds of giving up are starting to emerge. On both the far left and the far right, voices of capitulation are getting louder,” he said.

Iran refusing to export highly enriched uranium but willing to dilute purity, sources say

Iran is refusing to export its 300kg stockpile of highly enriched uranium, but is willing to dilute the purity of the stockpile it holds under the supervision of UN nuclear inspectorate the IAEA, Iranian sources have said. The proposal will be at the heart of the offer Iran is due to make to the US in the next few days, as the US president, Donald Trump, weighs whether to use his vast naval buildup in the Middle East to attack the country. Iran has a stockpile of uranium enriched to 60%, close to weapons grade, but is willing to down-blend the purity to 20% or below. Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, is also claiming that there has been no US demand to abandon the right to enrich inside Iran. The focus is instead on the purity of the enrichment and the number of centrifuges to be permitted. There had been discussion of the stockpile being sent to Russia, and for Iran’s domestic enrichment programme to be linked in with an overseas consortium, but Iranian sources are insisting the concept of a consortium has not been raised. Iranian media close to the government quoted an Iranian diplomat as saying: “We emphasised this position during the negotiations that nuclear materials will not leave the country.” The Iranian account of its relatively uncompromising position means a great deal of weight will have to be placed on the degree of access the IAEA would be given to inspect nuclear sites. The Iranian offer is likely to determine whether Trump feels compelled to launch military action against Iran. In an interview in the US, aired on Friday, Araghchi said: “Washington has not asked Tehran to permanently suspend uranium enrichment,” adding that Tehran had not offered Washington a temporary suspension of its uranium enrichment. He rejected reports that Iran had proposed suspending uranium enrichment for two to three years, saying: “It is not true that the United States has called for a complete cessation of enrichment.” His remarks were contradicted by the US ambassador to the UN, Mike Waltz, who, prompted by his interviewer, said the US was seeking “zero enrichment” by Iran. Reza Nasri, an Iranian lawyer with contacts inside the foreign ministry, warned: “If Iran is attacked while nuclear disagreements can still be settled diplomatically in a fair and equitable manner, other regional states will inevitably draw one conclusion: nuclear weapons are the only real deterrent against the US and Israel.” The news came as protests erupted at some universities, prompting fresh clashes in the street, at Mashhad University of Medical Sciences and at least two Tehran universities. The universities were reopening after being closed due to fear of protests. At Sharif University, the students chanted “Javed Shah”, “Until the mullah is shrouded, this homeland will not become a homeland” and “Death to the dictator.” The Sharif University president urged the students to stop, warning that the authorities would force classes back online. In London, about 1,500 protesters marched on Saturday to call on the UK government to close the Iranian embassy. Some people held pictures of Iran’s exiled crown prince, Reza Pahlavi, who one demonstrator said was “standing with the people of Iran”. One participant, an Iranian national who did not want to be named, said Pahlavi was the “only alternative” leader. He added: “We are not a dictatorship, we don’t want a dictatorship, we just want a democracy.” Protests are also expected at a meeting of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva on Tuesday when an Iranian official, Afsaneh Nadipour, takes her seat for the first time as a full member of the advisory council. Nadipour, a former Iranian ambassador to Denmark, is due to provide input on women’s rights. The UN Human Rights Council Advisory Committee is comprised of 18 independent experts from five UN regional groups and serves as the intellectual arm of the Human Rights Council. Nominations are made by governments and are selected by the council. She was elected for a three-year term in October.

‘We can see that courage’: Greece recovers long-lost photos of Nazis’ May Day executions

