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A training camp for the Senegalese women's basketball team in the US has been scrapped, with the West African nation's prime minister saying he cancelled it because some of the squad were denied US visas.

Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko said the team would now train in Senegal's capital, Dakar, "in a sovereign and conducive setting".

It comes amidreports that the US plans to impose fresh travel restrictions on 25 more African countries, including Senegal.

Earlier this month the US announceda ban on citizens from 12 countries, including seven from Africa. There were also partial travel restrictions on nationals from a further seven countries, with three from Africa.

The Senegalese basketball team had planned to train in the US for 10 days to warm up for the 2025 Women's AfroBasket tournament in Ivory Coast next month.

But the visa applications for five players and seven officials were not approved, according to a statement from the federation.

This prompted an angry response from the prime minister.

"Informed of the refusal of issuing visas to several members of the Senegal women's national basketball team, I have instructed the Ministry of Sports to simply cancel the ten-day preparatory training initially planned in the United States of America," Sonko said on Thursday in a statement shared to social media.

It is not clear why the visas were denied.

A US State Department spokesperson told the BBC it could not comment on individual cases because visa records are confidential under US law.

Senegal has one of the best women's basketball teams in Africa – consistently reaching the final four in AfroBasket tournaments and boasting players from top leagues in the US, Europe and Egypt.

The visa refusals are raising eyebrows because, according to the recently leaked diplomatic cable containing details of the extended travel restrictions, targeted countries were given up to 60 days to address the concerns raised by the US.

These reportedly include people overstaying their visas, lack of co-operation with deportations, links to terror attacks in the US, antisemitism or what it termed "anti-American" activity.

Following the reported new travel restrictions, Senegal's foreign ministry urged nationals to comply with their permitted periods of stay in the US.

Although it did not directly comment on Senegal's possible inclusion in the latest list of restricted countries, the government statement underscored that diplomatic and consular services were working in close collaboration with the US administration.

Meanwhile, Nigeria's Foreign Minister Yussuf Tuggar said the expanded travel bans could impede possible energy and rare earth mineral deals which West African countries can offer the US.

The Trump administration insists national security concerns and the high rate of visa overstays from some countries must be addressed.

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Filipino authorities are investigating a claim that dozens of cockfighter enthusiasts who disappeared three years ago were killed and dumped in a volcanic lake.

At least 34 men – who had been accused of fixing cockfighting matches – disappeared without a trace in the capital Manila and its surrounding provinces.

Six suspects were later charged for kidnapping and on Thursday, one of them claimed in a TV interview that the victims were strangled to death and dumped into Taal Lake, which surrounds an active volcano.

Cockfighting – where people bet on roosters battling to death using bladed spurs tied to their feet – is a multi-million dollar industry in the Philippines.

The men are accused of being involved in livestreamed cockfights, which were popularised during the Covid pandemic when in-person matches were forced to shut. But this made the industry even more lucrative, generating some 620 million pesos ($10.8m; £8m) a month in licence earnings for the government.

A 2022 Senate investigation also revealed that daily bets on online cockfights ran up to 3 billion pesos ($52.4m; £38.8m).

But after the disappearance of the men, the livestreamed fights – known locally as "e-sabong" – came under scrutiny and then president Rodrigo Duterte eventually banned them. Traditional cockfighting is still legal in the Philippines.

On Thursday, Justice Secretary Crispin Remulla told reporters that authorities would look into deploying divers to look for human remains under the lake.

"We can't just let it pass and just let it go. We have to be responsible enough to seek the truth especially in cases like this," he said.

Remulla also added that authorities would look into the new development, adding that they are looking into finding more witnesesses.

Gambling is legal in predominantly Catholic Philippines even though church leaders are against it in all its forms.

Some online gambling operations have also been linked to criminal operations.

Last year, Filipino authorities uncoveredmassive scam centres and human trafficking ringshiding behind online casinos that serve mainland Chinese clients.

This led President Ferdinand Marcos to outlaw the online casinos known as Pogos or Philippine Offshore Gaming Operations.

Niger's military junta says it will nationalise the majority French-owned local uranium company in the latest escalation in a row between the two countries.

Somaïr is operated by French nuclear fuels company Orano, which Niger accuses of several "irresponsible acts".

