The Senate, in a bipartisan super-majority, overwhelmingly voted to advance the measure, which Joe Biden is expected to sign

The US Senate voted resoundingly on Tuesday to approve $95bn in aid for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, as a bipartisan super-majority united to send the long-stalled package to Joe Biden’s desk for signature. The final vote was 79 to 18.

The bill easily cleared a key procedural hurdle earlier in the day. The Senate overwhelmingly voted to advance the measure in a step hailed by the Senate majority leader as “one of the greatest achievements the Senate has faced in years”.

Former DUP leader will be seen for first time since his arrest when he attends court in Newry on Wednesday

Jeffrey Donaldson is due to make his first court appearance in Northern Ireland on sexual offence charges amid a heavy security presence.

The former Democratic Unionist party (DUP) leader is scheduled to appear at Newry magistrates court in County Down on Wednesday morning to face allegations of sexual abuse against two people.

Juan Merchan reserves judgment on prosecutors’ request for maximum fine but tells Todd Blanche ‘you’re losing all credibility’

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The New York judge presiding in Donald Trump’s criminal trial held off on deciding whether he should be fined $10,000 for attacking expected trial witnesses in direct violation of the gag order designed to protect trial participants from being the target of Trump’s abuse.

The judge, Juan Merchan, reserved ruling from the bench. But he appeared deeply unconvinced by arguments from Trump’s lead lawyer Todd Blanche that a series of social media posts were just responses to political attacks on Trump and therefore permitted.

GCSE results in key subjects to steadily worsen until 2030, predicts research that blames failure to tackle impact of schools lockdown

Children in England could face the worst exam results in decades and a lifetime of lower earnings, according to research that blames failures to tackle the academic and social legacies of school closures during Covid.

The study funded by the Nuffield Foundation predicts that national GCSE results in key subjects will steadily worsen until 2030, when it expects fewer than 40% of pupils to get good grades in maths and English.

Fears Israel is influencing location of dock away from the north, where famine threat is most severe

A giant floating dock is nearing completion in the eastern Mediterranean from where it will be pushed towards the Gaza shore, but there is growing uncertainty over how useful the US project will be in containing a famine.

There are concerns in the humanitarian community that Israel has co-opted the pier plan, which Joe Biden touted as a way to bring about a “massive” increase in aid to Gaza, with one aid official saying the project was in danger of becoming a “smokescreen” for the planned invasion of Rafah.

Watchdog says only a third of local authorities are confident they will have enough places for September

The deployment of the government’s childcare scheme to tens of thousands more families is facing “significant uncertainties” and may struggle to meet its own targets, according to a report by Whitehall’s spending watchdog.

The National Audit Office revealed the Department for Education (DfE) had assessed the likelihood of being able to deliver the funded childcare places it promised for September 2024 and 2025 as “amber/red problematic”.

Authorities in Greece warn the dust concentrations can reduce sunlight and visibility, while increasing levels of fine pollution particles pose health risks

Clouds of dust blown in from the Sahara covered Athens and other Greek cities on Tuesday, one of the worst such episodes to hit the country since 2018, officials said.

A yellow-orange haze smothered several regions after days of strong winds from the south, limiting visibility and prompting warnings from the authorities of breathing risks.

Three-decade campaign by the Gweagal community of La Perouse sees repatriation of four spears to Kamay

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Four spears stolen from Kamay, now known as Botany Bay in Sydney, by Captain James Cook and his crew have been returned to their traditional owners after more than 250 years.

Forty Kamay spears were recorded as being taken by the British in 1770, at the time of first contact between the local Gweagal people and the crew of the Endeavour. The four spears returned on Tuesday are the only ones of the original 40 that remain.

Dabrafenib with trametinib can halt growth of some tumours for more than three times as long as standard chemotherapy, study shows

The NHS is to offer children with brain tumours in England a groundbreaking new targeted drug therapy to tackle the disease – a development charities are hailing as the biggest breakthrough in decades.

Gliomas are the most common type of brain cancer in children but experts say the standard treatment of chemotherapy can be brutal and gruelling, and also carries the risk of side-effects such as weight loss, seizures and headaches.

Full and part skeletons found in Mexico reveal body shape and anatomy of Ptychodus as well as its likely diet

Fossil experts say they have gained unprecedented insights into a type of enormous prehistoric shark, after finding complete skeletons of the creatures.

The specimens, discovered in small quarries in north-eastern Mexico within the last decade, belong to Ptychodus – a creature that roamed the seas from around 105m to 75m years ago.