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By Jacqueline Howard

BBC News

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has insisted his troops will advance on the Gazan city of Rafah, defying outside pleas to reconsider.

French President Emmanuel Macron was among those warning Mr Netanyahu off, telling him the human cost of Israel’s operation in Gaza was “intolerable”.

But Mr Netanyahu has ordered his army to prepare for a ground assault.

Some 1.4 million Palestinians are sheltering in Rafah, which has already come under bombardment.

Mr Netanyahu vowed to press on with a “powerful” assault, declaring that Hamas, the group which controls Gaza, must be eliminated from the southern city.

“We will fight until complete victory and this includes a powerful action also in Rafah after we allow the civilian population to leave the battle zones,” he said.

President Macron phoned Mr Netanyahu on Wednesday to say Israel’s operations in Gaza “must cease”.

He expressed “France’s firm opposition to an Israeli offensive in Rafah, which could only lead to a humanitarian disaster of a new magnitude”.

The prime ministers of Australia, Canada and New Zealand issued a joint statement expressing their “grave concern” that a military operation in Rafah would be “catastrophic”.

“We urge the Israeli government not to go down this path,” the statement read, adding “the impacts on Palestinian civilians from an expanded military operation would be devastating”.

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock, visiting Israel, warned that people in Rafah with nowhere to go could not “simply vanish into thin air.”

Spain and the Republic of Ireland have asked the EU, of which they are members, to examine “urgently” whether Israel is complying with its human rights obligations in Gaza under an accord linking rights to trade.

The health ministry in the Hamas-run Palestinian territory reports that at least 28,576 people, mostly women and children, have been killed as a result of Israel’s offensive in Gaza.

Israel took action after Hamas-led gunmen killed at least 1,200 people and seized 253 hostages in a surprise attack on its territory on 7 October.

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In the earlier days of the war, Israel had instructed Palestinians to seek refuge in Rafah as the Israeli military moved against the northern cities.

Rafah is Gaza’s southern-most and features a crossing point into Egypt where humanitarian aid has been allowed to enter the Strip.

Now Israeli authorities want civilians to relocate to what they call a “humanitarian zone” – a thin strip of mainly agricultural land along the Mediterranean coast known as al-Mawasi.

Among the displaced civilians in Rafah was Ahlam Abu Assi, who told AFP news agency she “would rather die” there than return to famine-like conditions like those experienced by relatives who had stayed in Gaza City.

“My son and his children have nothing to eat. They cook a handful of rice and save it for the next day,” she said.

Another city, Khan Younis, has been the focus of Israel’s operations in the south of Gaza so far.

Thousands of displaced Palestinians sought shelter there in the Nasser hospital but are now also being ordered to evacuate.

Mr Netanyahu’s vow to press on came after peace negotiations involving officials from the US, Israel, Egypt and Qatar ended inconclusively.

Israel’s prime ministerial office said Hamas had presented no new offer for a hostage deal and Israel would not accept the militant group’s “ludicrous demands”.

“A change in Hamas’ positions will make it https://belakangan.com/ possible to move forward in the negotiations,” it added.

France striker Kylian Mbappe has told Paris St-Germain he intends to leave the club at the end of the season.

The 25-year-old’s deal with the Ligue 1 champions is scheduled to expire and he has been heavily linked with a move to Real Madrid.

Mbappe’s future was the subject of a major stand-off with PSG last summer.

At one point, Mbappe was exiled from the first-team squad and left out of the club’s pre-season tour of Asia.

However, an agreement was reached that ensured PSG would not lose out when Mbappe eventually left and the terms of his now seemingly inevitable exit are still to be confirmed.

The forward has a one-year extension clause, so it is expected his departure will involve either a sale with a transfer fee or financial sacrifices on the player’s part.

Whilst PSG would have wanted Mbappe to remain at the club, his exit looks set to come as they aim to build a younger squad and move away from the ‘Galacticos’ plan, that has also seen Argentina forward Lionel Messi and Brazil international Neymar leave since the end of last season.

It is estimated Mbappe, who won the World Cup with France in 2018, earns around €200m per year (£171m).

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PSG are 11 points clear of second-placed Nice at the top of the French league and will also play Nice in the quarter-finals of the domestic cup.