Since seizing power in 2023, Niger's military leaders have said they want to keep more local control of the country's mineral wealth, and have distanced themselves from France, the former colonial power, moving closer to Russia.

Niger is the world's seventh largest producer of uranium and has the highest-grade ores in Africa.

"This nationalisation will allow for healthier and more sustainable management of the company and, consequently, optimal enjoyment of the wealth from mining resources by Nigeriens," the junta said in a statement.

It also accused Orano, which is owned by the French state, of removing more than its fair share of uranium.

The company, which has operated in Niger for decades, owns a 63% stake in Somaïr but last year the military authorities seized operational control of the firm.

According to the Reuters news agency, Orano has launched legal action against Niger over its actions.

Niger achieved independence from France in 1960 and the former colonial power managed to secure exclusive access to Niger's uranium supply through various agreements.

Analysts say this was seen by many in Niger as a symbol of the country's continued domination by France.

However, they also note that any uncertainty over the mining sector's future could threaten hundreds of jobs, as well as export earnings.

Earlier this week, neighbouring Mali announced it was building agold refinery in partnership with a Russian conglomerate.

Like Niger, Mali is under military control and says it wants to assert more economic control of its mineral wealth, while cutting ties with France and the West.

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The BBC says it has decided not to broadcast a documentary about doctors working in Gaza, due to impartiality concerns it has surrounding the production.

Gaza: Doctors Under Attack was commissioned by the BBC but produced by an independent production company. It was originally scheduled for broadcast in February, but has not yet aired on any BBC outlet.

In a statement, the BBC said it was "determined to report all aspects of the conflict in the Middle East impartially and fairly".

BBC News has contacted production company Basement Films for comment. Its founder Ben de Pear said earlier this week the BBC had "utterly failed" and that journalists were "being stymied and silenced".

The BBC said it was "transferring ownership of the film material to Basement Films".

BBC News understands the decision to shelve the documentary was taken on Thursday, following public comments by De Pear at the Sheffield Documentary Festival, and another of the film's directors, journalist Ramita Navai, whoappeared on Radio 4's Todaydiscussing the war in Gaza.

Navai told the programme Israel had "become a rogue state that's committing war crimes and ethnic cleansing and mass murdering Palestinians". Israel has denied accusations of war crimes and genocide in Gaza.

A different documentary, Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone, waspulled from iPlayer earlier this yearafter it emerged its 13-year-old narrator was the son of a Hamas official.

Gaza: Doctors Under Attack – also known as Gaza: Medics Under Fire – is said to examine the experiences of Palestinian medics working during the war in Gaza.

The film is directed by Karim Shah, Navai and De Pear, a former editor of Channel 4 News.

In a statement on Friday, the BBC said it had commissioned the documentary over a year ago, but paused the film in April, "having made a decision that we could not broadcast the film while a review into a separate Gaza documentary was ongoing".

"With both films coming from independent production companies, and both about Gaza, it was right to wait for any relevant findings – and put them into action – before broadcasting the film.

"However, we wanted the doctors' voices to be heard. Our aim was to find a way to air some of the material in our news programmes, in line with our impartiality standards, before the review was published.

"For some weeks, the BBC has been working with Basement Films to find a way to tell the stories of these doctors on our platforms.

"Yesterday [Thursday], it became apparent that we have reached the end of the road with these discussions. We have come to the conclusion that broadcasting this material risked creating a perception of partiality that would not meet the high standards that the public rightly expect of the BBC."

The corporation added that, contrary to some reports, the documentary had "not undergone the BBC's final pre-broadcast sign-off processes", adding: "Any film broadcast will not be a BBC film."

It continued: "We want to thank the doctors and contributors and we are sorry we could not tell their stories. The BBC will continue to cover events in Gaza impartially."

Speaking at the Sheffield Documentary Festival on Thursday, before the decision was announced, De Pear specifically blamed director general Tim Davie for refusing to air the film.

"All the decisions about our film were not taken by journalists, they were taken by Tim Davie," he claimed while taking part in a panel,as reported by Broadcast.

"He is just a PR person. Tim Davie is taking editorial decisions which, frankly, he is not capable of making."