In his book-filled office, Vangelis Sakkatos took in the images of the men lined up before a firing squad. The executions on May Day 1944 have haunted him since he was a boy. “Their heroism was the stuff of myth,” said the veteran leftist, casting his eyes over the photographs that have dominated Greece’s press in recent days with a mixture of fury and awe. “The years may have passed, but I haven’t forgotten.” At 96, Sakkatos never imagined the time would come when he would be able to “put a face” to the protagonists of a tragedy that would go down as one of the worst atrocities of Nazi occupation. The 200 communists, executed by machine gun fire in the Kaisariani shooting range, barely a mile away from his first-floor flat, were killed in retaliation for the fatal attack on a German general ambushed by communist guerrillas a few days earlier. The pictures depict the men walking into the firing range in Athens, their heads held high as they stare, seemingly unafraid, into the camera. Famously, they went to their deaths chanting partisan songs in a final act of resistance. “That is what we have always heard,” said Sakkatos, who for years lobbied with other leftists for a monument to be erected in their honour. “And now we can see that courage before our eyes.” Until last week, when the photographs were posted on eBay by Tim de Craene, a Belgian collector specialising in Third Reich memorabilia, it was not known whether the images existed. In the absence of pictorial evidence, testimony of the communists’ last moments rested on the handwritten notes the men had thrown out of trucks as they were driven to their deaths from Block 15, the notorious camp in Chaidari, on the western fringes of the Greek capital, where political prisoners were detained. On Friday, after days of outcry in the wake of the pictures’ emergence, the Greek culture ministry said it had signed a preliminary agreement with De Craene to buy the photos and he had withdrawn them from sale. The prints, believed to have been taken by Hermann Heuer, a Wehrmacht lieutenant, amounted to “a monument of exceptional historical importance”, it said. Few events in the collective memory of a nation that endured more than three years of German occupation have held such sway. The May Day executions – seen as the high point of the country’s communist-led anti-Nazi resistance – would inspire some of the country’s greatest contemporary artists. Poets, songwriters, painters and film-makers have all drawn on an episode that ever since has gripped the popular imagination. “It’s one thing to hear about their bravery and quite another to see it,” said Yiannis Eris, a communist party volunteer who gives guided tours of the firing range and national resistance museum in Kaisariani. “Now we know they faced the firing squad not only with immense pride but raising their fists. The night before they had made sure to wash and shave. They weren’t afraid of what was about to happen. They saw it as an honour.” The executions occurred months before Hitler’s defeated forces began withdrawing from Greece in October 1944, more than three years after the Wehrmacht marched into Athens and four after Mussolini ordered a full-scale invasion of Greece from Italian-occupied Albania. Heuer, who was stationed in the country from 1943 was probably part of a unit dispatched by Joseph Goebbels’ ministry of enlightenment and propaganda to document daily life in territories under occupation. “The images allow us to frame the drama of occupied Greece also through the eyes of the occupier,” Lina Mendoni, the culture minister, said in a statement. The collection is thought to include 262 photographs. Some bear the handwritten note “Aten 1.5.44” – the date of the massacre. Greek historians, who have long lamented the paucity of archival material from the period, have described the pictures as exceptional, saying their unexpected discovery will not only help research into Nazi-era atrocities but “open up the space” for further discussion into the bloody 1946-49 civil war that followed the country’s liberation. For decades, Greece’s communist KKE party was deemed illegal and commemoration of events such as the May Day executions was prohibited, in part because access to sites such as the Kaisariani firing range was off-limits. Until the collapse of military dictatorship in 1974, successive rightwing governments marginalised the role played by the leftist-led resistance during the second world war. In recent days, relatives who have recognised ancestors in the photographs have come forward demanding that the events of a period steeped in such trauma be finally acknowledged. “At last, we have pictorial confirmation of what has haunted the Greek left for decades,” said Kostis Karpozilos, a professor of history at Panteion University in Athens. “These images will open up the space for much-needed debate around the politics of memory in contemporary Greece which for so long have been overshadowed by the divisions of the civil war.” Indicative of that rancour, the marble plaque commemorating the 200 was vandalised and smashed by far-right vandals within hours of the photographs coming to light last weekend. On Friday, the memorial honouring the dead, in front of the wall where the men were shot, was covered with a mound of red carnations, testimony, say officials, to the surge in visitors wanting to pay their respects. “There has been a huge emotional response to these images,” said Anastasis Gkikas at the history department of the communist party’s central committee. “We’ve been inundated by calls from descendants of our dead comrades asking for the photographs to be returned to Greece. This is where they belong and this is where they should be put on public display for all to see.”