The French champions beat Real Sociedad 2-0 in the first leg of their last-16 Champions League encounter on Wednesday, with Mbappe scoring the opener.

It was his fourth goal in Europe’s top competition this season, while he has 20 goals in the domestic league in the present campaign.

Overall, he has 243 goals and 93 assists in 290 games for PSG and has helped the club to five Ligue 1 title wins.

Mbappe won a French top-flight title with Monaco before joining PSG as an 18-year-old in 2017, initially on loan before a 180m euro (£165.7m) move.

He scored 27 goals and registered 13 assists in 60 games for Monaco.

Mbappe was set to leave PSG on a free transfer at the end of the 2021-22 season but ultimately signed a two-year contract extension, with the option of a further year.

However, after Mbappe told PSG he would not agree to the additional 12 months of the deal, he was not selected for their pre-season tour to Japan last July.

He subsequently refused to meet with representatives of Saudi Pro League side Al-Hilal, who made a world-record £259m offer for him.

The striker later returned to first-team training following what PSG said were “very constructive and positive” talks.

Mbappe turned down a move to Real Madrid when he agreed to his current deal with PSG in May 2022.

He scored a hat-trick in the 2022 World Cup final but finished on the losing side as Argentina won on penalties, and Mbappe was subsequently appointed captain of France after Hugo Lloris retired from Les Bleus duty.

• Listen to the latest Football Daily podcast

Analysis – ‘Mbappe is going to Real Madrid’

European football expert Guillem Balague

It is the confirmation of something we heard for the last couple of days. It happened on Tuesday before training. There was an hour-long conversation with Nasser Al-Khelaifi, president of PSG, and Kylian Mbappe. They shook hands and Mbappe said “that’s it, we are gone”.

The French media, and other chosen media, got the memo from PSG saying he is leaving.

PSG are saying “yes he is leaving” but a bunch of things were mentioned as they are trying to put a positive spin on the story.

They are saying “we have started a new adventure that has to do with getting young French players and, in fact, the squad of PSG was the youngest in the last 16 of the Champions League, we have forgotten the galactico era and going somewhere else”.

Mbappe is going. It will take time for the separation to take place and they are negotiating a bunch of things including loyalty bonuses and other stuff.

He has not said where he is going yet… [but] he is going to Real Madrid. Nothing is done but he knows what Real Madrid will offer, although the desperation of the club has been reduced. Instead of the 50m euros (£42.6m) net they were offering in the last proposition, which Mbappe rejected, they are now talking 30m euros (£25.5m).

In the Spanish media over the past few months, Real Madrid have been saying they have a Plan B, so “Kylian if you’re not interested we will get Erling Haaland”.

Financial Fair Play rules will not allow them to sign both Mbappe and Haaland because this free transfer will cost Real Madrid between 100 and 120m euros (£85m-£102m) – that’s what they will have to pay the player to sign him for free.

In the next few weeks and months the negotiations will be between both parties – and I don’t think anyone else is https://belakangan.com/ in the equation.

It looks like chicken, it smells like chicken and, what do you know, it tastes like chicken.

You would never guess that the piece of meat in front of me did not come from a farm. It was made in a laboratory on an industrial estate just a few miles down the road.

I’m in Huber’s Butchery and Bistro in Singapore, which is the only restaurant in world to have so-called cultivated meat on the menu.

Feedback from customers has been “phenomenal”, according to the restaurant’s owner.

The meat’s creator – California-based Eat Just – says it is ethical, clean and green – with no compromise on taste. Billions of dollars are being poured into the industry, but huge question marks hang over its viability as anything beyond a novelty.

Ever since the first lab-grown burger – which cost a mere $330,000 (£263,400) to create – was unveiled in London in 2013, dozens of companies around the world have joined the race to bring affordable cultivated meat to the market.

So far, only Eat Just has managed to get its product approved for public sale after regulators in Singapore – the only country in the world to allow lab-grown meat to be sold – gave its chicken the green light in December 2020.

But it is still nowhere near being widely available. Cultivated chicken nuggets were briefly on the menu at a private members’ club in 2021.

That partnership lasted a few months and this year Huber’s has started offering a chicken sandwich and a chicken pasta dish to the general public – albeit only once a week with limited dining slots available.