He added: "The BBC's primary purpose is TV news and current affairs, and if it's failing on that it doesn't matter what drama it makes or sports it covers. It is failing as an institution. And if it's failing on that then it needs new management.

"Something needs to happen because they are making decisions from a PR defensive point of view rather than a journalistic one. If you make a decision on a journalistic basis you can defend it, but if you make it on a PR basis, you can't."

In relation to the war, De Pear claimed staff at the BBC "are being forced to use language they don't recognise, they are not describing something as it clearly is [for fear of impartiality] and it's tragic".

Responding to De Pear's comments, a BBC spokesperson said the BBC "totally reject[s] this characterisation of our coverage".

"The BBC has continually produced powerful journalism about this conflict. Alongside breaking news and ongoing analysis, we have produced original investigations such as those into allegations of abuse of Palestinian prisoners and Israel's use of bunker buster bombs and in-depth documentaries including the award-winning Life and Death in Gaza, and Gaza 101."

Earlier on Thursday, one of the film's directors, Ramita Navai,told Radio 4's Today programmeIsrael had "become a rogue state that's committing war crimes and ethnic cleansing and mass murdering Palestinians".

High-profile figures such as actress Susan Sarandon and presenter Gary Lineker havepreviously accused the corporationof censorship over the delay.

An open letter, which was also signed by cultural figures such as Dame Harriet Walter, Miriam Margolyes, Maxine Peake, Juliet Stevenson and Mike Leigh, said: "This is not editorial caution. It's political suppression."

"No news organisation should quietly decide behind closed doors whose stories are worth telling," it continued.

"This important film should be seen by the public, and its contributors' bravery honoured."

China's military has called a British warship's recent passage through the Taiwan Strait a disruptive act of "intentional provocation" that "undermines peace and stability".

The British Royal Navy says HMS Spey's patrol on Wednesday was part of a long-planned deployment and was in accordance with international law.

The patrol – the first by a British naval vessel in four years – comes as a UK carrier strike group arrives in the region for a deployment that will last several months.

China considers Taiwan its territory – a claim that self-ruled Taiwan rejects – and has not ruled out the use of force to "reunify" the island.

A spokesman from China's navy criticised the UK for "publicly hyping up" the journey of HMS Spey, and said the UK's claims were "a distortion of legal principles and an attempt to mislead the public".

"Such actions are intentional provocations that disrupt the situation and undermine peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait".

It added that it had monitored HMS Spey throughout its journey in the strait, and Chinese troops "will resolutely counter all threats and provocations".

Later, a Chinese foreign ministry spokesman said that while China respects other countries' rights to sail through the Taiwan Strait, it also "firmly opposes any country using the name of freedom of navigation to provoke and threaten China's sovereign security."

Taiwan's foreign ministry has meanwhile praised the patrol as an act that safeguarded the freedom of navigation in the Taiwan Strait.

While American warships regularly conduct freedom of navigation exercises in the strait, the last time such a journey was undertaken by a British naval vessel was in 2021 when the warship HMS Richmond was deployed to Vietnam.

That transit was similarly condemned by China, which had sent troops to monitor the ship.

HMS Spey is one of two British warships permanently on patrol in the Indo-Pacific.

Its passage through the Taiwan Strait comes as a UK carrier strike group, led by HMS Prince of Wales' aircraft carrier, arrives in the Indo-Pacific region for an eight-month stint.

British PM Keir Starmer has described it as one of the carrier's largest deployments this century that is aimed at "sending a clear message of strength to our adversaries, and a message of unity and purpose to our allies".

Around 4,000 UK military personnel are taking part in the deployment.

The group will be engaging with 30 countries through military operations and visits, and conduct exercises with the US, India, Singapore and Malaysia.

Cross-strait tensions between China and Taiwan have heightened over the past year since Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te, who champions a firm anti-Beijing stance, took office.

He has characterised Beijing as a "foreign hostile force" and introduced policies targeting Chinese influence operations in Taiwan.

Meanwhile, China continues to conduct frequent military exercises in the Taiwan Strait, including a live-fire exercise in April that it claimed simulated strikes on key ports and energy facilities.

China's latest criticism of HMS Spey's transit comes as two Chinese aircraft carriers conduct an unprecedented simultaneous military drill in the Pacific off the waters of Japan,which has alarmed Tokyo.

