Video shows former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte being arrested on a plane at Manila airport on an International Criminal Court warrant, over alleged crimes against humanity during his crackdown on drugs.
Seven medical professionals who cared for Argentine football legend Diego Maradona during his final days go on trial Tuesday accused of criminal negligence over his death.
Maradona died on November 25, 2020 aged 60 while recovering from brain surgery for a blood clot, after decades battling cocaine and alcohol addictions.
Each defendant risks between eight and 25 years in prison if convicted of “homicide with possible intent” — allegedly for pursuing a course of action despite knowing it could lead to the footballer’s death.
The passing of the star of the 1986 World Cup plunged Argentina into mourning in the middle of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Tens of thousands of people queued to bid farewell to the former Boca Juniors and Napoli striker as his body lay in state in the presidential palace.
More than 100 witnesses, including members of Maradona’s family and doctors who tended to him over the years, are expected to take the stand in the long-delayed trial in the Buenos Aires suburb of San Isidro.
The hearings are expected to run until July.
– Warning signs –
Maradona was found dead in bed two weeks after going under the knife, in a rented house in an exclusive Buenos Aires neighborhood where he was brought after being discharged from hospital.
He was found to have died of a heart attack.
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The night nurse said he had seen “warning signs” but had received orders “not to wake” Maradona.
The defendants in the case are a neurosurgeon, a psychiatrist, a psychologist, a medical coordinator, a nursing coordinator, a doctor and the night nurse.
The day nurse, who found Maradona dead, asked to be tried by jury separately.
Prosecutors have accused the medical team of pushing for Maradona to receive home care, which proved “reckless” and “totally deficient”.
They allege the footballer was abandoned to his fate for a “prolonged, agonizing period” before his death.
A panel of 20 medical experts convened by Argentina’s public prosecutor concluded in 2021 that Maradona “would have had a better chance of survival” with adequate treatment in an appropriate medical facility.
The residence where he was staying notably had no defibrillator.
Maradona’s family claim that leaked audio and text messages show that the star’s health was in imminent danger, said Mario Baudry, a lawyer for Maradona’s son Dieguito.
He said the messages showed the medical team’s strategy was to try and ensure that Diego’s daughters did not intervene “because if they did, they (the medical staff) would lose their money”.
– ‘ Justice for Diego ‘ –
The accused all deny responsibility in the star’s death.
Vadim Mischanchuk, lawyer for psychiatrist Agustina Cosachov, said he was “very optimistic” of an acquittal, arguing his client was in charge of Maradona’s mental, not physical health.
In the La Paternal neighborhood of Buenos Aires where the player nicknamed “El Pibe de Oro” (The Golden Boy) revealed his prodigious talent as a player for Argentinos Juniors in the 1970s, graffiti urging “Justice for Diego”! was daubed on walls ahead of the trial.
“All society needs to know… what really happened, who abandoned him… and whoever is responsible must pay the price”, pensioner Hilda Pereira told AFP.
Maradona “did not deserve to die as he died, alone”, she added, her voice quavering.
For its part, Argentina’s left-wing Pagina 12 newspaper wondered: “Will anyone be found guilty for Maradona’s death”?
Welcome to Uefa Champions League Squares – the new BBC Sport game which you can play alongside the live match action.
How to play:
The chance to answer trivia questions to earn edit tokens ends at 17: 00 GMT. After that time, you are still able to receive a gamecard but won’t have the opportunity to edit it.
We are still waiting for the first full house card. Will that be you?
Each gameday will begin at 07: 00 on the morning of every Champions League matchday this season.
You will have the chance to answer four trivia questions to earn up to four edit tokens before your Squares gamecard is generated, and you can use those tokens to make changes to your gamecard until 17: 00 that day.
Each edit token allows you to make one change to your card:
After 17: 00, your gamecard is locked down and you will take that card into that evening’s games. For new users looking to start playing after the cut-off, you can still receive a gamecard, but will not have the chance to edit it.
You will need to be signed into a BBC account to play Uefa Champions League Squares. If you are not signed in, you will be prompted to do so, or you can set yourself up with a BBC account, which will only take a couple of minutes.
Once you begin to play a game, you will need to continue playing that particular game on the same device, as gameplay cannot be synced across devices, although you can start a separate game on another device.
Please note, when you click the play button, a session cookie not listed in our cookie list will be dropped (Cookie name: low6, Token Purpose: to remember game progress, Cookie classification: Strictly Necessary).
Uefa Champions League Squares will be available to play on every remaining Champions League matchday this season.
Round of 16: 11 March, 12 March
Quarter-finals: 8 April, 9 April, 15 April, 16 April
Semi-finals: 29 April, 30 April, 6 May, 7 May
Final: 31 May
As this is a brand new game for BBC Sport, we’d be keen to get your views on it.
Did you like playing it? What could be improved? Would you tell your friends and family about it?
Watch highlights of every Champions League game from 22: 00 on Wednesday on BBC iPlayer and the BBC Sport website and app.
Australian Grand Prix
Venue: Albert Park, Melbourne Dates: 14 March-16 March Race start: 04: 00 GMT on Sunday, 16 March
After a three-month break, the 2025 Formula 1 season is almost upon us.
The Australian Grand Prix this weekend is the first of 24 races between now and Abu Dhabi in December.
There are plenty of talking points with Lewis Hamilton preparing for his Ferrari debut, Max Verstappen chasing a fifth consecutive drivers ‘ title and McLaren hoping to maintain the pace that brought them the constructors ‘ championship in 2024.