“Cultivated meat is real meat, but you don’t have to slaughter an animal,” says Josh Tetrick, chief executive of Eat Just, who spoke to the BBC from San Francisco. “This way of eating makes sense for the future,” he says.

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Unlike plant-based substitutes, cultivated meat is literally meat. The process involves extracting cells from an animal, which are then fed with nutrients such as proteins, sugars and fats.

The cells are allowed to divide and grow, before being placed in a large steel bioreactor, which acts like a fermentation tank.

After four to six weeks, the material is ‘harvested’ from the bioreactor. Some vegetable protein is added, then it is moulded, cooked and 3-D printed to give it the necessary shape and texture.

The resulting strips of deep fried chicken on my plate of orecchiette pasta certainly tasted like the real deal, if a bit processed. Perhaps the sort of chicken you would eat in a fast-food restaurant.

“It’s meat – it’s perfect!” says Caterina, an Italian student who came here especially to try the cultivated chicken. Normally, for sustainability reasons, she would not eat meat but Caterina says she would eat this.

Her only quibble? Serving the chicken with pasta, which typically does not happen in Italy.

Another diner from Singapore says he was surprised by how much it resembled real meat.

“It’s legit”, he says. “I wouldn’t know where it came from. My only concern would be the cost.”

The chicken pasta dish I ordered was S$18.50 ($13.70; £11), but that is vastly discounted relative to the current cost of producing the meat.

Eat Just will not say exactly how much it spends on making its cultivated chicken, but at the moment the company’s production capacity only yields 2kg (4.4lb) or 3kg per week in Singapore.

When you compare that to the 4,000kg – 5,000kg of conventional chicken sold weekly – at Huber’s alone – it gives you a sense of the scale of the task ahead. Put simply, they will need to increase production enormously to avoid making a loss on each piece of chicken.

Eat Just says it has already achieved a 90% reduction in costs since 2018 and the company offered me a tour of its new multi-million dollar production facility in Singapore, which it hopes will open next year.

The pair of shiny steel 1,320 gallon (6,000 litres) bioreactors certainly represent a sign of intent, but in reality they are a tiny fraction of the millions of tonnes of chicken that would need to be produced to match the price of slaughtered chicken.

The industry is urging for patience, but many scientists have already seen enough.

“The narrative presented by these companies is very strong”, says Ricardo San Martin, co-director of the Alt: Meat Lab at the University of California, Berkeley.

“But that narrative must be contrasted with the science”, he says. “Run the numbers, look at every scientific paper written by people who have no skin in the game, and you’ll see the answer is clear.”

“Can you do this, at scale, at a reasonable cost? No. Can you talk about saving the world with this? Again, no. These companies have to be honest – it’s wishful thinking”, he says.

Not only are there doubts about scaling up production, there is also uncertainty over the industry’s green credentials, which have been questioned by scientists.

In theory, reducing the world’s reliance on land and livestock for meat production should reduce carbon emissions, but at the moment the advanced technology needed to create cultivated meat is so energy intensive that it cancels out any benefits.

One study by the University of California, Davis even estimated that the process produces between 4 and 25 times as much carbon dioxide as regular beef. However, East Just has called the study “flawed”.

When asked by the BBC whether the whole project might end in failure, Josh Tetrick from Eat Just replied: “For sure”.

But he remains undeterred: “Making meat in this way is both necessary and highly uncertain,” he says.

“It’s not straightforward. It’s complicated. It’s not guaranteed and it might not work out. But the other option for us is not to do anything. So we decided to take a bet and go for it.”

Plenty of investors have decided to make that same bet. As of this year, an estimated $2.8bn has been spent on developing cultivated meat.

However, if cultivated meat is to become anything more than a niche alternative for the well-off in the developed world, then relying on investments from private businesses may not be enough.

Governments, Mr Tetrick says, are going to need to put “significant public money” into cultivated meat for it to rival conventionally slaughtered meat.

“This is like the transition to renewable energy… It’s a lifetime project – maybe a multiple lifetimes project,” he says.

At the moment though no country outside Singapore has authorised the sale of cultivated meat, let alone committed to serious investment.

According to Ricardo San Martin from UC Berkeley, both private and public funding for cultivated meat companies will dry up if they do not “look in the mirror” soon and present realistic forecasts to investors.