A 12-year-old girl has died and seven other children have been taken to hospital in an outbreak of severe food poisoning centred around a northern French town.

Symptoms began to emerge on 12 June in and around Saint-Quentin, south of Lille, with the children rushed to hospital over the following days.

The cause of the outbreak is yet to be identified, as the children, aged 1-12, are not thought to have mixed in the same groups.

The girl died on Monday from a rare condition called haemolytic uraemic syndrome (HUS) linked to acute kidney failure,according to the local prefect in the Aisne area.The most common cause of the infection is E.coli bacteria.

The latest case was reported on Wednesday evening, the regional health authority in Hauts-de France said.

All eight children were admitted to hospital with severe digestive symptoms, such as bloody diarrhea, and five of them had developed HUS, the authority said.

Health authorities are conducting biological analysis in an attempt to identify the bacterial strain involved in each case.

They said there was no indication the children ate meals together and they have ruled out any issues with local tap water, which "can be used for drinking and for all everyday purposes".

The infectious disease (HUS) is most often caused by E.coli food poisoning, authorities said. However, as the families involved had sourced their food from a variety of places, the origin of contamination is proving hard to find.

Food inspectors were investigating whether contaminated meat was behind the outbreak. Several butchers in Saint-Quentin were closed on Thursday, local news outlet L'Aisne nouvelle reported.

One butcher said all his meat, marinades and spices had been taken away to be checked.

Parents have been told to be vigilant and ensure strict hygiene at home, with authorities advising regular hand-washing, washing of fruit and vegetables, thoroughly cooking meat and separating raw and cooked food.

The family of Zambia's former President Edgar Lungu says he will be buried in South Africa in a private ceremony following a row with the government over the funeral arrangements.

Late on Thursday, President Hakainde Hichilema cut short a period of national mourning after Lungu's family refused to allow his body to be repatriated from South Africa as planned. His funeral had been set for Sunday in Zambia's capital, Lusaka.

The family now says it will announce later when Lungu will be buried in Johannesburg in "dignity and peace".

It will be the first time a former head of state of another country is buried in South Africa.

In his will, Lungu said that Hichilema, his long-time rival, should not attend his funeral.

The government and his family later agreed he would have a state funeral before relations broke down over the precise arrangements.

"We wish to announce that the funeral and burial of our beloved Dr Edgar Chagwa Lungu will take place here in South Africa, in accordance with the family's wishes for a private ceremony," family spokesperson Makebi Zulu said in a statement.

Mr Zulu thanked the South African government for "non-interference" and honouring the family's decision and desire during "this deeply emotional period".

In his address on Thursday, President Hichilema said that Lungu, as a former president, "belongs to the nation of Zambia" and his body should therefore "be buried in Zambia with full honours, and not in any other nation".

However, because of the row, he announced an immediate end to the mourning period, saying the country needed to "resume normal life".

"The government has done everything possible to engage with the family of our departed sixth president," he said.

The national mourning period initially ran from 8 to 14 June but was later extended until 23 June, with flags flying at half-mast and radio stations playing solemn music.

President Hichilema and senior officials had been prepared to receive Lungu's coffin with full military honours on Wednesday.

However, Lungu's family blocked the repatriation of his remains at the last minute, saying the government had reneged on its agreement over the funeral plans.

The opposition Patriotic Front (PF), the party Lungu led until his death, has stood with the family over the funeral plans.

"The government has turned a solemn occasion into a political game," said PF acting president Given Lubinda. "This is not how we treat a former head of state."

Civil society groups have called for an urgent resolution of the matter, with a section of religious leaders saying the stand-off was "hurting the dignity of our country".

"We appeal for humility, dialogue, and a resolution that honours the memory of the former president while keeping the nation united," said Emmanuel Chikoya, head of the Council of Churches in Zambia.

Lungu, who led Zambia from 2015 to 2021, died earlier this month in South Africa where he was receiving treatment for an undisclosed illness.

After six years as head of state, Lungu lost the 2021 election to Hichilema by a large margin. He stepped back from politics but later returned to the fray.

He had ambitions to vie for the presidency again but at the end of last year the Constitutional Court barred him from running, ruling that he had already served the maximum two terms allowed by law.

