News 03/11/26

Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor has been served a summons compelling him to give evidence at a Turkish businessman’s fraud trial.

He is not accused of any wrongdoing, but has been called as a witness by the defendant. It is understood the former prince will be required to give evidence before the High Court around the fifteenth of December, either in person or by video link.

Spain’s transport minister has announced he will step down following two deadly train crashes in less than a year.

Oscar Puente said he made the decision immediately after the latest collision on the twenty-eighth of October, which claimed sixty-nine lives. Mr Puente stated a transport minister cannot remain in office after two severe accidents, regardless of direct responsibility.

King Charles has addressed Commonwealth leaders in Antigua regarding Britain’s role in the transatlantic slave trade, stating history is not ours to choose or change.

Speaking at the summit, the monarch acknowledged that inheritance includes both past achievements and failures. His comments follow suggestions from Prime Minister Andy Burnham that he would be open to a formal apology, a position firmly opposed by the Conservative party.

A third teenage boy has been arrested after five teenagers were stabbed at a Halloween party in Hampshire.

Police were called to Park Road in Chandler’s Ford on Saturday night after an unknown group entered the event. A seventeen-year-old boy remains in a life-threatening condition in hospital, while four others have been discharged. A sixteen-year-old from Bristol has been arrested on suspicion of attempted murder alongside two teenagers arrested earlier.

A High Court judge has dismissed a man’s attempt to secure an injunction preventing two media outlets from publishing allegations against him.

The legal action was brought against the publishers of The Guardian and ITN. Lawyers for the media organisations said the claims involve an alleged abuse of power and status to engage in inappropriate and exploitative sexual activities with young women. The man cannot be named pending any potential appeal.

The leader of Reform UK in Hampshire has been charged with thirty-five offences against four victims, including twelve counts of rape.

The Crown Prosecution Service confirmed thirty-seven-year-old George Madgwick faces charges including sexual assault, coercive behaviour, and making indecent images of a child. Reform UK said Madgwick has been suspended with immediate effect. He is due to appear before Portsmouth Magistrates’ Court on the twenty-fifth of November.

Jury deliberations have begun in the trial of Russell Brand, who faces charges of rape and sexual assault at Southwark Crown Court.

The fifty-one-year-old has pleaded not guilty to three counts of rape, three counts of sexual assault, and one count of attempted indecent assault relating to six women between 1999 and 2009. Prosecuting lawyers alleged he ignored women when told no, while Brand told the court his relationships were always consensual.

Two passenger planes have been inspected in Warsaw, and a third in Spain, following a series of bomb threats targeting European flights.

Local media in Bulgaria say a plane travelling from Israel also landed at Sofia airport after an email threat. One flight from London Heathrow made an unscheduled landing at Warsaw Modlin, where specialists inspected the aircraft carrying one hundred and eighty-one passengers. A flight from Copenhagen to Warsaw landed as normal despite receiving a similar threat.

The UK meat processing industry has been hit by cyber-attacks, according to a senior security official.

National Cyber Security Centre director of operations Paul Chichester confirmed the impact was minimal, with officials working alongside affected businesses. The incident follows widespread attacks on supermarket fridges and freezers across Europe, including France and Ireland, where hackers accessed legacy internet-connected technology using default passwords, causing temperatures to rise and food to spoil.

The United Kingdom and the European Union have agreed a draft deal to remove post-Brexit checks on food and agricultural exports.

The two-hundred-page draft text for a sanitary and phytosanitary agreement has been circulated to member states ahead of an upcoming summit. The agreement marks the most significant progress in the Brexit reset so far, eliminating red tape and inspections that have burdened British exporters since leaving the single market.

Tenerife striker Jesus de Miguel has died at the age of thirty following a heavy collision during a Spanish second-division match.

The forward sustained severe head and chest injuries on Monday during a challenge with FC Andorra goalkeeper Jesus Owono, who was sent off. Despite initial reports describing his condition as stable, the player’s health deteriorated rapidly, with CD Tenerife confirming his death on Tuesday morning.

MI5 will not face contempt of court proceedings despite admitting it gave false evidence to three courts, senior judges have ruled.

The Lady Chief Justice Baroness Carr stated that a contempt case would be too complex to manage and not in the public interest. Instead, individual officers could face police investigation for misconduct in public office regarding false statements made about an abusive informant known as Agent X.

Artificial intelligence is helping to industrialise cyber-attacks and is highly likely to be targeted at Britain’s critical national infrastructure by 2028.

In its latest annual report, the National Cybersecurity Centre warned that China represents the most sophisticated and sustained cyber challenge facing the UK. The GCHQ agency stated that state-backed attackers are using artificial intelligence to identify system vulnerabilities, target potential victims, and operate with greater efficiency.

The United States military has conducted limited air strikes on Qeshm Island in Iran just hours before the American midterm elections.

Defence officials confirmed the actions were taken in self-defence following ongoing Iranian attacks on maritime shipping and US assets. Washington emphasized the action does not signal a resumption of major combat operations, despite routine interceptions of incoming missiles and drones.

A Brazilian co-pilot, a technology entrepreneur, and his young family are among nine people killed after a business jet crashed in Florida.

The Learjet aircraft erupted into a fireball in a neighbourhood in Greenacres, seven miles southwest of West Palm Beach, shortly before five-forty UK time on Sunday. Authorities confirmed that all passengers and crew travelling from Texas to the Bahamas died in the disaster.

Royal Mail has unveiled its annual Christmas stamp collection, marking sixty years since the release of the country’s first special festive stamp.

The set of five designs, created jointly by graphic designer Gareth Howat and illustrator Rebecca Sutherland, depicts traditional Nativity scenes. The artwork features Mary and Joseph travelling, the infant Jesus, an angel, shepherds, and the Three Wise Men.