“Unless there is a clear path to success at some point in the future, investors and governments will not want to spend money on something https://belakangan.com/ that is not scientifically proven”.

Pakistan has started to arrest Afghans as the country begins a nationwide crackdown on foreign nationals it says are in the country illegally.

Thousands of Afghans in Pakistan have made their way back to Afghanistan in the last two months. But many of them, who have called Pakistan home for decades, say they have nothing to go back to, while others say they are terrified to be heading back to the Taliban government.

You know you are getting closer to the border when the stream of trucks thickens. Faces old and young watch the road, sitting atop piles of furniture, firewood, cookers and air conditioning units that judder precariously as the vehicles weave through traffic on their way to Afghanistan.

We meet Abdullah at a petrol station in Punjab province. He has hired a truck to bring all 22 of his family members out of the country – 20 of them were born in Pakistan, he says.

“I initially came here when the Russian war started, I used to work in a brick kiln as a labourer. There are fewer job opportunities in Afghanistan,” he tells the BBC.

“I am very sad about leaving my house. I can’t express in words the pain I felt leaving it. Our house was made of mud, and we built it ourselves. I planted many trees there. My neighbours and friends were in tears [when I left] – It’s the cruel government that is making us leave.”

In the last two months around 200,000 Afghan nationals have already left Pakistan ahead of the 1 November deadline, according to the Pakistan government. The recent daily returnee figures are three times higher than normal, says the Taliban refugee ministry spokesman Abdul Mutaleb Haqqani.

The government says the first wave of deportations will target those without any documentation – adding that the policy is only aimed at those that are in the country illegally. UNHCR, the United Nations refugee agency, has also reassured that the government will not take action against those with refugee cards.

But Abdullah says he has been targeted despite having an Afghan Citizen Card – an ID issued by the Pakistan government. He brandishes a plastic wallet and shows the cards for his entire family. According to the government’s own website, this counts as an official document.

He says that despite this, the police raided his house and arrested his sons. The BBC could not independently verify this.

“The government says to go back, even though we have these cards. This level of problem has never happened in the past,” Abdullah tells us.

We climb into the truck – sitting on top of tarpaulin bags of belongings are Abdullah’s children, grandchildren and his wife. She didn’t tell us her name, but can’t stop crying.

“We have nothing,” she says in tears.. “We didn’t do anything wrong; we used to work as labour and feed the family.”

A much criticised policy

Pakistan is home to over four million Afghan migrants and refugees, about 1.7 million of whom are undocumented, according to authorities. As Afghanistan’s neighbour, Pakistan has seen people travel across the border for safety for four decades, from the 1979 Soviet invasion through to the more recent return of the Taliban in 2021.

Human rights groups have criticised the deportation policy, including Amnesty international which pointed out that because of considerable delays in the registration process, many new arrivals in Pakistan have not been able to obtain recognised identity documents.

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• Pakistan orders 1.7 million Afghans out of country

It called on the government to reverse its decision, saying that women and girls in particular would be put in “grave danger” if they returned.

The UNHCR is also concerned that certain groups of people, including minorities, journalists and women, could be at risk. They say they have received assurances from government officials that these groups will not be forced to return.

The organisation has issued slips to those that have approached them for help, in hopes the government will acknowledge them. Some we meet show us their printed slips hopefully, but for now these are not officially recognised by Pakistani authorities.

Despite the criticism, Pakistan’s government has forged ahead. Last week its interior minister announced plans to open centres around the country to help process detainees before deportation, saying that the elderly, children and women would be treated with extra care.

When challenged, the government has pointed out that it is within its rights to follow its own laws. Furthermore its “record of the last forty years in hosting millions of our Afghan brothers and sisters speaks for itself”, according to a foreign ministry spokeswoman.

The Taliban government has urged Pakistan to rethink its “unacceptable” move. The Afghan Ministry of Refugees intends to register returnees and house them in temporary camps, while the Taliban administration will try and find returnees jobs.

But there are worries about how thousands of deportees will impact the economy of a country that is already struggling.

Afghanistan was pushed into economic collapse when the Taliban took over in 2021, and foreign funds that were being given to the previous regime were frozen. The unemployment rate more than doubled from the period immediately before the Taliban takeover to June 2023, according to the World Bank.

UN agencies say around two-thirds of the population is in need of humanitarian aid.