Despite his disqualification from the presidential election, he remained hugely influential in Zambian politics and did not hold back in his criticism of his successor.

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India's Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) is yet to decide whether flight data and cockpit voice recorders from the Air India flight that crashed last Thursday will be sent overseas for decoding and analysis.

At least 270 people, most of them passengers, were killed when the London-bound Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner crashed less than a minute after taking off from Ahmedabad airport in western India.

Some media outlets reported that the black boxes are being sent abroad, but the ministry of civil aviation clarified that no final decision has been made.

The ministrysaidthe AAIB will determine the location for analysis after a "due assessment of technical, safety, and security factors".

Investigators have recovered both sets of Enhanced Airborne Flight Recorders (EAFRs) – the "black boxes" – from the Boeing 787 crash site.

These combined units, which record flight data and cockpit audio, were found on 13 and 16 June. The aircraft model carries two such sets to aid in thorough analysis.

Data recorders track with high precision the position of gear and flap levers, thrust settings, engine performance, fuel flow and even fire handle activation.

The data in the plane's "black boxes" can be used to reconstruct the flight's final moments and determine the cause of the incident.

However, some media outlets reported that therecorders had been badly damaged in the firethat engulfed the plane after the crash, making it difficult to extract the data in India and that the government was planning to send the recorders to the US.

Captain Kishore Chinta, a former accident investigator with the AAIB, told the BBC one set of recorders could be also sent to the US "to compare the data downloaded in India with that provided to the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB)".

He said although the newAAIB labin Delhi was inaugurated in April, "it's unclear whether it is fully operational for EAFR data downloads".

Meanwhile, Air India's chairman has said that one of the engines of the Air India plane that crashed last week was new, while the other was not due for servicing until December.

In an interview with Times Now news channel, N Chandrasekaran said that both engines of the aircraft had "clean" histories.

Separately, the airline said that inspections have been completed on 26 of its 33 Boeing 787-8 and 787-9 aircraft, all of which have been "cleared for service".

India's aviation regulator had ordered additional safety checks on Air India's Boeing 787 fleet after the deadly crash as a "preventive measure".

On Thursday, the airline announced that its flights will be reduced on 16 international routes and suspended on three overseas destinations between 21 June and 15 July.

"The reductions arise from the decision to voluntarily undertake enhanced pre-flight safety checks, as well as accommodate additional flight durations arising from airspace closures in the Middle East," the airline said in a statement.

The announcement came a day after the carrier said it would temporarily reduce flights operated with wide-body planes by 15%.

A US appeals court has ruled that President Donald Trump can keep control of National Guard troops he deployed to Los Angeles, despite objections from city leaders and California Governor Gavin Newsom.

Trump deployed the troops in response to widespread protests against his immigration crackdown. Local officials called it an unnecessary provocation.

A three-judge panel on Thursday said he was within his rights to order the troops into service to "protect federal personnel… [and] property". Trump called it a "big win".

The decision halts a ruling from a lower court judge who found Trump acted illegally when mobilising the troops.

In that earlier ruling, Judge Charles Breyer said Trump "did not" follow the law set by Congress on the deployment of a state's National Guard.

"His actions were illegal… He must therefore return control of the California National Guard to the Governor of the State of California forthwith," he wrote in his decision.

The judge however stayed the order until 13 June to give the Trump administration time to appeal against it, which it did almost immediately after.

Thursday's unanimous ruling said Trump's "failure to issue the federalisation order directly 'through' the Governor of California does not limit his otherwise lawful authority to call up the National Guard".

"This is much bigger than Gavin [Newsom], because all over the United States, if our Cities, and our people, need protection, we are the ones to give it to them should State and Local Police be unable, for whatever reason, to get the job done," Trump wrote on social media after the decision.

He also congratulated the court, adding: "America is proud of you tonight!"

The 38-page ruling, however, said the judges disagreed with the president on the merits of the legal challenge against his use of the National Guard. It said his decision to use the troops was not "completely insulated from judicial review".

Newsom responded to the decision, saying the court "rightly rejected Trump's claim that he can do whatever he wants with the National Guard and not have to explain himself to a court.

