Bulgarians are voting on Sunday in the seventh general election in just over three years, as their country faces growing political instability that could encourage the rise of pro-Russian and far-right sentiment.

He said that in the meantime it was essential for the UK’s productivity and growth to reduce the damaging impact of the Brexit deal struck by Boris Johnson “as best we possibly can”.

“If they do deploy to fight against Ukraine, they’re fair game,” he said. “They’re fair targets and the Ukrainian military will defend themselves against North Korean soldiers the same way they’re defending themselves against Russian soldiers.”

“We are witnessing a worrying surge in racism and discrimination against Muslims in Europe,” said the agency’s director, Sirpa Rautio. “This is fuelled by conflicts in the Middle East and made worse by the dehumanising anti-Muslim rhetoric we see across the continent.”

Indonesia’s outgoing president has used “Machiavellian tactics” to push his son into high office, human rights groups have warned, amid a resurgence of governments led by “nepo babies” in southeast Asia.

The country is currently one of only five in the EU that does not offer such partnerships, and the European Court of Human Rights ruled last year that this violates the rights of same-sex couples.

The trip marks a shift in the British government’s approach to China, with ministers seeking to improve engagement and build closer economic ties. Trade between the UK and China is worth £110bn a year.

Police officers urged paramedics and firefighters to treat the second novichok incident in 2018 as a drug overdose despite warnings from the ambulance and fire services that it had similarities to the first poisoning four months earlier in Salisbury, a public inquiry has heard.

former PhD student has been sentenced to four and a half years in prison for arranging to send a young girl to Iraq for female genital mutilation (FGM), in the first conviction of its kind in England and Wales.