Hamilton has been clear – he is going to Ferrari to win an eighth world title.
When a driver of that level goes to such a storied team, it’s obvious what the target is. So, questions about whether too much is expected of him miss the point – he and Ferrari expect that of themselves.
The impact of such an achievement would be massive.
Hamilton’s move to Ferrari has already dramatically increased interest in F1 in the run-up to this season. Imagine what the reaction would be to the sport’s most celebrated driver breaking the only remaining all-time record while driving for its most iconic team.
Will he do it? That depends on two things. Whether the Ferrari car is up to it, and whether Hamilton can beat his team-mate, Charles Leclerc.
As for comparisons with Alonso and Vettel, neither managed to win the title they and Ferrari so craved.
Alonso was plain unlucky – he should have won in 2010 and 2012. He was outstanding in both years, especially in 2012.
Had it not been for a catastrophic strategy decision in Abu Dhabi in 2010, and two separate assaults from two different Lotus drivers at the start of two different grands prix in 2012, he would have been champion.
Vettel’s situation was more complex – arguably he and Ferrari threw away chances in both 2017 and 2018 through a combination of driver errors and team fallibility. Many people believe Alonso would have won at least one of those titles had he stayed at Ferrari.
But that was then. The belief is that this is about as good a time as Hamilton could go to Ferrari.
In Frederic Vasseur, they have a team boss who has given the team a more international outlook, and is very matter-of-fact and focused on practicality. He seems to be having a good effect and moving them in the right direction.
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Every season is critical in F1 – people are always looking for signs of weakness. But the stakes are quite high for Russell this year, and that’s almost independent of Max Verstappen.
Russell is out of contract at the end of the year, and his new team-mate is an 18-year-old rookie, Andrea Kimi Antonelli. From the point of view of his reputation within the sport, Russell has to come out on top.
If he doesn’t, though, that does not necessarily mean his Mercedes career is over. But it would mean Antonelli had marked himself out as a potential future great.
If Verstappen is not available, Toto Wolff will stick with his current driver line-up into 2026 – Russell has come out of three seasons with Lewis Hamilton and just about won bragging rights. He has earned his status as one of F1’s very top drivers.
The pressure is also on Antonelli, even though his raw talent is believed to be immense. If he is comfortably beaten by Russell, he won’t be around long. Such is the way of things in F1.
If you asked that question to Max Verstappen himself, I know exactly what he would say. He fears no one.
Verstappen is absolutely confident that if he is given a car in which it is possible to win the title, he will win it. Doesn’t matter who the opponent is.
How he gets on with someone out of the car has no bearing whatsoever on his behaviour in it – you only have to look at last year’s Mexico City Grand Prix and his two penalised incidents with Norris to see that.
He is as ruthless as they come, and anyone who gets in his way will get the same treatment.
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There has been for some time widespread concern within Formula 1 about the actions of Mohammed Ben Sulayem, the president of governing body the FIA, and nothing over the winter has changed that.
Ben Sulayem has been embroiled in a series of controversies since he took office in December 2021, and his recent actions in changing the FIA’s internal rules to reduce accountability, and codifying a method by which drivers can be banned for swearing have just added to a long list of actions perceived to be problematic by many within the sport.
At the moment, though, there is no open conflict between F1 and the FIA, nor between the teams and the FIA.
However, everyone in the sport is very aware of the growing disquiet within the FIA itself – the latest facet of which was revealed by BBC Sport last week in its report on a number of world motorsport council members being barred from its latest meeting, a dispute that could yet see further legal action.
With an FIA presidential election looming at the end of the year, the sport’s bosses are keeping a close eye on events. But unless Ben Sulayem does something that directly affects F1 business, it is unlikely F1 itself will take any action.
The idea of introducing an extra pit stop into the Monaco Grand Prix has been given a guardedly warm response so far.
The hope is that this will add extra excitement to the race and reduce its tendency to become a procession.
Lewis Hamilton said he believed it was his idea originally, and added: “Monaco has to be at least a two-stop. The one-stop was never really great.
” That (two stops) won’t fix it all. We’ll still see some of the issues of not overtaking and stuff, but I think it will make it more exciting. “
Some, though, have wondered whether this was a reaction to a particularly bad event last year, which was itself caused by a specific set of circumstances.
Last year, there was a first-lap crash that led to a red flag. So all the front-runners fitted a set of tyres to get them to the end of the race, and planned not to stop again. That led to Charles Leclerc leading the race at a pedestrian pace and nothing happening.
But it’s not like that every year. Regardless of the difficulty in overtaking, Monaco has seen a series of interesting races in recent years, some influenced by weather, and others by problems experienced by one driver or another.
The mandatory two-stop has been arrived at as a necessary evil – introducing an element of artificiality to ameliorate a specific problem.
A series of taxi journeys in Japan reveal supernatural tales of unresolved trauma following the tsunami of 2011.
The Japanese city of Kamaishi was almost entirely destroyed in the earthquake and ensuing tsunami of 2011. It was the biggest natural disaster to hit Japan, killing nearly 20, 000 people.
More than a decade later, local taxi drivers claim to frequently pick up “ghost fares” of the deceased. Passengers spot an increasing number of wild deer which some claim to be intermediaries between the physical and spiritual worlds. A night with Kamaishi’s taxi drivers reveals a community haunted by its loss while still struggling for closure.
Who scored an own goal while on trial at Manchester City? And who puts chocolate in his spaghetti bolognese? England captain Maro Itoje reveals all in our team-mates quiz.
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