UK defence secretary says he has been ‘reassured directly’ counterpart Pete Hegseth that Starlink system has been restored as he seeks to cool tensions

Wes Streeting urged the US to stand by Ukraine on his visit to the American capital and sought to cool tensions between the two countries in the wake of the Starlink row that is threatening to set back Kyiv’s war effort.

The British defence secretary, giving a speech before a meeting with his US counterpart, Pete Hegseth, argued that supporting Ukraine was in the long-term interests of Washington, and a business opportunity.

Throttling of mobile internet system will affect Kyiv’s air defences more than its strikes on oil refineries. Now Zelenskyy must be hoping that US intel holds

In Ukraine the situation was already jittery enough. Donald Trump has been inventing ceasefires and buying Russian diesel to shore up his flagging popularity, while a sinister new wave of faster, jet-powered drones are breaking through Kyiv’s stretched air defences. Casualties are rising as the weather turns.

Overnight, Russia bombed three power plants that supply Kyiv, aiming to cut off heating and electricity to the city. According to the president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, for a second night in a row no warning came from Ukraine’s western allies of the incoming ballistic missiles – and so no air raid alert was issued.

Annual update from MI5 chief highlighted a complex cocktail that could have real-life consequences for Britain

MI5’s annual threat update covers so much ground it is easy to feel anxious. The terror threat has become more diverse, with far-right anti-migrant threats on the rise; while Iran has now firmly emerged alongside Russia as a country seeking to undertake violent and deadly plots in the UK.

“There is no law of physics dictating that rising state threats will be accompanied by diminishing terrorist threats,” MI5’s director general, Ken McCallum, said, although one of his core messages was that people and the country at large needed to focus on being more resilient. “In this new world, we should expect to be tested.”

Move from anti-immigration or anti-Muslim views to violence is ‘most marked trend’ in spy agency’s caseload over last year

Extremists with anti-migrant opinions are becoming increasingly likely to consider carrying out terrorist attacks against immigration centres and asylum hotels in the UK, the head of MI5 has warned.

Ken McCallum said a shift from radicalised rightwing sentiment to violence was “the most marked trend” in the spy agency’s caseload over the past year, contributing to a rise in the overall UK terror threat level.

UK to bring further sanctions against Tehran and IRGC after assessment Iran was likely to have coordinated incident

Andy Burnham said Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps were “almost certainly” behind threats to RAF Fairford, the firmest attribution of responsibility made so far by the UK after an incident late last month.

The prime minister told MPs the UK would bring further sanctions against Tehran and the IRGC in the aftermath of an ambiguous episode that, despite over a fortnight of police investigation, has yet to lead to anybody being charged.

Although there is scepticism about Tehran’s capabilities, it has become clear it wants Britain to feel it poses a risk

Britain may have been only peripherally involved in the bombing of Iran that Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu started, but in the past fortnight it has become clear that Tehran wants to pose a threat inside the UK in response.

In the aftermath of the confused incident near RAF Fairford, western officials are weighing up whether to warn publicly that Iran now has US military targets in Europe on its mind, such as the air force base in Gloucestershire.

Men aged 32 and 36 detained on suspicion of trespass, causing criminal damage and entering a prohibited place

Two Latvian men were arrested in the early hours of Thursday after they were discovered inside the perimeter of RAF Molesworth, a Cambridgeshire base used by the US military and Nato for intelligence operations.

The men, 32 and 36, were picked up at 2am inside the base, in an investigation that began four hours earlier when military police discovered an abandoned vehicle outside the facility.