Rachel Wright

I'm Rachel Wright, and in the early hours of Thursday, the 1st of January, these are our main stories. Donald Trump will pull National Guard troops out of three US cities after a Supreme Court ruling. And in a New Year's address, President Zelensky says Ukraine will not sign a weak peace agreement with Russia.

In the final hours of 2025, Donald Trump announced he was withdrawing federal troops from three US cities, Los Angeles, Chicago and Portland. Over the course of the year, the president has deployed the National Guard to several Democrat-run cities. He claimed they were needed to crack down on rampant crime and help with immigration enforcement. I saw today on one of your networks, not a friendly network,

Last week the US Supreme Court ruled that it was illegal to send troops to Chicago, citing a long-standing law against using the military as a domestic police force. And now President Trump has announced they'll be withdrawing, claiming that crime rates in the three cities have been reduced. But he said federal authorities could return if crime rose again. Our correspondent in Washington, Sean Dilley, told us more.

Is there any evidence that the security situation has changed at all in any of these cities as a result of the National Guard presence?

And what's the situation like in the other cities where Trump has deployed the national card?

While staying in the US, the Trump administration has also announced a freeze on funding for children's daycare in the Democrat-led state of Minnesota. This comes after a conservative YouTuber claimed in a video that centers run by Somali immigrants were taking public money without providing care. From Washington, here's Tom Bateman.

Let's turn to Ukraine now, because with very little indication that Russia's military invasion is nearing an end, President Volodymyr Zelensky has used his New Year's address to declare that Kiev is not prepared to sign a weak peace agreement with Russia, insisting all it would do is prolong the war. No way to you.

But he did express some optimism, estimating that around 90% of a peace agreement had been agreed, following weeks of intensive talks involving the US and European leaders. President Putin took a very different tone in his New Year's address, expressing confidence in total victory. This was his message to Russia's soldiers. You've taken on the responsibility of fighting for your homeland, for truth and justice.

Earlier, both Ukraine and the EU's senior diplomat, Kaya Kalas, had poured scorn on Moscow's claims that Ukraine had launched a massive drone attack on President Putin's residence in Novgorod, hours after Mr Zelensky's talks in Florida with Donald Trump. So, a relatively upbeat message from President Zelensky and a defiant one from the Kremlin. How should we interpret those views in this grinding, nearly four-year war? Here's our reporter, Will Vernon.

And then where are we with this claim by Russia that there was a massive drone attack on one of President Putin's residences?

The Economist-magazine named Syria its country of the year for 2025, celebrating its social and political transformation since the fall of the dictator Bashar al-Assad. Life in Syria under the new president, Ahmed al-Sharaa, is far from perfect.

Religious minorities, including the Alawites and the Druze, still face violence. But many Syrians who fled the country during its long and bloody civil war have been returning. Maliki Jasmati, a chef from Damascus, settled in Germany as a refugee in 2015. She's been back to Syria several times since Assad fell, and she told my colleague James Kumarasami that she's preparing to move home.

Kun Keir Starmer tuli Yhdysvaltain puolustusministeriön vuonna 2024, hän antoi tehdä poliitikkoa vähemmän tulevaisuudessa Britsin elämässä. Toisin sanoen, hän antoi tehdä poliitikkoa vähemmän tulevaisuudessa.

In normal times all this would benefit the main conservative opposition party, but as our political correspondent Rob Watson now reports, these are anything but normal times.

Rob Watson, staying in the UK and new discoveries at a medieval cemetery near the Welsh capital Cardiff have brought archaeologists closer to solving a mystery surrounding the women buried there. Our science editor Rebecca Morrell has been to the site to find out more. In a field in the Cardiff countryside, archaeologists are getting ready to lift a skull from a grave. It's 1,500 years old and incredibly fragile.

Our science editor, Rebecca Morrell. Japan elected its first female prime minister, Sanae Takeuchi, in 2025. After the latest election, there are more than 70 women in the Japanese parliament, the highest number ever. And most of them, including the prime minister, have submitted a petition calling for more women's toilets in the parliament building to accommodate them all.

There are just two female cubicles close to the chamber where members speak and vote, leading to long queues. The problem is not a new one, and certainly not one confined to Japan. Caroline Criado-Perez is the author of Invisible Women, Exposing Data Bias in a World Designed for Men. She spoke to my colleague Sean Lay.

And that's all from us for now, but there will be a new edition of the Global News podcast later. If you want to comment on this podcast or the topics covered in it, you can send us an email. The address is globalpodcast at bbc.co.uk. You can also find us on X at BBC World Service. Use the hashtag Global News Pod.

This edition was produced by Stephen Jensen and Peter Goffin. It was mixed by Holly Smith. The editor is Karen Martin. I'm Rachel Wright. Until next time, goodbye.

We got a call from the bank and said, are you aware that there's no funds in this account? A string of victims across the US, stretching from coast to coast. The amount of victims in such a short time was unbelievable. Real people losing real money, but the criminals are ghosts. The anger, the frustration, the fear.