“We’ve just had the earthquake which is impacting heavily on the situation in Afghanistan, and on top of that, winter is approaching so it’s not the best season to have people going back to a country that is already in a very fragile situation,” says Philippa Candler, UNHCR representative in Pakistan.

“We certainly don’t want to see a worsening of the humanitarian situation in Afghanistan as a result of large numbers of people being forced to return.”

The Taliban government announced an amnesty on those who worked for international forces, but there is still a strong sense of fear about what deportation could mean for many we spoke to.

Earlier this year, a UN report said hundreds of former government officials and armed force members were allegedly killed despite assurances from the Taliban of an amnesty.

One woman who was an activist told us in phone messages that she had tried to hide after finding out that the Pakistan police had their details. She said some of her friends had tried to move to villages to give themselves some time.

Another Afghan national -Rehman* – tells us he was part of theAfghan forces and left the country after he says he was beaten by members of the Taliban when they came to power.

“If I go back to Afghanistan, we face death,” he says. “Our lives are in danger. We are living here with one hope, that UNHCR might find a way.”

As we sit, Rehman’s little son curls up in his lap, flicking through his father’s phone and occasionally looking up. His daughter watches carefully from the side.

“I am worried about the future of my children. There is no way for my daughter to study because we don’t have legal documents,” he says.

“We are here without any https://belakangan.com/ destiny and unknown future.”

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By Anselm Gibbs

Paramin, Trinidad and Tobago

They are easy to spot among the rush of colour of the Trinidad and Tobago Carnival, their bodies covered in blue and their screams and antics somehow both frightening and fun.

They are blue devil masqueraders and they are fighting to keep a tradition alive.

It is a winding – and for visitors, at times, nerve-wracking – drive up steep hills to get to the remote village of Paramin, located in the north-western part of Trinidad.

Paramin is the home of the blue devil, a traditional Carnival character, according to local man Curdell Gibbs.

“The only place in Trinidad and Tobago, and by extension the world, where you can find blue devils come Carnival Monday, is Paramin,” Curdell says.

The Caribbean nation celebrates Carnival annually on the Monday and Tuesday preceding Ash Wednesday.

Costumed revellers participate in street parades and there is also competition among different masquerade groups or bands.

This year, Carnival organisers are expecting a high level of participation, but there is some concern.

“A lot of the traditional characters appear in mini-bands and small bands, but there has been a decrease in the number of those,” the president of the Trinidad and Tobago Carnival Bands Association, Mark Ayen, tells BBC News.

“They seem to be far fewer than what they have been before.”

Mark Ayen finds this alarming. He says that while the twin-island republic aims to develop its culture and Carnival, there must also be preservation.

On Carnival Monday night, when the hills of Paramin come alive with the annual blue devil masquerade competition, rhythms ring out from villagers with wooden sticks beating discarded metal biscuit tins.

It’s called “knocking a pan” and provides the soundtrack for masqueraders.

Curdell says the energy provided by those rhythms is unmatched and describes how it can sometimes have unexpected effects on those visiting.

“A lady from Germany held a banana tree and pulled it straight out of the ground and ran through the streets with it,” he recounts.

But Curdell warns that even in Paramin, where villagers say the heartbeat of the blue devil resides, fewer people are taking on the role.

He believes it is because traditional Carnival elements are not as accessible as before. He wants to see more young people involved and says more exposure will help.

The origins of the devil masquerade – or “mas” for short – date all the way back to the days of slavery.

The original term for devil mas is “Jab Molassie,” which is French patois for “Molasses Devil”.

The name describes “the sticky black substance the character was covered in, which in the old days was molasses”, explains researcher, author and cultural activist Dr Rudolph Ottley.

“Nowadays he could be covered in pitch oil [kerosene], mud, cocoa and come in a variety of colours like blue, red, green, silver etc,” he adds.

Freed slaves chose the devil to portray how they viewed slave owners, according to Mr Gibbs, who made his first appearance as a blue devil when he was just six years old.

Eighteen years later, Curdell and a group of friends are part of a masquerade group called Next Generation Underworld Creepers.

The shiny blue coat covering their bodies is not paint.

The colour actually comes from a process that starts with boiling water and grinding laundry bluing cubes, which are usually used to wash white clothes.