Decline in remote jobs risks shutting disabled people out of work, study finds

A decline in the number of jobs for people who need to work remotely, including those with disabilities, could undermine the government’s efforts to reverse rising unemployment, according to a two-year study. More than eight in 10 respondents to a survey of working-age disabled people by researchers at Lancaster University said access to home working was essential or very important when looking for a new job. Almost half (46%) of the participants in the Inclusive Remote and Hybrid Working Study wanted to work remotely all the time, with disabled women and disabled carers more likely to want to work fully from home. The needs of disabled job applicants run against the trend for employers to reduce hybrid and remote working, the study found. Analysis of Adzuna job vacancy data showed declining levels of remote job opportunities. In the financial year 2024-25, only one in 23 job adverts on Adzuna (4.3%) were fully remote – half the level seen during the pandemic peak of 8.7% in 2020-21. “Growth in the availability of hybrid jobs appears to have stalled, with only one in seven (13.5%) job vacancies offering hybrid work in 2024-25,” the report said. The findings followed official job figures earlier this week covering the three months to December, which showed one in 11 disabled people were unemployed (9.2%), double the 4.4% average. The Office for National Statistics found there were 547,000 unemployed disabled people, an increase of 110,000 since the same period in 2024. “Unemployment has risen across the UK economy in the last 12 months, but analysis indicates that the rate has risen far more quickly for disabled people than non-disabled people,” said the Work Foundation, a thinktank based at Lancaster University, which coordinated the remote-working project with Manchester Metropolitan University. Billed as the largest study of disabled workers’ experiences of remote and hybrid work in the UK, with funding from the Nuffield Foundation, it involved interviews with more than 1,200 disabled people. The report said that while remote and hybrid working remain more common than before the pandemic, the proportion of fully remote roles had fallen, and the rate of growth in hybrid jobs had slowed. It found that 64% of fully remote disabled workers said their work pattern positively affected their physical health, compared with 31% of those working remotely less than half the time. There was also demand for hybrid working from a quarter of respondents who wanted to work from home four days a week and 27% for three days or fewer. Only a tiny fraction – 1.6% – wanted to stop working from home. One of the respondents, Vera, who is in her 20s and works for a healthcare company in London, said she was based at home following stem cell treatment for multiple sclerosis (MS). She was unable to return to a frontline role. “Remote work has made it possible for me to stay in employment – without it I couldn’t work,” she said. “While I’ve reduced my hours to four days a week, working from home means I can manage cognitive fatigue and rest during lunch breaks so I can stay productive. “But I feel stuck, as there are so few remote-only roles. These are realistically the only roles I can apply for if I want to keep working and progress in my career.” A recent study by the Work Foundation and the MS Society found that nearly half of people with MS (47%) look for job locations that require little or no travel. Lead researcher Paula Holland said: “The increased availability of remote and hybrid working since before the pandemic has improved many disabled people’s experience of work. Our findings indicate disabled employees gain significant benefits including improved mental and physical health, better work-life balance and increased productivity. “However, companies mandating people to return to the office have seen remote-only opportunities plummet and this could prevent some disabled workers from returning and staying in work. At a time when the government wants to get people working, disabled workers report that access to suitable home-working roles can be the difference between working or not working.” A recent House of Lords report called for ministers to ensure remote and hybrid working is being prioritised to boost disabled people’s employment.