"We will not let this authoritarian use of military soldiers against citizens go unchecked", he wrote on X, adding: "Donald Trump is not a king and not above the law."

The court's decision allows for the continued deployment of around 4,000 troops to Los Angeles. The Trump administration says they have been protecting federal immigration agents and federal property during raids.

It said it took over California's National Guard to restore order and to protect Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents as they conducted raids across Los Angeles to detain people they believed were in the country illegally.

Trump also ordered 700 Marines to the city, despite Newsom's objections.

The National Guard was last deployed by a president without a governor's consent during the civil rights era more than 50 years ago.

Israeli forces have killed 23 Palestinians after opening fire on crowds gathered near an aid distribution site, witnesses and medics say.

Tanks and drones fired at thousands of people near a distribution centre in central Gaza run by the US and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), the witnesses and medics said.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said troops fired warning shots after people gathered nearby. An Israeli aircraft then struck "several suspects" who the IDF said continued walking towards troops.

The GHF has denied a shooting occurred near its sites. The Hamas-run health ministry says more than 400 Palestinians have been killed in similar incidents since late May.

That is when the GHF took over most aid distribution in Gaza in an attempt by Israel to bypass the UN as the main supplier of aid.

The move followed a complete three-month Israeli blockade during which no food entered the territory, putting the entire population at critical risk of famine according to a UN-backed assessment.

In almost all incidents, witnesses have said that Israeli troops opened fire, although there have also been reports of local armed gunmen shooting at people.

A spokesperson for al-Awda hospital in Nuseirat confirmed they received 23 bodies and more than 100 wounded. Images from the hospital showed bodies on the floor.

The IDF said the incident was under review.

The UN children's agency Unicef said the Israel- and US-backed food distribution system run by GHF was "making a desperate humanitarian situation worse".

Unicef spokesperson James Elder said a lack of public clarity on when the sites, some of which are in combat zones, were open was leading to mass casualty events.

"There have been instances where information (was) shared that a site is open, but then it's communicated on social media that they're closed, but that information was shared when Gaza's internet was down and people had no access to it," he told reporters in Geneva.

He said many women and children had been wounded while trying to receive food aid, including a young boy who was wounded by a tank shell and later died.

On Thursday, at least12 Palestinians were killed by Israeli forceswhile waiting for aid, according to rescuers and medics. The GHF denied there were any incidents near its site. The Israeli military told Reuters that "suspects" had attempted to approach forces in the area of Netzarim, and that soldiers had fired warning shots.

On Tuesday witnesses saidmore than 50 people were killedwhen Israeli forces opened fire and shelled an area near a junction to the east of Khan Younis, where thousands of Palestinians had been gathering in the hope of getting flour from a World Food Programme (WFP) site, which also includes a community kitchen nearby. The Israeli military said "a gathering" had been identified "in proximity to IDF troops operating in the area" and the incident was under review.

Unicef also warned that Gaza was facing a man-made drought as its water systems were collapsing. Just 40% of rinking water production facilities were still functioning, Mr Elder said.

"Children will begin to die of thirst," he said, adding: "We are way below emergency standards in terms of drinking water for people in Gaza."

In a separate Israeli attack on Friday, a medic with the Palestinian Red Crescent told the BBC that 11 Palestinians were killed and others injured in an Israeli airstrike targeting a home in the al-Ma'sar area west of Deir al-Balah in central Gaza.

Eyewitnesses said Israeli warplanes struck a two-storey house belonging to the Ayash family.

Hamas-run civil defence officials say Israel has carried out a wave of deadly air strikes on Gaza in recent days, following a brief lull in air operations that coincided with the escalation between Israel and Iran.

They reported on Thursday that at least 77 Palestinians had been killed in such strikes, which heavily targeted the Shati area in western Gaza City.

Local sources speculated that the renewed strikes may be linked to the targeting of Hamas security elements who have recently re-emerged across parts of Gaza, attempting to reassert control amid a breakdown in law and order. These movements appear to have been timed with the temporary easing of Israeli aerial surveillance due to the simultaneous military focus on Iran.

The Israeli military launched a campaign in Gaza in response to the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

At least 55,706 people have been killed in Gaza since then, including more than 15,000 children, according to the territory's Hamas-run health ministry.