“Put it in a bucket, pour the water and then you mash some lard into it,” explains Leonardo Joseph, another member of Next Generation Underworld Creepers.

“You let it cool, let it sit for a little while, so it turns into a paste.”

Mixing this blue concoction begins as early as two days before it is rubbed on to the skin, according to Leonardo Joseph.

For him, there is a bit of irony involved, as he is an altar server in the Roman Catholic church, yet he portrays the devil.

“You have your faith, but you are portraying the culture you love,” Leonardo muses.

Leonardo and Curdell are trying to instil a love for that culture in the new generation.

Their group has organised workshops, where youngsters can come to learn about blue devils and other aspects of Carnival, including wire-bending to make costumes.

It is part of their preservation push to save the traditional elements of Trinidad and Tobago’s Carnival.

“They’re really interested, and if they can do it, it will carry on,” said Daron Felician, the group’s expert wire-bender.

These cultural crusaders have their work cut out for them. “The mas has been slowly but surely dying, it’s sad to see,” Curdell says.

“I really feel the initiatives that we’re taking now, to bring the community together, will increase the traffic we have with blue devils.”

And the blue characters are something to behold: Accessories for devil mas include horns, wings, a fork, a tail and anything else the masquerader wishes to add.

Probably the most outstanding trick a blue devil has up his or her sleeve is fire-breathing. It involves filling your mouth with kerosene.

“Everything you imagine the devil would do, we try to incorporate,” Curdell says.

Born and raised in the usually peaceful Paramin community, Curdell says he began fire-breathing when he was 12 years old.

“You tighten your lips and blow a mist, you’ll get a small flame; if you tighten your lips and try to get a round opening, you’ll get a long flame, but still close to your mouth.

“If you breathe in through your nose properly and you blow out as hard as possible, with tight lips as well, you’ll get a big https://belakangan.com/ ball of fire.”

By Steven McIntosh

Entertainment reporter

Usher delivered a hit-heavy half-time show at Sunday’s Super Bowl – with help from special guests including will.i.am, Alicia Keys and Ludacris.

A disclaimer shown before the performance jokingly warned viewers it would feature “singing, dancing, sweating, gyrating, and possible relationship issues”. It would go on to deliver on all fronts.

Dressed in all-white and surrounded by a swarm of energetic dancers, Usher emerged on the stage at the Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas and launched straight into one of his best-known songs, Caught Up.

It kicked off a dynamic performance which took advantage of Usher’s dancing skills as much as his sizeable back catalogue.

Before his half-time show, Usher admitted it had been “a challenge to squeeze 30 years in to 13 minutes”. But the R&B star did an admirable job of cramming in as many of his most recognisable songs as possible.

He switched effortlessly between the two apexes of his music: club anthems and sex jams.

Some songs ran for a full verse and a chorus, others for just a few seconds. A tiny snippet of Superstar appropriately saw him sing only the lyrics: “Spotlight / Big stage” – as if to hammer home the magnitude of his Super Bowl show.

Once he was a few songs deep and well into his groove, Usher took a back seat as Alicia Keys appeared behind a bright red piano wearing an equally bright red outfit, launching into one of her own biggest hits If I Ain’t Got You.

The pair then joined forces to perform their duet My Boo – providing one of the sweetest moments in a performance full of reunions, as the pair joyously recreated their 2004 smash.

Producer-rapper Jermaine Dupri was whisked on stage almost as quickly as Keys was whisked off, joining Usher for a quick blast of Confessions Part II.

The combination of ballads and club anthems gave the singer moments to catch his breath, as well as show off his vocal prowess.

But even when performing two of his most famous slow jams, Burn and U Got It Bad, Usher couldn’t stand still – jerking his body to the rhythm as he performed on a circular platform which displayed the projection of a clock face.

Usher’s other guests included H.E.R. – who played a rousing guitar solo (the recognisable riff of Bad Girl) as Usher disappeared for his first costume change.

The singer re-emerged wearing a sparkly black-and-blue outfit complete with roller skates as he introduced will.i.am for their collaboration OMG – a song title which reflected the crowd’s reaction.

Lil Jon appeared for a slightly random but entirely welcome detour into his own anthemic Turn Down For What. But Lil Jon’s arrival on stage made obvious to fans what was coming next.