Iran prepares nuclear counterproposal as US considers limited military strikes

Iran’s foreign minister has said he expects to have a draft counterproposal ready within days after nuclear talks with the US this week, while Donald Trump said he was considering limited military strikes. The US president has ordered a massive buildup of naval forces in the Middle East, including repositioning aircraft carriers and other warships, leading to fears of an imminent war. But it is not clear if the military movements are intended as an intimidation tactic to put pressure on Iran to make concessions on its nuclear programme. Two US officials told Reuters that US military planning had reached an advanced stage, with options including targeting individuals as part of an attack and even pursuing leadership change in Tehran. On Thursday, Trump gave Tehran a deadline of 10 to 15 days to make a deal to resolve their longstanding nuclear dispute or face “really bad things”. Asked on Friday if he was considering a limited strike to pressure Iran into a deal, Trump told reporters at the White House: “I guess I can say I am considering” it. Asked later about Iran, Trump added: “They better negotiate a fair deal.” Tehran began stepping up its nuclear programme after Trump – during his first term as president – exited an internationally backed deal that had restricted Iran’s programme. He disliked the pact, signed by one of his predecessors, Barack Obama, and was encouraged to abandon diplomacy by Iran’s arch-enemy, Israel. Emboldened by Trump’s support for aggressive action, Israel then led a 12-day war against Iran in June 2025, which the US joined – although the campaign had a questionable impact on Tehran’s long-term nuclear ambitions. Speaking to US cable news network MS Now, Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, said there was no “military solution” for Iran’s nuclear programme. “That has been tested last year. There were huge attacks on our facilities – they killed and assassinated our scientists – but they couldn’t kill our nuclear programme,” he said. Araghchi held indirect discussions in Geneva this week with Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner, and said that the sides had reached an understanding on main “guiding principles”, but that did not mean a deal was imminent. Araghchi added he had a draft counterproposal that could be ready “in the next two or three days” for top Iranian officials to review, with more US-Iran talks possible in a week or so. Trump began threatening strikes again in January as Tehran crushed widespread protests with deadly force. Referring to the crackdown on Friday, Trump said that “32,000 people were killed over a relatively short period of time”, figures that could not be verified. “It’s a very, very, very sad situation,” Trump said, adding that his threats to strike Iran had led the leadership to abandon plans for mass hangings two weeks ago. “They were going to hang 837 people. And I gave them the word, if you hang one person, even one person, that you’re going to be hit right then and there,” he said. The US-based group Hrana, which monitors the human rights situation in Iran, says it has verified 7,114 deaths and has another 11,700 under review. Hours after Trump’s statements on the death toll, Araghchi said the Iranian government had already published a “comprehensive list of all 3,117” killed in the unrest, which he referred to as a “recent terrorist operation”. “If anyone disputes accuracy of our data, please share any evidence,” he posted on X. UN spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric reiterated concerns about heightened rhetoric and increased military activities in the region. During the Geneva talks, the US did not seek zero uranium enrichment and Iran did not offer to suspend enrichment, Araghchi told MS Now. “What we are now talking about is how to make sure that Iran’s nuclear programme, including enrichment, is peaceful and would remain peaceful forever,” he said. Asked about Araghchi’s comments, a White House official said: “The president has been clear that Iran cannot have nuclear weapons or the capacity to build them, and that they cannot enrich uranium.” Reuters contributed to this report

‘Psychological torture’: Spanish tenants fight back against housing ‘harassment’

When the Madrid building where Jaime Oteyza had lived since 2012 was sold to an investment fund two years ago, a local tenants’ union swiftly warned him what to expect. First the tenants would be told that none of their rental contracts – regardless of their expiry date – would be renewed, the union said. Then, as the 50 or so families in the building grappled with what to do next, a series of construction projects would probably be launched in the building to ramp up pressure on them to leave. “One by one, all of the situations that the union described began to happen,” said Oteyza. “Construction work was the weapon they used to make our lives impossible; power cuts, leaks, noise, drilling through walls, ceilings collapsing on top of gas stoves.” It’s a pattern that housing campaigners say is playing out across much of urban Spain, as investors seek to cash in on the country’s roaring housing market. The aim is simple: to force out long-term tenants as quickly as possible to make way for more profitable tourist, short-term or luxury lets. It’s come to be known across Spain as acoso inmobiliario, roughly translating as real estate harassment. The phrase refers to the myriad ways in which long-term tenants are subjected to worsening conditions so that they end their contracts on their own accord. But within the walls of one nondescript building in the madrileño neighbourhood of Lavapiés, tenants may have found a way to fight back. Last year, a dozen tenants, including Oteyza, turned to the country’s courts, alleging that the construction work was a bid to coerce them into ending their leases prematurely. Late last year, a court in Madrid agreed to hear the case, launching what housing campaigners say is the country’s first preliminary investigation into real estate harassment. For residents of the building, the groundbreaking case has added another layer of complexity to their long-running battle. “It’s bittersweet,” said Cristina Gómez, who has lived in the building since 2020. The court’s decision was “nice, as it confirmed we’re not just imagining things,” she said. “But at the same time, this is the result of a lot of suffering. It’s a shit situation for everyone.” The construction work began in November 2024. As the work led to flooding in some apartments and turned parts of the building into no-go zones, residents saw a clear attempt by the new owners to bypass the costlier, more time-consuming process of going through courts to evict them individually. The tenants said they tried to negotiate with the new owners – at one point even offering to buy the building for the same amount that the investment fund had paid for it – as the company offered some tenants a few thousand euros to help with the move. “They were very tough, very long conversations, at no point did they accept anything other than us leaving the building,” said Gómez. Noise levels in the building skyrocketed, as drills and jackhammers rang out and rubble was felled, said Oteyza. For those at home during the day, it was a form of “psychological torture”, he said. “It’s really difficult to live with noise, eight hours a day, day in and day out.” The father of two young children, Oteyza also worried constantly for their safety. “There’s a real fear that there will be an accident,” he said. “There might be a power tool plugged in on the landing. Or they’ve left a hole in the courtyard. These are risky situations.” As one tenant, who asked to be named only as Nani, put it: “We’re resisting and we’ll continue to resist, but it’s really difficult,” she said. “But we have to do it – it can’t be that those who have money can come and buy and sell buildings without caring about the lives of the people inside.” On at least five occasions, police and firefighters were called to the building as tenants wrestled with the fallout of the construction work. About 15 months after it began, residents say that about half of the tenants in the building have opted to leave. It’s a hint of the kinds of situations that are playing out across Spain, said Alejandra Jacinto, a lawyer with the tenants’ union who helped draft the pioneering legal challenge. “From sending in eviction companies to carrying out construction works that cause damage, to putting glue in people’s locks, real estate harassment is a tool that is increasingly being used,” she said. Both the legal challenge and the court’s decision to launch a preliminary investigation were trailblazing steps pushing back against this trend, she said. “I think it’s already sending a message that there’s no impunity and that not everything goes. You can’t act outside the law to achieve your goals.” The court battle had made headlines across the country, she said, offering a glimmer of hope as many in Spain reel from the soaring cost of housing. In January, campaigners in Barcelona announced that a local court had become the second to admit a case alleging real estate harassment. The case argues that the new owners of a five-floor building had left tenants without a working lift for more than a month, stranding elderly tenants and those with mobility issues, including one person who uses a wheelchair, in a bid to get them to leave. In Madrid, weeks after news broke of the court’s investigation, the tenants said it had already had an impact. “Curiously enough, we noticed that when the case made headlines, they continued working but in a more orderly, more systematic way and respecting the noise levels,” said Oteyza. In a statement to the Guardian, a legal representative for the building’s owner said the construction work was aimed at improving accessibility, reinforcing the building’s structure and renovating the roof, noting: “all of which are essential measures to ensure the safety and habitability of the property”. The company had all of the necessary permits to carry out the work, it said. The spokesperson said agreements had been reached with more than 30 tenants in the building, in a show of their “commitment to dialogue and the search for mutually agreed upon solutions”. It added: “Aware of the inconvenience that this type of work can cause, and in order to minimise the impact on the lives of the residents, the owner has offered alternatives from the outset to the residents directly affected by the work, providing them with options for temporary relocation to other homes and accommodation adapted to their needs.” At the building in Lavapiés, the tenants were bracing themselves for a legal battle that could stretch on for months, if not years. But for Gómez, it was an absolute necessity. “What’s happening to us is something that is happening every day, all the time around us,” she said. “I think we need to show them that we’re willing to enforce the law, that we know our rights and are going to assert them.” In a country where the average rent has doubled in the past decade, it also felt as if it was the only option, she added. “It’s not like I can just go to somewhere nearby or another neighbourhood, it’s impossible,” she said. “So where does one go?”