Ludacris appeared on stage as he, Usher and Lil Jon launched into a pulsing rendition of the R&B star’s career-defining hit Yeah!

There wasn’t much in Usher’s set which could be faulted – but arguably the number of star guests in the second half meant the singer got slightly crowded out.

Usher somehow also found time to recreate a skating sequence which had become a viral highlight of his recent Vegas residency.

Watching his set was US megastar Taylor Swift, actress Blake Lively, rapper Ice Spice, rapper Jay-Z, actor Paul Rudd and former basketball players LeBron and James Shaquille O’Neal.

Which songs did Usher perform?

1. Caught Up
2. U Don’t Have To Call
3. Superstar
4. Love in this Club
5. If I Ain’t Got You – duet with Alicia Keys
6. My Boo – duet with Alicia Keys
7. Confessions Part II – feat. Jermaine Dupri
8. Burn
9. U Got It Bad – feat. H.E.R.
10. Bad Girl (interlude) – performed by H.E.R.
11. OMG – duet with will.iam
12. Turn Down For What – performed by Lil Jon
13. Yeah! – feat. Lil Jon and Ludacris

Sunday’s performance was not Usher’s first appearance at the Super Bowl – the singer previously appeared as a special guest with the Black Eyed Peas in 2011.

His return to the NFL helpfully coincides with the release of his latest album Coming Home over the weekend.

Taylor Swift watches on

Throughout the game, cameras regularly cut to Taylor Swift, who was there to support her Kansas City Chiefs boyfriend Travis Kelce.

Fans had speculated about whether Swift would make it at all- the singer was in Tokyo the night before playing a concert as part of her Eras Tour.

But in the event, she made it to Las Vegas in plenty of time to see the Chiefs face off against the San Francisco 49ers.

The US megastar wore an all-black outfit and watched the game https://belakangan.com/ alongside actress Blake Lively, rapper Ice Spice, and her mother Andrea Swift.

By Nick Thorpe

BBC News, Budapest

The president of Hungary has resigned live on television over a decision to pardon a man convicted of covering up a child sexual abuse case.

It was revealed last week President Novak had given clemency to a man jailed for forcing children to retract sexual abuse claims against a director of a state-run children’s home.

Protests calling for her to step down had been growing in Hungary.

Ms Novak apologised and said she made “a mistake” in granting the pardon.

Judit Varga, the former minister of justice who approved the pardon, has also resigned from her new role leading the European elections campaign for Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s ruling Fidesz party.

The controversy which led to the resignations came after the names of 25 people pardoned by Ms Novak in April last year, as part of a visit to Hungary by Pope Francis, were made public by Hungarian media last week.

On the list of convicts was the deputy director of a children’s home near Budapest, who had been jailed for three years after forcing children to retract claims of abuse against the director of the home.

The director had himself been jailed for eight years over abusing children at the government-run facility.

Hungarian opposition parties and protesters had been demanding her resignation, but Ms Novak’s decision to do so was as sudden as it was unexpected.

Ms Novak is a popular figure in Fidesz and a rare female politician in a male-dominated country. She is a key ally of Hungarian Mr Orban and previously worked as his family minister.

In 2022, she became the first woman to hold the largely ceremonial role of Hungarian president.

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The case has unleashed an unprecedented political scandal for Hungary’s long-serving nationalist government.

In particular, it caused deep embarrassment for Fidesz, which has made traditional family values the cornerstone of its social policy.

Speaking in an address live on television, Ms Novak said she granted the pardon in the belief the convicted man “did not exploit the vulnerability of the children under his oversight”.

She apologised to victims who “might have felt that I did not stand up for them”.

“I made a mistake, as the pardon and the lack of reasoning were conducive to triggering doubts about the zero tolerance that applies to paedophilia,” Ms Novak added.

In addition to the resignation of Ms Novak, another leading female politician from Fidesz has also resigned over the same case.

Judit Varga, who was minister of justice at the time of the pardon, countersigned the clemency decision.

The double resignation of its two most prominent female politicians is a serious setback for Mr Orban and his party, with Ms Varga due to head the Fidesz list https://belakangan.com/ in the European elections in June.

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By Sofia Ferreira Santos

BBC News

A model of the Eiffel Tower has been officially deemed the world’s tallest matchstick building a day after being ruled out by Guinness World Records (GWR).

The 7.19m (23ft) tower had been disqualified on Wednesday for being made out of the wrong type of matches.

GWR said on Thursday it was too harsh at first and congratulated model-enthusiast Richard Plaud on his record.

Mr Plaud, 47, said this week had been an “emotional rollercoaster”.

It took Mr Plaud eight years to build the model, which is made out of 706,900 matches and 23kg of glue.

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He began building the tower by cutting the red, sulphur tops off commercial matches – but soon realised this would be a long and tedious process.

After contacting the manufacturer, Mr Plaud was sent kilos of plain wooden matches, and carried on building his model.

Mr Plaud, from Montpellier-de-Médillan in western France, completed the tower on 27 December and contacted GWR to authenticate his work.

He was later told it had been rejected as only “commercially available” matches qualified for a record-breaker – but on Thursday, the organisation changed its mind.

Mark Mckinley from Guinness World Records said the organisation was “really excited to be able to approve it”.

“We’re happy to be able to admit that we were a little bit too harsh on the type of matches needed in this attempt, and Richard’s attempt truly is officially amazing,” he added.

Mr Plaud hopes to put his tower on display in Paris for the Olympics in July.

The previous world record was held by Toufic Daher from Lebanon, https://milodingines.com/ who built a 6.53m (21ft) Eiffel Tower in 2009.

Michael van Gerwen triumphed on night two of the Premier League in Berlin as he beat teenager Luke Littler in the deciding leg of a thrilling final.

World Championship runner-up Littler, 17, missed two darts at double 10 to beat Van Gerwen and win a Premier League night for the first time.

But the defending champion and seven-times winner, 34, was able to close out the match at his next visit.

Night one winner Michael Smith remains top of the table with seven points.

Five of the seven matches on night two went to deciding legs – including Van Gerwen beating Smith and Littler knocking out world champion Luke Humphries in the last four – and the final was another gripping contest that went the full distance.

The Dutch thrower and Littler had already met in two previous finals in 2024, with Littler winning the Bahrain Darts Masters and Van Gerwen coming out on top in the Dutch Darts Masters.

Van Gerwen was beaten in his quarter-final on the opening night in Cardiff but posted averages in excess of 100 in all three of his matches in Germany.

“I played really well – at the important moments I was able to keep pressure on my opponents,” he told Sky Sports.

“I feel good, I feel comfortable and there is more to come. It’s good [facing Littler in another final] and I hope we can keep it that way as well.”

Nathan Aspinall and Peter Wright are the only two players yet to win a match in this year’s Premier League, although both put in much-improved performances in their quarter-final losses to Van Gerwen and Humphries respectively.

Night three of the Premier League will take place in Glasgow on Thursday, 15 February.

• As it happened: Premier League night two in Berlin
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Night two results

Final

Michael van Gerwen 6-5 Luke Littler

Semi-finals

Michael van Gerwen 6-5 Michael Smith

Luke Littler 6-5 Luke Humphries

Quarter-finals

Nathan Aspinall 4-6 Michael van Gerwen

Michael Smith 6-5 Gerwyn Price

Luke Littler 6-5 Rob Cross

Luke Humphries 6-4 Peter https://belakangan.com/ Wright

A pod of around a dozen killer whales trapped by drift ice in waters off Japan’s northern island appears to have successfully escaped, officials say.

The stranded orcas were spotted by a fisherman earlier this week, almost a kilometre off Hokkaido.

Drone footage showed the animals packed closely together and sticking their heads out of the water to breathe.

That sparked an official response – with officials travelling to the seaside town to monitor the whales.

The footage was also shown on Japanese TV, prompting a wave of public concern for the animals this week and calls for government assistance.

One environmental group even petitioned the Japanese government to deploy an ice breaker to help free the trapped orcas.

But on Wednesday, officials reported back saying their latest monitoring trip appeared to show the whales had moved away from the space.

“We believe they were able to escape safely,

” a local official in the seaside town of Rausu said.

They speculated that the whales may have made their way out between gaps in the ice.

The footage of the pod – which included younger orcas – had appeared to show some bleeding at their jaws – a potential impact of their attempts to escape.

According to Japanese media reports, orcas, unlike other large whales, can’t remain underwater for too long and need to https://belakangan.com/ resurface every few minutes.